Alara moved her head slightly as her eyes lingered on the Raider still holding the lifeless corpse of the hostage in his hands. Alara's finger tightened on the trigger of her pink AK-203, and then she released a faint scoff as she said. "There you're welcome. I killed the whiny little bitch who was begging for us to save her on your behalf. I'm not some weak, cowardly human who shows mercy just because someone cries and begs for us to save them. If that woman could not even try to fight for her own life, then she does not even deserve to live in the first place." Alara's tone of voice was merciless.
The Raider blinked at Alara in stunned disbelief, his grip on his handgun faltering. "Holy shit, lady," he said in disbelief. "I don't even know if I'm supposed to be the bad guy anymore. Even we raiders don't just randomly kill women like that. Yeah, we do a lot of bad shit we kill a lot of people, but that woman was a valuable hostage."
Alara raised her rifle to point at the man's face. "I don't give a shit about the value of human life. The only life I care about is Raven's. Now drop your weapon and tell us what we want to know, or I promise you will suffer the most painful death imaginable. And don't even think you can get a gunshot off. Your gun isn't even aimed at us. It's in the air. I bet you don't even realize you already surrendered, you fucking idiot."
The Raider looked up at his own hands, suddenly noticing that they were lifted up in an air in surrender. Panic appeared on his face as he quickly dropped his handgun onto the ground.
"Okay! Fine! I will tell you what I know. Just... not to her," the man stammered, nodding towards Alara. "That blonde bitch is crazy. I'll talk to you, lady."
Raven's expression darkened immediately. As she stepped forward, her voice low asking. "What did you just say about my girlfriend?"
"Nothing! I didn't say anything!" he backtracked on his words. "You want to know about Adam Carter, right? He's upstairs, on the third floor, inside the head librarian's office. He has five Raiders with him. One has grenades, another has an RPG rocket, and the last one is a freak who has a flamethrower. I don't even know where he got that from. He uses it to kill weeds, or so he claims. The guy is a nutjob, but Adam likes his flamethrower, so he invited him to join the Red Blood Raiders. Just... be careful. That whole floor is covered in paperback books. It's like a damn tinderbox up there."
The man took a shaky breath before continuing. "Adam Carter himself... he's a weak man. All bark, no bite. He carries a little Sig Sauer P322 around with him everywhere he goes. The man barely knows how to use it. Adam acts like he's the top dog, but without his core supporters, he's nothing. Before all this, he ran some organized crime gang, dealing in trafficking women and drugs. But most of his key supporters are already dead someone took out a bunch of them before the apocalypse, and the rest got wiped out downstairs just now. The only men he has left are the four in that room upstairs and that weirdo with the flamethrower. That's all I know, I swear. Can I go now?"
Raven blinked, momentarily distracted by something else entirely. Her thoughts latched onto a single detail the flamethrower. Her mind raced with possibilities. Flamethrowers were legal before the apocalypse? Used for weed control? That means there could be dozens of them in local hardware stores left untouched. And if she can get her hands on a few, study their inner mechanics, she can absolutely make her own. For example, a drone-mounted flamethrower? A turret flamethrower? A mobile robot with directional flamethrowers? Her eyes brightened at the possibilities.
"Raven," Alara said excitedly, breaking out of her daydream. "I know you're thinking about flamethrowers and all the fun toys you can build with them, but now is not the time for that. Focus. You can scavenge that flamethrower upstairs after we're done."
Raven blinked, saying. "Right. Focus."
Raven turned to the Raider saying "You can go. There's an exit behind us use that one."
Alara raised an eyebrow, visibly confused. That exit was destroyed by a grenade not long ago. But she said nothing, just watched silently as the Raider took off running past them.
He did not made it far.
A silent pew echoed out as the cloaked drone hovering in the corner fired a single gunshot into his back. He stumbled mid-step and dropped dead instantly.
Raven looked at his body, saying, "That's for calling my girlfriend a bitch. I'm a vengeful woman, and now I've proven it."
Alara moved towards Raven with a bright expression on her face, throwing her arms around Raven and pulling her into a kiss. "Oh honey, that was so romantic. You shot a man in the back to defend my honor. That's the most chivalrous thing you've done for me today."
Raven kissed Alara for a moment, then stepped back, saying. "Come on, Alara. Let's finish this up in time for dinner."
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