“Don’t shoot her,” said one of them. “I want a taste first.”

I scrubbed my foot in the ground hard, hoping like hell that I was at least loosening up the dirt a little. The moccasins were great for comfort and protection, but nearly useless for disturbing the earth. And for once, I really, really wanted to do that.

The two would-be rapists split up, one of them coming in from my left and the other, my right. I had just enough time to bend down and pick up the dirt I’d loosened before the one on the left charged me.

I threw the sand and bits of plant into his face, taking the few precious seconds I’d gained of him being blind to punch him in the throat and then kick him hard in the nuts. I got him with my shin, so it was a solid hit, but not hard enough to mangle them for life like I’d wanted. But he was down for now, and not anyone I had to worry about for the time being.

I spun around to meet my second opponent.

“Get that bitch under control!” yelled the slave driver standing over Winky.

My opponent turned to look at him, so I risked a glance, too. She was peeking up through her hair at him, and he wasn’t paying attention, too focused on me and his friend to notice that she had somewhat recovered from her earlier braining.

She reached up and grabbed his belt jerking it towards her enough to throw him off balance. She came up fighting, and the last thing I saw before the other guy was coming at me was a perfectly executed eye-gouge.

His screams of pain and frustration cheered my soul, but I had no time to wallow in the happiness, because the hands of the biggest guy of the bunch were closing over my throat.

I’d lost focus for just a second and that was all it took. My vision was quickly going dark; this guy was leaving nothing to chance. This wasn’t just a knock-a-girl-out choke hold … this was a strangle-the-girl-until-she-turns-blue kind of maneuver.

I came in above his hands and tried to bang them away, but I’d lost too much strength along with my oxygen. My vision narrowed and everything went gray. I couldn’t believe he’d gotten the jump on me. I was wondering if I would soon see my dad, when all of a sudden I felt his hands leaving my throat.

I gasped for air, trying to get my larynx to open back up. It felt nearly crushed from the pressure, and the pain and immediate swelling was killing me. As soon as I was able to see properly again, I put my hands up, ready to block the next move that came at me.

My vision cleared, and I wasn’t prepared for what I was seeing. The three slave girls had somehow managed to jump on my attacker from behind. The one that had been sleeping was awake now and looked incredibly energized as she pulled back with all her might on the rope that was wrapped through the zip-tie at her wrists, connecting her to her friends. That rope was now around the neck of her captor, and all the girls were choking the crap out of him.

The guy being choked was kicking his legs backwards trying to connect with their shins and reaching back over his shoulders from time to time to try and punch them, landing a few good ones; but they held fast, pulling on that rope as if their lives depended on it. And I was pretty sure it did, because if this guy escaped, he was going to have more than rape on his mind.

The guy with the gun was standing there agog. His gun was hanging at his side and he looked from partner to partner, confused.

Winky’s captor was on the ground, unconscious, and she was busy stomping on his face, over and over. She’d demolished his nose, and his lips looked like hamburger meat. It was disgusting, but I could feel her rage from here. The guy was ready to beat and rape her, and she had every right to end him, as far as I was concerned.

I turned my attention back to the kid with the gun, taking two steps towards him since the slave girls looked like they had this other guy in hand.

He saw me coming and held up his hands in surrender, the gun pointed at the sky. “Hey, I’m not with these guys,” he said.

“Looks to me like you are,” I said in a low raspy voice, the choking having damaged my throat somehow. It was hard to breathe, too.

“I’m not, I swear to God! They made me come along and do what they said.”

“You found us and turned us over to them,” I reminded him. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yes, I did! They test me all the time!” he said, his voice rising an octave.

“I don’t believe you,” I said, stopping four feet away. He still had the gun which I had to assume was loaded, and I didn’t think I could get to my hidden knife before he shot me. “Give me your gun if you’re not one of them.”

He looked from them to me and back again. “Here,” he said, walking over to the guy being choked by the slave girls. “I’ll do you one better.” He lifted the gun and shot the guy in the stomach. Then he walked over and shot the guy I had nut-crushed in the head, ceasing his moaning and writhing around on the ground.

I jumped with the sounds of the gun going off. The slave girls scrambled back out the way, grabbing onto each other while screaming and crying. The one who was sleeping before covered her head with her skinny arms, moaning like a wounded animal.

“See? Would I do that if I were with them?” he asked in a calm voice, smiling at me.

The gut-shot guy was screaming in pain. His voice sounded inhuman. I couldn’t tell if the hair lifting up on the back of my neck was from the calm demeanor of the murderer standing less than five feet away from me, or the horrible sounds coming from the dying guy.

“Jesus,” was all I could say, looking at the wounded rapist, watching the blood pour out of his abdomen and onto the ground. It was mixing with the rainwater, turning it pink.

“Don’t feel bad, he had it coming,” assured J-Dog. “Let me go finish this.” He strode over to where Winky was, and before I could think to stop him, he pushed her away and shot her attacker in the face.

My hand flew to my mouth, disgusted by the pure violence of it. I looked quickly at Winky, hoping she’d thought to turn away before it had happened.

