﴿ “If you experience a fever please limit your exposure to others. the new virus causes violent and unexplained mental effects.” Swept over the country came a deadly virus. A nun and a military guard find each other amongst the infested desert to find their way to Mexico for freedom and safety. ⋆⋆⋆
(WARNING: THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS DESCRIPTIONS OF GORE AND RELIGION AND POTENTIALLY SENSITIVE CONTENT. BE AWARE)
CHAPTER 3: NO MAN’S LAND.
A sinner does not deserve the safety of comfort, but rather the pain of penance. Does the desert know the difference?
She wiped the fleeting drop of water off of the corner of her mouth with a gloved hand. the heat sent a cold-hot shiver in her soul. Hot Pants could practically feel the thin layer of sweat forming already. What really bothered her was her hair. awkward, messy, choppy lengths that were impossible to gather out of her face. She mourned herself three sundays ago when the hair was neatly styled into her low bun that rested on her nape. She couldn’t even get this bird’s nest to stay put. One end would be pinned down, another would blow into her vision with the smallest gust of wind. Hot Pants had given up by the time the sun reached its peak.
Over the course of the last several days, she had taken upon herself to survive on whatever was left of abandoned towns, deal with occasional run in with bandits—or missionaries, a title they proudly bestowed upon themselves— She savored what little food she could find and used the rare bouts of rain as her water. She had also obtained a horse—a stallion she had led from the farm in Steeling. She didn’t steal him, she saved him. If those demons even had an appetite for animals. She doesn’t have a name for him yet. She had options, perhaps European Express, or Gets Up.
Hot Pants honestly had no clue where shes going—or where she had been going for the past several days. The desert stretched endlessly, and there was no telling what time it was out here, but she believes she soon will know. That God, watching over her, will give her a new path to follow, something to pay the price of her sin. She believes the gift of opportunity will be bestowed upon her soon. Thats what she believed hours ago, it surprised her how much her tightly bound beliefs collapsed so easily under the weight of disaster.
Her body ached from the injuries she had sustained, big bruises from the blunt side of guns, crescent blooming bruises from zombies who had clutched onto her, and a fresh wound in her thigh from a missionary’s gun. That same gun was tied to the side of her horse after she had knocked him out in a kick to his throat. It was a weak one, but the missionary went down quickly. Hot Pants convinced herself she needed the defense, that she hadn’t become God’s biggest sinner under the pressure of desperation.
She tugged at the reins, signaling the beast to slow down until they were at a complete stop in the vast desert. Hot Pants shifted and leaned up from where she was bent over whilst riding. Hot Pants came off the stallion, letting herself fall and sit on a nearby flat rock. Her thigh throbbed, earning a pained hiss from Hot Pants. She dragged the saddlebag off the rear of her horse. Hot Pants hadn’t had the time to properly treat it, only rip off a piece of cloth off of one of her brother’s tunics with her gloves staining the fabric crimson.
She couldn’t bear leave them, but she didn’t have the heart to keep them. The smell of his room was still lingering there, but just barely. It felt like a reminder. A reminder of what she had done. She remembered how she cradled the tunic, for just a moment. Before ripping it with a lump in her throat that she couldn’t quite swallow.
What she had done was a sin. Her greatest sin, which had separated her from God’s grace. She feels the guilt within her chest, her ribs and heart ached from the weight of it. the nights she took rest she could only think of his small body. Dark crimson against dead weeds. The smell of rot seemingly intensifying as if she fed fuel to a fire the size of a store. The last person she loved was dead by her own hands, she had cried for nights on end since it happened. She refused to accept the fact she had done it, but the gun was in her hands.
Hot Pants pinched off a glove, squeezing her eyes shut as she ripped off the cloth. The crown of the wound coming off with it as it welled with fresh bright crimson. The pain tore through her entire leg like lightning and a punishment from God. Hot Pants, pinching the blood-soaked piece, placed it down on the flat spot of the jagged rock. She let out a shaky exhale. Her habit and petticoat was hiked up to her thigh, pale thighs covered in blood exposed to the sun. Hot Pants cupped her bare hand around the wound as quickly as she could, but the blood was faster. fresh crimson stained the rock below her and more. the bullet was still lodged in there, a small piece of metal hiding in pools of blood and damaged tissue. The saddlebag had nothing but rolled up spare clothes, her small prayer book, spare ammunition she had taken from the missionary’s camp, and little amounts of food. Her luggage only held even more clothes and sewing items from her mother.
Hot Pants sat in the vast desert, pale sand blinding her eyes, blistering heat sending cold-hot shivers down her spine. Completely alone. She flicked her eyes towards the little leather book peaking out from the small container of dried up beef jerky and the bag of ammunition. With a pained sigh, she slipped out the ripped tunic, the smell of boiled lye and starch hit instantly. She felt that same lump rise back up in her throat from the familiarity of the smell. the hint of metallic from the blood on her hands didn’t help. She was tearing memories into rags to clean up her own filth. She felt disgusting about it.
With a tug that took all of her remaining strength, the fabric tore with a sharp tear. Her shoulders slumped, the wetness of her cheeks finally registering to her. Hot Pants wrapped her thigh with as much care she could, but the sting still shot her like a shock. Her jaw ached from how hard she clenched it to keep herself from screaming and alerting whatever was lurking nearby of her location.
