Seeking Daylight

by Becky Poirier

  Chapter Four

  “Wow,” was all Seth said when he saw the new improved me. I still hadn’t seen myself in a mirror, but I knew I felt a lot better. My hair was no longer a massive tangle of knots. And I wasn’t wearing a frumpy sweat suit anymore. Jane had found me a dark green wrap dress to wear. Normally the sight of a dress would have had me running in the opposite direction, but given my current situation there wasn’t much other choice…besides the dirty old sweats. So I’d taken the dress and tried my best to smile gratefully. Something about the way Jane looked at me, made me think she wasn’t exactly buying my change in attitude.

  I’d never been a good actor, so this whole process of earning their trust was going to be much harder than I thought. I decided my best bet for gaining their trust, was to make subtle changes every day. Hopefully that way they wouldn’t see the betrayal coming.

  I made sure to tuck my dress under my butt as Seth swept me up off my feet once again. The way his arms felt against me kept tugging at my memories, threating to pull me back into the past. It wasn’t the first time I’d been held like that, by a pair of strong arms that made me feel completely safe. I didn’t want to feel like that, or to be reminded of those arms.

  Seth kept looking at me when he thought I wasn’t watching. I didn’t like it and it was hard for me not to let him know that. The way he was looking at me reminded me of the way Alex had first looked at me. Back then the attention was new to me, and I’d been all too willing to trust him. I wasn’t going to do the same thing here. I learned a hard lesson, one that had cost me my sister. The only way I could make up for that was to follow through with my plan. I wasn’t going to allow for any distractions, no matter how kind or genuine they appeared.

  We were halfway down the staircase on one of the landings, when Nina came rushing up the stairs, her face flushed and her brow full of sweat. Judging by the look on her face I could tell something serious was going down. Seth realized this too and gently lowered me to the ground. I braced myself against a window ledge.

  “We need to talk,” Nina said emphatically. “Alone.”

  I was prepared to traverse the remainder of the steps on my own, but Seth stopped me as I started to hobble away from the window. “No she’s a part of this now. You can talk freely in front of her just like you would any other member of our group.”

  “That’s still up for debate and after you hear what I have to say you may change your tune. After all it was your foolish action of saving her that has led to our current predicament.”

  “What are you talking about?” I said jumping into the conversation before I could stop myself. Nina glared at me, which prior to what I’d been through would have been enough to make me back off but not anymore. I stood my ground as hard as it was to do.

  “The guy you let live,” she turned her attention back to Seth. “I guess he had enough time to follow you guys back. Because he’s here now, with several of his well-armed buddies.”

  “Crap!” Was all Seth could manage to reply.

  “That’s the understatement of the year,” she replied rolling her eyes.

  “What’s the problem?” I asked not quite understanding. Surely a group as large as theirs could take on a few roughnecks.

  “The problem,” Seth replied, “is that our two best shooters, Kyle and Wes are out on a run.”

  “Actually they’re our snipers,” Nina interrupted. “Some of us are good at close range, but those two are the only ones capable of getting in a clean distance shot. I’ve told you before we shouldn’t let the two of them leave together. But does anyone listen to me? No, of course not.”

  “It’ll be okay,” Seth tried to reassure me. I didn’t think I was acting scared; but he felt the need to reassure me, rather than Nina who was the one in hysterics at the moment. “You can get back to the others and send Jane up she’s not a bad shot.”

  “She’s not a great one either,” Nina grumbled.

  “Well I am,” I interrupted their banter.

  “You’re what?” Nina looked at me like an annoying fly that was buzzing around her head.

  “A good shot. Even with long range. My dad taught me,” I responded calmly. My father had prepared me most of my life for situations just like this. When they came up I didn’t panic because of how well prepared I was. Clearly they weren’t so prepared.

  It was more information that I had ever intended to divulge to this group about myself, but the time for arguing was over. If I was going to make my plan work, I first needed to survive long enough to heal. If that meant protecting this group, then so be it.

