"We could never learn to be brave and patient
if there were only joy in the world"
― Helen Keller
Meanwhile, not many miles away, Rick and Carol had finished looking inside some houses for medicine and anything else they could need, including food. Luckily the pair had just come across a nice garden with fresh food, it had tomatoes, grapes, apples and other vegetables.
"How'd you put his shoulder back before? You learn that from Hershel?"
Rick and Carol had bumped into a young couple, a blonde guy and a brunette girl. They were pretty much not ready for this world. The guy had dislocated his shoulder and Carol had fixed it.
"Internet," she replied. "It's easier than telling an ER nurse I'd fallen down the stairs a third time."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be," Carol told him. "Just fixed what needed fixin'. I actually convinced myself I was happy with him, which wasn't all that hard to do considering my idea of happiness then was just not being alone. He made a decent living, he was charming when he wanted to be, especially those mornings after he'd come home piss-drunk and..." She sighed. "Stupid. Stupid."
Truth was that Carol's biggest regret was failing her girls when they needed her the most. To not step up when she should have and keep them safe.
"I didn't think I could be strong," she muttered. "I didn't know I could but I already was. I failed them, Rick. I failed … her, I failed Cecilia too. She used to come to me when he was out at work and demanded me to do something as she showed me a new bruise and I did nothing, I just hugged her and told her it was going to be okay. She toughened up, got cold, got distant, she closed herself and that was my fault, it should have been me that had to toughen up. I should have given Cecilia, given them both the love and protection they needed but I thought I needed him to survive."
"Why don't you say her name?" Rick asked, noticing she only mentioned Cecilia's name.
"She's dead, Rick," Carol said, stopping gathering food. "Sophia. Dead. Somebody else's slideshow."
"Some mornings I still wake up half-expecting Lori to be there," Rick admitted. "Reminding me to pick up Carl after school or telling me breakfast is ready. Every Sunday she'd make us these pancakes that were just godawful." The two of them chuckled at that. "Clumps of flour that weren't mixed in right. Thing was she knew it was bad."
"Why'd she keep at it?" Carol asked.
"Well she wanted us to be the kind of family that ate pancakes on Sunday," Rick said simply.
Carol and Rick finished grabbing the fruit and some small vegetables into a plastic bag. They stood up and walked across the big garden, they still had a few houses to search. But they stopped in their tracks when they saw a basket and some fruit on the floor followed by red fresh blood on the grass.
They followed the trail to a fence, Rick pushed the gate and the first thing he saw was a leg with a tattoo, the girl had showed it to them earlier. On the other side of the street they saw two walkers feeding on her.
"We should get back," Carol stated. "Sam's probably waiting."
Rick and Carol went back to the first house they went in, Sam, the guy they found earlier, was supposed to meet them there. Rick had given him his watch, telling him that they were leaving in two hours. They waited some more time for him but they needed to get back, people were dying back at the prison, so they walked outside with the things they had found.
They put the stuff in the trunk, Carol tried to open the door but it was locked. This just wasn't a run to get supplies, Rick had other intentions, it killed him, yes, but he had to do this. Carol just looked at him a bit confused, the door should be opened.
"They might have lived," Rick told her, looking straight at the grey-haired woman. "Karen and David, they might have lived, and now they're dead. That wasn't your decision to make. When Tyreese finds out... he'll kill you. He damn near killed me over nothing."
"I can handle Tyreese," Carol said in a small voice.
"When the others find out, they won't want you there and if they don't make it back, if everybody dies of this thing and it's just the two of us, with Judith and Carl, with my children, I won't have you there."
"Rick, it's me. No one else has to know," Carol said, her voice starting to break. "I thought you were done making decisions for everyone."
"I'm making this decision for me."
I could have pretended that everything was going to be fine," Carol said, starting to cry. She wiped the tears and looked at Rick again, but the tears kept coming. "But I didn't, I did something. I stepped up. I had to do something, for us, for Cecilia."
"No, you didn't," Rick told her, shaking his head at her.
"If you think I'm going anywhere without Lizzie and Mika –"
If you want them to leave, to go out there with you?" Rick said, interrupting her. "Lizzie's sick. Mika is ten years old!"
