decided to change the rating to M for violence, hinted rape, character death, and a possible Lemon or two (if the reviews are good). This is pretty dark, even for me, but it's a challenge and I promise there will be a happy ending.
Day 1:
Addison's reflexes were stellar, Bailey noted. Her training kicked in and she barrel rolled across the floor, shouting for everyone to take cover for the moment. Her gun, which sat on the table where she'd nearly thrown a fit when they almost didn't let her take it in with her, was in her fingers in a ready pose. Zach was still by the door, and grabbed a glass bottle and broke it, holding two dangerously sharp objects in his hands.
The door was ajar, and Bailey found herself cowering with her stylist underneath the tables, pulling clothes in front of them.
"This isn't normal, there's so many guns." Addison whispered, her face crinkling in fear.
"Then we need to get us out of here." Cody spoke from where he was crunched into a ball, but still none the less demanding. Addison stood fully, and Bailey had never seen such a strong look on her face before.
"Not until we know it's safe." She said.
"If we stay here, and they come this way, we're trapped. Bang, dead." He emphasized with a finger and Renia whimpered a bit.
"We don't know what these people want, how many of them there are, or if they're prepared to kill or the guns are for show. I know that growing up at the Tipton was all glitz and glamour, but there's parts of Boston you'd wet your bed if you saw that I've seen!" Addison snapped.
"What's going on?" London whispered.
"We don't know." Bailey reached across to hold her friend's hand, and found London shaking like a leaf.
"Oh my god! Mosby and the twins!" Maddie gaped, "They were outside. Oh no, oh no..." She bit her lip, "Addison we have to see if they're okay!"
Addison's face changed a bit, but she never let down her guard. The door cracked open a bit, and the shots sounded farther away.
"We go quickly, we get out if I say so and leave them behind." She said, "Are we clear?" She held everyone's eyes until it was agreed. Bailey lied to Addison; she knew that if she saw her former teacher and, for all intents and purposes, principal she'd do anything to help.
"No one say anything. Try not to breathe." Addison's face was no-nonsense, and she slowly crept out the door with her gun held high. Zach said he would be the last to go, and Bailey ended up second to last, too polite to shove her way around.
The doors in the back alleys of the mall were deserted, and there were screams from far away. Bailey felt as though she was in a apocalyptic film, and to calm her nerves she found a makeshift weapon on the ground.
The first five doors didn't open, and the group came to the cussing- quietly- conclusion that all the doors would have been sealed off by the gunmen.
"I...We...we have to be safe." London fiddled with her engagement ring incessantly, "I have the best of the best guards!"
They turned a corner and saw a lump on the group. Addison approached with caution, turning the body over and checked the pulse. The silver badged gleamed on the vest, and Bailey took in a sharp breath not to start freaking out.
"You had guards." Addison's gaze looked up to where at least five more similar bodies littered the halls.
"So that's how they want to play." Zach growled, and Bailey watched his fist clench around the bottle, as he'd given the sharp pole to Cody.
"We need to get out of here." Marcus stated the obvious.
"That's going to be difficult. I can almost saw with certainty that they'd be meeting in the center of the mall,and they've closed off all the entrances. I'm sure they've wired the cameras already too, so we need to be careful." Zach went through quickly, looking at Addison after a moment.
"We can get to the closet and unopened store front from here. We need to change. Durable, no heels, no dresses, nothing that could get ripped and slow us down." Bailey decided, and London gave a gasp of horror.
"If I'm going to die, I'm going to die in style!" She hissed.
"Then die in very fashionable survival gear." Addison snapped, her patience running thin.
"Guys, I think it's fair to warn you that when I get really stressed, I tend to break out in hives and fart a lot, I can't help it." As he was speaking, eau d'skunk passed underneath everyone's noses, and Woody looked on sheepishly, "Sorry!"
"God, dude." Zach inhaled sharply, "Keep to the back of the group."
Woody rumbled by, so that he was almost behind Zach, so that even the elder Martin twin didn't have to suffer his unfortunate intestinal problems.
"His stink will either K.O. them on the spot or lead 'em right too us." Renia said bitterly, and she was scolded by at least two people, because Woody just looked utterly hurt.
