"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won.

There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible,

but in the end, they always fall. Think of it-always."

– Mahatma Gandhi

That day Rick prepared himself to go meet this Governor that had just made their lives worse since the day they crossed paths, first they kidnapped Glenn and Maggie, then they made Daryl fight his own brother after they captured him and finally he attacked them, wounded Axel and killed Teresa, plus damaging the prison.

Rick didn't know why he hadn't allowed Cecilia to come with him, he just had a feeling he should keep her away from that man, he shouldn't even see her, so he gave her a task, to take care of his son.

Around midday, Rick hugged his baby and son good-bye and got on the Hyundai they had, Hershel was going to drive. He had a hidden knife and gun around the knee of the leg he no longer had, nobody would suspect an old man with a missing leg to hide his weapons there, it was genius.

Daryl also had his crossbow, gun and knife ready, waiting for Rick, already sitting on his motorcycle. Rick wouldn't admit it but he was nervous about this meeting, it may be possible that he wouldn't get back to Carl and Judith but he was the leader, he had to do this.

The place Andrea mentioned was an abandoned place, exactly halfway to the prison and halfway to Woodbury, when they got there, Rick and Daryl went to examine the place while Hershel stayed in the car.

Rick went inside a building and even when they had agreed none of them would go inside alone, Rick wasn't surprised to see the Governor there already. A wooden table stood between the two men.

The Governor raised his arms in surrender with a big fake smile on his face, but Rick didn't smile, he looked like he wasn't in the mood to make friends.

"We have a lot to talk about," the Governor said.

"You attacked us," Rick told him. "Makes things pretty clear."
"I was trying to make things clear. I could have killed you all," he said. "I didn't."
"And here we are."
Rick noticed the Governor's hands moving towards his gun, he quickly raised his hand and pointed his gun at the man's head, once again he raised his hands in surrender.

"I'm gonna remove my weapon, show that I mean to negotiate in good faith. I'd like you to do the same. May I?"

Rick said nothing or did nothing, he just slightly moved his head and hand to the right, signalling him that he could if he wanted, which he did, taking his belt off with his gun attached to it and then he hung it in behind him.

"See? No trouble," the Governor said, smiling. "Now you."

But Rick didn't do that, he just lowered his gun and put it back in its place, close to him in case he needed it, the Governor just shrugged at him.

"Well suit yourself," he said, sitting on one of the wooden chair, hesitantly Rick sat down as well.

Out of the building, the Governor's people finally arrived, Daryl grabbed his crossbow and aimed at them. There was a brunet man, he remembered him from the other night, another man with glasses, dark blond hair, who looked like a geek and Andrea.
"What the hell? Why is your boy already in there?" Daryl demanded, still aiming at them.

"He's here?" Andrea asked in surprise.

"Yup."

Andrea just sighed in frustration before walking inside the building, leaving the four other men outside.

Both guys leaned against the car, as Hershel got out too and Daryl finally lowered his crossbow. And instead just paced around, but always having those two in his sight.
"Maybe I should go inside," Hershel commented.
"The Governor thought it best if he and Rick spoke privately," the man with glasses said.
"Who the hell are you?" Daryl asked.

"Milton Mamet."
"Great. He brought his butler."
"I'm his advisor," Milton said, like he was used to being insulted, words didn't affect him anymore, while the other man chuckled.
"What kind of advice?"

"Planning, biters. Uh, you know, I'm sorry. I don't feel like I need to explain myself to the henchmen."
"You better watch your mouth, sunshine," Daryl exclaimed in a threatening tone.
"Look, if you and I are gonna be out here pointing guns at each other all day, do me a favour, shut your mouth," the other man said to Daryl.

"We don't need this!" Hershel exclaimed quickly as Daryl walked towards the man and stood in front of him, like an alpha macho. "If all goes south in there, we'll be at each other's throats soon enough."

Daryl stepped away from him, controlling himself. He knew he just couldn't start a fight here, even when he wanted nothing more than punch Milton's stupid, nerdy face but instead he just started pacing again.

Back at the prison, everyone was preparing themselves, grabbing guns and ammo in case they could need them.

"If anyone gets pinned down, we need to make sure that they have plenty of ammo. I'll go work on the cage outside," Glenn informed the others.
"What we should be doing is loading some of this firepower in a truck and paying a visit to the Governor," Merle said. "We know where he is right now."
"Are you suggesting that we just go in and kill him?" Glenn asked him a bit surprised.

