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The World We Live In

Morality

“Morality is contraband in war.” — Mahatma Gandhi



It was hard to believe it was still so early in the day. It wasn’t even noon yet and they were already on to their next attack of the day, which they were determined to be successful. Georgie had rolled her passenger window down and then opened up the back window to allow some sort of cross breeze inside the truck as she and Rick traveled to the Shephard Office Plaza as it was starting to get a little too warm for their liking. With him at the wheel, that left Georgie to handle the map that Dwight had roughly drawn out on one of the sheets of paper Rick had been carrying around with him.

“So, you got all the lookouts?” she asked.

“Yep. Daryl and Morgan took care of all of ‘em but that last one this morning.”

“How was it?”

“Fine.”

“Did the Savior in question give you any trouble?”

Rick shrugged. “No. I caught him off guard. He was still yapping away, though, so I cut loose a walker that was tied to a pole. Let the walker do the rest.”

Georgie nodded; picturing the scene in her head. “That’s what you call being resourceful,” she quipped. “Doing the best you can with the tools you are given.”

Looking over at her, he smiled. With a gestured of his head, he changed the subject back toward the next step, instead of the ones already taken. “We almost at this place?”

“Yeah…” Georgie turned the map slightly and then looked up at the road ahead of them. “Pull off over there.”

Following her advisement, Rick turned the truck to the left and slipped it into some dense tree coverage at the base of road before it began a slight, curving incline.

“Where is it?”

“It’ll be up that hill a ways. Dwight wrote a little note in the corner, saying we’d be out of sight at the front if we stay below the hill,” Georgie replied, showing him the handwriting in the corner of the paper.

She didn’t wait for Rick to turn off the engine before hopping out of the truck. Slinking along the side of it, she signaled for most of their caravan to split off continue up the road that branched off further left with a simple swirl of a finger in the air and then pointing in the necessary direction. One vehicle pulled up and parked behind the truck, and Daryl parked just a little further back than that before he climbed off his bike to join Georgie and the three other guys from the second vehicle, with his crossbow readily in hand. As she folded up the papers, Rick slid out of the truck and she tucked the papers into his back pocket when he reached them.

Armed with his rifle, Rick nodded to the others. “Alright,” he muttered and then gestured with his eyes up the road.

Quietly, they followed just behind Rick as he darted across the road. They ran up the subsequent incline, one after the other; making sure to keep hidden with the help of the trees. As the entrance gate to the plaza began to loom before them, they glimpsed a security booth to the right of it with an armed Savior standing in the doorway on lookout. Without being having to be asked or told, Daryl aimed his crossbow and fired a bolt right into the Savior’s forehead. As soon as his body dropped, Rick and Georgie stepped out from the trees and ran forward toward the gate; pushing it open together. Daryl retrieved his bolt and quickly joined the couple and the other guys as they all hurried inside the plaza.

Before they even had the front doors to the office building in their sights, they were able to hear the beginning of gunfire coming from the back of the building, which meant the rest of their group had officially started the second assault. Slipping out from behind a large tree with their guns raised, Rick and Georgie took point and each fired a single shot into the heads of the two men guarding the front doors. Their blood sprayed behind them onto the door windows and once their bodies dropped, Rick, stepped forward and pulled open one of the doors.

Once he was inside, everyone else slipped in behind him. Daryl whistled for the others to follow as the main trio — which consisted of Rick, Georgie, and himself — marched forward through the entrance hall. After about ten feet, they turned left; keeping their weapons of choice raised still. Being ever vigilant in an unfamiliar location, even with a hand-drawn map to assist, was an absolute necessity. They couldn’t let their guards down, not even for a minute.

Coming to a stairwell on their right, they paused and Rick gestured toward it. “Signal if they’re already inside. We’ll be there.”

The other three guys split off toward the stairwell while Daryl nodded at Rick and Georgie. “C’mon. Let’s find them guns.”

The further on down the hallway they went, Daryl began to hang back to check down a smaller corridor, either to make sure it was clear or see what he could find. Rick and Georgie stayed together, however, as they reached what appeared to be the main entrance hall to the office building. Rick took pause; removing the folded up papers from his pocket and looking them over.

“What does it say?” Georgie inquired, looking around them before looking over his shoulder. “Where do we go now?”

“Stairs or an elevator shaft.”

“Ugh,” she groaned. “I knew this wouldn’t be easy, but I didn’t know how much upper body strength I’d be needing to use today. I mean, stairs I can obviously handle.”

Rick smirked slightly. “I got your back.”

“More like behind. No way I’m getting up an elevator shaft without a good push.”

“It’d be my honor to give your behind a good push.” The entire time he spoke, he never looked up from the paper. He was equal parts very seriously engrossed in the notes Dwight had written all around it, while also managing to banter with her.

Georgie chuckled quietly at his comment, but the sound of shuffling footsteps immediately drew her and Rick’s attention away. They aimed their guns, in case it was a Savior or a walker, but thankfully it was only Daryl approaching with his crossbow lowered. He seemed unfazed by their reaction; walking past them nonchalantly as their dropped their guns to their sides.

“Ain’t on this floor,” the shaggy archer mumbled.

Shoving the papers into his shirt pocket, Rick looked toward the ceiling. “The only option is up.”

“High ground,” Daryl nodded, pacing slightly. “Good cover.”

“Yeah, I’d put them up there, too.”

Daryl turned to face a set of double doors. “Stairs,” he announced, stepped forward. Gripping the handle, he gave both doors a good rattle, but neither would open. As they were obviously locked, Daryl chose the next option of kicking them open.

The doors weren’t budging under just Daryl’s ministrations, so Rick joined him and, side by side, they kicked the doors wide open after just two attempts together. As both doors burst inward, they slammed against the sides, revealing a narrow, darkened stairwell leading to the upper three floors. Taking the stairs one and two at a time, the trio hurried quickly, but carefully, up to the second floor. Forcing open those doors, which were stuck from the swell of humidity, most likely, Rick poked his head out into that second floor hallway and listened.

Pulling himself fully back into the stairwell, he gestured upward. “Our guys just walked by.”

“Okay, so third floor it is.” Georgie took lead this time, not waiting for either man to go first.

