I don't own any of the Walking Dead characters. Just playing around with 'em.
.
.
.
She came over the rise and found the stream. She crouched down and began filling up her collection of wrinkled, plastic water bottles. She kept a wary eye on the forest around her.
A branch snapped on the other side of the bank and she froze, eyes scanning furiously for any kind of movement. A shuffle of leaves zoned her eyes onto a brown shape moving through the underbrush toward her. A deer.
She relaxed and watched the animal cautiously approach the water. The wind must have been in her favor because it didn't even glance her way. She was hungry. She'd been hungry for days and considered briefly trying to kill it, but she didn't have the weapons or the energy. Even if she managed, it was too big to carry anywhere, too big to eat on her own, and she knew she'd lose most of it to the undead who walked the earth and ate everything they came across.
She sighed. She'd never have thought starvation would be her undoing, not in America, the land of plenty.
This summer marked the end of the first year since the outbreak of the virus that caused the dead to come back to life and attack anything they came across. It was stupid that in the midst of summer she still couldn't keep herself fed. Scavenging through the abandoned suburbs and towns was yielding less and less. Canned goods were a finite resource so it made sense they'd be scarcer now.
The deer's head came up and its tail flicked furiously.
There was a twang from the bushes and an arrow suddenly quivered in the oak a few feet above her head. Jo leapt to her feet and began sprinting through the underbrush at the same time as the deer bounded away in the opposite direction.
They had the choice of chasing the deer or her. No matter who they were, she had the sinking feeling they were going to choose her. She heard sticks snap and bushes shake as her pursuer tore through the underbrush after her. Panic spurred her steps as she tore up a ridge side.
"Hey, hold up!" A man hollered. "I ain't gonna hurt you!"
Not likely.
But he was gaining, his footsteps were louder. Panic gave her an extra burst of speed. She flew down an embankment and rounded a rocky outcrop and smacked straight into another man. They went down in a tangle of limbs. She frantically shoved him away, but he caught her arms in an iron grip, spun her around, and slammed her to the ground.
A trap, she realized and twisted under his weight. It was like trying to wiggle out from under a mountain. He laughed and the sour stink of his breath seemed to stick to her and her body panicked to get away. She snarled and tried to throw her head into his but he jerked back out of range and laughed. "Check it out! Got us a live one!"
She heard a gun cock overhead. "Put it down! Put it down or I blow her brains out."
The man with the halitosis from hell shifted on top of her to look behind him. She bucked her hips hard and almost threw him off. He swore as she scrambled to her knees. He yanked her back by her hair, punched her twice in quick succession, and slammed her back down on her back. As she lay stunned, her head ringing like a bell, he stripped her off her satchel and caught her wrists again and bound them tight with a shoelace in front of her. The string bit into the still-healing skin around her wrists. Tears leaked out of her eyes.
She turned her led to see the hunter held at gun point. He was a lean man with a mess of brown hair and strong, tan arms. The gunman was a wiry man with long salt-and-pepper hair secured in a ponytail.
"Right, now the knife too." Sullenly, the hunter unholstered a buck knife at his side and that joined the crossbow on the ground in front of him. "Alright, step forward now, come on." He was forced away from his weapons and made to kneel.
"Try him up, Hank. Girl, you try'n run and I'll shoot you faster than a wetback whelps," the man with the gun warned in a heavy southern accent. Her assailant got off her and cautiously approached the hunter. He had a swarthy complexion and a flat, ugly face. The moment he grabbed the hunter's arm, she was up and running. A bullet in the brain was better than what they had in mind, she knew. Shouts behind her, the gun banged, and a brick hit her in the side. With her hands bound in front of her, the force of the impact knocked her off her feet.
She landed painfully on her shoulder, her head slightly below her feet because of the angle of the hill. Hot fire spread over her left side and she struggled to breathe. Her hand felt her side and came back bloody. She jerked herself into looking position and, pulling back her poncho, saw a deep gash as thick as her forefinger, gouged from her side, just below her ribcage. Hot, dark blood poured down her side. She pulled in a wheezy gulp of air and scrambled to orient herself.
"Freeze, princess," The gunman said right behind her as she regained her feet. She froze. Fear turned her legs wooden. She turned her head slightly to see him breathing hard and holding a pistol about six feet from her head. "Don't make me do it. I told you, you run, I shoot. Next time, I'll put a bullet through your knee, see if I don't."
At his command, she walked back to their campsite. The hunter was bleeding on the ground by their dead fire pit. He was bound, hand and foot, and looked pissed.
"Mm, you are a pretty, little thing," the other, Hank, said with wolfish appreciation.
"You're not really my type," the hunter sneered. He, too, had a noticeable southern drawl.
"I wasn't talking to you, you dumbass redneck chicken-fucker." The man kicked him in the gut and the hunter buckled.
"Here," The gunman shoved her into his partner's meaty paws. "I feel like playing a different toy."
Hank pulled his own substantial knife out of a side holster and in a few quick movements cut through her blood-smeared poncho and shirt. Her sports bra took him a few awkward moments. As he worked on sawing through it, she saw the gunman pick up the crossbow and sit on a log opposite the hunter.
"Seeing as y'all are traveling so light, I reckon y'all got a camp around here. I don't suppose you'd just want to go ahead and spare yourself a little pain and tell me where it is now, eh?"
"Don't suppose so," the hunter spat.
