, The doctor took them back to the big room to show them something,

"Give me a playback of TS-19." He told the automated voice as he pressed some buttons on his computer.

"Playback of TS-19." VI's automated voice echoed.

"Few people ever get the chance to see this. Very few."

Something appeared on the big screen in front of them. At first it was a human's head, but then it transformed into a brain.

"Is that a brain?" Carl asked from his spot beside Addy.

"An extraordinary one," He turned to look at carl, then back at the screen, "Not that it matters in the end. Take us in for the HIV."

"Enhanced internal view." VI's voice echoed yet again.

There was the same human head, then it zoomed in on the brain. Different shades of blue sparked in the brain, and Addy thought it was quite pretty.

"What are those lights?" Shane asked.

"It's a person's life. Experiences, memories - it's everything. Somewhere in all that organic wiring, all those ripples of light, is you - the thing that makes you you unique and human." Jenner explained.

Science was never Addy's favourite, but she figured she could make an acceptance for this.

"You don't make sense, ever?" Daryl said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Those are synapses - electric impulses in the brain that carry all the messages. They determine everything a person says, does or thinks from the moment of birth to the moment of death."

"Death? That's what this is? A vigil?" Rick stepped forward.

"Yes. Or rather, the playback of the vigil."

"This person died? Who?" Andrea asked, amazed by the blue lights that were flashing on screen.

"Test subject nineteen. Someone who was bitten and infected, and volunteered to have us record the process." There was a twinge of pain in the doctor's voice, and Addy couldn't help but feel bad for him.

"VI, scan forward to the first event."

"Scanning to first event."

Suddenly, some stem-like lines turned black, and the brain lost it's pretty blue colour.

"What is that?" Glenn asked.

"It invades the brain like meningitis. The adrenal glands haemorrhage. The brain goes into shutdown, then the major organs."

The body on the big screen jerked for a second, then the entire brain went black instead of the blue colour.

"Then death," Jenner looked down, "Everything you ever were or ever will be - gone."

"Is that what happened to Jim?" Sophia's small voice asked as she looked up at her mother.

"Yes." Carol nodded sadly, gripping her daughter's hand.

"She lost somebody two days ago. Her sister." Lori explained why Andrea was crying.

"I lost somebody, too. I know how devastating it is."

Addy's eyes subconsciously trailed over to her father, only to find out he was already looking at her. The young girl looked down at her feet, she didn't know what she would do if she lost her dad.

"Scan to the second event." Jenner's voice stopped her train of thought.

"Scanning to second event."

"The resurrection times vary wildly. We have reports of it happening in as little as three minutes. The longest we've heard of it eight hours. In the case of this patient, it was two hours, one minute, seven seconds."

A sparkling red light started to form and grow in the test subject's brain,

"It restarts the brain?" Lori asks in shock.

"No, just the brain stem. Basically it gets them up and moving." Jenner replied.

"But their not alive." Rick stepped forward again.

Jenner gestured to the big screen in front of them, "You tell me."

"It's nothing like before. Most of that brain is dark."

"Dark, lifeless, dead," The doctor listed off, "The frontal lobe, the neocortex, the human part, that doesn't come back - the you part. Just a shell driven by mindless instinct."

The person on the screen began to move, Addy assumed this was them becoming a Walker. Then, there was a line through the person's head and they stopped moving.

"God, what was that?"

"He shot his patient in the head." Andrea answered Carol's question, crossing her arms over her chest and not taking her eyes off the screen.

"Didn't you?"

"VI, power down the main screen and the workstations."

"Powering down main screen and workstations."

A second after the female automated voice said that, the big screen in front of the group of survivors shut off, as did some of the computers.

"You have no idea what it is, do you?" Andrea accused.

"It could be microbial, viral, parasitic, fungal."

"Or the wrath of God?" Jaqui suggested, placing both her hands on her hips.

"There is that."

"Somebody must know something - somebody somewhere."

"There are others, right? Other facilities?" Carol asked tearfully.