The storage room for the new clothes was in a wild disarray, clearly searched before they arrived. Addison sent someone in one by one, to not draw attention as there was a door on the other side wide open and there were shadowy shapes pacing back and fourth. When Bailey was sent in, she took out her phone with shaking hands and threw off her shoes. accessories, and shirt- but her pants seemed comfortable, easy to move around in, and mostly durable, so they stayed. She was so fearful, and she couldn't believe how much emotions he felt, that she grabbed items that weren't exactly to her size, and she had to modify slightly in the hallway with a couple bobby pins and hair ties. London took the longest, and in the end Addison was so frustrated that the heiress wouldn't listen about the shoe situation that she broke the heels off of the five pairs she'd brought out to keep with her.
"Those cost a fortune each!" London cried with horror, dropping to her knees and cradling them like children.
"Are they worth your life?" Zach hissed above her, kicking them away. London just rubbed her tear-stained eyes and looked up, torn. Before she could say anything, Addison had throw off her combat boots, thrown them at London, and dove back into the room within record time. Bailey really respected the girl now.
"We have to go this way. I know this mall." Bailey whispered, "We may be able to sneak around the food courts and wait for help." She quickly drew with her fingers a map of the floor plan, explaining the path.
So, everyone armed with poorly misshapen weapons- sans Addison- crept out forward. The crying and yelling became progressively louder and louder until they reached the main center, and Bailey fought back the urge to barf. Blood, bodies, goddamn children laying on the ground. From just a quick look, there were at least fifteen, if not more people with harsh looking guns yelling at people who struggled in their grasps, most with clothes half torn off.
"Where is she?" One closest, too close for comfort in fact, screamed at a mall-goer's face, "Where is London Tipton?"
London was swiftly shoved to the back of the group, and everyone was told to hush up s Bailey and Zach moved forward to survey the situation.
"I can do this." Addison said softly to Zach, pushing him back.
"I'm going to be in the military!" Zach sounded very offended.
"Going, key word."
"Hey, I learned a few things already, took a couple classes." Zach said with a leery grin, "I couldn't wait."
"Well, food courts out." Bailey said sadly, pointing to where three men were pacing near one of their only plausible escape routes.
"Damn." Maya said under her breath.
The man was still screaming for London, shaking a teenage girl around like a rag-doll and grabbing her in places that made Bailey see red. His gun was pressed against her chin, and she was crying hard, saying that she'd never even met London Tipton.
"We have to do something." Bailey moaned.
Addison looked at her former friend, "Bailey. I know it's in your nature to help, but we've gotta think about ourselves."
Woody coughed from the back. "Is it also a bad time to say that if I get really nervous I may pass out..." He began to say, and before anyone could catch him, he fell like a deadweight to the floor. The sound echoed, and everyone's faces were that of pure and utter incredibility.
The sound alerted the man shaking the woman to their place, and he dropped her on the ground where she shivered and began crawling away.
"Oh god, oh god." Renia repeated over and over and Bailey's mouth went absolute dry.
"Well, well, I think we've found our mice." He called out, and more men with guns were at his side.
"We can't all get out." Zach quickly decided.
"They want London, and we don't know why. But I don't think they'll keep us alive if they have her. They're more likely to keep us alive so London will come to them easier." Addison murmured in response.
"So we keep London safe." Bailey looked back at the girl, who was currently on the ground unresponsive and blank-faced.
"At any costs." Cody nodded.
"I think I've found her!" The guy was yelling over his shoulder, and Bailey shoved London from the floor, shaking her and trying to make her move. Since their hiding place was already found, she found no reason to hesitate to smack her hard across the face- which surly woke her up.
"You ruined my makeup! I spent so long perfecting it!" London ran a hand over the already red print.
"Not the biggest problem." Addison licked her lips, "When I saw go, we're all going to run different directions, okay? I'm going with London, Cody you need be somewhere else. We don't know if they've realized that London can't do anything with her company in matter of speaking." Cody frowned.
"How do we know that's what they want, eh? Why I can't I stay with you?" He asked, looking at the gun in her hands.
"I'm sorry." Addison said, and there was no more time for words, because she shoved London out into the open.
"London! Run!" Marcus screamed and London, for once in her life, did not need to told twice. The whole join collapsed with beldam at this point. Woody was left in the shadows, because who wanted to lug around a heavy kid who blew their cover when he'd be perfectly fine on the ground, as Bailey sprinted off to the left, only throwing a momentary glance over her shoulder to see who followed. Cody.
But that one look directed her right into the hands of a greasy looking guy who pulled her hair and called her by name.
