Get Off on the Pain

Love, family, friends, three of the most important things to have in this world now. You may even say that those three things came hand in hand with one another, that you can't have one without some extent of the other. When looking at it like that there is one more thing that a person must have in order to obtain all three, and that is trust. The rarest of characteristics or emotions for someone to produce and receive. Nevertheless, one could still argue that those four things had nothing to do with surviving the new age at all and they'd be right, but surviving and living, actually living, were two totally different things. And when you're not trying to survive to live a life worth living, then what is the point of all of this?

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Mark screeched the car to a halt, the tires skidding a couple of feet on the dirt road leading up to the prison. The sight before us collectively causes our blood pressure to rise. Mark's quick reflexes caused us to stay undetected, we were still hidden behind the tree line before the road opened up to the field around the prison's front gates. Mark shut the car off cutting the engine before we were spotted.

"What do we do?" Mark asked, his eyes not breaking from the scene before us.

"Let's get closer. See what's going on," I responded. Before either of them had time to object I was already taking the lead and slowly popped open my door. I made a quick dash into the bushes as Mark and Lincoln followed behind not long afterwards.

I peered through the leaves that kept us hidden, my eyes locked on the Governor's side profile. He had maybe fifty people with him, all of them standing around their vehicles and each individual armed with multiple weapons. The Governor stood in the very middle of his army, propped up on the hood of a military tank. Rick stood in our gated-in field, directly across from where the Governor stood, while the rest of the group remained in the courtyard keeping a close eye on the situation.

"Let 'em go right now," Rick called out to the Governor. I furrowed my brows, questioning what he was referring to.

"Scar, there," Lincoln nudged my shoulder before pointing to a spot just in front of the tank. The Governor had Herschel and Michonne hostage, tied up a knelt down in the grass.

"I'll stay down here. Talk as long as you want. But you let 'em go. You got a tank, you don't need hostages." Rick attempted to defuse the situation.

"I do," the Governor responded matter-of-factly, "this is just to show you I'm serious. Not to blast a hole in our new home," the Governor paused, "you and your people, you have 'til sundown to get out of here or they die," he explained.

Rick shook his head, frustrated, "Doesn't have to go down this way--"

"I got more people, more firepower. We need this prison." the Governor cut him off. "It's not about the past. It's about right now."

"There are children here. They won't survive," Rick pleaded. It caused silence to fall among them just for a moment.

"I have a tank and I'm letting you walk away from here," the Governor raised his voice at him, becoming agitated. "What else is there to talk about?"

I don't know what lies he spun up to convince these people to come and take our home, but it was working. "We have to do something," I whispered, my tone angered.

"Scar we can't do anything," Mark snapped back at me, "We have no weapons. What are you gonna do against all those guns with your fridge handle?" he asked, bringing me back down to reality.

I shook my head frustrated, Rick fell silent. He was unsure what to do with the impossible situation. We couldn't leave, but the Governor had ambushed them. I looked back up to the rest of the group, I could faintly see them passing around any guns we had stashed. My eyes focused on Maggie and Beth though. The two of them stood pressed against the fence, holding hands as they stared down at their father in the hands of the Governor.

The Governor grew tired of Rick's silence. "I could shoot you all. You'd all shoot back. I know that. But we'll win and you'll be dead. All of you." He was trying to scare him, but he wasn't wrong. Although, I knew that Rick knew that the Governor would do that anyway. Even if we did surrender and try to leave, he'd shoot us in the back on our way out. "Doesn't have to be like that. As I said, it's your choice."

Rick looked down at Herschel for a long moment like he was looking for answers from him. My blood boiled when watching him sitting there on his knees, tied up and helpless. He stared back at Rick before Rick dropped his eyes to his feet.

"The longer you wait, the harder it's gonna be for you to get out of here."

"We can all--" Rick spoke up, but paused as if what he was about to say troubled him, "we can all live here together. There's enough room for all of us."

"More than enough." the Governor agreed. "But I don't think my family would sleep well knowing that you were under the same roof."

By the Governor stating that only proved my previous hunch, he had created a whole story catering to his benefit to get these people here at our gates wanting to take what we had.

"We'd live in different cell blocks." Rick offered a solution. "We'd never have to see each other 'til were all ready."

Herschel turned his head to the Governor, "It could work. You know it could."

"It could've. But it can't. Not after Woodbury. Not after Andrea."

"Look, I'm not saying it's gonna be easy. Fact is, it's gonna be a hell of a lot harder than standing here shooting at each other. But I don't think we have a choice." Rick said his spiel.

"We don't. You do."

"This is ridiculous, you know he's gonna start shooting at any moment," I muttered.

"Okay, what do you want to do?" Linc asked me. I looked over at him, staring at him while I racked my brain for solutions, a plan of some sort.

Then it hit me, "I'll be back," I said abruptly. I got up from where we were crouched behind the bush.

"Scar, where are you going?" Mark called out to me in a hushed tone. I didn't answer him.

I ran deeper into the woods so I wouldn't be heard by anyone out in the field before I took a hard right and booked it towards where I knew Rick had stashed one of his pistols. I cursed under my breath from not thinking about this sooner and prayed that it was still there. Every so often, through a patch in the trees, I could still keep an eye on the Governor's army by the side of our fence. I was almost directly behind them at this point.

It didn't take long for me to reach the dead birch tree just on the outskirts of the woods, something that was identifiable to return to when Rick needed it. I threw myself onto the forest floor, brushing away the fallen leaves that covered the dug-up dirt. I sunk my hands into the loose dirt, cupping heaves of mud and tossing it behind me. Then I felt it, my fingertips brushing against the cold metal. I buried my hand deep into the dirt around it and yanked it free.

I got back to my feet, brushing off the caked-on mud as I hunched over to the tree line. The last thing I needed was for one of them to hear me and alert the Governor of my whereabouts. I peered over another bush that I hid behind, I was staring directly at the back of the Governor's head. I had the shot.

"Now, we can all live in the prison or none of us can," Rick called out, standing his ground.

I raised my gun, aiming to shoot, but just as I had my target ready the Governor jumped down from the tank. He was out of my sight. Fuck. I moved further down trying to find a spot where I could get the shot.

"You, in the ponytails. Is this what you want? Is this what any of you want?" I could hear Rick yell out like he was flustered, but I couldn't get an eye on the Governor to see why.

"What we want is what you got, asshole," an unidentifiable man responded.

"Look, I've fought him before. And after, we took in his old friends. They've become leaders in what we have here. Now you put down your weapons, walk on through those gates… you're one of us." Rick pleaded.

I stopped walking when I was able to see Rick again and I followed his line of sight to where the Governor had gone. I could see the upper half of his body just over the hood of one of their vehicles. My heart jumped to my throat when I realized why Rick was in a panic. The Governor stood with Michonne's sword hovering next to Herschel's neck.

"Liar!" the Governor roared before swinging the sword back at striking it at Herschel's throat. His head toppled to the side, the blade not making a clean cut through the bone. Blood splattered and drenched Herschel's clothes as he flopped to his left and hit the ground. The Governor had no reason to take Herschel from us and he did it anyway.