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Well, one less to kill.
She quickly stripped off his clothing and put it on. It was filthy and stained with blood, but her own clothing was worse and now too small as well. It might confuse her pursuers. She ate some of his thigh, then quickly moved onward. In a while she would try out her speed again. This slow walking was boring.
She reached the highway just as a yellow school bus half covered in graffiti came rattling toward her. It stopped by the side of the road, and a dozen kids climbed out. They were carrying implements and buckets. Two of them manhandled a wheelbarrow out through the back door.
One of them, a girl with black hair, looked up, saw Gaia, and frowned uncertainly. Other kids stared past Gaia and pointed not at her but at the forest fire, which was certainly generating a lot of smoke. Even here, far from the trees, Gaia could smell it.
Gaia walked straight to the group, who were now heading into the field, tossing what looked like fish heads and bones ahead of them. The fish heads were instantly devoured by seething masses of worms, which then allowed the kids to pass unharmed into the field, dragging their buckets with them.
Gaia pulled out one earbud.
“Better get to work,” a boy said to Gaia.
But the black-haired girl, who had been watching her narrowly, said, “I don’t know you.”
“No, you don’t,” Gaia agreed. She didn’t want to alert and panic the others, so she avoided a light show and simply swung a backhand that crushed the girl’s head and killed her instantly.
The bossy boy said, “What the—”
He dodged her first punch; her second one caught him a glancing blow that shattered his arm. He opened his mouth to scream, but he never had the chance. Her hand found his throat and crushed his larynx as easily as crushing a grape.
She tossed his body behind the bus, where it wouldn’t be seen by the kids now moving slowly across the field.
There were ten in all. She followed them at a quick walk, stepping between rows of plants heavy with green pods. She caught up to the nearest girl and punched her once in the back and snapped her spine.
Nine.
The second one had time to yell, however, before Gaia knocked her head cleanly off her shoulders and set it flying to land between cabbages.
Eight.
The shout, cut short, alerted the rest of the workers, who spun and died, died, died as she easily killed three with blasts of green light.
Seven. Six. Five.
BLAM! BLAM!
One of them had a weapon. He fired fast and panicky. Gaia swept her beam and cut him in two.
Four.
No, there was a second gun. Too late!
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Gaia spun around, not so much knocked by the impact as by the spasm of pain. She fell on her back.
“Get her! Get her! Get her!”
BLAM! BLAM!
“I’m out of bullets!”
Gaia tried to sit up, but something inside her was badly damaged, and the pain was extraordinary.
In one ear Social Distortion sang “Story of My Life.” It was a song both upbeat and melancholy.
A girl with a knife rose up beside her. Gaia threw an invisible punch that sent the knife wielder flying.
