I wake the next morning alone, tucked in underneath my blanket, still naked. I get up and hurry to get dressed and make myself presentable. There's a sink and a mirror in the cell, but the sink doesn't work when I turn the knobs. I look up, catching a glimpse in the mirror, and it stops me short.

My hair has gotten a lot longer, tangled and frizzy from lack of consistent care, and my face is dirty and almost gaunt in how thin I've become. I reach up and press my fingertips to my cheek, pulling the skin, and swallow back the lump in my throat. I take the mirror off the wall and turn it away from me as I rest it in the corner.

I step out to find that the cell block is mostly empty and the door leading into that dining/common area is open. Daryl isn't on his perch either.

I run into Carol as she's coming up the stairs and she smiles at me. She's holding a water bottle.

"Good morning," I say. "Sleep well?"

"Like a rock," she replies with a sigh. "Don't think I've slept that well in months." She glances over me and her eyes seem to glint, lip curling into a smirk. "Did you have a good evening?"

I nod. "Oh, yeah, totally."

"Sounded like it."

I blush furiously and her smile gets even bigger. "Oh, geez, I'm so sorry," I mumble, pressing one hand to my face.

"Don't be. At least some of us are having fun, right?" She bumps her shoulder with mine, still smirking as she moves past me. "Come on. I'm going to see Lori."

I follow her back to Lori's cell, grateful for the distraction, and we find her nervously pacing, two steps one way, then two the other, repeat. She looks up at us, chewing her thumbnail, and Carol frowns a little.

"You feeling okay?" she asks, handing her the water bottle.

"I..." She looks down at her stomach, hand fluttering over it. "I...I don't know. The baby...I think I lost it."

My eyes widen a little in alarm, but I carefully school my expression as I look to Carol. She meets my eyes, nodding as she lightly touches my arm.

"I'll get Hershel," she says, hurrying back outside.

"Let's get you seated, okay?" I murmur, urging Lori back to her bed.

She sits with some effort. She looks pale, her breaths fast, and I test her temperature with the back of my hand. She seems fine on that front, thank goodness, but there's still fear in her dark brown eyes.

"What makes you think you lost it?" I ask, taking a knee in front of her.

She looks at her lap, at her fidgeting hands. "It hasn't moved. I..."

There's footsteps outside and Hershel appears at the door. He smiles softly at me and Lori, going inside and taking a seat on a nearby stool. He's grown a beard over the winter and his hair has gotten shaggier. It softens him, makes him seem even kinder, like Santa Claus.

"Want to fill me in?" he asks.

"It's the baby," Lori says. "I think I lost it."

"You haven't felt it move?"

She shakes her head. "Nothing. And no Braxton-Hicks." Her voice chokes a little and she rocks herself back and forth, unable to stay still. "At first I thought it was exhaustion or malnutrition."

"You're anemic?"

Again, she nods. She looks so gaunt, so tired, dark circles underneath her eyes, and she's never looked more frail. I wish I could offer more than emotional support. She flexes her hands on the bed beneath her.

"If we're all infected, then so's the baby," she whispers. "So what if it's stillborn? What if it's dead inside me right now? What if it rips me apart?"

"Stop," Hershel says, firm, and she looks away from him, sniffling a bit. "Don't let your fear take control of you."

"Okay," she says. She sniffles again, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. "Let's say it lives and I die during childbirth."

"You can't think like that," I say. "It'll only stress you out."

"It's not going to happen," Hershel says.

"Why not?" she replies. "How many women died in childbirth before modern medicine?" She stares at the floor. "If I come back...what if I attack it? Or you? Or Rick? Or Carl—"

Again, her voice breaks. I offer her my hand and she takes it, squeezing as she purses her lips together against a sob.

"If I do, if there is any chance, you put me down immediately," she says, looking at Hershel, then me. "You don't hesitate. Me, the baby—" A hitch in her voice stops her, just for a second. "If we're walkers, you don't hesitate and you don't try to save us. Okay?"

I look at Hershel, still gripping Lori's hand, and his expression is composed before slowly, barely, he nods. Lori sniffles again, letting out a long, harsh breath, and I move to sit next to her. I rub her back with my free hand and she smiles sadly at me.

"It might've been better if—" she starts.

"If what?" Hershel asks.

She exhales. "If I'd never made it off the farm."

"Lori, no," I murmur.

"You're exhausted, frightened," Hershel soothes. I keep rubbing her back.

Lori shakes her head, still staring at her lap. "My son can't stand me. And my husband, after what I put him through..."

"We've all been carrying that weight. All winter."

"I tried to talk to him. He..." She shakes her head.

"He'll come around," he assures her.

"He hates me." She nods a bit, more to herself than us. "He's too good a man to say it, but I know. I put him and Shane at odds. I put that knife in his hand."

She sobs, tears rolling down her face, and I wrap my arm around her. She tucks her face against my shoulder, sniffling, shaking, and all I can do is rub comforting circles on her skin.

"He loves you, Lori. I know he does," I say. If he didn't, wouldn't he have let her go? Let her run off into the sunset with Shane? Maybe that's twisted, but...