"Yeah, I am," Merle said, not afraid of being so blunt.
"We told Rick and Daryl that we'd stay put," Cecilia said to him but she couldn't deny she liked his idea.
"I've changed my mind, sweetheart," he said to her as he leant against a wall. "Being on the sideline with my brother out there ain't sitting right with me."
"The three of them are right in the middle of it, no idea we're coming," Glenn told him. "They could get taken hostage or killed. A thousand things could go wrong."
"And they will," Merle exclaimed.
"My dad can take care of himself," Carl told him, just before he walked out of the room.
"Sorry, son, but your dad's head could be on a pike real soon."
"Don't say that to him!" Cecilia exclaimed quickly to the older man.

"It's not the right move. Can't take the risk of putting them in the crossfire. That's my decision," Glenn said with determination. "It's final."

Glenn walked out of the room, to work on the cage like he said he would, and surprisingly Merle said nothing else to the Korean guy or anyone else.

Minutes later Maggie left as well, leaving Cecilia alone with Merle, who grabbed a backpack and started to fill it with ammo.

"Don't fuck this up, Merle," the blonde-haired girl said, she was sat on the floor with her back leant against the wall. "Why can't you do as you're told for once?"

"You know why and I'm quite shocked you aren't with me on this."

"I would support you if the plan wouldn't be so dangerous, anything could happen to them and I'm not willing to take that risk."

Merle continued to grab ammunition and putting it in the bag when Glenn walked back inside, and in no time he noticed what was Merle was doing.

"Hey, you're not going!" he exclaimed.
"I don't need permission."
"I can't let you."
"You can't stop me."
"If you're gonna live here with us, it's gonna be on our terms," Maggie exclaimed, but Merle said nothing, he just grabbed a rifle and the bag, walking towards the door. "If Michonne can do it, why can't you?"

"'Cause it's my brother out there, that's why. What's the matter with y'all?" he exclaimed, raising his voice, and then turned to face Cecilia. "Especially you! You love him, you shouldn't just sit on your ass while he's out there."

"He's a big boy, Merle," Cecilia muttered, trying to ignore the fact her usual pale face turned scarlet at Merle's word.

Merle said nothing else to Cecilia, he turned around and walked to the door, where Glenn stood up quickly to prevent Merle from leaving.

"I'm not gonna let you put them in danger," Glenn muttered in a surprisngly calm tone.
"Nut up already, boy. This guy cops a feel of your woman and you pussy out like this? Get out of my way!"
"No."

Merle was going to push Glenn out of the way, but Glenn hold on to him, they both struggled until they fell and down the stairs they went. Michonne, Maggie and Cecilia rushed to them, holding on to Merle to get him off of Glenn, but Merle was quite strong. The five of them kept struggling until a gunshot was heard, making them all stop, stunned.

It was Beth, she was quite dramatic with firing the gun and all but it worked. Merle let go of Glenn, who didn't waste time to lock the door so Merle wouldn't be able to leave, which only made him even more furious.

"There's no reason not to use this time we have together to explore the issues ourselves," Milton said, the others had formed some kind of big circle and Milton was walking in the middle of it.
"Boss said to sit tight and shut up," the other man, whose name was Martinez snapped at him.
"Don't you mean the Governor?" Daryl exclaimed.

"It's a good thing they're sitting down, especially after what happened," Milton said. "They're gonna work it out, nobody wants another battle."
"I wouldn't exactly call it a battle," Daryl told him.
"I would call it a battle and I did, I recorded it," Milton exclaimed, raising his hand, which was holding a small notebook.

The more this man talked the more Daryl hated him, Cecilia had mentioned him a couple of times and he remembered she said she disliked him as well, which probably influenced him to dislike the man before even talking to him.
"For what?" Daryl asked.

"Somebody's got to keep a record of what we've gone through. It'll be a part of our history."
"That makes sense," Hershel said, just leading Milton on.
"I've got dozens of interviews..." Milton started, getting excited but was interrupted by snarling.

Milton and Hershel stayed behind but Daryl, Martinez and Andrea, who had been kicked out about twenty minutes after she went in, grabbed their weapons, Martinez's being a baseball bat, went to where the snarling came from.

Daryl was the first to see the walkers, Martinez was next. They only saw two at first but more were coming. Daryl lowered his crossbow.

"After you," he said, doing a signal with his hand.
"No way. You first!" Martinez exclaimed.

Andrea got sick of their attitude, walked in between them and lunged herself on the first walker, stabbing it with a knife.
"Pussy," Martinez muttered, just before he killed the next one with his bat, hitting the walker in the head, destroying it completely against a piece of siding. Martinez looked back at Daryl with a huge smile, obviously bragging, Daryl just shrugged, unimpressed.

