John took a humongous gulp of Jack Daniels. The whiskey burned down his throat and sent a pleasant shock through his system. He looked down at the bottle and felt both love and loathing for the drink. He caressed it like a long-lost lover, before throwing it against the wall in disgust, shattering it into pieces.
"Angel!"
The angel stumbled in. Lifeless, seemingly unfocused, but ready to work to the bone to serve Eden's Gate at a moment's notice.
"Clean up the mess." He ordered.
The angel groaned and stumbled over to the mess. John liked the angels, they never questioned, they never complained, they were happy to do any work that was given to them. You could give them an impossible task and they would spend the rest of their lives trying to fulfill it. They had been exceedingly helpful in loading and storing supplies into the Gate.
He saw the angel pick up the glass with his bare hands. Cuts already decorating the calloused skin. The angel paid no mind to the blood or the pain. If they could properly use a gun they'd be the perfect soldier!
'What was it Jacob called them? Golems? "Rocks with hands, but no brain." He always preferred animals that listen.'
The loss of the Ranch forced John to take shelter with his followers in the Gate. Now he was strategizing from his office in the bunker. Not as homey as the Ranch, but at least this would allow him to acclimate to the underground bunker when the collapse Arrives.
Leaning over the desk, his eyes scanned every inch of the Holland Valley. The Project still owns a good chunk of the farmland and were close to full 100% completion.
'Until that Snake slithered into our fields.' He thought bitterly.
Eden's Gate still had a firm grasp of the valley, but without the US Auto to repair and refuel their trucks their movement was limited. Now they had to go all the way to Henbane River, to Lorna's Truckstop to refuel and repair.
Now Sunrise Farms were taken from their hands. That was two food production facilities taken from him now! More food taken out of the mouths of the worthy. He heard Chandra was killed, shot through the heart. Poor woman. So full of love that one. If they didn't get back the farm, they would be short a ton of food. And the unworthy will waste it. Stuffing their pig mouths, ignorant that'll all be a waste when the end of the world comes.
"And it's all because of that Deputy." He seethed.
Deputy Jones. A name that was far more trouble then it should have been worth. His whole future, paradise awaiting, was withheld from him, so long as that woman continued to sin against the Father. At Joseph's words.
'Why, Brother? What's so special about her?'
Taking a knife he stabbed it in the middle of Fall's End.
'She takes everything from you without any thought of the consequences. So many of our people are dying and you want her to join us?! What does she offer that you are willing to sacrifice so much?'
It didn't make sense to him. So many times he was tempted to just kill the woman, but Joseph's guidance kept him on the path. He managed to dig up the woman's files from the Sheriff's Department and only found a couple of interesting things.
'Her Father was a National Park Ranger and her Mother an Army Ranger. Maybe Jacob can tell me more about that. Has been to three different schools, two of which kicked her out for starting fights. Has a degree in psychology and criminology. A championship boxer.'
She lived an interesting life, but nothing special. There was nothing special about her!
"And yet I must save her from herself. Oh, the tests that God gives us." He rubbed his face.
Thankfully, he was not without plans. Very soon the Revelator will be complete, and the roads would be theirs once more. Then they can reclaim all that the unbelievers stole from them.
'I may not even have to take up Jacob's offer. Metal and fire will be far more superior then the claws and teeth of his failed experiments.'
*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*
"What is it? I'm extremely busy at the moment." John said crossly.
His subordinate was right to the point.
"John, we got her. We got Deputy Jones."
Those words were as beautiful as his victim's confessions.
"Now that . . . that puts a smile on my face."
. . .
America was in the dark. She could not see anything at all, but she could hear. God, could she hear.
Screams. Cries all around her. Cries of pain, torment, sadness, despair, outrage, and anger. Wherever she was it was a world of suffering and agony. Cold and hard all around her, a world made of steel.
'The bunker.' Her hazy thoughts deduced. 'I've been taken to John's bunker.'
Then voices spoke close to her. Peggies.
"They put up a good fight."
"Wake up sinner." She felt someone kick her in the stomach. Hard. "It'd be easier to put a bullet in her."
