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Aw shit, Coral thought as she turned her head to look behind her. There were two of them, a man and a woman. He had a rifle in his hands and she had a handgun in a holster. Her jacket was open showing it, and her hand rested on the butt, but she hadn’t drawn it. Yet.
“I’m in the middle of something,” Coral said, surprised at how calm her voice was. Benjamin’s muscles were tensed under her hand.
“We see that,” said the woman. “You a doctor?”
“Something like that,” Benjamin said.
The woman moved closer. The man said, his tone tense, “Kathy. Be careful.”
“I’m careful,” she said. She stopped six feet away and bent to look at Benjamin’s arm. “That’s a bullet wound?”
“Rifle,” said Benjamin. “Maybe from that one there.” He jerked his head toward his own rifle.
The man spoke. “You don’t know?”
“No, not exactly.”
Coral said, “We were escaping this crazy cult. They almost caught us. The gun was theirs.”
The woman nodded. She was a tiny thing, only five feet tall, if that. “There’s been some of that, I know. Cults.”
Coral began to think she might not be shot in the next few minutes. The woman seemed normal, as much as any human being she’d run into—at least since she’d met Benjamin half a year earlier. “Can I finish what I’m doing here?” she said.
“Okay,” said the woman. Kathy.
“Don’t make any sudden moves,” said the man.
Coral turned back to the syringe and loaded it up again. Once again, she shot it into the wound. Another clot was dislodged, and blood flowed quickly, dark and normal looking. “Looking better,” she said to Benjamin.
He was watching the people with the guns, and Coral knew he wanted to do something about it, could feel the bottled energy in his quivering arm, could almost smell the controlled anger coming off him. “One more time,” she said. If he was going to do something brave and crazy, she was giving him a time frame for it.
She loaded the syringe again and irrigated the wound one more time. Benjamin stayed where he was. Without turning to look at the strangers, she said, “You guys wouldn’t have a sterile bandage on you, would you?”
“Not here,” Kathy said, as the man said. “No.”
Coral sensed them engaging in some sort of non-verbal communication back there. They were deciding about her and Benjamin. Trust us? Kill us? Coral didn’t know what their options were, but whatever they decided was beyond her control. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to sound sane and calm and friendly for now. She could always escalate to violence later—and if Benjamin did, she would join him. “Okay, so I’m reaching for these bandages on that rock there. Don’t be alarmed.” She took one of the clean strips of bandage and dabbed at the blood running down Benjamin’s arm. Going for a second bandage, this one still slightly damp, she tied it around the wound. She felt him flinch. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. Does it feel better or worse now?”
“It’s fine.”
“You’ll have to put on your old shirt for now. I don’t think the other is dry yet.”
“Wait,” said the man. “Kathy, check him for weapons.”
“I have a pocket knife, right there on the rock,” said Coral, figuring they’d already seen it. Her pointing it out would make her seem less a threat.
Kathy circled the two of them, always leaving a clear shot for the man, and picked up Benjamin’s shirt, checking the pockets. She patted his jacket too, and had him turn out his jeans pockets, then motioned Coral to stand.
“Slowly,” said the man.
Coral stood, her arms well out, and let the woman pat her down. Benjamin was still seated, pulling on his shirt and buttoning it.
“Where’s your gear?” said the man.
Benjamin said, “We don’t have much.”
“I asked where it is,” said the man.
Coral looked at him. “I’m Coral. That’s Benjamin. I know Kathy. What’s your name, though?”
It took him a few seconds, but he finally said, “Martin.” He was younger than the woman, Coral thought, and despite a thick blond beard, looked no older than Coral herself.
“Martin,” she acknowledged, as Kathy completed her pat-down and moved out of reach. “Well, Martin, we’ve lost gear twice. I’m sure you know this, but there are some dangerous people out there.”
“We know it.”
“I’m sure you’ve lost gear too.”
He shook his head.
Why not? She tried to figure out a way to weasel more information from him, but she was trying to think of too much at once. Benjamin’s arm. Escaping another bad situation before it got worse. Where the rifle was. Where the hatchet was. What Benjamin was about to do, and what she should do to the woman if Benjamin made a move for the man. Go for her gun? Grab her to use as a shield?
Kathy picked up their rifle and deftly unloaded it, tucking the ammo in her pocket.
Another rifle lost. Coral was tired of this. She was tired of fighting other people. She was tired of the struggle to keep what was hers. And she was underfed and physically tired. “Look,” she said. “If you take my fishing gear too—pitiful as it is—we’re going to die. We’re damned close to it now. So if you plan to do that, just put a bullet in my brain now, would you?”
