Alone Together
Stronger
The drive back to Alexandria was quiet, way too quiet in Val’s opinion. There was an eerie feeling that something was happening or about to happen that she didn’t know about. A sort of calm before the storm. As they got closer to the camp, the large number of undead was the first thing to make her realize something was wrong, and as her eyes started to examine the bodies, her mouth went dry as she understood that they were not just outside the walls, but also inside. The sharp silence inside the truck conveyed the emotion that no one wanted to reveal. The sound of shots being fired, made all eyes dart to a figure in the dark, amongst the dead.
“It’s Glenn.” Sasha breathed out and before Val could even process any thought, Abraham stopped the truck.
Abraham and Sasha jumped out of the truck, closely followed by Daryl. Fear started to consume Val, blocking her ability to think and react. You've got to keep it together]/I]. Her booted feet hit the asphalt the same time she adjusted herself to the rifle Sasha had thrown at her. Shots were fired behind her, Abraham and Sasha taking down the group of walkers that had surrounded Glenn. Val counted every shot she fired, working with practiced expertise alongside Max. The dog pounced at every enemy that got too close, some of the bodies already too decayed, their skulls shattering when they fell to the ground and others being silenced by Val. Through the corner of her eye, she could see Maggie and a younger girl being rescued from the rudimentary watchtower that threatened to fall.
“C’mon!” She heard Daryl shout at her, as everybody got inside the truck.
“You guys go!” She shouted back, moving away from the truck and killing the dead woman Max had pushed against one of the metal walls. Five.
More of the dead were being drawn by the sound of her rifle, and the truck Daryl was driving towards the lake. Max pushed his body against a man without his right arm, the body slumping backwards and falling on top of another walker. Val aimed and killed them both with one single shot. Four.
“Max!” She gestured him to follow her, towards the truck that had stopped next to the lake, killing a few more corpses that tried to get her. Three. Two. One.
Val wasted her last bullet on the dead man that had taken an interest in her dog and with one swift motion she threw the rifle to the ground, unsheathing her machete in the process and cutting half of a walker’s head that approached to her right. Blood quickly covered her blade and stained even more her clothes. Without looking away too much from the bodies that constantly surrounded her, she tried to understand what Daryl was doing, watching him take a hold of an RPG before she had to turn to face the walking corpses again.
Her feet had started to run towards the street in front of the infirmary, where Rick and an ever-growing group of survivors battled against the undead, when a flash of light followed by the extreme heat that immediately reached her back, made her spin on her heels. She watched as the flames immediately took over the lake, burning deep red and amber, licking up in the air with the wind. He sure knows how to make a statement. A smile crept up her face, as she now understood Daryl’s plan, before she had to turn back to the fight in front of her, fear and adrenaline fueling her body and keeping her from collapsing from exhaustion. It was either fight or flight and she always chose to fight.
As more people joined the seemingly never ending battle, Val found herself surrounded by strangers, people she had never laid her eyes on and that now fought next to her or with their backs against hers, fierceness and determination seeping through each one of their moves.
It hit her, for the first time, that maybe she was wrong. Maybe she had been wrong all this time. She had been looking in the wrong places, trying to find a reminiscence of something she no longer thought possible to exist, but now she had found it. Hope. In the middle of strangers. In the middle of a town she had run from. In the middle of people she thought weren’t strong enough to survive this new world. But they were. They were stronger than she thought and possibly stronger than her. They had built something for themselves and now they were fighting for it.
The first light of a new day began to appear, bringing with it the weird muffled silence of the morning. There were no more moans, no more gunfire. Just the thick haze and the still burning lake full of corpses that had been drawn by the flames. People looked tired, but there was an electric energy in the air that kept everyone on edge, in the best of ways.
Val stood in front of the building that belonged to the infirmary, not wanting to step inside now she had found out that Rick’s kid had been shot in the eye. It was not that her stomach couldn’t handle it, the battles she had fought even before the dead had started to walk had prepared her to witness any kind of injury, but she didn’t know the boy, and barely knew his father, so she knew it was best to stay out of it.
“I’m glad you decided to come back.” Val heard Morgan’s words before she could turn to watch him walk towards her.
“You know, it’s not the first time you’ve told me that.” She wiped the blood that had stuck to her cheek with the back of her hand.
“And yet, here you are again.” He looked beyond her, Val’s eyes following his gaze. “Jessie and her kids died during the fight.” His tone had suddenly become a lot more grave. “She meant a lot to Rick and now Carl…” He stopped himself, taking a deep breath before speaking again. “Maybe we should start burying their bodies.”
