.I.
Hey Mr. Stargazer
Chapter 1: Inherent Disgust
"What is it?"
"Trucks. Looks like three, could be more."
"Shit," she hissed, shifting to kneel on her right knee to give her other one a break. "Can you get closer?"
"Looks like someone's at the gate," a man with a nearly empty semiautomatic rifle in his hands said. "Maybe if I climb a tree or something I could get a shot-"
"Don't," she said with a shake of her head. She turned to the heavier brush directly to her right. She couldn't see four pairs of eyes, but she knew they were trained on her earnestly. "Cameron, I'll give you a boost."
A gangly woman fought through the foliage to kneel beside the first girl, whose fingers were already laced and ready. The second woman adjusted her grip on the sniper in her hand, standing up all the while.
"Wait!" the man with the rifle whispered furiously, stopping the two women in their tracks. "He's leaving … he just went inside."
"Are you sure?" the first woman demanded, picking up her discarded pistol and waiting until the man affirmed their stroke of luck. "Rich, are you sure?"
"Yeah," the man named Rich nodded, gaze now solely focused on the wide open entrance. Cameron glanced at the first woman, watching as she wiped the sweat from her forehead, then turned back to the brush.
"Okay. Rich will lead, everyone stay close and check those trucks when we pass them. Don't shoot unless you have to. If this is Quade, we'll need hostages," she said, helping the remaining three out into the small clearing beside the road. Rich was still dangling precariously in sight, but he could take care of himself. "Jezebel, when we get to the entrance, you keep watch and keep that door open in case we need to get the hell out of dodge."
Jezebel was the only one disgruntled by the plan, but she bit her tongue and stood up with the rest of them without a word. Rich gave one last lingering sweep before he beckoned the rest of them to follow. They hunched awkwardly towards the first truck, until they were close enough to crane their necks and see no one was inside.
The woman gestured to continue, and Rich crept to the second truck, coming up on the left side as the rest went on the right. Five of them waited for a sharp whistle to indicate the coast was clear and then sauntered on. Approaching the third and final truck, whose nose was practically against the still abandoned gate, a man named Fisher hung back a little.
"What?" Cameron asked, sniper slung over her back in favour of a smaller 9mm revolver. The first woman also hesitated, worried they had missed something. Fisher gave the second truck a curious look.
"Thought I heard something," he muttered, turning around just in time to see someone climb out of the third truck wielding a pistol of his own. "Ace!"
The first woman turned upon instruction and grabbed the attacker by his ankle. She dragged him out of the truck too quickly for him to do anything but grunt loudly. He smashed his head on the door, then the steps, and finally the ground with a resounding crunch.
The sounds of a scuffle on Rich's side of the truck made Jezebel and a woman named Olivia scurry to his defense. Ace, who kicked the unconscious attacker behind the wheel, hurried over to the gates, waiting for the other five for regroup as well.
Rich, Jezebel, and Olivia had also stuffed their unconscious body out of sight, then jogged over to where Ace was waiting beside the entrance. They had a moment's breather before Ace nodded at Jezebel and they entered the camp. Or, it had used to be some kind of summer camp.
There was a distance between where they were and the nearest cabin. The cabins in the camp made a horseshoe around the center, where most of their people, Ace could see, had been herded and brought to their knees. A stack of firewood stacked by the entrance barely hid the five of them. Ace thanked her lucky stars someone had been too lazy to get rid of it yet. She could hear the sounds of scattered laughter and the jeering of a man she had only caught a glimpse of. They had weapons, that was all that mattered.
Cameron tapped her shoulder and she turned awkwardly to face her. God, she looked disgusting and tired. Ace swallowed hard at the sight of dried blood on Cameron's face. They had barely escaped with their lives not four hours ago. They couldn't take on three truckloads of people with what they had, as determined as they looked.
"Me and Rich can go towards the well. See if anyone's hiding, maybe try to see how many of them there are," Cameron said, pointing towards said well that was a few meters to their right. "You take them to the vault. Try to get some more ammo."
Ace nodded quickly, hoping her gaze didn't betray just how pessimistic she felt. She waited for Cameron and Rich to maneuver themselves to the other side of the wood pile. Ace gave one last calculated stare towards the cabin. She jumped when another wave of laughter broke the silence. They didn't seem very interested in the gate. Maybe because there were so many of them that no matter what the hell came through, they'd be able to handle it.
She reached out and grabbed Olivia's shoulder, much more tightly than was necessary. "One at a time. You first."
"Are you sure?" Olivia asked quickly. She seemed as distracted as Ace was, and that wasn't going to fly. Her gaze kept on traveling towards the mass of people, hoping or maybe dreading to see the face of her son.
