Chapter 9 - Dead End part 2

Lara's POV

How could he do such a thing? What made him do this… The look in his eyes, not a hint of mercy.

Alex was devastated. He sat down and stared in front of him for hours. Rick left, he went back the other way after he and Alex fought, but I decided to stay with Alex. I was not gonna leave my only friend that I knew wasn't dead. I looked around for dry wood or branches. Due to the rain, it was hard to find them. It was getting colder, not only because the sun was down, but also because autumn has come. As I broke down several saplings for wood I heard something shuffling through the bushes behind me. I took my bow and readied the arrow. My heart was racing, rendering me unable to aim my bow steadily. Despite the cool rain I was sweating like hell. Whatever was here a second ago, isn't here anymore. I let my guard down and put my arrow back in my quiver and my bow across my sweating body. I put the branches and twigs with my arrows in my quiver. As I made my way towards a second set of saplings I heard the same sound again, but this time from the bushes to my right. I aimed my bow at the origin of the sound and held my breath.

Come out, come out, wherever you are.

Suddenly I heard something running behind me. I turned around and saw a wolf dashing towards me. I shot the arrow straight through its head. I forgot about the wolf behind me in the bushes and got bit in my right leg. I fell towards the ground onto my chest. Its teeth were ripping through my flesh as I took an arrow from my quiver. I turned my body around, causing its teeth to rip further through my leg, and stabbed the arrow into the wolf's left eye multiple times until it went limp and released its grip from my leg. I was sitting there panting, leaning on my hands behind me and observed the bite wound for a minute or so. The bite wound was bad, but the bleeding was mild; I acted faster than I thought. The wolf must've been weakened before it attacked me; the wound was not very deep. I tried to stand up, but my right leg would just collapse. I took my bow and used it to stabilise my body and stood up right. I slowly made my way back towards Alex to bring back what I had gathered.

I made my way back to the camp and sat down near Alex.

"Look what I found!" I said excited, trying to lighten up the mood.

He didn't respond, not even a nod. He was just staring in front of him, gazing at the boring wall that kept us from progressing. The wall was a man-made structure and was covered with naturally formed vegetation. I stood up and began setting up a campfire.

"Alex, where did you put the matchbox?" I asked him, but he didn't respond.

I took one of the branches that was left over and threw it at him softly. It startled him a little, causing him to look up at me.

"I put it in your bag." He replied.

"Hmph… So you can talk." I muttered, rolling my eyes.

I took some bandage and the matchbox out of my U.S.M.C. bag that Roth provided me for this excursion and took a match out of it. I ignited the simple construction of branches, starting a fire. I blew gently into the fire and rubbed my hands. It was getting colder every second. While bandaging my leg I looked over to Alex. He was still doing the exact same thing; staring at that wall.

"Alex, staring at that wall won't get us over it." I mocked.

He was staring at it intensely and stood up.

"Maybe not over it... but it could get us through it." He responded and strolled towards the wall and touched it with his hands.

"We need something, something that can function as a lever." He told me hastily.

"Like a crowbar?" I responded, trying to come up with ideas.

"Yeah.. or an… an axe of some sort. Wait a second, Roth has an climbing axe, right?" He replied to me.

"Yes, but we don't know where he is."

"No we don't… but Rick does."

"Wow hey wait, that psychopath just killed a kid, I'm not coming near him again."

"Lara…"

"We could just circle around, right?"

"We don't know how far this structure stretches out. Besides, if we find Rick, he might lead us to Roth and his pickaxe."

"What if he doesn't know where Roth is?" I doubted.

"I don't know, but I've got a good feeling about this. Lara.. We need to do this, it's our only chance to find the others right now."

"All right all right..." I said slightly hesitant.

I finished bandaging my leg and tried to stand up.

"Jesus! What happened to your leg?" Alex said in shock and helped me stand up.

"Wolves." I replied nonchalantly.

"Damn, you okay?"

"Define okay." I joked.

"You're more badass than I thought, L.C."

"I'm flattered." I smiled.

We slowly backtracked our way back to the camp we were at earlier this morning. The trip was quiet, Alex was especially quiet. I guess he just wanted to focus on finding Rick. Suddenly, we heard the noise of cans rambling in the distance.

