I am officially one of those terrible people who don't update for weeks at a time. *sigh* Sorry, folks, life has been busy, but with only a few chapters left I'm really going to try to get these out on time. (Thanks to all of you who reviewed, by the way!) Hopefully there's still
17 - Chaos
I could hear all the girls in the barracks growing restless as the rioting noise became louder and louder, the shouts of angry men and violent boys commingling with sounds of violence and struggling. Those guys were fighting hard and moving fast, and already my adrenaline was pumping in anticipation of the breakout.
Our guards grew uneasy and went off to investigate the noise, leaving us girls unattended. Then the lights flickered on in the hall, and the barracks filled with anxious chatter and pandemonium. "Stay calm, everyone!" I shouted as loud as I could, making my way towards the front of the barrack, "We're going to get out of here, but you have to be ready to fight your way out and to take orders!" I didn't know if anyone heard me, but my bunkmates stood around me steadfastly, standing there with eerily calm expressions on their faces as I continued to shout instructions to anyone who would listen.
Then the lights blacked out again, and nervous talking turned into terrified screaming.
"Stay calm!" I repeated, "We're going to be rescued!"
No sooner had I spoken did a group of silhouetted figures appear at the end of the hallway, and they quickly began opening barrack gates and giving out instructions to girls as they filed out into the hall. "The fences are shut off now!" someone shouted, "If you see a guard or a doctor attack! Use anything you can as a weapon!"
"Craig!" I shouted, making my way through the crowd, "Is that you?"
"Ella!" he replied, pulling me out of the mob by the arm, "Everything's going great so far! Everyone really got on board with things."
"Is there anything you need me to do?" I asked.
"Can you get a group together and stand guard outdoors? We have to make sure nobody gets to the boats, and we need all the help we can get!"
"Sounds good!" Already the anxious girls around me were starting to calm down and organize, with Craig's guys and my girls directing them on what to do next. The hallway still sounded like a shouting match, but it was just like what I saw on TV, when they talked about how when a plane crashes the flight attendants have to be assertive to get the people unloaded more quickly. Everyone here was scared out of their wits and confused about what to do, so they needed some firm orders to get them going.
"Hey, you over there!" I called to one girl who looked about thirteen, "Come with me, we're standing guard outside!" I picked out several other stragglers from the crowd, and together we made our way through the building.
"Hey, where's an exit?" I asked a boy who was standing near a pile of fold-out chairs. "We're on outdoor patrol."
"Down the hall," he replied, handing me a chair, "Here, take this. If you see an adult, don't be afraid to bash them over the head." He handed chairs to the other girls and then we kept going.
As soon as I stepped into the cool night air I felt invigorated. The air was damp and the ground was soaking, like there had just been a big rain storm, and the sting of cold against my skin killed a little bit of the burning heat I felt in my aching innards. There wasn't any time to stop and enjoy the evening, though.
We quickly found the dock, which was only a few yards away and seemed to have all the boats still at their moors. There were some guys standing guard there, but they were itching to go patrolling the island so we relieved them of their duty. I positioned everyone so we had all angles covered—nobody was going to slip past us. All of us were shivering in our sleeveless shirts and bare feet, but I was impressed by how well all the girls held their ground. The guys had taken out most of the staff in the initial wave, but a couple of times a doctor tried to slip past us and get to the boats. They failed miserably, and were quickly dragged back into the building by the boys.
We stood there for hours, cold and exhausted, but I assured everyone that the worst was almost over. The sun had risen at some point, because what was once a dark, inky sky was now a grey swirl of thick rain clouds overhead.
"Hey, you guys!" It was the guy in charge of the boys' patrol group, a lanky guy with sandy brown hair.
"Yeah?" I replied.
"We need help searching the trees over there," he pointed to the dense clump of trees not too far from the dock, "A guard slipped away and we think he's hiding in there."
I nodded. "Kris, Theresa, come with me. The rest of you stay on patrol." We joined the group and headed towards the trees with the others. When we got there the group split up and ventured into the prickly grove of pines.
