No Plan Survives First Contact With The Enemy

[Ohm]

If one were to look inside one of the houses, one would have found a cocoon-looking bag huddled in the corner of one of the rooms. It had not been there during the day but materialized during the night. Its inhabitant was nursing their wounds after their last encounter with people got a bit awkward.

Something darted across the floor that Janice could not see. She could've used a drink right about now.

She stared into the side of her sleeping bag; a struggle for sleep had been her prerogative for the past few hours, and she had gotten no further into her goal than before. It was slightly open so she could get out of it, just in case. Whether or not that meant that she would be able to stop whoever would get the drop on her was a different story.

Janice caressed her knife. Her fingers danced along its edge as she lay on the ground. She had taken it from Tana, but it had been hers for days now, her sole travel buddy. She always kept it on her, no matter what; it was the one thing that was keeping her safe.

The helmet supported that cause; she didn't wear it while she slept, of course, but knowing that she had the protection close to her.

It made her stronger.

The past day had gone by like a blur; after the last time she saw people, she kept to herself as much as she could. Her face hurt less than before, a better sign than most; sometimes, she found herself wrinkling her nose while trying to breathe through it. Otherwise, she was fine. She still had her cocoon, and the helmet, so things were fine. They had to be.

She had kept herself indoors; the sleeping bag was nice and all, but if they thought she was sleeping outside in it now, then these terrorists weren't as smart as they declared they were. Janice was not sleeping anywhere outside if she could help it.

Besides, she had already tried that and did not care for the experience.

Instead, her mind was preoccupied with one constant that had bugged her for a day now.

The plan was not going to work. People were too afraid of her, which was good and bad, good in the sense of people not trying to pick a fight with her, but bad since it looks like no one would agree to team with her now. She would have to come up with something new, the plan made sense on paper, but everything she had done so far had made it too far out of her reach.

Janice had hoped that if she could give her version of events about Tana and Piper, then maybe she could've gotten people on her side. She did those girls a favor by taking them out when she did, Tana especially.

She still had goosebumps from that day, which came back every time she thought about her, which was pretty often considering the knife, and people around probably did not forget that she did that. In her mind's eye, Janice could still see her; her throat sliced open, her eyes wide as they bored into her, and the blood oozed out.

Janice sniffled as she sat up straight.

Piper was easier to think about; it had been at night shielding her from the worst of sights, and it was between the two of them, and maybe Janice was showing a bit of bias here, but she knew who she wanted to come out of that alive.

Just a shame that two people saw her after that. The closest thing to witnesses to what she had done. Maybe she needed to find them again and make sure they did not tell after they ran her off.

Maybe, the only thing she knew for sure, she had only one thing left, continue with what she did beforehand, more skulking around and getting the drop. That was the way to do things around here.

Janice sampled up her cocoon and stuffed it into her bag; afterward, she lifted her bag strap ‘round her shoulder; put on the helmet, and kept her knife on her person. Janice scurried out of there after a rat did much the same over her foot. She would have stayed if there hadn’t been more than one of them running around.

Janice sniffled again. She better not get a cold from this shit.

((Janice Cresner continued elsewhere))