The Dead World Ch. 17

The teenager hadn't spent much time in the darkness and rain. It wasn't safe to travel at night, even for someone as capable as Dog. The entire town seemed heavily saturated with the presence of the fallen. Scent and promise of a meal drew them up the shore after Charlie crashed the Humvee into the bridge, and the gunfire from his companions drew them across the bridge weeks back. The gathered reanimates of that horde had been hundreds deep, and once they funneled over the bridge, it would take nothing short of baiting them in a vehicle to draw them back that way again. They were trapped on this island.

Dog's eyes searched the darkness as he heard the chained door at the back of the kitchen shift, but fail to budge. Ghost tried it only once. In the front of the restaurant he could hear the second, far less friendly stranger kicking over tables and blocking the exposed entry point of the windows from the gathering of the reanimated corpses. Silence for a moment. Then a taunting, high whistle.

"... Come out, come out... wherever you are..." Crude excitement laced Killshot's young voice. The singsong tease caused Dog's brow to furrow, but he didn't move. With luck, the scouts would assume they were mistaken. The front door of the restaurant flung open as Killshot removed the chair blocking it, and the metallic voice of the device Ghost used to speak with resounded shortly after.

"Not hostile. Lone survivor. Bring him in alive." Ghost narrowed his eyes.

"No promises." Killshot sneered, and then laughed at Ghost's hardening expression.

At that, the young Asian man shoved the barrel of his companion's rifle toward the ground and glared, ignoring the cross return of Killshot's expression. It was common, working with newly promoted privates. They always seemed trigger-happy, overly eager men with swollen egos and something to prove. Ghost pushed ahead and quietly made his way toward the double doors leading into the kitchen with Killshot directly behind him.

The younger man hadn't removed the dark face covering or helmet obscuring his features as he watched Ghost's back, the shifting of his lightweight armor alerting Dog to the fact that they had now entered the kitchen. He slowed his breathing to bare necessity and closed his eyes, focusing on the sound of their footsteps moving quietly around the kitchen.

As they made their way up along the back of the line, passing the cluttered area for cleaning and sanitizing kitchen wares, Dog moved quietly, training his steps to the sound of their own boots so that he was but an echo to their movements. They slowly made their way around the whole of the service area, and Dog made certain that he kept crouched low out of the beam of light shining through the dark space, staying on the opposite side of their position. The process was grueling; painstakingly slow. Drops of sweat clustered along his forehead as he moved until the sound of their footsteps retreated toward the only door in the kitchen. They covered one another and left through the swinging doors, allowing him a moment to breathe again.

"C'mon, let's check the next one. He can't have gone far."

The splintering of glass beneath their boots and the swinging of the heavy front door held promise. Dog knew going out the way he had come was perhaps the most idiotic thing he could do. He knew he should wait it out, but his mind was barreling through a million thoughts at once. The scouts were on the island. It would only be a matter of time before they notified whoever they belonged to that they had found him here, and this place would be swarming with hostile, trigger-happy bastards. His chest tightened with fear as his thoughts shifted to Charlie, and then a flood of panic and dread filled him. By Skully's direction, they still had two fucking days before they left. They needed to be warned.

For a split second back on the pier, he almost debated letting the small Asian male know of the resort. He almost felt secure enough to tell him. He had never thought of giving away his companions before, but they were hardly companions by this point, weren't they? The idea that by doing so, he might free Charlotte from her dark fate had been fleeting. Now? There was no way in hell he could lead these violent, aggressive fuckers back there. They were already hunting them, and something told him they weren't happy at all about the mess he and his group left of their men, weeks back at the safe zone.

His pulse slowed. He gripped the revolver tightly while listening for movement. There was nothing but the snarling noises of the dead attempting to clamber their way through the broken window. He gritted his teeth and looked toward the back door. He would have to make a move, now or never, or run the risk of getting pinned down by the reanimates in this small fucking space with no way out and nothing keeping the dead from overwhelming him. Dog pressed the kitchen doors out nervously and peered through the sliver of space into the dining area, the sound of the boarded windows straining and shifting glass alerting him to what he was sure was a lively corpse that had made its way over the crude barricade of the tables which once occupied the dining area.