“It’s okay, I’ve got that.” Val rested a hand on his shoulder. The surprised look on Morgan’s face was hard to miss, but she smiled, taking the shovel away from his hands. “Trust me, I can do it on my own. Plus, I need it.” She glanced at the people who had gathered on the infirmary’s front porch. “I wouldn’t know what to do around all those people.”
Some people had already started piling up bodies when Morgan led her to the makeshift graveyard, a quiet place, surrounded by tall bushes and close to the metal wall that protected the town. After asking more than once if she really wanted to do that by herself, Morgan had finally left Val and Max alone with the three tarp covered bodies.
She breathed deeply, rotating her left arm in a long and exaggerated movement and making her stitched wound complain about the motion, before forcing the shovel against the grass covered ground for the first time. Although her body was occupied, her mind kept wandering towards the worst parts of her mind, the ones she had tried hard to shut down since she and Max had hit the road. She hadn’t thought about her family since she had left Georgia, deciding that there was nothing she could have done to save them, but, no matter how many times she told herself that, she still couldn’t believe it.
As Val finished digging the first grave, her eyes landed on the bodies only a few feet away from her and once again, she thought about her family. About her parents and how she had seen them for the last time in the form of mindless bodies, trying to reach for her as if she was their next meal and not their daughter.
Val looked up, sniffing loudly and trying to clear her already foggy vision as she started digging the second grave. She was not going to cry, she had cried already too many tears during the first weeks after leaving Fort Benning. And yet, there went her mind again, wondering what had happened to the rest of her family, to her brothers, one of them living in California and the other abroad, to her friends.
Movement behind the bushes made her wipe a strained tear and clear her throat, before Maggie could appear in her line of sight.
“You didn’t have to do this.” Maggie spoke somewhat tentatively, maybe because she was tired or because she didn’t know how to address herself to Val. Or maybe because she had noticed the water rimmed eyes.
“I know.” Val moved her eyes towards Max, lying on the ground closer to the wall than to the graves, paying no attention to both women and almost falling asleep.
“Well, Sasha told me you’re staying with us so the least I can do is show you your new place.” The girl smiled. “Then maybe you could take a shower and let Denise check on that nasty cut.” Maggie pointed at Val’s nose, twisting her face in a way that almost made Val smile.
“Yes ma’am.”
Val stepped into the shower and gasped as the hot water touched her skin. It somehow felt like waking up from a bad dream, her muscles finally loosening and allowing her to feel relief. She smiled, a soft chuckle escaping her lips, as the water fell steadily, hues of brown and red reaching the drain in a swirling motion. She couldn’t remember the last time she had taken a decent bath, let alone one that involved hot water.
The water stung in some areas of her body, where small cuts and wounds now appeared, wounds she didn’t even know to exist. Her hands worked hard to remove all the dirt from her skin, sometimes mistaking bruises for the filth her body carried, and making her flinch and frown.
An hour later she finally stepped out of the shower, the bathroom immersed in thick steam. It had taken her longer than she had imagined to wash her hair, not satisfied with the result until the water had started to fall without any speck of dirt. Awaiting for her were the new clothes Maggie had given her; a pair of dark jeans, a top and a faded plaid shirt. The jeans were too tight for her liking - almost two years of scavenging clothes had taught her that cargo pants were the best for movement – but she was not going to complain about having clean clothes.
The house Maggie had led her to still smelled new. She had assured Val that they had plenty of space, so the townhouse would be hers for as long as she wanted to stay. Climbing down the stairs she could see Max finishing his food from the bowl Val had conjured from one of the kitchen cabinets. She couldn’t help but smile as the dog dragged the bowl across the kitchen floor, his tongue cleaning it as best as he could.
The basket Maggie had given her, still rested on the kitchen countertop, filled with food, toilet paper and other things Val hadn’t bothered to identify. After dumping a can of dog food into the bowl, she had grabbed a can of tuna, eating it with her still dirty hands and had used the kitchen tap to satiate her thirst, before running to the shower.
“Wanna go out?” She raised an eyebrow at her dog, her hand resting on the door knob as she waited for Max to join her at the door. He didn’t though, choosing to jump to the brown sofa instead, breathing out loudly before resting his head on his paws. "Fine." Val mocked hurt. "But I have to. We don't want anyone thinking we're here just for the food and a roof over our heads."
The sun was now shining outside, no longer looking like it was being filtered through orange paper mache. The flames had consumed all the fuel dumped in the lake, leaving nothing but charred bodies as its legacy.