"You know who doesn't give a shit about all that?" Hershel asks. "This baby." She chuckles, still choked, and she pulls away from me as Hershel shifts closer. "Now let's make sure everything's alright. Hope?"

"Yes, sir?"

He smirks a little, shaking his head. "I think Rick might want you to join the search team," he says. "I'll take care of Lori. You can go."

I nod, getting to my feet, and I squeeze Lori's shoulder once more and offer her a smile. "It'll be okay," I say.

I take my leave as Hershel rolls up his sleeves. Carol waits at the bottom of the stairs, arms crossed. She sees me and sighs, moving closer.

"Is she okay?" she asks.

"Seems like stress, and a whole lot of other things," I say. "Hershel will take care of her."

"That's good," Carol says. She looks up at the second level. "She's so strong to be going through with this. I know there isn't much choice, but..." She purses her lips, then looks back at me. "It's a big thing, you know?"

"Very," I agree.

"You're being careful, right?"

I swallow a bit. "I...yeah, I..." I fidget, averting my eyes. "We...um, we haven't..." I pause. "Are you sure this isn't a TMI?"

"I'm just looking out for you. Both of you," she assures me.

I sag my shoulders. "We haven't gone all the way. Seeing what Lori's going through and all that...really works as a deterrent." She nods thoughtfully and I smile a little. "I always thought I'd be talking to my mom about this." I shift again. "I...none of this is what I expected. It's really thrown me for a loop."

"The end of the world?"

"And getting a boyfriend in the middle of it." It feels weird calling Daryl my boyfriend, only because it seems juvenile. He's very much a man.

She shakes her head a little, letting out a brief laugh. "It's a good thing. We could all use something good in times like this."

"Think you'll find somebody?" I keep my tone light, enough I could play it off as a joke if she takes it the wrong way.

Thankfully, she just laughs again. "Only if I'm lucky."

----------

Rick gathers everyone in preparation for searching the rest of the prison. Lori watches us all from the second level, Rick especially, while he helps T-Dog strap on riot gear. Apparently, earlier this morning when I was still asleep, they went out and stripped the walkers of their armour.

Carl fiddles with one of the helmets, putting it on and grinning at Beth as the visor slips over his face. She giggles.

"You won't need that," Rick says, taking the helmet back. "I need you to stay put."

"You're kidding," Carl says, brow furrowed.

"We don't know what's in there. Something goes wrong, you could be the last man standing. I need you to handle things here."

Carl puts on his sheriff's hat, then nods. "Sure."

"Great," Rick says, handing him a ring of keys. "Let's go."

We head out, Carl closing the cell block door behind us. T-Dog, Glenn, Maggie, and Hershel wear riot vests. Daryl, Rick, and I are left bare.

"You didn't want anything?" I whisper to Daryl as we walk.

He shrugs. "Worked fine without it before."

I reach for his hand, squeezing it, and he squeezes it back as Rick opens the barred door leading into the rest of the prison. He looks back at all of us, nods, and we disappear into the depths of the prison.

----------

It's dark, dark enough that flashlight beams don't feel like enough even though we all have one. We round a corner and the beams flash across bloodied skeletons on the floor, but no walkers. A spray can hisses as Glenn marks an arrow on the wall, pointing us back the way we came.

Maggie lets out a small shriek and we all jump, whipping towards her, but she's just run into Glenn.

"Sorry," she whispers.

We keep moving. Glenn keeps marking the way back. Every time we round a corner, we expect the worse, but again and again, there's nothing.

Until, of course, our luck runs out, and we emerge into a hallway full of walkers in prison jumpsuits.

"Go back! Go back!" Rick hisses, backing up into Daryl. "Move!"

We pile up, briefly, trying to get our bearings back. We go back the way we came, but more walkers stumble around the corner. Rick keeps directing us, him and Daryl leading us down hallway after winding hallway.

Daryl throws open a door and we crowd into a tiny closet of some kind, squatting low as we huddle in a circle. I hear walkers stumbling past us as we try to catch our breath. Our flashlights, aimed at the ground, cast eerie shadows over our faces.

"Where's Glenn and Maggie?" he asks.

"They were right behind us," I whisper.

"We have to go back," Hershel says.

"Which way?" Daryl asks.

Rick gets to his feet, slowly pushing the door open. The herd has passed us but Rick goes a bit further ahead of us, checking every turn before ushering us forward.

"Maggie?" Hershel calls as softly as he can. "Glenn?"

No answer. We keep going, searching, and I hear Hershel calling for his daughter. His voice echoes.

Just as we turn another corner, a scream pierces the tense quiet and I whip around, eyes wide. Hershel isn't behind us anymore.

Rick's already running past me, back the way we came.

"NO!" he shouts.

A gunshot. A groan and the wet sound of brains splattering, and the rest of us round the corner to see Hershel on the ground with a bite taken out of his right leg.

"No!"

Maggie and Glenn appear from a hallway we just passed, brought to us by her father's screams, even as she lets out a sob.

"Maggie!" Rick says.

She just gapes at her father, tears in her eyes. Rick and Glenn hoist Hershel to his feet even as he keeps letting out pained, choked wails. More walkers round the corner.

