Alex Explains the Dangers of Sharing Caves

A Chapter by SwagMaster

Alex finally gets a chance to explain his journey.

I froze, then stared at him.

"How on earth did you survive?" I asked incredulously, and he shrugged.

"Dumb luck, I guess." he offered. "The guy missed any vital organs, shot me in the arm instead, and when I fell, I landed in some only mildly rocky grass." He shifted to a more comfortable position. "And that is why I now have a useless arm and I look like I asked a female football player to prom." I laughed, and almost choked, at his snarky simile.

"I'm ba-ack!" Sadie sang, entering the room and bearing a tray with chicken noodle soup on it. "I brought Alex food!"

"Really?" Alex stared at the food. "Chicken noodle soup? There is no way you could get any more stereotypical."

"I think you underestimate me!" Sadie kept up her insanely chipper sing-song voice. She balanced the tray on Alex's lap and adjusted the strap so he could sit up. "Eat every drop or I'll force it down your throat." she warned Alex, and started to prod me out the door. "Time is up, let's go!"

"Wait, wait! He's fine! Please, Sadie!" I begged, and she hesitated, then took a closer look at Alex.

"He looks okay...." After a moment of hemming and hawing, Sadie relented. "Fine, but the second he start freaking out...."

"We'll stop, I promise." I assured her.

"This isn't even necessary." Alex whined. "I'm not a baby."

"No, you just have a bullet in your arm, claw marks across your chest, and a concussion from bashing your head on a rock." Sadie concurred, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"A mild concussion." Alex grumbled.

"Shut up and eat your freaking soup." Sadie ordered, and removed herself from the room. Alex caught my grin at the banter.

"It's not funny." he growled.

"'Course not." I laughed, and quickly sobered. I had more questions to ask.

"What happened after the truck?" I asked, trying to glean even more information.

"Well, I rolled for a while, then came to a stop." Alex continued, pausing at times to eat his soup. "That's where I got a good number of these scrapes and stuff, including my small bump to the head." he gestured to his head where the bulky bandage was wrapped. "When I got up again, I was a little out of it, and stumbled into the nearby forest. After stumbling around for a while, I finally just laid down on the ground and fell asleep, very disoriented."

"When I woke up, I found out I had fallen asleep in a cave. I wasn't about to go out and wander some more, so I decided to explore the place to more. It was really dark, and I tripped over something in my stumbling. There was a loud sound, and I felt something rake across my chest. I ran faster than I ever dreamed I could out of that cave, and didn't stop until I reached your house. And that-" he paused to take a sip of water. "is my story."

"Wow." was all I could say. "Even with all your injuries, you still managed to make it all the way here."

"I know, right?" Alex agreed, finishing up his meal. "I made it-"

"Just barely." Sadie broke in as she entered the room. "Adri, your time is up."

"Roger that." I joked, getting up willingly. Alex, for once, did not protest as Sadie guided me out of the room. As Sadie shut the door behind me, I wasted no time getting the boys and I back to work. While we finished up the chores, I looked at the clock with worry. Why wasn't Damien back yet? I started up dinner, finished it, and served it; still no signs of Damien or the girls. Contenting myself with saying he'll come later in the night, I sent everyone to bed.

In the morning, the chores were finished by noon, and I did nothing except wait and bite my fingernails. Hiding my panic, I finally I decided to go look for him with the boys. I quickly stuck my head in Alex's room, explaining to Sadie that she would be home alone for a while.

"No! I want to come, too." Sadie exclaimed, upset.

"Why do you have to take everyone? Damien's the only one missing, right?" Alex pointed out.

"No, Kate, Auriela, and Ella are missing, too." I corrected him, and his face turned panicky.

"Adri, listen carefully." he is dead serious. "Auriela was an unbelievably important asset to Charlotte, and there is no trace of doubt that Auriela was implanted with a TD. Odds are, they were finally able to discover Auriela's signal, and they all are-" he gulped. "Captured."

"Okay, we are moving NOW!" My voice reached an unnatural pitch as I quickly marched back to the kitchen where Dexter, Jeremy, and Peter were assembled. Sadie followed after me, begging to come.

"Please, Adri! I can help!" she insisted.

"What about Alex?" I demanded, shooing the other boys out to door to start out.

"He can come! He's healthy enough!" Sadie persisted, and I groaned.

"I don't have time for this." I growled. "Be ready in two minutes, or we leave." Sadie squealed happily, and sprinted inside to untie Alex from his unfortunate position. Within seconds, the two were back outside, dressed and ready to move. Without hesitation, we all began to jog towards the nearest town where Damien had headed to get food.

That now feels like months ago.

The town was only a half hour, maybe forty minutes, away, and the entire time was filled with relentless pounding feet and whirling thoughts of worry. Everyone was gasping for breath by the time the first house came into sight, as we had not stopped for rest even once; and still, we ran into the tiny town filled with people milling about.

