When the first Warrior comes up the stairs, gun raised and ready to kill, I pull away from the window and drop to the floor. Ryder and Reese follow suit, and Tobe crawls toward me on her hands and knees.
“Come out with your hands up!”
“Do they honestly think we’re just gonna come out, line up, and wait to be shot?” Reese asks with a sneer. “They may have the numbers, but we’re not going to gift up without a fight.”
“Attention!” That voice. I’d know it anywhere. “This is Frank Schultz, the leader and founder of the Warriors. We are giving you the opportunity to surrender to us, and you will be spared.”
“Do you think we’re stupid?” Reese shouts. “We know what is gonna happen if we surrender. You’re gonna shot me and my brother, and you’re gonna torture and break the girls so you can do whatever you want to them.”
“You have my word that no harm will come to the girls should you surrender.”
“I think you and I have a different opinion on what constitutes as harm,” Ryder shouts. “You can forget about us surrendering. We’ll defend this place with every last breath!”
“Don’t pick any more of a fight than you have to,” Reese warns. “I don’t want them to think the only way to end this is by killing us all mercilessly.”
“’m going to give you one more chance to surrender,” Frank says. “You have two minutes before I give my men the order to open fire on your house. If you wish to signal surrender, hang a white sheet out your window, and then come out with your hands up. Failure to do so will result in your immediate deaths.”
I run down the seconds in my head, but neither Ryder nor Reese moves to find a white sheet. Instead, they prepare their guns and ammunition for the upcoming fight that I’m sure will happen. I tighten my grip on my handgun, and look at the three spare magazines on the ground beside me. I’ve only shot a few zombies, and never any actual people. I’m not sure if I can do it now, even if they are horrible murderers and rapists.
There aren’t enough people left in the world to just carelessly kill someone like this. There has to be a solution. I want to believe there is, but to be honest I don’t see any solution presenting itself in the next sixty seconds or so. In sixty seconds, just one minute, the four of us are probably going to die, or Tobe and I are going to wish we were dead.
I glance over at Ryder, and he frowns. It looks like he wants to say something to me, but he gets interrupted by gunfire.
The sounds of the shots as they go off are so loud in the nearly silent island that I want to cover my ears with my hands and cower down behind the window, but I can’t. I have to prove my worth, or we’re all going to die.
The windows all shatter and bullets rip into the far wall. The television set explodes, the stuffing flies from the inside of the couch, and wood splinters burst in all different directions. In a matter of minutes, the entire living room is destroyed, and there is nothing usable left.
Ryder’s training takes over and, the second after the bullets stop, he has is gun up and pointing out the window. He pulls the trigger several times, and Reese follows closely behind him. I can hear the Warriors scrambling to take cover, but one Warrior isn’t fast enough, and someone screams in pain.
One down, nine to go.
The bullets riddle the side of the house, and Ryder and Reese both duck down, flattening their bodies to the ground. Tobe and I join them, squishing our bodies as flat as they can go, and we simply wait for this all to be over with. When the bullets cease, Ryder gets up and begins shooting again. but this time, his eyes widen, and he throws himself down to the ground just as a fiery bomb explodes ten feet to our left.
The front door bursts into flame, and the flames begin creeping slowly along the windowsill and up to the ceiling. “What the hell just happened?” Tobe shrieks, staring at the growing flames with a deer-in-the-headlights expression on her face.
“Molotov cocktail. They’ve got more prepared. This place is gonna be completely engulfed in flames soon, and we can’t stay here. Head for the back door, and we’ll circle around through the trees and make our way to the boat.”
Reese shoves me and Tobe toward the back door, and Reese stops just long enough to sling a backpack full of MRE’s over his shoulder, and then we’re out the back door and into the backyard. We make it almost thirty feet before Ryder slams into me, knocking me to the ground, just as the corner of the rabbit hutch explodes.
