The Young Fighters

CHAPTER 28

Jackson kneeled before the fallen Village Elder. Caden's eyes were red and filled with tears as he laid where he was shot. Alongside the youth was Will, before he could do anything, Caden asked him to help the others. He valued everyone's life over his. Those standing around in a group watched as Caden took a few more breaths. Snake took hold of his hand while Andy held the other. Tightly holding on to both fellows, he started to speak.

"I'm sorry I failed you all." He spoke with a hazy low voice.

"You didn't fail us, Caden." Andy replied to him as he shook his head. "You did lead us through tough times and brought us hope. You did nothing wrong."

"No!" Caden took in a deep breath. "I brought all this on you. All I wanted to do is keep Georgetown at peace; but instead I brought death and destruction."

"You're not to blame." Snake added, "Joel is the one who did all this. He's the one to blame. Not you." Snake saw Caden as a brother even only having to know him for a few days. Watching the Village Elder go up in tears brought more sadness to them and started making them feel as though they were hollow inside.

"I could have done better." Caden continued to shed tears as he looked up into the clear blue sky, huffing in a few more breaths. "If only I'd done better."

Suddenly the hold of Caden's grasp began to weaken before both hands slipped out of Snake and Andy's hands and fall to the asphalt road. Andy called out to the Village Elder numerous times but he'd gotten no response. Snake check for a pulse but found nothing. Snake's heart felt like it stopped beating knowing what was to become of Caden. He reached up towards the fallen leader's face and closed his dead eyes and looked up at everyone with horrified sincerity and told them that Caden was gone.

Fighters wearing caps removed them and placed them over their hearts while some of them broke down and tears. Everyone there grew so quiet that so much as the drop of a pin would be louder than a gunshot. Of all the people they had lost, Caden was the most important to them. Without him, Georgetown would be without law and order after he'd managed to restore it after a year had passed and the adults had vanished. He was a brother and a father to everyone.

"Where's Leah?" Liger asked,

"I'm not sure," Snake replied, "I've notified the north section and asked if they'd seen Leah and Mila." Jackson was standing next to Snake when hearing those words rang in his head. His love missing with another Village Elder. He started growing tense from hearing that she was absent from anyone's sight.

"Is anyone there?" An unknown voice called out from Andy's radio. "Come in! Hey!" Andy responded to whoever was calling.

"Who is this?"

"This is Lance Garcia." Liger knew that name well. "I'm one of Joel's generals."

"What do you want?" Andy angrily questioned.

"I wanna ask you a question." None of them could see his face nor had any of them seen it, but they could picture him smiling by the sound of his voice. "How does feel knowing you'd just lost the battle? I wanna know how you're feeling right now?"

Everyone was enraged by the fact he was asking such a difficult question. If he was there beside them all by himself, they'd rip him to bits. Andy responded with a tear jerking out of his eye. "We're devastated over not killing more of your soldiers. Including you."

"I'm sure you took enough of my men and I took enough of yours. How're your leaders taking it? I'd like to contrite to them for the bloodshed my army did on your little town. Then again, you took one of my fellow generals: Ben Philips and some of his lieutenants. But still, he was a lousy general." It almost sounded like he was glad Philips was killed. "But we'll say it's an eye for an eye. We'll put it like that."

"You sick monster! You killed Caden and Evan! Don't you have any remorse for them!" Andy's face grew red with anger to which he'd never experienced. "Damn you! Damn all of you sick freaks to Hell!" Andy started to wail in tears. "What did we ever do to you?" Starting to huff loudly he yelled, "What the Hell do you want from us?"

"We want you to suffer. And don't worry, we're not coming back."

"How do I know you're not lying?" Andy yelled again over the radio.

"I give you my honest word. None of us will ever come back to your hick town." Lance paused for a moment before ending the conversation. "There's also one more thing. Tell them your names."

"Andy!" A formulary voice cried out. "Andy is that you?"

"Leah?"

"Andy, they got me and Mila hostage."

"Mila!" Jackson cried out.

"Leah," Andy called out, "Where are you and Mila?"

"We're with Lance. He's taking us back to Washington City. Right now we're outside the county. I can't tell which county we're in. But he said we're going to be Joel's trophies." Leah said sounding as though she too was in tears. "Save us Andy, please!" Leah's voice was cut off as Lance budded in.

"Don't even bother trying to save them." Lance said sounding as if he had that same smile on his face. "Don't worry, we won't kill them. I also give you my word on their safety." Lance paused once more. "I've gotta hand it to you, that was a really good fight. The best fight I've had in so long. I must admit you trained your guys well. I'm very impressed. I'd love to chat with you more, Andy; but I've got a war trophy to deliver."

The radio signal was cut off and Lance threw the talkie at a building and it crashed upon the brick wall. Behind him followed a whole convoy of battered up cars and trucks loaded up with Georgetown battle vets. All of whom were feeling courageous as if they'd fought a real war.