(As Yet Untitled)

by DomWeasel

Watching the series again back in late 2022, I was reminded how much Sophia's arc in the TV show depressed me. Thought about it for several months and then rewrote season 2 with an original character to have some fun and take a break from another project, and to create a timeline where Sophia may or may not live as long as her comic counterpart. I don't know, I haven't finished yet

16. Peace

The Field was overrun. The battle, such as it was, had drawn a large number of walkers into the area around the prison although as Glenn and Maggie had spent the day out of their sight, the herd that had shown up had scattered. They were thick out there but not in a solid mass and some were even wandering off. In an unexpected way, the prison klaxons could be used to defend the place against the living by drawing in the dead. Of course then the problem would be getting rid of the dead. As we were for the moment holding our breath, there wasn't enough activity in the Yard to rile up those dead.

There was nothing proactive to do at the moment. The dead provided an outer layer of defence so we couldn't clear them. We couldn't leave to go on supply runs when we could be attacked again. Daryl and Merle were out there again, keeping watch and ready to race back if there was any sign of approaching trouble. All we could do was wait, rest and heal. We could wait and heal at least; everyone was too tense to rest.

I spent the hours lying on my bunk, clutching my talisman of finger bones and trying to keep my mind clear. This took a lot of conscious effort so it burned some energy but I wasn't sleeping in any kind of meaningful way; a couple of hours here and there that stopped me going insane but meant I swung between restlessness and exhaustion almost between footsteps. Something I shared with our leader. He had reverted to his cold twitchy self from the winter.

Between the attack and the arrival of a single vehicle with a conspicuously freshly painted white hood, only four days passed but they were agonisingly long days. Closer to four weeks. The car came in slowly, negotiating around the spike strips in the long grass and passing the stricken Humvee that had been left behind. The walkers in the Field swarmed to it and the driver stopped at the gates.

Daryl and Merle closed the gates at the entrance in the Field and then held their own in the Sterile Zone as we dealt with the walkers up at the Yard Gate. When a sufficient number had been downed, the Dixon brothers came through and then very efficiently took down the remaining creatures attacking the vehicle. No one said anything. It was all silently communicated that Daryl and Merle had intercepted the lone driver and escorted them in and that they considered there was no danger out there.

The driver was a woman I knew by vague sight. She had wavy hair and a worried face and I realised it was deliberate; she didn't look threatening. At all. She was armed only with a .38 like I had been trained with and I thought she looked more frightened now faced with us than she had been outside with walkers swarming and beating on the car's windows trying to get at her. There were no other firearms in the car and Rick searched it thoroughly to be sure and I couldn't believe someone would go out into the open armed with just one little revolver willingly. All she had on her besides the gun was a little map of the area.

Still nothing was said as she was escorted into the cell block, leaving Glenn and Maggie to keep watch. I observed her and she had been here during the attack and she was astonished by the difference between the seemingly abandoned space she had seen and what it looked like now that we had moved back in. Her eyes flitted around not because she was taking notes but because she was trying to understand that people really did live here and had made it somewhat comfortable.

She was sat down at one of the tables and Rick sat opposite her while Andrea with her stitched face took her left and Tyreese, mountain of a man that he was, sat on her right. Then there was myself, Daryl, Merle and Michonne with only Hershel providing a friendly face.

"She's got a message." Daryl said, speaking for the first time.

"And you let her come here?"

"Said it was for you. She got orders." Daryl shrugged and Merle scoffed which meant he would have never let her through while Michonne bristled at his tone. This was the closest those two had been to each other since Woodbury.

"What's the message then?" Rick addressed her now.

She wasn't happy about any of this but she had a job to do. "They want to talk." She said. "Somewhere out in the open far from our homes." She reached out, for the map that Rick had confiscated from her and he let her have it. "Here." She pointed at a spot which didn't seem to have any kind of significance. "Two days from now at midday."

"Who's they?"

"Martinez. Milton. Milton more than Martinez. They want to talk to you and they want to do it there and they'll bring two other people and so can you, I mean you can bring three people so there's four of you." She squirmed under all the hard stares and then her patience snapped. "Look, I don't want to be here! Once was enough! But they needed a volunteer and I figured as I put a bullet in the Governor that you could trust me so quit looking at me like I'm gonna try and bite you."

Merle laughed dryly which didn't ease any tension. Rick however almost seemed impressed. "You shot at the Governor?"

"He killed a child." She took a deep breath that rattled in her throat.

"She ain't dead." Rick said and her relief lit up her face. "Not yet anyway." Rick continued, deliberately toying with her emotions. Mine too.

"Why do they want to talk?" Andrea asked.

"Why d'you think?" The woman replied and I liked her attitude. "There's a lot to talk about, ain't there?"

Rick grunted so Andrea asked the obvious question. "How do we know this isn't a trap?"

"Because Martinez said you would think it was a trap and you would be stupid to think it couldn't be a trap. So you'll do what you have to make sure it ain't a trap." It was hard to tell if this babble was rehearsed or if she was just as tired as we were. This was harder for the people of Woodbury because they had been far more comfortable than we had and they were having to deal with the reality that life wasn't as easy as they had been pretending.

"She's got a point." Rick said and I thought he was being unexpectedly friendly. Perhaps it was because she was a woman and so far everyone he had dealt with from Woodbury had been male. So my suspicion she was the messenger because she was unthreatening seemed to be correct. "What's your name?"

"Karen."

Rick made the introductions, finishing with myself and Merle for effect and everyone thought he was being oddly friendly. "So, Karen… What do you think they want to talk about?"

She couldn't even be bothered to reply. Rick was suspicious and she wasn't going to indulge him. She would say nothing more and Rick knew she didn't know anything. That was the whole point of sending her. He let her go and Daryl and Merle escorted her and her car away and she probably felt safer with them than without.

"It's a trap." Andrea didn't hesitate.

"Maybe."

"Maybe?" Andrea folded her arms. "After everything that's happened, you think they just want to sit down and talk things out? If that was going to happen-"

"I talked to the Governor, remember?" He thought about that meeting for a moment and his eyes darkened. "He wanted us dead from the beginning. That was always his intention. But this Milton… He seems reasonable."

"When he was negotiating for hostages, sure." Andrea agreed. "What about this other one?" She looked at me for an answer rather than Merle.

"He's like you." I said and her expression told me to explain quickly if I wanted to keep my teeth. "He wants to keep his town safe. He wants to look strong and for people to know he doesn't take any shit." It was a dig at her and her attitude but it was also true. "He was more suspicious of me than the Governor. And he let Merle pass with… He let Merle pass." The reminder of what he had done seemed to embarrass Merle.

"That's what it comes down to." Rick declared. "I told them we weren't interested in killing them and it was all on him. I told them we came for Sophia, and he shot her. In front of all those witnesses. No matter what came next, that's got to have changed things."

"I'd like to believe that." Andrea replied. "But since when has anything made sense? Do you see any logic around here or out there?"

"If there's a chance that this can be over, I say we take it." Hershel spoke now. "Now the Governor's dead, what's the point in fighting anymore? For any of us?"

"They killed us and we killed them." Andrea reminded him. "At this point…" She stopped herself. She didn't need to explain it.

"I'm willing to hear them out." Rick said. "If what they want is to tell us we've got to pack our bags and leave, I'll tell them where they can go. If they want to tell us they're scared shitless and had enough…" He shook his head. "Whatever it is, the fact they want to talk is good. And they know we know it could be a trap, so we'll use our common sense. We'll check this place out first. Check it every day until we're supposed to be there. I'll bet you anything they'll do the same." It was enough to start placating Andrea but not Michonne. Tyreese meanwhile looked appalled and in many ways, he was struggling more with his brush with death than the people who had actually been shot. Hershel had been willing to go along with Rick all through the winter but his beard didn't hide the fact he wasn't comfortable with how ruthless Rick was being about this summer war.

It didn't matter though. Rick was in charge.

[][][][][][]

Rick could take three people with him to the meeting but he was seriously lacking in people to take. Allen, Axel and Oscar were completely out. Carol could not be dragged away with chains and a pickup. Tyreese was a rotten shot and I barely had any experience. Michonne and Merle were not diplomatic options for a meeting and Rick didn't trust them alone together. Sasha insisted she could do something despite her wound; she was right-handed after all. Tyreese tried to argue but she was stubborn.

So Michonne and Tyreese stayed behind to guard the prison while Daryl, Merle, Maggie and Glenn were the backup. For the meeting, Rick was taking Andrea, Sasha and me. He trusted himself and Andrea to take care of any immediate danger with Sasha able to help and me… I was here for another reason.

They had been over the location many times and found no surprises. They had encountered no one either but there had been evidence that others had been there; fallen walkers. That evidence suggested Woodbury wanted us to know they had been there to tell us they knew what we were thinking. It was a painful reminder that we weren't different. We were all people just trying to survive.

