Author's Note: Atlanta Natives, I took some slight, neglible liberties with downtown. Forgive me. Readers, your observant and erudite comments bring this story to life. Thank you.


Michonne careened around the corner.

Get to the water. Just get to the water.

Water was safer. That much she knew. She was a good swimmer.

The river loomed before her, an undulating black ribbon just beyond the trees and brick walkway. She just needed to get to it. She could escape that way.

Footfall. Behind her. Strange steps. An odd tramp-shuffle, the sound of an enormous cardboard box sliding and thumping across the floor. Many boxes. Too many.

Michonne sprinted towards the water.

Wrong way. You're going the wrong way.

It wasn't her voice. She knew it. She knew the voice.

But she was too panicked to place it.

Heart thrashing against her ribcage, she turned. She needed to see.

It was her undoing. She stumbled over her momentum and pitched forward. Pain ruptured across her knee when she hit the ground. She heard the skin open, a fleshy-wet tear. Blood burst from the opening. Pain so severe it stole her breath.

Something raced towards her. Closer, closer, closer. What was it? Oh God. What was it?

Fear seized her. Spine-stiffening, leg-locking fear. A terror so great that she began to pray for the first time in years—a jumbled, stuttering paraphrase of Psalm 23.

"I will fear no evil. Though I walk through the valley of death. I will fear no evil. Thy rod and thy staff comfort me. Thy staff comfort me. Thy staff—"

Michonne had always pictured the staff as a rainstick, tall as a man, the serpentine sound of which thwarted evil.

Now, knee throbbing, delirious with panic, Michonne pictured Jesus' staff as a katana bathed in blood. What had Jesus said to the disciples? Something about peace and a sword. She begged for the sword to smite her pursuers.

"Thy sword comfort me."

Voice trembling, she repeated this mantra, backing away. Each inch backward put excruciating pressure on her dislocated knee.

The thing—things?—slowed. The shuffling. One she had become of familiar with in the last few weeks.

And this street. She knew it well, even shrouded in darkness, dancing with contorting shadows, only illumined by one flickering street lamp.

Michonne fixated on the darkness. The shadows twisted.

Something surged into the light. Hands with gnarled fingers. Mangled arms. Wrenched legs. Faces. Michonne's mouth opened in horror.

Oh god. No. Please.

A scream built somewhere deep within her.

"Where are you going, babygirl?"

Her father staggered from the shadows. Pearly eyes ballooned from their sockets, off-white and shimmering. The mandible dangled. His jaw, only connected to the maxilla on the left side, threatened to detach at any moment. But his words were clear.

"Where are you going?"

Another shadow. Maddie. Skin shredded from her throat to her breasts. Her once pristine skin hung off in tattered strips, ashen and slick with blood. She advanced in silence, as quiet in (un)death as she had been in life. She reached out and curled her fingers. A beckoning.

Michonne croaked. "Maggie."

Her knee shrieked with pain as she scrambled backward. The concrete minced her palms.

Behind her father and sister, the darkness mutated. Bending and warping. Then, with the sounds of bones snapping, the shadow split in two.

Michonne began to weep. The scream swelled in her belly.

The twins heaved out of the darkness. In synch. Always in synch.

They crawled on their hands and feet. Inhuman, their backs arched towards the sky, their limbs askew. But they moved fast, advancing towards Michonne with more speed than she could muster. Like her father, like Maddie, their skin bore the evidence of their ordeal—mangled and swaying from the bone. Something had feasted on them.

NO, NO, NO!

"Where are you going, auntie?" Dre asked, blood pooling in the well of his mouth before spilling over his chin, down his neck, across his shirt. The simple grey t-shirt he favored.

"Wrong way, Meeshie," Ellie said.

She scurried forward. A mutilated insect. She smiled. Her teeth gleamed in the night, jagged and sharp. Rotting flesh hung from her mouth.

Michonne wailed.

The Camp

Morning

She bolted upright. The scream in her throat dwindled to a quiet groan. Residual fear clogged her airway. Gasping, she clawed at her throat. Sweat clung to her forehead, her neck, under her breasts. Michonne collapsed and curled onto her side. .

Breathe. It's okay. Breathe.

Tremulous minutes passed. She unfurled from the fetal position and rolled into child's pose, her arms stretched before her. The tent's polyester was cool under her fingertips. Slowly, time returned her breath. With each passing moment, her pants softened, her heart settled.

Don't ignore dreams that come in threes.

Her mother used to say so. And her mother before her.

This was the third night she had dreamed of her family.

Michonne's mother had rarely been wrong. She didn't know how to be. As admirable a trait as it was annoying, her father used to joke. Michonne had clung to her mother's wisdom. She believed in old knowledge, in the passing down of things, in knowing but not always knowing what you knew or how you knew it.

Still she never put much faith in dreams. It was too esoteric for her analytical mind.

But she believed that the mind, like the heart, was capacious, that it held onto things, stored them, acknowledged things before a person could make sense of them, hid them only to bring them forward again.

Her dreams were not precognitions.

They were recognition.

Parents who knew when their children had left the world. Spouses who felt the tearing away of their lovers. Twins suddenly bereft and cold without their other half.

Losing a limb, as some described it.

It was a truth she had been avoiding. She spurned it during her waking hours. She dismissed it as she patrolled the perimeter, made runs into the city, and tended to Mike.

Her family was dead.

Like Glenn's parents and sisters. Like T-Dogg's brothers, his father. Amy and Andrea's parents in Florida. Terry's mom and cousins. Mike's parents, his siblings, his brood of nieces and nephews.

Entire families. Gone.

Most of the world. Gone.

She was no statistician, but she was good at math. The chances of her family's survival was next to none.

She couldn't bear that reality during the day.

But, her mother used to say, truth comes at night.

Her eyes welled. She heaved a sigh to stave off her tears. There was no time.

There was never time.

No matter her rationalizations, she couldn't shake her foreboding about this place. With each day it grew. The others did not seem to share it. Not to the degree that she felt it.

The restlessness kept her awake at night. Circling the camp, even after Morales started his watch shift. Her apprehension deepened. The sun was rising when she finally crawled into her tent. She slept three or four hours.

It had to be enough.

Camp was in full swing. There was chatter. Puttering. The fire cracking. A short squawk of laughter.

She dressed, washed her face, brushed her teeth. She craved a hot shower and her pricey body wash. Her silk robe. Luxuries bygone. The pail of water she kept by her tent was a poor facsimile.

Mike and Terry's tent was still.

She stared at it, tracing the zipper from one end to the other, turning her nose up at the mosquitoes camped out on the mesh. She ignored the empty whiskey bottle.

She tapped on the flap. "Mike?"

Nothing. She called his name again.

A grunt. The creak of a cot, Mike turning over. Some rustling and shuffling. She unzipped the tent and slipped inside. Terry sprawled face-down on his deflating air mattress. Mike squinted at her.

"Good morning," she said.

He sat up, taking care with his leg. He made space for her on his cot. Wordlessly, she pushed his shorts up his thigh to inspect his knee.

"It looks better."

His voice crackled. "Yeah. Not as bad as it was."

"How does it feel?"

"Better. Still hurts like hell."

She imagined so. The skin around his knee was still bulbous and angry. He was healing at a glacial pace, more than a decade older than he'd been during his first ACL tear. There was limited medicine, an abundance of stress, and no ice. All he could do was elevate his leg and restrict his movement.

She leaned over and pressed a kiss to his shin, far enough away from his injury. He tensed for a moment and then sighed, tugging one of her locs the way he used to. His fingers whispered down the back of her neck; his large palm rested between her shoulder blades. She welcomed the dry warmth of his hand.

It soothed her. Enough that she almost told him about her nightmare.

But then his hand was gone, and Michonne swallowed her words.

His skin flaked. His eyes puffed from a lack of sleep. But he was gorgeous still. He had always been so strikingly handsome.

He met her eyes. Something he didn't do much of these days.

"You going on a run today?"

His voice was dull, listless. And, if she listened closely enough, she could hear the dash of irritation that never left his voice now.

Michonne shook her head.

"I shouldn't have to. The run team just came back yesterday."

She had already relayed the Atlanta ordeal to him, as Andrea had done for her.

Merle. Fucking Merle. Always causing trouble. Michonne would say hallelujah, good riddance! if not for Daryl. Daryl would be a problem.

Mike's shoulders eased. "Good."

Another peal of laughter. Carl. Michonne smiled. He had been bubbling with joy since his father's miraculous arrival.

