Without Law 14, page 12
I watched as he glanced over at Tara, and the platinum blonde smiled and cocked her head to the side as she leveled her pistol at him.
Robby’s eyes went wide, but he was distracted for a second, so I used that opportunity to step in front of Renee so that she was behind me. As I stepped, I pulled my pistol from my hip and pointed it at the young man’s head.
Robby’s men hollered at him, and he turned back around to face me.
“Fuck you, pussy,” the man said, and he used one hand to pull up his sagging pants. “Can’t even come at me like a man. Trying to get me all distracted and get a sucker shot in.”
“Cadets, remove all civilians from the area, now,” I ordered as I continued to keep my eyes locked on Robby’s.
I could tell the young man was not used to being challenged. He backed up slightly, but it was enough to tell me that he feared me.
I hadn’t even looked in the direction of the cadets when I had given them the order, but I could see out of my peripherals that they were following my commands. They whispered to the civilians, and I watched as the preppers slowly made their way around Robby’s group to head to the gate.
Robby tried to figure out what to do as they walked by. He jerked his hand slightly, as if he was about to threaten the preppers, but then jerked it back to me when he thought better of it.
“Hey, there’s only three bitches in here,” one of Robby’s men in a red shirt said as the rest of the group cleared out.
I smirked as I continued to stare at the small group leader. It wasn’t only small minded to think that if you couldn’t see someone that meant they weren’t there, it was also stupid.
“He’s a pussy and a liar,” Robby spat, but his eyes had no conviction. “And soon his bitches will be ours, too.”
I felt my face grow hot at that comment, but more about his use of the word ‘bitches’ than anything. The women that surrounded him were better warriors than he’d ever be, and he had no idea what he’d gotten himself into.
I’d stared into the faces of many men who had their guns leveled at me, ready to shoot, and I’d seen it all. Some were confident, they were going to shoot me whether or not they died in the process. Their eyes told me that they had nothing else to live for.
Others had been more skeptical, unsure of how to handle the situation and make it out alive. Unlike the others, I was sure that those men had someone waiting for them at home.
I’d seen fear before as well, but never fear like what I saw in Robby’s eyes. The young man didn’t want to die, but it was all he knew. I doubted the group behind him was forgiving when it came to their leader showing any signs of weakness.
None of them were prepared for anything like this, either, that much was apparent. I could practically see the hive mind they all shared. This was mob mentality at its finest. If one person showed weakness, then the rest would jump on them and kill them for it. There was nothing else to be done except try to remain in charge. Otherwise he’d be eaten alive.
Even though I saw what was happening, it didn’t give me pity for him. He had made his own decisions and wound up the leader of this band of assholes. He’d also decided to make himself a problem today, so I took no issue with being the solution.
I continued to stare into the young man’s blue eyes until I heard the courtyard go quiet. All of the civilians had to be out, then.
“Clear?” I asked the girls.
“Clear,” Anna called.
“Clear,” Tara and Paige echoed.
“Clear,” Bailey hollered, and I knew it was in response to the earlier comment about there being only three ‘bitches’ in the area.
I smirked as the man in the red shirt’s eyes went wide. The entire group glanced around as they tried to figure out where the sniper’s voice had come from. Fear flashed across their eyes, then, and I couldn’t help but be a bit cocky about the situation.
“Oh, yeah,” I said with a small shrug. “That’s my sniper.”
“I see how it is,” Robby growled, and he grew a bit more confident as he leveled his gun at my head once more. “You lure a bunch of people here so you can put a sniper on us. If I hadn’t pulled my heat, then we’d all be dead by now.”
In this instance I assumed that heat referred to his weapon, though I thought that sounded absolutely ridiculous. I never did understand slang, though.
“For real,” the guy in the red shirt said. “Fuck him up, Robby. He’s a fuckin’ pussy, hidin’ people n’ shit just to try and fuck us over.”
I wouldn’t bother explaining to them that I hadn’t brought anybody there in order to kill them, or the fact that it was specifically assholes like them as to why we needed Bailey in the first place. They wouldn’t understand, so there was no point. And even if they did understand, it didn’t fit their narrative, so there was no way they’d accept it. They were only blaming it on me so that they could feel more justified in their own shitty actions.
Robby obviously didn’t know what to do at that point. He kept his eyes narrowed on me, but he hadn’t made a move in well over a minute.
“Man, fuck this,” red shirt said when Robby didn’t respond to him.
The man reached to pull a pistol from the front of his pants, but this time it was out in the open and clear what he was doing, and Bailey didn’t disappoint. The blonde fired a round, and the man’s head exploded like a melon.
Blood and brains splattered onto the men around him, and a few drops landed down by my feet.
“What the fuck?” one of the men screamed while the others cried out in a general uproar.
“Get your guns out--” Robby yelled as he glanced back around at his men.
He’d done so well at maintaining eye contact with me that whole time, but now that he had lost the staring game it was time to take him out. I took that opportunity to let off a round from my M9, and it burst through his skull so he fell forward as more blood splattered on the four remaining men.
