War For The World

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

"You shot him Marcus... I can't believe you shot him"

This was the first time Alice had spoken in a good few hours. They were words that had been brewing within her for a while, words that she felt needed to be said. She'd kept her mouth shut through everything; through the hiding of the body, the rationing of his gear and the quiet snack break overlooking the dormant war machine.

Now however, standing at the bottom of the crumbled building positioned eerily close to the dormant war machine, she had finally found the courage to speak.

"I had to Alice, don't you get that?"

"No" she shook her head

"Alice look. He was a spy, a traitor; you saw it yourself! The stolen tech he had bundled away in his backpack"

"Sure, of course Marcus. But even so, you didn't need to kill him. He was surrendering... we could have tied him up or something and interrogated him for intel!"

Marcus nodded solemnly

"I accept that as an error on my part Alice. Im sorry, its just... that brick fell down – and he moved so suddenly! I thought"-

"You thought he was coming for you. I know"

The two shared the uncomfortable silence that came with shared regret, neither one wanting to carry the conversation on.

Alice admitted that it looked bad for Hayden, and that all signs seemed to suggest he was the traitor General Sharpe was after. The sting of betrayal that this sort of thought gave off penetrated deep within Alice. It hurt, to care so deeply for someone only for them to pull the rug out right from under you. She was brought back to the kiss they'd shared not a few days prior, and the elated sense of euphoria she had felt. Had it all been a ruse? A simple game of espionage on his part in order to get closer to the bases secrets?

Regardless of all of this was the fact that Marcus had murdered him in cold blood. Could she forgive her best friend for such a heinous crime, regardless of whether or not it was for the good of the nation?

"Im sorry Alice. I know you had a thing for him, but he was a traitor and I"-

"Let's just get the tech and go home shall we? I've had enough adventuring for now"

Marcus looked uncomfortable. Shuffling around in his boots, he seemed to be on the very verge of saying something. Alice waited, and when nothing came out she got a move on, pushing past him and out into the open roads of the decaying city.

Red vines were everywhere this deep into the city, with the deeper they ventured rewarding them with thicker and thicker underbrushes of the crimson horror. It was constantly pulsating. Ebbing, flowing, breathing in an absolutely sickening fashion that gave Alice Goosebumps from merely thinking about it. It was almost as if the entanglement of crimson vines were alive, feeding off the very despair currently emanating from the Earth.

They travelled slowly and quietly as not to alert the giant dormant tripod. Alice was terrified it'd move any minute, certain that any moment now it'd come to life and bear down on the two of them with its sickening dull roar.

It was for that reason that they stuck to the shadows. They floated in and out of broken buildings and behind pipes as they made their way slowly northwards.

"This is ridiculous" Marcus had said.
"We beat them! We've won. Do you not see its corpselike nature, how idly and soullessly it swings with the breeze?!"

Alice had had enough of his talk of victory. A small glimmer of hope resided within her that maybe he was indeed telling the truth, but as of right now she knew they couldn't risk it.