She was staring at the guy with the gun, a look of murderous intent on her face.

“Winky?” I said, confused.

“What’d you do that for?!” she screeched at the gunman.

“I was doing you a favor! What do you mean, why did I do that?! He was about to rape you, in case you didn’t realize that!”

“He was mine to kill, not yours!”

“What? Are you some kind of lunatic?”

He’d turned to face me, opening his mouth to say something, when Winky launched herself at him. She jumped on his back, grabbed his hair to jerk his head back, and bit his ear hard while she scratched his neck deeply with her fingernails.

He yelled in pain, reaching back with the gun to point it at her.

“Noooo!” I screamed, jumping into action and running full speed at the two of them, knowing I’d never get there in time.

The gun went off seconds before I reached them.

Winky screamed, moving her fingers from his hair to his eyes, digging them in deeply. Blood from his mangled ear ran down her mouth.

J-Dog spun around, trying to get her loose, and I saw the blood on her back when it was turned to face me. He went around one more half turn before I arrived, putting him in perfect position for a nut crusher, which I was more than happy to deliver.

“Kill him!” yelled one of the slave girls. “He’s the worst one of them all!”

I didn’t doubt her for a second. Neither did Winky apparently, because she reached into her boot, pulled out her knife, and drew it across his neck, cutting deeply.

She leaned back, grabbed his shoulder, and flipped him onto his side, making the blood go into the dirt instead of up in a fountain like it had started to as soon as her blade opened his skin.

I turned to the side and barfed, unable to keep my stomach from rejecting all this violence and gore. As soon as I wiped my mouth off, I looked up at Winky, expecting her to be suffering the same as me. But she was crouched over the now dead slave driver, her knife held out in front of her, like she was still seeing possible attackers ready to come for her.

“Winky?” I said tentatively. “Winky? Are you okay?”

She swung her knife towards me, narrowing her eyes.

“Oh, shit, Winky. Don’t go all berserker on me now. I don’t have it in me to fight you off.”

I heard footsteps behind me, but I was too alarmed over Winky and her knife to turn around.

“Bryn!” came Ronald’s voice. “What happened?” He came up next to me, breathing heavily. “Whoa. Some doo-doo hit the fan here, I see.” He looked up at Winky. “Uhhhh, what’s going on over there?”

I held out my arm to keep him from going any closer to her. “She’s gone into berserker mode. She’s done it before, when she was cornered. We just need to snap her out of it.”

“And how does one do that?” he asked politely.

“One smashes her in the face a few times,” I said quietly, hoping she wouldn’t hear me and take it as a threat.

“Oh, boy. And who is going to have that fun job?” he asked.

“That’ll be me,” I said, moving towards her slowly.

“Winky!” I yelled, trying to wake her up. “Get your shit together! I’m coming over there and I do not want to be gutted like a fish!”

She held her knife up higher, swaying back and forth on her feet, crouched down over the dead, now nearly bloodless body on the ground. She said nothing, just waited.

I shook my head. “I hate to friggin do this to you, but you leave me with no choice.” I walked over to her without hesitating, easily blocking the knife swipe by arching my stomach away from it. I smashed her in the forehead with my right forearm, doing what I could to not hurt her too badly. She had such a pretty face, I didn’t want to break her nose and have it be crooked for the rest of her life. Just because she was berserking on me, it didn’t mean I wanted to ruin her life over it.

Her head snapped back, and I took the opportunity to kick the knife from her hand and then grab her in a headlock. I bent her over and squeezed at about half-pressure. “Do you give up yet?!”

“No!” she growled, punching me on the back.

“Give it up, wild woman!” I grunted, squeezing harder. “I’m not letting go until you find Winky and bring her back here.”

She punched me a few more times on the back and on my hamstrings, yelling, “Let go of me you whore-loving bag of dicks!”

I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Daaaaamn,” said Jamal, coming up to join his brother. “Did I just hear that right? Did she just call Bryn a bag of dicks?”

“Yes, you did and yes she did,” said Ronald, whistling out his appreciation. “Girl can cuss.”

Winky’s hitting subsided and she finally stopped, out of breath and panting, her hands hanging down towards the ground now.

“Bryn?”

“Yeah?”

“Why do you have me in a headlock?”

“Because you freaked out on me again.”

“Oh, crap. I’m so sorry. Can I get up now? Ooooh, cruds my back is burning!”

“Careful!” yelled Ronald. “I’m not sure I’d trust her.”

“She’s fine,” I said releasing her and standing. “Welcome back, Winky. You had me scared for a second there.” I leaned over and looked at her back, making her turn so I could lift up her shirt. “That bullet grazed you.” I examined the spot where the blood seemed to be coming from and didn’t see an actual hole there.

“Good … I guess. It hurts like a mother, though.” She shrugged her shirt back down and looked around, her gaze landing on the dead body at our feet. “Oh, shit. Did I do that?”

“Yeah,” I said, laughing over the fact that she was a killing machine but was lucky enough to be able to block out all the bad parts. That was an affliction I wouldn’t mind having. I pushed her back so she wouldn’t step in my vomit.