Chapter 90 - 88

I don't know what I expected after all the chaos and the confront, but I know that I'm very eager for some action and stress relief by punching some annoying ghouls in the face; and a special snaky scaled one comes to mind, followed by a foxy one; but what I did not expect was to be used as a handyman of sorts.

After Asher's team confirmed our suspicious and find out that there were actual ghoul corpses in the underground river and that the murky normal water in some parts of town was even worse, they had no choice but to completely cut the water supply, and we did not even have time to celebrate that no one turned in sick anymore when the already jagged nerves of the citizens when down south fast with the lack of supplies and basic needs.

Rationing supplies is needed, most knew and understood that, but it does mean they have to like it.

Just as Asher said in his mumbles, beyond the food coming in from the Citadel not being able to reach us, there is not enough water for all, especially when most of it was compromised with the virus,  and it is only a matter of time before the city crumbles.

But even with the situation is looking dire like this of course Asher is too stubborn to give up like that.

So the already tired troop of soldiers have even more things to do by now, including me, working under the now heavy rain to bring hundreds of round blue barrels outside as others put some punctured cover to avoid that anything beyond the water fills them up, and after some boiling they would be good for use.

Only that, as all push themselves to their limits to gather as much water as possible and make use of the rain, I could only think of how this solution is merely temporary, and if the rains doesn't come to us them this city is doomed sooner than later. 

But better having some water than none I supposed, so we keep working, and I only stop when the pitter-patter of the water hits the cap of the Asher as the Captain, who had been helping out oo thus far, stops at my side.

"Abomination, follow me, let them deal with the rest."

Don't have to ask twice, this is really boring work after all.

"Sure" I answer as we walk away from the group, leaving other lower raking officers to take care of them.

Once we are out of reach, however, I get closer to Asher and try to speak over the rain hitting my cap.

"So, what is it now? For us to go away like that." Some action at last?

"…Food."

"…Food?"

"We are going out to eat."

Oh, I see, forgot that we have to do things like that, which is actually quite odd on my part since most of the time my thoughts were on food… ok, all the time really, but oddly enough, this time around I wasn't hungry.

Perhaps it has something to do with last night… and how I got to taste the coldy captain a little further…

Yeah, I could say that I was very satisfied… only that the desire did not succumb like I thought it would at first, rather it increased. 

I look at his back while we walk around the city, getting glimpses of that fair neck of his, remembering just how tender his skin is, always making me get carried away as he would pull me back by the hair only to hungrily eat me up from so close up, water tracing his increasingly naked body.

Hum… yeah, I would like to repeat dinner, dessert included thank you very much.

Only that, of course, in the current situation as soon as we arrive at his home his tired self is not up to play around, going to the kitchen and taking a cane of tuna out and eating it direcly from the cane, not even bothering with a plate, sitting down on the sofa and not saying anything beyond getting up for another cane.

Well that's a bummer…I think, watching him go back and forth, questioning why is he eating this much? And fish of all things!

…I wanted some too, I like fish after all, though I had never had much talent in hunting them down since I could not see clearly underwater

So I go towards the cupboard we went and take one cane for myself, making a dent in it with my claw and pinching the meat inside with my talons, munching the sour food down, only stopping when I get back in the living room only to find him laying on the sofa, and arm over his eyes, smooth breathing, so tired that the mere minutes it took me to go to the kitchen were enough for him to fall asleep on the spot.

I finish eating in silence, putting the empty can with his pile on the small central table, and not in the mood to change from these wet clothes and not sensitive enough to change his, I simply sit down against the wall, more used to these hard surfaces than the soft bed upstairs, and close my eyes too.

Only that that restless little nap would be the reflection of the days to come, for even though to his best efforts Asher is not capable of dealing with everything by himself, and food and water are things that cannot me made out of nowhere, no matter how much we wish for.

So after a week in this state, the city has grown lifeless, not only for the many now dead previously infected, nor only for the rationed water and food, not only for the monsters outside the walls day and night, taking shifts but never leaving, like crows and ravens waiting for our deaths, not only because of all of that, no…

The worst of it all is when the people from the Citadel started leaving.

I remember it, the day he came back from visiting the Colonel as I was forbidden to follow, and he never explained nor told me things when he went, but I always recognized the smell of tobacco and annoying human that would stick to him so I could tell that my lack of presence had something to do with only one person, plus he would always come back with an invisible frown of not only worry but anger, for the Colonel always carried lacking infuriating responses.

Such as now, when the requested supplies came by helicopter, when Asher was warned to go receive them, when hope started to appear only to be shattered down the next moment when he discovered that the helicopters would not come back to the Citadel empty handed.

And that they would not come back here at all after it, and even I knew by now what that meant.

That the Citadel is abandoning this place for good.