I woke the next morning with an arm draped over my shoulder. Luckily my nightmare hadn't woken the person beside me.
Isaac had turned onto his stomach, facing me in the middle of the night as his arm rested over my own closest to him. His fingers curled over the curve of my shoulder like he needed to be touching something, to remind himself he wasn't alone in such a vulnerable state.
I wanted to reach out, brush his curly hair away from his eyes, grown since the first time we'd met, but I kept my hands to myself—I couldn't wake him right now. Instead, I snuck out from under his arm and gently slid down the bed without waking him. I went to my chest of drawers first, grabbing some denim shorts and a baggier shirt than I would typically wear, easier to hide something, conceal it—
Rick told me to keep my gun on me today.
Once my outfit was picked out, I turned back to the bed, to Isaac. He had not seen the handle of the gun peeking out from the mattress, partially hidden by the bedside table. I needed to retrieve it without waking him.
Isaac would hate me for this.
He wanted us to live in this community, he wanted us to make this work—I didn't know how to make it work. Everything that happened since I arrived had pushed me further and further away from how everyone else had been seeing this place up until this point until the dream was a blur and I was left standing on all the reasons we should have been in charge.
Maybe his mind had changed on the people here, maybe after last night Isaac was beginning to see how unfit this group was. But he would never land on the idea that we would take over instead, his mind wouldn't even get that close.
I knelt beside the mattress, clothes balancing across my thigh as I reached for the handle. Isaac shifted as I lifted the mattress mere millimetres giving me enough space to pull the silver metal free from under my bed.
As fast as I had pulled it free, I hit it beneath my clothes and lifted them into my arms. I needed to change, to get out and leave Isaac to sleep. I grabbed my shoes and placed them on top of the clothes on the way out of my room and closed the door behind me.
My dirty clothes were thrown lazily into the basket as I left the bathroom, I would get back to them later. I told Rick that I would work with Pete, and keep him distracted from Jessie and his kids while I learnt medicine. And my head was all over the place for it.
I grabbed a quick meal before heading out the door. I knew I had to find Abraham before I went to talk to Pete. I'm pretty sure they were going to the construction site again that day and I needed to let him know that I couldn't join him, at least for the foreseeable future.
Abraham was on the sofa of his own house, lounging around on his own as I walked in. I gave him a quick greeting as he stood up, but I just stopped in the door. I didn't have the time for this to last too long, or at least, I didn't think I had any time.
"Hey, kid," he said with a smile. "Are you ready to head over to the construction site?"
I reached for the back of my neck, my nails pushing into the skin to calm my nerves. "No, I just came to tell you that I'm going to start working with Pete. I'm not sure for how long yet, it's just something I wanted to try."
I felt too jittery—I was going to give this away. Was it even a problem if I did?
Abraham nodded agreeably, pursing his lips. "Rosita works with him, she says that's okay."
"Yeah, I just think it'd be useful," I shrugged.
"No problem, see you later kid," he said and walked past me out the door.
"Yeah, bye."
He walked ahead of me, taking the turn right down to the front gate ahead of me, something we probably would have done together had I not needed to do this. It was just so annoying, there was someone in charge that actually trusted me to do the work down there and now I couldn't even go.
Before I could follow him, or at least walk over to Pete's house, Isaac called out from my porch, "Ace!"
"Hey," I stopped to greet him as he came down the stairs.
He jogged over and stopped before me. "Sorry, I just woke up and couldn't find you in the house. I thought you left for work or something and I wanted to say goodbye."
"I'm not going to the construction site today," I told him. "I was heading over to talk to Pete, see if there's anything he can teach me."
Isaac frowned. "I thought you didn't want to do that?"
"I didn't, I've just been thinking and it seems like it can be useful," I lied, well, partially.
He didn't seem convinced, though. Even as he nodded, I could see the frown on his features, "Okay. Well, if you're going to be around here for the day maybe we can hang out when you're done."
"Yeah, I'll see what we end up doing and get back to you," I nodded.