"I'm sure," Ace said, gaining Olivia's attention once more and nodding. "We'll get him out of there."
Olivia mirrored the motion and extended her leg carefully. "Say when."
Ace watched, bouncing a little on the balls of her feet. "Now!"
Olivia broke into a sprint, a flickering shadow in the blue haze of dusk. The fire that burned in the center of camp made the outskirts of the gates look like they were shifting. No one moved their attention away from the man who was pacing back and forth in front of their people.
Fisher readied himself and watched Ace carefully. Ace allowed herself to become distracted as the man stopped in front of a woman with a shock of blond hair. Bonnie.
"Ho-ly shit!" the man scoffed, bending down and positioning what looked like a baseball bat behind him sticking straight up. "You look like shit!"
Ace felt her hand curl into a fist.
"Ace?" Fisher asked anxiously, eyes on a different man, who turned around and was starting to walk towards the gate.
Ace was enraptured with the man holding the baseball bat, how he reached forward to touch Bonnie's face, or maybe to push away the curtain of hair in her eyes. Bonnie shrunk away from him, naturally, causing the man to make a crude comment. More laughter. Ace grit her teeth and shook her head to physically dispel the angry fog that was making her stupid.
Ace felt a shift, and she looked over to see that Fisher had gone on his own accord. She watched him disappear behind the cabin. Before she could follow suit, the man Fisher had spotted was suddenly only a few feet away. She slammed herself to the ground and scrambled to curl up and out of sight.
She held her breath, praying he would move on, but his footsteps halted. Ace, eyes wide and darting around for any kind of escape, saw only the gate inches from her nose. Sounds of scuffling reached her ears and she readied herself to be cut into bite sized pieces.
Instead, came the sound of water splashing on the ground not far away. Then came the smell. Grinding her teeth in annoyance, she scooted away from the wood that the man had decided to take a piss on.
After what seemed like forever the man was finished and began to move back to the group. This time Ace watched only to see if anyone was looking. She refused to acknowledge that the man had stopped in front of yet another one of her friends.
She darted across the clearing and didn't stop when she was behind the cabin. She knew Olivia and Fisher weren't stupid enough to wait for her. Barreling towards the weapons 'vault' that used to be some kind of mail building, Ace stopped only for the sound of footsteps frighteningly close. Arms outstretched, she dug her feet into the ground and scrambled into the crevice between two cabins.
Eyes wide and adjusting to the darkness quickly, Ace watched the man walk right past her hiding place and continue on to check behind the other cabins.
Just as Ace rest her head against the wall and let out a sigh of relief, the sound of something shattering came from within the weapons vault. Though equal in volume to a shrill scream in Ace's mind, the sound only attracted the one patrol, who readied his weapon and cautiously edged towards the unsuspecting vault.
Ace left her hiding place, but shoved her pistol into the waistband of her pants. She dug around her pocket and flexed her fingers into a comfortable position around brass knuckles. Careful footfalls and even breaths made Ace a ghost behind the unsuspecting patrol.
She awkwardly hopped so she was directly behind him. He held his breath, about to open the door to the vault and no doubt expose Olivia and Fisher. Ace brought back her right fist, reaching out with with her left and letting it hover over his shoulder.
Ace aimed her punch so she hit the back of his neck, where the brain is attached to the spine. Upon impact the man immediately went limp and Ace used her left hand to clamp down on his shoulder and throw him to the ground where he couldn't make noise crumpling to the floor.
She moved to the door, opening it a crack and being greeted with the terrified faces of Fisher and Olivia, standing over a broken gun case. She shook her head. "Hurry the fuck up."
Designating herself to watch duty, Ace first went over to the dead man on the ground and pocketed most of the things he was carrying, including a large knife that she used to plunge into his eye socket.
His clip was fully loaded, so she opted to keep it on hand instead of using her knuckles. With a few seconds of free time on her hands, she spent it tuning into the baseball bat wielding fuckface who had everyoneone their knees.
"But it's not just me, is it?" the man asked, the smile in his voice chilling. "It's ol' Seth too. Seth said to me that some Asian lady let him go. Isn't that right, Seth?"
"Yes sir," Seth responded. Ace's blood ran cold. She recognized that voice.
"But, see, I don't see any Asian ladies here," the man continued. Ace, curiosity getting the best of her, edged to the side and looked through the slits of the cabins to watch the man as he talked. He wore a leather jacket and a red scarf that was difficult to look at in the glow of the fire. "I see a little bitch who happens to be Asian, but no lady."
At his last comment, the man swung his baseball bat at Looey, who was kneeling dutifully before him. The bat missed him by a hair, and no one missed the way he flinched. Ace couldn't see his face, but she knew he had to look seething.
