Stepping out of the restroom with Carl causes several people to avert their prior stares, pretending as if they didn't hear Carl's initial rage. With his face turning to an alarming shade of red beneath his sheriff's hat, Carl rushes off to find a pew to hide in.
Rosita watches me from another set of pews, beckoning me with a hand and a contemplative look on her face, which I avoid, finding a seat with Carl instead. I lean my head back, hoping to get some sleep, despite the circumstances.
I hear a door open, looking up to see Tyreese leave Gabriel's office without Sasha, heading towards us when he spots me.
"Mind if we talk, little man?" Ty asks.
I offer to move, but Carl tells me to stay, that he needs to check on Judith anyway. Smiling at me before he leaves, letting me know it really is okay.
I shuffle up the bench, and Ty sits down beside me.
"How are they?" I'm staring at the office door. The light spilling from beneath the frame makes me feel disjointed. It looks dark and ominous.
I hear Tyreese shake his head next to me, "They're both strong."
I make a weird croaky sound in agreement.
I look at him, and he watches me back. He looks so tired. I suppose I probably do too.
"Have you heard about DC?"
Tyreese narrows his eyes slightly before shaking his head again.
"They were gonna go... Abraham's people. Rick told them they couldn't take the bus," I mumble.
Ty nods, "I heard shouting..."
Tyreese is still watching me. Somehow his tired eyes are seeing through me, watching my words but actually seeing my feelings.
I don't know why, but I start crying, exhausting myself further. "They wanted to leave, but Glenn stopped it, cut a deal that some of us would go with them tomorrow. Glenn, Maggie, Tara, and me. I didn't ask to go. I swear I didn't. They just wouldn't stop-"
Ty puts an arm around me, pulling me into him and holding tight. Letting me have my moment, the moments we're not supposed to have anymore.
"You did what you had too," Ty speaks into the top of my head.
His words almost make me flinch. After everything- all the death and the hesitating, the beatings, and the quiet before the inevitable disappointment... Being told it's okay feels out of place. Feeling accepted even more so.
Rick calls everyone to the front of the church after a few moments, going over the plan in great detail.
Carl, Rosita, Sasha, and I will stay behind to protect Bob, Judith, and Eugene- Gabriel as well, if only to a lesser extent. Meanwhile, Rick will lead the rest of the group to the school that Bob had described. The one Gabriel knew the location too. The new Termite nest.
We're all agreed until Sasha emerges from the office, rifle in hand. She stares at Rick with puffy Hazel eyes. Her wrath, showing through the tears.
"I'm going with you," she tells him.
"You should stay with Bob," Tyreese warns her. From the look on his face, I know he's thinking about Karen. The moments he lost with her. Moments he would do anything to have back.
"No, I wanna be out there. I want to be a part of this," with that, Sasha disappears back into the office, ignoring Tyreese's calls as he chases after her.
It doesn't register for me when Ty first calls out my name, I only hear him the third or fourth time. I look up to see him hovering by the office door, gesturing for me to follow, not understanding this until Carl gives me a gentle push towards the door. I follow Tyreese inside.
We find Sasha sitting on the edge of Gabriel's couch, tending to Bob with a damp cloth. I make a seat on the top of Gabriel's desk. Tyreese stands behind Sasha, casting his candlelit shadow over an unconscious Bob.
"I know how it feels," Ty starts, watching her as she puts down the cloth to take Bob's hand in her own.
Tyreese shakes his head, his voice low and gentle in that Tyreese way, "But this right here, the time you could have with him, you can't throw that away. I wish I had it with Karen."
Sasha turns to him, her brow furrowed, "Do you remember how you felt?" she looks to me, "How you both felt? What you wanted to do?"
I keep my eyes locked to the floor. Remembering how I felt, unsure as to how I feel.
"Yeah," Tyreese answers his sister, "It made it so I couldn't see it. Forgiveness. That's facing it."
"You want me to forgive them?" she retorts, raising her voice, "for hurting him? For trying to kill us? What the hell is wrong with you?"
Sasha turns to me when Tyreese can't answer her, "You wanna forgive them after what they did?"
"No," I answer truthfully, "they deserve to die for what they did... but you should be here for Bob."
