“Is that right?” he hummed.

  Wasn’t that what he told me to do? He needed to make up his damn mind. I scrunched my nose in displeasure and he softly chuckled before opening the door for me. I hopped in and pulled it shut so I didn’t have to see his face anymore.

  When the rest of the group climbed in, I realized Eliseo seated himself next to me in the back. I turned to him with a frown. “Who’s driving?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Strap yourself in.” He then reached over and pulled the belt across my body, buckling it in.

  The drive was longer this time around. Good thing we gassed up last week in preparation. I stared out the passenger window when a bump in the road made Eliseo’s thigh hit mine. I knocked it right off me, and he laughed under his breath.

  “What’s so funny?” I snapped, annoyed at this weird game we were playing. I never agreed to play anything.

  “You, Sili. You.”

  “Whatever.”

  Ignoring my retort, he continued to give me commands under his breath. “Stick with me when we make it to the destination, alright?”

  My irritation dissipated. “Why? What are we expected to run into?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Just stick with me so I can keep an eye out on you.”

  I turned to look at him in disbelief. “You don’t think I can handle myself?”

  His eyes sharpened on mine as he leaned in, our noses almost brushing, making me flush with weird emotions. “I didn’t say you can’t. I need you to stick by my side for my peace of mind. I don’t need to be distracted, wondering where you’re at if we run into shit, you feel me?”

  I bared my teeth and turned to stare out the window again. It seemed like the moment he found out I was a girl, he started treating me with protective gloves, and I was tired of it. What was all that training for if he was going to be this way when it was time to get down to business?

  The air chilled the glass, and I knew we were close. Adjusting my long-sleeved shirt, my legs started shaking with anticipation. What would we run across? Would we find anything good on this trip? I really hoped we didn’t run into any more bloodsuckers. I discreetly looked at the other people in this group and inwardly grimaced. I didn’t need to bring liability to myself.

  A warm hand held my left thigh down, and my head snapped to his face. Eliseo wasn’t looking at me, instead, he stared straight out the front windshield intently while trying to calm my nerves at the same time.

  With an audible swallow, I told myself to take a few deep breaths and calm myself and my running thoughts.

  “We’re going to pull off this road and hide the vehicle behind the cluster of trees,” the driver said.

  Eliseo inadvertently squeezed my leg as he responded to him. “Behind that one. Me and the kid will go do recon ahead of you guys. Wait for our signal.”

  “You got it.”

  The driver, an older gentleman—even older than Eliseo—pulled the vehicle smoothly to the side, crunching some of the fallen branches beneath our tires. I opened the back passenger door and jumped out with my partner right behind me.

  He placed his large hand on my shoulder and directed me forward. There was a field clearing a few paces ahead. Crouching behind an abandoned, rusted-out truck, my eyes tracked everything in front of me. Eliseo’s body heat was right beside me, keeping the chill at bay. There was an abandoned gas station and shop ahead about a mile out.

  “We should head around the backside, use the trees as concealment,” he whispered.

  I nodded. Sounded good to me.

  We moved quickly from tree to tree, trying our best to soften our footfalls, until we could see the back of the gas station. There was graffiti all over it, written messages that warned us away from the place.

  “It smells like blood,” I told him.

  “I’m sure it does. It’s probably old. This place looks to have been abandoned for some time already.”

  How could I explain to him that my sense of smell was heightened? The blood didn’t smell old at all.

  “Elis—”

  “Let’s go.” He moved quickly and placed his back against the wall, his pistol pointed up.

  Dammit. I had a bad feeling about this. Something in my gut screamed at me to go back. “Eliseo!”

  But he was already looking through the clouded windows and opening the backdoor with his gun pointed ahead of him. He lifted his hand and called me to his side. Growling under my breath, I did as he commanded.

  We cleared the gas station and the convenience store next door. Heading back to the Humvee, we called the others in the group to come down. When we all made it back, half of us scavenged the gas station and the other half the store.

