Five More Days With The Dead (Lanherne Chronicles Book 2) (24 page)

Instantly,
the snoring stopped, and with a yawn, Matt slowly sat up but refused to wake up properly.

‘I need a piss
,’ was all Matt mumbled, not even opening his eyes.

‘
Well, that’ll just have to wait for a moment, cause I need to talk to you,’ Steve began, hoping he could rely on Matt’s cooperation. ‘Today’s the day, man.’

Matt opened his eyes to look at his friend,
with a serious expression on his face.

‘Fuck, are you sure, Stevie-boy?’ he asked, pushing his arms out of the sleeping bag to rub some drool from his face
. ‘There’ll be no going back once you’ve started. You do know that, don’t you?’

‘
Yes, I do. I can’t stay here anymore. This is no way to live, not really. The way we’re treating people is just not right and we all know it. I simply can’t do this for even one more day, Matt. I just don’t have it in me, and I’m taking Penny and her friends with me,’ Steve replied, pausing to think how to phrase what he had to say next. ‘The thing is, even though I get why you can’t come with me, I’m going to need your help to get away.’

‘Christ, Steve. Man, your dad will feed my arse to the corpses if he thinks I helped you and the civvies go AWOL
,’ Matt began, knowing even before he had finished his protest that he would still do as Steve asked.

‘All you’ll need to do is turn your back for a few minutes while we’re on duty and the civilians and I will disappear into the countryside… gone
,’ Steve added quickly, nervously chewing his lip.

‘Just turn my
back, eh?’ Matt asked, realising there was more to come.

‘Yeah
, I will have to knock you out though,’ Steve said sheepishly. ‘Just so Sarge doesn’t think you were involved.’

‘Great,’ replied Matt resting his chin on his hands
, ‘can’t wait’

‘So you’ll do it?’ Steve said with relief.

Matt looked at Steve, raising his eyebrows. The two men had been friends for so long that they were more like brothers now. They had grown up together on the base, become soldiers together and ultimately because of each other, they became the men they were meant to be. They had stood side by side with the Dead before them and they knew the other would die for them; such was their friendship. Even though he would miss him, there was no way he was going to turn his back on his friend’s chance of a life away from the base.

‘What’s a bit of concussion between friends,’ said Matt, his mouth cracking into a smile
. ‘So what’s the plan?’

Ten minutes
later, Steve and Matt were once again braving the snow and freezing wind on duty manning one of the Jackals. They were watching the convoy’s flank and knowing this would be the direction from which his secret sword-wielding ally would be approaching, Steve had made sure they took this watch position. If he were to make his escape with Penny and the others, this would be the only direction they had a hope of fleeing undetected. While Matt kept an eye on the road ahead of them for any approaching Dead, it was the holding truck that held Steve’s attention. He knew he had to time it just right even to have a chance of pulling off the breakout successfully and when he saw Dave approaching the trailer with an armful of meals again, he knew the time had come.

‘Right, wish me luck
,’ Steve said, tapping Matt’s shoulder.

‘You’ll need more than luck, mate
,’ Matt replied, looking back at Steve. ‘Hey, look just look after yourself, man, and have a good life, okay.’

‘And you
,’ said Steve, glancing back to the trailer to gauge how much time he had left with his friend. ‘I’m going to miss you, mate, and thanks, thanks for everything.’

‘Yeah,
okay don’t go all queer on me, just get on with it,’ Matt butted in, knowing he didn’t really want to say goodbye to his friend either.

‘
Okay, bye, mate,’ Steve said with a sad smile, as he swung the butt of his rifle towards Matt’s head.

With a
‘crack’ the butt connected with Matt’s skull. For the briefest of moments, Matt’s eyes seemed to go out of focus as he swayed slightly in his seat. Then, as the trauma took its toll, Matt fell forward onto the Jackals steering wheel, unconscious. Pulling Matt’s prone form back into a seating position, Steve checked once more for any of the Dead on the road and with a final pat goodbye on Matt’s shoulder, he turned and jogged over to Dave by the trailer.

‘Need a hand with the door again?’ Steve said with a smile.

‘What? Oh cheers, Steve,’ Dave replied, nodding towards the door as he juggled to hold the food packs for the civilians.

Once Steve had unlocked the door, he held it open for Dave to walk through. With one quick glance around the compound, he followed him in.

‘Right, grub up, people,’ Dave said to the gathered group inside. ‘Sorry it’s just…’

Dave’s apology for the bad food was cut short, as once
again, Steve’s rifle butt connected with a skull, knocking the man to the floor.

‘Time to go people,’ Steve began, stepping over Dave’s unconscious body, his eyes instantly meeting Penny’s
. ‘We’re getting out of here and I need you to be quick, quiet and to follow me, no questions.’

It was only when he looked at the others in the trailer that he realised this wasn’t going to be the big escape he had hoped for. Sometime during the
night, the group had not only been given their neck pulse detectors, but the men of the group had been handcuffed to one of the interior walls to prevent a repeat of Richard’s escape attempt.

‘Shit!’ Steve said, looking back to Penny.

‘Unless you got the keys on you, we’re not going anywhere,’ Richard said, lifting his bruised and swollen face to look up at Steve. ‘But please, you’ve got to get the women and children away from here.’

‘No, I’m staying with you
,’ Nicky said, reaching for her husband.

‘Nicky...’ Richard began.

‘We haven’t got time for this,’ Steve interjected. ‘We’ve got to go now, but I promise I’ll come back for the rest of you, somehow.’

‘How do we know we can trust you?’ the woman they had picked up prior to arriving at Lanherne said defiantly, standing to look at the man that had already tricked and betrayed her once.

‘Look, nothing I can say can change what happened, but I’m trying to make it right,’ Steve replied, ‘and this may be our only chance to get away. We’ve got to go now.’

