Hey guys! Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been busy with school and work and all that jazz. With the semester coming to a close, hopefully I'll be able to post more. But never fear, the story is far from over.
As always, comments, faves, and follows always help give me motivation to write and are always appreciated! Thank you to everyone who's done any of that so far, especially those who have followed and are sticking with me.
Without further ado, onto the story!
Disclaimer:
Left4dead is Valve's property.
Chapter 10-Luck
"Hey, Nick, is this what yer ex-wife looked like at yer weddin'?" Ellis whispered, jutting his chin in the direction of the sobbing witch bride.
Nick shot him a glare. "Funny, hick. Very funny."
"Boys," Rochelle snapped, "focus on the real problem here. We all need to get past her."
Nick tore his glaring gaze away from the boy and returned his attention to the witch. Rochelle had a point- the bride was blocking the only easy way through the park. Creeping past her would be extraordinarily risky, and going around her wasn't an option given the fact that bushes and tall metal gates blocked any other paths through the park. Surely they could make their way over or through such obstacles, but by doing so, they would probably cause a commotion that would startle the sobbing woman.
"So what now?" Ellis asked. His companions looked equally as clueless, but then Melia's eyes lit up. She began creeping towards the bushes furthest from the witch.
Nick reached out his hand. Surely she wouldn't risk loudly walking straight through one of the bushes- would she? "Melia-" he began, but the girl only shushed him. Quietly, she continued forward, gesturing for Ellis to follow. The boy obeyed, following silently behind her.
The group watched as Melia and Ellis neared the bushes, low and quiet, preventing the witch from noticing them. They crept as far away from the witch as they could, only stopping when the gates prevented them from going any further.
Melia gestured to Ellis, whispered something, and the boy folded his hands above his knee. Melia backed up a few steps, ran towards Ellis, stepped into his hand. With his added push, she successfully vaulted over the high bush, barely knicking the leaves. She landed with a loud grunt on the other side, and the witch's growl grew louder.
Rochelle bit her lip. The fact that the teen had taken the risk of going first was no accident. The girl's words from the previous night echoed in her memory.
If there's extreme danger, you let me go first.
If things went on like this, the girl's luck would run out, and she would be killed.
Rochelle set her mouth into a firm line. She refused to let that happen. She would not let another person throw themselves into danger and die.
The group waited for what seemed like forever for it to die back down into muffled sobs. After they did, they let out breaths they didn't realize they'd been holding. Melia raised her hand and motioned for the group to follow before tip-toeing away.
Quietly, they followed. First Rochelle, then Nick, then, with some difficulty, Coach. Ellis vaulted off the nearby wall to get over, surprising the group when he cleared the bush with ease. The witch growled more than once, but never rose from her haunches. After waiting a few moments to ensure the infected's attention was elsewhere, the group continued on their way, leaving the sobbing bride to her empty altar.
"Well, that was easy," Nick said, grinning genuinely. He glanced back at the sobbing witch again, to make sure she hadn't heard them, then turned away, his slowly widening grin making him look ridiculously out of character.
Ellis pulled at his arms, stretching his muscles. "I wouldn' exactly call liftin' Coach easy," he said, ignoring the older man's glare, "but yeah, that was a helluva lot more peaceful than usual."
"It'd be nice if we could do that more often. About time this group had some damn luck," Nick continued.
Rochelle scoffed. "Yeah, we're a real lucky bunch."
Coach and Ellis exchanged glances. Where had Rochelle's usual positive attitude gone? Nick looked toward Melia, but the girl kept her eyes downcast.
The conman gently creeped closer to Rochelle, speeding up to match her hurried gait. Leaning down slightly so he could see her face better, he softly,hesitantly laid a hand on her shoulder. "You alright?" he asked.
For a moment, fire burned in the woman's eyes, and she looked as if she might slap him. But then the fire died, replaced by something even more terrifying: the absence of the usual light. Nick furrowed his brow, wondering what dark thought could make the hopeful woman's eyes look so dim. He massaged her shoulder slowly, tentatively. "Rochelle."
"I'm fine," the woman whispered, voice cracking. She turned away, her face again contorted in the pained expression that had now become familiar to Nick. He stilled his hand, knowing she wouldn't want to cry. Not now. She paused a few moments, sucked in a slightly shaky breath. When she spoke again, her voice was firm. Oddly calm. "I don't really want to talk about it. Thank you."
She turned to look at him now, with another look that he had recently become familiar with. The look that said I'm dying to talk about it, but right now I can't.
Nick nodded and turned away, lips pursed. Both women were acting weird, and he didn't like it. Something was up- whether he wanted to know what, exactly, he wasn't sure.
"What was it you were saying about luck, Nick?" Coach asked. The group stood at the edge of a broken stairwell, staring down half a story at the murky green liquid illuminated by the glows of their flashlights. A few of them held their noses, sucking in stuffy, moist air through their mouths.
Nick looked down at the bright white leg of his pants, wondering how they would look with a green-brown ombre at the bottom. "I guess we used all our luck up for today," he replied. "Not everyone gets to walk unharmed past a witch and tour an underground dirt museum in the same day."
Ellis looked back up the stairwell, recalling the dirty, empty rooms. "I don' think that technically counts as a museum."
"I'd still take that over this," Melia said, leaning forward when she caught sight of something brown floating in the water below.
Coach tucked his flashlight into the side of his backpack. "Alright, alright. Enough of the chatter. Let's get our asses moving. Who's gonna be first?"
