Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to Wcrp. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
Dead Men Walking
Topic Started: Nov 28 2014, 02:20 AM (70,857 Views)
DoctorYerishi
Member Avatar
Dude, wake up! We've got a world to save.
Eli kick-started the bike, just like he had observed the guard doing, right before he took one to the back of the skull. He thought these things all had electric starts now – which showed what he knew, apparently.

After a tension-filled minute, he managed to make the engine come to life. He glanced at Brandon’s limping form one last time, then hit the gas and hurdled forward.

I’m coming, Kelsey, he thought.

He was determined. More determined than he had been ever in his life. Even more determined than he was about getting the cure to California.

Just hold on.

And don't do anything stupid.

* * *

Annie realized too late that there was no accident. Her suspicion had grown more and more over the course of the walk over, and had hit a peak when she heard gunshots sound out somewhere in the camp. Then Martin had stuck a pistol in her back, gently confiscated her medical bag, and told her to keep moving.

“Think about your son,” he said, when he sensed she was considering a struggle.

“Where is he?” she demanded.

“He’ll be with you soon,” Martin said.

He nudged her along, and didn’t say anything else. He ignored her demands to know where they were going and why he was doing this. He just let Annie’s fear grow and compound until they had reached the train station and they were surrounded by Leonora’s men.

He kept leading her through the station to the tracks on the other side, where a passenger train was waiting. She faintly recalled hearing it arrive earlier in the day, after the standoff in the hotel – back when Lowell seemed like the biggest threat around them.

They stopped long enough for one of Leonora’s muscle-bound guards to advance and pat her down. Annie didn’t have anything on her, and the search made her feel violated. She closed her eyes tight until it was done.

“Get in,” Martin said when it was. He poked her in the back, nodding to an open door on the train.

“I want to speak to Leonora,” Annie said.

“Mother Leonora is busy,” Martin said, his voice devoid of compassion. “Get in.”

He pressed the barrel of his pistol hard into her back. She had no choice but to comply.

The compartment was dark and sparse. The seats had all been removed and the window had been painted black. It reminded Annie of Eli’s prison cell. She didn’t think that was a coincidence.

She heard the door slam shut behind her and she spun around. She tried opening it, but it wasn’t surprised to find it locked. She tried to keep a lid on her alarm and fear – which was no easy task, given the seemingly dire circumstances.

It took a minute for her eyes to adjust to the dim light, but once she did, she looked around. She gasped when she saw Willow – lying still on the ground. Annie rushed to the younger girl’s side and fell to her knees. She felt a surge of relief when she realized Willow was breathing. She tried jostling her awake.

“Willow, come on,” she urged. “Willow, are you okay?”

* * *

Hank burst into the lobby of the hotel, practically dragging Connor behind him. His heart was beating at roughly a million times per minute.

He flinched at the instant sight and smell of fresh blood. Emily was standing over the bodies of two more of Leonora’s men. She was wielding a shotgun. The situation seemed to be just as horrible as he feared.

He came to a sudden stop, finally letting Connor free from his grasp.

“What the…”

He doubled over and panted heavily. The sprint back had winded him. He didn’t feel like he needed to finish the question, anyway. The fuck seemed easily implied.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Make-7-Up-Yours
Member Avatar
Is that so?
"Bluuuuh... uuhhh, neee?" The young woman groaned unconsciously and rolled her head toward the sound of the voice.

Willow's eyes fluttered open. But everything was dark and blurry. And spinning. Why was it spinning? What was she doing? How did she get here? And where was here? Why did her head hurt like hell? Why could she not move? Her limbs felt like they had lead weights attached to them. Which, admittedly, was kind of weird since she could barely feel her arms and legs right now.

"D-Doc?" Her vision sharped enough so that she could make out Annie above her. "Did I mix drugs again...? Cuz my head hurts..."

* * * * *

"We don't know either." Antonio answered him curtly.

He would have loved to give Hank the full rundown of what he knew, but frankly, he didn't know much more than he did. Patrick attacked him and his people had gone missing. They needed to get them back. Though he had just ordered the killing of two men, he didn't have time to feel bad for them now. This was a matter of life and death.

Antonio swiftly started to look through the pockets of the guard closer to the desk. It didn't take long for him to find a key stored in one of his pockets.

"We don't know where anyone else is." He informed Hank quickly. "Including your family. They've all gone missing."

As he talked to Hank, he slipped behind the receptionist's desk. This was heavy news for the man, but like earlier, they didn't have time for a nice chat. Thankfully these guys hadn't expected them to get this far, the first office he checked inside had all of their guns neatly organized inside of it.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
DoctorYerishi
Member Avatar
Dude, wake up! We've got a world to save.
Annie’s emotions were all over the place. She was happy Willow was alive and mostly unharmed, but she was also deeply disturbed that she seemed to be drugged and had even less of an idea of what was going on than her.

