Daryl's Angel: Saviour (Book Two)

Chapter 32: All Quiet on the Front

I can't believe it's only noon. How can there be so much day left when so much has happened?

Rosita stabilizes Elliot's leg and gets him a pair of crutches, although I'm not sure how mobile he'll be. Falls like that and injuries like his killed elderly folks back when we had decent medicine. I'm going to do everything it takes to make sure he makes it out of this okay, even if his mobility is never the same.

I slip Old Dan's collar back onto my wrist and hesitate before putting my ring back on. I'll just have to take it off again if, God forbid, I have to do more surgery.

When I go outside, I get a real sense of the carnage. Alexandrians gather bodies into piles, loading them onto wagons to be buried or burned. Pools of blood stain front porches, the pavement, and the grass. I see severed limbs, savagely hacked from the bodies they once belonged to.

I don't see the body of the woman I blinded. Even if she got away, she won't survive long without her sight, and I let myself feel the guilt of knowing that I caused it.

I remember how I felt the day the outbreak at the prison began, at the terror and death that filled cell block D. I let myself start to believe that maybe those days were behind us, that I would never have to witness so much blood and loss again.

I go into the armoury, and there are more blood stains, splattered on the doorjambs and staining the floor. Olivia sniffles and cries softly as she struggles to take inventory, and she startles when she hears my footsteps behind her.

"Are there more radios?" I ask.

"Are there..." She shakes her head. "Right, yes. Um, they're right here."

She hastily wipes her round cheeks before pointing out the radios. Most of them are out with the horde team, but I take two of the few remaining. I thank her with little fanfare and leave, back onto our stained streets.

Michonne, Rosita, and Maggie stand near the front gate, their conversation getting clearer as I walk. For a moment, I'm almost hopeful because Michonne was part of the outside crew, and if she's back, then maybe so are the others. As her words reach me, that feeling dies.

"I tried to go instead. I wanted to," Michonne is saying. Maggie holds herself, one hand over her mouth. "The fire never got lit. We had to keep going. I'm sorry." Maggie inhales shakily, dragging her hand under her nose. "Glenn said if he got stuck, he would find a way to send us a signal."

"A signal?" Maggie repeats.

Michonne nods and, as she starts to speak, a distant voice makes all our heads turn.

"Open the gate!"

I stop dead, looking towards the watch tower next to the gate, where Deanna stands with her back to us. As if fog clears from my ears, I realize that there's a familiar drone filling the air, the groans of the undead. Lots of them.

"OPEN THE GATE NOW!"

It's Rick's voice, raw from exertion, and Michonne and Maggie rush to the gate with Rosita close behind. Tobin and Morgan blow past me. The gate rattles as it flies open. Rick sprints towards us, running ahead of a horde so massive that it's almost unbelievable.

Rick stumbles, shoving walkers aside, his hair and clothes soaked in sweat. Michonne and Morgan take out a few walkers that get too close as Rick throws himself through the gates, letting Rosita and Maggie roll it shut just as the horde slams against it.

It's a wall of them, gnashing teeth and greying skin, stinking of decay, and all I can do is stare. All I can think about is how Daryl is out in front of a herd just like this one, with nothing to save him if he stumbles.