Human Nature (Book 4): Human Nature IV by Borthwick, Finlay (13 ebook reader .txt) 📕

came over him: Kieran realised that if he eliminated Nolan here, then The Bandits would be leaderless, and thus the residents would have a far easier time fending the invaders off.

As each second passed, Nolan was beginning to overpower Kieran more and more.

He thought of reaching for his knife, though Kieran knew that if he took just one of his hands off of the carbine, it would give Nolan the opening he needed to overpower and kill him. In turn, this train of thought lead Kieran into realising that, whatever happened, he was going to be dead within the next minute. So, in order to make his death count, he decided on a drastic course of action.

The carbine was now slipping to one side, as Nolan was slowly bringing Kieran down onto the floor with him.

Still keeping both of his hands firmly on the firearm, Kieran tucked his head into his chest and clasped his teeth onto the grenade pin on the top grenade on his bandolier. With great oral strength, he pulled the pin out of the grenade and spat it out onto the floor away from him.

Realising what his nemesis had just done, Nolan’s expression dropped from sheer anger and determination to sheer fright and horror.

Ironically, Kieran was now the one malignantly smirking down at him.

With petrified eyes, Nolan squealed out in desperation, “Wait!”

From outside, it was just an ordinary semi-detached house. Much like the others along the street – and throughout the entire safe zone in fact – it was abandoned, dirty and covered in an overgrowth of nature.

‘BOOM!’

Within seconds, it had suddenly become nothing more than burning rubble and thick black smoke…

The explosion had been heard across the entire safe zone. Everybody, residents and bandits alike, ceased their fighting as they all turned to face the direction of the explosion.

“Annie? What the hell was that?” Elliot asked his sister in fear; they were both shooting down at bandits from one of the recently erected watch towers. Naturally, however, Annabelle was a far better shot than Elliot.

“Holy shit.” Annabelle gasped as she noticed the bold and smouldering smoke and flames in the distance.

“What is it? What do you see?” Elliot desperately questioned her.

“It’s one of the houses—Some crazy fucker has just gone and blown one of them up!” Annabelle exclaimed.

“Nolan! Come in, Nolan!” The bandit who had earlier asked Nolan for orders was now desperately trying to reach him via the radio. “Dammit!” He cursed upon Nolan not answering after several tries.

“Isn’t he answering?” The bandit who had asked about Donna questioned his ally.

“No… I think—I think he was in that explosion.”

And with that realisation, The Bandits were now indeed, as Kieran had hoped, very much leaderless…

Chapter 20: One Bullet

Just as quickly as it had stopped, the skirmishing had kicked back up again.

Rob and Michelle, desperate to avenge Nate, were among the first to resume fire.

“Look at him!” Michelle nodded down to Nate’s corpse, which was still rotting away next to them behind the upturned car.

“We’ll bury him after!” Rob reassured her as he maintained his shoot-and-duck strategy. “Please, Michelle, I am begging you—Stay with me right now!” He pleaded with her desperately as The Bandits’ shooting rather oddly became more scattered and seemingly without order.

“Of course, Rob. I’m right here!” She reassured him as she shimmied down towards the upside-down boot of the vehicle and peered up over it in order to return fire.

Gwen was taking cover behind one of the large oak trees outside of the hotel, wanting to guard the few terrified residents who were stranded inside, and were too scared to have ran to the armoury in the time which they were given.

Although a few straggling bandits had came her way, which she had dealt with, not many bandits appeared to be coming this way across the safe zone.

“Annabelle, Elliot, are you two okay?” She radioed out on the open frequency to ensure that her kids were not involved in the rather loud explosion that had just occurred.

“We’re fine, mum.” Annabelle responded. “I’m with Elliot right now. We heard the explosion, and we’re looking at it right—Well, I’m look at it right now, I mean. It was one of the houses along the estate road.”

Gwen was baffled by her daughter’s observation, “One of the houses? Why? What caused it?”

“We don’t know yet, but I don’t think now’s the right time to find it.” Annabelle countered, with gunfire audible in the distance both through her end of the channel and around Gwen’s location as well.

“Alright, keep safe,” Gwen acknowledge Annabelle’s concerns, “I’ll come and find you once we’ve driven these assholes back.”

Speaking of those ‘assholes,’ another bandit had come running around the corner, appearing to be fleeing from someone.

Without showing any mercy, Gwen stepped out from behind the tree and blasted him with her suppressed shotgun; the same peculiar weapon that Nikola had been examining earlier on in the armoury.

Following on from the lone bandit, Adela had come running along with a pistol; she was sweaty and out of breath, clearly having been hell bent on killing that one man.

“Adela!” Gwen called out to her and flagged her down, “Get inside the hotel! What are you doing out there, you crazy woman?” She was surprised to see that Adela was not hiding with Tia.

Adela stumbled towards Gwen, wiping her sweaty forehead as she did so.

“My God, what’s happened to you? Why are you looking so—Feverish?” Gwen stuttered when she could not think of the right word.

“I’m—Pregnant.” Adela confessed in her deluded state.

“Really? I was too once upon a time.” Gwen was not as surprised by this confession as she was intent on caring for the expectant mother that she was assisting with getting into the hotel, “We’re gonna get you inside and then