As Val crossed the road towards the infirmary, silence still hung between the people of Alexandria, although not for long, she knew, as the end of a battle meant the beginning of another one. The one of keeping the dead away while reconstructing the walls that protected their town.
“It’s Glenn.” Sasha breathed out and before Val could even process any thought, Abraham stopped the truck.
Abraham and Sasha jumped out of the truck, closely followed by Daryl. Fear started to consume Val, blocking her ability to think and react. You've got to keep it together]/I]. Her booted feet hit the asphalt the same time she adjusted herself to the rifle Sasha had thrown at her. Shots were fired behind her, Abraham and Sasha taking down the group of walkers that had surrounded Glenn. Val counted every shot she fired, working with practiced expertise alongside Max. The dog pounced at every enemy that got too close, some of the bodies already too decayed, their skulls shattering when they fell to the ground and others being silenced by Val. Through the corner of her eye, she could see Maggie and a younger girl being rescued from the rudimentary watchtower that threatened to fall.
“C’mon!” She heard Daryl shout at her, as everybody got inside the truck.
“You guys go!” She shouted back, moving away from the truck and killing the dead woman Max had pushed against one of the metal walls. Five.
More of the dead were being drawn by the sound of her rifle, and the truck Daryl was driving towards the lake. Max pushed his body against a man without his right arm, the body slumping backwards and falling on top of another walker. Val aimed and killed them both with one single shot. Four.
“Max!” She gestured him to follow her, towards the truck that had stopped next to the lake, killing a few more corpses that tried to get her. Three. Two. One.
Val wasted her last bullet on the dead man that had taken an interest in her dog and with one swift motion she threw the rifle to the ground, unsheathing her machete in the process and cutting half of a walker’s head that approached to her right. Blood quickly covered her blade and stained even more her clothes. Without looking away too much from the bodies that constantly surrounded her, she tried to understand what Daryl was doing, watching him take a hold of an RPG before she had to turn to face the walking corpses again.
Her feet had started to run towards the street in front of the infirmary, where Rick and an ever-growing group of survivors battled against the undead, when a flash of light followed by the extreme heat that immediately reached her back, made her spin on her heels. She watched as the flames immediately took over the lake, burning deep red and amber, licking up in the air with the wind. He sure knows how to make a statement. A smile crept up her face, as she now understood Daryl’s plan, before she had to turn back to the fight in front of her, fear and adrenaline fueling her body and keeping her from collapsing from exhaustion. It was either fight or flight and she always chose to fight.
As more people joined the seemingly never ending battle, Val found herself surrounded by strangers, people she had never laid her eyes on and that now fought next to her or with their backs against hers, fierceness and determination seeping through each one of their moves.
It hit her, for the first time, that maybe she was wrong. Maybe she had been wrong all this time. She had been looking in the wrong places, trying to find a reminiscence of something she no longer thought possible to exist, but now she had found it. Hope. In the middle of strangers. In the middle of a town she had run from. In the middle of people she thought weren’t strong enough to survive this new world. But they were. They were stronger than she thought and possibly stronger than her. They had built something for themselves and now they were fighting for it.
The first light of a new day began to appear, bringing with it the weird muffled silence of the morning. There were no more moans, no more gunfire. Just the thick haze and the still burning lake full of corpses that had been drawn by the flames. People looked tired, but there was an electric energy in the air that kept everyone on edge, in the best of ways.
Val stood in front of the building that belonged to the infirmary, not wanting to step inside now she had found out that Rick’s kid had been shot in the eye. It was not that her stomach couldn’t handle it, the battles she had fought even before the dead had started to walk had prepared her to witness any kind of injury, but she didn’t know the boy, and barely knew his father, so she knew it was best to stay out of it.
“I’m glad you decided to come back.” Val heard Morgan’s words before she could turn to watch him walk towards her.
“You know, it’s not the first time you’ve told me that.” She wiped the blood that had stuck to her cheek with the back of her hand.
“And yet, here you are again.” He looked beyond her, Val’s eyes following his gaze. “Jessie and her kids died during the fight.” His tone had suddenly become a lot more grave. “She meant a lot to Rick and now Carl…” He stopped himself, taking a deep breath before speaking again. “Maybe we should start burying their bodies.”
“It’s okay, I’ve got that.” Val rested a hand on his shoulder. The surprised look on Morgan’s face was hard to miss, but she smiled, taking the shovel away from his hands. “Trust me, I can do it on my own. Plus, I need it.” She glanced at the people who had gathered on the infirmary’s front porch. “I wouldn’t know what to do around all those people.”