"I mean," the man said, turning to the crowd of people. "Am I going crazy? Does anyone see her? Seth?"
"No sir," Seth said. Ace wiped her hands on her pants and swallowed hard. There was something unnerving about being the topic of conversation at such a cultish gathering.
"It's too bad too," the man said, shouldering his bat easily. "I actually wanted to thank her. To talk to her, at least." He moved out of sight, but at that point Ace was too nervous to shift and follow him. "Seth told me she was in charge. Sounds like she has at least one braincell in her fucking head."
True, she'd made the call to let 'Seth' go, but only after realizing that he was part of a bigger group and that said group would go looking if he disappeared. It wasn't a nice argument that she had with Looey, but she had won at least. Fat lot of good that did, seeing their current predicament.
"It doesn't matter." The man came back into sight, pointing his baseball bat lined with … something sharp at Looey's face. "What matters though, is where she is. You got others?"
A pause made Ace believe Looey wasn't going to answer. Finally, he choked out: "Yes."
Ace instantly tensed in concern. How badly hurt was he? He sounded like he had gotten the beating of a lifetime… She glanced back to see what the hell was taking Olivia and Fisher so long.
"How many?" the man asked evenly.
"Seven," Looey replied.
The man laughed, quick and humourless. "Aw shit. Are you telling me I'm going have to give this damn speech again? If they're going to be as sore about the news as you were, maybe I should just kill them…"
"No!" The cry came from a woman beside Looey, who was shaking out of either fear or anger; Ace couldn't tell. "Please no, they'll-"
"Miranda, shut up," Looey commanded,
Ignoring him, Miranda continued pleading to the very amused looking man. "They'll listen. We just have to go and tell them, they should be back from their run soon."
"Is that so?" the man asked, his voice low. The mass of people held their breath, unsure how he was going to receive such information. Ace found herself holding her breath too. He broke out into a smile. "Hot damn! Working for me already? I like it."
Ace's heart stopped. What had he just said? Olivia and Fisher exited the vault and were hissing her name, but she didn't care. Who the hell was this guy and what had he done to make Looey so docile?
There was one thing Ace was absolutely certain of, thinking of the gash on Cameron's face: they wouldn't survive working for someone else. They had already been burned before. Hell, they had been burned earlier that godforsaken day.
Seeing red, Ace raised her gun and closed on of her eyes, aiming for the man's obnoxiously red scarf…
Gunfire threw her off balance. It wasn't her. It came from somewhere directly across from where Ace stood, and made the man whirl around in surprise. Ace smiled. Cameron, probably. Fisher ran over and yanked her by the arm.
"It's time to go," he commanded, handing her a rifle and sprinting towards the still wide open exit. Ace didn't hesitate before following.
Jezebel was peering around the gate, shooting at anyone who came close. She wasn't the best shot, but Ace appreciated the effort. Fisher ran straight to the exit, but Olivia knelt by the last cabin and began to rain fire on anyone she didn't recognize.
"Don't be stupid," Ace shouted, trying to haul her to her feet and found herself being pushed away.
"I'm not leaving him," Olivia said, resuming her assault. Ace glared at the back of her head for only half a second. Then, she was loading up her rifle and positioning herself behind Olivia to cover her as best as she could.
If Olivia was grateful for her presence, she didn't show it. Ace helped as best as she could, but soon there was hardly anyone in sight. Many of them had taken cover, obviously wary of Olivia's wrath.
There were a few straggling closer to the exit, but before Ace could pull the trigger, they collapsed. A shape shifted behind the wood pile, then what looked suspiciously like the barrel of a gun poked out. Rich. It must be.
Lips quirking for a heartbeat, Ace whipped back around to try and knock out a few people rushing for cover behind the cabins.
Ace lifted up her rifle, peering into the camp as if expecting a whole army to rise out of the dirt and swallow them whole.
"Olivia, they're regrouping, we have to leave," Ace insisted. Someone had stomped out the fire. The camp was in utter darkness. There were a few panicked voices, but they were hushed and garbled. Olivia stood up but didn't move. "Olivia …"
Ace didn't hear so much as she just knew that someone was creeping up behind her. She smacked whoever it was in the nose with the butt end of her semiautomatic, not lowering it until she heard their body hit the ground. Ace reached backwards to grab Olivia and groped nothing but air.
Neck swiveling at an unhealthy speed, Ace's heart rose in her throat when she saw Olivia hurrying towards the center of the camp. People, kneeling and otherwise, still were dutifully the centerpiece of a squabble that couldn't last for more than a few more minutes at this rate.
