traded my life [TWD]

『71』

I didn't get to tell Maggie much as I asked her to keep Woojin. I just explained it was an emergency and I had to go. She didn't question much and I ran out of the cell.

I stopped by Rick's cell, but he wasn't in bed. I cursed to myself and ran outside.

Everything was wrong.

Rick was gone. Q was gone.

"Hyejin?" Beth asks as I run past her and Carl. "What's wrong?"

Everything. Fucking everything.

I spot Carol talking to Axel. 

"Carol! Where's Rick?" I ask.

"Outside," she says, nodding in that direction. "He's talking to Hershel."

I open the gate enough to slide through.

"Why? What's wrong?" she also calls after me.

Everything! Everything is wrong!

The hill down the courtyard was slippery, but I glide through with ease and determination.

Q. I had to find that piece of shit. He had the answers all along. Rick had to know.

A gunshot rings through the air and I skid on the rocks, tumbling and falling on my ass.

I sharply inhale and look around in confusion.

It's quiet. Eerily quiet.

The rocks below me sound loud as I ease up slowly, my hand on my gun.

My body startles when more gunshots go off. My eyes dart around wildly to find the source, but I couldn't see anyone.

A few rounds hit the ground around me. I curse and roll off the gravel and into the all weeds for cover.

The guns sound automatic- way too many shots being fired at once. 

"Hyejin!" Sasha whispers in desperation. "What the hell's going on?"

I look around, but it was hard to see. Then, I spot a bit of her hair. She was by Donna's grave.

"Woodbury!" I call back. "We're under attack."

"Hershel's down by the fence. He's alone," she says. "Rick's outside the walls."

"Fuck," I whisper to myself.

Woojin and Judith were inside with Maggie. Carl was in the courtyard with Beth and Carol. Rick was outside. Glenn was on a run. Hershel is meters away. Michonne was at the overturned prison bus.

"Where's Tyreese? Ben? Allen?" I ask.

"Tyreese left with Glenn. Ben is inside. I don't know where Allen is."

"Q?" I wonder.

"No clue."

I army crawl closer to her and sigh in relief when I see her face.

"Fight your way back to the prison. The kids are all up there," I lead. Woojin, Judith, Carl, Beth, and Ben. It was horrid. "Be careful."

"What about you?" she asks.

"I'm gonna get Hershel," I answer.

"Do you need help?"

"No. I'm okay. Just get to the kids."

"Here," she says and takes the automatic gun off her back. "You need this more than me."

I load the gun and give her a nod. She eases through the weeds, toward the prison.