Episode Sixty-six of Lilith's Escape

 

                                                                         

“Come to my office,” the commander ordered Edward and Scooter.

Edward wanted to have a moment with Lilith, but he was pretty sure the woman in front of him was not accustomed to waiting. So he followed her and Scouter down a dim lit hall way to where her office was located.

                                                                      

Ruth took her seat behind the desk and gestured for the men to grab the folding chairs against the wall. “You’re going into enemy territory tomorrow. Are you ready for this?” Ruth asked as she lit the tobacco in the pipe that she grabbed from the desk drawer.

                                                                     

Yeah, we’re ready to go,” Scouter replied. Edward nodded.

“I’ll have to say, the doc did a fabulous job on your face,” Ruth said to Edward.

“I’ll have to take your word on it, because I’ve been too busy to check in a mirror,”

“No, it’s good and the doc said that most of the swelling will be gone by tomorrow when you’re ready to start out.” Ruth leaned back in her chair and studied Edward as she puffed on her pipe. Edward felt like a bug under a microscope.

“How come the enemy doesn’t attack this place? They have to know that you’re here, am I correct?” Edward asked, hoping that she would stop staring at him.

                                                                 

“Oh, they know we’re here, alright,” she replied.

“So, why haven’t they attacked?”

“It might be better to just show you,” Ruth said, as she stood and placed her pipe into the china tea cup that now acted as an ashtray. “Come along boys, I ain’t got all day.”

As the men followed Ruth from the office, Edward asked Scouter, “Do you know what’s she’s talking about?”

                                                                      

Scouter nodded and said, “unfortunately.’  

Episode Sixty-five of Lilith's Escape

 

                                                                 

 

“Slow down,” Edward yelled over the noise of the quad. The driver was zigzagging all over the place and Edward was worried about Rita. If the driver heard his protesting, he had no idea.

                                                                           

Just then a rocket flashed past them, followed by an explosion overhead. Edward looked over his shoulder to see a drone crash to the ground, but that’s all he had time to see before the quad drove down a ramp that led under the museum.

                                                                    

As soon as they reached the underground tunnel, the metal doors were slammed shut. Lilith, Bradley, Jones, Scouter, the entire caravan had made it to safety.

The driver climbed off the quad and pulled off her helmet. Edward was amazed; the woman had to be in her 70’s. “We need a medic,” the woman shouted when she realized that Rita was in trouble.

                                                                      

While the medics rushed Rita away, Edward thanked the woman and asked for her name. She shook his hand and said, “I’m Ruth, the Commander of this post, and who the hell are you?”

“After today, I’m not sure,” Edward replied with a chuckle. He immediately took a liking to the little old lady who had a very tight grip on his hand.

                                                                         

Episode Sixty-four of Lilith's Escape

                                                                       

Heavy artillery was ringing out in front of them, but Edward’s attention was on the woman he carried in his arms as he rushed to safety. Rita was screaming something, but the explosion from the grenade that had gone off several feet behind them, made it impossible to hear anything but the ringing in his ears.

“We’re not going to make it to safety, please…put me down,” Rita was struggling to free herself from his tight hold of her.

Edward needed to catch his breath and lowered Rita to the ground, but when he realized that she was bleeding, his heart sank. “I’m not giving up and neither are you, he told her.”

                                                                          

                                                 

Instead of replying Rita pointed her gun at Edward and shot. When he realized the bullet wasn’t meant for him, he turned and saw the zombie lying on the ground. There were another twenty or more heading their way. “These bags of bones picked the wrong day to start with me,” Rita said through clenched teeth.

                                                                    

The sound of a loud engine caught their attention and when Edward spun around, gun aimed, he was surprised to see an elderly woman sitting on a four wheeled vehicle.  This was Edward's first introduction to a quad.

                                                                         

“What the hell are you waiting for? I ain’t here to take your pictures; climb on, now,” the grandmotherly rider shouted out.

                                                                        

                                           

Edward had no time to question the woman, not with the zombies within hand’s reach. He helped Rita onto the back of the bike before joining her. Edward was forced to hang on for dear life as the driver raced away.

