"Hit him again" Rook ordered.
And just as she was asked, Jess punched the Peggie again.
Rook and Jess stood at the edge of a forest, both were calm but a shadow of frustration rose within them as before them was a single peggie, he was tied to a tree with a thick rope many times over and completely helpless to the beating he was receiving, the cultist was the sole survivor of a ten person roadblock that was established just down the road but was quickly dismantled by the unseen force that was Rook and Jess. Now the Junior Deputy stood back, demanding answers from the man, and when he refused to cooperate, Jess would give him encouragement in the form of a beating.
"Come on bud, make this easy on yourself" Rook said coldly to the cultist.
"When is the next time Jacob will leave his bunker?" He asked.
But the Peggie remained silent, he merely glared menacingly at Rook
For some reason the defiant stare that was piercing him reminded him of the whitetails and how they stared angrily at him for something he didn't do, and despite being removed from the Wolves Den hours ago and a few dozen dead peggies later, there was still some kernel of hate still cooking within him.
"This is pointless" Rook sighed in annoyance as he removed the handgun from his waistband.
He walked up to the man, as Jess took a step to the side, excepting Rook to discharge his gun into the man's head, but instead Rook pulled back his arm and smacked the peggie across the face with it, knocking him unconscious, much to Jess's disappointment.
"Come on, we should look for someone else who will talk" Rook holstering the handgun before walking away from the scene.
"Why didn't you just shoot him, when he wakes up, he'll try to tell his buddies what we're doing" Jess whined.
"I don't want to just start executing enemies when they aren't useful or cooperative, I might as well just as bad as them" Rook sighed.
"Well that makes one of us" Jess muttered to herself as she unsheathed the large knife from her quiver and approached the unconscious man.
"There has to be another group of the son of a bitch's goons lurking around somewhere" Rook seethed as he looked over the landscape before him.
He had no idea where they were, all he could see was forest, road, fields and the ever-present mountains the loomed over them.
"Oh yeah, there's always more around, we just got to bait them out" Jess said, walking up to Rook's side, wiping the blood off her knife before putting it away.
"This was what, the third little camp out we hit, that's like twenty whatever men and woman we've gone through, this bullshit is getting on my nerves" Rook growled through grit teeth.
"Yeaah, these guys ain't like the bitches in the valley, they trained to have their shit pushed in" Jess sighed.
"So where do you want to go? Where's a good place to interrogate and kill peggies?" Rook asked.
"I can think of a few if you just wanna kill, but if you want to get something done, that's a whole other can of worms" Jess replied, rubbing her next.
"I've course I want to get something done, we'll do something and kill peggies" Rook scoffed, crossing his arms.
"Alright, fine Mister Initiative, the peggies like to keep an eye on the Pinko radio station so they can catch resistance transmissions"
"What kind of name is Pinko?" Rook asked, turning to give Jess a look.
"It's spelt like PIN-K0 or something, fuck if I know" Jess shrugged.
"OK well the Whitetails don't use walkie talkies, so I have no interest in the radio station, what else you got?" Rook asked.
"I don't fucking know, I don't pay attention to every little thing around here, I just kill motherfuckers" Jess huffed.
"Then we're wasting time, let's move out" Rook responded before marching forward, through the open field the stood on the edge of.
"What? slow down dude, we can't go stomping all over the place, Jacob has guy all over the place, we got to keep our heads down" Jess cried as she jogged up to Rook, trying to keep pace with him.
"Let them try to get us then, we'll kill them all, just as we've been doing all day" Rook replied, his eyes still locked on the horizon.
"Yes, I'm down for that but they have guns, machine guns, sniper rifles, shotguns, they can get us a hell of a lot easier then we can get them, so lets take it slow and stick to the shadows" Jess explained.
"I feel you Jess, but we can't spend all summer slinking around, who knows how long until they move their attack to outside the county or whatever they plan to do, we need cut down every asshole we come across, we need to stop the cult" Rook demanded.
"Yes, we will, but we got to be careful, this isn't a video game, you get shot then you die, that's it, no retry, I don't want to lose you too" Jess said, getting a little annoyed at his behavior.
"I'm not going to die, peggies will" Rook said, before stopping his stride and turned to face his friend.
"Listen Jess, everything is going to be fine, so long as you and I work together, we can do everything, just keep trusting me" Rook asked.
Jess gave Rook am unhappy look, she liked his newfound desire to kill peggies, but she didn't like his willingness to throw caution to the wind.
She was about to comment on how she felt, but before she could, an explosion went off in the distance.
"Holy shit what was that?!" Rook cried, snapping his head towards the sound.
"Sounds like someone isn't being careful" Jess replied, also looking in the direction of the explosion.
Then the pair could see a column of steady, thick black smoke rose over the nearby treeline.
"Wanna check it out?" Rook asked, turning back to Jess.
"I guess, if there's obviously peggies involved so let go kill" Jess shrugged before moving for the forest the veiled whatever was happening.
Rook watched Jess casually walk for a few seconds before quickly deciding he didn't like the set pace and instead broke into a jog, hoping to get to the site before he missed whatever was happening.
"Oh, come on dude" Jess whined before she also started jogging to keep pace with the Junior Deputy.
"Time waits for no one" Rook called over his shoulder as he nearly ran.
Jess groaned as she quickly followed suite.
As the duo moved quickly through the woods, the smoke overhead was somewhat visible every now and again through the thick trees, just enough to signify that they were getting closer and closer, not only that but they were beginning to hear a few gunshots echoed from the smoke's location.
"Sounds like Whitetails got themselves in so trouble" Jess huffed as she ran.
Rook's only reply was a simple and curt Good.
When the finally came out of the other side of the woods, they came to a hard stop as they were met with a lonely road that ran across some hills, it would have looked completely normal if not for the source of the thick smoke that was stuck on the side of a road.