Rick. The Deputy Cowboy, she had come to think of him. John Wayne.

"You were gone for a while yesterday," Mike said.

Stifling a sigh, she nodded. She knew it would come up. He had been morose during dinner. No more than usual, but morose all the same.

"I was scouting the mountain. Checking the perimeter."

"Yeah?"

She wanted to tell him about her encounter with the walkers. About her misgivings about the camp. Instead she only nodded. He wasn't really asking a question. Not one he wanted an answer to.

His attention drifted, eyes trailing around the tent, to the pile of clothes on the floor, the bottles clustered around the air mattress, Terry's prone and snoring form. HIs eyes lingered on the bottles.

Whatever had driven Mike to drink back in Atlanta had, somehow, peculiarly, relinquished him.

Michonne didn't know why. Maybe his injury. Maybe his dejection had consumed him so thoroughly that he had no energy for drunkenness. Mike had never cared much for drinking.

There was the occasional old fashioned after work with his colleagues. One or two beers when he was with his family. A single glass of champagne at events.

Where many saw drinking as freedom, Mike had seen it as surrender. Giving one's control away. Making oneself susceptible to all manner of foibles. Drinking, he used to say, made him heavy, disconnected from himself, unable to think. Thus his turn to the bottle as the outbreak spread had bewildered her.

But perhaps that was precisely what he wanted. Freedom from thinking.

In a way, he'd returned to what she recognized.

Only his sobriety brought with it a steely, relentless gloom. He was lucid again. Somewhat. His eyes had been so foggy in Atlanta and the first few days in the camp. Clouded with bemusement, with feigned nonchalance, with disinterest. It had frightened her.

There was none of that now, and it should have reassured her, soothed that tapping in the back of her mind.

And yet.

"Are you hungry?" she asked.

Mike shook his head, granting her his eyes once more. There was that look again. One he gave her mostly when he thought she wasn't looking. Shimmering and sharp. Frighteningly clear for someone who had been so out of sorts two weeks ago.

A shiver rolled up her arms.

"No. Carol brought something earlier. I asked her not to wake you. Since you were on watch for so long."

Michonne stared. As far as she knew, he had been asleep when she returned from watch. She patted his leg.

"I need to eat. I'll check on you later."

She stood. Like lighting, he grabbed her hand and held it, massaged it, pressed his thumb into her palm.

It brought none of the comfort it would have a month ago. She waited for him to say something. He took her in as if he wanted to. Staring, seeing…something. She saw the words build and then dissipate.

He released her hand and laid back on the bed. She left him there.

Cool air swished between the trees, wound between the tents. The noonday sun had yet to settle. By then the air would be near scorching.

That was another wrinkle about this place. Fall was approaching. The weather would only cool further. How well could they insulate the tents?

Michonne discarded the thought. For now.

Breakfast had passed. People had dispersed around the camp. Putting their hands to work. Gathering wood. Sorting inventory.

There was no official schedule. Not really. People came and went as they needed to.

But a semblance of routine comforted some. Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. Daily tasks. Lessons for the kids in between. She understood it. The longing for familiarity. The longing for a sense of community.

She liked these people. Some more than others. She trusted them. Enough.

But she had not yet come to think of them as her people. Or this place as her new home. Or any kind of home. She held these thoughts close, for reasons she understood and reasons she did not.

Breakfast today would be minimal as it was everyday. A packet of grits. A bag of lemon lavender tea. There was no sugar or honey but the tea was a welcome treat every morning. Soothing and familiar. Her own routine.

The fire pit was often deserted by the time she awoke. She preferred it that way.

Today the universe saw fit to give her company.

She considered coming back later, not wanting to interrupt the father-son pair. Carl, tucked into his father's side, had his head bent over A Chamber of Secrets. Deputy Cowboy kept a tight arm around Carl's shoulder.

Skin pink, he looked less haggard than he had the evening before. That was good.

Legend was that he'd been shot not long ago and fell into a coma. It was a miracle he was alive, let alone up and about. But from their brief introduction and Andrea's tale, he was a determined man.

Staring into the trees, he appeared distracted, looking without seeing.

Michonne sympathized. What a surreal nightmare to wake up to.

Sensing her approach, Deputy Cowboy turned his eyes away from the woods, blinking as if coming back to the present. He assessed her, head to toe. As he had the night before.

It was almost machinic. Terminator-like. She imagined her profile from his eyes. Streams of data appearing across the screen of his vision. Scanning, calculating. Her height, weight, musculature. Her weapons.

Assess the threat. Be prepared. Protect.

Once a cop, always a cop.

But then he offered a gentle smile, and the cop gave way to genial cowboy. Creases sprung up at the corner of his eyes, lines that had probably only just appeared a year or two before. Deputy Cowboy couldn't have been more than thirty-seven.

"Mornin', ma'am."

Ah. A country boy through and through.

His words meandered. Gavel soaked in honeyed whiskey. She couldn't decide if he or Shane had the stronger accent. Carl looked up and beamed.

"Hi, Michonne."

She tugged his bangs. "Good morning."

"You missed breakfast."

She missed "breakfast" most mornings. Carl made note of it all the same.

"I stayed up late."

"Reading?"

"Watch."

He nodded, eyebrows scrunched.

"Dad, we should help Michonne keep watch."

They took shifts. Shane often stayed up all night too, patrolling the other end of the camp even if it wasn't his turn.

Deputy Cowboy kissed his son's head. Carl, eager for his father's touch, leaned further into him. Michonne smiled, warmed by the tenderness between them. She thought of her nightmare, of Ellie and Dre, of her father and sister.

Skin flaking off in clumps. Bodies twisted into unnatural shapes. Eyes seeing and unseeing. Hands reaching towards her.

She rolled her shoulders.

"I ain't too keen on you out late, son. It's dangerous."

Michonne didn't blame him. This world was already woefully unfair to children. She hoped they could avoid saddling Carl with responsibilities for as long as possible. He should be able to sleep at night, not worry about keeping the camp safe. No matter how smart or watchful he was for his age.

"But if you stayed up, I can too. You can keep me safe and we can keep Michonne company. So she's not by herself."

She smiled at his offer. He reminded her of Dre and Ellie.

Deputy Cowboy ruffled Carl's hair and smiled.

"Provided," He said glancing at her left hand. "Ms.—"

"Michonne. Just Michonne."

He looked at her finger once again before lifting his eyes.

"Provided Michonne won't mind the company, I'll discuss it with your mother. But definitely not all night. You need sleep."

Chonne.

He put a lot of stress there. It dragged. Distinct from the way Shane or Jim said it—a thick rush of letters caught up in their drawl.

Cowboy looked to check her receptivity.

"I don't mind."

Watch tended to be uneventful, but company would be nice. At least, theirs would be. She had a soft spot for Carl.

Pleased, Carl turned the page in his book and snuggled closer to his father. Michonne placed the kettle over the fire and folded herself into one of the camping chair across from the duo. She blinked, fighting drowsiness.

"How's the book?" she asked.

It was all the invitation Carl needed. He was a quiet and mindful soul until something excited or confused him. Then he was garrulous. Hands waving. Knee bopping. Ideas flowing.

It alleviated her exhaustion for just a moment.

The boy's father kept him tucked against his side. He didn't say much, didn't need to. Carl did enough talking for the three of them. The man received his son's exuberance with a gentle smile and occasional kisses to his temple. As if he couldn't help himself.

Michonne watched. An ache settled behind her ribs.

"What are you gabbing about over here?" Lori asked.

She came to stand behind her husband and trailed her hands up his neck, into the nest of curls at his nape. He gave a gentle sigh, reached up, and held one of her hands. The left one. He fiddled with the ring there, twirling it around her finger.

"My book," Carl said, grinning.

"I'm glad you're in the learning mood. What time is it?"

Carl's brow furrowed. Then he groaned.

"Mom."

"I gave you an extra hour and a half, kid."

"But Dad's back."

Lori wrapped her arms around the deputy and rested her cheek atop his head.

"Yeah. He is."

If not for the setting and the thin layer of dirt on their faces, the image would be banal. Kid avoiding schoolwork. Parents putting their foot down.

"I'll come join you in a minute for…?"

Deputy Cowboy paused and looked up at his wife.

"Math in the morning. Reading and writing in the afternoon."

"Math."

Appeased with the agreement, Carl stood and threw his arms around his father who bear-hugged him in return, placing a series of kisses across his face. Carl giggled, and Lori smiled, her eyes pink and watery.

