We barely manage to avoid Molly as she patrols up and down the hallways outside our room. Thankfully she gives away her position each time with excessive coughing fits.
I slowly lead Carol to the room where Maggie and I were interrogated by 'Chelle. She waits patiently for me as I take breaks to lean against the cold stone walls, my chest feels like shaking a bag of loose gravel with each step.
Carol opens the door when I can't. Maggie's still here, desperately trying to cut her hands free against a broken shelf bracket. Apart from us, the room looks empty. The smell of rot and damp is apparent.
Carol cuts her free, and they hug.
"You okay?" Maggie asks into her shoulder.
"Have to be," Carol whispers.
Maggie hugs me next, and I yelp because it hurts. She pulls away to inspect my blood-covered face, brushing away tears from the crusted red.
"Jesus, what the hell did they do to you?"
The blood has dried on my face now- I can feel it. It's uncomfortable, and my nose and stomach hurt, and I just want to go home.
"It was Molly," I say quietly.
Maggie holds my head to her chest for a second, kissing the top of my head.
"I'm fine," I lie unconvincingly, blood drooling past my lips. I lie because I really don't want to cry right now.
Maggie's crying is silent as she looks at my broken body.
"They've spread out, but I think we can make it past them," Carol says. "We have to try."
Maggie looks at her, confused. "We can't leave them alive."
Carol shakes her head. "No, we should just go."
"Carol," Maggie says with a low growl. "We have to finish this. Look what they did to him. We have to."
Carol does look at me, tilting her head in a silent debate.
I just hold my middle and try not to breathe too loudly, my ribs scraping against each other when I do.
Carol finally nods and the three of us head back to the room we started in. Donnie is still unconscious on the floor.
Maggie unties the rope from his arm and the small amount of blood still trying to escape him spurts out.
I ready myself.
He doesn't move.
Maggie lifts his arm and puts two fingers to his wrist, searching for a pulse.
"He was already dead," she says, shaking her head. "He's turning."
"His weapons," I pant, moving to lean against a valve and some rusting pipes when I start to worry I might collapse.
"They took them off him after his outburst," Carol tells us. "We should go."
"We need a gun," Maggie presses. She points to the rope she'd handed Carol. "Gimme that."
Carol passes her the short rope and Maggie ties an end to Donnie's belt. Then she ties the other around the pipe I'm sitting on. Donnie starts rasping. Turning quickly. We wait for him to sit up, and then Maggie leads us out of the room. Donnie's walker reaches for the door after us.
We hide around a corner a little ways down the hall and wait.
I hear coughing approach, then the door to the room we just left creeks open. We hear Molly scream, the thud of a body hitting the floor.
"Eat shit and die, Donnie!" Molly shrieks from the room.
Maggie sneaks to the door quicker than we do.
"Where are ya, Magnolia?"
Maggie seizes Molly from behind, snatching her gun from its holster on her hip. Maggie hits her with it and Molly falls to the floor. Maggie keeps beating her with the gun. Again and again. There are cracks and squelches. Maggie doesn't stop until there's nothing left of Molly's head. A dark red stain on the floor surrounded by bone and brain.
I'm not sure if it's from the pain in my chest or the chunks of Molly on my face, but I vomit over my shoes and the concrete floor.
"Let's go," Maggie says, taking Molly's knife and handing the gun that's dripping with blood to Carol. Maggie grabs the hood of my jacket and pulls me from the room, only letting go when we're down the hall. There's a palisade of walkers tied to pipes along the walls, our exit blocked as they grab at us.
"They're using them to keep us in... keep the others out," Carol says.
"We can clear them," I groan, leaning into the wall as I try to focus on standing.
Maggie raises her knife, putting one of the walkers down.
Suddenly the sound of a gunshot fills the hallway and a bullet cracks into the wall beside my head. Carol grabs me and Maggie around our waists and throws the three of us into cover before Paula blows my head off. My body pounds violently, inside and out. Pain swells through me as we land on the floor, waves of agony as tall as the ones in the lake after Daryl fired the bazooka at it. We cower behind a couple of barrels as bullets hit the wall above us. Every part of me begs to give up and die. A walker from the palisade reaches out and grabs at my shoe, lying splayed on the ground and only held back by a rope wrapped around its neck. I kick its hands away with all my might as it clings to my foot, my shoe slips off and it loses hold of me.
