I must have zoned out for the rest of the ride back. I didn’t know what became of the pile of bodies, nor what happened with Cam. All I remembered clearly was walking back to my seat. From that point forward it was all a blur, until now. We pulled up to the guard gate, and upon seeing Lucas the guy from Jake’s team waved us through. Lucas pulled the truck up close to the front doors, where Alex and June were waiting. They’d likely been alerted by Jake that someone was coming.

Alex came around to my side, and opened the door for me, extending a hand to help me jump down from the raised seat. He had a smile on his face and asked something about how it went. Upon seeing my dazed expression the smile faded from his face, and was replaced by concern.

“What?” I asked, realizing I missed a question.

“Are you okay? What happened?” he asked frantically, scanning me up and down like he was checking for injuries.

I nodded and accepted his hand, sliding out of the truck. I turned to grab the bag of medicine from the floorboard and presented it to him weakly. I tried to produce a smile, but it didn’t reach my eyes, and did nothing to relieve his concern.

“Seriously Angel what’s going on? You’re scaring me,” Alex pleaded with me as I tried to wipe the blank look off my face.

Lucas came around the truck to our side. His face was red with anger. “You wanna help me deal with this?” he asked Alex, sounding impatient.

Alex nodded, still lost as to what was unfolding, and followed Lucas to the back of the truck. I numbly followed behind them, keeping my distance. Lucas threw open the back doors. Inside were three more bodies that needed to be disposed of in the morgue that was so kindly provided at the facility. They were shoved to the side, far away from the supplies. Between the supplies and the pile of bodies was Cam. She lied there, handcuffed yet again and her face was stained with tears.

“Dude what the fuck happened?” Alex asked Lucas with wide eyes.

“She happened!” he screamed back, gesturing wildly at Cam.

Lucas recounted the events to Alex, June, and Isabelle, who had taken note of the commotion and gathered around after sending everyone else back inside. I remembered the first half of his story clearly. He had a different perspective, but like mine it seemed to play out in slow motion as he described the events in painstaking detail. He weaved his tale of a girl gone mad with rage, and of a girl frozen on the ground. He recounted the brutal and unnecessary killing of the three men that could’ve easily ended in him or I being killed instead.

Then he got to the part I didn’t remember. After he got me to go back to the front of the truck he started to arrange the goods so he’d have room for the bodies. He didn’t want to leave evidence so close to the base, and figured it would be best to dispose of them here and make it look like they’d simply abandoned their post. He grabbed the bodies one by one and stacked them against the far wall of the truck, all the while he was laying into Cam for her reckless behavior.

He repeated to her over and over that the soldiers believed them. They were going to leave as soon as they peeked in the back. There was no reason to snap like that and kill them, and doing so without our prior knowledge was stupid and reckless. We could’ve all been killed if they were even a second faster than they were. She stared at him blankly the entire time he berated her.

According to Lucas her only response was, “They deserved to die. I’d happily do it again. We lived didn’t we?”

Her response left Lucas reeling with more anger than he could process at the time, and he was devoid of trust in her. He smacked the handcuffs on her so Alex could decide what to do with her once we returned, and threw her in the back of the truck. Lucas finished recounting the events and ran his fingers through his hair roughly while sucking in a large amount of air. He looked stressed and beyond angry. I’d never seen him this angry before, and it only served as fuel for more panic to build inside of me. June gently rubbed his back in an attempt to soothe him, and he tried again to take a deep breath.

His voice lowered slightly, “You should’ve seen her. It was like a rabid animal the way she leaped in for the kill. The screaming was inhuman. She’s a loose cannon. You figure out what you want to do with her but I'm telling you right now she’s not stable.”

Lucas threw his hands up and walked off, with June following closely behind him. Alex sighed and ordered Cam out of the truck. She muttered something under her breath and scooted herself to the edge, unable to stand in the truck with the handcuffs restraining her. He grabbed her arm and escorted her to the basement. He’d asked me to follow along, so I did. I remained several paces behind them, keeping a wide distance from the crazed girl. On the way inside we passed the house crew and Alex paused briefly to instruct them to unload the supplies, distribute them to the proper groups, and take the bodies to the morgue. They accepted the task and ran dutifully to the truck to start unloading.

Further down the hallway Jake emerged, a frown planted firmly on his face. “No need for an update, I heard everything,” Jake told Alex before he could be briefed.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Great then, can you please take Angel and get her calmed down, make sure she’s okay? I have to deal with this,” he asked Jake.

Jake nodded and ran to my side. Before he had a chance to lead me away Alex grabbed my arm and spoke quietly, “I’ll catch up with you as soon as I can okay? I have to take care of this and I'll be right there. I’m sorry you’re so shaken up.” He took one last remorseful glance at me, obviously upset that he had to leave me in this condition, and then resumed his trek to the basement with Cam in tow.