We arrived and disembarked and waited, and I was more concerned about walkers than people. Every time we were out in the open like this I was wary of walkers. They were the real danger. For all I knew someone had me in their scope right now but I wasn't concerned with that possibility. My missing fingers itched.

Sasha seemed to be regretting coming even before they arrived. Andrea and Rick made a point of looking unconcerned while I really was. I really couldn't care. There were many places we could have had this meeting. Comfortable places. I couldn't imagine that some random farm shed had been Milton's first choice so it had to have been Martinez's. He looked pissed. Pissed but restrained. Then he saw me and he was pleased and I saw why. Martinez and Milton had come with one grunt, and with Haley. For the same reason Rick had brought me. Martinez liked this because it proved that he could think like Rick.

"So what now?" Rick asked.

Milton answered. "I hope that we can have a civil conversation."

"Depends." Rick grunted. "Who we talking to?"

"I was hoping that you and I could sit down, and I also hoped you would bring… Him." He looked at me. "That's why we brought… Her. I believe we had the, uh, the same idea."

She was not impressed by any of this though that obviously didn't matter to Martinez or Milton. She looked quite prepared to shoot me.

"And us?" Andrea inquired, not liking being excluded.

"Milton knows what I think." Martinez spoke brusquely, just like her. "So they can talk and we can keep an eye on things." He gave Sasha a speculative look, obviously curious why Rick had brought two women along as his back-up. Sasha had concealed her injury well enough, though it would become obvious in an instant if a fight started.

"Okay then." Rick said in that manner that I knew meant he was ready to pluck his gun from his holster and lay waste to everybody if they gave him reason. Milton was armed but not in the same way. Rick's cannon and the pistol that Milton had pragmatically brought for protection from walkers could not be compared.

There was a table inside and I couldn't guess if it had already been there or they had found it and placed it here. There were four chairs and Milton and Rick sat at opposite ends, Rick letting Milton seat himself first, and then Haley and I were sat facing each other across the slimmer length. Rick was still wary of a trap but the way Milton had sat down quickly told me he wasn't similarly wary. Maybe he was optimistic. Maybe he was just naïve.

"Martinez tells me you swept the area before we arrived. He says you probably have a car nearby with reinforcements if they hear shooting so as you can imagine, we do as well." Milton spoke quickly. "I didn't want to do that but he insisted. I hope it won't be needed. I hope we can… Be civil." He used that word again and Rick didn't care for it, tilting his head and Milton might not have been familiar with this tic of his but he was smart enough to recognise it as a danger sign. "I think there's been enough killing."

Rick kept eying him. When he had seen Martinez, he had prepped himself to deal with that man and that aggressive fighter stepping back for this polite, bespectacled man in a jacket with duct-tape sleeves had thrown him. He was trying to understand him. The meek man from the Woodbury infirmary was not who he had expected to see again.

"I think the most logical thing for us to do for the moment is to set some clear boundaries. I believe we can agree the river is a, uh, natural boundary so I propose that Woodbury stays west of it while your group, your group stays east."

"I'm sorry… …What?" Rick asked.

"There is a huge amount of tension in Woodbury right now and I don't think anyone is, uh, that is to say…" Milton swallowed under Rick's baleful expression and glanced at me for reassurance. "The things Phillip did… No one wants to continue what he started but people are scared. And they're angry. I'm sure you have people of your own who feel the same way." He swallowed again as Rick showed no sign that he was ever going to speak. "I feel the best thing to do to avoid any further altercations is to use the natural border between us to keep our distance." He declared this very formally, with the last of his nerve.

Rick said nothing and gave no impression he was mulling it over either. He just sat there in his chair and I didn't think Milton realised that Rick had sat in a way that would make it easy for him to draw his weapon.

As Rick wasn't saying anything, Haley decided to fill the silence. "Who are you?" She asked me, as if they weren't there.

"Bas." I said. "A one-bit thief from Savannah."

"So that's true, is it?"

"The only lie I told you was that I was alone all winter."

"So that girl-"

"She was the one I took care of." I confirmed. "The one I "saved". She's been through a lot..."

Haley squirmed before continuing. "So you only told one lie?" It was much easier to talk about "us" than what had happened.

"I didn't need to make up anything else. It all just happened…" I decided to lay it all out and not just for her benefit but Milton's too. "We were making the prison a place we could live and one day this… Feral woman with a sword appeared at the fence. We took her in because she was shot, and then a few days later we were attacked. …We were going outside to clear some grass so we could make a garden and plant some crops and instead one of us took three rounds in the chest and me and that girl and another girl, we used his body as a shield to stay alive. They killed him, an old man, and a kid like us. That was our introduction to your town. And we needed to find things out so I volunteered. I went to Woodbury. …And then you came and talked to me." Summed up this way, the conflict sounded even pettier and everything I had been through in the past few weeks seemed trivial. That made it worse.

"And you weren't acting?"

"Who could act that dumb? Remember the arrow?" I asked and she couldn't help but smile. "Merle said you were gonna take me to a fight as a date."

"Merle's an asshole." She said, losing the smile.

"Yeah. You want him back?"

"You can keep him." She said and then glared at Rick. "That woman was going to kill me!" She spoke very deliberately but Rick didn't even look at her so she turned back to me. "I saw her in Woodbury! She went around glaring at everyone for a few days and then she was gone. And then she was trying to cut my fucking head off! Who is she?!"

"We don't know. Just… Someone."

"And she started all of this!"

"No." Milton spoke now. "She didn't. Phillip liked her sword, and he didn't like giving it back when she insisted on leaving. He really thought that someone with her talents could be useful to us and so when she left… You know. She didn't start this. Phillip did." He kept using his actual name rather than the title. I took a moment to wonder if it was to try and humanise him to us or because Milton was trying to figure out when his friend had changed. When he had become unrecognisable as Phillip and the Governor had been all that was left.

"Because he wanted a sword?" Haley demanded.

"Because he wanted control." Milton sighed and then pinched the bridge of his nose before speaking again. "Because Penny died, so he tried to control everything because if he had controlled everything before… It wouldn't have happened. At least, that's what I think he believed. I don't know… Maybe it was one thing or maybe it was everything together." This meeting was not going the way he had wanted it to. "But he's dead now and we have to move on. We all have to move on."

Haley glared at me. "She tried to kill me."

"She tried to kill me." I said. "Tried to kill him too." I jerked my head at Rick. "And Merle."

"And this is why we need boundaries. This is why we need to keep our peoples separate." Milton spoke quickly. "A cooling off period. Maybe later we can establish some kind of positive relationship but for the moment I believe the best course of action is for us to take care of our own and stay out of each other's way. Enough people have died for nothing." Now he spoke imploringly. "Martinez is ready to fight on and I don't doubt he can make life miserable for you. Just as you can make it miserable for us. But the only thing conflict will lead to is mutual destruction." He sighed. "We can't all have survived this long with the dead walking just to be killed by the living!"

It wasn't spoken with the eloquence of the Governor but it was heartfelt. Milton knew what issues Woodbury had more than anyone and how fragile the existence of the town really was. The strength of Woodbury's walls meant little when they couldn't secure their food and water supply. It was the same at the prison.

Rick stirred. "You're just willing to let bygones be bygones?"

"I am. I won't insult you by pretending others don't feel differently. I know you have people who are just as angry. Martinez is more cynical than me, but he knows now that we can't win a war outright. Not without it costing too much. He's willing to accept de-escalation. And wants me to tell you that if you do try to continue this; you'll regret it. I'm sure you have similar threats you want me to relay to him." Milton sounded tired now. The same as me. Rick too, though he was unwilling to show it but apparently oblivious to how he looked anyway. His eyes were shadowed and his stubble had become a beard. Milton had the same tired eyes but was otherwise far more presentable though he looked dreadful compared to the man I had first met.

Rick shifted in his seat and I could say nothing. He was suspicious and who could blame him? But this wasn't like the last time, when he had met the Governor on the road. "So you're in charge of Woodbury now?"

"People are looking to me, and Martinez. I don't pretend to be a man of action and Martinez would prefer not to have the whole burden of the town on his shoulders. For the moment, we're… Cooperating." Obviously that cooperation was difficult though it would have been far worse if it had been Merle he was trying to work with. "If this meeting has a positive outcome, we intend to make a more permanent arrangement, based on what the people wish."

Rick grunted. Milton used a lot of fancy words but he spoke plainly. Openly.

"You want to know if I can control my people. The answer is obviously no. If any of the family members of the people who've been killed decide to take action on their own, I can't stop them from slipping out in the middle of the night..." It was as close as Milton dared come to pointing out how badly things had escalated thanks to Michonne attacking and blinding the Governor. "But I would condemn them. As you would condemn your own, I hope."

"You mean if something happened, you'd trust it weren't on me?"

