THE ELECTED (Fighting Freedom Book 2)

by Paige Clendenin

  “How are you doing, Ribs?”

  “I think I’m okay,” I say as I step down onto the cold floor. My feet are bare, my boots resting on the floor beside my cot.

  “Take it easy.”

  I look over to see Mar still asleep. A bandage covers the spot on her leg that had been gashed open.

  “How long will she sleep?” I ask.

  “A few more hours, I would guess. You should lay back down and rest.”

  “How long have I been out?”

  “Eight hours. You needed the rest.”

  I try walking around for a minute to test my ribs. They feel great, better than I could have ever guessed. I take a better look at my ribcage and notice that my bruise has faded greatly.

  “We have the best of the best medication,” she states proudly.

  “I can tell,” I say as I stretch from side to side. I try a small jog back and forth between cots.

  “My, you’re the energetic one first thing in the afternoon,” she jokes.

  “The stronger I feel, the stronger I am.”

  “So, it would appear,” she laughs. “I will be back to check on you in a little while, please do try and get some rest.”

  “Alright.”

  She leaves the room, turning the light out on her way. It takes a few minutes, but eventually, my eyes become adjusted to the little rays of light coming into the windowless room. Being the curious person that I am, I walk over to the pad of paper that Barb has written on.

  It has a few medical terms that are hard to understand on it, but at the bottom is what I am looking for. It says:

  Discharge of patients 506 and 507 scheduled at eighteen-hundred-thirty hours.

  I look around the room and spot the clock on the far side. It is still too dark for me to see the numbers on it, so I walk over to the light switch. I flip the switch, hoping I can get the light on, the clock read, and the light back off as quick as possible.

  I test my speed and accuracy when flipping the switch on, reading the clock, and getting it back off in less than ten seconds. From what I can tell, the clock reads fifteen-hundred-twenty-two hours. That leaves just over three hours until we can go be with our family.

  I lay on my cot in the darkness, listening to the movement of the people in the other parts of the hospital. My eyelids become heavier every second.

  “Liz,” a voice calls out, “hey, Liz,” the same voice calls.

  I open my eyes to see the bright light on in the room. I look over to see Mar sitting up on the cot, Rodge looking over her wound.

  I must have fallen back to sleep.

  Her leg looks so much better than it did before. It has been sewn up and cleaned so all which remains is a small mark that will make for a nice scar in a few months.

  “Hey.” She smiles at me.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Better. You?”

  I stretch my body from side to side to show her I can move. She smiles at me again with happiness in her eyes. I look over to the clock and notice that we are about fifteen minutes away from what our discharge time is on the paper I had read.

  “When are we able to leave?” I ask, acting like I had no clue.

  “A half an hour or less, if you both feel well enough,” Barb says as she comes into the room.

  Mar looks at me and smiles again. I am happy that she can be pain free enough to keep that happy look on her face. We both know that soon enough we can be back with Eli, Jake, and the others.

  “I hope Zac and the others are back by now,” Mar says.

  “Me too,” I say absentmindedly.

  I can’t help but think about the fact that Rae still must talk to us about something. I have the thought in the back of my mind what she has got to talk to us about isn’t going to be good.

  After putting our boots back on and walking around the room for twenty minutes, Barb and Rodge sign our dismissal papers. As we walk towards the door, a guard comes in towards us.

  “Rae has asked me to escort you ladies to the showers to get cleaned up and then meet her and the others in the meeting room.”

  We both silently walk with the guard to the bathroom where we are given back our bags with soap, shampoo, and hairbrushes. The packs have our names written on them this time. It’s nice to know they keep the things you have used for you for a later time.

  Mar and I help each other shower, trying to avoid her stitches. It takes much longer for us to get finished up, dried off, and dressed than it did before.

  After feeling somewhat refreshed, but a bit stiffer than before, she and I follow the same guard to the meeting room that we have been called to.

  We are the first to arrive, allowing us time to stretch and rest before the others come in. Eventually, our family walk into the room ,surprised to see us sitting there.

  “What happened with you two?” Samantha asks.

  “It was amazing,” Mar says. “They had so many medical supplies, I had never seen so much stuff.”

  “Oh, well now I wish I would have gone with you,” Magi groans. “Did they have proper medical tools.”

  “On little wheelie carts,” I tease.

  Her eyes grow huge in mock enthusiasm.

  “It really was amazing, though,” Mar says.

  “Maybe I can take a tour at some point,” Magi says.

  “Or break a rib,” I laugh.

  I allow myself to get lost in the excitement of Magi’s joy. The only problem is, my own happiness is cut short when I realize that Cara, Baxley, Zac, Leah, Shawn, and Dia are nowhere around. Maybe they’re not back yet.

  Magi is still ranting about the hospital when Mar realizes the same thing that I have.

  “Where’s my brother?” Mar asks seriously.

  “We don’t know,” Jake answers.

  “What do you mean you don’t know?” I shout.

  “They haven’t come back yet,” Eli says. “Rae sent a team out for them, but I don’t know what they have found out.”

