AN: Here is the next chapter then, guys. Thanks for the great reviews you gave me from the last chapter. Can I say thanks to NateeeNotorious for your interesting reviews, made me laugh, then again a lot of things make me laugh. Sorry about the random cliff hanger sort of ending that I wrote but it came to me and I had to. So, I hope you all enjoy this chapter that I am about to proceed to write.

Jamie

The two figures hovering above me knelt down next to my face. The features of Mike and Tim were highlighted and I sighed in relief. They had seen me do the most idiotic thing I'd ever thought to do. The pain was still throbbing its way from my leg up to my stomach to my head. The dull burning had lessened slightly since the initial break.

Mike and Tim slowly started examining my leg in the darkness. "Hey I can't tell with this light but it looks like you might have broken your leg, kid," Mike stated.

"Yeah, I mean, come on Jamie, I've done some pretty stupid things, but that was just reckless...and awesome," Tim agreed. I groaned as they poked my shin bone. Okay, yes it was stupid; it was dumb it was reckless and irrational. I thought at the time that it would be fun, and that the drop wasn't so high.

Mike and Tim and dared me to climb a rock wall to see if I could get to the top. That wasn't the dumb part. The dumb part was climbing the tree at the top and then falling off.

"We need to get you out of here, it'll be light up soon and the seekers might be getting close on our tail," Mike told Tim quietly.

"Dude the only way is up or the long way around the edge of the cliffs! That will take ages, plus, Jamie isn't exactly the lightest thing I've ever carried!" Tim complained.

"Oh, sorry then for being an idiot! I'll just walk you know, I haven't got a broken leg or anything!" I said my voice laced with sarcasm, "Just go find something that we can splint my leg with and grab my jacket and wrap that around it. Then you guys can either carry me or help me hobble."

Dumb and dumber took my cue and went to find a suitable splint. I sat on the ground staring at the canopy of darkened trees. There was a slight slimmer of light starting to spread over the chink of visible sky.

My leg was starting to lessen in the throbbing and I took the chance to look at it. My skin was turning a bluish colour and I could see some of the skin sticking up slightly. It looked like a broken leg but I couldn't be sure until I got somebody to look at it. I sighed again and looked back up at the trees.

I really shouldn't let myself start to think, I shouldn't be left alone with time on my hands because all I think about is her. Violet. My mind was slowly venturing back to her face, her tangled mess of curls and her green eyes that were laced with silver.

Her smile would light up her whole face and I could picture her laughing at some stupid thing I said. I looked down again at my leg and tried to stop thinking about Violet. She was my suffering. All I could think about was her and I missed her. Every day I suffered because I was away from her and everyday I wished I had listened to her words. "Don't go," was what she had told me. She had told me not to trust Mike and Tim; but I did anyway.

Now look where I've ended up, on the cold, hard ground with a broken leg waiting for Mike and Tim to come back. I sighed for what felt like the millionth time and sat up on my elbows. I couldn't see or hear Mike and Tim and I was starting to wonder where they were, they could only go so far to look for a splint for my leg. I heard a branch crack to my left and looked over expecting to see the Tweedles; instead I came face to face with a group of four dirt covered people.

There were two men and two women in the group, the men were carrying .22 calibre rifles and the women were holding knives. I wanted to run in the opposite direction, but I couldn't. My leg screamed in agony when I tried to drag myself away from them. "Move another inch and I will shot you," came a gruffly voice from one of the men. I swallowed hard and stopped trying to move.

My breathing increased and my heart was pounding as the second man moved closer to me. He stopped when he reached my face, knelt down and pulled out a flashlight, shining it at my eyes. "He's human," gruffly voiced man stated.

"I can see that, Steve," said the man above me as he shook his head, "I see you've done some damage to your leg here, boy."

I simply nodded as my heart rate started to slowly decrease. The three other members of the group made there way over to me. The taller woman bent down and poked at my leg. I hissed as pain headed towards where she placed her finger.

"What's your name boy?" Steve asked me roughly.

"It's Jamie,"

"I'm Jessie, that's Sally and he's David," the woman who poked my leg told me, "Can you tell us what you did to your leg?"

"I...uh...fell off that tree up there. The two guys I was with said they'd go get something to splint it with, but somehow I don't think they're coming back anytime soon," I huffed.

"Okay kid, relax and Jessie will fix you up. Sally and I are going to see if we can find your friends, make it snappy okay Jessie, we don't want no suckers to find us," Steve grabbed Sally by the arm and dragged her off into the bushes.

