Survival Ties (The Outbreak Chronicles Book 1) (5 page)

“Paradis Roulette is close to
150 miles from here. It depends on what’s between here and there.” Sam
responded and patted her on the head. “The important thing we have to remember
is to stick together and help each other.”

When we had all calmed down from the
near miss in the Super Wal-Mart, Sydney made us all peanut butter and raspberry
jelly sandwiches for lunch. She even took one to the front of the bus for Tone
to munch on while he drove. Then she came and sat down to eat her own. Sam
cleared his throat getting all our attentions.

“What did we see inside the
store?” Sam asked.

“Blood and bodies.” Daisy
answered, taking another bite.

“Notice anything about that?”
Sam asked.

“No, what should we have?” I
asked, wondering what he had seen that we hadn’t.

“The bodies weren’t just chewed
up like the Red Eyes do; it looked like tools were used on them.” Tone called
from the front.

“Exactly. Which leads me to
believe that the crazed aren’t as far gone as the Red Eyes are. It’s like they
were almost trying to cut pieces like you would a cow.” Sam responded.

“Bringing up the crazed, what
the hell was up with the water and light fear?” Daisy asked as she finished
eating and leaned forward intently.

“I’m still not sure about that.
Maybe they’ve been in the dark for a while and the light hurt their eyes. The
water may have just caught them off guard.” Sam answered, “I can’t think of
anything that would make something afraid of water. Although, maybe Drew will
know when we get to Paradis Roulette.”

“I hope we get there soon.
Seems like the longer it takes the crazier things get.” I said, not to anyone
in particular more thinking aloud.

“It depends what we run into on
the way, who knows what we’re facing and what will slow this trip down.” Sydney
responded wrapping her arm around my shoulders.

“Was it really that horrible in
the store?” Sawyer asked, speaking for the first time since we had all sat down.

“Yeah it was like some horror
movie only covering your eyes didn’t make it go away.” Daisy answered.

“It also means that wherever we
stop we have to be careful and stick together, some places could be worse.” Sam
said.

“Are we going to have to stop
again?” Axel asked. He was fiddling with a piece of crust he hadn’t eaten yet.

“We might, depends if we see
someone who needs help, or we need gas, or we realize we need something we
don’t have.” Sam told him, patting his knee to comfort him.

Everyone went quiet for a
while, lost in their own thoughts.

I was watching the landscape
going by out the window. The side of the road was lined with cars that looked
abandoned. I didn’t want to look too closely at them. I’d rather believe their
owners walked away from them, then see something inside them.

Sam didn’t seem too interested
in stopping to check them out either. There was no point to go and look when we
saw no movement. All we might find were trapped Red Eyes in them and we would
be putting ourselves in danger.

I found myself heading back to
my room, tired of watching cars go by outside I wanted to lay down and maybe
sleep. Sawyer and Daisy both followed me and all of us ended up on the bed kind
of laying on each other.

Axel came in a short while
later and found a spot for himself with his head on Daisy’s stomach. None of us
said anything; we took comfort from each other doing something teens did all
the time.

I woke still in the pile and the bus
wasn’t moving. I looked for a clock automatically, but the only one in the room
was a digital alarm clock. The display was dead, which was just a reminder that
not even time mattered anymore.

I could hear the adults talking
softly in the living room. As I sat up I noticed that Angela and Thomas had
come in and joined us. They were sitting on the foot of the bed together, but
it was more than they had done so far. They both sat there watching us with
matching green eyes. Daisy rolled and saw them too.

“Well, hi there.” Daisy greeted
them like you would a frightened animal.

“Hi.” Thomas squeaked, talking
for the first time since we had found them.

“How are you two holding up?”
Sawyer asked, looking directly at Angela.

Angela shrugged.

She looked calm, unless you
looked at her twisting, clutching hands, then you could see what she was
feeling. She was putting on a brave face for her brother, but she looked like
she wanted to cry.

“I lost my sister and I have no
idea if my parents are safe or not.” I told her, “You really have to try and
focus on here and now and we’ll deal with whatever else there is together.”

“Together?” Angela asked,
looking at me like I was a lifeline.

“Yeah, you’re part of our group
now.” I answered.

“Not group.” Axel said, “Our
family.”

“You know what? I like that.”
Sawyer agreed. Soon all of us were teasing each other as we convinced Angela
and Thomas to join the pile we had going on the bed.

Our talking brought Sydney to
check on us. She stood with her hip against the door frame watching us. She didn’t
say anything but she was smiling, and seemed a bit surprised that Angela and
Thomas had joined us.

“What are you all doing?” She
asked after a while.

“Just hanging out.” Daisy
responded as she fought to get into a sitting position.

“How did you all manage to fit
on that bed?” Sydney seemed genuinely curious.