Carl gave his father a final kiss on the cheek and took off. Sophia was probably waiting for him. He left his mother behind and she leaned down, close to her husband's face. The couple exchanged quiet words.

Michonne tuned them out. The kettle begun to rumble. She turned her attention to it, lulled by the sound. Could she get away with closing her eyes for a moment?

Lori offered her a brief smile and a "Morning" as she passed. Michonne returned it. John Wayne watched his wife walk away.

Michonne wondered if it grieved him to do so, wondered if part of him panicked at the sight of her turned back, even if they were only going a few yards away. He watched Lori with a dejected longing, as if she would never return.

Had she not been watching him, musing about the forces that impossibly reunited his family, she might have missed it.

The sudden razor-like edge to his gaze; the tensing of his jaw; the tip of his thumb digging, digging, digging into the bottom of his wedding ring.

He continued to stare. His eyes shifted. Back and forth. Steadily, methodically. As if he was calculating the distance between two objects.

The ring slid up his finger, with resistance, towards his knuckle. Inch by inch. He pressed so hard that the skin paled and then bloomed into an angry pink. If he kept pushing, she felt he would fling the ring off altogether.

"How are you settling in?"

He exhaled in surprise and shifted his head in her direction. She removed the kettle from the fire and prepared her tea.

"Pardon?"

"I asked how you were settling in, John Wayne."

Pink spread across his cheeks. He shook his head and turned away.

'I ain't ever gonna live that down, huh?"

"It's John Wayne or Deputy Cowboy."

Grimacing, he appealed to her with a piteous look.

"No, ma'am. I can't accept that."

She blew on her tea. "I think it's fitting."

"No, ma'am. It's not."

The sheepish aw-shucks ma'am was hurting his case. He seemed to know it. After a moment, he raised his thumb to his eyebrow and scratched.

"I'm alright. Thank you."

So polite this one. Just like a good ole' Deputy Cowboy.

She sipped her tea and regarded him.

"You give me a real answer and I'll call you by your first name."

She had no idea why she was asking, really. She was exhausted; he was a stranger. But there was something a little doleful about him. And he reminded her of Carl.

He considered her, eyes thoughtful. "That right, ma'am?"

"That's the deal, Deputy. And stop calling me ma'am."

He grinned, and she felt accomplished. He was like his son. Serious and mannerly, with a spark of good humor hiding underneath all that reticence.

"That's a fair deal."

"I'm a reasonable person."

Staring intently, he said, "I get a sense of that."

Taken aback by his earnestness, Michonne raised an eyebrow. It was a charitable observation, but one she wasn't sure she had earned in such little time. She set about making her grits. Her middling appetite for it had waned even further but she needed to eat.

"So, Rick"—She gave him a pointed look—"How are you? Really."

He scratched his eyebrow again. He seemed to do so when he was thinking about what he would say. She'd observed this little habit a few times. Last night when they talked with Shane. Sharing his story at dinner, which she watched from a distance.

He seemed to approach words as if they were filled with equal amounts of import and liability. He inhaled.

"Finding my family again is everythin'. It's everythin'. I didn't know if I would."

Another ache. Between her breasts this time.

Her mauled family surging out of the darkness.

"Walkin' out of that hospital. I've never seen anythin' like it. Never heard anythin' like it. It was quiet. Real quiet. Somehow that was scarier than anythin' else."

A few weeks ago, the noise was deafening in Atlanta. Never-ending. Screaming. Crying. Shooting.

The groaning. Always the groaning. The bombs.

Everything had swelled. Earsplitting, as if the entire planet would explode. Then it stopped.

The great quiet followed. That was how Michonne thought of it. That sudden vacuum had frightened her more than the endless noise had. It felt like the whole world died.

Michonne couldn't imagine waking up to that silence.

"A man saved me. Set me straight. Told me what was what. Not that I could even fathom what he was tryin' to tell me, not 'till I saw it for myself. He was a good man. I'm supposed to—"

He trailed off and glanced behind him, south, toward his hometown.

"He was supposed to meet me after a while. I don't know if he can now. I dropped my walkie talkie back in Atlanta."

Sensitive to his reserve, she didn't tease him about his cowboy antics again.

The broken promise to his friend troubled him. And there was something else. She couldn't say for sure how she knew, but there was a fretfulness about him. He didn't wear it the way Shane did, but she sensed it.

Shane simmered with agitation, an edginess that sometimes pimpled her skin, as if she were standing too close to an electric fence. There was the hair tugging, the head rubbing, the pacing. The evening before he had prowled the camp all night, even more tense than usual.

Cowboy—Rick—was more sedate. A boulder around which torrential water flowed. There was a stillness to him.

But his disquiet was loud even if he wasn't.

"I made things real complicated for Glenn and the others. Was lucky to find 'em. And then Merle." He sighed. "Fuckin' Merle."

Fucking Merle indeed. The definition of a miscreant.

Rick looked at her, lingered on her face, maybe wondering if Merle had directed some of those colorful insults her way. The way he had apparently done to Theodore. When she neither confirmed nor denied, he continued.

"He was out of control. Men like that always are. Ain't good for much but trouble. Then everythin' happened fast. We left him behind. Felt like the right thing to do at the time."

At the time.

There it was.

"But not now."

The contrition on his face said enough.

"You probably think I'm full of shit. Feelin' sorry for Merle."

She took a sip of her tea.

"I don't empathize with virulent racists, Deputy." He frowned at her sudden formality."So, no, I don't resonate with your concern."

He nodded, refusing to look away. Others might have.

"But," she said, "It's your job to care. And you seem the type."

"The type?"

Using her two pointer fingers, she outlined a shape in the air. Then she patted her shoulder. His eyes narrowed in confusion until they lit with understanding. He emitted a rough, cynical crack of laughter.

"That ain't exactly what I'm known for."

There was an edge to his voice.

"I doubt that, Deputy."

"Rick."

They stared at each other. He was like Shane in that way. Eye contact was important him.

She leaned her head back, rolled her shoulders. God, she was tired.

"I don't share your compassion for Merle. But I understand why you would wonder if you did the right thing."

Something in the distance stole his gaze. Again, he weighed his words, pressing his tongue to the roof of his mouth. He looked at her, intentionally, as he spoke again.

"I don't care for Merle. Or men like him." His gaze intensified. "And I don't share his beliefs."

One can only hope, she thought.

Calm as he was, she put little stock in his assertion, even if he meant it. Earnestness was natural to him, it seemed, important. But many well-meaning white men had espoused similar attitudes.

The nice ones. The ones who didn't care if she were black, white, or purple. The ones who would never dare call her a nigger.

Those were the ones who proved themselves liars or cowards when it mattered. When their buddy got a little tipsy at the bar and said the quiet part out loud.

Rick continued to make eye contact.

"Still, I ain't sure it was right to leave a man behind."

Merle could rot on that roof forever as far as she was concerned. She had not a lick of neighborly kindness for him. He didn't deserve it. But she understood why Rick would care.

The ethics of leaving a man chained were murky at best. She might feel the same if she had been the one to leave him.

Morality. Ethics. Responsibility. Cumbersome things. Easy to discard in the chaos. Michonne could appreciate Rick's solicitude, his desire to retain even a modicum of humanity.

There was also Daryl to consider. His rage would threaten the precarious equilibrium of the camp.

"And your friend."

She was speaking more to herself, tallying the pieces before her, weighing them. His forehead wrinkled.

"Shane?"

Pinpricks of sharpness bled into his voice. Negligible enough that she was tempted to dismiss it.

"The one who saved you."

The creases melted from his face.

"Morgan."

She nodded, pursing her lips.

"You said you dropped the walkie talkie in Atlanta."

"I did. We were supposed to check in every morning at dawn."

"So. Merle's in Atlanta. And your walkie talkie."

"And the guns," he said.

Michonne stared, blinking. "Guns?"

He had pilfered an arsenal of weapons from his station in King County. An enormous bag of guns and ammo that was now sitting abandoned in Atlanta.

Guns they could use. Guns they needed.

There were three in camp as far as she knew. Shane's standard-issue Glock. Dale's rifle. And her pistol. She kept it hidden in her tent at all times.

They hadn't needed the guns yet.

But they would.

Her tea was tepid but she swallowed the rest. Rick had grown quiet, leaning forward in his chair, looking in the direction Lori and Carl had gone. He twisted his ring again.

She leaned forward too, keeping her voice lowered so as not to be overheard by Hanna and Jacqui nearby.

