Cristine planted her palm against either side of the sink, bend over and sighed deeply. She absently stared at the disposable gloves and mask she threw in there and clinched her jaw. She had a brief break from the day on the vehement begging of Alicia, Hailey, and Jake. She'd never lost so many people under her watch and didn't think she would ever have to since she wasn't a surgeon in the old world. She just researched diseases and helped her mentor with potential monsters in the laboratory. If a disease had to be surgically removed, she just had to forward her patients to an actual doctor in the field. Cristine shut her eyes, feeling helpless as the faces of the now deceased flashed through her mind and ironically remembered their names. Ella, Hank, Nate, Karla, Joseph, Laura, Esther, Samuel, Sam, Clifford, Nelly, Riley, Molly, Kat, Bonnie... the list went on.
"How bad is it?" Opening her eyes again, Cristine looked over her shoulder to see Troy standing at the entrance of her tiny bathroom. He was still in his uniform and casually leaned against the frame. Callousness oozed from him, but at the same time there was a tired anger that shrouded his whole body. The militia buried a lot of bodies today and did double time patrolling. They were spread thin now, given that this attack was one aimed at the militia.
Cristine shook her head silently, not wanting to talk about their dead. "How did it go?" She asked, referring to her request he and her father talk. It was desperate, but anything would do at this point. Seeing Troy bit on his lip and shake his head afterwards, made Cristine just rub the bridge of her nose. Her father was useless. "How are the defenses?" Cristine her voice was soft. It felt weird to talk to Troy again after their many fallouts. This being the biggest one as of yet. It was always death and violence from their enemies that made them approach each come to her to vent.
"Gone to shit. Me, Coop, a some green horns and a handful of young and old is what's left." Troy bared his teeth, the anger finally seemed to burst now that he was momentarily off duty and didn't have to act the part of a leader, but a Ranch member. "That asshole Walker needs to pay! The militia I get, we're fighters, but the others are helpless."
"Nineteen... we lost nineteen people so far and the only thing we could do was give them antibiotics and watch them fight. Never felt so useless." Cristine stared into the mirror, a weary replica copied every shift, twitch of the face. "They didn't deserve this."
"What happened today was on the Indians. Get yourself together and help me pick up the pieces." Troy pushed his body from its slanted pose and stood straight. Much to his dismay Cristine shook her head as response to his demands.
"I already told you, I can't fight with you and patch up people at the same time," she argued and with a damp towel wiped the blood from her neck.
"A quarter of our people are dead and you did what you could. You have Alicia and Hailey, hell even Jake. Let Dave have some responsibility in the infirmary, he's a doctor too," Troy demanded.
Cristine tore her eyes from the mirror and looked as if Troy just made a bad joke. "Dave's a vet."
"He can handle it, just like Jake is. I'm sure that brain of yours came up with something to at least slow the Nation down. That bargaining chip Alicia mentioned sounds crazier by the day." Having caught the unhidden streak of his anger and didn't bother masking it, Cristine stood straight again with narrowed eyes. "What? If we can't come up with anything, we'll end up negotiating again like some cowards and I'm not having that. A lot of ours were poisoned, can't we do something like that in return? Now's a really good time to put some of that knowledge of your previous occupation to use."
It was odd how, even through his anger and their conflict, Troy was always on the same wavelength as her in way. Of course she had thought of a way to get back at the Nation. They were all too busy with the sick, wounded and thinned out security to even bother with a planned retaliation just yet. That's why she hoped that maybe her father had something up his sleeve with Troy. But when she thought of the people they lost to the poisoning and came back as mindless ghouls, Cristine had one possible tactic they could use. It wasn't hard to collect, as it outnumbered the living at least 5000:1. She'd seen the virus up close and knew how it worked too, Troy's experiments as futile as they were, had merit when he ranted about his documentation to her in his mad excitement. "We can poison them back with-" the words tumbled from Cristine's mouth before she knew it until she paused midway and hesitated. Much to Troy's impatience by her disclination to share, he closed the distance between them and gripped both her arms, the pressure mild and controlled. He towered over her form.
Glowering down at her upturned face he coaxed in a low baritone, "whatever it is, it's better than this. This is war and the ends justify the means. You can't hesitate or be petty about it anymore." Troy gave her that look he reserved for when she crossed that line of demarcation. The ruthless and understanding eyes that convey Cristine wasn't that different than him. Not in these aspects. It was just that she hesitated because of her current anger with him and her own warped sense of moral obligation. Troy had to nudge her. He continued in a steady voice, even with a light chide behind his tone, "at least nineteen people you couldn't save, but can get justice for. Your family amongst them. I have your back," he said without of hesitance in his voice or deceit in his constricted orbs. "Just like you'll still have mine in spite of everything." He referred to the Trimbols, knowing Cristine hadn't said anything and wouldn't ever say a word to anyone. She would keep this secret, because in spite of her fury and disgust with him and her father; Cristine was smart and loyal. She wouldn't betray him or this place. She wouldn't jeopardize family as messed up as they were.
