MYA WASN'T THE only one still willing to fight. In fact, apart from when it had come to looking for Merle, she wasn't sure she'd ever seen Daryl spring into action so quickly before.
He threw his bottle at the door in a fit of rage, before spinning back around to Jenner, "Open the damn door!" He yelled at the scientist, who'd barely said two words since revealing what was going to happen to the group.
Mya hadn't stopped pacing around the room since she'd received the news, eyes glued to the countdown on the big screen. There had to be something that they could do, any way that they could stop Jenner or even escape without his help.
From where she sat with Sophia on the floor, Carol reached a hand out to Mya as she came back around, "Mya, please, just sit down. We don't have much time." Her mother told her tearfully.
She'd already given up and Mya wished she could admit she was surprised, but she couldn't allow her mother to just accept this fate so easily. "No, we're not dying. What's wrong with you?!" Mya shot back, unintentionally turning her rage from the situation onto Carol. She paused guiltily for a moment, lowering her voice as she continued, "Mom, it's fine, we're gonna be fine. You don't have to cry."
Partly complying with her mother's request, Mya crouched down, placing a hand on Sophia's shoulder and offering her the best smile she could muster up, "Hey, honey. You aren't scared, are you?" She asked her sister, with Sophia nodding back unsurprisingly, "Okay.. That's okay, it's okay to be afraid, but you're gonna be just fine."
Sophia didn't respond, instead burying her face into Carol's shoulder, muffled sobs proving that Mya's words hadn't helped her to feel any better.
"Soph, hey.." Mya tried again, tilting her head slightly, cautiously reaching for her hand, "Have I ever let anything bad happen to you before?"
Her younger sister shrugged half-heartedly. Perhaps Mya had, after all, she'd left her alone in that house with their father. It wasn't something Mya had ever been proud of, but Ed hadn't given her a choice, kicking her out the moment he found out she was pregnant with Faith.
Sophia had only been young then, probably too young to even remember why Mya had left, thinking her older sister had just abandoned her. She'd lost so much time with her, time that Mya still had to make up for and she was going to, she had to.
Realising she wasn't doing much to comfort Sophia, Mya stood back up, heading towards where Jenner sat, too careless for what he'd just announced to the group. If it wasn't likely he was their only means of surviving, Mya would've lost her temper long ago.
"You enjoy telling little kids they're gonna die?" Mya spat, hands slamming down onto the desk in front of Jenner, "I don't care what it takes, if you don't open this door now, Jenner, I swear to God, Daryl is gonna be the least of your worries!"
If he felt threatened, he didn't care enough to let it show, "Even if I do open the doors, it won't change what happens." He stated, far too calmly, "You should've left well enough alone, it would've been so much easier."
Lori spoke up, horrified at his answer, "Easier for who?"
"All of you, you know what's out there. A short, brutal life and an agonising death." Jenner clarified, as though he had any idea what was out there himself. Had he left the CDC since the outbreak has started? He glanced over at Andrea, who sat with her knees brought up to her chest, "Your sister, what was her name?"
Suddenly defensive of both Amy and Andrea, Mya took a step forward, scowling at Jenner, "Don't you dare start with that."
Despite this, Andrea answered him quietly, "Amy."
"Amy. You know what this does. You've seen it." Jenner repeated the name as he continued, ignoring Mya completely. He glanced up at Rick, "Is that really what you want for your wife and son?" He asked the former officer.
"I don't want this!" Rick hissed back.
Glaring at him, Mya added on, "If it was your family, your kids, in here, you wouldn't be doing this and you know it so cut the shit and admit you're not doing us a favour, you're killing us."
Shane returned from helping Daryl try and break open the door, resting his hands on one of the desks, exhausted from his failed attempts, "I can't make a dent." He reported.
"Those doors are designed to withstand a rocket launcher," Jenner stated, involving himself in a conversation where he perhaps shouldn't have, since it mostly consisted of people who were furious at him for what he was doing.
This was only proven further by Daryl lunging towards him, swinging an axe he'd been using on the door as he went, "Well, your head ain't!"
While most of the group held Daryl back, urging him to stop, Mya only stood in the way of Carol and Sophia, on the off chance that Daryl did swing and ended up missing. Still, him killing Jenner wouldn't help them, the scientist was no use to them if he was dead.
"You do want this." Jenner insisted, focus drawn towards Rick, "Last night, you said you knew it was just a matter of time before everybody you loved was dead."
The group fell silent again, Lori and Shane looking towards Rick, horrified that he'd even think that. Mya didn't say anything - it wasn't her place to - but she understood, she highly doubted Rick was the only one to have those thoughts these last few weeks.
"What? You really said that?" Shane asked, "After all your big talk?"
For a moment, Rick said nothing, stunned by Jenner exposing something he'd said in confidence to the doctor, before turning to Lori, "I had to keep hope alive, didn't I?"
Finally, Mya spoke up, "It doesn't matter! None of us want to die and you don't get to make that decision for us!" She argued back, "You do what you want, but leave us out of it."
