Taoree: Taoree Trilogy #1

by Michele Notaro

  Orrean quietly told us, “Very slowly move together and form a circle around Mandy.”

  We all did what he asked, no question about it. We moved closer together, and while I wasn’t happy that Wes was part of our circle and not inside it, I was glad that he ended up next to me so I could keep an eye on him. Orrean was on my other side, but I couldn’t risk turning my head far enough to see exactly where the others were. I had the feeling that at any sudden movement, the horde of Ferals would attack.

  Mandy slowly slid down my back as I whispered to her, “Nol, Colt, and Cal are behind us, right?”

  “Yes,” she whispered back shakily.

  Before I had too much time to worry about it, all the Ferals came running at us at once. They were grunting and growling and swinging their various weapons. Some had knives, others had crowbars or pipes, but the one off to my left and in front of Wes had a fucking shovel.

  As soon as the first Feral was within reach, I held my shoian to his stomach and held down the button, making the Feral seizure as Mr. Shovel took a swing at my brother. I saw Wes duck right before another evil bitch swung a crowbar at me. I threw my arm up to block my face and grunted in pain at the blow. I pushed back with the same arm, making her stumble back and bump into one behind her. I saw another Feral coming at me from the other side, but before I even fully turned toward the new threat, the Feral was flying backward.

  I didn’t have time to wonder about it because the Crowbar Bitch came back at me. I kicked out, trying to keep her back just as my shoian finished with its first victim. I immediately held the shoian against Crowbar Bitch and she started twitching. Unfortunately, Mr. Shovel had taken another swing as Wes, who ducked again, but the momentum of the shovel made Mr. Shovel knock into Crowbar Bitch. She fell to the ground, away from me and my shoian, so she was disappointingly still alive.

  I swung my elbow back against the chin of another Feral, turned on my heel and shocked it with my weapon, holding it to its neck. I was petrified watching Wesley dodging the shovel. He couldn’t get close enough to get him with the shoian because the shovel was so long. Wes surprised me though, when he finally caught the shovel with both hands, twisted it around and pulled the Feral closer to himself. He stabbed the bastard in the chest with his shoian and held it there. When another Feral tried to attack him, he kept his shoian against the shovel guy, but used his other hand to push the shovel away from himself and hit the new Feral in the head.

  I finished with my latest Feral just in time for Crowbar Bitch to get back in my face. I punched her in the lip, just because it felt good, then stabbed her in the stomach and held my shoian to her. I saw Orrean snatch another Feral out of the way when it ran at me. Orrean snapped that one’s neck while holding his Feral weapon against another.

  I had to take out two more Ferals before I really saw a difference in our surroundings. For a while there, I wasn’t sure if the stream of Ferals would ever end, but there was a small break in them that allowed me to check on Mandy and Wes. Mandy was still standing in our circle, looking around with her shoian at the ready, and Wes was punching one Feral while electrocuting another with his weapon.

  I moved a little closer to both of them as three more ran at me. The first one got a shoian to the face, while the second got a kick as I ducked under its swing with a metal pipe. The third was plucked off by Orrean again. Once I had the second one completely down and noticed no more coming from that side, I looked around to see who needed help. Colt still had three surrounding him, so I took a step in that direction.

  Before I could get there, Orrean showed up behind the Ferals and took out two as Colt used his shoian on the other. I looked around to make sure everyone else was still okay, and besides Cal, who was still holding his shoian to one Feral, everyone else was done fighting.

  I looked at my brother and winced when I saw a huge cut through the arm of his coat. When I looked closer, I could see a dark stain beginning to form around it. He also had a big cut on his cheek that looked like it was going to bruise pretty badly. I walked right over to him, hooking my shoian on the weird alien belt Orrean had given me, and wrapped my hands around Wes’s arm to try to stop the bleeding.