Tyreese look's shocked at my answer, almost a trace of disappointment in his gaze. That excepted feeling is gone. I realise I probably had it longer than I deserved.
"When he opens his eyes, the only thing he's gonna want to see is your face," Tyreeses tries again.
Sick of the conversation, Sasha gets up, drawing her knife and handing it to Tyreese, "Take it."
He doesn't. He just stares at his sister with his sad, tired eyes.
Sasha shakes her head, handing the knife to me.
"You'll need it," I tell her, brandishing the small folding knife I'd gotten from Madeline instead.
"You sure you're okay staying here?" Rick asks me, clearly showing that he's spoken to Maggie.
"The plan is for them to come here anyway, right?"
"That's the plan."
"Then I'm okay being here."
Silence has befallen the church, cast over it like a bad mood.
The group of us remaining behind -now with Tyreese instead of Sasha- is stuffed inside Gabriel's office.
Bob's wheezes and the occasional babble from Judith keep us all on edge, watching the door, listening for the smallest of sounds.
Rick's plan to lead our bulk into the forest is a bold one. If they're a second late, a moment off track, everyone in this room dies tonight.
Carl taps his finger against his holstered gun, making a rhythm of unease spread through the room like wildfire.
I sit by Bob's side, remembering my silent promise to Sasha. I won't let Bob turn, no matter what. My folding knife sits on my knee, my gun in my hands, which are trembling, making the weapon rattle.
"Hey," Bob whispers, now awake, "are you good?" He's looking at my shaking hands.
"Nervous," I mumble in answer.
"You know that game that Sasha and I play, good from the bad?"
I nod.
"This is the bad," he puffs, "But that just means you're due a whole lot of good."
I bite, "What's the good, then?"
Bob just smiles knowingly, like he's seen into the future and has no worries for me. "You'll know it when it happens."
There is a loud snap in the room beyond the office, an echoing creek of the front door opening, and then a familiar voice calling out.
"Well, I guess you know we're here."
Gareth's voice spills into the church like blood, staining its floors.
"And we know you're here."
Carl keeps his gun trained on the office door, which Gabrial had locked as a last-ditch effort to buy us time.
"And we're armed," Gareth goes on.
"Us too, asshole," I whisper to myself, Tyreese giving me a look as if telling me to watch my mouth.
"So there's really no point in hiding anymore- We've been watching you- We know who's here."
Rick should have realised by now. He should be back.
Gareth starts to taunt us from beyond the office.
"There's Bob. Unless you put him out of his misery already,"
I tighten my grip on the gun.
"And Eugene,"
Gareth's voice sounds like it all around us, closing in.
"Martin's good friend Tyreese,"
The blood pooling.
"Rosita,"
Making it's way to our office.
"Dear Rhys,"
Filling the church.
"His friend, Carl,"
Drowning us.
"Judith."
Carl cocks the hammer of his gun, unphased by Gareths taunts.
Gareth goes on, the floorboards squeaking outside the office door, shadows moving behind it.
"Look, you're behind one of these two doors-" Gareths shouts, clearly sick of his own voice- that makes all of us. "We have more than enough firepower to take down both!"
"How 'bout the priest? Father, you help us wrap up here, and we'll let you walk." It doesn't sound like Gareth's at our door, his voice further away.
I watch Gabriel closely as he clutches onto rosemary beads, rocking back and forth, trying to ignore their words.
"We'll even let you take the baby," Gareth negotiates.
As if on cue, tears start to fall from Judiths eyes as she begins to wail uncontrollably. Carl rushes to silence her. But it's too late.
Feet from all across the church congregate outside the office door. Probably the last congregation this church will see.
The terrifying noise of the Termite whispers comes from outside the door, heavy breathing on both sides, waiting for the penny to drop and bullets to fly.
Two loud thuds come from outside the door. Blood spills under it, staining the tips of Rosita's boots the same colour as my trainers. I feel relief washing over me.
They're back.
"Put your guns on the floor," Rick's voice comes from the room beyond, only a whisper, but one which I know they should not take lightly.
Gareth clearly doesn't know that.
"Rick! We'll fire right into that office, so you lower you're-"
Gareth's threat suddenly gets cut off by screaming, his screaming, as the sound of a bullet tearing through flesh comes from behind the office door. A sound that I didn't know a week ago, one that I now know too well.
