Chapter 135
There wasn’t any time to think about that. The others were moving, so Rain was, too, helping a couple of the girls who were having trouble walking. She could get them up the stairs, but beyond that, they’d have to split up, and then it would be up to Mist and Walt to get six half-dead, unarmed women out of a building teeming with people who wanted to kill them.
No pressure. None at all.
The struggle to get up the stairs was real. The women were so unbelievably weak, their legs shaking, it took forever for most of them to even lift their legs high enough to climb the stairs. The idea that they should all just pick up a girl and carry her up the stairs, coming back for a second entered Rain’s mind, but they couldn’t carry them all the way outside, so it seemed pointless to take them up the stairs when they’d still have to manage to get out of the building.
At this rate, the Mothers would be able to bring troops from another town and get them there in time before these poor ladies made it up the stairs.
As she was helping them up the stairs, the girl on Rain’s left was talking. Rain sort of wished she wouldn’t. Nothing she was saying was pleasant, and she truly needed to save her breath, but she was telling her what had transpired, and Rain had little choice but to listen.
“We’ve been in that cage for months,” she said, struggling to suck in air with every labored step. “Rarely food, hardly any water. When we got it… it was dirty.” She slowed for a second to lift her leg to the next step. Her bare toes caught on the lip of the step, and she nearly fell forward, but Rain didn’t let her fall.
“That sounds terrible, '' Rain said as they recovered. The other girl was making little sobbing noises, like maybe she was crying, but there wasn’t enough water in her body for tears to form.
“It’s been hell,” she said. “So many people didn’t make it. At first, the Mothers would take them away, but then they stopped. We took it as a good sign, though. If they were too busy to bring us food and water, too busy to take out the dead, maybe that meant the Rebellion was working.”
Rain wanted to say something in response, but she couldn’t even think of an adequate thing to say.
“We didn’t know. They wouldn’t tell us anything. They tried to get information, but most of us didn’t have any information to tell them. I wasn’t even part of the Rebellion. I’m glad it happened, but I didn’t know about it before it happened.”
Again, Rain was speechless. They were about halfway up the steps. Ahead of her, Rain noticed Adam was basically carrying the two girls on either side of him up. Maybe that was the best strategy. If they wore themselves out on the stairs, they’d have less strength to walk the rest of the way out of the building.
Once Adam had the two women at the top of the first landing, he came back to help Rain with one of hers. She scooped the other one up and carried her up. Rain had never thought of herself as particularly strong, but it was easy enough to carry this woman who was at least three inches taller than her, up the stairs.
Eventually, they all made it to the top of the stairs. Then, the real danger would be staring them in the face.
Mist let go of the women she’d been helping and swung her rifle around in front of her, letting the rest of them know she intended to be the first one out the door. She put her head out and looked each way before she stepped out, signaling for the others to wait. After a moment, she beckoned the rest of them, and they followed.
Mist and Walt were in the front, the girls all behind them with Adam and Rain trailing. Rain turned sideways so she could see behind her but could also look in front of her every once in a while so that she didn’t run into the slow-moving prisoners.
They made it down the first hallway without any problems. But then, as they were about to turn the corner and head down a hall that Rain knew had an exterior door, the sound of footsteps coming from behind them had all four of the rebels spinning around to see what the threat was.
A group of six Mothers was coming up on them fast. Mist shouted to the prisoners, “Get around the corner!” They all moved as fast as they could to get out of the way as the bullets started flying.
Rain got down and opened fire, aiming for foreheads, as she had before. She drew a bead on the woman on the far right and pulled the trigger. Her first shot was a bit wide, but the second one hit her mark, and the girl went down. Adam’s first shot had met its mark. So had someone else’s because they were down to three, and now they had the upper hand.
A bullet grazed Rain’s arm, but her uniform didn’t let her feel more than a sting. She took out another Military Mother.
Down to two, the remaining Mothers let another barrage of bullets fly. One of them went down hard, tripping the other. She scrambled to try and get up when a well-placed shot from Adam’s gun took her out.
They’d made it out of this scrape, but there was more to come. Rain hopped up and turned, assuming they’d all four rush around the corner to help the prisoners get out, but then she realized they had a problem. A big problem.
Walt was hit.
Log in with Google Account
Chapters
Favorite
Settings