"That is not the will of the Father." The peggie said firmly. "Take her to John. He's ready to hear her confession."
She felt herself get picked up like a sack of potatoes, slung over a shoulder. The drugs in her system kicked in again and she passed out, the screams of the trapped still echoed in her unconscious mind.
What felt like seconds in her mind, more likely minutes, felt like hours passed when she woke up. And she woke up in a place that only Freddy Krueger would consider home.
She was tied, arms and legs, to a chair. The room was dark, with only a red light to illuminate the place. The light came from an antler chandelier, as if to make this nightmarish hellhole look homey. To her left was a tool bench, with a wooden headboard . . . human skin was stapled to it. The skin had etchings of the seven deadly sins on them. The bench was clear of tools but was caked in dried blood. Metal was her environment. Floors, ceiling, walls, all of it was metal. This was exactly how she imagined John's bunker to be like. And that sicko wanted people to live in this place.
"MMM! MMMMMHHHHMM!"
The room though was not what garnered her attention. Just a couple yards from her was Deputy Joey Hudson. The poor woman was screaming through her duct tape gag, pulling at her restraints trying to get free from her rolling chair.
"Hudson!" America cried out. The woman looked okay, but if those broadcasts she heard the peggies listening to were anything to go by, Hudson was anything but. Upon closer examination, her face was stained with tears, bruised with a black eye, and a fresh red scar on her right cheek. She had cuts everywhere, bruises on her exposed skin. Her hands were bloody and missing a few fingernails, and, it was hard to see in this lighting, but she had a burn scar on her neck.
"Hudson! Hudson, calm down! We're gonna get out of this." She tried to assure her, but the woman was hysterical.
Hudson suddenly stopped her thrashing when the sound of a metal door creaked open and closed. Soft footsteps clacked against the metal floor from behind America. Looking over at Hudson, the poor girl looked like a deer in headlights. Completely petrified.
John passed America by, whistling a smooth tune that she recognized as "We'll Meet Again." In his hands was a tool chest that he casually dropped on the bench.
After dusting off the bench, and removing a tray from the box, John ended the whistle on a high note. Then he was silent. He turned around and showed off that pearly white, slimy smile of his. All America wanted to do was shatter every tooth with her fist, but she had to settle with her best death-glare. Which just amused the youngest Seed brother.
He then spoke nostalgically, in that calm, positive tone of his.
"My parents were the first ones to teach me about the Power of Yes. One night they took me into the kitchen and they threw me to the ground" John picked up a stapler and casually started adding to his collection of skin to the board, "and I experienced pain, after pain, after pain, after pain-*SLAM*"
John smashed the stapler onto the bench, making Hudson flinch and yelp in fear. America just continued to glower at the psychopath.
"And when I didn't think I could take anymore, I did." John grabbed a tattoo gun and walked over to America. Hudson cried out "NO!" but it was muffled from her gag.
"Something broke free inside, I wasn't scared . . . I was clear. I looked up at them and I started to laugh. All I could say was . . .Yes."
He turned on a lamp, shinning it on Jones. He put the tattoo gun together and loaded it with ink, hooking up the power cord. When he was done, he set it on a tray.
"I spent my entire life looking for more things to say yes to." He suddenly lurched forward and ripped open her shirt. America squirmed a little from his touch. His gaze settled on her chest for an uncomfortable amount of time. Then his eyes shifted to stare into her worried, defiant ones. His blue eyes looked so cold. "I opened every hole in my body and when those were filled I created more."
"But it was Joseph who showed me just how selfish I was being. Always receiving. Always taking. The best gift isn't the one you get, it's the one you give. And giving takes courage."
America scrunched her face in mock disgust. "John . . . no one needs to hear about how your brother fucked you."
John backhanded her.
"Ah! You're lucky I'm tied up John. Otherwise I'd kick your ass right here."
He lunged forward, getting in her face, slamming his hands on her arms, bruising them. America did not yield. She stared back, with narrowed, defiant eyes. Hudson was worried for her.
"You think you're brave, America?" He scoffed. "Think your petty insults mean anything? They're nothing, you are nothing, the unbelievers of Fall's End are nothing. You are not the force of good you believe yourself to be." He balled his hand into a thumbs up and underlined his "SLOTH" scar with the tip of his thumb.
