“No better time than now,” I whispered to the stink in the hole that had almost become such a physical presence that I could practically touch it.
I checked my bow that I had strung as soon as I saw Kenneth emerge from the building. I came up to my knees and aimed. I knew I had one shot. A miss would screw me since he would absolutely make it to his building before I could get off a second shot; also, an evasive target is way harder to hit.
I drew the string back, made a slight adjustment and said a prayer that no sudden breeze would whip up. I let go as I exhaled. The arrow seemed to be flying through molasses. I swear I could actually watch it spin as it flew through the air.
It hit him square in the back and sent him staggering forward a bit. The guy was a warrior, I’ll give him that much. I had my tomahawk out and was running flat out for the guy. I made the mistake of thinking that my arrow would incapacitate him. Instead, it might have just pissed him off.
The man spun and I actually skidded to a stop when I saw the blade this guy was pulling from the scabbard at his hip. With the long hide cloak he wore, I hadn’t known that he was armed. I guess I should have made that assumption. But, you know what they say about when you assume things…
The guy had an arrow jutting from his chest, but you sure couldn’t tell by the way he pulled that big ass sword out and whirled it around in front of him. I couldn’t tell if he was just trying to show off or if he was getting his hands and wrists warmed up. He did pause long enough to shift the sword to one hand so he could snap off the part of my arrow sticking from his chest.
Once I was a few steps closer, I also saw the slightest trickle of blood coming from the corner of his mouth. That had to bode well for me, right?
We crashed together and I quickly discovered that I was at a disadvantage when it came to our choices in personal weapons. I was on the defense for several swipes and hacks. If not for the arrows I had already managed to put into this guy, I don’t think I win this fight.
I was just wondering where the other kids in the compound might be. I knew there was at least one rover, plus, there were the towers.
When I shoved Kenneth back after parrying a series of his blows, an arrow almost exploded when it hit the asphalt that used to be a parking lot for this place. I had to respect the fact that at least the kids currently on watch in the towers had the sense to know they might hit their leader and thus refrained from firing their bows. I made a mental note to remember they were present if I managed to put down the leader. Something told me I would be a pin cushion if I was not careful.
I must also admit here that I was slightly unnerved by this guy’s silence. Through our entire battle, he never uttered a word. Unfortunately for him, the injury he received from my arrow proved to be too much. His attacks became less energetic. He was laboring visibly. He tried to feint high and over-committed. That was my chance as he tried to recover. I brought the head of my tomahawk up and smashed him on the chin. My follow through was a shot to the temple. The man fell to his knees and I finished him with a shot that more broke his skull open than cut it.
I barely pulled back when two more arrows hit the pavement. I winced and then took off at a sprint for the woods. There was a lot of yelling and threatening. I called back and told them that they had two choices: surrender or die.
The compound went silent. For all I knew, they could have been sneaking out of the place, but something told me that these kids would not just abandon their former leader despite his deceased status. They weren’t going anywhere.
I used the shadows of the evening to my advantage and made a complete circle of the place. I knew that the tower sentries had not swapped out. The rovers had returned one at a time. If I was not so set on converting these kids, I could have easily taken them down despite their attempts at sneaking in.
As it grows dark to the point of not being able to see, I hear the rumble of distant thunder. Just what I need…a good storm. The nice thing about storms when you are the hunter is that it allows you another level of darkness. No moon or stars to give you away. I will start with the tower sentries. If I can take them down and get them all in one place, I can let one go to be my mediator.
I really don’t want to have to kill these kids.
11
“Oh shit,” Cherish breathed.
The guard appeared confused and did not react until Catie was already about to pounce on the defenseless Cherish Brandini. By then, Catie had drawn one of her knives from a sheath strapped to her thigh.
“I am going to cut your heart out of your chest. I just hope you live long enough to know what it feels like!” Catie snarled as she lunged forward and grabbed the retreating woman by the hair.
Reacting much too late and with considerable indecision, the guard reached over and grabbed Catie by the elbow. “What do you think you’re—” That was all she managed before Catie jerked away and threw that same elbow, connecting with the young woman’s temple. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head and she dropped like a sack of potatoes.
Catie had only been distracted for a few seconds, but that had been enough for Cherish to retreat into the portable toilet and yank the door shut. There was a plastic rasp and the slider on the door now read “OCCUPIED” in the little window by the handle.
“Uh-uh,” Catie spat as she slid the blade of her knife into the gap in the door. With a flick of her wrist, the latch was shoved aside and she yanked the door open.
Cherish was pressed back into the rear of the tiny space that reeked of urine and excrement. She threw her hands up as the blade flashed and yelped in pain as the knife sliced across her bare forearms. Catie readjusted her attack and drove the blade in straight. Cherish tried to twist but still caught the blade in her right breast. She screamed and begged, words coming in a stream.
