Maggie's expression did not change.
She met the leader's gaze head-on. "The old man driving that RV? He's the one who tried to plead for the Observer earlier."
The leader's head tilted slightly.
"He did not persist," Maggie continued, "but he showed some conscience. So I believe his fate should be left to God's judgment, not ours."
Hearing this, the leader seemed quite satisfied and slowly nodded.
"But there are supplies down there!" The skinny man stepped forward, gesturing wildly toward the smoking wreckage. "We cannot just leave—"
"Supplies?" Maggie turned to look at him, and something in her expression made him stop mid-sentence. "Setting aside how much might even be left in that thing, it is almost dark. Do you want to send our people down that slope, in the fading light, to haul boxes back and forth while walkers converge from every direction?"
She pointed at the RV's smoking carcass at the bottom of the embankment. "Not to mention that vehicle just got hit with a rocket. Who is to say it will not explode again? Secondary detonations happen, Ben. Or did you sleep through that part of training?"
Ben's mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water. "I... I just thought..."
"You thought wrong. If you are so concerned about those supplies, feel free to climb down there yourself. I am sure God will protect you."
Ben's face flushed red, but he had no response. He looked to the leader for support, found none, and shut his mouth.
"Then we leave it," the leader said with a dismissive wave. "The righteous need not risk themselves for the scraps of sinners. Take the prisoners and strip their vehicles. We return to prepare for judgment."
Rick felt something in his chest unclench slightly. His back was screaming where the guard had kicked him earlier, pain radiating up his spine with every breath. But that was nothing compared to the weight crushing down on his ribs.
The others were down there in that burning wreck, and he could not help them. All he could do was watch smoke rise through the trees and pray to a God he was not sure he believed in anymore.
Stay alive, he thought desperately. I will come back. I swear I will come back for you.
The cultists swarmed the convoy.
They shoved bound prisoners into the beds of pickup trucks while others began looting what remained of Rick's group's vehicles. Doors were yanked open. Trunks were popped. Seats were torn apart looking for hidden caches.
"Holy shit, look at this!" One of the militants dragged a crate from the back of a truck. "These people are loaded!"
Another joined him, pulling out medical supplies. "Antibiotics! Painkillers! Surgical equipment!" He looked back at the prisoners with something like disgust. "This is what you hoard while good people suffer?"
A third found the food. He hauled out a box filled with canned goods. The man walked directly to where T-Dog sat zip-tied on the ground.
He held the box high, then kicked it over.
Cans scattered across the pavement, rolling in every direction. Some split open, spilling their contents onto the filthy asphalt.
"Look at this!" the man spat at T-Dog's feet. "You greedy, selfish sinners! Hoarding all this food, and you could not spare even one can for a desperate mother and her starving child!"
Another cultist picked up the theme. "Your souls are rotten! Corrupt! You deserve everything that is coming to you!"
"Amen," someone else muttered.
Rick watched, his jaw clenched so tight his teeth ached. Shane was beside him, zip-tied and bleeding from his nose, his eyes tracking every cultist. Daryl was on Shane's other side.
They had gathered those supplies at the CDC. Every can, pill bottle, and bandage represented hours of danger.
And these zealot assholes were calling them sinners for it.
"Move it!" A guard shoved Rick toward one of the trucks. "Get in. Try anything and I will put a bullet in your knee. God's judgment comes later, but I can start the pain early if you want."
Rick climbed into the truck bed, and the others followed.
The cultists kept looting. What they could not carry immediately, they worked around. Within twenty minutes, they had three vehicles roadworthy again.
"Load them up!" the leader ordered. "Take everything. God provides for the righteous through the suffering of the wicked."
Engines roared to life. The cultist convoy began to move, taking with them every scrap of supplies Rick's group had fought so hard to gather. The prisoners were hauled away in the opposite direction, toward some unknown compound and "judgment" that Rick suspected would not involve anything resembling due process.
The highway fell silent behind them.
---
Inside the car that had been declared "all dead," Glenn's eyes cracked open.
He was breathing too fast. His heart hammered against his ribs like it was trying to break free.
Stay still. Do not move. Do not make a sound.
The instructions Miranda had hissed at him when she had grabbed his arm and yanked him down were still echoing in his head. She had been fast, faster than he would have given her credit for.
"Play dead," she had whispered. "Do not even breathe if you can help it."
So he had not. He had lain there, eyes closed, trying to slow his racing heart while boots crunched on broken glass outside and that woman had opened the car door to check for survivors.
She had looked right at him. He knew she had. Through his barely slitted eyelids, he had seen her face.
She had seen him breathing.
He was sure of it.
But she had said nothing.
"Are they gone?" Miranda's voice came from the driver's seat.
Glenn managed a nod, then realized she could not see him. "Yeah, they are gone."
He pushed the door and nearly fell out of the car. His legs felt like jelly, and his hands would not stop shaking. The adrenaline crash was hitting hard.
"We need to move," he said, more to himself than to Miranda. "We need to—"
A muffled cry cut him off.
He froze. His hand went to the pistol at his belt, and he turned toward the source.
An SUV sat nearby, its windows blown out, its tires shredded. A dead walker lay beside it, its skull caved in by what looked like a stray bullet. Lucky shot, or maybe unlucky depending on perspective.
