In the Woods

by Merry Jones

  Shit. Had she been hit? She took a quick inventory of her body parts, searching for pain. But she remembered the suicide bombing, when her bones had been broken, her flesh seared and gouged, and she’d felt no pain. Nothing at all. So not feeling pain wouldn’t tell her anything about a bullet wound. In fact, all she could feel was the weight of the attacker holding her to the ground. The blood pool was spreading, coming closer to her face. So, wait. It wasn’t hers; couldn’t be. If the blood were hers, the pool would start under her, not close to her. Why couldn’t she think straight? What was wrong with her? Bullets kept coming, one after another, pop-pop-pop. A soprano voice stopped mid-scream.

  ‘Come on,’ her attacker shouted into her ear, hefted her up by her waistband, held her like a baby, except face down. He was strong, and she had no leverage, couldn’t fight him off. Harper felt his unbalanced run, watched the floor rush under her. Saw her prisoner’s face, half blown away. She turned her head, staring at him. Remembered riding on his back, poking his eyes. Oh God. Someone had pulled her away as a bullet had zipped past her head – the shot had been meant for her. Had hit him instead.

  Someone had saved her life.

  Someone from her unit?

  ‘Go go go,’ a man croaked. ‘Come on!’

  The floor flashed by. Harper passed over a casualty. A man – his back bloodied. She recognized him. One of hers. She turned her head, saw a woman crawling, one foot bare. Her ankle, swollen, purple. Splatted with blood. Harper’s head passed through a door frame. The running stopped. The floor stopped moving. The man holding her didn’t let go. She could feel his heart pounding.

  ‘Okay, we’re okay. Close it.’

  ‘But that other guy …’ The man holding her was out of breath.

  ‘Jim’s dead,’ said another.

  ‘How do we know?’

  ‘If he isn’t, he will be. We can’t help him.’

  Why were they speaking English? Shouldn’t insurgents speak Arabic? Farsi? Were they spies? Harper scanned the room. No windows. A mattress on the floor. A portable toilet. Dim light spilling from above. Two men, plus the one holding her. Clearly she was in a prison cell. Someone closed the door.

  Outside, the gunfire stopped. Nearby, someone was moaning.

  ‘Put me down.’ Harper tried to sound dangerous, authoritative.

  Beefy arms lowered her gently to the floor.

  ‘You okay?’ The voice was familiar.

  But it made no sense. Had to be a trick. A mind game, a form of psychological torture. She looked up. Hank knelt beside her, touching her forehead. Harper couldn’t help it, let out a yelp.

  ‘It’s all right, Harper.’ He leaned over and kissed her mouth.

  Harper put her hand out, touching him. Making sure he was real. ‘Hank?’ She frowned, trying to understand. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Daniels and I followed your trail—’

  ‘Have you seen my patrol? Are they okay?’ Harper tried to stand, needed to find them.

  ‘Your patrol?’

  ‘What’s she asking?’ one of the men asked.

  ‘My patrol,’ she repeated. ‘They were at the checkpoint before the ambush—’

  Hank put a hand on her arm. ‘Harper? Where are you?’

  What?

  ‘I mean, are you with us?’

  With them? She looked around. Everyone was watching her. ‘I can’t find my weapon. Or my ammo – everything’s missing.’

  Hank’s hands moved across her body to her sides, into her vest pockets. Was he searching her?

  He pulled out a lemon, held it out. ‘Bite this.’

  She looked at it, at him. Back to it. ‘Why?’ She knew she should, didn’t know why. Something about lemons glimmered just beyond her memory.

  ‘Go on.’

  Harper looked across the tiny room. Saw a woman prone on the floor. Two men in the shadows, one leaning over the other, talking softly.

  ‘Harper. Do it.’

  Harper took the lemon, opened her mouth and chomped. Sour liquid assaulted her tongue, jolted her senses, short-circuited messages to her brain.

  And propelled her out of wartime Iraq into a place where the danger was no less great, but the outcome far less certain.

