The Walking Dead Collection (113 page)

Bob smiles, closing the bag with a snap. “There’s no call for that, Marianne.”

She looks at him. “Oh … Bob, you sure?”

“This is Woodbury.” He winks at her. “We’re all family here.”

Marianne Dolan once stopped traffic with her olive-skinned French-Canadian beauty, her hourglass figure, and enormous blue-green eyes. A decade and a half of hard housework and single parenting took its toll on her looks, and the plague times deepened the lines around her mouth and eyes, but now, as she breaks out in a guileless, warm smile, the splendor of her once-lovely face returns. “I really, really appreciate it, Bob, you’re a—”

A loud knocking on the door interrupts her. Marianne blinks with a start, and Bob glances toward the door.

Marianne turns and calls out. “Who is it, please?”

From the other side of the door, the sound of a clear, forceful, feminine voice rings out. “It’s Lilly Caul, Marianne. Sorry to bother you.”

Marianne Dolan goes across the room. “Lilly?” she says after opening the door and finding Lilly standing alone in the corridor. “What can I do for you?”

“I understand Bob’s here?” Lilly says. She wears her trademark ripped denim and baggy cable-knit, her hair in mussy tendrils, a web belt loaded with mag pouches around her waist. Something about her complexion, the way she’s carrying herself, speaks of vigor, sturdiness, strength—the likes of which Marianne hasn’t seen in this woman before. The web belt is not a fashion statement.

“He certainly is,” Marianne says with a grin. “He’s helping Timmy, in fact. Come in.”

Bob stands as the two women approach. “Well, well … looks like the cavalry’s here. How ya doin’, Lilly-girl?”

Lilly looks impressed. “Look at you, Bob—making house calls now.”

Bob smiles and gives her a shrug. “It’s nothing … just trying to do my part.”

The look on Bob’s weathered face—now alert and clear-eyed—says it all. His pouchy eyes glitter with pride, his dark hair neatly combed back. He is a new man, and it delights Lilly.

She turns to Marianne. “You mind if I borrow the good doctor for a minute? Austin woke up a little under the weather today.”

“Not a problem,” Marianne says, and then, turning to Bob, she adds, “I can’t thank you enough, Bob.” She looks at her son. “Whaddaya say, Timmy?”

“Thanks?” the little boy mutters, gazing up at his mom and the other adults.

Bob pats the child’s head. “Don’t mention it, sport. Hang in there.”

Lilly leads Bob out the door, down the corridor, and out the exit.

“What’s the problem with pretty boy?” Bob asks as they stroll down the brick path in front of the Dolans’ building. The sun is high and bright in the cloudless sky, the heat pressing down on them. The Georgia summer isn’t far off—the vaguest hints of asphalt baking and miserable muggy days on the breeze.

“Austin’s fine,” Lilly tells him, leading him into a little alcove of poplar trees for some privacy. “I didn’t want to ask you about the Governor in front of Marianne.”

Bob nods and gazes across the street at a row of storefronts, where some kids are playing kickball. “He’s okay, far as I can tell. Still in a coma, but his breathing seems normal. Color’s good, pulse is strong. I think he’s going to make it, Lilly.”

She nods and lets out a sigh. She gazes into the distance, thinking. “I’ve done everything I can think of to keep us safe while he’s out.”

“You done good, Lilly. We’re gonna be fine. Thanks to you taking the ball.”

“I just wish he would wake up.” She thinks about it some more. “I don’t want people getting nervous, panicking. They’re already wondering why he would be out on the search for so long.”

“Don’t you worry, he’ll come back to us. He’s as strong as a bull.”

Lilly wonders if Bob really believes this. The seriousness and duration of the induced coma—Bob’s best guess is that it was brought on by a combination of hypovolemic shock and all the painkillers and anesthetic administered to the man during the rough patch immediately after the attack—is impossible to predict. As far as Lilly can tell, the man could wake up any day now, or remain a vegetable for the rest of his life. Nobody has any experience with such things. And the uncertainty is driving Lilly crazy.

She starts to say something else when she notices the sound of heavy footsteps on the wind—somebody trotting swiftly down an adjacent sidewalk—the noise interrupting her thoughts. She glances over her shoulder and sees Gus trundling quickly toward them. Built like a fireplug, the little man looks like he just got served with a subpoena, his bulldog features filled with urgency.

“Lilly,” he says breathlessly as he waddles up to them, “been looking all over for ya.”

