Brotherly Love

Chapter 19--The Escape

©JRF2016

I woke up on the floor in linen storage. I rubbed my aching head and felt the dried blood on my head and face. I hurt all over. As I came around the memory of what happened flooded back into my mind. My pants were still down around my ankles and I felt a tear slide down my cheek as I pulled them up. I pushed that tear back down and quickly converted that hurt to anger. I was going to make that bastard pay for this. I stood there until the dizziness subsided and I felt like I could walk back to the room. The dizziness hung on as I walked down that hallway amazed at the strength I had mustered.

"Where have you been?" Beth asked concerned. "You were gone all night, you're bleeding!" Before I could answer her I collapsed onto the bed and passed out again.

*********
Meanwhile back with Rick and the group...

Gabriel took us to his church's food bank and we were stocked up on supplies to last us a while. Now that we had supplies Abraham was ready to move on. Daryl and Carol had slipped away last night and I wasn't going anywhere until they got back. "We're not leaving without our people," I told him.

"Your people are gone and we need to get Eugene to Washington so we can save the world." He argued.

"They're coming back," I sneered as I stepped up to Abraham ready for a fight and he moved in on me as well. "We're not leaving without our people." I said again as Glenn jumped in between us.

"We'll go with you and they can catch up with us when Daryl and Carol get back," he said glancing back and forth at the two of us waiting for a response. I kept staring at Abraham but gave Glenn a nod of approval.

We were all gathered outside the church as Abraham finished loading the church bus. He walked up to me and handed me a folded up map, "That's our route, we'll stick to as much as we can so you can catch up to us. If not, well you have our destination." I nodded to him as we watched half of our remaining family load up to leave. I gave Abraham one final nod before he closed the door. They stared out the window at us as we watched them pull away. The others went back inside and I stood there watching until the bus was out of sight. I unfolded the map and stared at Abraham's message:

Sorry I was an asshole.
Come to Washington the
New world's going to need
Rick Grimes!

I looked back out at the road the bus left on and smiled as I tapped the folded up map on the palm of my hand. I walked back inside the church with the rest of the group.

**********

I woke up in my bed to my head throbbing. My body ached as I stood up. Beth walked in staring at me with her blue eyes shimmering and filled with water. "I was wondering if you were going to wake up," she said with her voice wavering. I sat back down on the bed the pounding of my head was too much and the room started spinning. I rubbed my temple as I looked up at Beth, "How ling have I been out?"

"Just a day. What happened to you?" I shrugged her question off. I really didn't want to think about what happened to me.

"Has Gorman been around?" Beth shook her head.

"He's been acting creepier than ever. He came in here a couple times and just stared at you. He kept looking at me too but he was really focused on you." She looked even more worried now, "Is he the one that did this to you?" I dropped my head not wanting to talk about him anymore. I finally replied simply with, "We need to get out of here as soon as possible." I knew as soon as he got the chance he would do this again and eventually even go after Beth. I couldn't let this happen to her. She helped me up and we went to find Noah to work on our plan. I was going to help him keep an eye out for Dawn while Beth tracked down the key to the doors leading into that elevator shaft where they were dumping all the dead bodies.
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I went to Dawn's office while Roxie and Noah kept her occupied. I checked the file cabinet first. There was one drawer unlocked, there was a wallet inside. I pulled out the ID inside it and looked at it for a second before putting it back. I turned to the desk when I noticed Joan lying on the floor beside it in a pool of blood. I knew she was going to turn so I tried to hurry up. I opened the middle drawer and saw the keys laid out neatly. I grabbed the blue key when someone grabbed me. Gorman spun me around and pressed his body against mine bending me back over the desk. "Dawn needed her key," I said quickly.

"That's funny because I was just talking to her and she didn't mention it," he smiled and grabbed a green lollipop from the jar on the desk. "Dawn doesn't have to know about this, it can be our little secret. You think we could work something out?" I nodded as he unwrapped the lollipop and put it to my lips sliding it passed them and into my mouth slowly. He leaned in closer to me as I reached behind me grabbing that jar and swinging it around smashing him on the head with it. He fell to the ground and Joan's now undead corpse pounced on him chomping down on his neck. I left the office and walked down the hallway spotting Noah and Roxie. Dawn walked by me and asked, "Is everything okay Beth?" I froze for half a second when I thought of the perfect plan.

"Joan's lookin' for you. I saw her and Gorman headed to your office." Dawn nodded at me and started that way. Roxie grabbed my hand and the three of us started our escape. Noah had made a rope from several sheets, he lowered me first, then Roxie, and finally himself. He was halfway down when a walker grabbed him through the crack in the door above us. He let go of the rope and fell the rest of the way down. We made our way through the basement and I used the gun I got off Gorman to shoot through them. We burst through a door and were outside. I was shooting walkers and Roxie was stabbing them with her newly made knife. She never did get hers back from Gorman. Noah made it to the gate and squeezed through. One of the cops tackled me to the ground. I smiled up at Noah who was on the other side of the fence now. If I had to get caught at least Noah got free, I owed him that for taking the blame when the doctor they brought in crashed. All of a sudden the cop on top of me fell to the ground. I saw Roxie and everything was in slow motion. She was yelling something at me but it didn't register at first. "Run Beth!" She screamed as the other cops swarmed her. "Get outta here! Run!" I did what she said and ran for the gate slipping through just before a minion could get a hold of me.

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"Your buddy Beth killed Gorman," Dawn told me, "Did you know about that?"

I smiled when I heard that causing her anger to rage more. "The asshole got what he deserved as far as I'm concerned." I looked directly into her eyes as I told her, "He was a dick." I turned my head and spit a mouthful of blood onto the floor. When I looked back up at her Dawn backhanded me and I could feel my lip split open. Dawn beat me real good for that escape attempt and my lack of concern for the death of Gorman. My right eye was swollen almost completely shut and I had a gash in my bottom lip. My nose was broken and made this awful whistling sound when I breathed. I got Beth out before Gorman could hurt her, that gave me an enormous amount of peace. Dawn turned as they were wheeling someone in on a stretcher unconscious.