On the side of the road, smashed against a large crumpled road sign was the corpse of a burning car, the driver side door was flung wide open, the frame and panels bent and twisted as fire engulfed the vehicle as it appeared the gas tank ignited and exploded, creating the smoke trail, bullet holes lined the side of the car and windshield shattered. Signs of peggies were evident, in both the cause of this mess and that they were meters from the fire,
"Damn, they really wanted the car to stop, huh" Rook muttered as he examined the scene.
Jess offered no reply as she studied the site intensely, despite her being near mute, Rook felt her silence to be off-putting.
"You ok?" Rook asked, turning to his companion.
"Something is up" Jess stated.
"What do you mean?" Rook questioned.
"The militia doesn't use vehicles, especially not some rinkydink boxcar with no protection like that" Jess observed, pointing to the ruined car.
Rook looked back at the car to see that it was indeed just a run of the mill car.
"Maybe someone from the valley or river came up hear thinking it was safer?" Rook offered.
"Then they would have been stopped at the border, we're nowhere near the border" Jess responded.
"Hm, this is quite odd" Rook muttered.
"Also where are the bodies, there's no one in front, the doors are wide open" Jess spoke.
"Maybe there being taken to be conditioned?" Rook pondered.
"No, they just don't take dudes like that, Jacob has to make the order, this was way to out there" Jess theorized.
Then more gunshots echoed down the road, in the direction the burning car was facing.
This time, Jess perked up more then Rook did, something was not on the level to her.
"Come on, the hunt is back on" Jess said before hurrying down the side of the road, bow and arrow in hand.
Rook offered her no reply as he quickly followed her, he could also feel something was up and it was going to lead them to more peggies, something Rook could not help but take advantage of. As they went, it was apparent that bullet casings littered the ground like, potholes on a long-ignored road, whatever they were chasing after, they were shooting to kill.
They carefully but quickly worked their way down the road, following the echoing gunfire and discharged shells a few minutes down the road before finally finding their culprits, there was four peggies, clad in camouflage fatigues, stood in the middle of the road firing into the nearby woods, it was clear their enemy was in the trees, with a little maneuvering and sneaking around, they were able to get behind the peggies without them and saw what they were firing at.
Somehow both surprisingly and not, it was Hurk Drubman, he was hiding behind a few large rocks, blind firing over the rockface with is patented SMG, but was failing to hit anything worthwhile. In response to his self defense, two of the four peggies tried to provide cover fire while the other two tried to flank Hurk on both sides.
"Aw shit we got to help him" Rook said loud enough for only Jess to hear as he removed an arrow from his quiver and prepared to line up a shot.
"Fine, but he's just gonna get himself killed tomorrow" Jess sighed as she also prepared to kill.
Thankfully, the Peggies were so distracted with trying to kill Hurk that they failed to notice that one by one, the soldiers fell with arrows in their backs, even as the last man realized what was happening, it was to late for him. A silence now washed over the mountains, barely a noise drifted across the area, even Hurk had stop haphazardly shooting.
After the last cultist was dispatched, Rook carefully scanned his surrounding to make sure there where no other peggies laying in wait but saw nothing to suggest anything. Feeling somewhat safe, Rook crept forward to retrieve his and Jess's arrows from the newly made corpses, in that time, Hurk nervously peaked up over the rocks and saw Rook pulling arrows from the dead cultists, seeing him made Hurk shoot up from his hiding spot.
"Holy shit Deputy Destruction, thanks for the save man, you really saved my bacon" Hurk exclaimed, smiling from ear to ear.
Rook stared unenthusiastically at Hurk, he wasn't thrilled that he had to save Hurk for who knows how many times now, just about every time they meet, he had to help Hurk in some fashion, and it was getting tiring, and Jess was right, he was going to need saving in the near future.
"Hurk what the hell are you doing out here, by yourself?" Rook scolded his friend.
"I was just tryin' to get some supplies back to Casa Da La Hurkmugus but them cultist sons of bitches took out my ride" Hurk explained quickly.
"What no, I mean why are you here in the mountains, do you have any idea how dangerous the mountains are?" Rook scowled.
"Oh that, Bro I live up here, got a house and everything, remember?" Hurk laughed as he climbed over the log to greet his friend.
Hurk's response was met with a groan from Rook.
Of course someone like Hurk would live in possibly the most dangerous part of the county.
Then Hurk noticed Jess who hovered near Rook.
"Oh hey Jess, long time no see Brah, you and the Deputy are always hanging out together, when me and Sharky do that, people say we're doing stuff to each other, so what about you, you and Benny a thing" Hurk rambled rambunctiously as his eyebrows bounced a few times.
"Fuck yourself" Jess scowled.
"Alright, alright, cool, cool" Hurk said cautiously, taking a step back and patting the air.
"So, what do you need supplies for? What could you be possibly planning?" Rook asked.
In truth, Rook didn't care what Hurk had in motion, he just wanted to make sure his friend wasn't going to put himself back in danger then go back to killing peggies with a clear conscious.
"I have some people hanging out at my place and I was just trying to get stuff together cuz they're stayin' for the long haul, Imma try and look out for them until all this blows over" Hurk explained.
"Really, how is all of that going?" Rook asked, his curiosity piqued.
He was also wary of Hurk's long term providing skills.
"It's going ok I guess, whatever goods I had are probably gone now, I heard an explosion a little bit ago, I'm pretty sure it was my car" Hurk sighed.
"Yeah, it's gone dude" Rook said.
"Oh god damn it, Cupid help me" Hurk grumbled in frustration as he limply kicked a dead peggie's arm.
"Man, what am I going to tell those folks?" Hurk whined to himself as he ran his thick hands through his hair.