"Shit! Who turned off the lights?" the man with the baseball bat hollered from across the camp. There was a loud whacking noise, presumably from said baseball bat and someone's flesh. "Six, huh? Five to go…"
Ace sprinted to grab Olivia's arm but was tackled to the side by someone who jumped between the cabins to get her. Landing on her side, her rifle wasn't in optimum position to be fired. Instead she whacked the person in the head with it until they released their grip on her neck.
In a last ditch attempt to grab Olivia, Ace left her rifle on the ground to grab her arm with both hands. "We have got to go!"
Suddenly, darkness was no longer their ally. The truck lights near the entrance lit up and they were completely exposed. Ace allowed Olivia to shake her off, so panicked that she forgot she was trying to be a hero. Instead, she focused on the man with the baseball bat, who was close enough that when they made eye contact she saw the impatience in his expression.
"Ace?" From the ground, Bonnie's trembling voice got stronger as she realized that it was, in fact, Ace she was talking to. Olivia had long since dove towards her son, stroking his face and demanding if he was okay. "Ace, stop. Please, you gotta stop-"
"Negan, there's one-" a voice called the man with baseball bat, cut off by a bullet to the back of the leg. He collapsed in a mess of pain as Jezebel ducked behind the gate, not wanting to be spotted again. The way the baseball bat man jerked at the man's words gave Ace a name to attach to a face. A face she didn't get to properly analyze before she did the exact opposite to what Bonnie was still pleading she do.
Negan''s people were still gradually coming over to her side of the camp, so she only had to shove one or two people out of her way as she sprinted across the center of the camp towards the exit. Ducking behind the last cabin after hearing more gunfire, Ace was assaulted by a flurry of shouts coming from her rght, coming from the weapons vault. She was surrounded … almost.
Bonnie was still screaming her name, and by then Miranda and even Looey had joined in, pleading she give up. Ace hesitated before the return fire from a few of the intruders spurred her into continuing a hasty exit.
Too quick for anyone to get a good shot at her, Ace bolted towards freedom, hoping Jezebel had gotten rid of whoever had turned on those truck lights.
Rich exploded from the wood pile and disappeared around the gate a few seconds before Ace reached it. He had been covering her, of course he had.
"Jezebel, go! I got the gate!" Ace commanded, allowing the other woman to slip past her and follow Rich as he sprinted down the road. Ace shot a few warning fires just to make the intruders second guess themselves before slamming the gate shut and running for dear life.
Ace had to dive into the tree line much sooner than Rich and Jezebel, simply because the latched gate wasn't much of a roadblock. She saw two dark shapes down the road scramble into the foliage and she prayed the majority of their pursuers would follow her instead. She could hear the brisk shouts of commands and a few more gunshots before they ceased as well. Ace continued running, her breathing even despite her speed and her load.
To try and signal anyone, knowing she wasn't alone, would be suicide. Instead, Ace continued south hoping they'd have the same destination in mind.
A few times Ace dove behind a tree to hide from a crack of a tree branch. Whether it was walkers or people Ace didn't care. Her hands wouldn't stop shaking at this point as exhaustion weighed down every her step. Occasionally she would smack her cheeks to remain high on adrenaline.
After a few minutes of running without meeting anything ugly, she was greeted by the barrel of a gun with a friendly face attached to it. Rich lowered his rifle and jerked his head at Jezebel.
"Said she needed a breather," he explained. He rubbed his arm, blood seeping through his shirt. A shake of his head stopped Ace from attempting to assist him. "Fisher? Olivia?"
"Fisher made it out, but I haven't seen him. Olivia stayed behind," Ace replied, still not panting as much as Rich or Jezebel. "Cameron?"
"She tried to shoot him and they swarmed her first," Rich said. "Fucking dumbass."
Ace disagreed but she kept it to herself. "Did she shoot him?"
"'Course not," he spat. "That's not how it works. We don't have luck. We have empty guns and a pregnant lady in the middle of the woods being hunting by some douche with a bat."
Jezebel looked miffed at being labeled as a burden, but she lowered her head instead of arguing. Rubbing her stomach wistfully, she struggled to her feet.
Ace felt a pang, thinking of the rifle she discarded back at the camp. She looked behind her, noticing that their hunters had become completely silent. A moment or two passed before Ace turned back to Richard, who was rubbing the baldness of his head with one hand in frustration.
"We circle back to the gas station," Ace said, squinting despite the glow of the moon making Rich's frown decently visible. "And hope Fisher makes it there too."
"And if Quade hasn't head out yet?" Rich demanded. "Talk about a rock and a hard place."
Ace was quiet for a second, looking past Rich with glazed eyes.
"Jezebel, I can help you walk," she said after a minute.
Rich snorted but was too exhausted to argue. Ace wrapped Jezebel's arm around her shoulder and followed Rich deeper into the forest.