"Get off of her!" Cody cried, and kicked the guy in between his legs from behind. The guy cussed and crumpled, and Bailey kneed him hard in the stomach as he went down. She opened her mouth to thank him, but he was already running, reminding her to do the same. The sound of a firing gun went off, and she felt like it was all to fast that Cody was clutching his shirt and red was welling between his fingers. He stumbled, and fell on the ground, gasping for breath and curling. Bailey stopped, stupidly, and fell at his feet.
"Cody! Cody, listen to me! God, don't close your eyes, you hear me?" She demanded, looking at the bullet wound in his stomach.
"It hurts." He whined, and Bailey licked her lips. She forgot about the gunmen. Until that is, she heard a bullet from her left and someone had screamed her name and barreled into her. Her head slammed into the ground and someone was pulling her along, and it wasn't until they were half-way across the fray that she realized she'd left Cody and Zach was beside her, panting.
"You're brother is just lying out there and you left him?" She nearly cried, but quieted herself.
"And you would have been dead with a bullet to the head, so thank me." He threw up his hands, "He'll be fine. Look." He pointed to where Addison had ran across the group and picked up Cody with graceless ease, thrown him over her shoulder and ran in their direction, shooting down a guy in the knees as she did so.
"Where's everyone else?" Bailey searched around desperately, and saw one of London's earrings glimmering across the way, and Marcus running after that direction, so she supposed that he was with her. Maddie was disappearing into one of the stores, and seemed out of the trouble. Woody was still passed out, she assumed, and she searched for Maya and Reina.
Addison was almost at them, and gasped out, "What are you guys doing sitting? Come on!" She hissed, and Bailey stood up and stretched her already bruising body from the impact, and followed Addison down one of the dark hallways, where power had buzzed out.
Just as they seemed to be reaching somewhat safety, and ear-splitting screech stopped Bailey in her tracks.
"Bailey, move!" Zach roughly shoved her forward, but Bailey turned back.
"That sounded like Reina." Cody, at her name, lifted his had, murmuring incoherently, and Addison stiffened.
They looked back to Reina being held by a gunman, barrel against her neck, and Bailey covered her ears so she didn't have to hear the fire. Maya was struggling against another, and Zach gulped, his eyes wild. He put his arms around Bailey, almost like an older brother or boyfriend, sheltering her from what had just transpired.
"Maya." He whispered, his voice hard.
"We can't help them now." Addison reminded softly, sadly, "We have to keep moving on so we don't end up like them."
"Hell," Zach muttered under his breath, and Bailey was unsure if he was referring to the situation or to the state of the mall- smashed windows already with glittering glass on the ground, pilfered storage areas, and a sorry looking place that she could hardly believe an hour ago was queing up for the announcement of Yay Me! Fashion Designs by London Tipton.
"This isn't hell." Addison glowered at him.
"I didn't said that. I said hell as in, 'oh my hell'." He said smartly, which to Bailey rolled her eyes, because it basically meant that this was hell and-well nevermind that.
"So where are we going to?" She looked at Zach and Addison, and a sigh of relief washed over her that out of everyone, she was separated with the two best gun-people and abilities, because her logic in situations like this was little. Not to say she couldn't theorize what to do, but that was it. It was only theories and discussions about 'what if' situations, she didn't experience things like this.
But she could shoot a gun. Sure, she may be a little rusty, but her older brothers had been teaching her how to shoot along with her 'A,B,C's', but she hadn't touched one since she left Kansas. She supposed in a dire need, she could will back all her old knowledge and hit a guy between the eyes.
Her family. They wouldn't even know about this. Perhaps it would hit news? Even so, her family was not one to read outside of their little town, and if it did stumble across the kitchen table or T.V. would they remember that she lived here now? And if so, even in that unlikely circumstance, they would never imagine she'd be one of the people who had been trapped here. What a depressing thought. She wished momentarily she'd called and said her 'I-love-yous' before she'd come, as silly as it was to imagine she could have had any predilections about the upcoming events of the day.
"We go far away. Hope a door was left unlocked." Addison said, and looked at Cody.
"And fix him." Zach finished softly, "You know how to, right Bailey?"
"I never started medical school!" Bailey felt her face grow hot, "But I mean, i sewed up cows and siblings all the time. Helped my mom clean wounds and things, but I've never taken a bullet out."
"You're going to have to try. I can pull it up on my phone for directions, but after that, I guess it's up to you." Zach's meaning was clear. After that, you'd better do everything in your damn power to save him.
"I will tr-," She began to say, but crossed her fingers behind her back, lest it was already to late, "I will save him."
