No Time To Bleed

The blast sent us flying backwards, Eli’s armored screams dove above anything else.

Flames surrounded all around us. Bullets and scraps of metal were all that afforded to fill the air besides the smoke. It choked and mugged my throat, took the tears right out my eyes.

“Come on! We’ve gotta move!” Alex grabbed onto my wrist and I stumbled.

I could barely see, let alone run. “We’ve gotta get Eli!”

“Clarissa’s got him! We’ve gotta get to the van now!”

My belt was still intact, but I had no idea what I had left. My gun was long as well and the bat was in the car. I had to say we’d been in a lot of hellish situations, but being shot at by a rocket launcher was the worst.

“Come on! You’re not giving up on me!” His hand yanked me further.

Coughs and sputters ripped on my throat. I still couldn’t see. My ears felt a ringing. All I had was Alex’s hand on mine and a crazy sense we were gonna die.

A mine blasted off and I went flying, hands flailing from Alex’s grasp as he screamed for me.

“Just go! Go without me!” I had no idea what I was screaming, but I felt it.

I hit the ground hard. Adrenaline had chosen now to dive into my veins. Men were all around me in clear white suits, just like the men who had taken that blonde girl.

I flexed my muscles.One surged forward, baton at the ready as it slammed down into my arm. I sent a crunching fist into the side of his suited head. He let out a wail and went down like bricks.

I let out a laugh. These people were no different than the zombies. They were monsters as well.

Another one tackled me. I squirmed against his grasp and fought. He flew off me and I heard a series of hits.

“Get up! We’re fighting our way out of here!” Alex pulled me to my feet.

There were at least three more for us to deal with.

I blasted forward, kicking off the floor and sent a roundhouse kick into one’s skull. My foot connected with a sickening crack and I let my sneaker slam into his stomach one he went down.

Alex slammed one over the ears and was hit in the back of the head. I jumped on the one who’d hit him and he went down. Red filled my vision as Alex pulled me off of him.

“Let’s go!”

We went sprinting through the blind fog of smoke.

“Where’s the van?! We can’t even see it!”

He whirled and whipped his gaze around panicked. This was the first time I’d ever seen him scared for anything. Alex was never scared.

“I don’t know.”

A metallic came next and all sorts of agonizing groans. The sound of glass breaking and something heavy whipped beside us.

“Get in! We’re leaving now!” It was Clarissa’s voice and we followed directions.

The van hit high speed with bullets tearing through all sides. We all had to duck down to avoid the oncoming rain of danger flying in from the nonexistent back windshield.

The front one seemed to be buckling under the pressure as well.

It seemed to take forever with all smoke and loud bangs and various bone shattering crashes to stop our escape. Eli just curled into a ball on the floor and this time he wasn’t crying, not a single tear and I couldn’t stop the numb feeling inside me as well. Alex was on the floor, holding onto Eli preciously. Clarissa and Cece were in the front seat navigating the turmoil.

“Where’s Shatoya?” I asked, not even sure if all the silence was real.

No one spoke for a long while. We just drove and drove and drove.

“She didn’t make it. I saw her get shot in the head. She went down and they tackled her.” Cece croaked.

Eli whispered something to Alex who just stroked Eli’s hair. “What’d you say little buddy?”

Eli repeated. “I said Shatoya saved me. They tried to take me, but she saved me.”

Could that little boy only be five or six years old? Having seen all the horrors we’d seen lately?
And suddenly I was crying, sobbing my little lungs and heart out til I was sure the seat below me was slick with my tears. Eli turned up and rubbed my hand soothingly as all of the world came crashing down on me.

Jesse probably dead. I’d killed Jessica. Amanda was gone. Ryant and his brother were in the clutches of Lexicon. William was dead. And now another person gone forever. People were dying all around me and I wasn’t sure how much more of this I could take. I wanted to go home, but I had no home anymore. Not with my dad and not with Aunt Meg or Uncle Trevor.

My old life was over and had been overtaken by the weeds of this one. Now it had fallen into all the cracks of the sidewalk I’d once overlooked. Even if we did find Ryant or Max or Lion or anyone else, there was no guarantee anyone of them were even alive. The entire world was just moving one while this little piece of everything was completely chaos.

“At least one thing’s clear from here on out…” Clarissa said from the driver seat.
“What’s that?”

I wasn’t even sure who’d asked the last question. It seemed incredibly stupid to even talk right now when we should be grieving.

“We know where we’re headed.”

I wasn’t even sure of that anymore. So I let myself fall into the most dreamless and heavy sleep of my entire life.