Dusk has settled over the prison. Through the office window, I can see a car park, fences surrounding it with a few of the dead clinging to it. I guess that's where the prison guard's parked. I wonder if we are the new prison guards in a way. I think about how we sleep in cells and live behind barbed wire. I decide we're more like inmates.

The office door creaks open, a dark silhouette behind the frosted glass. I find myself grabbing my spear, only to let go when I see Carl. I return to carving letters into the office floor.

"Is Hershel okay?"

Carl shrugs. I don't know if that means 'I've no idea' or 'yeah, he's fine.'

Carl sits beside me.

I've since migrated from the couch onto the office floor, sitting on our mess of sleeping bags and blankets at the foot of the desk. We sit there together as he takes off his hat.

"Hershel decided to move into cell block A," Carl explains his unspecific shrug. I guess it was a bit of both.

I nod. Cellblock A being death row, the place where the sick are living. I shudder at the thought of Hershel being in there.

"What are you still doing awake?" Carl yawns, taking off his shoes and holster, along with his stained purple flannel.

"Can't sleep." I give him one of his own shrugs as reasoning, which he seems to understand better than me.

He lies back, using his rucksack as a pillow since we forgot to bring our actual pillows, thanks to Carl's dramatic exit from our cell.

I stop carving into the floor, putting the knife Carl had forgotten to take with him on the oak desk above our heads, lying back next to Carl as we share the rucksack.

"I'm sorry about today." I finally tell him.

"Huh?"

"You got your sister taken away from you, and you've spent the whole day keeping me smiling."

"Rhys, you lost Karen today. You have nothing to apologise for."

I don't know how to respond, so I don't. Instead, enjoying the sounds of our breaths as we try to match them in the dark room.


Moonlight begins to spill into the office, illuminating a large clock nailed to the peeling wall, with little batons instead of hands.

-8:37-

I roll over onto my side, facing away from Carl, watching as the moons shine creeps across the carpeted floor.

"Still can't sleep?" Carl's voice is low and has a croak to it. Clearly, I woke him up, but he tries to hide it.

"No, but it's fine," I answer softly.

"Why is that fine?" he mumbles. I can feel his breath on the back of my neck, making my hairs stand on end.

"When I slept on the bus this afternoon. I was crying until I fell asleep."

"Why aren't you crying now?"

"Because I'm not alone."

I'm not sure if Carl even heard what I said until I feel his arm drape over my middle, not holding me tight, but just holding me close. His words a whisper, "I'm glad you're here too."


It's warmer than the cell when I wake up. I watch out the window, seeing the morning sun, and hearing the distant rattles of the deadheads against the fences.

I realise Carl's arm is no longer around me. Instead, his knee was sticking into my back with a painful jab. I roll myself away from him quietly, his gentle snores indicating his unconsiousness.

I try not to wake him as I change into cleanish clothes, stealing a brown sleeveless jacket with a faded camo hood from Carl's bag. I'd never seen him wear it, so I think he'll be okay with it.

Leaving Carl asleep, I head to A block to fulfill a promise. The cold November air turns my walk into a jog, zipping up the jacket as I run.

No one else is awake, so I wait at the visiting booth. I notice a pile of sheeted heaps in the corner of the room beyond the protective glass, red stains covering the top of each body beneath them. Sasha rounds the corner after a short wait.

"Hey," I sit up in the visiting chair.

"Hi, Rhys," she sits in the prisoner's chair, trying to looker better than she is.

"How did you-"

"Tyreese told me you'd check-in."

I nod, and we sit in silence for a moment before I tell her, "I think Ty is mad at me for what happened."

"He's not," she puts her bloody hand against the glass, leaving an ominous stain, "I think you might be the only person he doesn't blame."

I smile at this, not sure if Sasha means it as a compliment or just an observation.

Sasha says, "Hey, listen, kid. I'm fine. You don't need to waste your time sitting here with me."

"You're not wasting my time."

"Who's on fence duty right now?" She raises an eyebrow.

"We've got a new rotation worked out since you and Glenn are sick, and the others are gone."