“Very carefully.” I answered.

“Well, can you manage to
untangle yourselves and come eat some dinner?” Sydney asked.

Sydney watched as one by one we
all managed to wiggle our way free of the pile we had made. She seemed pleased
that Angela and Thomas didn’t disappear back into their room. They ventured
with us to the living room to see what was for dinner. Tone was cooking at the
stove when we all sat down in various spots.

“
Heard you
laughing back there, was about to come join you when Sydney put my ass to
work.” He said and smiled at us, winking when Sydney looked away.

“Well somebody has to keep you
in line Tone.” Sam called from the front of the bus.

“You see how they gang up on
me?” Tone asked us, trying his best to look hurt.

“They see plenty.” Sydney said.

It was easy to see why Axel
called us family.

Tone and Sydney worked around
each other in the kitchen. The smell of the chicken on the stove made my mouth
water as we waited.

Thomas had taken a liking to
Sam and was sitting on his lap while Axel showed Angela the board game
collection. We had a break from the chaos going on outside.

A gun fired.

I went to the windows with Sam
and Tone. Outside, we saw a group of men with two female Red Eyes. They had the
Red Eyes muzzled. Their hands were zip tied behind their backs. There was also
some of handmade harness around their upper bodies that the men had leashes
attached to.

Sam signaled for us all to be quiet.
He opened a window so we could hear what was going on without alerting the men
to our presence.

“I told you this would work.”
One of the men said, he had tribal looking tattoos going up his arms.

“Yeah, you were right.” a man
with shaved head said and laughed.

“I told you they wouldn’t look
beat up, hell they almost look alive.” The tattooed men said as he reached out
and slapped one of the Red Eyes on her butt. She tried to turn and snap at him,
but the whole get up they had to prevent that, worked. “Say no to me now
bitch.”

Tattooed guy’s friends were all
laughing. I counted four of them. One of the guys was wearing what looked to be
a police officer’s shirt while the other had a plain black T-shirt on. They
were all taking turns caressing the bound Red Eyes.

It seemed that the men had
known the two girls before they got turned. These men had found them, and were
planning to have sex with them even though they were dead. The thought was
appalling, who would be willing to do anything with a Red Eye besides run like
hell?

 No wonder the women had turned
them down while they were alive, these guys were creeps. I noticed there was a
fifth man that was staying further away from the group. He didn’t appear to be
laughing at their jokes.

“Sam, you hearing this?” Tone
whispered.

“Yeah.” Sam whispered back.

“We can’t let them rape those
girls.” Tone responded.

“They are dead.” Sam said,
looking at Tone like he was gauging him.

“You know that doesn’t matter.
They don’t deserve to be treated or disrespected that way. The world order may
not be where it was, but there is still a very solid line between right and
wrong.” Tone said meeting Sam’s eyes.

“I agree.” Sam responded.

“So let’s go rescue some Red
Eyes.” Sydney agreed as the conversation continued outside.

“Hey Aaron let’s see if we can
get one of these cars started so we can get home quicker and have some fun.”
Tattooed guy called to the guy with his hood covering his face, he was also
staying away from the group.

“Yeah, how about that cop car
over there?” Aaron responded scratching his head and looking around. The voice
sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place where I knew it from.

Tattooed guy was laughing as he
dragged the Red Eyes behind him towards the abandoned cop car. He only stopped
to pull out a knife that he handed to the guy in the police shirt. He used it
to cut open the shirt of the blonde Red Eye. Revealing a hot pink bra and some
small tattoos right above her hip bones. Aaron kept moving to the cop car, not
looking back at what his companions were doing.

“When we go out there we need
all of you to stay on the bus and stay quiet.” Tone told us.

“We will.” I told him.

“These guys may be pervs but
they are still human, let’s try not to kill them if we can.” Sydney said as she
checked the clip in her gun.

“What are you going to do with
the Red Eyes?” Axel asked.

“Kill them humanely.” Sam
answered as he returned his gun to the holster on his hip.

The three of them climbed out
the door silently. They started the trek of slipping behind abandoned cars as
they snuck up on the group. Aaron had the cop car door open and was messing
with the dash. His companions continued to cut select pieces of clothing off
the Red Eyes.

Tone had taken the lead and was
inching closer to tattooed guy; he was a couple of cars away now. Tattooed guy
didn’t even know Tone was there until he cut the leash he was holding to keep
the two Red Eyes with him. Sydney stepped up behind the Red Eyes and despite
tattooed guy screaming at her, she shot both of them in the head.

At the sounds of shots, the guy
in the police shirt went running followed by the guy with the shaved head.
Tattooed guy grabbed a gun from a holster on his hip and aimed it at Sydney as
the Red Eyes dropped. He fired. Tone jumped, knocking Sydney out of the way, but
we saw the blood spray from where he got hit. Sydney returned fire hitting
tattooed guy in the forehead. He went down as Sam approached, his gun trained
on the guy in the black shirt. Aaron stood up slowly from the car with his
hands in the air.

