Bonds {TWD}

Chapter 13 {ARIZONA}

A loud horn disrupts my concentration. The leaf I'd been carving becomes deformed and I throw my stick to the ground in frustration. But the horn doesn't stop, it's on going. So I stand up and face the direction the sound pierces from.
It's home. Needless to say the sound is going to attract walkers, and loads of them. So I take off with my knife at hand.
I swerve around trees and leap over trunks with speed, the old key thumping against my chest. I reach the source and take the gun out of my waistband.
I click the safety off and edge around the tree. The source is a large, blue cargo truck that's been driven into the wall. But it silences with the next step I take. I see a man carrying a sniper rifle standing beside the truck. I strafe to the side and trudge towards my tree.
I climb up and jump over, then wish that I hadn't. The chaos in front of me could bring a grown man to his knees. Thank god I'm not a grown man than.
I run towards the dirt caked and insane man who chases after a woman and take him down with one bullet, but I'm to late. The woman has a machete in her back.
I walk over and mercilessly stab her in the back of the head.
Then my head shoots up again, someone is attacking the community, someone is attacking my friends, my family, elders, children, Judith. I squint my eyes shut and open them with a new fire of fury in them as I storm away.
NO ONE ATTACKS MY FAMILY.
• • •
I hear a gunshot from ahead, from the house and I sprint at a faster speed than I ever knew possible towards the sound.
I round the corner and see one of the villains that invaded us on the ground, he has a bullet hole in his thigh.
"Please dude, please don't kill me, help me please my leg." The scum begs.
I look to see who he's begging, it's Carl.
Carl holds a large automatic and has it pointed at the guy. Then the guy lunges. He grabs Carl's pant leg and wrestles with Carl, and without thinking I send a bullet flying into his brain.
Carl looks up to see me slowly side step into the open. Behind him, a boy who was once introduced to me as Ron stares at me and as I step closer towards the body I see Enid standing in the front doorway.
Carl nods to me and turns to address all of us.
"Guys go inside, I can keep us safe." He says confidently.
I clear my throat and smirk. "We can keep you safe." I send a pointed stare at him.
Ron looks up at Enid then speaks. "No." Ron says stubbornly, then he takes off running.
"Ron!" Carl calls.
"Protect Enid, I'll get him." I order Carl. He looks at me desperately but I just run after the retreating boy.
• • •
I've lost sight of Ron, he's faster than he looks. But now I've come up into a corner and my gun is still full of ammo.
I turn around and see a boy, he's my age and I recognize his face.
"Andrew? Y-you're supposed to be dead." I choke out, but this dirt and blood covered monster that looms before me can't have once been the clean and generous boy I met two years ago.
"Huh, didn't think you'd recognize me- and yeah I am supposed to be dead, but you didn't aim well enough doll." He grunts and scrunches up the blood painted "W" on his forehead.
"How did you survive?" I ask.
"Magic." He says sarcastically.
"But-but what are you doing here?" I ask him, but the answer is obvious.
"I'm here to kill." He sneers
"Why?" I ask.
"Because it's what the wolves- my group told me to do." He explains.
"Why would you ever join them?" I ask emotionally.
"Because I owe these people my life." He grunts.
"You wouldn't if you hadn't betrayed me!" I exclaim.
"No. But then again, you were to hot to resist." He smirks and until now I hadn't realized how close he was, his forehead hovers millimetres from mine, then I feel it.
There's a cold blade pressed to my jugular.
"And I can't let anyone else have you." He hisses, his voice full of venom and lust.
He moves the knife away from my neck, and my knee swings up, into his crotch. He buckles over and I shove him down.
"Then why did you leave?" I ask as I point my gun at his head.
"Because I love to kill." He growls.
"You're insane." I growl back and unload my clip into his head.
I let out multiple large shaky breaths and take multiple staggering steps back until I hit the wall. I slide down the wall and stare with watering eyes at the mutilated face of a guy I once knew in front of me. I reach up and hold the warm chain between my thumb and forefinger. And I can't help but imagine Carl instead of Andrew in front of me. I open my mouth to mutter something to the dead body. But all that comes out is a squeaky wheezing sound, that of a dying bird.
Though it sounds like I'm sputtering out "I'm sorry", and I feel as if I'm not saying it to the body in front of me, but to myself.
I guess I subconsciously promised myself that there wouldn't be any more blood on my hands. I don't know how I thought that would work out, in the apocalypse. But I broke it none the less.
"Ari?" A voice snaps me out of my dark place, I drop the chain and snap my head up, causing some drops to shake off my chin.
"Thank god you're-" Carl starts until he sees my tear stained, puffy eyed face and the body in front of me.
"Alive?" I laugh shakily.
"Yeah." He sighs and steps delicately over the body towards me.
He crouches down in front of me and looks into my eyes, I hug my knees closer to my chest and look at my hands, avoiding his sympathetic gaze.
"Who was he." Carl asks and sits next to me.
"A traitor." I growl and kick the lifeless body harshly.
"You knew him?" He asks with a tinge of jealousy edging his voice, I smile a tiny unnoticeable bit at that.
"Yeah." I sigh, "before he changed into a murdurer."
Carl just nods and I release my knees, my hands flops to my sides and his hand creeps onto mine, his fingers melt in between mine, a smile widens onto my face and I close my eyes.