"We're not leaving," Rick said, loading his gun and hanging it over his shoulder.

His eyes met mine for a second and I shrugged. I had been barking up that tree all day yesterday, and I couldn't get anyone to see things his way. Nobody listens to me, and I made sure to keep my mouth shut as much as I can because the constant ignorance to my ideas was starting to get on my nerves.

"We can't stay here," Hershel argued.

I wondered how he was still able to argue that point, when leaving would be the worst thing for us right now. He had one leg, we had a baby that would cry most of the day, as Glenn said, and now I was sure I've cracked a rib because even standing here was becoming too much to deal with, though I never actually took any of the pills today. We didn't have enough here.

"What if there's another sniper?" Maggie asked. "A wood pallet won't stop one of those rounds."

"We can't even go outside," Beth said.

"Not in the daylight," Carol said.

"Yeah, because they wouldn't have any snipers at night," I argued sarcastically.

It didn't matter what time of day we went outside, if they had someone out there we'd get shot, day or night. I wanted to point out that this point would also made it harder to leave the prison, but I would be here all day arguing why we had to stay here. I was sure that even if we left the Governor would hunt us down, at least here we had some form of defence from his army.

"If Rick says we're not running, we're not running," Glenn added, finally agreeing with the thing I spent hours trying to convince him of.

It actually made me physically angry that he was so willing to listen to Rick now, take orders from him when he assumed he was 'crazy'. I bit the inside of my cheek, and kept my eyes on the ground, not giving him the satisfaction of being happy that he finally saw things my way.

"No, better to live like rats," Merle called, leaning against the gate to the cafeteria to listen.

I turned around, ready to tell him to shut the fuck up, but Rick beat me to it, "You got a better idea?"

"Yeah, we should have slid out of here last night and lived to fight another day," Merle was saying. "But we lost that window, didn't we? I'm sure he's got scouts on every road out of this place by now."

"If you're going to argue, at least make a good point," I snapped, rolling my eyes. "He has 30 soldiers, 75 people all together. And you're telling me he's only now decided to block the one, singular road out of the prison? If there's people there he had them there last night. It doesn't matter if or when we leave, there'll be a fight whether we leave or not, at least here we have the supplies and guns to defend it."

The guns was a slight over exaggeration, because we were running low on ammo. Rick never wanted to use the guns for that reason, and that's why we had to clear the prison without anything. He hoped there would be more in the armoury, but again, there was nothing there. Unless we found some other weapons and ammo, there was really nothing we could do.

But that didn't mean we couldn't get the prison ready for a fight. I had the bombs, which I had been thinking of ways to make them act more like mines, triggering when people get close to them. I just needed some time to actually work on these ideas, and right now time was my limiting factor.

"We ain't scared of that prick," Daryl added, walking towards him along the balcony. I had to stop myself from snapping at him for taking over.

"Y'all should be," Merle said. "That truck through the fence thing, that's just him ringing the doorbell. We might have some thick walls to hide behind, but he's got the guns and the numbers. And if he takes the high ground around this place, shoot, he could just starve us out if he wanted to."

Everyone was silent, and I wasn't sure if it was whether they were taking him seriously or just wanted him to shut up. I knew why I was quiet at least, and it was most definitely the latter.

"Let's put him in the other cell block," Maggie said after a beat.

"No," Daryl shook his head. "He's got a point."

"This is all you!" She yelled at him, marching towards Merle and stopping next to me. "You started this!"

"What's the difference whose fault it is? What do we do?" Beth asked, coming down the stairs.

"I said we should leave," Hershel repeated. "Now Axel's dead. We can't just sit here."

Rick didn't say or add anything, but I don't understand what Hershel wanted him to say. He'd already given his plan, people keep arguing with it but Rick has always had the same stance. I had tried telling them this yesterday, but I got promptly ignored. Now here he was saying everything I had parroted and it still didn't matter. According to them, we still didn't have a plan.