  Before I could ask for help, Orrean had his hands over the top of mine, covering Wesley’s wound. I felt a deep warmth traveling from Orrean’s hands into mine and pushing out into my brother’s arm. That same strange feeling in my chest came back. I had to close my eyes at the sensation. For some reason, I started feeling overwhelmed and a little dizzy. I felt myself sway, but was almost immediately surrounded by strong arms and was leaning back against a solid, muscular chest. At first I thought it was Colt, but when I leaned my head back and felt a chin right over my head, I realized it couldn’t be. The only person that tall was Orrean. I thought about pulling away, but my body betrayed me and soon I was sinking farther into the Taoree.

  Despite the strange dizzy feeling and the warmth traveling from the alien, into me, then into Wes, after a moment I was overwhelmingly content just standing there like that. It was like every cell in my body was relaxed and almost sighing in relief. I was vaguely aware of Orrean moving both our hands to cover Wes’s cheek, but all of that was over far too quickly for my liking—and I had to admit that I liked the contented feeling.

  After the energy stopped flowing from him, I felt Orrean place his warm hands on my shoulders, and I opened my eyes to find my brother staring at me with a strange look on his face. I tilted my head a little, wondering what that was about as I stared right back at him.

  Wes looked over my shoulder at the alien I was still leaning on and said, “Thank you, Orrean.” He nodded at me, but was still speaking to Orrean, “He has a gash on his forehead.” He pointed to my forehead, indicating the cut I hadn’t even noticed yet.

  Orrean carefully spun me to face him and gently placed his large hand on my temple. I felt his warmth seeping into me again and fought the urge to close my eyes. Instead, I stared at the dark purple eyes of the strange creature in front of me, which honestly wasn’t any better than closing my eyes and savoring the warm feeling, but once I was caught in his gaze, it was nearly impossible to look away. He seemed to move his face closer to mine, though I didn’t actually see him move.

  I felt the warmth generating from his hand, but I also felt it in my chest. That same contented feeling was back again, making me think that everything was going to be okay… good, even. When he finished healing me, he brought his hand down to cup my cheek and smiled gently at me. Our faces were so close, I could feel his breath hitting my nose and mouth. After an indeterminable amount of time, his smile turned sad and his eyes looked like they filled with tears. Then, all at once, he let me go—pulling his hands away and stepping back. As he turned away from me, it looked like the tears in his eyes were about to spill over.

  As soon as his back was to me, I was hit with a sudden all-consuming coldness in my chest that spread throughout my entire body. I gasped at the almost painful feeling, grabbing my chest and bending at my waist a little, unsure of whether I could go on standing or not. I sucked another large breath into my lungs, but the painful emptiness only grew.

  Right before I fell to the ground, Colt was there, pulling me to him and holding me up. I wrapped my arms around him and buried my face in his chest as a few tears fell from my eyes. I had no idea what the fuck was happening to me, but I felt like I lost a huge part of myself. Like I was missing pieces and I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to get them back.

  I didn’t know what Orrean did to me, but I had a feeling that wouldn’t be the last time it happened.

  ***

  Orrean kept his distance the rest of the day. He took his turn with Mandy and didn’t even hand me his bag to trade off. He simply left it on the ground, picked Mandy up and walked away without looking at me. For some reason, him not even looking at me was like a smack in the face. He was the one that did some weird alien voodoo to me, so why should he be the one acting all upset?

  I tried to ign
ore him the way he was ignoring me, but since he was leading the way, I kept getting reminded of the weird feeling he gave me, every damn time I looked forward. There was no real way to avoid looking at him when we had to stay fairly close together and I literally had to follow him everywhere he went.

  Colt seemed to know I was feeling uncomfortable though, and just like he always did, he seemed to understand what I needed. He held my hand, put his arm around me, or rubbed my back as we walked. When we stopped to eat dinner, he sat behind me and held me to his chest, not allowing me to feel the loneliness that wanted to creep back in for even a second.

  When he held me on his chest that night, he petted my hair and whispered sweet nothings to me until I fell asleep.

  I didn’t dream of Orrean that night; instead I had nightmares about my baby sister Mina, my parents, and other Ferals attacking us all. There was blood everywhere and suddenly, everyone—Colt, Cal, Nolan, Wes, Mandy, and even Orrean—was all lying around me, bleeding and dying, while I remained the only one alive. Then my baby sister appeared out of nowhere with a giant butcher’s knife in her hand that she stabbed into my heart.

