Chapter Text
Beth sat against the barn wall, legs stretched out in front of her, Judith cradled beneath her coat. The baby had been rooting restlessly for the better part of an hour—frustrated, confused, crying off and on in short bursts. Beth had tried everything. Switching sides. Rocking. Holding her differently. Whispering to her. But nothing worked. Judith wouldn’t latch.
Beth knew why.
She could feel it.
Her body was giving up before she did. The milk was nearly gone. She pressed Judith closer anyway, whispering apologies into soft tufts of baby hair. Her daughter’s small fists pushed against her chest in confusion, her lips seeking something Beth no longer had to offer.
Tears stung Beth’s eyes, but she didn’t let them fall. Not here. Not in front of them.
“She’s gonna bring the whole forest down on us.”
The voice came from Aaron—quiet, not unkind, just matter-of-fact. Beth looked up slowly, her eyes cold as ice. Aaron didn’t flinch.
“There’s applesauce. In my bag. Feed her.”
Rick looked over from where he sat nearby, sharpening a blade that didn’t need sharpening. His eyes narrowed. “You poisoned it?”
Aaron scoffed. “I’m not trying to poison anyone.”
Rick stood and walked to the bag. Pulled out the jar. Stared at it. Then dipped the spoon in and held it out toward Aaron. “Eat it.”
“What?”
“Eat it,” Rick repeated. “Or I’m not feeding it to her.”
“I don’t like applesauce.”
Rick didn’t blink. “Don’t care.”
Aaron’s shoulders stiffened. “That’s not what this is about. You think I’d poison a baby?”
Beth’s voice came then—quiet but sharp. “He’s not asking again.”
Aaron looked at her. Really looked. Whatever he saw there made him stop talking. He took the spoon and forced down a mouthful, grimacing the whole way. Rick watched him. Waited. "We'll give it about an hour."
It was the longest hour of Beth's life. Daryl and Maggie and Rick all hovered, but she cut them a glare with tear filled eyes that made them all take more than a few steps back. Beth was ready to break by the time Rick gave her the jar. She didn’t hesitate. She dipped a fingertip in the sauce and offered it to Judith, who licked it greedily. She took it gladly, her cries softening to contented slurps and happy little noises. Beth felt her throat tighten. This wasn’t what she’d wanted. This wasn’t what she'd promised herself. But Judith didn’t know the difference between shame and survival.
She just knew hunger.
The group had been arguing quietly since before sunrise. Whether or not to check out Aaron’s claim that there were vehicles stashed nearby. He and another man—Eric, his partner—had apparently driven an RV and a car close to the barn before the trees got too thick.
It was Michonne who pushed hardest to go look. “We’re not saying yes,” she told Rick, “but we should at least know if he’s telling the truth.”
Rick had refused. Flat. But then Maggie and Glenn had backed her. And when Carol gave the smallest shrug in agreement, Rick finally caved. He didn’t like it, but he gave orders anyway.
“Take Abraham, Rosita, Michonne, Glenn, and Maggie,” he said. “Stay sharp. Don’t split up.”
Outside, the scouting party disappeared into the trees, weapons drawn, nerves pulled taut. Beth didn’t watch them go. She stayed near the fire, near Judith, near Aaron. Merle sat against a stump, cleaning his nails with the tip of a knife.
“Any minute now,” he muttered. “This is the part where the clean-shaven prick turns out to be leadin’ us into a trap.”
Beth didn’t respond. Minutes passed like molasses. The wind picked up. Judith fell asleep again. Aaron said nothing. His eyes just tracked Beth and Judith like he couldn’t stop himself.
“I used to have guns pointed at me all the time,” he said softly.
Rick glanced up. Beth didn’t.
Aaron continued, “Before all this. I worked with an NGO. Went to places where people hated outsiders. Learned how to talk without flinching. Learned how to tell when someone was just scared... or dangerous.” He looked at Rick. “You’re scared,” he said. “But you’re not wrong to be.”