  Our conversation is cut short when the door swings open and Levi and Rae walk in. They both take a seat side by side at the table. They both look like they are exhausted, but neither one complains about it.

  “What’s going on?” I break the silence.

  “I don’t know how to tell you all this…” she begins.

  “We told them they aren’t back yet, so, just get to it,” Samantha says sternly.

  “Our team that we sent out to retrieve Baxley and the other members of your family came back empty handed.”

  “What do you mean?” Mar yells.

  “She means that Baxley and the others weren’t there,” Levi answers.

  “Where are they?” Jake asks.

  Rae slides over a piece of paper towards Jake and me. My heart is pounding too hard to look at it, but Jake picks it up to look. He sits there, staring at the paper for the longest time. Longer than I think my patience can handle.

  “What is it?” I burst out.

  Jake lowers the paper to the table with a look of sickness on his face.

  “They were taken…by The Elected,” Jake sighs.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  The entire room falls silent for a while. We are all in such disbelief that no one knows what to say or do. After a while of silence, the room erupts in tears, outbursts of anger, and cursing under people’s breaths. I, however, sit numbly as the chaos goes on around us.

  “People!” Levi shouts across us. No one stops their expressions of anger. “People,” he lifts his voice, standing up this time.

  Everyone falls silent, Magi and Mar crying, while Jake, Samantha, and Eli clench their fists. I still don’t feel anything but disbelief.

  “How could this have happened?” Samantha demands the answer. “This cabin was supposed to be safe.”

  “Nowhere is safe,” Levi begins.

  “Don’t give me that garbage.” Eli scowls.

  “The letter is self-explanatory,” Rae begins. “The Elected are quite clear that they w
ant you to know that they exist and will stop at nothing to stop you. Allowing yourselves to fall apart is a sure-fire way to do that isn’t it?”

  “You’re right,” I say. “If they know who we are, then they want us to fall apart.”

  “They know who we are, Liz,” Jake says, “My dad, your dad, the captain, they are all a part of this.”

  “You guys should take some time to regroup and figure out what you want to do,” Levi says.

  “We could really use you guys on our side, and fighting next to us, but if you feel you have to go find your family, that is alright too.” Rae smiles weakly.

  “After all,” Magi says, “we are all on the same side.”

  “That’s right,” Rae agrees. “I will leave you to your decision, you know where to find me, I would never hold you here against your will.” She then gets up and walks out of the room.

  “I will take you somewhere to talk things over and rest for the night,” Levi offers.

  “That’s kind of you,” Mar says.

  Levi walks us out of the meeting room and up a flight of stairs to a small room with a table and chairs and a few cots in it.

  “I will have some food sent up,” he says kindly, “but do me a favor though. When you make your decision, come to me first.”

  Levi walks out of the room, closing the door behind him before any of us can reply.

  “I say we blow this place and try to find our family,” Samantha says, calling us family for one of the first times since we have known her.

  “How do you propose we do that?” I ask.

  “With this,” she says with a devious grin on her face while she plops the file on the table with the war plans on it. Next, she grabs Jake’s bag, pulling out the portable computer from his bag that we got from The Elected vehicle. and opens it on the table. “Let’s hope this puppy has some battery left.”

  “We don’t have the charger?” Eli asks.

  “Why no, Eli. I didn’t quite have time to search a blazing van for technicalities, now did I?” she scoffs.

  She hits the on button, and to our surprise, the thing lights up. The first screen that pops up is a password protected page. Samantha holds the computer up, looking at the bottom and sides of it. She holds her attention to a set of numbers on the bottom left hand corner. Samantha snaps into the air.

  “What do you need?” I ask.

  “Something to write with and on,” she answers.

  I reach in my bag and pull out a pencil and the list of names and serial numbers from The Elected. The backs of the pages are blank, making them perfect to write on. Samantha writes twelve digits down on the paper in the same order as they appear.

  She then types the series into the computer’s password port, hitting the ok button afterwards. Invalid password comes up on the screen. She curses under her breath a bit before trying the numbers in reverse order.

  This time the disclaimer that pops up says… Verifying, loading, success. Just like that, we are in.

  Silently, we sit and watch her work her magic as she inserts the file that she had taken from The Force only a day or so before we left. Immediately, files pop up from war plans, to maps of where traps are, and maps of The Elected and where things and people are being kept.

  “Will you write this down please, Liz?” she asks.

  She flips through file after file on the small computer while I take down what is on each one. It takes a while to do so, but by the time it dies, we have nearly everything we need to figure out how to beat these guys, down to when and where they plan on starting the war.

  We discuss what we should do and what would be best for us and our family.

  By the time we are done talking, the sun is down on another day and the moon is high in the sky. As for now, we feel like it is best that we try to get some rest for the night and make our final decision come morning.

  In a place like this, we most likely will be safe enough to all sleep, but we feel it best to keep up the practice of having a guard awake always. Jake and I get the first watch, which allows he and I some alone time before anything else stands in our way. We both sit side by side at the table while Eli, Mar, Samantha, and Magi fall fast asleep.

  “I can’t believe this is happening again,” I say.