At the set of doors leading out onto the third floor, Georgie tried the handle and found it unlocked, but sticking just as much as the lower floor. Rick touched his hand to hers, forcing her to turn and look at him. With a simple raise of one finger, he gave her the hint to hold on before stepping out; to give it a moment and listen for any footsteps. While she was willing to acquiesce to his reservations, Daryl seemed less so; pushing past the couple and slipping out into the hall. Off Rick’s sigh, he and Georgie followed after their friend but were forced to stop abruptly when they saw there was a barricade of sorts that made it quite impossible.

“We backtrack a little. Go up to the fourth floor, check that first and then make our way down to this floor from that other stairwell,” Daryl muttered.

Looking around at each other, the three of them decided to go with that plan, but when they reached the fourth floor by way of the stairs, they found the double doors locked. And not just lucked, but barricaded. Daryl started kicking them open, but Georgie grabbed at his leg to stop him.

“What?” he grunted, looking at her through the hair hanging in his eyes.

“Kicking doors open on the bottom floor is one thing, but up here, where guns and ammunition is likely stored with any Saviors holed up—not exactly the best plan of action,” she whispered, eyeing him right back. “We don’t need them knowing where we are, backing us into a stairwell or hallway when they know the layout like the back of their hands and we don’t.”

“Yeah? Then what’s your suggestion, huh?”

“We go back down to three,” Georgie replied, throwing a look to Rick. “The elevator shaft.”

Rick nodded. “The elevator shaft,” he repeated. “Elevator doors are right off that hallway.”

“Exactly. We go back down to three, pry those elevator doors open and then climb our way up here to four.”

Daryl smacked his lips. “And what if this four is barricaded like down there?”

“Then we go all the way to two, or back to one and make our way back up that other stairwell, but those options will take us longer, and we got a schedule to keep,” Rick remarked. Looking between his wife and his friend, he patted the latter on the shoulder and then gestured back down the stairwell with a nod of his head. “Let’s go.”

And back down the three of them went, and out through the double doors on the third floor they went; crossing the hallway to the elevator doors awaiting them. To their right, that pesky barricade that went almost all the way up to the ceiling and was made up of a mix of heavy furniture and wooden pallets. It was obvious all three of them were wondering why the Saviors would have a barricade to one of their exits inside their own outpost, but that was a question that would just have to go unanswered.

Stepping forward, Daryl slung his crossbow over his shoulder and then reached out to pry open the elevator doors. Rick joined him, pulling aside one so Daryl only had to pull aside the other. Sticking head into the shaft, Daryl looked down and could see the elevator was all the way down, two floors below, at ground level. His gaze switched upward and then around the immediate area of the shaft’s inside.

“Okay. Yeah,” he grumbled. “We can do this.”

Georgie and Rick exchanged smirks.

“I’ll go first,” Daryl continued, moving carefully into the dark chasm.

Watching the archer work at grabbing onto the cords to pull himself up, Georgie wasn’t expecting the hand on her ass at that very moment. Looking over her shoulder, she stared at Rick with a raise of her eyebrow.

“I said I’d give your behind a push,” Rick quipped. “You go next. I’ll be right behind you, making sure you get up and Daryl can pull you up the rest of the way.

Smiling a half smile, Georgie nodded and then shoved her gun into the holster on her right leg. “Don’t let me fall to my death,” she joked, but only somewhat, as she stepped forward into the elevator shaft. “If this is how I go, I’ll be so disappointed.”

“Don’t worry,” Rick replied as reached for the nearest cord and turned her body toward the inner wall to their immediate right. “I got you, babe.”

“Okay, there, Sonny.”

Georgie really didn’t have far to climb up. It was literally only just one floor up and Daryl was already prying the upper doors open to the fourth floor. She hooked her foot into a corner groove and just tried thinking of this like climbing a rock wall, but without the safety harness preventing her from fall a few floors and snapping her neck and back and every other bone in her body. She was barely up two feet when Rick slipped in behind her and when he did the third floor elevator doors slid closed with a delayed, but heavy thud noise. Thanks to the fact that Daryl had already pried open the fourth floor doors and was crawling out, the entire shaft wasn’t complete darkness. Rick reached up, one hand gripping a cord, both feet hooked into the same grooves Georgie had used, while the his other reached up to grip some sort of knobbish bolt thing sticking out of the wall. He made sure one of his shoulders was parallel with Georgie’s butt so that if she did actually start to fall, he could somehow catch her by having her land there. He wasn’t really sure how that kind of situation would pan out if it happened, but he was determined that it would work out.

Fortunately, that kind of situation never panned out since Daryl had rather easily made it up and out of the elevator shaft with finesse, which was just not something one would assume he had. Daryl was able to get to his feet and turn around to offer Georgie a hand to help her up the rest of the way as if she weighed less than a bag of apples. Once she was free and clear of the elevator doors, both she and Daryl helped Rick up and out.

The sound of rapid gunfire was still an unmistakable sound in the distance as the three of them grabbed their weapons back up and quickly moved out into the corridor that went either left or right.

“Last floor. The guns have gotta be up here,” Rick remarked, a little out of breath from the climb.

“We still have the third floor if we don’t find them up here, don’t forget,” Georgie reminded.

Rick sighed. “Well, hopefully they’re up here.”

“He said they’d be here,” Daryl added.

“Everything else he passed you is checking out.

Georgie turned her back to both me and rolled her eyes. “The note said four floors and mentioned the stairway and elevator access, nothing about the specifics of which floor the guns would be on. You boys are just assuming and you know what they say about assuming…”

Daryl smacked his lips at her. “Yeah, whatever.”

“Well, just because we haven’t found the guns yet don’t mean they’re not here,” Georgie continued. “We’ve only just started. We gotta give Dwight some credit. Despite what he’s done before, or what we think of him, he’s helped us out big time and—”

“That guy’s a piece of shit,” Daryl gruffly interjected.

“If those guns get to the Sanctuary, they could cut through those walkers and free up an exit,” Rick stated, looking slightly over his shoulder at his friend. “We’ll go faster if we split up. If Georgie and I find the M2s, if you find them, we use them — hit the courtyard right then and there.”