"Who's on it?" Her eyebrow somehow climbs higher.

"Sasha, you need to rest. You can't keep this place safe if you don't get better. Just take some time to heal."

A coughing fit from Sasha proves me right.

"Just make sure everyone is doing their bit." She tells me between coughs.

"I will."

"Do you have a gun?" Sasha asks me.

"No, Rick thinks-"

"You need a gun. My handgun is with me, but my sniper is still in the tower. Don't waste more bullet practicing. It's just for emergencies."


Leaving A block feels good. It feels like a certain weight is given to you upon entering and taken on exit.

I feel a guilty pain for lying to Sasha about us having a rotation on the fences. Truth being, Maggie and I are the only ones left with the job. I just thought it best that she doesn't have anything to worry about while recovering.

I spend the morning clearing the fence. Patrolling up and down, and thinning out clusters the best I can. When Maggie finally comes to take over, I'm exhausted.

I decide I need to do something to keep myself from wandering to dark hallways and bloody cells.

I'm back inside the flipped bus now, spending the afternoon making it comfortable. The windows were now completely hidden behind curtains I'd scavenged from the empty offices. There's a bed of cushions where two seats used to be, making a cozy corner for me to hide in. The next aisle of seats along homed a collection of books that I had 'borrowed' from the office's bookshelf since the library was off-limits, some of Carl's comic books sit alongside them, a mug on top of them, reading, 'Java Saves.'

I retrieve Sasha's sniper from the tower, exactly where she said it would be. Now it sat with my spear, leaning against the back door of the bus, which sometimes would open and sometimes refuse.

I think about Karen. Her bracelet in my pocket is gripped tightly in my fist.

Who would have murdered her like that?

I rack my head for anyone I can think of, but everyone here was either sick or too kind to do it. This person was ruthless, cold, and calculated. They somehow knew that neither Tyreese nor I would be with Karen that night. They used the performance as a cover.

My train of thought is interrupted by a loud clanking sound from outside. I stop my Sherlocking to climb out the back of the bus, managing to force open the jamming door for once.

I see Carol walking away from a now moving noise trap- a few weeks ago Sasha had made them, bike wheels that sprung back and forth, grinding together to lure the dead to one spot. Sasha said she got the inspiration from some alien movie she'd watched before the outbreak. Walker bait, she called them.

I grab Sasha's rifle from the bus, strapping it to my back before taking my spear and sprinting down to cut Carol off from a hole in the fence we use to clear walker bodies.

She spots me running towards her. I notice her hand resting on her small holstered revolver.

"Hey, Carol! need some help?"

She seems to relax slightly at this.

She holds her hand above her eyes, blocking out the sun while she squints at my spear, "You know what you're doing with that?"

"I've managed alright up till now."

"I'm fine thanks." Carol waves me off as she starts untying the wire holding the fence hole shut.

"Please?" I ask, not meaning to sound as desperate as I am.

"Why?" Carol seems different than usual. Tougher.

"Cause' I can't stop thinking about Karen."

She nods. I can't see her facial expression thanks to the bright glare of the sun. "Fine. stay close."

"What are we doing out here?" I ask as Carol leads the way to a wooden bridge, not far from the fence exit.

"There's a problem with the water pump I need to fix."

I begin to find her new attitude weird. She seems to notice, adding, "I knocked over the last of our reserve water earlier. I can be such a butterfingers, I tell you." She smiles hard at me.

With the sound trap doing its job, Carol begins to pull a hose from the murky pond water, and onto the rickety bridge that we're standing on.

"It's clogged with mud," she tells me, bashing the hose against the bridge in an attempt to remove the dirt.

"We got two walkers incoming," I warn her, reaching for the gun on my back.

"Don't." Carol sets the pump down on the wooden planks, drawing her machete. "Save the bullets."

We wait for them to get closer, using the bridge as a choke point, we take them out with ease. Ensuring the dead don't fall into the water below.

Carol returns to the pump, using her knife this time to scoop the last of the sludge from it.

