Fear of God (Trials of Strength Book 1) (6 page)

You are
never
ever
leaving!

I shivered.

‘
We’ll be
moving through these tunnels as fast as possible. There’s a way up
to the surface that borders the town, and from there, we’ll be
moving across the land that cuts through the surrounding
mountains,’ Chris said. ‘Now, I’m gonna stress how important this
is. It is not going to be simple. We are not just going to pop out
the ground and run to freedom. It’s likely that we will come across
the hostiles in the town.’

A few people started
murmuring fearfully, but Chris quieted them with a wave of his
hand.

‘
It can’t be
helped, and I need everyone to stay focused, or
none
of us are going to get out, got
it?’ he asked as he stared down the people around him.

They were frightened, but
he needed them to be able to think. I started to panic. Thinking
under stress was never a strong suit of mine.

‘
I’m gonna be
handing out a couple more guns. I know, I know,’ he said, his voice
rose as the group started to protest. ‘You might not like it, but
again, you do not have a choice. I am trying to get you out of
here, so listen to me!’

Everyone
stopped.

‘
Now, get your
things together.’

For the first time since
I’d woken, people started to rush around, whispering amongst
themselves. Chris grabbed a couple men, and pointed over in my
direction. It took me a second to realise it was at me.

No,
please.

‘
Lucas, come
here,’ Chris said.

I started to sweat. I
started to shake. Numb, I slouched forward. Anna walked past fast,
and straight to Chris.

‘
What do you
want, sweetheart?’ he asked.

‘
A gun,’
Anna’s voice was as smooth as water over rocks.

I finally made it over to
Chris, and ignoring Anna, he turned to me.

‘
Know how to
use one of these?’ he asked, holding out the piece of black metal.
It glinted menacingly in the dull light.

I shook my head and took
a step back.

‘
No, no,’ I
stuttered. ‘I don’t want one.’

‘
I didn’t ask
that,’ he replied.

‘
No, I-I don’t
know how to use it, I can’t. I can’t, can’t use it. I
won’t.’

He grabbed my hand and
before Anna could protest, slammed it into my palm. It was heavy
and cold.

‘
It’s simple,’
he said. ‘Aim, shoot. Make sure you have your target and don’t
shoot any of us, Christ. Keep your finger off the trigger if you
don’t have a target. It’s loaded, but the safety is on, so relax.
Just turn off the safety up top, it’s here, see? If we do run into
trouble, better to have it off beforehand.’

I couldn’t. I
trembled and I knew the only way it would get better was if I
handed the gun back. I stared at it, fearfully pointing it down as
its ominous black taunted me. What if I hurt someone? What if
I
killed
someone?
No, I couldn’t. But any words I tried to form stopped in my
throat.

‘
He doesn’t
want one,’ Anna said, her voice soft. ‘You can’t force people into
this.’

‘
Wanna bet,’
he replied.

I couldn’t understand why
he couldn’t pick someone else. Anna wanted one. She was calm, she
was steady. Me? I just couldn’t stop shaking. Chris glanced at me
again though, and I realised this was a test. He wanted to make
sure I wouldn’t pass out again, that I could handle
myself.

I couldn’t.

Way to be
positive of your abilities…

What
abilities?

I tried to focus as we
left through one of the entryways. Chris in front, Paul and his two
sons, as I’d learned, brought up the rear. The tunnels were like a
labyrinth, every now and then they would branch off in multiple
directions, the dim light and darkness made it impossible to see
where they went. Pipes lined all walls, heading in all directions,
but Chris knew the way. He manoeuvred quickly through the hallways,
and another warning sign popped up at his understanding of the
tunnels.

Anna had stayed next to
me, and I tried hard to calm myself, I couldn’t let anyone down. We
had to get out. I had to find my family.

We walked for around an
hour, passing through rooms like the one we had bunkered down in. I
started to think the place would never end when we came to a long
ladder that headed up. Chris stopped, gave each of us a quick nod,
and started up. Anna headed second and I grabbed on after. We
climbed for a few minutes before we reached a hole in the ground.
Chris pushed aside a solid ground cover, the ones that litter the
streets everywhere, but no one thinks about them twice.

I climbed out and shut my
eyes. I was shocked by how strong the sun was. The sky was
cloudless, and the only hint at the season was the cold bite in the
air. We stared at grassy lands that stretched forward for miles.
Rocky hills jutted from the ground and grew to alarming heights.
These posed the big problem for escaping. The town was nearly
completely surrounded by green giants, with only a few roads
leading out to any motorways. These were useless though, mud-ridden
roads that were thin and hard to travel in such a group.

But the fields were wide
and level. From what I could remember, the closest town was a few
miles off, still hard travel, but easier to reach than the main
roads. Behind us sat the town, its grey squat buildings lined the
horizon, and the air was ominously still.

‘
Everyone,
safety off,’ Chris whispered, as the rest of our group emerged from
the tunnels. ‘Stay close and be silent.’

I aimed my gun down,
extremely aware of the damage I could cause. My arms wouldn’t stay
still, and I made sure my finger was nowhere near the trigger. I
couldn’t steady my breathing. The town almost beckoned me to it, my
mind in a furious tangle with itself to convince me nothing had
happened, and that my mother was waiting for me at home.

We began a slow, but
steady, slouch across the fields, the town behind us. The group
bristled with unspoken hope and excitement. Chris, Anna, and Paul
looked around wildly, double checking the countryside for anything
out of place. It was after the first field that we heard it, a
strange sound, almost like a whistle, but short and
quick.

‘
Chris?’ Anna
whispered.

Chris looked around
slowly, his eyes slits. We heard it again, and one of Paul’s sons
fell to the ground, blood pooling around his head. Chris’s eyes
went wide.