Rick stood and walked to him slowly. “If they don’t come back,” he said, voice low and flat, “I won’t shoot you. I won’t give you that. I’ll use my knife. Base of your skull. Quick if I like you by then. Slow if I don’t.”
Aaron swallowed but didn’t argue.
Judith settled in Beth’s arms with a soft, satisfied hum, her cries reduced to tired little whimpers that faded as her eyelids began to droop. Beth pressed her lips to the baby’s forehead, closed her eyes, and let herself breathe for the first time in hours. The relief was small and fleeting, but she clung to it like everything else worth keeping these days—desperately and quietly.
Across the barn, Aaron watched her with something unreadable on his face. Regret, maybe. Or grief. Beth didn’t care.
She adjusted Judith in her arms, rocking gently. The barn had gone still again, the kind of stillness that wasn’t peace—it was a pause. A sharp inhale before the next blow landed.
“Still got thirty-seven minutes,” Rick muttered, pacing near the door.
“No one’s counting but you,” Merle drawled from his spot near the firepit. He tossed a twig into the embers and watched it burn. “Ain’t like they’re gonna come back with balloons and a marching band.”
Rick didn’t rise to the bait. He just stared out through the crack in the door, jaw tight.
Carol moved beside Beth, crouching low. Her eyes flicked to Judith, then to the jar of applesauce still clutched in Beth’s free hand.
“She’ll need more soon,” Carol said softly. “We can find formula if we need, if we can find clean water. It's gonna be fine Beth.”
Beth nodded, but didn’t answer. Her throat was too thick to speak. Carol hesitated, then reached out and rested a hand lightly on Beth’s shoulder.
“You’re doing good,” she said. “You’re doing more than most could.”
Beth didn’t believe her, but she nodded anyway.
hey heard them before they saw them.
Not voices at first—just the soft crunch of boots on damp leaves, the occasional brush of a jacket sleeve against dead underbrush. The barn held its breath, every ear tuned, every weapon gripped a little tighter. Somewhere outside, someone stumbled, muttered a curse under their breath. A twig snapped.
Beth stiffened, arms tightening protectively around Judith. The baby stirred with a soft whimper, but didn’t wake.
Rick was at the barn door in an instant, his machete drawn. Daryl moved to his left without a word, crossbow lifted. Merle took the other side, his revolver already half-raised.
Beth stood slowly, heart hammering. The quiet outside was the kind of quiet that could break open into chaos in a blink.
“Hold,” Rick ordered, voice low and sharp.
The door creaked open an inch, just enough to let the cold night air curl inside. Beth’s fingers itched toward her knife. She took one step forward.
Then came the voice.
“It’s us!” Glenn hissed. “Don’t shoot!”
Rick hesitated—just long enough to remind everyone that hesitation could get you killed. Then he threw the door open wider, letting in the group one by one.
They looked like they'd crawled out of a grave.
Maggie came in first, arms full of a battered cardboard box. Her face was drawn and pale, hair plastered to her forehead with sweat. Behind her, Rosita staggered under the weight of two overstuffed packs, her braid tangled and a new scratch blooming down the side of her cheek.
Michonne was next. Her katana was back in its sheath, but dried blood still clung to the curve of the blade and the cuff of her sleeve. Her shoulders were tense, eyes scanning the barn like she was expecting something to go wrong before she even made it inside.
Abraham followed last, muddy to the knees, cradling a single can like it was sacred. The label was half-ripped, but the faded orange print still read S’Getti Rings.
Abraham entered last, cradling a can of spaghetti like it was something sacred, grinning despite the dried blood on his collar. “We got your damn s’getti,” he muttered, and slumped against a beam.
Aaron surged forward from where he was still tied, his voice strained. “Where’s Eric?”
Everyone turned toward him.
Glenn paused. “What?”
“Eric,” Aaron repeated, panic rising. “He should’ve been with the RV. I left him with the car—he was going to stay put in case someone came through. He should’ve been there. Why wasn’t he there?”
Michonne hesitated. “There was no one there, Aaron.”
“He wasn’t in the RV,” Rosita added. “Just supplies. No sign of another person.”