But Cody looked horrible, head lolling back, face deathly pale, and blood already leaking through everywhere, but not on the ground yet, so their trail was still unnoticed. But it wasn't like they were particularly looking for them, they were looking for London. Poor girl, she hoped that she, out of all of them, would make it out okay.
Addison led them silently up the stairs, and they exited near a Louis Vitton. Once, Bailey would have never imagined having one, but now the windows were smashed and some taken, so how horrible would it be for her to grab one of those purses that were spilling on the ground. She should get some sort of token, for enduring this, she told herself. Addison's eyes were on all the fancy stores too, but Cody moaned, and they remembered the task at hand.
Bloomingdales was the perfect option to camp out, and just as they were laying Cody down, the lights cut out, and they were cast into an eerie shadow. There was a vibrating sound, and Addison retrieved her phone.
"It's some of the others." She breathed a heavy sigh of relief, "It's Woody. He's hiding out at some store downstairs, in the back room. He wanted to know where everyone else was." Addison was about to type back, when Zach swatted the phone away.
"What if that's them? What if they got Woody and they want to know where we all are?" Addison's face paled as if she'd never thought of it, and she stared at the phone in disgust.
"I hope Maddie has the sense not to reply either, if she gets it." Addison whispered, knowing that all they really wanted to hear about was London, and hoped she'd be easy to locate.
Zach was pulling things up on his phone as Bailey arranged Cody among the blankets and display pillows, biting her lip hard. She didn't want him to die, not before she could really apologize, not before they could be friends again.
"How to take a bullet out of a wound, wiki how." Zach read out loud, "huh. Seems good enough." Bailey was standing up, and took the phone from his fingers, ignoring his protests.
"Number two is call 911. I'm sure they're well aware, so that's moot point." Bailey said dryly.
"Yes. In positions like this, I'm sure a bargain will be reached in no time." Addison agreed, but her face betrayed her true worry.
"This doesn't help. It's what to do until medical help arrives. I am the medical help." She groaned in frustration. She found what she was looking for, and began to rattle off things to her two companions.
"Something to clean the wound, alcohol i guess. Salt or painkillers. Tweezers. Needle and thread. Bandages. Water." She said, and Zach was on his feet in an instant.
"I'll go." He offered, "You all stay here." He said.
"I know he's your brother, but I will go. I have the most training. And, if you die, then Cody will have wished he did too." Addison pointed out, to which Zach got a very juvenile pout on his face, and began to argue.
Addison's argument was reasonable, though, and after just a moment of her well thought-out words compared to Zach's feckless complains, she had won and Zach sat angrily on the bed.
Bailey lay on the ground, looking around her. The moments ticked by painfully. She could hear the breathing of the twins beside her, so close and comforting. Rolling back on her side, she pushed away the threat of tears.
Soon later, she checked her watch. Addison had been gone a long time, but had promised to send out a blank message if anything were to happen to her, if she had the time. It wasn't completely comforting, but it eased Zach's mind it seemed.
She tentatively spoke.
"So what have you been up to since Seven Seas High, Zach?" She asked. Zach's voice was bitter and sarcastic.
"Really? My brother's dying, and you want to ask how my days have been?" The venom in his tone was enough to turn her voice sharp too.
"Fine. Stay silent alone in the dark. Sorry for trying to be nice!" She sourly rolled back over, curling up into a ball with shame and embarrassment. It was silence once more.
"I realized I didn't want to leave Cody yet. I wasn't ready to go out and die somewhere." Zach's voice cut through the dark, so soft, that at first she thought she imagined him talking to her. Slowly, she rolled back. She could see the contour of his body against the ebony.
"And this year, you're ready to die?" She saw him flinch, and immediately regretted asking, but Zach's answer was not as hostile as she expected.
"This year I have a better idea of what I'm fighting for, since I majored in history. If not my own reason, my country's reason." He replied steadily, "Cody hates it. We went to separate colleges though, he left me. I've lived without him for four years. I can do a couple more." He shook his head, "Realistically, i didn't expect us to get a house next door and raise our kids as neighbors." He scoffed.
"When did you become so wise?" Bailey wounded.
"That hurts, Bailey. I've always been wise." Bailey couldn't stop a harsh guffaw leave her, and covered her mouth with her hands.
"Yeah, i know." She was sure he almost smiled there, "I could hardly keep a straight face too."
Bailey stood and sat by him, looking at Cody. His breath was getting shorter, and she didn't have to have a degree to know time was of the essence. Why hadn't she told Addison this.
