Ark

Chapter 10

Dry leaves crackled underfoot as Bones ran. Dark green foliage flashed by in his peripheral vision. Low hanging branches swatted him and undergrowth snatched at his ankles.

When you’re waiting in a doctor's office, five minutes takes freaking forever. When you're being hunted by a bunch of inbreeders, it flies by.

Strangely, Bones was not frightened. Perhaps it was due to the surreal nature of the situation in which he found himself. Of course, this was far from the first time his life had been in danger, and he'd always come out alive. Deep inside, he always assumed things would somehow turn out all right.

Now he kept his eyes peeled as he dashed through the woods, looking for something that could give him an advantage. He stopped to pick up a few fist-sized stones and stuff them into his pockets. He kept moving, and soon he found himself running along the base of a twenty-foot rock wall. This could be it.

He hastily spied out cracks and outcroppings that would serve as handholds, and clambered up. It wasn't an easy climb, but scaling rock walls was one of his specialties. Aside from Maddock, few could keep up with him on a free climb. Bones could scale a wall that others would consider impossible to climb. His pursuers would never look for him up here. In short order, he was at the top and hidden in a thicket of hemlock. He waited, all his senses alive and attuned to every sound, every motion in the forest.

He was rewarded in a matter of minutes. A bearded man in a John Deere cap came trotting along the base of the cliff. It was one of those who had arrived last. Bones did not know his name and didn’t care. As the man passed below him, Bones rose up and flung one of the stones he had picked up as hard as he could down onto the passer-by.

The missile struck the man on the crown of his head, and with a surprised grunt, he crumpled to the ground. After looking around for other hunters and seeing none, Bones climbed back down to where the man lay. He rolled the fellow over onto his back and removed his cap to reveal a split scalp and a deep indentation that indicated a fractured skull. The wound was probably fatal, but Bones couldn't take the chance that the man would come after him. After all, this guy had been hunting him like an animal and would have shot him for the sheer pleasure of it if he’d gotten the chance.

Bones growled at the memory of the men taunting him, laughing as they sent him running into the woods. He dragged the dying man off the trail and bound him to a tree with his own belt. The man would probably die there very soon, but Bones didn’t care. These were no longer human beings to him. They were targets to be eliminated.

One down.

The man up ahead of Maddock was making far too much noise, carelessly crushing dry leaves and twigs underfoot. Either he was a complete idiot or he didn't suspect danger lurked anywhere nearby. Probably a bit of both.

With so many threats out there, Maddock needed to dispatch the hunter in front of him as quietly as possible. He didn’t want to use the rifle unless there was no alternative. Even if the other hunters heard the shot and believed it was one of their own firing at Bones, it would still draw them toward the sound and they would be wary.

Careful to remain silent, Maddock slid the rifle beneath a thick mountain laurel and placed the ammunition belt atop it. He tucked the dive bag holding the stone inside his suit, drew his knife and Bevel’s pistol, and silently crept up on the unsuspecting hunter. Much more cautious than the lummox he stalked, he moved with catlike grace, choosing his footfalls with care. He was keenly aware of the danger he was in as he closed the distance between them. There was no cover along the last intervening twenty paces. If the man heard or sensed his approach, well, Maddock would probably get him first with the .22, but unless he managed a head shot, the fellow just might manage to put a round or two into Maddock with his Remington. Furthermore, the gunfire would be a call to the other hunters. Finally, a voice inside Maddock's head pointed out that he had never fired this particular pistol, so he had no idea of its accuracy or firing tendencies. He shut the voice up, since the point was now moot. He’d make it work.

Fifteen feet…

Ten feet…

Five feet…

The man finally realized someone was coming and whirled around. He was too late to bring his rifle to bear, but the barrel smashed into Maddock's left hand, knocking the .22 free. Maddock lashed out with his knife, catching the man across the throat, but it was a shallow slice, barely worse than a cut from shaving. His opponent instinctively drew back, but before Maddock could stab him in the gut, the man struck at Maddock with the butt of his rifle. Maddock took the blow on the back of his left shoulder, turning with it. He spun, brought the knife around in a wide arc, and drove it backhanded into the man's neck just above his right shoulder. The man roared in pain and panic.

In his death throes, he pulled the trigger, firing wildly into the air. Maddock silenced him with a hard left to the temple that sent him crumpling to the ground. The neck wound was a death sentence, but Maddock didn't want the others to hear any more sounds from the dying man.

Too late.

Feet crashed through the undergrowth. Gunfire rang out and a bullet flew past his head and clipped a bough from the pine tree behind him. At least one of the others had been much closer than he expected! He took off back the way he had come, weaving between any bits of cover he could find. A moving target was difficult to hit. A moving target behind cover was even more so.

“He got Jason!” The cry was punctuated with another shot that barely missed. He dodged to his right into a dense stand of pines. Limbs struck his face and pine cones pierced his bare feet as he ran. In the stillness of the forest he could hear the men’s voices as plain as day.

“How do you think he got behind us, Pa?”

“He's an Indian. I suppose they have some tricks up his sleeve. I told you he would be a tough one. We’ll just have to be extra careful.”

“Bevel will get him if he heads back to the clearing. I’m going to go after him!”

Maddock spotted a low-growing patch of rhododendron and dove beneath it. He wormed his way in as far as he could go and waited. The footsteps came closer and two sets of booted feet trotted past his hiding place. They would figure out soon enough that Bevel wouldn't be getting anyone ever again. He gave them time to get out of earshot and then headed back toward the place where he'd hidden the rifle. He had not made it far when he heard more voices.

“He's dead,” said a calm, confident voice.

“Who do you think done it, Carter? Was it the Indian?”

“Obviously, unless you think someone else is out here. But why didn’t he take Jason’s rifle when he killed him? It's strange. And whose pistol is this?”

Maddock crept silently away. Now he had two men on either side of him, and only his knife for a weapon. On a positive note, he could now account for the locations of six of the seven men, two of them were permanently accounted for. Even better, it seemed that none of them had gotten Bones. At least, not yet.

He moved into deeper cover among the trees that lined the sloping valley wall. When he was far enough away to feel safe stopping for a few moments, he took time to rub dirt on his face, and did his best to blacken his dive suit with more of the rich, dark earth before moving on. He soon came to a spot where time and weather had eroded a deep, winding channel up the side of the mountain. It would likely provide an easy passageway to the top, but he hesitated, fearing he might stumble upon the seventh hunter coming around a blind curve. Instead, he chose a more difficult route up the slope, keeping in sight of the channel, but remaining behind cover as much as he could.

The sound of the waterfall grew louder as he climbed and he emerged on a ledge overlooking the lake and valley below. The two men who had shot at him were standing alongside the vehicles. The older of the two was speaking, waving his hands and emphasizing his points by poking the younger man in the chest. If either were to look this way, they would spot Maddock in an instant. That gave him an idea. But how best to put it into effect?