  The five of them huddled in the small dark closet where Jim had been imprisoned earlier. Angela had been hit in the back. Her wound wasn’t bleeding too badly but her breath was labored. Slader had been shot in the side. His bleeding had slowed, and he lay on the mattress, weak and clinging to consciousness. While Harper recovered from her flashback, Daniels did what first aid he could.

  Angela wailed steadily, a siren-like sound. Daniels, Hank and Harper sat against a wall beside the mattress.

  ‘What now?’ Daniels asked.

  ‘I have the key.’ Slader’s breath rattled. ‘Took it off Moose.’

  The key?

  ‘The locals …’ He grimaced, paused. ‘They can’t get in here without it.’

  Harper and Hank exchanged glances. Clearly, the locals could get in any time they wanted. They could, for example, take the door off its hinges. Or blast through it.

  ‘Buys us time.’

  Great.

  ‘So, we have a key. Anything else to help us?’ Harper raised her voice to be heard over Angela.

  Daniels had managed to pick up Ax’s gun. And Slader, even wounded, had confiscated Moose’s knife.

  Angela howled and cursed.

  The four others sat silent. Nobody felt the need to state the obvious. They were outnumbered, out-armed, trapped in a concrete hole without food or water. They’d already lost Jim, and Angela and Slader needed medical attention.

  ‘What do you think they’ll do now?’ Harper finally spoke.

  ‘Depends,’ Slader said. ‘If it’s up to Mavis or Hiram, they’ll probably shoot us.’

  Damn. Harper swallowed, pictured Chloe. Hank wrapped an arm around her, took her hand.

  ‘But maybe it won’t be up to them,’ Daniels offered. ‘Maybe someone else will take over.’

  ‘I hope not. Hiram and Mavis shooting us – that’d be good news.’ Slader stopped to catch his wind. ‘Cuz if it’s up to Josh and those guys, with Ax and Moose dead? They’ll skin us alive. I mean that literally.’

  Harper shuddered, gripped Hank’s hand. Thought about how they could fight with one knife and one gun.

  ‘Are we sure about Jim? He’s dead?’ she asked.

  ‘Half his head’s gone.’ Daniels was sitting against the wall, his head back, eyes closed.

  Silence.

  Harper leaned into Hank, watching the door, waiting for it to break down. Listening for shouting or gunshots. Nothing.

  Time passed.

  She was thirsty, needed to think about something else. Again, Chloe popped to mind, grinning, eating string cheese. Asking for more. Oh God, she couldn’t bear to think of Chloe. Needed to change channels in her head. Closed her eyes, saw Leslie, her shrink. Why was she thinking of Leslie? ‘Because,’ Leslie told her, ‘you come to me when you have problems. You’re hoping I can help.’

  ‘So, can you?’ Harper thought.

  Leslie watched her with her patient green eyes. ‘Mostly, I help you find a way to help yourself.’

  What was that supposed to mean? Harper opened her eyes, saw dismal faces. Three men looking hopeless, awaiting imminent death. Angela lying behind them, ranting to her late husband. ‘Phil,’ she kept crying. ‘Go away. You’re dead. Leave me alone.’

  Harper couldn’t stand it. Had to breathe some energy back into them. Divert their attention.

  ‘So, how’d you find us?’ She squeezed Hank’s hand.

  ‘I wouldn’t have if Daniels hadn’t come with me.’ He told her that the state cops hadn’t released him until almost sundown; then they’d insisted it was too late to search, and they’d have to wait until morning to begin again.

  ‘Your husband was pissed,’ Daniels said. ‘You should have seen him. I thought he was going to lose it and assault those two c
ops. But he didn’t. He just grabbed a flashlight and stormed back out to follow your trail on his own.’

  ‘Thank you, Hank.’ Harper leaned up and kissed his cheek. ‘You’re so persistent.’

  ‘Persistent? More like obsessed. He was pawing at leaves, looking for – what did you leave? Aspirin?’

  ‘Ibuprofen.’ Harper smiled. ‘I was afraid the squirrels would take them.’

  ‘It didn’t take long for Daniels to figure out where we were heading,’ Hank went on. ‘And he says, your wife’s got to be at the Hunt Club compound.’

  ‘Trouble was the area’s closed off with chain link and barbed wire,’ Daniels said. ‘The locals claim the whole parkland belongs to them, and they say the government stole their land.’