"What about Axel and Ceci –" Carol couldn't even finished her name because more tears came out of her eyes. The thought of leaving her daughter was inconsolable. "I can't leave my girl!"
"Axel is sick too and I highly doubt Cecilia will leave Daryl, leave Carl," Rick told her. "We'll keep them all safe."
Carol rested his back on the car as she hid her face in her hands, crying. She was remembering the last thing her daughter said to her, she could perfectly hear Cecilia's voice in her head saying, 'Be careful on the run, okay? I can't lose any more people, not now.'
She hadn't died and she wasn't going to die but Cecilia was going to lose her anyway. Carol hated what she did, what she felt she was forced to do but she didn't regret it, she was just trying to save the rest of them, to keep them all safe, to keep Cecilia safe, and Rick just couldn't see that.
"You're not that woman who was too scared to be alone, not anymore," Rick told her. "You're going to start over, find others, people who don't know, and you're going to survive out here. You will."
"Maybe," Carol mumbled, looking at Rick again, who turned his back on her so he could keep putting things inside the trunk. "Rick?"
"Mhm?"
"Don't tell Cecilia, please," Carol pleaded, making Rick face her again. "If we were ever friends, do this for me and don't tell her."
"And what do I tell her when she asks where you are?" Rick asked. "That you just left? I'm sorry but I have to tell her, Carol. She might get upset but she has forgiven you so much more already."
"That's the problem," Carol muttered. "I don't want her to have something else to forgive me for, she doesn't deserve it."
Rick said nothing else after that, he moved to the back of the car and gave Carol some of the stuff they found. There was a car there that Carol could use, so they put the things in the trunk, including some gasoline, food and other stuff.
Carol closed the trunk, trying to be strong in front of Rick but truth was that she was destroyed. She wasn't scared of being alone, Rick was right about that, she was scared she might never see Cecilia again but most importantly she was scared about losing her forever, Cecilia was hurt and it took her a long time time to heal, Carol allowed her to heal but with this, she wasn't sure if she would forgive her and that was what killed Carol the most.
"I know I shouldn't ask you this but could you take care of Cecilia for me?" Carol asked him. "Like if she were your own daughter? I know she can keep herself safe and technically she's an adult now but she's still my little girl and she..."
"I love her as my own, Carol," Rick told her quickly. "I always take care of her as I take care of Carl and Judith."
"Thank you."
Carol then looked for something in her pocket. She looked at the object for a few seconds before approaching Rick to give it to him, it was a golden thin watch.
"Take it," Carol told Rick. "Ed gave this to me on our first anniversary. Please."
Rick hesitated, he was kicking her out and she was giving him a watch, it didn't seem right but he took it anyway when she insisted. The watch was around twenty-five years old, Cecilia was twenty-one now and Carol met Ed a few years before Cecilia was born.
"I should have given it away a long time ago," Carol muttered, mostly to herself.
Carol got in the car, started the engine and drove away, leaving Rick with a horrible feeling of guilt but he knew this was what had to be done.
He knew this will kill Cecilia, especially now that Daryl was away. Rick wanted to wait until he got back but he knew that might not be an option. Cecilia would notice her absence and ask and she would eventually get mad for not being told, so Rick wanted to go look for her and find her and tell her as soon as he got back.
Daryl and the rest had come across a huge herd of walkers, there were thousands of them. As Daryl tried to go in reverse, the car got stuck after he ran some over. They were forced to go on foot since then, making them take even more time.
But they were lucky enough to find a car that could be used. Luckily, the car was next to an auto shop, they fixed the car, changed the battery and to everyone's relief, the car started. They got in and the Veterinary College building had finally come into view.
"You were a bit harsh with Cecilia yesterday," Michonne told Daryl, the other two were a bit ahead of them.
"I know, I didn't mean to," Daryl admitted. "I don't really want to talk about it."
The four of them kept walking towards the building as they all kept their weapons ready even when they had not bumped into walkers since they left the car a couple of blocks away, the car couldn't pass through there so they had no choice.
"Do you love her?" Michonne asked the long-haired man.
Daryl stopped in his tracks, taking a deep breath. Michonne also stopped and turned to look at him. Daryl was looking down at the ground and slowly looked up at Michonne, who was expecting his answer, Daryl didn't want to say anything but there was no way out.