  “I know, but this time we have the upper hand.” Jake says.

  “I know. We are lucky that Sam knows how to read these plans and that she was smart enough to take the file.”

  “And no matter what we choose, I think Wonder Shield will always be here to help us.” He hugs me.

  We sit in each other’s embrace, watching the moon through the one window in the room.

  “I don’t know if I can handle all of this much longer,” I sigh. “I say we get them and get as far away from danger as possible.”

  “The fight will only follow us,” Jake says, being the voice of reason.

  “I know, it’s only a thought,” I laugh.

  “I wish it were as simple as that, but we are in to deep.”

  “Yeah, I know, you’re right.”

  I turn to face him. He looks just as tired as I feel.

  “I wish we were alone,” I whisper.

  “Me too,” he sighs.

  He touches my ribs ever so slightly as to not hurt me. I slide forward in my chair to get closer to him. He leans in, touching my cheek, sliding his hand from my face to the back of my neck. After a moment, our breaths become one and we kiss, soft at first, but harder as our hunger for each other grows.

  We kiss hard and long, letting the emotion wash over us. His hand slips to the small of my back and slides up the inside of my shirt, up my spine. I hold the front of his shirt tightly in my fist, pulling him against me. I know this could not go any further with everyone in the room, and I’m not sure I am ready for that.

  Someday, in the right time and place, he and I can be together in the ways that we want, but for now, we have each other in the ways that are right for us.

  We spend the remainder of our time kissing and talking, trying to ignore the fact that over half of us are being put through who knows what.

  After two hours have passed, we wake Magi and Samantha up to take our place, pushing their cots together and laying down side by side. Jake puts his strong arm around me and allows me to feel weak and safe for just a little while.

  “Good night, Liz,” he whispers in my ear.

  “Goodnight ,”I say.

  As we lay here, allowing sleep to search us out, I know already in my heart what decision we have made. Only morning will tell for sure what we have chosen.

  Chapter Forty

  The sun wakes me at its first morning appearance in the sky. Eli and Mar are sitting at the table Jake and I had been sitting at the night before, finishing out their term as guards. It doesn’t take long before Magi, Samantha, and Jake are stirring also.

  We are so used to waking up with the sun, sometimes, even before it.

  “Good morning,” I say, holding a hand over my stinky breath.

  “Morning,” Eli and Samantha say at the same time.

  “Good morning, dear.” Jake hugs me from behind while I attempt to tie my boots.

  “So, we know what we are going to do, right?” Magi asks the group.

  We all give our consensus as to what we think is best for all of us involved.

  “We need to find Levi, then,” Eli says.

  “No need for that,” Levi says as he walks in the door.

  “My, aren’t you the creepy one?” Samantha jokes.

  “That’s me,” Levi snickers. “What have you decided?”

  “We are going,” I say. “Samantha found a way around the traps, at least the ones that we know about.”

  “I’m in, then,” he says nonchalantly.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I say.

  “Yes, I do,” he says. “I owe you at least that much.”

  “You don’t owe us anything,” Mar says.

  “Let’s just leave it at I’m goi
ng,” he says. “You guys get your things together, I will get some supplies, talk to Rae, and meet you on the front steps.”

  “You sure?” Jake asks.

  “Positive,” he concludes.

  Without another word, Levi leaves the room, leaving us to pack our gear and get ready for the next part of our adventure. We all gather everything that we can fit on us in case we need it. Moments later, we are walking out of our room, down the steps, and out of the building. When we get outside, Rae is waiting for us.

  “Levi will be along soon,” she says. “I understand why you are doing this.”

  “You do?” Magi asks.

  “Of course, family is more important than anything.” she frowns. “Take it from me, I don’t have any.”

  “Won’t you come with us?” I ask.

  “I can’t, Liz, you know that,”

  “I know,” I say. “It was worth a shot.”

  “We will all see each other again.” Her smile returns. “After all, Levi is on loan to you… I want him back.” She laughs for real this time.

  “I’ll come back in one piece,” Levi says as he comes down the front stairs with his own pack on his back.

  “Here,” Samantha says, handing copies of our notes to Rae. She and Magi must have worked on them while we were sleeping.

  “What’s this?” Rae asks.

  “Copies of war plans for The Division.”

  “Thank you,” Rae says, hugging Samantha.

  We all say our goodbyes to Rae as we walk away leaving her at the top of the stairs outside her building. I hope that we get to see her one day, and soon.

  Together, the seven of us walk out of the fenced in town and into the wooded unknown towards The Elected headquarters. We don’t stop for an ATV; we believe the element of surprise would be much better.

  On foot it will take us a few days to get to where we are going, but once we get there, we feel confident that we know what to do. There is an even bigger fuel to our desire to penetrate their forces. They don’t just have two of us anymore, counting Baxley and Cara, they have eight of our people. There is no way we will ever stand for one hair on their heads to be harmed.

  I look around at the remaining seven of us. I look to Jake first. I still love him so much that my heart feels like it might burst out of my chest at any moment. He is my rock, and without him, I don’t know how long I could live life on this Earth without falling apart.