“Rashellia!” Lara screamed at the top of her lungs, exploding out of the room into the hall.
I realized immediately that they must have been searching for our daughter. Drawing my gun, I burst into the hall, chasing after Lara. All the video cameras swiveled, locking onto us and following us as we ran, jumping over all the dead bodies that littered the hall. I was first to burst through the door into Tina’s room, and I stopped dead in my tracks. David lay face down, dead, sprawled out across the coffee table, with a smoke still burning in his hand.
“She’s gone!” Lara cried out, looking at the empty crib where Rashellia would have been sleeping.
I wasn’t paying any attention to her, though. My rifle dropped with a dull thud as I walked to the center of the room, my arms outstretched and my face stained with tears. Tina was hanging by her neck. A sign around her read “Death to the vermin,” spelled out in her own blood.
I cut her down, collapsing to the floor with her in a heap of tears. “Tina! No! Tina …” I cradled her lifeless body in my arms and kept whispering into her ear. “Come on, get up … not you. You can’t die. Get up.”
“She’s dead, Lance,” Lara whispered softly, taking her fingers and closing Tina’s eyes, which had fogged over with the gaze of death.
“Bring her back. Please. She’s my sister,” I begged and pleaded with Lara, holding onto Tina. I latched onto Lara’s leg, not letting her leave.
She dragged me away from Tina with her fiend strength. “I can’t. I’m not a shellian. She’s been dead for too long, Lance. There’s nothing I can do. I’m so, so, so sorry.” Lara tried to comfort me as tears stained her face.
I sat in the corner, crying, while Lara began to frantically search under the rubble for Rashellia. Not caring what happened to me, I walked over to David, reached into his pocket, and pulled out his 9mm. “This one’s for you, brother,” I muttered to him. I was deranged, driven by anger.
I walked into the bathroom and threw aside the shower curtain. A guard was lying in the bathtub, with a pistol pointed at my chest. Shots rang out—it was like something you would see in a movie. I shot and the bullet sailed through the air, going through his head.
His bullet sailed into my chest, just below my heart. I tried to breathe, but blood seemed to squirt out of my chest every time I let out a breath. I covered my chest with my hand, looking at the blood in shock, as I felt all my strength drain from my body.
“They killed me,” I muttered as Lara looked over at me, stunned.
I put a hand on the shelf to balance myself but collapsed to the floor, bringing all the stuff on it piling down on top of me. “Lance!” Lara screamed, sliding across the floor to cradle me in her arms.
I gurgled, trying to respond, but I couldn’t. Spitting out blood, I raised my pistol to the door as three fiends burst through. I unloaded the whole clip into them, killing them and letting the empty handgun go as my hand dropped limply to the ground.
“Hold on, Lance. We’re getting out of here!” she reassured me.
I felt Lara pick me up and hurl herself through the window of the building. Everything kind of went by in a blur. There were fiends on machine guns shooting at us. Lara tightly held my lifeless body in her claws. She landed on the beach, frantically ripping off my shirt to examine the wound. I wasn’t sure who was crying more—her or me—as I quickly felt myself fading away.
I brought my hand up, patting her, which seemed to take up all of my strength. I tried to signal that it was okay, knowing there was nothing she could do to save me. In a way, I wasn’t scared. I knew one day I would die in this war. I had lived past my nineteenth birthday, which I never would have thought I’d do, not in my wildest dreams.
The thought of leaving and letting Lara down was the only concern I had left as I struggled for my last breath. Lara was bawling, trying to stop the bleeding with her powers, but we both knew it was hopeless.
* * * *
Lance looked up at Lara, who was staring down at him with pleading eyes. “Don’t you die on me, Lance!” she pleaded, trying frantically to open his airway.
His face tightened in pain as he raised his hand, grasping onto her shirt and summoning all his strength as he pulled her down to him. “They went northeast,” he whispered vengefully, committing his last act in the war.
Tears streamed down her face as she nodded understandingly. “Don’t you worry. They won’t get away with this,” she whispered lovingly as rage boiled in her eyes.
Lance smiled to himself, coughing up more blood, which trickled down his mouth as his grip loosened. His body convulsed violently, and he let out his final breath, closing his eyes peacefully, knowing that he had died a free man.
Chapter 24
“It’s time for you to go to bed,” 159 told 2-5, giving her a light kiss on the forehead. She briskly got up, walking over to the door.
“Wait, Aunty 159! What happened to Grant?” she asked the young fiend, whose eyes were aged over with many years of pain.
“He managed to make it out and rejoined the resistance,” 159 told her solemnly. “There’s a note under your pillow. Maybe one day you will be able to piece together the full story of Lance,” she told the little girl. She took off her white gloves and lab coat, pulling out a loaded handgun, cocking it, revealing the scar across the top of her left hand.
The little girl’s voice was quivering as she called out her final question to 159, who had opened the door to 2-5’s room in an attempt to make her escape. Warning sirens came flooding through, filling up the room.
“159! Why would you tell me this story?” she called nervously to the shadowy figure in the doorway.
“Because Lance was your father, Rashellia.”
Table of Contents
The Unexpected War Copyright © 2012 by Jean-Pierre Breton
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
The Unexpected War Page 28