EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED
[ chapter six—now I know what you are ]

Madison set a plate down outside Nadia's tent, she'd been there since Adaline had been locked up. For three weeks she sat outside that tin shed. She's the only reason Adaline hadn't gone completely mad, and Mikaela was the only reason Nadia hadn't lost her mind.

Adaline had seen Troy quite a lot since that night. She'd probably seen Troy when Nadia spoke to her.

"Addy, baby," Madison spoke up, looking inside the hatch on the door. Adaline leaned against the tin shed, too tired to move. "Here." Madison held out a canteen for the girl. "Take it, baby."

The canteen dropped beside the girl, her eyes flickering open. "You get out soon. I gotta go away for a few days. I'm not leaving until I know you're okay."

Madison grunted as she reached inside the box, running her hand over Adaline's head. "I'm so sorry." She mumbled, pulling her hand back out.

"I love you." Adaline reached for the canteen, twisting open the cap and tipping some over her face.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

The door creaked open, and Adaline fell into the dirt.  The girl looked up at Crazy Dog, noticing something different about his face.

"Here." He spoke, holding a canteen out for the girl. Adaline sat up, pressing the canteen to her lips and tipping it up. "Don't guzzle it. You'll puke it up."

The girl exhaled, screwing the cap back onto the canteen. "You messed up like Troy or just another follower." The girl glared at the boy. "Who do you think talked him down?"

Crazy Dog took a pocket knife from his jeans, kitting the cable ties from the girl's wrists. "I'm gonna keep my eye on you." The girl raised her eyebrows. "You think wrong and I'll know about it."

"Did you cut your hair?" She asked, narrowing her eyes at him."Addy!" Nick exclaimed, helping his sister to her feet.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Nick set his sister down on the couch, her eyes wandered the room. They covered the broken windows with wood. The bullet holes in the walls were still there. "We still live here?" She mumbled.

Alicia made her way into the office. "Hi, bug." She greeted, wrapping her arms around her sister. She stood glaring at Nick. "What the hell, Nick? You said we'd go together." She hissed.

"She was already out when I got there." He shrugged, leaning against the desk, buried in papers.

Adaline unscrewed the cap on a jug of water. "Hey, easy. That's all you get." Lee spoke up from the top of the stairs. "Why?" Adaline asked, setting the jug down on the coffee table.

"They're rationing ranch-wide," Alicia spoke up, sitting down beside her sister. "Everything's shit off by the main well."

Nick looked at his sister confused. "Didn't Mom tell you?"

The girl shrugged. "If she did, I wasn't listening."

"Well, she and Walker are off to go find water." Adaline glanced up at her sister. She looked stressed out. "You okay?"

She set a salt shaker on the table. "Salt your water," she muttered, leaving the girl with her brothers.

"Nadia?" She asked. Nick smiled at the girl. "Mik, took her on a horse trail, thing."

Adaline leaned against Lee as he sat beside her. "Are they...?" Nick shook his head, rushing to sit beside the girl. "She has a boyfriend. They're just friends." Nick put quotations as he spoke.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline had stared at the ceiling of her room replaying the last time she were there in her head and the moment she pulled the trigger and shot Jeremiah. Though she knew it was what had to happen, she couldn't help but feel guilty for how things played out.

Heavy boots, and multiple of them, growing louder as they made their way to her door. Adaline felt useless as her room had been searched and her weapons seized.

Her stomach dropped as her door knob rattled slightly, the blondes hand searched for anything on her nightstand while her eyes remained on the door way.

Light peered into the room, growing brighter and darker again as Troy's right-hand men entered her room. Adaline sighed heavily, closing her eyes shut before she spoke. "Yall are aware it's the middle of the night, right?" Adaline hissed, crossing her arms over her chest as she felt exposed with the men standing at the end of her bed staring ahead at her. "What do you want?"

"To thank you," Coop spoke up, the girl looked at the men confused, for a moment before Cooper nodded his head to the door. "Come." Adaline glanced around the group, hesitant in following after the man as he made his way back out of the room.

Adaline threw her legs of the side of the bed, recrossing her arms as she fell in line with the men and followed them down stairs.

"We were ready to roll over, and then you and Troy... sacked up," Blake spoke, Adaline scoffed lowly. "They may not say it out there, but what you did in here meant a lot."

Damn. Troy was right.

"Everyone thinks the militias dead now that Troy is gone.. but it's not." Adaline pressed her eyes shut. "We're ready to fight.. if you guys are," Blake spoke.

