Page 156 of Hell Hath No Fury

“Okay, okay.” Ryker shot a thumb into the air. “But I’m not doing it.”

I turned my attention back to Bobby.

“You don’t gotta do this! C’mon, I’m a good guy. A decent guy. This place, think about it… You wouldn’t have a home if it weren’t for me,” Bobby pleaded.

“If it weren’t for your parents,” I corrected him, inching closer.

“But who’s been running this place for the past few years, huh?”

“Running it into the ground.” I pulled Mr. Malcolm’s knife out of my pocket, revealed the blade, and inched closer still.

He stood and kicked a leg at me as he started backing away. Kammie manuevered behind him, raising the rifle.

“I’ve got this one,” I said. “May as well save the ammo.” My lips curled up into an evil grin. Of course, I wasn’t planning on killing him. I just wanted to scare him, wanted to make sure he never thought about coming back here, never thought about touching me ever again.

But he kicked at me once more and then charged back toward Kammie who shoved the muzzle of the rifle into his stomach. He grabbed the muzzle and ripped the rifle from Kammie’s hands before she could recognize what was happening, sending several errant rounds into the lockers.

I ducked, taken back by the vicious, piercing sound of the gunfire. As I realized he was maintaining control of the rifle, I instinctively raced to his position and shoved the blade into his gut. He grunted, his eyes trailing slowly to me. He seemed to not quite understand what had just transpired. I didn’t give him the opportunity to react. I pulled the blade out with a jerk before thrusting it in again and again until some of his innards began spilling out of his abdomen. He gasped, dropping the rifle to the ground with a clatter, and Kammie quickly regained possession of it.

I lifted the knife high above my head and stabbed it down into his chest, into his heart. He groaned, dropping to his knees as blood drained from his lips. I tried to pull the knife back out, but it was lodged in his ribcage. He momentarily looked at me, his eyes pleading with me, his tied hands reaching out, before he fell face first into the floor, driving the knife in further.

I scanned the room until I found the brick on the floor and retrieved it. I then made my way over to Bobby’s twitching body. I had been overwhelmed by a flurry of rage and desperation, survival instinct guiding me, but with each stab, it became more personal, more fulfilling.

I lifted the brick over my head. “This is for Dr. McCormick, motherfucker.” There was a whack sound when I slammed thebrick as hard as I could against the back of Bobby’s skull. He made the slightest squeal, but another swift hit with the brick silenced him. Despite my arms feeling numb, weak, I forced myself to continue until the sound morphed into a thud then a squelch when the brick connected with his skull. I bashed his skull in until there was nothing left but shards of bone, hunks of brain matter, and the blood-soaked brick.

After throwing up, far away from the others so they wouldn’t know what my first killing really did to me, with much effort, the five of us dragged his body to the treeline and left him in the woods to be eaten by wildlife. Left him to become animal shit. I was bothered by how easily killing had come for me. How alive it made me feel to dispose of such a toxic waste of flesh and bones. The ability to kill must’ve been inside of me all along. Despite my post-killing vomit session, I knew it when the blade pierced his flesh. I knew it when I saw what they did to Doc. It came alive inside of me then, a raging fire never to be put out again. If I’m being honest with myself, I knew it back when I was being abused in foster care … when I would go to sleep imagining all the horrible things I’d like to do to my abusers, imagining a glorious reckoning of carnage and vengeance.

CHAPTER SIX

One month later

The police never came. Nor did any politicians. No FEMA. No non-profits. Only those desperate individuals looking for something, needing something. Food, water, sex. When it happened, we would try to scare them off. A few of them were killed and dragged into the treeline. I had gotten good at killing. No more vomit. Eventually, I began to enjoy the power it filled me with to see someone threatening me, threatening the children now in my care go tumbling into a heaping pile of dead humans. It would occur far more often in the coming months, but that first month, I had only been forced to take out a few, and they were the ones who no longer feared death, no longer feared being arrested for their sadistic urges. In this new world, they were predators, and we were the prey. Only we weren’t prey, we’d never be prey. Not if I had any say about it.