Daryl nodded. “End this quick.”

Without a word, he slipped down the corridor to the left. Rick gave Georgie a small nod of his own and the two of them went right.

“You’re with me,” he informed.

“Aren’t I always?” she asked with a little grin.



Quietly and a bit slowly, Rick and Georgie moved down the long corridor, guns raised to a certain extent; peering into each window they passed. Rick kept his sights on the right side and Georgie on the left. Each room they passed was increasingly more unassuming than the next. Most rooms were small, former offices or supply closets; mostly with just beds and other material objects to make them feel like home for the Saviors who lived out of each room. Up ahead, though, Rick finally came upon a larger room, where the corridor curved to the left, which seemed promising.

With a nudge to Georgie’s elbow, he got her attention and nodded to the door in question before bothering to open it up. With one hand on the handle and the other holding up his rifle, Rick slipped into the room first as Georgie walked in somewhat backward so that she could keep her eyes peeled in case anyone approached them from behind.

They stepped quite soundlessly inside, one after the other, passing a shelf full of matchboxes, candles and other minor supplies on their left. Directly before them, on the left side of this larger room was a door which ended up leading into a much smaller room that was made up into a rather nice bedroom setup, complete with throw pillows, curtains, dresser and lamps. Georgie was pretty sure she used to have the exact same bedspread, but kept that to herself.

Backing out of the bedroom, Rick tiptoed forward to the closed door of the second room beside the first while Georgie remained in the first to give it a more thorough sweep, to play it safe that they hadn’t missed anything. While she had crouched down to peer under the bed, Rick barked out a sudden grunting noise and as she darted out of the bedroom, Georgie was witnessing him being tackled to the floor by a Savior.

They were moving around so much that Georgie was unable to get a clear shot to just shoot the guy without risking injury to Rick, so she opted for jumping on the guy’s back when he had Rick pinned to the floor. While he was hauling back and punching Rick, Georgie had slipped one arm around the guy’s neck to get him into some sort of chokehold and yank him away. In response, the guy jerked his arm backwards and elbowed Georgie in the cheek, either purposely or on accident. It didn’t matter either way, because Rick saw red when Georgie was tossed backward and her heard hit the edge of a desk. Rick used that moment where he wasn’t getting hit to sit up and throw his weight forward so that he could head-butt the Savior and then grabbed for his Colt. He moved to aim for the guy’s head, and even pulled the trigger, but the Savior smacked Rick’s hand away and then socked him in the jaw.

In response, Rick pushed the Savior back with a shove to the chest with his boot, causing the Savior to tumble back into another desk, and then proceeded in kicking the guy twice in the face before mirroring Georgie’s move of climbing onto his back. The hope was to subdue him, maybe choke him to death, but the Savior was strong and still not going down without a fight as he carried Rick forward on his back. Running forward, the Savior headed for the wall, turning in time to throw Rick up against it and pinning him to it. Rick kept his arms on the guy’s neck; tightening and tightening his grip. The struggle continued as the Savior twirled around, trying to toss Rick off, to no avail, and ending up throwing Rick up against one of the shelves.

The shelf broke and all its contents flew off and fell down, as Georgie finally got back up to her feet, rubbing her aching head in the process.

“The M2s. Where are they?” Rick gritted out, maintaining his chokehold.

“No…guns!” the Savior gasped, as he was struggling to breathe, let alone talk. “Grace…”

Looking toward the second room neither he nor Georgie had had the chance to inspect yet, Rick growled. “They’re in there?” Rick forced the Savior forward, leading them both toward the room.

Adrenaline must’ve kicked in for the Savior as he got some control back. “No! No!” Hunching forward, he kept Rick on his back and off his feet. Running backward, he slammed Rick into the wall again.

“Rick!” Georgie called out, realizing he’d just missed being impaled on one of the three metal braces that had held the broken shelf up. As Rick continued to simply stand there, still choking the guy, an idea appeared.

Hurrying forward, Georgie grabbed the Savior by either side of his face and stared Rick directly in the eye. She cocked her head to the right, gesturing to something he wasn’t catching on to. “Move.”

Turning slightly to his left gave her more leverage as she guided the Savior around, while still in Rick’s grasp, and when Rick’s grasp loosened enough, she shoved the Savior forward until his head was impaled onto one of those metal braces. The man was killed instantly; his body drooping and his head sliding back off the brace from the weight of his body, which then dropped unceremoniously to the floor.

Rick crouched, catching his breath and looking down at his and Georgie’s pseudo-tag team effort. Blood dripped from a cut on his face and he his curls clung all around his face and upon the back of his neck from sweat. Shifting his gaze upward toward Georgie, he simply nodded to her and then turned to dig into the man’s pockets; removing a set of keys. When he stood up, he stepped over to Georgie and touched his fingertips to the side of her face.

“You okay?”

Georgie nodded. “Just a hit to the face and a bump on the head. I’ll live.”

Knowing she could hold her own allowed him to push his concern for her wellbeing aside for a little while and focus on what they’d come there for. Looking over at the closed door to that second room the Savior was so desperate to keep Rick and Georgie out of, Rick walked forward and unlocked it. When he opened the door, however, he was not expecting what he found.

Georgie came up behind him and was just as equally surprised.

There was also an unspoken amount of guilt and sadness that washed over them both.

The walls were painted blue, all except the wall at their immediate right which was covered in hand-painted zoo animals. Directly before them was a crib with a handmade mobile. Above the crib, on the wall, was an oval mirror and to the left of the mirror the name ‘Gracie’ was also hand-painted. It was below that, inside the crib, where they found a sleeping infant girl that broke them a little.

They’d been expecting to find guns, big time artillery. Not a baby.

“Gracie,” Rick muttered, quite shook over this discovery. “No. No.”

Georgie looked up at him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “We didn’t know.”

“He was protecting his child…” Tears were stinging his eyes as he struggled with the realization that they had just orphaned this little girl.

“We didn’t know,” Georgie repeated. “How were we supposed to know? Dwight said there’d be guns, not her.” Licking her lips, she looked down at the baby, who was in a deep enough sleep that she hadn’t woken up crying to the racket outside her nursery. “We won’t just leave her here. We’ll finish what we came here for, and then we’ll come back for her. We’ll bring her home. Someone will care for her. And if no one steps up to the plate, then we will.”