"Trust has to start somewhere. And I want to believe that we both want what's best for our people and that's definitely not a war." He wasn't getting anywhere with Rick so he looked to me. I was here because I knew Milton and Haley was here because she knew me. I was the only one on our side they had something close to a positive impression of because Merle didn't count anymore. To Milton, Rick was an unkempt man with a constantly baleful expression who had stuck a gun into his jaw.

I decided just to voice my own thoughts, knowing they would be shared. "We were minding our business when we were attacked so we wouldn't drop our guard. You wouldn't either. You raided us, we raided you. I was a spy… So even if we walk away today, we're all going to be paranoid no matter what. And three months from now we'll still be paranoid. It won't stop. You won't trust us and we won't trust you. But if we stick to our corners, then we're just being vigilant against everything else out here so it's not a waste of time. We'll build our defences and you'll build yours… We'll feel better. Maybe… Maybe the fact we know we don't trust each other makes things easier. We can't deceive each other if we're both expecting each other to attack and if we know how vigilant we all are, we won't be stupid enough to do anything. We can hope anyway…"

It was similar to being back on the Greene farm; I was saying things that people were thinking but not saying. There was nothing special about what I was saying; it was just the facts. The facts as they stood for everybody rather than just ourselves.

Rick sat up and it understandably unnerved Milton. "I don't want to fight." He said which further startled him. "I've got more pressing needs, 'specially now your friend is gone. I don't really want to slaughter a town…" He let the weariness into voice. "And maybe now you've shot a little girl, your town doesn't want to slaughter us." To this, Milton could only close his eyes. "I don't trust you. Any of you. But I can agree to boundaries. We can all sleep with one eye open." He was thinking of Theodore.

Haley stared at him and then turned to me. "He's dramatic, isn't he?"

I said nothing but something in my expression made Haley grin. The two kids in the middle however did nothing to ease the tension between the two adults. During the short time I had possessed a TV in my apartment before the world had gone to hell, I had watched a variety of programs including a lot of medical dramas but also a few history documentaries. One had been about the Cold War and it had described numerous scenarios between the Soviet Union and the USA where the two sides had been glaring at each other across some line in the sand, ready to destroy each other and the rest of the planet over some petty slight and every time it had been a war that neither of them could win but they had still been unwilling to back down. They both had their share of problems at home to deal with and still they had been raring to destroy each other and everything else. I had never really understood that but now here I was between two sides that might not have had tanks and nukes but were just as paranoid and suspicious.

Haley looked at them both and then shrugged. "Do you want to take a walk?" She asked me and while Milton definitely did not wish to be left alone with Rick, Rick gave me a nod that he wished the opposite. We stood and slipped out quietly. Haley waved at Martinez and the other guy while I simply shrugged at Andrea and Sasha. Andrea gave me a disgusted look first and then rolled her eyes.

It was my first time taking a walk with a girl my age. Beth and I had stood or sat together plenty of times, Haley and I had done the same thing but this was my first walk. She had a bow and I had my crowbar and I knew we both looked ridiculous for it.

"So how have you been?" I asked, just to see the look on her face.

"Before or after you knocked me on my ass?"

"Pick one."

She put the tip of her bow to my throat and pushed so I was backed up against a wall.

"This takes me back."

"Here's how it was for me. You were gone with all your stuff, and the Governor… He grabbed a load of guys and hit the road. No one knew anything and then he came back and said you were a spy and they had just stopped you bringing a bunch of people to the town to attack us. That was what he told us."

"And you believed him?"

Haley pressed her bow harder against my neck. It wasn't much of an answer but I got the message; she hadn't known what to believe. She released me and we kept walking. We made a lap and the four of them were still eying each other warily and I wondered what Rick and Milton could possibly be saying that hadn't already been covered.

"You know I wasn't pissed at you." She said. "It was everyone else. Everyone muttering behind my back like I was some bimbo you seduced... You know everyone thinks we fucked?"

"Shit."

"Oh yeah." She said with heavy bitterness. "You didn't just fool the town, you fucked the girl dumb enough to trust you. I heard someone say it'd serve me right if you had knocked me up."

"That's messed up…"

"Oh yeah…"

"If it makes you feel better, I've never had sex. Ever."

Haley gave me a look of astonishment which was flattering in some ways. "Seriously?"

"Yeah." I was surprised by how freely I revealed this and then realised how much I didn't like the thought of her being ostracised because of me. Especially for something as grotesque as having sex with me…

"That does make me feel better." She said. "And it explains a few things about you."

"Really?"

"I thought you'd just been alone too long and that was why you were all… Squirmy." She grinned. "Seriously, never?"

"There weren't many opportunities... And junkies were never attractive to me. So you… You…"

"Teaching you?" She offered.

"That was an experience." Considering everything that had taken place this summer, it was the only positive thing to happen to me.

"Yeah, I remember the tent you were pitching." She had regained so much of her lost poise but then pulled a face. "We should be talking about them, shouldn't we?"

"Why? There ain't anything we can do. Rick brought me along because I know people but what I think doesn't matter if he's made up his mind. Not now anyway."

"Why?"

I had told her about my time on the farm but now I spent the next lap filling in the details and then told her about life during the winter and those early days at the prison. I left out nothing, including Rick's strained relationship with his wife that might now finally be improving.

"People know about the girl now… If they know about a baby…" Haley wasn't sure and that was sad. "It sucks."

"Rick's not going to let his guard down. He'll have people watching the road for another attack and I bet Martinez will have you doubling up on the walls so a mouse couldn't slip in. There'll be loads of people standing around waiting for an attack that never comes. People who could be doing something better. And we can't change that. Andrea, the blonde woman back there, she ain't gonna relax. Dale was the one person she had left and your guys gunned him down. And Allen? His son died in his arms and he had just lost his wife; he might not even accept peace! Because Milton's right, there's nothing we can do to stop someone with a grudge going after revenge."

"You say that like you've got experience."

"I've seen it before." Whether they were in a gang or just one man; there was nothing you could do to stop an angry person acting on their feelings. If you locked them up; their feelings would just ferment.

"Ain't you wise?" She remarked and I deserved that. I didn't respond as our attention was gained by a couple of walkers shambling toward us. "Are you going to be my manly protector?"

"Ladies first." I waved theatrically with my crowbar and she bowed back to me before taking an arrow, leisurely putting it to the bow and then she drew. Her casual motions were in stark contrast to the force with which the arrow struck her target through the eye. She grabbed another arrow and loosed this one far more quickly. "Your turn." She declared, leaving me with just one. I gave it three good whacks and that was all it needed. "So sexy." She remarked.

"Are we really doing this?"

"Why not? It was fun before."

"True." I said but still shook my head as she retrieved her arrows and ostentatiously bent over for my benefit doing it. She was wearing pants today instead of shorts but they were just as snug. "You know I'm gonna hear about this when I get back."

"You'll have something to talk about then."

"Just what I need. More for people to discuss about me."

"What do you mean?"

It was tempting but the sheer amount of effort it would take to explain everything regarding Sophia, even after having told her the backstory, was too exhausting even to think about it. "Nothing. I'll just deal with the jokes about you trying to… Convert me." I sighed. "Sad thing is, that would be nice. Boring."

"That would be nice." She considered it. "I did like having you around. It felt normal, and you weren't pushy." She stopped walking. "What do you think would have happened? I mean, if you really had wandered in from the cold?"

"You tell me."

"It could have been interesting." She said carefully. She didn't want to speculate or consider her feelings any more than I did. It was another one of those things that the end of the world had gotten in the way of. She stopped us and cringed and squirmed before asking the question that Milton hadn't raised and she been avoiding by talking entirely about us. "Is she okay?"

"She's alive." I said. It had been nice to see Haley just to forget about it for a little while. She didn't like my answer and as we resumed walking, I could see her pushing it down so it couldn't hurt her. And the way to do that was to nudge me, to flirt with me again, to distract us both.

We re-joined the others and Andrea and Martinez could agree on the fact they didn't like how comfortable we were with each other. Haley decided to annoy them both by leaning on me, so I put my arm around her. It amused Sasha at least the way that Andrea and Martinez both rolled their eyes and looked away in disgust. We sat down because we were tired after walking in circles and that was why we leaned against each other again. I listened but I had no idea what they were saying in there. Perhaps they were simply getting to know each other, as much as that was possible these days.

Haley laughed aloud as I started awake. Milton and Rick were standing over us and they were both confused. Andrea, Martinez and the other Woodbury man were appalled and as before Sasha was amused. It was amusing that I could fall asleep in a situation that was as tense as this. But as I hadn't slept properly in ages I could pretend it was sheer exhaustion rather than the alarming idea that I was simply that comfortable with her.

"Comfortable?" Rick asked, trying to regain his grasp on the situation.

"Apparently." Haley answered for me which didn't help with his grip.

"We're going home." Rick declared. "We keep away from each other and mind our own business."