"How old are you, Jamie?"

"Eighteen, I'm almost nineteen, I think," I told them. We conversed a little while Jessie was fixing up my leg. Turns out they'd been on the run after the seekers had found them and taken some of their friends. Steve was in his forties, David was thirty two, Jessie was twenty eight and Sally was thirty. They'd known each other long before the invasion happened and I had realised that they had a very, very strong hatred for souls.

When David had told me this I think I flinched. Of course I understood how most humans left hated the souls, but I couldn't completely agree with them. I mean, my sister had been taken over by a soul and Wanderer was like my other sister because of it. Sunny had such a sweet nature and was open with you once you got to know her. And then there was Violet. How could I hate the souls when I was in love with one?

I was in love with one. My heart rate sped up again as thought about it and I couldn't help but smile to myself. "So I take it from the smile that you hate the soul suckers too right?" David asked me.

"Uhhh, no actually. I get why you hate them, I mean, I hate the fact that my parents are gone and all, but maybe it needed to happen. We needed them to realise that when you only have a few people surrounding you, you have to make the most of it and bring them closer. We needed them to let us realise that we were killing this planet and hurting each other with violence that wasn't necessary. The group of people I lived with were violent all the time to each other, but then Wanda showed up with my sister and we realised there was no reason to fight anymore,"

David and Jessie were staring at me, "Okay, yeah, they took over and got rid of most of the human population, but that's just how they live, that's their purpose, their being. Our purpose is to survive and reproduce, it always has been and always will be, no matter how many souls are living on this planet and how many humans are living on it," I stated.

"Wow, I've never heard a human talk so kindly about the souls before. Why do you, I mean, why to you think they're good?" David's voice laced with curiosity.

"My sister was the only one I had until we met Jared. And then she disappeared. Jared and I found my uncle's hiding spot and joined his family there. We never thought we see Melanie again. But then her body showed up, with a soul in it. Why, because that soul loved us just as much as my sister did. Wanda was willing to give up her life in my sister's body to give us Melanie back. Wanda thought she had given up her life but we brought her back when we realised that we loved her just as much. She is the most selfless person I know and I love her like she was my sister."

The two faces in front of me were in shock, "So, you and your family live with a soul?" David asked, astounded.

"No, we live with three souls. And believe it or not, Wanda and Ian, a human, just had a baby. It proves that our two races can coincide."

A rustling in the trees behind us told us that Steve and Sally were back. "What's got you two looking like a bunch of browns cows?" Steve jested.

"No, nothing, it's too long a story for now. He can tell you later, let's get him up and let's get out of here," Jessie replied. The men lifted me up and placed under my arm a stick shaped like a crutch. I was slow at walking but I still managed to travel at a decent pace. Sally and Steve hadn't seen any sign of Mike and Tim and were pretty sure they'd run off. I shook my head and said that I would definitely be getting an "I told you so" from Violet when she heard.

The group of four were taking me to one of their bases and were going to stay there with me while my leg healed up. I told them about the caves, but didn't mention that they were caves, just a long term base. I also didn't tell them how many people there were living there.

I wondered how I could trust these people. They were strangers, yet they had offered to help me when I had been deserted. They saved my life in one way or another. If they hadn't come along I would have most likely been found by souls and taken away.

Maybe they could help me find my way back to the caves, maybe I could take them with me, once I figured out if I could trust them or not. I sighed once more before finally closing my eyes and drifting off into sleep.

Violet (roughly a few weeks or a month after Jamie was abandoned and rescued)

I was up and out of bed before anybody else. I had a huge build up of energy that I needed to release. I bathed and washed my clothes before heading to the kitchens to start the daily food production. Before long I was joined by Jeb and Lily who were up early. A few other women made their way to the kitchens and helped me with preparing food.

After a while everybody was up and atom and eating or cooking or cleaning. Jeb had assigned jobs for today and I was pleased to be back to wanting to help again. My mind still drifted to Jamie but I would force myself to only think of him when I was alone. I couldn't keep letting his absence bring me down.

I know it affected everybody else too, and it hurt that he might not be coming back, but we needed to keep on moving or we would never be able to do anything ever again. I had decided to lift my attitude about the situation after I realised it affected everybody else and put more strain on them. We all had to work to keep up our spirits, I mean, without Jamie life didn't seem as bright. Life was a lot duller for me and I'm sure many of the other members of our family felt like that.