"This means something. This is true courage . . . to own your sin. To etch it on to your flesh and carry its burden and when you have endured –when you have truly begun to atone—to cut it out like a cancer and display it for all to see! My god that's courage."
"That's not courage you moron. That's just masochistic psychopathy."
John ignored her and fished out a knife from his toolbox.
"I'm going to teach you courage, America. Teach you how to say 'yes.' So you can confront your weaknesses. Confront your sins! You will swim across an ocean of pain and emerge . . . free. For only then can you begin to atone." He sounded euphoric, like he just got high off his own bull crap.
He leaned against the bench and looked between the two law enforcers.
"So who wants to go first, hm?"
America still glared at John but held her tongue. But then her eyes fell on Hudson and the rising fear on the woman was palpable. She had been through so much already. As much as America hated to give the psychopath what he wanted, Hudson needed help.
This fucker didn't know what real courage was.
"Yes." She spat with every fiber of hatred in her being.
"Yes!" John shouted victoriously. John approached and she saw more relief then happiness in his face. "Yes. Ah, I swear you won't regret this. I promise."
The knife in his hand waved playfully. For a second America thought he was going to stab her. But then he spun around on his heel and made his way over to Hudson.
"But before we begin I think it's only appropriate that Deputy Hudson goes back to her room. Confessions are supposed to be private after all."
He pushed Hudson's chair, until the two deputies were face to face. Hudson was hysterical again, crying and screaming. Being near John brought out a whole new level of fear in her.
John shushed her and stroked her shaking head soothingly. "I'm not here to take your life. I'm here to give it to you." Hudson kept muffling no, no, no.
His attentions returned to America. Instead of pretending to be gentle, he didn't hide his violent edge as he started choking her. "I'm going to open you up and pour your worst fears down your throat! And as you choke, your sins will bubble up, revealing themselves to me. Then you will truly understand the Power of Yes."
America gasped when he let go. "Fuck . . . you . . . brotherfuker."
"Hold this for me, would you Deputy Jones?" John slammed his knife into America's leg, causing her to scream out in pain. Hudson joined her in the screaming. "I'll ask for it back when I return."
Hudson was rolled out of the room screaming the whole way until America couldn't hear her anymore. America took several gasps of breath, trying not to focus on the pain shooting through her thigh.
She tugged on her bindings. He wrists and ankles were secured to the chair. She tried moving, making the chair screech, but could barely make an inch. Hanging her head, the Deputy tried thinking of another plan, but the knife in her leg wasn't helping her process.
It hit her. 'The knife.'
America tried reaching for the knife, but her hands were too far away, and they couldn't stretch further. She bent down, twisting her head at an odd angle and gripped the handle in her mouth. Slowly she lifted the blade out of her leg, making her whimper, but she did not stop or let go.
Finally, the knife came out and America moaned in relief and pain. Using her tongue to change the angle of the blade, she bent forward moving her head back and forth against the rope bindings. It took a good minute, her neck ached a lot, but she managed to cut the rope and break free. Taking the knife from her mouth she cut her other restraints, he wrist and her legs and she was free!
Quickly standing up, America experienced a bit of vertigo from the drugs and soreness but shook it off. She took a step and tripped. Yelling out in pain. She caught herself and looked at the thin hole in her leg.
"Shit." America looked at the bench and hobbled over to it to grab the stapler. Grabbing the tool, America took a deep breath to gain some courage for what she was about to do next. Pulling the skin together, placing the stapler mouth to her leg, she closed her eyes and pulled the trigger.
"GRRR-FFFFUUUUURRRRR!" Inhaling sharply, she slammed the stapler on the bench. She took several deep breaths and tried collecting herself. When most of the pain subsided, she looked up with fortitude in her eyes.
"Hang on Hudson. I'm coming." America said determinedly.
At first she intended to go through the door John took, but there were likely guards waiting outside. Looking around she saw a door that led into a basement.
'Can't think of any other way.'