  I woke up, crying and in a panic. I felt so stupid when Colt finally calmed me down, reassuring me that it was only a nightmare. I knew it was irrational, but the panicky feeling stayed with me for a long time, so I ended up telling Cal, who’d been on watch at the time, that he could just go to sleep and I’d take over. Colt hugged my waist as I sat in the dark, keeping watch and freaking out that my nightmare would come true.

  I startled at the sudden quiet voice, “Jeremy?” It was Orrean. It was the first time he’d spoken to me since before the big horde of Ferals earlier.

  “Yeah?” my voice sounded raw.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he said quietly. “Everything will be okay.”

  I took a shuddering breath, but his words did bring an unusual comfort to me, even though I knew he didn’t really know that. Still, the gesture was nice, so I whispered, “Okay,” back to him. A few minutes later I heard him snoring.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “You have a headache again?” I asked Colt when I saw him rubbing his temple—again.

  “Yeah,” his voice cracked, and I could tell he was in pain.

  I frowned at him and suggested, “We need to get more Tylenol from Nolan.” I eyed him when he didn’t respond, then added, “I’ll go get it.”

  I took a step in front of him, but stopped when he grabbed my arm, saying, “I already took some.”

  “How long ago? Maybe you need another dose.” I tried to keep my voice low because I could tell that noise was triggering his pain.

  “It’s probably been just over an hour,” he responded with his eyes closed, since he was holding on to my arm.

  I frowned again and asked, “Is it a migraine?” He nodded, so I said, “We’ll have to find you different medicine.”

  He nodded, then whispered, “I think Orrean said something about that. I’m gonna go ask him. I’ll be right back.” He opened his eyes and sped up his walking to get ahead of me before I could respond. I kept frowning at him as I followed him with my eyes. I almost walked up there with him, but he didn’t seem to want me to, so I just slowed down to talk to Wes and Cal, who were bringing up the rear today.

  I saw both of them staring at Colt, Orrean, Nolan, and Mandy up front, so I told them, “Colt has a migraine.”

  Cal had a weird look on his face that I couldn’t decipher, but Wes said, “That stinks. Is he getting medicine?”

  I tore my eyes away from Cal’s facial expression to look at my brother. “I think so.”

  Cal ignored me, saying, “I’ll be back,” then he sped up to the others, leaving me alone with Wesley.

  To distract myself from Colt, I took in my brother and noticed that he looked even more exhausted than usual, so I asked him, “Are you okay?”

  He huffed out an annoyed breath and said, “Are you just trying to rub it in?”

  My brows furrowed at him. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  He glanced at me with a disbelieving look on his face, huffed out another breath and angrily asked, “You just wanna say it and get it over with?”

  “I have no fucking clue what you’re talking about.”

  He eyed me again with a disapproving glare, then he rolled his eyes and sighed, “I couldn’t sleep last night. There, you happy?”

  “Why would you think I’d be happy about that?” I mean, really? What the fuck?

  “You’ve been telling me all week that I’d have nightmares from killing Ferals… it seems you were right,” he confessed, suddenly much more interested in our surroundings than in me.

  “Wesley, I’m really sorry,” I said, all at once feeling guilty, yet wanting to stick my tongue out at him since I’d been right the whole time. I didn’t though, I simply tried to make him feel better. “This is kinda gross and disturbing, but you will get used to it. Sometimes I still have nightmares about it, but not as bad as the first few nights.” It was true… I had nightmares all the time now, but it wasn’t always about me having to kill Ferals.

  He huffed out a breath, but didn’t respond, so I added, “Seriously, Wes, it’ll get better with time. You’ll get used to it.”

  Wes finally looked at me. “Really?”

  “Yeah, definitely.” I elbowed him in the ribs.

  He pushed me more forcefully than I had expected, so I flew a few steps away from him, causing him to laugh. “Thanks, J.”