"Yeah." He sighed. "I have for a while now."
Daryl had always loved Cecilia but not in any special way. He loved her as Oliver loved her, or as Hershel, Beth and Maggie loved her the only difference was that he liked her and they were closer than with anyone else but it had been about a month or two ago, during a run, that Daryl realized he didn't just love her like that anymore, he had fallen in love with her, he loved her more than any other person he had ever met.
They were out to look for new blankets for themselves and some other members of the group, they hadn't had a problem until they were forced to get separated. Daryl panicked, he couldn't find Ceclia for almost three hours and during that time he realized how more important Cecilia had become to him and he would certainly die inside without her. That day Daryl realized he truly loved her.
Daryl didn't believe he was capable of falling in love with someone or that someone could fall in love with him. He had never had a girlfriend, he only randomly hooked up with girls back in the day, he didn't even have close friends. He never had someone to show him he could love and be loved.
"The day before all of this, she said she loved me, she thought I was sleeping but I heard her, I was too surprised to say it back," Daryl admitted. "And then the next day after we killed the walkers in D, I tried to tell her but I chickened out."
"That only means you have to get back to tell her," Michonne said with a smile but then it turned into a smirk. "So you two sleep together?"
"Sometimes," Daryl said. "But not in the way you think, now come on, we need to get the medicine and leave as soon as we can."
The group got into the building and made it to the room where the medicine was kept. Tyreese and Daryl searched some more other rooms, looking for other things they needed while Michonne and Bob kept grabbing the medicine bottles.
It was not until they had found everything they needed and they were exiting the building that they found walkers inside a room. The group followed the signs out of there and ended up in a very dark room full of empty cages.
Unluckily, the door they had come from was broken and couldn't lock it, so they just threw cages to make it harder for the walkers to get to them and behind the other door, the one they needed to pass to leave, were more walkers.
"How many?" Daryl asked.
"I can't tell," Michonne said, trying to look through a little gap between the doors where the walkers were trying to get them.
They couldn't leave and on the other side the walkers had finally pushed the door and were getting inside, they were cornered.
"We can take 'em!" Tyreese exclaimed, panic was evident in his voice.
"No! They're infected!" Bob yelled. "Same as at the prison. We fire at 'em, get their blood on us, breathe it in. We didn't come all this way to get sick."
Almost all the walkers there had blood that came from his eyes, just like Patrick. This used to be a building with animals, it made sense the virus was here as well.
"How do we know the ones in there aren't any different?" Tyreese asked, referring to the ones behind the door they needed to go through to leave.
"We don't," Michonne exclaimed.
"Well, it's gotta change sometime," Daryl said.
Daryl cut the chains that were keeping the doors semi-closed, the walkers got in but before they could get any closer, Bob shot at one and Michonne beheaded the other two, luckily there weren't any more.
The group ran out of that room, went up some stairs and ran down a hall, more walkers were coming out of every room there, from time to time Michonne would cut some of their heads off and Bob would threw furniture and some stuff to slow them down. They got to the end of it and to their bad fortune the door was locked, they were trapped, again.
"Don't have an exit," Michonne exclaimed, Daryl kicked the door but nothing.
"Then we make one!" Tyreese yelled. "Get down!"
Tyreese grabbed a fire extinguisher and threw it at the glass. Tyreese and Daryl helped Michonne up, allowing her to leave first. She jumped on the ceiling of a walkway, they were extremely fortunate that they had something to jump on. Tyreese was next, followed by Daryl and lastly Bob jumped, but he fell, making his bag hang from the ceiling, several walkers gripped it but Bob held on to it, refusing to allow them to take it.
"Bob, let it go!" Michonne exclaimed.
"Let it go, man!" Tyreese said. "Just let it go!"
"Let go of the bag, man!" Daryl also urged him but he just wouldn't let it go.
Somehow, Bob was able to pull the bag from their grip, by the force and the inertia of the action, Bob fell on his stomach and the bag landed a few feet away from him, opened. Daryl spotted a bottle of liquor inside of it and that was it.
"You got no meds in your bag? Just this?" Daryl asked him, obviously pissed. "You should have kept walking that day." He said referring to something they have talked earlier about the day Daryl found him and took him to the prison.
