Not What We Expected (Major and Elizabeth)

Elizabeth had been travelling with Hannah, Selena and Frank since they had met up in central London a few days ago. They were heading towards an army blockade on the outskirts of Manchester, it seemed to be their last hope to have some form of normality now that the Rage virus had decided to destroy everything that they held dear.

Well, destroy everything that Elizabeth and Selena held dear to them, Frank and Hannah still had each other, and that notion that they could be okay like they were okay made Elizabeth and Selena have the strength to carry on fighting against this thing.

Those freaks.
Those unnatural...freaks.

Now they were approaching the blockade and things did not look good, they did not look good at all. First of all there was nobody there, no guards, no civilians even. Not even any infected. It was enough to make Frank almost break down on sight -this had been their one hope and now it seemed like it was about to be dashed.

"No no no this can't be it!" Frank exclaimed "We have to check the cars, there must be something in the cars!"

He jumped out of the taxi and both Elizabeth and Selena followed, holding up their weapons in case the blockade wasn't as empty as it seemed. Although they probably would have been attacked by any infected around the area already.

Hannah got out with them and began to look around for anything that she could take with them, anything useful. It was so like her and it made Elizabeth smile softly and snort, even in the face of this crushing disappointment. Looked like Selena was right.

"I don't like this." Selena muttered "I think we should go."

"Yes Frank, this is too exposed, we need to go." Elizabeth stated with a nod.

"Go? Go fucking where?!" Frank raged, as he ran his hands through his hair, stomping away for some time on his own, his swearing had obviously upset Hannah as she went after him to see if he was alright, she looked as crushed as he did.

"Well this is great." Elizabeth stated under her breath to Selena, and both of them sighed softly before rushing to deal with a situation at hand, Frank seemed to be going crazy! It was like he was infected but there wasn't any geeks around here...so...

The bodies! It had to be the bodies, he had consumed some blood as it dripped down, that must be it.

"Get away from him! Hannah!" Elizabeth instructed and passed her back to Selena away from Frank.

"Dad!" Hannah cried out fighting against Selena.

"He's infected! Kill him Liz! Kill him!" Selena pushed, her tone was frantic as Franks body twitched and jerked uncontrollably in front of them, growls and hisses coming from his lips, they only had a few seconds before he turned.

Gripping her bat with a firm hand, Elizabeth roared out in an effort to psych herself up but before she could make contact with her crowbar, bullets went flying into Frank sending his body twitching to the ground. Looking at Selena in shock, the army men who appeared were yelling at her to move away and she did so slowly, like she was numb from the shock.

Major Henry West.

He was Major Henry West and he was in command of what could very well be one of the last little strongholds of humanity in the British isles. Of course this was mainly because his entire 'population' was his soldiers, the men who had served under him for many years now. They were highly trained and well armed and that meant that a lot of these infected freaks never stood a freaking chance.

And that had been before he had managed to secure enough mines and explosives to create a half-way decent minefield out in front of his current base of operations.

Having spotted the vehicle heading towards the check point he and some of his men had made their way down there to meet up with them. Secretly he was hoping that the travellers would include some women who would not be opposed to some male company. After all, they were going to need women. But at the same time he didn't want to use force.

What was the use in saving humanity if you broke down society?

Ending the life of the infected man had been as simple as giving a hand signal to one of his men as the others moved in to secure the area. Hands behind his back, he marched over to the small group of survivors and thanked his lucky stars. All three living travellers were female. He smiled comfortingly at the small party,

"Good afternoon ladies, I am Major Henry West." he greeted them politely before gesturing back to the treeline, "If you would like to escort me and my men back to our jeeps we can have you safe, warm and fed within the hour."

He paused as the sound of howling infected echo'd down the road,

"I advise some haste ladies."

Elizabeth, when she saw that the army men were luckily in time to save them from being eaten by Frank or having to kill him themselves, was relieved. She didn't want Hannah to end up hating her because she was the person who had to put an end to her fathers life, even though technically he was dead as soon as the infection began to work its way into his blood stream.

