Surrounds (Bonds) Read online

  "Sounds like a plan..." Lacey sighs. Wonderful, another night cooped up in a foul smelling barn, with a foul smelling boy, and with a can a beans. She begins following Henderson slowly.

  It had been a day and a half since the yellow kitchen incident and neither of them had brought it up. Lacey saw no point in it. It already plagued her nightmares. Without fail, screams and begging rarely left her mind, and instead loudly echoed inside of her like a god-awful catchy tune. Henderson wasn't much of a talker, which constantly left them both in hours of silence and her mind in constant wondering.

  Lacey frowns unhappily at the back of Henderson's head. Why on earth did she find his near muteness attractive again? Silent and mysterious, she thought there was more to him. She curses under her breath. She would hand over her last can of beans for someone who talked nonstop like her little brother. Yeah, that little idiot never shut up.

  Lacey stops suddenly, which goes unnoticed by Henderson who continues forward. Her baby brother, he was alright, wasn't he?

  "Henderson..." He had yet to say anything about her brother. Her stomach churns. How could she forget about her brother? He was only seven and he needed someone to look after him, he had annoying habits of getting himself into trouble. Also, their dad wasn't very parental, he liked his work and nothing else. "Alan..."

  "He's with your father." Henderson assures without even turning around fully. "He's fine. All we have to worry about getting to him and your dad."

  His news does nothing to calm her down.

  "Come on," he continues, "we only have a couple of hours of sunlight left." He begins walking again.

  (O)

  Chapter 12

  Alasa

  Alasa frowns down at the wood in her lap, she had spent hours attempting to carve it into a dog and only succeeds in making a... thing... An unhappy sigh escapes her. Her lack in skill likely is a result of having no talent and being watched like a hawk by 'him'.

  She's not even sure why he's doing it. Why he's sitting across from her like that and watching her destroy a poor piece of wood. But then again, she's not very sure why he actually does anything. It is hard understanding someone who only growls. Why was she here? Why here? What in the heck was flying in the freaking sky a day ago?

  Alasa gives up, dropping the wood and her feet and instead beginning to amuse herself with watching the flames of the fire flicker lazily. She notices when he grabs the wood and blade which had been dropped by her and began hacking away at the wood, but never looks at him.

  Five minutes later, an impressive carving of a wolf is dangled in front of her face and she has no choice but to look at the beast. He's watching her intently, a little to intently. Gooseflesh springs up over he flesh and she forces her gaze away from his and onto the wolf. She frowns.

  She tentatively takes it. Can he understand her? She wasn't understanding something.

  "What's your name?" She blurts, running her fingers slowly over his work, it was detailed. Something wasn't adding up here. Alasa wasn't expecting an answer, but ends up looking back up at him anyway, expectantly. He only looks at her. She bites her lip, looking back down at the carving. "You need a name... everyone has one."

  He only sits in front of her, off to the left, not blocking her view of the fire. Which she finds oddly thoughtful...

  She wasn't understanding something here.

  "How about... Ian?" She had always liked Ian as a name. A couple of her dogs were named Ian... Not that he's a dog...

  He only stares at her blankly. She takes his silence as a no. "Yeah..." She nervously says. "You don't actually look like an Ian." She thinks for a few minutes, digging her feet into the earth in front of her. "Guy? What about Guy?" Her best friend's father's name was guy. Once again he only stares. Her attention settles on the flickering flame in front of her before falling to the carved wolf in her hands. "Wolf?" He once again stares intently, but he blinks slowly after a few seconds. She assumes he agrees. "Wolf then... I'm Alasa..." Alasa motions slowly to herself. "My name is Alasa." He only growls a brief growl before turning around and leaping out of the cave's mouth.

  (O)

  Chapter 13

  Lacey

  She had never seen anything like it and she hoped she never would have to see it again. Above them the once blue horizon had seeped red, a dark bloody red, an unnatural red. Around her wind whipped at her hair angrily, nearly painfully as Henderson pulled her along. His panic was felt, it, as if it’s on living thing, pumping into her.