“It was Erin, I had nothing to do with it!” she squealed.
“Liar.” The word was spoken with almost no emotion or inflection as Catie drove the knife to the hilt and then yanked it free. “You. Fucking. Liar.” Catie said each word, punctuating it with a vicious stab into the body of Cherish Brandini.
“”What the…!” a man’s voice roared from what seemed like a million miles away. Catie did not react and continued to stab over and over. Now her attack was becoming more frenzied as she drove the blade hilt deep into the body of a woman who now stared blankly at the roof of the portable toilet, her eyes glazed in death.
“Catie!” a familiar voice called from far away despite the owner of that voice being right in front of her.
She had no recollection of how she ended up back in the middle of the old locker room. Something sticky seemed to coat every inch of her body. Salty liquid trickled into her eyes and made her blink away the stinging sensation. Braden was standing in front of her and he was covered in blood. That caused Catie to tighten up and she looked around for an attacker.
“Hey,” Braden said, this time his voice was calm but urgent. “Look at me.”
Catie blinked away the stinging sensation in her eyes and felt the adrenaline that had hit her so hard mere moments ago as it ebbed and began to recede. Realization struck and she started to turn back towards the portable toilets. Braden’s grip tightened and he pulled her back around to face him.
“No, you don’t need to see that.” He started to guide her towards the door.
“I think it’s too late for that,” the man who had been their escort snorted.
“That bitch is crazy!” a voice called from someplace.
For just a moment, Catie remembered what she had done and thought that perhaps she hadn’t actually finished Cherish Brandini off. That didn’t seem possible; and then she remembered the young lady who she had knocked out.
Catie took a step towards the woman with the intention of apologizing. The woman jumped as if she had been hit with a jolt of electricity.
“Keep away from me, you lunatic!”
“Okay, that’s enough,” the Viking said with a snort of laughter. “Sure don’t know how we are gonna explain this.”
“Nothing to explain,” Catie said as she pulled away from Braden. Her head gave a sideways nod towards the row of portable toilets. “That woman and a friend of hers crucified my husband and left him for a mob of zombies. I got the friend a while back, never thought I would see Cherish again. I got lucky.”
“The woman you killed was named Cherish?” Braden sounded incredulous.
“Cherish Brandini,” Catie answered with a nod.
“Yeah, well she was a prisoner of ours. We caught her and a group of about fifty men and women a few days ago. They were scouting us. From what we confiscated, they had detailed notes on another settlement just south of here.” The Viking walked over to the portable toilet and pulled a sturdy spike and hammer from his belt. With a few quick movements, he placed the spike in the center of the forehead of Cherish Brandini and smacked it good with the hammer a few times. “We have them separated, men and women. Our interrogators have been working their way through the bunch. I guess you just moved somebody up a spot in line.”
“They are part of a pretty large army. The thing is, I have no idea who is in charge any more or what their agenda might be,” Catie offered. She gave a very brief description and recounting of what she could remember about Erin Bergman’s army. The young woman named Erin had said something about her name being Erin Crenshaw now since she had apparently gotten married to some poor unfortunate bastard, but she would always be little Erin Bergman as far as Catie was concerned.
“Hmm, that is good to know. We haven’t even been thinking to ask them about being part of a big army. I think we figured that a group this large was just a band of raiders. Not often that you see a scouting party numbering over five. But if that army is the size you say it is—”
Just then, the door to the locker room flew open and Jess strode in with four others dressed like they were about to ride into battle. She only cast a brief glance in the direction of the row of portable toilets before stopping in front of the Viking escort.
“Report to the watch commander, Roger,” Jess said with no inflection or sign that she was angry.
“I was hoping that we could meet with you before you encountered the other prisoners,” Jess said as she made her way over to Catie.
“If there is to be some sort of punishment, I think it should be directed at me. Your guards had no idea and Braden certainly didn’t know anything was going to happen. Hell, I didn’t either until that bitch walked out of the toilet.” Catie moved her hands to her belly almost protectively. “And if you are going to kill me or whatever, please, could you possibly consider waiting until my child is born?”
“Wait.” Jess held up her hands. “Are you putting yourself up for execution even though your forces have the zombies outside our gates with an order to attack if you don’t return? Tell me how that works to my favor.”
“Naturally I would ask you to release Braden so he could give the word for our people to fall back and get the zombies away from your gates if I am to be punished for killing that piece of trash,” Catie replied.
“Well I don’t think you will be facing the headsman’s axe anytime soon,” Jess sighed. “We just discovered that this scouting force managed to get a messenger off to some unknown location according to our latest round of interrogations. We thought that we snagged them all, but it seems we were wrong. Now we have to decide how we can fight a war on two fronts.”
“But you don’t have to fight a war on two fronts,” Catie insisted.