I hear the click of Paula's empty gun after it fires its last bullet. Carol seems to as well because she jumps up and points her gun at the woman. Maggie's holding me in cover, shielding my head and keeping me away from the walkers as they try to creep closer with snapping jaws.
"Just run," Carol pleads. But I hear Paula's footsteps getting closer.
"Shoot her," Maggie says, motioning for me to stay down as she slowly stands. I roll onto my side and peek out from behind the barrel.
"Go on, do it," Paula says like she doesn't care with a sniff then a shrug. "You've killed Donnie. You've killed Molly. Your people have destroyed my home."
Paula inches closer.
With laboured breaths and heavy grunts, I stand up too, clutching my middle. A walker's boney fingers graze my lower back and make me take a step forward.
"He doesn't sound too great," Paula says, faking a frown of worry in my direction.
"Get out of here," Carol whispers to our captor.
"Carol," Maggie says sternly.
"You have no idea," Paula goes on, still stepping forward. "The things I've done. What I've given up. What I had to do."
"Just run."
"Carol, shoot her!"
"Go ahead! I've already lost everything."
I hear a squelch from my right. A walker slips away from the spike through its chest keeping it in place, toppling towards Carol with its teeth bared.
It grabs her shoulder.
I shove it away.
Carol fires a shot at Paula.
Maggie stabs the walker.
Carol keeps her gun on Paula, who's slumped against the wall. A bullet is buried in her side, crippling her.
"Paula? Paula?!" 'Chelle's voice carries around the corner. "Molly?"
She turns the corner, seeing everything in slow motion and reaching for her gun.
Knowing how this ends if I don't, I somehow forget the searing ache in my chest and fling myself at 'Chelle. The gun flies from her hand and slides across the floor, spinning behind some crates. 'Chelle hits me in the gut and sends me reeling to the floor. Maggie sprints forward, snatching at 'Chelle, scratching and kicking and punching.
"You lying bitch!" 'Chelle screams at her.
I scramble for the gun, every part of me numb from everything but pain.
I reach behind the crates desperately, my fingers catching and cutting on splintered wood.
'Chelle slices at Maggie's stomach. A deep gash in her shirt.
I can't find it.
Carol turns the corner, putting Molly's gun to 'Chelle's temple and pulling the trigger. Then 'Chelle isn't a person anymore. She stops all that. 'Chelle's head shatters into a million pieces of red and bone and splatters across the brick wall behind her.
I finally find the gun, fumbling with it and jumping up. I limp to Maggie's side. She's panting heavily.
"I'm fine," she gasps, lifting her shirt to reveal 'Chelle's knife did catch her skin. "I'm okay. She missed."
I'm reeling. Cursing at myself.
If Carol hadn't been there.
Paula makes a grunting sound from the walker blockade.
I raise 'Chelle's gun, but Carol steps forward, lifting her own.
"I'll do it," Carol murmurs.
Paula starts laughing, blood pouring from the bullet hole in her side.
"Oh, you're good," Paula grins. "Nervous little bird. You were her," Paula sneers, sliding her way up the wall until she's on her feet, her back to the walkers that all grab at her with a hopeless and desperate hunger. "But not now, right?" She nods. "Me, too."
Carol steps closer. I follow, my knuckles ghostly white and bloody on the gun.
"And you?" Paula smirks at me. "Killer? You're just afraid. Broken. No wonder you try to make everyone feel sorry for you."
"I told you to run," Carol shakes her head at her. I can't see her face, but I know by her voice that she's crying.
"If you could do all this," Paula looks around, "what were you so afraid of, Carol?"
Carol takes another step. I'm right behind her.
"I was afraid of this..."
Paula leers at her again, laughing harder this time. Then she suddenly spins back, smacking the gun away from her face and snatching Carol's shoulders. Paula slams her against the wall, pulling her towards the walkers.
I aim my gun as they struggle.
Maggie's shouting something.
The walkers are so close.
I can't line up the shot.
