Part Nine

Eden: Paradise Lost

Part Nine

Flashback

Lance (narrating as it happens): We had just landed in DC back when it was still occupied. President Geer was on the roof with some other congressmen. We had commendered the helicopter and they were expecting the man who facilitated Haven City's fall and some of his cronies. What they got was a badly injured me, and two others. Kris, and a girl named Brittany Brice. 

The three stare down a bevy of armed soldiers as they step off the chopper. 

Lance:, Course, we didn't get any kind of presidential welcome…

Lance is being water tortured and held under a vat of ice water for long moments as we bear Brittany screaming from being shocked tortured. 

Lance: Tortured us for hours till the general arrived. He wasn't sure what happened to Have City, hell, I don't even really know what exactly caused it all to go to hell. But what he did have was that three people were the only ones to leave that city alive, and that made us enemies to the United States of America. He wanted answers.

The General sits in front of Lance as Lance looks severely beaten and on the verge of death. 

Terry refills their drinks and makes bigger drinks with bigger glasses as he hands one to Lance who sips at it. 

Lance: Of course we all have the same story, and of course…

Lance is shown being repeatedly dunked in the water.

Lance: They didn't believe it. Six months went by, the three of us locked up and starved when the general came back one day. and he had an ultimatum after some news about what happened to Haven became public knowledge. 

The General is speaking to still broken down Lance. 

General: So, not all of your stories were lies. But that doesn't mean I don't think you played some hand in it. But someone has to go down for it. So you have a choice. You can go down, be the scapegoat. Kris, he's been exonerated, will be put back into the corp. I need every able body man in the service protecting EDEN. You, you're just a commie bastard with a tainted background. You'd be a perfect fall. But. You get a choice, that's as American as it's gonna get for you. That's how humane I can be for you. 

Lance: And then he gave me the actual offer..

Terry: Which was?

Lance: Take the fall or...let Brittany take the fall.

Terry looks at him as Lance trembles as he takes a bigger drink. 

Lance: I told the general to shove the ultimatum up his red, white and blue ass. And you know what he told me next...he told me that she had already agreed to take the fall and...because I declined she would get her wish and die a patriot, disgraced to all but who knew her. But nonetheless a patriot to her country he kept saying. I couldn't speak or argue...I couldn't do anything. The dressed me, tended to my wounds, fed me. They let me go, and brought me front to her execution.

Brittany is shackled as she is led to a public ground where thousands are cheering as they attach her to the platform where a firing squad stood. 

Lance and Kris are brought together as they are forced to stand and watch as soldiers and the General stood by. 

Lance ( to Kris) we can stop this!

Kris: we can't…

Lance: We promised him...you promised James! we can't!

Kris: We can't do anything, Lance! She did this all on her own…

Lance: We let her... we're no better than if we had given her up…

Brittany looked at them as they began counting down, Brittany nodding at them as tears came down her face as  they reached "One" and she closed her eyes as eight men fired all at once and the crowd roared with approval. 

Terry's hand shakes as he puts his drink down as Lance fights back his tears. 

Lance: The rest up till now has been pretty mynute and at best, uneventful.

Lance finishes his drink and sets it down. 

Lance: Now you know. Now you know. 

Terry: Boss, I'm sorry. That wasn't right what happened to you, that wasn't fair.

Lance: It doesn't matter. You can't fight certain forces, and I've had to learn to live with that. 

Terry: How does…"he" feel about it?

Lance: Mmm, I don't know. I do know one thing though. When his brother died something died with him too. Kris isn't the same man, and I guess neither am I. 

Elsewhere, An apartment in the Square.

Kris lays wide awake, staring at the ceiling and then out of the window. 

Lance: But...whatever has changed in Kris...I can see it in his eyes now... it'll be the death of him…

The Misfits Hangout

The sun rises over EDEN as Lance yawns and comes into the computer room as Max is still up and is surrounded by coffee cups and empty home made energy drinks. 

Lance: Max, get some sleep, bud. 

Max; In a few hours, sir. I've got about 60 percent of the data decoded and I can have it done in like…

Lance: Max.

Lance spins him around to face him.

Lance: Sleep. 

Max: Yes, sir. 

Maxwell gets up and goes to his cot that was a few feet away as Terry was sitting on a stool in the kitchen drinking coffee as Cody and Dustin were in the living room section playing an old video game. Lance comes in and pours himself a cup as he looks at the others. 

Lance: When did y'all get in?

Dustin: little while ago, morning to you too, boss. 