"Hey, we can work something out, why don't we head back to your place and get to brass tacks?" Rook offered.
"If that's what you want then sure, but you got some wheels, it's a bit of a walk" Hurk asked.
"Well your car is gone, and I don't have one, so I guess we have to walk" Rook stated.
Hearing that he would now have to walk a great distance, Hurk let out a long-winded whine to let everyone know he was upset.
"No way dude, that's so far away, my place is like, on the other side of the mountains!" Hurk whined.
"Wait seriously, you needed to get to the other side of the mountains to get supplies?" Rook asked, surprised at the scarce level of supplies.
"It might as well be, to get there we got to walk for like twenty minutes that way if we wanna get to my place" Hurk gripped as he pointed towards where his car was originally pointed.
He pointed nowhere near the mountains, in fact he was pointing in the opposite direction and was merely making it sound so much worse than it really was.
Before Rook could scold Hurk for his whining and over-exaggerating, Hurk kept on talking.
"Ughhhh, man I'm going to die" Hurk whined as he began shuffling down the road, dragging his feet all the way.
After a few feet, Rook was about to join him, but then Jess pulled him back, intent on speaking with him alone.
"What's up?" Rook asked.
"Dude this is bullshit, we don't have time for this" Jess gripped.
"Ok sure maybe, but we can't just leave people with Hurk, he can barely take care of himself, I want to at least set them up, so they'll be ok" Rook replied.
"You said it yourself, we need to hit peggies and hit them hard, why else have we been knocking out peggies left and right all day, why not just clear out everyone around his place, he's safe and we can get info, two birds with one stone" Jess tried to offer but let out more irritation then intended.
"Then more peggies will fill the void and come find out what happened in the first place" Rook retorted.
"Your so impossible sometimes" Jess growled in anger.
"Just chill ok, we will kill, I just want to make sure everyone is ok" Rook said, trying to calm her down.
"No dude, fuck off, this is stupid" Jess bit back, keeping her stance on the matter.
Rook felt he didn't have the time or patience when it came to dealing with her stubbornness, he knew she was just going to bitch and moan until he caved in or she just has enough and ran off somewhere else, and he didn't want her to be by herself in a place like the mountains.
"Tell you what Jess, once we get this over with, I'll let you decide how we do things for a bit, you can take the lead and deal with Jacob your way" Rook offered.
He wasn't too thrilled about giving Jess the reins as she knew just what kind of person she was, but he also knew what kind of person Jacob was, there was no way he could deal with the army vet by himself, he needed to fight hardcore with hardcore, even if that meant making a few sacrifices along the way.
Jess regarded rook for a moment as she almost looked down her nose at him.
"Your fucking serious, aren't you?" she asked.
"Aren't I always?" Rook countered.
"Alright Boy Scout, you got yourself a fuckin' deal" Jess said before hurrying passed Rook, catching up to Hurk.
Rook probably should have been worried how quickly Jess took the bait like that, but another part of him didn't care, he had a feeling just about everything up until Jacob is taken care of will have some sort of means to and end attached to it.
Just as Hurk said, it took them twenty minutes to get to the Drubman estate.
Perhaps it took a little longer then that as every now and again, they had to hide or sneak to avoid the patrolling groups of peggies in heavily armor trucks, Hurk sung songs of praise as the three of them walked up the driveway, happy that he made it without stopping to take a break as the house came into view. It was a simple wooden house with a porch and awning running along the front of the house, a few windows dotted the walls and a bulky air conditioning unit stuck out of the wall on the second floor, poorly tended flower bed lined the sides of the porch, a flagpole stood feet from the house, at the top, three American flags flew valiantly in the wind.
"This is it fam, Hurk's gate!" Hurk proclaimed proudly as they walked up the front yard to the house.
"Yeah cool man, nice place" Rook said quickly, more interested the people in need then the prominence of the estate.
Jess said nothing and kept following Rook, not wanting to be here, Hurk merely rambled on about something as the three approached the front porch, Rook didn't listen, he was to focused on inspect the house in case peggies tried to raid the premises.
Then Hurk hopped up the porch and stopped at the door before fishing out the keys and inserting it into the lock.
"Come on in, me casa eh su casa" Hurk said as he unlocked the door.
"I'm pretty sure it pronounced differently" Rook commented as the door swung open.
Hurk didn't give a response as he stepped inside his home
As soon as they entered, Rook could tell it was a fairly modest home, but there were very peculiar things that littered the house, be it hanging from walls or tucked in the corners of room, things Rook couldn't quite piece together why Hurk would have on display besides from letting guests know he had a hand in decorating the place.
"So how many people are here with you?" Rook asked as he examined the foyer, and more importantly watched Jess, who had the all to familiar mischievous glint in her eye.
"Oh, you know, a few, c'mon I'll introduce y'all" Hurk said casually as he entered the room on Rook's immediate left.
"Yeah sure" Rook replied as he followed his friend into the next room.
By the way Hurk spoke, Rook assumed there was a few people were in the house, maybe a family, no more then six, but he quickly discovered he was sorely mistaken, as soon as he entered the living room, he saw that room was packed with men, woman and children, fifteen in all, all of various ages, some sat on the couch and other pieces of furniture, some leaned against walls or huddled together on the floor, trying to do something to kill time, they looked dirty and a little malnourished, their hair was a little to long to be stylish, but the second Rook, Hurk and Jess stepped into the room, everyone looked up at the newcomers with fear in their eyes, they had not seen anyone new in a time.
"It ain't just peggies and militia dudes out here" Hurk muttered as Rook took in the civilians.
Rook looked down at the scared people essentially trapped inside for their own good, chained to Hurk as he was the only one brave enough to go out and get what was needed.
"Hey y'all this is the guy I was talking about" Hurk said with a grin, putting an arm on Rook's shoulder and pointing a thumb at him with the other hand.