Rick turned, ready to leave the room, but Hershel stood up and yelled at him. "Get back here!"

Rick stopped, looking at me, but like his eyes were somewhere else. He looked angry, pissed.

"You're slipping, Rick," Hershel continued. "We've all seen it. We understand why. But now is not the time. You once said this isn't a democracy, now you have to own up to that. I put my family's life in your hands. So get your head clear and do something."

Again, Rick started leaving, ignoring everything Hershel told him as he opened the gate and walked past Merle to leave.

I agreed that Rick needed to hear some of that, but it's not like he'd been here arguing for nothing. It would be hard for us to leave, it would cause a fight, just the same as staying here would. At least we understood these grounds, where to go, how to use them to our advantage. It's not like we were trying to infiltrate him again, if the Governor wanted us so badly he would have to come here.


Rick actually did come back after Carl had gone to speak to him, which surprised me. I don't know what Carl wanted, because they had not spoken since Rick had his outburst the other night.

Rick stopped as Maggie left one of the cells with a rifle. "Take watch. Eyes open, head down," as he said that he handed her the keys.

Then he walked over to the others, Daryl, Michonne, Glenn and Hershel, and I followed, hoping now that we could all agree on some kind of plan on what to do.

"Field's filled with walkers," he said. "I didn't see any snipers out there, but we'll keep Maggie on watch."

"I'll get up in the guard tower," Daryl suggested, "take out half of them walkers, give these guys a chance to fix the fence."

"Or use some of the cars to put the bus in place," Michonne added.

"We can't access the field without burning through our bullets," Hershel said.

"So we're trapped in here," Glenn snapped. "There's barely any food or ammo."

"Been here before," Daryl said. "We'll be all right."

"That's when it was just us. Before there was a snake in the nest," Glenn stared at Daryl.

"Man, we gonna go through this again? Look, Merle's staying here," Daryl said. "He's with us now. Get used to it. All y'all."

As Daryl walked away I couldn't hide my eyes rolling. We still have a say in this my ass. Daryl was running this now, whatever he wanted was going to happen, because nobody wanted to lose him again. It was making everything worse but as long as it kept Daryl here no one gave a shit.

"Seriously, Rick, I don't think Merle living here is really gonna fly," Glenn argued, despite the fact that Daryl had now walked up the stairs and was on the balcony getting away from the group.

"I can't kick him out."

"I wouldn't ask you to live with Shane after he tried to kill you, or Ace with the Governor," Glenn gestured to me, and I nodded absently, agreeing that I did not want to live with the Governor.

"Merle has military experience," Hershel argued. "He may be erratic, but don't underestimate his loyalty to his brother."

"What if we solve both problems at once? Deliver Merle to the Governor. Bargaining chip. Give him his traitor, maybe declare a truce."

"Oh come on," I rolled my eyes. "Michonne killed his dead daughter. But yeah, Merle is the one he wants. Merle was someone he was able to blame so his people didn't turn around and hate him. He found Daryl and realised it'd be the perfect coverup for how we got in there without being spotted. Then he didn't have to tell his people about the two prisoners."

"She's right," Rick said. "This isn't going to solve anything right now. We just have to keep getting this place secure for today, if you take anything outside then keep your head down."


I was in my cell when I heard people yelling, working on some of my new weapon ideas. I left the cell and entered the cafeteria, trying ti get a better understanding of what everyone was shouting about when I saw Maggie and Carl run back inside the prison.

"It's Andrea!" Maggie called, almost sprinting inside to tell us.

I couldn't tell whether she was excited or frightened, and everyone reacted the same way to the news. It was like they were kicked into high gear, Rick handing guns out to Daryl and Merle. It seemed like everyone else was also grabbing some kind of weapon head outside as well. As I ran over, Rick called out to me, "Ace! Gun!"