She knotted the fabric, the last sting of pain lingering before it dissolved into a familiar sense of dull ache. Hot Pants let herself slump with a shaky exhale, every breath seemingly getting smaller as she took them in. Her horse—being the gentle stallion she had seen him be before this rapture—Nudged the crown of her head gently, his ears pinned back, he snorted with concern. Hot Pants looked up, she felt a smile curling at her lips. The stallion nudged her, she could feel the trembling huff as he pushed his muzzle against the crown of her head. Hot Pants reached a hand to rub firm circles with her palm on the side of his neck soothingly.
“Easy boy, Im okay.” She cooed. It was a half-truth; something to reassure the stallion about her well-being but also so she could deal with this on her own. Her thoughts lingered back to the fabric, the wound throbbed a dull ache, she reached a hand and slipped out the prayer book. The black Moroccan leather was worn out, the clasp loose. The edges of the pages were lined with gold, still in decent condition. She memorized every word printed on these holy pages. She loved the smell of the prayer book, the smell of oak-tanned leather, incense and lavender the book absorbed from the church. The smell instinctively relaxed her, but the air in her lungs began to feel as if it was suddenly too little.
Hot Pants joined the church when she was 17. She did it to escape their father, and to save their family the burden of spending money on her for the upcoming winter. She spent six years there. Six years of praying. Six years of Grand Silence. Six years of manual labor that ruined her hands. Six years of stitching revolting wounds, and watching children as they died. She surrendered her birth name for Hope. Sister Hope. It wasn’t her name. It was never her name, but she took it as hers. she gave into the self-erasure if it meant her family’s burden could be lightened.
Hot Pants was 17 when she cried on her knees in-front of Mother Superior. She was 18 when their dad vanished and she became a Bride of Christ, when she became Sister Hope; and 19, when she traded her white novice veil for the black veil of a professed sister and took her first vows. For the next four years she devoted herself to the Ora et Labora: she cleaned, she swept, and she cared for the ill. she prayed five times a day, for four years. Prayers became almost like meditation, sometimes she felt a rush of warmth during cold mornings like the spirit of God Himself had come to praise her for her devotion. She prayed until her knees were bruised from the splintering wood beneath her. She worked until it ruined her hands.
Hot Pants gazed at the sky, the sun made the back of her eyes ache from its brightness. The sun was at its most predatory, even if there was no one to tell her when to pray, her body still felt it. Though, she couldn’t get herself to pray. She was separated from God’s grace the moment her brother stopped breathing. She had become an unworthy Bride of Christ the moment she pulled the trigger. Now, her hands were defiled. Praying now would be like washing a stained habit with dirty water.
The memory was stained everywhere. Her clothes, her hands, the image burned into her retinas. the smell stung to her nose every-time the wound throbbed in her leg. She couldn’t have done it. Not to him. Her hands, Her hands have saved lives for six years. For six years, Her hands had nursed people back to health. There was no way she could have taken one. She couldn’t deny the gun was in her hands but had God really have no other option but to put her in that position? Had she really committed a sin so blasphemous she had to be punished like this? Her stomach churned a hollow dull ache from the starvation but she had taken it upon herself to follow in the steps she had seen some sisters follow during their spiritual sickness.
Out here, the Vox Dei wasn’t here to signal prayer hours, but she heard them in the back of her head nonetheless. 3 strong strikes, with lingering vibrations strong enough that she felt it in her teeth every-time. Hot Pants loved prayer. Maybe it was the meditative routine; something she could look forward to when nothing else goes right in the day. Maybe it was the fact she could think Someone was listening when she finally talked. To think that there was Someone who could understand her. She no longer had Him out here. She no longer had anyone out here. In a way, nothing felt different. Maybe, she never had anyone. Not here, not anywhere.
Hot Pants felt her throat close up, the lump grew bigger inside at the bottom of her throat. Her eyes stung with tears she messily swiped with the back of her hand. Her body shook as she gasped for air through tears. She cried but no one was here to comfort her, to wipe her tears and tell her everything was going to be okay. She was the one who had done those things. She held the faces of dying children, she looked into their eyes and saw nothing but fear. When no other sister was looking, She comforted them with the belief that it wasn’t death, but an invitation from God to join Him in paradise. A paradise she wouldn’t be apart of anymore. She prayed for countless dying children who cried for sister and tugged at her habit. In their terrified watery eyes she saw herself, a 17 year old girl, who barely knew anything about having a family. Her hands spent six years holding dying children. Her hands carried candles. They could not have pulled that trigger.
“Domine Iesu Christe,” Lord Jesus Christ. Her breath hitched air in sharply but her throat squeezed like strangulation. Hot Pants ducked her head into her knees, her hands clasped tightly, she felt her short nails dig into the webs of her hands, “Dei, miserere mei, peccatricis.” Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Hot Pants took a shape intake of breath, “Domine Lesu Christe, Dei, miserere mei, peccatricis,” She repeated the phrase like it was the only thing she had left. It felt like the only thing she had left. Hot Pants repeated it until the words mangled into blabbers that had lost their meaning. Her body squeezed into itself as she wailed. She wailed until every ounce of her heart was poured out, she felt her body go almost completely slack she grabbed onto the side of the rock to keep herself steady, hers hands smearing damp tears across her cheek, breath still catching in short sharp intakes. Thats when she felt the malleable velvety pressure of a snout and the warm air that puffed through her head.
The stallion huffed in her face, Hot Pants flinched at the puff of grassy sweet air, the familiar sharp smell of ammonia and salt mixed with sun-baked hay brought her back to reality. A sweltering hot reality. She was still in the sun, blanking out for what felt like hours. The smell stung her nose in a way that almost felt comforting. Hot Pants patted the beast’s side, and she couldn’t help but smile. Maybe she did have someone. It wasn’t a person, but it was someone. Her eyes burned with a tint of teal from the sun as she slipped her glove back on and limped to the saddlebag and its scattered contents.