“I don’t know,” Annie said softly.

She helped her up and leaned her against the wall of the compartment. She tried to get a good look at her eyes, but that was a losing battle in the dark.

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

* * *

“Mom?” Connor asked, his eyes suddenly alight with fear.

Hank’s eyes were the same way.

“They attacked Brandon…” he tried to recount his side of the story, but Antonio’s report of his family was so devastating it made it hard to keep going. “Wait… no… no, no, no, no…”

As fast as his depleted lungs would let him go, he dashed for the staircase. He didn’t know how, but Antonio had to be wrong. These were people they were dealing with, after all, not biters. No matter how many horror stories Eli’s group had, he couldn’t just accept that people would do this to him.

“Riley!” he called out as he climbed the stairs. “Ruby! Andy!”
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Strompy
Member Avatar
More posts, more Busey.
"Is Brandon okay?" Emily asked.

Hank and Connor were understandably too distracted to answer her. Hank made his wsy to the stairs.

"Hank, they're not up there. They took them." she called out before following him.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
DoctorYerishi
Member Avatar
Dude, wake up! We've got a world to save.
Hank was only lightly aware of Emily following him, and even less aware of the words she was saying. He was too busy thinking of his sister, his daughter, his son and his best friend – who, at this point, might as well have been his brother. Their safety was all he could think about.

“Riley!” he called out again. “Ruby!”

He reached their room and scrambled to get the door open. He charged inside and looked left and right. He looked in the bathroom, in the closet. He fell to his knees and looked under the bed.

“Riley!” he yelled for his sister once more, then for his daughter again. “Ruby!”

They weren’t there. Antonio was right. They had gone missing. They would have answered him by now.

He climbed back to his feet, taking deep and ragged breaths. Emily was waiting for him by the door frame. He rushed past her and headed down the hall.

“Andy!” he called out. “Andy!”

He passed Antonio’s room – the door was open. He stopped and peaked inside. Patrick was there. He wasn’t moving, his eyes were closed. Hank might have thought he was dead, but why handcuff a dead person.

He shook his head. Didn’t matter. Not a lot mattered in that instant.

“Andy!” he kept yelling.

Finally, he reached Andy’s room. The door was closed, Hank practically ripped it off its hinges.

“Andy!”

There was a groan in response.

“Ugh…” his voice was unmistakable. “Hank?”

Andy was laying in the middle of the floor face-down. There was a syringe sticking out of his neck. He groaned again as he fumbled for it, finally getting his meaty fingers around it and pulling it out.

“I feel… funny…” Andy groaned some more.

He rolled over. Hank looked around the room – there was another man there, one of Leonora’s. He was also face-down on the floor, but he wasn’t moving. Not even a little. Hank stared at him long enough to make sure, then he rushed over to help his friend.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Make-7-Up-Yours
Member Avatar
Is that so?
Willow pushed herself into a sitting position, with no small degree of discomfort. Not only was her head throbbing, she realized, but so was her entire body. As whatever they injected her with rubbed off, it was reminding her that she hadn't been cutting down pretty severely on her painkillers. And God was the pain starting to act up.

Wait, the stuff they injected me with...?

"Where's Emmett!?" Willow suddenly called out.

Despite the pain, she swiftly scrambled back to her feet in a panic as the memories swept over her. Only to find out that her legs had not fully recovered yet, leading to her falling back to the ground with a loud "OOF!" She groaned uncomfortably, but didn't try to get up again.

* * * * *

Antonio frowned; now that he looked at them, there were a lot of weapons here. There was no way he and Emily could carry them out of here alone. But he needed to carry as much as he safely could. He snagged Nolan's autorevolver Willow's FNP, and a few other miscellaneous handguns and stuffed them into his bag. Then he grabbed the Ruger Gunsite and slung that bad boy over his shoulder, but stopped there since he was already starting to feel a little encumbered. Then he grabbed his trusty pump action shotgun and he was ready to go.

Almost ready.

"Connor." Antonio walked out of the armory looking more than a crazed soldier than a priest.

He knelt down so he could be near eye level with the boy. He held out the handgun that he had been using recently -- the last thing he ever saw himself doing. After all the talk he had said about not teaching the children to shoot, here he was handing Connor a gun. It turned out that back then, Eli had been right and Antonio was wrong.

"We're going to find your mom, don't worry." He assured him as confidently as he could. "But in the meantime... don't use it unless you have to."
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Strompy
Member Avatar
More posts, more Busey.
"That's what I keep telling him." Brandon said as he leaned heavily against the door frame.

He was breathing heavily and his right leg had gone so far beyond pain from the activity he couldn't even feel it anymore. Even considering everything he still managed a smile to see Connor was okay. He was starting to feel woozy from a combination of exhaustion and blood loss. He geard gunfire from the hotel and feared the worst, but it seemed at least Antonio and Connor were still alive.

