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A knock at the door of her home startled her, but she kept her rifle steady. She quickly rechecked the chamber. Then she patted the pocket on her cooking apron. The bullets were still there.
Another knock, and she took a deep breath. She exhaled out of her mouth slowly and shuffled her feet so that they were shoulder-width apart. She knew that firing the gun could push her off balance. That was not an option.
Behind her, a timer sounded off. She didn’t budge. The casserole would have to burn.
“Ma’am!” a young man shouted from the outside. “Ma’am, this is the court official! We know that you are home! Can you please open the door? We don’t want to get a warrant, but we will if we must!”
“GO AWAY!” Willa shouted. The sharpness of her voice startled her. She couldn’t remember the last time she raised it.
“Ma’am, this is protocol.”
“This is mine,” she whispered.
“Ma’am, please. This is not proper!”
“If you do not leave my property,” Willa yelled. “I will shoot you in the head!” The knocking and the pleading ceased. She could hear the young man whispering to someone, discussing how to best deal with her. Willa instinctively, took a few steps to the right and away from the center of the door. If they decided to fire their rifles (if they had them), she would be out of the way.
“Mom!” Jacob shouted from the top of the stairs. “Just let me go!”
“NO!” Willa roared back at him. “YOU’RE NOT GOING!”
“Mom...I won’t let you get hurt.”
Willa looked back at her son. She tried to tell him to go back to his room, but her voice cracked. She began crying as she tried to find the words, which only made Jacob take another step down the stairs. Seeing him approach, she found her resolve again.
“Take another step and I’ll turn the gun on you,” Willa said softly. “Don’t test me.”
“Okay, okay,” Jacob said, holding up his hands. He did not go back up either.
Willa removed one hand from the rifle and wiped the tears from her eyes. Oh, how she loved that boy. He was so thoughtful, so kind and sweet. Every year he had gotten older, he had become more of a blessing. He would make her laugh when she was feeling down. He would make her dinner when she was stressed out over another job rejection letter. Sometimes...sometimes...he even made her forget about Carolyn.
“Go back upstairs,” Willa’s voice was hoarse. “I’ll let you know if you’re needed.”
“Mom, really quick. Listen, real quick. Mom, if you die...I won’t be able to survive. Okay? If you die over me, I will break. Okay, Mom? Please. We...we can visit each other.”
“Visit each other?” Willa said. “When? It’s forbidden. Until you are an adult...when you are an adult...you won’t want anything to do with me. You’ll forget all about me. You’ll be part of their culture then. You’ll be part of Comida.”
“Mom, I lost,” he said. “Mom...I lost, okay? These are the rules.”
“The lottery should be abolished.”
“Dad’s working on that.”
“Don’t bring him up!” Willa snapped. “He’s not here fighting for you, is he?!”
“No, but...”
“GET UPSTAIRS!” Willa shouted and Jacob scurried upstairs.
“Ma’am!” the court official shouted from outside. Willa craned her neck towards the back of the house. Did she hear someone in that direction?
“What is it?” Willa asked, raising her rifle and staring down the barrel.
“We will have to breach the house if you are unwilling to comply. We will do our best not to harm you, but if you insist on maintaining this course of action, we will make an example out of you. It is our hope, as fellow citizens of Musgrave, that we do not have to resort to those barbaric tactics.”
“The truth comes out,” Willa said. “You’re uncivilized, after all.”
“Ma’am, we said that we would talk.”
“You said nothing of talking, and you have no intention of doing so. You’re here to take away my son, as you did my daughter. I let her go then, because I was weak. I was too damn weak, but today, I will fight for him. I will atone for what I did to her. For what...” she grit her teeth as the tears returned. She growled under her breath and kept her sights focused down the barrel. “For what I did to her!” she continued. “I never should have let you take her!”
“Think about it, Ma’am. If Jacob goes to Comida, he can reunite with his sister. They will be under the same roof, even. He will still have family. Isn’t that a good thing? Carolyn...she’s alone, isn’t she?”
