The Hunt

by T. J. Lebbon

  Her breath came fast and nervous. What if they could land? Would the trees shield her as well as she hoped? What if they slipped down ropes from the helicopter and surrounded her? She hadn’t planned this enough. Hadn’t considered every possibility, every permutation.

  She closed her eyes and controlled her breathing, and thought of something Holt had said. Once you’re in play, don’t worry about maybes.

  The sound of the helicopter suddenly changed and grew louder as it crossed the ridge and drifted down towards the car. She could see it through the trees, hanging out over the valley and slowing as it drew level with the idling vehicle, three hundred feet out. She kept completely still. They were watching, and they’d be checking the area around the BMW as well as the vehicle itself.

  ‘Come in closer,’ she said. ‘Come on. Come and see.’

  The helicopter’s side door slid open. The sun was beyond, so the aircraft’s interior was in shadow. Still she felt watched. She slowly lowered herself down until she was lying on the loamy ground, mostly sheltered behind a tree trunk. The gun was clasped in her right hand, her index finger resting across the trigger guard. She’d only touch the trigger if she was going to use it.

  ‘Come on … ’

  If the helicopter came close enough, she’d stand and open fire. It wasn’t much of a plan, but it was all she had. Her blood was up, her need to avenge nowhere near sated by the three dead people in Chris’s house. They were only the start.

  And she had yet to meet Grin.

  Holt had told her that to down a helicopter you should always aim for the tail rotor. The chance of hitting the pilot was remote, and the windscreen would often deflect a bullet off-target. The possibility of loosing off shots at the bodywork and hitting something vital was also small. But shoot at the tail rotor, and it would only take one good or lucky shot to shatter one of the blades and send the aircraft into a deadly spin.

  One good shot. She had fifteen bullets, and three spare magazines.

  ‘Come on.’

  The aircraft drifted a little. A puff of smoke bloomed in its dark doorway, one of the BMW’s side windows shattered, and a shot rang out.

  Rose didn’t move. It was too far out, and tempted though she was to stand and start shooting, she’d mess up her only chance.

  Another puff of smoke, another impact on the car. Several more followed, the shots sounding distant and lost amidst the broad landscape, the wide sky.

  ‘Come closer, come on!’ she said, frustrated.

  But the Trail weren’t stupid.

  The helicopter tilted away and flew off down the valley. Its whipping rotors thud-thudded from the mountainside, and soon it was far enough away for her to hear the sound of the idling car engine again.

  Rose stood, let out a held breath, and leaned against the tree. A warm breeze brought the smell of heather. A red kite circled high up, still searching for a kill. But she didn’t feel disappointed. She’d known it was a long shot, in more ways than one.

  Losing them now only meant that they’d be there for her to kill further down the line.

  Chapter Twelve

  rage

  ‘Piss stop,’ Vey said. The van ground to a halt and the handbrake clattered on.

  Gemma glanced up at her mum’s blindfolded face, then whispered across to Megs.

  ‘Hey, Megs, we’re going to stretch our legs.’

  ‘Not you,’ Vey said.

  ‘What? But I need to go.’

  ‘Then go.’

  Gemma felt a rush of anger, blooming at the centre of her and radiating out to tingle her numb limbs. It had first manifested an hour before. Burning through the cool distance she’d cocooned herself within, the rage had surged to the fore when Vey laughed at her mother.

  ‘We don’t have much money,’ her mother had said, voice low and calm.

  ‘Don’t worry, I have,’ Vey had said, laughing past the grin that drew a wrinkled mask across her face.

  Gemma had felt the rage beginning to grow then, and she welcomed it back now.

  ‘You really want us to wet ourselves?’

  Vey didn’t even look at them.

  The van’s rear doors opened. Gemma squinted against the light flooding in and saw Vey jump to the ground outside. A shadow filled the opening. A man stood watching them. It was the tall man from the house; she’d heard Vey call him Tom. She’d filed his name away, but as she slid it into the box she’d grown cold. They won’t tell us their real names, will they? They’d only risk doing that if … But she would not allow herself to complete that thought. To do so would be to let the fear back in.

