Apocalypsis 02 - Warpaint

using them from before. I didn’t bother to try and learn the calls, though. I can’t sing worth a dang, so they were totally out of my range of capabilities. Luckily, Rob was a big war movie buff, so he’d picked up some wartime hand signals that he taught us. We just made the rest up on our own.
    Winky moved into place and settled in, just as the dogs appeared again below us.
    ***
    The dogs searched around on the ground near the tree and looked up a few times, sniffing the air. Winky and I didn’t move a muscle. I closed my eyes for fear they’d see them moving around and start barking.
    I heard their paws padding off in the grass and opened my eyes again. They had gone up to lay by the murky pool - a rottweiler and a pitbull. Oh shit, they have a pitbull. Those dogs scared the doodles out of me. I could only picture what one of them would do if it got a hold of me. I closed my eyes again and took a deep breath to clear the horrible visions that were crowding my mind. I needed to stay alert and focused, not freaking out about a potential dog attack in my future.
    Winky and I stayed put for what seemed like hours, seeing and hearing nothing except the occasional movement from the dogs who often went to press their noses against the glass door of the house and presumably the door to the pool house, too. I could see them going in that direction and stopping, but I couldn’t see exactly what was there. My legs were going numb and my feet were tingling. I’d found a limb I could sit on while resting my back against the trunk, but it wasn’t comfortable enough to make it a good spot for longer than a couple hours, max.
    My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the sliding glass door opening again. I couldn’t see who it was, so I looked up at Winky. She was staring through the leaves, concentrating very hard.
    I heard some footsteps around the pool deck and then some rattling chains, followed by another door opening; and this time, it was closer. Whoever it is, must be going into the pool house. He entered where the dogs had been standing on several occasions while we watched.
    “Don’t be afraid,” his voice said. “Just come out here where I can see you better.” He sounded tired. It was the same guy who had yelled at the Dave person. It was surprising to hear his voice sounding so different, almost caring. Earlier he’d sounded like a real jerk.
    “I don’t want to go in! I don’t want to go in there!” came a girl’s pleading voice. She was crying and clearly in a panic.
    “I’m not taking you in there, I already told you that. I’m not the friggin butcher, okay. I’m the one trying to help you.”
    She sniffed, clearing her throat. “You’re with them. That’s all I need to know.” She wasn’t sounding as frail now - more like pissed.
    “Yeah, well, just like you, I don’t have a lot of choices in my life right now.”
    “We all have choices.”
    Yeah. Definitely angry.
    “Okay, well explain it to me,” he said in a slightly hushed but irritated voice. “Tell me how it is you think I have a choice here.”
    “You don’t have to be all up in here bein’ their nazi doctor and shit. You could get out. Leave here. Let the rest of us out too, on your way.”
    I heard a chair scrape on the pool deck. “Sit down so I can look at your arm, would you?”
    Another chair scraped the surface. “You got nothin’ to say, do you, Mengele? You know I’m right. You’re just a chicken shit white boy, just like all the rest of them. Doin’ whatever Dave says, kissing his be hind all the time.”
    “Shut up, LaShay. It’s not like that. And stop calling me that name. It’s Sean.”
    “Sure it is. It’s exactly like that. And I’ll call you what I want. I don’t see no sweet little Irish boy sittin’ here in front of me. I see a monster , jus’ like Hitler’s doctor Mengele.”
    “Listen … what would be the point of leaving? I’ll just get caught again and brought back. Probably punished. It’s already happened once, in case you haven’t noticed. And you know how much they like to punish people here. Besides, if I go, who’s going to take care of all of you guys, huh?”
    “You call this taking care of us?” She made a disgusted noise. “All you do is keep us alive so they can eat us later.”
    “Whatever, LaShay. Just sit still so I can change this bandage. Your arm’s going to get infected.”
    “Don’t bother,” she said, pushing her chair. “Take me back to