Isaac turned into his own house, saying goodbye and that he had to change his clothes, which was when I took my chance to slip away and walk over to where Jessie and Pete lived. I hoped I had the right house, I was just going to the one where I'd seen Carl before with his friend Ron.
As I reached the crossroads, Carol intercepted my path, coming back from someone I'd seen her talking to down the street. "Rick told me what you're doing."
Well, hello to you, too. I merely nodded and hummed.
"Got your gun?" she asked.
"I do, but I don't see the point in having it," I told her. "He's not just going to try and kill me the second I walk in there."
I hoped.
"No, but he will start getting suspicious. How are you going to fill all that time for days on end?" Carol asked.
"It can take up to seven years to get a medical degree," I said.
"This isn't going to work," was her answer.
"Don't you think I know that?" I exclaimed, stopping and turning to face her. "Don't you think I told Rick that when he asked me to do it? I told him the same thing you did, that if this mattered to him so much then he should just end it."
"It's better to have the gun on you if you're going to do this, just in case," Carol said.
"I do," I repeated, not hiding the annoyance in my voice.
Carol nodded and walked past me when I was finally able to walk up the stairs of the porch where Jessie and Pete lived. I waited for Carol to be gone before I knocked on the door, knowing it would seem a little weird if she had just been watching from down the street.
Jessie was the one to answer the door. "Hey, Ace."
"Hi, is Pete in?" I asked.
She frowned, tilting her head a little, but nodded. "Yeah, I'll get him for you. Come inside."
I followed Jessie into the main room and stopped as she walked further into the house to find Pete. I crossed my arms and looked around. Everything was completely normal—I don't know what I expected to see, but there didn't look to be anything wrong. No broken items or holes in the walls.
There wasn't a lot of time to think about it before Jessie came back into the room with Pete on her heels. "Hey, something you want?"
"I was just wondering if your offer is still good to teach me medicine?" I asked.
Pete raised a brow. "I can, but I thought you didn't want to learn anymore."
"I know, I've just been thinking about it and I think it'd be stupid to pass it up," I said, hoping the excuse would be enough to sway him. Jessie gave a small smile, telling me it had worked on her at least, and she turned her eyes to Pete.
Pete gave a nod and a smile that made my stomach churn. "You are right about that. Come on, we'll have a little chat, see where I should start you."
What bothered me was how normal he sounded. It was not obvious that he was abusive, maybe why it had been flying under the radar for so long, because he masked whatever his true nature was when other people were around. Even Jessie acted like everything was fine like he wasn't hurting her when they were alone.
I gave her a small smile as I followed Pete into the next room. "I still have some books that you can use, though some of them are still down at the infirmary."
"That's okay," I shrugged.
"So, I assume you don't have any experience already?" He asked, and I stared at him, confused. "That was a joke."
"Oh," I realised and cringed. "Sorry. I had the chance—to learn some stuff. Maggie's dad was a veterinarian, and he offered to teach me a few things, I just never had the time."
"I get that," he said with a tilt of his head as he began looking through his supplies.
"I think probably one of the most important things you'd need to learn right now is stitches," he said and pulled out little blocks of what looked like nude-coloured rubber. "I mean, it's all important, checking for symptoms like concussion or dehydration, but injuries are far less subtle than they used to be."
I nodded. "Yeah, I guess."
"You have some time today?" He asked, rifling through the door.
"Yeah, I do."
And every other day.
While staying here and distracting him was my main focus, there had been many scenarios where learning stitches could have helped us, I realised. And there would probably be many more situations in the future where I or someone else could be hurt and would need stitches.
"Okay," he said. "We'll start with that. Afterwards, I'll take some time and look through my books and we'll go over some theory. I have a basic idea of what you might need to learn from what I've been showing Rosita anyway, so hopefully, we'll just get you caught up to where she is and I'll teach you both from there."
Pete placed some needles and thread down on the table. "Shall we start?"
I was no good at stitches, so bad that no person should ever let me near them with a needle in my hand. Cringing, I tied the knot at the end and cut the thread as Pete had done so much faster—someone would bleed out before I could stitch them up.
