'May God have mercy on your souls,' Tyreece mumbled.
As we approached the command house, I heard the screams of our people. 'Run!' I heard Nina shout. We raced to the house to find it overrun, how on earth had so many of the dead reached this far into our community? I didn't have time to dwell on it as we ran into the fray, there was maybe ten people alive inside. I couldn't believe my eyes, there had been a hundred people on this island, fifty army personnel, thirty civilians and twenty able bodied people that could fight.
Now there was maybe ten trained people left and maybe the same amount of regular people.
'Nina, you're alright!' Tyreece exclaimed.
'I'm fine but we need to get out of here, now.'
'No, I need to contact Lieutenant Corbin. He may be able to help us, he could have operatives nearby,' I told them.
'What do you need us to do?' I heard Liam ask.
'I just need you to keep the dead out of the radio room until I've finished talking to them,' I said urgently.
'Yes Sir,' I heard a voice from behind me. It was Marshal and his friends, I could see a few non-combat ready people with them. I nodded as I raced into the radio room, luckily there was no corpses inside. The others closed the door behind me, I hated having to sit in here while they risked their lives but I had to contact Corbin. While I had been wary of him and his people, I had to admit that if there was any help to be found it would come from him.
'This General Hannibal, we have an emergency here, do you read me? Over,' I tried not to sound panicky, I didn't want them to think I couldn't handle it when things got rough.
'This is Lieutenant General Corbin, what is your emergency over?' He sounded as calm and collected as ever.
'The island has been overrun, there's barely even twenty of us left. We need help, over,' I told him.
'Can you get to a boat? Over.'
'Yes, we have boats on the harbour, over.'
'Get on the boat, travel to Portsmouth and we'll have our operatives with you within a few a days. Over.'
'Thank you, over and out.'
I flung open the door to find my troops fighting a large group of corpses, I didn't hesitate as I joined in the fray. I wouldn't shoot my gun inside as it would be too easy to injure one of my own.
I slashed and sliced my way through them, but there was just too many to deal with and we were in an enclosed space. 'We need to get to the harbour, and get on a boat. Now!' I shouted. I grabbed Willow by the hand and pulled her out of the house, I kept calling to the others to head to harbour but I wasn't sure how much they heard me over the screaming.
'We can't just leave them,' she told me sadly.
'We have to get to the harbour, we need to ready the boat,' I replied urgently.
I could see the tears in her eyes, I didn't want to leave either but the island was too overrun, there was no way we could clear this and stay here. We raced down to the harbour, catching up with a few of our people along the way. We found Theo and his friends, we also found Tyreece, Nina, Molly and a few of the island people. There was ten of left.
'Did you see Liam or Fred?' I asked the others as we ran.
'Fred's gone, I saw it myself,' Nina replied tearfully.
'Liam's gone too, h-he saved me,' Molly told me.
'Fucking hell,' I said angrily.
We got to the harbour in one piece, just barely. The dead were all around us, in a way it was lucky that there wasn't much more of us. We only had the one boat, it could only hold fifteen people.
'What did Corbin say?' Willow asked as climbed on to the boat.
'He told me to get us to Portsmouth and he'd sent operatives over, he said they'd be here in a few days,' I replied tiredly.
'Where will we go from there?' Nina asked fearfully.
'I honestly don't know, but all I do know is that help is coming.' It was fortunate that we always left the keys in the boat, I told Tyreece to control the boat. I needed a minute to compose myself, I'd lost everything, my home, most of my friends, my people but as I turned to look at Willow I felt a sense of gratitude that at least I still had her. I didn't usually display my affections in front of my men, but I didn't care. I flung my arms around her and just held her as I watched the boat sail away from our home.
I didn't know what the future held for us, or where we would end up but one thing I know, was that I would never let anything like this happen again. I'd do whatever it took to keep them safe.
