“Frank ? You’re already back ? It’s been less than half an hour …” Asked an incredulous George as his friend came down the stairs.

“Yeah … *hum* .. I know. It’s just that I didn’t want to ruin those nice parting vibe we had going so I took the time to be sure.” Responded an awkward Frank.

“Sure of what ?” Asked Marie from the side, half angry, half reassured about her husband coming back.

“Well, I didn’t manage to open the hatch much and, from the look of it, it’s a definite possibility that the house kinda collapsed on it a little … It won’t budge past a few centimeter, just enough to see the debris outside ...”

“Oh … shiiiit ...” grumbled Marie in response

George sighed “Let’s all go together, maybe it will open if the four of us push together ...”

“What about the radiation ?” Asked Alice from the side

“You two will put on the protection suits, Frank and me will go like that. I’d rather die of cancer in an odd twenty year than dying of starvation for a whole month.” said George

Hearing the plan, all four of them nodded, hoping it would work.

***

“Hey, the dog smelled something !” Shouted a soldier standing over some rubles.

The next instant, ten other men spread across the zone of debris started to converge toward his position. When they had seen both the major and captain secretly trying to sneak out a search dog, they had volunteered to help. Not even questioning their motive.

Well, at least not directly, they eventually did question their motive and then laughed their ass off. The major didn’t quite feel proud at that moment, he felt quite stupid even, but no one suggested to turn back so he decided to go with the flow.

The major was the first to reach the soldier, he had bolted faster than everyone else and started digging with his hand before the others even arrived. Later a soldier handed him a shovel, and they all continued digging in silence. Guided at intermittent time by a seemingly anxious dog.

It took more than half an hour of digging for a soldier to hear a small plaint, a tiny voice, no bigger than a whisper. Nearly hidden by the wind. The rescue operation members immediately stopped working at the signal and, after listening for a bit, all heard it.

It was faint but it was there. The major inwardly screamed a ‘she is alive !’ before digging with renewed energy. Many soldier were exhausted due to their previous days of labor but none thought about taking a break.

It took fifteen minute for the squad to reach her and another fifteen minutes to get her out, slowly but carefully. On their way back, the major cried while holding the barely conscientious eight years old child in his arm, claiming a miracle to any who would hear him.

At first they did not quite believe him .. Heck, even he didn’t quite believe himself ! But the phenomenon continued the next night, and the night after that. Once it even happened twice in the same night !

Everytime he woke up in tear, the whole rescue squad would immediately be assembled, even some citizen joined, volunteering to help. Together they would then head out and come back more numerous, with a bigger smile plastered on their face.

It was an incredible thing to find such hope in the middle of despair.

The atmosphere of the refugee camp improved daily. Many had doubt over the major’s supposedly miraculous dreams but many other believed. Especially those who had been saved themselves ...

On the fifth day, things took a weird turn. When he woke up that morning, the major immediately found his captain and announced in front of everyone that his friend was to be renamed Bob. The captain of course protested but the major made it an order, not giving him a choice.

Useless to say that the captain was not very happy with being renamed. He unfortunately wasn’t the last as the major proceeded to rename all the high ranking member of their base with various names like Eugene, Squidward or Garry.

Many started claiming the poor major had lost it … Much more believed it ...

The situation was only diffused later, when a soldier into old cartoon caught the reference. The renaming fit was then shrugged off as a bad joke attempt by an overly zealous major and the base quickly resumed it’s normal activities. Sadly for the captain tough, Bob sticked as his surname …

The day that followed was rather normal, for the first time since the little girl’s rescue, the major didn’t have any dream. In the morning, he was found grumbling in cafeteria, pacing back and forth. Something definitely bothering him. He only calmed down after the little girl he had saved came to spend time with him. Since the beginning of her recovery, the cheerful little girl had always tried to spend as much time as she could with the major.

All could see she was not quite all right, that she would be marked for life with what she had seen and lived. She often stared at nothing, her eyes vacant. Her emotions always on edge, quick to smile but also quick to cry. She however did her best to live through and the major praised her greatly for that.

On the seventh day however, things changed drastically. When the major woke, he was different, his eyes crazed. Immediately after he woke, he asked the whole base to assemble in the sport room, claiming he had something important to announce.

He talked about how he had heard a divine voice, a voice of kindness who wished nothing but to save this ruined world. He claimed the divine voice had told him of a sacred place, a place where hope for mankind would be found.

He then announced that they would all leave on a pilgrimage to find this hope. That they were to set out the very next day at dawn, and that London was their final destination.

What followed was a complete uproar, very few in the hall believed his crazed words to be true. Even more since it entailed leaving for the currently most dangerous place in the whole UK, the remains of their old capital …

The major made it an order, an order to be followed under threat of martial punishment. Useless to say that didn’t help. As he saw the first sign of the situation getting out of hand, Bob jumped on the makeshift stage and screamed for everyone to calm down.

He told the major that this was an important decision that should be discussed with everyone. He claimed that they should only send a small group, 15 people at most, and that sending a whole four hundred person crowd was definitely reckless, if not borderline suicidal.

The starfish argued that a 400 person crowd was but a small group in front of the divine will. He then ordered people to start preparing, for they would leave at dawn, no matter what !

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

The situation was once more getting sour. Bob, asked for calm once more, less successfully this time. He then shouted at the major to stop this little game, the get a grip and come back to being the great leader they all followed ...