The constant smell of rot left her vision blurry, just not from dizziness. Hot Pants pushed the saddle bag back onto the stallion, who huffed a puff of concern. She leaned against the stallion’s flank, looking out to the vast desert ahead of them. the waves distorted the view from cacti in the distance, the only sound was the sound of leather hitting leather as the saddlebag shifted in her horse’s stance. The desert was empty, and it only made the feeling deep in her ribs worse.
Hot Pants struggled to mount her horse with a bullet lodged into her thigh. She knew she had maybe a day or less to get it out, or she’d lose a leg—or her life. She imagined herself in the sand, choppy pink layers against blinding beige sand. Like small boots against dead weeds. Hot Pants drew in a deep breath between her teeth at the memory, the lump in her throat balling up her airway, Hot Pants threw herself onto the saddle, finally mounting her horse. Once she finally got herself steady, She gave a firm tap with her foot as the horse began to move. Maybe she’d name him, Gets Up. It made more sense than the latter, they were in America, not Europe.
Hot Pants leaned in, the horse’s footsteps came faster as they sped up with a firm kick of her foot. The wind came at them, cooling wind that lightened the exhaustion from the heat. The clattering of the gallops against the silence of the desert made it seem less vast. The wind blurred her vision with pink blue and beige. She felt the weightlessness of the air brushing past her. The throbbing pain on her thigh seem to dissolve into static. She sighed and let her head loll back slightly, the sound of wind rushing past her ears be and the feeling of light pressure pulling her back ever so slightly was everything she needed to feel. Hot Pants felt light. the heat of the desert didn’t seem to reach her anymore. She kept a grip on the reins, but she let her body slump, feeling the contracted muscles let go felt like an exhale she had been holding in for six years. She was suffocating, now it was time she lets go.
The dusty winds kicked up from below Gets Up’s hooves. She watched as they rode against the train tracks, a blur of wood and silver against the bright beige of the sand that dusted it below. Her eyes followed the track to the distance where it thinned down until she could no longer see it. She remembered the train that passed by Steeling. It carried visiting families, travelers, men with purposes. They were loud, but the kind of loud that relieved a suffocating environment from the grasp of silence.
She grew up memorizing Steeling. A moderately sized town where everyone knew everyone well enough to support each other. Farmers let the little ones visit the animals, who reached out with their tiny hands to pat and pet them with that toddler roughness. Mothers chatted and traded advice to one another about various of things. Soap from lye, grease stains out of petticoats, and recipes out of what little they had. Hot Pants remembers listening as she fiddled with a handkerchief angel her mother crafted her. She listened to everything around her when she was little. From the dissection of going-ons that happened in the town, to the heavy burdens that winter hit them with. She remembered those women so clearly. They looked, tired.
Hot Pants tugged at the reins, Gets Up slowed his pace. The remains of a town stood crumbled before them. The stores were empty. No people to soften the noise of the silence, no ambient noise, no life. It dug at something in her that she couldn’t quite name. Hot Pants led her horse slowly, watching the carcass of a town pass by as it rotted in the sand. The throbbing pain in her thigh seemed to grow worse. Every movement that flexed Gets Up’s leg muscles moved her thigh and sent a throbbing pain through her entire leg.
Eventually, after a few long minutes of strolling the town, she had found what she was looking for, the doctor’s office. Hot Pants slowly let herself dismount from the horse with a low pained hiss. She tugged at the lead rope, Her thigh betrayed her with a white-hot ache. Hot Pants staggered, catching herself on the horse’s flank with her elbow. God knows what had happened to this town and its people, Lord protect them. Hot Pants loosely tied Gets Up to a post near the tracks beside the office, slipping a fresh fabric from the saddlebag.
Hot Pants stumbled into the office, gripping the aged door frame with her strength. The smell of outside rot and desert blew into the usually distinctive smelling room and stung her nose. The burn of carbolic acid and sweet choloroform had an undertone of metallic decay and the undoubtedly unpleasant smell of abandonment. Favoring her left leg, she dragged herself rather pathetically through the front room.
Hot Pants stumbled and caught herself against the torn plush settee that was near the entrance. The soft roughness familiarized to her palms, a velvety texture where patients who were too injured laid down on. She remembered treating countless travelers who had all sorts of injuries or illnesses. Now, the deserted place of knocked over dark velvet oak chairs against cracked utilitarian wood squeaked and rattled with its age and the recklessness of abandonment. She pushed forward despite the dereliction, being with the church also meant being the first line of defense on the front lines of medicine. With God’s little mercy, this place was built on similar blueprint as the apothecary back in Steeling. The only difference, the peeling wallpaper was deep maroon here.
She remembered how many little ones cried being in there. They never looked at her with gratitude, more like absolute terror. The kind that had them wide-eyed and crying until their throat was raw. Hot Pants had stitched a little boy’s arm once as the father held him down, the boy screamed, cried, kicked until the procedure was over.
Hot Pants pivoted for the floor, landing on her good side with a shock of pain that coursed through her entire left side. She undoubtedly knew that it would be bruised sooner or later, but she didn’t have the time to think about whether a bruise or a bullet lodged in a deep part of her right leg was more important or not.
With both forearms, she pushed herself up, her body protesting all over now, and with her strength, she gripped her fingers against the splintering wood with a sharp exhale through her mouth and pulled her body forward. Hot Pants stretched her other arm out, gripping against the small cracks between the wooden planks and pulled herself. Hot Pants dragged herself against the wood until she reached the other side where a log book desk sat. On her stomach, she bent her knee and grabbed the edge of the desk with both hands, pulling up with her arms, and pushing forward with her good leg until she was up.