"Don't you see?" Jenner questioned, "There is no hope."
Rick stepped forward again, "There's always hope. Maybe it won't be you, maybe not here, but somebody, somewhere-"
"What part of 'everything's gone' don't you understand?" Andrea cut in.
It was understandable, after everything Andrea had been through, that she'd lost all hope. If the roles had been reversed, if Mya had lost Sophia, she knew she'd feel the same. The idea of losing Faith was even worse, especially knowing it was a possibility.
"Listen to your friend, she gets it." Jenner said, seeming to have a soft spot for Andrea, or at least some level of understanding towards the mindset she'd adapted as of late, "This is what takes us down, this is our extinction event."
Carol let out a cry from her place on the floor, something that only angered Mya more. She wasn't angry at her mother, of course, but filled with rage at the fact that she had to feel this way, that she had to fear for her life like this.
"This isn't right, you can't just keep us here." Carol pleaded.
Jenner leaned forward in his seat, towards where Mya's mother and sister sat, "One tiny moment. A millisecond. No pain." He stated, almost like he was repeating a mantra.
This didn't win over Carol, naturally, "My daughter doesn't deserve to die like this!" She managed to say between sobs.
Mya couldn't hear it for much longer, she refused to stand by and listen to Jenner try to convince her mother and twelve year old sister that being collateral damage for his own suicide attempt was the kindest way to die.
"Wouldn't it be kinder?" Jenner asked them, "More compassionate to just hold your loved ones and wait for the clock to run down?"
Mya glared at him, seething, "If you don't open these fucking doors-"
A gun cocked behind Mya and she took that as her queue to step out of the way. Shane stomped forward, a shotgun in his hand, ignoring Rick asking him to stop, "Open that door." He commanded, weapon aimed at Jenner, "Or I'm gonna blow your head off, do you hear me?"
Not doubting that Shane would follow through with his threats, Mya turned to get Sophia and her mother out of the way. "Don't look." She whispered quietly to her younger sister.
"Brother." Rick leaned towards Shane, trying to stop him from making a fatal mistake that not only would kill Jenner, but trap the group inside the CDC indefinitely, "Brother, this is not the way you do this. We will never get out of her."
Screaming in a fit of rage, Shane instead moved his gun away from Jenner's face, firing at the computers screens across the room. Mya only care about getting Sophia out of the way, not wanting a stray bullet to hit her.
Before he could fire anymore, Rick knocked the gun out of his hands, sending his friend flying to the ground with a jab from his elbow, "Are you done now? Are you done?" Rick asked him after a long pause, filled only by the sound of Shane's ragged breathing.
"You still think this'll be peaceful and painless for you?" Mya eventually moved away from the rest of the group, heading back towards Jenner.
Rick, after getting Shane to calm down, returned to try to convince Jenner, "I think you're lying, about there being no hope. If that were true, you'd have bolted with the rest." He argued, making a valid enough point, "You chose the hard path."
"Not because I wanted to." Jenner hissed back, standing up and pointing at the screen, "I made a promise. To her, my wife."
"Test Subject 19 was your wife?" Lori asked.
For the first time, Mya felt she could actually relate to Jenner somehow. In a world where she didn't have Faith, where she didn't have anyone to love except for Gareth, what would she have done if she were to lose him?
"I'm sorry, truly I am." Mya offered, her tone softer than it had been towards him previously, "I'm married too, I can't imagine that pain, I don't want to know what that's like."
Jenner glanced over at her, "But your husband isn't here." He pointed out, more like he was asking a question rather than state a fact, maybe trying to figure out if she was married to one of the members of the group.
Mya shook her head, "No, we got separated at the start. I was at work, so he took my daughter and got out of the city." She explained, "I have to find him, I have to find both of them."
There was a split second, where it seemed like Jenner was considering her words, contemplating opening the door, but it didn't last, "Then I'm sorry for your loss, I'm sure you know they're probably already gone."
She wanted to be angry - it took everything in her not to snap back at him - but given what he'd lost, his pessimism made sense, even if she didn't agree with it. "Maybe you're right, maybe I'll never know for sure, but there's still a chance." Mya insisted, "If it was your wife out there, you'd take that chance too, you'd do anything to know the truth, don't pretend I'm not right."
Jenner said nothing, making Mya worry that he wasn't going to listen to reason.
"My daughter, her name is Faith, she's nine years old and she is the most important thing in this world to me, there's nobody I love more than her." Mya continued, growing desperate as the clock continued to count down - seven minutes left now. "She loves cartoons, comics and colouring in books and I need to know if she's okay, don't you understand that? She needs me, I'm her mother."
Rick took this opportunity to chime in, "All we're asking for is a choice, that's all we want." He told Jenner, "A choice. A chance."
"Let us keep trying for as long as we can." Lori begged, arms wrapping protectively around Carl, who stood in front of her, eyes still red from crying.
Jenner drew a breath in, seeming to actually take their words into account, to actually understand their reasons for wanting to keep on fighting. Eventually, he spoke, "I told you topside is locked down, I can't open those."
