'Of course, the first single, available, hot girl in 1000 miles shows up, makes me feel like an idiot, steals my double-barrel, and then says I'm the one that can't be trusted," Columbus thought as he was walked back to the store's main room.
"Better it is for you to make the mistake of trusting us than for us to make the mistake of trusting you," Wichita had said not a few seconds ago, when he genuinely asked why they were doing this to them. Which was a clear indication of deep-seated mistrust of others, if his psychology class knowledge was still accurate. Not that it mattered much given the 18-inch barrels shoved up against his back.
"Honestly, I have to tell you both that this is the fucking dumbest thing you could have done," Tallahassee remarked, his eyes flashing dangerously as a twelve-year-old pressed his mare's leg against his lower back. "I understand being cautious, especially in a world teeming with fucked-up zombies eager to eat us— and there are still assholes out there who would harm you girls. However, there's a huge difference between keeping your distance from someone at gunpoint to prevent them from fucking with you and scheming to steal someone else's shit for yourself." Columbus nodded to this infallibly as he looked behind him at the two.
"I have to agree with him on that," he said. "Statistically, it's gonna get you both in a worse place than just being generally against interacting with other survivors- Ugh!" he grunted when Wichita hit him in the back of the head with the barrel of his gun. This made him stumble into the door that opened onto the main room.
"Gonna chime in here and say that you both shouldn't be shit talking the two people who have no real reason not to shoot you right now" the older sister said with a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Now I'm gonna ask a simple question from the two of you, where are the others here with you?" she asked as she eyed the blood-filled room. The smell of the place was getting worse since she walked out the first time after hearing the gunfight.
Columbus, getting back to his feet, gave her a nervous look as he faced her fully. "Others, what others? It's just us here," he lied terribly. Tallahassee shook his head as he watched the nerd's face morph into a pained expression, before shifting his eyes in every direction fast enough to make himself nauseous. Wichita just gazed at him for a moment before looking at the piles of bodies that were peaking through the aisles, before looking back at his face, and looking at him like he was adorably stupid.
"Mmh hmm, and I know the sound of more than two guns, as well as the fact that you two weren't going to be enough to kill off this many zombies, so" she said before moving forward to point the gun right between his eyes. "Where are your friends, how many, and what are they carrying?" Columbus gulped as he felt the cooling steel of the barrels from the overuse not thirty minutes ago. He wanted to open his mouth and say something, but his Genuine fear of death made him shut up involuntarily. Seeing him not answer after a few moments, she sighed and flicked the gun over to the old cowboy. "How about you, you loyal enough to die for them too?" she asked him.
The cowboy just shifted his two chest-raised hands of surrender into two middle fingers as he gave her a sour look over his shoulder. "You shoot us and they'll come kill you anyway, don't see a reason to assist the two of you with an upper hand, bitch." again she waited a moment to see if either would crack before sighing and shifted back to Columbus and turning him around to face forward. She pushed him forward with her sister following her lead and making Tally walk forward as well. The four, two hostages and hostage takers, moved through the store, with Wichita shouting out into the store while looking down each aisle as they went.
"Okay! Listen up! I've got your friends here at gunpoint. If you don't come out, guns on safety, and hands up, I'm gonna blow a hole right through their chest!" she shouted. It was only when the four were at the center aisle did they spotted a Native American twenty-something who seemed to be fucking around on her phone with her headphones in. finally seeing the two's back up, at least one of them, she pushed the two into the aisle to walk closer. The woman didn't take notice as she seemed to smirk at her phone and chuckle. "Hey!" Wichita shouted out as the four made it to the middle of the aisle. Leah looked up, finally saw the situation, and gave the two boys a look of derision. Then smirked before holding up her phone and taking a picture as she took out her headphones.
"Yep," she said as she got a great picture of the four. Columbus with his fearful look, Tally with his pissed off expression, Wichita with a Cheshire smile, and Little rock with an adorable no nonsense frown plastered on her face. "Your sister is gonna fucking laugh her ass off that you two got done in by a pretty face."
"Woah, we don't need her to know about this," Tallahassee said, shifting his open palms forward in a stopping motion.
"Oh no, I think we do!" Wichita shouted out as she looked at Leah. Hearing that the man she had at gunpoint had a sister meant a better chance that she could make her come out and drop her gun. "In fact, why doesn't she come out so we can get to the part where she, you, and anyone else hiding drop their guns and walk out to surrender?"
Leah looked at the older grifter with a raised brow. "You seriously shouted for us to surrender?" she flatly questioned Wichita. Wichita nodded at the guns pointed at the two men.
"This makes me pretty serious," she said, and Leah just sighed and shook her head.