The M4 hurt as it landed in my arms against my chest, and I had to hold back a yelp, deciding that whatever pain I was in didn't matter with a possible enemy on the doorstep, again.

"What's the plan?" I asked.

"She's still living with the enemy after what happened," Rick muttered. "She can't be trusted."

I knew what that meant.

Keep guns on her, treat her as the enemy. Maybe a little better, since the last time anyone from Woodbury came to the prison we killed two out of five soldiers. I assumed it would be harder to do that with someone I knew, someone who had been in the same group as me, but we were in a tough situation. We couldn't just pretend her showing up was not some ambush or trap, so we had to keep an eye on her.

"Maggie, Beth, stay at the door, keep an eye out," Rick ordered. "Carol, get up on the bridge, look out for snipers. They could be sending her in as bait!"

They both nodded and Beth grabbed a gun from the table.

"I'm coming out, too," Michonne said.

Rick just nodded, "Stay back, head down."

I noticed that most people were armed, probably getting ready for another fight. Maybe they did bring her as bait, and they knew that we'd go out to see her. Everyone had a gun ready.

I stood behind Rick at the door.

"Come on," he muttered, and we ran out.

We moved from over to cover, and I followed behind Rick until we made it to behind the guard tower wall for cover. I could see Glenn and Carol ready on the bridge, and I heard Andrea killing walkers as she got closer and closer. Daryl had run across to the other side.

Rick called out to her. "Are you alone?"

"Open the gate!" She yelled back.

"Are you alone?!"

"Rick!"

Rick glanced back at me, muttering, "Keep your gun on her," and then he threw the keys to Daryl. "Open it."

Daryl opened the gate, and Andrea pushed the walker she had away, before running back through the gate. I pointed my gun at her, and Rick rushed forward, grabbing her by her shoulder and pushing her against the fence.

"Hands up! Turn around!"

"What?" She exclaimed.

I could see her face for a second, shocked that we would treat her that way, which meant that she thought we'd just let her inside. I couldn't tell whether it was genuine or not, unable to decide whether or not to trust her. It could've all been an act, and I hated that our people were standing so far out of cover when there could be more snipers planted around the prison.

"Turn around now!" He yelled.

I moved around to the side, gun trained on her as Rick started patting her down and taking any weapons out from her holster. As he started checking her for a gun a walker came up to the fence and slammed against it, slammed against her. She screamed and Rick pulled her away from the fence and forced her to kneel on the ground.

"Get down!" He demanded. "On the floor."

Behind me the others had not trained their guns on Andrea like I had, maybe they had not been instructed to do so like I had, but they were all looking away, looking for snipers. Part of me was grateful, the other was curious as to why I had to be the one to shoot at our friend if she did anything wrong.

Andrea looked up when she saw me, mouth open in shock, but I couldn't tell whether it was because I had a gun on her or whether she was surprised to see me alive. "Ace."

"I asked if you were alone," Rick said, leaning toward her.

"I am," she gasped.

Rick grabbed the strap of her bag, yanking it over her head and throwing it away.

"Welcome back," he grabbed under her arm. "Get up."

As we went back inside, Rick nodded for me to lower the gun, which I did, and Andrea just stared at me for a second. I saw out of the corner of my eye that the people on the bridge saw that he was bringing her into the prison, and went back inside where it was safe. I waited for him to lead her to the doors, and let Maggie, Daryl and Michonne go first.

I also waited for Merle, but he waved a hand and grinned, "Ladies first."

"Piss off," I muttered, walking inside.

When Rick led her into the cafeteria, the others had come down from their positions on the bridge. She met eyes with Carol and walked over to hug her, looking over Carol's shoulder at everyone standing around to see who was here.

"After you saved me, we thought you were dead," Carol explained, releasing the woman.

That brought up some memories that I was not expecting to think about today, how we found everyone on the highway and just decided that Andrea was probably dead, though from what I gathered, had she not found Michonne she probably would have been dead. We couldn't just risk the group and head into an overrun forest looking for her, because more of us would've died that night.