The major took it all without a single reaction on his face. Then as Bob claimed this was nothing but a foolish idea, that nobody in their right mind would accept to follow that plan, and that he would do anything rather than let his friend walk to his death, Patrick shot him.

The shot was unexpected. The crowd simply froze, instantly silent. None had paid particular attention to the gun the major always had at his belt, the gun that he had just used to kill what had probably been his best friend.

Uncaring for the silence, eyes crazed. The major advanced once more, stepping over the corpse of his friend to stand at the very edge of the stage. He then repeated his word, his tone more fervent. His demeanor more assured. His eyes more crazed and decided. He assured everyone that the divine will would be made onto earth, that they would all be saved, and that he would sacrifice anything in that endeavour.

Another shot sounded in the silent room and the major staggered, falling from the stage.

In the hall, chaos followed. A group of crazed follower, all believing his miracle had been the will of the divine, were now shouting murder to whoever would hear. A crazed woman whose son had been saved by those very miracle stole a machine gun from a nearby soldier, shooting at the major’s murderer. Killing many innocent bystanders in her vengeful endeavor.

The situation escalated rapidly from there … the hall soon drenched in blood.

In his last moment, the major regained a semblance of sanity. He realised what he had done, and cried tears of blood. The last thing he saw in the world of the living, was the face of a crying little girl, hugging his soon to be corpse with all her strength.

With the last of his force he patted her head. She looked at him, devastated, urging him not to move. Telling him everything would be all right.

The major smiled as he spoke his very last words, a smile full of regret but a smile nonetheless.

“I am … sorry”

Hearing those words, the little girl broke, continuously crying while the fighting slowly died down and long past that. Of the four hundred and nineteen refugee, seventy-one had survived, quickly scampering away from the battle zone with everything they could carry, none present to support a little girl as she clenched a corpse with all her strength.

It was only a few hours later, when night had fell over the hall, that she slowly rose up.

Her tear had simply dried, the sadness slowly replaced by an unending feeling of emptiness.

She had lost her family to a tsunami. She had lost her grandfather to an earthquake. Finally, she had lost her hero to the whim of a so called god of kindness.

That very night, a little girl who could no longer cry swore vengeance on the heaven, before disappearing into the night …

***

“Well, that didn’t work” Mentioned Frank on the way down

“We know, we were there” Grumbled Marie, annoyed by her husband remarks

“So what’s the plan ?” Asked Alice “I don’t want to discuss it in front of the children”

“Maybe we could crawl through the air vents, find our way to the surface” Said Frank as a metaphoric lamp was lit over his head.

“Oh yeah, hope you lost a few pounds though, the vents are no wider than 10 cm in diameter ...” responded George with a cynic tone. Disappointing a hopeful Alice, who had forgotten that particular detail … Blaming herself for having watched too much spy movies ...

“So what ? We just starve while hopping for a miracle ?” Asked Frank

“Well, that sounds more and more like a plan ...” said a depitted Marie

“Not quite yet” Interrupted George “Fortunately for us I used to store various old things in the shelter rather than simply discard them. There should be quite a few parts I could repurpose ...”

“What do you have in mind ?” Asked Alice

“A radio, not just a receiver but a transmitter. We could try to send some distress signal with our position in morse. Hopefully mine isn’t too rusty ...”

“Anything we can help with ?” Asked Marie

“Well, not really” Said George “The biggest problem is that I don’t have my tools, the rest I’m quite confident I could manage. Did you guys keep your cellphones around ?”

“Yeah, I have mine, why ?” Asked Frank while Marie and Alice motioned they had theirs too

“Parts … I should be able to repurpose their FM transmitter to emit on a large band of frequencies at intermittent time. I just need to remember those frequency modulation formula and from there it should be simple to form a carrier with our data. The thing is, I haven’t used those equation for years … Maybe I can work them out .... do we have paper ?”

“Yes, my agenda ! I also brought a pen. I won’t be able to help tough, that looked a bit too complicated ...” Said Alice honestly while Marie and Frank nodded behind her.

“Not really, it’s first year engineer stuff. Second year at most ...”

Alice grumbled a “Well sorry your dumb wife can’t help ...” before she was unexpectedly silenced by a rogue kiss from her husband. Maybe she would let that one go.

“Gosh, you two need to get a room” Complained Frank at the back.

“Yeah maybe we should” said George while he winked at his blushing wife. “While I work, could you three plan with what let’s of our food. We need to last as long as possible ...”

“Sure can” Voiced Marie, distracting the attention from Alice “What I said earlier stay on the plate though. We also need to check how we do on water and fuel, that may kill us sooner. Especially if we lose the air pump alongside the generator ...”

“Good, let’s get to work then. Can’t leave everything to George !” Said Frank, trying to get some motivation out.

“Right, well said Mr Goldfinger !” Commented George, making the couple suddenly freeze in place.

“You heard that ?” Asked Marie while trying to keep her cool

Alice placed a hand on her shoulder. “Trust me, It was a miracle that the children didn’t hear ...”

Marie and Frank both furiously blushed. This was definitely the most embarrassing day of their life ...

----------------------------------------

Sorry for the late chapter guys, hope you liked it ^^

Also, In requiem of our favorite major, a little song ... May he RIP in piece ...