America The Dead Book Two: The Road To Somewhere (21 page)

Ronnie repeated the observation
again.

"Hang on... They're talking on the CB," Mike
said.

Ronnie switched on a portable CB unit and
punched up channel seventeen.

~

"... Fuckin' care,"
a voice said.

"You thinking of running? 'Cause
if you are, once I get these fuckers? I'll be coming for you... get
your ass back here, Johnny red, I'm calling the shots now,"
Shitty told him.

"Shitty, I didn't say I was
running... What's to fight, Man? What's to fight?"
Johnny red asked.

"I had better see your fuckin'
lights coming back this way in the next five minutes, Johnny, or
maybe I'll come get
you
first,"
Shitty told
him.

"I'm coming, I'm coming,
Jesus,"
Johnny red whined.

~

"Can you see those other two trucks?" Mike
asked.

Kate and Jeff had both been checking the
horizon with the night Scopes as well as the area around the
trucks.

"No,"
they both said in Unison.

Both radios hissed static in the
silence.

"Okay," Mike said. "Go look... But be
careful."

~On the Highway~

The night before, Death had suddenly shown an
interest in Psycho. He had never so much as looked sideways at her
before. He had called her into his truck after they had stopped for
the night and told Chloe to get lost for awhile.

This thing is coming
together
, he had told her. And he told her
that she had proven herself. And he needed a second woman, and how
did she feel about that? Then he had taken her, loveless and hard.
When he was finally done, he told her to get her shit, she was
traveling with him and Chloe from now on. Then he had done the
other thing to her, on her stomach.

Shitty had been crazy, but
not
too
crazy, he
knew what the deal was. Psycho had been scared to death, better the
crazy you knew than the crazy you didn't. And now
this...

The truck was on its side in a ditch with
Psycho trapped underneath a large duffel bag of fully automatic
machine pistols and rifles. She knew that much, but whatever else
was in that bag, or on top of that bag, she didn't know. She only
knew the bag was on her lower body. It was pressing against her
face and she couldn't move.

She had begged Chloe to help her, but she had
ignored her, crawled to the back of the truck, and slipped out
through the broken window. She had heard no shots like she had when
Death had tried to make a run for it.

Maybe Chloe had made it. If so, she'd better
hope that she, Psycho, didn't find a way out of it as well. Because
if she did and she caught her, she'd pay. But right now, it sounded
as though she had another problem.

A footstep sounded softly nearby, whoever it
was had stepped in the glass scattered on the highway. When she
looked up, she was looking at a woman's face. She was peering down
the barrel of a large pistol she was pointing at her
face.

"Jesus," Psycho said. "Don't do it. Don't
shoot." She squeezed her eyes shut.

"Like you didn't shoot at us?" Kate asked
her.

"I didn't shoot at nobody, Girl, no one,"
Psycho told her.

"Uh huh... Don't call me girl either," Kate
said. "Keep your hands in sight and I will try to get that shit off
you so we can get you out," Kate said. "Do anything stupid and I'll
shoot you, or these boys will.“ She stepped aside and let her see
that Ronnie and Jeff were standing just a short distance away.
“Believe it," she finished.

Psycho stretched her hands up over her head and
kept them there.

~

They had her out of the overturned truck in
about ten minutes. Kate leaned her up against the truck and patted
her down, as Ronnie and Jeff watched the highway and the
girl.

"Ain't got nothing," Psycho told
her.

Kate continued methodically, her hands tripping
over the safety pins in the girls upper body and stomach. She found
a knife wedged down into her right boot.

"What are you, a Dyke?" Psycho
asked.

Kate held up the knife and smiled.

" I forgot about that," Psycho said.

"Is there any place you didn't stick a safety
pin in?" Kate asked.

Psycho blushed deep red and a frown spread
across her face. "I... I didn't," she stopped, near
tears.

"They did?" Kate asked.

"All of us," she said.

Kate stepped back. "Are you gonna do anything
stupid?" she asked.

"Are you gonna kill me?" Psycho asked
back.

"Why would we do that?" Ronnie
asked.

Psycho said nothing, then, "No, I just don't
want to be hurt anymore... be scared anymore," she told
them.

"What your name?" Kate asked.

"Psy...
Cindy
, they named me Psycho," she
told them.

"Cindy sounds better to me than
Psycho. I'm Kate," Kate said. "And nobody here will hurt you. You
can stay with us if you want to... or you can go...
after.
When this is
over, you can go if you want to," she told her.

"After?" she asked.

"After this part is over... whatever they have
in mind," Kate said.

"They're gonna try to kill you.
Death, that's all he wants...
wanted.
" She said.

Kate looked at her.

"You killed him. He's dead," Psycho looked over
at the body sprawled not far from the truck. She look down towards
the other truck, another body sprawled there.

"Who's the other one?" Kate asked.

"Other one? I only see that one and Death
here," she indicated with her eyes. She walked towards the second
truck.

"Murder," she said. "It's Murder. Where's the
other one?" She asked Kate.

"On the floorboards in the back," Jeff
said.

Cindy leaned through the shattered
back window and popped her head right back out. The top of her head
was gone but it was...
"Cassie,"
she said aloud. "She was Murder's
woman."

"And who's woman were you?" Ronnie
asked.

"Shitty's... Well, Death's. I mean, Shitty's up
until last night, and then Death took me away from him. So, I guess
I was Death's woman," She squinted her eyes, clamped one hand to
her mouth, and hurried to the side of the truck and threw up. A
mental snapshot of Shitty's first woman, Bitch, struggling to
breath... the horrible clicking sound she had made, jumped into her
head, and then she leaned over and threw up again. She dry heaved
after that, but there was nothing left to come up. She sat down and
began to cry. Staring at her vomit speckled boots.

