Jacinda Cross

[Jacinda]

2021

Jacinda nearly tripped, the tip of her boots catching on an asphalt seam. She caught herself and looked at Regan disbelievingly. For some reason, he didn't meet her eye. Just kept looking ahead. It was silent and she thought about this.

It just....it just didn't feel right. Julie...the way she acted, the complete lack of concern. The absence of fear or shame. Somehow, she just couldn't see it. It was like one of those puzzles. Something was missing in the picture. Something that would make what Regan had said true.

But then again, how would she know? She didn't have any friends Julie's age, not growing up. Definitely not now. What would a girl who's father was hurting her act like? And how was he hurting her? Was he hitting her? Beating her? She tried to remember the way the girl moved. Normal. No stiffness to the way she walked. No obvious bruising.

How did he know? You're still young, Jacinda. Regan knows. In her gut, that was the scariest part of all. That Regan recognized the signs and she missed them. At least that's what she thought bothered her. He sees something. The thought of someone hurting Julie made her sick.

Her voice was a whisper. "Are you sure? She seemed fine to me."
There was more that bothered her, though she couldn't put her finger on it. Rescue her? She liked Julie. She did. It had felt....nice to hang out with someone else. Well, Julie wasn't exactly her age. Julie was young. But in some ways- embarrassing ways, Jacinda admitted to herself- Julie seemed older. It would be nice to have her with them.

And yet...part of her hated the idea. Violently rejected it, refused to even consider it for a moment. She tried to put into the words the her reaction, for her intense revulsion at the idea. It just....something bothered her deeply. She and Regan were together. Family. They had a routine. It was them against everyone else. Adding a person to the mix...that would change all of that. And somehow, deep down, she knew she would lose Regan, was already losing him.

All of this swirled around in her mind as they entered the restaurant. She didn't notice the smell of coffee and burned food in the air. She didn't notice the fake wood paneling with pictures of hunts and other memorabilia on the walls, or the wooden bar top where a few men sat nursing a beer. She didn't notice the tears in the cheap booth covering as she slid in to to sit. She was trapped in her mind, like a maze or a never ending circle. Around and around, she chased the feeling and couldn't catch it except that she did.not.want.it.

Finally, "Are you sure Regan? She has a family. A mother and a sister. Even if her Father is...doing what you say he is, she still has family. We can't just take her."
He looked her in the eye and she saw...she wasn't sure what, except that the fear that had been a weight in her stomach became lead and she wasn't hungry now.

Regan seemed to perk up as the waitress came and he ordered a beer and some chicken fried steak. She just got some ice tea. "I'm not feeling hungry. That sandwich from earlier was big. Maybe I still have a bit of the stomach flu,"
she answered when he raised an eyebrow.

He looked concerned. "You want some more crackers? Hun, can you get my wife some crackers with her tea?"
Wife. For some reason she didn't get excited at the term, not this time. There was something missing when he said it.

She nibbled on the crackers, all the while, feeling that lead in her stomach grow. She wanted to be sick. She wanted to run away. Something was wrong. Regan talked about where they were going. He tried to describe the Appalachian trail, the types of creatures- both natural and unnatural- that lived there.

She tried to show interest, but in truth she was faking it. She felt it deeply. She felt adrift. Gone from home. Regan was home. She kept repeating that as a mantra. But like a word that was repeated enough till it meant nothing, the mantra did nothing. Even Regan seemed fake, as if he didn't mean what he was saying about their future. As if he were lying.

Something was tearing in her and she desperately wanted to do something about it. Powerlessness seemed to overwhelm her.

She glanced around the room, watching the patrons, salt from the crackers making her lips dry. She didn't want to look at Regan. She took a drink and saw a man come in. There was something off about him, though she couldn't say what, exactly. He moved....funny, as if his clothes were too tight, even though they were typical cold weather nighttime wear.

He wore a wool cap with ear flaps pulled down, but what she could see of his forehead and face was pale white. Sickly pink. And there was a tightness to his eyes and mouth. The man went to the bar and sat down.

She nodded in the direction to Regan who then carefully called for the waitress so he could look without drawing attention to himself. The waitress came over and he ordered another beer. When she left, Jacinda saw something in his eyes. A smile, definitely. And other things. Relief? Marvel? Awe?

He took a long drag on his first beer and then, licking the foam from his mustache, smiled and whispered. "My god, sweetie. You are a treasure."
Despite how she felt, his words sent a thrill of pride and happiness through her. This was real. Genuine. What she craved.

She leaned forward, avoiding looking at the man, whispered, "What is it?"


He held his small smile, knuckling his mustache, fighting a grin. "That's a roug, girl. Fresh and new. Barley turned. Or changed. Whatever. Still mostly human though I imagine the hunger has already started. And you caught that from all the way over here."