“We killed her father.”

“No. I killed her father.” Georgie frowned. “She’ll never know who her parents were. She’s way too young. But someone will raise her and protect her. We’ll make sure of it, even if we have to do it ourselves.” With a sigh, she rubbed Rick’s upper arm and leaned in to kiss it. “C’mon. She’ll be safe in here for now.”

Slowly leading Rick out of the room, Georgie took the keys from him. She was about to lock the door up, but wondered what would happen if everyone was killed, including her and Rick. Who would be able to get to the child and take care of it? Even if it ended up being more Saviors returned here, at least someone would be able to get into the room and get to the baby so it didn’t die alone of starvation. So, she closed the door but left it unlocked.

The two of them stepped away from the dead Savior on the floor. The fact that Georgie had impaled him face first onto that metal brace meant there was no need to stab his head anywhere to prevent him from coming back. It was one less brutal thing to do to the man, even if he was a Savior. He was also a parent, and both Rick and Georgie were able to put themselves into his shoes, after the fact. If it had been them, and a Savior had come bursting in, they would’ve done the same as him to protect their children.



Having left the office space containing the nursery, Rick and Georgie continued down the corridor where it had turned left. Pushing open one of the doors, Rick went in first with his rifle raised. Georgie, behind him, came in with her own gun down at her side as she took in the sight of the room. It was just another bedroom setup, with a single lamp on for a light source. Off to the side something on the dresser caught Rick’s eye. Sauntering over to it, he lowered his own weapon and removed a photograph; staring down at it in confusion.

Georgie stepped up beside him and glanced at the photograph as well. Knitting her brow together, she reached out and gripped one side of the picture. “I know these two,” she remarked with gradual realization. “This man and woman…”

“So do I,” he muttered softly. “Dammit.”

“Keep your hands down. Turn around slow.”

Turning, both Rick and Georgie found themselves staring into the face of the man in the photo, who was now aiming a gun at them. Moving to stand side by side with their backs to the wall, they stared at the man in full disbelief and a considerable amount of curiosity.

The man looked between the pair, but his focus was primarily on Rick. “Hi, Rick,” he greeted.

“Your name…” Rick began to say.

“Morales,” Georgie finished.

Morales eyed her. There seemed to be a look of recognition on his face, but it was slight. “I know you, too, don’t I? But barely.”

“You were in Atlanta,” Rick remarked.

“On a highway, just outside Atlanta,” she added. “You cut me off on the road to warn me the city was overrun.”

“That was a long time ago,” Morales muttered. “It’s over, Rick, and whatever your name was.”

“Georgie.”

“Whatever.” Unclipping a walkie-talkie from his belt with his free hand, he held it up. “I called the Saviors back. And they’re coming.” After a couple moments of the three of them eyeing each other, he added, “Guns down. Now.”

Rick began to crouch down first, setting down the rifle and then his Colt. Georgie was a little slower to react. She was considering the fact that they were technically two against one and could probably, very easily take him. But, there was shared history, no matter how small it was, and it was obvious neither she nor Rick wanted to fight Morales if they didn’t have to.

With their guns on the ground, they both stood back up and continued to just stare at Morales, both wondering the same thing: how did he come to be a Savior, living in Virginia when last they both saw him, albeit separately, he was on his way to Birmingham, Alabama with his family? Well, the fact that his room only had a single bed was one clue that perhaps there was no more family, and if no more family, then what else did he have left? Losing his family, and in most likely a horrible manner, could be enough to send him wandering anywhere, a shell of the family man he once was, and right into the arms of a community such as the Saviors.

“So, you’re the Rick from Alexandria,” Morales deduced, seeming just as surprised by this development. “This whole time, it was you.”

“You called your men in for nothing,” Rick retorted. “The fight’s out there. It’s just us in here.”

“Did you hear what I just said? I know who you are. I saw it in the mirror through the open door. And it wasn’t any kind of blast from the past. As soon as I saw you, I knew you’d made the same trip as me. From there to here.” Morales scoffed, his aim on both Rick and Georgie never faltering. “Shit, well—well, I guess we aren’t the same people we used to be, huh? ‘Cause you’re monsters. I called them back ‘cause you’re a prize, Rick. We’ve been told. We don’t kill you, the Widow, or the King. Not if we don’t have to.” Shifting his gaze toward Georgie, he narrowed his eyes at her. “Are you the Widow, Georgie?”

She shrugged. “Sort of.” If she had still considered Jake her husband when Rick had killed him, then yes, she was a widow. But she wasn’t the widow Morales was talking about.”

“Sort of,” he repeated. “So then you’re fair game.”

“No,” she insisted. “I am the Widow. I just hate that title.” Turning to give Rick a look, she added. “I consider myself a wife, not a widow.”

Morales mulled this over for a moment, and then removed his gaze from her. “So, why are you here, Rick? I know you…just like before. You’re always the guy willing to rush in. But why? What is it you’re looking for? Nothing to say, huh? It doesn’t matter. Not anymore. Not for either of you, or anyone else you brought in here. ‘Cause what’s left of my people—they’re coming. And we’ll get you to Negan. Or we won’t. Either way, we’re gonna settle your shit, peaches.”

“Is your family here?” Rick asked.

Finally, Morales faltered. He lowered his gun so that his aim was no longer on Rick’s head, but more at chest level. “We never made it to Birmingham. They didn’t.”

“Well, I’m sorry.”

“I am, too,” Georgie added.

“Really, Rick?”

“I am,” he insisted. “I lost people, too. We both have.” He gestured between Georgie and himself. “Lori. Shane. Andrea. Glenn.” Rick bit back on his anger and grief, the latter of which still felt so fresh. “Negan killed him. Forced him to his knees. Bashed his head in right in front of us. Right in front of his pregnant wife!”

“He had a wife?”

“Not before. He met her.”

“In this?”

“Yeah,” Rick nodded. “In this.”

Morales, a little confused now by Georgie’s claim at being the Widow, turned to her. “So, are you Glenn’s widow? Is Glenn’s widow the Widow, or…?”

