AS THE WORLD FALLS DOWN I RICK GRIMES

I'm The Violence In The Pouring Rain

I'm The Violence In The Pouring Rain

And there's a storm you're starting now
And there's a storm you're starting...

Rick sat on the porch steps, shoulders hunched, still disturbed by his altercation with Alexis even now. He was starting to spend a lot of time on these porch steps, almost like it was a border between both his worlds, the inside and the outside. There was a harvest moon high above; reminding him of the night he'd killed Shane, the memory almost worn threadbare by thinking.

At that point in time, he'd left Merle handcuffed to a roof, as well as killing the two men in the bar, but those assaults had been oddly impersonal, executed with icy precision. But Shane had been like his brother, Cain and Abel; killing him had killed a part of himself. That had been the turning point, where he'd changed, evolved even. There was a new world now, a new order to ascend above, hunt or be hunted.

"Rick."

He glanced up, only to see Alexis standing in front of him, the moon casting shadows across her face, making it even more unearthly as usual. She had a face that couldn't be tired of, the kind that could be appreciated like a painting, the passing years adding depth to the patina. "What do you want?" he said quietly, echoing his earlier words.

"You," Alexis snapped, startling him, "handcuffed to my bed, making me the envy of every woman in Alexandria."

"Even Deanna?"

"Especially Deanna."

Rick just looked at her for a long moment, before bursting out laughing, the sound strangely rusty, ringing through the darkness. "I said you were nuts," he said, shaking his head at her, "and I was right."

"At least I don't go around offering people death," Alexis flared up, rounding on him, "ordering them to barf or die."

"At least I don't go around jumpin' out from behind trees at complete strangers," Rick retorted, getting angry now, "nearly gettin' myself killed in the process."

"It sounds like you're stuck in a timewarp," Alexis said tiredly, sitting down beside him, startling Rick for the second time.

"If you wanna talk about timewarps, look around you," Rick said, recovering himself, "it's like steppin' back into Stepford."

Alexis shook back her hair, making it flash strangely silver in the moonlight, falling over her shoulders like a shimmering veil. "I don't like playing house," she said, staring off into the distance, "I never did."

"What, you'd rather be out there playin' with death?"

"I don't fit in here, Rick." Alexis said tiredly, wondering why she was even telling him this. "I'm not interested in catching a husband or recipes or anything. If I hear Mrs. Niedermeyer talking about that goddamn pasta machine one more time" -

- "See, this is precisely what this place's problem is," Rick snapped, startling her this time, "you keep missin' the bigger picture, focusin' on the things that don't matter. All you're thinkin' about is that your face doesn't fit, your horizons are too narrow; that outside these walls is your escape, but you're just talkin' through a hole in your head. You wouldn't last two seconds out there, Alexis, so keep within your walls and learn how to play house - shack up with some douchebag and bang out a few babies, live what's left of your life because that storm never passed you by; it's been here the whole time."

Alexis just looked at him, her full mouth mocking. "I didn't have you down as a philosopher," she said, elbowing him in the side, "Plato better watch his back."

Rick just shook his head, torn between being annoyed and amused. He'd been walking dead for so long, but Alexis was waking him up against his will, forcing him to see another side to the world. "Make it more like Nostradamus," he said tiredly, "I've got quite the eye when it comes to apocalypses."