  "Damn… Damn…" She could make out Henderson’s low mantra as he quickly led her forward, around a fence and across an open field. She trips, because clumsy people always fall when they shouldn’t, but Henderson in his rush continues dragging her along, barely slowing enough to right herself. "Damn… Shit…Shit… fucking shit."

  Honestly, despite the ominous sky, she found Henderson’s sudden change in his potty mouth mantra, funny. It was so ‘unlike’ him. She also then decided spending so much time alone in that basement had altered her state of mind. No biggy. The clouds were bleeding and last week she had witnessed a murder and didn’t even help. Someone was begging for help and all she could do was hide in a smelly closet.

  The girl blinked. So that had been traumatizing, she noted. She was honestly worried.

  A monster of a hill appears ahead of them and she whimpers, her legs weak and her feet were blistered, busted, and now bleeding. But the fact that whatever had Henderson so spooked was friends with a red sky, forced any ideas of a break back down inside of her.

  As she had been expecting going up was hard, but it was going back down that obviously hid a sneaky danger. She couldn’t feel her legs, so it was only ‘sort of’ surprising when she tripped over her own feet and began tumbling downhill, successfully bringing Henderson with her.

  She lands on her face and blood filling her mouth. It hurt. The thought of never moving again filters in and out of her mind for a few seconds as Henderson calls her name.

  Then a loud, bone chilling screech, like a thousand, no a million, bird-monkey hybrids yowling begins, nearly deafens her. She instantly sits up, attention instantly going to the horizon that was now black instead of red. A pitch black, a shimmering onyx. It takes her a minute to realize that the wind is no longer blowing. It takes another for realizations that the horizon was still red, but there was something nearly half as large and black slinking through it. It took another minute to realize that it wasn’t one thing, but hundreds flying through the blood red sky.

  Then she feels it. The overwhelming feeling of the air gaining weight and pressing harshly down on her. Suddenly she cannot breathe and she wheezes pathetically, shaking her head disbelieving above her. It was so heavy. So, evil.

  She’s in danger. Her life is in danger. It’s a sudden realization which hits her squarely, perfectly, without a mistake. Her body tenses, her mind flashes. Run. She can’t fight and running is her only option. Run.

  Only, her feet can’t hear her. Her legs aren’t going to listen. Suddenly her feet are filthy betrayers and hate her.

  No… She whimpers. No… No…

  The black portion of the blood red sky is drawing closer, so close now, she can see the winged beasts which make up most the black.

  Suddenly her left cheek hurts and she’s staring into the wide brown eyes of Henderson. Her hand finds her stinging cheek. He’s shouting something barely heard at her before yanking her onto her feet.

  Henderson and she bolt off.

  She can hear again without even realizes she couldn’t and she honestly wishes she couldn’t, agony assaults her hearing each one of the monster’s screeches like a blade to the ears.

  It’s so loud and so painful, she barely notices Henderson breaking a window of a house and pulling her inside of a darkened living room. She barely notices as she yanks her upstairs and into a bedroom. As soon as she has both hands free they cover her ringing ears. Henderson pushes a bed in front of the bedroom’s door and a dresser in front of th
e window.

  She finds herself once again inside of foul smelling closet, her body pressed against Henderson as she clung against him. Her body shook her mind wasn’t working.

  A scream lifted from inside of her as something large hit into the other side of the house, causing it to tremble as if the whole thing was going to crash down. Then something smashed into the window, shattering it. Henderson tugged her against him, her screams becoming muffled by his shirt.

  Outside the closet, the home continued shaking as more of the black monsters hit the home.

  A cry escapes Lacey as another monster body slams into the house and something lands into the bedroom outside the closet. The body smashes into the walls, destroying everything inside of it. Its body even crashes into the closet and nearly shatters its door open.

  Lacey cries harder.

  Henderson’s arms grow tighter around her and he whispers soft words and shushes her.