The moment he dared to step forward, Killshot rushed him. He squeezed the trigger almost impulsively, the revolver firing, thrust toward the ground by the hunter's quick movements before Killshot swung the butt of his rifle around and caught Dog roughly in the shoulder. Dog wasted no time flinging the revolver at his face and responded in rapid succession, slashing out with the sharp, ten-inch blade taken from the kitchen, looking to catch his assailant in the break in his armor. There was a sound of fabric shredding as he did so, catching him at the break between his shoulder and neck just barely. Dog's aggression was met with vicious laughter as Killshot dropped the rifle from his hands and ripped his hunting blade from his hip.

"You wanna dance, kid? Come the fuck on then." He tossed the blade between his hands as the distance formed between them, the quiet sound of Ghost dispatching one of the corpses hanging through the window deaf on Dog's ears. A low, vicious growl rolled deep in the voiceless teen's throat, his eyes narrowing as he flipped the chef's knife abruptly in his hands and rushed forward, forcing it down toward Killshot's chest and then rapidly across.

The sound of steel scraping the thin chest plate of the young hunter's armor hissed into the air. Dog jerked just as quickly to the left, dancing out of the way of Killshot's blade as he slashed at the air in return, a touch slower than Dog but no less vicious in his attempts to slice through the unarmored teenager's torso. In the darkness, it was hard not to stumble over chairs and debris. It was lucky that the place had been empty to begin with, but a knife fight in the dark early morning hours had few ways of playing out well for the teen.

Dog was tired.

He was exhausted from sprinting through the amusement park on the pier while dodging live rounds at his back and cannibalistic corpses appearing before him en masse through the morning fog. Killshot advanced, tackling Dog to the ground when he was within distance with a grunt, who struggled to hold the young hunter's blade at bay while attempting to catch him with the chef's knife in some space that was not plated. Dog stabbed viciously at the layers of Killshot's armored torso, trying his hardest to dig through the dark plating.

Ghost was on Dog in moments as he moved to assist, pressing his boot down upon Dog's right shoulder to pin him against the carpeted floor, drawing his pistol and angling it at the teenager's head to cease his desperate attempts to stab the scout's companion. Dog was no fool. He knew when he was outmatched, and he was hardly a formidable opponent half starved and out of sound mind at the moment. It did little to stop the defiance reflecting harshly in his hazel eyes as his gaze darted from the unfamiliar, youthful face of the Asian scout to the masked idiot who seemed intent on trying to murder him. The growl that rolled from his throat was feral, wild and defiant. Terrifying enough to cause a chill to race the length of Ghost's spine.

"You lost, kid, give it the fuck up or I'm going to put this knife in your chest." Killshot's deadly quiet voice inspired Dog to abandon his futile attempts to break free.

He fell still as Ghost nervously bent down, prying the chef's knife from his fingers before gesturing to Killshot to rise. The hunter moved to his feet slowly, returning his hunting knife to its sheath, hoisting his rifle from the ground by the carrying strap. Killshot glared down at Dog, matching the hateful gaze of the teenager before slowly pushing up his mask and looking to Ghost now that they had successfully subdued their target. He fished a set of handcuffs from his back pocket and arched his brows, struggling to catch his breath.

"Happy, midget? Lil' fucker's alive... and he's riding back with your ass. Let's move out before we get stuck on this stupid floating death trap and have to radio for evac. My Pa will kick my ass for embarrassing him like that."

The room was dark when her eyes opened. The blackout curtains were drawn. There was silence for what she felt was the first time in weeks as the storms that battered the Georgia coastline for the better half of the last few months gave way to a clear sky. Dove blinked slowly, and felt a dull, panging throb of a headache at her temples as she dragged herself to sluggish consciousness.

No nightmares, not last night. She assumed the fact that she had downed nearly half the bottle of vodka she had shared with Ruthless was to thank for her dreamless sleep. The malaise and nausea she was feeling now she could do without. Dove pushed back the blankets, shoving her haphazard curls over her shoulder as she glanced around the room for her boots.