"Hershel, my God. I can't believe this," Andrea was saying, looking around the group. Her eyes landed on me again for a second, but she had seen me outside with a gun to her head so she didn't really say anything to me. "Where's Shane?"

Yikes.

Part of me forgot that she wouldn't have known that, but when I worked out that Shane must have killed Randall himself, I kind of guessed what was going to happen with the two of them out there. Though she never knew about the bodies, how they turned without being bitten, only dying as the trigger. I wondered if she ever got the chance to work that out over her time alone.

She took the lack of answer as a reason to continue these awkward lines of questioning. "And Lori?"

"She had a girl," Hershel answered. "Lori didn't survive."

"Neither did T-Dog," Maggie added.

"I'm so sorry," she shook her head, when she finally saw the young boy. "Carl," he just stared at her with an emotionless face, and then she turned to his dad. "Rick, I—"

He just shook his head, and she stopped, still wanting to comfort him in some way, but knowing there was no point. I wondered why she even bothered asking, everyone who was still alive was in this room, with only the baby still being in the cell block. There was no need to keep asking, despite the closure she needed and wanted.

"You all live here?" She asked after a pause.

"Here and the cell block," Glenn told her.

"There?" She gestured to the gate behind Rick and stepped forward. "Well, can I go in?"

"I won't allow that," Rick marched over to her, getting in her way.

"I'm not an enemy, Rick."

Rick, like myself, seemed to get pretty mad at that statement knowing what we knew about Andrea now. "We had that field and courtyard until your boyfriend tore down the fence with a truck and shot us up."

"He said you fired first," she said.

"Well, he's lying."

"He killed an inmate who survived in here," Hershel said.

"We liked him," Daryl said from his spot sat on the table, "he was one of us."

"And he shot Ace," Rick said. "Maybe cracked a rib, it was lucky she had the armour on or he would've killed her."

Her eyes met mine again, but I just stared her down.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know anything about that," Andrea said. "As soon as I found out, I came. I didn't even know you were in Woodbury until after the shoot-out."

"That was days ago," Glenn muttered.

"I told you, I came as soon as I could," Andrea seemed mad at him even suggesting she took her time, but we have been through a lot in the time that she could've come to see us. Her eyes then wandered to Michonne. "What have you told them?"

"Nothing," was all Michonne said.

Andrea shook her head, mouth open in a smile of disbelief. "I don't get it. I left Atlanta with you people and now I'm the odd man out?"

"He shot Ace," Rick repeated.

I was glad that we were drawing more attention to that point, because she clearly wasn't aware why we didn't trust her, despite telling her countless times what the Governor had done, and by association, that made her untrustworthy. I had been shot, the man really tried killing me when I was knocked back by the bullet. I was almost on her list of people she would've asked about being dead, and it seemed like she didn't care at all.

Me and Andrea were never close, but I expected some kind of sympathy with how close I was to death.

"He almost killed Michonne," Glenn said, "and he would have killed us."

"With his finger on the trigger!" She pointed at Merle. "Isn't he the one who kidnapped you? Who beat you?"

No one answered, because apparently that didn't matter to us anymore. We were keeping Merle just because, at this point. But that didn't change the fact that he did what he did because the Governor didn't seen to allow him to look for Daryl on his own time.

"Look, I cannot excuse or explain what Philip has done," she started. "But I am here trying to bring us together. We have to work this out."

"There's nothing to work out," Rick said, and tilted his head to the side. "We're gonna kill him. I don't know how or when, but we will."

"We can settle this," she said. "There is room at Woodbury for all of you."

"This is bullshit!" I exclaimed. "We told you what he did, and that barely scratched the fucking surface. Torture, execution, he made Daryl and Merle beat the shit out of each other. The man killed the fucking National Guard because they existed in the area for fuck's sake. And you think after what Michonne did he's just going to take her back?! What kind of stupid idea is it that we live with him—?!"