“Glenn’s widow is pregnant. Why would a pregnant widow be leading a fight?” Georgie questioned. “There are plenty widows in this world, but if you’re looking for the Widow, then I’m your gal. He’s Rick. I’m the Widow.”

Rick threw her a glance and then looked back at Morales. “Are you Negan, too?”

Morales brought the aim of his gun back up to Rick’s face and sneered as if he were Clint Eastwood. “I lost my family. I lost my mind. I was in some…tow trailer. Sleeping myself to death. Waiting to become nothing. And the Saviors—they found me. They thought I was worth a damn. Worth bringing back with them. So, yeah.” Morales began to nod. “Yeah, I’m Negan. To make it this far, this long—I had to be. I had to be something. Just like you.”

Rick shook his head. “We’re not the same as you.”

Morales scoffed. “How’s that?”

“Well, look at you.”

“Look at me? Look at us, Rick. Look at us. We’re three assholes who’ll do whatever we have to just to keep going. And the only difference is, I’m the one holding the gun. That doesn’t make me any worse than you two. That just makes me luckier. ‘Cause let’s face it, if it wasn’t me, if it was you holding the gun, I’d be brains out on the floor right now.”

“You don’t know that,” Georgie muttered.

“And you do? Huh?” Morales questioned.

Rick leaned forward ever so slightly. “I know I wouldn’t want to.”

“Come on. Is that the best you can do?”

“I’d—I’d at least try to find another way.”

“Yeah? Why? ‘Cause we knew each other for a few days back at the start?” Throwing Georgie a look, Morales added, “Or because I saw you driving down a road, alone, looking for your son?”

“You offered that I could tag along with your family to Birmingham. Strength in numbers, I think you said.”

“Yeah…and maybe if you had, you would’ve been there to help me keep my family alive, or maybe they still would’ve died and you and I would’ve both come this way anyway. Maybe you would be Negan, too.”

Georgie shook her head. “Or maybe you could’ve come with me and found Rick and his group, and not become Negan. I wasn’t in a place to go with your family. I’d just lost mine and was in my own dark place. Our journeys weren’t meant to be the same, but clearly our paths were still meant to cross.” She shrugged, watching a twitch in Morales’ lip as he shifted the aim of his gun slightly toward her before resuming it fully upon Rick. “We made choices. Some good, some bad. We can do bad things and be good people, and we can be bad people given the chance to do good things.”

Making a decision, Morales turned his gun completely upon Georgie, which had Rick none too happy. “You know what I think? I think you can talk all you want.” Despite his aim on her, he eyes were on Rick now. “You can say all the words. Lori, Shane, Andrea, Glenn—they’re all dead, and somewhere along the way, Officer Friendly died right along with them. Just like I did with them. That’s what I know, Rick.”

Before Morales could say anything else, a figure approached from behind him.

Rick and Georgie both saw that it was Daryl, with his crossbow raised. Rick wasn’t quick enough in shouting “no!” at his friend to stop him from what he was about to do. When the “no!” left Rick’s mouth, Morales whipped around with his gun and was met with one of Daryl’s bolts through his neck. Morales dropped to the ground, choking to death on his own blood.

“You good?” Daryl asked the couple while they just stared down at Morales’ dying body in shock.

Rick fumbled for the words. “That…th-that was…”

“I know who it was,” Daryl replied. “It don’t matter. Not one little bit.” He leaned down and removed his bolt, and in the process bringing death swiftly to Morales. “You find them guns?”

Wiping a tear from her cheek, Georgie looked toward the wall for a moment and shook her head. “They’re not here,” she answered.

What?”

Dropping down to his knees, Rick holstered his Colt and handed Georgie’s handgun up to her. When she accepted it and slipped it into the holster strapped to her leg, Rick picked up his rifle and then stood back up. “He called the Saviors back from the courtyard,” he informed, taking Morales’ handgun off him. “We gotta get out before—”

Rick was cut off by the loud thudding sound of doors in the distance. The three of them looked at each other and then out the doorway to the room, to the hallway beyond it. Daryl ducked to the side as Rick passed Morales’ gun to Georgie so that she had a second weapon on her.

“They’re here,” Rick announced.



Rick, Daryl and Georgie had taken off, running down the corridor, turning where it curved and then continuing until they reached the elevator bay. The sound of gunfire was growing louder the closer they got to it.

“Clear,” Daryl announced, ducking in near the elevator, as a gunshots came up from open elevator shaft; ricocheting off the metal and causing the trio to duck back closer to hallway.

“Dammit,” Rick growled.

“It’s them!” a man’s voice called out from below, followed my more indistinct shouting of voices from the floor they were on.

Looking back and forth, between the left and right sides of the hallway, Rick gestured toward the right, which they had just come from. “There! Go!”

As Daryl darted forward into a room, Rick tried to lead him and Georgie to the same place, but gunshots in their direction forced them back, with Rick and Georgie slipping back into the alcove. The three of them took turns ducking outside their respective places, firing shots of their own when they could and then ducking back in as not to be shot. The Saviors firing at them were making their way toward them; getting closer, little by little. When Rick’s rifle ran out of ammunition, Georgie hand Morales’ gun to him. Taking it, he resumed firing at the Saviors coming from the left side of the hallway while she fired at those coming from the right, the same as Daryl.

“Hey! Hey!” Daryl called out. “I’m out!”

Rick looked over at him and then around at what they could do. Eyeing the fire extinguisher across the hall from him and Georgie, he turned and looked back at Daryl. “Hey!” He held up three fingers and off Daryl’s nod, turned and shot the fire extinguisher. As air hissed and a thick fog was created, Rick shouted back to Daryl as he gestured to him. “Come on!”

Without hesitation, Daryl darted up the hall and dove into the alcove while Rick and Georgie had his back. As the Saviors ran toward them, the trio used the fog to their advantage. Not being seen until too late, they took turns grabbing any approaching Savior, yanking them forward and shoving them into the elevator shaft to their deaths below. Others were met by a sudden blast of rapid gunfire, which dropped them dead to the floor.

Those shots hadn’t come from Rick, Georgie or Daryl.

