Risen World

The day was not a good day for Nathan. After an exhausting afternoon of standing on the sidelines and training while the ladies took out zombies he came home, fell asleep, and woke up sweating like a pig. He was as sick as a dog and he couldn't get the strength to get out of bed. After a while he could hear a voice in his head as Natalie started talking to him.

'Nathan are you ready to go?' Natalie's voices rang in his mind. He was getting use to the sensation as he started to think of it as some type of hands free telephone communication.

'I'm sorry, I don't think I'll be going with you guys today. I feel terrible. I think I might have caught a flu or something.' Nathan responded.

'Do you think we should call it off, maybe we should all stay in today until you feel better?' Natalie asked with concern.

'No it's alright you guys can go ahead without me. I'll try to sleep through this so I'll be good to get back in the action tomorrow.' Nathan let her know with a bit of a tired chuckle. He felt the link go silent as he rolled back over in the bed and started to try to put away worrying thoughts that tended to pop up whenever he got sick. At first it was easy to put such thoughts to the back of his mind since there was always something to keep him busy for the past couple of weeks or so. He never really had much time to sit down and think. With all the training and building going on he hadn't been alone with his thoughts. Now that he was, he wasn't happy with the depressing attitude that he was starting to get.

All he could think of was how useless he was. Out of everyone in their group he was the one just along for the ride. Unlike the girls who had what could be qualified as super powers in his mind, he couldn't gain strength at rapid speeds or learn how to use weapons in a matter of weeks. Then there was no comparing him and Joshua. One was a martial master that was more than twice his size and could handle himself even better than the girls with super powers. The other was a programming nerd that knew more video game knowledge than anyone in the group. Now that he thought about it that was probably the only thing he knew better than anyone else in the group.

Even with the training Joshua was putting him through he was not catching up with them, in fact the gap was only growing bigger. Of course he knew it wouldn't be normal for someone to go from a five foot four inches, hundred and ten pounds when soaking wet pipsqueak to someone with a Greek God physique in a matter of weeks. He was just hoping he would see signs of his improvements in some way. Even now Joshua still wouldn't let him use anything but the shovel when they went to grind zombies. What was he supposed to dig the zombies a grave or something?

With such thoughts Nathan tried to fall asleep for a while, but just couldn't find that sweet spot in the bed. When he was about to give up he heard a knock at the door signaling someone was looking for him. He struggled his way out of bed and slowly paced his way to the door grimacing at the bright light shining in his face when he opened it. When he was finally able to look at his visitor it was as if he was looking at an angel descending from above with a bowl of chicken soup and some orange juice. Then he realized it was just Joshua.

"I came up to bring you some soup to help you feel better. There's also a few aspirin in case you have a bad headache or something." Joshua said as he entered the room. He walked over to the nearby table to set the platter down.

"How come you couldn't have been one of the girls, then everything would have been perfect." Nathan said before coughing into his hand. Joshua gave him an odd look before shrugging.

"Natalie is busy helping out with breakfast for everybody and you and I both know Laura wouldn't be caught dead doing this." Joshua said with a smile.

"Yeah, but a man can dream." Nathan replied before sitting down in front of his bowl of soup. He started eating it and wasn't surprised he couldn't taste much while being sick. "Are you guys going to head out again?"

"That's the plan." Joshua answered, but when he got a good look at Nathan he started to see signs of something eating him up inside. He thought about it for a moment before asking him. "What's wrong? I know you're sick and all but you just seem…down."

"I was wondering…am I useful to you guys? I mean I don't really help yet you bring me along anyways. I just wish I could do more." Nathan spoke slowly at first, but eventually got his feelings out.

"Hmmm, I don't know you really don't do much…" Joshua started to say as he put on a fake pondering expression that earned him a glare from Nathan. "…but honestly that doesn't matter. You're a part of the group and you do what you can. Hell half the stuff we figured out were pieced together by you, and I highly doubt anyone else here would have been able to find that broadcast signal so fast. The point is all you should worry about is being able to do what you can. Every little thing will help us all out in the end."

"Thanks Josh. I needed to hear that. I thought if I started training I would be able to help out more, but there are other ways I can help even now." Nathan replied as the depressed air about him faded away back towards his usual excited personality.

"Hey it took years for me to train and get to where I am now, just like it probably took years for you to get good at programming. Don't expect any short cuts, the only reason Laura and the others are learning so fast is because they have a supernatural occurrence helping them. If they had to go head to head with someone that was trained like me and had the same capabilities as them they wouldn't stand a chance." Joshua explained.

"They wouldn't stand a chance going head on with you even with their powers, Laura's fire is to slow, Madalyn wouldn't even be able to land a blow on you from what I've seen let alone poison you in a fight, and although Natalie can probably hear your thoughts while fighting her she probably wouldn't be able to react fast enough. In other words, you're already too strong on your own so let noobs like me get a chance at powers before you get any." Nathan finished with a huff as he went back to eating.

"Very funny." Joshua chuckled before heading towards the door. "Get some rest and we'll check up on you when we get back." Nathan merely did a simple nod in response to Joshua as he watched the man leave his room. Nathan smiled for a moment at the encouragement and was glad to have a good friend like him around during the current situation. After finishing up his food he headed back to bed and was finally able to find some peace in sleep. He dreamed of becoming a video game character or something before being forced to wake up after a jump scare.

