Remains of Humanity - Book 1

Chapter Nine

The smell of manure and the uncomfortable prickling of the ground woke Jesse from his unconsciousness. He squinted his eyes upon trying to open them, when a bright light shown into his face. As he adjusted his vision, the first thing he saw was a wooden wall accompanied by piles of hay stacks against it. His head was tilted on his shoulder as he leaned to the side against the wall as well, shifting himself to sit up straight. When he had instinctively tried to place his hand by his aching head, he soon realized he could not because both of his wrists were tied together by thick rope, including his ankles.

Jesse scanned the area, and came to the conclusion that he was placed in a barn. It was not long after before he noticed two men inside with him, sitting on barrels while facing each other by a table. They were conversing, but the striking head on Jesse's head was limiting his hearing, for a time at least. The men were both white and thin, however the rifles against their seats compensated for their overall lack of intimidation.

When Jesse tried to force his bonds loose best he could, the rummage he was causing caught the attention of his assumed guards.

"His awake." said the one man, with brown short cut hair, standing from his seat.

The other partner continued to slouch with his long black hair slightly covering his face, grabbing a green, glass bottle from the table and proceeding to drink from it. Its contents ran down his mouth, but the man did not care.

The brown haired guard walked over to Jesse and kneeled down to face him, "Morning sleepy head!" he said as he slapped a hand covered in dirt against Jesse's right cheek, "You've been out for a while now."

As soon as the man was done harassing Jesse, who could only react with a furious glare, and he glanced back at his partner, "Go call Clayton." he commanded.

"Why don't you call him." the partner answered. He was seeming too lazy to comply.

"Just go freaking do it! I'll watch this guy."

The long haired man let out a irritable sigh, before standing from his seat and shifting to the two doors of the barn, with minimum effort to spite his partner.

As soon as he was gone, the remaining guard turned to face Jesse again, "You are in for it now, asshole."

Jesse remained quiet, he just did not see any reason to say anything. Its not like he could do anything either.

"Do you know who we are?"

Jesse did not answer, which only caused the man to slap him again, this time with a sting to remain, "Are you deaf?!"

There was a red hand print on Jesse's right cheek now, "No..."

"Do you know who we are?" the man repeated.

"...No."

"See this here..." the man said, while pointing at the shoulder of his pullover, showing a poorly stitched badge of a vulture, "We are the Vultures, and this is our badge."

Jesse was very tempted to reply with, 'You don't say?' but he knew what the consequences of his words could be, so he refrained best he could "What's that? A group?" Jesse asked instead.

"It's our gang! And I assure you that you will remember that for the rest of your life!"

"Why am I here?"

"You don't get to ask the questions, asshole!"

Jesse proceeded to look around, "Emilia..." he said softly while looking at the man, "... The girl, Where is she?"

The man did not answer, but only stood up and walked to the barrels to grab his rifle.

"Where is the girl!" Jesse demanded, while desperately trying to loosen himself. This was met with a pointed nozzle to Jesse's face.