Jake led me off towards my room and grabbed me a new set of clothes, insisting I needed to change. I hadn’t realized mine were covered in blood yet again. It was becoming far too common of an issue. The only difference was that this time the blood belonged to men that posed no imminent threat to me. They weren’t going to hurt us, but we killed them anyway. Now that we knew the whole story that the soldiers were being deceived as well it was already harder to swallow the killings. Killing men who didn’t even intend to hurt me felt like committing a senseless crime. I went to the bathroom and ripped off the bloody clothes as quickly as I could. I rubbed at the dried blood on my face until my skin was red, and then put on the new clothes.

I went back out to the bedroom, feeling slightly better to be out of the dirty clothes, and sat with Jake. I told him how I felt about everything. How I felt like I was killing innocent people now that I knew they were being lied to the same as we were. How a part of me didn’t want to react when the man had pointed the gun at me. I could see in his eyes that he feared for his life. He wasn’t going to shoot me because he was evil, or because he believed I deserved to die. He was just scared, fighting for his life the same way we were, and we cut him down.

Jake listened intently as I spilled my heart out, trying to untangle the mess of emotions. He just let me talk and get it all out. Once I was done talking and calmed down a bit he finally spoke, “Listen, I know you don’t want to hurt innocent people, but like it or not they stand between us and freedom. They may not have been trying to kill you yet, but had they thought for a second that you weren’t real soldiers they wouldn’t hesitate. You have to know that.”

I nodded sadly. A part of me did know that was the truth. It was an unavoidable conflict, but it still felt like senseless deaths on both sides. If the government wasn’t manipulating everyone, if they’d just come out and admit their mistakes, we could’ve found a better way. I was grateful that Alex was in charge, and striving for that very goal. He didn’t want anyone to die unnecessarily. I wondered how he would handle Cam. Her attitude had already put her on thin ice, and knowing she put Lucas and I’s lives in danger, and forced us to claim three lives would only make that ice thinner. Alex would be furious. He was always one to remain calm, logical, and forgiving, but I wondered if he could stick to those principles in these circumstances.

After what felt like far too long Alex finally came back up to the room, looking exhausted. He thanked Jake for keeping me company, and Jake excused himself. Alex closed the door before swiftly coming to me and engulfing me in a tight hug. He whispered how glad he was that I was okay, and kept me securely in the hug for a few moments. I closed my eyes and breathed in the moment, letting myself finally calm down. I told him all about the mission, and how Cam had acted. It was much the same story as Lucas had told him, but mine was a lot blurrier.

“So what did you do with her?” I asked quietly, fearful of the answer.

Alex sighed deeply. “I talked. For a long time. Then I listened. I listened to her tell me all about things the soldiers had done to her before she came to us. Things she didn’t want to say the first time we asked. You saw her reaction to them, the hell she was living in, I’m sure you can imagine what she went through. It wasn’t just a beating, I’ll leave it at that.”

I let my imagination take over. It produced disgusting images of what she must’ve gone through. I nodded grimly as I processed what he was trying to tell me. Maybe some of them were evil after all. The screams that escaped her lips, and the haunting look in her eyes when she attacked, they made more sense now. She wasn’t really present in the moment. Stuck in the back of the truck and coming face to face with more soldiers must’ve transported her back in time, to a much worse reality.

“I forgave her. I know it’ll take time for people to trust her again, especially you and Lucas, but I’m not asking you to forgive her just yet. I just can’t go through with any sort of punishment after knowing all of that. She’s not going on any more missions with us for the time being though that’s for sure. She wasn’t thrilled about it but I assume she knows how badly she messed up.”

I nodded in acceptance. It was admirable how kind and forgiving he was, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t at least slightly scared that she’d be free with how unstable she was. We talked about it for a bit longer, and came to the conclusion that she would be able to handle our leadership style, even if she didn’t agree. Her only real issue with stability seemed to be when she was face to face with soldiers, and we’d make sure we were ready before that happened again.

“I need to catch up with Lucas and let him know what I decided. Do you want to take the rest of the day off or handle some light business like catching up with the groups now that they’re stocked up?” Alex asked softly as he stood up.

“I’ll work. I don’t want to just sit here and stew in this feeling,” I replied and followed him out of the room.

I spent the rest of the day keeping busy. I checked with each group to make sure they’d received everything they needed from the restock, and ensure the numbers were good for some time. I grabbed a quick meal and fielded questions about the commotion outside, assuring everyone that it was handled, and they were safe. I finished the work earlier than expected and popped in to visit June. I asked her if she’d known anything about Cam’s background with the soldiers. She confessed that while she didn’t know for sure, she had a hunch. I then paid Jake another visit and asked him to keep his ears at attention for her, in case she lost it again. He assured me that he’d listen carefully for anything unusual.

Once the sun shining through the windows finally gave way for nightfall I returned to our room. I’d beat Alex back, and took my time with a long shower. I carefully scrubbed every inch of my body, making sure no traces of blood remained. We turned in early that night. I was desperate for sleep after the long draining day. My thoughts fell back on Cam as I drifted off to sleep. On the howling that escaped her in the truck, and the horrid memories she must’ve been reliving. I only hoped she’d find a way to move past this, as I had with my own troubled past.