"There may be some - People like me." Jenner swallowed thickly.

"But you don't know? How can you not know?"

"Everything went down - communications, directives, all of it. I've been in the dark for almost a month."

Addy couldn't imagine living underground for a week, let alone a month. Never knowing if it's day or night? Not knowing what's going on up there? She thought it would be awful.

"So it's not just here? There's nothing left anywhere. Nothing? That's what you're really saying, right?"

Jenner didn't reply causing Andrea to scoff and the young girl's father to sigh and rub his eyes,

"Man, I'm gonna get shit-faced drunk, again."

"Dr Jenner, I know this has been taxing for you, and I hate to ask one more question. But that clock," Dale pointed to a big clock on the wall with red numbers, "It's counting down. What happens at zero?"

"The basement generators, they run out of fuel." Jenner replied as he started to walk away.

"And then?" Rick asked.

"VI, what happens when the power runs out?" Rick asked when Jenner didn't reply.

"When the power runs out, facility-wide decontamination will occur."

......................................................

"What does that mean?" Addy asked her father as they walked back to their room.

"What does what mean?"

"That word. De- de-con -?" She struggled to say the big word right.

"I don't know, don't sound good." Daryl replied as her grabbed a bottle of booze. Addy sat on the couch under the air conditioning, and after a few minutes she felt the cool breeze stop.

"Why is the air conditioning off?"

"And the lights in our room?"

"Yeah, what's goin' on? Why's everything turning off?"

There was a bad feeling in Addy's gut that definitely wasn't welcome.

"Energy use is being prioritised," Jenner said as he took the bottle out of Daryl's hand.

"Air isn't a priority? And lights?"

"It's not up to me," The doctor shook his head as he continued walking down the hall, the group hot on his heels,"Zone five is shutting itself down."

"Hey! Hey what the hell does that mean? Hey, man, I'm talkin' to you. What do you mean, it's shutting itself down, how can a building do anything?"

"You'd be surprised."

"Rick?" Lori called from a balcony overlooking the big room.

"Jenner, what's happening?" Rick asked hurriedly.

"The system is dropping all nonessential uses of power. It's designed to keep the computers running to the last possible second, it starts as we approach that half-hour mark. Right on schedule." Jenner gestured to the big clock, that had the number 00:31.27.

Jenner stopped at the bottom of the stairs and handed Daryl the bottle back, who snatched it out of his hands.

"It was the French."

"What?"

"They were the last ones to hold out as far as I know. While our people were bolting up the doors and committing suicide in the hallways they stayed in the labs until the end. They thought they were close to a solution."

"What happened?" Jaqui asked.

"Same thing that's happening here," Jenner replied, walking up the stairs and looking down on them as he spoke, "No power grid. Ran out of juice. The world runs of fossil fuel, I mean, how stupid is that?"

"Let me tell you something -"

"To hell this Shane!"

"I don't even care, Lori, grab our things. Everybody, get your stuff we're getting out of here, now!" Rick instructed everyone, and nobody needed to be told twice.

Just as everyone was rushing out, a loud alarm went off making Addy whimper and push her back into her dad's stomach so she was standing in front of him.

"What's happening?" Daryl didn't answer. he didn't know what to say, so he opted for placing his rough, calloused hands on her shoulders and rubbing them comfortingly.

"Thirty minutes to decontamination."

A larger version of the clock showed up on the screen, scaring Addy even more. Tears formed in her eyes.

"Doc, what's going on here, Doc?"

"Everybody, y'all heard Rick! Get your stuff and let's go! Now!" Shane shouted, and everyone began to leg it for the door, but a metal slider covered it and prevented them from leaving.

"Did you just lock us in? He just locked us in!" Glenn yelled as Jenner sat down at a computer and began talking to something.

Carl called for his mom as Daryl nudged Addy to go to Carol, so the young girl complied and went to hug Carol's side, which the older woman gladly accepted.

"You son of a bitch!" Daryl yelled at Jenner, "You locked us in here!"