They sank back, catching their breaths and waiting to see who it was.

“Teams of four! Sweep the offices!” Aaron’s voice echoed, not too far off.

“Aaron!” Rick bellowed.

“Rick!”

“We’re by the elevator!” Squinting through the smoke, Rick sighed and looked between his friend and his wife with a slight sense of relief.



After the firefights, both inside and outside, were over, there were no surviving Saviors left. The team gathered together, walking around, assessing the damage they’d helped wrought while putting down any Saviors that had reanimated as walkers. Rick had reclaimed his Polaroid camera, taking pictures here and there of the damage and the death to go along with the one he’d managed to get at the courtyard the Sanctuary that morning. Daryl was using his crossbow on the walkers and then reclaiming his bolts right away. Anyone injured was loaded up into the back of one of the armored trucks together, to be taken to home to be fixed up. Their dead, meanwhile, we being covered with sheets or blankets. There was no room to bring them home just yet for burial. They would come back for the bodies when they could. The priority was on their living, not on their dead.

News that Francine was one of their recently deceased and that Eric had been gravely injured reached Rick, Daryl and Georgie, and Aaron had gone off to retrieve his husband. But, as it would turn out, Eric hadn’t survived his injury. He had succumbed to it, and then come back. By the time Aaron had gone back to the tree where he’d left Eric, all that was left behind was a large bloodstain on bottom of the tree trunk and a rifle where Eric had been sitting and, in the distance, Eric was walking away to join a retreating herd of walkers, now that he was one of them. Aaron was beside himself with grief, unable to bring himself to shoot Eric; instead just letting him go. Thankfully, Scott was there to console him.

Rick, having ceased taking pictures, began to write two copies of the same letter; one to be passed along to the Hilltop, and the other to the Kingdom. They letters would be left in the drop boxes they’d set up in advance, that were as inconspicuous at the come. One such drop box was an old microwave, sitting in a wheelbarrow full of other broken junk on the side of a road. The three communities would be leaving their letters for each other in them so they all knew how the day’s events had faired for everyone.

Georgie, in the meantime, had headed back upstairs to the fourth floor of the office building; utilizing that set of stairs that went all the way up, even if it was the long way round to get up there. There was just no way she was heading up that elevator shaft on her own. She passed through the corridors, sensing where she had to go without any problem; crediting herself with having a naturally great sense of direction. She had always only had to look at a map once, or drive somewhere once, and she would know how to get back and forth from point A to point B without getting lost any time beyond the first time.

The smoke had cleared from the fire extinguisher Rick had destroyed and the bodies of the Saviors they’d killed were still lying where they had dropped onto the floor. Before exiting the building, after Aaron had shown up with multiple teams, any Savior not killed via headshot was put down with a blade to prevent reanimation. So, there was no threat that would catch Georgie unaware as she walked the hallways alone. Even Morales, who had been shot through the neck with Daryl’s bolt, had been knifed, well after the fact.

Morales was actually Georgie’s first stop on the fourth floor. She stepped into his room where his dead body laid; a pool of blood underneath him; coagulating. She stared down at him, at his eyes that Rick had closed after Rick had been the one to come back and slide a blade into his ear. Fatal wounds aside, Morales looked at peace. It was something that had clearly evaded him, and despite the end he’d met, at least he was with his family again. Georgie frowned and stepped over his legs; avoiding stepping in any blood as she grabbed up the photo of Morales and his wife from the dresser. Stepping back over his legs, she removed the sheet from his bed and then crouched down beside his body. She tucked the photo into the pocket of his outer shirt and then crossed his arms over his chest. Taking the bed sheet, she draped it over his body.

He might’ve become a Savior, but he had history with Rick, Georgie and a few of the others that had been with Rick since the beginning. Actually, even before Rick. She supposed Daryl, Carol and Carl would’ve known Morales even longer, and possibly better. Either way, he wasn’t a Savior then. He wasn’t a bad guy then. She wasn’t even sure he was a bad guy now. If Georgie hadn’t ever found her son and lost her mind in the way Morales said he had, and was just lying around, waiting to die, the lure of the Saviors offering her a place with them would’ve been something she would’ve taken up on. And if, like Morales, the Saviors had become her people, her family, and outsiders were attacking, she could see how, from Morales’ point of view, that he was with the good guys and she was with the bad guys.

But morality, what was good and what was bad, was subjective.

There are good and bad eggs on both sides of this war, and it had only just begun. Made one wonder how all this would change people? Would they lose more of themselves in the bloodshed, or gain hope and a sense of freedom from oppression? Would the lives they’ve lost and would still lose be worth it in the end?

Georgie believed it would be worth it. People are going to die, one way or another, as long as the Saviors remained the opposition. At least these deaths wouldn’t be in vain. Of course, the least amount of deaths would be ideal. All anyone really wanted from her side of the fight was for Negan to be brought down. If he was out of the picture, she could be content with most Saviors going on their happy way, as long as the oppression and needless killing of people in communities under the Saviors’ thumb ended.

Closing the door to Morales’ room was like closing another chapter in their story, another chapter in their lives, and in this fight. Sometimes stories overlap, and this particular chapter happened to be Morales’ final chapter—his epilogue.

Georgie walked away from the room, a considerably less sad about his death.

At the end of the hall, where it would curve in the direction of that elevator bay, Georgie continued straight; entering into the large office space with those two bedrooms. She still had the keys on her that she had taken off of Rick, but she didn’t need them. She hadn’t locked the nursery, after all. Pushing the door open to the small room, she walked up to the crib and found the baby girl wide awake with dried tears on her face. Clearly she had woken at some point and was crying for attention, or for food, or perhaps because she had soiled herself. Or maybe it had been the sounds of constant gunfire, not far outside the office space.

Frowning, Georgie placed a hand upon the baby girl’s chest and gave a soothing rub. “Hey, there, pumpkin—it’s okay. Are you hungry?” She looked to the table off to the side of the crib and saw there was a container of formula and below that there were bottles of water. Taking a clean baby bottle, she went about measuring out the ideal amount of powdered formula and dumping it into the bottle and then filling it up three-quarters of the way with water from one of the water bottles. Putting the cap with the rubber nipple back on, she gave the baby bottle a shake to mix the formula and water up and then picked the baby girl — Gracie — up.

