The world felt different, it felt almost unreal. A lot had happened and it was overwhelming Ivy's brain. As she sat on the bathroom floor motionless, she thought about Beth trying to kill herself, the new boy by the name of Randal that no one seemed to trust.

Sophia.

Thoughts flooded through Ivy's head, she was thinking what would happen if she just ended her life, right there on the bathroom floor. Her eyes trailed over to the razor that lay on the edge of the shower, then to the glass soap dispenser. It could have been so easy.

It felt as if there was a pit that had formed in her stomach as she thought about Sophia and the sound of Carol's motherly cries overwhelmed her. She placed her head between her knees and held back tears, she had only slept once within the past four days and she was immediately woken by her own nightmare which she comforted herself for.

She hadn't thought about Randal at all and she had occasionally checked on Beth. She didn't want Beth to feel as if she were being watched. When Hershel had left for the bar, Ivy criticized him for leaving his family, but as Ivy sat on the bathroom floor, the same floor she had stayed for three days in a row, she related to the old man. She hadn't come out once, not even to eat. People had come knocking at the door, every single person had come on their own at some point to speak to her from the other side of the door, except Shane.

"Ivy open the door, it's Carl." He pleaded. Ivy snapped her head towards the door and instantaneously reached for the handle, allowing the boy to walk in. He looked down at her and Ivy looked away, ashamed. She couldn't see herself but she could only imagine how pathetic she looked. She didn't know what was wrong with her. Carl slowly walked to the bathtub and sat at the edge, closing the door and locking it behind him.

"Mom is going to come try to talk to you in about ten minutes. I know you're sad but please listen to her, because what she has to say is important." Ivy nodded her head and turned towards her younger brother. "I'm sorry also."

Ivy's eyes widened and her heart began to ache. "Come here." She demanded. Carl sat next to her and Ivy wrapped her arms around his body to which he mirrored her actions. She felt tears drip down her face and she began to sob uncontrollably. "I don't know what it is, I can't stop...there's a feeling that won't go away in my entire body and I just can't do this anymore." She cried through hitched breaths. Tears were falling on top of Carl's brown hair as he squeezed her tightly. She could feel his body shake as well, but barely. "I feel like I'm like a burden or...I don't know. I'm constantly ignored and I'm tired of the fighting and I just don't feel needed." She stuttered as salty tears poured down her face.

"I need you Ivy." Carl promised. Ivy looked down at her brother and her lip quivered. "I need you because you're the only person that I can actually talk to now, you're kind of the only person that understands me so please don't think that you're not needed because I need you Ivy, please."

"I love you." She told her brother as she squeezed him tightly.

"I love you too." He promised. "Don't ever leave, or think about leaving or dying."

"I won't as long as you won't." Ivy smiled.

"I won't die." He said with a small grin on his face. He stood up and opened the door. "Mom should be up here any second so just listen to her okay?" Once again Ivy nodded her head and Carl closed the door, leaving her not only physically, but mentally alone.

Minutes had passed until finally she heard a knock at the bathroom door which she assumed was her mother. She didn't speak but Lori walked in anyways, slowly she stepped over Ivy and sat right next to her. "I'm sorry that you're feeling the way that you are right now, I'm sorry that you have to grow up in this world baby."

Ivy felt the tears swelling in her eyes again but she blinked them away. "I haven't talked to you in three days...reminds me of the time that your dad and I grounded you for sneaking out to go to Chloe's house and you didn't speak to us for an entire week." She chuckled.

Ivy let out a small laugh and thought about her best friend. She had grown up with Chloe and Sam but she hadn't seen them since the day everything went down. Ivy slowly moved her hands from her lap up to her face to wipe the tears away. "Ivy...I'm pregnant."

Ivy's heart stopped and she faced her mother with a look in her eyes that wasn't recognizable. At first, a feeling of happiness washed over her, followed by a feeling of what she felt was regret, then anger, then confusion, but ultimately she settled on happiness. "I'm gonna be a big sister again?" She smiled.

Lori laughed and let out a sigh of relief at Ivy's new found happiness and nodded her head. "Is it Dad's?"