Adaline met her brother's eyes, "Look, we'll need guns." Adaline exhaled a heavy breath, she was sure the men did too when Nick made his way down the stairs and beside his sister. "We don't have. I think we should keep a low profile."

Cooper and Blake glanced at one another smirking, "We thought you'd say something like that. Brought you a little gift." Blake pulled out a gun holding it out to Adaline. "Last free gun on the ranch.. if anyone deserves this, it's you."

Adaline wrapped her hand around the grip, slowly looking up at the men. "Rest. We'll talk more morning." Blake spoke, and the men behind him followed him outside, leaving the eldest Clarks in their silence.

Adaline slapped the gun into her brother's hand. "I'm going to bed."

"Adaline?" Nick called after her, though she ignored him.

The girl's body slowly fell against the door, and her eyes fell on a familiar jacket that sat in a basket beside the door. Troys jacket.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline stood leaning against the wall as Blake spoke, "Just a matter of time before the nation slaughters us in our sleep. We need to fight." Blake hissed. "We need to finish what Troy started. Back what's ours."

Adaline sighed, "Coop, they have the guns. And they haven't hurt us." Adaline shrugged, "yet. First the land, then the guns, now they're double dipping." Coop spoke up. "You. You're the one that stood up with Troy, right?" Adaline furrowed her eyebrows looking over at Nick confused.

"I'm just saying is if we attack first, we're gonna end up just like Troy, okay? He moved too soon, that's why he's out there and we're in here." Cooper turned away from Nick shaking his head. "No one is saying give up, but we do need to wait," Nick exclaimed.

"How long do we wait?" Cooper asked angrily, Adaline scoffed, shaking her head annoyed with the group.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline leaned against Nick's bedroom door as her siblings argued, it wasn't that hard to eavesdrop when the door had bullet holes scattered across it. "What happens when they find out what you, Mom, and Addy did?"

Adaline groaned lowly, pushing the door open. "You know?" She muttered as she sat beside Nick.

"The second she called Otto's death a suicide I knew," Alicia explained, examining her siblings. "Was it you?" Nick sniffled pressing another cigarette to his lips. Adaline nodded.

"And I was upset I wasn't a part of it, how shitty is that?" Alicia muttered, "But then I felt relieved, because what a burden it is to be mom's favorite." Adaline pressed her head against the wall, pressing her eyes shut with it.

"I didn't do it for her." Adaline hissed as Alicia went to walk away. "I did it for you, for Nick, Lee, and Nadia. Everything I did was for you guys!"

There was a long pause between the siblings, "Look at what killings got us. Look at what it's done to you." Alicia hissed.

"We're alive aren't we?" Nick muttered, tossing his packet of cigarettes onto the table.

"We keep trying to make her love us.." Alicia shook her head, "She's broken." Adaline put her head in her hands, groaning loudly. "Maybe we're all one big broken mess?" She muttered, lifting her gaze to Alicia as she stood in the doorway.

"Maybe."

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline took notice of the double dipping of a ranch member. The girl leaned over, placing her hand over the opening of the top of the jug. "Put it back." She spoke, softly, trying not to alert the lines of people.

The woman yanked the jug away from Adaline, preparing to cuss her out. "What are you going to do, turn me over to the nation?"

Adaline had grown tired of repeating herself to both sides and stepped closer to the women. "Now."

The women scoffed. "You know they're doing it, too." The blonde girl reached deep inside for a deep breath, begging for strength against whatever evil thoughts crept into her mind.

The woman began screwing the cap on her jug. Adaline pressed her lips together sharply, turning to the second jug beside her tipping the water back into the well.

"Hey, stop. What are you doing?" The woman hissed, covering the opening of the jug with her hands.

The women began screaming to scream, claiming Adaline was stealing her water. "You're taking half your share," Adaline muttered, nudging the woman back.

The women continued to argue and the blonde girl. "Let go." The woman hissed, digging her nails into Adaline's hands.

Adaline's patience thinned with every nail she dug deeper into her hand. Nick wedged himself between the two, taking the jug from both of the girls. "Okay, okay, okay."

"You care more about them than you do about us." Adaline blankly rolled her eyes back, scoffing at the women.

"There is no them and us!" She exclaimed, Alicia's hand meeting her back. "You're an idiot!"

Lee turned around from crowd control slapping the woman across the face and leaning over her as she winced. "What was that?" Lee challenged, Nick pressed the jug to Adaline's body, gripping his brother's arms and pulling him back.

The retired militia met Adaline's cold eyes stepping back from helping the women up. "He hit me!" The woman shouted, relying on the aid of the well to help her up.

