CHAPTER SEVENTEEN | c a r e
14/06/19

She wasn't actually awake, though her mind was racing. It thought and it imagined and it dreamed, dancing around ideas and writing stories as she lay there on the soft ground that cool spring morning. Her fingers grasped at the bright green blades of grass underneath her, twisting them and just feeling nature as she slowly began to wake up. The girl's body wasn't quite up yet, though; she didn't know the last time she had been able to sleep comfortably and safely, so having this one peaceful night, should it even be her last, was enough to lull her into a deep rest that nothing and no one could shake her from.

To add to the tranquility of the day, a bird chirped out cheerfully in an otherwise quiet world; it wasn't often that something so beautifully alive consumed the sound waves in the air rather than the rotting, revolting cacophony of the dead. Her mind honed in on the sound, treasuring its musical genius and sweet notes. She wished she could listen to it all day.

Around her, almost a dozen other people were enjoying the same gift of a morning. Only two men were actually awake, and for different reasons. One of them, the dark-haired, bearded father paced around the perimeter of the oasis-like field as he surveyed and verified its potentially misleading image of safety. He hadn't slept. The previous night, it had taken hours for his pregnant wife to convince him to simply lay down, and he was up again the second her breathing slowed.

The other, wearing a sleeveless shirt that was simply a flannel shirt with the sleeves ripped off, stared out into the wilderness keeping watch. The forest, where they had spent their previous eight months, was his turf. Inside of a fence, he felt caged. He felt as though he didn't belong. The only thing keeping him there was the slight sense of duty he felt to the people sleeping behind him, as well as the subtle hint that perhaps they actually cared about him. He didn't know much about that, though; he wasn't one for connecting with others emotionally.

The peaceful time was coming to an end, though; Rick was set on pushing the previous day's success even further by expanding their lands. Today, they would tackle the courtyard and perhaps even part of the prison itself, the field not being a suitable living area on its own.

Adira understood. With Lori due any day now, a field would not muffle the cries and whines of a little human who knew no better. She still didn't want to let go of the morning, though; it was sufficient for now, and she didn't see the point of rushing through the lazy, blissful feeling she had at the moment.

But she had to. She could hear the others getting up, feet tip-toeing and voices softly murmuring as they allowed the girl to sleep in. No one could deny how peaceful she looked, quite the opposite of her normal state of demons plaguing her mind. She knew it wasn't long before they were to be fighting again.

The sudden clang of metal startled her though, and her newly opened eyes betrayed her awakeness before she was able to pretend to continue sleeping. She sighed and stood up, stretching and wincing as countless nights of sleeping on the ground took their toll on her tired body. The group was all gathered by the gate to the courtyard, so she walked over there as well.

They discussed the plan for a few minutes, walkers in prisoner uniforms groaning just feet away from them and clutching at the metal fence, desperate for their next meal. Adira wasn't originally meant to be apart of the group that would go in fighting due to that same cut on her arm, but she argued that they needed all the hands they could get to ensure that the circle remained tight and that they could handle as many walkers as possible.

"Ready?" asked Hershel, right next to the gate alongside Rick. Without anyone responding, Rick opened the gate, and the circle carefully stepped into the courtyard, weapons up and ready to be used. They fought their way further in, beheading and slashing and cutting walkers as they went. The rest of the group stood at the fence, rattling its chain links and shouting in an attempt to draw some of the walkers' attention towards them. Any monsters that stumbled over soon ended up on the ground with a large hole in their head made by the pipes the rest of the group was stabbing through the fence.

Adira soon found herself covered in a spray of blood, something that bothered her, but she kept pushing. knowing that it only took one mistake for the circle to break and for someone, perhaps her, to get bitten.

Suddenly, T-Dog got out of formation, heading towards a riot shield. "Don't break rank!" yelled Rick, but T-Dog only went further forward.

"We need that," he said, sprinting for the shield.

"T!" shouted Rick. A walker was coming towards him as he picked up the shield.

Adira made a quick decision; it was risking her life to save T-Dog's or letting him get bitten. Naturally, she went for the first option. Breaking rank, she ran out and tried to stab the walker in the head as it made a grab for T-Dog.

Unfortunately, her knife was a bit short compared to everyone else's, and before its blade could make contact with the walker's head, its cold, wrinkled hand grasped her wrist, pulling her towards its gaping mouth.

Just before its blackened teeth sunk into her soft, unbroken skin, T-Dog ran forward, bashing it with his new shield, and Daryl ran up to finish it off. As his crossbow hit its head, Adira could feel its energy dying and its fingers unclasping from her arm.

She didn't look up, in shock at what had just happened, but nodded at the two men and started back towards Maggie, Glenn, and Rick.

"Adira! T! Daryl!" Glenn and Maggie both shouted, breathing heavily and eyes wide at their group members who just risked their lives for a shield. They quickly got back into the circle though, one shield stronger but hearts beating faster.

As they approached the arch under the walkway, Rick called out, "Almost there." Adira sighed with relief knowing they'd gotten through the worst of it and now had a courtyard to live in. But her relief was short-lived once Rick had looked around the corner and motioned for them to get against the wall. There was a whole horde of walkers behind a fence with an open gate.

That was the least of their worries, however, as walkers with riot gear on stumbled out from multiple directions. Their helmets blocked their heads, the necessary entry point for their weapons to reach the brain. They all attempted to swing at the monsters but they couldn't kill them. As they tried to kill the walkers, Rick and Daryl closed the gate, sealing off the majority of the walkers.