  Without any further argument, Seth swept me back up into his arms and we ascended one flight of stairs and then ran off down a long industrial hallway, not stopping to let me down. Nina was fast on our heels and breathing heavily behind us. Seth wasn’t even breaking a sweat.

  When Seth finally lowered me to the ground, we were standing in a large room that I hadn’t been to before. It looked like at one point it had been a conference room. Now it was a greenhouse. There were large windows in the room, some were smashed in but most were still in great condition and allowed the sunlight to fill the room perfectly. In the middle of the room were several large tables, with deep wooden buckets filled with soil and a wide variety of plants. I probably would have been a lot more curious about their little garden if we weren’t in the current emergency situation.

  Focusing on the task at hand, I noticed that standing by the edge of one of the windows with a pair of binoculars, was one of the men I hadn’t really met yet. He was short and stocky, with a scruffy grey beard. He looked like the quintessential version of a redneck. He was holding a large military grade gun. It had an excellent scope. I eyed it in envy. It was the perfect weapon for surviving the apocalypse. I’d never had anything so fancy. Lined up against the wall, I spied several more of the same type of weaponry. I had to work hard to keep from drooling. I’d hit the motherload with this group.

  Seth wrapped my arm around his shoulder, as I hopped over to one of the guns. “Are you sure about this?” He asked me. “I hope it won’t come to us having to use these but if it does…it’s just that killing a human is a lot different than killing one of those things.”

  “I know,” I replied trying not to show emotion, at the memory swelling up inside of me. The memory of the first time I’d taken a human life. Back then I’d felt bad about it. My dad didn’t let me dwell on those feelings. He called me a hero and reminded me that because I took that man’s life, my sister got to live. My family got to live. And since that time I’d done what was necessary to save those I loved. I didn’t have that anymore…no one to love, or kill for, except my revenge.

  Seth spoke to the man by the window, “Cletus could you give us a gun please?” Wow. Cletus? You couldn’t get more stereo-typical if you tried. I was half expecting a banjo to start strumming up. Cletus handed me the gun. It was heavier than it looked. I hadn’t held a large weapon in a couple years. Handguns were so much easier to carry with you than a big gun, especially when on the run. With my injured foot I was finding it hard to stand properly and hold the weapon straight. Add to that my injured arm and this was going to be tougher than I thought. Nina eyed me skeptically as Seth rushed over to the far end of the room, where several chairs had been stacked against the wall. He grabbed one and rushed back over to me. He positioned the chair in front of one of the broken windows. I sat down carefully and put my gun on the edge of the broken glass and looked through the scope as I held onto it as best I could.

  It felt nice to have such a powerful weapon in my arms again. The first time I’d shot at someone, my hands couldn’t stop shaking. Now they were steady. I looked through the scope and instantly saw the ugly short guy from the other day. This time I didn’t fear him. He was looking cocky like he had the time before. He was surrounded once again by bigger men. There were three of them flanking him and they each held riffles in their hands. Those guns might have been intimidating, if it weren�
��t for the awesome power of the gun I held in my own.

  The ugly man was the only one who didn’t have a gun. Instead he had a loudspeaker. “What an idiot,” Nina said to no one in particular. “They use that thing and they could attract every monster in the neighbourhood.”

  “The hives are sleeping right now and even if they did hear it, it would echo off the buildings. They won’t be able to locate the source,” Seth reassured. “Besides, we’ve studied the area. There isn’t a hive for miles.” There was something about the last part of what he said, that didn’t feel truthful. Maybe it was just my suspicious nature, but when someone looked away when talking to me it usually meant they were hiding something. And when he said there wasn’t a hive for miles, he hadn’t looked at any of us. “We’ll be fine,” he added confidently looking me in the eyes again. He seemed more concerned with my fears, than anyone else’s. Seth was a mystery to me and one I didn’t plan on figuring out.

