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Trubel spins around, her machete coming up and acting as a shield. The clanking of metal filled the night air as Trubel squares off with a hundjäger who just will not give up. She keeps her body on the defense, using moves she learned by watching Nick fight; she takes a lot less hits now. Waiting, she watches for an opening to make a move.
Finally, the hundjäger lets his guard down, just barely, and Trubel makes her move. Her machete makes contact with his arm, slicing down the bone, distracting him enough for her to swing harder and higher; his body hits the ground with a thud as his head lands two feet away.
“Fucking finally.” She bends down and wipes off the machete on the guy’s jacket. “You better be the last one,” she says before walking away, hoping this was the last in the gang that had come to town looking for Josh.
Protecting Josh has turned into The Non-Stop Josh and Trubel Road Trip. They never stay in one place too long; they camp out in the truck or get a cheap motel room. There have been times when Trubel has missed the comfort of having a steady home, but more often than not, she is happy to have had to chance to travel with a friend.
As Trubel pulls into the motel parking lot and parks the truck in front of room 3, she looks around to make sure there is not anyone around to witness her walking into the room with with cuts and bruises and blood on her clothes. She is quiet as she slips in the room, not wanting another lecture from Josh about how hard it is to scrub blood out of clothes in a laundromat full of people.
“Where have you been?” Josh asks as he stands up.
“I tracked down that last hundjäger. I think we’ll be good for another day or two, but then we’ve gotta move on.”
“Oh good, just enough time to scrub the blood out of your shirt.” He crosses his arms over his chest.
“Come on, Josh,” Trubel whines. “Not tonight.”
“You know, I can go along. I can help.”
“I know you can, but I don’t want to risk you getting hurt. If you could see them, it would be a different story.” Trubel steps closer and lays her hand on his shoulder. “I’m supposed to protect you. That’s what I plan on doing.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I guess I just feel like I’m dead weight.” He shrugs and pulls away. “I feel like I should be doing more. You put your life on the line for me on a pretty regular basis, and what do I do?”
“You scrub the blood from my clothes; you patch me up when I need it; you pick up odd jobs so we don’t have to sleep in the truck so much; you make sure we always have dinner. Josh, you do a lot. Maybe it’s not the same as what I do, but it’s just as damn important.” She looks up and smiles at him.
Before Josh can say anything, Trubel’s phone starts ringing.
“Sorry.” She pulls the phone from her pocket and looks at the ID.”It’s Monroe,” she tells Josh before hitting accept. “Hello?”
“Hey, Trubel,” Monroe says rather awkwardly.
“Is Nick okay?” Her mind immediately goes to the worst case scenario.
“He’s...okay...mostly.”
“Monroe, what’s going on? Not that it’s not nice to hear from you, but there’s something going on; I can hear it in your voice.”
“There’s a situation here. Everyone is alive, but there’s...trouble afoot.”
“Okay, Sherlock,” Trubel teases. “You want me to come back to Portland?”
“We’d really appreciate it if you could. Nick could really use your help right now,” Monroe says, not wanting to tell Trubel about Juliette over the phone.
“I’m on my way,” she says before ending the call.
“Where are you going?” Josh asks.
“We’ve gotta go back Portland. Nick is in trouble.” Walking over the bed, she pulls her bag out from underneath and starts shoving her things in it. “
“What about me?”
“I’m gonna take you back to that cabin we stayed in a while back. No one should come for you; they won’t expect us to go back west. I’ll leave the map here with a different city circled. They’ll head there instead. I’ll check out the situation with Nick and then I’ll get you.”
“I could come along. Nick’s done a lot for me too.”
“I know, but if Nick’s in trouble, it can’t be good. There’s no way you’ll be safe.”
Josh nods and then starts packing his own bag.
“Three days at most, man. I’ll leave you with the knife.”
“Nah, I’ll be fine. You might need it.”
“We should really look into getting another knife,” Trubel says. “I’ll have to see if Nick can spare one.”
A day later, Trubel is pulling up in front of a cabin, checking it and the surrounding area before feeling like she can leave Josh there. She makes sure he has enough food and asks one more time if he wants the machete, but he just tells her he is better at improvising, having used his dad’s urn and ashes to subdue some guy who was after him.
“Hey, Trubel,” Josh calls as Trubel is getting back in the truck.
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
She smiles, nodding. “You, too.”