Martinez looked at Milton who nodded and I didn't see anything in either man. For Milton this was a good outcome and for Martinez, he didn't seem to feel they had lost any face. I had no doubt that when he got back to Woodbury, he would organise patrols and maybe even a guard on the bridge over the river. The same way Rick would do the same thing himself with Andrea and the Dixon brothers.

Haley picked herself up by pushing down on me and I got up wearily. I really wanted to believe that this was a peaceful, if tense, resolution. But I was no less paranoid than the people I had referred to. Martinez and Rick glared at each other like a couple of dogs but at least didn't bark at one another. Milton nodded amiably at Andrea and Sasha who didn't know what to do with the politeness.

"I'll say goodbye this time." I said and then cringed at how corny it was to say this. She pulled an appropriate expression for it too.

"I'll see ya around." She replied and then pulled a different expression. "You know what? Fuck it."

My second kiss was as much a shock to me as the first, although the shock wore off quick as this time I could respond to it; as much as my cautious instincts allowed anyway. Restraint was a good thing I guessed.

She finished it by knocking me on my ass. "See ya." She said, grinning at me down in the road. For my part, I bit my lip in amusement at her way of making us equal as I watched her walk away and get in their vehicle.

Then I remembered I wasn't alone.

"You jus' gonna sit there all day?" Rick asked and it was alarming to realise he was actually amused.

I got into the vehicle and lasted a mile before I answered Andrea's glare via the mirror. "What?"

"Do you want to explain?"

"I made a friend."

"Is it normal for your friends to grab your ass?"

"I don't know. She's the third friend I've ever had. Another girl…" I mused. "You can't hate everyone."

"You don't think that was a conflict of interest?" She inquired, sounding very lawyerly.

"No. Because I'm not going to see her again, am I? Not if we're sticking to our territory." I could help but grin. "Unless you think I'll be sneaking off to hook up?"

Andrea rolled her eyes while Sasha snorted. Rick shook his head but he still seemed amused.

I meanwhile did have a question for him. "Are we actually gonna do that? Stay in our own corners?"

"That's the plan." Rick grunted. "Milton seemed sincere. But we all know we can't trust each other."

"So what does that mean?" Sasha inquired.

"It means we stay put, we stay alert and we don't give them any reason to feel threatened."

"So it is a truce?" Andrea asked.

"Milton seemed sincere." Rick repeated. "He told me what we already know; that Woodbury's got other problems to deal with. They don't want to fight but they're scared. If we stay away, let things calm down… But we're not going to rest."

We joined the others and Rick reported the events to them and I remained sat in the car as the melancholy crept over me again. Haley had provided a brief sweet distraction from it and I felt guilty for it.

[][][][][][]

Everyone had their own thoughts and feelings regarding a truce with Woodbury but ultimately they fell into the same camps. Hershel, Beth and Tyreese wanted to believe it was over and we could get on with the business of living. Glenn, Maggie, Sasha; they were optimistic but cautious. Andrea, Daryl, Merle, Michonne; they were going to treat it as if we were still at war. Lori and Oscar shared a fatalistic attitude it seemed to me, not saying anything and accepting how little control they had over anything.

Carol had only one concern and that was Sophia. She didn't participate in the discussion at all although I thought that her feelings could be best summed up as mama bear. It didn't just apply to Woodbury but to all of us as well.

For Allen, it was unacceptable and only his reopened and freshly re-stitched wound stopped him getting into a physical altercation with Rick. Tyreese told him to sit down and shut up as gently as it was possible to say such a thing. It was messy.

At the end of the day and all these various talks and discussions, I sat by the fence in the Yard, looking down into the Field and ignoring the walkers snarling inches from me. We would retake the Field tomorrow Rick said. We would build a core of defences up here at this fence to defend against an attack by people but we needed to drive the dead from the Field, back to the outer fences. That way we could sleep in peace.

"Hello you."

"How did you know it was me?" Beth sat beside me on the pallet and didn't like how close we were to the gurgling walkers.

"Two people would come and sit next to me. So…"

"Are you avoiding her?"

"I'm avoiding her mom. She needs her space. Just her and her girl for a little while… I'll see her tomorrow."

"Why?"

I grunted.

"She misses you. Her mom told her you gave her blood."

I grunted again.

"I know it's hard to see her like that, but she needs to see you."

"I know. …But every time I think about it, I just see her… Falling…" It made me shake and I tried to get a hold of myself; literally hugging myself.

"So it's not because…" Beth did that thing where her rural accent became more pronounced. Mischievous. She was distracting me.

"Who told you?"

"Andrea told everybody and everybody told me." She gave me a sly look. "How was your second kiss?"

"I don't feel unclean." I said.

"Even though you made out with the enemy?"

"We didn't make out!" I protested but Beth had a big grin on her face. "It was just a kiss."

"And then she pushed you down so I guess you're both ten. Maybe you should have pulled her hair."

"When I was at Woodbury that night… I knocked her down so they wouldn't think she just let me go. She was getting even."

"Why do you think she did it?"

"What?"

"Andrea thinks she's playing you." Beth said this with a shake of her head. "Like they're trying to make you their spy instead of ours."

"What do you think?"

"Depends, how good was the kiss?"

"It'd be a hell of a kiss to make me turn on y'all."

"Sasha said you looked pretty…" Whatever Sasha had said Beth decided to translate more tactfully. "Overwhelmed."

"Second kiss." I reminded her. "First time I could enjoy. First time I could… Do something." I felt myself flush and Beth giggled as I squirmed and the sound only made me squirm more. "I'm only like… Four years behind everyone else."

"Do you like her?" Beth asked, suddenly very serious.

"Do I like the first girl to ever flirt with me?" I asked myself.

"Do you?"

"Course I do! But she's over there and I'm here and I ain't stupid enough to…" I couldn't even say it.

Beth could however. "Fall in love?" She asked and grinned.

"Don't be ridiculous."

"It happens." She said and got a knowing smile on her face. "It's very sweet. Very Romeo and Juliet."

"I… Don't know what that means."

Beth gave me a startled look before remembering the big gaps in my knowledge. "Forbidden love. It's a story about the children of two warring families falling in love."

"And then what?"

"Oh, they both kill themselves."

"Nice."

"But the two warring families reconcile." She said. "So maybe for the greater good… You two should think about it…" She beamed at me.

"Y'know, you look angelic but you have a really devilish sense of humour sometimes."

"I wonder why." She said, looking pointedly at the walkers in our faces. "Don't they bother you?"

"Yeah… But I needed to think and I didn't want to fall asleep so… They keep me awake."

She decided not to question my reasoning. "What are you thinking?"

"What's gonna happen; obviously."

"What do you think?"

"Rick doesn't want to attack Woodbury. Milton doesn't want to attack us. But plenty of people want to keep fighting so I'm not going to get comfortable."

"Haven't we all been through enough?" She meant everyone; Woodbury included.

"You'd think. I'm starting to miss being stuck in the infirmary in bed."

"Why don't you go to bed?"

"Like I said, I was thinking. I wanted to do all my thinking first and then go to bed."

"Do you want me to be quiet?"

"Why are you here?"

"I wanted to know what you're thinking. Daddy puts a positive spin on everything and Maggie keeps stuff back. You don't. You tell me how it is."

"Yeah… I do that with Sophia… And Carl… Guess that's the way I weren't raised…" I shook my head. "I trust Milton. He's a smart man; he knows it ain't in Woodbury's interests to fight us. I can't trust anyone else though, so we all have to be paranoid and twitchy for however long it takes."

"Takes for what?"

"Say nothing happens for a month. People will think the other side's trying to lull them into a false sense of security. Making them let their guard down. And it'll be the same the month after that. The leaves will be falling before everyone starts to think we really are leaving each other alone… And that's if nothing happens."

"Like what?"

"Like the family of the man I killed, or anyone else they lost comes looking for revenge. Or Allen tries to attack them. Or Michonne, I don't know what her deal is now the Governor's dead. And Merle…" He was unlikely to have let go of his grudges. "It's all real fragile."

"I just want to watch things grow." Beth said and then she leaned on me. A few months ago I wouldn't have understood but now I knew she was looking for a little comforting considering everything that had happened and could happen, so I put my arm around her and she leaned in closer. It was the least I could do considering she had come out here to take care of me. And she had a sly dig to make to keep taking care of me. "Your girlfriends wouldn't like this."

"You're an evil person, Beth Greene." I said and then pressed my spare hand into her face, making her giggle. I realised she didn't even care it was my half-hand.

[][][][][][]

Rick had made plans. The first day of our truce was not going to be peaceful and we were going to take back the Field first before he elaborated. To get the house in order before stirring up trouble.

"Here we go again." He remarked at the fence, and then the gate was pulled open and he and Michonne went sprinting down the track. This time he didn't do any shooting as he went but Michonne seemed incapable of passing anywhere near a walker without slicing it up. She took out three of them before she reached the entrance and even from here I could see Rick's impatience as he held the Inner Gate for her and then closed it to seal off the Field. She shut the Outer Gate and then the two of them began to work their way along the Sterile Zone, making it safe.