"You're a thief!" A man of the Nation exclaimed. The woman lunged toward the man, using every ounce of strength she had to shove him back. "I saw you with the water."

The Nation and the people of the ranch began to surround the two bickering idiots.

Lee glanced at his sister, neither of the two helping with the overlapping arguments and shoving to the right of them. "Are we gonna...?"

The blonde shook her head continuing to empty the women's water back into the well. "Maybe it'll be good for them, to get some of their pent-up rage out."

Lee hesitantly nodded, turning back to the ever-growing crowd at hand.

Alicia had managed to wedge herself in the middle, "Listen to me!" She exclaimed, her bellowing voice had frightened the blonde at the fountain. She'd heard her sister's tired shouts far too many times.

"We only have six weeks of water left." Adaline leaned toward her brother, trying to recall whether that small detail was supposed to be kept quiet or not. Though it's probably best not to turn Alicia's anger toward them.

The crowd began to question the girl's previous statement as if the words hadn't been clear enough.

"If we don't work together, we will run out and we will die." Lee winced, rolling his shoulders around nervously. "It is that simple."

Yet Adaline was sure someone in the crowd would still ask something dumb.

"So please... stop."

Billy shook his head, shaking his finger at the girl. "You should've said something sooner."

The women from the previous argument stepped forward ripping a jug from a man in the nation and rushing through the crowd with it.

Adaline screwed her face up in disgust confused about what the women were trying to achieve considering the jug was empty.

One of the Nations men stepped back throwing his arms back with him, knocking Alicia into the dirt.

The blonde and her youngest brother rushed to their sister's side, helping her to her feet. The Nation and the Ranch swarmed into one everyone fighting someone, praying their fists land into someone from the other side.

Adaline continued to fuss over her sister when a shot went off behind the crowd. "Back away from the well!" Crazy Dog exclaimed as the overlapping arguments came to somewhat of a stop.

"We're taking it to make sure everyone gets what they need." Alicia nudged her sister away, stepping toward Nick, who stepped away from them as the sides began to form once more.

Crazy dog, Ofelia, and one other guard made it halfway when Nick stepped in front of the well. "Move aside, Nick."

"You're not taking the well. Stick to you half of the ranch, we stick to ours." Nick instructed his only fault with that plan was the exact thing he was standing in front of.

"The waters here, Nick." Lee stepped, closer toward the well. "We're not walking away from it."

He'd been looking for Nick's approval all their lives, but Adaline could never figure out why. Till one day when everything clicked. Stephan, their father died before Lee even got to know him. Though Nick was.. well... Nick he was a Male and taken over as head of the household. (For less than a month.) As misogynistic as that sounds in some ways it was true.

Nick shrugged, "there's a pump on your side." Lee had slowly but surely made his way to his brother's side.

"No." The crazy dog spoke softly." Nick glanced down at the pistol in the boy's hand, lifting his once white shirt, now brown in some places and a dirty off-white in others. (Adaline feared the shirt was the same one she'd seen him in at least two weeks ago... Yikes.) The last free gun resided in Nick's hands.

Crazy Dog smirked as his eyes scanned the gun. Nick glanced back at the well, seating himself upon it. Adaline watched as a little girl stood beside him, her mother following along. Lee and a couple of other ex-militia also stood beside the well.

Ofelia's hand pressed against Crazy dogs chest as he stepped toward Nick. "Not now." She whispered.

Adaline's eyes flickered between Nick and Crazy Dog. "I'll keep the peace. Not at all costs. Got that?" Adaline pressed her lips together, rolling her eyes as Blake began to babble on about taking as much water before they (the nation) do.

The people of the ranch had begun making weapons out of farming tools, while the people of the Nation dug trenches in search of water.

The people of the ranch gave Adaline a headache she feared she'd never recover from.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline woke as a hand wrapped itself around her mouth. Reaching for her machete, her eyes meet Troy's. "I told you I don't get lost, Clark." The girl shook her head, as he lowered his hand.

"I didn't think I'd see you again." She mumbled, sitting up to face the boy. "Here I am." Adaline watched him as he sat down, he was covered in blood and dirt but still attractive as hell.

Adaline glanced at the boy's hand, he was covered head to toe in dirt, grime and who knows what else. She knew he smelled like death as his wound was full of dirt.

Adaline picked the boy's hand up, unwrapping the bandage. "I'm glad you're alive." She mumbled, grabbing the first aid kit from the drawer beside her.

Troy stared at the girl and the room around them, They hadn't seen one another since this room and here they were back again. "I don't believe you mean that."