"This is my bud, Ben, the Junior Deputy" he boasted.
Upon hearing the newcomers name, Rook could see the civilians eyes light up and a few whispers were passed around, Rook wasn't sure if news of his slander had reached their ears or not, Hurk was no help figuring that out as he was either that relaxed when it came to death or the militia really does stay away from him.
Then someone from the back of the room stood up and stumbled towards Rook, the person was a woman, she was in her mid thirties and clothes were distressed along the edges and had seen far too much wear and tear, she lurched towards Rook almost as if her legs were not her own, most likely from lack of exercise within Hurk's walls,
She grabbed one of Rook's hands with both of hers and shook it vigorously before looking up at the Junior Deputy.
"Thank you… thank you, for all you have done, please, please, kill every last peggie, make them pay for what they did" She begged Rook with a fragile voice, shaking his hand all the while.
"Of course, I will take care of all this" Rook said, hoping to reassure the woman, hoping she would give back his hand and go back to whence she came.
But as seconds ticked by, she kept shaking his hand, almost whispering to herself her plea for help, it was clear something was wrong with her, then someone else rose from the crowd of people and approached the woman, they gently placed their hands one the woman's shoulders and pulled back slowly, by the woman's reaction, she must have understood what was going on and released Rook's hand before being shepherded back to a place to sit down, the woman quietly rambling to herself as she returned to her spot.
Rook watched the woman as she went in a state of awe, he had no idea there were even civilians in the mountains let alone what condition they would be in, the woman was in a perpetual state of shell shock, he couldn't imagine what state the children were in, he needed to get the out of the mountains and to the valley, it wasn't right to stuff this many people into one small house. There was no way all these people could live in a healthy manner like this for weeks if not months.
But one thing did spark Rook's curiosity; Hurk's dad, Hurk Senior, Rook knew exactly what kind of man he was, he was the type who wanted to deport all Canadians for some obscene reason and was almost hostile to his own son in regards to his decision making skills, there was no way Hurk Senior had been ok with sharing twenty something strangers for possibly weeks.
"Hurk can I talk to you for a moment?" Rook asked, grabbing Hurk's arm and pulled him into the adjacent room.,
"What's up Broski?" He asked as they entered the room.
"Hey uh, where's your dad in all this, I doubt he's cool about all this" Rook asked quietly.
"Well uh, you see" Hurk said uncomfortably as he rubbed the back of his neck, breaking eye contact with Rook.
"At some point while I was helpin' y'all down in th' valley, I guess Jacob's guys came in here and killed him, they tore up the place something fierce too, but noting I can't tape back together or cover up" Hurk said uncomfortably.
"Shit dude, I'm sorry to hear that, I'll make sure Jacob pays for what he did" Rook said, hoping to reassure his friend.
"Thanks Bro, but I could really use your help again, my Pa was always going on about how I was a good for nothing, so I guess I'm just tryin' to prove him wrong and help people, just like you Bro, and I can't get everything done by myself" Hurk explained.
Rook stared at Hurk for a few seconds, he could tell his words were genuine, he really wanted to help these people, but Rook had absolutely no faith Hurk could actually provide what these people needed to survive, but by god he refused to go crawling back to the militia for help.
"Is there anything I can do to help you keep these people safe?" Rook asked.
"Well we're short on food, unless you got some Doritos hidden somewhere, we got to go get some more" Hurk said.
"Well if you're in the red, I guess Jess and I could go hunting and bring a few deer's back" Rook offered only to have Jess in irritation.
"Oh no it's not like we need it ASAP, we got maybe two or three weeks left, but that goes fast y'know, I'm just trying to keep us out of the danger zone, it's what you would do, right?" Hurk asked.
"Right, obviously" Rook almost sighed, struggling not to strangle Hurk for wasting his time.
"But asides from food we're ok, peggies don't really come up here, I figure its on account of me bein' so fuckin' radical all day everyday, it's like you say Bro; be rad not bad" Hurk beamed.
"Hurk, I have not once said that ever in my life" Rook responded near instantly.
But Hurk didn't give his rebuttal, instead he just moved on as if Rook had agreed with him.
"So, how's shit going for you, are you moving with that militia yet?" Hurk asked.
"Uhhh, no not yet, but hey uh, bout them, have you talked to the militia, like at all?" Rook inquired.
"What you kidding?" Hurk giggled.
"The militia stays far the fuck away from me all the time, they can't handle my ways" He grinned.
"Ok that's good, don't let them in here, trust me, you do one thing wrong and they'll make you out to be a monster" Rook seethed a subtle anger.
"Uh yeah Bro, I hear yeah loud and clear, don't want 'em here anyways" Hurk nodded, picking up the venom hidden in his words.
Then the floorboards creaked softly behind Rook, the noise caused him to look over his shoulder in a fear of someone hostile was coming up behind him, but instead discovered Jess was leaning against the door frame and watched him impatiently, her arms were crossed, and fingers drummed against her arms, Rook couldn't blame her for wanting to go as soon as possible, yet again Hurk has wasted their time, he should have sent the man child on his way so they could have gone back to killing son of a bitch cultists and finding out Jacob's schedule,
"Hey since you seem fine to a degree here, me and Jess are going to head out" Rook said quickly.
"Aw really man, you wanna stay the night?" Hurk asked.
"No thank you man, we got things to do" Rook replied as he back pedaled, moving to the door.
By the creaks in the floorboards, he could tell Jess nearly ran for the door.
"Alright, that's cool man, you gotta save the day, I feel you" Hurk nodded.
