As we reached Cell Block D, the screams grew louder.
They tore through the concrete walls in waves that barely sounded human anymore.
The others had already gathered outside the cells. Nobody spoke. They just listened.
Inside one of the cells, the boy hurled himself against the door hard enough to shake it. His face struck the bars with a wet crack. Blood streamed down his forehead, smearing across the steel as he clawed blindly through the gaps, teeth snapping at the air in front of him.
His mother collapsed to her knees. The sound she made scraped the bottom of the throat, the kind that only comes when the body refuses to accept what the eyes are seeing. She reached toward the bars.
"No… no, no—"
Beth grabbed her shoulders before she could throw herself forward, but the woman tore free almost immediately and stumbled back toward the cell.
"Baby." Her voice dropped to something barely above a whisper. "Baby, it's okay…"
The boy slammed against the bars again. The entire door rattled in its frame.
She flinched backward on instinct.
Then she reached for him anyway.
She crawled forward through the blood coating the floor, trying to touch his face through the metal.
"Look at me, Lucas." She was begging now. "Please look at Mommy."
The boy lunged at her hand with a guttural snarl.
Beth yanked her back so fast she nearly fell.
No one said anything. Eyes dropped to the floor, then drifted back up, unable to look away for long.
One man had pressed himself flat against the railing, staring at the undead boy as though he expected him to somehow break through. Others stood back from the sick cells, back from each other without realizing it. People had spread themselves across the block, leaving a wide stretch of empty floor between themselves and the bars.
Nobody wanted skin contact anymore.
A woman quietly pulled her sleeve up over her mouth. Someone else took two quick steps away after hearing a cough nearby. The distance spread through the block little by little, people separating themselves on instinct, eyes darting toward anyone who looked pale or sweaty. The infected, in their cells, watched all of it carefully.
"What happened here?"
T-Dog stopped short beside me, breathing hard. The words barely made it out of his mouth.
Behind him, Carl had gone absolutely still. He watched the boy rake his fingers down the bars until the skin split as he tried to break the metal bar. He didn't look away.
The sound of flesh hitting metal echoed through the block again, and again.
In the neighboring cell, a woman stretched her arm through the gap toward the man across from her. "You're my boyfriend, aren't you, Marquis? Please help me—"
He flinched away, shoving her arm back hard enough to send her stumbling sideways.
"Don't touch me."
His voice barely rose above a whisper. But she heard it. A single tear ran down her cheek. She stepped back quietly and didn't say anything else.
The man immediately reached out after her. "Lisa… I'm sorry—"
She didn't respond.
"You're a doctor, aren't you?"
I looked down.
The mother was still kneeling by the bars, eyes locked onto her son even as he clawed at the air in front of her face.
"Please help him," she whispered. "He's scared."
The boy smashed his head into the bars again.
She flinched at the sound but kept talking like she hadn't heard it.
"Lucas doesn't understand what's happening. He's hurting himself... Please help my baby."
Her voice cracked near the end.
"He's all I have left."
Then her hands closed around my ankle.
Her eyes were locked on mine urgent, gutted, and scoured clean by grief.
For a moment, I couldn't meet them.
She reminded me too much of someone I didn't want to remember.
"Please," I said. "Let go."
I tried to pull my leg free, but her grip only tightened.
"Please help my Lucas." Tears rolled down her face. "Please…"
Her eyes lifted toward mine.
That was what hit me first.
Not the tears.
Not the blood.
The look in her eyes.
For a second, the prison disappeared.
I was back at the motel.
No, no, this couldn't be real.
My mother was in front of me, smiling despite the blood on her face.
"Max, honey, don't cry…"
Her voice echoed inside my skull.
"You look so cute when you laugh."
Her final words.
I stared at my own hands bloody and shaking.
This isn't real.
This isn't fucking real.
"LET GO OF ME!"
I kicked her away too hard and she crashed into the wall. The impact knocked the air from her lungs. She folded over, coughing violently, then went still.
The entire cell block went silent.
I stumbled backward, trying to breathe.
My chest seized. My heartbeat hammered against my ribs in a rhythm that felt wrong arrhythmic, too urgent, like something about to give out.
The walls pressed in.
I dropped to one knee and caught myself with a trembling hand against the floor. Blood smeared across the concrete from my palm.
Breathe.
I tried again.
The air wouldn't come properly.
The scream, the blood, and people.
Everything collapsed into noise.
I reached out blindly for something solid, fingers shaking so badly I could barely feel them.
"Max."
A pair of arms wrapped tightly around me before I could react.
"You're okay." Carol's voice was soft beside my ear. "You're safe."
The words pulled me back slowly. Piece by piece, the room came back into focus.
The cold concrete beneath my knees. The smell of blood and silence, everyone was staring at me.
I made myself breathe slower, even though my chest still ached. Then my eyes found the woman I'd kicked.
She was sitting against the wall where she'd fallen, one arm wrapped around herself, while Beth knelt beside her checking for injuries.
I opened my mouth to apologize.
Nothing came out.
Something sour and heavy settled in my gut. I looked away.
"I'm okay," I muttered. "You can let go."
My voice sounded hollow even to me.
Carol loosened her grip carefully, like she thought I might go down again. She pulled a cloth from her pocket and pressed it gently against my face, wiping the sweat away before stepping back.
I pushed myself upright on unsteady legs and kept my eyes on the floor.
"Here."
Daryl held out a canteen toward me.
I took it with a shaking hand and drank. The cold water evened out my breathing, but my pulse was still restless, still off. On instinct, my hand moved to my chest, searching for the weight of my necklace.
Nothing.
I dropped to my knees and started searching the floor, fingers sweeping across the concrete in quick, desperate strokes.
"Lord, I—"
I looked up. The priest stood over me, hand extended, Lucky Cat necklace dangling from his fingers. The one Clementine had given me.
I grabbed it too quickly, too roughly, and got it around my neck before he'd even lowered his hand. The moment the pendant settled against my chest, something in me went quiet. Not gone, just quiet.
"Thank you," I said.
"Please don't say that," he replied.
I nodded once, not entirely sure what he meant, and turned back to face the block.
The living, the dying, and the ones in between.
I made myself look at all of it.