To Cara’s credit, she was pretty damn good at driving.

Her teammates had absolutely no idea that we were gone until it was too late, and once we were out on the open road there was no stopping us.

The only problem was that she was a bit of an asshole.

“This is your plan, huh?” my ‘hostage’ mocked as I tried and failed to pop my arm back into place, “Keep me at gunpoint until we either get shot or I test my luck? You must be real smart.”

“Just drive, alright?” I practically pleaded, “I’ve got enough to focus on right now.”

“Like what? Do you even know where we’re going?”

“The…” I trailed off as I realized that I actually didn’t, “You know what? I don’t know. Do you have any suggestions, or just jabs and insults?”

“Actually, I was thinking we should go to the hospital.” Cara replied matter-of-factly.

“Why? Is that where your squad agreed to meet if you got separated?”

“What squ-oh, those guys?” she asked with a scoff, “All I had to do with them was say ‘friendly’ in as girly a voice as possible and they couldn’t help themselves. Suddenly they were giving me guns, and ammo, and bandages-”

“I get it,” I snapped past a particularly sharp breath before finally accepting that I wasn’t going to be able to fix my arm without medical equipment, “you sold your gender out for some loot.”

“I didn’t sell out my gender,” Cara shot back, “I used my gender, I sold out myself. What I do has nothing to do with what every other woman decides to do.”

“You said ‘do’ too many times there,” I said, my Aspie brain struggling with the abnormal repetition, “you know that, right?”

“Yeah, I heard it too.” Cara chuckled, “Look, my point is that I’m just here to play the game. I had a long day at college, and I needed something to do for a few hours. I ain’t hiding a tactical fire team up my ass, and I ain’t doing anything but trying my hardest to survive the longest.”

I believed her, I really did, but there was still this part of me that wanted to be wary of her, this sort of paranoid instinct that told me that, given the chance, she’d blow me away before I had the chance to open my mouth.

“Okay, hospital it is.” I finally said after slumping back in my chair, “Speaking of, how’re you holding up? I got you pretty good back there.”

“That you did,” Cara replied, “I managed to stem the bleeding some with one of my bandages, but I’m still redlinin’.”

“Good.” I breathed before realizing what I’d said, “I mean, not good that you’re hurt, good that goin’ to the hospital doesn’t only benefit me.”

“And how’s that a good thing?”

“Simple. You suggestin’ we go there for my benefit and my benefit alone is suspicious, but you suggesting it because you’re in need of some stuff… well, let’s just say that it settles me some.”

“Fair ‘nough.”

Things stayed quiet for a few seconds after that, before Cara decided to go ahead let out a bored raspberry, “That a Colorado accent I hear?” she asked, “I mean, under all that pretendin’ you’re not crap?”

I was briefly surprised that she’d been able to hear it, given the fact that I’d actually gone to a great deal of effort to hide the fact that I was from somewhere ‘less-than’ in the eyes of most people, but then I realized how it would’ve come creeping through.

“Yeah, only really comes out when I get to talking with others from the same area.” I replied in an attempt to sound smart, which I’m sure Cara just rolled her eyes at.

“Big surprise you recognized my accent,” she half-laughed in response, “not like you didn’t grow up ‘round girls like me, huh?”

“In all fairness, I wasn’t aware that we were playin’ the ‘get to know each other’ game quite yet.”

“Game?” Cara scoffed, “Ain’t a game when you’re talkin’ to people.”

“May as well be,” I said assuredly, “take that for example. You’ve taken offence to me callin’ social interaction a game, which means I’ve failed the dialogue and have lost so social points with you.”

Cara seemed pretty well stumped by what I’d just said, but eventually settled for a shrug, “S’pose everyone’s got their own way o’ dealing with people.” she said somewhat understandingly, “You really ought to consider seein’ someone about that though, before you decide to climb up a bell tower and play some kinda RL arcade shooter.”

“Don’t worry ‘bout that,” I replied with a little laugh, “doctors have signed me off as being safe to play with others. We should be comin’ up on the hospital soon, right?”

“Unless you wanna try for the city one, yeah.” Cara said before pointing down the road, “Forest should end soon-ish, then it’s only about a half-mile ‘fore we hit the hospital. Gotta be careful though, whole bunch o’ people were heading that way when I dropped.”

“How many?”

Cara seemed to think on that for a few seconds, before shrugging, “Twenty? At least?”

“Twenty?” I scoffed, “Do you think we’re prepared to handle twenty players?”

“What’s this ‘we’ stuff?” Cara chuckled, “You still got a gun on me, don’t you?”

I went to say no, but saw that I did, in fact, having my SVD sitting on my lap aiming in her general direction, “Alright, fair enough,” I said before slinging the gun over my shoulder with a sharp breath, “I just figured we could start playing a bit nicer now that we both know that neither one of us is trapping the other.”

“You don’t know that,” Cara joked, “I could be leading you to your death, and you wouldn’t be able to do shit.”

“I could shoot you.” I replied with a smile.

“Yeah, but you won’t,” Cara said confidently before turning to face me, “unless you want this bus of yours to flip.”

“Alright, alright, keep your eyes on the road.” I laughed as the trees finally started to give way to fields, “Last thing we need is for you to wreck us.”

“And you just assume I’m gonna wreck us ‘cause I’m a woman?” Cara mocked before turning her attention back to the road.

“No, I assumed you were gonna wreck us ‘cause you’re drivin’ at over eighty in what clearly should be a forty zone.”

“Heh, you’re just bein’ paranoid.” Cara replied confidently as she pointed out toward the large structure in the distance, “See, there’s the hospit-”

Now, I didn’t see the muzzle flash, nor did I notice the punctured tire before we started to roll, but boy did I hear the whip crack of that rifle.

Oh, and Cara was doing a good bit of cursing too.