Cristine suppressed a sharp breath from escaping her mouth as his fingers tensed around her arm, feeling drawn in by his words. Words only Troy was willing to say to her out loud without batting an eye. Even if he was clearly trying to get her on his side. But that's how they worked. Be direct to get what the other wanted, under the pretense of survival and protecting their own. Her father- he would, without a doubt, be furious with her dabbing her fingers in militia business again. But she didn't care. He ruined his chances the moment he hit her. "Then promise me," Cristine more or less demanded and alternated her tight gaze between his eyes. She had to be sure that Troy wouldn't break her trust again if they went through with her plan. He needed to follow it and prove himself. Her heart raced in her throat as if she would vomit the organ out and Cristine stepped closer, making their bodies almost touch. She watched Troy slightly tense by the proximity, but he listened intently to her condition. "That you won't betray my trust again and lie to me. Promise that you won't keep secrets from me... no matter how bad they are."
Troy's eyebrows rose up his forehead, surprised by her plea. Cristine never asked him to promise such things. Never thought she still cared about his opinions this much. She'd been very indifferent lately so Troy didn't understand why she still worried about this so much. Troy swallowed and remembered all the times he saw Cristine for who she really was; pleased and wanting more of that ruthlessly smart side. He would honestly thank her on his knees knowing she was willing to do everything and more for the Ranch. "I promise." Troy sucked the inside of his lower lip and stopped his body at the last moment for doing something he wasn't sure of. "No more secrets." Cristine nodded and breathed in. Troy's words were like a spell that changed her anxious eyes to frosty calculation. Even Troy had to double take and question the quick change in spirit. That shift couldn't be counted as normal. Troy moved on his feet and concluded that Cristine needed someone to say these things to her to give herself a peace of mind. Like some type of anchor. He still had a chance to make things right with her and go back to how things were before. It dissipated some of the rooted ire in his mind.
"We don't have the manpower, so we need to do this covert and smart. We'll probably lose more people, but I think this is our best chance to even the playing fields," Cristine began. Troy urged her to continue and in the meantime removed his hands from both her arms. There was a light discomfort for suddenly grabbing her like that. He reacted on reflex, but witnessing Cristine's indifference and obliviousness to his actions, Troy was able to leave it at that. He would have to be mindful. He didn't want to send out the wrong signals that he would hurt or threaten Cristine in any type of way. That wasn't who Troy ever wanted to be anymore in regard to the woman. "We make them sick, like they did to us." Cristine reached for his waist and gripped the handle of his hunting knife before she slowly pulled the weapon out and flashed the cold silver between their faces. "Get them back with some good old biological warfare." Light passed through Troy's eyes and the blue hue of his irises got brighter. Like fireworks burst behind them and it showed on his face as the gears inside his heads twisted and quickly puzzled the pieces of her plan together.
"Go on." Troy didn't hide his satisfaction at this point, smirk stretching on his lips. A mixture of surprise and eerie excitement when he listened to her plan. Use what nature had given and let it do the work for them. It would definitely spare them some efforts. The dead were an inexhaustible resource that he researched and learned things the average person hadn't. Coupled with Cristine's extensive knowledge, this was using their intelligence and smarts to good use.
Cristine continued, "we collect blood and fluids from the dead, coat the weapons with it, and infect them through injuries."
"You sure it'll work?" Troy asked.
Cristine answered without hesitating, "it'll work. Whatever is inside the infected simply needs to enter the bloodstream. No antibiotics to save them. That's how we even the playing field and cut down their fighters like they did to ours." She broke eye contact and looked at the blood-slicked sink for a minute before staring at Troy with a much stronger determination than before. "If we can kill, we kill. But the main thing is to hit as many and let the infection do the rest. Have them fight off their own."
Troy ran his tongue over his upper lip and cocked his head, eyes narrowed. He was thinking and filled some gaps of her otherwise solid plan to weaken the Nation, "we give Walker the idea we're desperate. We aim for their fighters. The ones that are stronger and healthier turn faster. We can speed up the process by releasing the dead on their camp too. It means we'll have to get close to them, but we know the basics of the terrain. I think Jake still has a map of the reservation and I've been there to save Alicia. So we can definitely pinpoint the best places and blind spots to attack from without being noticed." Troy stepped back and leaned against the bathroom wall. He was quiet, thinking over Cristine's ingenious plan. This could actually work. No. It was going to work. The only thing was gathering enough people to pull this off and that would be the difficult part. But it wasn't impossible. Cooper was and expert bowman. They were running very thin on fighters and didn't have time to recruit the able bodied people. They needed to act fast, had no leverage and were living on borrowed time; Walker's time.
"You think we can convince your father with this?" Cristine's question made Troy snort as if she asked if big Otto would step up as a father and give a damn about his son or what he did- had done for the safety and comfort Ranch.
"Don't count on it. He's most likely still being drunk and miserable somewhere," Troy snapped in a low tune despite himself and curled his hands to the sleeveless part of his tactical vest. With his head tilted back, Troy's gaze remained fixed on a frowning Cristine.
"I think my dad's sober enough since the anthrax attack. So that leaves convincing him at least." She crossed one arm over the other and pressed her thumb on the center of her chin. The middle of her brows were pulled down, sloped inwards as she shared her thoughts.
"We should tell Madison. She will definitely back this." Troy didn't need to guess the mother's allegiance, Madison would do anything in a heartbeat if it meant saving her family. Usually, Cristine didn't get Troy's fixation with Madison, but at this point they needed ever single person on their side for this plan to succeed. "I'll tell Jake. You take Madison to convince James. You'll need the backup."