Hot Pants gripped tightly on the edge of the log book desk. The squeak told her everything of its age, she figured this town was much older than Steeling, they had sturdier wood than there, and this desk may be waiting to collapse under her heavy lean at any moment. Hot Pants let out a groan, nothing in this office was doing her any aid in navigation. Though she was a nursing sister, she always squinted when she was in the front room. The covered windows never spared much light, the room was always drowned in an amber gloom, Hot Pants squinted. the smell of paper debris and dust itched her throat and made her cough, There was nothing to hold onto besides whatever was on the other side of the curtain that divided the front room with (what she assumed was) the back surgery. Hot Pants remembered how terrified the little ones were of it. Even through the thick velvet curtain, she heard kids protesting and crying out of pure terror. She hadn’t ever really been able to get the memory of the genuine terror of their faces or the piercing screams out of her memories, despite the training. She kept a monotonous face, through every single scream and cry. Only when she was absolutely sure no other sisters were around could she gently comfort a child. A gentle head-pat and a prayer before she walked away. It may have jeopardized that poor little ones soul but it felt right to having every ill child look as if they’d seen death itself when it was just her.
Hot Pants felt her leg throb impatiently, drawing a hard hiss from her that sucked the saliva to the back of her mouth. She folded, nursing her own injured and bleeding leg with a soft grip that still made her thigh ache dully. The cloth was stained a crimson patch from the wound already, She’d need something to disinfect and to remove that bullet. If not, she’d be risking her leg—or her life.
Shifting her weight, Hot Pants moved her hand from the desk to the turn of the wall. The peeling wallpaper became slick and tacky under the heavy sweat of her gloved forearms. The moisture dissolved the old ink, staining her glove a splotchy maroon rectangle that only smeared further when she stupidly attempted to wipe it off with an annoyed grunt.
Hot Pants shifted her weight to her left leg, sliding a hand to the wood of the doorpost. Hooking her fingers to keep a sturdy balance, she bent her right leg and hopped into the curtain and into the even darker back surgery. The smell of carbolic acid and old iron stung her nose sharply, she felt the drop of temperature when she entered.
The back surgery was the place where they checked up on patients and did what they needed to do to help them. Hot Pants wobbled against the aged porcelain wash stand beside her as she crept into the left side of the room. In front, massive dark-stained oak apothecary shelves that held leftovers subtly shook with a mysterious rumble from the distance outside of the office. Leftover useless chemicals swished slightly in the bottle. A skeletal and seemingly empty instrument cabinet that held everything she might have needed stood in the opposite corner on thin legs, Maybe it was far too late as someone might have gotten here before her. to her right, a utility desk that held every record of patients. The least aged thing from the looks of sturdy utilitarian wood, stained a dark mahogany. In the middle was the main attraction: the exam table. A narrow, high-legged frame of stark, white-painted iron. A thin, hard slab of horsehair padding wrapped in stiff, cracked black leather sat on top for the patient to lay on, though it looked more like a butcher's block more than a mattress. Below the mattress, thick leather straps with heavy brass buckles that held down thrashing limbs hung from the sides. Hot Pants swallowed at the sight of those.
To her assumptions, Her needed tools were not here. If she was lucky, perhaps there were tools in general here. Hot Pants took a shallow breath, stumbling over to the exam table. She caught her torso onto the mattress of it, fresh pain blooming across the side of her thigh and sternum. Something clinked lightly below her heel, Hot Pants looked down, shifting her habit to see what was glinting in the orange gloom that cut in through the velvet curtains.
Foreceps. Long, thin, curled scissors glinting below her ragged heel like a miracle. Hot Pants clenched her jaw lowering herself to swipe it off the floor between her shaky gloved fingers. She pulled the fresh fabric she had slipped from the saddlebag. as well as the heavy jackknife beside her spray. This was the painful part, trying to pull the slug out of her thigh before it began to rot.
Hot Pants unrolled the bloody fabric, gripping the knife. She slung her leg onto the exam table. Fabric stuffed into her mouth for her to bite down on. She grinded her good foot into the bare pine wood boards. She deserved this. Sinners do not deserve the safety of comfort, but rather the pain of penance. But a bullet doesn’t care who its lodging itself into. Hot Pants slipped off both gloves, placing them to her right on the exam table.
The knife sunk into the ugly crater, opening the tunnel. Burning-hot pain shot through her. Sharp and agonizing. Her jaw worked against the fabric. She tasted heavy wool. Fresh bright crimson spilled over. Her fingers, the knife, the table. Her throat squeezed into itself. She felt the trickling warmth against her thigh, and the stinging of uncontrollable tears from the blinding pain of it. But she continued nonetheless.
With shaky hands, Hot Pants dropped the knife, and scrambled for the forceps. Her bloodied hands made the forceps slip and fall until she was able to finally get a hold of it through the blood’s tackiness. Blood spilled and bubbled over her thigh, Hot Pants bunched up her habit and shifted it back. The foreceps opened her flesh, her thigh bit back in stinging blinding pain. The feeling of what felt like molten lava being poured into her wound and the violatingly cold forceps grabbing blindly for a slug that was shot into her hours ago made her let out a pained whimper muffled by the fabric in her mouth. Hot Pants squeezed her eyes shut, finally exhaling with a muffled wail. Her tear-streaked cheeks left her face feeling shivering cold. the driving pressure only immense when she dug deeper for what felt like an eternity. She’d done this countless times. To cowboys who had nearly lost their lives when they couldn’t keep their nose out of business they had no right being in. She had done it to a little boy. Nearly blowed his brains out if it hadn’t been for his elder brother, it had only been the shoulder. Lord protect them if they are alive. Every other swipe and move, she hit something that made her jump up. Her vision went white at the edges, she squeezed them shut. She just prayed to the Lord that she wouldn’t faint. Every time the forceps opened, it felt like her thigh was being ripped open like bread. The moving of the forceps went up to her brain and made her stomach heave nauseatingly. Blood covered her thigh and dripped onto the floor in unpredictable patterns that drove the forceps deeper out of sheer adrenaline.