Reese is at the trees, and Tobe is behind us, cowering against the side of the rabbit hutch. Four Warriors have us pinned down, and Ryder can’t lean around the hutch far enough to get a shot at them. These Warriors are smarter than the ones out front; one of them always has a loaded gun, and the bullets don’t let up.
Frank steps out from the trees, missing Reese by mere feet, and looks at us. “You didn’t really think I’d leave the backdoor uncovered, did you? All you’ve succeeded in doing right now is making more problems for yourself. Now, I’m going to enjoy killing you all.”
“Wait!” I shout, jumping out from behind the rabbit hutch. “I’m the one you want. I’m the one that killed your men. Take me, and let them go.”
“Sam!” Ryder snaps, glaring at me. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Hopefully saving your lives,” I say, looking over my shoulder at him. I turn back to Frank, and bite my cheek to keep from crying. “I’ll come willingly if you just let them go. You don’t need them. Please.”
Reese is watching me with a mixture of horror and anger on his face. I can tell he wants to yell at me, but he can’t or he’ll give away his position from the trees, and he can’t afford to do that right now. So he looks down at the rifle in his hands, and I want to shake my head at him, but I don’t want Frank to notice.
Reese might be able to kill Frank, but he’ll be dead before he can pull the trigger again. He knows that, and his arms go slack, and I’m not worried about him shooting up the place. He’ll pick the best time and place for a fight, and it’s not right now or right here.
“If I go willingly with you, will you let them all live?”
Frank considers my offer for a moment. “Hmm, you are the one that killed my men, and you are the one that managed to hide from me for so long. You’ve obviously got spunk; I’ll enjoy breaking you.” A shiver crawls up my spine, and I try not to let it show. “Alright. If you come with me, I’ll let your friends live,” he says, extending his hand out to me.
“Sam, don’t do this!” Ryder says, taking a step forward. He leaves the safety of the rabbit hutch, but Frank doesn’t give the order to kill him, which I take as a good sign.
“I have to. He’ll let you live if I go with him.”
“Ryder’s right,” Tobe says from behind the rabbit hutch. “You can’t trust him.”
“Sam–”
I turn to Ryder and whisper, “I won’t let you all die when I can do something to save you. I care about you too much.”
A pained look flashes across his face, and he shakes his head. “No. You’re not doing this. I won’t let you.”
I step forward before he can try and stop me, and take Frank’s outstretched hand, even though it repulses me to do it. His hand tightens painfully around mine and he smiles. There’s a mean glint in his eyes, and I’m not sure if it’s because he’s crazy, or because he’s evil.
He pulls me closer. “Kill the man, and take the other girl.”
Tobe screams and Ryder brings his gun up too late. The shot goes off, and Ryder falls back to the ground. A red blossom spreads across his right shoulder, and he starts to breathe harshly. I scream and kick at Frank, but I can’t get away from him. Ryder’s bleeding to death feet from me, and I can’t be with him.
Frank lifts me off the ground, and two of his other Warriors step forward to grab Tobe. They drag her kicking and screaming from the backyard, and I watch Ryder start to choke on his own blood. There’s another shot, and I see Reese duck into the trees, out of harm’s way. He disappears, and Frank nods to two
of his men. They run off into the trees after Reese, and I can hear gunfire, but it’s getting farther and farther away.
“Let me go!” I scream, trying to free myself so I can run to Ryder. He’s bleeding to death and he needs me. I slam my elbow back into Frank’s gut, and he groans, but doesn’t drop me.
Instead, he wraps his arm around my throat and whispers, “I love a feisty woman.”
I should stop fighting because this is only turning him on, but I can’t. I can’t just leave Ryder behind, especially when I know that I’ll probably never see him again. He’s going to bleed to death alone and in pain, and I haven’t told him I’m sorry for our last fight.
Frank drags me through the trees, out front to the dock, and he loads me into his boat. Then he binds my wrists and ankles, but leaves my mouth uncovered so I can scream for Ryder. I scream from the moment he was shot until long after the island disappears from view.