  Eliseo let me choose which I wanted and followed me. The store was still pretty stocked up with useful things. Grabbing the backpacks we brought with us, I began stuffing it with cans of food and other useful necessities like toothbrushes and combs.

  Guess that bad feeling from earlier was a spoof. Maybe it was some leftover bad taint in the air. Crouched down to the floor, I rummaged through the random items as far as my arms could reach. My ears perked up when the sound of pills in a bottle rolled from behind the back counter. Turning to look, I saw Eliseo with a full-blown smile on his face right before he shoved it into his pack.

  Maybe that was why he was such an ass. He was probably in pain all the time. No one looked at a pill bottle with that much longing unless they were suffering in silence.

  He saw me looking at him and he gave me a genuine smile. Electricity shot through my body. It was weird when he wasn’t being an asshole. I wasn’t used to it.

  Standing, I dusted off my cargo pants and threw the bag on my back. Eliseo took that as my signal that I was ready to go.

  “Two minutes, and we head back to the Humvee!” he called out to everyone around us.

  The other guys collectively murmured their agreement and zipped up their bags. We met up with the other half and it looked like all our packs were full. I was feeling good about this trip. We were going to come back with a lot more than the last trip we made.

  “Alright, men.” Eliseo checked his watch and looked at the sky. “We found a good loot early on. We still have another good hour before we need to head back to the meet spot. You guys want to keep moving forward or go back now?”

  One of the random new guys piped in with eyes full of excitement. “I say we check out what else we can find. We’ll just stash this stuff in the Humvee. There’s plenty of room.”

  I looked around as Eliseo called for a vote. The majority wanted to try other locations. I really had no say since Eliseo would drag me wherever he went, anyway, like we were stuck at the hip.

  When we made it back to the vehicle, Eliseo threw both of our bags in the back. Grabbing the back passenger door handle, Eliseo tapped my shoulder and jerked his head toward the front passenger side. I followed his direction and got in with him getting into the driver's side.

  “Alright, let’s head north for another few minutes and see what we find,” he instructed as he started the Humvee.

  The drive over the uneven terrain was quiet besides running over a few dead brushes. Soon, we came across a house in the middle of nowhere and pulled around the side about a mile away. There was a barn and shed to the side of the main home.

  “Tools,” I whispered under my breath, and Eliseo nodded.

  “We might find something here. Let’s check it out,” he told everyone.

  We all got out with our weapons in hand. Eliseo walked around the shed while the other men went toward the barn.

  “What do you think happened here?” I asked him. My mind was whirling with different scenarios, none of them good.

  “Who knows? But it looks dilapidated, like it’s been sitting alone for a while,” he observed.

  We bypassed the shed that had a door hanging on a single hinge. There was nothing inside. Walking up the porch of the main house, we both crept around and looked through the windows.

  “I don’t see any movement,” I mumbled under my breath, mostly to myself.

  “Me either. Stay behind me.”

  I quickly did as commanded right before he kicked in the front door. Dust fell in a cloud and we both covered our faces with our arms, coughing. Eliseo moved through the living room, his gun up. There were two levels to the house and the bottom was covered in the same dust that was on the door. Whatever was in here, never left judging by the lack of disturbance in the environment.

  Walking up the creaking stairs, we found four closed doors. The pistol in my hand felt heavy with what we may encounter behind them.

  Eliseo kicked the first door in, and the smell of mold and something else wafted out. Looking around his broad back, my heart constricted at the sight of two decayed bodies in an embrace on the bed, one smaller than the other.

  The sheets were darkened with old bloodstains, and the shredded curtains moved with the breeze that filtered through the window.

  Flashes of a woman holding me when I fell over my father’s tools played in the back of my mind. She was my mother, wasn’t she? It was the only thing that made logical sense…

  “Oh, poor baby. It’s okay. What are you doing out here?” Her voice soothed me every time I heard it.