Chapter 30
Frankie
Two months went by and we stayed on the farm, in truth I don't think any of us wanted to leave. We had become valued members of the group and Jade revelled in not having to be the leader all the time. We had all come to love it here, we had electricity and hot food not to mention that this place seemed to mellow Kyle out. We were all happy and free here and Jensen had become quite the farmer.
Jade had found love in the form of Ash a man in his early thirties who was tall and well built. He had shoulder length chestnut brown hair and beautiful blue eyes, he loved smoking weed and he and Jade could often be seen getting high together. It was a funny sight indeed, I can remember the first time she smoked it after going so long without. They had laid in the field staring at the stars, me and Violet had gotten quite a thrill from scaring the living hell out of them by jumping out from behind the bushes.
Marcel was happy being with his mother's people, he often took shifts in the watchtower to keep an eye out for walkers or dangerous people not that there were any other people near here. It made me sad to think that he wasn't going to come with us when we left, I would miss him. We all would, since he told us that he wouldn't be joining us, we'd made an effort to spend more time with him.
Brooke had become quite a little mother, there were three other young children here and she often took care of them when their parents needed a rest. It seemed that being here made her much less neurotic, which was definitely a good thing. I'd seen a new side to Brooke since we'd been here, she was happier, calmer and it seemed she'd found her calling in life.
Delilah was good all round on the farm, she loved feeling like she was close to her family again. We remained close friends even though we spent less time together, I just wished she could find true happiness like Jensen and I did, or like Jade and Ash. I knew Marcel had liked her but sadly she just wasn't into men.
Finn became a master a ploughing and harvesting the fields, he loved it and he'd even found a football which he played whenever he could. He and Jensen had become really great friends, I think not having to constantly fight for our lives enabled them to build on their friendship.
Violet was happy here as well, I knew she still missed Dom but Violet took it upon herself to be involved in just about everything. She asked Delilah to train her some more, given that Jade was often preoccupied Ash. Not that Violet minded, she was glad Jade had found someone. She also helped out with Lottie in the kitchen, so she'd learned to cook. Violet helped us to patrol the perimeter, and made sure that she was as helpful as she could be.
Rowena was very much like Violet, she got involved in just about everything though she always made time to for Kyle. She could cook, clean and help out on the fields. We spent some time together, and despite that I still didn't fully trust Kyle I felt glad that at least she was happy.
As for me, I took to reinforcing our defences, organising the runs we went on and when Jade wanted a time out from going out there, I took care of our people. Since we had that chat after Annabelle we'd both been taking turns in leading our people.
Now we were safe, and not having to always fight for our lives or make such hard choices I found that the role being the leader was not such a burden. In fact, I loved it. Not that I was ever one for praising myself, I knew that I could do it, I could see things others couldn't and I don't just mean the visions. I could look at a plan and see flaws others couldn't, I could find ways out of things and somehow always manage to keep my family safe.
On the last trip into a nearby
town Kyle had brought Rowena back five boxes of hair dye, I don't think I'd ever seen her so excited. Her hair was now bright blue, I'd been wary when she first did it but it looked absolutely beautiful. Kyle and Rowena had indeed become an item, though we all thought it was weird at first we got used to it. Jade still didn't like it, and she had told them so she even told Kyle that if he hurt her baby girl in any way she would make him pay. Though I think that given that Kyle had also brought Jade back some hair dye as well as some hairdressing scissors and thinning scissors went a long way to helping her like him.
We were happier than we had ever been, though I knew that Finn missed his mum, Faye and Leon but he talked to them everyday on the radio. I even got to start reading again, they didn't have a whole lot of books but they had enough to keep me occupied for a while. We'd not had any deaths or anything bad happen to us since being here, and it seemed that for the time being we put our mission on hold. I sat in fields talking to our family, and Kyle about when we were getting back to our mission.
'I know what you're all going to say,' Jade told us.
'Well, answer the question then,' Rowena replied.
