Ferndale's Second War of Independance IV

John was the first on the scene, tribute to Kamashi’s run as well as his own. He was only slightly out of breath when he arrived; you didn’t survive long as a spy unless you could run at top speeds when required to.

“You really haven’t had a chance to know what you’re supposed to do, we were going to talk to you about this today,” Kerma told John guiltily. “But now is the perfect time to implement this plan so we’ll just have to go with it.”

“Alright, I think I know what you’re talking about, Sam told me some of it when he was planning it,” John said cheerfully. The spies were not known for being great planners so working without having any set guidelines except what Kerma and Frendral were able to briefly layout was something that John could handle easily.

“Here are the explosives,” Frendral said, handing John a bundle from a box at the foot of the wall.

“Are you sure you’re willing to do this?” Kerma asked. “I mean you could get yourself blown up if this goes wrong, it really is volunteer only.”

“I’ll be fine,” John assured her. “I’m not a stupid amateur who doesn’t know what they are doing; I can take care of myself.” Kerma was about to point out that John had no experience with bombs specifically but then stopped herself, there was no point. This was a war, they were all risking their lives, and John had volunteered, that was what mattered. What happened next was up to fate, Kerma decided, not her.

John slipped around the back of the wall. There was a way in and out of the city through a very well disguised gate. It looked exactly like a piece of the brick until it was open but even so they weren’t taking any chances of it being found. A guard was posted at all times next to the gate now that they were at way; they too had a warning bell. It might have been risky to have another gate but it was also useful, during the last war they had regretted not having any way out of their city while under siege so changes had been made. Those changes came with risk but the benefit, especially for the spies, was far greater then the danger.

John was forced to make a wide detour around the assembling enemy army. If they found him then all of their planning would be over, and he would probably be killed. In the last war the spies had had the idea that even if they were caught they might not be killed since they were still considered children. They were no longer considered children and it was a well known fact that when an underground city found an enemy spies they were killed. Usually they were questioned first and that was even worse, though John promised himself he wouldn’t talk, nothing was proven but there were rumors about the questioning methods used.

Coming up behind the advancing army would have been easier had John thought to grab one of the uniforms the spies had stolen from the enemy camp over time. They had a uniform for every single one of the underground cities, and their faces weren’t widely known so they could get away with such easy tactics. He had left Ferndale on such short notice though that he hadn’t managed to grab one. John was also starting to wish that the spies’ dress code was something other then black, which stood out sharply against the desert sand and was as hot as an oven.

To be continued...