The Messengers of Sanctuary

38 - Benjamin

Ben was having a pretty great day.

Well...no he was having a pretty great month. First of all he was still alive, if I didn't make that clear already. Second, the Canid had basically stopped interrupting their hunts at this point, at long last allowing them to cull the undead population to a significant degree.

Ben also couldn't help but think that those two facts were related, but at the moment he didn't really care. He sat beside Chrissy on the porch, watching as the first flakes of the season began to fall. It was early June so the snow was just on time.

"So you're not feeling weird at all?" She asked, it was a common enough question these days. Everyone had been prepared for Ben to turn into a zombie, but here he was, clearly still human...but with some changes.

Ben sighed, "I feel as normal as ever."

Chrissy leaned against him, "I hate this, I hate that we have more time but we have no way of knowing how long that'll be..." The small child in her arms began to whine and she sat up straight, muttering reassurances into his ear for a moment. "Perhaps it didn't take hold though. Maybe your system was able to fight it off?"

Ben nodded, looking up into the white sky as the flakes of snow lazily embraced gravity. "At this point though we could assume I'm immune? That would be cool." Chrissy gave him a flat look and he tried his best to look as innocent as possible, looking at her with wide eyes. "What? Maybe that's why the Canid stopped coming, it figured out I was immune or something and gave up?"

"Ben, we have no way of telling if you're truly immune." She held up Jackson, the kid squirming as he clearly wanted something. "Ben, you have a child. We aren't testing if you're immune."

He shrugged, looking away from her and back at the sky, it was so very white, perfect and pure. It felt like it was covering his wrongs in a layer of powder. That thought was unnerving, so he was about to go back to talking, but...well there was something up there? It was difficult to see but it seemed to be getting bigger as far as he could tell.

Ben got to his feet warily, examining it with concern. Was it some type of bomb? Who would drop a bomb in the middle of nowhere though? That made no sense.

Chrissy was watching him curiously, following his gaze to the thing falling from the sky, "It looks like some type of box? It's not falling very quickly though, perhaps a parachute?"

Ben frowned at it for a moment and then made a decision, "I'm going to check it out, it looks like it's going to land a bit off and I can warn you through the radio if it's something bad."

Chrissy looked like she was about to object, but instead she sighed, "Please be careful Ben."

He grinned at her, "Always."

---

Less than an hour later, Ben stood above a creature. He'd assumed she was a zombie at first from the red eyes, but once she spotted him, the eyes turned...golden with rage it seemed. She also moved faster than any zombie or human he'd ever seen, almost like the Canid given human form.

Ben didn't let that thought process continue, there was no way a human version of the Canid could be a good thing.

After she wounded him the battle was basically over, Ben had come to find that if he hurt anything with his blood, it would stop attacking soon afterward. This time was no different. Ben held his sword at the ready, standing above the kid monster, ready to take her head off.

And then he saw her eyes. They were still golden, an unnatural golden that glared up at him with contempt and barely restrained anger. There was a hint of sadness too, as if whatever soul was inside this creature was resigned to this fate.