Aaron’s face went white. He pulled against the restraints instinctively, chest rising and falling in quick, shallow breaths. “No. No—he was there. He was supposed to stay there.”
“Maybe he saw trouble and bailed,” Abraham offered. “Took a detour.”
Aaron shook his head violently. “He wouldn’t leave the post. Not unless—” He stopped short, choking on the implication.
Rick stepped closer, looming. “If you’re lying—”
“I’m not lying!” Aaron shouted, voice cracking. “I wouldn’t—.He had the flare. You saw it. You saw it.”
Rick narrowed his eyes, but said nothing.
Aaron looked to Michonne, to Glenn, to Beth. “Please. You have to believe me. Something’s wrong.”
Beth didn’t move. Her gut twisted, but not out of sympathy—not yet. She’d seen good liars before. She’d been fed calm words through clenched teeth. Every breath out of Grady had sounded like concern.
She bounced Judith lightly, keeping her voice even. “Then maybe he’s dead.”
The silence that followed was immediate and sharp.
Aaron stared at her like she’d slapped him. “He’s not,” he said, almost pleading. “He’s not.”
Beth didn’t answer. Didn’t soften. Judith stirred in her arms again, her mouth opening and closing in frustration.
Michonne stepped forward and set the bags down with a thump. “We found what you said would be there. RV. Car. Food. You weren’t lying about that.”
Aaron’s head dropped. His whole frame sagged like the adrenaline had gone out of him all at once.
Rick rifled through the bag nearest the door—two more jars of applesauce, a can of carrots, some unopened formula packets. He held up a packet of baby wipes with a grunt of acknowledgment, then tossed it back.
“This is ours now,” he said flatly. “Whether we go with you or not.”
Aaron didn’t argue.
Maggie crossed her arms. “You said we’d vote.”
Rick glanced at her, then at the others slowly filtering into the barn. Sasha, shoulders tight. Carol, keeping her distance. Glenn, looking older than he had yesterday. And Beth—silent, watchful, with Judith curled against her like a second heartbeat.
Beth stood, adjusting the baby with one arm and resting the other on the hilt of her knife. Her voice was calm, but there was steel beneath it.
“We’ve followed too many people down bad roads. If we do this, we do it together. And we do it smart.”
Rick gave a slow nod. “Where is it?” he asked Aaron. “Your place.”
“Alexandria,” Aaron said quietly. “About fifty miles northeast. Should take us a few days if we avoid major roads.”
He pulled in a shaky breath. “I’d normally drive you. Help with the turnoff, the gates. But I know you won’t let me lead.”
Rick didn’t confirm or deny. “What’s the safest route?”
Aaron looked up. “Route 16 to a back cutoff. It’s clear. We use it all the time.”
Rick crossed his arms. “We’ll take 23. Through the backwoods.”
Aaron stiffened. “That road hasn’t been cleared. There are washouts. Deadfalls. You could lose people—”
Rick cut him off. “And if someone is watching your usual route, we won’t be the ones walking into a trap.”
Aaron looked ready to argue, but one glance at Rick’s expression shut him down.
The barn filled with a quiet tension—no one cheering, no one relaxing. They were only agreeing to walk. And walking could still mean dying.
Beth looked around at their faces: hollow-cheeked, grim-eyed, bent but not broken.
“We walk smart,” she said again. “No one gets left behind. No one wanders.”
She paused. “No one dies.”
It was a lie. They all knew it.
But no one called her on it.`
Later, after the barn had gone quiet again—after the last can had been stacked, the last weapon cleaned, the last whispered argument folded into silence—Beth sat alone beside the firepit.
The flames were little more than a whisper now. A few glowing embers blinked lazily beneath blackened wood, casting faint shadows that danced up the barn walls like ghosts that hadn’t decided whether to leave.
The lollipop was gone—melted to nothing in the ash, consumed by fire like it had never been anything sweet. No wrapper. No stick. Just a memory that still clung to the back of Beth’s throat like bile.
She stared at the spot where it had burned, even though the evidence had vanished hours ago.