"So when are you leaving on your rescue mission?"

His head inclined away from her, surprised. A deer in headlights.

Ten feet away, Jacqui laughed. Hanna slapped her arm. Neither paid them any attention.

Still, again, he looked in the direction Lori and Carl had gone. Then his gaze circled camp, landing on Shane who was talking to T-Dogg and Glenn.

Attuned to his friend and partner, Shane glanced at them, frowning in question. Rick focused on her. He leaned even further toward her, drawing in a quiet breath.

"It would be dangerous. Goin' back there."

"It would."

"We barely made it back last time. It'd be foolish."

"Seems like you've already made the choice, Deputy."

"Rick."

Michonne gathered her locs in hand and fanned herself. Waves of hot air glided from the fire pit.

"You're thinking like a cop right now."

Caressing the band of his wedding ring, he swallowed. Dirt shifted under the toe of his boot.

"I don't know that I can afford to think like a cop anymore. My family's here. I just—" He exhaled harshly. "I just found 'em."

Guilt saturated his words. Sobering words. Words laden with history as much as the present.

She knew cops well. For better and worse. Mostly for worse.

All-nighters at the station. Missed PTA meetings and dinners. Cases that consumed. Crime scenes that siphoned energy and words. Grievous injuries in the line of duty.

That was before. The risk was even greater now.

"I understand that," she said, her voice, like her eyes, drifting in the direction of Mike's tent.

Promise me, Michonne.

Her thoughts lingered there, inside that tent, with her bruised and aggravated lover. Then they drifted.

Down the mountain. The one walkers apparently could not climb. Two wide lanes and a gentle left curving onto I-16E. QuikTrip slushies that painted the tongue blue. 246 miles of down south highway. Sade turned all the way up.

Michonne wasn't much for communing with the dead. That was her mother's skill. And Maddie's.

But, and she would swear to it, Michonne never felt her mother's presence more than when she was making the drive to Savannah. And, God, she heard her voice. Clear as a bell from the passenger seat.

Tell me what to do, Michonne pled, closing her eyes. Please.

The fire crackled. Voices filtered from parts of camp, forming a low, stuttering drone.

Her mother's silence persisted. Sitting there, eyes closed, activity all around her, Michonne might as well have been sat in a room devoid of noise. She opened her eyes again, using her hand as a shield against the sun.

The cowboy watched her, eyes squinted in thought.

"Yesterday," he said. "What you said to Shane—"

A shriek slashed through the muted activity of the camp. Sharp and sonorous. It echoed, rebounding into the quarry and looping back into camp.

Michonne stood, Rick only a tick behind her. The force and speed toppled his chair. A flash of eye contact. His turmoil disappeared. In its place, steel. They turned and ran without a word.

Ahead, Shane raced from the RV towards the woods. Muscles bunched and expanded in his back and thighs with each stride. Theodore and Glenn chased his heels.

Another scream cracked through the trees.

Carl. Sophia.

Rick knew it too. Feet swallowing up the distance, voice booming, he called to his son. Simultaneously, Lori and Carol called for their respective children. Michonne couldn't see them, but their panic was sharp, rippling in the backs of their throats.

Her dream. Ellie and Dre's heaving and contorting forms.

She ran faster.

They broke the tree line just as Carl flung himself into his mother's arms. Sophia was already wrapped in Carol's. The children spoke breathlessly, voices pitched, words jumbled by fear and their sobs. But Michonne heard the one that mattered.

Walker.

"Fuck," Shane said.

He abandoned Lori's side where he'd been hovering as she examined Carl. Rick took his place as they drew closer, beginning to kneel, reaching out for his son. Carl turned into his father's stomach with a watery sob.

"Go," Lori pled, staring into the woods where the children had been. "Go, Rick."

Rick nodded, kissed the top of Carl's head, and ran after Shane.

"Are you okay?" Michonne asked.

She unsheathed her blade as she looked between Carl and Sophia, who was shaken but silent.

Despite youth and meekness, Sophia rarely cried. Even when she was afraid, even when her mother hid tears in the sleeve of her cardigan. Michonne blamed her father. With his large hands and angry, devouring eyes—the parts of him that delighted in pain. Among others.

Carl nodded, sniffling. "It didn't get us."

"How many?"

He gazed after his father.

"We only saw one."

Giving his chin a gentle tap with her knuckle, she left them there.

She heard the struggle before she saw it.

Grunts. Curses. The spongy thwack of metal hitting skin.

Sweating and swinging, the men struggled against a lone walker. They put up quite the fight. Large branches. The butt of a shotgun. A shovel. Applied with ferocious but futile effort.

Groaning with each hit, the walker remained standing. Nearby, a mutilated deer lay spread in its own organs.

Michonne might have found the scene comical if not for the hazard of their blundering. Rick could be pardoned, new as he was to this world. The others knew better.

How many times need it be said? Destroy the brain. Immediately. For fuck's sake.

She stepped forward. A hand wrapped around her bicep. Mike, balancing precariously on one leg as Terry held him up. He must have heard the commotion too. She stared at his hand before shrugging it off.

"Michonne."

Theodore noticed her approach and, with a puckish grin, stepped back. Swinging an invisible bat, he waved her into the circle of grunting men as if welcoming a latecomer to a party. Jolliness was absolutely obscene in the moment. Profane. But his gap-toothed smile shrank the tightening ball of irritation in her stomach.

Jim swung, hitting the walker in the chest with the shovel's blade. The impact spun the walker in her direction. It bared its teeth at her and advanced. Exactly the way she wanted.

She slashed. Air whistled past her ear.

Thunk.

An arrow lodged itself into the walker's forehead just as her sword made contact, splitting the head in two.

Startled, half the men turned in her direction. Rick stared, wide-eyed. First at her sword. Then at the still walker on the ground, its head bisected and oozing an odorous, gelatinous fluid. He blinked at her in disbelief.

The other half whirled towards the shaded woods. Steady footsteps approached. Brush crunched underfoot. Shane, Glenn, and Theodore raised their weapons. Michonne kept her sword at her side.

The day's events were about to get even more exciting.

"God-fuckin-dammit. Fuck!"

Daryl charged out of the woods, glowering at them. Crossbow at his side, face and hair smeared with days worth of dirt and sweat, he looked a mess. His scowl turned to the walker on the ground. He hocked a slimy wad of spit in its direction.

"Been trailing that fuckin' deer for hours. Son of a bitch."

Daryl wasn't a walker. Small miracles. But his appearance created a different problem altogether.

"Dixon," Shane said.

"Hell is wrong with y'all? How many times I gotta say it, huh? The brain, chuckle fucks. The fuckin' brain. This girl the only one with some goddamn sense in her head."

He gestured at her dismissively as she sheathed her sword. Daryl retrieved his arrow, lamenting to himself about being surrounded by the most dimwitted motherfuckers alive.

Examining the mauled deer, Daryl glanced up at the loitering group. He squinted.

"Who the fuck are you?"

Rick stepped forward. "Rick Grimes."

"Rick Grimes?" Daryl repeated the name as if it was the most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard. "Where the fuck did you come from?"

"Atlanta. King County before that."

Daryl looked between Rick and Shane.

"Shit. How the fuck that happen?"

"Long story."

Daryl looked back at the deer, done with the conversation. He cursed. Another glob flew and landed on the walker's tattered shirt. Michonne stared at it, her eyes blurring as she considered the implications.

Grunting, Daryl stood.

"Where my brother at?"

A walker. Up the mountain. In camp.

Nobody answered Daryl's inquiry. He called again for his brother, turning toward their tents.

Michonne squatted next to the walker. She inspected it. Debris stuck to its hair and clothes—leaves and twigs from the Oregon White Oak trees that surrounded them. Mud smeared across the knees of its pants, the toe and bottom of its shoe. She stared in the direction it had come from. North. The slope of the hill led down the mountain and directly to the highway.

"Merle! Where you at?"

Both the embankment and mountainside were steep. Crowded with trees, brush, and rock. It was a punishing climb.

"Daryl. We gotta talk," Shane said.

Whatever Daryl heard in Shane's voice stopped him. He pivoted. The men had formed a semi-circle around him: Shane, Rick, Theodore, Glenn, Jim, Dale, and Martinez. A wall.

Mike and Terry stood off to the side, refusing involvement.

"Bout what?" Daryl asked, eyes narrowed in suspicion.

Michonne touched the tip of the walker's shoe. The mud was still slick. It had made the climb. Recently. Just as she feared they could.