Lori's smile faded and Ivy quickly spoke, "You don't get to be mad at me for asking that, I'm just wondering. I'm not mad at you for sleeping with Shane because in a way, I get it...you were grieving. I'm simply just wondering."

"It's your dad's, even if it isn't it still is." Ivy indeed and answered her own question. She knew Judith wasn't her father's, the timeline didn't match up but it doesn't matter anyways.

Blood doesn't make you family.

Ivy made her way down the stairs slowly. She was hoping she din't run into Liam for multiple reasons. She didn't want to care about him, she didn't want him to be an important part of her life but she couldn't help herself.

That was the problem.

She peaked over the stair railing to see if anyone was down there but it was clear so she quickly ran down the rest of the stairs when out of the corner of her eye, movement caused her to turn her head. Carl was walking alongside Shane and they were walking towards the barn. Quickly Ivy ran over to the door and quietly opened it. As she stepped outside for the first time in three days, the smell of fresh air caught her by surprise, but this time it was different. It wasn't fresh flowers, and healthy wasn't the since of fresh she was talking about.

Death.

She cringed and began walking towards the barn, ducking behind a tree in an attempt to not be seen. The last thing she wanted was to be seen by Shane. She stayed put and watched Car walk off. All of Shane's attention went towards Andrea instead of Carl. "What a great father he would be." Ivy mumbled to herself as she sprinted from behind the tree to behind the barn. Once she got to where she needed to be and looked around, it felt like a baseball hit her in the chest. This was the place that she had heard the moans and cries come from Carol's grieving heart, where she heard the call of a mother losing her child and her heart melted. She shook it off and climbed through the side of the barn where her brother had done the same thing only seconds before.

"What the hell are you doing?" She whispered quietly as she followed him. She managed to make her way into the top of the loft unseen by Carl and she wanted it to stay that way. She had found a position behind a stack of hay and watched the conversation between Randal and Carl take place.

It was silent at first, Randal just stared up at Carl with a hopeful expression on his face whereas Carl looked at him with quite the opposite look. "Hey." Randal whispered. "That's a sweet hat. I'm Randal what's your name?" He asked. Carl just ignored him which Ivy found pretty funny.

"The sheriff guy...that your dad? I like him." Ivy raised her eyebrow and payed close attention to his movements. He was bouncing up and down, he was anxious. He had some sort of intention here and she could clearly see something was wrong as his voice got jittery. "Your mom out here too?" He was ignored once more. "You lucky you still got your family. I lost mine. Hey I don't know what people been saying about me but I didn't do nothing. I swear."

Ivy felt a tinge of sorrow for the boy, he seemed sweet and she felt bad that he was chained up like an animal. Carl began climbing down from the loft and Ivy crawled to the other side of the hay bale. She was at an angle where she could jump down if she needed to, but she risked being seen. "Your dad was gonna let me go until his friend started fighting with him." Ivy heard more words coming from the boys mouth but she blurred it out until one sentence.

"You help me, I'll take you and your folks back to my people. We'll take good care of you. Ivy jumped down as Randal jumped forward at Carl. She moved swiftly in front of the boy and looked into Randal's eyes. She had never felt a sense of urgency like that in her life. She never broke eye contact, not once, not until the doors of the barn rattled open.

"What the hell did you say to them?" Shane grabbed both Carl and Ivy and pushed them back, protecting them with his body. "What did you say to him huh?" Shane walked up to the boy and grabbed his gun from his holster. Ivy's eyes widened as Andrea repeatedly screamed his name, sternly. She didn't want him blowing his brains out in front of either of the kids.

"You like talking? You like talking?" He pressed the tip of the gun into Randal's mouth and Ivy watched in horror. She hoped she'd never feel what Randal was feeling right now.

"Back off!" Andrea demanded with her gun held up. Shane looked down at both Ivy and Carl with an angry look on his face. "Get your asses out this door right now, let's go." He demanded.

"What are you doing?" He pushed Carl and left Ivy standing there.

"Please don't tell my parents." Carl pleaded. This wasn't even a situation where Ivy could defend herself, she knew what she did was wrong so she took her punishment instead of fighting, partially because she had no energy to fight with Shane.

"Carl that ain't cool man you could have gotten hurt. Ivy you too, you can't be letting him do stupid things like that." Ivy kept her head down to the ground, looking at the black leather boots she had on.