'I honestly don't know, yes we've got our mission and that hasn't changed. But we're happy here, we've got stability, safety and security. Those things are hard to find in this world,' Jade told her.
'I know, but when my mum made the vaccine we promised to save the world,' Finn spoke up.
'How about this, we stay here until the new year. Gather more supplies and get some cars for us, and then we go,' I suggested. We talked for a while trying to decide, I loved living here and I know the others did to, but Finn was right, we needed to move on. I knew part of Jade's reason for wanting to stay was because of Ash, she was afraid that he wouldn't want come with us. I didn't want her to lose him, and it wouldn't be fair if she did, but that was the sacrifice we made for saving the world.
'Alright, I think we should go with Frankie's suggestion,' Kyle surprised me by agreeing.
'So do I,' Jensen agreed.
Everyone else agreed though Jade looked a little sad, when everyone else left I pulled Jade to onside to talk to her.
'I know Ash is the reason you want to stay, have you asked him if he wants to come with us?' I asked gently. 'No, I'm afraid to,' she confessed. 'Well then, I think it's time you talked to him. I think he really cares about you, I have a feeling he'll join us,' I told her smiling.
'I'm glad one of us is being positive,' she joked.
'I just have faith, everything will be alright,' I replied happily. We walked back to the house, we had another job to do today. We were trying to decide where to go on our next scouting mission. We had been scavenging all the areas nearby for fuel for the generator and looking for working cars, we'd picked clean all the small places within thirty miles. There was nothing left in any of the little towns or villages, so we'd decided to venture into a city.
There were two options for us, one was Stoke-On-Trent which was a fifteen minute drive away, the other was Birmingham which was almost and hour away. Even though we'd already been to StokeOn-Trent, we hadn't fully checked it, but I thought it would be a waste of time.
As we sat trying to decide, I noticed Kyle looking a little smug in the corner. I shook my head, I never could figure him out. When Rob had suggested going to Stoke-On-Trent or Stafford, it was Kyle that then pointed out that Birmingham wasn't too far away. I wondered if he'd planned for us to argue like this, while he had been much more well behaved since we arrived here that didn't mean I trusted him any more than before. Jade came in not much later, she looked happy. I smiled at her, looks like Ash would be joining us after all.
'We need to make a decision other wise we'll end up running out of fuel,' Rob bellowed.
'Everyone be quiet!' Jade shouted at the top of her voice. The room fell silent, I don't know what it was about Jade but even amongst this new group she was able to command and lead in a way. Her and Rob had sort of unofficially shared the leadership, while Rob still ran his group and Jade still took charge of ours, she could make a room fall silent and quell any arguments among these people.
'Sorry,' they all murmured.
'Now first things first we need to look at our options, it's either Stoke, Stafford or Birmingham. So let's weigh up the pro's and con's,' she said politely. One at a time we went round the room and everyone had a say, Kyle of course wanted to go Birmingham. Though his reasons were valid I had to admit, he felt that if we ran into any trouble with either people or walkers we shouldn't be near home in case they followed us back. Not only that, as Birmingham was bigger we stood more of a chance of finding an increased amount of supplies.
Rob on the other hand thought Stoke was a better choice because it was nearer and if we ran into trouble we could return home quicker. We had quickly ruled out Stafford as it was much smaller than either Stoke or Birmingham, and we needed somewhere reasonably big in order to find plenty of supplies.
After hours of discussion we finally decided to go to Birmingham, while me and Jensen had been among those who had wanted to go to Stoke the majority voted for Birmingham after Kyle's speech. I had a very bad feeling about it, I just knew something bad was going to happen. I tried to talk to Jade about it later that day, even though I knew it was futile.
'I agree with you but the group has decided so we have little choice but go with the majority,' she said frustratedly.
'I just know that something bad is going to happen though, and you always tell me to listen to my instincts,' I told her.
'And you should, but these people aren't like us, if we tell them you have a bad feeling they'll think you're crazy,' she replied sympathetically.
