HEART OF GLASS
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR !
[ season three, episode four ]
Sleeping was a necessity almost as much as it was a burden.
In the hollow darkness of a resting mind, memories resurfaced ─ good ones, bad ones, fictional ones based on loose events. Everything that bloomed in the face of slumber had meaning to it. Marley's dreams were often melancholy, a never ending cycle of remembrance. She saw the faces of the ones she lost, haunting her, taunting her with the guilt she had never been able to eradicate. It was inescapable.
That night, Marley dreamt of Bonnie. Dreaming was a soft way to put it. Her mind was plagued with the horror of her best friend's demise, and her brain churned through the scene with gut-wrenching accuracy.
Her hand slipped. Even now, that image was clear as day ─ the way her fingers absconded from Bonnie's, an accidental yet fatal mistake she made as the decimated ruins of Atlanta city smoked all around them.
God, her hand slipped.
Marley bolted upright in the top-bunk, wiping the sweat beading along her hairline. Saliva rushed to her mouth, and her chest felt like it was burning, thick flames licking her ribcage. Perhaps that was Bonnie's spirit coming back for retribution, burdening the blonde with blooming buds of pain. Forcing her to remember what she did on that fateful night. But it didn't matter either way. The guilt of Bonnie's death had been slowly gnawing away at Marley's innards since the very beginning of the apocalypse, and would eventually lead up to the penultimate fate where she was left a hollow shell of her past existence.
Her hand slipped.
She could have saved her. Bonnie . . . her last moments were spent in agony as the walkers did that . . . and the blood. So much blood. Marley's stomach clenched.
As she threw her legs over the bunk, she noticed a figure looming behind the drawn curtain of her cell block. The silhouette rippled in the rivulets of dewy light that filtered in through the window outside, slivers of daybreak seeping beneath the curtain.
A new day. Another chance at survival. More resurfacing memories coming back to haunt her.
Marley pushed her hair out of her face and called out, "Beth?" She recognised the shadow ─ the outline of the messy ponytail, the slightly hunched stature. "You can come in. I'm decent."
Slender fingers drew the curtain back. Light blazed into the cell, spilling across the cobblestone floors and splashing up the walls. Marley lifted an arm to cover her scorched eyes, grimacing.
"Mornin'" Beth said warmly. "How are you feelin' today?"
"I should be asking you that."
She jumped down from the top bunk and landed on the floor with a muffled thump. Desperate to distract her mind, Marley rifled through the folded pile of clothes in the corner of the room ─ she had no idea how Sage had the patience to fold it all ─ until she came across an acceptable pair of pants, and a grey cropped-sleeve shirt she borrowed from Maggie back at the farm.
It was then Marley noticed that her hands were shaking. She ignored it and continued prepping herself for the day.
The early-morning chill bit at every inch of exposed flesh as she threw the clothes on over old undergarments, caring little about Beth's presence. They were practically sisters.
"How's Hershel?" Marley inquired, running a comb through her knotted tresses.
He woke up yesterday, despite his chances of survival being slimmer than the entire group's combined will to live. It was a miracle. Everyone was astounded. Hershel Greene suffered severe blood loss following his unprecedented amputation, was missing an extremely important limb as a result of it, survived the walker-bite, and still managed to valiantly cling to life despite it all.
He was strong. Mentally and physically.
"He's fine. It's like nothin' ever happened ─ he's already seein' to everyone else." Beth informed, her chapped lips curling to form an illustrious smile. She was more than pleased to have her father back. Over the past couple of days, Beth had been so worried about losing Hershel that she didn't stop and take a moment to think about how it would feel to see him open his eyes again.
Relief. That was one word for it.
Marley patted her friend's shoulder, "He's a doctor. What do you expect?"
"He's a veterinarian."
"Doesn't make a difference. We all bleed the same, don't we?"
Beth shrugged, only slightly indifferent to that analogy, "I guess."
"Hershel cares about everyone here like they're his patients," Marley added, adjusting the annoyingly creased hem of her shirt. "I think that's a trait worth acknowledging, right? His selflessness."