Yet, she had warned Shane the night before.

"Bout Merle, man."

Shane had taken on his deputy stance, one hand on his hip, the other holding the shotgun, shoulder and chest spread wide. Rick stood beside him. He kept his large hands at his side. But he looked no less imposing than Shane, if not a touch more impassive.

Daryl looked Shane up and down, then the other men, Rick in particular, as if he could sense his role in his brother's silence. Turning his back to him, he yelled into camp again.

"Merle!"

"He's not here," Theodore said.

Daryl whirled around. Nose flared, his eyes cut a hole in the group.

"Whatchu mean he ain't here? Where he at?"

Michonne noticed all of this in a detached way.

The men, their apprehensive glances. Daryl's mounting anger, his fidgetiness. The walker, the spit on its shirt, the mud on its shoes. Mike and Terry on the edges. Mike's eyes on her. Lori and Carol and the children watching from the periphery. Lori clutching Carl. Carol clutching Sophia though it was Sophia holding them tall.

The sun was higher now. The woods were dark. Darker than she had ever seen them, ever felt them.

Maddie often spoke about the feeling of things, the way things could telegraph what was coming.

You just have to pay attention, Meesh. Nobody pays attention.

Michonne paid attention. She swore she heard Death whispering from the trees.

The Camp

Late Morning

Daryl was a raging bull. Huffing, charging. His fury created an orbit that most refused to enter.

After all, they had not abandoned Merle in Atlanta.

And, privately, they cared not an ounce for him.

Daryl could barely decide who was more deserving of his anger. The man who had lost the key or the one who had created the need for the key in the first place.

He swung from one man to the next. Angry words spit at one. Threats issued to the other.

Theodore held up his hands. A concession. To his part in Merle's absence, to Daryl's plight despite Theodore's animus towards Merle and men like him.

But no matter how ferociously Daryl advanced, Theodore held his ground. Affable, yes, but stern when needed. Like Uncle Stu. Jolly. Loving nothing more than a good laugh. But they never suffered fools.

"Let's talk, man. Come on," Shane said.

He stood between Daryl and Rick, who Daryl focused his wrath on. The stranger among them, the interloper. Daryl seemed as irritated by his newness as he did by Rick's calmness.

The insults—

Fuckin' pig.

Useless cop bastard.

Backwater, hick motherfucker.

—bounced off Rick. He planted his boots in the dirt and made steady eye contact. Tall but lean, he was smaller than Theodore, less bulky than Shane. But he held still. More reticent than his friend but still commanding, as cops tended to be. In fact, it was his reservedness that lent him authority and gravitas as he watched Daryl.

"I ain't interested in talkin'. Fuck we gon' talk about, huh? Y'all left my brother."

Michonne kept watch by the woods. Her hand itched on the hilt of her sword.

"That was me. I did that," Rick said.

Andrea stepped forward.

"And none of us bothered to go back. Be mad at all of us. But your brother was out of control, Daryl."

"So you left him up there? With walkers at the door?"

"We didn't mean to leave him. Things got out of hand," Glenn said.

Daryl pointed at Rick.

"They got outta hand cause of this dumb fuck here."

Rick pursed his lips but didn't dispute the accusation.

Scoffing, Daryl turned away from him, unimpressed with Rick's silence. He vibrated with anger. Michonne could see that even from her position.

Everything about Merle repulsed her. His leering, his bigotry, his tobacco-rotten teeth. Universe-willing, he was dead. But, goddamn her, she felt sorry for Daryl.

"Where?" Daryl asked. "Where you leave him at?"

"The Tower Shops. Downtown. On Peachtree," Theodore said.

Daryl let out a long groan, lacing his hands behind his head. He skewered the surrounding group with an acidic look.

"I'm goin' to get my brother."

Nervous shuffling. More glances.

"Daryl. It's Atlanta, man," Shane said. "It's crawling with walkers. I understand. We all do. But it's a suicide mission."

Rick shifted, placing his weight on his right leg. His eyes settled on his boots. It was a small movement. Negligible in the grand scheme of activity. But Michonne noticed.

"You don't understand shit," Daryl said. "I don't give a fuck what you say. I ain't leavin' my brother out there. I ain't built like that."

He stared at Shane. Hard. Shane's nostrils flared and he met Daryl's gaze, straightening his back.

Dale approached. He held his hands out at his waist in a placating motion.

"Shane's right. It is dangerous. Especially alone."

The cowboy's chest inflated then deflated. He looked up. First at Shane and Daryl who were still locked in a private dispute, eyes hot and accusing. Then to his wife. She stood a few feet away with her arms wrapped around Carl, pressing him into her torso. She met her husband's gaze and frowned at what she saw there.

Apology.

Then, to Michonne's surprise, he swept the group until he found her. He had made a decision. One he'd made at the fire pit that morning. Probably even before that.

"Naw. Not alone."

The words wrenched Shane out of his clash with Daryl. Wide eyed, he looked first at Lori, who was equally stunned, and then at his best friend.

Daryl spit on the ground.

"What?" Shane asked.

Lori whispered to Carl before leaving him next to Carol and Sophia. Her face was stricken.

"I'll go with you to Atlanta," Rick said.

Daryl turned his head as if he needed a better look at the man he'd just wanted to throttle.

"Why?"

"I'm responsible."

Still skeptical, Daryl stared at him.

Lori placed a hand on Rick's shoulder. He turned to her.

"Rick, what are you doing?"

"The right thing."

Lori wore the look of a woman confronted with a foreign language. She blinked, racking her brain for definitions, context clues, anything. Rick's declaration robbed her of a response. Shane did not suffer from the same speechlessness.

"That makes no damn sense. You just got back. You know what's there."

"I do."

"Then what the fuck are you doing?"

Rick released his wife from his stare, from his silent appeal for understanding.

"Like I said, I'm responsible."

"No. You're not." Lori found her words. "Merle attacked T-Dogg. You did what you had to do."

Her voice was crisp. Sure. Her conviction as impenetrable as her husband's.

Michonne shifted her attention to the woods, as she had for the last few minutes. They remained quiet.

Jim hovered. He couldn't keep still. The back of his hand on his sweaty forehead. A step forward. Another back. Shifting from leg to leg. Fanning himself.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

His eyes snapped to her. Glassy pupils swam in his scleras. It reminded her of fruit jiggling in a jello mold. He took a moment to settle on her face.

"Yes, ma'am," he said.

He rarely used her name. It didn't matter how many times she corrected him.

"Just awful hot."

"You sure?"

He nodded. "Feels like a lot happened today already. You know?"

"I do."

His pallid, sweaty skin twinkled in the sunlight. She scanned his clothes. No fresh blood. No injury.

"Jim." She moved closer, not wanting to draw attention to them. "Were you bitten?"

Beads of sweat flung in all directions as he shook his head. His eyes were wide, insistent.

"No, ma'am. I swear it. You can check me if you want to. I won't put up no fuss."

"You seem shaky."

He dropped his eyes to the ground. Michonne glanced again at the woods, then at the group. Her skin prickled.

"Got a bad feelin' again. Like how I felt that night. On the highway."

Jim's eyes demanded something of her. The hair on the back of her neck stood.

"You feel it too, right?" he asked. "That's why you're standing here. It's why you ain't takin' part in all that."

He jerked his chin to the group.

"You know things, Ms. Michonne. You feel 'em. Here."

He patted his stomach. Hers sank.

"And here."

He touched his heart. Hers drummed.

He left a trail of blood and sediment on his already soiled shirt.

His clarity brought with it an odd comfort. She had the strangest desire to tell him about her dream. She wanted to tell him that she didn't know what he saw, but she wasn't like her mother or sister. She didn't feel things the way they did.

Instead she said:

"We aren't safe here."

Jim nodded. A relieved huff of air passed his chapped lips. His shoulders relaxed.

"Naw. I reckon we ain't."

Having come to an understanding, they turned to the group.

Lori and Shane formed a triangle with Rick. Wife, husband, and best friend. The former stood nearly shoulder to shoulder. It was as close as Michonne had seen them since the cowboy arrived. The absurd turn of events had united them once again.

Their words didn't carry. But the surrounding group needn't hear the words to understand. A gesture here. An inclined head there. Cowboy's eyes roving back and forth.

It was an intrusion to watch this unfold. Even from a distance.

Michonne felt acute sympathy for the couple then. For Rick—knowing something he didn't know. For Lori—knowing what Michonne was sure nobody was supposed to know.