~A small willing army~

The twins came to just as the moon had reached
the middle of the black sky.

Somewhere in the blackness the
horse had gone. Gone to find it's own kind? She thought that was
so, but she could not read the horse the way she could her own. She
only knew it had a part... served a purpose. It had gone and it
would come back. Possibly with another of its own kind. Maybe...
maybe not. Its mind was not her mind. She had only made it as she
was supposed to. She turned her attention back to the twins. The
twins were hers...
for
her...

The silvery light was bright, almost daylight
in its intensity. The twins did not fight the changes as she had
thought they might. Their eyelids fluttered almost in unison. Black
liquid eyes shone out and took in their surroundings, and each
other. They looked around at the darkness, making not a sound, and
then lifted their black eyes to the moon above. When they looked
back down, they gazed at her frankly, seeming to accept their fate,
looking to her to guide them, their eyes large, liquid black,
reflecting the cold, silvery moonlight. And she realized they were
not the same. One was slightly taller, a streak of silver-white in
her hair, falling across her forehead. She swept it
aside.

Donita rose from her crouch and set off into
the night at a fast walk. The twins fell in behind her; the boy
brought up the rear. The twins walked obediently, quietly looking
around at the trees and the woods with their newborn eyes as they
followed. They reached out and linked hands as they walked, drawing
closer to one another.

She led them out of the scrub and into the deep
woods. The tall trees marching away in even rows. Absolute silence
fell as they walked. The predators recognized them and left them
alone. A small rabbit stopped, sniffed the air and began to shake
with its fear, frozen in the path of the Walkers. Donita skirted
it, but stopped and turned to see what the twins would do. The
twins stopped when Donita stopped and looked down at the rabbit
frozen on the pathway.

They moved forward slowly, unlinked their hands
and squatted beside the trembling rabbit. The shorter one reached
out one hand and began to stroke the soft fur of the rabbit. The
other, with the streak of silver-white hair still fallen across her
forehead, dangled her own hands between her thighs and watched, but
she made no move to pet the rabbit or stop the other from doing so.
The silence seemed to deepen, the time to crawl. The Rabbit seemed
to tremble less... leaning into the girl's hand as she stroked the
fur.

Donita almost didn't catch the movement. It was
so fast. The other girl's hands flew from between her thighs and in
one movement closed around the Rabbits throat, pulled it into the
air and then flipped it backwards with a fast snap, breaking it's
neck. She threw the bundle of fur back to the ground at the other
girl's feet. The rabbit's feet kicked hard once... twice.. and then
stopped. A thin trickle of blood flowed from one side of its pink
nose. The smaller girl cocked her head to one side, raised her eyes
to look at her sister briefly, then looked back down at the rabbit
where it lay on the ground by her feet. She extended one hand,
touched the blood that ran from the rabbit's nose and then bought
that finger to her blue tinged lips to taste it.

Her eyes closed, and her body began to shake.
Her twin leaned forward and rested one hand on her shoulder, a
barely audible whisper coming from her lips. Words spoken strongly,
but there was no air in her lungs to move across her vocal
chords.

I Love You,
floated on the dark forest air.

Her eyes opened and locked with her sisters.
The red smear of blood on her blue-tinged lips seemed startlingly
bright in the moonlight. She looked down at the rabbit once more
and then stood from her crouch, took her sisters hand and turned
back to Donita. Donita held her eyes with her own for a moment and
then turned and began once more to make her way through the rows of
tall trees, the three children following quietly behind.

~War Two~

Kate had left with Cindy and walked back into
the camp from the hillside. They had talked along the way, and the
things the girl had told her had infuriated her.

"This is my man, Mike," she said, making
introductions. "Bob, Tom and David," she continued. "This is Cindy.
She was forced to be with them."

Mike looked from the safety pins jutting out
from her shirt to her belly button, her upper lip and nose. The
Safety pins made the largest impression. He looked to Kate, his
eyes asking if she was sure. Kate nodded.

Mike looked back at the young woman. She looked
so young and pale in the moonlight, washed out, dressed as though
she were playing a part. "If Kate is sure you're okay, then you're
okay with me," Mike said. He offered his hand and she touched it
with a closed fist. He tapped her fist with his own.

"We're going down to the creek; we'll be back.
First aid kit in one of these trucks?" Kate asked.

A look of concern came into Mike's
eyes.

"Not me," Kate said. "We'll be back," she
leaned forward and kissed Mike.

~

Kate rummaged around in the closest pickup
truck and came up with a first aid kit and a tube of antibiotic
cream. In the back seat of the second truck she came up with some
clean clothes and a pair of boots that were close to the right
size.

Cindy walked the dirt path down to the creek,
staying behind Kate. Up ahead, the moonlight reflected off the
water, rippling across the surface with the current's
flow.

Kate turned, "Okay," she said, " let's
see."

Cindy pulled her shirt off over her head and
Kate gasped. She had told her that both men had beaten and abused
her, but she had no idea it would be so bad. Healing scabs that
looked suspiciously like bite marks graced one shoulder and part of
one of her breasts, rusting safety pins in each nipple, and on her
stomach Shitty's name had been carved into the flesh. Murder had
x-ed it out and carved his own name below it.

Cindy began to cry, shaking with the sobs. Kate
took her in her arms and held her. When she was able, Kate helped
her with the cuts and bruises, removing the rusty safety pins as
she went.