The electricity never came back on either, meaning neither did the water, the gas, the cars. Kammie and I went out once, past the gates of the campus in hopes of finding someone to help. The roads were desolate, empty. Houses and businesses were burned out and looted. And then we saw them, bivouacked in an abandoned gas station… Soldiers with Russian patches on their shoulders. They were resting, hadn’t seen us before we hightailed it out of there. On the way back, we saw the three of them in front of a bombed-out house—the Harrison brothers. The only way I could tell it was them was by the tattered clothes on their charred bodies. And when we arrived back at thegymnasium, we decided we wouldn’t be venturing out again. Not unless our lives depended on it. We knew the Russians wouldn’t think twice about killing some kids. Potentially other terrible things before we were put down. And we wouldn’t be telling anyone else about the Harrison brothers. They didn’t need to know, to live with the knowledge of just how easily it could be to die in that new world.

It was just us. We were left to fend for ourselves. Nine children. Well, eight if we’re counting me as an adult. I had just turned eighteen after all.

After constant bickering, infighting, and temper tantrums, we all agreed to move back into the residential building, into our own rooms, so we’d have our own space … sort of.

We moved everyone into the five rooms closest to the entrance so that we couldn’t be trapped. Reluctantly, the four of us eldest kids, myself, Monica, Kammie, and Juliana took four rooms in either corner with the younger kids in the rooms between us. Kammie and I took the rooms closest to the main entrance, across the hall from each other, while Juliana and Monica took the two on the opposite end.

By that point, one month after the EMP hit and the country went to hell, we had picked the Carvill’s home clean. Most valuable of what we’d taken was food, clothes and blankets, but we’d procured practically everything we could find, and depending on how old, date didn’t much matter either. Eventually, we decided to take absolutely everything, and we stripped it clean of all its wood for fires. I don’t know why we didn’t just stay in their house, saving ourselves much time and effort. Maybe it’s because that residential hall was the only home most of us ever knew. Maybe with the world burning around us, a little familiarity went a long way.

We raided the administrative building too. Mainly, the rec room. We got all the board games, puzzles, toys, books, andmagazines. We got bicycles, different types of sports balls, and some measly workout equipment from the shed behind the gym. Anything to help us keep the kids entertained. Kids who, just one month before, relied mostly on electronics for survival.

We also grabbed notebooks and pens from the administrative building for journaling or drawing. Found some candy and a few snacks in several of the teachers’ desks, and a liter of vodka in Mr. Mejia’s classroom closet. Even though I’d never drank alcohol before that point, I stuffed the bottle into my duffel bag without anyone noticing. I’d share it with the other older kids, of course, but I at least wanted to be the one distributing it. I still didn’t trust them then, no one except Monica. And I knew we’d need it eventually, when the younger children began changing, worsening, revolting. We would need it for some wounds too, when the alcohol from the nurse’s office ran out.

Speaking of the nurse’s office, we took anything there that wasn’t bolted down. All of it would be useful if our isolation lasted much longer, if tragedy struck…

What many non-Floridians don’t know is that it can get quite cold in the wintertime, especially when you’re near the water. The chilly air penetrated the exterior and guts of the old building with considerable ease in December, leaving lots of whiny children with thinned out Florida blood. We had agreed to make fire pits made out of old, metal trash cans in rooms diagonal from each other, in mine, and in Monica’s. Hannah and Star stayed with me and the twins with Monica. We left windows cracked open for ventilation, and it seemed to quell their crying enough. More than a dozen blankets and layers of jackets ever did.

One particularly cold night, I was awoken by what sounded like screams … distant, muffled. My fire pit was still blazing, keeping the twins just across the room from me toasty and content, cuddled up with each other and still sleeping. I openedmy door and stepped out, acknowledging Kammie for a moment who stood at her own doorway, half-asleep.

Ryker also appeared at his door as I investigated the noises.

“Ashe, what’s going on?”

“Ryker, you need to gra—” Before I could finish my sentence, a tongue of fire darted out from the bottom crack of the door two rooms down, Monica’s room. We heard the scream again. Her scream.