Daryl walked past martinez, crossbow ready again and shot one walker straight between the eyes, by the time he was done, Martinez was swinging the bat in his hand like a pro, before hitting another walker's head.

Andrea noticed they were just showing off so she walked away, knowing she wasn't needed anymore, the men didn't notice she left. Daryl instead, shot the next walker, hit it in the eye. Martinez prepared to kill the last walker but Daryl wasn't going to let him have it, he grabbed his knife, narrowed his eyes and threw the knife before Martinez could do anything, the walker fell dead for good in front of Martinez. Daryl bent down next to the body of the last walker and checked its pockets, finding some cigarettes.
"Look what he's got," he exclaimed, showing them to Martinez. He stood up, grabbed one and offered another to Martinez.
"Nah, I prefer menthols," he exclaimed.
"Douchebag," Daryl exclaimed with the cigarette between his lips. "You army or something?" he asked after he took the first drag.

"Nah, I just – just hate these things," Martinez said. "After what they did to my wife, kids."
"Sucks."
"Thanks," Martinez muttered, getting extremely sad out of a sudden. "This is a joke, right? They ain't gonna work anything out. Sure, they'll do their little dance and tomorrow, next day they'll give the word."
"I know."
After that Martinez finally accepted the cigarette, Daryl took the box out of his pocket and handed it to the brunet man, who grabbed one, and they peacefully smoked together, which was quite surprising. On the other side, Milton and Hershel were having a nice conversation as well.

"May I ask how you lost your leg?" Milton asked the old man.

"I was bit."
"So you cut off your leg to keep the infection from spreading? Interesting," Milton exclaimed in surprise and wonder. "How long after the initial bite?"

"Immediately."
"You didn't bleed out?"

"We have good people. They took care of me." Hershel replied, as he kept reading Milton's annotations.
"Doctors?"

"No. We learned by trial and error."
"Me, too," Milton muttered. "May I see it? Your stump, I'd like to, um, see where the amputation was. How... high above the bite."
"I'm not showing you my leg," Hershel exclaimed, playing it cool, so no one knew he was hiding something in there.
"It's important data," Milton insisted.
"I just met you, at least buy me a drink first," Hershel said intending a joke, making himself laugh and eventually Milton laughed as well.

But unfortunately inside the building no one was laughing, the atmosphere was quite tense and they weren't getting to any kind of agreement or solution.

"Now, my people, they're not combat-tested like yours are, but I've got more of them. So this fight, it will go down to the last man," the Governor said to Rick. "So let's end it, today. Let's not do this, we can walk away."

Somehow Rick didn't like where this conversation was going, by his tone he knew he wanted something and he was sure he wasn't going to like what he was going to say.

"You have something that I want," the man said, making Rick's suspicion correct. "One thing, well actually two, that makes this all, alright."
"I'm not giving up the prison," Rick said quickly.
"No," the Governor said chuckling, sitting down again. "No, I don't want your prison. That doesn't sound safe at all. I mean, you lost your wife, another man there."

"We're not moving on."

"Best you stay where I can keep my one good eye on you."

"What do you want then?"

"I want Cecilia," he said, making Rick's heart skip a beat and his blood to go cold. "And..."

"Can't give you Cecilia," Rick said, trying to control his anger. "Can't because you killed her, one of the walkers you brought back to the prison bit her." Rick lied before even processed it in his mind.

"That's a real shame," the Governor said, not because she died but because he couldn't have her anymore. "I guess I'll have to be satisfied with Michonne, besides, I wanted her more than the sweet, quiet Cecilia. Just turn her over and this all goes away."

Then the Governor made a pause, took off his eye-patch and showed Rick the damage Michonne had done to his right eye, which looked really disgusting.
"Is she worth it? One woman worth all those lives at your prison? Is she?" the Governor asked.

Rick was more than glad he lied about Cecilia because he was more than sure that the Governor wanted nothing more than to torture them and slowly kill them both, mostly Michonne but Cecilia would pay as much as Michonne if he hadn't lied.

Rick didn't know what to do, he wanted them all, his family, to be safe, to be alive, but he couldn't just turn her over, Michonne. He wasn't that kind of guy.

"So, why waste your time on a two-bit vendetta? Why risk it all? You could have a statue of yourself in the town square, Governor. Killing Michonne is sort of beneath you, don't you think?"

"You could save your son, save your daughter," the Governor said in a cold voice. "Everyone you know. It's your choice."
"If I give you Michonne," Rick spoke up after a long silence. "How do I know you'll keep your word that you'll stop?"

"You can have everything you want. I told you, I don't care about you," he said. "You think about it. Two days. I'll be here at noon."