Meanwhile, the rest of us were at the fence. When we had come here, we hadn't had the strength to take them all out hand to hand so we had resorted to shooting. Now though we were all well-fed and we could save the bullets and use the fences to our full advantage. The Dixon brothers, the Greene sisters, Andrea, Glenn, Tyreese and myself made short work of them. There weren't so many in the Field, not when there were ten of us to deal with them. None were left standing facing us in a brief time and then the gate was opened and half the group went to the Inner Gate, letting themselves through to join Rick and Michonne and completely unnoticed by the walkers trying to get at them through the fence. They could have attacked them from behind but it was an unnecessary risk when they could use the fence for protection. The other half of the group checked the bodies.

The first time I had stabbed walkers in the head in this Field to make sure they were eliminated had been in March. Was this still July? I didn't know. It was hot and humid now though so the feeling of déjà vu wasn't as strong as it might have been.

That quickly, simply and brutally; the Field was cleared. Now Rick explained his intentions.

"Daryl, I want you to keep an eye on the bridge. Don't cross it; I don't want to give them the satisfaction. Just keep an eye open. And if they're doing the same thing, don't even step foot on it. Stay out of the way."

"For how long?"

"As long as you have to."

Daryl considered it. "Alright."

"Keep the workin' dogs out of the house." Merle remarked, already heading for the bike and so leaving Rick no chance to retort. It made sense to send Daryl and Merle to do this job though; they were the best equipped to survive in the open quietly. Merle even had a crossbow of his own now. And continuing to keep Merle away from Michonne was definitely a wise course of action.

"If they come again." Rick continued as if Merle hadn't spoken. "We have to hold them up here." The high ground of the Yard was the only realistic way of defending the Field from people. The closeness of the treeline to the outer fences left it vulnerable. And ploughing a truck through it was obviously an option for an attacker. That was what Rick outlined. "We'll put some tree trunks down between the creek and the fences. That'll stop anything short of a tractor or a monster truck."

"And if they bring a tractor?" Andrea asked, because she had to.

"It'll be a big target." Rick said. "We need to focus on what we can do right now and right now, we can cut some trees down to stop cars hitting the fence. We'll put the spike strips further up the road to protect the gates. We put some trunks down in the grass and we bring some logs up here, pile them up; make something better than some pallets and table tops."

"How are we going to do that?" Glenn inquired, looking out at the trees.

"We got a saw." It was one of the many things that had been recovered before the fighting with Woodbury had begun. "And we can use the trucks to drag the trees same way we moved the bus."

"That's a lot of noise." Maggie pointed out.

"Yeah, it could be rough." Rick made it sound trivial. "But we gotta do this."

First we had to clear the outer fences which took much longer than the Field but Daryl and Merle driving off on the bike had drawn quite a number of them away. I had a much stronger sense of déjà vu as we set up a perimeter, just as we had always done to protect our convoy during the winter months. Andrea and Michonne took one direction, Beth and I another, Glenn and Maggie a third and our little triangle left Rick and Tyreese free to play with a gas-powered chainsaw.

The saying was 'If a tree falls in the woods and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?' The question for us was if a tree falls in the woods, how far would the sound travel and how many walkers would it draw? The answer was simply far enough, and as many as were around. Another question that I had was how long before Rick decided to see if he could crush a walker with one of those fallen trees. The answer was tree number four. Tyreese shouted for us to move and then I got to see first-hand what it looked like when a human had a ton of tree fall on them. I couldn't even say it was the most disgusting sight I had seen.

They carved off the branches, cut the trunks into more manageable pieces and then dragged them into place. From the creek to the road was not that far so it didn't take that many trees to form a barrier. The chainsaw also meant the work didn't take that long. It would have taken days with axes or a handsaw but the chainsaw was a beast. Maybe I would live long enough to remember how effective it was and miss it when we ran out of gas. Or maybe we would find one that had batteries…

We obviously couldn't surround the entire prison with trees. Not in a single day anyway… But the stretch of open ground from the creek to the road was covered, there were logs to start building a wall behind the Yard fence, the treeline was less overgrown and we had a lot of firewood to load up into the pickups and bring into the prison. This meant the evening chore was dragging out all the bodies in the Field and bringing them inside to be burnt. So the first job in the morning would be shovelling the charred bones and ashes for disposal outside the fences which wouldn't happen until the second job which would be clearing the outer fences and general area. Then it was back to being lumberjacks…

I was grateful for the work. For the distraction. Being outside the protection of the fences meant being focused. No time to brood. Only to do my job. I wasn't given the task of cremating this time, probably because they thought I was unstable. Instead I stood watch, taking over from Sasha who had been in the remaining tower at the Yard Gate; the one that was bullet-scarred but not blown up. Rick waited down at the Outer Gate to let Daryl and Merle back in. I felt understandably vulnerable in the tower conspicuously in the centre of the Field and the Yard but I preferred to be here than down there; in the tower where Dale had died.

When the Dixons returned, I listened to Merle complaining about being out there. Not because it was dangerous but because he had been bored. Bored of sitting around and waiting. Watching Woodbury had had some action but watching a bridge had nothing. Not even a lone walker had disturbed them. They had seen nothing all day. The argument, or at least Merle's griping, continued on into the cell block but I didn't care. If Merle was only complaining about being bored that was better than starting a fight about what had happened back in Atlanta. I felt that was still yet to come. And Merle and Michonne would have to make their peace because she was another 'working dog' as he put it. Merle and Rick could probably settled their differences with a good fight. If Woodbury had had bare-knuckle fights for entertainment, maybe we should have too. Put Rick and Merle down in the basketball court while we watched from the bleachers. It would work for them. A fight between Michonne and Merle however would quickly turn lethal.

It was the end of day one of the truce and we had spent it preparing for war. I had no doubt that Woodbury had done the same. The only hope was that like us they had all been defensive preparations but hope was in short supply now. Hope had been replaced with cynicism. I remembered Rick's face when we had first come to this place and Carl and Sophia running in the grass. Would it be spring again before we felt safe outside again? The cell block didn't feel safe anymore either.

I pushed my fist into my forehead, trying to crush all the thoughts I had avoided during the day as they flooded into my brain. I had been better at this in the past. After all, if I hadn't I would have been as drugged out as my parents to avoid dealing with reality.

Reality…

I was in the tower. Somewhere below Michonne was lurking and it stayed that way until Glenn and Maggie came to relieve us. They looked awful, having slept for only a short time before coming out here but that meant they wouldn't have to work in the morning. We were lacking in bodies at the moment.

I should have gone to bed. I should have. But that wasn't where I went. I chose instead to fulfil my promise to myself and to go and see Sophia. Sure, it was the middle of the night but I had only said I would see her. Not talk to her…

Allen and Oscar had both vacated the infirmary, likely having decided they would prefer to vegetate in a cell than in here. At least we could hope Allen was vegetating and not plotting. That left Axel who was in the exact same position as when I had last seen him, Hershel who was asleep in the chair in the office again and Carol who was asleep in the bed next to Sophia's.

It was appallingly quiet. You expected lots of beeping and whirring machines in a medical place but without power, there was none of that. There was only a dynamo lamp that had faded down almost to nothing. The rest was still and silent.

"You've been avoiding me."

"Yes."

"You were in here the other day."

"Yes."

"You left."

"Yes."

"You don't want to see me like this."

"No."

She looked somewhat less pale though that could just have been the lack of light. She pointedly looked at the lamp and I spun it up as quietly as I could to avoid waking her mother. Carol looked skeletal in its light.

"How are you?"

"That's not funny." I said.

She smiled. "I think it is. Because I was shot, and you weren't." She closed her eyes for a moment. "What's it like being stabbed?"

"It feels like someone's punched you. They hit you so hard that you're numb… Then it starts to hurt. …Though last time, I blacked out before it hurt."

"Blood loss." She nodded sagely.

"Did they give you something?"

"Something." She confirmed and it was a relief to hear. "I felt like I was punched. But my head hurt more. At first… Then it was like someone was burning me." She began to pull her blanket down and I looked sharply away. "I'm all wrapped up so I can't see what it looks like." She remarked. "What are you doing?" There was a pause and then she giggled entirely without humour. "Right… I'm not wearing anything… That's weird." She giggled again. "And you're normal, so that bothers you."

"Yes."

"I'm covered up now."

Whatever pain meds she was on, they were strong enough that she was effectively high and so I didn't trust her. I very carefully swivelled my eyes to look at her just on the edge on my vision and then back again. "That's not funny." I repeated.

"Yes it is. You don't want to see. That's normal… That's funny." She declared and shuffled. "I'm covered now."

I was just as cautious but she was telling the truth this time. She was smiling at me in a way that fitted her age but the look in her eyes did not. She might have been loopy on the painkillers but they couldn't reach inside to that part of her that was always hurting.