  “I wanted to see what Papa was doing,” I told her. “I wanted to help.”

  Her familiar smile wrapped around my heart like an embrace. “My dear, the best place for a child to help is to stay out of the way. Come on, you can help me cut up the vegetables we just harvested. How does that sound?”

  “I’m not good with a knife, the handle’s too big, Mama.”

  Her smile softened her wrinkled face. She patted my shoulder and moved me away from the greenhouse. “Baby, every woman should know how to wield a knife. You’ll learn. It’s a skill you need to have to make it in this life.”

  “Yes, Mama,” I conceded.

  “Sili? Where did you go?” Eliseo stood before me with his warm hands on my shoulder, his face crouched right beside mine, staring into my eyes. I blinked a few times until he came back into focus.

  “I-I’m sorry. It was a memory. Sorry.” Why couldn’t I remember that she was my mother at first? The memory that played back this time was so vivid—like it was yesterday.

  Eliseo’s concern was written all over his face, but he didn’t address it. “Come on, let’s clear out the rest of the rooms and get out of this house.”

  “Okay,” I answered softly, still haunted by the memory that played back.

  He kicked the next door in, and there was old blood spatter all over the walls, sprinkling the ceiling. I frowned at the direction of it before my eyes cast toward a skeleton lying in a slump on the bed with a gun still in its hand.

  Was this what our future looked like? So bleak that it became easier to just kill oneself? How long before we become like this family here? Withering away with hopelessness. Dust, stale air, and light decay tickled my nose as I continued to look around.

  Eliseo walked in and grabbed the skeleton’s gun. I followed suit, rummaging through the side table and dressers in case I found some ammo—and I did. Some of the clothes looked pristine, having been preserved away from the dust. I grabbed some shirts and shoved them into the small bag I brought along with me.

  “Check the other room, too, in case you find some other useful stuff for yourself,” Eliseo said as he walked toward the next room and kicked it in. More dust came down in a cloud and I held my breath as I left the room.

  Reentering the first room, I tentatively looked through the dressers to find some feminine undergarments. How did he know? Looking at the embracing bodies again, the smaller one looked to have been a teenager. My heart ached, not only for the old residents here, but for the fact that my memories were still fragmented. How could a person forget their parents?

  “Sili. Are you alright?”

  “Yeah.” Shoving the undergarments in some of my cargo pockets, I ran across a bra and stopped. I had been accustomed to hiding under my disguise that I no longer recalled what it felt like wearing one of these contraptions.

  The bag I had with me wasn’t big enough, so I made the decision to leave the bra behind and shoved the dresser door close.

  We both walked down the stairs and turned into the kitchen to look around. As we opened and closed cabinets, the sound of a faraway gunshot rang in the air.

  We both bolted out of the house toward the barn to witness blood spraying in front of us in a wide arc. Another ragtag group was fighting with our men. I pointed my pistol at the closest one, pulling the trigger and getting him in the chest. He screamed and fell to the side, rolling off one of our guys he had pinned under him.

  I heard an animalistic growl before Eliseo tackled a guy who snuck up behind me. They grappled on the ground for a few seconds before Eliseo straddled him with his weight. The glint of the blade distracted me as he sliced the man's neck, spraying blood all over his front as he repeatedly plunged his knife into the man’s chest cavity.

  My adrenaline was running at full speed with this surprise attack. The smell of copper covered his normal musk, and it made my mouth water and tickled my nose at the same time. I couldn’t comprehend what was happening and I stood there for a few moments, trying to collect myself.

  My ears twitched when I heard leaves crunch behind me. Twisting with my gun, I fired off a couple of rounds before rolling on the ground and crawling behind a bush.

  “Where the fuck did the kid go?” The stranger’s voice made the hair on the back of my neck stand.

  Memories bombarded me, flickering in and out with images of red, fires, smoke, and screams. A moan and cry of agony brought me back as I watched one of the strangers stab one of our own.

