Inferno

forty nine.

Nathan took a quick survey of the area, and then back at Merle. He stepped into the street to close some distance, not even caring if the man was two inches taller than him.

"Michonne was here," He explained. "and if you haven't noticed, that blade belonged to someone else that supposedly died on your watch too. The Governor doesn't take kindly to liars."

Nathan admittedly was almost taken back at how silent Merle was being, used to him constantly opening his mouth and saying any kind of bullshit he could come up with. However, he didn't need to speak — he could see it all in his eyes, crumbling down like a wall at this revelation. There was some doubt there too, a mistake that the young man could understand.

They didn't like each other, so why should they trust one another's word?

"That's some bullshit."

Nathan's eyes squinted and crushed his cigarette with his boot.

"Still a stupid, racist, and misogynistic flea, huh?" Nathan said. "Look, i'm not any better myself. We clearly don't like each other, but I'm just tryin' to warn you, man."

Merle eyed him cynically. "Why?"

"Because you saved her, something I was supposed to do," Nathan stated, crossing his arms over his chest. "Philip is planning something tonight and it ain't gonna be pretty, so I suggest you get the fuck out."

Merle glanced around the street the same way Nathan had moments before. The Governor's militia was prowling around the streets, and in this moment, he realized they looked like dogs. They didn't know it, but they had leashes, trapping them to a man that possibly could be another person entirely behind his mask.

Nathan was trying to get rid of his.

"What 'bout you?"

He met Merle's eyes and contemplated, hand scratching at the end of his growing beard with a thoughtful frown. What about him? What was his new mission?

He definitely didn't want to stay here, but he also couldn't run away from the fucked catastrophe he created. He needed to know more, learn what the Governor was going to do with Rick's group, and pass it on. This was a situation that wasn't going to be left so easily.

"I have some things to do first," Nathan spoke. "I can't work under him anymore. I can't be that person."

Merle nodded, and the young man hoped, wondered, prayed that he was doing the right thing. He had to be good, he had to try.

Nathan had to make things right.

━━━━━

Samantha felt feral.

The taste of her own blood was a familiar visitor, the bruising it's companion, swallowing her up in a hazy mind of wonders as her and Michonne trekked through the streets. She was used to a mouth full of blood, mangled fists that had been slammed into opposing forces. Samantha had been that person once, the adrenaline of violence filling up her body like some otherworldly pleasure, but she had thought that girl had been erased completely.

She never left. Not completely.

That girl was only sleeping, stirring in a restless slumber and slowly awakening with each punch that life had thrown at her. Every emotion was erratic, enhanced into something entirely larger as she kept it lodged inside. She still hasn't mourned, still hasn't processed anything since she found her old group, and just now it's becoming apparent.