  ‘I need to go toilet,’ Megs said.

  ‘Me too,’ Gemma said, glaring at the man. Her eyes were growing accustomed to the light.

  ‘You can hang on,’ he said.

  ‘I can’t!’ Megs said. Gemma hated hearing her sister sounding so scared and upset, but she didn’t shift her attention from the man. She was striving to see something in his eyes beyond cold, calm indifference.

  ‘Let my children go,’ her mum said. ‘Whatever this is, please just leave them by the side of the road, and take me instead.’

  ‘Mummy!’ Megs said. She was crying behind her blindfold, and every time her shoulders shook, Gemma could see her grimacing in pain.

  The man did not even respond.

  ‘At least untie us from the bench,’ Gemma said. ‘Please.’

  ‘Starting to sound like your sister,’ Vey said, reappearing beside the man and climbing back into the van. ‘Please please please!’ Her mocking of Megs was almost too much.

  ‘Fuck you,’ Gemma whispered. Behind her she heard her mother’s sharp intake of breath, and Megs’ sobs shuddered into a shocked giggle. Inside, Gemma smiled.

  But Vey and the man seemed unfazed. Without another word he slammed the doors, and Vey settled once more in her seat across from them, nursing the gun in her lap.

  As the van started moving again, crunching across gravel and then onto a smooth road surface, the acidic tang of urine filled the confined space.

  Megs started sobbing once more and said, ‘Sorry, Mummy, I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s not your fault, honey, don’t worry, it’s not your fault.’

  Gemma glared at Vey and forced her own bladder to let go.

  Chapter Thirteen

  scree

  Chris did what he knew best. He ran.

  The aimless, random shooting soon died down when the helicopter left. His pursuers must have realised that they were alone then, and the initial buzz gave way to thoughts of pursuit and conserving ammunition. Crouched down, Chris paused to watch the helicopter head north up towards the ridge into the next valley. The car was no longer where he’d seen it parked up there, and Rose was long gone.

  They would be after her. She’d killed three of their number, and now that their clients were on their own expedition hunting him, the Trail would be attending to more personal matters.

  He hoped that Rose knew what she was doing. She’d seemed efficient and calm in the house, and very certain about her actions. But there had been aspects to her and the things she said that made him realise that this wasn’t her world at all. Perhaps once, she had been just like him.

  He used the rocky outcropping as cover for as long as he could, climbing diagonally up the mountainside and keeping the spur between him and those chasing him. Moving quickly and confidently, he tried to keep to sheep trails where the ground below was easier to make out. Ferns grew almost to his thighs, and clumps of heather clung around boulders tumbled down the hillside in a time before any human had ever set foot here.

  Chris usually loved the indifference of nature. Whether he walked across this mountain or not, his presence would have no effect whatsoever on its journey through time. Today, that indifference was more cutting than ever. For an instant it felt smothering, and the unfairness of what was happening threatened to drive him down, its weight unbearable. But he maintained his pace, looked to the horizon, and focussed
on where he was going.

  He moved at a pace that he knew he could comfortably maintain for two or three hours. His runs in the hills often lasted that long, sometimes longer. True, he had never run with a target on his back before, and that gave him added impetus. But he would also have to be cautious that the threat did not make him push too hard. He knew his body well – what he could and could not do, the aches and pains, the signs of dehydration and exhaustion – and he had to keep listening.

  He was also not used to running with such a weight on his back. Sometimes he’d take a small backpack, especially on longer jaunts, usually containing a water bladder, waterproof, phone, and a few snacks. But the pack he carried now was at least three times as heavy as those he’d usually take. He had to factor that in. It was just one more thing to think about.