Although I wasn't here for this, whether I came out of this experience with more or less knowledge than I had before was not the most important thing, it was still disheartening to see how different my work was from what it was supposed to be.
We had been working on it for a few hours, and in that time I couldn't stop Pete from stepping out a few times because he had to go to the infirmary to check in on Tara and stopping him would have just made me look more suspicious.
When he returned, he inspected my work. "Well . . . it's getting better."
"That's awful," I said, my eyes flicking between his attempt and my own.
"Well, it is your first time doing this," Pete gave a bored smile as leaned back in his chair. He looked up at the clock and when his eyes returned to me, he tilted his head to the side. "Maybe we should break for the day."
"No, please," I tried immediately. "I want to learn."
"If you'd like, you can take it home and practise some more yourself," he offered.
I shook my head. "No, because I don't know what I'm doing wrong so if I take it home I'm just going to teach myself to make more of . . . this."
"Why the sudden change of heart?" Pete asked in a tone I could only now see as menacing.
Maybe he was done sitting here with me, while nothing he tried teaching me seemed to get any better. I wasn't sure how Rick expected me to keep his attention for hours on end days at a time, but I had to if he needed the time to think about how we were going to deal with him.
"I've just been thinking about the offer," I said. "I got hurt a lot from being on the road and the war . . ." I trailed off for a moment, thinking of good excuses. "I just think I should know how to take care of myself if I'm ever in that kind of situation again."
"Well, I doubt you ever will be in that kind of situation but . . . accidents happen," he went quiet for a second, and added, "being on the run group."
"I'm more likely to get hurt in construction," I admitted.
"Well, stitches are a must then," he agreed. "And potentially a tetanus shot."
"No, I had one when a saw broke in my dad's garage and cut down the back of my arm," I said, twisting my elbow to show off the scar. "Probably have a good six, seven years left before I need one of those."
Pete only laughed in response after inspecting the wound. "Just the stitches then—cut it and try again."
Pete also redid his stitches, probably just needing something to pass the time while I completely failed over and over again. I was supposed to be good at working with my hands, I don't know what the hell this was.
Some voices distracted me from the practice, and I couldn't stop myself from reacting before Pete too heard them talking.
"All you have to do is say yes—"
"Would you do this for someone else?" Jessie's voice cut through. "Would you do this for anyone?"
Pete perked up a little, looking over his shoulder to the door. I'd heard it too—Jessie speaking with a muffled voice that I couldn't quite make out. But I prayed it wasn't who I thought it was, messing up what he'd made me come here to do.
"Who the hell is she talking to?" Pete muttered as he stood up.
"Wait," I tried to stop him but he was already out of my reach, "Pete."
I chased him out to their main room when I saw who she was talking to, and it was just as I feared as Rick shook his head to answer her question. "No. No."
Jessie had tears in her eyes as she nodded.
"Rick," Pete called, getting his attention. Rick met eyes with me and I tilted my head at him, a way to ask, what the hell are you doing? He'd asked me to do this and then came here anyway. "What are you doing here?"
"Pete," Jessie said.
"What are you doing here?" He repeated.
"Listen to me," she tried again.
"I'm gonna have to ask you to leave, Rick," he looked back over his shoulder and pointed at me. "You too, get out."
"No," Jessie said.
Pete turned quiet for a second but smiled manically. "Excuse me?"
"You need to leave," she said.
"What are you talking about?" Pete stalked towards her, and I stepped forward, my hand on my knife.
"Just go, Pete."
"What have you been saying to each other?" He tilted his head, standing so tall over her. "Huh?! What have you been doing?!"
"Pete, you and me are gonna leave now," Rick said the second he yelled.
Pete looked over Jessie's shoulder. "You come into my house . . ."
"Pete, you and me are leaving," Rick shifted his weight on his feet.
"You're leaving right now," Pete said who was now standing in front of him. "You think you're the law? You actually think you have a say in anything here?"
"Step back," Rick warned him.
"Who the hell do you think you are?"