“Take a breath, Gus, what’s the matter?”

The man pauses, leaning over with his hands on his knees, catching his breath. “They want to use up the rest of that gas we got stored in the warehouse.”

“Who does?”

“Curtis, Rudy, and them other guards.” He looks at Lilly. “Say they need it for the rigs at the wall. Whaddaya think? That’s the last of the fuel; that’s all we got left.”

Lilly sighs. In the Governor’s absence, more and more of the townspeople have been coming to her for advice—for decisions, for guidance—and she’s not sure she wants to be the one giving it. But somebody has to. At last she says, “It’s all right, Gus … let ’em take it … we’ll go on another run tomorrow.”

Gus nods.

Bob looks at her for a moment, a strange expression crossing his deeply wrinkled features—a mixture of fascination, concern, and something unreadable—as though he knows something is different about her. Gasoline has become the lifeblood of Woodbury, not only an energy source but also a sort of morbid gauge of their odds of survival. Nobody fucks around with the rationing of fuel.

Lilly looks at Bob. “It’ll be okay. We’ll find some more tomorrow.”

Bob gives her a tepid nod, as though he knows she doesn’t really believe anything she’s saying.

*   *   *

Over the course of the next three days, they do find more fuel. Lilly sends a small contingent of guards—Gus, Curtis, Rudy, Matthew, and Ray Hilliard—out in one of the military cargo trucks. Their mission: to scour the auto centers at the ransacked Walmart and the two Piggly Wigglys on this side of the county line. They hope to find one of the underground holding tanks still containing a few gallons of residue. Plan B is to siphon as much as possible from any stray wreck or abandoned car that hasn’t been stripped to the bone by looters or two years of hard Georgia weather.

By the time the men return on Wednesday evening, they are exhausted but successful, having stumbled upon an abandoned KOA campground in Forsyth, forty miles to the east. The garage out behind the clubhouse, padlocked since the advent of the Turn, held a couple of rusted-out golf carts and a huge holding tank half-full of the sweet unleaded nectar of the gods—nearly a hundred and fifty gallons of the stuff—and Lilly is delighted with the windfall. If folks are frugal with it and ration it wisely, the fuel will provide Woodbury with another month or so of power.

For the rest of that week, Lilly keeps a lid on things as best she can, oblivious to the fact that events are about to spiral out of control.

FIVE

On Friday night—a night Lilly and her inner circle will later mark as a significant turning point—a warm front rolls in from the south, turning the air as muggy as a greenhouse. By midnight, the town has settled down and fallen silent, most of its inhabitants slumbering on sweat-damp sheets, a regiment of guards quietly keeping watch on the walls. Even Bob Stookey has taken a break from his round-the-clock vigil with the Governor and now sleeps soundly on a cot in one of the adjacent service bays under the racetrack. Only the infirmary—still blazing with the harsh halogen light of an operating room—buzzes with the muffled clamor of angry voices.

“I’m sick of it,” Bruce Cooper complains, pacing in front of the broken-down monitors and gurneys shoved up against the back wall of the medical bay. “Who made her Queen Bitch? Bossing people around like fucking Cleopatra.”

“Settle down, Brucey,” Gabe mutters from his chair angled next to the Governor’s bed, the wounded man lying as still and pale as a mannequin under the sheets. It’s been a week since the Governor tangled with the girl in the dreadlocks, and over the course of those seven days, Philip Blake has remained mostly unconscious. Nobody is comfortable with calling it a coma—although Bob has labeled it as such—but whatever grips the man seems to have its hooks deep within him. Only on two occasions has Philip stirred ever so slightly—his head lolling suddenly and a few garbled syllables coughing out of him—but each time he sank back into his twilight world just as abruptly as he came out of it. Nevertheless, Bob thinks this is a good sign. The Governor’s color continues to improve with each passing day, and his breathing continues to clear and strengthen. Bob has started increasing the amount of glucose and electrolytes in the IV, and keeping closer track of the man’s temperature. The Governor has been at 98.6 for over two days now. “What’s your problem with her, anyway?” Gabe asks the black man. “She never did anything to you. What’s your beef with her?”

Bruce pauses, thrusting his big hands into the pockets of his camo pants, letting out an angry breath. “All I’m saying is, nobody made it official that she should be the one in charge right now.”

Gabe shakes his head. “Who gives a shit? She wants to be temporary honcho, let her be temporary honcho.”

