Rick and his group had spent the long hours of evening trapped in the boxcar, whispering strategies in the dark.
Hope had narrowed down to sharp edges and makeshift weapons. Rick hunched in the corner, sawing at a jagged piece of wood with the zipper of his coat.
His jaw set, breath low and controlled.
The spike came free, rough and splintered, but strong enough to drive through bone.
He slid it behind his belt, tucking it beneath his shirt.
When night fell, they listened.
Boots scuffed outside. Voices drifted through the metal walls... loud, careless.
Rick's group tensed, muscles coiled, eyes on the door.
The fight never came.
Instead, smoke hissed through the top vents. A choking fog filled the boxcar, making eyes sting and throats burn.
They coughed, covered their mouths, squinting through the haze. Minutes stretched, muffled curses echoing off steel.
Then the lock clanked. The door groaned open.
Figures in the dark yanked Rick and several others out.
Daryl, Glenn, Nick, Jim, Felix.
They were shoved into the dirt. Plastic zipties bit deep into their wrists, locking their arms behind them.
Rick twisted his hands, tensing his wrist slightly so hed be able to slip them.
Daryl shifted beside him, face stone, eyes promising violence when the moment came.
They were dragged across the yard, shoved into a long building. The air changed instantly. It was thicker, hotter.
The smell hit first; copper, rot, and smoke.
Then the sight.
Bodies.
Slabs of men and women hung from meat hooks, swaying gently, flies buzzing at the seams of torn flesh. Meat left uneaten, left to rot.
Butchering tools lined the walls, black with dried blood, glistening with fresh. Steel tables crusted with gore.
Even for Rick, who had seen too much, it was almost beyond comprehension.
Beside him, Daryl's jaw clenched tight enough to crack teeth.
He remembered Joe's words, back at the Bates Motel months ago.
"There are people out there who don't just kill. They feed. You hear me, Grimes? They feed."
Rick hadn't wanted to believe it. But here it was.
They were forced to their knees in front of a long metal basin.
A few other captives already knelt there, wide-eyed, shaking. The basin's floor was stained dark from years of use.
Countless lives bled out into its trough.
The butcher came in. White apron, long knife glinting under the light, red streaks already smeared across the fabric.
Gareth strolled in beside him, clean as ever, smiling like it was just another business deal.
Another man followed, a steel baseball bat dangling from his hand.
"Did you check the inventory?" Gareth asked casually, like he was asking about supplies in a warehouse.
The man with the bat snorted, bored. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. Let's get this over with. I'm hungry."
Gareth sighed, as though inconvenienced. "Fine. But after... you finish the inventory."
He turned to leave when Bob's muffled cries caught his ear.
Gareth stepped forward and pulled the gag away.
Bob's voice spilled out, desperate, pleading. "We can... we can help each other.You don't have to do this..."
Gareth shoved the gag back in, expression flat. "Yes. We do."
Rick's glare locked on him, unflinching, cold as winter steel. The intensity of it drew Gareth in.
Rick's gag was tugged away.
The moment the cloth loosened, Rick snapped forward, teeth snapping shut inches from Gareth's fingers.
Gareth jerked back, startled, then let out a strained laugh.
"We saw you," Gareth said, straightening his shirt. "Out there in the woods. You had a bag. You left without it. What was in it?"
Rick's lips curled, his voice low, steady, dangerous. "An AK-47. A .44 Magnum. Automatic rifles. A compound bow. And a machete with a red handle."
His eyes burned with the kind of promise that didn't fade. "That's what I'm gonna use to kill you."
The room went still. Even the butcher paused, knife hovering.
Gareth chuckled, but it wavered at the edges. "And how's that supposed to happen? You'll be dead in a few minutes."
Rick's mouth twitched into something between a smile and a snarl. "Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But I will."
The words carried no desperation. Just fact.
Gareth's laugh was thinner this time, forced. He stepped back, motioned for the gag to be shoved in again. "No. You won't."
He turned, still chuckling, but the sound rang hollow as he left the room.
Behind him, Rick's eyes stayed locked, unblinking, on the door. Waiting.
Because he knew.
Joe was out there.
...
Joe stood at the edge of the rail yard, his rage like a storm barely chained.
