[4-14] The Town

[Gildarts]

Just as she spoke, a breath of steam coming from her parted lips, a loud, sudden Beeewwoooop! caused her to nearly jump out of her fur-covered seat. The eerie pitch brought Christa out of the clouds that her head was lost in and she felt the muscles of her saber-toothed steed hasten, nearly jostling her off her ride.

A silent wince held an everlasting clench in her face, where the pain hung heavy and wet, dampened by the blood of the dead. Her shoulder was throbbing and below her, Red’s paws were scuffing wearily against the ground; he could feel the ooze of his reopened shoulder wound trickle steadily down the back of his leg. As Christa fished out the radar, which was pinging fucking incessantly again, a big black square lay before them parting the trees. Beside it, another, until the tormented pair were delving deeper within the darkened city streets, paved with desolation and insidious shadows of forgotten smiles.

Deserted.

And it wasn’t just the empty creep of the night that gave it away. Christa knew for sure (from both her gut and her senses,) no one was sleeping. They strolled, this town had actual buildings, though it had little resemblance to home. “Red?” she asked, as though hoping his mind was still there, not taken, as Took’s had been, by the carnivorous island.

“Hm?” he huffed, barely getting out a breath around the fatigue now descending into the marrow of his bones.

“What the Hell is this place?” her tone quiet, “We’re on an island with cannibals and fucking rock monsters and it's like someone just decided to colonize, something’s wrong, my gut’s telling me-”

Red’s motion slowed to an alert stop as her voice was lost, as she turned her head over her good shoulder and froze as her fingertips hovered over the hilt of her knife. There had been something in the window, just there. A shadow? A doubt, slowly descended into an adrenaline dump, pumping fear through her veins.

Waiting there for a moment, she was unable to look away from the window that held too many lost answers. Who were the people who gazed outward from the other side? Once, perhaps a little girl had looked out, tugging her older sister’s shoulder while the milkman came, or when daddy used to come home, strolling down the street after work. Now, as she shined her flashlight she saw it was barren of all life and the answers she sought.

The sniper remained crippled by the reminiscence of sorrow, now held back the gentle ache of tears as she spiraled the loop of the iron key in her fingers. There were no monsters chasing her, there was no one behind that broken pane. There was no death to rise up against and face. Only her own, shitty reality.

Beewooop!

“Red, I need to sterilize this wound, don’t want to catch his crazy...” she said, trying to make a joke but her voice had been bleached by a dejected numbness of tone, “I’m going to check this house for a medicine cabinet. Then it looks like we’ve got our plate full, Abner’s here, as well as the library, then maybe we’ll see where this fucking thing is trying to take us this time,” her smile was as dry as the chapped skin of her lips, “Wonder which one we’ll find first?”

One foot touched the ground, firmly planting as the treads grated with the uneven edge of asphalt, next the stiff leg swooped over Red and as it touched the ground the sniper’s body collapsed. It only lasted a second and she put a hand up to bay the beast back, “I’m fine,” but the tortured waver in her voice told him the woman wasn’t. She used the support of Red’s shoulder to stand and it was then where he noticed a sour-smelling wound in her thigh that must’ve made it hard to move, let alone walk.

With a slight limp, Christa hopped the three patio steps. The house seemed normal enough to the lion, who eyed the gunslinger uneasily. There was no need to announce that he was going with her inside, they had been through this much together and he had just saved her life. She blinked the haunting ghosts of nostalgia as she twisted the brass doorknob. Unlocked. The pungent smell of decay barreled into their noses, “Helloooo?” she called out, just to be sure the place was empty and paused in the mudroom while her eyes snagged on a photo of the smiling family who owned this house. Where they were now, he didn't know.


“Layers and layers of lies... Betrayed by a sad glint in a child’s eyes,” she quoted without knowing it and then moved along, touching a few household knick-knacks along the way. As Red passed, he looked closer at the picture, wondering what had made her think that this family was unhappy. The smell of smoke filled his nose, his eyes burst wide open, “Christa?”

The blonde was in the kitchen, smoking a cigarette and looking through the dim fridge with a flashlight. Between puffs she muttered softly, “I tried the switch. Power’s out.”

Red could taste the tar as it caked his lungs and through the boiling of his eyes, looked at the now empty carton discarded on the table, right next to a glass of goopy black milk and a plate full of moldy cookies. “I keep trying to wrap my head around what happened to this family, oh and, they aren’t upstairs, I would’ve heard them. So far as I can tell, they left with the oven still warm from the cookies they just made. Ever heard the story of Roanoke?”

Red shook his head, his eyes staying glued to Christa’s face in the lapsing darkness. She didn’t seem quite herself, though the same could have probably been said about him, “No, I thought you were getting medicine?”

“It’ll probably be in the cabinet upstairs, that’s where we used to keep mine,” she said in a rather chilly tone, “And my leg wasn’t quite ready to do the climb, listen, Roanoke was a story I heard, about, well, a whole town who just up and left without packing anything. The mystery is behind the most obvious question, what made the entire village just up and leave? For people, items hold sentimental value,” she looked down at the lit cigarette between her lips, slightly amused, since it was the only thing keeping her sane through it all. Or maybe it was the idea of him being so close.

“Anyway, you think you’d at least pack some canned food, if you’ve got a pantry the size of a walk in closet,” she pointed at it and continued, "When Abner mentioned the town, I thought there might be people, and maybe there are some yet, but I have this really nagging feeling in my gut, just keep your ears perked.”