“She has a foster family,” Willa said. “But they are not her real family.”
“We can ensure that Jacob is given to the same one.”
“Why would you do that?” Willa asked.
“We don’t want any bloodshed,” the court official said. “We’re willing to negotiate.”
“It sounds good, Mom,” Jacob said.
Willa didn’t turn around, nor did she address him. “You don’t have the authority,” Willa said to the stranger outside.
“Yes, I do,” he said. “I am part of the court. I can make intercessions.”
“Write up a court order, have it signed by a judge and deliver it, then I will consider.”
“We have a schedule, Ma’am, and we cannot get a judge on short notice. How about we take Jacob and hold him? We won’t process him until the order is given to you.”
Willa looked back at her son. He nodded towards her, pleading for the situation to end. The moment she looked into his eyes; she had her answer.
“I can’t,” she whispered to Jacob.
“Mom, I want to go,” he pleaded.
“You’re lying.”
“No, no, I want to. I’m not fit for Musgrave anyways. I might be able to make a name for myself there.”
“Jacob, forgive me.”
“Mom, no!” Jacob shouted.
“Get back upstairs,” she said, turning towards the official and his guards outside. “You’ll understand when you’re older.”
She fired the rifle at the front door.
* * *
“WE’LL HAVE TO BREACH it quickly,” Willa said to Tristan on her left, as her thoughts fell on the present situation. She lay on her stomach atop a sand dune with the others of Expedition One. Max and his men, Rups and Scout, would approach from the front while they attacked the back, sending the wagons and carriages full of barrels and debris into the aluminum wall, hoping to push through shortly after. Willa’s plan was a standard drill that she had performed hundreds of times in Hearth—send in a distraction—ideally someone that the enemy knows—then break through the back to catch them off guard. Be swift, cautious, and thorough.
She had hoped that Momo would have changed her mind. She was certain that her prowess on the field would have guaranteed them a success, but she was unresponsive. When Willa approached her earlier, asking that she attend, the Great One sat on her hands and shook her head adamantly. She refused to speak.
Instead of Momo, Desmond had decided to come after all, which in Willa’s mind, put their situation in negative odds. He was right earlier—he was a liability and sure to make a mistake in the field, no matter how smart he appeared to be.
“You sure you want me to go crazy in there?” Amy asked to Willa’s right. “Just throw around stuff?”
“It will make them uneasy,” Willa said. “However, I do want you to be careful. If you are targeted, run out of there. We don’t know what kind of weapons they have.”
“I’ll be fine,” Amy laughed.
“I’m serious. You may have used some technique from Comida earlier, and it got us out of our situation, but this requires Hearth training to execute.”
“You think me throwing my face in sand and getting kicked in the face was a Comidian technique?”
“We don’t have time for your feelings, Amy,” Willa said flatly.
“This is true,” Desmond sighed. He was sitting a few yards behind them, per Willa’s orders.
“Can you lay down?” Willa snapped at him. “Someone might see you!”
“From back here?” he sighed, laying down on his belly. “There, are you satisfied?”
“We don’t have time for your feelings,” Willa said to him.
“I’ll follow your lead,” Tristan said. “Amy goes crazy. You’re there to take down any immediate threats. Got it. Sounds simple enough...but what about Desmond? What’s his role?”
“Lookout,” Willa muttered. “If reinforcements show up, then he’ll shout and let us know.”
“Would we be able to hear him through all the commotion?”
“It doesn’t matter, we’ll be fine.”
“Now who has feelings?” Desmond asked.
“Max and his men are approaching the front,” Willa said, pointing over the sand dune. The area they were about to breach had been mostly hollowed out, as if the Mercenaries had taken the time to dig out a camp for themselves. It formed a crude sand crater. However, based on the encroaching sand dunes rising on all sides, Willa suspected that a small storm would efficiently destroy their base of operations.