"Wow, and I thought you would be smarter given you tricked these two, and were able to figure out that they weren't alone," Leah said while putting the phone away and looking behind the grifters. "Yet you, by your own volition, casually walked into an aisle and never once checked to see if someone followed behind you." The words and gaze made the two girls freeze for a second and flick their gaze behind them. Only to see down the barrel of a handgun pressed into their turned face. Akane was smiling brightly at the two girls who honestly didn't even make it a challenge for her.
"Yeah, when you started shouting about killing them, I was hoping for some kind of stand-off or cat and mouse game of us trying to get the drop on you," Akane said sadly. "Instead, you just walked into an aisle the second you see someone?" she questions with a shaking head, "that's just disappointing." Finally, she just looked at the two with a chipper smile and casually pulled back the hammer on her 1911s. "Well, lower your guns or I'll kill you," she said. Wichita looked down the barrel and mentally panicked at the sudden turn of events. She could see Little Rock gazing up at her, hopeful she could talk the two out of this now. Instead of doing what the woman said, she tried to double down.
"Or, counteroffer, you drop your gun and I don't shoot your fri-Arg!" she said with as much steel as she could until Akane shoved the barrel of her gun into Wichita's mouth.
"Yeah, that's not gonna work on me, girl," Akane said as she firmly pressed her other gun against the side of Little Rock's head. "I'm more of a scorched earth kind of negotiator, you know, like if you kill them, then I'll kill your little sister before blowing your brains out." She then leaned in and gave Wichita a glassy-eyed and dead look as she whispered out the next part. "I'd make sure to give a good solid five minutes before I did, giving you time to suffer before meeting her in the afterlife." Wichita grew wide-eyed and started to lower her gun instinctively at the psychopathic threat, her sister doing the same, before Tallahassee spun around and took back his mare's leg and was now pointing at Wichita.
Seeing this, Wichita looked even more scared as they had just lost one of their hostages and were now staring at two different barrels. Little Rock looked practically ready to genuinely cry as her sister was likely going to be shot, and she right after. Akane, however, just started to chuckle evilly as her fun was cut short. Opening her mouth to make a guffaw about Tallahassee stealing her thunder, and ruining her threat, as now there was no reason to act on such a sadistic plan, she was interrupted when the last person anyone thought to speak shouted out.
"Jesus Christ!" Columbus shouted. Whipping around and looking at her, Tallahassee, and the two grifters, he let what was bottling up for the past few minutes of living out some of his worst fears in being in the apocalypse. "Can we all just fucking stop with the hostage taking, sister killing, threating fucking murdering people to steal shit-FUCK!" he shouted out. Everyone visibly grew wide-eyed as the boy took a breath and threw his hands around in a jerky mess as he tried to channel his bottled anger. "I'm just trying to get to my fucking family so we can try to, I don't know, build a community or some sort of civilization restart! Can't we just fucking stop with the human on human killing bullshit and just fucking try and survive together instead!" he waved his hands at the dead on the floor around everyone, "For fuck sakes, there are zombies! Actually fucking flesh eating zombies! And you're all just pointing guns at each other! Come the fuck on!"
...Silence held the small gathering as Columbus took in deep breaths as he recovered from his rant. Not a single word was said as most were still processing mentally the sudden outburst that had been delivered. Akane and Leah blinked once as it seemed that the situation had rushed Columbus's rant from the source material. Instead of a yellow Hummer H2 being the backdrop for it, they were treated quite a lot earlier due to the prolonged hostage situation ramping up his already suppressed frustrations of being in a world of zombies.
"Makes quite a bit of sense, given his original rant came from literally the second meeting of having a gun shoved into his face," Akane thought as she looked at Columbus. She, Leah, and Logan had wondered if stopping the theft of the car would keep it from happening. "Guess it was more a matter of time thing, than a situation bringing it to light, or...maybe both?" she thought quizzically.
"Ooooh," Tallahassee finally spoke from the silence as he looked at Columbus. The nerd's words caused his finger on the trigger of his gun to loosen as he felt the tension bleed off somewhat. He looked at Akane, who still had her handgun shoved into Wichita's mouth, and gave her a look. "Maybe best to be the mature ones here, hmm?" he hedged. Wichita, for her part, did her best to give a pleading look to Akane while Little Rock did her best, crying child puppy dog eyes. Akane, for her part, simply looked at everyone, then Leah, who was smiling as she knew that Akane didn't want to kill the two girls. Still, with a dramatic sigh, she pulled out the gun from Wichita's mouth, making the older grifter spit and smack her lips from the gun oil and powder residue.
"Fine, but I'm still taking my pound of flesh," Akane said as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a black permanent marker. Everyone but Leah looked at her in question at that, making Akane smile brightly.