"You heard that? Those are Rick's traps! That could be him." Alex exclaimed and started running.

I followed him and tried to pick up the pace, but the bite wound didn't help. We eventually reached the handcrafted traps made by Rick. But we didn't find Rick as expected. We found…

"Jonah!" Alex yelled.

"God damn… Alex… Lara... I didn't think you guys made it. l- I'm so glad you two managed to get out alive." Jonah said relieved and hugged us both tightly.

"Same goes for you, Jonah." I told him, while he hugged us.

"That's enough Jonah, you're crushing my bones!" Alex chuckled uncomfortably.

Jonah took a small step back and scanned us both.

"Lara, your leg! What happened?" Jonah said.

"I got bit by wolves, y'know, the usual." I replied.

Jonah crouched down, took of his backpack and zipped it open. He took out a bottle of alcohol and handed it to me.

"Put this on the wound." He said and continued searching through his bag.

I took off the bandage, applied the alcohol, re-bandaged my leg and handed the bottle back to Jonah. He took the bottle of alcohol back and handed a bottle of water to Alex.

"Drink." Jonah said.

Right before he closed the bag I noticed something.

"Jonah, is that... " I began.

"I know it's not tea, but I figured you guys were thirsty." He replied.

"Not that, Jonah. I meant what was in the bag." I clarified.

He opened it back up and took out Roth's climbing axe.

"Where did you find it? Do you know where Roth is?" I asked Jonah worriedly.

"I wish I did. Last time I saw him we got separated; a large group of crazy men took him away. I managed to stay out of their sight, but they took Roth, Reyes and Sam. I should've helped them..." He replied, clearly devastated about what happened.

"it's not your fault, Jonah. You were outnumbered. By the way, what happened to Whitman?" I questioned.

"Dunno, bastard took the lifeboat and sailed off without us." He responded.

"But I think I have an idea where Roth could be. He told me if we ever got separated, he would head towards the Endurance." He added.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's find that damn boat!" Alex said optimistically.

"Hmpf… Ship." I said quietly.

"Ship, boat, it's all the same." Alex rolled his eyes.

We started heading back to the wall, this time with Jonah by our sides.

"Lara, you should drink something." Alex said and passed me the bottle of water he got from Jonah.

I opened the bottle and drank from it. The water was still cold and refreshing. I handed it back to Alex and he passed it along to Jonah. When we arrived at the wall, Alex took out Roth's ice axe from Jonah's backpack. He investigated the wall and noticed some inconsistencies. He took a few steps back and prepared the axe. He then swung the axe at it and broke off a piece of the wall. Spiders started crawling out of the hole made by Alex, causing him to back away from the wall. He then repeated the process until a gap, big enough to climb through, was revealed. Alex was panting as it took quite some time to break the wall to this extend. Whoever built this structure sure knew how to hide a secret entrance.

"This.. is.. a terrible secret entrance." Alex panted.

I guess Alex doesn't agree.

"So… Who goes in first?" He asked with a goofy smile.

Nobody responded.

"Fine. I'll go first…" I said.

Jonah took a glow stick from his backpack and handed it to me. I snapped the glow stick and shook it around, lighting it up. I then climbed through and Alex followed. Jonah took off his backpack and threw it through the gap first, before he climbed through it himself. Once we were all inside we began making our way through the claustrophobic cave way. We barely fit inside it, we had to move through it sideways. The absolute worst part was that the cave way was filled to the brim with cobweb and the spiders that occupied them. I could feel the spiders crawling down by body and moving through my hair. I've never experienced so many shivers in a row.

"Oh fuck, this is crazy, maybe we should go back?" Alex panicked.

"Come on, we're almost there, don't give up now." I said, facing him.

"Fuck fuck fuck fuck… Lara, don't just stand there, keep walking!" Jonah yelled.

"Keep your mouth closed or they'll climb inside." I teased him.

"Very funny, Lara." Jonah replied.

Suddenly my foot slipped, causing me to fall down to the ground.

"Lara!" Alex exclaimed and tried to reach towards me.

"Ah shit!" I yelled as I hit the ground.

Before I knew what was happening, I was sliding down some kind of slope, desperately trying to grasp something. All of a sudden I was free falling for what felt like five whole seconds, before I hit a pool of water and went under.

~ End of Chapter ~