Lance snorts as Cody chuckles and takes a lead.

Lyndsey's Apartment

Lyndsey wakes to see Miles at the foot of the bed, dresses as he touches her ankle and smiles. 

Miles: I gotta check in, babe. Be back in a few okay. 

Lyndsey: Miles, don't go…

Miles: I have too. But I promise I'll be back. 

He comes over and kisses her before heading out, Lyndsey curling with her blanket as he had a worried look across her face. 

Nick's apartment

Nick looks at Rebecca sleeping and goes and grabs his helmet as he quietly slips out of his apartment. 

His bike is louder as the streets are far empty at this hour and he drives freely and fast as he waves and cuts down streets as only various military personnel are about and are used to this from him. He comes into fools landing near the entrance/exit zone and comes up to Ajax and Jared as they wait for him. 

Jared: Didn't think you'd show today.

Nick: Why cuz of Rebecca? please. 

Ajax: Let us out, Frank!

Frank: Got it, you have a two hour pass. 

Ajax: Understood

The three walk out of the opening gates side to side.

The 23rd Outpost

Shane was looking over a picture of a home built into the side of a mountain, as Mary walks by and reaches for it as she snatched it and looks it over as she was already in her gear.

Mary: What's this?

Shane: hands off, dike. 

Mary: Whoa, ease the fuck up with the slurs alright. 

Shane: Please hand it back…

Mary does as he takes it and puts it away. 

Shane: That happens to be my home, my real home, not whatever this place is. 

Mary: You have a no shit mountain base?

Shane: I had invested in some good stocks back when that shit mattered. Amassed a small fortune. Spent every single dollar making that bass. Fully stocked for up to twenty years for at least thirty, thirty five people, back when I thought my family actually gave a shit about me. I made this place accessible by only one road and a few runways I had carved out of the side of the mountains. The amount of money to obtain the permits alone you wouldn't believe. Irrigation for farming, cattle pens, chicken coops and the likes for food growing aside from the nonperishable food I stocked on. Running water straight from the lake and a filter system to wean out all the gross. Plus a few thousand packs of bottled water just in case. I'm telling you we could survive there for years without having to make a single supply run. 

Mary: Bullshit. 

Shane: I spent ten years of my life before the outbreak getting that thing made. Solar powered energy and gas and electric back to generators ensure power. State of the art lab and equipment stocked with all forms of medicine and medication for asthma or diabetes or anything. I knew something like an emp or a nuclear attack would happen one day, zombies not so much. Before I could get there though, I got caught up with the General and owed him my life. Dude saved my ass. My debt to him is serving ten years for him saving me. In two more years I can go back to that and live the way I've always wanted. 

Mary: Dude, if I had all of that I would've just bailed already. Why haven't you?

Shane: I keep my promises. All we have in the end of the world is our word. I tend to keep mine until I am no longer obligated too. 

Mary: Uh huh, I still call bullshit.

Shane: I don't honestly care.

Mary laughs as a she heads off, shaking her head as Shane looks at the picture again and then turns and puts it away as Miles comes inside along with Rebecca who was looking around. 

Rebecca: Anybody seen, Nick?

 Few miles outside of Eden

Jared fires and watched a walker go down, Jared snapping the bolt on the rifle as he hands it off to Nick, the three sitting in a small bunker near a ridge where a large portion of walkers reside down a long a sloped hill as thousands were all crammed together as they were trying to get into a choke point near a bank by one of Eden's far end walls. 

Ajax: You ever feel that us doing this is just... futile?

Nick fires and drops another zombie, Nick smirking as he hands it off to Ajax.

Nick: One less zombie, one less chance to get bit. 

Jared: Amen.

Ajax sets up his shot. 

Ajax: But what does it matter? We've cleared out millions, slaughter mred them all with turret guns, bombs, tank barrages, and yet, every time this part of the year comes up(fires and scores a headshot) More and more just show up, amassing, waiting to get in. 

Jared drinks from a flask and hands it to Ajax as Ajax hands the rifle back to Nick.

Ajax: I just don't see any good from anything we do.

Nick: That's just the way the world is now. Learning to survive with no real hope in sight. 

Nick fires and kills another deader.

Jared: I don't think about this stuff anymore, honestly. when you start to dwell on the why's you end up…

Jared fires and and drops a zombie with well time headshot. 

Jared: ...Just like that. 

The three go silent as they continue to trade the rifle back and forth as the drop zombies with careful shots.

End of Part Nine.