Beth shrugged, scuffing her shoes against the ground, "Sometimes I wish he would just . . . I dunno, think about himself." She shook her head then, chewing on the inside of her cheek as if she wanted to chew those words right back up and pretend they never left her mouth in the first place. Guilty, Beth peered back up at Marley through heavy eyelashes that fanned out above her oceanic eyes, "God, that makes me sound selfish, doesn't it?"
"No, not at all," Marley assured. She placed her hand on Beth's shoulder, gently squeezing the flesh ─ touch was her signature comforting gesture. "Just shows you care about your Dad. That's, like, the opposite of selfish."
"You think?"
"I know." Marley said pointedly. She took her hand away from Beth's shoulder, smiling instead of reaching out through touch. It meant a lot more, in a sense. Your face was like a canvas ─ every little stroke made a difference. Every little stroke had the power to highlight the emotions of the muse and elicit certain reactions within the pensive audience.
Beth mirrored Marley's smile and enveloped her in a warm embrace. They stayed corded in one another's arms for a long moment, finding a solace that couldn't be sought anywhere else within the cage of lithe limbs.
When they broke apart, Marley realised she had almost completely forgotten about her nightmare.
Not long after, the two adolescents trudged out into the open cell-block. Carol and T-Dog were sitting on the stairs leading up to the second floor, talking animatedly about something that was evidently amusing. Everyone else was outside, where Hershel had been taken to try his luck with an old pair of crutches Sage found in the infirmary during her unapproved scouting mission.
Obviously, Marley had scolded Sage for deliberately getting herself into danger ─ and the response from her sister was as she expected. Sage was trying to be more independent, and she had helped Hershel in the long run. Without her efforts, his walking ability would be massively hindered.
With that, she ─ annoyingly ─ had a point.
Marley wanted to be mad, and for good reason. She made a promise to her mother as she lay on her deathbed: keep Sage safe was paramount. But how could she keep Sage safe if she was wandering off without Marley's knowledge? How could she live up to her mother's dying wish if Sage was getting herself into precarious situations when Marley was unaware?
Like at the farm, the sisters were back to having frequent arguments over the most meagre of things. The air between them was thick with tension, their anger blossoming like ripening rose buds.
Thankfully, they were not explicitly ignoring one another ─ and that was a huge step forward in terms of negotiation. Marley just wished it could be a little easier. She never wanted to have a strained relationship with the one person she loved more than anything in the world.
But not everything could be perfect, she supposed.
At midday, Marley and Beth went outside to discern Hershel's progress; the fact he was alive and well seemed almost too unbelievable to be true. Beth immediately ran to her father's side, cradling his arm between her hands, laughing in exhilaration at the sight of him brandishing crutches and hobbling freely.
From the sidelines, Marley grinned. She wandered up to stand beside Lori, who had her fingers curled around the pockets in the metallic fencing, her smile just as wide and just as proud as Maggie's and Glenn's and Beth's.
"Whoo! Go Hershel!" Marley yelled in encouragement, hands cupped around her mouth.
Lori laughed, cheering simultaneously ─ as did everyone else around them, including Carl, one of the nicer prisoners, and Carol.
Hershel's mouth tightened to form a smile, and he hobbled along to the other side of the courtyard with his family cheering him onward. Propelling him, though not physically.
These days, they truly were a family. A family surviving together, with different names and different blood and completely different DNA. The one thing that brought them together was their similarities, and an unbroken bond. A multitude of shared experiences strengthened that bond ─ the common adoration and respect they held for one another as the world crumbled all around them.
Their hearts beat as one.
And for a moment, they could be happy.
But eventually, that happiness would disintegrate. It was an inevitability. Unavoidable. When the butterfly of destruction flapped its wings, the hurricane began to churn.
"Walkers!"
And there it was.
Fight or flight kicked in instantaneously. Undead prisoners and guards were streaming into the courtyard, piling through a drawn-open gate at the very top of the slope, that was supposed to be sealed at all times. Sluggishly, the decayed figments of the past began to approach the group.
Marley pulled her machete from her waistband and started swinging it at the walkers. Adrenaline surged through her and she couldn't focus on anything but the stumbling targets heading directly for them.
They kept coming, a siege of ravenous monsters, and an alarm was blaring in the distant crevices of the prison, coaxing the dead toward the survivors.