She practically cried tears of relief when the forceps closed around something shrunkenly small, but unmistakably metallic. Hot Pants tugged at the forceps, feeling the warmth of more blood seeping out. Her hands were covered in blood, She could barely see the color of her skin much less her own gunshot wound from the amount of blood there was. that signature metallic smell nauseated her even more if the forceps hadn’t done that job already. Hot Pants tugged once. Hot Pants tugged then twice. The forceps ripped out of her. She squeezed her eyes shut. Pain exploded through her right leg. Blood welled, and spat itself to the floor in a sickening splat. Hot Pants let her upper body go slack against the exam table, rubbing a lazy hand through her face.
her hand left something sticky and unmistakably metallic. She looked at her hand, then both hands, then her thigh. The blood welled from the throbbing crater in her thigh. the weight of her head became heavier before she could process anything else. The bullet was out, she was fine. The exploding pain rode itself down into an ache that had her hissing every time she shifted her leg.
Hot Pants reached for her spray, lifting herself up from her arms. Every muscle in her lower body protested louder than anything else. A press of the spray burned cold-hot pain into her thigh, before a weightlessness settled into the middle of her thigh. Hot Pants let out a ragged exhale, her thigh was brand new. She looked at the spray, shaking it as she spun it back into its holster under her habit.
She wasn’t sure when she had acquired this ability, somewhere when she first became a Novice. Hot Pants wasn’t sure whether it was a gift bestowed upon her by God, or a curse to haunt her for as long as she lived. Her first year of Novice was the worst year of her life. Hot Pants prayed until her knees were sore, she cried, she worked until her calluses bleed. She had to keep a straight face infront of dying children. Thats when it manifested. In the convent, Her knees were bruised, numb, when she found the canister on the floor. A golden canister, its ridges were geometric yet perfectly aligned to her grip. At first, she thought surely someone had left this behind in the convent after a prayer. She reached for it, it felt natural to hold. Like someone had intentionally left this here for her. She held it for a moment, the top of it was a small circle for the nozzle, with a bigger ellipse below, narrow dents carved around the sides of it, the handle in the middle matched her grip, it fit snug in her hand like it was made for it. Like it was made for her.
She remembered, the bottom of the canister was the same, the same ellipse shape, same narrow carvings into it. She shook it—once, twice, nothing sounded. Hot Pants raised her other hand in the direction of the nozzle, her index pressed down. A warm, thick vapor, skin-colored shot out from the nozzle, splashing onto her hand. She remembered the smell, a distinct copper of what was undoubtedly biological matter. She ripped her hand away. Hot Pants Intended to wipe it off, though, upon looking at her other hand, she was surprised to see it was completely smooth. She had burned her palm just days earlier, it was a grotesque scab that was scarred across her finger, still healing. She still had to work, with little to no time to let it heal, she was ripping open the wound every other day. Now? It was entirely gone. Her hand looked like it had never done a days work. Hot Pants dropped the canister.
What is this? What did it just do to her?
Hot Pants snapped out of her thoughts when a clumsy creak of the floorboards sounded, not of a human but something else.
She hopped off the exam table with the clutched, bloody jackknife in her hand. the creaking stopped, listening. Hot Pants took a step forward, the wood squeaking in protest under her heels. She took a step,, then another,, then another. Until she was at the velvet curtain. Hot Pants stood, the room held its breath, She reached her hand for the velvet curtain slowly.
Before she could open it fully, the corpse jumped at her through the curtain. It covered her in heavy, unbreathable fabric. The dust hit first. A suffocating cloud of lint. She heard a deafening crack. Something clattered against her forehead. Metal, hard. She felt the clawing of hands through the fabric. Each movement send a mist of lint, grey dust, and something else that made her cough. Her eyes stung at the suffocating cloud of dust that drapped over her. The world shrunk to darkness and the sensation of whatever was over her, attacking her mindlessly. She assumed a ghoul. She always assumed a ghoul.
Hot Pants lifted her left arm to pull the velvet taut with her strength, using the jackknife to saw it into whatever was on the other side with a wet plunge. She struggled, using her weight to lift herself off and out of the curtain, and using it to muffle the ghoul. Hot Pants let it struggle. Curtain fabric was heavy, used to muffle the sounds of what went on in the back surgery.
Hot Pants took a step back, something crinkled distinctly under her heel. She looked down.
A newspaper? Had the ghoul been carrying a newspaper?
Hot Pants lifted her foot. The date of the newspaper was dated for July 5th, 1899. Ten days back? She moved her foot completely. The newspaper was obviously yellowed out from age, crumpled from what she assumed was rough-handling of the newspaper itself. Across the top of the page, the title was bold and big, as usual for catching the eye of potential readers. What it said, thats what caught her eye completely.
