“That’s bad,” I say.
Jake spins around to look me in the eye for the first time in forever.
“Yes, it is bad, but it will be ok, Liz, we will figure this out together,” Jake whispers, low and soft, then he spins on his heels and opens the driver side door. “Hop out,” he shouts the commands to everyone left inside as he grabs his backpack and the keys, turning them to the off position.
The vehicle’s engine stalls, but now we are beginning to realize that ours is not the only engine in ear shot.
Chapter Two
The remaining members of our party left inside do as Jake instructs and pile out with guns and packs in hand. As she comes out, Samantha drags Morimoto behind her, him trying to resist with no success. Since the second we apprehended him on the roof of The Force complex, we have kept a close rein on him. He has not been untied for even a second since the night Jake fought him. I think Samantha is enjoying making him suffer just a little bit too much. She always has been one for making a bad guy suffer.
Although, I am all for it.
All at once, we hustle further into bank of odd-looking trees, heading into the start of yet another wooded area. The woods may have to become our home after all of this is over. The Force complex and the woods are about the only home any of us know anymore. Returning to the R9 may never be an option. It would never feel like we belong even if we did return. The people we were when we left that place are so far from the soldiers that we are now.
It takes a minute to gauge from what direction the sound of the oncoming vehicle is coming from. We all hold our breath while trying to analyze the situation praying that for once we are all wrong.
“It’s coming from the east,” Jake whispers while pointing towards the direction we had been traveling from.
We all look to the east as if awaiting something huge to happen.
“I wonder if it is someone looking for us?” Mar asks, almost so low you can’t hear her. “Or a stranger?”
“I guess we will find out soon enough, we left a trail of transmission fluid for half a mile,” Samantha says in a snarky tone. Jake glares at her almost as a reminder that her tone is uncalled for. Her tone is almost always uncalled for, but she wouldn’t be Samantha then.
I don’t know at what point he and I became the leaders of this group, but we are who everyone looks towards for orders now. Except for Morimoto, of course, Samantha is the only one that tests that theory from time to time, but Jake always seems to be able to shut her down.
Samantha rolls her eyes in protest, but she maintains her silence knowing that not doing so would put her on Jake’s bad side, and no one wants that.
“That’s what I thought,” Jake says as he turns back in the direction of the sound with a slight grin of satisfaction on his face.
“They must be driving slow,” Magi says, “it is taking them forever to pass.”
“Unless they have stopped,” Zac says, with a look of hope in his eyes.
“They haven’t stopped, buddy. I don’t think so, anyway,” Eli replies. “I can still hear the turn of their tires; don’t you hear that thud sound?”
Zac shakes his head in acknowledgment with a look of disappointment on his face.
“If they are guards from The Force,” Mar pipes up, “they will be keeping formation like before, right?
“If it is The Force, they will be traveling in a convoy of six vehicles with a large gap between them,” Magi answers. “That is protocol for all members of The Force who leave the complex.”
“That is how we maintained the utility vehicle we are using now,” Samantha tells Magi.
She had stayed back in the woods with Zac, Shawn, and Leah at that time. They were all too weak or sick to fight or be put through the trauma then. None of us may be strong enough to be doing this now, but we have no other choice.
“We took the last one in the convoy after Samantha shot all the guards inside,” I finish.
If I think of all the people who have died in the past few days at the hands of all of us, me included, my stomach aches with guilt. For the twentieth time in the last hour alone, I have had to remind myself that we are in a war and those who have died were bad people who would not have thought twice to kill any number of us. I’m sure we haven’t broken the surface on the casualties that will pile up the closer we get to Syl and Shae.
Magi nods her head in conformation.
Suddenly, the source of the sound comes into view. It is a vehicle for sure, and by now, it is slowly creeping by. This one is nothing like the utility vehicles the guards use. It is a blue truck like the one that Jake had at the complex, only, it appears to be a bit bigger. On the door of the truck is a small label that is too small to read from the distance we are at, and none of us want to risk getting any closer to see what or who they are.
The truck begins to slow down even more, the closer it gets to the bank of trees our vehicle is hidden in. I wouldn’t say it is well hidden. Samantha is correct, we left evidence of our whereabouts for a while down the road.
“We need to get further into the woods,”