Rick repeats himself, "Put your guns on the floor and kneel," his voice still a calm whisper.
When I asked him about his hat, Carl had told me about how his father was once a police officer. Rick never fitted that description in my head. I was starting to see it now.
"Do as he says," Gareth whimpers, his voice far less threatening. Probably thinking he can negotiate out of this. He knows Rick even less than I do.
One of the other Termites tries arguing, Tyreeses' eyes darting to the door at the sound of his voice. I presume that would be Martin, Tyreese's 'friend,' the one that put his hands around Judith's neck. I feel my grip on the gun tighten further, my knuckles white.
I hear Gareth being moved away from the office door, "No point begging, right?"
"No," Rick tells him, his voice void of hate and rage, replaced only by a desire to kill.
"Still," Gareth tries, hoping for mercy, "you could have killed us when you came in."
"We didn't want to waste the bullets."
"We used to help people. We save people! Things changed. They came in and- After that," Gareth lets out a sadistic giggle, "I know that you've been out there, but I can see it. You don't know what it is to be hungry."
Silence.
"You don't have to do this. We can walk away, and we will never cross paths again. I promise you."
Silence.
"Please..."
Then, Rick's voice breaks through the silence, piercing it like glass shards through flesh, snapping the tension of the church in half. "You'll cross someone's path. You'd do this to anyone, right?"
I hear the sound of a blade being drawn.
"Besides, I already made you a promise."
Rick's words echo eerily through the church, cutting through the despair and ignorance, leaving only violence.
The sound of that violence rings out from beyond the cramped office. Louder than the screams and the begging is Judith's crying. As if she knew what was happening beyond the door, not understanding why it has to be, only that it is.
Tyreese opens the door after a few moments, peeking beyond it to see his sister driving her blade into a man's chest repeatedly, his blood covering her. Carl shields Judith's eyes from it, holding her close as he sits beside me on the edge of Bob's couch. He's shaking wearily, tired of the violence. I don't speak, I just watch Sasha work through the cracked open door.
"It could have been us," Rick tells her, his face coated in Gareth's insides.
"Yeah..."
Gabriel stepped from the office, moving aside for Sasha and Abraham to enter. I follow the priest out, looking at the blood bath which stains hollowed ground.
"This is the lord's house," Gabriel tells the church.
"No," Maggie responds, her voice breaking. "It's just four walls and a roof."
I see Michonne look at a bag with her head tilted knowingly. Carl's orange rucksack, worn by a bloody stump resembling a Termite. Something is sticking from the bag. Michonne reaches forward, bending down, and I struggle to see what she grabs from the bag under the pale moonlit windows. She pulls it out, and the light catches it, dancing familiarly up the blade of her sword.
When Michonne leaves the corpse, I step forward, taking the bag off the Termite without getting too much blood on it. It's heavy, so I open the bag, mine and Karen's unfinished book still in the front pocket. I look deeper, searching into the main compartment of the bag, feeling a good feeling about what I find. A worn brown poncho with red diamonds decorating it's sewn surface.
The sun is beginning to rise, and everyone is busy cleaning themselves up.
Bob had insisted on bringing back all the clothes from the food bank when they were there earlier, a decision we are all grateful for now. Those of us not covered with Termite blood still feeling as if we are.
Rick takes Judith from Carl after washing chunks of Garath from his beard and changing to a less red shirt, while Sasha takes over watching Bob for me. Free of obligations, Carl and I make our way to the restroom to change, picking out new clothes from a plastic tub on our way.
Inside the restroom, I change my clothes. Not sure I remember the last time I changed clothes. But certain it has been a long time since I've needed to peel them from my skin.
Carl changes too. I'm not sure if it's the fact we've survived kidnappings and cannibals together, or the fact that we just saw what Rick made of Gareth... but changing in front of each other isn't awkward.
I wash in the now dirty water, a downside of being the last in line.
Wearing new jeans is possibly the best experience of my life. Happy to be wearing clothes that aren't crusty with my blood and the blood of others.