It made her seek out her own lover.

He stood on the periphery, looking upon the events with the practiced eye of an attorney. He had been good at reading others. Once upon a time. She wondered what he saw in these people, what he was thinking. Questions she might have asked him. Once upon a time.

Terry's eyes had that supple, pleased look about them. Filled with the lazy curiosity of a drunk.

Michonne thought of that brown leather couch. A relic from Mike's past that he refused to part with.

Meanwhile Daryl grew tired of the back and forth.

"Y'all three gon' fuck or can we go?"

Shane and Lori separated as if burned. They were synchronized in their avoidance. Lori turned her back to both men. After a deep and purposeful breath, her trembling hands stilled at her sides.

"If you're going to go, now's the time," Dale said. "I'm sure you can imagine why being out there at night is ill-advised, Deputy."

Go early. Get in. Get out. No fuss. Those were their tacit rules.

"I can," the cowboy said. "And it's just Rick."

His eyes flicked to her. She gave him an indulgent look back.

Dale smiled his assent. T-Dogg stepped forward with his hands locked atop his head, which he gave a defeated shake.

"I'm coming."

Rick nodded in appreciation. Glenn groaned when T-Dogg turned to him.

"Oh, come on, man."

T-Dogg clapped him on the shoulder.

"You know the city."

Removing his sweat-soaked baseball cap, Glenn pushed his hair from his forehead before shoving the cap back on.

"Fine." He cursed. "Fine."

"Y'all finished assemblin' the Scooby Doo gang?" Daryl said.

"Almost."

Eyes followed her as she approached. She felt none more strongly than she felt Mike's. T-Dogg, however, lit up. He gave a thunderous, triumphant clap.

"Now that's what I'm talking about!"

Daryl eyed her, as skeptical as he'd been about the cowboy joining. She hated his brother. He knew that.

"Why?" he asked.

He might as well have barked at her.

She and Rick made eye contact.

"The guns."

A ripple went through the group. Questions. People drew closer, even the ones careful to keep their distance during Daryl's uproar. Even Mike and Terry.

"Guns?" Shane looked between her and Rick. "What guns?"

Rick glanced at Lori before clearing his throat.

"I had a bag of guns with me when I came into Atlanta. Dropped 'em. If we're lucky, they're still there."

Stunned, Shane rocked back on his heels.

"Fuck. From the station?"

Rick nodded. "A couple shotguns. Some nine millimeters. Good amount of ammo."

A chorus of Holy Shit and Jesus filtered from the crowd. Even those discomfited by weapons knew the value of that kind of arsenal.

Michonne glanced back at the woods. Jim had moved closer, but still took up his post. She couldn't explain why, but she felt like they were running out of time. Jim's position only heightened her urgency.

Jacqui followed Michonne's gaze.

"You think more of those things are coming?"

Her voice warbled with disgust.

"Yes," Michonne said.

Another ripple. Eyes darted to the trees. Shane sighed.

"It won't do us no good to start panicking."

"It's not panicking to wonder if something is going to come out of those woods," Jacqui said.

Michonne could have kissed her. She'd always liked Jacqui.

"But we only saw one," Carol said. "Maybe it was a fluke."

Martinez put an arm around Hanna's shoulder.

"We've been up here for weeks without seeing one. We're so high up. It's possible no more of them will make it up here."

Resisting the urge to sigh, Michonne sought out Rick. He was watching her. She gestured with her head. It was time to go.

He nodded before his attention drifted behind her. She didn't need to turn to know that Mike was there.

"Two minutes," she said to Rick.

Mike hobbled beside her to her tent. He rarely received her attempts to help. She had stopped offering.

"You said you weren't leaving today."

"I wasn't."

"And now you are. For Merle."

Mike might as well have spit the name. He fumed, in his own quiet way, lingering outside the tent while she gathered what she needed.

"What happens to Merle doesn't concern me."

"Then why are you going?" he asked.

"We need those guns."

"But why do you need to go, Michonne?"

She retrieved something from under her cot and beckoned him closer. When he continued to stand by the tent flap, she came to him. Gingerly, she placed the item in his hands. Her gun. Wrapped in a faded Army t-shirt. Her father's. Mike shoved it back towards her. She refused it.

"Michonne."

"Do you know how to disengage the safety?"

Again he attempted to give it back. She took it, making sure he watched as she unwrapped it and clicked the safety on and off. She wrapped it again and placed it in his hands.

"Make sure no one else sees it. Unless you have to use it."

"For walkers?"

"I hope."

He frowned. The calculating look from earlier came upon his face. The one she recognized from watching him in court.

Most of the group was kind. They wanted to survive. But Michonne never forgot why her father had wanted her to stay in Atlanta, why he'd cautioned her against traveling.

Fear made people honest.

And, for the first time in a while, she and Mike were on the same page.

"Okay."

"Not even Terry."

He hesitated. Her shoulders tightened as she braced for his indignation. She loosened when he nodded, tucking the gun close to his body. She slung her bag onto her shoulder and walked past him. He caught her arm.

"You didn't answer me."

He had been asking some form of that question for weeks.

Why? Why worry? Why leave? Why stay?

Why you?

She gave the only answer that mattered to her then.

"We need the guns."

He stared at her, hand still wrapped around her bicep. She stared at his hand, waiting. This was their holding pattern now. Waiting. She didn't know what Mike was waiting for.

Yes you do. Maddie's voice. You know.

Dirt rasped under booted feet. Michonne turned. Andrea. She stopped, staring at Mike's hand wrapped around Michonne's arm.

"Sorry," she said. "Didn't meant to interrupt."

But she made no move to leave, placing the majority of her weight on her left leg and crossing her arms.

Mike barely spared Andrea a glance. He remained locked in whatever standoff they were having. The one they kept having. Eventually his hand dropped to his side. He angled his body, keeping the gun tucked away from Andrea's view.

He said nothing as he walked away. His injured leg dragged behind him.

She had always adored his back. Long and muscled. She'd loved to rub it, grip it, wrap her legs around it, rest her head on it after their lovemaking.

Now she was tired of seeing it.

"You okay?" Andrea asked.

She reached up to secure her hair in a ponytail. Sweat stains bloomed under her arms and her hair tie was fraying. White elastic peeked out from the black nylon. A few more uses and it would snap.

"Yeah. What's up?"

Eyeing her, Andrea fanned herself.

"It's a fucking mad house around here."

Michonne smiled despite herself. Andrea fell into step beside her.

"You don't owe Merle shit."

"I know," Michonne said.

"Not sure why the new guy cares so much. He saw exactly what Merle is. He was the one who restrained him."

Michonne wasn't convinced that Rick did care about Merle. Merle's wellbeing just so happened to be implicated in his principles. But none of that mattered to Michonne. Merle was Daryl's business; Rick's principles were his own.

"We need the guns."

She felt like a broken record.

"You're worried. About the walkers."

"We should all be worried."

Andrea nodded. Her eyes narrowed seriously, but Michonne saw the smoothness of her face, the flat set of her mouth. Andrea was nothing if not expressive. It was one of many things that endeared Michonne to her. Her face hid nothing. Mostly, it was amusing. Except for now.

Andrea's face indicated mild concern, but not urgency. Their situation was problematic but not perilous.

"Trouble in paradise," Andrea said, pointing her chin.

Michonne followed her eyeline. The newly reunited couple huddled together. Lori's shoulder's were rigid, her face set. Their conversation was tense.

But it was Shane who caught Michonne's eye.

He loomed, broad shoulders widened further by his crossed arms. Visible only in parts.

His crop of brown hair. His biceps. The edges of his legs. Obscured, in part, by Lori's slender frame. Like a shadow.

As Michonne and Andrea passed, Shane's eyes slid away from Lori with pained reluctance. As if he couldn't bear to let her out of his sight for even a second. Michonne met his gaze.

And there it was. That…thing.

She had seen it before.

The night she'd stumbled upon he and Lori. When Lori had done her best to hide the stain on her shirt.

At night when he paced the camp.

Yesterday when she warned him about their exposure.

This morning, at a distance, while he watched Rick and Lori whisper to one another, Rick's lips whispering across her cheek.

Dark, leaden clouds that threatened a torrent of rain. A mesocyclone that promised not one tornado but many, all touching down at the same time.

The thing churned and churned.

Then his eyes emptied.

He dipped his head at her. He watched until she and Andrea passed.

The hair on her arms stood.

The Camp

Afternoon

Lori stared with unseeing eyes at her cot.