'What should I do?'
'Just be careful, and while you're out there if something feels wrong don't do it,' was all the advice she could offer. We had decided that out of our group, me, Jensen and Angelo would go on the run. While the others had offered, Rob was sending most of the farm group out so we didn't really need any more of us to go. I knew I would have felt better if Finn were coming with us, we would be leaving first thing tomorrow morning.
The feeling in the pit of my stomach grew, I tried to listen to the plans but my mind was elsewhere.
We'd gotten to know Angelo a lot since being here, he was a kind, loyal lad who was only a year younger than me. He was always on hand to help out, and loved taking care of the kids. One of the many things I loved about being on the farm was the fact that they had animals, our dinner's often consisted of eggs, which was perfectly fine with me as its meant having hot food. Tonight's dinner was eggs and chips, it felt like a fine last meal, I thought sadly.
Jensen could tell something was wrong, but I had yet to find the time to talk to him. After dinner we retired to our tent and he immediately asked me what was wrong.
'I have a really bad feeling about tomorrow, I've tried talking to Jade but she doesn't want the others to think we're crazy so we can't warn them,' I told him feeling upset about the whole thing. 'As much as I hate to say it, she's right. If we go off spouting about dreams and bad feelings they will think we're crazy, to be honest you're not the only one who has a bad feeling about it, I do too,' he replied looking uncomfortable.
I sat there not knowing what to do, there's no way that we could protect all of these people while we were out. Some of them were going to die and there was nothing we could do about it, my heart felt heavy as I laid down on my sleeping bag.
I woke in the morning with bats in my stomach, I rubbed my tired eyes as I got up. I pulled my long blonde hair into a ponytail, tightened the laces on my boots and prepared for what I knew was going to be a hell of a battle. I couldn't eat my food at breakfast, my eyes felt heavy as I had been awake most of the night worrying. Despite the sunny weather, I felt as though a storm cloud were hovering over me.
We gathered a short while and said goodbye to the others, I hugged Jade goodbye. I clung to her for a moment, fearing that I would not see her again.
'Don't
worry, you'll be back,' she whispered comfortingly in my ear.
'I hope so,' was all I could say. Jensen, Angelo and I hopped in the little red Fiesta and began to drive along the M6 towards Birmingham. We said very little as we drove, I looked at Angelo in the drivers seat. His face gave away very little but I could tell that he to was feeling unnerved about our mission. I wanted to offer some form of comfort, but at that time there were no words that could quell my own fears, so I did not try to subdue anyone else's woes.
Jensen's brooding face did little to offer me comfort either, I could see it in his eyes that he feared we would not return. We stopped along the motorway to move cars from the middle of the road, with twenty-three of us working together it took very little time. There were but a few walkers roaming the roads, nothing we couldn't handle. Our small victories should have vanquished my worries, yet I found that the nearer we were to the city the more my heart began to race.
I had wondered many times if these concerns were just my mind playing tricks on me, could I just be projecting my own fears on to others and working myself up for no reason? It seemed unlikely as the others appeared to feel the same, well our group did, I didn't know about the farm people.
Though they had been kind and welcoming to us and we had become a part of them, I did not feel about them they way I did Jade and the others. I had asked myself why, on many occasions but no answer could ever come to mind.
'We're almost here,' Angelo said sombrely.
'Here's where we need to park,' I told him, as I pointed to the spot marked on the map. We were to park at Birmingham Cathedral and wait for the others to catch up, I jumped out of the car to see a large herd of corpses running this way. I pulled my large machete out of it's sheath and got ready to fight.
Angelo and Jensen stood next to me as the herd grew closer, I sliced one that had got too close but there were two more right behind it. Jensen pulled me back as it went for me, while Angelo stabbed it in the head. I saw the others pull up nearby, relief washed over me as I knew we couldn't have handled these by ourselves.
Dead World Rising (Book 3): The Cure Page 30