"Someone who's trying not to kill you!" Rick snapped.
Pete threw the first punch, but Rick's landed on his shoulder. It didn't matter though, because Pete managed to get another off hitting Rick across the face.
"No!" Jessie yelled.
"You wanna stop now!" Rick tried again.
Pete grabbed Rick and shoved him across the room and back into a wall, before punching him in the ribs. I wanted to step in but I didn't know if Rick would have wanted me to, whether Jessie even agreed to whatever Rick had planned or if he just came in.
"Come into my house?!"
"Pete, stop it! Jessie cried.
He knocked Rick's head back against the wall. "It's my house!"
"Pete, stop it!"
Rick managed to gain the upper hand, pushing Pete back as they both screamed out and they threw each other over the sofa.
"Rick!" I yelled.
I wanted him to say anything, tell me something that would let me know what I needed to do. But they just kept fighting, hitting each other once they got to their feet. When Rick lost his footing, Pete took his chance and threw Rick through the window and went over with him.
I sprinted down the porch after them as a crowd began to form around Rick and Pete, who fought bloody in the middle of the street. Rick was on top, and punched him before trying to dig his thumbs down into his eyes.
Looking back over my shoulder to Carol, who was holding Sam behind her back. She gave me a look, but I still didn't know what I was supposed to do.
When I looked back, Pete had managed to get on top, rolling them over and holding Rick down. Jessie ran over to them and tried to pull him off. "No! Stop it!"
Pete threw his arm back and struck her in the face, knocking Jessie to the ground and Rosita rushed to help her. Rick managed to use that time to get the upper hand and flipped them back over, and Pete tried pushing at his shoulder to get away.
Carl ran towards them and tried to grab Rick, but he couldn't step in just yet, Rick wasn't thinking straight. "Dad, get off!"
Rick pushed Carl away, which was when I sprinted forward, lifting him to his feet after he fell over. Carl looked between me and his dad, like he wanted to step into the fight, but Carl had no chance in a fight like this. I had no chance in a fight like this, but I'd step in if it meant Carl didn't get hurt.
"Stay back!" I raised my hand to him and waved him away. "You're just going to get hurt!"
Instead of moving back to join him, I stayed where I was, watching the fight. Rick seemed to have it just fine at that moment, and so I left them. I stepped in as Pete managed to get off a punch and shove Rick over, getting the upper hand. He quickly flipped so his hands were wrapped around Rick's throat instead, squeezing hard. A gasp emanated from the group, but not because of the fight.
Because of me.
Because of the gun in my hand.
"Get your hands off of him," I said, placing the gun against his head. "Don't make me ask you again."
"Ace!" Martinez yelled.
There were more murmurs from the crowd, terrified as they asked: She has a gun? Where did she get a gun? I ignored the comments and questions and focused on Pete, who slowly began to obey me, his hands releasing Rick as he raised them in defence.
Rick took this chance, the loosening of Pete's grip as he tried to keep his life, and flipped them over. His arm came around his neck as Rick was now behind Pete, them both lying on the ground as Rick tried to choke Pete out instead.
We had to kill him, even if it ended there, this had to happen.
But I could see the fear in their eyes as they looked at us—at me, at Rick. People used to walk around the prison with guns on them, but this was the first time anyone here had seen one being used inside the walls, being used to threaten one of their own.
"Stop it! Stop it, right now!" Deanna ordered as she ran over to us. Her eyes then landed on me, flickering down to the gun in my hands—not my gun, but one of theirs. "Where did you get that? Put it down!"
She couldn't keep her attention on me though, as Rick whispered to Pete. "You touch them again, and I'll kill you."
"Dammit, Rick!" Deanna yelled. "I said stop."
"Or what?" Rick pushed himself to his knees as Tobin and Nicholas stepped forward, to us. They didn't make a step before Rick pulled out his gun and aimed it at Tobin, and Nicholas shot a step backwards. "You gonna kick me out?!"