"You killed someone." She said.

"Who told you that?"

"I heard it. It's okay though… I ate someone's ear."

"Excuse me?"

"I bit someone. And I ate his ear… That's gross, isn't it?"

"A little bit." I had no idea if she was serious, remembering a dream or confusing something she had seen a walker do with her own memories.

"You have missing fingers, and there's a guy in Woodbury with one ear…" She made some odd popping noises. "Mom's worried about you."

"I'm not sleeping well." This was not a proper conversation but I couldn't just leave. I shouldn't have come. "I haven't slept properly in a long time now. …No one has."

"Ask Mr Greenshel. He could give you something."

"He already did." It hadn't helped. "I need some real rest."

"…So why are you here in the middle of the night?"

"To see you."

"Oh… That's nice." She nodded. "You're nice to me." She reached out and limply patted me with one of her skinny hands. "You don't want to touch me."

"No, I don't." I nodded, ignoring the way she was swatting me and trying not to think about the experiences she was casually relating to me.

"Good. That's good." She withdraw her arm back under the blanket, wincing as she pulled at her wound and then gave herself an embrace. "Why are men all the same?"

"Ask a woman."

Sophia nodded as if I had imparted some kind of ancient wisdom. I had in my life had many conversations with people who were drunk or high and I hadn't thought she would be one of them. She was far from the first person her age though. There was a reason street people turned to drugs and alcohol and kids were no exception. "You're tired." She said. "I should go."

"How about you stay in bed and I go?"

"That's clever." She said and then some lucidity appeared in her eyes. "You'll come back?"

"I always do."

"It's really boring here." She sighed. "I hate being sick." Not that much lucidity then.

"You'll get better." Now it was my turn to sigh. "Give it a little while."

"How long is a 'little while'?"

"Go to sleep." I advised and I wasn't sure how to say goodnight. She provided the answer by swatting at me again, trying to pat me for reassurance. I took her hand and squeezed it, thinking about the first time I had tried to reassure her. Just like then I was trying to assure myself as well.

[][][][][][]

I was right about the morning. The ashes from the fire were still too hot for disposal but there were plenty of walkers down at the fence that needed to be taken care of. Eight of us as Glenn and Maggie were still sleeping from their night shift and maybe fifty of them. In the open that would have been far too many but behind the fence it meant half a dozen a piece and just a few minutes of work. We strung them out like before and then spiked them. And while doing that stragglers came out of the woods and I watched how they negotiated the line of logs. Most of them tripped on them; two trunks side by side was a little skip for the living but I couldn't recall ever seeing a walker jump. The ones that stepped over the first made it over the second but the ones that stepped on the first log fell flat. It was a minor obstacle to the dead, nothing more. But it wasn't a defence intended for them.

"I want to talk."

I had lost my focus if Rick had been able to appear beside me without me noticing. Sure, I had been watching the dead in front of me and I had people on my sides but it was a bad lapse. I bit back a sarcastic comment and I didn't like that this was my first instinct. I had been dutiful and helpful during the winter but I had become a pain in the ass since we had come here; making 'smart' remarks all the time. Although, the winter had been peaceful for me while life in this prison… It had been trying.

"That girl…" It was all he needed to say.

"We said goodbye."

"Yeah, I saw. But I want to know if you're planning to say hello again."

"No."

"Really?"

"Yeah. We talked about it. What could have been… We ain't…" I tried to think of the right way to phrase it. "We ain't pining for each other."

Rick casually lanced a walker. "Really?"

"No."

"Okay then." He said and I didn't know if he believed me. Perhaps he only wished to know what I would say. "Now about the other girl." He sounded grim. "What's that about?"

"You tell me. What do you think?"

"I don't know. That's why I'm asking."

"She's my friend." That was all I had to say about it. He tightened his jaw but he didn't push it. He moved along the line and it was Beth's turn to be interrogated. Perhaps he was just touching base with everyone. Maybe it had started with Merle complaining at him last night. He could hardly sit us all down to have a discussion about our issues and feelings; it wouldn't fit the way he ran things.

Daryl and Merle left with the elder Dixon grumbling some more. Sasha stood watch at the entrance while Oscar set himself up by the Yard Gate, propelling himself there with crutches. He should have still been in the infirmary but I guessed he found Axel lying there like a vegetable too depressing. If Axel didn't come around then Oscar would be the last surviving inmate we had found.

Rick trusted Tyreese with the chainsaw. The big man was the best to wield it, I guessed. That left five people to keep watch and take on any walkers that appeared. I wondered where Carl was and why he wasn't the one at the gate instead of Sasha and then I considered that maybe he was in the cell block today, just as yesterday, because he felt he was protecting it. Protecting his mother, his sister, Hershel, Carol and Sophia. I had to admit that was actually admirable.

"What are you thinking about?" Beth asked me.

"We're spread thin." I answered and she knew what I meant. The two of us looked very young next to Andrea, Michonne, Rick and Tyreese. With Axel comatose, Allen with a chest wound and Oscar with a thigh wound; that was three people down and out. Sasha's wound meant she could stand watch and shoot if she had to but fighting hand to hand would prevent her healing. Carol was not leaving Sophia's side. Hershel had to keep an eye on his patients. Six of the adults were out of commission. That left eight; Andrea, Daryl, Glenn, Maggie, Michonne, Merle, Rick and Tyreese. Beth and I made ten. Half the group. Ten people to somehow guard the road to the prison, guard the prison itself and work on strengthening it. With Glenn and Maggie sleeping and Daryl and Merle on the road, that left just six of us on this side of the fence. It was funny; Michonne and Merle had brought our numbers back up after losing Dale and Theodore but Judith was no substitute for Ben.

With all our wounded, we were in a bad way.

"Remember what I told you." Beth smiled. "It'll get better."

I shrugged, and she gave me a less than gentle whack with her axe handle for being negative. I needed that.

We added to the log barrier so that it reached from the road and angled around to the treeline. With the prison being an island amongst the trees; this meant the rear entrance was now protected against vehicles. The front was another matter but for the moment that was walker territory and with the fence already down that side and the burned-out section allowing access into the complex there was no need to ram a vehicle through it. Rick, and especially Andrea, wanted to reinforce the Yard fence. Make it so we had a bulwark from which to fire.

I listened to them discuss it at lunch while sitting with Beth. She was sat next to me so that she could nudge me every time I started to stray into dark territory in my head. The best thing to do was talk about it.

"I saw Sophia last night. Middle of the night. She was awake…"

"How was she?"

"Loopy on pain meds." I said, making Beth half-smile. Only half because I could feel the sad expression on my face. "And weird…"

"Weird?"

It wasn't my place to tell Beth about Sophia's father. Not the whole truth. "Her father was an abusive asshole and then she got abducted by a creepy asshole. She's made the link…"

"Link?"

"Like she attracts them. That's what she seems to think." I decided I couldn't tell her a thirteen year victim of sexual abuse had tried to flash me. It couldn't be explained away without telling Beth everything. "She knew I was avoiding her because I didn't want to see her." Beth gave me a look. "I mean, see her like that."

"She was shot. That's hard to see."

"Yeah, but I wish she didn't know that. Ain't kids supposed to be clueless about this stuff?"

"Boys maybe." She gave me another half-smile. "Did you really think she wouldn't know?"

"No… I just didn't… She's on pain meds and she's still… Or maybe she's just a girl and she's normal and I'm the idiot." I shook my head and there was one thing I could share. "She says she bit a guy's ear off, when we were attacked… She says she bit it off, and she ate it…"

Beth stared at me without blinking for maybe thirty seconds. "I think that's the meds talking."

"I hope so. But… Maybe she did… That's going to be fun to talk about when she's clearheaded."

"Maybe she won't remember telling you."

"Fun for her mom then." I drummed my fingers on the table. "How do you think she's doing?"

Beth squirmed. She actually squirmed with how uncomfortable she was thinking about it. "She hasn't left her for more than a few minutes." She was saved from continuing by the sound of Judith whimpering. We both looked around and it was very strange to see all four members of the Grimes family sat together and actually looking like a family. Lori held Judith and Rick was fussing over her having kept his distance for so long and we both looked away, embarrassed from intruding on them. "Do you think they're okay now?" Beth whispered, meaning Lori and Rick.

I remembered their conversations from when we had first arrived here. How Rick had looked when Judith had been born and Lori had been a sharp shock away from expiring for what felt like weeks. "Maybe." I said, for the sake of Beth's optimism. Lori I knew was desperate for reconciliation while Rick had been resigned. It came down to Judith and how Rick saw her. Sure, maybe he was nice with her now, Lori too, but it would take just one intrusive thought about Shane to push him toward thinking Judith was Shane's child and deciding both of them were a painful reminder of his former best friend.

I was good at reading many people but Rick wasn't one of them. I had no idea how he felt.