The girl's eyes shot up to his, her fingers squeezing the antiseptic over the wound. "But you saved me... in your way, so..." Adaline began to rewrap his hand, questioning whether this whole interaction was real or not, that tin shed had messed with her sense of reality.

"I'm here to return the favor." Adaline tied the bandages off, wrapping her own hands around his.

"There's a reckoning at hand, something new, something to— something to delight in." Adaline wiped her eyes, wondering if it was her that was sleep-deprived. "What the hell did you do, Troy?"

Troy opened his mouth to speak, "A beast, Ads. From the desert I think, nothing to keep it from growing. It's bigger than you can imagine, it's biblical."

Adaline narrowed her eyebrows at the boy, "What are you, sleep deprived?"

"You need to listen to me, in case your brother didn't. In a few hours, this— this whole place is gonna be obliterated." Adaline looked at the boy heavily confused, pulling her hands away from his. "I want you to get Jake, 'cause I want him to see this."

Adaline hadn't felt fear since the last time she and Troy were in a room together. Was staying away from Troy Otto the best thing for her? "What'd you do?" She mumbled, Troy ran his thumb back and forth over Adaline's Ankle, climbing off the bed.

"It's beautiful.." he mumbled walking over to the door, and disappearing before the girl could follow after him.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Adaline followed her brother to Alicia and Jake's cabin. The pair looked at one another, Adaline waiting for him to knock, "knock." Adaline looked at her brother offended, "You knock." She hissed.

"Why do I have to knock, it's your sociopathic best friend." Adaline's jaw dropped, heavily offended by the boy's words, "You became friends with him first."

Adaline pressed her finger to her lips leaning against the door. The conversation inside was faint though the girl could hear enough. "...or is it an alliance? Madison works Otto, Adaline bonds with Troy while you— while you seduce me?" The girl stood vastly, wide eyes as she stared confused at the door.

"Just knock, Adaline!" Nick exclaimed. The girl shook her head mocking her brother, "Just knock, Adaline. Prick." Jake opened the door as Adaline went to knock.

"You two are annoying." Adaline and Nick's jaws dropped, with almost the same facial expression.

"Well, good morning to you too. We have good and bad news." Nick spoke sarcastically, "Mostly bad." Adaline added, Alicia looked between her siblings. "Let me guess, you two caused it?"

Adaline furrowed her brows shaking her head profusely. "No, why would you even think that?" Alicia raised a brow at the girl scoffing beneath her breath.

"Troy was at the house." Nick blurted, "Jesus Christ!" Alicia exclaimed, walking into the kitchen. "Looked like he hadn't slept in days," Adaline added, glancing at her sister worriedly.

"Where's he now?" Jake asked, "ran off. Said he wanted to warn us, somethings coming, wanted you to see whatever it is."

"Alright, Madison drove him north." Jake spoke, "he doesn't know that land, so he probably followed the sun west, to McArthys." Jake turned around to go back upstairs, and  Alicia spoke up. "Troys full of shit. He's baiting you, all of you."

"Well it worked, I warned him not to come back. He did, he has to face that. I have to face him." Jake grumbled.

Adaline sighed, "You guys can't go."

"I'm responsible. Plus someone's gotta look after your boyfriend." Adaline examined Alicia's face, "What's wrong?" Alicia shook her head, Jake rushed past the girls out of the house.

Despite they're sisters warning Nick and Jake continued into his truck. "I'll bring him back." Adaline assured his sister, wrapping her arm around her quickly.

Something bad was coming, Adaline could feel it in the cool morning air.

⭑ ⭑ ⭑

Lee had remained at her sister's side since Adaline threatened him before she'd left early this morning. Adaline was worried about they're sister and them being the siblings they were Lee didn't complain. The walkie in his sister's hand crackled, Nick's voice patching through.

"Alicia, can you hear me? Over." The girl stopped in her tracks raising the walkie to her mouth. "Nick? Where are you?"

Static crackled through the walkie. "...an infected.." Alicia pressed her eyes shut as only part of the conversation patched through. "An infected what?"

"...coming your... do you copy?"

"Tell me where you are and I'll come get you."

Nadia ran up behind the girls, pulling Adaline to the side as the radio crackled. "Hold on." The boy muttered, stepping back toward his sister.

The redhead pulled the boy back toward her. "There's a horde coming," Nadia spoke quickly to keep the boy from walking away.

Lee turned to his sister, Alicia had split off from the girls, most likely in search of Ofelia or Crazy Dog.

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word count — 3249

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ₊˚ପ⊹ *:･ﾟ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