The van jostles me against the wall dividing the vehicle's cabin from the cargo hold; the ropes around my feet and wrists rub painfully against my irritated skin, though at this point, I can hardly even feel it. Steele keeps a firm grip on the rope leash Jess tied to my wrists, and a glance through the back window of the van sends another shiver down my spine as reality hits me once more.

Tall flames consume the farmhouse, pillars of smoke rising from its skeletal form as I'm driven further and further down the long country road to only God knows where, stuffed in the back of a kidnapper van full of terrorists and murderers. 

The echoing screams of my friends pound against my skull now, the memory of Jess forcing me to listen to her men kill them, to Steele killing them. When the screaming died down, replaced with the crackle of fire and cracking wood, Steele returned with the severed, bloody, beaten, and bruised head of Dani, wrapped in her flannel. 

No sound left me.

Not even the hot tears streaming down my face could be felt while Jess's manic laughter filled the air.

A boot catches me painfully in the shin, and I stare at its owner, who watches me with a satisfied smirk as she brings me back to the present. "You're a hard woman to find, Cassy," Jess notes, nudging me with her boot every other word. 

I stare at her, too numb to make an effort at a biting remark. 

She pouts at my silence, giving my shin one more good, sharp kick before she leans back on her bench, looking bored and scratching absentmindedly at the large burn scab covering half of her face with her bandaged hand. "Whatever," she sighs. "Your pops is willing to offer quite the price for your pretty little head, and fortunately for you, he wants that head attached to its body and unharmed. 'Not a hair is to be out of place,' he said." She grins, patting the bloody flannel mound on her lap, and my blood boils. "You're pretty privileged, Princess. You'll be getting top-tier care before we wrap you up nicely and ship you off to Daddy Dearest. Shit, we might even throw a bow on top." She smirks over at Steele, who stares dead-eyed at the side of the van, expressionless. "What do you say, Snowdrop? Should we throw a bow on top?" 

Steele's look slides over to Jess, neutral. "Not my call," she deadpans, her voice husky. She smells heavily of smoke and gunpowder, the bitter scent of blood heavy on her jacket, and her hands are stained with it.

Jess simply groans, thumping her head on the side of the van. "I swear, this is why I don't take you anywhere; you're such a buzzkill. Unlike that cute little friend of yours, now she can be fun sometimes!" Jess winks at Steele, who doesn't bother with any sort of response. She looks as dead inside and numb as I feel.

Steele simply returns to staring at the van's blank inside wall. She's not much bigger than me; lean and short with shorter, messy white-blonde hair framing a sharp, pale face. She sports ripped-up jeans and a black biker jacket, a faded white band shirt with old bloodstains. She casts her frozen eyes my way when she notices me watching her, but I don't even bother looking away. 

She watches me while the van bumps along, her cold eyes boring into mine, her expression neutral as she regards me, though it's the only sign of life she gives as she watches me.

Jess groans, making Steele look over at her boss. "God, if you're gonna eye-fuck each other, wait until we're at the base first," Jess exasperates, winking at Steele once more, whose expression hardens at the comment. "Oh, right, sorry, you don't 'do' that anymore, huh? Not since you killed your little-"

"We're coming up on the highway," the driver interrupts what Jess was about to say, and Steele looks glad for the interruption. 

I feel that whatever Jess was about to say would have pushed Steele to express herself in a rather violent manner, similar to the one that simmers just under my skin.

I wish she had finished her sentence. It would have given me a chance to beat the fuck out of Jess and turn her head into a chunky variety of wine.

"Oh good," Jess sighs. "Only a hundred and twenty miles to go." 

I glance at her, confused. Where are they taking me? Why so far away from Atlanta? 

Jess takes notice of my concern and grins. "What?" She purrs. "You thought we were gonna take you straight to Daddy?"

I glare away from her; whatever they have planned for me, I don't have much say in it anyway. 

I would rather die than play their games.

She's clearly annoyed with my silence, but I don't care. "No," she says, sitting forward. "You see, since you led us on such a chase and caused so much fucking damage, I have a bit of a job for you. Grimm wants to meet the cheeky cunt that's been evading his eye and has a proposition for you, and you're not in any position to decline it." She laughs. "Not if you want to keep your head." 