“CURE FOUND!” In bold eye-catching letters. Hot Pants lifted the paper with both hands. She couldn’t believe this. No way they could have found it. Was this God’s mercy to man? Her eyes scanned the paper, descending to the smaller paragraph below it. It didn’t say much, but it said everything she needed to know. Everything she had prayed for.
SAN ANTONIO, USA. July 5th, 1899.
> Government officials announced today that Mexican scientists have successfully developed a treatment for the Zombie Plague. Authorities are urging all survivors to seek refuge in the capital, where the cure will be distributed. This breakthrough is expected to bring new hope to communities still grappling with the crisis.
The cure. The opportunity. God had given her an opportunity to repent. Find the cure. Prevent anyone else from suffering the Zombie Plague. Hot Pants hands crumpled into the paper, she stared at the letters for too long. They didn’t change. Not one bit. Cure. Developed. Capital. Cure. Developed. Capital. Cure. Developed. Capital. The words didn’t change no matter how hard she looked.
The paper crinkled in protest under her grasp. the ink blurred. This wasn’t an accident. Had that corpse carried this all the way here by accident? God didn’t leave her to rot, He just made her wait for a miracle bigger than herself. The capital of Mexico. Thats where she needed to be. To reach the manifestation of God’s grace and cleanse herself of her sins. God had heard her prayers through the vast desert. She was a good sister, the best sister she could ever have been.
She prayed, she worked, whenever she saw her brother, he always came running to her. He always had a toy in his hand. Most of them were from scraps, but he didn’t care if they were made of dirt. Her brother still carried it everywhere. That boy was imaginative. More imaginative than the others when it came to making his toys out of scrap. She remembered her rare visits home from the convent when the house smelled of sweet kerosene she felt in the back of her throat, clean linseed oil that surprisingly clashed well with the kerosene and dust that she saw carrying through the light shining from the windows sometimes. She remembered the smell very well, she had smelled it for 17 years, before having to get used to the smell of old vellum from the books, and the sweetness of dried roses. She’d go up to her brother’s room to surprise him, she never really got familiar with the smell of his chambers; the smell of chalky rot from his treasures, the fading memory of iron grease, and something else she couldn’t quite remember now. Her brother always had his hands bending or twisting materials into something she was sure could’ve been a new invention if the budget was higher.
She held him herself when he was a newborn. His brother was born around the time she had joined the convent. She remembered the night clearly, like it had only happened a day ago. The world had been asleep except for some other sisters aiding in other medical crises, Hot Pants stayed back with the woman. No one knew this woman was her mother. The room was illuminating by a dying tallow candle and the heavy smell of animal fat and sharp alkaline that stuck to the back of her throat and stripped away any other smells from the room. Her mother’s face was fuzzy in the dark but she could see the color that labor had taken from her, it looked almost translucent under the yellow candle flame. Greasy sweat was still clinging to her forehead and upper lip. Her eyes were sunken and she saw the firm shadows of the bite marks in her lips from the contractions. Her brother felt so impossibly light in her arms. Like holding a bird with a broken wing. He was small, and smelled like warm amniotic fluid mixed with the faint scent of her mother's skin. His skin was hot to the touch against her own skin. His tiny chest fluttered with a heartbeat that felt three times faster than her own. That little boy who ran to hug her leg whenever she came home. That little boy who shouted for sister. That little boy who copied her fighting moves whilst their mother watched from the doorway. Hot Pants held her brother both in his first moments and his last. She was the cause of both his birth and his death.
She had to do this. For her brother. Mexico City. that was where absolution was waiting for her. Where the manifestation of God’s tools bestowed upon man, where she could lay her brother’s spirit to rest. There was no other way. From here? That would be 80 kilometers. Possibly even 90. On horseback it would probably take her months.
Hot Pants folded the newspaper. A rattle sounded in the distance, like a train. The ghoul groaned and growled, clawing at the heavy velvet curtain, Hot Pants slid the forceps and some additional antiseptic into her grasp. She slipped her gloves back on, walking out and leaving the office as it was to rot for the next person that ventures through this town to carve it out even more.
She stepped out, squinting at the seemingly blinding sun, A train she hadn’t noticed before stood on the previously empty tracks. She had seen those before, at times they would whirl past with a vast amount of materials. Now, one stood before her. Had someone come to this town? Had a ghoul become smart enough to handle such?
Hot Pants walked to her horse, next to the office stood a hair saloon. It looked untouched, except for the initial panic. Hot Pants gloved hand instinctively touched her hair, if she was being honest, she had been complaining about it since missionaries had disgraced her with these choppy layers. Her hair stopped below her eye, then at her mouth too, before ending at her shoulders.
Before she knew it, Hot Pants found herself inside. She stood on the black-and-white encaustic floor tiles, her boots crunching softly on a thin layer of blown-in desert sand. Ahead of her, a seamless wall of massive plate-glass mirrors stretched down the room, cracked and frosted with gray dust. In the amber gloom, the porcelain styling chairs sat, their tufted maroon leather split open, exposing the dry stuffing beneath. The place looked basically untouched. The only thing useful from this place would be any leftover scissors or blunt objects.
She looked at the long slabs of cool, white Italian marble counters. Staring back at her through the grit on the mirrors were dozens of porcelain shaving mugs, gilded with the names of dead or missing men, sitting alongside crystal tonic bottles with withered rubber squeeze-bulbs. There, thrown on the floor, a pair of shears. Her heels clicked against the tiles with a noise that sounded too loud in the freezing saloon. the shears were equally cold against her fingers. Hot Pants walked into view of the mirrors. Her habit was dirty, stained with dried blood.
