Obedience

Silence filled the Humvee.

It was not difficult to understand why.

Maggie had no reason to make friendly conversation with the man who had cut away her clothing and violated her boundaries, even if the confrontation had begun with a genuine mistake. Isaac, for his part, could not pretend he had forgotten what he had done once the misunderstanding ended.

For several miles, neither of them spoke.

Isaac broke first. "Which way?"

The road split ahead, one branch turning left and the other right.

Maggie looked at him, then at the large sign beside the intersection. A white arrow pointed left beneath the name of the high school.

"Can you read?" she asked.

"Didn't see it."

The answer was so casual that she almost laughed. Almost.

Maggie remembered her own reaction during their earlier encounter.

Maggie's face heated with anger and embarrassment. "What do you want from me?"

"You could do the same thing to me," Isaac said. "If that would make us even."

"Are you out of your mind?"

The image that came to mind gave Maggie no sense of revenge. It left her flushed and embarrassed.

Their exchange eased the tension a little. Isaac said, "I'm truly sorry for what happened last time."

Maggie watched the road. "I know. Don't bring it up again."

"All right."

Red-brick buildings appeared beyond the trees. A white clock tower rose above the roofline.

Maggie pointed. "That's it. My old high school."

"You don't know what it's like there now, do you?"

"No. We've stayed on the farm since the outbreak. If Carl hadn't been shot, we probably would have kept doing that."

Isaac lifted the radio. "School ahead. Slow down and watch the perimeter before we approach."

"Copy," one voice answered.

"Understood," came another.

The vehicles made a wide circuit around the property.

Isaac's expression hardened. Maggie's did the same.

Walkers surrounded the school. Police cruisers and military vehicles sat abandoned along the approaches, suggesting the campus had once served as an emergency shelter.

Whatever refuge had existed there was gone.

The crowd outside might contain much of the town's remaining population. Bodies drifted across the open plaza and along the fences in loose, restless clusters.

Isaac stopped the Humvee at a safe distance.

Merle pulled up on the left with Glenn. He leaned out his window. "What's the plan? That's a whole lot of dead."

Shane stopped on the right with T-Dog. "How do we get through that?" T-Dog asked.

Isaac studied the grounds again. The open plaza held most of the walkers. Beyond the inner fence, between the school buildings, the numbers looked thinner.

That mattered. The dead outside had space to move and no obstacles keeping them in place. Enough noise could pull them away from the entrance.

"Out of the vehicles," Isaac ordered.

They gathered behind the three cars, using the metal bodies as partial cover.

"If we fight through the plaza, we waste ammunition and exhaust ourselves before we reach the infirmary," Isaac said. "We draw the walkers away first."

Everyone nodded. Charging the crowd would be the stupidest possible choice.

Isaac looked at Glenn and T-Dog. "You two take a vehicle and lead them off the grounds."

T-Dog frowned. "How?"

Merle snorted. "Use the horn. Play music. Hell, aren't Black guys supposed to love rap? Maybe you'll discover you're a star."

"Enough, Merle," Isaac said.

Merle shrugged and fell silent.

Isaac looked at T-Dog. "Do it the way Merle said. Use a vehicle, make noise, or find another method. I don't care how you do it. Draw the walkers away. Understood?"

Glenn nodded. "Don't worry."

T-Dog answered, "All right. Understood."

Isaac looked to Maggie. "Where's the infirmary?"

She pointed through the fence at the central academic building. "There. Middle building."

"We'll deal with the inside once we're through the doors." Isaac checked the plaza again. "Glenn, T-Dog - go."

Glenn and T-Dog exchanged a look, ran to the vehicle on the far right, and drove toward the plaza.