Some part of her expected clutter, but she dragged her mind back to the evening before, and remembered that she had not spent the night in Slash's room, but rather Ruthless' suite. It was all a bit blurry now. She remembered giggling, glass breaking, and sorrow. Such deep, deep sorrow. She remembered feeling thankful, and weightless, and... safe in the company of the Russian man who was nowhere to be seen.

The room was almost immaculate and untouched, except for the extinguished candles lining the table and dresser. She rubbed the back of her hand against her eyes with a yawn, and found her boots placed at the foot of the bed, moving to pull them carefully onto her feet. Retrieving the empty water bottle, Dove set her attention on the restroom at the back of the suite.

She tilted her head down after turning the water on, drinking deeply from the tap to ease some of the discomfort of dehydration she felt settling in before filling the water bottle. At some point while she rested, she slipped from the leather jacket and discarded it to the floor. Dove retrieved it in haste and slid it onto her arms, holding the bottle of water as she exited the suite and into the darkness of the hall.

The scent of diesel lingered in the air as she started hurriedly down, thinking to check her room first and foremost with the slightest hope that Slash had managed to recover Danny and that he might be waiting for her there. The hopefulness she felt was almost overwhelming.

She slowed to a stop as she passed through the lobby, noticing with wide eyes that the equipment, weapons and rations gathered there were all now absent. Beyond the glass of the resort entrance, she could make out the vehicles for their evacuation on the lawn between the two towers of the courtyard. The RV obscured most of the view. Beside it, the Humvee waited with the cargo area full and the cover secure over top of it.

There was no movement from the men of the group as she crossed from the east wing to the west wing. Dove swallowed nervously. The reality that she would be leaving the home she had known for six years seemed to rush her with this sight. The weight of it caused her distress and panic, picking up her pace as she power walked toward the stairs and made her way up to the fourth floor. It was dark and eerily quiet as she climbed.

Her heart drummed loudly in her ears, pausing nervously on the platform of the fourth floor to drink from the bottle she had brought along before discarding it in the stairwell. Dove pressed the metal bar, the door swinging inward as her eyes struggled to make out much in the dark hall of the fourth floor. The window at the very end was obscured in part. Someone was standing there. Waiting.

It was hard to make out who exactly. There was a chill in the air more than the lower floors, and more intense than the days prior when the rain fell over the weeks. Sunlight fought to beam between puffy white clouds lazily speckling a soft blue sky, but it was awfully nippy. A clearer sky might have been nice to see if she didn't feel so tense and uncertain.

Dove watched the man standing at the end of the hall, unmoving and unbothered. Something in her told her to turn around and go back the way she came. What would be the point, though? Dove had accepted well by now that she couldn't run or hide. If it were Danny, he would have been glad to see her, and she him. He'd have rushed across the distance.

Dove clenched her jaw and started forward, fighting back the foreboding uncertainty gripping her. It felt like an eternity walking down the hall, drawing nearer to the dark figure standing before the window looking out over the sea. The closer she came, the better her eyes adjusted in the darkness. The more she realized that despite his height, it was certainly not Danny. Prickles of anxiety inspired her to slow her pace the nearer she came.

"You've been busy, haven't you, Dove? Misbehaving again?" The deep, antagonizing tone of Colton's usually cold voice stopped her in full a few doors from her suite. She swallowed anxiously, shaking her head hurriedly. Her eyes followed him as he pushed off from where he stood against the wall, the sunlight streaming from behind him as he advanced toward her.

"I... I've only been doing what you told me to." She protested the accusation boldly, holding her head high. Skully stepped lightly. Dove responded by desperately shifting nearer the wall the closer he drew to her. The bandanna wasn't drawn up over his face for once. There was a smooth, coy smirk curled across his full lips. His sharp blue eyes were languid and narrow as he moved forward, strands of his thick black hair teasing before his gaze.

"But not how I directed. 'Diablo... Slash... and then Ruthless,' wasn't it? Slash dismissed you... and so you moved on to Dog, hm? And where is he now?" Skully sneered.

