“Avian!” West started shouting as we reached the edge of the tents. “Avian!”
We barreled into the clearing and ran straight for the medical tent. Avian burst out of his tent, stepping aside when he saw my load, and followed us in.
“A Hunter shot him with these electric rods,” I explained as I laid Graye’s still form on the table. “They hurt.”
Avian grabbed a piece of medical equipment and pressed it to Graye’s chest, listening to the other end. “He’s still breathing but his heart beat is erratic. How long where they in him?” Avian started compressions to Graye’s chest.
“Not more than fifteen seconds. I wasn’t far away,” I paced the small space of the tent, passing West as he stood in one corner, watching Graye as Avian worked on him.
“The Hunter?” Avian huffed as he worked on Graye. He stopped and listened to Graye’s chest again.
“I killed it,” I said through clenched teeth. “I don’t know if there are any more though.”
“You’ve got to get back out there,” Avian said as he ripped away the remains of Graye’s shirt, exposing the burned flesh underneath. “You’ve got to check.”
“Come on,” I said to West, stepping out of the tent. Gabriel and Bill came running up to us just as we exited.
“Is Graye with you?” Bill asked as he stopped before us. “I couldn’t find him.”
“A Hunter shot him,” I said, feeling anxiety, knowing we were wasting time. “Avian’s taking care of him. We’ve got to go check for more of them though.”
Bill nodded and the three of us ran back into the trees without another word to Gabriel or anyone else.
“How much ammo do you have?” I asked Bill as we jogged through the trees.
“Two mags and a pocketful,” Bill answered as his eyes scanned the trees.
“West?” I asked as I checked the chamber of my own hand gun, replacing the bullet I had used on the Hunter.
“Full mag,” he replied as he checked it. “Nothing extra though.”
“Here.” I shoved a handful of bullets into his hand, pulling them out of my pocket.
I pressed faster back to where I had found Graye and the Hunter, West and Bill quickly falling behind me. I smelled at the air. The scent of the Hunter I had killed wafted through the air, undetectable to anyone but me, I was sure. I quickly passed its body, following the path it had created through the grass and undergrowth.
I ran another half mile before I saw it.
I froze beneath a low tree, jumping behind it as it came into view. My ears searched for any hints of an attack. When I found none, I turned my eyes back to the mechanical beast before me.
I’d never seen a helicopter so close before. It looked like an oversized mechanical bug, its blades still and less threatening looking. It was hard to believe the machine could be so silent. It was a piece of raw, powerful destruction when it was flying.
But if there was a helicopter here, that meant there was more than one Hunter. They always flew in pairs.
By this point Bill and West had finally caught up to me, huffing as they came to my side.
“A chopper?” Bill said as he crouched at my side, a gun in one hand, his finger on the trigger. “Then there’s another one out there.”
We each scanned the trees, our senses strained and ready to spring.
“Stay close,” I said as I started west, heading in the opposite direction we had just come from. “If you can’t shoot it, run. Let me take care of it.”
They followed silently as we came to the other side of the helicopter. A clear trail led in the exact opposite direction the other had gone. They had split up to cover more ground. The Fallen didn’t bother to cover up their trails. They had nothing to be afraid of, no one to hide from.
We followed the trail for two miles, seeing no traces of the Hunter other than his footsteps.
“You think it doubled back?” Bill whispered, his gun still raised, finger on the trigger, the same as West and I.
“We would have seen it by now,” I said quietly in response. And just as soon as I said it the trail ended. The small patches of grass that had been smashed by its weight suddenly disappeared. I glanced up, my eyes searching.
“It went up,” I said, my eyes tracing the path it had taken through the trees. There wasn’t much to see. “It could be anywhere now.”
“Maybe we should split up,” West said, his breathing betraying his nerves.
“Bad idea,” I said quietly. “They can’t infect me. You wander on your own and what’s going to be your barrier?”
“I’d prefer it not have to be you,” he said quietly.
As I registered West’s words I also heard the snap come from behind us. “Get down!” I screamed as I whipped around, pushing both Bill and West to the ground. Half a second later the Hunter fired, the bullet grazing the side of my thigh. I stumbled, half falling on top of Bill.
I had just gotten back to my feet when it started sprinting towards us. Every muscle in my body flexed as I sprang and hurtled myself at the Hunter.
We crashed to the ground, a mere ten feet from Bill and West. I clung to its shoulder with one hand, beating at the back of its head with the butt of my gun with the other. With one hand, it reached back, grabbed me by the back of my neck, and slammed me to the ground.
My hands flung out, grabbing its ankle as it started toward the others, and dropped it to the ground. It turned its empty eyes on me, coiling its leg for a crushing kick to my face I barely managed to avoid. Two shots were suddenly fired, both barely missing the Hunter and myself.
Undeterred by my efforts, it turned its focus back to West and Bill.
“No!” I screamed as I leapt back up and jumped onto its back. “Get away from them!”
And then something I couldn’t explain happened. The Hunter froze, me still clinging to its frame, and then took two steps back. And then it stood there, staring out at nothing. Before it could do anything else, I scrambled off its back, drew my gun again and blasted a hole in the back of its head. It collapsed to the ground in a heap.
And then I buckled, caving in on my right leg. It didn’t hurt, but apparently it wasn’t going to hold my weight anymore.
West and Bill were instantly at my side. “How’d you do that?” Bill demanded. “It listened to you.”
“What are you talking about?” I huffed as they each grabbed one of my arms and helped me to my feet, supporting my weight for me.
“You told it to get away from us,” West filled in for Bill. “And then it stopped and backed away.”
Adrenaline was still pumping through my system, making everything seem like a blur in my head. “Why would it listen to me?”
“Maybe because you’re partly like them,” West said as we scrambled through the trees.
“Whatever just happened, let’s just get out of here,” Bill said as his eyes stared intently at the path we had just come down. “We’ve got to get you to Avian.”
FIFTEEN
I limped out of the medical tent, cursing under my breath.
There wasn’t much Avian could do for my leg. I had tried to tell Bill and West that. He had simply wrapped the wound and sent me out, turning his attention back to Graye. He was still unconscious and Avian was having to pound on his heart every so often to keep it beating normally.
“Eve,” West called as I headed in the direction of my tent. “Are you alright?”
“Leave me alone, West,” I said as I shook my head. I refused to look at him as I kept on my path.
“What?” he asked, his voice sounding taken aback. “What did I do?”
I just shook my head, my jaw clenching together. Something boiled under my skin. He’d better do as I said or he was going to be the victim of an explosion.