The rivers daughter

10- you're lucky you've got us

After having a large and thorough talk to Thomas, we decided to go save Minho... all by ourselves. Maybe not the smartest idea but I definitely wasn't leaving Thomas to go alone.

As we head up the stairs, Thomas glances behind us, making sure no one's following us. All of a sudden, we hear Newts voice. "Where do you think you're going then?" He asks, turning on the lamp that sits on the table next to him.

Thomas looks at him and his shoulders slump slightly, "Newt..." he sighs. Right as I'm about to speak, Newt walks towards us. "Don't be twats about it," he says, "I'm already in." He grabs the bag from Thomas's hand.

"Come on," Newt says as he walks over to the jeep, flinging the bag into the backseat through the window. Thomas shakes his head slightly, "no. No, not this time," he says. "Look... even if we find Minho, there's no guarantee we make it back from this."

"And yet you bring her?" Newt says, glancing at me. "Look, I had to fight to get this far," I say exhaustedly. "Well, you two will need all the help you can get then, won't you?" He says, opening the front door and leaning against the side of the jeep.

Frypan pokes his head out, his usual cheerful smile on his face. I let out a huff of a laugh while Thomas just scoffs, not liking that his plan is being changed. "Well, we started this together... may as well end it that way, too," Newt says.

I look at Thomas, trying to gauge his reaction. "Okay," he says, "let's go get him back." A slight wave of relief washes over me, glad that Thomas is seeing sense here.

I pat him on the back before walking over to the jeep where Newt opens the door, letting me climb in. Newt climbs in next to me while Thomas sits up front with Frypan.

As we drive, I watch the sunrise in the distance. The jeep is silent besides the road noise, all of us keeping to ourselves for the meanwhile. We drive past a sign that reads "Mandatory infection check; 2 miles ahead" which is just a shitty reminder of the reality we live in.

The sign was old and rusty, falling apart by the second. It matched the rest of the world perfectly, almost as if that one sign represented something bigger.

Something important, almost like a warning of what's to come but lacking context of why we should look out. Frypan stops the jeep right before a large tunnel.

We all get out of the vehicle, looking into the tunnel with uncertainty. Newt raises an eyebrow and looks at Thomas, pointing at the tunnel. "You want us to go in there?" he asks.

Thomas looks down at the map in his hands, studying it in hopes to find an alternative route. "Look, I don't wanna come across as too negative... but, I mean, if I was a Crank, that's exactly where I'd be," Newt says, gesturing at the tunnel.

"I don't think we have much of a choice," Thomas says. I look at the map over his shoulder, "he's right, we'll just have to be careful," I say. We all look at the tunnel for a moment, silently weighing up our very limited options.

Suddenly, Newt breaks the silence. "Alright, I get shotgun," he says, heading back to the jeep and climbing in the passenger seat. The rest of us soon follow, Frypan driving once again while Thomas and I sit in the back.

As we drive through the eerie and dark tunnel, a sense of uneasiness washes over us. The jeep jerks as it drives through the dips in the road, water splashing up from in the dips. "Well, here we go," Frypan says.

I glance around outside the jeep, keeping an eye out along with Newt and Thomas. "Yeah, just take it nice and slow," Newt says, his eyes not leaving the path ahead of us for even a second.

All of a sudden, we spot a Crank standing about 100 metres away from the jeep, watching us. "Woah, woah, woah..." Newt says. Frypan instantly stops the jeep before looking back at me and Thomas.