The crowbar to the head only made his body die as well, not just him mind.

"Oh shit." Elizabeth gasped softly as she ran her hands through her hair, just looking at the dead body of Frank on the ground, he had been a good guy, taken them in when they had needed saving from the infected.

Placing her hand over Hannah's eyes, Elizabeth shook her head at Selena; "Don't let her see okay?"

Nodding her head at the advice of the army man, Elizabeth thought that it would be best if she did the introductions, after all Selena was too busy trying to strong arm a fighting crying Hannah into the back of one of the Military jeeps that they were occupying.

"Thanks for the save. I'm Elizabeth, that's Selena and the little one's Hannah. That was her dad, Frank." Elizabeth ran her hand down her face in frustration but made her way onto one of the jeeps anyway to sit the other side of Hannah, who had in fact been trying to climb out of the jeep as she had entered.

"Oh god." she whispered to herself as she held her head in her hands, trying to pull herself together, now they had to look after Hannah, it was what Frank wanted them to do if anything was to happen to her.

The Major winced a little bit as he saw the youngest of the party crying. Evidently the older man had been her father or a father figure at the very least. It was never easy knowing you had killed the loved one of someone but it was easier to think of if you accepted that once they were infected they were as good as dead anyway.

When a person was infected they lost themselves... but try telling that to the young woman who's father you ordered killed.

"Our pleasure to be of assistance... I'm just glad we saw you on the road or else we wouldn't have gotten here in time." he admitted to her before nodding quietly, "Unfortunately I have seen the expression she made far too many times and know what it tends to mean. But it is a pleasure to meet you Miss Elizabeth."

Getting into the lead Jeep, he cast a glance back at the ladies in the back of the jeep and smiled comfortingly at them before patting the side of the jeep. The driver nodded and began driving, the other jeep following behind as they began to drive in a zig-zag pattern that was marked out only by some white sticks,

"This is our base of operations." he explained to them before chuckling, "Sorry about the sharp turns... we have heavily mined the area for added protection and as a sort of alarm system."

As the jeep pulled up to the house he went round and opened the jeep doors for the ladies,

"Ladies if you would..." he clapped his hands slightly, "Food, bed or hot shower first?"

Elizabeth was just trying not to show that she was so shaken by what had happened in front of Hannah, both she and Selena needed to be strong so that they wouldn't have to deal with the fact that they really were truly fucked up by what had happened. Both she and Selena had shared several crushes looks on the way to the base.

They were both devastated that the thing that was keeping them going, the hope and happiness that one day they would be as okay as Hannah and her Dad was now completely gone.

She just hoped that the soldiers here were able to offer them something equally as amazing so that they wouldn't be forced to try and live on without having any real inspiration. Not running for their lives every day would be a great start though.

"Its beautiful." Elizabeth commented with a soft smile, clambering out of the jeep she took in the lovely historical house and grounds "Such a wonderful building, even better with the knowledge its protected by a mine field." she laughed trying to break the tension rising in both Selena and Hannah. Elizabeth didn't know why they were on edge.

The words...hot shower, made Elizabeth brighten considerably. A hot shower would be amazing right now.

"I think I'll take that shower, then some food, then bed." she stated with a grin "We uhm, we got some food ourselves in the Taxi cab, take whatever you guys want, I guess we're all sharing resources now anyway."

Henry could tell that the women were not exactly in the right frame of mind for any "repopulating the earth" discussions right now and he didn't blame them. Their only shared male friend had just been put down due to becoming infected. It was only natural that they needed time to adjust and sit back and deal with it all.

He chuckled a little bit when Elizabeth spoke up about the house.

He had mainly chosen it for it's large indoor spaces and it's commanding field of view, with a far line of sight in all directions to prevent them from being taken by surprise. But even he had to acknowledge that their little base camp was a beautiful piece of real estate,

"Yes it is isn't it?" he agreed before shaking his head a little bit, "I came here with my school many years ago, on a school trip and all that. It was just the closest place to our old position that I thought was defensible."

