The Horde

Chapter 10

The walk down to the door was relatively short, or at least it seemed that way as they quickly approached an iron door which had been left slightly open. Hannah glanced over her shoulder at Alex, who had decided to raise her gun.

"Matt?" Thomas' voice cracked as he yelled into the dark room, although he could make out a large lump in the middle that appeared to be the outline of a chair.

Hannah touched his arm lightly but he stiffened at her touch. When he turned back to face her, his cheeks were damp and his swollen jaw seemed to have darkened in colour.

She cleared her throat and then let her hand fall back to her side, "I can go in first if you need me to."

He shook his head lightly, tears still making wet paths down his cheeks. His grip tightened on his gun before pushing the door open more.

Alex followed closely behind while Hannah notched an arrow into her bow. As soon as she walked in she immediately noticed the dramatic drop in temperature. The chair in the middle of the room became clearer as she walked closer, and her eyes strayed to the restraints on the arms and feet of the chair. When she looked up to the head of the chair, she noticed the blood stains, some that looked years old while others looked as if they appeared only a few minutes ago. Tools of different shapes and sizes lay on a steel table wedged in the corner of the room, every one of them bloody.

"Matt," Alex whispered, her voice bounced off the walls and Hannah and Thomas rushed towards her immediately.

Their friend was in rough shape, to say the least. A large cut went across his lower stomach and the wound appeared to be deep and infected. His natural skin tone was barely visible under the bruises that covered his body. Some appeared to be weeks old, while others looked as if they were still gaining a yellowish tinge to them. He had curled up into the fetal position and hadn't noticed the pool of blood that had formed around him.

"Matt? Buddy, hang on. We are going to get you out of here, alright?" Thomas had made his way to Matt's side and attempted to lift him, resulting in an earsplitting scream.

Matt grabbed at Thomas' shirt with trembling hands, dried blood had gotten trapped under his finger nails, "I thought you left me." He closed his eyes tightly and opened them again, the glaze that had covered them was gone and he seemed slightly more alert. "You're really here?"

Thomas nodded, biting his lip to hold in his tears. He needed to focus on the physical pain of the swell that had started in his lip instead of the pain that he had been forced to endure seeing his friend like this, "I'm here, Matt. And I'm not going to leave you ever again."

He smiled in return, although they were disrupted by a rough coughing fit, blood leaking from Matt's lips and onto the cement floor. Thomas paled, although he pushed back the bile that had built up in his throat and helped his friend lie on his side. Thomas pushed his head through the hole of his shirt and lifted up the corners, pulling it off him and then wrapping it tightly around the deep wound on Matt's stomach, causing his friend to wince.

Hannah looked back towards the door and sniffled, realizing how limited their time was, "Here, give him my sweater and then we need to get out."

Thomas gratefully grabbed the thick sweater that Hannah handed him and wrapped it over his friends shoulders, not wanting to put Matt through the pain of putting his arms through the sleeves.

Hannah felt a light tap on her shoulder and she hesitantly took her eyes off the two boys to look at Alex, who immediately wrapped her arms around Hannah's neck as she tried to hold herself up while muffling her sobs, "I convinced myself that he was dead, Hannah."

She smiled sadly, knowing that Alex wouldn't be able to see through her tears, "We all did at one point or another. But the important thing is that he isn't dead."