"Shane! Shane!"

Daryl grabbed the back of Jenner's lab coat, but Shane pulled him away with ease as Daryl growled in frustration.

"Jenner, open that door now." Rick told him sternly.

"There's no point, everything top side is locked down. The emergency exits are sealed." He was oddly calm.

"Well , open the damn things!"

"That's not something I can control, that's something the computers do. I told you - once that front door closed, it wouldn't open again, you heard me say that!"

"It's better this way."

No it's not, Addy thought. She didn't want to die this way; she didn't want to die at all, and from the looks of it, neither did anyone else in the big room except Jenner.

"What is?" Rick looked exasperated, "What happens in twenty-eight minutes? What happens in twenty-eight minutes?!"

"Do you know what this place is?" Jenner told up and shouted, making Addy flinch, "We protected the public from very nasty stuff! Weaponised smallpox! Ebola strains that could wipe out half the country! Stuff that you don't want getting out, ever!"

Jenner sat down at a desk and composed himself, "In the event of a catastrophic power failure and a terrorist attack, for example, HITs are deployed to prevent any organisms from getting out."

"HITs?"

"VI, define."

"HITs, high-impulse thermo baric fuel-air explosives consist of a two-stage aerosols ignition that produces a blast wave of significantly greater power and duration than any than any other known explosive except nuclear. The vacuum pressure effects ignites the oxygen between five thousand and six thousand degrees, and is useful when the greatest loss of life and damage is desired."

By the time the automated voice had stopped explaining, Addy was full-on sobbing, clinging onto Carol and Sophia for dear life.

"It sets the air on fire. No pain. And end to sorrow, grief, regret. Everything."

Addy flinched as the glass bottle Daryl threw smashed against the metal door that prevented them from leaving.

"Open the damn door!"

"Out of my way!" Shane yelled as he ran towards the door with an axe. Someone threw Daryl one and the men both began to work together trying to open the door.

Addy was sitting in between Andrea's legs with her back facing her as Carol and Lori had their own children to worry about. Andrea's arms held Addy against her chest as the young girl sobbed uncontrollably.

"You should have left well enough alone, it would have been so much easier." Jenner said from his spot on his office chair.

"Easier for who?" Lori asked, she sounded more angry than upset.

"All of you. You know what's out there. A short, brutal life and an agonising death," He turned to Addy and Andrea, "Your - your sister. What was her name?"

"Amy." The blonde woman replied while stoking the back of Addy's head.

"Amy," He repeated, "You know what this does. You've seen it. Is that really what you want for your daughter?" His eyes flicked to Addy, who was still crying.

"She's not mine." Andrea shook her head, but before Jenner could say anything Rick and Shane approached.

"Can't make a dent."

"Those doors are made to withstand a rocket launcher." Jenner said.

"We'll your head ain't!" Daryl yelled, coming at the doctor with an axe.

"Back up!" Everyone held him back.

"You do want this. Last night, you said, you knew it was just a matter of time before everybody you loved was dead." Lori looked at her husband in shock.

"What, you really said that? After all your big talk?" Shane asked.

"I had to keep hope alive, didn't ?" Rick looked to his wife.

"There is no hope! There never was."

"There is always hope, maybe it won't be you, maybe not here but somebody somewhere!"

"What part of everything's gone do you not understand?" Andrea suddenly said, making Addy frown. Had she lost hope too?

"Listen to your friend. She gets it. This it what takes us down. This is... our extinction event."

"This isn't right!" Carol sobbed, holding her daughter close to her chest, "You can't just keep us here!"

Jenner leaned forward on his chair, "One tiny moment, a-a millisecond, no pain."

"My daughter doesn't deserve to die like this!" The woman stood up and rushed off, handing her daughter to Dale.

"Wouldn't it be kinder? More compassionate? To just hold your loved ones and wait for the clock to run down?" Jenner said as Shane cocked his gun and headed for the doctor.

"Shane!"

"Get out of my way, Rick!"

"Open that door, or I'm going to blow your head off." Shane threatened.