Some people had already started piling up bodies when Morgan led her to the makeshift graveyard, a quiet place, surrounded by tall bushes and close to the metal wall that protected the town. After asking more than once if she really wanted to do that by herself, Morgan had finally left Val and Max alone with the three tarp covered bodies.
She breathed deeply, rotating her left arm in a long and exaggerated movement and making her stitched wound complain about the motion, before forcing the shovel against the grass covered ground for the first time. Although her body was occupied, her mind kept wandering towards the worst parts of her mind, the ones she had tried hard to shut down since she and Max had hit the road. She hadn’t thought about her family since she had left Georgia, deciding that there was nothing she could have done to save them, but, no matter how many times she told herself that, she still couldn’t believe it.
As Val finished digging the first grave, her eyes landed on the bodies only a few feet away from her and once again, she thought about her family. About her parents and how she had seen them for the last time in the form of mindless bodies, trying to reach for her as if she was their next meal and not their daughter.
Val looked up, sniffing loudly and trying to clear her already foggy vision as she started digging the second grave. She was not going to cry, she had cried already too many tears during the first weeks after leaving Fort Benning. And yet, there went her mind again, wondering what had happened to the rest of her family, to her brothers, one of them living in California and the other abroad, to her friends.
Movement behind the bushes made her wipe a strained tear and clear her throat, before Maggie could appear in her line of sight.
“You didn’t have to do this.” Maggie spoke somewhat tentatively, maybe because she was tired or because she didn’t know how to address herself to Val. Or maybe because she had noticed the water rimmed eyes.
“I know.” Val moved her eyes towards Max, lying on the ground closer to the wall than to the graves, paying no attention to both women and almost falling asleep.
“Well, Sasha told me you’re staying with us so the least I can do is show you your new place.” The girl smiled. “Then maybe you could take a shower and let Denise check on that nasty cut.” Maggie pointed at Val’s nose, twisting her face in a way that almost made Val smile.
“Yes ma’am.”
Val stepped into the shower and gasped as the hot water touched her skin. It somehow felt like waking up from a bad dream, her muscles finally loosening and allowing her to feel relief. She smiled, a soft chuckle escaping her lips, as the water fell steadily, hues of brown and red reaching the drain in a swirling motion. She couldn’t remember the last time she had taken a decent bath, let alone one that involved hot water.
The water stung in some areas of her body, where small cuts and wounds now appeared, wounds she didn’t even know to exist. Her hands worked hard to remove all the dirt from her skin, sometimes mistaking bruises for the filth her body carried, and making her flinch and frown.
An hour later she finally stepped out of the shower, the bathroom immersed in thick steam. It had taken her longer than she had imagined to wash her hair, not satisfied with the result until the water had started to fall without any speck of dirt. Awaiting for her were the new clothes Maggie had given her; a pair of dark jeans, a top and a faded plaid shirt. The jeans were too tight for her liking - almost two years of scavenging clothes had taught her that cargo pants were the best for movement – but she was not going to complain about having clean clothes.
The house Maggie had led her to still smelled new. She had assured Val that they had plenty of space, so the townhouse would be hers for as long as she wanted to stay. Climbing down the stairs she could see Max finishing his food from the bowl Val had conjured from one of the kitchen cabinets. She couldn’t help but smile as the dog dragged the bowl across the kitchen floor, his tongue cleaning it as best as he could.
The basket Maggie had given her, still rested on the kitchen countertop, filled with food, toilet paper and other things Val hadn’t bothered to identify. After dumping a can of dog food into the bowl, she had grabbed a can of tuna, eating it with her still dirty hands and had used the kitchen tap to satiate her thirst, before running to the shower.
“Wanna go out?” She raised an eyebrow at her dog, her hand resting on the door knob as she waited for Max to join her at the door. He didn’t though, choosing to jump to the brown sofa instead, breathing out loudly before resting his head on his paws. "Fine." Val mocked hurt. "But I have to. We don't want anyone thinking we're here just for the food and a roof over our heads."
The sun was now shining outside, no longer looking like it was being filtered through orange paper mache. The flames had consumed all the fuel dumped in the lake, leaving nothing but charred bodies as its legacy.
As Val crossed the road towards the infirmary, silence still hung between the people of Alexandria, although not for long, she knew, as the end of a battle meant the beginning of another one. The one of keeping the dead away while reconstructing the walls that protected their town.