Tobe is huddled up beside me. She’s bound just like me, but she isn’t struggling as much. I can tell by looking into her eyes that she’s already given up. She knows what’s going to happen to us when we get where we’re going, and she’s already shutting down. All the work we’ve accomplished over the last couple of days is completely undone, and she’s reverted to being an abuse victim.
Except this time there is no wine to help her cope. But at least she doesn’t have to suffer alone this time…I think to myself. She and I are going to be tortured, probably beaten, and possibly sexually assaulted. Ryder is probably dead, and Reese is missing; nobody is going to save me this time. I’ll have to find a way to keep myself and Tobe safe from these horrible men.
I don’t know how long we’re in the boat, or how far from the island we’re heading, but the entire trip seems to pass by in the blink of an eye. One moment I’m leaving behind two of the only people I’ve come to care about since this infection spread, and the next Tobe and I are being thrown into a tent and tied to the wooden pole that supports it.
“Tobe? Are you alright?”
She whimpers, but doesn’t say anything. Over the next couple of hours I try to get Tobe to speak, but she’s completely unresponsive. She knows what’s coming in the next few days, and she’s mentally preparing for it by zoning out. Her body may be here when they come for us, but her mind won’t be.
Night comes, and I try to get some sleep in-between crying for Ryder and thinking of escape. I’m alone in a strange camp with Frank and his Warriors, but I’m going to need to keep up my strength if I’m going to have any chance of fighting my way free. So even though I’m terrified at what might happen, I can’t stay up all night worrying about it.
Finally, a few hours after nightfall, I manage to get some sleep.
In the morning, I wake up with sore shoulders and a stiff neck. I spent all night with my arms tied behind my back and my head slumped down to my chest. My entire body is sore and my muscles scream in protest when I try to work my wrists free from the rope binding them.
After a few minutes, I have to stop and admit that the rope isn’t budging. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon, but this gives me time to come up with an awesome escape plan. Today I’m going to do something other than cry for Ryder like I did all last night.
Knowing that he bled to death sometime last night nearly kills me, and it takes every ounce of strength I have to keep from bursting into tears and becoming useless. The thought of never seeing Ryder again hurts my heart, and for a minute I think about giving up. What point is there in escaping if Tobe and I can’t go back to Reese and Ryder?
We won’t survive long on our own. The last week has shown me that. If Tobe and I don’t have Reese and Ryder to help take care of us, we’re going to either starve to death, or get eaten alive and turn into soulless flesh-eating monsters. Neither of those things sound great, but neither does staying here at this camp with Frank.
I take a deep breath, and look around the tent. There are three others girls tied to another pole, and I check them out in terms of usefulness. One of the girls looks to be about fourteen years old, and she might be a couple of inches taller than me. Her hair is light blonde, her eyes are light gray, her lips are thin, and her build is petite. When she looks at me, her eyes are dead and lifeless.
The other girl is a couple of years older, but she can’t be more than sixteen, and a few inches taller. Her skin is a soft, espresso color, and her eyes are large and brown. Her hair is black, wavy and long, hanging almost to her waist. Her build is athletic and powerful; she might be of use in an escape attempt.
The third girl is a couple of years older than me, and about the same height as the dark-skinned girl. Her hair is blonde and short, and she has a similar expression on her face as the youngest girl. She’s completely given up hope of being rescued, and she’s probably just hoping for an easy death.
“Hey. Hey, are you alright?”
The dark-skinned girl looks up at me with dark, pain-filled eyes. “What do you want?”
“How long have you been here?”
“I’ve only been here for about a week. They caught me while I was digging through what’s left of the drug store near my home. I thought they would rescue me, but they dragged me away, beat me, and starved me of food and water.”
“What else did they do to you?”
“Nothing yet. They’re trying to break me down before they do anything more to me. After four days with no food and water, they dragged me into one of the other tents and threw me down on a bed. One of the men tried to have sex with me, but I bit one of his fingers off.”
I gape at her. “You bit off his finger?”