Nanaki left the room, then Christa, with a c-c-click! and the door closed behind them, the smell of gas from the stove, not quite reaching Red’s smoke-filled nose.

Thud. Thud. Her lethargic steps carried her up the stairs like a slow drum-roll. With every pound of pressure she let weigh on her thigh, the pain struck  her neck and shoulders, much worse than the arm hanging there in a splint and cloth bundle; worse even, than the half-chunk Took had taken of her. Motherfucker. She cursed to herself, blaming the heathen for what had been done to her even as she took a swift glance around the empty rooms of the house and then approached the only bathroom upstairs. She’d been right and the first aid kit had been left in the bathroom upstairs, “Guess we’re lucky for the supplies, but I’m not thanking Omni just yet, not until we get off this shithole of an island. Do you think Took was from this creepy little town?”

“Not sure, there’s no one around looks like it’s been deserted for decades,” he noted the dilapidated furnishings and the musty smell of decaying wood. Next would be the tricky part, it seemed, because she asked Red to go find a sewing kit. He delivered, the handle held by his mouth and she used his tail to sterilize the needle.

“Thanks, why don’t you go wait outside?” her tone smooth, “I’ll be down in a minute.”

“I collapsed on the mountain for five minutes and woke up just in time to pull a cannibal off of you, you’re insane if you think I’m leaving your side.” No, she was reckless.

“I turned the gas stove on in the kitchen,” she said through a mouthful of smoke and didn’t bother to regard Red’s exasperated expression, “I’m going to blow up this house, but before I do, I have to do a little sewing, won’t take long, I was just warning you ‘cause of your tail,” the tank she wore was ripped and bloodstained, the fabric easily peeled off of her, except where the blood had already dried like industrial glue on her skin. Red recognized the very human indecency that would be looking at a woman who was just wearing her bra and a sling over her torso and looked away from the mostly bruised skin immediately, she didn’t seem to care, since he wasn’t human enough to know where to look.

Christa’s hand was steadied by her next puff, while she found it a little difficult, to prop the flashlight’s beam directly at her wound without having it topple over the edge of the shelf perched on the wall. Red remained out of loyalty, which added an extra golden flicker to the room. “You know,” she said making conversation just before she winced at the acidic sting of peroxide on her leg wound, then her shoulder, “I’m totally stealing all their toilet paper before we leave.”

A few stitches, some gauss, and they were rolling. Both patched up and down the stairs, oh, and Christa now has a shirt on too, “I’ll meet you outside,” she said to him.

“No, let’s go.”

Their eyes met across the dark room and neither blinked, creating a stalemate. “This house is identical to the one my parents were killed in. Down to the fresh baked cookies, Red. If you look at the pictures, the kids are two little girls, one with brown hair, one with blonde, with a nose just a hair smaller than mine.” Christa continued, looking at the coal-filled fireplace. “First they shot them. My sister was shaking behind me, then, they strung them up in the fireplace and made them sizzle. I guess they thought they’d cremate them and save us the trouble,” Her eyes carried over Red’s shoulder, as though glimpsing at the memory.

“And you know, I couldn’t even use the antique pistol from the mantel because it only had one bullet. So I had to watch, and pray that neither came close to us, my fingers were trembling too much to shoot straight,” she spoke her deepest regret, “If only I could have saved them.”

Tick tock, tick tock! clicked the pendulum clock in the corner of the room. Red allowed a moment of silence and said, “There’s no one here left for you to save.” It was time for her to be done fighting the ghosts of the past, and instead, she had to let them burn.

The words slapped her in the face. She nodded and walked over to the fireplace picking up the gun that appeared to be from the seventeenth century, as she did, Red’s eyes widened as he saw an actual blackened toe sticking out from the coal-covered bricks.

“Let’s go,” she commanded, and Red went by her side, Christa flicked the cigarette to the ground and slammed the door and ran before the the house erupted into a blaze of fire. BOOM!

“Seems we have a pattern,” she smirked and bounced remarkably lighter, “Red, I’m going to ride you again, ‘cause I don’t think the stitches will hold... This’ll be a good signal, Abner said he was at the radio tower, but I don’t see anything tall around. Let’s keep heading in, I’ll load my gun with the heat seekers.”

Red’s fur was bristling. She searched for the reason and her jaw hung open wide as she watched, thankful she wasn’t on that damned street anymore. Drawing near to the heat of the flames were creatures darting fast across the street, they had shapes that were human, but over the sounds of the flames, only a chorus of gargling sounds could be heard. Christa dipped her head next to the cat’s ear and whispered, “Run.”

Instantly, they jolted forward, Red moved with such speed she hoped they could escape those monsters that seemed to keep emerging from no-where. One emerged from behind a shrub and apparently caught the scent of her fresh wound for it began to follow them taking uneven, twitching steps. She pat his back to tell him something was up, but there was no way she could snipe this enemy if she had to use two hands to hold on. “There!” she said as she spied a large building and Red carried them there.

They were just fast enough, the duo made it up the stairs with enough time for Christa to hop off and begin to barricade the door, unearthly knocking filled the halls of the giant room full of shelves. “What the hell were those things?” her voice echoed as her eyes fell on the cursive scrawl of the establishment's name, “Thank God for Saint Alighieri's”

The flashlight swung from side to side, blood written all over the walls and the bindings of the books in strange patterns. A trail of blood soaked into the carpet, leading across the room.