Sorry it took me so long to write a new chapter you guys. Enjoy!
Murphy's Law
"Stop!" I call out and stand up from my seat, heading towards the back of the bus. I look out the back window and watch Roque running towards us with the kids. I look back at Jensen, "Help Roque get the kids in."
I turn back to the emergency door and unlock it, swinging it open as Jensen runs down the steps of the bus. Roque quickly lifts the kids up with Jensen's help and I take them; one after the other and place them behind me.
"Where's Clay?" I ask Roque while I take another kid. I spot Cougar run up from behind Roque and Jensen, rifle on his back. He runs to the side of the bus and up the steps.
"Finishing the job." Roque growls back as he lifts another kid up to me. I shut the back door and lock it after the last kid is lifted into the bus, making sure it was secure. I push my way to the front of the bus and stand in the aisle. Cougar sat in a seat behind me and to the left with a kid while Roque and Jensen sat in the two front seats.
"Time to go!" Roque calls out and I round on him, my eyes hard.
"We can't leave Clay!" I yell at him. He looks back at me and shakes his head.
"We can't wait any longer!" I shake my head back at him and then move to the steps of the bus.
"Rhos! Come back!" I hear Jensen yell as I step onto the dirt path. I suddenly collide with something hard and then feel myself being picked up. I give a small yell as I feel myself slung over someone's shoulder and then the person heading up the stairs of the bus.
"I told you to watch her Jensen!" Clay yells and sets me on the ground, giving me a little push into the seat with Jensen. My back collides with Jensen's shoulder and I look over at Clay, who sat down in the seat with Roque.
"Where the hell were you!" I yell as Pooch starts the bus up again. Clay looks over at me with an angry stare.
"I was doing my job!" He yells back at me and shake my head.
"You're job!"
"Yeah, my job!"
"Well, are you alright!" I yell back, anger no longer in my voice.
"I'm fine!"
"Good! I was worried!" I cross my arms over my chest and turn around in my seat to sit right, staring out the front windshield of the bus.
"I was too." Clay tampers off, his gaze falling on the windshield as well. I look to my right at Jensen, noticing his blank stare.
"What?" I ask slowly, unsure of the look he was giving me. Jensen shakes his head and takes a quick look back at Clay before looking back at me.
"What was that?" He asks, dragging out his meaning.
"It's just the way were are." I answer with a shrug and look back out the windshield. Pooch continues to drive the bus out of the village while Jensen shouts constantly that he needs to drive faster.
"Pooch! Just drive faster!" I shout, unable to listen to Jensen anymore.
"Hold on!" Pooch calls out as he pushes the gas pedal into the floor. I grip onto the little barrier keeping Jensen and me in our seat as I watch the trees go by from the front windshield. My eyes slowly go wide as I see the trees up ahead disappear into nothing.
"Pooch! Hill! There's a hill!" I scream and point to the drop ahead of us. Unfortunately it was a little too late and we went off the hill with the explosion of the air strike behind us. We hit the slope harshly, me hitting my forehead on the barrier in front of the seat I sat in.
"Hold on to her damn it!" Clay shouts, looking passed me at Jensen. I feel my head ache and become dizzy slightly. I shake my head once swiftly and close my eyes tightly to the pain I had caused to surface.
The bus races down the hill as Pooch tries to stop us, making the bus skid and thrash left and right. I feel one of Jensen's arms cross over my belly and grip onto the seat edge beside me as if to keep me belted to my spot.
The bus continues to skid down the hill and then stops abruptly at the bottom as the front of the bus lands in a shallow puddle of mud. This time I don't hit my head. Jensen's arm had acted exactly like a seatbelt, but winded me.
"Everybody alright?" Clay asks, looking around at everyone. I nod my head and look over at Jensen.
"Your arm okay?" I ask and pull his arm from over my belly. He nods his head and flexes his arm, "You could have broken it doing that."
"That's better then what Clay would do." Jensen gives a small shaky laugh.
"Oh really?" I ask rhetorically, my lips forming a tight line. I turn around and hit Clay in the shoulder with a closed fist.
"What was that for!" Clay shouts, glaring at me.
"Because I can!" I shout back and stand up in my seat. Clay growls and also stands, looking around at the children who were laughing, "Nice job Clay."
I commented and look over at him with a small smile of appreciation. He nods his head and lets go of his arm where I had hit him.
"Alright, everybody out!" Clay shouts and moves from his seat. He, Roque, and Pooch are the first ones out the bus doors with the kids following after them. Cougar passes by Jensen and me and then we follow off the bus.
"Which way's North East?" I hear Jensen ask Cougar. I reach into one of the pockets on the front of my vest and pull out a compass as I walk along the line of standing children. I stop at the front of line of children beside Clay and Roque.
I look behind me and then pocket the compass. I look back at the children and try to remember what Spanish I knew.
(Please, be quiet!) "Por favor, cállate!" I call out and look around at the children. I take a deep breath and realease it, "Quién quiere ir a casa?" (Who wants to go home?)
The children all speak at once and I laugh, a bright smile on my face. I look to Clay beside me and laugh again before raising a finger to my lips and shushing the children.
"Bueno...vamos a llegar a un lugar seguro...Luego se irá a casa...pero hay que seguir con nosotros." I look around at all the little faces, "De acuerdo?" (Okay...we are going to get you to a safe place. Then you will go home...but you have to follow us. Alright?)
The children either nod or say yes and I point to the direction behind me. Then I make a motion for them to follow me as I start walking in the direction I had pointed to. Clay stays close at my heels, followed by the rest of them.
