Our Life (Sequel to "Remnants")

Unforeseen Consequences

-Riley-

Several hours had passed, with no sight or even a hint of Aiden's presence in the area.

I clutched onto my pistol as though my life depended on it - hell, it perhaps would...

But as the analogue clock beside my bed reached 0500, I gradually came to the belief that I was panicking about nothing now.

After another quarter of an hour, I released my grip on the pistol, my hands physically aching from having clutched it for so long, as the welcome light of dawn gradually seeped over the horizon.

I stretched my limbs with a groan, realizing only now how tired I was following a whole night without sleep.

Hoping to gain at least an hour or so of decent sleep, I rested back on the couch, welcoming the comforting contact with its soft leather as I gratefully accepted sleep.

—

I was awoke shortly after with a loud scream, which had me jolting upright in a split-second, since any female scream I heard these days would bring back memories of my mother's screams.

This was not my mom, however, and I was intrigued as to what caused it.

Fearing the worst - a walker infestation - I once again reached down and picked -*up my pistol, walking outside once more and cautiously looking around.

Still not fully recovered from my near death experience outside earlier, I was quite hesitant to walk out into the street, but was relieved to see that many other curious people were walking outside to investigate the noise.

Knowing that even someone as reckless as Aiden wouldn't risk trying to kill me in a street full of people, I proceeded along with the majority of the crowd toward the church, where the scream seemed to have originated from.

As I neared the large structure, I noticed Carl among the curious members of the community.

"Carl," I beamed, jogging over to him as he looked on in confusion, "morning."

"Morning, Ri," he returned the gesture, welcoming me with an embrace, "you got any idea what's going on?"

I shook my head in decline, "just follow the crowd and we'll find out."

The two of us did exactly that, until we reached the set of steps leading up to the church.

A large mass of people were already on the scene - some were watching on in —bewilderment, whilst others looked shocked and in disbelief.

Trying to gently push my way through the crowd, I temporarily disbanded from Carl to get a close look at the cause of this early disruption.

Eventually, I reached the front of the crowd.

Stepping around the dried blood which had trickled down the steps, I peered between two adults' shoulders and identified the cause of the blood that stained the marble church steps.

Aiden...

I stood for several moments, both utterly perplexed and horrified to see a body inside the walls of Alexandria.

Until now, such a thing was almost unheard of, but sure enough, Aiden's body lay splayed out over the entrance to the church.

My initial fear was that he would reanimate as a walker, but I discovered with a grimace that his head had impacted against the next step.

So Aiden tries to shoot me in the middle of the night, then someone shoots him. Was someone helping me? Perhaps they fired the bullet, as a warning shot? Or perhaps they have hostile intent, and the killing of Aiden wasn't influenced by his actions toward me? God knows...

Alexandria wasn't as safe as we once thought, and people would start asking questions. The fact that Aiden had threatened to kill me only a few hours before he wound up dead would certainly be one such inquiry - his hatred toward me was not unknown by the public, and a silent kill in the night would make sense given our hostility.

"Get out of the way," a familiar voice demanded, "get out of the way."

We all reluctantly parted from the scene, as a bewildered Deanna Monroe was forced to witness the bloodied body of her only remaining relative.

"Ai-Aiden..." she stammered, her voice trembling as she slumped to her knees beside the body.

"My boy," she sobbed hopelessly, her voice echoing a pain and anguish that we had all felt once upon a time, and it was the worst feeling in the world.

"Please..." she trembled in sorrow, "please, my son."

Her pleas were in vain however, and a harrowed Deanna was reduced to reaching over with a quivering hand and placing it in Aiden's lifeless one, "Please don't... please don't go."

I couldn't watch this anymore.

Aiden was certainly cruel to me, but I would never have wished this upon him, and especially not his already bereaved mother.

I turned around and began pushing back through the crowd, wondering how the hell this had happened, and fearing the events to come.