For The Many

Chapter 25

 Today's the day. We will be going into the Shifter's Head Quarters in only a few hours, and... Not all of us are going to come out of this alive. That's a given. Some of the other humans have volunteered to help, but not many, and the rest have left to go into hiding. So far, there are eight of us. Tarot, Click, Sarge, Dayoh, Marta, my dad, an elderly man called Robert, and me. Not much of an army, but we'll have to deal with it.

- Evan Durand, September 3rd.

"C'mon Click! It's just a photo!" Marta laughed, as she knelt to get a better shot.

"It's embarrassing!" He complained, his face exploding into red. Marta had asked him to pose for a photo with the other Shifters, and had positioned him next to Tarot. He seemed to be overly sensitive to the camera, for some reason.

"Please?" She begged, and eventually, he shuffled into the view of the screen on the back of the camera.

"Say cheese!" She yelled.

"Huh?"

The photo was of the four of them pulling the most confused face she had ever seen, and was almost as funny as the one of Evan she had taken two days ago.

"Now, Dayoh, Sarge, could you step out?" They nodded, and started to walk away to begin the last minute preparations. Click to began to leave, but Marta stopped him. "No way, you're having this photo took!"

"But-"

"No, Click, no buts! You're the reason we trusted her," she argued, and he sighed deeply.

"Fine."

Click shuffled closer, burying his hands in the pockets of his lab coat and pursing his lips to show his discontent. "Three... Two... One," Marta counted. As she said one, Tarot reached over, grabbed Click's cheek and pulled him towards her, kissing him full on the lips. The flash went off, and the image was captured.

As they parted, Click looked at Tarot, dumbfounded, and asked her what she was doing. "I had to do it at least once," she muttered.

"What do you mean at least once?" He responded.

"I might die, Click."

The pair continued their conversation, while Evan moved to stand next to Marta. "The plan worked, then," he said with a smile, and she nodded.

"Tarot got her kiss... I wonder if Click feels the same?"

"Oh, I'm almost positive he does."

No sooner had the words left his lips than Click kissed Tarot again, assuring her he wouldn't let them hurt her, then hugged her tight to his chest. "We should probably get ready," Marta suggested.

"Yeah," Evan agreed, taking her hand in his and walking towards the vehicle they would be taking.

Preparations were finished less than an hour later, and everyone who would be leaving piled into the pick up truck. Click and Tarot took the seats in the front, and everyone else sat in the cage-like back.

The topics of conversation were not positive - most were what they would do if they survived, not when Head Quarters fell, and even Evan and Marta soon began using conditional vocabulary. "If I make it," Sarge said, as he watched the horizon for a sign of the sun going down, "I'll break my ties with the Military and start living."

Dayoh was oddly silent the entire time, tinkering with a small box with a black button on it for the whole trip, while Robert and James discussed their glory days.

Head Quarters was a gigantic, grey building, above ground just like Dome had been, and seemed to loom horribly ahead of them, but that didn't intimidate them. They had prepared for this, and they were not going to back down now.