"Lori!" Marley cried, grappling with the pregnant woman's wrist. She was the most vulnerable member of the group, not to mention the obvious fact she was carrying a life inside of herself. Marley couldn't risk losing two people in one bite. "We have to go inside!"
Lori's gaze was trained on Rick, who was sprinting up the prison walkways to reach the endangered group. Maggie was behind them, struggling to choose who to migrate toward ─ she looked disoriented and angry and sorrow all in one heartbeat. Her father just woke from unconsciousness, and now the only safe haven they had secured in months was being infiltrated by the dead. Everything that could possibly go wrong had.
"Marley!" Maggie yelled hoarsely. She gestured to the door behind the locked fence, her eyes growing wide with desperation. "In here!"
"Where's Sage?" Marley demanded.
"She's with Glenn,"
Breathlessly, Maggie pointed across the courtyard. Running through the walkway was Sage and Glenn, the latter gripping her feeble wrist tight enough he wouldn't lose her in the chaos ─ and she looked terrified. Marley's chest exploded with relief, but her heart quenched painfully beneath the warmth. She still felt reluctant moving away from the unfolding carnage without her sister by her side. Every other precarious occasion they happened to be twisted into had separated the Whitman sisters, with Sage endangered and Marley often hysterical.
But . . . she trusted Glenn. She trusted him more than she trusted herself. Sage's thrumming heart was sitting precariously in his hands, and he would go to great lengths to protect it.
With this in mind, Marley rushed after Lori, Carl and Maggie. They almost toppled over one another in their rush to get inside. Marley slammed the metal door and pulled the rusted, narrow lock gratingly across the surface. Within seconds, the sound of gnarled hands banging maliciously against the door echoed in the barren halls of the prison.
"Now what?" Marley asked breathlessly. She looked between everyone, heaving for oxygen.
Her heart ached for Carl. He looked so frightened, so innocent and childlike. Blanched, he plunged another bullet into his gun and held it aloft ─ just in case. Lori placed a hand on the back of his head and directed him ( and the others ) toward cell block B.
But walkers had infiltrated the interior of the prison, too. Snarling and thrashing, they gushed into the hall, tracing the sound of the blaring alarm that screeched in every minuscule corner of the dark, dank prison.
"Run!" Lori cried.
Maggie latched her hand around Marley's forearm and dragged her into the hallway, with the two Grimes family members racing up ahead. Their brief solitude was permeated by the spine-chilling sounds of insatiable walkers coming to peel the flesh from their bones.
They continued running, blindly following the extending dark void ahead, with Death perched on their shoulders.
Eventually ─ after what felt like years ─ the walkers eased into the distance, and the hallway up ahead was barren.
Marley peered over her shoulder, her fingers hovering over the hilt of her machete. Nerves were pulling excruciatingly taught in her chest, and her vivid apprehension only worsened when she saw Lori suddenly stumble to a halt, clutching her stomach.
She clutched the mother's elbow, steadying her, "What's wrong?"
Maggie looked equally as concerned, "Lori?"
"It's the baby," Lori muttered, wincing. She grabbed her stomach again, her entire body bending in on itself like a flimsy wire. "I think it's coming."
"Mom?" Carl squeaked, petrified.
It felt like Marley's heart stopped. As if to make sure, she gazed down at Lori's hands ─ both cupping the swell of her belly ─ and then peered back up at the woman's face, which was drawn into a tight grimace. The timing couldn't have been any worse; the world surely had it out for this poor, small group of survivors.
She and Maggie exchanged a terrified glance.
"Uh, okay, let's ─" Marley started, only to be interrupted by snarls. Of course, the walkers had scoped them out. Of course. Their shadows sloped against the walls, and then they appeared at the end of the hallway, gurgling and trembling. "Shit! Turn around!"
Maggie looped am arm around Lori's back and helped the woman walk forward. Meanwhile, Marley and Carl took to the frontline, pointing their weapons down the corridors branching off in alternate directions. After a while, they came to a dead end, but it was a fortunate circumstance because on the left hand side there was a metal door leading into a generator room.
It was better to take their chances in there than out here, with the walkers.