He glanced around, his hopeful gaze only met by empty stares and wandering eyes. Sighing, he took a step forward, towards the water. "That's what I thought."
Quickly, before he could change his mind, he lunged forward, landing with a loud, disgusting shlop in the muck below. Ellis sucked in a breath and jumped after him, while the other three peered down hesitantly from above.
"It ain't so bad!" Ellis called up. "Barely knee deep!"
"For you!" Rochelle replied. Ellis towered over her and Melia by nearly a foot, and his legs were longer and lankier, his torso smaller and more compact. The girls were sure to be up to at least their thighs. Gathering her courage, Rochelle plugged her nose and leapt into Ellis's arms, confirming her suspicions. The water stopped at the middle of her thigh, sloshing up to her hips when the others moved too quickly. She groaned in disgust and kept sucking in air through her mouth, trying not to think about what could be hidden in the murky liquid.
Ellis and Coach looked upwards, arms outstretched for the two remaining party members.
"I can catch you too, princess!" Coach called to Nick. The conman rolled his eyes, a soft growl escaping from his lips.
"Just get outta my way!"
The two men obliged, stepping to the side and turning their backs so the splash wouldn't hit their faces. Nick jumped and landed without even a grunt. The grace of his fall and the way he immediately began preening his hair and suit reminded Melia of a cat. She chuckled softly to herself, watching from above as Nick desperately picked pieces of God-knows-what off of himself.
Nick heard the girl's laughter and spun on his heels, sneering up at her. "You gonna come down, giggles, or are you just gonna sit there and make us wait in this shit?"
The teen pursed her lips for a moment, as if contemplating which snippy comeback to use. The group was surprised when she said nothing, choosing to blow a raspberry at Nick instead. The conman only raised a brow in response.
Melia looked down at the water below, squinting. How far it was exactly, she couldn't tell. Her world was spinning. She felt it again, that feeling deep in her gut that something was just off, but she didn't know what was causing it. She took a moment and massaged her temples, hoping to stop the dizziness. But then her vision went black at the edges, one of her knees giving out beneath her.
From below, it looked as if the teen had just barely leaned off of the staircase instead of putting in the effort of jumping. Her feet slipped off the edge of the last stair, and she plummeted down a floor, to where the group was waiting. Ellis shot forward and caught the girl in his arms, then eased her to the ground. She stumbled, leaning heavily into his chest. Though Ellis would've liked to think the move was flirtatious, something told him that that was not the case. It was becoming obvious, even to him. Something was wrong.
Then Melia was pushing herself off of him, cheeks red, shaking her head as if to clear it. She scampered away in the water as best she could, creating large splashes by launching the water from her thighs with quick movements. Rochelle was quick to follow.
The dim lighting and deep, stinking water made it difficult to navigate. The group trudged along in the darkness for a while, guided only by the little light provided by the occasional emergency lamp. After a bit of wandering the group found themselves at a ladder, which they trudged up one at a time, careful not to let more sewer water drip onto their bodies. They found a few medical kits and weapons at an abandoned camp on the dirty alcove above.
"Well someone chose a shitty place to camp out durin' the apocalypse," Ellis said. The group turned to glare at him, but the boy didn't stop. "Shitty," he repeated. "Get it? Shitty..." He glanced around at the scowling faces then, pulling his lips into a pout. "Alright, fine. Excuse me for tryin' to lighten the mood a lil' bit."
Melia muttered something about dad jokes, and Nick rolled his eyes.
"Just stay quiet, hick," Nick said. "We're in their shitty camp now, which, by the way, must have been especially shitty because no one is still here."
The group was silent for a moment then, questions racing through their minds. What had become of the previous inhabitants of the camp? Why had they camped in such a place?
...had something trapped them?
It seemed they all had reached the same conclusion. No one said a word. They were listening, waiting.
A large chorus low growls sounded in the near distance.
The infected.
"Fuck," Nick cursed. The group quickly looted the camp and moved towards the sound of the growls, their hearts dropping when it became clear that the infected would stand between them and the only way out of the sewers.
They crossed under an arched brick tunnel to another alcove, this one lined with metal railings. Past the alcove was a room- a HUGE room- perhaps as large as a football field, or bigger. The entirety of the space was filled with the common and special infected, who growled at each other, and nothing, as they sloshed through the sewer water.
There had to have been hundreds of them.
"Great," Rochelle said. She approached a metal gate, which had once led to a metal pathway that would carry the group over the death-filled water. But that pathway, of course, had been broken, leaving the group with no option but to hop down to join the zombies.
Coach pointed to a large red button next to the gate. The sign around it read
Gate will open
Alarm will sound
"Double great," Coach said grimly. Nick pulled out a pipe bomb and a lighter, and Ellis and Rochelle cocked their guns.
"This'll be fun," Rochelle said, peering down her sights at the horde below.
Nick smirked half-heartedly.
"Like I said, your definition of fun just shows that you need help."
Coach stepped between the two, cutting off further conversation. Melia crouched low, as if ready to sprint, and Coach let his hand hover over the red button.
"Ready?" he asked. The group nodded silently, eyes trained on their targets. Coach couldn't help but be reminded of his times as a track coach before he coached football, when he called to his team, telling them to be on their marks. This, too, was a race, but a very different kind. This time, his team would be running for their lives.
He just hoped they could win the race.
Coach inhaled, exhaled, and slammed his fist down on the button.
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed it, please be sure to leave a review below, fave, follow, or share with your friends! I always love getting feedback from you guys!
I hope to see you again in the next chapter of The Young and The Infected!