She remembered stories of her mother that she was told in secret, how she learned to fight by covering her chest and cutting her hair. She had done it to keep herself safe, and now her children. Hot Pants was nine when her mother told her that. Her mother told her that she settled down to start a family because its what her life was meant for. It was God’s plan for her. She thought her mother was a brave woman. Hot Pants would consider herself lucky to have such a mother. She just wished she had savored the last hug she was given and the warmth of it while it was still there.
Hot pants grabbed the longer part of her hair on the left side, twirling it against her fingers. She had short hair when she was little, a bob with bangs that grew out to just plain straight hair before the plague. She pressed her hair between her index and middle, raising the shears up to where her hair would be at her jaw. The shears closed around her hair like a bear trap.
Snip. A sharp crisp sound, and the hair fell gracefully to the floor. messy, uncoordinated individual strands scattered to her feet. She fully closed the shears with a final snip. Her hair shortened to her jaw. She stood there for a moment, before snipping the other side. Hot Pants grabbed the shorter end that ended at her mouth, snipping it to her nose. By the end, her hair felt light, like something had lifted from her shoulders. Her hair ended at her jaw. Not in smooth cuts, but not in jagged cuts either. Another length ended at her nose, tickling it softly. Hot Pants moved it from her nose with a feathery-soft swipe. Another length ended below her eye. Then, her bangs, stuck to her forehead from sweat, ended right above her eyes. Her hair was dry, like straw.
Back in Steeling, the moms nearby all loved her hair, they cooed over the length and the silk texture it seemed to have. She remembered how proud her mother seemed, she remembered how she too excited stood upright, confident in her hair. She remembered the warmth of the heated rainwater pool into her scalp. When she still had chub on her cheeks. Even as she grew, that tradition never stopped. It only grew scarce when she joined the church. Right now, she craves her mother’s hands more than anything.
The freezing air hit the little neck she had exposed. It felt nice, less suffocating than her previous hairstyle. Hot Pants slipped the shears into her grasp along with the forceps. She looked towards the saloon. her heels clicked against the tiles as she walked behind the styling chairs, and towards the back-bar. A long yet narrow workspace lined with marble counters. Hot Pants dropped to her knees. Her habit pooled like neatly spilled ink on the tiled floor. Directly beneath the marble slab sat dark, heavy walnut cabinet doors. she reached a gloved hand to the pull-handle.
The smell hit her immediately. A sour, foul, heavy smell. The hinges creaked with a rusty groan, the smell of rancid tonics stung her eyes. She reached a hand in. There were various of tonics and items, though Hot Pants latched her hand onto the bottle once she felt its cold distinct shape. A small, heavy amber glass apothecary bottle.
She pulled it out into the dim amber light of the saloon. The glass was coated in a thick velvet layer of gray desert sand. With her thumb, she swiped the sand off. Faded black ink labelled of the bottle: GLYCERINE.
Gets Up huffed impatiently when Hot Pants finally slipped out of the saloon. Hot Pants slid her hand across his side, unrolling the rope from the anchor infront of the office. The sun warmed her back, under all the heavy wool, she had been pleasantly surprised to have cooled down so quickly.
The rope had come loose when the sound of stumbling and thudding sounded. It wasn’t far away, but it wasn’t close either. It didn’t sound like the distinct sounds of a corpse’s stumbling, but neither did it sound like steady steps of someone either. Hot Pants slid the forceps and shears into her saddlebag. heavy metal clinked with glass bottles as she slipped a pistol into her grasp. It was small, metal, something she had taken from missionaries as secondary weapon in the situation that her rifle couldn’t finish the fight. She straightened her arms were down, perfectly concealing the pistol with her habit that blew against her legs in the desert wind. The sight before her was nothing short of bizarre. Well, the man was, but the way he walked was utterly bizarre.
A young man, around her age she assumed—if not older—in military uniform. The double breasted military coat looked surprisingly clean for how many days its been. his long blond hair messy and obviously unkept under the military cap. He walked like he obviously had too much to drink. The cape draped over him, covering the rest of his uniform from her sight. His arms stretched out like a toddler learning to walk. Hot Pants smoothly prepared to fire in the case that anything were to go wrong.
The faint sound of the click made the man’s head snap towards her. Like a predator locking onto prey. It made her jump at the speed of which his head turned. There couldn’t have been a way he could’ve heard that. Unless he was a ghoul. Did ghouls have the ability of heightened hearing? There was no time to answer that.
One step—and a loud bang—and the man was on the floor, nursing his wounded shoulder. He cursed and grunted, looking towards her. His tongue dipped out for a split second towards the gushing crimson that finally stained his suspiciously pristine uniform. What the hell, who is this guy? She kept her arm extended with the pistol, her foot slowly lifted itself infront of her other foot in a slow step as she inched near the man.
The man was attractive, she gave him that, but his strange behavior definitely took away that charm. His features were sharp: Blue eyes, blond hair, defined jaw, and sharp canines she chose to ignore. Hot Pants used her heel to push the guard down onto his back, gloved hand stained with crimson against his wounded shoulder. She pointed the pistol between his eyes, one wrong move from him and he was a dead man.
“Christ, woman..” The man groaned, squeezing his eyes shut in agony. He let out the sound identical to a wounded animal. Hot Pants kept the pistol aimed inbetween his eyes. The guard attempted to reach up, but her heel quickly pinned it back down. He let out a growl, baring his teeth. His pupils were basically sharp slits. This wasn’t a man, but it wasn’t a ghoul either. She looked over his face. She really looked this time.