"I don't know. Slash went out to look for him--after he turned me away..." Dove realized she was rushing through defending herself and becoming increasingly nervous. She glared up at her darkly handsome tormentor, feeling little more than aggravation as he drew closer with smooth, deliberate steps. Like a predator stalking his prey. He was almost within arm's reach. Dove took a few more steps away from him.

"Diablo?"

"... He... w-we..." She felt her face flush deeply. The bastard had told her he would ask for the details. She wasn't sure what exactly it was he wanted to be told, or how vivid he expected the details to be. Some part of her felt she didn't need to ask. He'd enjoy the humiliation and discomfort of forcing her to recount tempting the other men into enjoying her services, wouldn't he?

Dove struggled, tripping over her words as she huffed a breath in frustration, shaking her head. No. She wasn't going to do that. He'd get only what she gave him. "He tried to turn me away... I didn't let him, I swear--You can ask him yourself."

"I did. I believe you... Not so fortunate with Ruthless, though, were you?" His flippant reply didn't bring her any comfort. Dove tried her best to shake her nervousness and uncertainty, paying little mind to the thought that Skully could be herding her. Moving her where he wanted her. Her eyes darted down the end of the hall, biting her bottom lip gently as she took a few more slow steps back away from Skully until she felt the pressure of the wall at the end of her hall at her back. Her heart caught in her throat.

"N-No--I tried, I really did... he... I... I can't make any of them do something they don't want to--this isn't fair." Her voice lilted in exasperated fear. Skully's grin widened. She was cute when she was nervous and uncertain, tripping over her words and riled to panic.

"It's more than fair." There was a wicked delight in his voice as he closed the distance between them swiftly, placing his hands on either side of her head to trap her from escape. Dove tensed impulsively. Her breath caught in her throat as she shook her head in protest, even as Skully shifted a hand to curl his fingers loosely around her throat. "Yes, little Dove, it's very fucking fair. You've got a responsibility to our group now, and you're going to uphold it... Otherwise, well... Why should I bother keeping to my end? Hm?"

"I did what you told me to do..." Her voice was hushed as he looked down at her with deviant amusement, watching the fire ignite in her eyes as she glared up at him. Her defiance was a stark contrast to the way she trembled beneath his fingertips, and the feeling of her pulse quickening beneath his grasp as he leaned in.

"You failed. Twice. You went out of the order I gave you, to play with your little boyfriend--who is now missing, likely to avoid his penance for being so fucking foolish anytime he gets around you. Running off in the Firebird, right? You were smart to talk him out of it..." He felt her swallow hard. "What did I tell you would happen if you failed?"

Her eyes ripped away from him, from the expression of delight and lust darkening his gaze. His hand shifted, his fingers dipping beneath her chin, tilting her head up to force her to look at him. Dove felt her mind wipe blank. She tried desperately to find her voice.

The words were there on the tip of her tongue; a vicious, hateful and stubborn retort. They never came. He grasped her chin, his long fingers holding her face firmly. She hated the way he forced her to meet his gaze, the deadly calm of his voice... the temptation of his smirk.

"What did I tell you, Dove?" Skully's question was almost playful, taking pleasure in exerting control over her and making her aware of exactly what would happen next.

"I'd spend the day wasted... with you..." Again, softness had taken her voice as she forced the words out. Painfully demure words. Words she felt were hardly her own. Her compliance caused her face to burn, but what choice did she have? She wanted to rip free from his grasp and turn away from him and fight for her personal space. She wanted to refuse him and bury down the conflicting impulse she felt now. The building of unfamiliar anticipation she felt twisting in her stomach, but a part of her knew well what defiance earned her in the past. She was not interested in testing his patience.

"How many days did you waste?" He chuckled, his thumb smoothing against her plump bottom lip. Skully's free arm dropped, pressing beneath the fabric of the leather coat she wore as he circled her thin waist and drew her flush against him. Her hands shifted to his chest, pressing against the firmness of his pectorals as she struggled for space.

"I'll--I'll try harder, I promise--Please... please, just..." The flood of embarrassment she felt paled in comparison to her nervousness and anxiety as she pleaded with him. Colt arched a dark eyebrow with the smooth, devilish smile still lingering on his lips as he leaned in, and let his lips ghost against hers.