Episode Sixty-three of Lilith's Escape

                                                              

  

                                                                 

Lilith and the soldiers in the front began to fight the zombies while Edward and the older children began running towards the museum that could be seen in the distance. The little ones were scared and were crying. Edward picked up one of the little ones in his arms, while shouting to the others to keep running. Bradley was in the lead, making sure they would not be surprised by any zombies coming out of the bushes, but something was wrong. Someone was missing.

                                                                   

“Where’s Rita?” he shouted out to Bradley.

“I thought she was keeping up,” Bradley replied, but he had to keep the children moving.

Edward felt sick to his stomach and when he saw Scouter coming up with the last of the children, he turned over the boy he carried, to Scouter and said, “I’m going back for Rita.”

                                                                    

He ran as fast as he could, past the soldiers and armed civilians who were putting up a good battle, past the bodies of zombies who were cut down. But he couldn’t see Rita and called out her name.

“I’m here,” she called out, the sound coming from above Edward’s head. He looked up to see her wrapped around a branch high in the tree.

                                    

“How the hell did…” he was about to ask.

                                                                      

“Don’t ask…the baby’s coming, help me,” she pleaded and then began to cry.

Edward didn’t know how or where he found the strength, but he was able to get Rita down from that tree and then he picked her up and began moving towards the other soldiers.

“I bet you’re cursing the day you first climbed into that caddy,” Rita teased, trying to make light the dangerous situation they were in.

                                                                 

“On days like this, yes,” he answered, but when the sound of heavy artillery rang out in front of them, he added, “Now what?”

 

Episode Sixty-two of Lilith's Escape

                                                       

                                                                        

The children were warned, “Keep quiet and move fast.”

The older children, who were heavily armed, moved into action and formed a protective barrier around Edward, Rita and Bradley who stayed with the youngest, making sure that they could keep up with the caravan.

The caravan began its journey and moved like a snake around the abandon cars that lined their side of the road. Lilith and several soldiers were in the lead, followed by the oldest of the children, the middle of the snake held the weakest and the tail consisted of heavily armed soldiers. They moved quickly and silently out of the subway and across a street named Broad Street. The caravan made its way to the cover of the trees before several drones made their fly over.

                                                                

“How often do they fly over?” Edward asked Rita, taking notice that she was struggling to keep up. “You okay?”

“We think every twenty minutes, but I might be wrong,” Rita replied.

                                                                   

“Are you okay?” Edward asked again.

“I might be in labor, but don’t worry about me.”

Before Edward could reply, there was a commotion at the front of the line. He saw the flash of Lilith’s sword and a scream. He moved the children deeper into the nearby bushes and told Rita to stay with them, while he ran ahead to help.

                                                                          

“What the hell…?” Edward had begun to ask, but he saw that Lilith had already killed the female zombie, and that she held some type of collar in her hand. “What is that?” he asked.

“The zombies are being controlled by radio waves,” Lilith replied and then threw the collar away. “We need to move quickly,” she urged and pointed to more zombies trying to make their way through the woods.

                                                                        

Episode Sixty-one of Lilith's Escape

                                                                 

It was dusk by the time the caravan climbed out of the subway station at Pattison Ave. They at least could use the cover of the trees and bushes to keep them hidden from the drones, which frequently flew over the city looking for resistance fighters, but if there were zombies in the area, the very same trees and bushes would also endanger the living from seeing the shuffling dead in time.

                                                            

Rita was making her way back towards Edward and Bradley. As she waddled towards them, Edward wondered how she was doing; she looked so huge, so uncomfortable. “Lilith will lead with Tzaddik bringing up the rear with a few of the soldiers,” she told the men.

“Where do you want us?” Bradley asked.

“The three of us, along with some of the women, will protect the inner circle.” The inner circle she was mentioning was the children, the group’s most important cargo.

“Will you be alright…uh…you know?” Edward was attempting to be polite in pointing out the obvious.

“I’ll be fine. Just call me Wonder Woman,” Rita teased, but her expression revealed how worried she really was.