He didn't move, didn't breathe too fast.
He crouched low, simmering in the silence, waiting for the sun to sink.
When the horizon swallowed the last light... he moved like a ghost.
Like a released spring, he bolted forward.
His silenced Glock coughed twice, neat and precise. Two watchmen crumpled by the gate before they even knew he was there.
Joe stripped them without hesitation...
Michonne's katana, Daryl's crossbow slung across his back.
From another body he ripped Maggie's necklace, clenching it tight before sliding it into his pocket. A promise.
He vaulted the fence, landed in a crouch, blade already drawn.
A door creaked open ahead. Someone stepped through, about to shout...
The katana whispered, and his throat split wide.
Joe never slowed.
He tore through the corridors, gunshots muffled whispers in the night.
Each squeeze of the trigger dropped another, each swing of steel carved open flesh.
He was precise, merciless. Like a reaper.
By the time alarms started shouting through the compound, half the building was already silent forever.
Blood pooled in doorways. Limbs sprawled like broken mannequins.
When they finally noticed... Joe didn't hide.
He kicked a door open, shotgun roaring thunder.
The first blast tore a man's torso apart, the spray painting walls and ceiling.
Screams erupted, boots pounded. Chaos erupting throughout the building.
Joe advanced.
Bullets cracked around him, glass shattering, sparks flying.
He moved unfazed, destroying lights one by one. Darkness swallowed the hallways.
Panic swallowed the men. Their muzzles flashed blindly in every direction, while Joe slid through the shadows.
He answered their panic with control.
Measured blasts and deliberate cuts. Chests split open. Arteries fountained.
He left them crawling, choking, knowing the dead would rise and finish what he started.
Every body was a weapon waiting to turn and help him ruin this place.
Soon only one man stood.
Alex.
He shook as he raised his rifle, hands unsteady.
Across the dark hallway, Joe walked slowly, steps deliberate, blade dripping.
Alex fired...
His rounds sparking, punching holes in walls, not even close.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Empty.
Joe's smile broke the silence, sharp and terrible. He stepped closer, eyes glinting, laughter spilling out low and unhinged.
Alex dropped to his knees, pissing himself. "Demon… You're a demon!"
Joe tilted his head, savoring the words.
Then he laughed, full and jagged, like something unholy. "That's right. I'm here to send you where you belong."
Alex screamed and threw a desperate punch. Joe caught the fist in midair, his elbow hammering down.
CRACK!
The bone shattered. Alex shrieked, clutching his ruined arm.
Joe leaned close, whispering through his smile. "I've had my fun with you. Hope you like the heat down there."
Steel flashed once.
The katana split his skull clean, silence swallowing the room again.
Joe stepped over the corpse, blade dripping, shotgun still warm in his grip.
He pushed out into the night as the compound trembled, walkers already stirring, screams echoing.
And Joe walked forward, calm and relentless.
His slaughter had only just begun.
...
Joe slammed through another door.
The air changed instantly.
Thicker, hotter, rank with copper. He froze for half a second, eyes scanning.
A slaughterhouse.
Hooks dangled from chains overhead, some swaying gently, dripping. Tools lined the walls... cleavers, saws, knives, every one of them black with old blood.
On the tables and benches lay parts. Arms, legs, torsos half butchered, tossed aside like livestock.
Joe's teeth clenched.
Movement snapped his focus. A man in a bloodied butcher's apron turned, eyes widening.
Joe didn't pause.
His katana whistled once, severing the man clean across the chest, spraying red across the hooks.
He barreled through another door, shotgun raised and didn't hesitate.
Two captives lay slumped over a long metal basin, blood still spilling from open wounds.
Others knelt in line, wrists bound, gags tight. At the far end, a man raised a steel bat high over Glenn's head, mid-swing.
Rick was next in line, teeth bared, muscles straining against his bonds.
Joe pulled the trigger.
The shotgun roared thunder. The butcher's skull vaporized in a cloud of gore, his body launched backward across the room.
The swing never fell.
Every captive's head snapped up. They stared at the figure in the doorway.
Joe, drenched head to toe in blood, katana dripping, eyes burning like fire.