"Do you hear me?"

"Go stand with Dale." Andrea told Addy quietly, so the young girl complied and went to stand with the older man, who accepted her into a hug.

"Brother, brother, this is not the way you do this. We will never get out of here!"

"Shane, you listen to him." Lori told him sternly.

Rick said something to him, but he was cut off as Shane let out a yell and shot at the computers next to Jenner's head. The three children screamed and clung onto eachother as Shane continued yelling.

Thankfully, Rick managed to disarm his partner and get him on the ground.

"You done now? Are you done?"

"Yeah, I guess we all are." Rick handed T-Dog the gun and looked around at everyone,

"I think you're lying."

"What?"

"You're lying about no hope. If that were true, you'd have bolted with the rest and taken the easy way out. You didn't. You chose the hard path. Why?"

"It doesn't matter." Jenner shook him off.

"It does matter, it always matters. You stayed when others ran, why?"

"Not because I wanted to. I made a promise to her - my wife."

"Test Subject nineteen was your wife?" Lori asked, in shock.

"She begged me to keep going as long as I could. How could I say no?" Addy flinched as Daryl started to hit the metal door with his axe again. "She was dying. Should have been me on that table, I wouldn't have mattered to anybody. She was a loss to the world. Hell, she ran this place, I just worked here. In our field, she was an Einstein, me - I'm-I'm just Edwin Jenner. She could have done something about this, not me."

"Your wife didn't have a choice, you do. That's- that's all we want. A choice, a chance."

"Let us keep trying as long as we can." Lori begged. Jenner sighed, thinking for a moment.

"I told you, topside is locked, I can't open those." He went over to a desk and swiped a card and put in a pin, and thankfully the metal door opened.

"Come on!" Daryl yelled, he waited for his daughter to run up to him before hauling her upwards and carrying her down the hallway.

"Come on, let's go!" She heard Glenn yell.

"Move it, move it, move it!"

"Come on! We got four minutes left!"

T-Dog tried to pull Jaqui out of the big room, but she resisted,

"No, I'm staying! Im staying, sweetie."

"That's insane!" T-Dog told her, his eyes wide.

"No, it's completely sane! For the first time in long time. I'm not ending up like Jim and Amy. There's no time to argue, and no point, not if you want to get out. Just get out, get out!"

Dale, Andrea and Jaqui stayed behind as the rest rushed out to get their belongings. Thankfully, The Dixons didn't have much to pack so they were done in no time.

Daryl put Addy back down on her feet as they reached the exit. The men pounded and hit the doors, but it was no use, they weren't going to budge. Shane and Daryl began hitting at the glass with their axes, but they barely even scratched the glass. Addy gripped Carol's hand tighter.

"Dog, get down, get down!" Shane told the man as he cocked his rifle and shot at the glass, but still nothing.

"The glass won't break?" Everyone was starting to panic again.

"Rick, I have something that might help." Addy and Sophia held onto each other as Carol approached Rick with her hand.

"Carol, I don't think a nail file's going to do it." Shane said, really not helping the situation.

"No, your first morning at camp, when I washed your uniform, I found this in your pocket." The woman pulled out something Addy had only ever seen in movies, a grenade?

"Look out!"

Everyone rushed for cover, Daryl grabbing Addy's hand and pushing her behind him. The young girl covered her ears when the grenade went off, but the group of survivors didn't waste a second getting up and out of there.

Addy stayed behind her father as him and the others took out some oncoming walkers. Everyone climbed into their vehicles as Dale and Andrea hopped out of the broken window. Rick honked the RV's horn and the pair ducked down behind some sandbags.

Daryl protected Addy's body with his own in the truck and the seconds ticked. The girl held her breath until she felt it. The massive shock wave that rocked the vehicles and sent heatwaves after them.

They slowly sat up, the father and daughter duo both panting as they observed what used to be the CDC and was now a mess of fire and concrete.

The group could only be grateful they were alive as they drove away, a black smoke filling the air behind them.