Mines

Chapter Twenty-five

I dash down the hallway, and immediately find myself in combat with a solider who just lunged at me, aiming to hit me in the head with his gun. I knee him, hard, in the stomach, and he staggers back, doubled over and coughing. I'm about to shoot him in the head when I hear a familiar voice, clear as day. It's a voice I haven't heard in a while, and it sends shivers down my spine when I do.
"Now that's just cruel." The voice whispers in my ear, and it startles me so much, my hands jerk up pull the trigger on the rifle, and the bullet completely misses the guard, hitting the wall opposite me. But he's had enough time to recover, and he's onto me again. He rushes forward, though not as fast as he might've done, since he's still injured from my attack. His hand flies around my throat, and cuts off my oxygen. My fringes scrabble uselessly against his fist, willing him to let go. And he does, because moments later Hercules, spotting my predicament, darts forward and uses a huge stone to smash his head. He falls to the ground immediately and weather dead or only unconscious, we don't know.

     "Are you okay?" Hercules asks, and a huge feeling of déjà vu washes over me, I can't respond. A young Herc asking me the same question, in almost familiar circumstances because back then, I heard the same voice. Her voice. I'm brought back to reality by a soldier attack us with his sword that he's pulled from his belt. He lunges forward, his arm outstretched and Herc, dodging the blade, punches him in the face with the hand still holding the rock. The guard falls back, clutching his bleeding nose, and I come forward and pry his sword of his hand and use the butt to bring down on his head. Now that my survival instincts are somewhat gone, I feel squeamish about killing. "Are you okay?" Herc asks again, as though nothing as happened.
     "Yeah," I lie. "Where's Lafayette?"
     "He woke up. Guess gunfire will do that to you. Felt fine enough to fight, he said. I made him head back to where everyone else was, and a rebel went with him to help." Herc responds. I hand him the sword.
     "Thanks." I say smiling at him, and I mean it in more ways then one. "You take the sword, okay? I got this rifle."
     "Alright. I'm not that good with a sword though, but it's more useful than a rock," before running off he glances back at me. "John, stay alive, okay?"
     "Doing the best I can." I reply.

"How many are left?" I can hear Alex's voice yelling, and I look up to see him in hand to hand combat with a British solider. He has a gash across his forehead, and blood is pouring down his pale face.
"We've lost about five or six, and they've lost eight! We're doing better than I expected!" Washington's jubilant voice calls over to answer. This is going to take forever. I think as I spot one of our rebels getting shot in the arm. We can't afford to lose anymore people! I don't want to see anyone else die.
"You'll figure it out John. I have faith in you." she says again. Get out of my head, you're not helping. I think furiously, and clutch my head, which has started to throb. You're making it worse.

And so the battle rages on. I'm not sure if I can even call it a battle, maybe a "furious fight" would be more aptly named. I find myself wondering if Lafayette got back to the cave alright, and if he did, what's he doing? Telling everyone else what's going on? If so, they're not going to stand for this. They're going to come help us. Are they? And what's the point of all this fighting? Captain George meant for us to die in the gunfire, he's not going to let us go after this. So what comes next? There always seemed to be a plan mapped out in my head, and now it's gone. Because right now, all my being is based around this one fight, and trying to keep the people I love, alive.

"John, duck!" Alexander's voice calls to me, and I see him lunging across the narrow corridor and to me, he forces me down just in time to get out of the way of a stray bullet. We land in a heap on the floor. "What's the matter with you? You can't zone out in the middle of a fight!" he says, his voice high an anxious.
"S-sorry I was just- just thinking." I stammer, my power of speech seems to be slightly marred by the worries about the battle, and the closeness of Alex.
"Think later. We have to keep fighting!" Alex says, roughly shaking me, trying to snap me out of my trance. He stumbles to his feet and turns, about to continue the fight when I grab on to his shirt, and pull him back down.
"Alex we can't keep fighting!" I quake. "This isn't going to lead anywhere, we have to run! Go back to the cave with everyone else, and run somewhere... somewhere safe!" Alex pulls himself from out of my grip.
"No we don't. This is what we've been waiting for!" he shouts.
"We're not prepared! We were meant to die, and it's a miracle we're not! We need to be better prepared, and so we will be, we'll fight again, I promise." I counter. Alex opens his mouth like he's about to say something, but then seems to think better of it. He closes his mouth, smiles, and nods.
"You're right. We can't win with only fifteen of us. We need more people to win our independence," he pulls me up from the ground, and still holding my arm runs towards Washington who's just blocked a vicious attack with his sword. "Sir! We need to retreat." Alex says to Washington as he pummels the guard with the butt of his gun. Washington looks taken aback.
"I never thought I'd hear those words coming from you, Hamilton," he smiles. "Okay, so this is what you're gonna do. Round up everyone fighting on our side, or for us. Then take them somewhere where you're keeping the others, John can then lead us out of the mines." he then turns to me still smiling. "John, you're going to lead us through the desert. Do you think you can do that?" I return his smile.
"Of course, sir."