  (O)

  Chapter 14

  Lacey

  It takes only ten minutes, but the house no longer shakes and all is quiet. Too quiet. They don’t actually leave until an hour later. Henderson leading the way, they both step out into a destroyed home. The wall leading into the hallway is gone, along with the wall which the window once was.

  Outside the huge hole, is a now clear sky, not a creature in sight, not an ominous unnatural hue either. Its blue again, with random fluffy clouds lazily drifting across and blocking out the high noon sun.

  Henderson urges her out of the home, worried it would fall down on them.

  Lacey takes only a few steps outside before crumbling to the ground. Her fingers run over a ten-inch gashes left in the earth, claw marks. She's never seen anything like it. Its surreal.

  "What in the hell, Henderson?" She whispered, her voice weak. "What was…?" He had said anything about creatures flying from above, only people going mad, being taken over by something. Never a red sky and it being filled with creatures.

  He never mentioned hoards of… hoards of… What were they? 'Demons?'

  "Sometimes… It happens…" Henderson collapses onto the ground beside her, his upper half bent over his legs, his body trembles.

  Sometimes it happens… Lacey stares at her shaky hands. Sometimes it happens.

  "Are you alright?" Her attention lifts and settles on Henderson. He’s asking if she’s alright. Inappropriate annoyance and anger begins filling her. He’s asking if she’s alright after living through a nightmare. There were hoards of demon… things… roaming about and he hadn’t told her? Did he forget? Not very likely. Why in the hell was he always hiding things?

  A few acrimonious words were biting at her lips, but then she truly looked at him. His brown eyes were wide, too wide, too brown, too filled with complete and utter fear.

  Helplessness began to settle over her. If he was afraid, how was she not to be? If he wasn’t alright, how would she even think about being alright?

  He had been the one to get her out of the field and away from that hoard, he had snapped her out of her fear and saved her. Because without him she would have been a bloody mess, half of her in one of those things and another half spread out across rural Untied States.

  Why on earth would she be angry at him?

  She’s use to it. The girl realized. She’s use to being angry at Henderson, it was so easy. He was quiet, he never fault back, he never argued. He never stood up for himself. Every argument they had been it, he would always accept blame. He would agree that everything was his fault.

  It was so maddening.

  Hell, did he even care about himself at all?

  "Are you alright?" The words left her mouth like and accusation, harsh and hateful. She ignores her own tone.

  If he notices, he ignores it. "It’s going to be awhile before we find a place that wasn’t hit by them." He explains standing and offering her a large hand.

  She takes it after a moment of hesitation. His hands are very rough but also slick with sweat.

  He offers her a weak smile, nearly invisible behind lines of worry and dark bruises from exhaustion underneath his half-open eyes. "You don’t have to worry though." He assures his weak smile twitching into something stronger.

  She believes him.

  Chapter 15

  Lacey

  She finds herself constantly looking at the cloudy sky, afraid she would see crimson. But it had been a day since then and it was still blue. Her whole body aches, every inch of her felt as if it was a big sore, one big bruise. They had slept in a shed last night, amongst gardening tools and pesticides, oil, and lawn mower gas, it hadn't been a good night. Every house they came across had been destroyed by the hoard. It was horrible. The air was stiff and quiet now, like the calm before a storm. Lacey hopped not, her mind was still reeling from yesterday's mess.

  "Hey, Henderson?" She winces, her voice oddly loud in the cursed silence.

  "We’ll stop in a few hours I promise." He tugs on his backpack strap, attention still ahead of them.

  "I wasn’t going to say that, Henderson." Lacey says dryly. Henderson glances at her.

  "Oh, sorry." He tugs at his sweaty hair. "What were you going to say?"

  "I was going to say…" She flicks a dirty strand of dark hair over her shoulder, lightly glaring at him. "I… uh…" She bites her lip, face falling out of its glare. Flashes of clinging to Henderson in that tiny closet hits her hard, her shamelessly whimpering and blowing snot on his shirt also entered her mind. He had somehow kept it together. He hadn’t broken down like her. "I… Thank you." She whispers, as she quickly looks away.

