The Rest of your Life

Chapter 32

Rory had woken up early. She had had a nightmare and hadn't been able to get much sleep, so instead of reading or playing with Judith, she decided to take a walk through the prison. It's when she got to D block that she heard it. The groans.

She quietly got out her gun and walked in, just as the screams started. She began firing, trying to kill as many walkers as she could. How'd this even happen?

"Out! Everybody get out!"  Rory yelled above the screams, people rushing past her in a panic. The girl groaned as she was pushed to the floor by a man running out of the block. How was it that she, a child, was less scared than a grown man?

Rory looked to her side and saw one of the men firing a shotgun. She heard more gunshots as she stood back up, more people coming into the block to help. An arrow shot into a walker to her side, she breathed out a sigh of relief. Rick and Daryl were here.

She dragged a child by the hand and pushed him into a cell. "Stay there." The kid just nodded at her, tears in his eyes. She then turned around and stomped on a walkers head.

Rory flinched back as Glenn swung his machete at a walker close by. She saw Carol ushering a little girl into a cell with Karen before Rory kicked a walker onto the ground and slammed her knife into its eye.

The cell block had gone eerily quiet.

"Are we clear down here?" Rick panicked. "We're safe?" Rory frantically looked around, panting before running up the stairs to check the cells, Daryl following behind her. She looked over as Glenn gasped, a walker shooting out of the cell.

"Get down!" Glenn dropped as Daryl fired a bolt at the walker, killing it. Rory walked over and helped Glenn up as Rick opened the curtain to the cell.

"Oh...It's Patric." Rory mumbled, the three men looking to her. She was dreading having to tell Carl.

People started bleeding into the cell block to help check and clear the bodies, Rick watching in silence as Rory put a knife through peoples heads. They were alive just hours ago.

"What we're you even doing in here?" Rick asked the girl, Daryl looking to the two.

"I was just walking... heard the growls." Rory said slowly before looking to Rick. "I— I tried to get them all out, I tried."

"I know, I know." Rick reassured, holding the girl close as she shuddered against his chest. She collected herself after a few minutes, following Rick to Doctor S and Hershel.

"No bites. No wounds. I think he just died." Rick told the man.

"Horribly too." Doctor S told them. "Pleurisy aspiration." Rory had no idea what that meant, so the girl looked to Hershel, who smiled grimly at her.

"Choked to death on his own blood." Hershel explained. "Caused those trails down his face."

"The—the walkers at the fences." Rory spoke, the men looking to her as she stumbled for words, still slightly overwhelmed. "Some of the walkers look like that... blood from their eyes..."

"I saw them on Patric too." Daryl agreed, nodding at Rory.

"They're from the internal lung pressure building up, like if you shake a soda can and pop the top." The doctor explained. "Only, imagine your eyes, ears, nose, and throat are the top."

"It's a sickness from the walkers?" Bob asked, Rory jumping, she didn't even know he was there.

"No, these things happened before they were around." The doctor stated. "Could be pneumococcal."

"Could be what?" Rory mumbled, receiving a jab in the side from Daryl.

"Most likely an aggressive flu strain." The doctor continued.