Judith slept in her arms, tucked tightly beneath Beth’s coat, one chubby hand curled into the fabric near her collarbone. Her face was soft in sleep, cheeks rosy with leftover heat from the fire. She made the tiniest noise as she breathed—a half-sigh, half-sighing snuffle that Beth had come to recognize as her deep-sleep sound.
So peaceful. So innocent.
It felt like a lie, somehow. Like even sleep couldn’t keep the world from pressing in around them.
Daryl crouched nearby, crossbow balanced across his knees, boots planted wide. He hadn’t spoken since the vote had gone through, since Rick laid out the route and the sun began to dip toward the treetops. He hadn’t needed to. His silence didn’t bother Beth anymore. She’d come to understand it like a second language.
“You think it’s real?” she asked, voice barely more than a breath.
Daryl didn’t look at her.
“Don’t matter,” he said.
Beth nodded. She kept her eyes on the fire, watching it spit and flicker. Sparks curled up into the dark like dying stars.
She swallowed once before speaking again. Her voice was rougher this time, less steady. “Judith’s not gonna take to me forever.”
Daryl glanced her way then, but said nothing.
“My milk’s almost gone,” Beth whispered. “She cries and tries to latch, and there’s just… nothin’. She gets mad, like she don’t understand what’s happening. And I keep pretending like I can fix it if I just hold her right. Like my body’s not quitting on her.”
The words scraped raw on the way out, but once they started, she couldn’t stop.
“I can’t feed her. Not the way she needs. I keep thinking if I just eat more, drink more, rest more—but we don’t have more. And I don’t know what to do when she figures that out.”
Judith stirred lightly in her sleep, one tiny leg kicking out beneath the coat. Beth adjusted her automatically, smoothing a hand down the baby’s back, grounding herself in the movement.
Daryl shifted his weight slightly, arms resting on his thighs. “You kept her alive.”
Beth huffed softly, no humor in it. “For now.”
Daryl finally turned to her fully. His expression didn’t change much—but his eyes softened just enough to be noticed.
“That ain’t nothin’,” he said.
Beth blinked, staring at the flames again. “Feels like it.”
She was bone-tired. Not the kind of tired sleep could fix. It was a kind of tired that came from holding on too long, from carrying too much. From being everything to someone who couldn’t survive without you—and knowing that one slip, one crack, one failure could end her.
And still doing it anyway.
Daryl didn’t try to comfort her. He didn’t lie, didn’t offer easy answers or empty reassurances. He just sat there beside her, quiet and unmoving, like a wall that hadn’t crumbled yet.
That was something too.
Beth’s hand moved on its own. She reached across the narrow space between them, fingers brushing the rough calluses of his palm. He didn’t pull away. Didn’t even flinch. He just curled his fingers around hers, steady and sure.
Her eyes burned.
She looked down at Judith—soft, sleeping, trusting. Still hers. Still breathing.
They’d go tomorrow. Not because they wanted to. Not because they believed in some safe-zone fantasy, or because the barn was collapsing, or because Rick said so.
They’d go because there was nowhere else left to run.
Chapter Text
Day 529 Post-Outbreak
Beth was up before the others. She didn’t wake so much as unraveled from a half-sleep filled with aching limbs and the stale smell of wood rot and old blood. Her back screamed the second she shifted, stiff from the cold and the awkward position she'd folded herself into sometime during the night. Her spine cracked like dry twigs, and her right hip throbbed where it had pressed against the hard barn floor for hours. Judith was still nestled tight against her chest, her little body warm in a way that made Beth shiver rather than settle. The baby’s mouth hung open slightly, slack with exhaustion, her cheeks pink and damp from a night of fussy tears. She’d spent most of it whimpering and rooting, latching only for a moment or two before growing frustrated again. The sound of her hunger had gnawed at Beth’s insides worse than the cold.
Her coat—thin, patched, and long past its prime—held barely enough warmth for one person, let alone two. She kept Judith zipped inside it with her, skin to skin, but the heat between them felt like borrowed time. Like the baby was draining what little Beth had left to give and still begging for more.
Beth didn’t blame her.
