About ten minutes later.
Ahead on the highway, a massive oil tanker had overturned, completely blocking the road.
The convoy was forced to stop.
Several people immediately got out of the vehicles, guns drawn, on alert.
Rick looked around at the towering woods, and an instinct honed during his years on the force caused his heart to skip a beat.
"Something's wrong," he muttered. "Everyone stay in the cars! Watch the flanks!"
Just as he signaled the vehicles behind him to prepare for a confrontation—
"Boom!"
A flare shot into the sky, trailing a piercing shriek.
Immediately afterward, armed militants ambushing them from the high ground and woods on both sides of the road launched a ferocious attack!
"Get down!" Rick roared, ducking back behind the vehicle.
Bullets rained down furiously on the vehicles, but Rick quickly noticed something unusual. Nearly all the enemy's bullets were hitting the tires and the hoods.
"They're shooting the tires!" he yelled at Shane.
The tires of the first few vehicles in the convoy were instantly blown out, leaving them completely paralyzed on the spot.
They wanted to take them alive.
Rick's heart sank. He glanced at the terrified faces of his companions behind him, gritted his teeth, and decided to take a risk.
"Shane, cover me!"
Rick suddenly leaned out, pointing his pistol muzzle downward, and raised one hand high, signaling that he meant no harm.
"Don't shoot!!" he shouted toward the high ground. "We mean no harm! We have children and elderly people in our cars! We are just passing through!"
He attempted to use their civilian status to appeal for mercy.
However, the only response was a brief silence, followed by merciless laughter.
A cold voice came through a loudspeaker: "You sinners! Drop your resistance immediately! Accept judgment!"
"I can't take this anymore!" Ed's shout came from a car in the rear.
He violently shoved the car door open and scrambled out, rushing away. "I don't want to die! I'm getting out of here!"
"Ed! Come back!" Carol cried out in despair.
Ed's action seemed to light a fuse; several other survivors also broke down and rushed madly toward the woods with him.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
The gunfire from the high ground resumed.
"Ah—!"
The fleeing people fell to the ground instantly. Some died on the spot, while others dragged bloody legs, wailing on the ground, and were quickly dragged away by the armed personnel emerging from the woods.
Only Ed and one or two other lucky survivors managed to scramble away and vanish deep into the dense forest.
"If you remain stubborn!" the voice from the loudspeaker sounded again, filled with undeniable authority. "This is what happens!"
"Look behind you!" the voice continued.
Rick whirled around, his pupils contracting sharply.
He saw a rocket fired from the high ground, trailing a long plume of exhaust, accurately striking the RV bringing up the rear!
"No!!" Rick let out a heart-wrenching roar of fury.
A burst of fire erupted from the rear of the RV, and the massive impact instantly sent the RV out of control.
Dale frantically spun the steering wheel, but the RV still smashed through the roadside guardrail, rolled sideways down the steep embankment, and vanished into the woods below, leaving only a trail of thick smoke.
"Ahhh!"
The screams coming from the RV were drowned out by the lingering sound of the explosion.
Louis... Dale... Andrea... Amy... All the gunfire and battle cries seemed to fade away at that moment, replaced only by a sharp, high-pitched ringing in his ears.
He froze in place, unable to breathe, seeing only the swirling column of thick smoke before his eyes.
Rick vaguely seemed to hear someone roaring, and perhaps someone grabbed his arm.
But he couldn't hear anything now; he only knew he had to get over there.
Instinctively, he raised his gun, like a provoked beast, and madly prepared to rush out of cover.
"Rick!!"
Morales suddenly tackled him from the side, tightly wrapping his arms around Rick's waist from behind.
"Calm down! Goddamn it, calm down!"
"Let go of me!" Rick's eyes were bloodshot, and he struggled desperately, trying to break free from the restraint.
Morales used all his strength to pin him behind the car, shouting loudly, "The car didn't flip at high speed, the slope isn't steep! The people inside might still be okay!"
"But if you rush out like that, you're just throwing your life away!"
While restraining Rick, he rapidly shouted toward the rear: "T-Dog! Daryl! Stop the others! Those people have the high ground, going out there is just asking to be shot!"
"Da da da da!"
A burst of bullets instantly traced a line of fire right in front of where Rick was struggling, and scorching gravel sprayed up, pinning him firmly in place.
"Do you want to try that again?"
The condescending words from the loudspeaker not only failed to break Rick but pushed his rage to the extreme, making him almost break free of Morales's hold.
"Rick!!"
But a cry filled with fear and sobs suddenly pierced the fury clouding his mind.
Rick's movements instantly froze.
He turned his head with difficulty and saw Lori desperately shielding Carl, her face streaming with tears, looking at him with an almost pleading gaze.
"Think about the others!" Morales's voice sounded again.
Rick looked at Carl's pale little face, then at the smoking cliff face in the distance. The anger that threatened to consume everything was gradually replaced by helplessness.
Finally, he slowly released his grip, and his weapon heavily struck the ground.
"We... surrender..."
The militants swarmed down, disarming and binding Rick, Shane, and all the other survivors.
A man wearing a tactical mask and a bulletproof vest walked out, clearly the leader of the group. He addressed his subordinates coldly:
"Maggie, Ben, take some people and check the vehicles. See if there are any survivors."
A young woman wearing a fitted vest, with neat short hair and a beautiful face, stepped forward.
That was Maggie. She and two others began searching the disabled vehicles along the road.
Maggie casually walked over to a sedan that had been disabled after a "rear-end collision."
The car body was already deformed, and the windshield shattered. She pulled open the door and took a quick look, seeing several adults and children slumped inside, covered in broken glass and "bloodstains."
The finger of one of the Asian men seemed to twitch slightly.
Maggie's gaze paused for half a second, but she pretended not to notice and closed the car door again.
"Let's go back," she called to her two companions. "They're all dead."
"But..." one of the tall, thin men clearly hesitated, seemingly thinking she was being too perfunctory. "Shouldn't we at least check the RV?"
Maggie gave him a cold glance: "It's almost dark, and the smell of blood will draw all the Walkers in the vicinity."
"That vehicle was full of the old, the weak, and the sick. Even if there are survivors, they'll make a good dinner for the Walkers."
The man was momentarily choked by her words, shrank his neck, and said nothing more, returning with her to report the situation to the leader.
However, just as Maggie was reporting to the leader that everything was fine, the tall, thin man suddenly interjected:
"The overturned RV hasn't been checked!"
This sentence caused everyone present to freeze.
"What?" Rick, bound on the ground, suddenly lifted his head, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the tall, thin man.
"Bang!"
A guard nearby mercilessly slammed his rifle butt into Rick's back. "Behave yourself, sinner!"
Rick let out a muffled groan, but he ignored the pain, still staring intently at Maggie and the leader.
The leader turned to Maggie, his voice under the mask carrying a hint of scrutiny: "Maggie?"