“C’mere.”

Georgie sat down with her in the rocking chair in the corner and proceeded to feed Gracie, who fussed a little at first, possibly just uncertain about whom Georgie was. But, the bottle won out in the end and Gracie went to town on sucking it down. Georgie even hummed a little, to soothe the little girl as best she could so she would feel comfortable in a stranger’s arms. After a few minutes, she heard footsteps approaching from outside the nursery, in the office space, and Georgie wasn’t surprised to find Rick appearing in the doorway.

There was a funny look on his face; something between sadness and amusement. “Figured I’d find you here.”

“I went to Morales’ room first.”

“So, I noticed. I’m assuming the bed sheet was your handiwork.”

“We couldn’t bury him. Even if there was time,” she responded, pulling the bottle away from Gracie’s lips when she began to pop it out on her own; a telltale sign she was full. “It was something I could do.”

“I wish we hadn’t lost him like that,” Rick admitted, leaning against the door frame with his arms folded over his chest. “I thought that maybe after all this was over with…this war…after we kill Negan…”

“That we could all coexist?”

Rick sighed. “It’s a thought. I know there’s good people living at the Sanctuary, and even at the outposts. We’re giving them options. They don’t have to fight back. They can surrender and we can all live in this world together, with no sociopathic dictators ruling over everyone. We can all govern ourselves and work for a better tomorrow together. I want that. I want that for the children that have to grow up in this world—our children.” Rick gestured to the little girl in Georgie’s arms. “Even Gracie. I want her to grow up and have a good life the same as Carl, Judith and every other child in this fucking apocalypse.”

Sitting Gracie up, Georgie braced her by keeping a hand upon her chest and then rubbing her back in strong, yet gentle, circles. “I want that, too.”

“What’re you doing?” Rick inquired, raising an eyebrow.

“Trying to get her to burp. You can’t just smack a baby’s back — gently, of course. You can’t force a burp to happen. You gotta coax it out, soothingly.”

“Lori used to rub Carl’s stomach, I think.” Rick smirked at the memory. “I smacked his back. Gently, of course. For Judith, too. It took forever for them both.”

As if to make Georgie’s point, an audible burp that sounded more like a tiny hiccup echoed from Gracie’s lips. “See? Coaxing.” Standing up, Georgie brought Gracie back over to the crib and laid her down. “I’m just gonna check her diaper, and change it if need be, and then we can get her out of here and head on out.”

“You’re not getting attached to her, are you?”

Georgie couldn’t tell if Rick was asking out of amusement or concern. “I’m just taking care of her at the moment.”

“I don’t think we should take her with us. I mean—yeah, we’ll take her away from here, but not with you and I. Someone else can take her. We got another stop to make after here, and Daryl can’t take her home on his bike. But someone can take her home to Alexandria.”

“And after?”

“Honestly?” Rick unfolded his arms and stepped forward as he watched Georgie unzipping Gracie’s pink, footie pajamas and checking to see if she was soiled.

And she was.

“Yeah. Honestly,” Georgie replied, reaching around for a clean diaper and a diaper wipe.

“I don’t think you and I should be the ones who take her in. I think someone else should,” he admitted. “There are plenty of people who have lost their children and don’t have anyone else back home. Gracie could fill a void for them. Even if it’s just a temporary thing.”

I’ve lost my children.”

“Yes,” he nodded. “But you and I both have Carl and Judith. For you, Judith, especially. She’s only ever going to know you as her mother and me as her father. Neither of us are her biological parent, but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s our child. Gracie could be someone else’s child. She should be someone else’s child.”

“I suppose your right,” Georgie agreed, handing the soiled diaper to Rick, who promptly set it in the waste bin next to the door. “It’s not fair that we have all the kids while others have none.”

“Exactly. Plus, I’m already raising one daughter of a man I’ve killed. I don’t think I can do it again.”

Georgie threw him a look over her shoulder. “You didn’t kill Gracie’s father. I did, remember? And he was the bad guy. We didn’t know he was protecting her. We were going on the assumption it was guns. And, unfortunately, this is one of those moments where he was simply the bad guy and we were the good guys. Debating if killing him was wrong or right is a topic for another time. And as for Judith, you didn’t kill her father. From what you’ve told me, Shane had started to go off the reservation and was planning on killing you first, right?”

Rick shrug, but also nodded. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“So, there. It was self-defense. It was kill or be killed, and it’s not like you wanted to do it. You had a pregnant wife and a son that needed you. You being killed would’ve been a worse outcome than Shane being killed.”

Rick breathed in deeply and out sharply. He didn’t say anything further on the matter. He simply continued to watch Georgie clean up Gracie and redress her. As Georgie began to swaddle the little girl, Rick grabbed up a handful of diapers and a full container of formula, as well as the baby bottle Georgie had been using. Juggling it all in his arms, he looked around for a bag of some sort. Rick ducked out of the nursery and slipped into the bedroom next door where he found a backpack and then tossed the supplies for the baby inside. He then returned to the nursery and tossed in the baby wipes and a couple of folded up onesies. He zipped up the backpack and then looked up at Georgie.

Nodding to each other, they left the nursery with Gracie comfortably in Georgie’s arms.

As they made their way outside the office building, Scott could be heard calling out directives.

“Guns aren’t here. We gotta go right now, people! They’re gonna pull away the herd, but we aren’t taking any chances!”

Waiting for them, Daryl stood by his bike, Aaron was sitting on the trunk of a car and Tobin was coming over as well with his rifle slung over his arm by the strap. Gracie started to fuss, which turned into a bit of a cry as Rick and Georgie joined the group by the remaining caravan of vehicles.

Tobin raised an eyebrow at the couple. “She was inside?”

“She was,” Rick nodded. “We have…we have a stop to make, and Daryl’s got his bike. Maybe she can go back with you or Scott.”

“She can go with me,” Aaron spoke. Jumping down from the back of his car, he walked over; still looking very much a mess from having lost Eric. “I can, uh, t-take her to the Hilltop. She’ll be safe there.”