She moved slowly, every muscle sore, joints stiff and resistant. The sky outside the barn slats had begun to shift—no real sunrise, just the first silver suggestion of dawn bleeding into the black. A low fog crept along the ground, curling in soft tendrils through the gaps in the walls. It looked like breath caught in a dying throat. Thick. Heavy. Still.
She knelt beside their pack and began to sort through what little they had left. Her fingers were stiff and uncooperative, tingling from cold and overuse. She worked by memory more than sight.
One jar of applesauce. A single cloth diaper that was mostly clean. A spare shirt that no longer fit her and one of Judith’s socks that had been missing until now. No water. Not enough of anything.
Judith stirred, a soft, tired sound like a protest more than a need. Beth pulled her tighter, pressing her lips to the baby’s temple, breathing in the faint sourness of milk that hadn’t been there. She didn’t know how many more nights like this either of them could take.
She felt a shadow shift to her left.
Daryl.
He moved in that quiet way he always did—just barely brushing her shoulder as he passed to check the edge of the barn wall, scanning for danger. She didn’t startle. She just let herself breathe a little deeper, grounded by the smell of dirt and pine and faint smoke that clung to him like a second skin.
He paused there beside her, one hand resting on the wood, eyes forward. But then—slowly—he looked back over his shoulder.
Their eyes met.
Beth didn’t smile. Not exactly. But something softened in her face. A warmth that hadn’t been there a second ago. She adjusted Judith’s weight, tucked the baby’s arm more securely into the coat.
Daryl’s gaze flicked down, just for a second—to the baby, to Beth’s hands. Then back to her.
His expression didn’t change much, but the corner of his mouth twitched, like he might’ve smiled if he remembered how.
Beth tilted her head slightly, chin lifting in that way she did when she wanted him to say something but wouldn’t push him to.
He didn’t say anything.
He just reached out and gently brushed her knuckles with his.
Not a full touch. Just enough.
Her fingers twitched, startled—and then curled back in return.
A beat passed.
And then he turned away, walking ahead into the morning mist.
Beth watched him go, her chest aching in a way that had nothing to do with the cold.
Carol passed behind Beth a moment later, ghost-silent, checking and double-checking each pack with clinical precision. Her fingers moved like they’d memorized every weight, every seam. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to. They all knew what this morning meant.
Rick stood alone near the barn’s edge, just past the collapsed trough where they'd kept rainwater days ago. He was a silhouette against the haze—motionless, carved from stone. One hand rested on the hilt of his machete, the other dangling loose by his side.
Beth watched him for a moment.
He wasn’t looking at anything specific. Just the trees. Like he expected them to answer something he hadn’t said out loud.
The air was thick with quiet. Not peace—never peace. But the silence that came before a choice, before movement. The kind that only survivors knew. The kind that meant every step forward was one closer to something worse.
Beth looked down at Judith. The baby shifted in her sleep, one tiny hand clenching around the collar of Beth’s coat like she knew. They were leaving the barn. And nothing about that felt like safety.
Aaron was quiet—too quiet.
Not the kind of quiet that came from fatigue or resignation. This was a pacing, coiled-spring kind of silence. He moved like a tethered dog, every few seconds drifting toward the edge of the barn door, eyes sweeping the tree line, then snapping back toward the others as if expecting someone—anyone—to announce something new.
Beth watched from the side without speaking. She didn’t need to ask. She already knew what was gnawing at him. She was thinking it too.
Eric.
The man he hadn't seen since the night before. The one he'd trusted to wait. The one who hadn't been at the vehicles.
The air was thick with fog, heavy enough to blur the edges of the road and smear headlights into halos. When they finally set out, it was without ceremony or conversation. Just a few exchanged nods and the scrape of boots on wet gravel. They moved like ghosts—quiet, purposeful, half-there.
Glenn and Maggie climbed into the sedan, their movements methodical. Abraham took the wheel of the RV with a grunt, Rosita sliding into the passenger seat beside him, still limping slightly from the night before.
