I.

"Do you think we should go out there?" Craig asked as he watched the chaos from the window. Worry creased his brow when he saw more of the undead than the living limping through the streets. He was concerned about what Michonne had gotten herself into. The guilt of being safely inside while she was out there risking her life was starting to get to him. A view of dreads twisting in the air drew him closer to the window. He watched as Michonne did a pirouette that would evoke the envy of a prima ballerina as she cut off the heads of three walkers. He stood there in awe wondering when she learned to do that.

"Michonne said stay here, and I have learned to listen when she says to do something." Father Gabriel said. "Beside her, Rick and everyone else are more than capable of taking care of themselves and all of us."

"Ron? Sam? I told you boys to stay close. Where are you?"

Craig and Gabe turned to see Jessie come from the kitchen while wringing her hands. "What's wrong, Jessie?" Gabe asked.

"I can't find my boys."

Before another word could be uttered Sam popped up from where he was hiding behind the couch. "Is Carol back yet?" He asked.

"No, sweetie not yet. Where's your brother?" Jessie said through her tears. She was crying because she was scared. Because she was relieved to see Sam. Because deep down she always was sad. But most of all she was crying because in this chaos her baby boy called out for another woman.

"I'm here too." Ron walked down the stairs, adjusting the back of his sweatshirt. He walked to where his mother and brother were crouched down behind the sofa. "Everything's going to be okay, Mom. I'm the man of the house now. I know Dad did a lot of bad things. I guess I just loved him anyway. I wish I could have saved you earlier, but I'm not going to let anyone hurt you ever again."

Jessie wrapped her arms around both of her sons as they rested their heads on her shoulders. "I love you both so much."

Craig turned back to the window and jumped when he saw a face staring back at him. He grabbed at the knife he took from the kitchen.

"It's Rosita." Gabe said as he ran to open the door for her. Craig blew out a breath he didn't realize he was holding as he made his way to the door too.

"Michonne asked me to come check on everyone. Things are becoming manageable out here. Everyone good here?" She asked.

"We're okay in here." Craig said. "You guys are obviously okay out there." He looked out into the street seeing mostly decapitated and still bodies of the undead lining the streets when they were just limping through a moment ago.

II.

"Dad come quick." Carl yelled. Rick was running full speed and stopped abruptly as he arrived at the clearing where the abandoned house stood. The display before him left him speechless. An array of dead rodents and other small animals made a messy trail leading to the front of the Alexandria gate. He hadn't noticed in his urgency to get to Carl.

"It's just like at the prison," Carol said, "When Lizzie was leaving the mice for the walkers. Someone must have did this on purpose. They wanted the walkers to show up at our doorstep."

"Fuck," Rick said under his breath. He walked over to where Carl stood and placed a hand on his son's shoulder. "You okay?"

"I'm fine Dad. We need to investigate this further though. Maybe we should head deeper into the woods and see if there are any other clues." Carl backed away from his father to head behind the house.

"Carl stop, " Rick said, "Where's your sister? Michonne? I thought I told you to stay close to her."

"I saw how many walkers were out there. I knew you needed my help."

"Did you see where Michonne went?"

"She was making sure Judith was safe. I followed Carl out to make sure he was safe." Carol said.

"Thanks, Carol." Rick nodded at her to show his appreciation.

"I know how to keep myself safe." Carl said.

"You do, but you still should have listened to Michonne." Rick said. "I didn't see her out there in the streets. Maybe she stayed with Judith, but I can't imagine her not helping with the fight." Rick said.

Carol could hear the slight panic in his voice. "Come on," she said, "It's dark. It'll do us no good stomping through the woods looking for clues now. Let's go back, make sure everyone is okay, and regroup."

III.

Michonne looked around at the bodies around her. Relief flooded her body when she realized none of them were of her family members. None of them were Rick or Carl. She made her way to the front of the community where Abraham and Tobin were tossing buckets of watch onto the fire.

"It's not as bad as it looks," Abraham said, "Only one tree burned. Whoever set it sure as hell wanted us to think the whole fuckin' community was on fire."