In a moment of revelation, Maggie pushed up the helmet of the walker in front of her and stabbed it up through its chin, successfully killing the brain. Smiling in triumph, she turned to Glenn, Adira, and T-Dog with bright eyes. "See that?" she breathed. The others soon began to copy her, pulling up heads with helmets and stabbing through chins. Soon enough, the ground was littered with corpses and the courtyard was free of the dead roaming it.

Glenn and the others started to run back towards the other half of the group, but halted when Rick commanded "Stop". He was looking around them, still wary. Adira didn't get why, they'd just killed around fifty walkers and all was quiet save the groans of the walkers trapped by the fence.

Glenn responded, confused. "Well, it looks...secure."

Daryl shook his head, agreeing with Rick. "Not from the look of that courtyard over there," he said, pointing towards the fence they'd just sealed off. He then turned to a walker lying on the ground. "And that's a civilian."

T-Dog sighed, taking his arm off the wall he'd been leaning on. "So the interior could be overrun from walkers from outside the prison."

"If there's walls down, what are we going to do? We can't rebuild this whole place," said Glenn.

"We can't risk a blind spot," said Rick, looking at all of the possible entrances into their courtyard. "We have to push in." He started walking off towards one of the doors and the rest followed. Though tired, they all trusted Rick's judgment.

Adira was almost to the door when she felt a hand hold her shoulder back. She jumped, almost thinking it was a walker like the one that had almost killed her not too long ago, but relaxed once she saw that it was just Daryl. "Not you," he said, not looking her in the eye. "Go back to the others."

She furrowed her brow. "What? Why?" Didn't they need help pushing in? She didn't understand why Daryl was telling her to go back. He avoided her inquisitive gaze though, and just lifted his hand to beckon her back to the yard.

"I said go back to the others," he grunted, and walked off to join Rick, Glenn, Maggie, and T-Dog.

Adira stood there for a second, unsure of what had just happened, before doing what she was told and returning to the group members still in the yard. She wasn't in the mood to argue with Daryl, still a bit shaken up from her near-death experience. His piss-poor attitude wouldn't make her feel any better.

As she rounded the corner, she could see Hershel, Carol, Beth, Carl, and Lori pressed up against the fence trying to see what was happening. She quickened her pace, knowing they were completely in the dark. As she stepped through the gate, she answered the five pairs of questioning eyes staring at her with a simple "They're good." She locked up the gate before adding on to her statement. "They just wanted to see how it was inside, we think we got most of what's here."

Without another word she slumped down against the guard tower, back pressed against the cool metal and eyes closed as the warm sun beat down on her face. She felt someone else slide down next to her and opened her eyes and turned her face to see her favorite blonde-haired vocalist.

"Are you okay?" Beth asked, noticing Adira's rather distant and quiet demeanor.

Adira cracked a smile for her friend's benefit. "Yeah, just a close call out there. Other than that I'm fine. I guess that, and...Daryl sent me back here for whatever reason. I don't really know why. I didn't feel like causing an argument, so...here I am."

With that, she turned her head back and closed her eyes again, feeling the peacefulness of the morning just as she had an hour before. Beth stayed quiet, looking at her friend with a knowing smile. She may have only been seventeen, but she could see what was going on. It was just like when her friend Emily back in school had the biggest crush on a boy named Paul. He liked her back too and they were the best of friends, always looking out for one another. They never saw that the other wanted them as more than a friend, though, so they stuck together in a constant state of longing and denial. She knew Adira and Daryl were nowhere near friends, but their interactions were similar.

Not long after, Glenn came out to tell them that it was safe. He led them all into the cell block, where Daryl was tossing bodies down to T-Dog. "What do you think?" asked Rick, coming down the stairs.

"Home sweet home," said Glenn as they all looked around at the dark room filled with blood and the scent of death.

Adira didn't listen to what they said after that; she was too focused on the fact that they were finally safe. She actually had time to process how the last few months had been. It was hard, it was brutal, it was terrifying. She'd lost all hope of the world ever returning to a somewhat normal state.

And there was the fact that she had almost died that morning. She could still see the walker grabbing her, she could still feel its cool fingers pulling her towards it, she could still hear its hungry groans coming from a mouth full of rotting teeth about to sink into her skin. Its groans were incessant, loud, and soon were all she could hear. She felt tears fill her eyes as her breathing quickened and her heartbeat increased, just thinking about what had happened.

She was shaken out of her terror by Daryl's voice echoing around the room from above. "I ain't sleeping in no cage. I'll take the perch."

Adira saw the rest of the group dispersing to claim their cells, so she walked all the way to the end where no one else was. She wasn't exactly in the best mood and didn't really feel like being around the rest of them at that moment. It had been a while since she'd been allotted the luxury of having her own space.

With each step flashes of the walker entered her mind. As she grew closer to the cell groans filled her ears and she couldn't control her breathing. Her heart felt like it was about to explode. All she could think about was her parents, how they looked when they'd been devoured. That was almost her. It was her fault all of those months ago and it would have been that morning too.

She reached her cell stumbling and clutched onto the bars as she began to feel a bit lightheaded. She closed her eyes and focused on breathing slowly, trying to calm down. It was okay. She was okay. She was alive. She was safe.

As she stepped one foot through the threshold of her chosen cell, she heard a voice grunt out a "Hey", making her stop in her tracks. She turned to see Daryl a few feet away.

Adira didn't say anything, just wanting to take a nap. "Ya gotta take better of yourself, ya almost died today. Watch out for yourself, alright?" he said gruffly.

Just as he turned to leave, her quiet, timid voice broke the silence. "Thought you didn't care."

Already walking away, he didn't turn his head over his shoulder or slow down as he said emotionlessly, "I don't."