The Hunted

by Steve Scheunemann

  “I’m guessing it’s an outline of the training they had done and planned for me. My training had often been away from here and the instructors were not always monks. In fact, they were often not monks. They obviously had extensive contacts outside the walls of this place. Just like someone else I once knew.”

  “Do you think they were connected with Angus?”

  “I never thought about it until now, but I’m almost sure of it. How many organizations of that size can exist in a world full of Hunters?”

  “Most of them deny the existence of even one organization, so actually I’d think there could be quite a few. It’s an institutional blind spot with the BGP. They won’t admit anyone could resist in a world they control. They deny to themselves the possibility that anyone is a good as they are. You are proof that they are wrong on that score, but they won’t ever believe it. You killed Mtumbe in seconds, but even if they saw it they would consider any explanation other than the truth, which is, you were that much better than he was. Mtumbe was one of the best at unarmed combat in the BGP. There are maybe 100 or so who are better than he was and you handled him like a…like a puppy.”

  Matt understood the reference to the puppy each potential Hunter was required to kill in his childhood. He could see the pain it caused Abbey as she thought back on her own puppy. He silently reached out to her and put his arms around her, giving comfort.

  Going back to the wall he resumed prying with his knife, until a six-inch section of rock face came loose. Behind it was the fissure Matt had mentioned, but there was more.

  Matt had expected that all security measures had been deactivated and that behind the rock face he’d find only the fissure he’d mentioned. Instead he found himself looking at a lens of some sort and a digital display counting down from 5 seconds. He wasted 3 of them deciding that the lens was a retinal scanner and that something bad would happen when the countdown reached zero unless the right retina was scanned. Having only one choice in eyeballs to place before the scanner he took the chance that his own would work. Looking into the lens he was momentarily blinded as lasers scanned his retina and decided if it passed muster.

  The countdown stalled at one second and a small data disk popped out, fell to the floor, and rolled until it hit Matt’s boot and stopped. Bending to pick it up was all that saved Matt from a nasty burn as white hot flame shot out of the crack in the stone.

  “I guess that’s that. Nobody will be tickling any data out of that system. Probably a wise precaution since we know that Malone has Miller on his team and he’ll be here sooner or later. They will track us here and it won’t take too long, so what now?” asked Abbey.

  “Well,” Matt replied, “now we make our great escape. You don’t think that an illegal religious order, every member of which was under sentence of death, and which was training a child to resist and possibly attempt to destroy the system, would have an active escape plan, do you?

  “These mountains are riddled with old mines. In the lower levels here at the monastery there is access to the mines. We can cover more than 100 miles underground. There are so many branches and false tracks that unless you know where you’re going it’s almost impossible not to get lost.”

  “I hope you know the way then.”

  “It was one of the first things I learned. I think I was no more than six when I learned the escape routes.”

  “Let’s get started then. Where do we find this entrance to the mines?”

  “In the well house behind the southern building. The one with the kitchens and mess hall.”

  Looking out the window Abbey said almost too softly to hear, “I was really hoping you were going to tell me it was in this building, Matt. We may have trouble getting there. McLeish and his hounds have found us.”

  Crossing quickly to her side, Matt saw what she meant. They had not actually been discovered yet, but three of the Great Hounds were already in the courtyard and as they watched another two joined them, followed momentarily by McLeish himself.

  “Damn. Ten minutes and we’d have been beyond their reach, at least until we left the mines. Abbey we can’t use firearms. We’re too close to the bunker. We know they’ve found it through the link set up to my PDT. I could have played them for a while, making them think we were inside still. At least until the mountain blocked the signal.

  “We’ve got one Hunter, five Great Hounds, and I’m sure he’s got some of the BGP uniformed officers with him or close by. Back at the bunker are what? Three more Hunters, an attack helicopter, and God alone knows how many uniforms. We have to get to that well house. If we set foot out in the courtyard the dogs will have us in seconds. They may not be the best trackers, but they won’t have to be. If we allow them to pin us down, they’ll call in all their help, too. If we kill one of them the rest will send out the alert unless we can kill them all one at a time without alerting the others. A pretty tall order. Of course, if we do nothing, even Great Hounds will sniff us out within another ten minutes. I guess we can go out in a blaze of glory and take as many of the bastards with us as possible. Or we can hope against all hope that we can somehow manage to sneak into that well house and make our escape. Since I’m not ready to call it quits just yet, I say let’s get sneaky.”

  Quickly but fiercely kissing Matt, Abbey said, “Let’s do it.”

  35

  Paris, European Territory

  July 8, 2080

  Vasily was sometimes amazed he was still alive. Sasha and all the others had been cut down like wheat before the scythe. His harrowing escape from Eastern Europe to the west had been mostly a vague blur. He’d been convinced he would be caught and killed like the rest, and had thought that event was happening when he’d been grabbed off the street and shoved in the back of a delivery van with a gun pressed tightly to his temple. It took a moment for him to realize that the BGP would simply have shot him; therefore this was not the BGP. Since they had grabbed him quickly and quietly and then moved out of the area he assumed they were not in any way official. That meant they were probably friends despite the gun at his temple.