Now her and Rick's cot.

Where he'd desperately made love to her the night before. Where she had lied under and to him.

Her stomach roiled. She breathed, in and out. Air lodged in her trachea and she coughed, beating her breast.

She yanked a hand through her hair, the strands snagging on the ring she'd returned to her finger.

A silver band with a tiny pear shaped diamond. She stared at it, eyes welling. She'd worn this ring since she was nineteen.

Rick had been gone for exactly thirty-seven minutes.

No.

Lori glanced at her watch.

Thirty-eight minutes.

The watch was a thick black band befitting the elderly. A gift from her mother. It was hideous. But that didn't stop Lori from grabbing it as Shane ushered she and Carl out of the house weeks ago.

Shane.

She clamped her legs together at the reflexive fluttering. She hated the pulsing she felt, and she hated the heavy stone of shame sitting in her belly.

Looking at her watch again, she laughed. Or sobbed.

Collectively, she must have stared at the clock for hours over the course of her marriage. Waiting for Rick.

Here she was again. Waiting. At the end of the fucking world.

Rick had given her the look. The one he'd always given her, his unfairly handsome face hovering over hers. Apologetic, beseeching.

Please understand, the look said.

But she didn't understand. She never understood.

Why leave? For Merle? For fucking Merle.

After everything they'd been through. After everything he'd survived to return to her and Carl. A brick to the face would have stunned her less.

Collapsing on the cot, she buried her face in her hands. She glanced at the ground, almost expecting to see her skin sloughing off. Surely she was coming out of it.

"God, Rick. What the hell are you doing?"

She sighed. She couldn't even dwell in her anger.

His absence ruined her.

And yet.

She needed time to figure out what to do. She had fucked her husband's best friend. Many times. The same best friend who, it turned out, had lied about her husband's death. Why had Shane lied to her?

You can never tell him.

She was sure of that. No matter how much guilt and remorse eroded the lining of her stomach. Rick could never know. He had survived the impossible—a gunshot, a coma, the apocalypse. Despite that, he'd found them. She would not break his heart.

No, she could not hurt him. No matter their previous years of marriage, those moments that had emptied and perplexed her. She would shield him from her indiscretion. For their sakes. For Carl's.

She straightened, resolved. It gave her a tinge of sweet, warped relief.

And, shamefully, it left room for that growing sense of betrayal she felt.

Pull yourself together, Lori. For fuck's sake.

Time was not her friend. She couldn't afford to sit here, reminiscing and falling apart.

Carl. She needed to check on her boy, make sure he was okay.

He'd taken the news of Rick's leaving with a nod far to grownup for her liking.

"It's okay," he said. "I know you'll come back to us, Dad."

Carl was his father's son in that way. Thoughtful. Stoic. Accepting most things with little complaint. Except, of course, his bedtime. And behind his eyes—the beautiful blue ones he'd gotten from his father—there were the things he just wouldn't say.

Her sweet boy. Thrust into this nightmare at such a young age. He didn't deserve the tumult, the uncertainty.

She left her tent dry-eyed and determined.

But her son was not where she'd left him.

"Dale, have you seen Carl?"

Eyes tender, Dale smiled. Something in his look embarrassed her, but she didn't have time to parse through it.

"Down at the quarry with Shane and the others."

Lori's heart plummeted. She thanked him in a shaky voice and turned. As soon as she was in the woods, she sprinted. Her boots kicked up dirt as she flew down the incline. Her right foot slipped and she flailed backward, barely catching herself on a tree trunk. Her palm stung.

"Shit." She righted herself. "Fuck."

She beelined down the hill. A madwoman possessed. It took everything for her not to burst onto the shore. She caught her breath, hands on her knees, chest heaving, until she was sure that her breathing was normal.

Andrea, Jacqui, Amy, and Carol sat on the shore, items of clothes passing between them in an assembly line. They giggled, appearing to gossip like old hens. Ed loomed a few feet away, hulking and hideous, red-faced and sweating, pinning Carol with an irate stare.

Any other time Lori would have joined them. If only to shield Carol from her husband's wrath and his constant hunger for her humiliation, her deference. This time, Lori couldn't.

Shane and Carl were knee-deep in the water, splashing and making a ruckus. It pained her. The wide smile Carl wore, his laughter. He adored Shane; he always had. And now she had to sever their connection.

"Carl," she said as she approached. "What are you supposed to be doing?"

Shane's head jerked up at the sound of her voice. She avoided his face.

"Oh. Shane said—"

"It's not about what Shane says. It's about what I say."

Carl smiled. "Oh come on, Mom. It's just a little—"

"Carl. Now."

He frowned, her sternness surprising him. He was used to her playfulness around Shane, their easygoing camaraderie. He'd grown used to Shane talking her out of things with that boyish grin. When was the last time she'd disbanded an intermission between the two?

"Go ahead, bud. Do what your mama says."

Carl looked between them, eyes searching.

It chilled her. What he might have seen. What he might have noticed before today. They'd been so careful. As discreet as they could be. But maybe he'd intuited something? She stared at him as her heart hammered.

Finally, mercifully, he nodded.

"Sorry, Mom."

Feeling sorry for her harsh tone, she reached for him and stroked his face.

"Get," she said swatting his backside.

He laughed, and the tension between them broke. She turned to follow him, refusing to look at Shane.

"Lori, wait. Can we just talk for a second?"

She whirled to face him.

"No!" she hissed. "You don't talk to me. You don't talk to my son."

Eyes widening, he graced her with that head tilt. The one that said he was as indignant as he was confused. And, rather than retreating, he crowded her. Again she cursed that fluttering, that carnal need to have him inside her. They hadn't been alone since Rick returned. She wanted to keep it that way.

"That's how it's gonna be?" he asked. "After everything? After we—"

"Don't. Don't you dare."

She darted a look at the women. Their attention remained on their task and conversation. Ed never paid much attention to anything besides Carol.

And Sophia.

Lori looked back at Shane.

"You told me he was dead."

He pressed her further into the cliff wall. His eyes pled; his hand reached toward her. She slapped it away.

No touching. Never again.

"Goddamit, Lori. I swear I can explain. Please."

His voice rang with sincerity and despair. Her chest tightened with sympathy and the impulse to believe him. She dismissed it.

"Rick is back, Shane."

Something flashed in his eyes. Something she didn't recognize in him. His jaw tensed as he shook his head in disbelief.

"You're just gonna cut me off, huh? From Carl? From you?"

Lori stared, stunned at his incomprehension.

"My husband is alive. Your best friend is alive. This is done."

She ducked around him before he could say anything else. Wind whispered past her hand as he reached for it and missed. He called for her as loudly as he dared.

For the first time in weeks, she ignored the sound of her name in his mouth.

Atlanta

Afternoon

Michonne heard them. In every direction. That rasping, gurgling moan. Multiplied by thousands.

A choir of the dead, Jacqui had called them once. The worst choir she'd ever heard.

In the city their groaning joined together, amplified as it bounced off of steel and glass. It reminded Michonne of the airport, that relentless mechanical whirring.

"We stick to the side streets and the alleys. I don't like how many geeks there are today," Glenn said.

He was right. Walkers had seemingly proliferated overnight. The city was crawling with them. Almost as if the city couldn't contain them.

Something about the thought nagged her. But she didn't have time to consider it.

They had two rules. Be quiet. Be quick.

Michonne had been on runs with Glenn and Theodore before. She knew what to expect with them. After weeks in the camp with Daryl, she knew he was light on his feet, disappearing and reappearing with more dexterity than one would expect from a man his size.

The cowboy was the wildcard.

But whatever naivety and desperation had lead him on horseback into Atlanta had vanished.

He moved nimbly on long, bowed legs, keeping pace with her. She knew by the way he held his weapon—two hands on the grip, barrel pointed at the ground—that he knew how to use it and use it well. If his healing gunshot wound troubled him, he never showed it.

They turned the corner onto Carnegie Way, approaching the Towers from the west. Peachtree was swarming with the dead. They would need to enter the mall from the side. Assuming walkers hadn't infested that alleyway.

Three blocks head, a drove of them milled about, waiting for the slightest bit of stimulation.

Glenn held a fist in the air, and they paused. He gestured and they affixed their backs to the wall.

"Stay along the building. They won't see from this distance if we don't move too much," Glenn said. "Keep quiet."

Michonne signaled for them to hold. Wordlessly, she unsheathed her sword and moved to the front of the line. Her weapon was the quietest. Daryl fell in line behind her, his crossbow at the ready.