He laughed a little bit when all the girls seemed to brighten up at the idea of hot showers. Gesturing for them to follow, he led them into one of the bigger bedrooms with a large bathroom. He gestured around it,

"Well then here is where you three shall be staying. I'll bring in camping beds for two people if you don't want to share the double." he told them before humming a little bit and talking into his radio. When that we done he smiled at Elizabeth, "Sent one of my boys to collect it now my dear. Thank you for offering."

Elizabeth was just happy that they were safe and didn't have to be watching their backs all the time now, although she was not so happy about being stuck in a house full of army boys, she hoped that they would be able to call on their training and make sure they were disciplined enough not to cause them any hassle.

She wasn't above kicking them harshly where the sun don't shine if they made any inappropriate moves. Although, herself, she was a little bit glad that there might be someone around here who perceived her as attractive, or as a woman. Fighting on the road you forget a lot of that stuff, none of it matters, staying alive mattered.

"How did Manchester come to be the way it is?" Elizabeth asked with a shake of her head "We couldn't believe it when we saw it on the horizon, was it a firebombing gone bad or...are you not allowed to tell us?"

As soon as she saw the bedroom, Elizabeth laughed softly as Selena jumped immediately and starfished on the massive bed. Hannah seemed to be interested in taking a hot shower, and of course after what had just happened, Selena and Elizabeth were only too happy to allow her the right of going first.

"Thanks, I think we'll manage to all squeeze into the one bed though. Don't worry about it, it's the least we could do in return for allowing us to stay, besides, the Taxi's got all our personal things in too, we kind of wanted to keep those." Elizabeth grinned cheekily.

Rubbing at her arm she smiled a little shyly; "So uhm yeah, thank you. Is there any time we should come down for dinner or, is it get your own kind of thing?"

Henry knew that there was going to have to a be a bit of a crack down with the discipline of his soldiers as he knew that some of them were a bit impulsive. And he had no doubt that they were all... well... horny.

There wasn't any nice way of putting that to be honest.

But he was going to let them all know that he was going to be taking an incredibly tough stance on any attempts to force the young ladies into doing something they were uncomfortable with. He was not about to endanger his little dream of repopulating Britain by having one of his soldiers act up due to the stresses,

"Manchester wasn't anything the army did to be honest. We wanted to try and keep the city... all of our supplies were moved there." he admitted before shaking his head, "But this is what happens when there's no one to watch their homes, to maintain them... and no fire brigade to put the fires out. We have to wait until it rains and hope most of our supplies are not destroyed."

He smiled a little bit and leant up against the doorway to watch them enjoying the simple pleasures of their room. He nodded a little bit,

"I shall have the private bring your supplies up to you as soon as possible." he assured them before smiling, "I would be very honoured if you would join us for dinner at seven. Until then ladies."

**

Henry hummed a little bit to himself as he selected the wine that they were going to be drinking from the wine cellar. Making his way back up to the dining room, he smiled at the sight of his soldiers not on duty enjoying themselves in a playful way. Thankfully they weren't doing anything too rash or too heavy-handed so they were not to scare the ladies if they decided to join them.

He was kind of waiting on them.

Sitting at the head of the table, Henry poured himself some wine and savoured it by drinking it slowly while his men had some beers. He had taken great pains to explain to his men that if any of them touched the women without clear consent... they would be shot.

Elizabeth was so happy right now.

She was almost purring.

The warm shower had worked wonders to heal the aches and pains she was feeling even though she was bruised from all of the things she'd whacked into in a hurry to escape the infected. It was only now she had the time to stop and check that she realised just how bad it really was. Her legs were speckled with bruises and so was her back and ribs.

Ah well, it wasn't anything she couldn't handle.

Slipping into her tight black jeans, Elizabeth pulled on an oversized purple jumper over her plain vest top, although she was warm from the shower she thought it would get cold pretty quickly in a big cavernous house like this.