And with that, Rook quickly turned around and hurried for the door, as he got close to it, he could see it was ever so slightly open, Jess had snuck out. As the door flew open and Rook swiftly left the house, Hurk warmly and loudly bid them farewell before closing the door again. As soon as Rook left the house he could see Jess hurrying down the driveway, not wanting to be left behind, he ran up and caught up to her, the second he caught up to her voiced, she voiced her thoughts.
"Fuck man, that was fucking gross in there" Jess gripped.
"I know, perhaps we can help the later down the line" Rook responded.
"We can help them by killing every peggie in the county" Jess whined.
"Your probably right but they need a better living condition" Rook spoke.
"Then let's get them out of the house by making it safer, let's go knock over some peggie infested sites near here" Jess offered, getting impatient again.
For thought about reprimanding Jess again for wanting to kill everyone in the area as that will just draw attention to Hurk's house, and that was something he couldn't abide by, but then again, he did really want to kill peggies as well, he wanted Jacob to feel the sting of losing people just as he did.
Change wasn't going to come easy, if he wanted it, he had to make it happened.
With a sigh he turned to his hooded companion.
"Alright, fine let's go" Rook nodded.
"Bout fuckin' time" Jess groaned before grabbing a hold on Rook and pulled him off into the unknown.
Just like the beginning of their day. Rook and Jess went from one site after another at Jess's discretion in hopes of killing more peggies, but once they finally arrived at the first makeshift campsite, equip with tables, desks and other furniture to be used as barricades and walls, but both of them were surprised to see not only were the locations were deserted, but the site was ransacked, tables were flipped, containers were upturned and their contents scattered along the ground, drawers ripped from desks, the place had been torn apart as the attackers had been looking for something, feeling disappointed her "fishing" spot had been poached, Jess lead Rook to another site nearby, but yet again, that spot to had been emptied and despoiled, making the pair to move again, but one after another, site after site, they discovered everything nearby had been all empty and vandalized, not even bodies could be seen, the only evidence that lives were taken were a few half-dried bloodstains most likely created from a person being hit by an arrow, the bodies nowhere in sight. Getting frustrated at the fruitlessness of their venture, they moved to another, as the afternoon turned over to the evening, they were zeroing in on site number eight.
"This is fucking bullshit, why the shit are the Whitetails suddenly so aggressive? I swear to God I'm going to fucking lose it if this place is fucked too" Jess growled in frustration as they walked through the woods, trying to find the campsite Jess once knew about.
"Maybe they're trying to camouflage their attacks inside of ours" Rook shrugged casually.
But deep down he was getting just as impatient as her, this isn't how he wanted to spend his time, he wanted to make a difference, not wander through the mountains.
"We haven't been here that long, there's no way they could hide behind our shit, there must be something going on" Jess theorized.
"Who knows, maybe they're just stepping up their game since things seem to be getting worse here" Rook gruffed.
"Fuck knows, those nerds are a really careful bunch" Jess spoke.
"No wonder you jumped ship when you did" Rook commented.
"See, told you I had my reasons" Jess laughed.
"Yeah, you're uh, a lot cooler than them, you'r-" tried to say before being cut off.
"Bu, bu, bu, shush now" Jess suddenly whispered loudly, waving a hand at him while shushing him as she lowered herself into her usual crouch.
"What?" Rook whisper shouted back, crouching slightly as her sudden change in demeanor made him nervous.
"We're getting close, come on" Jess signaled before moving faster, towards the site.
Rook wanted to call out to her to wait, but it was to late, she had already moved forward, to far away to hear his lowered tones, hoping she had the restraint not to do anything rash without him, Rook warily tried to catch up with her, ready for gunshots to ring out, but as he moved forward he heard none, instead he found Jess tucked behind a thick oak tree, peaking over the side, watching something, she briefly looked back at him to give him an order.
"Dude, check this out" She said, nodding towards whatever she was watching.
Rook sighed in annoyance as he did not enjoy Jess's need to run off ahead, he slowly worked is way over to her, taking his place next to her within some bushes, once he was comfy he was able to see what had Jess so engrossed, in front of the was the campsite they were supposed to hit, it was similar to what they had seen before, blood stained the ground here and there, a few boxes and containers were thrown to the ground and items discarded. But what was different from the previous seven sites was that there was a handful of Whitetail militiamen and woman combing through the site, seven in all, all looking for something.
"Goddammit, of course there's Whitetails out here" Rook sighed in frustration.
But Jess had a completely different line of thought.
"Look at that" Jess cackled lightly.
"They're a bunch of newbies" She giggled.
"What makes you say that?" Rook asked.
"Look at 'em, no one's on lookout, there all searching for something, I could pick them off one by one and no one would notice" Jess grinned sinisterly.
Rook examined the militiamen and woman before him, and he saw Jess was right, even he knew better then that, whoever these people were, they weren't used to doing what they were doing.
"So, you wanna go somewhere else?" Rook offered, really wanting to leave.
"Not yet, check this out" Jess said before standing up to full height and casually walked into the makeshift campsite.
As she walked in all the Whitetails were far to preoccupied with what they were doing to notice Jess nonchalantly enter.
"Well, well, well, what do we got here?" Jess said loudly as she entered the center of the site, her voice making all the Whitetails freeze and faced the new voice as fast as they could, expecting the worst.
"Looks like a bunch of greenhorns who didn't remember to keep an eye on their perimeter" Jess snarked,
"Your Jess Black, aren't you? Eli told is about you" one Whitetail claimed, stepping forward while everyone stayed back, unsure of what to do.
He was a younger male, barely a man and far to young to be killing to stay alive.
"Glad to see he hasn't forgotten about me just yet" Jess sneered as she shelved her hands in her hoodie's pockets.
"How could anyone forget you, you were like, one of the best there was until you ran off with that murder" the young man alleged.
"So, what are you grunts doing all the way out here, looking for your tampons?" Jess teased.