“Some stupid bitch from some fucking gated community?!” Bruce snaps at him. “She’s a lightweight!”

Gabe levers himself out of his chair, his back still a little stiff from the debacle in the alley a few days ago. He balls his fists as he comes around the Governor’s gurney and stands toe-to-toe with Bruce. “Okay, let’s get something straight. That lightweight bitch you’re talking about, she saved my fucking ass the other night. That lightweight bitch has more cojones than ninety percent of the men we got living in this place.”

“So what?—So fucking
what
?!” Bruce stands his ground, glaring at Gabe with eyes blazing. “She can aim a gun, pull a trigger. Big fucking deal.”

Gabe shakes his head. “What the fuck is your deal, man? You get up on the wrong side of bed today?”

“I’m outta here!”

Bruce storms toward the door, shaking his head, disgusted, mumbling obscenities under his breath. He makes his exit in a huff, slamming the metal door with a bang that reverberates through the tiled chamber.

Staring at the door, Gabe stands there for a moment, nonplussed by it all, when he hears a sound coming from across the room that stiffens his spine.

It sounds like a voice coming from the man lying on the gurney.

*   *   *

At first, Gabe thinks he’s hearing things. Looking back on it, he will come to the conclusion that he
did indeed
hear the Governor’s voice at that moment—right after that door had slammed—the words enunciated so clearly and spoken with such clarity that Gabe initially figured he was imagining the sound of the voice saying something like, “How long?”

Gabe whirls toward the gurney. The man on the bed hasn’t moved, his bandaged face still elevated slightly on its pillow, the head of the gurney at a forty-five-degree angle. Gabe slowly approaches. “Governor?”

The man on the bed remains still, but suddenly, almost in answer to Gabe’s voice, the single eye, which is still visible on that face—peering through a hatch-work of thick, white, gauze bandages—begins to blink open.

It happens in stages, feebly at first, but fluttering more and more vigorously until that single eye is wide open and staring at the ceiling. Another few blinks and the eye begins to focus on things in the room. The pupil dilates slightly as Gabe approaches.

Pulling the folding chair next to the bed, sitting down and putting a hand on the Governor’s cold, pale arm, Gabe fixes his gaze on that single searching eye. His heart races. He stares into that eye with such feverish intensity that he can almost see his own face reflected in the teary orb of the eyeball. “Governor? Can you hear me?”

The man on the gurney manages to loll his head slightly toward Gabe, and then fixes his one good eye on the stocky, crew-cut head looming over the bed. Over dry, caked, chapped lips, the man utters again, “How long—?”

At first Gabe is thunderstruck and can’t even form a response. He just stares at that haggard, bandaged face for one endless, excruciating moment. Then he shakes off his daze and says very softly, “—were you out?”

A very slow, very weak nod.

Gabe licks his lips, not even aware that he’s grinning with giddy excitement. “Almost a week.” He swallows back his urge to cry out with glee and hug the man. He wonders if he should get Bob in here. Even though this man is probably a few years his junior, this is his boss, his mentor, his compass, his father figure. “You were awake a bit here and there,” Gabe says as calmly as he can manage, “but I don’t think you’ll remember anything.”

The Governor turns his head slowly from side to side as if testing the limits of his condition. At last he manages another hoarse sentence: “Did you find Doc Stevens?” He takes in a shallow breath as though the very act of posing the question exhausts him. “Force him to patch me up?”

Gabe swallows hard. “Nope.” He licks his lips nervously. “Doc’s dead.” He takes a deep breath. “They found him right on the other side of our fence. He went with that bitch and her friends … but he didn’t last long.”

The Governor breathes through his nose for a moment. He swallows thickly and takes in another series of agonizing breaths. He blinks and stares at the ceiling, looking like a man waiting for the residue of a nightmare to pass, waiting for the cold light of reality to return and chase the shadows away. At last he manages to speak again: “Serves that fucker right.” The anger glittering in his eye slowly brings him back, gradually allows him to get his bearings and bite down on the situation. He looks at Gabe. “So if the doc’s gone, how the fuck am I not dead?”

Gabe looks at the man. “Bob.”

The Governor takes this in, his one visible eye dilating and widening with shock. “Bob?!” Another pained breath. “That’s …
fucking ridiculous
 … that old drunk? He couldn’t draw a straight line—let alone patch me up.” He swallows with great effort. His voice sticks in his throat like a record skipping. “He refused to be Doc’s assistant—made that fucking
girl
do it.”