We sprinted up and down the streets, calling for our lost friends, and our only replies shrieks of playing children and the friendly residents calling hello. As we neared the grocery store, we skidded to a stop in front of the back door where they received new shipments of goods. Just as Damien had said, unopened crates littered the large garage, while a handful of workers lugged them into the store to be sold.

No sign of anyone we knew.

Desperate, we started to run again, but I tripped and crashed to the ground before making it five feet. Irritated, I picked up the piece of garbage that had caused to lose my footing, ready to fling it as hard as I could, but stopped dead in my actions after examining the trash closer.

It was a small brown box; only big enough to hold something small.

Like a locket.

As I stared at the box, I began to have trouble breathing. Alex was right, a voice in the back of my head whispered. Auriela and Damien are dead. You'll never see them again. Shut up, I told the voice fiercely, and concentrated on not falling over. The others noticed my state of petrification, and halted, confused looks dancing across their features at the sight of me gazing wide-eyed at the crumpled up box clenched in my fist.
"Adri, are you okay?" Dexter's sweet English accent made me blink, and stare at him with a stupefied expression. I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.
"Adri, what's that?" Alex asked sharply, his eyes narrowed with suspicion at my fear.
"It-it's a box." I'm not sure who said that. Maybe me.
"Why do you have the box, Adri?" Sadie joined in with slow, deliberate pronunciations, as if I was thick. I guess I was; my mind was so sluggish and unwilling to accept the truth.
"Damien had it." I whispered. "Alex was right. They took Auriela. They took Damien. They took them all!" My voice raised in volume until I was practically screaming, and some workers in the store gave us weird looks. Within seconds, a hand was over my mouth, muffling my shrieking until it lessened to a quiet whimpering. When they deemed it was safe to remove their hands, I lay on the ground, gasping and struggling to grasp what had just happened.
They took them.
Again.
They were back in that god-awful place, and it would only be a matter of time before the horrendous experiments killed them all.
It wasn't fair.
This wasn't happening.
No, it wouldn't happen.
"Let's go." I forced myself to stand, with raggedy breathing and a sudden nausea.
"Go? Go where?" Peter asked curiously.

"To get them." I answered firmly, and began walking away.

"Are you insane?!" Jeremy practically screamed. "It's suicide! Their loss is perfectly acceptable, if we want to survive." I stopped in my tracks, dumbfounded he had just said that. Sadie make a small squeaking sound in her throat, and Peter gasped; they had a reason, too.

I swiveled around, marched back to Jeremy, and punched him in the face. Cursing and shouting, Jeremy landed on the ground, holding his now bloody nose.

"There." I said with satisfaction, turned, and resumed my walk. "Anyone wants to join me is welcome." I called over my shoulder.

"I'm coming." Sadie jogged up, and Dexter, Peter, and Alex joined us.

"I'm in." Alex proclaimed.

"Me too." Peter agreed.

"Those gormless duffers have no idea who they're dealing with." Dexter said cheerfully, his British insults confusing, as usual. After a while of walking, I heard Jeremy jog up and tag along with us, completely silent and sullen. I wisely chose to leave the matter alone, and just ignore him.

"No, wait. This way." Alex stopped me, and pointed in another direction. By now, we were picking our way along the edge of the forest where the house was located.

"What?" I stared at him curiously, and Alex flushed.

"Um-uh, the road!" he blurted. "I remember where it is, because I-yeah." A little bewildered by his odd behavior, I started in the direction Alex pointed, and, sure enough, we came across a road within an hour of walking. Shooting Alex a confused look, I started to follow along the road, taking care to stay near shrubbery in case the need to hide arose. Carefully picking our way through the trees, we all were silent and uncomplaining as I led them on a relentless trek all through the night. Nobody was tired; we all were wide awake and worried.

However, as the night wore on, I started to notice signs of enervation in everyone. Trying to ignore it, I pushed them even harder, until Jeremy finally interfered.

"Adri, we have to stop." Jeremy protested. "Look at them; they're all exhausted. We have to stop and make camp."

"No, we can't!" I protested. "We're so close!"

"You don't know that." Jeremy argued. "I know you're heartbroken about your sister and that moron Damien, but you have to think about the welfare of the rest of these guys." As much as I had a terrible hatred, no, overwhelming, intense, smothering, overflowing, crushing, engulfing, and overpowering loathing, I had to admit he was right. I was a little too hard on them, too caught up on finding Auriela.

"You're.......right." I muttered, gritting my teeth. "We'll stop here for the night, okay?" Ignoring Jeremy's look of shock at my agreement, I stomped over to a nearby clearing and started arranging small makeshift mattresses of pine needles and leaves. Peter and Dexter, the youngest of us at only nine years old, immediately plopped down on a bed and fell asleep. Submitting to my own weariness, I curled up on one of the piles. Then I sprang up and laid back down on a different one next to Sadie, after Jeremy tried to sneak into the needle berth next to my first one.

Within seconds, the sounds of light snoring filled the air, and I was the last one awake. The stars above twinkled merrily, and I wondered how they could be so bright up there when things were so terrible down here. Troubled, worried, and tired, I finally drifted off to sleep.

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