From the bushes, Rook growled to himself in displeasure.
"We're picking clean campsites, our mentors are emptying them and moving on while we comb through the sites" the man said.
"Looking for something good" Jess asked, taking a step towards the man, she was planning to squeeze everything she can out of him.
"The peggies are trying to landlock sections of the region, we're trying to find out what areas and how to sneak in, they're bound to be up to something really bad" he said.
Then another Whitetail quickly walked up to him and grabbed his arm tightly.
"Hey, shut up, you don't need to tell her anything, she's not with us anymore" She said sternly.
Then she turned to Jess who was lackadaisically watching.
"We have what we need, take whatever you want from this place and leave us alone, you're not getting anything from us" She said, just as sternly.
"I don't suppose it has anything to do with that?" Jess asked, pointing down at the woman's hand, not the one that was once on her cohorts' forearm, but her other on as she had a crumpled manila envelope clenched in her fist.
"We've been collecting bits and pieces all day, like I said, we are not giving you anything" The woman warned.
Still watching the whole exchange from a distance, Rook was growing increasingly annoyed, he was regretting allowing Jess to just wander out there, he knew she'd just pick a fight, and he was already villainized enough already, he didn't need Jess brand of madness weighing him down as well. Not wanting to let things go from bad to worse, he rose from the pushed and stomped towards Jess, the second he entered everyone's eyesight, everyone's attitude and posture changed, everyone became more wary and hide any visible anger to keep any altercations from occurring as Eli had instructed them. But one Whitetail, the one who engaged with Jess, he did not follow the rules given to him and made it clear how he felt.
"And why is he here?" he spat in disgust that the Junior Deputy was before him.
"Excuse me?" Rook countered, not taking the man's attitude lightly.
"You heard me" He spat challengingly.
"We're no here to do business with you, so just go back to where you came from and let us work in peace" The man ordered.
"Tell you what, why don't you tell us what you know, and we'll leave, I just want to help people, I can't do that if I'm not informed on what's going on" Rook offered, trying to sound positive as he spoke, but he could feel the gravel tones deep down tried to climb it's way out.
"You want to help, you mean like those people in the lodge?!" The man challenged, a fist tightening around the bow on his shoulder.
"You shouldn't just through out rumors and half truths like that, that's how you divide a team" Rook growled, the gravel and grit, coating his words.
"Just help us out, Toady" Jess grinned dangerously.
The man stared at the two people hassling him for info, a series of emotions, trying to decide what to say, but before he could, the woman stepped in again.
"Sorry Deputy, we can't let you do that" the woman next to the man said assertively.
"We were told not to help you in any way, orders straight from Eli himself" she said.
Rook regarded the young man and woman, they we're basically kids, they didn't know right from wrong, they were just blindly following someone who they believed they knew what they were doing, a feeling he felt many times in his life, but regardless he couldn't let something like their feelings get in his way.
"Well nothing Eli won't know, won't hurt him" Rook said, trying to blow them off as he began walking forward again, an arm outstretched to snatch the worn-down envelope out of the Militia woman's hand.
But after a few steps, the Whitetail pulled back, moving away from Rook, denying him of what he wanted.
"We're not going to give you anything, kindly fuck off" he said, his words sounding more like a threat then a warning.
"I'm just trying to help! Stop getting in my way and let me do my job!" Rook cried angrily, he was losing his patience.
"You made it clear to us how you do your job, we don't want someone who has no problem killing innocent people to get the job done, we're trying to help the county, not ruin it" The militia woman declared.
"I'm not the bad guy here, we're all on the same side" Rook said.
He was getting very frustration at the kid's stubbornness.
"No, go away Deputy, we will not help you, we are leaving" the man said as he began walking backwards, away from Rook and Jess.
Something about the whole conversation was coalescing something in Rook and it was making him angrier and angrier, he was so sick and tired of the Militia fighting him despite it not even being twenty-four hours since he was kicked out, and he was done taking their shit.
"Shut up and stop fighting me!" Rook cried as he stormed forward, intent on relieving the children of their info
But his actions were not taken kindly.
"Back off Deputy!" The woman barked as she stepped back further as the man next to her removed his bow and quickly loaded an arrow into it.
The act made Rook stop in his tracks, as Jess was ready to jump at a moments notice, to either attack the militia members or to cover Rook, the other Whitetail around them shifted and moved, all on edge, they knew of what Rook was capable of.
"We will get aggressive if we have too" he threatened.
"I didn't do anything I wasn't told to do!" Rook exclaimed angrily.
"You were told to get visual conformation! But you didn't, you only poked your head in and listened! You killed those people and have no one to blame by yourself!" The whitetail declared sternly.
"You shut your Goddamn mouth!" Rook bellowed angerly, pointing an accusing finger at him.
These people knew how to press his buttons, and Rook hated it.
"Your surrounded Deputy, you know it and Miss Black knows it, so why not get the fuck out of here, I'm sure peggies are looking for you" The man warned.
As much as Rook hated to admit it, he knew the militiaman was right, he could see the whitetails flittering around in his peripherals, they were all nervous and ready to defend themselves if need be, seven versus two was an easy equation. Rook stared angrily at the kid who pushed against him, he was making himself sick with anger, people in the valley would be falling over themselves to help him, but the mountains were different, and Rook had to be as well.
Then Jess tugged his arm.
"Come on dude, they ain't gonna play ball, let's bounce and make a campsite and set up for the night, we can try some shit in the middle of the night" Jess growled lowly.
Rook continued to stare motionlessly at the Whitetails in front of him, seething in anger.
"Yeah sure, whatever" Rook growled be fore turning around and stopping back the way he came, the Whitetails behind him gave him a wide birth as he passed by.
Jess who had yet to move, regarded the man and woman who fought them.
