Blood and Thunder

Chapter 9 - Scrambled

The siblings stayed in the tunnel for the night. It wasn't the most comfortable place but it was the safest, for now. Rosia slept slanted against the tunnel wall, but Alexander couldn't sleep at all. His mind was racing, what was he supposed to do now?

He looked at the time, morning had arrived. A new day had dawned and Alexander had no idea what to do. Rosia started to stir, and she soon opened her eyes. She rubbed her eyes but said nothing to her brother. Alexander didn't blame her, she had been through a lot in the last twelve hours. Alexander opened his bag and looked for something that his sister could eat, he fished out some breakfast bars and handed one to his sister and ate the other himself. They would need their strength. The food seemed to have woken Rosia and she soon started to ask Alexander about the plan.

He kept silent, he had no idea what they were going to do. Maybe his father wrote something in the notebook about what they were to do. Alexander went to the front pocket of his bag to retrieve the notebook. His heart stopped. The zip was undone. The pocket inside was empty.

Alexander searched the rest of his bag frantically. It had to be in there somewhere, it just had to be. The contents of his bag were scattered over the tunnel floor but the notebook was nowhere to be found. It must have fallen out somewhere, or worse, someone could have taken it. He had to go and look for it, but he couldn't risk taking Rosia. But was it safe for her to be alone here? Maybe Sykes and his people would have thought they had run somewhere else. Or they could be at the house just waiting. Either way wasn't safe for Rosia.

Half an hour later, both children were searching the tunnels, hoping that the notebook would be in there with them. After over an hour searching, Alexander admitted to himself that it wasn't there, which left his with two possible places. At the house, or in someone else's hands. He needed to go to the house to find it, if it wasn't there then Alexander had no idea where it could be.

Alexander lead Rosia out of the end of the tunnel and towards the house. They couldn't risk walking out of the tunnel the way they came in. They wouldn't see if anyone was there until it was too late, and they couldn't take the chance, they may get caught too and then they'd never get the chance to get help.

Alexander scanned the surrounding area of the house, it looked like everyone had left. He told Rosia to keep watch outside while he checked inside.

He stepped through the door, the sound of glass cracking underneath his foot filled the silence. He walked through the hall and past the dining hall. The whole house looked like it was flipped upside down and then turned over again. Photo frames were smashed, vases and glasses were thrown against walls. He searched the floors, looking for this little notebook. It had to be here somewhere...

He walked slowly up to the office door, or what was left of it anyways. The door had been kicked through. The lock was still in place but the middle of the door was split in two, the gap was big enough for a large person to step through. He stepped through the gap but stopped the moment both of his feet touched the floor. The room was nearly unrecognizable. Books and sheets were everywhere, the desk was overturned and broken in half. The draws were spread over the floor along with their contents. They were obviously looking for something, but with the room in this state, Alexander couldn't tell what, or if they found it.

Walking around the room, he tried to imagine what they were looking for. He saw footprints of many different sizes on the pages of books. This was the work of a group of people, not just one. What would be so important that a whole group had to look?

Alexander turned to walk out of the room when something on the floor caught his eye. Blood. Alexander stood staring at the small puddle on the floor. He hoped that it wasn't whose blood he thought it was. He started to get pain in his head, and he realised he had been holding his breath, scared that someone would hear him breathing and come running. Forcing himself to breath again, he ran out of the room and began searching the whole house for the notebook. He needed to find it so he could get out of here, and quickly.