...

"We need to get him up and get out of here right now, before their people come looking for them. We've got out weapons downstairs. We need to get in the RV and get out of here." Emily explained.

If Leonora's men showed up now they were dead. The only chance their friends and family had was if they escaped to fight for them another day.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
DoctorYerishi
Member Avatar
Dude, wake up! We've got a world to save.
Annie grimaced as Willow tried and failed to get up. The realization that Emmett was missing didn’t help mattered.

“He’s not here,” Annie answered, as she helped Willow sit up once again. “Just don’t move, okay? Tell me what you remember.”

* * *

Connor looked nervously from the heavily armed Antonio to the Browning 1911-22 he was offering him back. He accepted it wordlessly, then spun around when he heard Brandon’s voice.

He was okay! The thought gave him some relief. That relief lasted up until he actually laid eyes on him.

“Brandon! You’re bleeding!”

* * *

Hank nodded at Emily’s instructions, and groaned as he helped his large friend up and off the ground.

“Thank God you’re okay,” Hank said, as he got Andy’s arm around his shoulder. “What happened here?”

“I was… um… going to ask you that,” Andy groaned out his answer. “Last thing I remember is this guy injected me with something. Then I… I kind of freaked out.”

Hank finally got his friend to stand up. He started to lead him towards the door. He stopped when he heard a groan.

Hank looked back, worried that the guy Andy had managed to overpower was waking up. And he was waking up. But not from a nap. He looked up at them with glassy, lifeless eyes and started to climb up from the ground.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Strompy
Member Avatar
More posts, more Busey.
Part of Emily had to acknowledge it was messed up that she was actually relieved the guy was dead. It meant not having to spend a moment more than they needed to subduing him. With a quick smile and a sigh of relief she walked over to creep and began bashing its skull in with the butt of her shotgun until it stopped moving or making noise.

"What'd you do to that guy?" she asked out of sheer bewilderment, offering an regretful shake of her head to Andy after she recognized the insensitivity of the question.

She wouldn't have wanted to talk about what she just did either, but Andy wasn't even armed. It was... dusturbingly impressive.

...

"Yep." Brandon confirmed as calmly as he could manage.

He didn't want to panic Connor, and especially not himself by making a big deal over the dangerous amounts of blood he would be losing if he didn't do something about them. The knife wound was the main concern. The bullet had taken a neat bite out of his side, just like Willow had suffered, he could aooly pressure to that for now, but the knife wound was dangerously close to some very important arteries and they were pumping a lot of blood that geneeal area.

"Your mom... is she around here?" he asked as he tried to catch his breath.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Make-7-Up-Yours
Member Avatar
Is that so?
From her new sitting position, Willow slumped forward. What was she doing here? Where was Brandon? Was he okay? What about Emmett and the others?

"I was talking to Leonora..." Willow started to recall for Annie. "And it seemed like it was going alright until I told her we were still planning on leaving. She asked that question a couple of times, I think. Anyway, then one of her guys injected something in my neck! I smuggled in Maxwe- no, Jen's butterfly knife and managed to slice one of them across the chest in self-defense. But after that, it gets really fuzzy. I... I don't know what they did to Emmett."

By the time she finished talking, Willow realized her heart was slamming against her ribs and her breathing was shallow. Her stomach was twisted into a knot and she had the overwhelming urge to throw up. Without the numbing effects of her drugs, her anxiety was coming to the surface in full force.

Willow curled herself forward, brought her knees into her chest, and then clasped her hands over the sides of her head.

What's gonna happen to us? She thought. Is this where we die?

* * * * *

"We... don't know." Antonio answered for Connor.

He needed to tell Brandon what was going on. From the looks of him, though, he needed medical help. The guy had proven his tenacity and ability to take hits, but... there was a lot of blood. And Antonio didn't know anything about treating wounds that required more than some Neosporin and a Band-Aid.

"Emily and Hank are upstairs. Everyone else is missing." He told Brandon everything relevant. "We've reclaimed the armory, but we need to find Leonora and get some answers out of her."
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
DoctorYerishi
Member Avatar
Dude, wake up! We've got a world to save.
Andy was finally standing on his own two feet. Hank took a few careful steps back and made sure he could stay that way before he lowered his arms.

“I… I don’t really remember,” Andy said, clutching his head. “Like I said, I, um, I freaked out.”

Andy stumbled a step forward, Hank had to step in and help him get right again.

“Where are the kids?” Andy asked when he was steady once more.

Hank frowned deeply. It was a question he was desperate to know the answer to himself.

* * *

Connor tightened his grip on his pistol after Antonio’s answer.

“Then let’s go!” he said. “Let’s get her.”