"—Ace," Rick stopped me, and looked at Andrea again. "You know better than that."

"What makes you think this man wants to negotiate?" Hershel asked. "Did he say that?

"No," she said.

"Oh, fucking great," I muttered turning around, now completely pissed off.

"Then why did you come here?" Rick snapped.

"Because he's gearing up for war," she said. "The people are terrified. They see you as killers. They're training to attack."

"I'll tell you what," Daryl started. "Next time you see Philip, you tell him I'm gonna take his other eye."

"We're taken too much shit for too long. He wants a war? He's got one," Glenn added.

"It wasn't already a war?" I asked, genuinely confused.

Andrea stared between them, somehow shocked at everyone's attitude towards this situation. "Rick. If you don't sit down and try to work this out, I don't know what's gonna happen," she said. "He has a whole town. Look at you. You've lost so much already. You can't stand alone anymore."

"You want to make this right? Get us inside."

"No," she denied.

"Then we got nothing to talk about."

"There are innocent people."

Rick ignored her and left into the cell block, leaving Andrea standing there speechless. She turned around to glance at Michonnne who just shrugged, showing that she agreed with Rick.

Michonne did eventually leave the building with Andrea, and everyone dispersed, leaving to do their own tasks. I just sat on one of the tables, gun behind me as I waited for this day to be over.

I wanted to do some kind of work, but even breathing still hurt so much. Anything that bent my chest, made me twist or move was just about bearable, despite the excruciating pain that always came through in the middle of tasks. So I just sat there, ignoring my breathing or even moving as I wanted for something (and hopefully nothing) to do.

After around five minutes, Rick came back out into the cafeteria. "Ace?"

I nodded, glancing at him, now being dragged out of my own world. "Yeah?"

"Those police cars inside the prison, do they run?"

"I've only checked one of them," I said, "it does."

He nodded. "If she wants to go back, she can have it."

As he said that, Andrea came back inside, followed by Michonne. Neither person looked happy, and I know that they had very different opinions on why Michonne left Woodbury, or why Andrea stayed behind, so I basically understood their argument without being there to hear it.

"Can I see the cell block," Andrea asked Rick.

Rick only sighed, nodding his head for her to look.

"Get that car ready?" He asked, but it wasn't a request. I needed to get that done, because I too doubted that Andrea was staying with us.


Andrea had seen the baby, and said her goodbyes to everyone in the prison. She tried to give me a hug which I promptly stopped because it would kill my chest, and she seemed a little hurt, but acted like it didn't matter.

"Bye," she smiled.

I just nodded.

Rick had someone else pull the car out from the prison gates. After I had done a quick check to make sure there was enough fuel for her to get all the way back to Woodbury without getting stranded.

"Can you spare it?" She asked Rick.

No.

"Yeah," he nodded.

He was probably right, but I didn't want to send a car back to the people we were at war with. Give them more supplies, more ways to carry their people here. Rick was lucky I had even agreed to let her take it and that's only because we hadn't gotten the chance to use it ourselves.

"Well, take care," she said sincerely.

Rick just continued looking ahead as she got into the car, closing the door behind her and adjusting the seat a little. She started the car and was just about ready to drive it out of the prison.

"Andrea," Rick stopped her. "Careful out there."

"You too," she nodded and drove off.

Glenn opened the gate for her to drive out, and I waited silently for the gunshots to ring out, but there was nothing. We came back inside the cell block, and there was nothing for anybody to do but wait. The minute I realised that we literally had no more work we needed to do, I headed to my cell block, ready to get an early night to not continue feeling the amount of pain I was in.


"Ace?" I heard Rick from my door.

I went to roll back to look at him, but had forgotten about the pain until I moved. I winced, but managed to get out a: "Yeah?"

