Never The End (Sequel to 'What Keeps You Alive')

Chapter 27: Urgent Moves

--------Chapter 27: Urgent Moves----

"What do you mean they got out?" Bennett snapped as a few of his men stood in front of him outside the compound fence-line, The Pit directly behind them. Bennett indicated to The Pit. "You mean to tell me that two of them went down into The Pit and they managed to get out and disappear back into the woods? There were ten of you, and two of them. Not to mention that the other four left as well; they were under supervision; how the fuck did they get out?"

No-one spoke up, Bennett growling in annoyance.

"I'm not overly worried about four of them escaping, but there were two people locked up four stories from the ground," he continued, looking around at everyone. He looked to Collin who was avoiding his gaze. "Collin? You were outside the door, so how did they get out?"

Collin looked up, meeting Bennett's gaze as he answered.

"One of them climbed down the balconies and got to the ground," he said, the unimpressed expression staying on Bennett's face the entire time. "Gates was going to follow but we caught him before he could."

"So then why is he not still locked up somewhere else?"

Collin sighed. "Because he threw himself off the fourth story balcony and managed to get away from us."

Bennett gave a bit of an unamused laugh as he crossed his arms.

"So Gates throws himself off four stories, joins his friend down on the ground, gets our other prisoners out of their cells and then manages to get them all outta the compound before taking off into The Pit with one of them," he said, making sure he was hearing it all correctly. "You've got to be fucking kidding."

"I wish I was."

Bennett shook his head, the anger evident.

"Alright, does anyone know where the six of them are headed?" he continued, looking around at everyone. "Because I'll be damned if I let any of them get away from me."

Collin was the one to speak again.

"Our best guess is that they'll be going back to their group," he said, Bennett looking directly at him now. "We assume that they'll all wanna meet up and continue on to wherever they were heading in the first place."

Bennett gave a nod, looking him over.

"Well then, we can't have that," he said, Collin and the others all staying silent as he spoke. "Their group still has Oscar; unfortunately there's now nothing I can do in the way of that, as our only bargaining chips have disappeared, so he's as good as dead. Collin, I want you and two others to go out and follow their group. Don't engage, but follow them for as long as you can and find out where they're heading. You have as much time as you need; we don't need everyone here right now. Find out where they're going and when you can, take them all out."

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The sun was going down by the time that Ashley felt he could slow down. He was on the road and had been for a while. He just needed to find where everyone else was and then they could move out of the area. Ashley was rather worried that he was being followed, but he hadn't seen or heard any sign of anyone since he'd left. He was really hoping that everyone else was ok and that nothing bad had happened.

The sun finally set, making Ashley sigh. Now that it was dark, it was going to be harder to find everyone, as he had no light source and he was stuck outside in the open in the dark. A gunshot suddenly sounded, making Ashley jump in surprise as it echoed around the area; it was incredibly close.