"I can handle myself." Carl announced which made Ivy laugh.

"Let me tell you something." Ivy rolled her eyes at these words as she's heard them a total of three thousand times since knowing Shane. He got low and pointed at Carl's face, "You do not go near him again do you hear me?"

"You won't tell my parents will you?" Carl asked. Ivy walked away, not really caring if her parents knew or not. All she cared about was getting away from the noise.

The fact that the world can be so beautiful while still being terrifying is confusing. Ivy looked up at the blue sky and at the green trees. Everything was pretty. Carl stood kicking a bullet around while Ivy and Oliver sat on the ground.

"Hey sweet girl, where's your daddy?" Lori asked. Ivy pointed up to the hill and Lori walked away. The three had walked to Sophia's grave and Oliver walked to sit by a tree. He  sat in front of a one of the graves but far enough that Ivy think he knew the person that lay in it.

"You know, we'll see Sophia again in Heaven someday." Ivy looked up at Carol then down at the grave. Ivy certainly didn't believe in God, not anymore, but she wasn't about to hate on Carol because she did. "She's in a better place." Oliver had gotten up now and walked towards Ivy.

"No she's not." Carl announced. Ivy looked at the boy in utter disbelief and out of the corner of her eye she could see that Oliver's jaw had dropped. "Heaven is just another lie, and if you believe it, you're an idiot." Carl walked off and Ivy stood there in disbelief.

"Oh my god!" Oliver laughed. "You're brother is ruthless...I love it." Ivy laughed and let Carl go off. She didn't feel the need to follow him. She looked over at Oliver who was making his way back over to the same tree he was just sitting at previously. Ivy watched as the boy slowly crept away to the tree, but he sat on the other side of it now. Ivy stood there in confusion but settled on shaking it off. She turned on her heels and started making her way towards the house.

It smelled like lemons. Maybe someone sprayed something or was cooking, she really couldn't tell. She walked up the stairs, one by one until she reached the second floor. Her plan was to go to the bathroom as it was starting to get dark now, Maggie had suggested she shower.

Ivy had grabbed the clothes she had worn to the farm, the ones that were previously covered in not only her own blood, but her brothers. She looked at them for a moment and put them down, trading them out with a white shirt and a pair of black skinny jeans. She walked towards the bathroom when she stopped by Liam's door. It wasn't completely open, but it was cracked, allowing her to only see the beige colored walls and the brown, wooden desk on the wall. She walked closer and balled her fist up.

Part of her wanted to knock but the other part of her wanted to walk away.

Which she did.

As she turned back away and sat her clothes down on the bathroom counter she looked down, "Damn." she groaned as she walked back towards his room. She balled her fist up and hit it against the door three times. Immediately she started regretting her decision to turn around. She thought back to when he was cleaning her lip but, how he made her feel, the butterflies that filled her stomach. The way his breath felt against her lips and the way his lips felt against her neck. Like it was right. But she didn't want it to be.

"What?" He yelled as he stood up, she could hear the aggressive stomps coming for the door and when he slung the door open, the hard expression on his face softened. "Yeah?" He asked.

"I just wanted to make sure you were...you know?" She stuttered.

"Alright?" He asked.

Ivy nodded her head and looked at the ground.

"I'll be fine." He said, his voice breaking a bit. Ivy looked up and could see the expression on his face.

"Obviously not." She said with a bit of attitude which she immediately regretted. Liam shook his head and held the door open wider for her to come in.

"You can come in, or not I don't really care. It's obvious that you don't care either since you've been acting like I don't exist to you right?" Ivy's small smile faded and a pit framed in her stomach of embarrassment. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have..." He sighed and laid on his bed. "Please, go." He asked.

"No." Ivy answered as she shut the door behind her.

"Ivy, I don't know what you want. I can't do this right now just go." He demanded. He wasn't yelling at her but his voice was going up and his tone was becoming more stern.

Ivy put her head down and pursed her lips. She didn't know why but one foot was placing itself in front of the other without her permission and she inched her way closer to Liam. "Scoot over." She demanded as she stood in front of him.

"No." He spoke.