Storing the knife in her pocket, she hobbled down the stairs. When she reached the bottom her foot kicked a socket pipe. Picking it up, she gave it a few practice swings before nodding in approval.
'The sharp edge on the sockets will do some damage.'
Searching, America thanked God that there was an open pipe that probably led to some other part of the bunker. Crawling through it and then falling down a ways, she found herself in a barracks. Right in front of her was a peggie. On his knees and praying to God to make him a better man.
'God can't hear you in here motherfucker.'
She raised the pipe and struck the guy in the head. He was dead on the first hit, but she double tapped him to make sure.
"Eddy?"
'Shit, he wasn't alone.'
"Eddy? What's wrong?"
America pressed herself against a stood up mattress. When the woman came in sight America bashed her head in with a sickening crack. Her blood joined Eddy's on the floor.
Outside the barracks, another lone peggie was moving boxes. America casually approached him and tapped his shoulder.
"Hm?"
America moved around him out of his sight and struck him in the neck. He choked and wheezed, his neck very much broken. Raising the pipe, she buried it in his head. She had to wrench it from his skull she buried it so deep.
Checking his body, she managed to find a 9mm, a couple of clips and some ear plugs.
"This'll come in handy." It was smart for the cult to carry around earplugs in case they had to discharge their weapons. She could only imagine how deaf she'd be if she fired a gun in these closed corridors. Putting the earplugs in, she kept moving.
As she moved down the long hallway, she could once again hear the cries of the people.
"Let us out!"
"Why are you doing this?"
"I'll do whatever you want. Just don't hurt me."
"I want to go home."
"You killed my family!"
And the cultists were trying to justify themselves.
"Be quiet."
"We're trying to save you!"
"Atone and you will be freer then free."
"The Collapse is upon us."
"You're safe."
All those cries could be heard behind locked doors and tiny vents. Like some kind of terrible surround sound from hell, where you could hear the cries and moans of the damned. America was getting turned around trying to guess where the people were.
'How many have the cult taken?' she internally fumed.
Opening one of the heavy doors, America stepped out into a forked hall. Seeing a pair of peggies to her left she crouched down and hid behind some crates.
"Ya heard that the Deputy was caught?"
"I did! I hope John takes his time skinning that snake." He chuckled.
"She's killed a lot of us, sure, but I just hope she learns from John's teachings."
"Your too softhearted, Will."
"Everyone deserves a chance to walk the right path, Gary. I was a teacher once, I know the importance of teaching and learning. Sometimes it's that one person that makes it all worth wile."
"Sure, whatever you say, Will."
The two split. America heard footsteps walking toward her direction. Lying in wait, she sprang up and wrapped her pipe around the peggie's neck. The peggie looked shocked and scared seeing just who had him trapped.
"I'm gonna make this easy on you. Where is Deputy Hudson?"
She pulled on the pipe choking him, making him gag. Loosening her grip a bit so he could talk, the cultist wheezed out his words quietly. The man must have been a coward because he sang like a caged canary
"Down that hall, main door." He pointed in said direction, answering almost instantly.
'So much for devotion.'
"Where are you keeping my weapons." She wanted her silver six-shooter back.
"W-we're keeping them in an armory. Down the same hall, but you need a key."
"Where's this key?"
"Dennis has it—HURCK!"
"Who is Dennis? You flea-beards all look the same."
"H-he's got blonde hair . . . and the sin pride etched on his left cheek. Can't miss him"
"Thanks for the tip."
She pulled the pipe back more. The peggie struggled to push it off, but America was stronger then him. There was a crack and his windpipe was crushed. Dropping the peggie to the floor she checked him for anything of value. A couple of clips, a set of goggles, and a smoke grenade.
'I can use this.' She smirked.
Heading to the room, she poked inside and saw a bunch of peggies. Some were sleeping in their bunks, others reading their bibles, some were moving furniture, and one peggie was shoving another into a barrel that was leaking green mist.
She pulled out the smoke grenade and hooked the pin.
'Let's get this party started.'
She pulled the pin and threw it into the middle of the room. Before any could figure out what that clank noise was, the grenade erupted and filled the room with a thick gray smoke.