Daryl glared at the man, the others weren't any less pissed at him. People were dying and he just cared about his alcohol. Daryl turned, ready to throw the bottle but Bob stopped.
"Don't," he exclaimed, putting a hand on top of his holster.
Instead of getting intimidated, Daryl got even more pissed. He stepped towards him and confronted him, disarming him and then Daryl grabbed him by the collar of his vest.
"Just let it go, Daryl," Tyreese said quickly. "The man's made his choice. Nothing you can do about it. Just gotta let it go."
"I didn't want to hurt nobody," Bob said after Daryl let go of him. "It was just for when it gets quiet."
Daryl pushed the bottle into the man's chest, getting closer to him again. "Take one sip," he said.
"Before those meds get in our people, I will beat your ass into the ground. You hear me?"
Daryl walked away from Bob, knowing they couldn't waste any more time. He picked up his crossbow and kept going until the end of the walkway, followed by Tyreese and Michonne, and eventually Bob. The four of them jumped off the walkway and ran to where they left the car, trying to evade the walkers.
"That's where I was travelling, Highway 100," Tyresse said as they were discussing what to do after they safely got to the car, where Daryl was resting, taking no part on the discussion.
"Then it will take about seven hours to get there," Michonne commented. "We're gonna need more gas."
"But we'll get there," Tyreese assured her, then he walked in front of Daryl and informed him. "Taking Highway 100."
"I heard," he muttered.
Michonne got in the driver's seat, next to Daryl, who was staring intensively at a small picture. Michonne tilted her head to have a better look and after a while she finally saw the picture clearly, it was of Daryl and Cecilia.
"Rick took it yesterday, before all hell broke loose," Daryl told her before Michonne could ask. "Cecilia got the camera from the last run we did. I saw it on the table and I just had to take it."
Daryl sighed as he looked at the picture again and then put it back inside his pocket. Daryl was very grumpy that morning when Rick woke them up with the clicking sound of the camera but he loved the picture once he saw it. He would never say that to Rick, though.
"You were right, what you said before," Michonne told him. "About the trail going cold. I don't need to go out anymore."
"Good," Daryl said, closing the door as the others got inside too.
Michonne started the engine as the two in the back seat closed the doors. They were going to take some hours to get back to the prison but at least they had a car now and they were successful at getting everything that was on the list.
"Are you okay?" Michonne asked Daryl, who had a worried expression on his face, they had been on the road for about forty minutes now and he hadn't said anything at all, not even to mock her driving, which he usually did just to tease her. From time to time he took the picture out of his pocket and looked at it for a while, before putting it back in his pocket.
"I don't know," he muttered with a sigh. "I just got a very bad feeling."
"Lots of people died, others are getting sick, it's normal to feel like that," Michonne told him.
"No," Daryl exclaimed as he shook his head. "This is different, I can't explain it I just feel like something really bad is happening right now or is about to happen and a part of me knows it has nothing to do with the sick people."
"Maybe you are just a bit paranoid," Michonne said, trying to make him feel better. "I'm sure they are all okay."
"I hope."
Cecilia's POV
I opened my eyes feeling extremely disorientated and I had a massive headache. I tried to focus my eyes to see better but my eyesight kept being really blurry. I closed my eyes because the headache was only getting worse.
I was about to raise a hand to pinch the bridge of my nose when I noticed I couldn't and that's when I panicked. My hands were tied behind me and I was sat on the floor with my back against a wall. I looked around me and the little I could make out only made me more nervous, I didn't know where I was, I was sure I wasn't in block C or in the administration building.
I closed my eyes once again, trying to concentrate hard to remember what had happened but I couldn't, there was only darkness. I remembered I went out to the woods with Sean but everything else was so confusing. I remembered when we got on the road and saw some shops on the other side but that was it, there was nothing else.
I moved my feet and found out they weren't tied, I tried to get up but my legs just gave up as soon as I tried to stand up. I rested my head against the wall, biting my lip and trying hard not to cry.
Was the Governor back and he kidnapped me? Was he going to use me as bait to get to Michonne and then torture us both? Had someone else done this and if they had, why had they done this?