"If you see him start shouting!" the patrol leader called out.
As I made my way through the grove I felt like I was being engulfed by the trees, with massive pine branches scraping at me from all directions. I couldn't see anything but prickly green, and I grimaced as my tangled hair got caught on an overhand branch. "There'd better not be pine sap in my hair," I grumbled, reaching up to free myself from the pine needles.
Before I could so much as take another step, however, a hand clasped around my mouth and a blade was pressed against the side of my neck. "Make another move and it will be your last," the harsh voice whispered in my ear, causing me to swallow nervously and frightened tears to well up in my eyes. Something tells me I just found the missing guard.
I didn't dare fight the guard as he ushered me out of the pine grove and away from the patrol group, who had left the path from the trees to the boats exposed. The girls guarding the docks were the first to spot me, and they froze in fear when they saw that the guard had a knife to my throat.
"Make a sound or get in my way," he uttered to them, "and she'll be dead before you can even take a step. Now move!"
Wordlessly the girls stepped to the side and let the guard pass, watching with wide eyes as he walked towards the boats with me still in toll. I cast them desperate gazes, silently pleading with them not to let this man escape. Didn't they realize we were all dead anyways if he got back to the mainland? But seeing them standing there in the grey morning light, shivering and terrified, I remembered that they weren't warriors or fighters or anything like that. They were just scared, sickly kids—that's all that any of us were.
I was led roughly down the dock to the nearest boat, and without so much as a warning he shoved me onto the deck and then jumped in, leaving me sprawled face-down and dazed by the sudden impact. My inner pains had been somewhat muted before by the evening's adrenaline, but now my burning innards churned with raw pain and I stifled a scream, and my body clenched as I the boat's engine sputtered to life. I was too sore and scared to lift myself up and look, but I could feel the boat slipping away from its mooring and floating out onto the choppy ocean waves.
You can't let him escape, I urged myself, Stop him or everyone else dies too! It hurt to even lift my head off the deck, but I knew I couldn't just lie here and let the guard escape. Biting down hard on my lip I raised myself onto my hands and knees, then I pushed myself from a kneeling stance into an almost standing position—I was still hunched over because of my newly agitated abdominal pains. With the guard turned away from me as he stood at the helm, I figured I could catch him off guard, maybe steal the knife he was holding. It wasn't a plan that was likely to work, but it was the only one I had.
As I took my first steps towards him the rain started to come down, the patter of the heavy raindrops helping to disguise my cautious footfalls. When I got about halfway to the guard, however, I realized that caution was pointless, and that if this was my last stand I was going to make it a struggle.
I ran at the guard and jumped onto his back.
Even though it was clear he hadn't been expecting it, my surprise advantage wasn't enough to give me the upper hand. The guard ripped me off of him like I was a pesky two-year-old and pinned my arms behind me, and even though I could feel his knife brushing against my wrists I knew I couldn't reach it.
"Let me go!" I shouted, fighting against him with any remaining energy I had.
"Stop struggling!" he ordered, trying to hold me still.
"You have to turn the boat around," I pleaded desperately, "Can't you see what they're doing to us? Please, just this once, show some humanity!" His grip held fast, but I continued to resist, and with my legs I tried kicking at the controls to mess things up.
The guard dragged me away from the controls, livid at this point. "Be quiet and sit still or I'll throw you into the water!"
"I'd rather die!" I shrieked as he dragged me closer to the edge, the heavy rain soaking us both.
"Then so be it!"
Before I even had time to register what was happening I was off the boat and in the water, submerged in the churning sea. The chilly water was paralyzing both mentally and physically, and for a moment I was dazed, but then for a moment I broke the surface, and I gathered enough air to scream, "Help!" The cold was searing, and everything felt terrifyingly numb as I was tossed helplessly by the storm. I barely had another breath's time before a wave pushed me back under, and I found myself totally lost in the dark, lifeless ocean.
