Hook, Line, and Sinner

I clutched my hand tight around my ankle, securing the blade I had delicately placed between the leather of my boot and my sock. People were taking off any clothing they had and fashioning it into some sort of weapon. Glenn had pulled out nails from the floorboards, wedging them like claws through Michonne's belt and wrapping it around his hand. Abraham, the red-headed drill sergeant had removed one of his dog tags, sharpening the dull metal on a broken piece of wood to use as a noose. Daryl stood on watch, peeking through the small crack in the door to warn us when they were coming. We were gearing up for war.

"Alright, got four of them pricks coming our way," Daryl said. All of our heads snapped up. I got to my feet, stationed just behind Rosita, the little feisty girl with the pigtails.

"Y'all know what to do," Rick spoke up. He placed himself directly in front of the door, he wanted to be the first to get his hands on them. "Go for their eyes first. Then their throats."

"Put your backs to the walls on either side of the car now," a man ordered us, his voice deep and commanding.

We all stood there, grouped together like a pack of wolves. Our fists propped up in front of our chest, weapons wrapped around our knuckles or clenched tightly in our palms. My gaze then trailed from the door to the roof of the car, hearing footsteps echo from above me. My eyes squinted closed as the sunlight shone through upon a trap door sliding open above my head. An entrance we had no idea existed. I threw my forearm over my eyes, trying to see what was going on. But before I could even make out the figure standing above me a canister was dropped down, landing just between my feet. The hatch was shut again as soon as the canister hit the ground.

I looked down, my jaw falling open as a cloud of smoke quickly leaked out of the tin can. My brain couldn't process it fast enough for my feet to move. I stood there like an idiot, knowing very well what it was.

"Move!" Abraham shouted.

My feet were torn off the ground when Daryl grabbed me by the arm, yanking me away from the explosion. The blast wasn't huge, but in the small space we had been confined in, the fumes quickly clouded every inch of the car. It sucked out any measly air we had left and filled your lungs with thick and dry vapour. My eyes watered as I coughed on the smoke entering my lungs, choking and spitting up anything I could to relieve the dry irritation.

The cloud of smoke then went from a dark murky grey to a foggy white when the main door screeched open. I huddled myself against the wall trying to make myself small, unnoticeable.

"Daryl!" I screamed out as a hand latched onto my left ankle, tugging my leg as hard as it could and I was dragged on my stomach out of the car.

My body hit the ground with a thud. I winced in pain as my elbow landed hard underneath me. My eyes dialled in and out of focus, I was so lightheaded from all the smoke inhalation that I wasn't even sure if the man hovering over me was real. His face was dirty and his hands were covered in a fresh coat of blood. Then my eyes closed. When they opened again Rick was thrown to the ground beside me. I was staring at his back, he wasn't moving. My eyes glance up at the man standing in front of me, his nose bled profusely. His figure blurred when he stomped down on Rick's head. My eyes shut for good after that.

By the time I became conscious again I was being carried into a warehouse by two men. Each one with a hand underneath my arms to hold my limp body up. My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach, threatening to eliminate what little food I still had left in my body upon seeing a butcher to my right. He stood in front of a surgical table with a chainsaw in hand. The sound of the blade was haunting as the chain tore through the flesh of a dead man's leg. He had been stripped naked, his right left already cut off and being washed with some sort of alcohol in a tub beside the surgical station.

My hot breath hitched in my throat when I realized I had a rag across my mouth and tied at the back of my head. My eyes then landed on three bins as the men dragged me across the room. Each one stating a different thing, "Wash. Food. Burn." I was beginning to hyperventilate, I jerked my body up, trying to rip my arms free of their hold. I grunted and screamed as the rag muffled anything that came out of my mouth.

"Get her on the table. Quickly," the man holding my right arm said. They tossed me up on a surgical table like I was a rag doll. My back hitting the cold metal as I squirmed. The two of them overpowered me with ease, pinning my arms down by my side and zip-tied both of my wrists to the handles.

I rolled my head to my left, hearing the struggling grunts coming from the other men they dragged into the room. I watched as they each knelt Bob, Rick, Daryl, Glenn, and four other men up against a metal trough, their heads hanging low over the box.

Two men walked over to where I laid, each of them wearing a plastic apron smeared and splattered with fresh blood. One of them, a bald-headed man with a crooked nose and pointy bat-like ears, picked up a steel bat from the table above my head. The other, a twenty-something-year-old wearing a backwards baseball hat and safety goggles on his forehead, picked up two knives. He slid the blades of the knives against one another, sharpening them for whatever was about to come. The sound of it pierced your eardrums, making your heart race with every step he took towards the trough.

I groaned out, the tears slipping from my eyes as I watched the man with the bat take practice swings behind their backs as he waited for his partner to finish sharpening his knives. I threw my hands up against the zip ties, feeling the plastic cut through my skin as I tried to yank my arms free. My head rolled back over, looking at Daryl as he did the same. I could see him try to jerk his hands from behind his back and his ankles that had been zip-tied together. He finally looked over to my side of the room, his eyes becoming wide behind the wisps of his long hair. It wasn't until right now that he realized I had been dragged in here with them.

"Alright, let's get this going," the younger man said, giving the word that he was ready. He walked down the line, passing our group of people and down to the other side where a bleach-blond man knelt. The man whimpered as they hovered behind him.

I rolled my head over to my right, shutting my eyes tight as the tears rolled down my cheek. I struggled so hard to try and rip my hands free to cover my ears. But I don't think that even my palms could shield the sound of that steel bat ricocheting off of the man's skull. The sound of each of them shouting through their gags caused me to bring my attention back over to them.

That's when I saw it. That look in their eyes. How far from humanity we have truly strayed. There wasn't one ounce of the person we were before left in this room. The terror escaped from my lungs as I stared at the scene before me. The man's limp body hung lifelessly over the side of the trough, his neck slit open from ear to ear as the blood poured out of him. Without hesitation, they were onto the next.