(Roxane POV)
“That fucking hurts!”
Victoria had finally dug out the bullet from my shoulder. I was lucky it was shallow and didn’t hit any bones, but the pain still hurt like shit. What made it suck more was she had all the grace of a gravedigger.
“Well Roxane, this is your fault for not killing that bastard sooner. How the hell did he even escape you?”
Victoria made the executive decision to abandon the mission after the bullet she deflected hit me in the crossfire. It was horrible timing. After that new guy escaped me, I went to grab more ammo and help Victoria. Only for the moment I opened the door outside the deflection to end up right in my shoulder. The real wound was the fact it was that new guy who shot it. How did I even miss my initial shot? It was probably whoever was on the phone telling him to run.
Victoria had her own vehicle parked on the opposite side of the school. We hopped in and left shortly afterwards. Honestly, we probably could’ve stayed and kept fighting. Sofia was injured enough to be fatal if we waited another hour. Victoria though didn’t want to risk Sofia having back up arrive. We were already at the border, if anyone else arrived then we were screwed. Add in my injury it was probably the safe decision. Although, not a desirable one.
We were thirty minutes out of Lynchburg at a small town called Appomattox. It was important for something in the civil war but I didn’t pay attention in history class to know what. This small diner was basically empty when we arrived. We just needed somewhere to stop and take care of my shoulder. The old white lady behind the counter tried to ask if we needed her to call a hospital. She currently lay behind the counter with her neck cut open. Victoria’s mouth was watering just smelling her but she luckily waited until she dug out the shrapnel.
I sat on a stool next to the counter. Victoria poured two cups of coffee for herself and I while she knelt down and began to find what part of the old bitch would be best. She was nice and fat, which according to her was a good thing for cooking. She tried to explain her logic to me and it was basically this: you cook the fat and ugly ones so you don’t have to look at them and you eat raw the hot ones so you can appreciate their beauty.
I never understood her cannibalistic obsession and chalked it up a matter of personal preference. No matter the meat, Victoria had a part of the human body she preferred and a method to cook it. Fried chicken? Deep-fried human abdominal muscles. Pork chops? Human thighs. Lobster? Buttered human eye balls. I’ve worked with Victoria long enough to have tried many of these and I can say with confidence that none of them compare to a medium to medium rare steak.
If you choose to ignore her cannibalism and her barking, howling, and growling during fights and sex(an act she often performs while eating raw human), she is a pretty normal individual. At least I can hold a conversation with her about something other than work. She watches television and keeps up with the news.
I watched as she finally stood up from the floor. She took off one of her gloves and had used the other to cut off the woman’s thigh muscle and breast. She compared large breasts to butter the way they could perfectly caramelize on meat. She looked over to me and held up the loose breast in her hand.
“You want some?”
I shook my head in response. She shrugged her shoulders.
“Suit yourself. Want anything else from the kitchen?”
“Nah, I’m good. This coffee is fine.”
She didn’t insist and walked off to the kitchen to cook herself a meal. I wondered how she was always eating. She could probably destroy a full 150 pound human in a day, bones and all, if she wanted to. It may have been related to her contract but I wasn’t confident in that. I looked down on the old lady who was butchered. Blood pooled around her neck and by her body as her muscles were stolen for Victoria’s meal. She was right that looking at ugly people while you eat ruined your appetite.
While she cooked, I spent my time on my shoulder. We had enough bandages and medicine that I could easily wrap it but I envied others whose contract gave them some sort of healing method. Victoria’s contract provided her the ability to heal wounds by consuming flesh. Victoria wouldn’t even need to sleep if she ate enough. It’s why we stopped here as well. It was better to just let Victoria eat a woman than wait a few hours in possibly dangerous border territory while we rested. That would mean I could rest while we drive back.
I didn’t envy arriving back though. What soldier would be excited to return to tell the General they failed their mission? I wasn’t that kind of masochist. Maybe Sofia was. Last time someone failed this badly, they were forced into exposure for a month. She survived luckily but the stories I heard weren’t something I wanted to experience myself. Although, the current situation was bad enough that maybe, but maybe, I could get off lightly with only some extra work to redeem myself.