Anarchy, Burning(ONC2022 Entry)

Part 19- Fryga

Fryga Olsen jolts to wakefulness at the sound of a thunderous explosion. Head aching, she unfastens her seatbelt and forces the driver's side door open. Stumbling out, she breathes in a lungful of dust and doubles over. She coughs violently and tries to get her bearings. An apartment building explodes, sending glass and debris flying in every direction. The smell of burning rubber fills her nostrils. Through watery eyes, she sees the bodies slumped in the van.

It all comes back to her: The boat, the bridge, the bodies. The invasion, the hellspurs. Maria, Amelia, Emily and Elijah. She goes to the van's side door and pulls on the handle. It doesn't budge. She knocks on the glass.

"Wake up," she grumbles.

"Hey, do you need help?" a cautious bass voice asks.

Fryga spins around, hellfire bubbling under her skin. A handsome black man and a young Asian kid stand behind her, hands raised. They are covered in soot. The boy looks harmless, scared. The man has a shotgun slung over his shoulder by a strap. Behind them are others, beat down and tired.

"Stay the fuck back," Fryga growls.

"We just want to help, lady."

"You heard me." Spikes begin to break the surface of her skin, tiny barbs meant to scare them away. She can't afford to fully shift with nowhere to rest afterwards.

"Careful. This one is feisty." This time the voice is that of a southern gentlewoman.

"Your fucking possessed! Stay back, you might be contagious." One of the strangers chuckled.

"Look, there's safety in numbers and we can all use safe harbor."

An explosion rocks the street and half the block is lost in a shower of glass and stone. They all take cover as an abrasive cloud blows past, cutting and biting as it envelopes them. Fryga squeezes her eyes closed against the scraping cloud, but listens for any sound of the strangers trying to get to her van and its cargo.

They come out from cover as the cloud thins, but Fryga is distracted by a new sound. The sound of yelling. She turns to the van where silhouettes move behind dust-caked windows.

"Daddy, wake-up!"

"Elijah! Elijah!"

"Daddy," Fryga whispers as she turns to the van door, but she's not thinking about the desperate father whose boat saved her life. She thinks of the father who was never there for her, who beat her mom, whose grave she danced on. She tugs on the handle and the door groans, but doesn't budge. "Help."

Despite having their own wounded, the group of strangers don't hesitate to lend a hand. The woman with them, beautiful and brown, is the one who suggests going in through the rear door. They carefully remove the supplies, without giving them a second glance. Fryga wonders if they're just genuinely good people.

I've run into too many since the end of the world... makes my skin crawl.

"He's not breathing," Emily shouts, snapping Fryga out of her musings.

"Daddy!"

Maria jerks awake, her head and hair slick with blood and the glass from the windshield. Part of Fryga wants to go to her, the other still holds a grudge and knows you can't trust a cop.

"Do any of you know first aid?" she asks.

"I do," the brown beauty and the guy with the pistol says in tandem.

"Good. Can we move him?"

"We need to try," says the possessed guy. "The fighting is spreading this way."