  “I won’t fight you. You can take the gun away.”

  “Yes, I believe we can, for you are our friend. Truly the enemy of my enemy is indeed my friend. I know that in some ways our cause is not your own. You have no care for the Basques or all that we have suffered. What care you if we have been ruled by the Spaniards or the French or the ‘World Government’ we are Basques. However, I know that you believe in freedom. There are many like us around the world. Some are in New Zealand and others are like you and me, we want freedom yes, but we want that freedom in our homelands. It is not enough for us to simply escape the tyrant. No! We must drive him from our lands. There is the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, the Sons of Liberty in America, the Jews in Jerusalem, and many more groups. Most are in some way tied to the government in New Zealand. For now the Kiwis offer support, intelligence, and supplies mostly, but often weapons and they even sometimes will fight beside us.”

  “It is not enough to live free, if one must abandon his homeland to do it,” replied Vasily.

  “You see, you do understand us Basques quite well. For centuries we have fought for our homes, fought the Spaniards, fought the French, fought the UN and today we fight the World Government,” Vasily’s captor snorted his contempt at the last.

  “I am Marco, and you are Vasily. We are free men and freedom fighters. I have contacts you do not. That is the only reason I am not, as you are, fleeing for my life with my countrymen dead behind me.

  “I have been reading of the one called Angus,” Marco said, changing the subject kindly. “He was a man among men. He would have understood men like us. He never truly had a country of his own, but would have made a proud Basque. The BGP hunt for the one called ‘Matt’ who is the author of the first treatise on him. The other, obviously, comes from New Zealand, but Matt has never been there. It is a thing I can tell from the readings I have done. He is not one of them. He is one of us. We must find
him. You, me and the others like us. He is very important. His words stir my heart. If he could tell our stories like he did for Angus he could do such good for our cause. There is power in his words,” said Marco.

  “Words would not have saved Sasha. For that we need weapons and equipment as good as the BGP and we need men who can fight as well as the soldiers. My men were brave and loyal. The only thing they did well was die,” Replied Vasily bitterly.

  “With this Matt to speak for us as he has done for Angus, we will find men who will fight for us. My friends in New Zealand can get us the weapons, and their Marines are even better than the soldiers. No, we must only fear the Hunters. They are a plague on free men everywhere. They will wipe out an entire cell when they find one. It is why we are arranged as we are. The Kiwis have thought about setting up a network that is worldwide and decided that working with native born resistance is better for security. I have contacts with men such as this Angus was before he began to train with only Matt, but I do not have contacts with the other organizations. My codes reach only men in New Zealand, not America, or Africa, or even Eastern Europe. It was good luck and some good homegrown spy networks that found you for us.

  “I do not propose that you join us. The cause of the Basque is for the Basque to fight for. You will once again fight for your homeland as well. What I offer is to introduce you to my Kiwi friends. They will help your cause in ways I never could. Also, I ask that we share intelligence. The Kiwis believe that by keeping us separate we cannot betray one another. The cell technique is as old as resistance, and it works. It also limits us. As you have seen, the BGP does well at finding us anyway.

  “None of us who fight will die as old men in bed. We will go down in a hail of flechettes from some Storm Troop’s weapon. How many of the bastards we take with us is what matters. We must kill enough that resistance is no longer seen as futile. We must kill enough that our sons and their sons will take heart and continue the fight. Perhaps by the fifth generation there will be a victory. Perhaps the small yellow skinned fellows who fight on in Tibet will live free. The Kurds will have a homeland, the Jew, the Cossacks who hold out in Siberia, and the proud Zulu warrior. All will be free. Men and women will govern themselves, in their homelands, as they were meant to.”

  “Marco, my new friend, let us find this Matt and we will bring him into the fold. He will speak for us as you say, but more. I have seen some of this ‘Angus’ stuff you speak of. I also can read what is not written. He has fought them. He has fought them and won! Don’t you see? With him to lead us we could win in this generation. Our sons could grow up not fighting for the dream of freedom, but living it as free men.

  “You say the Kiwis are wrong to keep us so separated. You are right, but what you envision is not enough. We must fight together. No more will the Basque fight only for your mountains. No more will the Sons of Liberty fight only to free America. We cannot win by fighting only to liberate our own little corner of the world. That has worked for New Zealand only because it is a very remote corner in which they hide, and it is only temporary at best. We will only be free when all, or at least most, of the world is free of the current government. This man, I think, can unite us all. He has the words, as you say, but more he has the spirit. We will find him, and when we do I will place myself, and what men I have left, under his orders.”

  36

  July 9, 2080

  Silent Heart Monastery, North America

  Matt was convinced this was the end. There was no way he and Abbey could sneak out of this one. Both were, of course, experts at moving undetected, but it was a Hunter and five Great Hounds they were trying to sneak past over basically barren ground. The monastery grounds were free of any cover or means of hiding their scent from the hounds. Matt considered their weapons: two BGP issue sidearms, a 7mm magnum hunting rifle with very limited ammo, a compound bow and two dozen broad-head arrows, and two good hunting knives, although one was in slightly less than perfect shape.