  When the stranger turned to look at me, his face flickered, distorting his facial features, right before it flickered back. He jumped up and ran, and I leaped to my feet as well. I grabbed my crossbow and secured a bolt, but missed the target as he jumped over a fallen tree and dodged around a tipped-over wheelbarrow. Throwing my weapon down, I chased after him and decreased the distance between us enough for me to reach for my knife and throw it in his direction. It hit the target, but it didn’t stop him. I watched as he took a few steps, turned, pulled the knife out of the back of his thigh, and threw it right back with an inhuman amount of force. In shock at what I witnessed, I didn’t dodge in time, taking the blade right in my chest, knocking me to the ground with a crash.

  My breath wooshed out of me upon impact.

  “Sili!”

  My vision blurred, my mind replaying the strangers' flickering face and the memory of something else from the past. I felt like the blade lodged in my chest broke a rib bone and pierced through to the other side. The excruciating pain coursing through my body brought back a familiarity and more faces, menacing grins, and roars. How many times had they stabbed me?

  Hands roamed my body and I kicked and screamed, consumed by the mental cage of my memories. Smoke, fire, blades, and screams. Life flashing before my eyes. Darkness, unearth dirt. The smell of blood…

  “You brought that among us!” they accused them.

  “How could you bring that monstrosity here?” came another voice among the angry masses. “Do you not care about the safety of this community?”

  My father stood tall like a sentinel with his arms crossed, blocking them from getting to me.

  “Sili. Open your eyes. Look at me. Look at me!”

  I cried out when he tried to move me, fighting a darkness that threatened to drown me in another moment in time.

  “Stay away from me!” I threw my fist at the man before me, collapsing his face in. The crunch of bone was barely discernible in the moment. My strength was out of control, and it scared me.

  “Caleb!” she cried before turning her glare on me. “You monster!”

  “No!” I screamed as the community dragged me by my arms away from my family, away from all I had ever known.

  The fires began to dance at my feet as my father attempted to get to me through the throng of angry faces that held him back. Tears streamed down my face while the heat exponentially increased as the flames came to life. It was my mother who broke through the crowd, jumping into the flames with her knife in hand, sawing at my ropes as her dress began to catch fire.

  “Please!” I begged through my sobs.

  “Get her off there!” one of the random community members screamed out, pointing at my mother while sneering at me.

  “She’s out of her damn mind!” came another voice.

  “Faheemah. Just hold on, baby.”

  A mouth pushed against mine and I was pulled back to the present, my mind fading in and out of awareness. Eliseo blew air into my lungs and I was confused. Why did my limbs feel so heavy? He did it again and my fingers twitched and my eyelids fluttered. Another blow and I coughed, sputtering to the side, moaning as the skin on my chest started to itch in that familiar way.

  “What the hell?” Eliseo growled above me.

  He rolled me onto my back and stared at my chest as it began to knit itself back together at rapid speed. I tried to kick him off me, to no avail. He would condemn me. They all did. He leaned his head in with his eyes ablaze with something akin to fury as my body healed itself like nothing happened, leaving perfect skin behind.

  When his eyes snapped to mine, his nostrils flared and his lip curled with a snarl.

  5

  ELISEO

  I took too many knocks to my head. I couldn’t be seeing what I was seeing. What the fuck kind of sorcery was this?

  Fitri’s skin healed completely before my eyes, leaving soft flesh and only bloodstains behind. I was so focused on bringing her back to life, doing whatever I needed to do, that it didn’t register in my mind that she was probably already dead. I refused to believe it. The knife jammed deeply beside her heart, I had to dig my fucking fist in her wound to pull it out, still holding on to hope that maybe it missed the mark.

  The suspect was already gone by the time I got to her. I just needed her to open her damn eyes!

  “Get off me,” she screeched, her energy returned.

 

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