They made it a block without incident. The walker's synchronous hum swallowed the sound of their footsteps.

As they crossed the intersection, the hair on the back of her neck stood.

One yard. Three more. Each brought with it a greater sense of danger. Her skin pebbled.

Something was wrong.

When they'd crossed, she held up two fingers. The men stopped and she pointed to her right. They diverted to the east, out of view of the walkers.

"What is it?" Glenn asked in a whisper.

Michonne peered around the corner, her eyes scanning the street. It was empty save for abandoned cars and debris.

"I don't know."

But it was something. She knew that much.

Someone appeared at her side. Rick. He said nothing, just examined the street alongside her. His finger hovered over the trigger, and his jaw tensed. They exchanged a look. He felt it too.

"What y'all see?" Daryl asked, dismayed by their silence.

"Nothin'," Rick said. "Yet."

"We're almost there," Glenn said.

They heard the implicit question. Should they keep going? The mall was a block away. That meant Merle was. The guns too.

Instincts were never to be ignored in this new world. But diverting again would put them further away from the mission.

They also needed to leave the city before nightfall. That was non-negotiable.

Michonne never took her eyes off the street, but nothing appeared.

She turned to find Rick watching her. He raised an eyebrow; she pursed her lips. She looked back at the street, still seeing nothing, but knowing, instinctively, that something was up. She waved her hand in a so-so motion. Then she drew a line between her eyes and the street, then up towards the buildings. He followed her hand movements, nodding.

"Stay alert," Michonne said.

When they moved, Rick replaced Daryl as her six. She hadn't asked him to; Daryl didn't protest.

They crept in a single file line, faster than they had previously.

They approached the alley parallel to Peachtree Street with some relief.

Until some whistled. It was piercing.

Her heart dropped.

The whistle had not come from their group.

"Move!" Daryl said. "Get your asses in gear!"

Another whistle. Then a clamorous noise. As if someone had launched a bowling ball into a row of trashcans.

The sea of walkers turned in their direction.

Shit.

They launched into a sprint. They were faster than the walkers, sure.

But that wasn't the problem.

They turned into the alley, leading them to the series of emergency exits they'd been seeking.

The first door held.

"Shit!" Glenn said.

He kicked at the door. With no luck. Again and again.

Daryl moved to the next, a few yards further. He threw his shoulder against it. It groaned; he grunted in pain. But the door held.

Walkers spilled into the alley, hungry mouths bared.

This was the problem. Now their only exit was blocked. There was no way of getting passed that many of the dead.

Michonne dashed to the third and final door, Rick on her heels. Unlike the first two doors, this one had a handle rather than a push bar. It was locked.

Without wasting time, Rick pulled her back and she went easily. He raised his gun and fired. The sound was deafening. It left her ears ringing

But it worked. The bullet had carved a hole in the door where the lock had been.

As if in mockery, the door creaked open.

"Here! Come on!"

Glenn, Theodore, and Daryl ran to them. They piled into the darkened room, slamming the door shut behind them.

Destroying the lock to get in meant that the door wouldn't keep anything out.

"This ain't gonna hold," Rick said.

Michonne whirled around, searching. In the dark, she could just make out countless rows of shelves.

A supply room? Storage? It didn't matter.

Theodore and Rick held the door as she, Daryl, and Glenn ran to the nearest shelf. She prayed it wasn't bolted to the wall or floor. The pulled, straining. The shelf groaned. But it moved.

Oh, thank God.

With adrenaline-induced strength, the hauled the shelf against the door, panting all the while. They added another. And another. And a fourth for good measure.

Walkers beat gnarled hands on the door, but the barrier held.

They would not be able to exit this way. But they'd have to worry about that later.

They stumbled their way through the dark until they found another door. It opened into a long service hallway.

There, they collapsed against the wall. Closing her eyes, Michonne placed a hand over her breast. If she pressed hard enough maybe her heart wouldn't vacate her chest.

After a few tremulous moments, Daryl groaned.

"Who. The. Fuck. Was. That?"

Glenn shook his head, unable to speak. He doubled over.

A hand rested on her elbow. She opened her eyes.

"Are you alright?" Rick asked.

She nodded and straightened. He pulled his hand away.

"You?"

"Yes, ma'am."

She gave him a look. He turned his head, but she saw the edges of a smile. He scanned the hallway. Glenn unfurled his body from the wall.

"There's two maintenance stairways that go to the roof. We took the east one last time. That's the door T-Dogg chained."

"How many floors?" Michonne asked.

"Twelve."

Her lungs protested.

"I ain't built for this shit," Theodore said.

Daryl shouldered his crossbow and pulled a bowie knife from his belt. He stalked down the hallway. His patience had worn thin.

Michonne looked at the door they'd just come through. She was confident their barrier would hold. But that didn't address the more salient problem.

Someone had summoned those walkers.

Which meant there was at least one person who know they were there. More likely, multiple someones. Someones intent on killing them.

How many vantage points did they have? How many of them were there? Had they found and taken the guns?

Theodore and Glenn were halfway down the hallway, following behind Daryl. Rick hadn't moved.

"The guns," she said. "Where did you drop them?"

"On the main street. In front of the mall."

Peachtree. Where the legion of walkers was.

"We can see better from the roof."

Good. He was thinking what she was thinking.

"Lead the way, Cowboy."

It was her turn to smile when he turned his back.

The Camp

Afternoon

The sun hammered the back of his neck. There was no wind.

The most pronounced aches were below his neck. In his back as he bent forward. In his thighs. His arms. 'Specially his arms.

Felt like he'd swam a country mile.

Don't think too much about that. Dig.

He brought the blade of the shovel down into the dirt. It was soft and turned.

Two feet deep so far.

Gotta go deeper. So animals couldn't get at the bodies.

What bodies?

There were no bodies.

Not yet.

How many? How many had he dug?

He looked up. Sweat dripped into his eyes. He swiped at them. His eye stung.

Christ, it was hotter than swamp pussy.

He winced. He hated that kinda language.

That was his foul-mouthed brother's schtick. Finding a way to link everything back to pussy. Probably cause he never got much of it. Colon cancer had killed him at the ripe age of thirty-seven. Went to the ER for stomach pains and was in the ground five months later. Figures he'd die from rotting inside out. Jim didn't miss the loathsome bastard. Not a lick.

He blinked. What the fuck was he doing out here?

Holes. The holes. How many?

Not holes. Graves.

Three, Jim counted. But they would need more. He knew it. On account of his dream. He couldn't remember a damn thing from it. Just knew he needed to dig.

Leveling the tip of the shovel with the ground, he used his weight to press it in, until the dirt gave way with a soft hiss.

That's it, he thought, the way a lover might. That's it.

What had he dreamt? He thought and thought and thought but couldn't remember.

People were going to die. That's all he knew.

Like his beloved and their children. He didn't get to bury them.

The shovel clanged as he brought it down harder. And harder.

His hands bled.

Atlanta

Afternoon

The climb up the east stairwell was steep and brutal.

But none of them had the courage to stop and catch their breath. They all felt it. Time slipping away.

Daryl led, skipping two stairs at a time, while Michonne held up the rear, mounting the stairs sideways so she could see behind her.

The stairwell, to their relief, was quiet. If walkers had been there before, they were gone now. It boded well for Merle.

Or it should have.

The closer they got, the more ominous the silence grew.

Daryl cleared the final landing and paused at the closed door.

They listened. Nothing. Not a sound.

Ice reached up her spine.

For all her animosity towards Merle, Michonne dreaded what they would find on the other side.

It was T-Dogg who approached the chained door, unlocking it. He then stepped aside. It shook Daryl out of whatever had stalled him.

Sunlight flooded the stairwell as the door swung open. Rick wasted no time following Daryl onto the roof, his gun raised. Theodore was right behind him.

Michonne knew something was wrong before she'd made it to the landing.

Daryl wailed. Her blood ran cold. She had never heard him make such a sound before.

"No!"

She heard what sounded like a retch.

"No!"

Breathing deeply, Michonne forced herself onto the roof.

She stopped, horrified. She followed the scene backwards.

From the opposite door, opening to the other stairwell. To the trail of blood leading to the piping, were it puddled. There was a lot of it. To the bloodied saw, minced flesh gathered on the blade. Then, finally, to the thing that had distressed Daryl so.

Merle was nowhere to be found.

Not most of him, anyway.

The only thing left was a severed hand, dangling from the handcuffs.