  ‘Government fucking did.’ Slader began coughing. ‘Took the land right out from under us.’

  ‘Anyhow, they’ve cordoned off a section where they hold their meetings and so on.’

  ‘The government allowed that?’ Hank asked.

  ‘Course they did,’ Slader said. ‘They know the truth and don’t want it to come to light, so …’ He hacked again. ‘So they let us be. It’s a tacit agreement, or it was.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Daniels said. ‘The government hasn’t given them formal title to the fenced-off land, but they also haven’t done anything to take it back. My opinion? Angry confrontations cost money and cause bad PR. And the locals haven’t been harming anyone. So the state just lets them block off a section of the woods and looks the other way.’

  ‘So we got to the fence,’ Hank went on. ‘I used my hunting knife to rearrange some barbed wire. But once we climbed the fence, we found nothing. Not a single building, just a field and an old storage shed. And a mound of stones that looked like an entrance to an underground bunker. Nobody was around, so we went over to it and saw the door—’

  ‘Your husband was fiddling with the lock when the door swung open and a couple of women greeted us with shotguns. I knew one of them—’

  ‘Those had to be Mavis’s women,’ Slader wheezed. ‘Tough as they come. They’d shoot you, then go home and bake a pie.’

  ‘Well, they were kind enough to invite us in,’ Hank said.

  ‘And here we are.’ Daniels sunk back into gloom.

  Angela had been mumbling constantly, but no one had been paying attention. ‘Phil, no. Go away. You’re. Dead.’

  Harper had been deliberately tuning her out. But now, she listened.

  Angela thrashed. ‘I swear I will. I’ll shoot you again.’ Kicking, she shouted something unintelligible, then was quiet.

  Harper looked at Slader. ‘Was that a confession?’

  ‘Well, no one read her her rights.’ Slader’s breath rattled. ‘But I told you she did it, didn’t’ I? She’s batty, talking to her victim. Maybe her conscience is haunting her.’

  Silence again. Harper put her head against Hank’s shoulder, trying to come up with a plan.

  The silence lingered. Finally, they heard movement on the other side of the wall. Hank grabbed the knife; Daniels took the gun. The three of them backed away from the door, braced for the unknown.

  ‘What’re you bothering about?’ Slader breathed. ‘They’ve got us. We’re fish in a barrel.’

  Not necessarily, Harper reasoned. Being underground as they were, they could only be approached from above. Which meant that the locals could be eliminated as they came, one at a time. Oddly, their position might actually give them an advantage.

  Unless, of course, the locals dropped in a grenade.

  As Josh slipped into his Bog Man suit, he felt his senses come alive. His breath quickened, and a fierce hunger rose in his belly. He could already smell their blood, see them twitching, hear their wails. He wasn’t sure who was alive down there, but dead or alive, he would take his time with the chief, for old times’ sake, and to show that even cops weren’t safe around there. The blonde was spunky, had a nice rack, so Ax would want to spend some time with her. Fine. He didn’t mind sharing as long as he could have her body in the end. He imagined the bunch of them, hanging from the trees like ornaments in the morning light. Who would find them first? Campers? The ATF? He hoped it would be the media, so the pictures would fly over the Internet and the news, announcing to the world that outsiders entered these woods in peril of their lives.

  The Bog Man zipped up his chest, pulled on his head. Carried his paws up the steps and out of the bunker. He looked across the field, listening to the fury of his heartbeat and the threat of his breath, watching the shed. As soon as Simon and Dave brought in the last two prisoners, he would be ready. He was the new leader. The only one of his kind, and no one would stop him.

  Pete and Bob hustled across the field toward the fence.

  ‘This is going to be great,’ Bob said. ‘We’ve got enough power with us to send the pipeline to the moon.’

  Pete glanced back at the shed. ‘Think we tied them tight enough?’

  ‘Shit. You tied them. You think you didn’t?’

  Pete had no idea. Had never tied anyone up before. ‘I’m just saying. What if they get out—’

  ‘We’re gone, dude. They’re not going to come after us. At least not until it’s too late.’