"We'll figure it out." Mya added on.
The doctor walked back over to the keypad on the desk, pressing a few buttons. Mya felt relief wash over her, enough to overwhelm her almost, as the door slid back open, before Daryl could take another swing at it with his axe.
Jenner had listen, he'd actually listened, they could go.
"Come on!" Daryl urged the group, nobody wasting any time to rush out of the room, not wanting to stick around in time to witness first-hand what happened when the timer ran out. Mya just prayed they'd make it to safety in time - just over four minutes to go.
She whispered a quick thank you to Jenner before bolting it towards Sophia and Carol, "Let's go, we need to hurry!" Mya told them urgently, although she knew that fact was obvious to the both of them, "I told you we were gonna be okay."
"Hey! We've got four minutes left! Come on!" Glenn cried out to the stragglers of the group, namely T-Dog and Jacqui, the latter appearing reluctant to leave.
Jacqui pushed T-Dog away gently, "No, I'm staying!" She told him and Mya felt her heart sink. She wanted to tell her it was the wrong decision, to beg her to go with them, but after asking Jenner to give them a choice, it wouldn't be fair. "I'm staying, sweetie."
"Jacqui, are you sure?" Was all Mya could muster up, to which she nodded.
While it seemed like T-Dog wanted to convince her otherwise, it was clear Jacqui was dead set on her decision, "I'm not ending up like Jim and Amy." She clarified, "There's no time to argue and no point, not if you wanna get out."
She was right, they had to go before it was too late. There was no time to mourn Jacqui, as much as Mya wanted to, and she made sure to rush Carol and Sophia out of the room ahead of her.
The light seeping through the windows on the top floor gave Mya hope. She wasn't sure if she would've preferred to see the clock still counting down, to know how much time they had, or if that would've made her stress even more. They'd had four minutes before leaving, four minutes to figure out how to escape and get as far as they possibly could.
T-Dog rushed for one of the doors, unable to open it, no matter how much he tried. Daryl and Shane moved towards the windows, using the axes they'd previously tried on the door downstairs to try and break the window; once again, to no avail.
After a few attempts, and T-Dog using a chair to try and break the glass, Shane tried with his shotgun, even a bullet having no effect on the glass.
"The glass won't break?" Sophia asked.
Mya instinctively placed a hand on her shoulder, "It's okay, we're gonna be okay." She told her, although now she was unsure herself. They were out of that room, so close to the outside and yet they had no way of escaping.
"Rick, I have something that might help." Carol chimed in, digging into her bag.
Shane scoffed, "Carol, I don't think a nail file's gonna do it." He remarked condescendingly, his tone angering Mya, despite the pressing matters already at hand.
"Shut your mouth, Shane." Mya spat.
Ignoring Shane's comment, Carol continued to search through the bag, "Your first morning at camp, when I washed your uniform, I found this in your pocket." She explained, her hand shaking as she held out a grenade to Rick. Mya's eyes widened.
Rick didn't hesitate to rush to the window with the grenade, the rest of the group getting as far back as possible as Shane yelled for them to look out. There was a moment of silence, where all that could be heard was Rick pulling the pin from the grenade, wasting no time to sprint back towards where the group hid.
The glass shattered, thankfully, giving the group a clear opening to run to. Mya wasn't sure how long they had left now, maybe only two minutes, but they had a fighting chance, they just had to keep running and they'd be okay.
It was strange, being outside again, feeling the wind and sun both hit Mya at once as she ran through the courtyard. Walkers shuffled along the grass, never making it close enough to the group before Shane shot them done, clearing a path.
The cars were in sight and Mya practically shoved Carol and Sophia into the RV, bundling into it after them. Some of the others climbed into the other cars and Mya made a point of counting everyone in the group, to make sure nobody had been left behind - excluding Jacqui.
"Wait, where are Andrea and Dale?" She asked, before Rick could turn the car's ignition on.
A terrible silence filled the RV, before Lori pointed back towards the CDC frantically, Mya following her gaze to watch as Andrea and Dale stumbled out of the building, "They're coming!"
They made it past the courtyard, before Rick looked down on his watch, likely realising that there would be no time for them to make it into one of the vehicles. Lori leaned out the window, yelling at them to get down, while Rick honked the horn to get their attention.
Hardly a second later, the explosion came. Mya didn't give herself the chance to stare, only able to feel the heat coming from the fire of the CDC, shielding Sophia as she moved as far back into the RV as she could, trying not to think about the walkers the explosion would attract.
The sound of the CDC collapsing seemed to go on forever, Glenn being the first one to get the courage to look up, followed by Rick and then Mya. The crashes from the explosion slowly ceased into a quiet burning, as Mya's eyes searched for Andrea and Dale, letting out a sigh of relief as they stumbled into the RV. They were okay, they were all going to be okay.
Sophia finally poked her own head up, glancing over at her sister, "Is it over?"
"Yeah Soph." Mya said with a nod, "It's over."