I lunge forward, refusing to do nothing, tearing Carol away and shoving Paula backwards. There's another crack from my chest. I watch as Paula is impaled on one of the walker spikes. Her face is bitten into and chewed apart by the dead person sharing the spike. She screams and twists as her cheek is eaten from her face until I can see the bone. Her death is slow and agonising. She gurgles on her own blood as she dies with fear and horror in her eyes.
When I take my eyes off her I see Maggie staring between me and Paula's corpse. Carol's crying.
"Paula, we're approaching the perimeter. Are we a go?"
I put my back to a wall as Carol takes the walkie off Paula's belt. I want nothing more than to slump to the ground.
But I know we're not done.
Carol waits for Paula's gurgles to stop.
"Do you copy?" The man on the radio asks.
Carol takes a deep breath rubbing her eyes before doing her best Paula impression into the radio.
"Meet us on the kill floor."
It takes us five minutes to get ready.
Five minutes to get all the gas cans from the slaughter room.
Five minutes to pour it all over one room on the kill floor with a sliding door.
The five minutes are up.
I didn't say a word in those minutes. I Just helped Carol do what she had planned.
She told me I wouldn't like it.
Maggie tells me I did what I had to, but something in her face tells me she hates it.
Carol takes Molly's pack of smokes and her lighter.
We're hiding in a storage room next to the kill floor. It smells like gasoline. Maggie leaves the door cracked open so we can see into the hallway.
"I think I might have killed eighteen people," Carol whispers to us. She glances at the blood on her sleeve. "Nineteen," she corrects herself, scratching at the stain.
I look up at her, my eyes stinging from the gas in the air. She keeps talking.
"I should've killed Donnie, too, in the woods. I had a clear shot. I didn't miss. None of this would've happened if I had just killed him." Carol's voice breaks.
"Don't think about it," Maggie says coldly.
"I can't stop..."
"We're almost done."
I'm listening to them both closely.
Then I hear footsteps. Lots of them.
Maggie pushes the door until it's almost shut. The reinforcing Saviors pass by. Four or five of them. They stop in the room we doused.
"Careful," one of them warns. "The floor's slick."
Carol sticks one of Molly's cigarettes between her lips.
"You sure this is it?" Another asks.
"She said kill floor."
Carol stares at us. Lighting the smoke using that golden lighter with the skull on it.
"Hey, this one's locked!"
Carol yanks open the closet door and steps out into the hallway behind the Saviors. She pushes the sliding door closed on them.
Maggie and I help her.
Carol drops the cigarette in before the door clicks shut.
The room ignites. A bright flickering glare comes through the small glass window in the heavy, metal door. The people inside scream as they burn. As they burn like Karen burned. The way she went out. Only I'm a part of it this time. It's me. Smoke fills my lungs as it leeks beneath the door and rushes down the hall. It smells like the Prison. Like Terminus. Like Wiltshire. Like Alexandria. It smells like this world. Smoke and fire and burning screams.
Maggie pulls us away.
It takes us a long time to find the stairwell in this maze.
My chest keeps making a scraping sound as we walk. Carol stays with me while I rest at the top of the stairwell. Maggie takes my gun gently and goes down the stairs to search for the exit.
The two of us sit on the steps together. Carol lights up another cigarette. The stick is stained in red. After taking a long drag and staring at me the whole time, she offers it to me. I accept with a shaking hand. I'm not sure if it's how they're meant to taste but It tastes like blood.
Carol watches me cough up the smoke, my lungs hurting as much as the rest of me. I thought once that my first time smoking would have been at a party, drunk and too lightheaded to know what I'm really doing. Maybe with Carl and Mikey and Enid and Ron. Instead, I'm sitting with Carol on the stairwell of a slaughterhouse, covered in blood and bruises, painfully aware of what I'm doing. What I've done.
"I'm sorry," Carol whispers.
I look at her, and she's crying.
I'm crying, too.
"I'm sorry I made you do that..."
"You d- did what you had- had to," I croak. I try to take another puff, but my lips are trembling, and I can't breathe in.
Carol sobs like I've never seen and I offer her back the cigarette.
"Was Karen the first person you killed?" I ask.