Rick was covered in blood, his head swinging wildly back and forth as he then turned the aim to Deanna, who raised her hands in defence. He wasn't himself, different. Sure, I had my gun out, to stop Pete from killing Rick. But this? Maybe this was the plan, but it couldn't happen like this, not with Rick's mind somewhere else.
"Rick," I whispered.
"Put that gun down, Rick," Deanna tried.
Rick didn't listen to her, keeping his gun raised. I watched Glenn step to Nicholas and Tobin, telling them something before they stepped away. Rick was panting, staring at them as he shook his head, staring at them.
"You still don't get it," only then Rick lowered the gun, not because he was listening, but because it seemed like he couldn't focus on everything at once. "None of you do!" he swung his arm around and looked over his shoulder at the others.
As I looked at him, Hershel spoke in my head. Can you tell me, in those moments, Rick was acting in his right mind?
No.
Because this was different than last time. Because last time I was willing to jump in front of the gun, because I knew he wasn't aiming it at anyone but just swinging it around. Today he had a gun aimed at real people. He was threatening them.
"We know what needs to be done and we do it. We're the ones who live," Rick said beside me, and I looked down at him. "You, you just sit and plan and hesitate. You pretend like you know but you don't! You wish things weren't what they are. Well, you wanna live, you want this place to stay standing? Your way of doing things is done."
I could hear the silent shots coming from the tower, Sasha with her gun as Rick told me the night before. But she wasn't here for this, because it wasn't supposed to happen like this. She had to be killing the walkers that were building up from all the noise.
"Things don't get better because you—you want them to," Rick told Deanna, stepping into conversations only had between them. "Starting right now, we have to live in the real world. We have to control who lives here."
He pointed his gun down at Pete as he said that.
"That has never been more clear to me than it is right now," Deanna agreed, and her eyes flickered to me again, the gun in my hands, before staring hard at Rick.
Rick turned back to look at her, a wicked smile on his face. "Me? Me?" he let out a breathy laugh. "You—you mean me?"
"Awful big of you, siding with an abuser," I snapped. Even though I could see why she'd be worried about Rick, maybe even me, she'd done nothing to prove that she wanted to help her own people from what Pete was doing to them.
"Your way is going to destroy this place," Rick told her. "It's going to get people killed—it's already gotten people killed." Gotten our people killed. "And I'm not just gonna stand by and let it happen. If you don't fight, you die. And I'm not gonna stand by and—"
Before he could finish his sentence, Michonne hit him in the back of his head, and Rick fell to the ground unconscious, and he dropped his gun. She leant down and picked it up off the ground, breathing heavily a few times, before her eyes turned to me, and she held out her hand.
"Give it to me," she said. "Now."
I handed Michonne the gun.
There was murmuring from the crowds, about me, about what Rick had done. I pushed it all to the back of my mind, knowing that I may have to come up with some lies to get out of this, that I would have to lie to all of them so we still had the upper hand. If Rick gave away our tactic, did we still want guns as our upper hand?
"Where did you get the guns?" Deanna asked. "Did Rick give one to you?"
I clenched my teeth, looking over my shoulder to my people—to Carol. She nodded her head forward to me as if to declare you know what to say. My eyes trailed to the ground in front of me, and I held my tongue for a moment.
"I took them myself."
Her eyebrows shot up as she asked, "Why?"
That was the time to keep my mouth clamped shut because I wouldn't risk saying anything in that moment that could make it seem better or worse for either one of us. Me or Rick. There were stares, and I avoided everyone's gaze as I completely ignored the question and prayed that would be enough.
When she realised I wasn't going to answer, she turned around to talk to her husband and son, as if to decide what to do. What they had to do was kill Pete, but I wasn't going to tell them that, if they didn't learn it from Rick then they weren't going to listen to me.
"What are we going to do?" I heard the faintest mumbles as she discussed it with Reg and Spencer. "I don't know that I can let him walk around right now."
"And Pete?"
"Let's deal with Rick for now," she answered.
My jaw set, and I wanted desperately to scream at them to deal with the real issue, not someone who lashed out because they had been on the road for so long. But my eyes met with Martinez who had his arms crossed, and he shook his head at me, telling me don't you dare.