  When she finally looks at Henderson, he’s smiling a little. "You don’t thank people often. This is serious… are you sure you’re alright?" His lips begin twitching with the need for a wider smile.

  Blinking slowly at his joke, the girl only shakes her head. "I’ll never do it again then." She nods slowly to herself, still staring at him. Henderson’s jokes usually ended up like this… bad. A small smile curves its way onto her lips. She had actually liked such a thing about him. Henderson is such an oddball. He once was her oddball.

  Both of their shadows are long once they make it out of the hoard’s path and houses and business no longer lay in ruins. A lonely grocery store is now their destination and Henderson unclips his machete from his hip and pushes open a door blocked by broken crates.

  "Wait here, I’ll check it out."

  This wasn’t unusual. Henderson usually checked out what was inside a dark, dusty, cramped space, while it was her who stood outside of it as ‘look out’. But they both understood it was Henderson with the truly dangerous job.

  As she watches Henderson vanishes into a darkened hall she feels off.

  (O)

  Chapter 16

  Alasa

  She wonders how old he is. Her fingers still in their actions of scaling a fish to stare at ‘Wolf’. His long black hair shields his face as he works, his pale flesh washed-out and paler underneath the fire’s glow. He had not a wrinkle, not even the tiniest of blemishes on his skin. There was no clear indications of his age besides him being over sixteen and possibly under forty. It was odd, his agelessness. He had finally found a better food substance then Rats and she was insanely happy about that. This she could work with.

  She watched him sharpen his machete on a rock, oddly not intimidated by it at all. She begins scaling the fish again before opening her mouth.

  "Hey…" She calls out hesitantly, wincing at the volume of her own voice. Wolf looks up slowly, pinning her down with a blank stare. Alasa shifts onto her behind and off her bruised legs, wincing. The ground was obviously not her friend. She never realized how wonderful chairs were before now. "Wh- Why exactly am I here?"

  His sharpening ceases and he’s left holding the, now very sharp, machete in his hands. She gulps, maybe asking while he was holding a weapon wasn’t one of her best ideas. It wasn’t as if he could answer anyway.

  Wolf stares at her for a minute before turning away,
his back facing her as he grabbed another one of his blades and began sharpening that one as well.

  Uh… She bites her lip, wincing teeth digging into a spilt. "I mean, my family is probably very worried and stuff…"

  No response.

  A sigh escapes her. Slowly climbing to her feet, Alasa picks up a few sticks she had sharpened and skewered her fish and set them by the fire to roast. Once again Alasa sighs. She turns and nearly leaps back into the fire upon finding Wolf merely inches away from her.

  "God!" She cries, quickly catching her balance before falling into the flames. "Stop doing that." Her breathing comes out harsh and frantic.

  Wolf looks oddly amused as he grabs her arm and began tugging her out of into the tunnels. Alasa remains quiet, unsure what to make of this. Her legs begin to burn and ache and she quickly realizes how long they had been walking. Much longer in comparison to last time. All kinds of twists as well as some climbing and descending. Soon, like before, there’s a dot of light which grows bigger and bigger when they grow closer. Soon, when it becomes much too bright, Alasa shuts her stinging eyes, pressing a hand over her face.

  Only when they stop and her hand arm is let go does Alasa slowly blinks until her vision is less hazed. Outside, they are outside, actually outside, as in on the ground. Her body tenses as her gaze takes in the forest around her.

  Her attention snaps quickly to Wolf as he begins walking away, left, towards a clump of bright green bushes, disappearing through them. Alasa stands still for a moment, weighing what to do. A second later her feet quickly decides upon following the bizarre creature. The fact that he hadn’t growled out to follow him was strange.

  Her hands brush away the bushes and finds herself nearly falling over a hill. Quickly she teeters on the tiny perch overlooking the green, wild-flower filled valley below. It was a sight after spending so much time hidden away in a dark, wet cave.

  She can make out Wolf, already half-way to the other side of the clearing, moving in quick strides.