Bonds {TWD}

Chapter 11 {ARIZONA}

I sit between the two crosses with Carl standing behind me, his hand grips my shoulder reassuringly. My hand plays with the cold metal key as I stare blankly between the two crosses.
We sit in the silence of the forest until the sound of a car causes us to snap our heads towards the road. The sound stops and feet pound the pavement. I stand up and Carl's hand drops to the gun on his leg, as does mine, because on the chance that these people are nice, cars attract walkers, but most people these days aren't nice.
Speaking of the devil, five men carrying machine guns stalk towards us.
"Shit." I gasp as I recognize one of the men, the one that had been walking down the side of the road while I drove by, before I got kidnapped.
Carl looks at me as one of the men lunges and knocks us both down, causing a shriek of surprise to erupt from my throat.
My eyes get covered by a tight fabric and I scream and thrash to my best ability with a white Dwayne Johnson holding me back, I'm picked up by my waist and thrown into the back of the car we heard.
"Ari? Ari? Ari?" Carl repeats.
"Yeah?" I choke.
"We'll be okay." He tries to reassure me.
"Keep telling yourself that kid." A man chuckles gruffly from the front.
I grit my teeth and readjust my shoulder blades. I brush something with my shoulder and it moves, it also gives off heat and feels comforting.
I sigh and close my eyes from the nothingness in front of them.
• • •
I open my eyes to a large cement basement,  I yank on my hands and feel a harsh rope rub on my wrists.
"Darling, you may nat wanna do that." A tall potato sac shaped man with brown hair smiles pervertedly at me, his yellow teeth poking out of his gums. I spit in his direction and his smile instantly drops.
He jumps up from his rickety chair and stomps over to me. "Listen bitch." He growls, "you'd better be a nice-" he kicks my ribs, "-little-" he steps on my ankle causing a painful snap, and a yelp in my part "-pretty-" he sneers and knees my right eye, "-girl." He finishes with another painful kick to my stomach.
"Macoy!" A man shouts, the man who hit me who I assume is Macoy, looks towards the second man who wears a button up shirt and jeans with sneakers, but this man is blonde and has a kinder face.
"Step away from the girl." He demands with his features hardening.
Macoy obeys and glares at the man.
"Seamus." He glowers and walks up to the man, inches from him and then bashes into his shoulder as he storms away down the hall behind the man.
"Sorry about him." He apologizes quite convincingly.
"If you were sorry you'd let me go." I say snidely.
"I'm not that sorry." He scoffs. "Do you know what you did?" He asks me with narrowed eyes.
"What? I've done so much shit in the past couple years that I could be put in hell at this moment, mind you I think I already am." I roll my eyes.
"You murdured my brother, his best friend and two other of our friends." He tells me angrily.
"Oh, so you're one of those cannabalistic maniacs huh?" I ask as I calm my voice and hope it doesn't shake. I've been kidnapped by who knows how many cannibals, and Carl... Oh god where's Carl!
"Yes, and you're going to stay here and pay the price. Or the boy won't come out alive." He threatens, I can't let that happen, Carl was in the wrong place at the wrong time is all, he doesn't deserve to die, I do.
"Ok." I sigh shakily as my eyes start to water.
"Good girl." The man smiles and crouches down next to me, a evil smile plastered on his face.
"Bring the boy!" He orders evenly as he bares holes into my forehead with his eyes. He finally stands up and takes a couple steps back before two bald potato sacs drag a squirming Carl in.
I take in the sight of him, gag in his mouth, hair sleek with sweat, a large gash in his leg and his hands bound behind his back.
I choke on the emotions that rise in my throat. His eyes widen at the sight of me and he stops thrashing, before one more fit of fish out of water moving I shout.
"Stop!" I tell him with tears threatening to spill.
Carl mumbles something through the gag.
"For god sakes get the gag off him! It's not like it makes any difference." The blonde man orders, the darker of the two males rips the gag out of Carl's mouth and lets it hang around his neck.
"Ari, what-?" He asks but I cut him off.
"Carl you're leaving." I tell him sternly.
"Not without you!" He protests and I lower my head so he can't see the tears slip from my eyes.
"I'm bound to hurt you Carl, just like I always do. I'm so sorry." I sniffle. "Please just go." I beg
The potato sacs take that as a que to shove him out. They push him forward towards the door to my right.
"No! Ari! Goddammnit! Let me go!" He yells and screams and thrashes until he's thrown out, he pounds on the locked door and then it stops. There is silence.
"What now?" I ask the men that are gathered menacingly around me in a semi circle.
"You pay." Says the blonde man as simply as if he announced his favorite colour was blue.
I gulp as the men flow out of the room leaving me and blondie alone, he rolls up the cuffs of his spotless light blue dress shirt.
He walks calmly over to me and snaps his boot into my ribs, crushing something inside of me. I hunch over and cough out a hunk of blood. More flurries of kicks land all over me, one hammers the key into my chest and another scrapes the chain across my skin. When I'm throughly beaten to a pulp, he cuts my bonds and I flop forward onto the ground my cheek slapping against the ground.
I can see his boots and hear his voice announce something incoherent, then I feel the vibrations of his boots fade away.