She grins at her pun, smacking the bloody mound in her lap like she just told the funniest joke in the world, and I start to play a fantasy in my mind of ripping her and everyone in this van to pieces.

The entire ride I spend inside my head replaying the events that unfolded today; John's betrayal, watching the light in his eyes disappear as Jess slit his throat, being forced to watch Jess's team of Widow's - Steele included - march up to the farmhouse and open fire, having to listen to the panicked and pained screams of my friends inside who were caught unaware, watching the Widow's set the house ablaze with my friends inside. 

Steele tossing Dani's head at Jess's feet.

The pure joy in Jess's laughter when she picked it up by the hair, the face almost unrecognizable with greyed, bruised, and bloody skin. Her face is beaten so bad that the puffiness of the bruising masks the scar I gave her when we first met in the woods completely.

Imagining the dying faces of Dani, Josh, Sparrow, and Quentin, even Matt just solidifies the shroud of numbness that drapes over my shoulders like a curtain of stone. My own sister hates my guts, my little brother is buried far from home, my uncle is dead and burnt to a crisp somewhere states away, and my estranged mother waiting for me, somewhere in the world, likely believing that her own children had abandoned her, and that's even assuming that she's even alive anymore.

For once since the outbreak first started, I'm...

Alone...

I have nothing left to live for at this rate, the locket lost and buried under the rubble of the farmhouse with the rest of my belongings.

Wait. 

The locket. 

My eyes flick over to Jess, looking out of the van's back window and too preoccupied with her boredom to notice me. 

I don't have the locket. 

But I know where it is. And that fire is bound to get a lot of Feral's attention. 

Jess is likely counting on me to be broken, shattered, and desperate, and she might be right. 

But a broken survivor is more dangerous than someone with something to live for. I have nothing left to lose, but if I'm going down, I'm taking this bitch with me.

The next several hours are spent in silence, a plan formulating in my mind, and the next thing I know, the van pulls through a heavy set of gates and drives through what looks to be a military base, dozens, if not hundreds of Widow's marching around and carrying out orders shouted at one another. 

We pass a prominent sign that I barely have time to read, and my heart drops; Fort Benning. 

According to Uncle Tommy, this was the last place David was stationed, and if that's the case, it's also likely crawling with Atlas soldiers. The van pulls around to the front of a large building, and Jess grins. 

"Home sweet home," she stretches and stands as Steele's small friend opens the back van doors. The early light of dawn floods the back of the vehicle and blinds me momentarily, and I'm drug out of the van by the rope tied to my wrists, tripping over the gap between the ledge and the van, landing painfully on my injured side. 

"Get up, Princess," Jess orders, and I don't need to see her face to know that she's smiling. 

The rope tightens, and I'm drug to my feet, trying to hold my side in an effort to stop the pain, but the pulling won't stop. 

"You," Jess says to a nearby Widow, who snaps to attention, "get the doc and tell him he has a special patient in the Cage."

The Widow nods and rushes off, disappearing around the corner, and it's then that I realize we're in a large grocery store's docking bay. The steel shelves used to hold freight pallets have been converted into walkways, where Widow soldiers watch the large room. Jess leads me from the back room and onto the sales floor, which has been cleared of the shelving and replaced with tents, makeshift shacks, sleeping bags, and more elevated walkways where even more Widow soldiers patrol inside.

We pass by the deli department counter, where a few Widow's are busy cooking food for the dozens, if not hundreds of people gathered here. Several bastards are dressed in black riot armor with the Atlas logo on their sleeves, confirming that they've been working together this whole time, but Jess doesn't let me get a closer look at their faces. 

She yanks me ahead towards the large metal shutters leading out to the gardening section and nods for Steele to open them up. A tall, older man with thinning hair and cracked glasses approaches Jess, and she smiles. 

"Ah, there you are, Doc!" She says. "I'd like you to patch up my friend here and be gentle with her, yeah? I need her in pique condition by the end of the week." 