"You know where you're going?" Clay asks after a few moments of walking.
"You don't trust me?" I smile and then nod my head at his grunt, "You want North East right?"
I look over at him. He nods his head and gives a small snort of a laugh. I look behind me at the children, unconsciously smiling to myself and my thoughts.
"You wanna tell me about what happened now?" Clay asks suddenly, catching me offguard.
"About what?" I reply, my eyebrows knitting together. Clay stares at me hard and I shake my head, realizing what he was referring to. I was about to say something when I feel a tug on my hand. I look down between Clay and me to see a little girl with straight black hair holding my hand.
(Are you really taking us home?) "De verdad nos lleva a casa?" She asks in a small voice. I stare down at her and then smile, nodding my head.
(Yes...we are taking you home.) "Sí...estamos tomando a casa." I struggle to phrase the reply right and then smile at her again. I give her hand a reassuring squeeze and look over at Clay, "Let me be happy for a bit longer. Please?"
Clay nods his head and looks back before us at the jungle we needed to trudge through. I look back at the children again and then to Jensen and Cougar leading the back. I laugh to myself and then look back before me.
We continue to walk until we reach a clearing. A helicopter crosses the sky and circles before landing about a yard from us in the clearing. We all stop and watch the helicopter for a moment, wanting to be sure it was safe.
I look down at the girl, who held my hand tightly, and smile at her. I bend down and pick her up, placing her on my hip. The helicopter door opens and a soldier sticks his head out.
"Ves a ese hombre?" I ask and point to the soldier in the helicopter. The little girl nods her head and looks back at me. I think through what I want to say and then speak slowly, "Va...lo lleve a casa."
The girl smiles and I start to walk us over to the chopper. Clay moves ahead of me and to the open door of the chopper and the soldier.
"We can't take all of you! It's you or them!" The soldier calls out to Clay. I look over at him, my hair flapping around in the wind the propellers of the helicopter created. Clay looks down at me and the little girl I held, then at the children behind us.
"Take them!" Clay calls back to the soldier and takes the girl from my arms, lifting her into the chopper. I move to the left a little as Clay, Roque, Cougar, and I help the kids into the chopper. Cougar says something to the kids in Spanish, waving to them as he steps back.
I look over at Clay, crossing my arms over my chest as one of the boys tries to get him to take his bear. Clay laughs and pushes the bear back to the boy, shaking his head.
"You keep your bear. You keep it." Clay smiles, pushing the bear back to the boy again. I smile and walk back to where the others were, Clay following behind me. I turn back to the chopper and watch as it starts to lift into the air. I wave at the little faces in the window as the chopper rises higher.
"Do you hear that?" Roque asks, looking up at the sky. I look to Clay beside me and shrug my shoulders, not hearing anything, "It's sounds like screaming."
I look back at Roque with a laugh in my throat and spot something in the sky, soaring towards us. My smile falls and I quickly look back at the chopper.
"No!" I scream as the rocket shoots across the sky.
"Rose no!" Clay yells as I try to run towards the chopper. He grabs a hold of me, wrapping his arms around me tightly and pinning my arms beneath his. He tries to pull me back, but I flail the best I could, trying to break free.
"NO!" I scream again as the rocket hits the chopper. The explosion creates a bright array of yellows and reds as the chopper falls to the ground in heaps of burning metal and ashes. I scream out again, trying to rip myself away from Clay to run to the wreckage.
"You can't do anything!" Clay shouts and I start to fight harder, "There's nothing you can do!"
I thrash one way and then the other, accidentally causing Clay and me to fall to the ground on our knees.
"No!" I scream and struggle against him still, though I was beginning to wear myself down.
"There's nothing you can do Rhoswen." Clay breathes out in my ear as I stare out at the helicopter. I couldn't believe it. They were so close to being home and the little girl...
I slowly give in to what Clay is repeating in my ear softly and stop flailing. I feel pressure build behind my eyes as it starts to cloud my vision. Clay's hold on me loosens slightly as he pulls back a little to look down at me, making sure I was alright.
He reaches to my neck and pulls off my dog-tag. He then stands up and pulls off his, telling the others to do the same. He throws our tags into the burning flames of the helicopter and then walks back to where I still knelt on the ground.
"I can't do this anymore..." I whimper out softly.
"Rhoswen..." Clay kneels before me and takes my cheeks in his rough hands.
"I just can't...He's taken everything from me, Clay..." I speak up, my voice choppy and cracked. I feel the tears escape and trail down my dirt smudged cheeks, "My brother...my niece...everything's gone!"
Clay pulls me to him and lies my head on his shoulder, his hand holding my head there gently. I feel him breathe into the hair at the top of my head, whispering something I couldn't make out.
I couldn't take it anymore. Everything I had bottled up was now overflowing, ready to just explode. My brother, my niece, and now these kids...all dead while I was still alive and walking the earth when it was them that should be alive; living.
"It's all my fault...!" I cry out, letting go of all myself control, "Everything is my fault!"
"It is not your fault." Clay growled into my hair, looking out over the top of my head with glazed eyes, "All this blood is on Max's hands. Not yours!"
"Laura's dead because of me...! Because I couldn't..." I choke off and start to cry into Clay's shoulder, not caring that the others were watching from behind me. I wrap an arm around Clay's neck, covering my face completely in the crease of my elbow. The cracks and pops of the burning helicopter behind Clay continued to burn and with it burned my sorrows.