I don't even remember when he left now, it would have had to have been three or four months ago. Life does seem drabber, but it moves on and there is nothing we can do to bring him back from his journey. Most of us were still calling it a journey because we refused to believe that he may be dead or a soul. Ian slowly approached Jeb and me while we were eating our rolls.

"Jeb, we have a slight situation that you need to see, now," he said in a low and brisk tone.

"What's going on Ian?" I asked quietly.

"You don't need to be involved with this now, Violet. Jeb, come quickly please," Ian insisted. Jeb followed him out of the kitchen area and I stared after him. I wondered where they could be going in such a hurry. I couldn't imagine what the problem could be.

I looked around the kitchens to find that Kyle, Jared, Mel, Ian and Jeb were now the only ones missing. "They must need the muscle," I thought out loud. Lily who was standing close turned and raised an eyebrow. I shrugged and told her I was just thinking aloud. I stealthily made my way out of the kitchens and into the main cavern area. The sun was shining and blinding off the mirrors as I walked passed. I headed down the south tunnels towards Doc's but didn't hear any talking.

As I peaked around the corner I realised there was nobody there. The only other places they would have gone were the main entry tunnels or the game room. I ran down the halls and paused before entering the entrance tunnels. What if they saw me spying on them?

Would I get in trouble? What if it is something so bad that I will never forget it? I shook it off and snuck down the halls. As I got closer to the storage area I could hear quiet mummers. I paused as I stuck my head slightly around the corner. I pulled it back quickly after I had seen the gathering. Kyle, Jared, Mel, Ian and Jeb were standing around two figures, Mike and Tim.

My breathing picked up as I realised that there was no Jamie with them. I felt tears starting to well in my eyes. I tried to pull myself together and started listening to their conversation.

"I can't even fathom why you would even think to come back here without my little brother," came Mel's angry voice.

"Look, we don't know what happened, we told-,"

"I don't want to hear it," Jared interrupted.

"Just let us explain,"

"Okay, fine, explain to us then why you had the urge to come back here without my nephew and with a story that is so full of rubbish that not even the dumbest of people would believe it. Explain to me that," Jeb's voice echoed off the cave walls loud and clear.

"Well, it started like this, we left and started looking for souls to find but every time we thought we saw somebody good, another reason would tell us that we judged wrong. So anyway, then somebody obviously put in that they saw strangers lurking around and then next thing we know, seekers are on our arses and we're running every which direction to try and throw them off. We knew we couldn't come back here quickly and jeopardise you all," Mike said.

"This still doesn't explain how Jamie got lost!" Jared exclaimed.

"I was getting to that!" Mike retorted angrily.

"Well I-," Jared started but I heard somebody smack him and he stopped.

"Continue Mike, before Jared rips your head off," Melanie seethed.

"Okay, well anyway, as we were running through some bushland with seekers somewhat chasing us, Jamie ran in another direction. We couldn't just stop and turn around so we tried to back track to where he was without getting caught. We found his jacket lying on the grass with a note that read, "I'm going to a safe haven I know. Will be okay, Jamie." And so we took his jacket and kept on running. We figured once we'd lost the seekers and came back here to tell you." Mike finished.

"Oh well that seems reasonable," Mel stated in a calm voice. But then I heard a loud smack that could only be her fist hitting one of their faces.

"Ahhh for gods sake you bloody crazy bitch!" Mike yelled.

"That is for letting my brother get away, and this," another loud smacking sound, "Is for lying about everything that happened. You think I don't find it hard enough to live knowing that my brother might be gone forever? I can't deal with this, I'm leaving,"

I twisted on the spot and ran down the hallway, I didn't want them to know that I had overheard there whole conversation. I decided that I would intercept Mel when she passed the tunnel to her room. My breath was still fast and my heart was still pounding in my ears. I knew now that Jamie was either lost somewhere or that the worst had happened. How could I have let this happen?

It was my entire fault that I'd let him go and I never even told him my deep and true feelings for him. The thoughts echoed in my head and I realised that he was gone, and I would never get him back.

AN: Well that's the end of that chapter. Not exactly how I wanted it to end but it was just how it turned out. The events somewhat turned out different then I had planned. Mike and Tim were never going to leave but then it came to me! So any who that's not really that important. I would like to thank you guys for reading and putting up with the fact that I don't update often enough, but today I was in the mood so yay for you then! Please review and tell me what you think. Was it clichéd? Was it completely awesome? Did it suck to the deepest pits of Tartarus? Let me know and I would really appreciate it! Love you guys for reading and reviewing. Thanks!

Nickynoo