"No," Carol sniffs, taking the smoke back and wiping her eyes. "Ryan... Lizzie and Mika's dad. I put him down after he got bit." She pauses. "It happened the same day you arrived at the Prison." Carol inhales smoke. "I didn't really know him," she tells me on the exhale.
"Karen was the first person that you knew?"
Carol nods.
I nod.
"Paula was the first person that I knew," I say.
"You didn't."
It hurts to speak, but I make sure that I do.
"Her name was Paula," I say. "She was a secretary and her boss was an asshole... she liked reading inspirational emails and she hated making coffee. She had four daughters." I pause. "I knew her better than anyone else I've killed."
Carol doesn't say anything.
She hands me back the cigarette.
Then she tells me something.
"It won't stop eating at you. You'll always remember, even though you had to do it. It won't stop."
"Maybe it shouldn't."
Maggie gets back, telling us she found the exit. There's smoke flooding past our feet from the kill floor as she leads us down the stairs and past the slaughter room, past 'Chelle's gaping head and Paula's snapping teeth. Maggie puts Paula down for me... the walker that got her, too. She then grabs Paula's gun, loading it with what she found before and putting it into my hands. I try to whisper that I'm sorry to the twice dead woman on the spike, but Maggie pulls me along.
There's a door ahead. Light from the sun is coming through a window above.
Maggie and Carol slide the metal door open, a gun on the other side points at us. We point back. Then all the guns are lowered.
"Maggie?" Glenn speaks and his voice reverberates off the walls. They hold each other tight, 'Chelle's gun clattering to the floor.
Daryl grabs Carol by the shoulders. "We got your trail. You start a fire?"
Carol nods gently, mouthing something to him that I can't hear.
Gabriel rushes past me with the rifle I leant him sweeping the hallway. Abraham, too. Both of them say something that I miss. The room is spinning at me and my legs are shaking.
Daryl touches Carol's chin. "Hey, you good?"
She shakes her head, and he holds her so close that nothing is left in between them.
Then Rosita's rushing in, gun up.
When he spots me standing still and small, Rick holds me so tightly that I can't breathe.
"Rhys-" he pulls me in tighter, every muscle in my legs dropping at the support, fatigue hitting me like a train. Rick's holding me up, one hand on the back of my head, his other rubbing circles on my back. He whispers into my only ear. "You're safe now."
I nod even though I don't believe him. It hurts so much but I can't speak to tell him.
I can hear Maggie explaining to Glenn.
"They're dead. They're all dead, the ones that took us. They're all dead."
Over Rick's shoulder, I see Glenn holding her face.
"Hey, are you okay?"
"I just... I can't anymore," she cries.
They're holding each other again.
Rick lets go of me, Rosita quick enough to catch me before I hit the ground. She ducks under my arm and leads me from the burning building.
I can hear Rick talking to Primo.
"Your friends are dead. No one's coming for you. So you might as well talk."
"Let him burn," Daryl grunts.
"I'm gonna ask you one last time..." Rick growls. "How'd you get the bike?"
"We found it..."
"Like hell you did!" Daryl barks at him.
"We found it," Primo says louder.
"Was Negan in that building last night, or was he here," Rick asks.
"Both," Primo answers. "I'm Negan, shithead. There's a whole world of fun that we can talk about, so let's have a chat."
Rosita pulls me further away from the building, but not before I hear Rick speak.
"I'm sorry it had to come to this."
I flinch as a gunshot rings out.
Rosita cleans me up quietly and gently with a damp cloth inside the RV's bedroom. She leaves me to try and sleep when she's done. But I can't sleep because my eyes sting from the smoke and my head's bleeding and my nose is throbbing.
I hear the door to the RV bedroom open.
I recognise the footsteps of Sasha as she quietly sits on the bed beside my head.
She puts Tyreese's hammer on the table beside the bed. I can't look at it. I look at my hands instead. The blood coating them is thick.
Sasha knows I'm awake because my eyes are wide open.
She gently slips her hand under my head, lifting it thoughtfully and placing it on her lap, stroking my tangled hair with her hand.
Her knees are warm and I cry into them. Sasha shushes me.
"I know, baby."