"What's their deal?" I meant Andrea and Michonne who were eating together. They didn't say much to each other and yet they didn't seem awkward. Whenever I saw them together, they appeared to be that way; comfortable.

"They seem to get along." Beth shrugged. "I don't know why." Andrea hadn't exactly being talkative to us two and her history with Beth wasn't good; obviously. I could understand why Andrea would be drawn to Michonne though and that was because Andrea had been determined to be able to defend herself ever since Amy died, to be fully independent and not require the help of others to do that, and Michonne obviously embodied that.

Sasha and Tyreese had taken food through to Allen in his cell and I wondered what they could possibly say to him at this point. The man had lost everything and his relationship with those two had been contentious before Ben's death. I was the guy who had pointed a shotgun at him… He was frequently with Hershel though and Hershel had a way of talking that was calming, even without his life experiences. I imagined him talking about losing his first wife and how he had gone on to be happy with another woman, to marry her and have another daughter. It was unlikely Allen would be receptive to such talk but he needed to hear it from someone who wasn't just spouting platitudes.

"Haley and I talked about 'dating'." I said and Beth was startled by the random comment; she had no idea what I was thinking. "She told me in Woodbury, people are desperate not be alone. And they don't have many options… Everyone's scared of dying alone…"

"What are you talking about?" She was still whispering.

"Allen's alone now. Most of us are. And there's very few people left so it's even more obvious. Painful…"

"So… What else did Haley say?" She was curious now and I realised it was because it sounded like I was hitting on her.

"Seems when they first built Woodbury and they were all scared, she got a lot of offers. And apparently, lots of suggestions to repopulate the Earth…" I gave Beth a look and she looked revolted. "Dale and I talked about it once. How we couldn't keep our little group intact, just us… Otherwise it would be you and me, Carl and Sophia… Which is grim." Beth raised her eyebrow. "I mean that we wouldn't have any other options, not that you're a bad option, we'd be forced I mean not forced…" I gave up as she smirked. "I really shouldn't talk about this stuff with girls."

"No, you shouldn't." She said. "We'll meet people. If there's an entire town up the road-"

"Only sixty people."

"There's still people out there."

"We'll see." For the moment, they weren't welcome.

[][][][][][]

We followed the same routine for a couple of days only instead of placing the logs in the grass outside the prison, we put them behind the fence in the Yard. It was only a low wall, not even waist high, and I didn't put much faith in logs versus machineguns but they were indeed better than pallets and table tops.

The labour would have been exhausting enough even if I hadn't given up a sizeable amount of blood. The heat and then the heat with accompanying rain didn't help. Although, it did help with our truly appalling hygiene. I had had a shower at Woodbury but the others had made do with rags and a bucket of warm water. The rain provided another option and I took in the odd sight of Glenn standing in his underwear in the middle of the basketball court, using a bar of prison soap to wash himself in the monsoon-like downpour. He was lean but healthy. Strong. That was a good sign for all of us. It was hard to believe how tired and exhausted we had been when we had first arrived.

The rain made it unsafe to be beyond the fence because of the limited visibility so we had to abandon the woodcutting. Instead lunch saw the adults sit around, plotting what their next move would be. The debate was whether to secure more of the prison or not and Rick wanted to reinforce our defences, not create even more for us to defend. It was the old problem; the prison was too big for so few of us. And Rick was still in charge so the debate was him repeatedly saying no so my interest waned until Andrea said they wanted to secure the prison library; before we were bored to death.

I was thinking of getting involved in the debate when Carol strode into the common area took hold of me by what little hair I had regrown since cutting it off before going to Woodbury. The sight of her pulling me out of my seat and then dragging me out only earned a cursory glance from the others before they resumed their conversation and I heard them talking as if there had been no interruption as Carol released my hair and pushed me along the corridor.

"Hi, Freckles." I said and then jumped as Carol slammed the door behind me, leaving me alone with Sophia and the vegetative Axel. "Did I do something?"

She had regained a good amount of colour and she was also not dosed up on strong painkillers this time. Mild painkillers, maybe. "I said I needed to see you and…" She squirmed. "If it'll make me feel better, she'll get it."

I didn't doubt it and I sat down, feeling like Carol was watching me even though she was in the office next door. I was concerned that she was giving us privacy. "Did I do something?"

"No." She squirmed again and I noted she was wearing an adult T-shirt now; like a hospital gown. "Did you come and see me, because I think I had a dream about you and I think… I did… It was… I-"

I cut her off. "I came to see you and I didn't think you'd be awake and you were and you were high as a kite. You kept slapping me which was weird because usually it's drunk people who do that. But you have been shot so it's okay to be weird. When I was here, I freaked out because I saw Beth and I thought she was an angel and I thought I was dead." We were both babbling at each other.

For good reason. She decided to just bluntly ask the question. "Did you see me naked?"

"No."

"No?"

"You thought it would be funny. I didn't. I didn't look. You were drugged up." I gave her the way out but she didn't take it and I could see what she was thinking and I stopped her. "One day you might want to tell me every nasty thing you've been through but I don't want to hear it until then."

She stared at me and then shuddered in that uncomfortably familiar way. She shook her head miserably.

"Do you want to tell me about biting someone's ear?"

It seemed she didn't remember telling me this because her eyes became big and then she blushed. "When we were attacked… I jumped on someone and I… I don't know why I bit them but I did."

"Biting works. It scares the hell out of people. Especially now."

"I swallowed it." She said and now I stared at her. "I didn't mean to! I was biting the guy and he threw me and then… I swallowed it."

"That's…"

"Unfortunate."

"It's disgusting! I ate someone!"

"You didn't eat someone!"

"I ate his ear!" She declared, her eyes absolutely massive now. It had at least distracted her from the other thing.

"It was an accident."

"Another accident…" She sighed.

"If you're feeling guilty about being shot, I'll shoot you." I warned.

"I'm not feeling guilty…"

"I know you." I said, and I found it embarrassed me. "You're lying there right now feeling guilty your mom's had to go through seeing you like this and forgetting you're the one that went through it. That's what you do. You got shot by a psychopath, Sophia. You're allowed to be angry."

"I don't know…" She shuddered again and then I could see her decide to move past the question of her guilt complex. "He said he took me to protect me." She meant the Governor. "Because I wasn't safe with all of you people. He wanted me to believe it too! Like my own mother was a danger to me!"

"He said things to you in a deliberate tone. Like he knew better than you." I said and she nodded.

"He didn't like you." She said. "He really believed…" She shook her head. "Why did he take me? Did he think he could… Adopt me?" She had given it some thought.

I took a breath. "Milton thinks that he started to lose it after his daughter died, and after Michonne killed her again… Maybe he did think you could replace her."

"Rescue me from the bad people and be my new father." She shuddered and wasn't aware of it. "He really believed what he saying to me."

"He was like that before. I thought he was just power-hungry… I didn't realise he was insane."

"He was. He was insane." Sophia made the assertion with such determination it shook me. "I told him my mom would kill him." She said. "Did she?"

"No. When you… She went straight to you. The rest of us shot him."

"You shot him?"

"I shot at him… I don't know if I hit him. It was a group thing…"

"Just like that? He just… Died?"

"He either died instantly or he bled out. No one was trying to save him anyway; some of them shot him too."

"That's good." She said, as close to vengeful as she might ever come. "Who… Took care of him?"

"I don't know." I hadn't even considered that issue. What had Woodbury done with the body? That must have been awkward for them; something to test Martinez and Milton's unlikely partnership. "It doesn't matter now. We made an agreement with Woodbury; they stay away from us and we stay away from them."

"Do you believe that?"

"You don't? You used to be optimistic."

"Before I killed a man and got shot." She replied in a most un-Sophia way. "You killed someone."

"Yeah…"

"What happened to him?"

"I don't know. I'm trying not to think about it."

"It doesn't help." She said and it was wrong on so many levels that she could advise me on this. "You should think about it."

"Later. When we get a chance to breathe."

"So, never?"

"I don't think sarcasm helps."

"We never get a chance to breathe." She sighed. "Get my mom, please." She asked.

Carol and I sat on the bed beside hers and listened to her tell her whole story in Woodbury. What she remembered anyway. She remembered being abducted but not being shot. She had vague memories of the Woodbury infirmary but they melded with those of being in here. Carol took hold of my arm as her daughter described being tied up and alone with a deranged man and I lost the feeling in my hand when Sophia described that man gagging her and leaving her in a locked room. By the time Sophia was finished relating her entire story, I was close to agony. I understood why Sophia wanted to talk to us both at the same time but I still felt like I was intruding on something personal. Sophia described her entire experience and then asked a simple question.

"Why?"