  The sidearms were fast, had plenty of ammo, with three extra magazines for each, and had plenty of knockdown power. They would in fact outperform even the best pistols of the previous century. Instead of throwing a large chunk of lead as pistols of old did, these ‘bullets’ were wickedly pointed to ensure penetration of even hardened targets, and each carried a small explosive charge. In effect, after penetration the bullet became a small fragmentation grenade, exploding and sending small pieces of shrapnel through the victim’s body. They could literally blow a limb clean off. The problem was the same as it had always been for pistols; they were not very accurate at a distance. They were also, like all firearms, loud.

  Matt considered trying to silently take out the hounds with the bow, but rejected the idea. First it was a 60-pound draw weight bow. It had been a real bear for Matt to draw as a boy, but was adequate for any game in North America given the right circumstances. It could, no doubt put down one of the hounds, but if he hit a rib it would probably stop the arrow, making a second shot necessary. There was simply no way to take out five of the beasts silently. If he could get McLeish first maybe, but then if he had uniforms with him they’d certainly close in.

  As if to confirm Matt’s fears, no less than a dozen uniformed BGP officers began to come through the gate and spread out. These were not Hunters or even Storm Troops, the soldiers who shared a genetic background as the Hunters. These guys were from the genetic strain that immediately predated the Hunters. Physically they were every bit as impressive as the follow-up model. They just weren’t as smart. They were not dumb by any means, and would have tested at a near genius level. They simply lacked much imagination. They had no intuition, and took no leaps. Able to master anything they were trained in, they did not take on independent learning. They knew very well how to search for fugitives and were quite expert with their weapons.

  Abbey noticed it first, “Matt, do you see the way the uniforms are following the hounds? I think this is a team that has been trained to work with them. Can we make that work for us?”

  “Maybe. I was thinking about the bow. Trying to figure out how we can use it to kill them off since it’s silent, but I’d decided it would never work.

  “Abbey, I figure we have about one chance in twenty of making it out of here alive. A minute ago I figured it at one in a thousand. Give me a tee shirt from my pack. Make it the dirtiest one in there.”

  Not quite sure where Matt was going with this, Abbey dug out a dark blue tee shirt that Matt had worn the day before. They had not found a convenient stream to wash it in yet, and the day had been long and arduous so he’d sweated quite a bit. The shirt was pretty ripe.

  While Abbey was digging out the shirt, Matt had laid five arrows out on the floor in front of him. Tearing the shirt into strips he tied a piece to each arrow.

  “What I’m gonna do is fire an arrow past each of the hounds. I hope they’ll take the scent and follow. If you’re right about the uniforms, and I think you are, they will follow the hounds. We’ll have to move fast because as soon as they find the first arrow, the game is up and they’ll figure out what we’re doing.

  “If we can make it into the mines I think we’ll get away. There are a few camps of altered humans in there. They’ve been modified for mining work. They’re pretty far removed from the mainstream, and don’t look all that human. They are not fugitives, or even hiding out. They were brought in to work the mines and when the mine petered out, they were simply left there. They are not too happy with the government, but at the same time they are left alone. We can’t count on them for much support, but as long as we don’t bring the BGP with us, we may be able to trade with them. They knew about the monks here for years and never told their overseers.”

  Taking up the first arrow, Matt fitted it to the bowstring. Then he held a second in his teeth. Looking out the window Matt could see all five hounds and the uniforms following each. The beasts were half feral and the troops were keeping a healthy distance. Those hounds would turn on them given the c
hance. It was only McLeish’s presence that kept them under control. This meant that the chance of one of them seeing the arrow in flight was pretty small. Sighting to fire each arrow past a hound’s head but to still carry off into the distance was difficult. He wanted them to catch the scent, but he needed enough distance that the arrows would not be found too soon.

  The first three shots went out in under five seconds and worked perfectly. In each case the hound seemed to suddenly find the scent, and take off in the same general direction. Abbey even noticed some of the troops with the remaining two hounds start to turn in that direction.

  The fourth hound must have seen the arrow in flight because he snapped at it as it whizzed by. Great Hounds have amazingly fast reflexes and he almost caught the arrow. Instead of his teeth closing on the shaft, the arrow flashed right through the beast’s right cheek. There was a splatter of blood and the beast let out a growl, then took off in pursuit of the arrow. Slowed by its passage through the hounds flesh, the arrow fell far short of the others.

  The fifth arrow performed as beautifully as the first three had. No human seemed to notice what had happened to the fourth hound yet and it was not acting any differently than its fellows. It was bleeding heavily from its mouth though.

  “Let’s go.” Matt was up and moving quickly to the stairs.

  They made it out of the building and were passing along its west wall moving silently when McLeish noticed the blood from the fourth hound’s mouth.

  “Ho, Spartacus! To me, boy.”

  As the hound turned and ran towards its master one of the troops found the arrow that had fallen short. Other than stooping to pick it up he didn’t react.

  He really had no idea what it signified.

  McLeish was not so slow. He saw the arrow with its slip of cloth, and put it together with the hound’s bloody mouth in an instant. He quickly traced the arrows trajectory.