  Nina’s demeanour didn’t change as she loaded her own weapon. I continued to look through my scope beyond the men and around the surrounding buildings. They wouldn’t walk out into the open without having a plan. Even those hillbillies couldn’t be that stupid.

  On cue the ugly one lifted up his loudspeaker and began talking through it. “There’s no need for things to get ugly between us. I’m sure you’d love to hold onto your supplies and this lovely safe place you got here. It looks like a sweet set-up. We’ll let you keep it if, you give us her.”

  Seth looked at me, as I briefly took my eyes off the scope. He looked both angry and worried about how I was taking this all. I don’t know why, but I felt the need to let him know it didn’t bother me. I gave him a reassuring smile. “Well they’re sure desperate for a lay,” I replied not feeling the least bit scared.

  Seth smiled and Cletus burst out laughing. “I like her. We’re not handing her over.”

  “Agreed,” Seth responded. He pulled out his own loudspeaker up off the floor. Nina put her hand over it before he could start to speak through the thing.

  “Are you crazy? You’ll give away our position.”

  “Good,” he said with a smile. “Then they’ll see that we’ve got the upper hand and hopefully they’ll decide to leave.” Nina looked like she wanted to argue. Despite all the control she had over the stores, and the twenty-year difference in age, Seth was clearly in charge in this situation.

  I returned my attention to my scope and continued to search the area. “Sorry boys but she’s not a piece of property for me to just hand over, it looks like you’ll be spending another night alone.”

  The ugly man’s smug look didn’t disappear and I noticed that his companions wore the same sick smiles. They could see our weapons now and knew they were more powerful but they weren’t afraid.

  “Well I was really hoping we could do this trade nice and friendly but it seems…” I don’t know what he was going to say next but before he could finish his sentence I fired the first shot, not at him or his companions on the ground but at a man who was on a roof of one of the buildings opposite who had his high powered machine gun trained on Seth’s head. My shot rang through the air as the stranger’s body fell off the roof face planting on the ground directly behind his companions.

  They wore the same look of shock as my new comrades. Before the shock could wear off, Cletus jumped into action shooting two of the three armed men. Nina was the next to come to her wits as she shot the third armed man. Unfortunately, she only managed to hit him in the arm. Cletus had to finish him off. The ugly man’s look of shock turned to terror as he dropped his loudspeaker and turned to run. Before he had run more than a few yards I shot him in the back of the head. He dropped dead right on the spot. I lowered my gun feeling both relief and pride.

  My three companions were staring at me all with different expressions. Seth was still a little confused, Cletus looked impressed and Nina looked downright pissed. “What the hell were you thinking?” She asked as she yanked my gun out of my hands. If I had been in better condition, I probably would have smacked her just for annoying me. I liked that gun and now that it was gone, I was back to feeling weak and pathetic.

  “I was thinking that before the sniper got a chance to put a bullet through Seth’s skull, I’d take him out?”

  She looked a little shocked. She was clearly still trying to figure out what had happened, but it didn’t matter to her whether I was right or not she wasn’t going to let a stranger like me tell her off. “You have no idea whether he was going to shoot or not. You could have given Seth a chance to talk them down.”

  “Seriously?” I almost laughed as pulled myself up out of the chair. Seth moved in to help me, but I declined his help instead bracing myself against the windowsill. “Did you even know that guy was up there? Were you even paying attention to that situation? The sniper was waiting for a signal and the ugly one was about to give it to them. We wouldn’t have stood a chance. So instead of berating me, you should be thanking me.”