While Georgie continued to cradle Gracie, Rick stepped forward with the backpack in his grasp. “Aaron—you sure?”

“Eric and I were gonna go up. We were gonna go there after and update Maggie. So…that’s what I’m gonna do.” On the verge of fresh tears, and with his voice breaking, Aaron added a simple: “Please. I have to.”

Frowning sadly for him, Georgie knew Aaron needed this. He needed this to help him get through his loss, even if it was just a temporary fix; a Band-Aid on a gunshot wound. Carefully she stepped up beside Rick and handed Gracie over into Aaron’s ready and willing arms.

“Her name’s Gracie.”

Aaron smiled at Georgie through the tears in his eyes and then down at the adorable little girl. “Hey, Gracie.”

Rick handed off the backpack to Aaron next and then took a step back and signaled for everyone to get ready to roll out. A few engines started up and some vehicles already began driving off to head home to Alexandria, which included Scott and Tobin. Aaron turned and headed to his own car with Gracie, while Georgie hoped he got to the Hilltop safely. As she joined Rick at the Jeep — previously owned by the Saviors — that they were taking, as the armored cars and trucks had already departed back for Alexandria, Rick handed her the Polaroids he had taken while Daryl migrated over to his bike.

“See you at home,” Rick said to Daryl.

“You sure you wanna talk to them assholes alone?” Daryl inquired.

Rick set his rifle into the back of the Jeep and gave the archer a brief look over his shoulder. “I’ll have Georgie with me.”

“Two heads better than one?”

“Yeah. Plus Georgie doesn’t come off as threatening as you do.” Rick flashed a small smile at her as she climbed up into the passenger seat.

“I’m the good cop to his bad cop,” she teased.

Rick nodded. “That’s how it gets done.”

“Alright. If you’re gone too long, I’m gonna come lookin’ for you both.”

“That’s the plan.”

A couple gunshots rang out and struck Georgie’s side of the truck, missing both her and Rick, who shoved her down and then ducked off to the side with his Colt immediately drawn. Daryl wasted no time, either; aiming his own gun in the direction the shots came from. Georgie crawled to the other side of the vehicle and let herself topple out onto the ground, removing her gun from her leg holster just as Rick came round to join her. He peered across the seats toward Daryl and gave him a signal and then crept back toward the rear of the Jeep to get a view from there while Georgie remained where she was.

“Hey!” Rick called out, looking toward a tree that was the shooter’s likely cover.

“Hey!” a voice replied.

“You’re alone. You gotta be. There’s not enough room for two of you behind that tree. And there’s a herd coming. I’m just sayin’.” After no response, Rick continued, moving back near Georgie, and peering across the seats to the Jeep. “I’ll tell you what. We’ll make you a deal. You drop your gun and come on out — you tell us what we need to know. You do that, you can take a car. You go. You love. How about it?”

“Why should I trust you?”

“’Cause I’m giving you my word. There’s not a lot that’s worth much these days, but a man’s word—that’s gotta mean something, right?”

“O-o-okay.”

Rick stood back up, moving out from behind the Jeep. Daryl and Georgie both stood up as well, but remained in place. All three of them with their guns aimed, just in case. A moment later a young man, possibly in his very early twenties, who looked rather scared to be alone in his predicament, came out into the open with his hands raised in a sort of surrender. More importantly, he had done what Rick had asked and come out of hiding without a gun.

“W-what do you want to know?” the kid — because that’s what he pretty much was — asked.

Rick dropped his Colt to his side; feeling no threat of danger from the kid. “You ever have any M2 Browning .50-caliber guns here?”

“We did. For a while,” the kid replied, his voice shaking.

“What happened to ‘em?” Daryl growled angrily.

“They got sent to another outpost yesterday.” The kid responded as quickly as he could, looking as if he’d piss himself at any second. He was flinching at the thought of getting shot. His entire posture was that of a young man not built for this kind of fight; who was simply stuck in terrible situation.

“Which one?” Rick asked; his tone a little more on the gentler side than Daryl’s.

“It was Gavin’s. It’s west of here.” Sensing no immediate threat from Rick, the kid stood up a little straighter and began to lower his hands, but only a smidgen. “Can I, uh—can…can I go?”

The kid dropped backward to the ground from a gunshot to the head.

Rick and Georgie both knew they didn’t fire the shot and turned to look at Daryl in surprise.

“What the fuck?” Georgie blurted.

“Which team’s at Gavin’s?” Daryl wondered, acting as if he’d merely swatted a fly out of his face.

Rick and Georgie stood there, just staring at him for a moment. Turning to look at his wife, Rick nodded for her to get back into the Jeep as he wordlessly headed for the driver’s seat. The two of them watched as Daryl climbed onto his bike and started the engine with no sweat off his back.

“What the fuck was that?” Georgie muttered to Rick as she slid her gun back into her leg holster and began to shove the Polaroids into the glove box.

“I don’t know,” Rick bit out before chewing slightly on his bottom lip. “Doesn’t matter right now.”

“Doesn’t it? He just killed an unarmed kid.”

“He was of age.”

“He was barely older than Carl.”

Rick looked at her for a moment. “Do you think the Saviors would hesitate to kill Carl? They killed a kid at the Hilltop.”

“We’re not Saviors,” Georgie retorted as Rick started up the Jeep and began to pull away, following after Daryl. “We’re supposed to be better than that.”

Rick sighed. “I know. But we don’t have time to chastise Daryl for shooting that kid. We have a schedule to keep, and we gotta think about our own right now.”

Sitting back, she gripped the sides of her seat to keep herself in place as the seatbelt didn’t seem to be working and there were no doors to keep them inside the vehicle. Rick, at least, had his grip on the steering wheel to keep him stationary.

“Well, sooner or later we gotta think about more than just our own.”


Notes

Comments

Completely understand. Thank you for sharing your talent with us all. Looking forward to your new story updates on Road Not Taken and the sequel to We Can Change.

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
1/7/19

Thanks for the update today!

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
8/26/18

Sorry to hear about your aunt.

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
3/31/18

Thanks for the update today!

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
7/29/17

Nicely done!!!

Grimesgirl63 Grimesgirl63
1/30/17