"Had to be a trap." Said Maggie coming up behind her.

"I'd bet that on my mother's gotdamn grave." Abraham said.

"Have you guys seen Rick?" Michonne said. She spun around in a circle trying to see the community from every angle, but still she had no sight of him.

"He took off towards the woods." Abraham said.

Michonne ran in the direction he pointed. "Rick," she called out as loud as she could without attracting any walkers.

"Michonne!" she heard her name shouted back at her.

A few seconds later Rick came into view; running towards her with Carl and Carol not far behind. She didn't have time to breathe a sigh of relief before Rick pulled into a tight hug. "Thank God," he whispered into her ear. "I was getting worried when I couldn't find you."

After being caught by surprise by the hug she relaxed into it; grateful he was okay. "I was worried too."

"Judith?" He asked as he reluctantly pulled away from her.

"Judith's fine. She's with Tara and Eugene." She turned to Carl and wrapped her arms around him. "Next time I tell you to wait for me, you wait. Are we clear?"

"I'm sorry, just everything happened so quickly. But you gotta see what we found." Carl said.

Michonne looked up at Rick and met his eyes. "It's not good." He said.

IV.

"Someone has obviously been putting those animals out here on purpose to lure walkers to the community. We need more than one person manning the front gate at all times. Three or four would be ideal. Sasha is our best sharp shooter, but she can't be in the watch tower twenty-four seven. I need to assess everyone that can handle a gun and give out four hour shift assignments through the day and night...," Rick trailed off when he realized Deanna wasn't listening to him, "Am I'm boring you?" He said. "Excuse me for trying to protect this gotdamn community."

"I was listening to you, Rick." Deanna let out a weary sigh. The usual well put together woman was wearing an old cardigan, sweat pants, and a t-shirt. Her hair was pulled back into a pony-tail show her very visible graying hair at the roots. "I just don't think all of that is necessary. We have enough protection. No person was hurt or killed last night. We'll be fine."

"How can you say that? This is the second time since we've arrived here that walkers have come through the gates."

"Then maybe it's you that's the problem then." She said sharply.

Rick took a step back and tilted his head to the side. "What is it, Deanna? You want me and my people out of here?"

"My husband and son were alive before you came here. Seems you brought in all of the problems."

"Or I exposed the problems you swept under the rug." Rick challenged. He stood with his feet wide apart with his right hand resting on the butt on his gun.

Deanna studied him for a moment. "You know I told you I read people well. I'm rarely wrong, but I think I misjudged you. Not completely, but I didn't take into account how much of your soul you may have lost while surviving out there. Your gun is your security blanket. As long as you have that thing strapped on you think you have a right to dictate lives. You think you have a right to decide who lives or dies. But one day this hell we're living in will be over, and we will need to rebuild this world. We can't do that if we all start thinking like you. If we all become savages."

Rick laughed humorlessly. "You weren't preaching this when you told me to shoot Pete after he killed Reg. I have killed to protect my family. I will probably have to do it again. I would kill to protect you. If that makes me a savage," Rick shrugged, "Then I can live with that. At least those I love will still be alive."

Deanna just shook her head. "I always tried not to live with many regrets, but they've been piling up the last few weeks. Do what you think you need to do to protect the community." Deanna grabbed a photo album from the coffee table and made her way up the stairs. "By the way, the reason I asked you here was to tell you I'm releasing Nicholas. He's remorseful. I don't think he'll be a problem anymore.

"He shot Glenn. He could have killed him. He wanted to kill him. And you're just going to let him out to roam free in the community. If he kills someone that's on you." Rick felt his whole body start to heat up. The naiveté and willful ignorance of the community never failed to simultaneously shock and anger him.

"I thought killing was alright with you, Rick. Maybe Nicholas thought he was protecting himself from Glenn after what happened Aiden." Deanna's voice faded and Rick heard the slam of a door closing. He was about to make his way up the staircase to finish their conversation when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't do it." Maggie said.

"Did you hear what she said?"

"Every word. And believe me I'm pissed off more than anybody about the man who shot Glenn being free, but we have bigger fish to fry. We need to protect the community. Protect our family from whatever is out there."