Everyone had stayed out in the cell block, from what I could hear. Beth sang another song and there was quiet chatter about the plans for tomorrow, which I couldn't hear, even though it happened so close. I really just tried focusing on getting some sleep, which was not happening because of the pain, and this was the first someone had come to see me in over two hours. Rick entered the cell, so I pushed myself up, hand over my chest as I breathed out.

"Have you taken anything today?" Rick asked.

"We don't have a lot," I said. "I'll be fine."

"I'll bring them in now," he said. "You need to take care of yourself."

I can heal when this is over. That was really what I was waiting for, this whole fight to be over so I could spend a few weeks getting over this injury over my chest. Unfortunately, right now I did not have that luxury. It was like being on the road all over again.

"Did you need something?" I asked after a beat.

Rick gave a nod. "I'm leaving tomorrow. Gonna see if there's any guns back in Kings County. We had a record of who owned them, had permits. If they're still there, it's a big haul. We need those guns."

"What's where you were from, right?" I asked.

I remembered the first thing Shane said to me was that he was a Sheriff's Deputy from Kings County police department, and I knew that they worked together so it didn't take a genius to work out that's where he was from.

"Yeah, near my home."

"Okay."

Rick continued what he was saying before my interruption. "I won't be gone for long, just the day and we'll be back before it gets dark. I'm taking Carl and Michonne," he explained. "I want you to take over."

I thought about it for a second, really not wanting to have to take over again. That was a lot of work to do and I was in a lot of pain, which I probably should have used as an excuse to get out of this.

"There's things I wanted to try tomorrow," I said.

He tilted his head, genuinely curious, "Like what?"

"Remember that smoke bomb?" I asked. "I was thinking about using shrapnel, throwing a nail bomb or something into the tombs. I could take a look at the back wall, see if we can use the breach to escape."

Rick was nodding, thinking about my idea, but I knew he didn't like it. I didn't either, but without lifting or shooting at things, this was all I had left that would keep me in minimal amounts of pain.

"I really need you here," he said finally.

"No one listens to me here," I said. "You should just leave Daryl in charge."

"He is, but he's gonna be busy keeping an eye on Merle," Rick said.

"So Hershel," I said. "Leave Hershel in charge. No one listens to me, and I can't keep Merle in line, and we can't guarantee that Daryl will do anything to him if he starts acting up, so that comes down to me, too."

Rick was quiet for a moment, "I've put a lot on you these past couple days, not always intentionally," I thought back to his outburst for a moment, but listened intently. "I know why you don't want to, but I really need you right now. You said it yourself, I can't trust that Daryl will watch Merle, and Hershel won't be able to do anything if he plays up, but you can."

It wasn't really Merle that I was worried about, I was looking for any opportunity to kick him out of the group, despite Daryl's protests and arguments that he was staying with us. But keeping an eye on him was a different things because I could have to diffuse whatever shit he gets himself worked up over.

Not only that, but people in the group still didn't believe what we were doing was the right plan, which meant more arguments, more explaining why we had to stay in the prison and then more getting ignored due to my age. It was the worst experience having so much power with no one actually listening to it.

"My only other option is Glenn, and he means well, but if anything happens he'll just kill Merle," Rick said. "He's looking for that excuse. I need you on this."

Despite me arguing with his request, which I normally would have agreed to do, I knew that no matter what I said at the end of the day Rick would expect the utmost effort from me in this task that I really hated.

So I sighed and nodded. "Okay."


Here it is.

I have a question for everyone. I know there's not a lot of changes this season and I do have different things coming up for the next season. I want to know if there are big changes people are waiting for or would want me to do or whether you prefer the original characters view of the story.

I know people have different tastes and I do get things suggested to me (on more than anything) so please tell me what you would prefer. Just remember new ideas are hard to come up with (and how they incorporate into the story already there), and I have uni to try and get through also haha

Hope you enjoyed, and let me know what you thought :)