"Thought you called them Deadheads?" she cocks her eyebrow at me as she screws the cleaned nozzle back onto the hose.

"I did." I think for a moment. "Just kinda prefer Walker now."

She gives me a look like she doesn't believe me.

There's a sudden grinding noise coming from the sound trap as it begins to lose momentum.

"Shit."

"GET BACK INSIDE!" Rick's voice explodes from inside the fences as he sprints towards us. He sees the trap and manages to get it going again before it stops, keeping the Walkers' attention.

We all exchange a trade of silent nods as Carol and I make our way back to the way we got out, Rick meeting us there.

"Piece of cake," Carol tells me.

I offer up a high five, which she hesitates before accepting.

Rick looks furious.

"We decided to do that tomorrow," Rick tells her through gritted teeth.

Like back in the cell, I make myself look busy by fiddling with the bike lock holding the fence shut.

"We don't know if we get a tomorrow," she retorts. "We had it covered."


I find Carl in the garden. His Dad leaving him in charge of it seemed to make him want to work extra hard today.

"Where'd you get the gun?" Carl asks me as I lean over the garden fence.

"Sasha wanted me to have it." I take said gun off my back, propping it against the fence before hopping over it, joining Carl on the cabbage patch.

I get on my knees and help Carl pull weeds from the turned soil.

"You don't have to," Carl tells me, ripping up a particularly stubborn one.

"I know. I want to."

We pull weeds and talk about how uncomfortable the office floor was last night. Carl, telling me that he read what I carved into the floor the other night.

"What?" I laugh.

"You spelled base wrong," Carl repeats himself, "Jus' saying."

"What? No, I didn't."

"Uh-huh, did too!"

"Dude, I didn't spell base wrong."

"It's B-A-C-E," Carl spells it out with a smug look plastered across his face.

"No, it isn't! That's not even a word, asshole!"

"It's not?" Carl's face dropping upon realising he's wrong.

"No!" I can barely get the word out through my laughter.

"Oh." Carl is clearly embarrassed.

"Dude! It's a four-letter word!"

"Well, it should be a word. From now on, I say it is."

"You can't just make up words."

"Well, I jus' did."

We both laugh for a while at the new word with no definition.

"Where's your Dad?" I finally ask what has been on my mind.

Carl gives me a weak smile, "Looking for whoever killed Karen."

"Good."


Once Carl's chores are done, he goes to grab us some lunch while I wait patiently in the sideways bus, flipping through a Superman comic.

"Are you reading a comic?" Carl asks with a self-satisfied grin when he finally appears, throwing me an apple.

"Only because you were taking so long. Why do you even read this thing if Superman is invincible?" I ask, getting only a dismissive headshake in response from Carl.

"I got you a present," Carl tells me.

I look at him with curious eyes, with a mouth full of apple.

He pulls out the gun I had arrived with. The one the crazy man gave me.

"What!?" I splutter, apple chunks flying in every direction.

I wipe my mouth on my sleeve, getting to my feet and taking the pistol from Carl's extended reach.

"I know your shooting sucks but-"

I cut him off, wrapping my arms around him.

"Thank you."

"I just grabbed it from the armory."

"Not the weapon." I laugh into his shoulder. "just- thanks for not treating me like I'm broken."

His blue eyes pierce me.

"Almost forgot!" He suddenly says, reaching into his pocket. He pulls out a small tan leather holster, "found it in the armory, though it might help."

I take it, sliding my Beretta into it and attaching it awkwardly to my hip.

Carl laughs at me. "It's an SOB holster, idiot."

"SOB-what now?" I ask, confused.

"Jus' give it here," He snatches it back, and before I know what's happening, I'm being spun around by my shoulders. Carl begins tucking my flannel into my jeans. I jump away with a yelp.

"What are you-"

"Jus' trust me."

I relax, letting him continue.

"Done."

I reach behind me and feel my gun, clipped to my belt at the base of my spine, its butt facing up. I draw it and then reholster it, getting used to the new ease of access.

"Thanks, Carl."

"Wanna go back to the office?"

"Sure."