The crying was coming from underneath it.
He approached slowly, gun raised, trying to peer under the corpse in the fading light.
"Hello?" he called softly. "Is someone there?"
The crying stopped abruptly.
"It is okay. They are gone. You are safe now."
Nothing.
He grabbed the walker's arm and hauled it aside. It was heavier than it looked, dead weight in the most literal sense.
Sophia was curled underneath.
She was covered in blood. Not her own, Glenn realized after a heart-stopping moment. The walker's blood was smeared across her face, clothes, and hair. Her eyes were huge in her pale face, and she was shaking so hard her teeth were chattering.
"Sophia. Sophia, it is me, Glenn."
Miranda's kids, Louis and Eliza, appeared beside him. Eliza was clutching a doll, and she held it out toward Sophia.
"Here," she said. "You can hold her if you want."
Sophia's face crumpled. She started crying in earnest now.
"Mom," she managed between gasps. "Mom hid me. She said... she said do not make a sound. She said stay under the..."
She could not finish.
Glenn pulled her into a hug, not caring about the blood or the smell. She was kid and her mother had just been dragged away by religious fanatics. What else could he do?
"Glenn." Miranda had climbed out of the car. Her face was streaked with tears. "Dale and... they were in the RV. We need to check."
Glenn looked toward the embankment. Black smoke still rose from the tree line. He could smell burning rubber and gasoline even from here.
Dale, Amy, Andrea… and Lucien.
They had been in that RV when it got hit.
"Stay here," he told Miranda. "I will be back."
"Glenn, maybe you should..."
But he was already moving, sliding down the steep slope toward the wreckage.
---
The RV had come to rest on its side against a massive pine tree. The impact had crumpled the rear section, and flames licked along the undercarriage where ruptured fuel lines fed the fire. Smoke poured from broken windows.
Glenn approached cautiously, his gun raised more out of habit than any real expectation of finding walkers this close to a fire. The heat was intense, making the air shimmer.
"Dale!" he called out. "Andrea! Anyone!"
Nothing.
He circled around to what had been the side of the RV and was now effectively the top. The windows were shattered, glass scattered across the pine needles and dirt.
"Dale! Can you hear me?"
"Glenn?"
The voice was weak, but it was there. Glenn's heart leaped.
"Dale! Where are you?"
"Inside the driver's seat. I think... I think I am stuck."
Glenn found a window large enough to climb through and hauled himself up. The interior of the RV was a disaster. Everything that had not been bolted down had been thrown around during the roll and crash.
Dale was wedged in the driver's seat, which had partially collapsed during the crash. Blood ran down his face from a nasty gash on his forehead, and he looked dazed.
"Do not move too much," Glenn said, climbing through the chaos toward him. "You might have a concussion."
"Amy?" Dale's voice cracked. "Andrea? Where..."
"Here."
Andrea's voice came from deeper in the RV. She was sitting against what had been the floor, now a wall, cradling her sister.
Amy looked bad.
She was unconscious, her face pale as paper. Her abdomen was a mess of blood-soaked fabric, and Glenn could see something that might have been a piece of metal rebar protruding from her side.
"Oh God," he breathed.
"Do not." Lucien was sitting nearby, leaning against the overturned kitchen counter. His face was pale too, and he looked shaky, but his eyes were clear. "Do not touch Amy. If you move her wrong, you will kill her."
Andrea's face was wet. "She is dying, Lucien. She is..."
"She is not." Lucien's voice was firm. "When the crash happened, that rebar went into her side. It looked horrible, and she lost blood, but I stopped the bleeding while you were unconscious. The wound missed her kidney and liver. She got lucky."
"Lucky," Andrea repeated hollowly.
"Yes. Lucky." Lucien met her eyes. "She hit her head during the crash. That is why she is unconscious. But she is breathing, her pulse is steady, and the bleeding is controlled. She needs proper medical attention, but she is not going to die in the next ten minutes. All right?"
The kid was covered in blood and soot, yet he spoke like a battlefield medic. It should have sounded absurd.
Instead, it was the first thing that had made sense all day.
"The others..." Dale managed.
"They were all taken," Glenn said quietly. "Ed and a few others ran into the woods. I don't know if they're alive."
"Who is left?" Lucien asked.
"Us. Miranda and her kids. Sophia." Glenn ran a hand through his hair. "That is it. Everyone else is either dead or gone."
Silence filled the RV, broken only by the crackle of flames outside.
"We cannot stay here," Lucien said finally. He tried to stand, swayed, and caught himself against the wall. "It is getting dark. All that gunfire and the explosion... every walker for miles is going to converge on this spot."
"Where do we go?" Dale's voice was desperate. "Amy needs a doctor, or at least somewhere clean to treat her properly. Glenn, do you know this area?"
Glenn almost laughed. "Dale, I delivered pizzas in Atlanta. Why would you think I know the backwoods of rural Georgia?"
"But..." Dale's eyes were pleading.
Glenn sighed. He tried to think back to the map Rick had shown them before they left the CDC.
"There was a church," he said slowly. "I remember seeing it on the map. Maybe... I do not know, maybe five miles from here? Something like that?"
"Do you know how to find it?" Andrea asked.
"No." Glenn shook his head. "I have no idea where it is from here. We could wander in circles for days."