‘You’re wasting time,’ Cam said to the four women free of the handcuffs that held the men in place
. ‘Every second you stand around thinking about it, the less chance you have to get away. Just go, go while you can.’

Slowly
, Penny stood, pulling her eyes away from Steve’s gaze.

‘Anne, Justin, look after Alex and stay close to me
. We’re going to have to move fast, okay,’ she said calmly, reaching down to pick up Jimmy.

‘You’ll have to carry him, if you’re coming
,’ she continued, dumping the small boy in the woman’s arms as she picked up his sister, Samantha.

The two women looked at each other, each silently challenging the other. Two strangers brought together by a bad situation, each having to trust the other with their lives. Then something in the woman’s eyes changed
. She knew the soldier had been right. This may be their only chance of escape and she would have to take it if she could.

‘My name’s Jennifer,’ she said quietly to Jimmy, repositioning him onto her hip
, ‘but everyone just calls me Jen, okay, little man.’

With the quickest of smiles to the woman who had joined them, Penny turned back to Steve.

‘I’m staying too,’ said the other woman, holding tightly to the hand of the man sitting next to her.

The two had been picked up together over a week ago and as they had both been selected to be rescued, they hadn’t seen just how brutal this rescue mission really was. For
them, the base offered a life free of the Dead and they would take it, no matter how strict the regime in charge turned out to be. 

‘Justin, do as Penny says and we’ll be together again real soon
. I promise,’ Nicky said, pulling the small boy into a fierce hug and praying her words wouldn’t prove to be a hopeful lie.

Justin began to cry silently, hugging his adoptive mother back tightly.

‘I’m sorry, but we’ve got to go,’ Steve said, anxious not to stay any longer.

‘Take care of them
,’ Nicky said, looking up at Steve, her tears falling freely as she pushed Justin reluctantly away from her. ‘Take care of them all.’

‘I will
,’ Steve said, as he nodded seriously to the weeping woman who had entrusted the care of her son to him.

Looking over at the small group now in his charge, he noticed the woman called Jen, struggling to keep hold of the small boy she held in her arms. Unlike those from Lanherne, this woman had lived too long on the brink of starvation and simply carrying the boy’s extra weight was obviously a struggle for her weakened body.

‘Here, give the boy to me,’ he said to her, pulling Jimmy from her arms. ‘We’ll be able to move faster if I carry him.’

‘Thanks
,’ she replied, steadying herself briefly.

‘Right, let’s do this
,’ said Steve, moving to the door.

Opening the door slightly, Steve scanned the makeshift compound for activity. Luck seemed to be with the small escaping group at that moment, with the only sounds of activity coming from the communications tent and with most of the soldiers not on watch duty still in their tents trying to keep warm, they might just have a chance. If Steve could get them across the small open space outside the holding truck and to the tents, they should be able to get
to the Jackal and freedom, undetected.

‘Stay l
ow, keep quiet and follow me,’ he whispered back to Penny, Jen and the children.

Taking a deep breath, Steve darted silently across the stamped down area of snow, over to the row of small tents. Penny, close on his heels, clutched a scared Samantha close to her chest, while Alex ran alongside her holding tightly to her jacket. Behind her, with her heart pounding in her chest, Jen ran with Anne and Justin, trying to keep up. Steve had made it past the first couple of tents and already he could see the back of the Jackal, tantalisingly close.

‘
We’re going to make it
,’ he thought to himself.

It was then that behind him, Jen caught a glimpse of two soldiers about to step out from behind a tent right into Steve’s path. Skidding to a halt, she silently grabbed Anne and Justin, pulling them into the small gap between two of the tents, praying they hadn’t been noticed. Raising her finger to her lips, the two children looked at her with fear in their eyes.

‘Well, what have we here? Going somewhere?’ Jen heard one of the soldiers say, followed by the ominous sound of a rifle being cocked.

Jen, cursing the heavens for their bad luck, knew that while the soldier’s attention was otherwise diverted, the two children and
she might still have a chance to escape. Taking a small hand in each of hers, Jen crouched low and led the two children along the side of the tent. With adrenalin pumping through her as she peeked around the front of the tent, Jen could see the soldiers forcing Steve to his knees, while Alex clung terrified to Penny’s leg.

‘No!’ came Penny’s cry, as one of the soldiers began a vicious attack on Steve, while the other had his gun pointed menacingly towards her and the three children to stop her from darting forward.

Jen knew it was now or never. With Penny’s screams for the soldier to stop alerting the rest of the camp, her window of escape was closing fast.

‘Ready?’ she whispered back to the boy and girl crouched next to her.

Not waiting for a reply, Jen pulled the two children forward and darted across the open space behind the backs of the soldiers engrossed in their beating.

‘
Please, please, please
,’ she silently prayed, desperately hoping neither of the soldiers would turn and notice her escape.

Some unknown deity must have heard her
prayer, because she had made it to the back of a large vehicle that sat on the perimeter of the camp, undetected. Pulling the two children down by one of the large wheels out of sight, Jen stole a peek at the man sitting in the driver’s seat. With his eyes closed and a small trickle of blood running down his forehead, Steve had planned this escape route for them to take all along.

‘We’ll ma
ke a break for the hedgerows,’ she whispered to her two new charges.

With one last glance back at the camp and the sounds of Penny’s pleading
for the attack on Steve to stop fading behind her, Jen broke their cover from behind the vehicle and ran with Anne and Justin to the nearest patch of hedgerow cover that grew by the side of the road.

‘Stop, you bastards, stop! You’re killing him
,’ Penny screamed, as Streiber began to kick at Steve’s already bloody body curled up at his feet. 

‘Streiber
,’ came the hard voice of Sergeant Blackmore. ‘Explain!’