"What would I do without him? I guess I know now how he feels." Zach gave a short laugh, "Maybe I'll have to re-think enlisting. Find something 'useful' to do with my life." He screwed up his face at the thought.
Addison crashed through the store, bags hefted on her arms, breathless.
"Sorry it took so long! There's guys everywhere near the main circle! It's like a video game or something." She moaned, and dropped the bags quietly, "I got anything useful."
"In Louis Vitton bags. Yes, those are useful." Zach snarked.
"Those are useful!"
"Perhaps to starlets at overrated movie premiers, yes." He countered easily, and Bailey had to intervene, before it got ugly. The two fought like she and Zach had at school, and was a little missing the way they used to banter gracefully.
"Cody?" She asked, reminding the two.
"No I'm Zach!" The elder twin said automatically, but his voice changed, "Oh!"
Within seconds, the materials were out and Addison and Zach between them were holding three phones and two flashlights on Cody's body. She tentatively picked up the materials.
She remembered first meeting him, how young he looked and how innocent he was. How they'd grown, how they'd lived. Any longer, and well, things wouldn't be living. Zach had been even younger, even more childish. Yet here he was, acting so mature. She looked up at him, and his eyebrows furrowed.
"What?" He asked, "What's wrong?"
"Nothing." She replied softly.
She began to work on his stomach. After what seemed like a lifetime, she was firmly wrapping the gauze around his newly stitched stomach, poorly done at best with the tools she had, but he seemed more stabilized.
"That's all we can do now." Bailey said, tipping a bit of water into his mouth and helping him swallow. Some dripped down his chin, and Addison reached out to wipe it away, her eyes soft. Zach had wandered off as she finished, not able to see his brother look so dead.
"Do you like him?" She asked, and Addison jumped.
"Me? Like Cody?" She sounded off-taken, and her eyes were lighting up.
"He's a great man. I don't mind if you do." Addison's smile was thin.
"I just don't want to see one of my best friends hurt."
Bailey didn't press anymore, and walked away too, leaving the delusional Addison alone, with the feeling that Addison was straight out lying to her. She looked at her watch; for all the excitement today, it was only five. Her stomach rumbled.
She found Zach rifling through the bags, and eating a box a chips. Her stomach growled even louder, and Zach looked up.
"Hungry?" He asked.
Her stomach roared.
"I think it speaks for itself." Bailey said hesitantly, and reached out to grab the box anyway though.
Their quiet munching was the only sound that was spoken between the two after that, if you could really call it talking. Addison fussed over Cody, and Bailey recalled once that may have been her, but yet she felt guilty even now she was not. She let that feeling go, though, and found a bed far away from the group, and lay down to nap.
It was still dark when she woke, and she wondered why it was so...oh yes. Her insides turned to lead, and she clenched her fists. The darkness of the department store taunted her, and she raised her head to look around. Zach was tossing and turning in his sleep, and Addison sat firmly on a chair facing the door, the gun in her lap. She looked exhausted, and Bailey felt suddenly selfish for taking the nap. She was about to offer to take watch, when the reality of why she'd woken hit her.
It was a voice being projected through the speakers, the voice that told shoppers when the mall would be closing. The static was thick, and for a second all Bailey could hear was the discharge. A voice grunted, and the mic was tapped, and then he spoke.
"London Tipton, I doubt we've properly introduced ourselves. I am the leader of this, and I am looking for you. I grow tired of this relentless game of hide and seek, it's been nearly eight hours, and it's time for you to give up. If you're sheer exhaustion of being curled in a ball somewhere is not enough to make you come forward, I think we have someone here who will." At this, both Addison and Bailey tuned in sharply to the voice.
"He came in here, screaming your name with a ring on his finger. Either you're his mistress, or his fiancee. Either way, it would be a shame for something to happen to him. And to prove this is not some fabricated lie..." There was a shuffling, and a new voice came on. It sounded vaguely familiar to Bailey.
"London! Babe, don't come here! Stay where you are! Don't-," His cries cut off and the leader returned to the mic.
"So there you go. You have two hours. Or, well, i think you know." There was the bang of a gun, and Bailey flinched. Then, there was no more announcements.
"Oh, oh god." Addison whispered, "Do you know the voice? It sounds very familiar."
"I know. I feel I know him." Bailey pressed her fingers to her temple, "That makes it worse." She knew Maddie would never let London go freely, so she flinched as she imagined what would become of the boy in a few short hours. It was ghastly.
