the last one standing

chapter 1

“Come on, faster, faster, just a little farther to go, if they catch you, it’s all over.  For you, for Ma, Pa, Sadie, for Anna, Theo, Jack, and Alec, all of them will die if you can’t slip through their fingers just one more time.  If you can evade them just once more, they will be safe!  Come on Kara! You can do this! You’ve got to!”  She urged herself on, determined to escape the soldiers of the New Order pursuing her; it didn’t matter if she lived, if she could just get across the river and to the clearing, they would survive.

The river was closer and larger than ever, swollen with heavy rains upstream.  She kept her eyes off the churning waters below as she tiptoed across the fraying rope that connected the two banks.  Once across the un-sturdy “bridge,” she took a sharp rock and severed the frayed end so that the rope fell into the angry river.  She ran as fast as she could, keeping in mind that not only her life was on the line, but all of the lives of the ones she loved also depended on her reaching the clearing before the soldiers of the New Order did.

Rain poured down, falling in torrents around her, soaking her raggedy and dirty clothes; cold, drenched, and shivering, she ran on.  The dirt smudged across her face turning to mud, mixing with the crusty blood streaked across her cheek, her tangled, matted hair sticking to her neck, but still she ran on.  Branches whipped her face, but her pace did not slow.  Lightning struck the tree to her immediate left, and the clippity-clop of horse hooves beating on the slippery wet ground only made her sprint faster.  Branches got caught in her hair tugging at it, but not even that slowed her down in the slightest.  Finally she broke through the trees, entering the clearing.  Piles of charred wood was all that were left of a once beautiful house, a house that had once, a long, long time ago, been Kara’s home.  But she could not dwell on the past, thinking of the happy times before the third world war, she must remain in the present and focus on the task at hand.  She dove into the charred remains; only seconds later she emerged covered in ash, holding in one hand, a rusted steel dagger, encrusted with mud and blood, ready to plunge into the heart of its unsuspecting prey.  In the other hand, she clutched tightly a tattered old bible.  She paused for a moment, and then dashed off, the knife in its sheath tucked in her belt, bible tucked in the folds of her tunic-dress.

At last she escaped the sounds of hooves beating against the now muddy dirt road, the sounds of weapons thumping against the backs of the New Order’s cavalrymen, the pouring rain, and the powerful gusts of wind that flung droplets of rain into her face.  At last, she had found her family’s secret shelter; at last, she was safe.  Covered in branches, wonderfully camouflaged, the shelter was invisible, unless you knew exactly what to look for.  Immediately Kara had recognized the unusual way the light filtered through the branches, she smiled, she was home again.

She ducked through the netting, branches, and leaves that covered the shelter and entered the little one room yurt.  She took a deep breath in, how nice it felt to be home!  The patchwork quilts folded in the corner (Anna and Sadie’s handiwork), the wool covered walls that kept in the heat, the warm bearskin rugs covering the dirt floor, and the three room dividers made of old pieces of worn out blankets, how homey it felt.  It was perfect!

On the far right side of the dome shaped yurt, a blue and yellow checked blanket sectioned off the part of the yurt where Kara and her siblings used to sleep.  Kara pushed aside the blanket that hung from the rafters.  On the ground there lie five straw ticks.  Sitting on top of the tick farthest to the left Kara found the old hand-carved wooden comb that her father had given her for her seventh birthday.  She picked up the comb, admiring the handiwork, and began to brush the twigs out of her hair.  Still combing through her hair, Kara left the room and went to check the rain barrel outside.  Delighted to see that it was full, she went back inside, tucked the comb in her back, and grabbed large pitcher.  She filled the pitcher with water from the barrel then pulled aside the motley colored blanket sectioning off the back of the yurt and dumped it into the bathing basin.  She made a few trips back to the barrel until the basin was filled.  Kara undressed and gritting her teeth she slid into the basin.  It was all that she could do not to scream, the water was freezing cold, but Kara knew that she could not risk making a fire.  Kara bathed quickly and from the laundry bin sitting against the left wall she grabbed a towel, and a clean cotton tunic.  At the bottom of the bin lay her red cloak, and her father’s brown one.  Kara lifted the brown cloak to her face; breathing in her father’s woodsy sent.  Tears sprung into her eyes as she thought of the danger that her father, and the rest of the family was in.  She fastened the cloak at her throat with the wooden pin that Alec had carved one day when he was 14.  Her fingers absentmindedly traced the lines that formed two hands releasing a dove.

Kara walked once again into the open area of the yurt to retrieve a quilt from the pile when all of a sudden; out of nowhere a dart flew right past her face nicking her cheek just barely.  She received only the tiniest scratch, but never-the-less Kara began to feel dizzy.  The room started to spin, and her vision was beginning to go a little bit blurry.  Kara turned around and saw a slight girl wearing a brown cloak.  The girl removed her hood and smiled wickedly.  Kara gasped and her last thought before she blacked out she uttered aloud, “Violet? Why?”

Violet cringed at the sight of her former best friend lying on the ground, not dead, but knocked out.  She wouldn’t wake for at least 36 hours, and would be paralyzed for another 24 after that.  That is, if the poison did its job.  Violet knelt on the soft rug and checked Kara’s pulse.  It was faint and a slow, but still present.  A malicious smile crept across Violet’s face.  Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was wondering why she wasn’t trying to help Kara, why she was handing Kara over to the New Order.  Hadn’t they sworn that they would die rather than betray each other?  That thought began to surface, her eyes lost their cloudy and confused look, and a look of horror replaced the grin.  “What have I done?” she whispered, terrified.  One of Violet’s guards noticed that she was returning to reality again and promptly shot his Taser into the small of her back, sending a shock up her spine and knocking her out cold.