A slow smile spread across her lips, the feeling of powerlessness fleeing. This was a thing she could do something about. "Yeah? So....we take him?"


He looked at her for a while, as if studying her, looked her up and down. "You got some size on ya, last I noticed. Strong too. Good eye. Good instincts. I trained you well. I think you could take him. What do you think?"
Her jaw dropped. Her? Alone? He believed in her?

Emotions warred inside her, now. All her doubts against this confidence that Regan- the man she'd loved since she was a girl, the man that had been Father as much as lover- believed in her. A test. This is a test. If I do this, then I prove myself. His equal. His wife.

She nodded, mouth set in determination. "Ok. I'll do it."
He sat back, smiling at her, his eyes shining with....she hoped it was pride. And maybe a touch of sadness? Why was he sad? Maybe because his little girl was all grown up. She reached out her hand and took his, squeezed it.

"You can do this Jacinda."
Then his voice became wistful. "My girl...you'll always be my girl."
It felt like a goodbye. She was leaving a girl. She would come back a woman. His woman.

She smiled, kissed him on his cheek, looked at the man at the bar and then left by the back door. She went back to the truck and got her gun, as well as her big hunting knife. She glanced across the lot to their room. Julie might be in there with her dad. Or maybe in their own room. The jeep was still there. Or they might be out.

She pushed all that aside for now. The hunt. She wanted that knife. She wanted the roug to howl, to scream, to acknowledge her. It had killed her mother. Raped, tortured, even chewed on her. The old roug had died. But she swore to all that existed in the universe. No fucking roug would ever escape from her alive. She was Jacinda Fucking Cross. Atharim. Avenger. Killer. Hunter. Pride filled her.

It flowed through her as she set up to watch the exit from a distance. And then she did as Regan taught her. Don't get cocky. Focus on the hunt. She let go of anger, of rage, of determination. There was the here and now. That was all. She absorbed the night, caught the rhythms as eventually, patrons started to leave. Regan came out, stumbling a little- how many had he had?- and headed to back toward the hotel. He didn't glance her way.

The roug came out, standing in the light of the doorway, smelling the air. Mist seemed to curl around its lips. It went to a truck and opened the cab, reaching in for something. After a moment, a cigarette lit up and it stood there taking a drag. Time stretched out as it seemed to savor the flavor. And then, cig done, it stepped it out and headed toward one of the liquor stores still open. The hunger was still new, Regan had said. She went to the truck, a camper shell on the bed.

She looked around carefully and then tried the lock. It opened and she carefully slid in and laid down on the plywood that covered the bed. Nobody slept in this camper. It was purely for transport. The damp musty smell of iron and oil and rags filled her nostrils and she inhaled. She tried to extend her senses- hearing, smell, the feel of the truck- tried to imagine she could feel the footsteps of the roug on its way back.

Her heart beat slow, another trick Regan had told her. A pounding heart could distract you, be too loud for you to know, to hear, what was going on. Deep breaths kept it even. She heard the shhhhhh of vehicles driving past the truck and still she waited.

Her ears perked up as finally, she sensed someone coming, the faint clomp of boots on the lot. The door opened and the vehicle shifted as it climbed in. Big. For a moment, that scared her. But she had been taught how to fight bigger stronger creatures. As long as she had surprise and a weapon, it made little difference.

She heard a wet phlegmy hacking cough that seemed to go on for a while. Finally, the vehicle started and they began to move. No music came on. It drove in silence. She tried to follow the turns. Straight, then left. Straight for maybe a minute. Right, the rough feel of cattle guard, and they were on dirt road. Reflected on the roof she saw shadows and lights of passing and following vehicles but once they turned off the main road, darkness covered everything.

The road went on for at least 10 or 20 minutes. It was hard to gauge exactly. The road was relatively smooth and then a left and it was much more rough and bumpy- rutted. They bottomed out a few times. Not well maintained at all. They were climbing. Another five minutes and the vehicle pulled to a stop. She could smell wood smoke from a stove.

The door opened and it got out, the sound of it coughing getting fainter as it moved away. She waited another five minutes before readying herself. Despite her care, her heart started up again. This was it. And now, her heart was pounding, loud, thundering in her ears. Was she really going to do this? Regan will be so proud. The thought of his smile when she returned, the blood on her knife, helped her, calmed her.

Carefully, she wriggled close to the tailgate. She reached up to unlock the camper window she'd climbed into, carefully extended it out.

Suddenly, the tailgate dropped open and hands reached out, grabbing her legs and feet, dragging her out. Her head bounced off the bumper and black closed in around her.


Edited by Jacinda, Jul 3 2018, 09:22 PM.