"You're not going to survive like this" she said, looking down her nose at them before trailing after her partner.
"Neither will either of you" The man called out, wanting to get the last laugh.
But neither Huntress nor Junior Deputy offered a response as they left the campsite.
After forty-five minutes of walking, Rook and Jess found a comfy little spot among the trees and rocks of a small forest to set up for the night, but despite the long walk, Rook had not calmed down, if anything he was getting worse as he was left alone with his thoughts for the majority of the walk as Jess preferred the silence. Once they had finally settled down for the evening, a small fire pit was erected and a half dead log was rolled towards it to be used as a bench, once the site was as good as it could possibly be, Rook was left at the campsite while Jess hunted dinner, he wanted to join her but she declined his help, she claimed his anger would clout his judgment and skew the hunt, but they also need someone to guard the camp in case someone came wandering by, be it peggie or Militia. Not liking his situation Jess had given him her walkie talkie to hold on to temporarily so he may call a friend to calm down, as despite Jess's short temper, she would not put up with his all night, leaving Rook to stare down at the walkie impatiently half waiting for Jess to return and half thinking of someone to call. He fiddled with her walkie for a few moments, it was beat up and scuffed from prolonged neglect, no wonder she easily gave it to him. He didn't want to talk to Nick or Mary as they would ask more questions then give help and there was no way he'd call Sharky or Hurk, eventually his mind drifted over to one such "Friend" to call upon, Faith, but he felt uncertain about calling her, he felt their "Friendship" had been on the rocks recently as there conversations were becoming few and far between, and they were shorter and shorter each time, if he wanted to use her for information he'd need to try better with her, she extended the pseudo olive branch to him, she could easily retract it at any time.
Finally, he decided he needed to pay the woman a call and tuned the walkie to the frequency they normally used.
"Faith you home?" he gruffed.
But his question was only met with the silence within the white noise.
"Faith? Faith? You there?" He asked again, getting more annoyed.
But only more white noise crackled through the speaker.
With an exasperated sigh, Rook was ready to give up and go back to impatiently waiting for Jess, but before he could but the walkie down, the walkie crackled and buzzed to life.
"Benjamin, is that you?" Faith's voice came, she almost sounded surprised to her his voice.
"Yeah, it's me" Rook sighed, trying to calm down, even if slightly.
"Is everything alright, normally I am the one who calls you" Faith asked.
"Oh, things could be better" Rook growled in response.
"Ben are you ok, you seem very irritated" Faith asked, concerned.
"No, I am not ok Faith, I am angry, I am very angry, I have been for a while now!" Rook nearly exclaimed.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Faith asked, a little surprised to hear Rook was so worked up.
"I have been made out to be a villain, people are treating me like I'm trying to hurt people" Rook spat scornfully.
"What happened?" Faith asked.
"Jacob put a bunch of innocent people in a building for some unknown reason and made me and the militia believe it was wolves, so we went to go blow up the building so he can't condition them, but when I blew it up we found out there were people inside and the militia blamed me for it, I checked inside, I checked just like they asked, but Jacob tricked me!" Rook almost yelled his angry tangent into his walkie.
"And now if you can believe it, they won't even share info with me when we bump into each other in the field, maybe if I had their info, maybe I can actually save people rather then hide in some bunker like a bunch of pack rats, obsessively scheming and plotting to survive for another day, maybe if they got off their asses and actually looked at stuff, I wouldn't have hurt those people Jacob tricked me with!" he fumed angrily.
"It's all Jacob's fault not mine, Jacob did it, not me" Rook ranted, his voice cracking as his anger quickly fizzled out as he tried to make it clear it wasn't his fault.
"It's not your fault" Faith said, trying to reaffirm him.
"I know, that's what I've been telling everyone, but no one believes me!" Rook cried in relief that someone was believing him.
"I'm not surprised this is happening, the militia are a bunch of bad guys" Faith said.
"Exactly!" Rook cried in agreement.
"Well ok, Eli is fine, I don't think he's a piece of shit, but everyone is, there all a bunch of gullible, inbred hicks, I don't think they care if a cult is taking over the county, they just want someone to shoot at!" Rook cried.
"Yes, the militia are bad people, I don't think you should associate with them, they can easily be tricked by Jacob and just want to use and discard you" Faith reassured him.
"Totally, that's why I'm doing this on my own, me an' Jess are out here, killing peggies, trying to get to Jacob, I'm going to show the militia how dumb they are, they'll regret being so blind"
"Why not come down to the Henbane, get away from all the war and violence, come to me and we can discuss this calmly like the mature adults we are" Faith offered.
"No, I can't do that Faith, no, no, no" Rook said quickly, shaking his head.
"I need to make him pay, I need to make Jacob pay for everything he's done, for making it look like I killed innocent people!" Rook cried.
"I believe your innocent Ben, all this killing and killing your planning to do won't clean the blood off your name, if we work together, we can accomplish your goal, I have connection, but I need you to come to me" Faith offered.
"Faith, I'm sorry, I'm not leaving the mountains, I need to clear my name and stop Jacob, I have to do what is right" Rook demanded.
"I'm worried what will happen if you do stay and try to fight, Ben you don't know my brother like I do, he won't go easy on you, he will throw everything he has at you if it completes his goals" Faith said, trying to talk her friend out of his plans.
"And so will I, I will throw everything at Jacob to stop him, I am a Junior Deputy of Montana, it is my duty to not rest until the people of this fair county are safe, through hell or high water, I will do whatever must be done to save the populace, no criminal will go unpunished" Rook preached.
"Ben you sound like those militiamen" Faith said, worried.
"I'm nothing like those in the militia!" Rook spat angrily.
"I don't know how they can live like they do, eating rations all day, not bathing, it's like the like that kind of thing, I for one don't, hell, I like… I like… I don't know what I like at the moment, but I know it's not living in the hole like a bunch of animals" Rook ranted, stuttering occasionally.