He didn't waste a second. He charged forward, blade slashing ropes, boots pounding through the gore-slick floor.
Rick's hands came free first. Joe shoved the shotgun into his grip.
"Is Carol here?" he barked, eyes never stopping. He cut Glenn loose, shoving the Glock into his hands.
Daryl next... his crossbow returned with a slap against his chest.
Daryl's voice was grim, shaking his head. "She's not here."
For a fraction of a second, Joe's face fell. But he didn't falter. Not now.
"Let's move," he growled.
They burst from the slaughterhouse into chaos.
Automatic fire rattled across the compound. Screams tore through the night.
Walkers were everywhere.
Swarming the fences, spilling through breaches, clawing at fleeing men.
Joe's earlier gunfire had called them over, and the bodies he'd left behind were rising.
Turning the compound into its own execution ground.
The living were screaming. The dead were feeding. Fire licked at the edges of the rail yard.
Joe and Rick led the charge, tearing through anyone in their path. Every gunshot, every blade strike, every bolt sang through the madness.
Finally they reached the train cars.
Rick's heart pounded, their people were inside. He smashed the lock loose, yanking the door wide.
Shapes lunged from the dark, makeshift weapons raised.
Spears of broken wood, jagged glass, anything that could kill.
"STOP!" Rick shouted. "It's us!"
The weapons froze mid-air. Faces came into the light... Maggie, Sasha, Abraham, Rosita, Tara.
Relief crashed into the air, raw and overwhelming.
Maggie jumped into his arms and kissed him hard before backing away.
Joe shoved Michonne's katana forward. Her eyes going wide as her hands closed around the blade she thought lost forever.
She looked up at Joe, at the blood covering him, at the wild fire in his eyes. For a second, no words came.
And outside, Terminus burned.
...
They ran hard, boots pounding the tracks, smoke and screams rising behind them.
Glenn's chest heaved, but adrenaline kept him flying. He smacked Abraham on the side as they sprinted.
"Told you!" Glenn barked between breaths, grinning wide despite the madness.
Abraham shot him a look, eyes wide in shock. "How the hell..."
"No time!" Glenn snapped, but his smirk said it all.
The group swept down the line of boxcars,
Rick and Joe prying open locks, one after another.
Gaunt faces poured out, blinking into the night, too stunned to ask questions. "Move!" Joe barked, shoving them forward.
"Stay low, stay fast!"
At the last car, the door screeched open and a tall black man came bursting out, fists raised, ready to fight.
Then his eyes locked on someone small in the crowd.
"Clementine?!"
The little girl froze, wide-eyed. Her voice cracked with joy. "LEE!"
She bolted, arms flung forward. The man scooped her up mid-run, crushing her tight, eyes wet with disbelief.
For one heartbeat, everything stopped... the horror, the smoke, the gunfire.
Just the two of them clinging to each other.
Joe and the others stood frozen in shock. For a moment even he felt it... impossible reunion, hope pulled from the ashes.
But his instincts snapped fast. "Let's move, NOW!"
He shoved through, leading the surge to the fence line. Barbed wire stretched high, a last cruel barrier.
A couple of people tore off their coats, throwing them over the wire to blunt the spikes.
One by one they scrambled up and over, hands bleeding, clothes tearing. Joe boosted Maggie, then Clementine, then shoved Glenn after.
Then the shouting started.
Spotlights snapped on. Gunfire cracked, sparking off the rails. Terminus fighters had spotted them.
Bullets whined past, chewing the dirt, tearing bark from nearby trees. Joe fired back with his backup sidearm.
"Go! Go! Go!" Rick roared.
The group poured over, bodies dropping hard on the other side. Some made it. Some didn't.
A few strangers went down screaming in the dirt, riddled with bullets, their blood soaking into the gravel.
But most of them hit the other side breathing.
Rick, Glenn, Daryl, Maggie, Abraham, Michonne, Carl, Sophia, Sasha, Lee, Nicole, and many others.
Joe landed last, rolling to his feet.
Behind him, Terminus burned. The screams of the dying and the moans of the dead mixed into one endless roar.
He glanced back only once, eyes narrowed, before rushing after the group.
Everyone rushing into the dark woods, a few strangers splitting up.
They had survived Terminus.