‘
EVERYONE
DOWN!’ he screamed. ‘IT’S A SNIPER!’

Everyone froze, and then
anarchy erupted. They ignored Chris and started running in all
directions, some remarkably sprinted back towards the town. They
never made it far, more whizzing sounds filled the air, and those
running towards the town jerked and hit the ground. The snipers
looked to be on the roofs of its buildings.

‘
GET DOWN!’
Chris bellowed, but it was too late.

Anna tried to grab a few
people and wrestle them down but they wrenched themselves from her
grasp and ran with faces pale and terrified.

‘
Lucas…’ she
started, but monstrous shrieks filled the air and figures on the
horizon burst from the streets of the town.

Around thirty blurred
shapes charged across the fields for us. Blood matted their hair,
covered their clothes, and I realised these were the monsters
everyone was afraid of. Monsters like Mr Williams.

‘
LUCAS!’ Anna
screamed, but I couldn’t move.

My blood was
ice, and I was paralyzed. One of the creatures reached one of the
groups and lunged. It hit a woman and they barrelled to the ground,
hard. A clean twist and the woman’s arm ripped right off. I
screamed. Blood and screams and
death,
it was hell.

There was a heart
wrenching cry from somewhere nearby, and I turned to see Amelia and
Hannah, frozen and clinging to one another. Terry was nowhere to be
seen. Something ran for them, a blood-crusted hellbeast, and I
blinked at the speed of the creatures. They almost blurred. The
memory of Mr Williams flashed through my mind, and my arm gave a
twinge with the remembered strength. What were they?

Another cry brought me
back to reality. I raised the heavy weapon in my hands and aimed at
the beast as it charged the women.

What if I
miss!? What if I kill one of them!?

I just stared, unable to
fire. Amelia grabbed Hannah’s hand and tried to run. Two steps,
three, and an explosion like none other erupted from the ground at
their feet. The force lifted me into the air, and heat licked at my
cheeks. My lungs emptied as I hit the ground and groaned. A pinkish
mist drifted with the smoke where the two women had
been.

The screams were gone.
Anna was at my side, her face panicked as she shouted something,
but I couldn’t hear her either. A high pitched ringing had replaced
all sounds, and fear switched to confusion. What was
happening?

I stood. Everything
turned slow, distant and broken. I stared at Anna, her eyes wide
and her face glistened with sweat. My chest burst into flames, like
hundreds of pieces of burning coal crawled under the skin. I looked
down at my hands, covered in a shiny red liquid. Blood soaked my
clothes as it slithered from the two bullet holes on my
body.

I heard my name, the
ground rushed to catch me, and I blacked out.

The
Retreat

I remember falling in and
out of consciousness. The world around me busy and loud, but it all
moved so slow and sounded so far away. The sun was gone, replaced
with strips of light that hung from the ceiling and barely broke
the suffocating darkness.

‘
Terry,
please!?’ a woman shouted. ‘Help him!’

A man cried out in the
background, screamed names that sent tremors through my body, or
was that something else?

‘
Doctor, there
is nothing you can do for your family, but if you don’t help this
boy then he will die!’ a man’s voice said. ‘I can’t help him
alone.’

More heart-wrenching
cries, the same two names, and then I was lost.

*

My body was on fire. Anna
hunched over me and tried soothing words to get me to listen. Her
hands were stained red, and she pushed hard down on my
chest.

‘
Terry!?’ she
shouted.

Terry came into view, his
eyes red and puffy. His face was no longer kind, but strained and
broken.

‘
Keep your
hands there,’ he said. ‘Mr Bishop, focus, can you breathe alright?
Are you having any problems breathing?’

I could only stare. The
pain subsided but fired back to life. What was
happening?

‘
Chris!’ Terry
called.

I heard a voice reply,
but the words swirled into nothing before they reached my
ears.

‘
I need
supplies, hospital supplies!’ Terry replied. ‘The bullets appear to
have travelled through without damaging any major organs, and both
bullets appear to have exit wounds, but if we do not stop this
bleeding soon…’

Bullets?

‘
Appear!?’
Anna’s voice cut in. ‘You’re not sure!?’

‘
Miss Gordon,
I am doing the best I can with what I have, not what I need!’ he
shot back.

Then I was taken by
darkness.

*

Terry pulled my eyelids
up and shone a brilliant white light in them. He said nothing, but
his face had relaxed and no one was screaming anymore. My arm
pinched from the needle and tube that dangled from it. I was no
longer in pain, but my eyes dipped and a familiar haze settled in
my head. The only thing I wanted was to sleep.

My nightmares were
horrible. Mostly, they continued their theme, a dark room with
floors covered in blood and men whispering in the background. A
burning hell ended those. A nightmare that started the same, ended
with a ringing phone, and a voice so terrifying, it squashed all
hope from the world. But the new ones were the worst. Two women
stood on a field, people ran around them wildly and cries broke
through the air. These two women, a mother and child, stood
clinging to one another with wide eyes and gaped mouths.

They stared
off into the distance at a blur, something moving faster than those
around it. It screamed and snarled, closing the distance with
unprecedented speed. Only I could stop it. I had the means, a dark,
heavy object that weighed my arms down. I aimed, but froze. I
couldn’t fire. These were
people,
men and women who had greeted me on the street for
years; that had children and lives, hopes and dreams, hearts of
gold. What had happened to turn them into such monsters? What piece
of myself would I give up by taking all of theirs?

It was too late though,
the two women turned and blinding light erupted from their feet.
The world shook and burned, the women gone, dead. All that was left
was a crushing guilt, and a broken-hearted man.