Pulling my old T-shirt over my head, I toy with the idea of keeping my shredded flannel shirt but decide against it, one sniff being enough for me to fling it out of the restroom window. Instead, I wash up and put on a new t-shirt and flannel shirt, having to tie it in a knot at the back when it's doesn't fit. I pull on my sleeveless jacket with its familiar camo hood, hugging myself in the cold room. I look around for the poncho, realising I left it in Gabriel's office.
Slipping into a fresh pair of socks causes a strange melancholic feeling to shower over me.
As I put my shoes back on, I catch Carl staring at me. His blue eyes are fire in the water, a calm haze concealing something harsher. His knuckles are white as they grip onto his dirty t-shirt. His clean clothes clearly not as game-changing for him.
Carl looks overwhelmed by something, his face twitches as he stares into the space between spaces, trying to see through it like Daryl's smoke.
"You okay?" I whisper, feeling like I'm waking him from a dream. Frightened to pull him away too fast.
His blues snap to me, moving closer, so much emotion stored behind his eyes that I'm worried they might flood. I expect him to hug me, but he doesn't, he kisses me instead. It's aggressive and full of everything he can't say out loud. He holds on tightly but his grip somehow stays gentle. Like all the sharp flinches and fast pull aways has taught him how to look after something as broken as me.
I pull away after a blissful moment.
"Jesus man," I half laugh, half hyperventilate, "Do you wanna slow down a bit?"
"I- don't, I- I need this."
My fingers are lost in his hair, as his pull me closer. He moves away from my mouth, doing something to my neck that immobilises me in rapture. His hands explore beneath my shirt. But I can see blood.
I try to pull away gently, but Carl holds on, caught in the moment. And there's more blood.
I push him away this time, harder than I mean too. Carl tripping against the toilet stall.
"I- I'm sorry… I didn't-" I try.
Carl reaches out.
So much blood, that it covers me.
"No, don't touch me!"
Carl stumbles backwards, shocked by my outburst.
I can see how hurt he is.
"What is it?" His tone is blunt.
"I can't," I mumble, not wanting him to hear me.
"What?"
"I can't!" I shout at him, finally giving him the answer he needs.
His face changes. Softer than before.
When he speaks, his voice is small, "Is it me?"
"No."
"Then what?" Carl asks, "Is it because of what happened at the Cavalcade? They won't come back, Rhys."
I shake my head as I slump to the floor, sitting with my back to the dirty stall, a piece of toilet paper stuck to the bottom of my crimson shoe.
"It's me... I killed someone, Carl."
It feels strange. Admitting it to him makes me feel more guilty than the priest ever could.
"At Terminus?"
But Carl isn't judging me.
"Yeah," I stare at the tiled wall ahead, "but he wasn't one of them. He was a prisoner like us. He was the same as us, and I killed him, with that knife," I gesture to the blade tucked into Carl's belt.
Carl sits beside me on the cold floor, both of us looking forward. I know that he gets why I can't now.
"Y'know, someone once taught me that if you're alive, you're in between. Taught me that there aren't any more good guys and bad guys. We're all jus' either closer to one or the other, but never all the way," Carl pauses, thinking on a painful memory, "When you told me that, you helped me forgive myself for what I did. You told me if I feel bad about it, I can't be more towards the bad than the good."
I take in a heavy breath, trying to remember how I felt when I told him that.
I exhale, "I- I can't stop thinking about everything, ever since we got here. Last night Sasha asked me to put Bob down for her, and I didn't hesitate. And- I don't think I feel bad about what I did... What does that make me?"
Carl doesn't know what to say, putting an arm over me instead, whispering that I'm good and he's here, as we sit together on the restroom floor.
"Gabriel told me that it was a sin... that I'll go to hell for what I did."
"He said what?" Carl sits up angrily.
"It's fine... I don't even believe in hell."
"Really?" Carl relaxes, arm still over me. "I guessed you were religious since you know so much about churches."
"My Grandparents on my mum's side... when they were alive. They were really religious. Made me go to Sunday school whenever they would babysit me."
"And you never believed in it?"
"I guess, for a time. My Dad got pissed at them when he found out."
"Why?"
"Wasn't his thing."
The gross restroom goes quiet.
"Why did- um, why did you need to?" I finally ask him.
There's a look on Carl's face, a look filled with pain and anger. It only lasts a second, then he's just holding me tighter.
This chapter was a bit of a fluster cluck. Sorry about that.