Finally, she turned and addressed the crowd. "We need to put him somewhere, let him think about what he's done."
Michonne nodded. "Okay."
"Her too!" Pete got out, waving an arm at me. "She put that thing to my head!"
I snapped, marching forward. "Go fuck yourself, you were going to kill him—!"
Martinez was in front of me in an instant, pointing in my face. "Shut the hell up, do you hear me? Stop running your mouth, you're in deep enough shit as it is."
Fuck this.
I had my gun out only when someone was going to die, and I certainly didn't threaten a whole group of people in my stead. Pete, however, did try to kill someone in broad daylight. And I didn't want to throw Rick under the bus but he waved a gun at people who weren't involved in this.
"Just do what she says," Michonne told me, her tone quiet but chilling.
Clenching my teeth, my eyes trailed off to the side in silent agreement, and Deanna said, "Hand over your weapons."
I hesitated for a second, my eyes on Martinez and Michonne who told me to do what she said in their eyes. When I realised there was no way out of it, I sighed and reached for the clip of my holster that fell away from my hips, though, instead of giving it to Deanna, who had her hand outstretched, I gave it to Michonne, who reluctantly took my holster from me and held it in her own hands.
"It'll be in your house for you tomorrow," Deanna said.
"Where do you want to put them?" Michonne asked.
"The basement of my house was under renovation when all this began," Deanna said. "It isn't exactly a cell," I didn't deserve a cell, "but it would do for the night. I'll get Rosita to come and tend to his wounds."
Michonne nodded. "Okay."
"I'd like to talk to you more about the guns," Deanna said.
I stared up at her, offering a look that told her that I would not be partaking in that conversation even if she made me sit in front of the camera again.
"No?"
Again, I held my tongue.
Deanna then turned back to Michonne. "We'll get two mattresses for them from one of the apartments."
"We'll deal with it."
And they did that. Martinez helped Michonne carry Rick to the basement with me on their trail, and while Rosita was looking Rick over and cleaning out the glass from his wounds, they brought down two mattresses.
"I'll be back," Michonne said. "Gonna put your holster in your room."
I just hummed and sat down on the mattress.
As the door closed behind her, Martinez helped Rosita lift Rick onto the mattress so she could keep working on him. Once he'd done that he was pacing around the room, looking at me like he wanted to scream and yell, but he managed to keep it inside for a while.
"You gonna talk about all this now or when you can work out what your story is?" Martinez snapped.
"I took the guns," I repeated.
I wasn't sure if he even wanted to know whether he would pass that information along to Deanna as a way of talking me up and protecting me from the brunt of the consequences I would receive from what I'd done.
"You aimed it at someone," he said.
"Because that's a shock," I muttered.
"He's all cleaned up," Rosita stood and looked at me. "Are you gonna be alright in here? Need anything else?"
"Fair punishment would do," I said, but at the look I got from Martinez I just rolled my eyes and leaned my head on the wall.
Martinez waved his hand dismissively. "I can't fucking do this, I'm going back to the infirmary. I'm not going to stand here and watch you fuck this up for yourself."
"Little late for that isn't it?" I asked.
Martinez didn't answer, spinning on his balls to walk out of the door before he could say anything else. Rosita just followed him out, giving me a small smile as she closed the door. The room fell dark, with enough light coming through the blocked-up window that I could still see everything.
I looked over at Rick, trying to hold in all my anger. I was dealing with the situation and he just came into their house anyway. If he wanted to kill him, he should have just gone ahead and done it. We couldn't have locked Pete up.
There were maybe five minutes of darkness before the door opened again and Michonne entered the room. Michonne pulled in a chair and sat down. She stared at me for the longest, maybe waiting for me to say something. I didn't have anything to say to her, because that would be explaining what happened or why we had the guns and I didn't know if she was supposed to know. "Was this his plan?"
"I don't want to talk about it," I mumbled.
She tilted her head and watched me for a moment, before asking, "When did you stop telling me things?"
More silence followed.