Before anyone could respond, some more noise could be heard from the stairway. It was noticeably louder than the noise Hank and Emily had made going up. Connor readied his pistol. He relaxed when he saw it was just Hank and Emily again, except they had that big guy, Andy, with them.

“I’ll need a gun,” Hank announced.

“Me too,” Andy said.

* * *

Annie remembered the new injuries Gregory was sporting, and that Willow’s story had just accounted for. Her grimace didn’t go away. Their situation seemed dire with every new piece of information she learned.

There was also Willow to think about – she was clearly coming down from whatever drug Leonora had dosed with her, and she was coming down hard. She looked terrible.

“Everyone else is still out there,” Annie said, trying to comfort herself almost as much as she was trying to comfort Willow. “You know they’re not going to let anything happen to us. They’re going to get us out of here, you know they are.”

As if on cue, the door behind them slid open again, bathing the compartment in a sudden burst of sunlight. Annie had to shield her eyes as she turned to look.

“Where’s my brother?” she recognized Riley’s voice, sounding distressed.

“He’ll be here soon,” she heard Martin answer – the same way he had answered her about Connor. “You can wait for him in there.”

“We’re, uh, we’re good out here,” Ruby’s voice was next. Her distress was equally obvious.

“Get in,” Martin said.

Nobody spoke for a moment, but Annie had a pretty good idea what was happening. Soon after, Riley walked up the steps and came into view, carrying CJ in her arms. Ruby followed behind her, but not willing

“What are you doing?!” Ruby protested, even as she was forcefully helped up the steps. “Stop it! You can’t just… you can’t just lock us in here!”

It turned out Ruby was wrong about that. A second after she said it, the door closed behind her, and it was dark once again.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Make-7-Up-Yours
Member Avatar
Is that so?
Antonio waved an arm toward the receptionist's desk and, more specifically, the armory not far behind it; "You've got your pick of the litter. If nothing else, we had a lot of guns out there."

He glanced toward the doorway. The other ways leading into the lobby. No signs of anyone else on their way. He should consider it a blessing, but it was almost eerie how nobody was showing up anymore. Even after gunshots broke out just a minute or two ago. Hopefully that meant nobody had heard them.

"Brandon..." He shifted his attention to the blonde haired young man. "Can you move?"

* * * * *

Willow hugged her legs and breathed deeply. The calm that she had felt before was gone now. The illusion of safety she was able to take refuge in was shattered. Now she didn't know what to expect. The arrival of a few familiar faces didn't put her at ease, but it gave her a little more information. They were collecting people alive. Or at least they were collecting the women and children alive. The implications were... oh God, the implications.

Brandon... Shit, I need to get out of here.

"W-wait... are we..." She trailed off for a moment. "Are we on the train?"
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Strompy
Member Avatar
More posts, more Busey.
"Take a pistol each, as well as one of those AR15s on the floor." Brandon said as he made his way over to the same weapons.

Emily made a bee line to him and gave him a hug which he returned happily. He wasn't just happy to still have his friend with him, he was happy to have another fighter in the ranks, it improved their odds.

"You're bleeding." she informed him and he nodded his head tiredly at the old news.

"There's some more bad news you guys. Noah and Alma broke Lowell out and took off through the gate in a truck. Kelsey climbed into the back without them seeing. Eli has gone to get her back. When he broke out though, Lowell shot Nolan. Nolan is dead." he said with all th composure he could manage.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Make-7-Up-Yours
Member Avatar
Is that so?
"Wait, did you said Nolan is dead?" Antonio latched onto the last phrase in particular.

Even though Brandon had said it out loud, it didn't feel real for a few moments. He and Nolan had a mostly professional relationship, but he had known the young man longer than he had known anyone else here. He had consoled him during the early days of the outbreak. Nolan's loss was one that cut particularly deep. The fact that Eli and Kelsey were now out of the action as well didn't help anything. It was only because of the urgency of their situation that Antonio was able to remain composed.

"We need to find Annie and the others." He said stoically. "Willow and Emmett never came back from Leonora's office. We should go there first."
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Strompy
Member Avatar
More posts, more Busey.
"Before Patrick's friends get here." Emily added.

"Patrick was here? They must have really wanted this handled." Brandon commented as he pick up his carbine.

"Is here. He's unconcious upstairs." Emily explained.

She slung one of the bags full of hardware over her shoulder and looked over to see Brandon staring into space with a peculiar expression she couldn't understand.

"Bring him." he said quietly "We might need him."

"He won't talk to us, and if we get Leonora we won't need the hostage." Emily pointed out.

"Bring him." Brandon repeated.

There was a certainty in his voice and expression but what they meant, Emily didn't know.
Online Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
ZetaBoards gives you all the tools to create a successful discussion community.
Learn More · Sign-up Now
Go to Next Page
« Previous Topic · Roleplaying · Next Topic »
Add Reply