Slay Inc.: Cara's Tribe and Their Sadness

CW: Human trafficking, attempted abduction, violence

After returning from the recon job to the wendigo realm, Cara had to get back to work quickly. She heard from the tribal sheriffs that a few strange trucks were seen coming through town. Late at night and not stopping for gas or food. That was off pattern from normal, almost everyone would stop to pick up a few souvenirs or at least a snack. About 100 miles north of the reservation, a young girl had gone missing. Not native, a white girl, but it was alarming. So the town was on the lookout. Other native girls had gone missing over the years, but some thought they had just left town quietly to get away to have a bigger life. The tribe knew better. Some of them maybe, but not all. For decades women and girls had been murdered or missing with little help from investigative authorities. It was up to people like Cara to try and find out what was going on, and try to prevent it. She decided to patrol the major roads leading into and out of town. She had been doing this for about a year. Sometimes on one of her bikes, sometimes on her horse. She did not know if there was one individual, or several working together, maybe trafficking. She was fairly close to the Highway of Tears, and its devastating stories of dozens of missing women.

Tonight, she was patrolling a stretch of road where a lot of the native girls would walk to go see their friends. It was a lonely road in the woods but had a fair amount of traffic. Cara knew one or two trucks had been seen going down it a bit late at night. She was on her horse Wind and they were following a 4 wheeler trail along the road, but some woods still kept her hidden. She saw a few girls walk down it, busy chatting on their phones. She was being a sort of guardian angel, making sure they had safe passage. There were a few other tribal members who did the same thing. They had to watch out for themselves because local law enforcement couldn’t, or just were not interested.

Tonight she was not looking for supernatural predators, but human ones. Big difference. With all the harm monsters brought to people, and here people had to bring harm to people. It was devastating to think about. As it got later, she was about to turn and go home when a young woman about her age came into sight. She thought she would watch out for this girl and then turn towards home. But out of the night, the lights of a large truck lit everything up. It started to slow down as it approached the young girl, and stopped to offer a ride. The girl seemed to refuse, but the truck did not move on… instead the driver got out and started to approach the girl. Within a moment he had his hands on her and she was resisting. He quickly threw her into the truck and took off. Cara started towards them as fast as she could on her horse, but she knew if they did not catch up fast they would lose them. She turned off into the woods, thinking she could cut them off where the road turned. She scrambled down a short incline and was almost on top of the truck. It was moving a bit slower because the trucker was fighting with the girl. Cara had no real choice but to jump onto the vehicle and try to scramble to the driver’s door. Fortunately the girl was shoving at him and he wasn’t looking in his mirrors or he would have seen Cara. She managed to open his door and jump in with them. It was a free for all and his foot hit the gas. Now all 3 of them were fighting with the girls trying to overpower him. He was a big guy, but Cara had a stun gun and was able to zap him. Breathing hard they pulled over. The girl was scared now, and shaking, hardly believing what had happened. It all happened in just a few minutes. Cara recognized the girl, she had been 2 grades behind her in school. They hugged for a moment, and talked, out of breath and shaking. Cara opened up the back of the truck and was horrified at what she saw. It was set up for tying people up, and transporting them. There were some water bottles and loose remnants of clothes and other stuff people had dropped. There was some blood and hay for the people to lay on. Could she have lucked out and got a trafficker? They had to work hard to get the guy tied up. They put him in the sleep cabin of the truck. Cara hoped her horse was ok and went back home, she knew her way. They started back to town, calling the sheriff to let them know they were coming with some special cargo. What a night, Cara thought, probably would have been easier to hunt a wendigo.

They stopped at the police station. 3 of the tribal elders were there. Cara did not know how this was going to go for the guy, it would be up to the tribe to decide. Getting rid of the truck would be easy, but if he went to the federal government they could investigate and maybe find out how many others were involved. With a lead like this, it would be far easier for them to get an investigation going. Cara and the girl gave their statements, got some medical attention then left. The girls talked as the sheriff drove them home. They both thought about what could have possibly happened if Cara had not been there. They talked about the other girls who were never found. They knew that to protect the future of their tribe, they would have to be proactive like this, basically fighting back. Because they knew they would be back, hunting their precious girls.

After the girl was home, Cara and the Sheriff talked about how serious this was, and what to do about it. Cara said they should at least increase patrols and she would talk to the local young native girls about safety more often. Young girls rarely thought of danger and were too trustworthy. They knew they could not just leave it to the local law enforcement. They wondered if turning him over to the feds was a good idea. Their tribe was well able to handle interrogating him themselves. Cara knew that would involve torture, and they would have to get rid of the body. She hoped the sheriff and his men would make a good decision on it.

She got home, and said goodbye to the sheriff. Immediately she went to the pasture, and thank God Wind was home and unharmed. She had never ridden her like that, but Wind had stepped up and become a hero. Cara went off to bed, tired, frustrated, and worried. The world seemed so much darker than it had this morning.