They all scrambled to grab their weapons, and one of them tried to run away, but none of them were quick enough.
Tara took out a younger guy with baggy jeans and a blue shirt that said something about a volcom stone. He went down with a quick shot through the neck, and since the men all stood closely together, he fell against his companions.
The guy he’d fallen into screamed and tried to shove him off, but Anna let off a round and the man went down with a bullet to the temple, and he and his friend both tumbled to the ground.
The one that tried to run was headed for the fence. The barrier around King’s Garden was well over six feet high, though, and there wasn't anything to grab onto aside from plants, so I wasn't sure what his plan was. If he was planning on trying to hop the fence then he’d soon be disappointed.
It didn't matter either way, though, because Bailey let off a second round that landed on the left side of his head and pushed him over onto the ground. His body fell to the right with some good force behind it, and he landed in an unnatural position with his leg bent underneath him and his head cocked back in a distorted and disgusting way.
Paige took out the last guy in the group. He was scrambling to find his weapon, or any weapon really, but he hadn’t quite managed. The brunette let off a round that landed in the dark haired guy’s chest, and then another that went straight through his nose.
Paige wasn’t the best shot we had, but she was efficient, and her target now laid on the ground with the others.
“Clear,” I said, and I looked around proudly at the girls as I holstered my pistol.
I stared down at the group of dead men in front of me. Most of them were fairly young, about the girls’ ages. Most often it was sad to see someone so young lose their life, but I had no sympathy for this group of assholes. I was sure that we weren’t the first people they’d done this to. They’d probably survived on the backs of others and that just didn’t sit right with me. There was no room for that in the new world order, and it wouldn’t continue, not if I could help it.
We’d run into too many people with that same mentality already, and honestly, there was no way we could have let them leave, even if they tried to walk away after that. Not only had they threatened everyone around, but they knew too much about where part of our group lived, and I wouldn’t have trusted them to have left alive. They’d already proven how incredibly stupid and selfish they were. There was no way I’d risk the lives of my citizens or Renee’s citizens by allowing them to leave.
“Should we call everyone back in?” Anna asked.
“I don’t think so,” I said with one last glance at the pile of bodies in front of me. “Let’s move this outside. Bailey, you can come down.”
I didn’t think the civilians or cadets needed to see the pile of bodies that were left in here.
“Okay,” the blonde said, and a second later she handed her rifle down to Paige, then hopped off of the top of the fence.
“Good job,” I told the girls with a smile.
“I should have taken out that Robby guy earlier,” Bailey said, and she bit her lip. “I didn’t realize he had a gun in his pants.”
“I know,” I told her. “It’s okay. I saw it happening, and I knew that you had us covered. We handled it.”
“Okay,” the blonde said with a large sigh. “I just don’t like getting caught off guard like that. I feel like a failure.”
“You’re not a failure,” I said sternly, and I put my hand on her shoulder until she looked up at me. “You couldn't have known that he had a hidden gun.”
“Right,” Paige agreed. “Besides, he turned away from where you were when he pulled it out.”
“Yeah, I didn’t even see it until he had it in his hand,” Tara said. “And I was closest to him post wise.”
“Plus, we got it taken care of,” Anna reminded her with a smile. “We’re a team.”
“You’re right,” Bailey said, and a small smile came to her face. “Thanks guys.”
I couldn’t stand to see the blonde unhappy, but I had known that she was going to be disappointed in herself for that one, so I had mentally prepared myself for it. Still, it didn’t make the look on her face any less depressing. She was my sweet, kind girl, and it never felt good to see her upset.
I smiled once more at the blonde, then I led our small group out the gate and over to the group of newcomers that had shown up.
“Tav,” Renee said, and she walked to me with eyes full of concern. “Is everything okay?”
“It’s fine,” I assured her, then I raised my voice so the rest of the group could hear. “I’m sorry you all had to witness that. The men inside have been dealt with.”
I wanted to see the reactions of the others. I trusted the people that were left to not try anything like that, but I wanted to see if they approved or disapproved of our actions. If they weren’t willing to kill for those around them, those that were part of their community, then they probably wouldn’t make great allies. We could still do trades with them and things like that, but if that was the case then I’d know not to rely on them in the upcoming war.
“Glad you took care of them,” Ben, the veteran with the preppers, said as he walked over and shook my hand. “I was about to take out that asshole myself.”
“I saw that,” I chuckled. “I’m glad you and Johnny followed my signal.”
“It was hard,” Johnny, the preppers’ leader said. “We had been worried about people like that when we came to this meeting.”
“Everyone should have been.” I nodded. “There’s too many people like that out there nowadays.”
“They think everything belongs to them,” Jesse said with a shake of his head that caused his dreads to move back and forth.
“You all are off the grid, I imagine?” I asked.
“That’s right,” Johnny agreed with a nod.
“Have you been under attack at home?” I asked. “I’m only curious if where you stay is safe or not.”
“It’s plenty safe,” Ben assured me with a small smile. He could tell that I was genuinely concerned.
