my tears ricochet

Chapter Forty Five

Ivy's hands were blistered from propping cedar rails against the fence. When one snapped she didn't realize until Rick charged forward, sliding onto his knees and shoving against the fence to keep it from buckling further. She saw when the second one broke, the third one bending against the constant weight. "Run!" The man shouted at her and Carl, giving up the burden to chase after them both.

Rick physically shoved one of the walkers with his shoulder and lost his balance for a moment. Carl grabbed at him and pulled hard. One of the few towers left physically standing from the Governor's attack offered shelter and Ivy yanked on the door to hold it open, sliding in herself when the two managed to get into safety unscathed.

They went through the other side of the tower and looked back through the limited portion of the fence. Ivy swallowed a bit of nervous fear to see space reduced.

The prison had stolen parts of Ivy and left her with only the dark things. She had bled for it, planting her grief so deep inside the ground that it formed roots connecting to her heart. She had memorized the shape of the walls and fences, barbed wire like veins wrapping around the shadows. Teeth, bodies. Graves. Ivy saw herself in the reflection of the collapsed fence. She saw herself in the dead that swarmed like locusts overtop a field.

Daryl wanted this place to survive. He wasn't fond of what it had meant, that old legacy, but he saw the future it could hold. And with that broken fence, Ivy saw those futures turn into ash and nothing more.

A sad soul could burn a perfectly good one. Hershel had told her that in the aftermath of her grief but she saw it clearly in that moment, those bodies fighting and clawing, trying to take back every single inch Ivy had bled for, her group had bled for. Their souls would burn up everything left that could burn.

"What do we do?" Carl asked, shoving back his hat to see better.

"Maybe I could back the bus up against the fence," Rick said, turning around to check the options. That had been the original solution when they settled peace up. The bus had been parked right at the mouth of the yard until Oscar figured out a better solution to keep out the dead.

Ivy blinked, feeling her pocket for that switchblade. "Would it hold?"

The fence was a massive gap to salvage. It would take long before the rest of their defensives sagged further and threatened to break. One bus wouldn't be the solution.

Rick wasn't the same man that had broken soil to plant new life. She was seeing shadows of who he had first been, who he was always meant to be. He grabbed Carl by the shoulder and pulled, jerking his chin so she would follow them. "Come on," he ordered.

They kept a cart of guns stationed around the prison, a reflexive action since the Governor's first storming of their defences that had left Axel dead and Carol pinned. "Pockets," he ordered, shoving ammunition towards them. Ivy took it on instinct and pushed away the thought of how Daryl kept spare bullets for her gun in his own pockets. "Got this?"

Rick was pulling out guns that wouldn't kick back as hard. She vaguely recognized them from Glenn's brief walk through of shooting with a rifle. Ivy had once been after one of the assault rifles that looked bigger than the rest and he had plucked it from her hands with a grimace, warning her that it had enough force to swing back and break her jaw.

"All right, listen to me."

"All right."

"Magazine goes in here. Release is here," Rick instructed, stepping lightly. He had a natural way of sliding into maneuvers. Ivy mimicked her step and tried to follow but the clanging of the fence was loud and it disoriented her. "Make sure it latches."