He looked around the room and noticed it was the same as before he fell asleep leading him to believe no one had come to visit. 'I must not have slept for very long.' Nathan thought before getting up and stretching a bit. He still felt sick, but the soup and medicine had made him feel well enough to move about. He decided to clean up his mess and took the bowl and glass back down to the kitchen sink. While moving through the building he noticed that the place was fairly empty, so most people must be outside either scouting or patrolling the area. He also remembered Joshua had assigned some people that knew how to make some wooden arrows to work on those along with making some extra bows for people to use in case of an emergency.

After putting his dishes up and giving them a quick wash he decided to walk around the Mansion a bit to stretch his legs before heading back to sleep. Wondering the halls he was able to appreciate how well maintained the place was and how large it was with all the rooms. Although not everyone had their own bedroom, if it came down to it this place could probably house over a hundred people. While walking down an empty wing on the second floor he started to notice an odd smell fill the place. The further he walked down the hall the stronger the smell became until he turned the corner and ran into three people he didn't ever want to be alone with.

Lazing around at the back of the corridor were Jacob and his two cronies. They were smoking what from the smell definitely couldn't be cigarettes while hunched over playing cards in the middle of the floor. From the way they were talking to each other they were a little out of it, but they were still aware enough to notice Nathan poke his head around the corner. Jacob gave him a wide grin that sent shivers down his spine before standing up and walking over to him. "Well look at who we have here boys. Little nanny boy has blessed us with his presence. What you get sick of hiding behind the oaf already." Jacob said as he stood proudly over Nathan at only two inches short of a foot taller than him. His two friends joined them as they spread out around Nathan cornering him.

"No I w…was checking out the p…place, after getting s...sick I just wanted to m…move around a bit." Nathan said as his stuttering came back in full force do to his nervousness.

"Oh what's a matter man? We're friends aren't we? Ain't that right Matt, Rick?" Jacob said getting laughs of approval in response. "Now why don't you help your friends out and do a little something for us. I've noticed you've been going out of camp with the big guy and those two girls a lot and although I would love to ask you to help us get alone with the girls I doubt that'd work out. So the next big thing would be if you could get a few things for us. You see were starting to run out of weed and we know just the place to get some."

"So what do you e…expect me to do a…about it?" Nathan barely mumbled out the question as he looked down at the floor avoiding eye contact.

"Well now I was just getting to that part. You can have the big guy and the beauties scout out the area, while they're doing that you can get the drugs for us. Understand?" Jacob said as his eyes settled on the smaller boy in front of him. His once wide smile had turned into a snarl as he noticed Nathan wasn't responding for a moment.

"No…" Nathan's voice was so quiet the other three had to strain their ears to hear it.

"What did you say?" Jacob said as his scowl deepened at what he thought he heard.

For a moment Nathan's body trembled before he clinched his fist and looked up towards his aggressor and stared him in the eyes. "I said NO!" He shouted before being met with a fist that sent him crumbling to the floor. He curled up into a ball as a hail of kicks and punches met his body as the three older teens all took their anger out on him. He felt like it was taking forever for them to finish letting lose as his body made him want to scream in pain, but he held it all in before passing out.

When he woke up his hands were tied behind his back and his legs were tied up as well. His body still ached from the beating he took and he could feel his face swelling up from the punch Jacob had sent his way. Opening his eyes he could see that whatever spot he was in had no light and the room outside was on the darker side with no sun coming in from a window or light from the ceiling. He could only see outside his container through a small crack in whatever the three boys had shoved him in. It felt similar to the tight space of a locker back at school from the several times he had been shoved into one by the very same people.

"Well what do we do now Jake? The kid won't get it for us and that was probably are best bet." Nathan could make out the whinny voice of Rick coming from in front of the locker.

"Then we just get it ourselves, we've been out on scouting trips before and everything that direction has been clean so far. Will just sneak out and be back before anyone knows." Jacob said as the voices started to fade further away in to the distance. Soon Nathan could here footsteps heading upwards as if they were climbing stairs, but he didn't hear any creaking as if they were climbing stone steps instead of wood.

'Looks like they locked me in the basement.' Nathan thought as he put two and two together. He tried to struggle for what felt like a while to break though the ropes or bang his way out of the locker, but all that did was tire him out. His depression started to come back in full force as he was panicking at his situation. After a while he finally stopped and tried to call for help, but his mouth was taped over and he couldn't make a loud enough noise. 'Damn it if only I could let Josh know before those idiots bring trouble back.'

Just as he was starting to scold his self for the whole mess he felt a voice enter his mind from the mental link. 'Hey Nathan you doing alright? Joshua wanted me to check up on you just in case.' Natalie said with a concerned tone.

'Damn it I'm so stupid! I could have just sent a mental message.' Nathan's voice screamed out in his head.

'What's wrong Nathan' Natalie replied.

'You guys have to hurry back, those three punks might end up making a mess of things.' Nathan said as he hoped they wouldn't end up being to late.