Beth hesitated before stepping inside the RV, her eyes flicking toward Daryl, who met her gaze from a few feet away. He gave the smallest of nods. She returned it. Then she climbed into the back with Judith still strapped against her chest, the baby’s breath warming a faint patch through her coat.
Aaron slid in beside her. He sat close, but not too close, perched on the edge of the bench like he wasn’t sure whether he was coming along or being transported as a prisoner. His hands shook once before he shoved them into his jacket.
The engine coughed to life. The RV groaned, the tires crunching wet leaves and gravel as it rolled forward into the mist.
Aaron didn’t speak at first. Just stared out the window with unfocused eyes, shoulders curled in, like he was trying to make himself smaller.
Beth adjusted Judith slightly, tugging the blanket higher around her head to guard against the morning chill seeping in through the cracks in the walls.
“You think we’ll find him?” Aaron asked suddenly, voice low—barely a ripple in the stale air.
Beth didn’t answer right away. She could hear the hope in his voice and the fear stitched just beneath it, pulling tight like thread about to snap. She thought about what she would want someone to say if the roles were reversed.
The problem was—she didn’t believe in pretty lies anymore.
“We look,” she said finally. “But we don’t slow down.”
Aaron nodded, but it was tight, brittle. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the seat in front of him. She could see him forcing himself not to ask again, not to plead.
Judith began to fuss.
It started as a soft, nasal whine, but within seconds it swelled into frustrated cries, muffled only slightly by the wool layers wrapped around her. Beth unzipped her coat slightly, trying to shift her position, bouncing the baby gently. Judith turned her head, rooting blindly with her mouth open in confusion, her cry sharpening to a ragged wail.
Beth winced. Not at the volume—she was used to that—but at the fact that she had nothing left to give.
“Shh,” she whispered. “I know. I know, sweetheart.”
She reached into her bag, pulling out the half-used packet of formula with one hand. Her fingers brushed the bottom of the bag. No clean water. Not even the can she’d scraped together yesterday. She stared down at the packet for a long second, then clenched her jaw.
Aaron turned toward her, noticing.
“I have a canteen,” he said quickly, fumbling for the inside of his jacket. “It’s clean. I swear. Sealed tight. I haven’t touched it.”
He pulled it out and offered it with both hands like a peace offering.
Beth didn’t take it right away.
She sniffed, leaned forward, twisted the cap off, and brought the bottle to her nose. No metallic scent. No sourness. Still, she swirled it once, watching for cloudiness.
Then, slowly, she nodded.
“Thanks,” she murmured, not meeting his eyes.
She tested it on the inside of her wrist—still cold, but drinkable. Then she dipped her pinky in and tasted it herself.
Neutral. Chalky. Not spoiled.
Good enough.
Beth brought the bottle to Judith’s lips, gently guiding the opening into the baby’s mouth.
Judith latched immediately, her cries softening into soft slurps. Her little hands curled into Beth’s chest again, fists clenching and unclenching in sleepy relief.
Beth let out a long, slow breath.
She closed her eyes for just a moment, listening to the rhythm of her daughter’s drinking, feeling the tiny exhale of warmth against her skin. It wasn’t peace, but it was something close enough to fool her heart for a few seconds.
“You’re good with her,” Aaron said softly beside her.
Beth opened her eyes.
She looked at him for a beat, then back down at Judith.
“I have to be.”
They’d been in the car for less than an hour when the road narrowed, curling into a long bend framed by skeletal trees and half-collapsed fencing. The fog thickened, clinging low to the pavement like it didn’t want them to see what waited ahead.
Beth had just started to close her eyes—just a moment, just to rest them—when she felt the shift in the car’s momentum. The subtle hesitation in Glenn’s foot on the gas. The too-late recognition of movement in the headlights.
And then everything turned red.
The first impact wasn’t the worst—it was the sound that followed. A sickening thunk, wet and final, as the sedan plowed into something too soft and too heavy. Blood splattered across the windshield in a sudden sheet, painting it crimson. Bones crunched beneath the tires. Something—an arm, maybe—slapped against the glass with a hollow smack.
Beth flinched, instinctively curling her body tighter around Judith, shielding the baby’s head with her hand.