The peggies started coughing uncontrollably. They wandered about looking for the exit or just someone to lean on. America made her kill.
Holding a handkerchief to her mouth and nose and wearing the goggles she got off the peggie, America rushed in with the knife that John "gave" her. The peggies, unable to see, felt their throat's open up and pour out blood. She took the knife and shoved it into their guts and skulls. Twisting the handle for good measure. They called out for each other, which just gave their position away and allowed America to bury John's knife in them.
She found the peggie she was looking for. Blonde, "Pride" scar on his cheek. He looked like he was handsome once upon a time, if it weren't for the ratty beard and scar on his face. Dennis was near the couch. America practically tackled him into it and started stabbing him multiple times in the sternum before cutting his throat open. The couch became stained with his blood.
Searching his body, she found a silver key in his pocket. But before she could search for her weapons, one of the peggies jumped onto her back.
America growled as the man screamed in her ear. He gripped her body in a strong vice as he tried stabbing her with a gardening trowel. Keeping his stabbing hand away, she reached behind and grabbed the hem of the man's shirt. Performing a shoulder toss, she slammed the man into the floor.
The look of the peggie was unlike any she'd seen before. He was bald, wearing rattier white clothes then even the usual cult grunts. He had no shoes and weirdly enough he wore a face mask, bearing the cult's cross, over his mouth.
Not dazed in the least by the toss, the peggie sprang right back up and tried stabbing her again with the gardening tool. Holding him back, America got a good look at the guy's manic eyes. They were milky white, and devoid of any reason or control.
The peggie screamed at her, his strength was unreal. It was like he was putting all of his adrenaline into killing her. Continuing to scream, the peggie put both hands on the trowel, bring it closer to her chest.
America took out her 9mm and shot the peggie in the abdomen. This didn't even phase him!
'What the hell is this guy?! He acts like I just poked him!'
She shot him again and again and again, but he just kept coming. Kept on screaming! Tired of hearing his mouth, America pointed upwards and shot him through the chin, the bullet exiting out the top of his skull.
This stopped him dead in his tracks. His body fell on top of her, with the trowel slipping from his hands, clattering to the ground. America panted and pushed the dead guy off.
"What . . . the hell?" She breathed "This guy . . . acted like he couldn't feel anything I did to him."
Kneeling down to examine him more, she pulled off his mask and was repulsed by what she saw. He had no lips! His teeth and gums were exposed, framed by scarred, wrinkly ridges. From her examinations, she saw signs of bite marks, indicating that the man chewed off his own lips.
"Why the fuck would he do that? What the fuck did the cult do to you?"
She wouldn't get any answers from dead bodies and stood up. Putting the gruesome knowledge in the back of her mind, she went looking for the armory that held her guns. It was easy to find in the hall, a sturdy, white locked door with the word "Armory" spray-painted on it.
Opening it with the key, she whistled at the sight she took in. There were a lot of guns, in crates, on shelves, America was upset that she was only one person and could only carry so much. At least she could hoard some of the ammo that the cult had graciously labeled and alphabetized.
'Someone likes their orderliness.'
Scouring for her weapons, she found her belt and holster in a plastic box. Judgment was still snuggled and safe in said holster. Her dad's knife was also put with the belt. She found Fall's Ghost and the Farmhand set on a shelf and the Star-Spangled Basher was put in a bucket with some other bats. As she was loading up all the ammo and special ammo she could, her eyes fell upon a gun that made her eyes sparkle with delight.
A beautiful, long, hard, bountiful . . . M60 LMG. It was just sitting on a table, with a single light showcasing it like a prize on a game show. America slowly approached it. Her hands touched it, stroked it, then she gripped it and held it firmly in her arms.
"Oh . . . yeah." She said sexily.
Her eyes drifted away from the gun and fell onto the ammo that was sitting on the table next to it.
"Anti-Armor Rounds" it said on the large box.
America smiled sinisterly and every peggie in Hope County shivered for reasons unknow to them all.
Exiting the armory, she retraced her steps through the hallway and walked through a large steel door. She entered a room that had three other doors, each thick, made of reinforced steel, that had valve handles to open them. The one ahead of her however, had a window and through the window he could see John and Hudson.