“Don’t shoot.” Aaron called.

“Don’t move.” Sam responded,
“Syd, he okay?”

“From what I can see he is.
Bullet went clear through his shoulder.” Sydney answered as she helped Tone up
and started walking him back to the bus.

The guy in the black shirt drew
his gun and aimed it at Sam, but just as quickly Aaron had a gun out and shot
him. Sam looked at Aaron for a minute before he nodded.

“Grab a tarp when you come back
out.” Sam called after her.

Sydney brought Tone back onto
the bus. She directed Sawyer on how to clean the wound, while she grabbed a
tarp and headed back to Sam.

“Cover the girls.” Sam told her
and she did.

“Could you cover my brother
too?” Aaron asked, “He’s the one with the tattoos.” Sam nodded to Sydney and
she covered tattooed guy with an end of the tarp. She kept him as far away from
the Red Eyes as the tarp allowed.

“What were you all doing?” Sam
asked Aaron, still holding the gun pointed at him.

“Man, I don’t know what Wayne
was thinking, but once he got something in his head it was better just to go
along with it. He was a mean son of a bitch if you tried to oppose him on
anything.” Aaron said, “I didn’t want to do it so he found his drinking buddies
and still had me tag along.”

Not being able to place the
voice was bugging me.

“What did he have you do?” Sam
asked.

“See, we met these two girls at
the bar a few nights back before the world went balls deep crazy. Wayne, now he
really liked that blonde, think her name was Cat or something, but the redhead
kept getting in his way.” Aaron said as he lowered his arms to his sides.

“How does that get us here?”
Sam asked.

“I’m getting there. He bought
her drinks and was trying to get Cat to go home with him but she said no. He
was pissed and still reeling about it when we found the girls after being bit last
night.” Aaron explained. “Wayne told them he’d help them and they would be okay
they just had to come home with us where he had the supplies. He got them to
this house and down to the basement.”

Aaron took a breath and looked
between Sam and Sydney.

“Wayne got them to let him zip
tie their hands. He told them it was for his safety, since cleaning the bites
was going to hurt. Soon as their hands were tied he knocked them out.” He
continued.

“What happened then?” Sydney
asked.

“He started strangling the
redhead. I told him to stop but he told me it didn’t matter they’d been bit
they were dead anyway.” Aaron answered. “He strangled Cat too, than made those
muzzles and those harnesses. I know what he wanted to do was wrong but he’s my
big brother and he’s never listened to me.”

“That’s quite a tale there
Aaron. You just confessed to watching your brother kill two women.” Sam
responded to Aaron’s story.

“As I said I didn’t want
nothing to do with it. I tried to calm Wayne down but he’s a mean guy and he
holds a grudge like a starved dog holds a bone.” Aaron explained, “Please don’t
kill me. I swear I didn’t touch the girls nor was I going to. I was planning to
take off as soon as he was distracted.”

“Well now, what should we do
with you Aaron?” Sam asked, lowering his gun finally.

“Take me with you? I can help
with your friend Wayne shot, I’ve cleaned wounds like that before.” Aaron said
after he thought about it for a moment.

“How do we know you’re not
going to try and get revenge on us for killing your brother? We’ve got kids
with us trusting us to keep them safe.” Sam asked him.

“As I said. The world’s gone
crazy and Wayne wasn’t someone I would have saved if I could, even with him
being my brother.” Aaron answered.

“Sydney, cuff him.” Sam
decided, “It wouldn’t be right to leave him alone out here.”

“Thank you.” Aaron said as he
turned around and placed his hands behind his back. Sydney handcuffed him and
they led him onto the bus.

Once they got Aaron on the bus
they took off the handcuffs so he could take a look at Tone. He pushed his hood
down and looked up. My eyes met his blue-green ones, eyes I’d seen a hundred
times before.

“Ashlyn?” He asked after a
minute.

“Yeah.” I answered and went to
hug him, “Where’s Emily?”

“She’s dead.” Aaron said and
his eyes looked like they were watering up.

Emily was his younger sister
and one of my friends. Aaron adored Emily. I remembered how many times he would
give us rides or money or anything else she asked him for.

“How?” I asked as tears started
to escape from my eyes.

“I don’t know. Wayne said she
refused to go with him. He wanted to meet with me and she attacked him when he
tried to grab her, he said it was an accident.” Aaron answered.

“Your brother killed your
sister?” Sawyer asked as she joined us, she had been friends with Emily too.

“Yeah he did.” Aaron said and
turned to look at Tone.

“How does it look?” Tone asked.