36. New Leader, New Rules

1.3K 111 7
                                    

Bo stood once again over the water filter, her mouth and nose masked with a blue bandana, her power rifle over one shoulder. The filter chugged away, churning out the water she'd been using for weeks without realizing that if everything had been how she'd left it they should still be on rationing. A frown ran across her lips, her hands braced on her hips as she examined the new parts shining like pearls against the dingy old ones. Most of the patching had been replaced and even new piping had replaced some of the heavily rotted old stuff. Something was off.

There was no way they should have been able to afford such nice parts for the water pump, and they certainly couldn't have afforded that many. Not only that, but the guns in the camp were too many and too high-quality to be anything they could have scrounged up or traded for. All the walls of the camp had been reinforced with steel, and Bo had caught sight of packaged rations in a new supply tent as well. There was something going on, and Bo felt a queasy pit in her stomach open up. She'd been so busy making sure her dad was rested and comfortable that she'd ignored the entire camp for almost three weeks now. Her gut told her this was a mistake, and she hated not listening to her instincts.

She knelt down again, adjusting a pipe that might have been slightly out of place... though, truth to tell, she'd been seeing problems where there weren't any, just to keep her mind off of...

A hand slammed down on her shoulder. Without thinking, Bo grabbed it, shoving it from her arm and spinning around at the same time. Her rifle was off her shoulder, in her hands, and ready to shoot in the span of two seconds. She only just stopped her finger from squeezing the trigger when she saw Aston glaring back at her.

"You could've gotten yourself killed sneaking up on me like that!" she snapped, clicking the safety back on and releasing a long breath.

"It's not my fault that you're so bloody jumpy all of a sudden," Aston grumbled, crossing his arms over his broad chest and shifting his weight to one foot.

"I'm sorry," Bo said, slinging her rifle back into place. "I just keep wondering if I'm going to turn around one day and see the Beast standing there. It's been well over the time he wanted me back by, and I just can't get it out of my head that he's going to try and claim me."

"Don't worry about the alien. If he tries anything then I'll just call the commander and have them send over some heavy guns--" He cut off sharply when he realized what he'd just said.

Bo looked up sharply. "The what? What commander?"

Aston's jaw worked and he got that narrowed look to his eyes that always came when he felt slightly bad about something, but not bad enough to apologize. "Look, I thought it was time I let you know that I signed us up to do rotations in the Terra Preservation army's militia corps."

"Aston!" She groaned and threw her hands into the air. "What in—what were you thinking? The militia? You know how I feel about them! They're nothing but organized bandits, and I don't want anything to do with their strong-arming and thievery."

"You were gone, Bo, and no one knew if you were ever coming back. I did what needed to be done and what I thought was best. The militia may have a sketchy past, but they take care of their own. In exchange for two months marching for them in the year, we get things we could never have dreamed of. Strong electricity in the camp, foods, parts for the water filter." He jerked his chin at the square box and Bo groaned inwardly that she hadn't thought of the obvious before this. Of course he'd gone to the militia as soon as she was out of the picture. He'd been gunning to do it for a year now, and she shouldn't have expected him to honor her ideals when he didn't hold them himself.

"They're common thieves-"

Aston raised an eyebrow. "Where do you think the medicine helping your dad is coming from? A lot of lives have been saved by signing up with them, Bo."

"Look, I see the benefits, and I'm thankful that you were able to keep everyone safe and healthy while I was gone... but the militia is not where we need to seek help. We haven't lost anyone only because we haven't made a nuisance of ourselves yet. You've seen how the Terra Preservation has slaughtered entire groups of people for getting too close to the protected zone. They killed a kid for daring to want to escape the Blast Zone and live somewhere where food can be grown by anyone," Bo said. "And you obviously haven't started our rotation with them. We'll be down so many men just a week into fighting for them, and it won't be for honorable reasons. All our friends, all the people we've known our entire lives, they'll soon be lying dead in the dust fields because they tried to raid an innocent camp and take their supplies to use as bribes for more recruits. Do you really want to die attempting to steal from people just like us?"

"The problem is, Bo, I don't want to be one of those honest camps that get raided. I'd rather we died doing something other than sitting in the dust fields with little defense, just waiting for the militia to put us in their sights," Aston said. "On their side, we're safe from them and any roving bandits that might want to try their luck. That outweighs anything else."

"Murder and thieving never outweighs everything else," Bo said. "I don't like what you're becoming."

Aston shrugged. "I don't really care."

Before Bo could unleash a verbal torrent on his stupid head, he turned on his heel and headed back for camp. She glared at his retreating back, but had to replace the protective covering on the water filter before she left. She let him walk off, even though she wanted to slug him and try to knock sense into his brain.

When she finished securing the water filter and replacing the camouflage net around it, Bo, too, bent her steps toward home. It was a long walk, and she used the time to think. Well, stew.

Her frustrations with Aston were growing. She should have known that he wouldn't hand over control as soon as she walked back into camp. He held it with a vice grip, taking every opportunity to let Bo, and everyone else, know that he made the decisions now. It sent a shiver down Bo's spine to think of the way he shut himself up in his tent, talking with his little posse. She'd never seen him quite this... aggressive before. She wanted to blame the militia, the way they encouraged violence in any young man who showed an interest, but she knew that Aston always had that spark of rebellion in him. He wasn't the kind of person to take orders, and once he had a foothold to power, he wasn't going to relinquish it just because the prodigal daughter returned from her sojourns in the forest.

Bo knocked on the front gate and the sentries let her in. She supposed she should be glad Aston hadn't yet implemented some password to keep her out of the camp. He'd do anything to show the men and women on security duty that she was no longer the one to take any orders from.

On the way to her tent, Bo ducked her head and kept the bandana on. It wasn't easy, being the girl who'd spent weeks in the clutches of an alien. At first everyone in the camp had been bursting with questions, ready to ride off into the sunset to avenge their leader's daughter. But when she'd told them she couldn't lead them to the Beast, and that she had no idea where his house might currently be, they'd grown confused and distant. Conversations dwindled, contact with her that wasn't due to business disappeared, and Bo found herself the unfortunate outcast of the camp. Aston flexing his power didn't help matters either. It wasn't that everyone hated her, but that they were wary. They'd forgotten how to deal with someone who'd spent so long in alien company, and frankly they didn't want to remember.


Bo and the Beast (Book #1) (Completed)Where stories live. Discover now