Marley shouldered the door and shoved Carl inside ─ ignoring his angry glower in the process ─ and shouted hoarsely at Lori and Maggie to hurry. They did, although Lori was struggling to remain upright, pressing a hand to her stomach and hissing between her teeth. Bu Maggie kept her composed, and the two women passed through the door and vanished inside of the generator room.
Without wasting a second, Marley slammed the door behind them. She twisted the metal lock, sealing them away from the inevitable danger lurking beyond the damp walls.
Lori gripped a metal chain hanging down from the ceiling, fighting against the surging contractions that were crippling her body.
"What are those alarms?" The woman managed to query through ragged breaths.
"Don't worry about it," Maggie assured. Briefly, she and Marley exchanged a concerned look. They didn't know what brought on the ceaseless squeal of the alarms, either ─ but it was the absolutely least of their worries considering Lori's current state and their lack of experience.
Carl pointed his gun at the closed door, "What if it attracts them?"
Marley shot him a pointed look, "It won't."
"Lori, let's lay you down," Maggie offered, placing her hands on the woman's shoulders.
In return, Lori exhaled sharply, "No, the baby's coming now."
While Lori bent over the generator, gripping the sides of it so tight her knuckles blanched, Marley pulled Maggie aside. Her eyes were bloodshot ─ inky pupils ballooning out ─ and she looked extremely fearful, her gaze constantly shifting to Lori. Marley was more than likely an exact mirror-image of Maggie at that moment, considering her heart was beating a tumultuous rhythm beneath her ribcage and she could barely retain oxygen within her lungs.
She hadn't felt this scared in a long time.
"What do we do?" she asked Maggie quietly.
Maggie didn't look entirely sure of herself. Her shoulders bunched up, and she stuttered between different possibilities, until her mind finally settled on, "Anything we can. If this baby's coming, we need to be ready."
Swallowing through a sandpaper throat, Marley managed to nod, "Okay."
"And you need to help me. Can you do that?"
"Sure. Yeah ─ yeah, of course."
Wielding a supportive smile, Maggie reached forward and squeezed Marley's shoulder. Reassuring. Panicked. Then, she hurried back over toward Lori.
Truthfully, Marley wasn't exactly convinced she was going to prove to be anything other than a burden. A constriction that was blocking Maggie from doing what she needed to do. Birthing a baby was a difficult and complicated process, and back Before, people had to train for years and years before they were allowed anywhere near a pregnant mother. Marley was barely sixteen ─ she had no idea what to look for. She felt she wasn't mature enough yet to deal with something like this. And Maggie hadn't been undergoing the same intricate training that Carol had been in anticipation for this exact event. They were basically going in blind.
But it was an inevitability at that point, sharpened into complete clarity: Lori would be delivering the baby in that generator room. And Marley couldn't simply stand back and watch; she had to help Maggie.
She had to.
Borderline hyperventilating, Lori finally laid down on the floor, and Maggie helped remove the woman's pants.
"I'll do an exam," Maggie said breathlessly. Although, she wasn't moving vigorously enough to suck the oxygen from her lungs ─ it was more from anxiety and fear. "Let me see if you're dilated."
"You know how?" Carl inquired. Marley had an arm around his shoulders , though she was prepared to jump into action if necessary.
Maggie rolled her lips together, a finger of sweat dribbling down the side of her face, "My Dad taught me, but trust me, it's my first time."
She spent a moment looking to see if Lori was dilated. However, going by the expression of confusion on Maggie's face, Marley could only assume it was a tricky thing to understand. And that they were going to be left in the dark concerning the baby's condition.
"I can't tell." Maggie said.
Lori pushed herself up, so she was leaning all of her weight between her elbows and hands. She shook her head, wincing, "I gotta push."
"Okay."
Maggie and Marley immediately rushed to help the mother back to her feet. She gripped the side of some metal object that was fairly wedged into the wall, and her knuckles grew white from strain around the edge of the metal lip. Her features scrunched together as she attempted to draw the baby out, teeth clenched together, eyebrows practically touching, veins bulging in her neck ─ but there was nothing.
"Somebody!" Lori cried, still straining. She released a deep breath, and stood straight again, eyes flared wide. "I'm okay, I'm okay."