I looked down at my body to check two things, one for bites or scratches. I didn't see any blood so that means I'm okay, I hope I'm okay and two, I checked my clothes, what if I was raped? I didn't want to think about it but it was a possibility, so I was a bit relieved to see every piece of cloth still on.
So far everything seemed to be in their right place, I even had my shoes on and a good sign was that nothing hurt beside my head and my ass felt a bit numb but I wasn't sore or anything, I only hoped that they had just dragged me here, tied me and that was it, that they hadn't done anything else.
I wasn't sure how much time had passed but my vision was slowly getting back to normal, I looked out the window and noticed it was almost dusk time. I couldn't be sure if today was the same day I left the prison or if I had been out for more than a day.
I had tried so hard to break free that I was sweating, I was too weak to get up and I felt so helpless that I was silently crying. I was scared, I couldn't deny that and I was also so lost in what had happened, the thing that was bothering me the most was that I had no idea how I ended up here.
After it was completely dark, I heard footsteps outside of the room. I hadn't heard a single noise until now, not even moans or the singing of a bird, just nothing and I wasn't sure if I should be glad by hearing something now or not.
A person opened the door and walked in, they were looking down at the floor and had a hood on, the room was so dark I couldn't see his face but by the build of this person I could tell they were a man, taller and stronger than me.
"You're awake," he whispered, I couldn't recognize the voice but it seemed really familiar.
"Why am I here?" I asked, my voice hoarse from the lack of use, the man just chuckled at me.
"You'll know... with time."
The man bent down in front of me and forced me to drink some water, I tried to spit it but he made me swallow it. I was really thirsty and hungry too now that I think about it but the less I wanted was to eat or drink anything that this stranger was giving me. I drank about half the bottle when my stomach grumbled, all I wanted was to hit it to shut it up but the man heard and forced me to eat some bar he had in his pocket.
I was even more scared when I saw his gun hanging from his belt. I knew I didn't have my gun or my knife with me, I didn't even need to look down to make sure, why would they leave me with those? They would be stupid.
"How long have I been here?" I asked him.
"Hours," he whispered again.
"Why?"
The man didn't answer that question, he just grabbed the wrapper from the bar I had just finished eating and put it in a container in the corner of the room, I did feel better now that I had eaten and drunk something but that didn't make me feel any more better about this fucked up situation.
The room was mostly empty, it only had a broken wooden chair, a big table that probably matched the chair, some boxes, the container where he put the garbage and a shelf. I wasn't sure what was on that shelf because it was too dark.
My mind was going one hundred miles an hour trying to think what I could do to get free and escape. Should I try to be nice to the guy, maybe thank him for the food and the water and maybe establish a conversation with him and just maybe I could get him to free my hands so I could attempt a run out of this place? Or should I just keep my mouth shut because he might get sick of me and just shoot me and kill me?
I wasn't sure why this guy, which I now know that he wasn't the Governor, had kidnapped me and kept me in here. Was he going to torture me? Was he going to use me in some twisted way? Was he going to feed me to the walkers?
Now not only my ass was numb but also my legs and my hands, the rope around them was a bit too tight and the position of my arms hurt, I was so scared I hadn't noticed before but now that I did I couldn't stop thinking about it.
"It's time to sleep," the man said, scaring me even more.
The man bent down in front of me once again, always keeping his head low so I couldn't see his face. The man ran one of his hand on my head, caressing it. I tried to pull away but he only gripped me by my hair quite harshly and I cried out in pain.
"Ungrateful little bitch," he exclaimed angrily.
The man let go of my hair just as harshly as he grabbed it and before I could react he covered my mouth and nose with a cloth, I kicked and screamed but there was no use without my hands.
Soon I started to feel really tired and drowsy, I felt like my eyes weighed a ton, I fought to keep them open, not wanting to get unconscious and become even more vulnerable but soon darkness overwhelmed me and my eyes closed.
Hello guys! I hope you enjoyed the chapter. I loved the fact it was centred in three different places, and you could see what was happening with Rick/Carol, Daryl/Michonne and Cecilia.
And good news concerning my ankle, it's better. I have started doing exercises, mostly balance to strengthen it and I can use the bike at the gym for ten minutes, if it hurts I must stop though.
QOTD: What were your thoughts when Rick kicked Carol out?