Rushing to the door, she tried opening it, but the handle wouldn't budge. John saw her through the window and smiled. America fired three shots from Judgment at his face. Three dents appeared on the glass, but did nothing effective. The bullets just bounced off.
"Fuck!" She slammed her fist against the glass, wishing that it was John's face instead.
'Bullet proof glass!'
John was still smugly smiling at her through the glass. He pressed some button on his side that activated a comm for him to talk to her.
"I know your sin. It drives you. Every thought, every action. Your sin is wrath." He released a single laugh. "So, I'll indulge you. Become wrath. Let it fill your body. Let it consume your soul because in the end . . . you'll still be empty."
America this time laughed. "Empty? That's cute John." She continued laughing, pissing John off if his decreasingly cool face was any indication.
"I'm not empty John. Before all this bullshit I was leading a pretty happy life. Actually, just starting one. Had two loving parents, friends, a roof over my head, and God." She saw John's eye twitch. "I was happy, but you're not are you John?"
. . .
His silence was all the answer she needed.
"I know what you are John. You're a sinner. You're a scared little boy crying for his big brother to save him from his mommy and daddy. You act all tough and controlled, but really, you're just so frightened and in pain. And you're trying to put all that fear and pain in others, because no matter how many people you get to "confess" it'll never be enough to fill that . . . emptiness inside you."
John banged on the door between them. "Fuck you! You don't know what you speak of, sinner! You don't know me."
"No, but I do know criminals. Psychopaths like you always have a Freudian reason for why they do shit. Your reason: is because you want people to hurt, the same way your parents hurt you. Because that's the only "love" you've ever gotten. Even Joseph gives you that kind love."
"Don't you talk about my Brother like that!"
America shook her head, smiling wryly. "Tsk, tsk, tsk. I don't know what's more pathetic, that you actually think Joseph would ever let someone like you into his Eden's Gate or just your life as a whole."
"AAH!" John banged both fists on the glass plating, roaring and snarling at the woman who was just in arms reach from him. "You bitch! You whore! You blasphemer! You FUCKING SINNER!"
"If you don't like my judgments John, then come out here and prove me wrong."
He almost did just that but stopped himself. His glare intensified, but he was in more control then a few seconds ago.
"No. You still need to confess. I'll see you again. . . once you are completely consumed by wrath and then . . . I'll rip off your goddamned skin. Until then, Deputy Hudson here will just have to take your place for the time being. I'll be waiting. We'll both be waiting."
John pressed some kind of switch. An alarm blared, the vents started leaking bliss fumes. On the PA a voice was warning that the bunker would become sealed soon. John grabbed Hudson and dragged her deeper into the bunker.
"MMMMMMM! MMMMM!"
"Hudson!" She banged on the door. "Just hang in there! I'll get you out of this hell hole! I swear!"
They went around a corner and she lost sight of Hudson. Cursing one last time, America took the door to her left and started running to the surface. After running up the stairs she came to a room full of furniture. Paper signs were placed on them, each had a different designated location that she guessed was somewhere in the bunker. Silo A, Silo B, D, etcetera. One sign on the wall caught her attention though.
"Surface" with an arrow pointing up a stairwell.
Shouts came from the next set of stairs. America coughed violently, the bliss fumes were starting to make her head hurt, almost seeing red at the corner of her eyes.
Running, America came across peggies on the stairs, ready to take her on. In these tight corridors she couldn't miss. The M60 fired and it was like music to her ears. Blood practically exploded from the cultist's bodies. These anti-armor rounds were no joke. They messed up flesh and bone!
The stairs seemed endless, the haze of bliss wasn't helping either. She could hear voices echo in her ear. Suddenly, when she was close to the end, another one of those bald freaks charged her. Remembering that these guys felt no pain, but also remembering that she had an LMG with powerful ammo in its belly, she fired and tore that peggie and the one behind him apart.
She arrived at the entrance of the bunker and twisted the wheel. The door hissed and opened up. America practically jumped out and sucked in all that sweet, clean air.
But she would not get to enjoy it for long.
"The Deputy has escaped."
