Carter had a terrible feeling walking back to the camp. Not the movie cliche kind, and not what he'd expect from having just narrowly escaped from Roid-raging cannibals. He just had a terrible feeling in his gut that something was going terribly wrong. He'd learned not to ignore those instincts so he picked up the pace despite the extra weight on his back.

Angela noticed and looked at him concerned. "Is something wrong?" She asked.

He raised an eyebrow. "You mean other than narrowly escaping death from insane superhumans that are probably going to hunt us tonight?"

She frowned rubbing the mark on her neck where the monster had scratched her and pulling up the side of her shirt where it kept falling down from the tear as she'd been doing periodically since they left. "You seem in a hurry." She pointed out.

"I just feel like we need to get back. It's probably nothing." He said not wanting to worry her.

They continued on in silence for a few more minutes before the camp came into sight. Joseph spotted them first, and soon the others were gathered around them in the center of the camp. Well, most of them. "Where's Emily?" Carter asked dropping his pack.

Joseph looked around. "I don't know. Haven't seen her." He said.

"That Chris guy pulled her into his tent to talk to her about something I think." Someone else chimed in.

"Oh fuck. Which one's his?" Carter demanded.

The guy pointed to one of the tents at the edge of the camp in confusion.

Carter ran to the tent, his heart racing. He heard muffled screams as he got closer to it. He tore the entrance open to find Chris on top of Emily keeping her pinned on the ground. He had his left hand over his mouth and his right down her pants, her shirt had been removed and it looked like she had given up on struggling.

Carter began seeing red. Everything tinted with the blood he could hear rushing through his ears. He grabbed Chris by the collar with one hand and yanked him off of Emily, slamming him into the ground. He punched Chris in the solar plexus listening to his lungs deflate like a balloon then started dragging him back to the center of the camp.

He threw Chris on the ground ignoring all the onlookers and reaching into his backpack. "I found all sorts of interesting gadgets. I don't know what any of them do. Wanna find out?" He said hearing the mania in his own voice. He didn't even care how insane he sounded when he started laughing.

"No, please no." Chris pleaded barely able to talk past his cramped solar plexus.

"Clearly you're the type of guy where no means yes." Carter laughed pulling out a fairly long device with buttons on the sides. "You don't listen to it, why should I?"

Joseph started to step forward "Carter I think you need to-"

Carter flashed him a dangerous look. "Stay out of this." He said. He pointed the device at Chris and a jet of white hot flame shot out of it lighting Chris's clothes on fire.

He began thrashing and screaming, rolling around to put himself out.

"Interesting." Carter said enormously. "Some kind of close range flamethrower." He continued looking through the backpack as Chris struggled, finally snuffing out the flame. Carter pulled out another device. A small black box with a red button on top of it. Carter pushed it.

Him and Chris both clasped their hands over their ears in shock as it started emitting a horrible high pitched noise. Carter reached over frantically pushing the button again and it stopped. He had to be careful with that one. "We can't have that." He said. "That one makes us all suffer and I'm only after you." He tosses it next to the flamethrower and began looking for another device.

He pulled out a cylinder with a glass end and a handle with a switch. He directed the glass end at Chris and flipped  the switch. Chris began screaming in pain as a highly concentrated laser beam came out blinding him.

"Very interesting." Carter said putting it with the others and reaching back into the bag.

"Please... Stop." Chris begged clutching his face.

"Ah, see that's exactly the kind of language you should have listened to and you wouldn't have ended up here. You did this to yourself." Carter replied deadly calm. He pulled out a device with two buttons and a rubber handle. He pressed the buttons and two prongs at the end came to life with electricity, bridging a connection with Chris from 6 inches away. He began convulsing violently then went completely limp as Carter turned it off.

Carter checked his pulse and felt nothing. "Oh no you don't." He said angrily getting on top of him and starting cardiac compression. He was not gentle and felt several ribs crack before Chris gasped and started to regain control of his body. "I'm not done with you." Carter said as Chris opened his eyes and started looking around disoriented.

Carter only gave him a moment to recover. Just long enough for him to be able to feel pain. He pulled a knife out of the bag with a small button on the handle which made it start glowing cherry red. He grabbed Chris's right hand and began cutting off his fingers one by one with the hot blade. "Was it worth it?" Carter asked. "Are you feeling good about yourself right now?" Chris was too disoriented to answer.

Carter tossed the knife aside and pulled out a small handle with a button. A red line of plasma came out of the end when he pushed it. Slowly and methodically Carter used it to burn the word "Coward" into Chris's forearm.

Next came a large can that looked like it could me mace or bear spray. He pushed the nozzle and it sprayed a liquid onto Chris's face. His skin began to hiss, bubble, and smoke. Chris shrieked in pain covering his face with his arms muffling his strangled sobs.

Carter pulled out a new device. This one had a needle at the end. He shoved it into Chris's left arm and immediately black and green started to streak from the wound spreading across his arm. Some kind of poison began infecting him making his arm go dead.

Carter kept looking. He found a circular device with an incredibly abrasive end. He turned it down and it began spinning rapidly. He pressed it into Chris's waist and it ground down to his bone within seconds. Chris's screams began to almost not even sound human. The mix of pain, fear, and despair would have made Carter feel simpathy for Chris if he wasn't the lowest of men.

He pulled out a new device. This one was a small disk. One of many. He placed it on Chris's ribs and pressed a small button on it. Immediately he smelled burning flesh as it began glowing and fusing into Chris, his skin smoking beneath it.

Next he pulled out a pair of what looked like brass knuckles but with small drills at the end. He pressed the button on them and the drills came to life. Two strikes put 8 neat holes into his ribs. Carter struck again and again until Chris's mangled body could hardly be recognized as human and left him to bleed. But first he covered him in sand and rubbed his wounds raw. "Count yourself lucky. Maybe you've suffered enough for them to let you out of hell early. Not that you deserve it." Carter said spitting on Chris. He was still breathing. It would be a while before he finally succumbed to his injuries.

That was when Carter came back to reality and noticed everyone staring at him in shock and horror. "You prey on a defenseless woman, you cross me, or you endanger anyone here this is what happens to you. Clear?" He said to everyone watching him.

No one dared disagree. Carter neatly packed all of the gadgets back into his pack and headed back to check on Emily.

She had largely recovered. Her clothes were back on properly and she looked shaken but not broken. "Are you okay?" Carter asked.

"Yeah." She said taking a deep breath. "Nothing I haven't been through before. I'm not injured." She noticed the blood on Carter's hands. "What did you do to him?" She asked hesitantly.

"He won't be a threat to you or anyone anymore. That's all you need to know. Trust me."

She hesitated for a second then nodded. "I'm sure I don't want to know." She said. "What happened in the forest? Did you find any food?"

"Come on." He replied. "There's a lot the whole camp needs to know about and rather only say it once. Besides Angela has plenty of her own insight I'm sure.