Ivy rolled her eyes and popped him in the arm, "Scoot over." She demanded once more, to which he did. Ivy sat next to him and the two sat in silence.

"One of the walkers that Daryl shot." He stopped talking for a second and put his head down. "Was my mom."

Ivy slowly turned her head towards him and bit down on her bottom lip, she didn't want to say anything so she did everything in her power to keep her mouth closed.

"Which I knew she was always gone obviously, but having to see her decaying, to know that she was gone but wasn't really gone the whole time, to know she was walking around in a barn right next to the place I've been staying at for almost two months kind of hurts, I guess." Ivy watched as one singular tear fell from his face. Guilt washed over her and she wrapped her arms around his body from his side. It was sort of an awkward position so he shifted his body until the two were facing each other, embraced in each other's arms. Liam wrapped his arms around her waist and she wrapped hers around his neck.

At one point the two ended up laying on his bed, Ivy was laying on his chest with her arms wrapped around his body and she never let go. She didn't want him to think that she wanted to let go. "I'm sorry." She stuttered out.

"You didn't do it." He assured.

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Ivy awoke to screaming from downstairs. She looked  around and saw Liam sleeping right next to her. Her jaw dropped as she remembered falling asleep. She shook it off and started to run downstairs.

"Are y'all gonna watch too?" Dale asked with tears in her eyes. Ivy looked at her father and ten to her mother. "No y'all will go hide in your tents and try to forget that we're slaughtering a human being."

"What's going on?" She asked.

"They're trying to kill Randal, just execute him like he's nothing."

Ivy shrugged and looked at the faces from across the room. "What? He literally tried to pounce at Carl the other day, I heard him...with my own ears by the way say, 'let me go and i'll bring you to my people."

Glenn listened to her with his eyes squinted and his lip curled trying to hold back a slight smile. "So, kill him or let him go, do whatever but if you let him go we're all gonna die." She said with confidence in her voice.

Dale shook his head and sighed, "I won't be a party to it." He began walking out and Ivy looked between everyone. "This group is broken." He told Daryl as the door slammed shut. Ivy thought it was wrong to just straight up kill the kid but what other option did they have. He'd find his group and Daryl said it himself, they have more people than this group. Ivy watched as everyone walked away as if nothing happened and she began to agree with Dale. This group was broken.

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Night had fallen and Ivy sat with Carl. Her father, Daryl, and Shane had taken Randal to the barn so Ivy was watching Carl. She stood up and turned around to grab a stick from the ground. "You remember that one time me, you, mom, and dad went to that water park and me and you were going to go down that slide and I pus-" Ivy turned back around and Carl was nowhere to be seen.

"Carl!" She rasped out as she looked around. Fear rushed through her body and she began running towards the barn, the only thing allowing her to move was the adrenaline rushing through her veins. "Carl!" She whispered.

Out of the corner of her eyes she watched something move, as she looked she seen the end of the sheriff's hat that the boy wore every day. She sprinted in that direction and heard his voice speak, "Do it dad...do it." Ivy grabbed his arm and looked at him in the eyes.

"You can't do that, you can not run awa..aw..away." She looked in the barn and her eyes landed on her father, holding a gun to the blindfolded boy. Everything that she had ever said about wanting the boy dead, or that we would be better off dead. It all washed away as she listened to the whimpers of the boy, then it flooded back as she remembered the way he pounced at Carl, what he had said about the women his group came across.

She looked down at her brother when the realization of what he had said hit her. "Do it dad...do it." repeated in her head. Why was he acting like that?

Her father put the gun down and said something to Daryl and Shane, but Ivy wasn't paying attention. He stared at the two and Ivy felt hills down her spine. Nothing was said as he walked his two children back to the tents and Ivy kept her head down. She no longer wanted to say anything, she no longer wanted to make snarky comments, she no longer wanted to be listened to and she didn't know why.

Ivy watched everyone stand up, it was silent and it caused her to cringe. Everyone sat there waiting for news on whether or not the boy was dead, all of these people wanted him dead, including Ivy, but none of them would have done anything about it themselves, not the people standing around her anyways. That's why she kept her head down, because neither would she.