Hannah had decided she wasn't going to come to dinner, too upset she hadn't had a chance to bury her father or say goodbye properly, and Selena didn't want to leave her on her own so, it was just Elizabeth coming down for something to eat, under the instructions to try and save something for the other two girls.

Approaching the dining room she stepped inside, her hair was down loose and unfortunately still wet, it was too long to dry quickly on its own. The room quietened slightly when she came in and it made her blush softly, taking the only vacant seat opposite Major West, Elizabeth coughed slightly;

"I uhm, the other girls aren't coming. It's just me." she stated with an apologetic smile "Hannah isn't feeling too well and Selena didn't want to leave her alone, they might come down later if there's anything left."

Turning to the soldier who was the cook, as she had been informed, Elizabeth smiled gently; "It smells really nice, thanks."

Henry spotted Elizabeth coming through the door before his men did and he was honestly glad that he did. It meant that he had time to gape a little before his men did the same. Meaning he'd recover faster and be able to assert control better should the situation call for it. But in the end the situation didn't call for it as his men managed to gather their wits faster than expected.

Those who didn't were teased good-naturedly by those who had done.

Smiling at Elizabeth, he pulled the chair out for her to sit in before sitting back down himself,

"It's not a problem, I imagined that young Hannah would not be up for this little dinner so soon after... well the events of earlier." he admitted before smiling a little bit, "But I'm sure there will be some left over for them."

With a nod to the soldiers acting as chefs and waiters, platters were set down on the table before their covers were removed. Five large platters of real roast chicken, stuffing and select vegetables were on each platter. The soldiers all began to dig in, leaving Henry and Elizabeth a whole platter to themselves. He held up the bottle of wine,

"Would you care for a drop of wine? I think it's old and expensive... but I've never had much of an eye for the stuff on a collector's level... just a drinker's." he told her with a small smirk, "Eat up. This chicken is from one of ours... we actually have a rather large number of them in the yard."

Elizabeth blinked a little bit in shock when she saw what they were going to be eating tonight, it was like this place really was paradise. She didn't think she would be eating anything like this so soon after being here, it was like they had been super organised and managed to set themselves up pretty well here in that such short amount of time.

Honestly it made her so glad they had decided to come here.

"Wow." she gasped softly "This is great." Elizabeth beamed, readily taking a few slices of chicken and a few potatoes and vegetables.

It was more than what she had eaten in a day since this whole thing had started out and it was undoubtedly more healthy than just living off sprite, pepsi and whatever vending machine they could loot at the time.

"I would love some actually, it's been a tough well... month or so." she stated with a small sigh "I always just used to class them on price, the more expensive the better they should be." Elizabeth admitted with a grin.

Sighing happily as she had some of the chicken and vegetables Elizabeth tucked in; "Seriously, is there anything that you haven't thought of?" she smiled softly "You guys really have it made, you don't know what its like out there, I'm glad we decided to come, although I can't believe we're the only ones who answered your message."

Henry had to admit that he imagined that the integration between the soldiers and the women would have been a bit more... turbulent than it was actually turning out to be. It seemed that wherever he looked his men were welcoming the women with open arms and not just for the 'advantages' that came from having such women on friendly terms.

Could it be that his men had wanted companionship in another way too? A less primal but none the less basic way? They wanted to have friends. Friends who were different to them. People who would have different experiences and different views.

"Well private Laskey does do some amazing roast chicken for an American." he joked a little bit, getting the finger from the young private, "But he's a good kid. Youngest US Marine they ever sent over here to serve with the SAS. He's a bit shy though so he tends to spend most of his time in the kitchens."

When she accepted his offer he smiled and poured her some wine into her glass. This was a rose wine so it looked no different to any other rose wine but he knew that this one was over a hundred years old,

"Well this one should have been in the hundreds of thousands price range... if I'm reading this right it's from the 19th century." he told her with a smirk as he sipped it, "And delicious."

