Sierra || Lloyd Hansen

12. Guard Dog

With your arm around Claire's shoulders, she helps steady you as you walk through the maze to find an exit. You take a shaky breath and stop walking for a second, looking around you.

"What?" Claire looks up at you.

"I don't feel so good," you mutter.

"Are you gonna be sick or something?"

"No, not like that, bad gut feeling. I'm not usually wrong with that," you sigh and turn back the direction you came from, "Go find my friend, she'll keep you safe."

"Five, you can't go back, you can barely walk. And Six said-"

"Lucky for us I'm a fighter and smarter than him most of the time. I'll be fine, so will Six."

Claire hesitantly nods and continues walking towards the exit while you turn and retrace your steps slowly.

≣≛▸✭◂≛≣

Coming to the opening to the center of the maze, you hear the safety of a gun click. Looking ahead, you see Suzanne lining up a shot at Lloyd.

Without a second thought, you charge forward, tackling her to the ground and knocking the gun out of her grasp just after it goes off. Court immediately abandons his fight with Lloyd as he sees you, running over to help you. Suzanne gets the gun back and shoots him to incapacitate him.

"What the hell?" Suzanne yells at you, shoving you off her and pointing the gun at you and Court. You stay seated on the ground and Court raises an arm in surrender, sitting on the edge of the fountain and keeping pressure on his wound with the other. Lloyd stays where he is, kneeling in the fountain and raises his hands as Suzanne turns the gun to him as well as a threat.

"Don't shoot him."

She scoffs, cocking the gun once more to retake the shot you forced her to miss.

"Kill him and he gets the easy out," you rattle out quickly to keep her attention, "Why not leave him to rot in prison for the rest of his days?"

She glances at you, raising an eyebrow in intrigue, "You really want to let that toxic piece of shit live?"

You glance over at Lloyd who just looks back at you, not sure what your goal is here.

"We have history," Suzanne continues, "Me, Denny, Lloyd, we all went to Harvard together. Those two had this absurd bromance which made it impossible for me to prove to Denny how much of a liability Lloyd was. Then I see these two troglodytes bashing each other. The whole thing just crystalized. Lloyd Hansen is going to take the fall, dead or alive, for everything that has happened. Now, I know how to do that. What I need are a few witnesses to corroborate my story. So, if you two want that girl to live to a ripe old age, you're gonna do exactly as I say. Bad news is you'll probably get your old cells back, but the good news is, if you two behave, I'll let you out to play sometimes. 'Cause frankly, you are both freakishly good at why you do."

Court raises his hand slightly.

"What? Do you have a question? What is that?"

"Does this plan involve us all living?"

Suzanne looks down at you, "If Lloyd acts as a witness to corroborate the story, yes. Yeah, you're gonna live."

"Then we should go," Court mutters, "Lotta blood... lotta blood."

≣≛▸✭◂≛≣

Court is carried out on a spinal board. Claire looks over as a paramedic checks her over. He smiles slightly at her and holds up a sign of the horns to show he's ok and she smiles back at him.