"Carl, Ivy go inside please." Ivy let Carl crawl into the tent first and she shortly followed. Ivy wanted to yell at Carl, yell at him for running away and for intruding on everything, of it wasn't for him running she wouldn't feel all of the guilt that she was feeling right now but she couldn't find the words.

Until she did.

"You can not run off like you just did." She demanded in a whisper with tears filling her eyes. Carl looked up at her and his mouth opened, but as he saw her glistening eyes he closed his mouth and listened. Her green orbs were filling up with salty tears and her vision was starting to blur, but she didn't want to let the tears fall. "The day at the survivors camp, do you remember when you and Sophia saw that dead deer being eaten by that walker?"

Carl looked around for a moment and nodded his head yes. "When I heard you scream, that was one of the scariest things in my life. Carl you are my person okay?" She whispered. "Right now, you're my everything and you're the only piece of good left of me." Two tears fell down her face and she wiped them away quickly. "I don't want to be mean to you because you're the good part of me, but you can't run away, you can't not listen. You are such a good person and I'm scared one day, being a good person is going to get you killed."

Carl nodded his head and reached forward, giving Ivy a hug when a scream ripped them apart. Ivy jumped in front of Carl and yelled. "Don't move." She demanded as she crawled out of the tent.

"T-dog, get a gun now!" Rick screamed. Ivy heard her mother scream for her but she walked away anyways.

Ivy began running with her mother and father towards the field.

"Over here." She heard someone yell. Everything felt slow even though she was running faster than everyone behind her. The sounds of moans were growing louder as she began getting closer. She could now see a body on the ground and her heart stopped.

"No, not again not again." She begged quietly. "Please." Dale lay face up on the ground and Ivy felt as if she couldn't breathe. People were crowding him and she was being pushed out of the way but she couldn't move, she was being nudged around and she could barely feel it. She felt dizzy and sick. Ivy looked at the intestines spilling out from the top of Dale's stomach then at the walker on the ground. She took a deep breath and her lip quivered.

"You're gonna be okay." She heard come from someone's mouth but it sounded monotone and robotic, like a video was being put into slow motion. Her whole body ached and she heard someone come up from behind her. Slowly she turned her head, or it seemed like she turned it slowly, she laid eye on Liam who halted to a stop, not being able to peel his eyes away from Dale. He pushed his way through the crowd of people and placed his hands on Dales stomach.

"We have to operate on him right now-get Hershel." Andrea yelled. Liam quickly took his short off and gathered all of Dale's insides into the shirt in an attempt to keep them inside of his body. He didn't know what to do. Hershel had taught him a lot but never anything for this. Liam drowned the voices out and shivered as the cold breeze hit him against the bare skin of his torso. He breathed heavily as he held pressure to the giant, gaping wound on Dale's abdomen, but he wasn't able to hold pressure, instead his hands were sinking into Dales' body. Up to his forearms were covered in blood and it felt as if he couldn't breathe.

Ivy watched and did nothing but stand there. She didn't know what to do. But somehow, someway everything snapped into reality and she ran over to the other side of Liam. "What do I do? How- how- how do I help?"

"We have to hold pressure. We have to hold pressure." He repeated this two more times and Ivy tried to help Liam keep the blood inside of Dale;s body but it just sprouted up instead. Ivy wiped her face and felt the wind hit her face, it was cold so she knew there was blood all over her cheeks and mouth, but she didn't mean to do that. She felt her father and Glenn's hands pull her away and hold her as she screamed. "NO!" She yelled. "We can save him, we have to save him, we can save him!"

"Shhh...no baby we can't." Her father whispered. Glenn had on hand on Ivy's arm and the other gripping her shoulder. Ivy settled down and watched as Daryl and Shane helped pull Liam away. Ivy stood there as Daryl kneeled down and placed a gun to Dale's head. Every thought, every word, every motive Ivy ever had went away within the next ten seconds.

"I'm sorry, brother." Ivy watched as blood poured from Dale's head onto the ground and looked down at her own hands. Red was everywhere, it was crowding her vision and it was beginning to be the only color she could see.

Liam stared at the body Of Dale Horvath and turned on his heels, walking away. Ivy stared at him and felt tears falling from her face. She thought about Randal and all of the roles that were being played in today's "game".

Judge.

Jury.

Executioner.

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A/N
anyways...