Cannibals

Chapter 17

~~~ Derc's P.O.V. ~~~

Lailah and Hillman walked close behind as we searched for a new hideout and our next meal. Though we still had plenty of leftover meat, I needed to make sure the two of them could kill and show no remorse.

"This way," Erick said quietly.

He pointed to a group of trees and bushes that we could hide behind. The four of us sat and took cover. I knew it would probably be a while before anyone passed so I decided to just rest. I sat back against a tree and fell asleep. After what only felt like seconds of sleep, Erick was tapping me on my shoulder. As I turned my head to see what Erick was pointing at I realized I had been asleep much longer than a few seconds. My entire body was stiff and ached and that made my burns flair into pain.

Erick was pointing off in the distance. I didn't see anyone, but I could hear voices coming from that direction. They were walking this way. Everyone pulled their knives out. Erick and I had positioned ourselves behind Lailah and Hillman. As the voices came closer, I was about to start whispering instructions, but what I saw on Hillman and Lailah's faces made me stop.

They looked ready. They looked like they'd done it a million times. They looked like they wanted to kill. So I sat back to watch how they'd react when the people came close. They were already in sight. The dark, tall man was laughing at something the short, rainbow haired woman had said. They were walking hand in hand and each had a backpack that looked to be full of supplies.

The moment the two of them passed where we were hiding, Lailah and Hillman jumped into action. Lailah was quick and just slit the woman's throat. Hillman on the other hand went berserk and stabbed and stabbed and stabbed at the man. He was dead after the third or fourth stab to the back but that didn't stop Hillman. That was exactly what I wanted to see.

~~~ Seth's P.O.V. ~~~

We stopped when we saw all the blood. It was everywhere! The street, the trees, the bushes. It looked like Derc's handy work. It was a bad sign. Derc's rage only seemed to be growing. And that made this trip even riskier. But we had to keep going. We needed to check the gates of the quarantine. I looked at the map and decided we'd press forward.

Every now and then we'd spot a piece of paper with a message about a food drop that had happened. We needed to see if maybe they still had food. And if there was any way of contacting families outside of the quarantine gates. I didn't like that the blood continued in the direction we needed to go though. Hopefully we didn't run into Derc. And hopefully the group I had with me had no trouble dealing with Derc either.

~~~ Marissa's P.O.V. ~~~

Seth and a small group of ours went out to search the gates. The rest of us stayed back. Alex didn't like the idea. He felt it should have been a bigger group. Also not everyone in his group has had a lot of training with weapons. There were only four remaining survivors not from our original group. But Seth insisted that it was a good way to get them motivated and a good way to train. He'd taken everyone who wasn't in our original group but Zachary, who had sketched out defenses and traps to put around the school.

We had found more walkie talkies on one of our supply runs. Arianna made sure Seth left promising to radio back every so often to check in. I could tell it worried her any time someone walked out the school doors. But we needed to get home to our families soon. Also, it didn't seem like any help from outside would be coming so we needed to get out ourselves.