Just like dad taught me, I held the stock of the rifle against my chest as I kept my eyes locked on the deer.
I took a deep breath and pushed my finger slowly towards the trigger, shaking as I noticed the deer becoming clear enough for me to shoot.
Hesitant, I pulled the trigger, hoping that after the loud bang that busted my eardrums, the deer would be laying on the moss stone. I took my focus out of the scope to find my target, I had been successful. I pulled my walkie out of my pocket and called towards camp, "Sam, start a fire, I'm bringing home a friend." I chuckled and ran towards its body that had already bled in its surrounding area.
Walking further, I began to feel uneasy, I was all of a sudden met by multiple small stings that spread across my face.
"Stop right there! That deer belongs to me now." a voice yelled, unable to pinpoint its location. I began to look at the buildings that surrounded me, trying to find where the voice had come from.
"I don't mean no harm. Please, I need this, we can share it, no one needs to get hurt." I yelled in response, still looking aimlessly around. "Please, at least give me something in return, something. . ." I yelled again, trying to keep my voice steady.
"Lower your weapon, and we can negotiate." the voice yelled. I was very hesitant, but I lay my weapon where I stood and held my hands up.
It was quiet, I could hear the sounds of leaves rushing across the town roads, and the wind chimes that had to at least be a mile away.
I heard the sound of a foot hitting the pavement behind me, I slowly turned around and was met with a man, a young man, who seemed to be 2 decades behind me. He was wearing a bomber jacket with worn out cargo pants, but he had a clean shaven face and well trimmed hair, perhaps too well trimmed. He held his weapon aimed at me, but slowly began to put it down as he inspected me.
"How long you been out here?" the man asked as he handed me a bottle of water.
"Too long. . .too long. What about you?" I said as my hand slowly approached and grabbed hold of the bottle.
"I'm asking the questions here." The man replied, quickly interrupting me. I nodded in response, a little irritated.
I noticed he began to inspect me more until he finally looked at my face. He lowered his gun, his full attention now on me.
I was too shocked to inspect him when he handed me his gun.
"You gonna shoot me for that deer? Do it now."
My jaw slightly dropped, was there a trick to this? A part of me wanted to pull that trigger, so I could get it over with and take the deer back home.
I aimed the rifle and met his face eye leveled to the barrel. My mind was set completely on him, no one else in the world existed in that moment except the two of us. A loud static noise came from the walkie hanging at my side.
"Daddy, did you find something to eat? Me and Sam started the fire, and It's big!"
It was my daughter, all the tension in my mind had ceased, and with eyes wide open, I stared at the man as I radioed back to camp. "Everything's fine honey, keep the fire alive, I'll be home before dark."
Oddly enough, the man smiled, and he began to speak.
"Looks like we have some things to work on, my name is Paul, Paul Rovia, but if you like, you can call me Jesus."
Bewildered, by the man's attitude, I introduced myself.
"My name is Christian. I'm grateful we could come to this and not any of us winding dead."
"We see a lot of that these days, right? I wouldn't want to make it any worse. Sounds like you have a camp, how are you holding up?"
My skin grew cold, I locked eyes with him again, meeting them with great fury, hoping that he couldn't see the fear that was hiding behind mine.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you. We have a community nearby with walls, food, shelter, we are willing to take you in if you can stay true to the rules that we have." False, false, and false, I was tired of hearing about hope that would later extinguish, I couldn't afford to go through what me and my family had to go through.
My walkie went off again, "Daddy, Uncle is on his way to find you, he's going to help you carry whatever you found." my daughter said, in a childish tone.
I turned my attention back to Paul, who still had his calm and sophisticated look on, something just did not seem right to me.
I began to hear the air whistle back and forth as I noticed an object heading towards the two of us. I quickly ducked as I heard a thump and the sound of a body hitting the cement. I peeked from my arms and saw a figure slowly approaching. As it approached closer, I realized who the figure was.
"Taking that boomerang was a great idea." the voice said.
I scoffed and quickly got up to face the figure that was already standing above me.
"Zach, Mike is going to be on his way soon, in the mean time help me tie this man up."
"You're welcome. Anyways, who is this guy?"
I pulled zip tie out of my pack and began to push the man's arms and legs closer together. Before I was able to start tying, I felt the impact of the man's boot hitting the tip of my nose, pushing me onto my back. I looked up and saw him jump himself up and back kicking Zach in the chest, pushing him to the ground as well. I quickly crawled to my rifle and aimed the barrel to his back as he began to run away. I heard the groan of a lurker somewhere behind me, a group of 5 of them had shown up. I quickly got up to shoot the ones closest to me, but I was stopped by the sound of a bang, a gun shot, but it didn't come from the rifle I was holding.
I turned around to see the man laying on the ground, under the street light. The shooter was behind an abandoned car, he began to move forward, revealing himself.
"Come on, help me pull him back to camp." the voice said.
Zach helped me eliminate the lurkers that had been approaching me.
Zach chuckled as he held the back of his head. I quickly turned from the massacre and began our approach towards the voice.
"Mike, he had his gun drawn at me, he didn't kill me."
"Well you know what, if you're asking me to give him an easy time, you're wrong. I'm not letting that happen again."
Mike responded as he looked up at me, reminding me of the large scar that stretched along down his left eye.