  “Thank you. For what? For turning us into killers.” She looked like she was tempted to train the gun on me. “And were you even thinking about the consequences of what you were doing? We now have five bodies that will attract the beasts. The loudspeakers have surely already told them we’re here and now the blood will help them lock down our position.” She turned her focus to Seth. “I told you bringing her here was a mistake. She’s going to get us all killed.” She looked back at me. “You may not care whether you live or die but we do. If you’re going to kill yourself just do it already.” She put the guns down and rushed out of the room. Seth rushed after her as I collapsed back down in my chair

  I was left feeling completely confused. In the moment I was sure I was doing the right thing. He was going to kill Seth and then the others would have killed the rest of us or most of us. They definitely wanted me alive. But Nina did have a valid point. The blood would draw the demons to our location. Even though the sun was still high in the sky, I wasn’t sure how long it would take to clear the mess and mask the scent. If it was even possible to get rid of that much carnage in time.

  Molly’s image flooded back into my mind. I saw her reaction when she realized the demons had breached our defences. The look of terror was something I couldn’t erase from my mind. Her image morphed into sweet innocent Matthew, who was several years younger. While I was sure he didn’t stand a chance at survival, I didn’t want to be responsible for any more death. What had I done?

  Cletus brought me out of my morbid thoughts as he placed his hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. You did the right thing. We didn’t have another choice. Their kind have never had hope. They take and kill without remorse. They would have killed us and then tortured as many of the women as they wanted, probably over several days. What you did saved us all.” I smiled up weakly at him. “And don’t worry about the mess down there it’s not the first time a clean-up was required. We’ve had success in the past and we have plenty of time now. Don’t fret, those beasts won’t find us.”

  “He’s right,” Seth said from the doorway. He looked out of breath and angry. Before today I hadn’t seen him angry. It didn’t feel natural on him. His face wasn’t meant for that emotion. He was too good for that. “I’m sorry for what she said to you. She had no right. And you were right.”

  “About what?”

  “That we owe you a thank-you. So thank-you.” I smiled at him allowing some of the fear I’d felt to wash away. “Cletus is right. Don’t worry about the infected. They won’t find us. You’re safe here, I promise you that.” I wasn’t worried about myself it was just Matthew and now him. And that scared me. I was starting to care, in spite of everything I told myself. They were starting to matter. And maybe they were doomed, but that didn’t mean that I couldn’t try to help protect them for as long as I was here. And then when I left, I would leave it up to fate. In a couple of months none of this would matter anyways.

  Seth picked me up and began carrying me back down the sta
irs. There was silence as we descended the staircase until I finally broke it. “Thank-you,” I said softly.

  “For what?”

  “For letting me help.”

  He smiled. “You’re welcome.” Silence lingered again for a moment and then he asked. “Do you think you could return the trust by at least telling us your name?”

  No, I thought. There was no point to it. It wasn’t like I was staying here forever. And if I went there it would only make it harder to leave. Still if I was going to have them trust me enough to be able to put my plan into action, then I needed to give them something. So I gave him the only name I could think of. It was the name of my imaginary friend I had when I was four.

  “It’s Amber,” I replied. There was something in his face, that made me believe he wasn’t entirely convinced that was my real name. But he didn’t question it.

  He simply replied, “It’s nice to meet you Amber.”

  Chapter Five

  In a place like this, word travels fast. Of course I was pretty sure that it was Nina who had spread the word of what I’d done. If she’d expected to receive support for getting me kicked out, it seriously backfired. I was the new hero in town. Not that I wanted the attention. It would certainly support my plan for gaining their trust, but I had no intention of getting to know anyone else. Now, with my newfound popularity, that seemed impossible.

  Since Seth had dropped me back off in the main living area, I’d been accosted by pretty much everyone in the community. The only person who didn’t come shake my hand was an older gentleman who sat off in the corner. Since I’d come here, I hadn’t once seen him engage anyone in conversation. I doubted he was on Nina’s side. I wasn’t even sure if the man could speak. Him I liked. He had the right idea. The rest of them were annoying me. My plans to sleep away the afternoon were shot. Thankfully, most of them couldn’t chat too long. Clean-up needed to happen right away. Those who were strongest were sent out to clean up the mess, I’d made or helped to make depending on who you asked.