[][][][][][]

It was still raining that night and I listened to it. I was lying there wide-awake and reflecting on Sophia's question. I had no answer. I had never had an answer to the question why life was relentlessly cruel. In the past, before the dead had started walking, I had never thought about it. After all, it had just been the way it was and the people I dealt with didn't ask such questions; life was life. It was only since meeting Sophia that I had begun reflecting on my dark past and comparing my life to that of other people. Sometimes I sympathised with people who weren't hardened to suffering like I was and other times I wished they would stop whining over meaningless inconveniences.

I couldn't tell Sophia why terrible things kept happening to her. Her mother couldn't either because she had been asking herself the same question since before either of us were born. Dale had been unable to give me a reason either when I had talked to him. He had told me I had to accept it.

Not for the first time I considered how my indifference to religion was because it claimed that there was a grand plan and everything 'happened for a reason'. The idea I had decade-old cigarette burns scars for some greater purpose…

I decided to stretch my legs and it wasn't lost on me that the last time I had done this… There was no lightning and thunder this time. But there was a man in the darkness, although this time he was sitting and I didn't have to fight him. I wouldn't win anyway. Not against Rick.

He nodded at me. He was holding an empty glass and it was dry. He hadn't poured himself a drink though the bottle was there on the table. He was going through the motions without actually drinking because he couldn't afford to get drunk. So far as I knew the last time he had been drunk had been at the CDC.

"I'm sorry." I said without thinking. "For every time I've been a pain in the ass the past few months."

"You made up for it." He grunted. "And you ain't been anywhere near as bad as Merle."

He had a point there. If I was a pain in the ass then Merle and Michonne were a spike through the brain. "I know why I'm awake."

"How is she?" He asked.

"Wondering why horrible things keep happening to her. She was getting over killing a guy and then she got shot…" I didn't know why I said it as if this was new information for him. "She was so excited about this place and its potential and…" I pointed at the dark wall. "There's bullet holes in her artwork."

"That about sums it up." Rick said and then decided 'Fuck it' and poured himself a glass. The smell of the whiskey hit me hard and I knew that I didn't want a drink. Rick meanwhile savoured that smell before taking a sip. "When Carl was shot." He said while the drink was still burning in his throat. "I thought that was it. Carol had lost her child and the next day I lost mine and I thought that was it. If we could lose both kids in two days, what hope was there? But Carl, he clung on, he pulled through, and I thought maybe things weren't so bad. 'cept Sophia was still gone and I had to see Carol watch me and my wife keep our child while hers… And Shane said it; he said it was hopeless. In the old days if a kid was missing more than seventy-two hours, everyone knew that meant you were looking for a body after that. I didn't want to believe it. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't tell Carol her daughter was just gone. And when Lori told me she was pregnant; how could I have another kid in a world like that?"

He looked up at the ceiling and then down into his glass before taking another sip. "Y'know what kept me up before we found this place? Wondering how things would be if Carl had died. If you hadn't kept Sophia safe. If Shane…" He trailed off and I let him gather his thoughts. "When Daryl brought you two back, I thought it was a sign. A sign that there was hope. And then later that day, Hershel told me that when Shane showed him what walkers really were, when he realised his wife and son and nephew were all dead and he saw us gun them all down… That was when he realised there was no hope. He thought Carl living was the miracle that would bring them back to him. And he was wrong. He didn't think the two of you coming back was proof of anything. A little reprieve… But nothing that could stop the inevitable. I told him that maybe that was true, but every day we survived, every minute more, that was worth it. Even if we thought it was inevitable we'd all die in the end, it was better to fight 'til that end than just… Lay down and accept it." He looked into his glass. "That's what I told Jenner. I told Jenner. I told Hershel. And then we lost the farm and all of them gave up." He looked at me. "Not you."

"I was concussed." I reminded him. "I wasn't thinking straight for days. And when I was… I'd already done the whole giving up in despair thing. It almost got me killed." It had almost been a year since I had shut down because of how disturbed I had been by the undead. Now they didn't bother me at all. "Daryl didn't give up."

"No… Daryl, Hershel… Dale…" He stared into the dark as he remembered the old man. "Then Dale got sick. And we clung on. Somehow. Day after day, week after week until we found this place." He looked at me. "Merle thinks they're just biding their time and they're gonna attack us again. What do you think?"

"Milton wouldn't. I read all his notebooks, we're just a waste of time and resources. But Martinez… Or whoever in Woodbury lost someone to us…"

"Tyreese told me Allen wants to kill someone. He doesn't even know who he wants to kill but he wants someone to pay for his son's death and it weren't the Governor because he's dead now and never knew Ben even existed. He never knew Allen existed… But he thinks whoever did kill Ben is still out there." I wondered why he was confiding this in me and then realised he wasn't; I was simply a way for him to voice his thoughts. "And he wants to track them down. If it's the same at Woodbury… We were excited about planting crops! Now we're building walls against the living. Wooden walls…" He made all our efforts in the past few days sound ludicrous, and really; they were. But he wasn't done. "Got to start somewhere though." He drained the glass and for a moment looked as if he would pour himself another but then pushed it away in disgust for having succumbed in the first place. "We went to Woodbury to finish this. But it ain't over. Because it's never over. Things haven't changed; walkers or people, the threat's always out there and we're always worried about the ones we love."

He was right. Woodbury's first attack had taken us by surprise because we had been prepared for an attack by walkers, not people. If we were to have a problem with people, we hadn't expected it to come completely out of the blue. We hadn't expected Woodbury or anyone to launch such a stupid attack. But now we were prepared for another such attack and that left us paranoid. We were prepared to face people now.

I didn't like his remark about 'the ones we love' though.

[][][][][][]

It was still raining. Merle very loudly and very aggressively announced that he wasn't going back out there in this weather and Rick said okay. Merle had clearly prepped himself for a full argument and Rick had been likewise prepared for it. I looked away as Merle grasped for something to complain about but Rick had pulled the chair out from under him simply by being logical; the rain made it impossible to see or hear anything out there so a couple of sentries by the bridge was pointless at best and suicidal at worst. He had never intended for them to leave today. And Merle figured this out and realised his dramatic declaration he wasn't going to do what he was told had been pointless.

Before he could start a different argument though, Hershel came in to announce that Axel had died.

Man that he was, Hershel immediately began to apologise to Oscar, saying he wished there was more that he could have done. But even though he did, he didn't need to explain that there was very little he could have done. A small prison infirmary was equipped to stabilise people before they were sent to a real hospital. Hershel had had no means of assessing the actual damage done to Axel and therefore no way to even begin treating him.

Struck in the head by a mad man who had wanted to abduct a child. I didn't actually know if the Governor had been the one to do it but it made sense. Axel had been an earnest man, thoughtful, hardworking. He had also flinched from violence of all kinds. I wasn't sure he had even begun to acclimate to dealing with walkers, even through the fences. And now he was dead. That brought our casualties against Woodbury up to four…

Thirteen adults, one old man, four teenagers and a baby. That was the prison population now. If the prison had consisted of just this cell block and some surrounding fences, it would have been workable. But I knew from my time there and our repeated break-ins that Woodbury also lacked the numbers to properly defend their town. They had been over ambitious with the amount of space they had claimed.

Four adults, one old man and one teenager; that was the population of the prison's graveyard once we put Axel down. Big Tiny, Donna, Dale, Theodore, Ben and now Axel. It was filling up fast.

(15,752)

Author's Notes;

Milton and Rick sit down like the Governor and Rick did in the series, only this Rick is the aggressive one. My way of toying with how the Governor is Rick's dark counterpart.

I never liked the resolution of season 3. The Governor shooting down thirty-odd people by himself with not one trying to defend themselves and only Allen raising a gun to him… It was like they realised they had rushed the Woodbury arc through the season and that's why the Governor disappears, and then reappears to conclude the prison identically to the comics.

Instead the Governor is dead, and Woodbury endures. A persistent human threat that isn't immediately overwhelming.

A problem with season 3 was the lack of people in the prison for them to kill off. With Dale gone in season 2, Hershel having fewer daughters and Tyreese's group going to Woodbury, it left them short of redshirts. So Oscar is killed during the raid on Woodbury and Axel is shot in the counter-raid. I thought long and hard about killing off Axel. I'll probably regret it. But someone had to die and as Allen lived despite his wound, someone had to die from theirs. Poor Axel. Can't catch a break in any timeline.

More hints about Sophia's abuse by her father. I've seen abused people making jokes about it while drunk or high. It's just as awkward as what I've written here. There will come a time when Sophia will talk about it, but not yet. She's not there yet.

Threw Bas a bone with Haley. To both characters, considering how grim things have been in the past few weeks for them. The two of them reflecting on what might have been… Obviously a less than subtle reference that she's dead by this point and he never existed in the OTL. It's also more reflection on the way things are in these tiny communities; the dating pools really are limited. It would have been so easy to pair Bas off with Beth and instead they're good friends. I don't like stories where people pair off simply because they have no other choices.

This chapter only covers a few days, like my earlier prison chapters. I haven't addressed Carol's feelings yet. Suffice to say they're far from forgotten.