Zach slept through the whole thing. But, they all waited on the dot two hours later to hear the gunshot, but it never happened. Addison's brain fizzed over with solutions.
"She gave herself up."
"I don't think we'd still be here." Bailey whispered.
"Okay, they didn't have the guts to kill him."
"They killed Renia and Maya."
"He's been working with them all along. He's just a pice in a game. A sick, sick game." Bailey didn't like thinking about that one-it would break London's heart. She had no answer.
"Perhaps he escaped?" She offered her own, to which Addison snorted derisively.
"Sure, and pigs fly. These guys know what's what. They wouldn't let a prisoner escape!"
"They let us escape."
"I feel it's only because they choose to." Addison bit her nail nervously, "I don't think it's going to end well for us, wether London is found or not." Bailey bit her cheek so hard that she tasted blood. She'd never felt such fear before, never been so close to death. She worried about them all- not just herself, though.
Cody's condition didn't seem to change much, but he was still alive. That was...perhaps an improvement. But they couldn't tell anything, and she was unsure how much pain he was in. She wished she could help him more. Zach was kicked awake (Addison letting out a little anger) and it was declared that each would sit watch for the night with the gun, lest they men decide to come and capture them as well.
"The police will be here soon. It's been a long time, but things like this are fragile." Addison kept repeating, but licking her lips and twirling her hair.
"You sleep. I can watch first. Then Zach." Addison had refused sleep earlier, so Bailey felt it was the least she could do. Addison's gratitude was plentiful, but she refused to sleep until she knew for sure that Bailey could handle the gun.
Zach was quick to fall back asleep, and Bailey was left up and awake. Now a sliver of the moon shone through the store, and she felt like she had invaded someone else's house, with all the beds, furniture, and seemingly everything one would need in a house.
Her morbid curiosity beat her at around 2 A.M. She crept forward carefully, out of the store. There was just silence, but as she approached she heard devilish laughter from below. Looking to her left, she saw a light on the bottom floor, with many men sitting in a circle, playing cards for their spoils of the mall. She turned her gaze to the other side, where the center lay. Her small body was concealed in the shadows, and she made extra careful to hardly breath as she crouched down, looking at the bodies. She counted, trying to remember how many she saw earlier that day. They hadn't even been touched. She wanted to know if they had killed London's beau.
There was eight casualties. The eldest was an old man which she'd passed as he'd been in the Apple store buying a new phone, and the youngest was a child of no more than fourteen. Renia lay where she had fell, dried blood pooled at her body. Bailey bit back a cry at the injustice and blatant disregard of it all- how they just left her there, a broken stickmen in a undeclared war. But she did not see Maya, so that gave her hope. But as she remembered the gun at her throat, there was no way she could have survived and reasoned that her body was hidden behind something she could not see. She bit hard on her knuckles to resist the urge to dart forward and find Maya and Renia's bodies, bringing it to their friends. There was movement to her left, and she stiffened as she calculated her options. She could scream, but more would come, but perhaps hopefully Addison. She could fire, and miss and that would be horrific. She could stay silent and kick him in the balls before he-
Heavy hands covered her mouth and she did the last of the options on pure instinct. There was a low moan as her elbow made contact with the groin area, which she hoped her assailant was a male, and she began to sprint away, turning back to see...Zach. Dammit.
She picked her way back, where Zach was rolling on the floor in utter silence, but it was clear he was biting his hand to keep from making a sound.
"Sorry." Her whisper was almost just an exhale of air.
"Bailey..." He hissed through his fingers.
"You grabbed me!"
"I didn't want you to scream, but it was unsafe for you out here."
"it's unsafe for both of us." Bailey said snappily, "Can you walk? Or are you paralyzed."
"It hurt, but yeah." He glared at her, but not before looking out to where Bailey had been studying. She knew his eyes searched for Maya, and she couldn't decipher pain or relief when he neither saw her body. After all, there were worse things than death, and the spoils of war never had to be materialistic. She shuddered, and from just a glance, she knew Zach was thinking the same thing.
"I should have protected her."
"You didn't know."
"I wish I had." He said back at the other end at their store, "I want to burry Reina." He murmured.
"I do too." Bailey agreed, "if anything, I want to get her away from there." She gave a dark look behind her, full of hatred.
"Not tonight." Zach put a hand on her shoulder, "It's an hour past your time. Go to sleep."
Even under the circumstances, Bailey need not be told twice. She slept, her her dreams were haunted by the image of Renia's body and Cody's hardly moving chest.