Darkness Falls (Book 1): Rise of the Fallen by Martin W. Francis

is a plus. It was impossible to tell the others that we had been guinea pigs for the well water even though we were in short supply of clean drinking water. Luckily Sam allowed us to put off making an excuse of explaining the water was fine to drink. He came across one of those trucks that delivered five gallon bottled water to businesses while out scouting with Kurt. They drove it straight to my house. The news spread quickly that we had an indefinite supply of water to last for a good period of time. I eventually told the others the well water was safe without explaining how I was privy to the information.
    A few days later, I was sitting at headquarters with Jerod. We decided to take turns sending out a messages once an hour over the radio for possible survivors. On our fifth attempt a response came back over the channel we had been broadcasting.
    “Hello, hello? Can anyone hear me?” A young male voice spoke sounding a little frightened.
    I grabbed the mic in a rush feeling an urgency to respond. “We read you loud and clear. It’s nice to hear another voice. Everything alright? You sound a little panicked.” 
    “Umm, we heard your message about providing protection, shelter, and stuff. Not sure where you’re located mister but to be honest we could use a little help.”
    “You can call me Rye. Where are you at and what is your situation?”
    “Oh, I’m David by the way. A couple friends and I decided to come into an electronic store for some tech. We didn’t make sure the place was completely safe. There are…” A gun shot went off and a girl screamed followed by the sound of things being moved around. “Sorry, we are in quite a fix over here. I have no idea how many Fallen are outside or how long we can keep them out.” David sounded like he was about to break down into tears.
    “Just tell us where to find you. We will do our best to help get you guys out of there.”
    David took a deep breath calming himself over the line. “I’m not exactly sure of the address. The place is called Alluring Gadgets. There was a police station a few blocks away on Main Street.”
    “Ok, just hang tight. Do whatever you must to stay safe. Help is on the way.”
    As soon as David had come on the line sounding distraught Jerod took off to get the others. Once they began arriving I was looking in a phone book. I found three electronic stores by that name. Two of them I knew by their addresses were near Main Street. I had to cross-reference the police stations to pinpoint the one we were looking for.
    Explaining the situation everyone geared up for whatever we were about to get ourselves into. There was no way we were going to leave survivors in peril, especially a group of kids. I talked with David over the CB radio as we drove to assure them help was coming and to monitor the situation. At one point the Fallen were starting to break in. Calming them down I had them look around for an exit. Outside one of the windows they found a maintenance ladder that was attached to the building running from ground level to the roof. They safely made it out of the room before the Fallen were able to break in. They now were residing on the roof since the ground level was occupied with too many Fallen for any attempt at escaping.
    Our party arrived a few blocks away from their location at the Dollar Bookstore in a short period of time. From our vantage point we saw that there were countless numbers of infected packed around the building. Masses were pushing against each other to get inside the front entrance that had been broken into. Several attacked each other in frustration of not being able to get closer. Using my binoculars I checked the roof. Two boys and a girl were waving their arms while looking in our direction. 
    “Looks like three teenagers. They are safe on the roof unless the Fallen recall they were able to climb ladders before they were infected. If any of the smart ones are around that is always a possibility since