Edward could see Lilith at the front, near to the steps leading out of the subway. She was pointing to something on a map that Jones was holding in her hand.
                                                                   

 She must have sensed his eyes on her, because she glanced towards his direction and smiled. Edward and Lilith needed to talk, to touch base and maybe mend fences, that's if they made it to the museum, alive. 

Episode Fifty-seven of Lilith's Escape

 

                                                                          

 

“Go on, Edward replied.

“I recognized most of those poor souls…they lived around here and the bridge underpass. I don’t think the enemy knows our whereabouts yet, but to make sure, we should move camp tonight.”

“There are too many of you, surely we’ll be noticed if we move camp.” Edward was worried about the children.

                                                                        

“There are tunnels within tunnels in the subway system. Our movements will go unnoticed,” Tzaddik added.

“I won’t leave until you're at the new location,” Edward replied as the oldest of the children climbed down from atop the barrier and ran past him and the soldiers and right up to Lilith. She hugged them to her, smiling as she listened to their excited chatter.

“She's not an evil creature…don’t hold her to your standards,” Tzaddik whispered to Edward.

                                                                     

He found it hard to believe that anyone would mistake Lilith as anything other than cold and manipulative, but right now, Edward was seeing a different side of her as she interacted with the children…no, she wasn’t evil, but she sure as hell wasn’t good. Did he care? No, as angry as he was with her, he still loved her.

“Let’s get this circus on the road. We have a date with the naval base tomorrow,” Scouter said, and then patted Edward on the shoulder.
                                                                                                   

Episode Fifty-six of Lilith's Escape

                                                                        

Rita and a few of the older boys had somehow managed to get on to the steel beam that ran across the train tracks. They threw what they had into the mob. It wasn’t enough to kill all the zombies, but it helped by giving the resistance fighters time to regroup.

                                                                                                                               

Lilith was still fighting the zombies on the other side of the chain fence and didn’t look like she needed any back up, so Edward and the others were left to take down the handful that hadn’t burned to a crisp from the Molotov cocktails.

When the last zombie was put down, Lilith joined the group. As she wiped her sword clean, she asked, “How many did we lose?”

“One,” Tzaddik replied and then pointed to a female soldier. “I put her out of her misery.”

                                                                 

Edward looked to where Tzaddik had pointed and saw that the soldier had been shot in the head. “Are you sure that she was infected?” There were no visible wounds.

Tzaddik glared at Edward and then walked over to the woman’s corpse and flipped her onto her stomach. The back of her tee-shirt in shreds, Edward saw that a chunk of flesh was missing from the midsection of her back.

                                                                     

“We need to patch-up up the entrance, make sure that the barricade holds in case of another attack.”

“Your enemy knows where you are,” Edward said to Lilith.

“Maybe not, Bradley replied.

                                                                        

Episode Thirty-nine of Lilith's Escape

                                                            

Lilith instructed Edward to use the oars and not the motor on the row boat. “We don’t want to attract any attention to us,” she warned.

Edward’s arms were aching by the time they had crossed over to the other side of the river.

                                                                       

“Pull the boat over to the side and cover it with the camouflage net,” Lilith ordered. While he did this, he noticed her speaking into a small hand held object.

“Who were you talking to and what is that in your hand?” Edward asked Lilith when she had finished her conversation.

When she realized why he was puzzled, she laughed. “I’m sorry. I forget that you’re from the past. This is a cell phone and I’ve just contacted our team.”

“So, it's like a walkie talkie?” he asked and took the phone into his hand.

                                                                     

“Better,” she replied and watched as he examined the phone.

 He pressed a symbol on the screen and when mapping coordinates opened up, he asked, “Is this showing where we are?”

                                                                      

“There are satellites up there that can pinpoint our exact location. They’re here, come on,” she said and walked towards the barbed wire fence.

                                                                           

Edward gave one last glance over his shoulder to where the statue of Liberty once stood. He couldn’t shake the feeling that his own beloved England was in the same disintegration as the States. Holding the phone in his hand, he hurried after Lilith and towards the two people standing in the shadows.

                                                                         

“Who the hell is he?” the male warrior asked Lilith.