"You're doing great, Lori. Just keep doing it," Maggie reassured. "Your body knows what to do. Let it do all the work."
Despite her effort, Marley's attempts at reassurance in comparison were pitiful. She patted Lori's back gingerly, a muscle ticking in her jaw from how tight she was clenching her teeth, and struggled to think of something fiery to say to keep the mother on her feet.
Her heart was thundering like she'd just ran a marathon. Sweat dribbled down the length of her back, and the heat in the small, compact room was so stifling that she felt sick.
It was Lori. Carl's mother, Rick's wife ─ she was an important member of the group, and her life was practically in the hands of a teenager and a half-qualified farmer. Not only her life, but the baby's, too.
"Lori stop!" Maggie yelled suddenly. She pulled her hand away from Lori as she let out a blood-curdling screech. Her fingers came back all individually coated in dark crimson. "Somethings not right!"
In a domino effect of chaos that happened almost instantaneously, the alarms drained away to silence, and Lori collapsed in Maggie's arms. Her eyes were still open, but barely, flittering in and out of consciousness.
Maggie helped lay her down on the floor, really panicking now ─ and for good measure.
A puddle of blood leaked out from beneath Lori's legs, seeping into the cracks paved within the concrete flooring. She was pale as a sheet, and her eyes were slipping between closed and open. Marley grabbed her hand, felt that it was slightly cold, and tried to squeeze some semblance of life into the wrinkles between her fingers.
"Mom, come on. Keep your eyes open." Carl pleaded, starting to give way to fear.
Maggie swallowed her nerves, throat bobbing, "I gotta take you back to my dad."
"I'm not gonna make it," Lori whispered faintly. Weakly. She was so pale, her face looked almost grey.
Marley could feel tears choking her, welling in the back of her throat. It was like a lump, forcing itself forward. In an attempt to disenchant herself of its hindering presence, Marley squeezed Lori's hand tighter, suddenly realising this could be the last time they ever shared touch while the other was still breathing. She tried not to be a pessimist ─ but it was no use. Her mind drifted to the negative outcome of every situation, no matter how meagre. It was simply the way of life nowadays.
She couldn't see past the darkness. Nobody could.
"With all this blood, I don't even think you're fully dilated yet," Maggie spluttered, refusing to see truth ─ if there was any ─ in Lori's half-conscious woes. "No amount of pushing is gonna help."
"I know what it means, and I'm not losing my baby." Lori muttered weakly. She was struggling to stay awake, but she was really trying to keep her eyes open, regardless of any temptations. Her gaze drifted to Maggie, "You've gotta cut me open."
The room stilled. It went completely silent. Marley thought she could see stars for a split second, with how hard Lori's unprecedented demand hit her.
Eventually, after what felt like hours but probably summed up to about a minute, Maggie shook her head, "No. I can't."
"You don't have a choice."
"I—I'll run for help." Marley decided adamantly. She would not allow this to happen. Not without professional assistance, not without Maggie's dad or Carol's training. Not without Rick's knowledge. "I can make it to Hershel on my own─"
"No!" Lori bellowed, stern and authoritative and materialistic all in one breath. She looked up at Marley, and the girl could've sworn she almost broke down into tears right then and there. But she wanted to be strong. She didn't want to upset Carl more than necessary, so she valiantly fought the pressing urge to cry, even when Lori's pale lips formed a small smile, "Don't. It's okay."
Maggie placed her hands on Lori's knees. Her eyes were glassy, and her voice wobbled with shedding emotion, "Carol's the one that practiced that. Dad only taught me the steps, Lori. If I ─"
"Please."
"─I have no anaesthetic, no equipment─"
"Marley has a knife," Lori said.
She nodded toward the dagger poking out from beneath Marley's waistband, the end of the sharp blade congealed with walker blood and glinting in the pale light filtering through the barred window that was suspended high above the generator.
Marley's eyes stuck to the knife for a long while. She'd never felt so disgusted by it before. The way it looked was unnerving, all sharp and deadly and poised to kill. Harbouring violence. Harbouring death. The temptation to throw it away to some deep corner of the room where they would never find it again was overwhelming.
She gulped and peered down at Lori, "We can't use this. It's dirty and you won't . . . you'll get an infection."