“That remains to be seen.” Jess motioned for her escort to head for the door. “Let’s have this little meeting. Not exactly the circumstances I would have liked, but I think we are at a point where this snowball gets away from us if we don’t get it under control in a hurry.”
Catie excused herself, reminding them of her initial reason for coming in this room in the first place and then followed with Braden stepping up beside her. As they reached the doors and were about to exit, the young woman who had been Cherish Brandini’s guard called out. “What am I supposed to do with the body?”
“Take it to the incinerator,” Jess answered. “Then go let her people know that she won’t be returning.”
“But—” came the strangled and obviously confused reply.
Jess stopped and spun on her heel to face the woman, holding the door open for Catie and Braden to pass through under her arm. “If this is too much for you, then perhaps we will have to reassign you to the wall. I told your commander that you were not ready for this sort of thing. I have a feeling his reasons for requesting your transfer to this job have more to do with your performance in his bed rather than your actual ability as part of the defense force.”
Jess stepped out into the hallway and shot Catie a knowing smirk. “Some things never change, am I right? The pretty ones always try to sleep their way to the top and then act surprised when they discover that the job they thought they wanted actually involves work.”
Catie shrugged and smiled. She hated to admit it to herself, but she found that she really was starting to like this woman. It would be a shame if she was forced to deal with her in the same way they had dealt with the citizens of Montague Village. Despite her policy of making allowances for the women and children in the end, there could be no such leniency for a woman like Jessie Springfield. She was a fighter…a warrior…and thus, she would have to be classified as a threat.
They exited the building and crossed an empty street. Catie could hear the sounds of a city defending against a siege. There were shouts and the barking of orders over the almost steady background noise of the moans and rasping cries of the undead.
A short, squat building that looked like it might have once been a little automotive shop of some sort appeared to be their destination. When they reached the roll-up doors, Jess gave a solid rap with her gloved fist. A moment later, a ladder was tossed down.
“None of the doors or windows on the ground floor of any of our buildings is accessible. Most have some sort of reinforcement on the inside. Many of the more important ones are steel plates that we managed to salvage from the college in Chattanooga,” Jess said proudly. “There were only about fifty of us, but in those early days, that was actually an impressive number since most groups were a handful of people or even singles.”
Catie made a sound of appreciation as she made her way up the ladder. Once they were all on the roof, the ladder was immediately pulled back up. A trap door was opened and led to another climb down. Inside, she confirmed her suspicions that this had been a garage. Besides the two lift racks, there was the distinct smell that greeted you in every garage. She was a little surprised that it lingered so many years later, but she supposed that perhaps it had worked itself into the very fiber of the building. Jess led them to one of the bays and Catie was amazed to discover another trap door in the floor.
They climbed down a series of rungs mounted into the concrete wall and arrived in a small chamber made all the more claustrophobic with the arrival of Jess, Catie, and Braden.
Two men were sitting at a desk and both looked up as soon as Jess arrived. They stood and greeted the woman with a crisp salute.
“This is the woman, commander?” one of the two men asked with a dubious expression on his face.
“I’d be careful if I were you,” Jess warned. “I don’t think she would have a problem kicking your ass…pregnant or not.”
Catie hid her smile. And then something dawned on her. She turned to Jess. “Commander?”
“I hated the sound of president,” Jess replied with a shrug.
“So you are the person running things here?”
“It isn’t a dictatorship, but I do have the final say.”
Catie instantly had a new and increased appreciation for this woman. Not only was she seemingly very smart, but she also led from the front. After all, Catie had encountered her outside the walls of this community. Which brought up the question…
“What were you doing outside your gates when I ran into you?” Catie asked, not really expecting an answer, but deciding that a closed mouth did not get fed and an unasked question did not get answered.
“We managed to break one of the people in Cherish Brandini’s group a few days ago. They told us about the main body of their army. I had to see for myself and I didn’t trust anybody else to go see what these people had moving in our direction.”
Once again, that was something that Catie could understand. In any other circumstance, she felt that she and this Jessie Springfield would have been friends. It was still possible for such a thing to happen, but it would take a lot more time and effort. Neither were things that Catie had a surplus of at the moment. It didn’t help any that the last thing Catie knew about the army was that they were set on wiping out the immune. That immediately put them on the side with Jess and the ideology to which her people subscribed.
“Okay, something just flitted across your face, and it didn’t look pleasant,” Jess said, moving over and taking a seat at the big desk that sat against the far wall; the men took up a position on either side of her and came to parade rest, eyes forward and no longer examining Catie. (At least not openly.)
Catie considered her answer and finally decided that she did not have the energy to play cat-and-mouse games. Also, if Brandini was a sign that Erin’s army was still together and on the move in this direction, that took everything that she had laid out in the past several days and threw it into a blender.