"Oh, God, help me," Hershel begs.

"Daryl!" Rick calls.

Daryl surges forward and shoots down a walker. We turn to go back the way we came but again, we're trapped on both sides.

"We're blocked! Get back! Get back!"

We run down the only hallway left clear, Daryl and I taking up the rear while the others clamor. Between Hershel and Maggie and Rick, there's no coherence to anyone's words anymore. I hear the clang of metal against metal and spare a look over my shoulder as T-Dog kicks in a set of double doors.

We rush inside a large room that must've been the cafeteria, judging by the tables and chairs piled up around the room, and immediately, Daryl, T-Dog, and I throw ourselves against the doors, slamming them shut just as the walkers reach us. The doors heave as the hoard presses against us. I fumble with my belt buckle and slip it from my waist, lashing the doors shut as T-Dog and Daryl keep forcing it closed with everything they have.

"Hold him down," I hear Rick order, and I look over my shoulder just as he reaches for his axe. "Only one way to keep you alive."

"Rick, we don't know if that'll work!" I shout.

"We have to try!" he retorts.

I latch the buckle back together and step back as the doors heave again, but the walkers can barely get their fingers through. Daryl and I have just turned around when Rick brings the axe down on Hershel's leg. There's another scream of agony and Maggie sobs, cradling her father's head, before he goes silent.

Rick keeps chopping, blood spurting, and I fall to my knees next to Hershel as I check his pulse. Still there, way too fast, but he's alive. I just don't know for how much longer.

With one more chop, the lower half of Hershel's leg comes off, and Rick swipes it aside. I pull off my plaid button-up, leaving me in a tank top, and press it to the bleeding stump. Rick fastened his belt above Hershel's knee and I've never been so glad to see a makeshift tourniquet.

"Oh..." Rick says. He stares at his hands in a daze, the axe clattering to the floor. "He...he's gonna bleed out."

I don't respond. I tie the shirt around his stump using the sleeves, but it's not nearly enough to stop the bleeding.

"Duck," Daryl whispers.

I don't look, just listen, and Daryl gets to his feet as he aims his crossbow, but he doesn't shoot. I look up.

Five men stand behind a barred window, but they aren't walkers; it's other survivors, very much alive and very much witness to the brutality Rick just inflicted. Daryl's flashlight illuminates their shocked faces.

"Holy shit," a blond man with a handlebar moustache says.

"Who the hell are you?" Daryl demands, moving closer, bow still raised.

"Who the hell are you?" one of them retorts.

"We gotta go back. Hope, your kit—" Rick says.

"I haven't had to use it, but Hershel showed me how," I say. "Maggie, do you know his blood type?" She shakes her head and I purse my lips. "Looks like I'm up then. We have to move. Rick, Glenn, pressure on the knee."

Rick and Glenn both move to my side, taking over pressure, and I stand and turn to Daryl.

"Why don't you come on out of there?" he says to the men. "Slow and steady."

A tanned man, maybe Hispanic, with long black hair and a thin goatee emerges first, eyes slightly narrowed even with the shock in them. I raise my hands a bit. They're covered in Hershel's blood.

"We don't want any trouble," I say.

"What happened to him?" the man asks.

"He got bit," Daryl says.

"Bit?" he repeats. He reaches for a gun in his front waistband, where he's tied the sleeves of the top half of his jumpsuit around his waist.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy now," Daryl warns as T-Dog raises his pistol and Daryl's finger flexes against the crossbow trigger. The man raises his small gun, aiming it between Daryl and T-Dog. "Nobody needs to get hurt."

The other four have come out too, three black men and the one white man. One of the black men is huge, a veritable mountain of a man with a thick black beard. There's a mid-sized guy, stubbled and bald, and the third is a shorter man with shifty eyes and a tuft of hair on his chin. He seems young. The moustached blond holds himself in a tight self-hug, mouth agape.

"You got medical supplies?" Glenn asks. He taps my shoulder as he passes me. "Hope, come on."

"Whoa, where do you think you're going?" the giant man asks, but Glenn doesn't say a word as we go past.

I follow him into the room the men just came from, but the place is bare. It's just an old prison kitchen and one that's been picked clean too.

"There," Glenn says, rushing to a giant metal table on wheels.

Outside, voices are still raised, panicked.

"Who the hell are you people anyway?"

"Don't look like no rescue team."

"If a rescue team is what you're waiting for, don't!" Rick shouts.

We sweep everything off the top of the table, left with the closest thing we have to a gurney. Glenn and I roll it back out to Hershel and the others. I hold it steady while Rick, Glenn, and Maggie haul Hershel up and onto it.

"Holy Jesus!" the blond man exclaims when the bloody stump hits the table.

"T, the door," Rick says.

"Are you crazy? Don't open that!" the skinny black man shouts.

T-Dog gets my belt off the door handles, allowing a single riot-gear walker through, and he stabs his fireplace poker right into its chin. The hallway is clear again, for now, and we push out into it.

"Daryl," Rick shouts. "DARYL!"

Daryl backs up, never turning his back to the prisoners until he's back in the hallway.