The Orphans (Book 4): White Lie (31 page)
Mark said, “You talk a big game but I kind of think you aren’t as special as everyone makes you out to be.”
“He isn’t, he just knows how to use those guns. He hasn’t done that much since he has been here,” John said.
Shaun said, “I just killed two hundred of the Turned out there today.”
At this, they both shut up, wondering immediately if they were making the wrong choice, but figured they had proceeded too far into what they were thinking now was a mistake. That number though was something insane that they hadn’t ever heard anyone talk about happening. Mark swung a right arm at Shaun. Shaun stepped to the left using one of his open palms to push the punch to the side. When Mark was looking at that happening, he didn’t see the right cross that was coming straight for his face. Shaun followed through, snapping Mark’s head back then he followed that up with putting a right leg behind his legs and shoving Mark backwards on his backside. When he tried to push up again he got a foot hard to the chest.
John wrapped Shaun in a bear hug squeezing tight and trying to lift him off of the ground. Shaun stepped to the right, lifting his elbows out and opening up the arms. He brought down an elbow into the middle of his chest sending the last bit of air mixed with spittle out of his body. He leaned forward and brought a second elbow into his groin. When John was falling down, Shaun put a foot in front, this time pushing him forward and off balance. The two boys both stared at him from the ground, holding themselves in a way which would ever make themselves comfortable.
Shaun hovered over the two of them, keeping a few feet away from the both. He knelt down, picked up his guns and backpack. He said, “Unlike you guys, I have a girl who has been out of commission for quite some time and I need to go see her. If the two of you are done getting the shit kicked out of you, then I'm going to go ahead and proceed onto that. Did either of you have any problems with me doing that, or did you want to kick my ass some more? I have a feeling you wouldn’t be able to go to many rounds.”
John, whose face looked like he was going to puke, said, “I can’t believe you did that.”
Shaun walked away and over his shoulder he yelled, “Yeah, funny how people do things like that when it is two on one. You guys have a great day. If you touch me again I’ll break your damn arms. Do you understand me?”
They nodded their heads and they did not think that he was kidding. There was pure, controlled rage in his face. Shaun walked into the distance and out of sight. The two boys pushed up from their spots, helping each other into the guard's office, sure that they were not going to have any further issues with him.
Shaun wasted no time heading for the infirmary and when he entered it he saw Kya and Patrick both smiling and sitting next to her. When they saw Shaun they both got up not saying anything. They knew that there’d be nothing that would keep the two of them from speaking together. When he saw Ellie there was a short tear that formed in his eye. He tried to blink it away but seeing the miracle of life in front of him was better than anything else. He couldn’t believe that she was actually up, that she was awake. It was incredible. He walked up, leaned down, not caring who was around, and gave her the longest kiss he’d ever had before. She was weak, but with what energy Ellie had was used to wrap her arms around him and kiss him back. He climbed onto the bed lying next to her, conscious to be delicate of her head wound while brushing the hair from her face. Shaun said, “They didn’t think that you were going to wake up, they were losing hope.”
Ellie whispered, “Did you think that I wasn’t going to wake up, did you give up on me Shaun?”
“I never gave up on you Ellie.”
“Where were you? Why weren’t you here when I woke up?”
“I had been here by your side, I’d had some issues myself, I don’t know if Lou mentioned to you but I fell through the ice when I was trying to steer the Turned away from the grocery store. Well, weeks of sitting by your bedside left me being able to see only one thing and that wasn’t healthy for me.”
“What do you mean you could only see one thing Shaun?”
“I couldn’t stop seeing that thing attacking you. I was on the floor and defenseless, there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t believe that it was happening and it is all that I was able to see Ellie.”
“So you left to do what?”
“To take care of the Turned, I wanted revenge. I wanted to have them dead for you. It was all that I could think about. After sitting here for days and weeks on end, I figured out something that would work. When I did, I left with every intention of being back hours before. But we ran into a bit of an issue.”
“With you that never sounds as easy as it is. What happened Shaun?”
“A group of survivors were out and they wanted my guns, and me.”
“What did you do?”
“Fired off a magazine worth of rounds shooting one of them in the leg and booked ass up the hill and away from the base. I couldn't imagine bringing them back here. Clary and the rest hit me on my radio and we went from there. You can say that those following me originally are either dead or Turned by now. They had friends come though and we know where they live.”
“So you are going to what, go and take them out?”
“No, we are going to do some recon on them. But it isn’t going to be today and we aren’t going to leave anytime soon. I’m staying by your side until you don’t need me anymore.”
“There isn’t going to be a time, or day for that matter, that I don’t need you Shaun, and you best feel the same way that I do.”
Shaun kissed her again and said, “Yes, don’t worry; there’s no future without you. It’s a world I don’t want to think about Ellie. We will figure the rest out when it’s time, there’s nothing that I am going to do but help you get better. I’m not going anywhere.”
Shaun’s tears dripped on her cheeks and they thought that their future together was going to be a bright one. Clary and Aslin stopped by soon to check on her and could see the young couple resting, a much needed rest on Shaun’s part. Aslin said, “Should we tell him that we are ready to go or leave him be?”