"We are going to have us some fun, aren't we girlie?" the Hispanic chuckled into her ear, squeezing her breast too hard. She turned her face away from the swell of his rotten breath, but it didn't help. He pressed up against her and slide his hands over her.
"Please. Let me go." She heard herself say in a scared, pathetic voice.
He just laughed, pumping out puffs of noxious fumes like a freight train. "Oh yeah, beg me, blanca, beg me and I'll give ya something good."
Like hell this is happening again, she thought wildly, as his hands groped her. Fear kills faster than bullets. She stuffed all her fear into a small part of her mind and began looking for something, anything, that could help. Her eyes fell on the knife strapped to Hank's thigh. He hadn't clipped it back into place after he'd cut her shirt off.
Distantly she heard the crossbow twange and the hunter cry out.
"Oi! Take it easy. He'll bring the skin-eaters down on us," Hank snarled at his companion. In the moment he was distracted, she managed to partially wiggle out from under him. She shoved her knee into his elbow, sending him off balance, and scrambled away.
"Where you hurrying off to, cupcake?" He grabbed a handful of her hair and dragged her back. "I ain't even started with you yet."
There was a loud rustle of leaves and the other man cursed. As Hank popped the button off her jeans, she saw the gunman rise and wander out of view. She was blubbering like a baby while she watched the knife out of the corner of her eye. He struggled to roll off her jeans and she slammed the side of her hip up into his crotch. He yowled and smacked her. She cringed away from the blow and turned that movement into a lunge for the knife.
Her hand locked around the hard handle and she yanked it toward her, then up into Hank's soft belly. Hot blood laced down her hands and he yelped like a kicked dog. She twisted the knife up under his ribcage into his lungs. He reeled backward and she almost lost the knife. He stared in disbelief at the blood darkening his shirt and pink, frothy spittle colored his lips. She frantically disentangled herself from him.
From the corner of her eye, she saw his cohort running toward them with his gun up. She shoved away from the dying man and dove at the log where he'd left the crossbow. She heard the gun's crack and heard a whizz by her ear. She brought the crossbow up, aimed with one eye, and squeezed the trigger. He dropped, a neon orange fletched arrow jutting from his chest like a flag.
He moaned and clutched at the bolt as she half ran, half slid to him. She buried the bloody knife through his ugly dark eye with a satisfying squish, relishing the wild fear in his eyes. Hank was crawling toward the crossbow she'd dropped. She ran back to him, kicked him square in the face, and, as he fell backward, sunk the knife into his temple with both hands.
She had to move. The gunshot was bound to attract the dead. Her eyes fell on the hunter who was struggling against his bonds. He had a crossbow bolt sticking from his shoulder. She dropped the gun and grabbed the knife. Awkwardly, she flipped it upside down and sawed at her bindings. The shoelace parted like butter. She flexed her wrists, trying to ignore their stinging.
"You gonna let me go or what?" The hunter growled. They both heard the distinctive crunch of leaves through the trees. Deaders incoming. She looked back at him, her mind churning. He'd been chasing her, forced her into the clutches of those dead assholes. By right, she should kill him too and run and not look back. She retrieved the gun and checked the clip—only one left—then put the barrel against his temple and watched his face lock down.
"Why the fuck were you following me?"
He grimaced. "Thought you might need some help."
"Bullshit." She pressed the gun into his head.
"I ain't like them," he spat scornfully.
"Bullshit." It didn't have the same force. One of the deaders was getting close, already eagerly snapping at them with lipless, yellowed teeth. She knew what she should do, but…
"So then kill me already. Either cut me free or pull the trigger. The hell you waiting for?"
She hated being told what to do. She shoved the knife into his bound hands. "Save yourself, jackass."
She put a round into a deader right as it lunged for the bound hunter. She picked up her bag, hugged it to her chest, and started running.
"Okay, assholes!" She shouted, drawing them away from the hunter. "Over here!"
She barreled into a half-eaten corpse of a man with enough for to impale it on a twisting branch behind it and slammed her knife sideways into the base of its skull. "Let's see how fast you run for your dinner!" she shouted as she took a moment to pry the knife free. Her plan was working very well, she realized. A quick glance around saw nine weather-rotten faces in pursuit.
She led them away as fast as she could. Her abdominal muscles were clenched, involuntarily trying to prevent exacerbation of her injury, making every other step a cramping thunderbolt of pain. All it takes is one, she reminded herself as she dodged around a wide tree. One false step, one I don't see, and they'll be all over me. They were like sharks, she swore, attracted to the scent of fresh blood more than anything. Already blood had saturated through the top of her jeans.
She got to the road, pausing at the tree line for a cursory look. There was a small town a few miles up the road and she knew a few secure nooks and crannies she could hole up in. Sticking to the trees, she limped onward. The wind shifted and a cool breeze ran over her face. She breathed deep and froze. The stench of death rolled over her like a tank. She knew from experience what a smell that bad and that strong meant. Instinct told her not to go forward. As she edged back to the tree line, she heard the moans, a distant, rising chorus, up ahead and glimpsed the first heads marching in a decomposing phalanx. The dead behind her were catching up. Maybe she could cut through the middle and—
"C'mon," a low, raspy voice said behind her. She jumped like a cat in a water, almost falling on her ass, and turned to see the hunter. He was crouched low, watching the road intently. The arrow gone from his shoulder. "This way." He turned and ran in a crouch through a piney thicket.
Not seeing any better options, she followed.