The left corner of his mouth was poorly covered by a bandage, underneath she saw something pulsing, white, possibly bone? Was he hurt? A pang of guilt hit her chest for a moment though she saw no blood. His skin cracked from that side of his face, reaching his temples, and across his nose. She leaned down, harshly shoving the gun between his eyebrows.
“State your business, or I will not hesitate to shoot you again and leave you here to rot.” Her voice was firm, she just prayed that the guard didn’t notice the underlying tremor in her voice.
He laid there for a moment, chest heaving as he swallowed and finally spoke,
“Corporal Diego Brando. I come in peace.” He hissed through a clenched jaw. He swallowed and dipped out his tongue again.
“Diego Brando,” She tasted the name on her tongue. She stood up from him, lowering the pistol.
Diego’s gloved hand slid from his shoulder to her ankle. With a sharp, desperate wrench of his forearm, he yanked her foot out from under her. Diego threw his entire military weight forward, lunging up to slam them both into the sand. The impact knocked the wind clean from her lungs, her spine cracked against the sand as it dusted under their weight. For a second, she couldn’t inhale. The force of the impact sent a white flash that blinded her vision. Her ears muffled every other sound with a loud ring.
The pistol clattered to the ground. Neither of them moved. Diego began to crawl towards the gun. Hot Pants drove her elbow into his chest, earning a frantic gasp mixed with a grunt from him. Diego dragged her down by the waist. He was quick to reach the gun but Hot Pants was faster. Hot Pants slipped the pistol from under him. She used the blunt side to hit him square on the forehead. Diego went down with a grunt, cupping his hands around his face. He had lost to a nun once more.
Hot Pants helped herself up, stumbling. She dusted out her habit with her hands, looking down to the military guard. Diego was curled up into himself, from the wind brushing his hair away revealed the trickling of blood trailing down his temple. For a second, he didn’t move. She thought she had taken another (not so) innocent life before he let out a pained groan and lifted himself onto his forearms. His military hat was thrown, abandoned at his feet.
“Since you aren’t a ghoul, I’ll spare you.” She turned back to her horse. Gets Up snorted sharply, fighting against the rope in a panic. Hot Pants walked slowly towards him, soothing the panicked stallion with firm pressing strokes and a low cooing voice.
She had just settled Gets Up when Diego yelled out again.
“Oi! Are you just going to leave me here!?” He was struggling to get up, She could hear him loudly cursing about vows and God.
Hot Pants merely turned her neck towards the man on the ground,
“I suppose you and I don’t have the same destination, why should I help you?” She turned back around, pulling the lead rope loose from the anchor. Hot Pants heard clumsy rustling and the sound of stumbling creeping closer to her from behind. Diego felt and leaned against Gets Up, who immediately took interest in the man. The stallion shifted his hooves heavily in the sand, blowing a nervous breath. She didn’t have the space to carry a wounded soldier from this place, it would be too much for her stallion to carry.
“I have a train, sister, I can get you anywhere you’d like to be.” Diego smiled at her, it looked more reptilian than human. It was obvious he was trying to court her of some sort, or maybe needing relief through his journey. She had no interest in partaking.
“My destination is Mexico.”
“Eh? Mexico?” Diego’s smile dropped instantly. A look of confused carved itself into his sharp features. Hot Pants walked to the opposite side of the horse, Diego followed like a lost puppy. Thats when his rapid fire questions started. Like a toddler asking ‘why’ over and over. She gave him answers that would lead him nowhere.
She slid the saddlebag off, Diego kept blabbering. That’s when she felt the pull of her shoulder, Diego turned her around, hands gripping her biceps, face inches from hers.
“You won’t make it there. Not on horseback.” He hissed, his grip softening. The phantom grip was enough—she had reached her limit with this man. “Sister, if I may—“
He didn’t finish his sentence when she grabbed his collar, using her weight, she stepped into his space, and slammed his body into the ground with a fluid twist of her torso. Diego let out a gasp that sounded like air being knocked straight out of his lungs. Hot pants leaned down, face inches from his. Just like he had done to her too many times.
“You talk too much for a guard who doesn't know how to protect his center of gravity. Keep your hands to yourself before I break them.” She hissed into his ear. Her hands trembled as she dusted her habit once more. Leaning back up, She looked towards the train dominating the horizon on the tracks. A great black iron beast she had seen pass by her town many times. The very tracks it sat on were what she used to keep herself in check on her horse. these tracks were straight, steady, never-ending. The train vibrated with a low, rhythmic mechanical rumble. The rumble she had heard earlier when exiting the doctor’s office. It vented steadily. Rhythmic chuffs of white steam blew from its underbelly into the shimmering desert air. The smell of burning anthracite coal and hot axle grease drifted across the sand, thick and sulfurous. A smell she had begun to smell when she exited the hair saloon.
Hot Pants looked back down at the bruised Diego, having been defeated by a nun three times now. He was pretty roughed up. She would be surprised if he still had the nerve to be an arrogant dick. Though they had just met, she already hated everything about him. The reptilian undertones in his features that made a shiver go down her spine, the way his tongue dipped every now and then and how much he swallowed. She especially hated his accent, that stupid accent that somehow made him seem even more arrogantly cocky.
“There’s still daylight left to burn.” She finally spoke, she kept her voice flat. Diego looked up at her, his eyes widening in the surprise that she still accepted.
She let out a deep exhale, gathering the lead rope into loose loops in her left hand. With her right, she took a short, firm grip just beneath the stallion’s jaw, tucked her shoulder tight against his flank, and guided his head forward.
AN: literally tweaking my back hurts okay heres a longer chapter. whole lotta character building I love Hot Pants
titsay
areudirty
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