When she asked if there was anything they hadn't thought about he thought it might be time to touch upon a subject,

"Well we didn't think about the future for one thing. I mean how can a group of thirty men save a country right? There's not enough people here." he told her honestly before smiling bitterly, "Picture this... you hear a broadcast on the radio saying that you can protect people and that the infection isn't there. You go to the location and find the people... but the people are more interested in your supplies than your lives. Our message is like dozens of the same kind of message... only ours is genuine so far."

Elizabeth laughed softly when she listened to the soldiers rib each other, it was nice to see some other interaction besides just running for your lives, open hostility or crying your eyes out because someone you loved had just ripped apart your other loved ones in front of you. It was a nice, warm, friendly environment that she had sorely missed since everything started going south.

"I'm sure that he and Hannah will get on well then, she likes to cook." she smiled softly "You might end up spending a fair bit of time together you know...when she feels better."

Frowning softly when she thought about what had happened to Hannah, she sometimes wished that the girl would pull herself together. Selena and she had lost everyone, but they didn't act the way that she did. Perhaps it was because they were more mature.

Taking a small sip of the wine, loving the way that the alcohol burned down her throat, Elizabeth shivered slightly and hummed; "It really is lovely, it's so nice to be able to have alcohol again, me and Selena never thought it was a good idea while we were on our own, we needed to be alert in case of an attack after all."

With a small nod Elizabeth smiled lightly; "Well that's very true, but maybe you should just be waiting until help gets here? Besides, I don't think there's much of a country left to save, we just drove up from London, there's nothing and nobody but those things." she stated with a sigh, picking at her vegetables.

"Ah yes, I guess people are more than a little bit wary of who to trust these days." she stated with a little click of her tongue as she popped a rather long green bean stalk into her mouth in one.

Henry grinned a little bit when she suggested that Laskey and Hannah might get along because that was rather hopeful to be honest. But the soldiers, of course, immediately began teasing the blushing young man to the point of almost bullying. Immediately Henry put a stop to that by tapping the tabletop once, immediately getting his soldiers to calm down and go back to their other jokes and games,

"Well I'm sure they'll both spend a lot of time getting to know one another. God knows she's closer to his age than the rest of us." he joked a little bit and winked playfully at the young soldier before shaking his head, "Maybe he can help her you know? Make her feel better about it all, help her recover."

He nodded in agreement since he himself had gone on a fast from alcohol when the shit began to really hit the fan. Back when it was just villages getting the disease... all the way back when the cities still had people in them and the majority of families were still largely whole,

"I can understand that..." he sipped his wine carefully, "I didn't touch a drop of anything until the mine field had been completed... and by that time it had been awhile since my last drink. I might have... over-indulged myself too."

When she suggested that he should just be waiting until help arrived he chuckled a little bit and nodded in agreed,

"Well that seems to be our best option... wait it out and see if France and the rest of the world has enough good will towards us to attempt to rescue us." he agreed before humming, "But until the world decides to send in the reinforcements I see no reason why we shouldn't do absolutely everything within our power to survive."

Elizabeth thought that it would be a good idea if the two of the younger ones spent some time together, after all it might be good for Hannah to relate to someone around her own age instead of having her and Selena fussing over her. It would be good for her as long as he didn't try any funny business, but as long as she consented, that was what being a teen was all about wasn't it?

The raging hormones and such.

"I think that would be a wonderful idea, I know that me and Selena would appreciate it if you would at least give it a shot." she smiled gently at the younger soldier.

Finishing her food, Elizabeth sighed happily and patted her stomach which was now lovely and full from the feast that she had just eaten. Luckily there was some food left for Selena and Hannah as it didn't look like they were going to be coming down any time soon.

"Overindulging yourself?" she stated with a gasp "Whatever shall we do with you?" Elizabeth teased softly "I'm pretty sure you can be forgiven for going a bit overboard, I'd be worried if anyone hadn't done so since this whole thing started."

It seemed to be a little heavy a conversation for dinner time but Elizabeth agreed with Major West, they needed to take every precaution to survive, they didn't know how long they were going to be here after all waiting for help.

