Page 90 of The Commander

“Do it.”

Watching her face, he gripped her arm just below the injury. She winced, mouth pinching as she prepared to hide any cries of pain, but she didn’t pull away. Their eyes locked—her green ones feverish, but resolute as always, daring him to do what needed to be done.

“I—” she started, breath shaky. Her words cut off into a sharp gasp as he moved with calculated precision, the pop of her shoulder realigning echoing between them.

“I told you,” he murmured, not unkindly.

For a second, they remained still, the intensity of the moment crackling in the tight space of the truck. Her ragged breaths settled into a rhythm, chest rising and falling. He brushed the edge of her uninjured forearm with his thumb, connecting with her smooth, human skin. He should have saved her from this.

“If this is what your arrogance is going to cost me, don’t do it again,” she muttered through clenched teeth, her eyes fluttering shut briefly as she breathed through the pain. “I’ll take it under advisement.” Giving her a moment, he gathered the rest of the supplies to make her comfortable. Ointment on the raw scrapes on her skin, nitrate bandages where necessary. He worked with efficiency, cataloging every wound, every bruise.

After gulping down the fever reducer and made for humans painkiller he’d supplied, she sipped her water, fingers trembling slightly.

“Finish all of that, Kitten.”

“I’m working on it, Dude.”

He really hated that term. They’d have to discuss things she could call him. Dude would not be one of them. Once satisfied she had whatever comfort he could offer, he stood and turned his attention to the sky, scanning the horizon. The setting sun stretched long shadows across the broken remnants of the road, painting the wasteland in deep oranges and purples.

Walking over to the intersection she’d pointed out, he found a rusted sign that read I-70, the most direct route to where he wanted to go. He took a moment to orient himself, the map he created flickering through his mind. This world had once been pavemented and crisscrossed by millions of roads and dotted by just as many communities. As the larger cities spread out, eating up land, the humans kept the many outdated motorways—some changes only came with extreme force. There were multiple ways to get where he wanted to go using the truck, but not all of them were open or safe.

Another mistake was not creating a separate fucking copy of a map.

Returning to the truck, he found Kitten leaning back in her seat, her freckled face pale beneath stray strands of bright red hair. Her eyes remained closed, though the rise and fall of her chest had steadied. She wasn’t asleep yet, though.

“What did you see?” she asked, voice soft.

“I-70.”

“Oh, this is fine, then for a little while. How fast does this thing go? I think we can go this direction for a couple of hours. Are we going to stop and rest for the night? What about pursuit?”

“We will stay in the truck as we drive, it’s equipped to keep you safe. And I told you, I doubt there will be pursuit.”

“But what if we get lost? Run out of fuel?”

“Not in your lifetime.”

She opened her eyes, looking at him with a mix of gratitude and exasperation.

“You’re bossy, you know that?” A hint of a smile played on her lips.

“Yes, I know. You’ll grow accustomed to it.” He showed her all his teeth creating a feral, possessive expression.

She didn’t flinch away this time. Her lack of fear made him want to stop, do more, take the taste he’d been craving. But he couldn’t while she had the fever.

“Oh, I doubt that very much,” she shot back, her voice betraying both defiance and a grudging touch of affection.

CHAPTER 30 - CARA

Whatever the Commander had given her for pain relief made Cara drowsy, though she had no desire to sleep. Every time her eyelids fluttered, memories of Brenda filled the darkness, her voice piercing the chaos of the Red Hats descending on the loading platform.

Brenda, older by nearly a decade, had worn her years poorly—thin from head to toe, with bony arms and thin legs always in motion. Sitting down next to Cara in Springfield’s community dining room she’d pointed at the untouched roll masquerading as bread on Cara’s plate and held up a glass jar of hand shaken butter and announced, “this fixes everything.”

Cara had nodded, startled by the sudden intrusion. After months of sitting with two old men who barely spoke, someone her own age had finally approached her. She offered the bread willingly, eager for conversation, for connection. Sharing became a thing. Food, laundry soap, other rations. Anything to keep the chatty, outspoken woman by her side. Her presence filled up the empty noise of Cara’s loneliness.

Brenda knew everyone in Springfield. She gossiped about the town’s tangled relationships with an air of authority. Who had fathered whose child. Who had snuck behind whose back. She even knew that the mayor’s wife made the best apple pie in town and would trade slices for extra rations of sugar and butter. Brenda spoke like she held the keys to Springfield’s secrets, and for a while, Cara had believed she did.

In turn, everyone seemed to know Brenda. Once they became friends, people started acknowledging Cara, too—mostly men, sending casual nods her way. Springfield boasted about ten “unmatched fuckables,” as Brenda had called them, with all the indifference of someone discussing livestock. She had an opinion on each one.

---