"You won't survive, Lori." Maggie added, speaking only what Marley couldn't.
"My baby has to survive." Lori mumbled, iron-willed in her pleas. She inhaled sharply, the muscles in her arms straining against the thin flannel tank-top as she fought against the pain of another contraction. Her pleading grew more desperate, "Please. My baby . . . for all of us. Please, Maggie! Please!"
She was no longer asking. She was begging. This wasn't something the woman was on the fence about, even in her state of delirium ─ it was real. It was tempted sacrifice, to keep her unborn baby alive.
"You see my old C-section scar?" Lori continued obdurately. She lifted her shirt, revealing a thick, jagged white scar running across the bottom of her stomach.
Maggie looked at it, the ineluctability of the situation dawning on her. Her eyes welled with tears, and she shook her head, "I can't."
"You can. You have to."
With trembling hands, Marley placed her knife on the ground. Her lip curled at the mere sight of it, "It's too dangerous," she practically whispered, her voice slightly nasally from the tears lodged at the back of her throat. Any particularly serious provocation, and the tears would burst forth like an onslaught of water ripping through a broken dam.
Lori reached up and weakly placed her hand on Marley's cold cheek, rubbing a soothing circle against her skin, "It's okay, sweet girl. It's okay."
"It's not. Lori─"
"Listen to me," Lori said sharply, though her voice was still soft. She was rushing now, wanting to get everything off her chest before the inevitable happened. Her hand cupped Marley's jaw. "Everything happens for a reason. This was meant to be ─ it's a turn of fate. Alright? Now, I don't want you to carry this with you forever. Please. You're a sweet girl, Marley, and this world does not deserve you. Show it your worth."
Lori's face blurred, and the unshed tears finally sprung to the surface, coagulating between Marley's lashes. She nodded against Lori's bloodied hand, and a weak sob rattled in her throat.
She didn't know what to do, so she shuffled aside, forming a path for Carl to shuffle through. It was his mother ─ and Marley knew from experience how difficult and gut-wrenching and devastating it was to say goodbye to a mother on the verge of death. How hard it was to accept the fact she was slowly caving to defeat, and you couldn't do anything to stop it. Couldn't do anything to change fate. Couldn't bring your mother back when the scythe eventually swept down to claim its victim. Nothing. You just had to watch the life fade from her eyes, knowing you were the last thing she ever saw, and wondering if she'd be proud of the person you became. Wondering when you'd meet her again.
Marley placed a hand on Carl's little shoulder, and watched as Lori's face fell into a mask that did quite well at hiding her despair.
"Carl? Baby, I don't want you to be scared, okay?" she breathed tiredly, while her son watched her gradually slip away. "This is what I want. This is right. Now you . . . you take care of your daddy for me, all right? And your little brother of sister, you take care─"
"You don't have to do this." Carl interrupted, tears streaming down his rosy cheeks.
Lori mustered up a smile, "You're gonna be fine." She curled her fingers around his hand, and held it close to her chest ─ holding the one thing she loved the most in the world against her heart, where it belonged. Where it would stay. "You are gonna beat this world. I know you will. You are smart, and you are strong, and you are so brave, and I love you."
Carl sniffed, wrapping his fingers tightly around his mother's hand, "I love you, too."
"You gotta do what's right, baby." Lori continued, her face pale and gaunt, but her eyes so bright in spite of it ─ so full of love and adoration for her boy. "You promise me, you'll always do what's right. It's so easy to do the wrong thing in this world. So don't . . . so if it feels wrong, don't do it, all right? If it feels easy, don't do it. Don't let the world spoil you."
Her voice cracked, splintering her words in half. She reached up and swept her fingers across Carl's cheek, wiping away his tears.
"You're so good. You're my sweet boy. You're the best thing I ever did. And I love you."
Lori pulled Carl into an embrace, clutching him tightly. He sobbed into her neck, and Marley couldn't watch without feeling like she was intruding on their last moment. She turned away, gnawing on her lower lip ─ which was trembling in accordance with her hands and her heart ─ and made eye contact with Maggie. They were both one straw away from breaking down, barely holding it together, eyes brimming with tears. Who could blame them?