"You seem to be doing a good job, and now that we're here, Selena and I will help however we can. We're pretty good in the field so, as long as Hannah can stay here, we'll have no problems going out in the day." she offered with a gentle smile, cradling her wine in hand.

Henry knew that if the two youngsters hit it off then the possibility of sex was very high. And was that such a bad thing? They were teenagers. Before the world turned to shit they would have been expected to fool around a little bit so he didn't see any reason why they had to suddenly go all medieval over the whole thing.

Hormones survived despite the Rage virus after all,

"I'm sure that Laskey would be happy to try and cheer her up at the very least." he smiled softly, "We all need friends in these trying times after all."

When she said that he could be forgiven for overindulging himself he smirked in a slightly amused manner before speaking,

"I spent two days locked in the study doing nothing other than drinking my way through the old owner's whiskey collection." he told her with honesty and a small smirk, "Over indulging is a little bit of an understatement... but if you can forgive me then I don't suppose it matters."

She was offering to help out with any missions outside of the grounds he knew but right now there were no planned missions outside the mansion grounds. After all, they had to make sure that the women settled in happily first and foremost. Dismissing his soldiers, he stood up from the dinner table,

"Come, lets take some up to Hannah and Selena shall we?" he suggested with a small smile before smirking as he carried the platter, "And yes you may take that bottle of wine and another for the three of you. We have no shortage of the stuff."

Elizabeth was about ready to fall asleep now that she was warm, she was fed and she had some alcohol in her system, why on earth would she not be content to enjoy her little moment of peace and security? She didn't know how long it would last although she did hope it was going to be around for a long time, until they got rescued or even after that if that day never came.

They just needed to hold out until the infected starved to death, then they would be okay to start living like normal people again.

"Wow, that is a little excessive, I can't believe your liver didn't implode after drinking that much whiskey in that short a time frame. You must be some sort of super human." Elizabeth teased with a cheeky grin "If I had the capability to drink that much I might have done the same thing, so, you're very much forgiven if it really matters."

Nodding her head with a small smile she had been ready to take the platter but Major West beat her to it and she blushed softly, he was a real gentleman. He didn't seem to want them to go outside and help them either, maybe he just wanted them to rest up first? She wasn't against that idea in the slightest.

"Thanks, I'm sure they'll be glad of it, even Hannah when she feels a bit better." she smiled gently "Well thank you very much, I know Selena and I will need it, we've got a lot to talk about." Elizabeth admitted as they climbed the stairs to the room that they had been given, pressing her ear to the door, she didn't hear much going on.

Knocking, Elizabeth opened the door with a gentle smile, Hannah was asleep it seemed.

"Is she feeling any better?" she asked Selena quietly "We brought you both some food, it might be a little cool but, its better than nothing right?"

Henry had always thought he was a man of excess in some ways and a Spartan man in other ways but he knew no other way to live and wasn't sure if he wanted a different way to live. Chuckling a little bit, he nodded in agreement,

"I think it's on it's last legs right now." he joked a little bit before shaking his head, "I'm glad that you can forgive me but it was nothing superhuman in the slightest. Just... a lot of drinking and a lot of not-so-pleasant reactions to so much alcohol being pumped into my system."

As he carried the platter up to the room being used by the ladies he was struck by the fact that this was the first time he'd acted like a gentleman towards a lady in almost a month now. After the first week panic had set in and there was no use trying to reason with people in the cities. You had to just force them to do what you told them. To move back. To avoid certain areas.

To run away.

"Well good, we want you to feel welcome and accepted her because you really are." he assured her with a small smile as he entered the room to set the platter down on the table quietly. He made certain to be quiet because it was obvious that Hannah was asleep. He bowed his head to Selena, "Goodnight Selena."

He turned to Elizabeth with a soft smile and bowed his head again,

"Goodnight Elizabeth..." he told her quietly as he went to close the door, "Sweet dreams."