With that the Governor stood up and walked out of the building, leaving Rick to his thoughts for a few seconds before he also stood up and walked out.

They all got back on their vehicles, even Andrea, who hesitated at first. It was not until now that she realized how bad the Governor was but truth was that she had fallen for his charming personality and his looks and after what felt like agonizing seconds for her, Andrea finally got on the passenger seat of the Governor's car.

When Rick, Hershel and Daryl got back to the prison, Carol opened the gate and some of them walked outside to meet them, including Maggie and Glenn.

"Let's get inside," Rick told them.

They all gathered in block C, in the hallway in front of the cells, almost everyone was on their feet, some leaning against the walls. Cecilia was one of the only ones that was sat, she was holding Judith in her arms, Carl was next to her.
"So, I met this Governor," Rick announced. "Sat with him for quite a while."
"Just the two of you?" Merle asked.

"Yeah."
"Should have gone when we had the chance, bro," Merle said disappointed, as he walked away, but stayed at the back of the group, still interested in what Rick had to say.
"He wants the prison. He wants us gone," Rick told the group, making everyone's heart sink, even when deep inside themselves, they knew all along. "Dead. He wants us dead for what we did to Woodbury. We're going to war!"

Surprisingly, none of them showed any kind of fear, just determination, even when almost all of them were scared, especially Rick. He was scared for Carl, for Judith, and if he died, who would take care of them? He knew the group would but if it came to a life and death situation, he wasn't so sure who would risk their lives for his kids.

With that Rick walked out of the room, leaving the Michonne part out on purpose. Merle, for starters, wouldn't hesitate to take her to that man, and everyone would start arguing about it, Cecilia would be the first to oppose and he had no idea who else would oppose and who else would be on Merle's side, and he didn't need that. He didn't need his people to waste their time arguing when it was just him who had to take that decision, as hard as it was.

Rick headed to this kind of bridge that connected a part of the prison to the other. Rick heard the door cracking but didn't bother to look who had followed him, by the sound of clutches, he knew it was Hershel, the old man stood next to Rick.

"The group's taking it as well as can be expected," he said. "Merle and Michonne are convinced we should hit first. Cecilia and Carl want to stay here, Carol and I think we should take our chances on the road. We're in this together, so if we stay and fight, so be it."
"He gave me a choice," Rick confessed. "A way out."
"What does he want?" Hershel asked.

"Michonne and Cecilia at first," Rick said looking at the old man. "I lied and told her Cecilia was killed the other day, so now, he just wants Michonne."
"He'll kill her," Hershel said in a tone that made it obvious he was against turning her over.
"And then kill us anyway," Rick told him. "But what if he doesn't? What if this is the answer?"

And that was what the question in Rick's head that was making him crazy. A very big part of him knew that giving him Michonne wasn't going to solve anything, he couldn't trust this man but a tiny part wanted to believe that the Governor was a man of his word, and that maybe, just maybe, this was the solution.

A way to keep Carl, Judith and Cecilia, who he now loved as his own daughter, and the rest of the group to be safe but at a great price, someone's life.

"Why didn't you tell them?" Hershel asked him.

"They need... to be scared."
"They are," Hershel assured him.
"Good," Rick said nodding. "'Cause that's the only way they'll accept it."
"She saved my life," Hershel said quickly, referring to Michonne. "And Carl's. Glenn, Maggie... if she hadn't come here, we never would have known they were taken and everything she did for Cecilia all those months, she kept that girl alive. She's earned her place."
"Yeah," Rick agreed. "Yeah, she has."

Rick knew she had done that ever since Carl told him she was one of them when the three of them went on a run to get more weapons and ammunition and he knew Carl didn't trust people easily, which made him more assured Michonne was a good person and that's why this decision was so hard plus he wasn't a heartless person.

Rick knew that by accepting the deal and taking Michonne to him it was the same thing as he pulled the trigger himself but he couldn't stop thinking about Judith and Carl.
"Are you willing to sacrifice your daughters' lives for her?" Rick asked Hershel.

"Why are you telling me?" Hershel asked, instead of answering Rick's question.

"Because I'm hoping you can talk me out of it," Rick admitted.

Hello guys! Sorry for not posting until now, I was terribly sick and still not 100% okay but at least I have no more fever.

Tomorrow I have a very big important tournament, so I need to get fit again to be able to play at my fullest. This tournament will determine if I go to the Pan Ams Games in USA, in Connecticut, (does anyone live there?) but by the looks of it I will go, these two girls that were a threat to me won't play.

Well, as always thanks for keep reading and would love to hear your opinions on this chapter and what you think will happen in the next :D