The Herd

Chapter 17

We sat around the table in The Room. The lights were off, the only visibility were courtesy of the monitor screens, and the illumination of the table. All of us, except Cameron and Luna, were inside eating our meals while we talked.
     Noah stood with a half eaten McDouble on the side accompanied by a large drink as he typed on a digital keyboard on the table. He had changed from what he was wearing earlier into some brown shorts, a black tee, and a camouflage hoodie.
     Damien changed into a white tank top, and orange shorts. He feasted on the rest of his fries, for his burger was already gone, and his Mountain Dew bottle sat on the table next to his feet as he tipped his chair and had his feet up on the table.
     Antonio sat while typing on another keyboard on the table screen with one hand as he held his drink in the other. The wrapper of his burger was rolled into a ball and sat on his side. He wore a blue tee and gray pants with his cowboy hat on the table, opposite from the burger wrapper over the keyboard.
     Kap sat while he ate his own burger with the fries sitting on the table. He wore his smiley-face pajama pants with no shirt except a green button-up, of which wasn't buttoned, but his new bandages covered his entire right bicep and shoulder along with most of his chest. His bandaged arm hung in its own little hammock, releasing stress of of his shoulder.
     James sat wearing his red jacket and jeans as he delicately tried to strip the cheese off of his burger since Noah forgot to order it without.
     I shared a meal with Catherine as we sat together on the table opposite to Noah. I wore a black t-shirt and my left shoulder had an ice pack strapped to it. An aching shoulder and a bad case of whiplash was all I gained from the car crash.
     Noah sighed and swiped his keyboard up the table. It changed and projected up a hologram of the Exterminator.
     "Ugh." Antonio groaned. "What about him? Forget him." He waved his hand like he was swatting away a fly. "We don't care, the Jocks are who we want now. They've gone way to far."
     "Agreed." Damien says. "We've been on bad terms for a long time, but they've never struck us head on before like that. Not that aggressively, and not that close to succeeding in killing any of us."
     "Well, we did kinda take their people." James said.
     "They tried to take you!" I chipped in.
     "None of it was planned." He replied, shrugging. "That was shit chance that they met us, and they took it. Same as we would have. What happened on the road was the Jocks trying to get their people back."
     "Are you really defending them?" Kap asks. "Saving them or not, you weren't there on the road. You didn't get hit by a fucking semi-truck!"
     "Yeah." I shook my head. "We want the Jocks."
     "I know." Noah said. "But the Exterminator," he points at the hologram. "is how we get them."
     "What does he have to do with them?" I asked.
     "For years we've been trying to find the Jocks." Noah points out. "We never succeeded. The Exterminator hired them to protect him. We get him, we get them."
     "And how do we do that?" Damien asks.
     "We found him once before." Antonio says.
     "And we'll find him again." Noah says. "The Exterminator is high on the gang hierarchy, but specifically on the drug selling and smuggling side of things. We poke a finger into his business and the ripples will reveal him."
     "What about Christian?" James asks. "He's deep in the drug business."
     "That's what I was thinking." Antonio said, nodding his head.
     "That's a good start." Noah said. "We ask him if he knows anything and we can run from there. Anyone know where to find him?"
     James sighs and mumbles to himself "What day is it?" as he looks at his watch. He looks back up and shrugs. "I know where he'll be tomorrow."
     "Good. You and I can go see him." Noah says.
     "Wait, how do you know?" Kap asks. "Someone into drugs?" He teases.
     "I don't take drugs, Kap." James says.
     I take the final bite of my burger and roll up the trash. "Okay," I said with food in my mouth, but Catherine slapped my shoulder. I held up a finger signaling them to wait while I chewed. I finished and swallowed. "What do we do right now? There's gotta be-"
     "We stay low." Noah cuts in. "We heal up. We rest. We prepare. The Jocks hit us on the way here, which means, they're closer to finding where we live then they have ever been. We show any more information than we can afford and we're toast."
     "What?" Kap interferes. "You can't really expect us to just sit here and-"
     "You," Noah says, pointing at Kap. "You especially need to stay here. You and Cameron are seriously wounded and need to heal."
     "But I want to help." Kap continued. "They almost killed me, and almost killed Kahu. I will not just sit on my ass and let you guys-"
     "I understand that." Noah says. "But we cannot risk letting you, Cameron, or Kahu on the field until we're sure you're okay to operate."
     "I'm fine." Kap insists.
     "With that arm, you probably can't throw a knife." Antonio kicks in.
     "That's why I have this arm." Kap flips him off with his left hand.
     "The answer is no." Noah says. "And that's final.
Kap raises his good arm in the air and cusses. "Fine. Whatever." He stands up and leaves the room with the rest of his meal in his arm stretcher like a grocery bag.
"That went well." I said.
"We have a lead," Antonio pointed out. "That's what matters."
"Well," Noah swiped his finger across the table and it shut off, turning black. "I think our business is done here."