Maggie would carry this guilt with her forever. Meanwhile, Marley would be without a maternal figure, once again. And to think, only thirty minutes ago all had been good.
Butterfly to a hurricane.
"Okay," Lori managed to compose herself. She pressed a kiss to Carl's cheek, and he clambered back to his knees. His face was red and blotchy, tear-stained. "Okay, now. Maggie, when this is over, you're gonna have to─"
"Shh!" Maggie butted in. She couldn't bear to hear it ─ to accept Lori's fate.
"You have to do it, it can't be Rick."
Maggie noted the desperation in Lori's voice and took a deep, shuddering breath. She schooled her features into something close to neutrality, nodding intensely. There was so much responsibility in her hands, so much culpability, that Marley was surprised she hadn't collapsed from the pressure of it yet.
"All right," Lori sighed, rolling her shoulders back. She looked terrified, but she also looked ready. "All right. It's all right."
The moment had dawned on them all. It became apparent by the stillness in the room. Maggie looked at Marley, and the latter could immediately understand what she was trying to convey through eye contact. Knife. I need the knife, before I change my mind.
Marley reluctantly curled her hand around the hilt. It had been so helpful in the past, so handy and convenient when the walkers were around and posing a terrible threat to her life, or Sage's life, or Beth's life. Now it was going to be taking away a life instead of saving one ─ someone who wasn't already dead and decaying. Lori. She was the closest thing Marley had to a mother after she was stripped of her biological parents right at the start.
But this was what Lori wanted. Sacrificing herself to bring her baby into the world was a pretty damn selfless way to go out.
Hesitant, Marley picked the knife up from the ground and handed it off to Maggie. The woman tried to smile in appreciation, but it was more of a grimace than anything else. Then, her gaze shifted to the C-Section scar on display, and she looked back down at the knife, completely coming to terms with the fact she was about to use that exact blade to rip open Lori's stomach. Killing her, inevitably.
It was the only clear outcome of the situation ─ Lori wouldn't live through it. They wanted her to, but it was an impossibility. The blood loss would be insurmountable. Nobody came back from something like that; if they did, it was because they were dead. Dead and milky-eyed and prepared to sink their teeth into anything within sight.
Marley thought it was better to die this way than anything else. Selfless and true. Brave. She just wished it could have been different, and that Lori could live.
Her last moments would be spent in pain. Marley wanted to take it all away and bear the agony herself, so that Lori could pass peacefully. Life didn't work that way, unfortunately. It was a terrible, cruel thing, feasting on the innocent, giving way to the malevolent, planting hurdles across every path leading to freedom.
Nobody was spared.
Lori's eyes drifted to the ceiling. Her chest heaved a long, prolonged breath ─ almost as if she was gone already, this being the concluding gasp of air ─ and she smiled softly.
"Goodnight, love."
And then the blade met skin.
Blood gushed over Maggie's fingers as she tore across the flesh, gliding the knife over the reopened scar, and Lori released an agonised scream in return. Her entire body trembled and shook until the pained scream drained away to a chilling silence, and then Lori's eyes closed for the last time. Carl was crying harder than before, pleading with Maggie to stop hurting his mother, but she was already gone.
"Marley, give me your hands," Maggie commanded in a weak, drained voice. She made a second incision, tearing through the flesh to reach the baby. "Marley, please."
All Marley could see was the blood. There was so much of it ─ who even knew a person could have that much in them? Crimson waves rocking over the shore. Red sticking to Maggie's fingers. Red coating the end of her knife. Red pooling on the ground beneath them. Gallons and gallons and ─
"Marley!"
She snapped back into reality.
"I need to keep the site clean. Hold it open." Maggie ordered briskly.
Hands shaking, Marley grabbed the two chunks of skin that had at one been melded together, and held them apart so that Maggie could cut through the amniotic sac without barriers. There was so much blood, however, that it was difficult to see no matter what. She kept wiping it away from the gaping wound, her hands completely crimson within seconds. It kept streaming and streaming and streaming. Red, red, red.
"I see it," Maggie informed, removing her hands from the incision. "I see the ears. I'm gonna pull it out."