"Find her and bring her back to John!"
Peggies knew she was out and much to her horror, she saw more of those bald, milky-eyed freaks coming at her with farm equipment!
Getting up, she swung her LMG cracking one of those bald peggie's heads open. With a gut still full of ammo, America pressed the gun's trigger and let it roar. The anti-armor rounds tore through the peggies like they were paper. They penetrated the trucks, turning them into swiss cheese before exploding in a great ball of fire. If a cultist wasn't killed by the explosion he was trying to put himself out before he was burned to death.
Those screaming peggies continued to charge, fearless of the bullets she was unleashing on them and their fanatical brothers.
"Drive the sinner from our home, brothers and sister!" John declared over the intercom. "Let her run, let her hide. For no matter where she goes, God will guide us to her!"
America shot the speakers and made a dash for a truck. Peggies were crawling out of the wood work and she didn't know how much ammo she had left in the LMG. The bald peggies were especially starting to get on her nerves. John had a shit ton of them!
Tossing the gun in the back America turned the trucks key and put it in drive. Several of those bald cultists started smashing the truck, one even shattering the window and tried strangulating her. She put on the gas and rove off, running over a couple peggies and breaking the arm of the one that had a hold of her. Several cultists fired their weapons as she speeded out of the place.
She didn't even bother sticking to the road and just drove down a hill into the forest. The truck was barreling down the hill at fifty mile an hour. The jarring bumps made it difficult to keep focus and keep her eyes set on not trying to run into trees. It didn't help that the bliss didn't fully leave her system yet and was screwing with her eyesight.
America had no clue how far she drove before the truck fell down a steep cliff and rolled up a hill, stopping at a bridge. By hitting a tree.
America jerked back and forth. Her head throbbed and her neck ached. The bliss in her system finally wore off and she got out of the truck. Groggy and—
'Oh God!'
She threw up. All the drugs and the adrenaline pumping through her system was too much. When she was done emptying out her stomach, she wiped the bile from her mouth and got on the horn.
"This is Deputy Jones, calling anyone from the Resistance. Anyone copy?" She sighed tiredly.
Half a minute passed before someone finally answered her. It was Mary May.
"America? America is that really you? Where are you? Nick said you were taken by John's Ushers."
"I was." She spat, both to insult John's name and because of the vomit aftertaste. "They took me to their massive bunker. I escaped, but Hudson and a lot of other people are still trapped. I can't get to them." She said.
"Where are you? We can send a chopper to pick you up."
"I'm outside John's bunker. Somewhere on the path that leads there."
"Head towards the road, we'll prep a chopper to pick you up."
"Sounds good."
There was a pause on Mary's side. For a second America thought she lost contact, but then the bartender spoke up. Sounding a bit remorseful.
"Listen, Deputy, I'm glad you're safe, but we need your help right now."
"What?"
"Eden's Gate finally rolled out that secret project of theirs from the Railyard. It's a big-ass semi with plated armor and guns! They're calling "The Revelator." It's like a goddamn tank! They're trying to take the roads back. It's killed so many of our patrols already and its heading right for Fall's End."
Forgetting her fatigue, America grabbed her guns and started marching toward the rendezvous point. Determination and fury was all she was feeling now. She was only gone for a while and John finally pulls out his big guns.
"Where's it going now?" She asked seriously.
"It's heading toward the gas station on the main road."
"Get people clear, I'll handle it."
Before Mary could ask her what or how, she disconnected the call.
'John wants to see me become wrath?" Her LMG creaked from how tightly she was gripping it. 'I'll show him what real wrath is when I burn down his whole operation! When I drown his people in their own blood! When I rain lead and fire down on their heads! And finally, when I take his life with my own two hands! John wants WRATH?!'
A helicopter flew over her. It bore peggie markings and was looking for her. She shot it down with her M60. It exploded in a fiery blaze before it hit the ground.
'I'm going to give him wrath.'
AN: New Dawn is out tomorrow people! I'm so excited I can barely contain myself! Obviously I'll be busy playing it, so don't expect updates to any of my stories for a while. Have a great day everyone! And enjoy the apocalyptic New Dawn!