Rick rubbed a hand across his face and looked up the stairs one last time. "Yeah." He said.

V.

Rick walked out of Deanna's house to find Michonne sitting on the porch steps. "Hey." He said.

Michonne stood at the sound of his voice. "How'd it go?" She asked.

Rick shook his head and gestured for them to start walking. "About as well as you'd expect. It's like talking to a fucking brick wall with these people. The community could have gone up in flames last night with walkers everywhere, but none of them seem to care."

"Well, fuck them then." Michonne said.

Rick stopped walking and raised his eyebrows. "Excuse me."

"Fuck them." Michonne repeated. "I was all for their way of life when it looked like there were no threats. But after the attack last night and the Wolves out there we do what we need to do. They'll benefit from our protection, but we're no longer asking for permission. This is home now. I'm not letting Carl and Judith go back out there to barely survive."

Rick smiled at her. "One more day with a chance." He said.

Michonne smiled back. "That's all I ever wanted for the kids. For all of us."

"Lets gather everyone at our house around noon to go over the game plan."

"Sounds good."

They walked on in silence for another block. Rick looked over at her from the corner of his eyes once they reached the lake. "So I know there's a lot going on," he started hesitantly, "But are we ever going to talk about yesterday?"

Michonne looked down at her feet suddenly feeling shy and nervous around Rick. "I haven't processed all that happened yesterday yet. Maybe we can talk when we're able to take a breath after we deal with surviving whatever is coming."

Rick nodded and placed his hands inside the pocket of his jeans. "If that's what you want. But you know there's no guarantee we'll ever get to have that conversation."

Michonne finally looked up and locked her eyes on his. "We don't die, Rick."

He lifted the corner of his mouth in a half smile and looked off to the side. "Our luck gotta run out sometime."

Michonne reached out to grab Rick's hand. "Not if I can help it." She said.

He looked down at their intertwined hands and smiled. They dropped their hands as they saw Carl coming towards to them.

"Do you know school is still in session today? After everything that happened last night they want us to go read about people who are all probably dead or walkers by now." Carl stood with his hands on his hips with his feet wide apart. He was almost a carbon copy of his father.

"At least for today you don't have to go." Rick said. "We need to come up with a game plan and I want you there. Safety is the top priority right now."

"Cool." Carl said. "I want take some shifts in the watch..." Carl's voice trailed off as he spotted someone running towards them.

"What is it?" Rick asked as he saw Carl's attention was adverted elsewhere. Ron was walking towards them. Something was different about the teen.

"I want to talk to you, Rick." He tried to sound tough, but his voice was chocked full of nerves. He kept looking behind him, and rubbing his neck. Rick instinctively took a step forward while holding out a hand to keep Carl behind him.

"Okay, son. Go ahead and talk." Rick said.

"Don't," Ron's voice came out in an angry squeak, "Don't call me son. I'm not your son. You ruined my family. I saw you kissing my mom and then I saw you kissing her," he pointed to Michonne, "You don't care about her. You don't care about anyone, but yourself." He reached for his waistband and pulled out a gun.

Rick put his hands up in surrender. "Okay Ron. It doesn't have to come to this. We can talk it out." He saw Michonne take a step forward. He did a slight shake of his head letting her know he had this.

"No I think it does," Ron said sounding bolder. "All of us would be better off without you here."

"You don't want to do this, Ron." Carl said through clenched teeth.

"Why do you still get to have a father when mine is gone? And now he's going to use my mom and throw her away."

"Ron lets just go back to my house and talk this -" The loud pop in the air took Rick back to the night he ripped out a man's throat with his teeth. He felt the same disorientation. Everything was moving in slow motion. The brush of Michonne's hair tickled the side of his face as she ran by him to take the gun away from Ron. He tried to tell her to stop. Tried to tell her not to escalate the situation. Absently he went to push Carl further behind him, but his hand only met air. The drumming of his heart intensified in his ears as he looked back for Carl. The body of his son laid in the lake. A red circle on his torso became bigger and darkened the water around him as he sunk below the surface.