“We have run into a few assholes out on runs, though,” Jesse said. “They get worse every time.”
“For a while everyone we ran into seemed to be on speed or something,” Johnny said with a shake of his head. “I don’t know where the hell they were getting it, or if they were making it or what, but those sonsabitches were no joke.”
“We took care of them,” Tara informed them.
“What do you mean you took care of them?” Jesse asked, and he narrowed his eyes on the platinum blonde.
“Yeah,” Anna agreed. “We took out their posts. There shouldn’t be any more of them around.”
“Wow,” the dark skinned man replied. “That’s impressive.”
“Speaking of impressive,” Michael, the Cadet leader, said as he worked his way into the circle. He and the other two cadets had been standing nearby with wide grins on their faces, just waiting for an opportunity to speak.
“That was awesome,” Missy, the short haired brunette, said, and she almost sounded like a fangirl.
“Yeah,” Omar added, and he looked at the girls. “Are you all Army, too?”
“Where did you serve?” Missy blurted.
“Yeah, what branch?” Michael pushed.
“Oh, uh, nowhere,” Anna said, and she was clearly uncomfortable with all the flattery.
“What?” Missy asked. “Your guys’ aim was spot on.”
“Yours especially,” Michael said as he turned to Bailey. “And you were hidden so well, I wouldn’t even have known you were there!”
“Speaking of that,” Johnny said, and he looked at me with a raised eyebrow.
“Sorry about that,” I apologized. “It was strictly for cases like Robby and his goons. We had no negative intentions.”
“Oh, of course not,” Michael said, as if I’d been talking to him, then he turned back to Bailey. “So, if you’re not military, then where’d you learn to shoot?”
“Oh, um, Tav taught us all,” Bailey said, and her face was beet red with embarrassment.
“You did all their training?” Missy asked me.
“I did,” I chuckled.
“When did you meet them?” Omar asked.
“Yeah, how long have you been training them?” Michael pushed.
“Can you train us, too?” Missy asked.
“Alright, alright,” Renee laughed and stepped up next to me. “I’m sure that everyone is a bit excited after what just happened. It seems like we have a pretty good group here now. Why don’t we head inside the fort? We can get some water and something to eat.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Johnny said politely. “But we rely on ourselves for food and water. We won’t take from you, but we’d love to set up a trade for the future.”
“Nobody’s called me ma’am in a long time,” Renee said, and a smirk came to her face. “But if you want to discuss this trade, then I suggest you come inside and at least get cool for a second. I’ll trade you some refreshments for some of that prepper wisdom. Deal?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Johnny replied with a smile.
The two of them seemed to be flirting subtly, and I watched with amusement as Johnny followed Renee back toward the fort. She was a good looking woman, and he wasn’t too bad himself. All of the preppers seemed like decent men, too, so I figured there was no harm in a little flirting at the moment. Not as long as it didn’t affect our dealings with the group.
“Come on,” Michael told the family that they had brought with them, and they started to walk toward the fort.
The mother looked back at me, and I smiled in return. She still seemed scared, but I thought that some food and water would do her some good. It had to be hard to have children out in this kind of predicament, and I felt for her and her husband. They were clearly survivors, but they also didn’t have much survival knowledge. If they had, then the Cadets wouldn’t have said that they were seeking food and shelter.
Granted, the children with them appeared to be teenagers, but anytime someone had to put their kid through a difficult situation it had to be hard on them as a parent. The family was even dirtier than the preppers, and I was sure that they didn’t shower too regularly. It had to have been a hard walk from Boston, and I felt bad for them. It was somewhat cool to see a family push through all the trials they had and come out on the other side, though.
I followed Renee and the rest of the group over to the fort, but the girls and I hung back slightly so we could keep an eye on everyone.
“While we’re just walking here,” Tara said, and she turned to all of us with a wide grin. “I’d just like to point out that I totally called this.”
“I knew you were going to bring that up,” Anna chuckled and rolled her eyes.
“Duh,” Tara said.
“You did call it,” Bailey agreed with a nod.
“It was pretty cliche that those were the bad guys, though,” Paige said with a shake of her head.
“What do you mean?” Bailey asked. “They’re not exactly who I picture when I think of bad guys.”
“No?” Anna asked, then she shrugged slightly.
“You thought that, too?” the blonde asked.
“Well, yeah,” the redhead replied. “Not bad guys like villains in a movie or anything, but they were clearly assholes.”
“Fuckboys,” Tara added.
“Fuckboys?” Bailey asked, and her blonde eyebrows pinched together.
“Yes, exactly,” Paige agreed. “They were total fuckboys.”
“What’s a fuckboy?” Bailey asked.
“I’m not sure I’m familiar with that, either,” I chuckled.
“You know,” Tara said, “like, guys that will be super sweet until they sleep with you, and then they just turn into dicks.”
“Right,” Anna agreed with a nod. “Or they just string you along forever, but they’re really talking to ten other girls, too.”
“Sounds just like a regular douchebag,” I said curiously.