They were in a herd.
The kind you didn’t drive through.
The kind you drove into.
Walkers swarmed from the fog like wraiths, their limbs dragging through the wet grass, jaws snapping open in snarls that faded into the roar of the engine. Glenn jerked the wheel, trying to weave, but there were too many of them. The road was slick with gore now—red smears and shattered limbs streaking the pavement.
“Don’t stop!” Rick barked from the passenger seat, one hand braced on the dash.
“Wasn’t planning to,” Glenn shot back, voice tight. “But this is getting bad!”
Another body hit the hood with a thud—a walker’s face pressed grotesquely against the glass before sliding out of sight. The windshield wipers tried to sweep away the mess but only smeared the blood, turning the world outside into a red, dripping blur.
Judith began to cry.
The sound cut through the chaos like a knife.
Beth tightened her grip, her hand already fumbling for the bag at her feet. Her fingers brushed the canteen, but her hands were shaking—too much adrenaline, too much cold—and she fumbled the canteen, nearly dropping it to the floor.
“It’s okay,” she whispered to Judith, though she didn’t believe it.
Another crunch. Another scream from the fog. Someone shouted outside—maybe Rosita, maybe Abraham. The car jostled hard to the right.
Then the engine let out a sick groan and died.
The sedan coasted a few more feet, tires sliding in the slush of blood and bone, before shuddering to a stop.
Beth barely had time to brace herself before silence rushed in—thick, suffocating, unnatural.
“Are they behind us?” Rick asked, already reaching for the door handle.
Glenn swore under his breath. “Should be—”
He turned the key. The engine sputtered. Then nothing.
Beth looked up in time to see Rick slam the door open and step into the mist, blade in hand. Glenn followed, crouched low, trying to see through the blood-streaked glass.
The headlights from the other vehicle—the RV, Abraham’s truck, something—flared faintly behind them. Figures moved in the distance. Shapes sprinted toward the car, weapons raised.
Beth let out a breath, tension seeping from her muscles just a little. Reinforcements.
Then Rick’s flashlight swung through the cabin, illuminating something glinting beneath the backseat.
Beth turned her head to follow the beam.
A small black box.
A radio.
Her blood ran cold.
Rick picked it up slowly, turning it over in his palm. His mouth was a hard line.
“He was listening to us,” he said flatly. “Before the barn. Maybe longer.”
Beth’s stomach turned.
Beside her, Aaron sat frozen, his face pale and slick with sweat. His lips moved, but no sound came out.
Then the sky cracked open.
A red flare lit up the fog with a sudden hiss, streaking upward and exploding like a silent scream. The color bled into the mist, casting everything in a sick, blood-colored glow.
Aaron’s calm shattered.
“No—no, that’s them,” he said, scrambling to his knees. “That’s one of ours. That’s Eric. I need to go! I need to go now!”
“Sit down,” Michonne ordered, stepping in front of him.
Aaron pushed forward anyway, voice ragged. “You don’t understand. If he’s signaling, he’s in danger—we were supposed to stay close! He thinks I’m dead!”
“We don’t even know what it means,” Rick snapped.
“You don’t know—but I do!” Aaron shouted.
Then everything happened at once.
He lunged sideways, twisting violently.
His boot connected with the car door, slamming it open. It cracked hard into Michonne’s hip, knocking her to the ground with a sharp gasp. Beth reached out, instinct taking over—but Aaron was already gone, a blur disappearing into the trees.
“Shit!” Glenn shouted.
Rick moved to help Michonne up, pulling her to her feet with one hand.
“Let him go,” Rick said through clenched teeth. “We don’t chase.”
Michonne gritted her jaw, brushing herself off. “We should. If that flare was from his people, they might think it was you who saw it. That’s our best chance of finding them.”
Rick hesitated.
Then nodded.
“Glenn. With me.”
They were already moving, weapons drawn, vanishing into the darkness before Beth could say anything.
She stared after them, heart pounding, Judith still crying softly in her arms.
The smell of blood hung in the air.
The red flare glowed faintly through the trees.