  I picked up a small rock off the ground and threw it at him. He had been facing forward, so it hit him right in the head, and I started cracking up. He laughed, but ran over and pushed me, making me fall on my side. He didn’t fall with me, so I swung my leg against the back of his knees, taking his legs out from under him and made him fall flat on his ass. I started cracking up, but a second later, he tackled me to the ground on top of my backpack and tried to grab my arms so I couldn’t wrestle him off of me, but I was able to grab one of his wrists and lift my hips to flip him over. I grabbed his other hand and held them both to his sides, pinning him down with my body and smiling smugly at him.

  “Okay, okay,” he yelled after he tried and failed to get me off of him, “truce!”

  “Say, ‘My big brother is better than me,’” I demanded through a big smile.

  He huffed and rolled his eyes. “I’m not sayin’ that.”

  “Then I’m not getting up.”

  He squirmed around, but it was clear that I was stronger than him, so he couldn’t move me away. Through clenched teeth he said, “Fine. My big douchebag brother is… better than me,” he mumbled the last part.

  “What was that?” I asked, holding my ear closer to him.

  “I’m not sayin’ it again, asshole. Just get off me,” he sounded exasperated.

  “Promise not to retaliate,” I demanded.

  He narrowed his eyes at me, but eventually gave in. “Fine.”

  I quickly jumped up and ran a few feet away so he couldn’t tackle me back down. He sat up and shook his head at me, but had a smile on his face.

  I smiled. “Come on. We gotta catch up.” I walked back over and offered my hand. He took it and I pulled him to his feet. Then we walked quickly to the others who had stopped walking and were watching us in amusement. I shrugged, not ashamed of wrestling with my brother. It was the most normal thing he’d done since we found him at home, so I didn’t regret it at all.

  Colt offered a small smile, but I could tell he was still in pain, so I walked over to him and pulled him in, pushing his face into the crook of my neck. He sighed as I started rubbing his back, so I kissed his hair and whispered, “You want me to carry you or something?” I was only half serious, but would carry him if it would help.

  I could feel his smile on my neck. “Nah. I’m not gonna make you carry me just because my head is pounding.”

  “I would,” I told him.

  He snorted, but didn’t say anything. He wrapped his arms around m
y waist, under my backpack and pulled himself closer to me. I felt terrible that he felt so bad. I knew from experience how awful a migraine was, how much you just wanted to cover your head with a blanket and block out the light and the whole world. Since I figured he was getting a little relief stuffed into my neck like that, I suggested to everyone else, “Why don’t we stop here for some lunch?”

  “That’s fine,” Nolan answered immediately.

  “How we doing on water?” I asked as I led Colt to a large rock that I could lean against. I kept his face against me so he wouldn’t even have to open his eyes. It was awkward, but whatever, it worked.

  “We should probably find a water source before we make camp tonight,” Nolan said, following me over to the boulder.

  I pulled Colt’s backpack off his shoulders and let it fall to the ground, then I shifted around until I was able to drop mine, too. I brought Colt with me as I sat down and shifted us until he was sitting sideways between my legs, leaning on me with one shoulder so his face was still in my neck. He turned even farther into me, so his eyes were flush with my skin, blocking out the sun. I grabbed my water bottle and made him drink some, thinking it might help, before letting him settle back down into me.

  Everyone else sat around us and set up some canned potatoes and other random gross food, but I stayed quiet, not wanting my voice to irritate my boyfriend’s head. I kept rubbing his back, and when I went to make him eat a few bites, I realized he had actually fallen asleep, so I simply let him sleep. I figured it might help. Orrean kept shooting concerned looks Colt’s way as he ate.

  When everyone was done eating, I had to nudge Colt awake. He and I got up and started following Orrean again. Wordlessly, my brother grabbed Colt’s bag from him and threw it over one shoulder and his bag over the other. I wrapped my arm around Colt’s shoulders and held him close to me so he could maybe rest a little or at least keep his eyes closed for long periods of time as we walked. I didn’t know what else to do.