Their headquarters was a two-story farmhouse, comprised of several small rooms inside. The sides had small barns with stalls for the horses. The barn looked brand new, but the support beams weren’t erected properly. Some of them were sliding away from the ceiling which told Willa that it had been sloppily put together. The barns were probably added recently.
This brought up an interesting point. No matter how dumb they appeared to be—building a headquarters surrounded by sand and adding brand new barns without proper support—it did speak of their numbers and available technology. To move two barns, regardless of the shoddy craftmanship, meant they had the proper equipment to do so. They could not be underestimated.
Max didn’t know anything about them besides their name and reputation. Since he was still a kid, barely ten years old, his older sisters had shielded him from their dealings. Most of his knowledge of the world was passed down through bedtime stories and overheard conversations.
“Any hesitation?” Willa asked. She was not afraid, but they were not her. In her mind, they were still untested.
“No,” Tristan said. “Let’s take care of this. I’m ready to see what happens next.”
“Any chance this is a trap?” Amy asked. “Maybe one of us should have gone with Max to the front door.”
“I need you all.”
“What about Desmond?” Amy asked. “He could have gone.”
“No!” Willa said sharply. She sighed heavily and closed her eyes. “There is no need to put him in needless danger.”
“He’s an adult,” Amy said. “He can take care of himself.”
“No,” Willa said again. “It wouldn’t have worked. Talking won’t work here.”
* * *
THE COURT OFFICIAL shrieked like a banshee as the blast shredded away a part of the front door. The back door to the house slammed open. Willa could hear the remains of the door falling onto the neatly made-up kitchen table, all ready and set up for dinner. Now it was a mess, and this only made her more furious. She reloaded the rifle and stomped over to the kitchen. One of Musgrave’s armored guards was stepping over the mess he made. Willa readied her rifle and fired it at his head.
The bullet bounced off his steel helmet, but the force knocked him backwards into his partner. Willa began reloading the rifle as the front door slammed open. She sucked her teeth and was about to change targets when Jacob rushed down the stairs. He tackled the first guard through the door, even though the guard was armored. The guard barely budged. He threw Jacob to the side like a tissue.
Willa stuck the muzzle of the gun into the guard’s face. Since there were slits in the helmet, he would survive the blast, but his vision would certainly be gone.
“Helmet off,” she ordered. The guard hesitated and she sneered at him. “Have it your way,” she said, starting to pull at the trigger.
Jacob barely managed to tackle her to the ground, just as the rifle went off.
“JACOB!” she screamed at him as he scurried away from her.
“Mom, it’s over!” he said. A few more armored guards stepped into their home, waiting to assist their comrade.
“Is the court official okay?” one of the guards from the kitchen called out.
“Yes,” the young man said, “I’m okay.” He stepped past his men at the front of the house. Willa slowly reached out for her fallen rifle, but Jacob quickly snatched it away.
“Mom, let me say good-bye,” Jacob said. He turned to the court official as he stood to his feet. “I’ll go willingly. Let me say goodbye!”
“After what she did...” the court official began.
“Let me say goodbye or I’ll fight by her side!” Jacob gripped the rifle firmly.
“Fine,” the young man said. “Please make it quick, and hand over the weapon.”
Jacob threw the rifle into one of the guard’s arms and ran to his mother. Willa wrapped her arms around him and wept into his shoulder. She was furious with him for giving in, but this was no time to scold. It could be the last time she would see him.
“Find your sister,” Willa wept. “Take care of each other.”
“I will,” he cried. “I promise.”
“Don’t forget me,” she said. “We’ll see each other again someday.”
“I won’t forget,” he said.
“That’s enough,” the court official said. “It’s time to go.”
“You’ll always be my mom,” Jacob said. One of the armored guards pulled at the back of his collar, ripping him away from her. Willa reached out to him, but they began carrying him away like a prisoner, pulling at his arms and legs. Willa jumped to her feet and rushed the closest guard.
“Don’t treat him like that!” she screamed.
Someone punched her hard in the face.