She plunged her hands inside, and Marley peeled the flesh farther apart to create more room. Throughout the entire lengthy process, not once did she glance upward, where she
would see Lori's pallid face. Not once. She couldn't bring herself to do it.
She was dead. Dead. It didn't feel real. Lori couldn't be dead.
"I can feel the leg." said Maggie. Bile rose in Marley's throat at the sight of Maggie's hands bulging beneath the surface of Lori's swollen stomach. She decided to look at the wall instead. "I'm pulling it out now."
"Okay."
There was a soft squelch of flesh, the nauseating sound of skin ripping apart, and then Maggie gasped. Peeling her gaze away from the wall, Marley looked down at the mass of skin and blood nestled in the crooks between Maggie's arms. She could just about make out the squashed face of a newborn baby. Unmoving. Not crying. Silent.
"No . . ." Marley whispered, taking her fingers away from Lori's stomach. She shuffled forward on her knees, leaning over the inanimate child.
Maggie carefully flipped the newborn onto its front, and rubbed a small spot on its back with her free hand. Everyone held their breaths, praying for a miracle. And a miracle came.
A baby's cries bounced off the walls around the small room.
It was a girl.
✧.｡. *.
Light. It blazed in her eyes the second they stepped out into the courtyard.
Silhouettes swam before her eyes, little blobs of colour intermingling in the far distance. A row of people, watching them come out. A row of people listening to the wailing of a newborn child. A row of people who could only assume by the lack of a certain individual what had happened in the space of an hour.
Marley Whitman didn't even feel real anymore. There was a faint buzzing in her ears, an incessant chirping reminder of what happened in that generator room.
Death. It followed her everywhere.
She looked down at her hands. Crimson. Every wrinkle lined with blood. Lori's blood. She couldn't shake the lingering horror at the sight of it. There had been so much of it . . . how could that have been real? Normal? Surely it wasn't. A human body couldn't withhold that much blood. And no human body could excrete that much, even in death.
Right?
It couldn't be real.
The first thing Marley heard as she came around from her stupor was an axe clattering to the ground, and then the heart-wrenching sobs coming from a man. Rick. It had to be. It sounded like him, though she'd never heard him actually cry before now.
He kept saying the same word, repeating it over and over again, his voice growing heavier by the second, "No. No, no, no."
Warmth tracked down Marley's cheeks, but she felt numb. Numb to the bone ─ the coldness that came with grief already seeping deep into her glacial bones. She couldn't really feel anything. She couldn't even remember when she started crying, she just knew the tingling sensation trickling across her face had to be tears. Or blood. Blood. Maybe it was blood.
She looked at her hands again.
It was dry, caked between every callous. Blood. Lori's blood. Beautiful, bold, kind, funny Lori who comforted Marley on the rare occasion she felt down enough that she required something other than words that didn't hold the power to lift temperamental feelings. Lori would place a hand on Marley's scalp, carding her fingers through the wavy blonde locks that the girl inherited from her mother.
Carl inherited his nose from his mother. He had the same mouth, too. But now his mother was gone and those similarities were just ghosts in the wind.
"Marley. . ."
Someone was reaching out to her. Their fingers brushed her shoulder, but she shrugged away, almost stumbling to her knees. What if she got blood on them? Lori wouldn't have wanted them to be tainted by the horrors of her last moments.
"Hey, hey," She recognised it to be Glenn's voice. He came to her. "You're okay. You're fine."
"Lori . . ." Marley gulped, shaking her head again. "She didn't ─ the blood . . ."
"I know. You're fine." Glenn reassured softly.
Marley couldn't help it. She dropped her head against his chest and burrowed her face deep into his shirt. It smelt like Glenn ─ sweat and dirt and wood. An indistinct aroma of sandalwood aftershave that he found and used during their time on the road. There was a comforting edge to the scent, something that brought her back to reality. His arms cocooning her was grounding, and the concrete beneath her feet swayed, the annoying hum rattling against her eardrums dissipating.
"I've got you," Glenn muttered against her hair. He held her close, arms tightening. "You're fine."
And she was. For a moment, at least.
But when she closed her eyes, Marley couldn't see through the thick, dense cloud of red.
⋆.ೃ࿔*:･
so basically...im upset