The old man looks from Jess to me, thick, black rings under his eyes indicating lack of sleep, and he sighs. "Yes, ma'am," he says and turns to Steele's small friend. "Let Hank know to take over up front, please." 

She glances quickly between Steele and the doctor, then nods, walking briskly away as Jess watches her, amused. 

Jess yanks me outside with her and into the gardening section, which has been reinforced with barbed wire, metal plates, and plyboard to keep the Feral's out and prisoners in. Inside the reinforced garden section, a handful of wooden bunkbeds have been erected in one corner, made of scrap material and obviously no mattress of any sort. Raggedy sleeping bags lay on top of the pressboard where you're supposed to lay, offering little comfort, and not a soul seems to be kept here.

Typical.

"Welcome to your new home, Princess," Jess purrs. "Dinner is at seven sharp; I hope you like stew. The Doc will be in shortly." 

She removes the leash from my bonds but keeps my hands bound, shutting the giant metal shudders as she leaves me alone. 

The sun is beginning to set by this time, and the outdoor lights flicker on, barely illuminating the dingy accommodations. Through the grated ceiling of the yard, I can see a few Widow's wandering around on the rooftop, and a couple of people dressed in black military-grade armor are posted on the corners, all of whom are armed with assault rifles. 

Even if I wanted to escape, it would be impossible by myself. 

By myself...

A heavy blanket of fog weighs on my mind at the thought. 

Every time I've been captured, I always had my siblings with me; I had a reason to live, to get out, to move on.

But I don't have that anymore.

My mission has failed. My friends and girlfriend are dead.

And I'm fucking pissed.

I pace around the enclosure like a starving, restless wild cat, plans of escape and destruction formulating and dissipating as quickly as they appear. 

I could kill the next bastard who steps inside. Jessica said she needed me alive, so there's no way they'd kill me in retaliation and risk David's wrath. 

No, they'd likely torture me, and I'd be back at square one. 

I could take one of them hostage and demand to be let go!

No, because then what? I spend the rest of my days wandering the endless wasteland of death? Get your shit together, Cassandra; this isn't a fucking video game. Out of the corner of my eye, I spot a piece of the metal sheet against the wall jutting out, jagged and split, and an idea hits me. I quickly make my way over to it, watching to see if any of the bastards on the roof notice me. The small corner where the jagged piece juts out is in a blind spot, impossible to see from the roof but almost in clear view of the shudders. Thinking fast, I grab the piece and bend it back and forth until it snaps in my bound hands; the sound is not nearly as loud as I expected.

At the sound of the shudders opening again, I tuck the jagged piece between my palms and step away from the wall as an older, balding man who has clearly not slept in days steps inside with Steele and Steele's small friend.

"So," the older man sighs, pausing at the entrance while Steele closes the shudders behind them, "you're Cassandra." 

I stop several feet before them, my heart pounding a mile a minute as I glare at him. Tattooed clear as day on his forearm is the giant spider marking that Widow's wear, signifying that he's killed someone to earn his place. He says that as though he were expecting someone else, perhaps someone more intimidating or more worth the trouble.

The doctor glances back at Steele, who only stares at me while her small friend looks between the group of us. Realizing that he won't get me to talk to him, the doctor sighs and vaguely gestures for me to sit down. 

"You can either sit, or Steele can make you sit," the old man sighs when I stand still. Steele rolls her shoulders back when I glance over at her, ready to move if she's needed. Whatever plan I follow, I'll need to be in the best condition I can be, and tangling with that monster would do me no favors. 

I wander to one of the many picnic tables, my eyes trained on the group of Widows before me, and I sit, stiffening when the old doctor sits next to me. Roughly, he grabs my chin, tilting my head this way and that as he scrutinizes my face. He repeats the process with my arms and legs, then starts to lift my shirt to examine my abdomen. My fist cracks against his jaw before he can even look at the bandages, and he collapses to the ground, groaning in pain as he holds his face. 

My satisfaction is quickly shot down when my body becomes weightless, my head slamming into the top of the table with the rest of my body following painfully after, and my arms are roughly wrenched behind me. A curtain of white hair blocks my view as Steele growls, "Try that again, and I'm popping your shoulder out of place."