The woman shook her head. “We’re not going to kill you.”
“Nor will I be used as a whore,” said Coral.
Kathy’s eyebrows shot up, as if she’d never heard of such a thing. “We wouldn’t do that, either.”
“Huh,” Coral said, making her skepticism clear in her tone.
“We’re—” Kathy looked at Martin. “We’ll talk about it later. We need to get going, Martin. Light’s fading.”
“Yeah,” Martin said. “Where’s your other gear? You need to bring it along.”
Benjamin was thinking over the situation, weighing his chances. Coral could almost read his mind as he decided there was nothing to do but go along with these people. “In there,” he finally said, nodding his head toward entrance to the snow cave. He was cradling his bad arm by the elbow.
While Kathy crawled into the snow cave and began pitching their gear out, Coral exchanged a look with Benjamin. He shrugged.
“I know,” she said, agreeing that for now, their best option was to cooperate. “Is your arm that bad?”
“It’s fine,” he said, letting it drop to his side, but slowly. She could tell it was tender.
She turned to Martin. “Can I make him a sling with that shirt hanging over there?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Thank you,” she said. She had to tie the shirt around herself first to figure out how to convert it to a sling, and then, with another nod of permission from Martin, she went to Benjamin and slipped it around his neck.
“I don’t need it,” he grumbled.
“I know,” she said, but she kept adjusting the sling for his height. “There. Try walking a few steps.”
Martin’s rifle, which had sagged, came back up.
Grimacing, Benjamin walked a few steps, turned around, and walked back. “It’s fine, but—”
“I know. You don’t need it,” said Coral. “So you’ll humor me by wearing it, so I don’t throw a tantrum.”
That earned her half a smile. It made her feel better, despite the situation they were in with these strangers.
She looked at Martin. “Can I roll up my sleeping bag, or are you going to take that away from me too?” Kathy had already pocketed her knife.
“Shake it out first, so I can see if there’s anything hidden in there.”
Coral did as he said and then rolled up her bag and tied it snugly. She slung it over her shoulders. “I assume you’re taking us somewhere.” Their compound or lair or whatever. Another trap?
Kathy emerged from the snow cave, pushing the last of their gear ahead of her and holding to their hatchet. “Burlap sacks, huh? Go on and pack them.”
“I had a nice backpack, once,” said Coral. “The cultists did something with it.”
“When you say cult, are you talking polygamous Mormons or...?” Kathy said.
“They weren’t polygamous, and they weren’t Mormons, unless I’m very confused about what that is,” said Coral. And that was possible. She’d never met a Mormon before, as far as she knew. “This was some weird UFO end-of-the-world thing. Totally crazy, no offense if that’s your deal too.”
“I’m a Methodist,” said Kathy. “Lapsed, I guess.”
Which struck Coral as funny, that in the post-Event world, someone still identified themselves that way. Sounded safer than alien baby-breeders, though.
Benjamin had made short work of his share of the packing. He stood and pointed at the burlap sacks. “Do you want us to carry them?”
“I’ll take the heavy one,” Coral said, reaching for it.
“No,” said Benjamin. “I’ll get it.”
“You’ve done more than your share this past couple weeks. And remember your arm,” she said.
“Let Coral take hers. I’ll take the heavier sack,” said Kathy. “You can baby that arm.”
Wrong word to use, baby. Benjamin scowled at it like a six-year-old kid being told he was a baby.
That told her, as much as anything, that he must be hurting. “Did I make it worse?” she said.
“I’m fine,” he said. But within a few steps, he put his arm back in the sling.
Martin was no fool about positioning himself well behind the rest of them. Benjamin went first, then Coral, then a space of eight or ten feet, and Kathy. Martin brought up the rear and directed Benjamin to follow the newcomers’ tracks back toward the west. The sun was a barely-lighter patch in the sky as they walked toward it for nearly an hour.
Coral was surprised at herself for how calmly she was acting. Inside, she was angry, and frightened, and barely holding herself back from attacking the superior force, unwise as that would be. Somehow, despite her inner turmoil, she was keeping it together and pretending to be a meek and obedient prisoner.
She knew she was physically weak, and Benjamin’s arm would limit what he could do in an attack. If they were to free themselves of their captors, it would have to be through wile, not direct force. If they were to free themselves, they needed their rifle, and the hatchet, and her knife back too. Without those, the odds against their survival skyrocketed.
For now, Coral could bide her time.