  When the slope was manageable he ran, watching the ground several steps ahead so that his pace was not staggered by unexpected rocks or potential trip hazards. He jumped any hole or rock that might have slowed him, landing softly on the ball of his foot and driving forward, using his momentum to take him on beyond the danger without allowing a jarring impact to risk injury.

  The backpack was snug to his back and shoulders. He could hear the swish of fluid in there, and was pleased that he had a decent amount of water. There were energy bars and gels, and dried meals, too. But other than the out-of-date, mouldy sandwiches he’d taken from the holdall the Trail man had given him, he had no real food.

  That was something to worry about later.

  At a steeper part of the hillside he had to slow down, pausing in a depression in the ground to view the lie of the land. To reach the high ridge he was aiming for he’d have to climb past the ferns and up a rocky slope, and it was probably steep enough to have to use his hands to grasp at the ground and haul upwards. Not exactly a technical climb, more a scramble. But it would slow him down.

  He stood up straight and looked back along the slope, shielding his eyes from the sun. At first there was no movement other than the gentle swish and sway of occasional plants in the breeze. Then he saw a flicker way along the slope and a little down from him. The camouflage clothing made it difficult to make out, but the spike of a weapon gave the hunter away. Further back and down, a flash of white. Another hunter had already stripped off their jacket to reveal a white tee shirt underneath. Good. He’d be able to keep better track of them.

  At least they were a good distance away. Chris had no idea about guns, but he guessed that even if they had the best rifles money could buy, they’d have to be a crack shot to even get close to him at this range.

  But he didn’t know that for sure. It was a gamble. He’d have to gamble a lot if he was going to get out of this.

  Thinking about guns, the sniping abilities of those chasing him, the distance he was putting between them … this was all so ridiculous. He looked around for a moment, breathing heavily, hands on hips as he searched for whoever was playing the big joke on him. Maybe he really had been hypnotised, let loose in a TV reality show. Maybe his family were in on it. But there was no Rose, and none of his family looking down. It was real. He knew that, even as he continued working through the disbelief, because he could remember the blood and gunfire in his house, and the emptiness when he’d returned home to find the stranger drinking his coffee.

  He had to shrug off the unreality, shake the conviction that this was a trick, a joke, something bad that could only ever happen to other people.

  This was real.

  ‘I’ll just wait for them to get here, talk them down,’ he said. They were normal people chasing him across the hillside. Not soldiers or killers, not if Rose was to be believed. Rich, but ordinary people, probably with jobs and families, pets, health worries and favourite songs. He’d just wait. Talk to them. They’d all realise together how stupid this was.

  He raised his face to the sky and closed his eyes, and a gunshot echoed across the valley.

  He ducked down. He’d not heard the bullet – no whistle, no impact, no ricochet like they showed in the movies – but wasn’t even sure that he would. That far away, wouldn’t he feel the impact before he even heard the shot? He thought so. Which meant that this one had already missed him when he’d heard the report.

  It also meant that they’d seen him.

  Carefully, he lifted himself up again, looking past a jagged spine of rock and across the hillside. A flock of small birds took flight, darting and singing in the mid-afternoon sunlight. He envied them their easy escape.

  The movement was easier to spot now, because the men were running faster. They’d seen him. Any pretence at caution, at stalking, was gone. He had to move.

  Straight up the slope was too steep, and it ended in an almost vertical scramble that would slow him down far too much. He could go down into the valley, but that would give them the high ground. Maybe he’d reach the road before they moved down and across the hillside to cut him off, maybe not. It was too risky. He had to keep to his original plan – up the steep slope at an angle towards the ridge, then down into the new valley on the other side. He’d take advantage of every second he was out of their sight to get as far away as he could.

  But not too far, he thought, and Rose’s voice finished the sentence: because if they lose you, you lose everything.

