Salamander by Harley Hanna

  Chapter 6

  I pushed open the door to the Mess Hall, this time, it was two in the morning. Jack wanted the meetings to be later to fully assure no one would find out what we were doing. Though I’m sure some people in my room block were suspicious as to why I was walking around at two in the morning.

  As I opened the door, I realized I must’ve been late because everyone was already there. Going to sleep after dinner and waking up at two wasn’t easy though. I took my seat in between Dardian and Sam, avoiding the stares of the few impatient and obviously cranky people.

  “Well, now that everyone’s here, we can get started.” Jack said. “We have some pretty big stuff on tonight’s agenda so let’s just jump into it. Dardian, Tim, where are we on the weapons.”

  “Well, we have a lot. But we don’t have most of what’s on this list.” Tim said, pointing to the paper that sat in front of him.

  “Yeah, I mean C4? Rocket Launchers? Where are we supposed to get that stuff?” Dardian said.

  “We’ll find some place, the world wasn’t cleared of explosives as soon as The Giants arrived.” Jack replied, breathing deeply and running his fingers through his hair. “So, what do we have?”

  “Lots of guns that’s for sure.” Dardian said.

  “Any specifics?” I asked, wondering just how much firepower we actually had.

  “Let’s just say we have enough guns to arm every person in The Cross, twice.” Tim said, shocking everyone at the table.

  I knew we had weaponry, but I had no idea it was that much. If we had so many guns, this thing should be easy to take down. If we could hit it in the right spot a few times, or break into whatever is under the hard stuff, we should be good.

  “Don’t get too excited, we won’t be able to take it down with just guns, we need explosives. The guns are nice for defense against other humans, and distracting…’it’. But, all the bullets in the world won’t take him down.” Jack said. He was right, I’d shot at that thing before and it didn’t do anything. It turned him around, and it got his attention, but he wasn’t fazed. I remember pulling the trigger, I’m not sure what I thought would happen. Back then I was naïve. Maybe I thought I would shoot him and he would collapse, letting out one last breath. I would be the savior of humanity.

  It didn’t work like that. He just grew angrier, I remember seeing his face as he charged towards me. The loud thunder of his feet on the ground. It was something I had to experience over and over again. Every night in my dreams I could hear the loud thrum of his footsteps.

  “Like I said, where are we supposed to get this stuff?” Dardian said.

  “We’ll I had an idea, but I’m not sure you’re gonna like it.” Jack said. He started unfolding one of his papers, revealing a map of the surrounding area. “I know I said that we should disband the Salvage Department, but we need explosives to take this thing down. We need weapons, and we can’t do that without going out and getting them. And I need my best person on this.” He shot a glance at me.

  I sat silent for a few moments, running it over in my head. It was just another risk, another risk in a world of risks. It would just have to add to the pile.

  “What’s the mission?” I replied.

  Jack smirked, he’d finally got me on the same page. “Well, ideally, it would be Karia, Dardian, and Tim. A three person group is just small enough to move quick, and just big enough to back each other up.” Jack said, waiting for the inevitable response from Dardian and Tim.

  “Wait, why us?” Dardian said.

  “Because, you three are the best I have. Karia has done this hundreds of times, Dardian knows guns better than anyone else, and Tim is a brick-house, he’ll be able to protect my best assets.”

  “I feel slightly offended…” Riley said. “But I can see your point.”

  “Don’t worry; I have jobs for you two. Sam I want you on public relations all the time, I want to organize events here in the bunker to take people minds off everything. We need to raise people’s spirits.” Jack said.

  “Okay, I can do that.” Sam replied, looking satisfied with having something to do.

  “And Riley, the best way to people’s spirit, is through their stomach.”

  “I don’t think that’s the saying, but okay.” She replied.

  “My point is, hopefully this mission will be fruitful in other ways. This place the team is visiting will hopefully have a large amount of food. Stuff we haven’t seen in a while, like chocolate.”

  “Don’t play with me Jack.” Riley said, laughing.

  “Now, back to you three.” He pointed to a spot on the map. “This is us, The Cross sits right in this field, as you know.” He pointed to a large red circle to the right. “This is unexplored territory, just places we never got to. In these places we never got to, is an army bunker, one a lot like this. If it hasn’t been raided, we could be in for a very large supply of weapons, water, and yes Riley, maybe even chocolate.” Jack said, smirking.

  “Isn’t there a large chance that someone could already be there?” Dardian said. He had a point; the army bunker had supported us for about two years before we needed to even think about scavenging. If we found another one, we could be set for a while.

  “There’s a chance, but this place only lasted us a couple years. It’s been five since all of this started, they would’ve had to have left and started to find different sources of food and water by now. We most likely would’ve run into them.”

  “Okay, but what if it’s just one guy? He could still be living on that supply.” Tim said.

  “Then you only have to deal with one guy.” He said.

  “Wait, you want us to kill them?!” I said, shocked that Jack would even think about something like that.

  “No Jesus, I mean you could reason with him, maybe trade for the weapons. You could even let him join us if need be.” Jack said.

  “You want us to bring new people in?” I said. “We haven’t accepted new people in years. What’s changed?”

  “Everything’s changed Karia, you’ve changed, I’ve changed, and everyone at this table is a different person than the one that climbed down that ladder. This world has torn us apart and spit us out. Back then I would’ve realized that we were low on resources and we don’t have much space. But, if getting the weapons required to take this thing down, means letting a few more people in our group, then I’m fine with that.” Jack said, quieting the room in an instant.

  “Okay, I agree.” I said.

  “Now, you do what you need to do to get those weapons, if everyone is on board, you’ll leave tomorrow.”

  “I am.” I said, the first one to speak, hoping the others followed.

  “Me too.” Dardian said, quickly after me.

  The room was quiet, everyone’s eyes were on Tim, waiting for his response, or lack of one.

  “Fine, I’ll go. No need to pressure me or anything.” He said chuckling.

  “It’s settled then.” Jack said.

  This time tomorrow we would be on the run, dodging through trees, and trying to hide from the numerous threats that could be trying to kill us.