Friday, December 20, 2013

2.5.9.9 Exodus


















The division of the group confused the horde, and after they split in two, more of them chased after Marcus’ group rather than Samuel’s group. Many got caught in the sand, or so confused that they stopped chasing all together and wandered back up to the boardwalk or even into the ocean. By the time they started to catch up with the survivors, only four were after Samuel’s group, unfortunately four times more were after B Squad. 

Samuel and Atticus kept luring the zombies on, long away from anything else. They left the town of Cape May and got into some wilderness as the sand dwindled to rock. Marcus and the others on the other hand walked up the beach which was the town’s back spine, wrapping them around to the bay. Chambers stayed behind and let the sixteen pass him. 

Chambers shot three consecutive arrows, cutting the number to thirteen and finishing the arrows in his quiver. He panicked. Lately Chambers had been distracted with the goods he got back during the church to maintain his ammunition. Now they were expended. luckily he took down the back 3 and the other dead-heads didn't seem to bother noticing. 

He paused to take his boots off and tread barefoot in the sand, tying his laces to his belt.  Chambers slid a blade out from under his vest. He sneaked up on the first one. It was a decrepit old thing, just some meat on a mobile skeleton. So Chambers popped his blade in its neck and snapped the head off, like an apple from the branch.

Chambers picked up its head and threw it at the next one.

Except when it hit they all turn around. By the time Chambers caught up with the group only one was left which Marcus took upon himself to chop to shreds with his axe. They wrapped completely around the Cape and were walking parallel to the bay when they came upon a restaurant called the Lobster House sitting next to a bridge. Behind the Lobster House was a yacht that was docked and serving as its bar and waiting area. 

 "There's our girl..." Chambers notified everyone, “Find a way to dislodge it.”

They began cutting the carpet and taking apart the floor. Chambers walked up to a statue of a pirate decorating the bar. He put his fingers around the statue’s black eye-patch. He popped off a clip around the back; it was a legitimate eye-patch. Chambers adjusted his headband back to his forehead and put the eye-patch on.

 The sails were dropped; Alice was nowhere to be found. Marcus left the boat and went to look for her inside. She was dragging stacked boxes of food from the kitchen along the dining room floor on a tablecloth. Marcus smirked as he walked around her and helped get the food to the boat. When they returned the yacht was now free from the deck of the Lobster House, but something was still keeping them docked. 

Marcus pulled the tablecloth over the gaped ledge and onto the boat, dragging it to the center of the bridge and letting go before going over to Chambers, “Hey nice, eye-patch. What a find!”
“Thanks. I know, right." 
"So what’s holding us up?”
“I don’t know…I’ve never been on a boat before…”      
     
Marcus laughed, “Some pirate you are…” He really thought Chambers was joking at first. But the blank look on Chambers’ face finally sunk in and Marcus realized.  “Well did you bring up the anchor?”
“Anchor! That’s right!”

Alice laughed as she leaned in on them by the doorway with her hand holding her elbow, and her finger hooked in her mouth, tooth under nail. Chambers ran out the other door, a little embarrassed, and went to get the anchor. Once it was wheeled up from the depths, the sails took the wind and carried them out of the docks. 

“Do you know what you’re doing, luv?” Alice asked him.
“Excuse me?” Marcus looked at her.
Alice kept forgetting he was American...that this was America, and she just used a non-threatening colloquialism on a man that she actually had feelings for. In short, Americans are so wound-up, even the men.
“My father had a yacht. He took me out on it every weekend of my childhood.” Alice explained to him.
“I think I can handle turning a wheel…darl-ling...” 

Alice blushed and walked out smiling. He was just as awkward as she was… What a refreshing notion. “Call me if you need me!” she yelled out from the deck, very casually, right? The Lobster House yacht left the bay and swept the beach from not too far out so they could look for the others.  

Once they got to the southern tip of Cape May, the shore got rocky and grassy with wild grown weeds and trees everywhere. That is where they caught up with Samuel, Atticus, Rebecca, and Tyrell, taking cover on a beach next to what looked like concrete wreckage but was really once a ship called the Atlantus.  

Samuel sent them out into the ocean one by one, as he, being last, made a run for it, lingering zombies caught them. There is nothing more terrifying than running from a zombie, other than having to do it in waves of water.  As Samuel fended them off they swam over to the yacht. Once he got to where they couldn't stand it was easy. They safely climbed aboard and set sail with food, free of zombies, for the South, and Florida; putting the nuclearized Northeast behind them, while completely avoiding the nation’s capital.

As they sailed away Alice sat on the deck, staring out at the drifting beach, growing smaller and smaller. Alice felt horrible. She thought he would come back. They said he always came back.
Samuel sat down next to her, and put his hand on her back, patting her. “I know what you’re feeling.” He went on, “Part of me wanted Jackson to get back before we left too, but I guess too much happened.”   
    
“Was he your dog?” Alice wiped away her tears.
“No, he was my neighbor’s dog. But my son loved him…And I thought…”
“What?” Alice turned to Samuel, who was choked up. “You can tell me.”
“I just thought Jackson would help me find my son…”
“I’m so sorry, Samuel.”

Samuel and Alice stared out at Cape May leaving them in the distance, as they drifted out east, deeper into the ocean, and safety. Atticus, Marcus, and Tyrell were inside, looking at maps, trying to figure out where to go, and how to get there. Chambers was getting sea sick off the edge of the boat with Quinn and Rebecca tending to him. 

Chambers had saved all of them on multiple occasions, now it was time for them to take care of him, even though he was a tweeker. Everyone got to spend that night fast asleep. It was the first night, for many in a while, that they didn’t have to worry about being torn apart in their sleep. The Lobster House yacht took them away, took them to safety…took them south.


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