“Yep,” she smiles proudly. “They didn’t try anything again after that. I went one more day without water, before they finally had to relent and give me some or risk killing me. So now they’re starting my torture over again. It’s been almost forty-eight hours without water.”
“What’s gonna happen to the two of us?” I ask, nodding my head at Tobe, since that’s the only part of me that can move right now.
She frowns. “They’re probably gonna come in and beat you, then starve you, and then in three days time, they’re gonna test you. If you fight back too much, you’ll start over again. If you fight just enough, you’re fair game to all the men. That’s what happened to Melissa here,” she says, nodding her head at the younger blonde, the one with the dead eyes. “They’ve had her for about two and a half weeks I think.”
I glance at Tobe out of the corner of my eye. “Did you know her when you were with them?” I don’t get an answer, but I didn’t really expect one. She hasn’t said a word since we were on the island, and she’s not going to start now. I look back at the dark-skinned girl. “She was abducted by the Warriors before and was held for over a month.”
The girl shakes her head. “I’m sorry to hear that. What’s your name newbie?”
“Sam.”
“Naomi,” she says. “I’d offer you my hand, but they’re kind of tied up right now. Are you alright?”
“I’m just wondering how Frank and his group managed to find us. We traveled a long way to get here, all the way from Louisville, Kentucky. How did they track us this far?”
“I think I can answer that for you. I heard one of the men say that they found your apartment and an open map to Beaver Island on one of the counters. That’s near here, right?”
I sigh. “Yeah, it is, and I left that map there without even thinking about it. That’s how they found us. They knew where we were going, and we used the first dock we found. We weren’t exactly hard to locate.”
“Hey man, Frank wants you to check in on our guests!”
Naomi looks at me. “Do whatever they tell you, but don’t make it easy on them. Never stop fighting, or they’ll get rid of you.”
The tent flap pulls back and a man walks in. He can’t be more than twenty, but he looks older and more deadly with a shotgun in his hands. He’s dressed in army fatigues, black combat boots, and he has a black cap on. “How are we
feeling today ladies?”
Tobe, Melissa, and the other blonde don’t answer, and they don’t look up. They just hang their heads in total silence. He looks at them with obvious disgust, and then turns his attention to Naomi. “How are we doing today firecracker?”
She sneers. “Just peachy. My new friend and I were getting to know one another. Gotta problem with that, sir?”
He smiles. “God, I love ‘em feisty.”
She looks unfazed for the most part, but I can see a slight hint of fear in her eyes. She knows what’s going to happen to her once she becomes more approachable, and she’ll do anything to keep it from occurring. Even if she’s given up hope of rescue, she can’t look like she’s given up.
He turns to me. “Well, our new recruits are awake it seems. How’re you feeling?”
“Fine.”
He smiles and rolls up his sleeves. “You won’t be for long.”
Chapter Seventeen
On the morning of our fourth day in Frank’s camp, Frank himself finally comes to visit us. When he pulls the tent flaps aside, Naomi cringes, and Melissa and Tobe both start to cry. He doesn’t look at any of them though; he walks straight over to me, and crouches down in front of me.
“How are we feeling?”
He has to already know the answer to that. I can finally see out of my left eye again, but I’m sure it’s still black. I have two swollen and broken fingers on my left hand, and my ribcage, back, and legs are riddled with footprint-shaped bruises. It hurts every time I move, but I refuse to show him that pain; he’ll just get off on it.
I’m not going to answer, and he knows that. It’s the same question he’s asked me several times over the last three days, and I’ve never answered. I don’t think he really expects me too, but he always asks anyways. Every time he checks in on us, which is several times a day.
He doesn’t usually stay long. He just comes in and tests me before leaving again. I’m not sure what the test is, but apparently I fail it every time, and he has to come back and do it again. Naomi’s failed as well. But Melissa and the other blonde pass, and they’re taken out of the tent a few times a day by different Warriors.
Zombie Island Page 16