"Don't trust them Ben, they see you as a pawn, don't let them move you like one" Faith implored her friend.
"No need to worry, I got out of there this morning I think, I'm not going back there" Rook stated.
"And where will you go since you won't work with them?" Faith asked.
"I-I don't know, I'm sticking with Jess like always, we're going to kill every peggie we see, we'll fix the county" Rook preached.
"Jess? Whose Jess, you never spoke of her before" Faith inquired.
"Jess is a friend of mine, we've been working together for a long time now, we're really close, we've killed so many peggies and we won't stop" Rook stated gruffly.
"Well at the very least I'm lad your making friends and have someone who will keep you safe in these trying times" Faith said anxiously.
"Yeah, you should meet all the friends I have back in the Holland Valley, now those are good people" Rook said, thinking of all the people he could trust.
"How many friends have you made out there?" Faith asked.
Rook was about to answer, but a few sticks cracked, a hundred meters ahead of Rook, the noise, made him snap his head forward as he feared it to be peggies, or worse, Whitetails.
Rook watched his surroundings with baited breath as nothing suggested the source of the noise, his experience didn't let him relax, and since he couldn't see the possible threat, his hand slowly and subconsciously drifted for his bow that sat next to him on the log, ready to move at a moments notice.
Faith said something but Rook didn't perceive it, he was too focused on what was going on around him.
Then the perpetrator emerged from the leaves and trees, it made Rook let out a sigh of relief as he saw it was actually Jess returning to the campsite, but this time she came back with a triumphantly look as she held two dead rabbits in her clenched fist. But seeing the woman made him tense up in a quiet state of panic, he knew he had to end his conversation with Faith, if Jess found out, even everything they had been through, she'd probably kill him for it.
"Hey Faith, I got to go, some shit came up, I need to deal with it" Rook said quickly, not to loudly as he feared Jess hearing.
"Please call me back at a later date, I do wish to talk to you about a few things" Faith begged.
"Yeah sure, I'll do it later" Rook sighed as he clicked off the walkie before changing its channel.
Then Rook's eyes flicked back up to Jess who approached the campsite, unaware of what he was doing, Rook didn't say anything as she entered the campsite.
"We eatin' tonight boy" Jess grinned as she sat down on the log and placed the rabbits on the soon to be light fire pit.
"Nice work Jess" rook said, trying to sound innocent.
"this shit was easy, you should see what I could do in an hour" Jess remarked.
Thankfully by the way she spoke, it sounded like she believed him. Then Jess sat down next to him on the log, admiring her handiwork.
"So, anything happen while I was gone?" Jess asked.
"Nope, not a thing went down" Rook sighed.
"Sweet, if we're this deep in, no one can find us, that should be enough for you to do your planning bullshit or whatever you do" Jess sighed in dissatisfaction as she leaned back as much as she could on her log.
"That's not a bad idea, it wouldn't hurt to try to stay ahead" Rook remarked.
"So, what? let me guess, you wanna take the slow approach, you wanna interrogate more peggies, trying to scavenge little bits of info that we can use to get to Jacob right?" Jess asked.
"I don't know Jess" Rook sighed, leaning back into his portion of the log.
"Maybe you were right, maybe I should have listened to your more, maybe if we did things your way, maybe we wouldn't be where we are now" Rook guessed.
Jess stared at Rook in utter disbelief over what had just left his mouth, never had she expected him to say as such, but once the initial shock subsided she tilted her head back and laughed, it wasn't her usual, evil cackle, or her malicious haunting laugh, her laugh was soft and happy, like a girl with not a worry in the world, it even carried a squeak to it, like her lungs weren't used to laughing.
He couldn't help to feel a warmth wash over his face.
"You always laugh like that, Squeaky?" Rook teased.
Hearing that, Jess immediate turned to the Junior Deputy.
"Oh fuck off and die, bitch" Jess demanded, trying to stifle her laughed.
"Whatever you say, Squeaky" Rook replied as he turned himself away from her, facing back to the fire pit.
"I'm just glad you feel that way because we got a big day ahead of us" Jess grinned.
"What do you mean?" Rook asked.
"Well in case you forgot Boy Scout, you told me if I held on while you dealt with Drubman and his fuckin' gulag, then you would let me take the wheel and be the brains of the operation for a while" Jess said with a shark tooth grin.
"Yes, I do remember that" Rook nodded, remembering his promise to his friend.
"Good, get ready, we got some shit to do later tonight" Jess said
"What to you have planned?" Rook asked, noticing her subtle excitement.
"You'll just have to wait and see dude, it's going to be wild" she smirked.
Hello everyone.
I'm sure you are all aware of what is going on in the world, covid-19 and how it is affecting the world. As of a little while ago, my province was declared a state of emergency and almost all business have shut down on the day to day, just as they have around the world, I for one am one of the lucky/unlucky few who have a job that is deemed "essential" Now that in it of itself is fine with me as I am at no risk of dying from such a disease as I am a healthy young adult, but regardless, a lot is changing in my life because of what's going on around me. Writing has been a passion of mine for a long time and I wish to do my best with what I love, and I believe quality is better then quantity, that being said I wish to say.
I am taking a small break from this story.
I feel my writing has declining these past few chapters and that is something I can not abide by, and with things getting worse and worse by the day, the odds of me holding a job is slowly shrinking and it is apparent to me that that fact and many other things in my life are distracting me from my passion, now I will say I'm possibly putting this on hold until Covid is gone.
I feel at most I will be not updating for a month, but with the way things are that could be longer.
I'm sorry if this is dis-satisfactory but I refuse to deliver a sub par product.
Peace and God bless.
K.B.K.