  He considered taking a few seconds to check again in the rucksack, but unless there was a machine gun in there it would be wasted time. So he moved instead, ducking low and following a natural depression in the land, kicking through a pile of old bones and tangled wool. Fresh sheep shit rolled beneath his trainers, and several creatures startled him as they fled. If the hunters had half an ounce of sense about them they’d see that, and note the direction he was taking.

  He switched directly uphill for a couple of minutes, crawling as low as he could on hands and knees. He tried his best to avoid the sparse fern plant stems, following a line of moss-covered rocks for a time, then dropping down into another dip carved by a dried-up stream. He used this to move uphill faster. His heart hammered, breath came deep and fast, and he was soaked with sweat once more. No time to stop for a drink; that would have to wait. The bladder was full, but Rose had not fed the drink hose out through the opening in the rucksack. He’d have to stop to take a drink.

  But he couldn’t allow dehydration to get a hold on him. He might have a long way to run, and he had to consider his nutrition as seriously as his route across the rugged landscape. That was another advantage he hoped he had over these men – the knowledge and abilities required to survive a long chase in the mountains.

  Climbing from the small ravine, he looked back downhill. But the fold in the land he had just climbed blocked his view. He didn’t like not being able to see how close they were, but it also meant that they couldn’t see him.

  It was maybe a hundred metres to the ridge line, up a steep slope with plenty of opportunities for cover. He could creep as slowly and as carefully as possible. Or he could run.

  Something punched at him – the memory of his wife and kids in that van, its impact like a solid fist to his chest that purged a cooling flush through his veins. He felt light-headed and weak. This isn’t me! Once, when he and Terri were courting, they’d been in a pub in their local town. They were childhood sweethearts, and they grew together through their teens with all the emotional and physical upheaval that accompanied the process. It was still a time when going out and drinking together was a novelty, and an older, bigger man had stumbled into Terri. She’d fallen against a shelf filled with empty glasses and a dozen had shattered on the floor. She’d been lucky not to gash her arm open.

  But instead of leaving it there, the drunk had started ranting at her, spittle speckling his beard, arms waving. Chris had stepped in and punched him in the face, and he’d gone down in a heap.

  Applause through the pub, a sickening sense of dread in him, and a look of terror in Terri’s eyes. It was the first and last fight of his adult life.

  He didn’t do violence.
He hated conflict and confrontation, so much so that as an adult he’d avoided it all his life. Terri made all the phone calls to haggle with insurance companies or negotiate the price for a new car. Sometimes he was called a wimp. Some friends said that he’d never have a bad word to say about anyone, whether they deserved it or not.

  This was not him.

  He started uphill. Cutting across the hillside to make the going less steep, he pushed with his feet and grasped with his hands, aiming for solid rock rather than stones that might be loose. His trail-running shoes with their plastic nibs clasped onto the ground, and he used each solid footfall to propel himself upward. His calves burned, knees throbbed. He soon started breathing heavily again, but settled into a decent rhythm. Chris knew the effort he could expend to maintain movement over a good distance, and he kept to that now. A shot, a shout, and he would have to move faster.

  He closed on the ridge, skirting around a dip in the hillside, visible only because of the thinner spread of ferns. Perhaps his pursuers wouldn’t notice that, they might fall in and break a bone, call for help or extraction. He assumed they’d have constant contact with the Trail.

  He pressed flat to the sloping ground and rolled onto his side, looking back and down. He could still see his pursuers, struggling uphill towards him. They were already spreading out, the two in the lead – one of them the fit-looking Blondie – seeming to work together, three others strung out behind them. At the rear came the big Rambo character, stripped off to his white undershirt. They were too far away to make out their expressions, but he hoped they were hurting.

  Just as he started climbing again he heard something. He paused, opening his mouth and breathing out slowly as he listened for the sound of engines. There, in the distance back to the north. The helicopter appeared low over the ridge and followed the road down into the valley.

  What did that mean? Had they found and killed Rose? He clasped at the phone in his small back pocket, but it would waste time to call her now. And whether she was alive or dead, her fate had no effect on his immediate situation.