  Pete didn’t answer. The radio kept squawking about the perimeter, about checking in. He worried that the men they’d captured were being missed. That someone would come looking for them. Meantime, the distance between the shed and the fence seemed longer than it had when they’d arrived. And the ground was bumpier, full of rocks and weeds and animal burrows. Hard to negotiate in the dark, and they couldn’t risk exposing themselves by using flashlights.

  Pete moved along, stepping cautiously.

  The radio started again. A woman this time. ‘Mavis? Are you going? Respond.’

  There was a burst of static. ‘Positive, Annie. We’re heading out now.’

  ‘Did you hear that?’ Pete looked behind him, back toward the compound. ‘I think they’re going looking for those guys.’

  ‘Then we better move. Hurry up, would you?’ Bob scolded.

  ‘I’m too sore to hurry. And you need to slow down. If we stumble and that liquid stuff gets shaken up, we’re toast.’

  ‘No, you know when we’re toast? When they catch us, that’s when.’

  Again, Pete looked behind them. Saw somebody emerge from the mound of rocks across from the shed. Not just one somebody. Another, then another.

  ‘Shit.’ He jabbed Bob’s arm, pointing.

  Bob looked, cursed. Started running.

  ‘Stop. Don’t run.’ Pete froze, unsure how sensitive the explosives were. Would the running motion set them off? Would it knock them against the other containers?

  ‘Come on,’ Bob growled. ‘It’s dark. They can’t see us.’

  Pete watched them, thought Bob was wrong: If he could see the group, they also could see him. And he saw them clearly, clumped together like a stampeding herd, coming fast.

  The radio crackled. ‘We’ve spotted two men heading to the gate.’

  ‘Are they Simon and Dave?’

  ‘Negative.’

  ‘Bob.’ Pete was short of breath. ‘They’ve got us.’

  ‘Hey, you two! Stop!’ A shot whizzed past them.

  The radio voice said, ‘Try to keep one for questioning.’

  Shit. Keep one? They were going to kill the other? Or a bullet might hit a backpack, killing all of them. Pete stopped, raised his arms. Surrendering.

  Bob kept going, looked back. ‘Fuckers,’ he breathed.

  Light beams flashed in Pete’s face.

  ‘Don’t stop. Run!’ Bob yelled.

  Pete thought that was a mistake. ‘No – don’t run. Get down,’ he called.

  But too late. A beam of a light landed on Bob’s back, and then the red dot of a laser.

  ‘Stop!’ a woman shouted. ‘I’ll shoot your friggin’ ass.’

  ‘Bob.’ Pete carefully dropped to the ground. ‘They’ve got us. Stop—’

  Abr
uptly, Bob stopped, hands in the air. He turned, greeting the several men approaching with raised weapons.

  ‘We got ’em,’ one of them reported into the radio. ‘We’re coming in.’

  ‘Great. See you in a minute.’

  ‘On the way.’

  With their rifles, the men indicated that Bob and Pete should turn around and head back where they’d come from. ‘Move,’ a man grunted.

  Pete watched Bob, wondered why he didn’t threaten to blow up these guys the way he’d threatened the ones in the shed. But Bob obeyed, silently marching toward the mound of stones.

  ‘What’s Josh going to do with them?’ one guy asked.

  The woman laughed. ‘You mean where will he hang their skin?’

  The others laughed too.

  ‘In the morning, these woods are going to be draped with hides,’ somebody else said.

  ‘First, he’s got to find out who sent them. How far the conspiracy’s gone. Josh’ll probably decide how to dispose of them depending on how they cooperate.’

  Pete’s mouth was dry. He felt dizzy, as if the ground were swaying. Were these people really talking about killing him and Bob? And, oh God – skinning them? Why had they come here? What did they care about the pipeline or the future of fossil fuels? And why had he let Bob steal those explosives? He thought of his mother. The girl in the snack bar. He didn’t want to die.

  The woman went ahead, led them around the mound of rocks to a steel door. Unlocked it. ‘Go on.’ She opened the door, gestured with her rifle.

  Bob nodded, took a breath and started toward the door, but he faked left and full out raced away, heading toward the fence.