A Different Virus - Laura's Story

Chapter 96

The traders normally set up tables and let the locals come barter. Most had come and gone already. Some were still in our fenced camp at the moment, bartering over supplies and goods. I looked over with a frown. Diane was leaving the town's palisade at a swift pace, ignoring our group as she headed straight for the treeline.

I blinked as I saw her eyes flicker lighter and darker. That wasn't good. She was trying to hide their light, but she was upset enough that she couldn't quite control it completely. She was definitely angry though, I could see it clearly in her body language. Diane disappeared into the trees without even glancing at the camp.

Roland had also spotted her and meandered over to me, "I haven't seen her run off like that before."

I still watched the trees where she had disappeared, although I knew that she would have picked up speed the moment she was out of sight. "She only does that if her temper is close to snapping. The leader must not have been nice. She was very mad."

Roland was silent for some time before walking off. I went to see if anyone else needed anything. I packed a few odds and ends to various tables for the next hour as the trading began to wind down to just a few stragglers.

"I heard a bright blue-eyed lady teleported in front of Damen and threatened him with a sword."

"Yeah, I heard that too. I don't see her here though, she must have teleported somewhere else."

"I hope she doesn't attack anyone else. Damen lost his voice when she came after him, so if she appears and goes after you, try to scream before she stops you from calling out."

I peeked over to see two locals speaking quietly while they looked at the traders. The one turned in my direction and I glanced away before they could see my eye color. I had been fast enough that they hadn't seen me look away.

A couple of the traders had heard their comments and had seen my evasive action though. I ducked behind a trailer as I felt a few people watching me sympathetically. They could only be speaking of Diane, but she didn't teleport.

She rarely moved faster than a normal person did when anyone could see her, unless there was a very good reason for it. Diane had been very mad when she had left to let her temper cool down. What had happened to make her so angry? She was rarely angry and quickly forgave others. She wasn't the type to hold grudges either.

They said that she had threatened someone with a sword and stole his voice... If they thought she teleported, then she had used her full Heartfire abilities to move that fast. I had never seen her threaten someone with a weapon though. She had pinned that leader in Eagle Holding, but she hadn't drawn any of her many weapons.

As for stealing his voice, he had probably been so scared that he just couldn't talk. Or perhaps Diane had locked eyes with him and he simply had stared at her in shock.

I sighed and leaned against the big trailer. This part of the fence faced away from the palisade so no one would see me over here. There wasn't much room between the fence and the trailer with the new trucks. We had stopped at Steel Crossing and Roland had picked up his new steam powered trucks.

There were five of them, so the fence was more crowded than before. Roland had traded most of the horses though, so that gave us more room than we would have otherwise had. These trucks were much faster than his old ones, and we had covered a lot of distance in last few weeks.

Our average speed was so fast that I actually had to run to keep up. They could go faster than even Diane could run if they kicked it into high gear. Several traders had taken lessons on how to fix and maintain the powerful boilers. The solar panels helped out as well, although the trucks could run completely off solar if needed.