Pain

Chapter 5 - Love Wins

Chapter 5
Love Wins

Another few days passed with no sign from any of the three boys. Everyone continued to keep whatever massive secret they knew from me and Nigel and Jen continued to fight about everything that had happened since we'd come back here. Everything was a complete disaster.

Finally, we came to the conclusion that the longer we stayed here whittling away our food sources and letting our muscles and skills deteriorate, the better the soldiers advantage over us was. Koby gave the group the kick in the pants we all needed by calling everyone around the fire-pit.

"I think we all know why we're sitting around here right now," he began. "I'm not going to go on about that, but it's time we put our skills and resources to the test and did some damage around here. The longer we sit around, the higher the chance that we have of being found or the soldiers taking back some of the land we won."

In the short amount of time that I'd been out of my tent in the last week, I'd noticed Koby working on something by the water. He appeared to have a map of some sort, but given his not so subtle warning to me before we left New Guinea and Gerty's foreshadowing that something had happened with him, I hadn't gone near him.

I wasn't at all surprised when he pulled the map out from his back pocket and held it out for everyone to see. Up close, I could see that it was a map of the very mountains we called home, only he'd drawn little red crosses and black marks all over it.

"I've been mapping out routes since we got back," he explained. "Every day I go out into the bush and find trails, then when I get back I map them. I think if we all go out together, we could use one of these to get an advantage point over the soldiers."

I saw Nigel raise his eyebrows, clearly impressed. He opened his mouth to speak when he was cut off by a panic-stricken voice slicing through out campsite. I saw the colour drain from several faces around me. Jimmy's voice was immediately recognisable.

"HELP!" he yelled. "PLEASE!"

I jumped up from my log, grabbing a loaded gun that was within my reach. I saw Nigel and Koby do the same before the three of us looked at each other and tore off into the bush. The others armed themselves and followed close behind us, focussed on getting to Jimmy as quickly as we could.

Koby and Nigel were the first to reach him, followed by Rocky and Jacoby. I was the first of the girls to make it and the moment I saw him, I wanted to turn back around and run as far as I could away from there. Jimmy was on his knees beside a pale figure, his face wet with tears and his clothes torn and bloody. He'd found Karlo just like he'd set out too, only Karlo was dead.

There was a crash behind me as someone dropped their gun into the leaf litter and dropped to their knees. I turned and saw Jen as white as a ghost. The moment I laid eyes on her she started sobbing uncontrollably. Gerty dropped down beside her and held her, while everyone else looked towards Karlo.

"We need to get him back to camp," Nigel said, kneeling beside the body. "We can't leave him here, he deserves more than that."

The next part was the hardest. Rocky, Jacoby, Nigel and Koby all took Karlo's body back to camp while the rest of us tried to get Jimmy to move. Although he was completely conscious, it was as though he had just switched off. He made no indication that he could hear anything we said to him and eventually we had to drag him back to camp. It was awful.

By the time we got back, the boys had wrapped Karlo up in a spare rug so that we couldn't see his pale face and they were working on digging a grave beside the two that were already there for Gordon and Braden. I was certain that there'd be more graves to be dug before this war was over.