Clary said, “We can simply wait, there’s no rush. Let the two of them heal. She needs her body, and he needs his mind. We can continue getting people ready and move on from there. I think that we have a chance, more so now than ever.”
The End
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Other Titles
Surviving the Turned Vol II (The Orphans Series)
Strangers Vol III (The Orphans Series)
Gabriel: Only one gets out alive:
Gabriel
Buried: Broken Oaths
Buried
The Uninvited
So from her on there are a few extra things that I wanted to do. First there are two short story contests I did in November 2015 when I won Zombie Book of the Month Club for my 2
nd
time. I did a 100 word short story contest and below is it!
Allen Gamboa
The MRI machine....
I have always been claustrophobic so when they wedged me into the MRI machine I freaked. I didn't care if my rotator cuff ever got fixed. I'm a big guy and being immobilized in a loud medical device sucked. Of course it didn't suck as bad as when the machine stopped and the screaming started. The techs had wrapped me up so tight in the machine I couldn’t move. The screaming grew louder as the door burst open! As I tried in vain to pull myself free I suddenly felt the cold Dead hands on my feet. At that moment realized I wasn't going to be this apocalypses’ Rick Grimes.
Wy Bowman
He was hungry but the thought of food made him feel worse. Driving home he tried drive through but the food came right back up. His head pounded, his body shook even with the heat on high. Pulling in the drive, staggering to the house he hears the TV. The girls are watching their shows and Cassie's cooking dinner. His girls see him and run yelling, "daddy". He bends down wraps his arms around his babies, they are so warm. They smell so good. He thinks he hears screaming and wonders if he is drinking something hot. It's so good
One more thing that most I like to do. Being a indie writer is not easy so I like to help out new authors, this one is my friend and fellow Author Ricky Fleet. He is signed under Optimus Maximus Publishing
Chapter 1
Joan stood before the wrought iron gate, a sense of trepidation gnawing at her. It wasn’t a feeling of danger, merely apprehension about what was likely to happen in the coming minutes. Two days previously, she had followed the coffin of her dear departed mother down this gravel pathway, supported and comforted by a small group of friends and well-wishers. Naturally, she had broken down a little, but the presence of other people had served to reassure her. Now it was her, alone.
Looking around the carpark at the entrance to the cemetery, she noticed hers was the only car, which only reinforced her sense of isolation and loneliness. The day was overcast and threatened rain at a moment’s notice. Wind soughed through the trees and hedgerows, a wailing cacophony that sounded like the massed sighs of the recently deceased. Taking a deep breath and composing herself, Joan took a step forward, clutched the handle and opened the gate.
As she walked down the path, gravel crunching underfoot, her grief grew with each step. Pausing where the path opened into the graveyard itself, she had a momentary blank in her mind. Where was the burial plot? It was almost as if her subconscious was trying to protect her. Perhaps it was too soon to pay her respects, the emotion too raw.
She closed her eyes and balled her fists, willing the pain to go away, which was as likely as being able to lift herself from the floor by her own shoelaces. Opening her eyes and looking up, her mind cleared and it came back to her. Her mother was buried to the left, behind a centuries old mausoleum which had fallen into a state of disrepair. Perhaps the family line had passed away, or in today’s selfish society, the honouring of your ancestors was a much lower priority to people. Joan continued walking down the side path, past the mausoleum doors that had long since been broken and lay open. Litter and alcohol containers were strewn across the steps to the entrance and graffiti could be seen just within the main doors.
Her pace slowed as she reached the plot. Her fear and sorrow grew to such an extent that her chest became tight and she could barely draw breath. The mud was still piled where the coffin had displaced it, only a small patch in the middle seeming to have sunk in. Flowers stood around the headstone, although after two days they had started to wilt. Something that had been so lovely was now another stark reminder of what was occurring only six feet under the soil to her beautiful mother. Joan stood before the gravestone which bore the details of her mother;
Gladys Price
June 16
th
1952 – September 12
th
2015.
She lives with us in memory, and will forever more.
All strength left her and Joan fell to her knees, only the soft, loamy soil preventing damage to her joints. She put her face in her hands, racking sobs escaped her and she cried out; “I miss you Mum, I miss you so much.”
Joan would have given anything to have someone there with her to lean on, to share the burden of sorrow, but it was not to be. Her mother had been a troubled woman, finding it hard to express herself and make friends. Her father had been killed in an industrial accident when Joan had been only a year old. Suddenly left alone with an infant had only served to make her mother more withdrawn and introverted. As the years had passed, caring for her mother had left Joan no time for her own life, which is why she had never married, or had children.
Her sobbing subsided a little. Looking up from her hands, she glanced around and noticed that a few other people had arrived. It served to reduce her feeling of isolation and gave her some relief. The improvement in her fragile emotional state was short lived. Embarrassment flushed her cheeks because the other mourners’ attention was fixed on her. They must have thought she was making such a scene with her crying and wailing. She looked away, concentrating on the grave instead, trying to cool her burning face. She did not notice the movement at the broken entrance to the mausoleum, or how the other people in the cemetery had begun to slowly, clumsily, make their way toward her. If she had been in a better frame of mind, she may have even noticed the mode of dress of the others; how it was entirely suits and dresses, and how they were all covered in dirt and other filth.