Apocalypsis 03 - Exodus

be a few minutes. And then I’ll be back. With a baby head.” Winky’s head was shaking in disbelief as she disappeared up the stairs, leaving me alone with the Charles Manson of mothers.
    ***
    Brittney swung her top leg up and down, her gaze roving around the room as we waited.
    “So,” I said, breaking the freaky silence, “tell me how you know about Bodo.”
    She stopped bouncing her leg and looked at me through narrowed eyes. “I’m not going to tell you how to find him until the deed is done.”
    “No, I know. I’m not asking where he is. I’m just wondering how you know about him since you’ve been up here in this room the whole time.”
    “I saw things. I hear things. People tell me things.”
    “What people.”
    “Sean. The minions.” Her voice took on an edge of pride that was more than a little disturbing.
    “The minions?”
    “That’s what Loco called them. The minions. They were the ones who had to do my bidding, since I was, well, you know…”
    “I’m not sure I do,” I said, hoping I was wrong about my suspicions.
    Brittney smiled in a ghastly sort of way, her face with a far-expression as she spoke. “I was the Queen. I was repopulating the earth.”
    “And Loco was the King?”
    “That’s what he liked to say. But I was going to pick another King. One I liked better. He just didn’t know it.”
    “Why did he let you keep all those weapons? Wasn’t he worried you’d … pick another king or whatever?”
    “He never saw this place. He thought I lived in the bathroom.”
    I frowned. “He’d be pretty stupid to fall for that. The toilets don’t work up there and neither does the water.”
    She shrugged, smiling to herself. “I threw some poo out the window now and again. He fell for it. He brought me stuff to eat and water to drink. I always gave it to the dogs. They stood below my window every day waiting for their meals.” She giggled, obviously proud of herself for outwitting her suitor.
    I had to nod and give her the respect she deserved. She’d taken a more than crappy situation and found a way to survive. Maybe that’s why she’d left her mind too. Survival. Could I have stayed present and sane after being raped and wooed by a cannibal named Loco? I felt a little sorry for her, then. I still didn’t think I would have the same urge to kill my baby as she did, but at least I understood where it might be coming from.
    “You’re a very strong person, to have gone through all of that.”
    “Maybe. I don’t know. My brother helped.”
    “Where is he?” I had seen no signs of the kid in the family photo, but the faces downstairs were hard to picture as they had been. The death mask was too different.
    “He’s gone. He left.”
    “Where’d he go?” I couldn’t believe a sibling would leave like that in the middle of all this.
    “He went to the bar-b-cue.”
    I instantly felt sick to my stomach again. Oh, please don’t let this mean what I think it means.
    “You’re not saying … that Loco ate your brother, are you?”
    “No. Not just Loco. Everyone.” She turned her head slowly and looked at me, dead in the eye, and said, “Everyone ate my brother. Eh. Vry. One. ” Her mouth thinned into a line. Then she took a deep breath through her nose, opened her mouth, and screamed with all her might, right in my face. “EVERYONE!”
    My hand rocketed out automatically, and slapped her hard. Twice.
    Her face slashed first left and then right with the force of it. She recovered quickly and was crying and screaming at the same time as she leaped at me, her jagged nails poised to rip my eyes out.
    I jumped to my feet, dancing out of reach. I wanted to lay her out on her funeral bed with my bare hands, but her story was the only thing standing between Bodo and me, so I couldn’t kill her, much as she might have liked me to.
    She rushed me with zero finesse, rage against the world her only guidance. It was pretty effective, since I had to focus so much on not hurting her. I let her hit me with her body, using the backward force to bring us to the wall. I tensed myself for the impact and used the couple seconds she needed to recover to put her in a bear hug. I slammed her face with a head butt, earning myself an instant headache in the process. Blood poured out of her nose and ran down the front of her face to her neck. The stains spread across the white of her dress, hideously gruesome. She looked like she’d just stepped out of a low-budget horror