by Sonja Stone
As a result, Nadia was almost relieved when, on the first Friday morning of February, she woke to find a survival course order had been slipped under their door, and her name was printed across the top.
This weekend is your first survival course. This is a solo mission lasting three nights and four days. You will be driven to an undisclosed location in the desert. Your mission: navigate back to campus by 2100 hours on the final day. You will be issued one water bottle, a wool blanket, a small ration of nuts, and a field knife (see Hashimoto Sensei to secure your weapon).
Nadia searched the floor for Libby’s notice. “Wait—why didn’t you get one?”
“I don’t know,” Libby said. “Let’s check with the boys. Maybe they’re going one at a time, too.”
Alan and Simon were already at the dojo when the girls arrived. Neither had received an order. After all the students had assembled themselves on the mat, Sensei entered the room.
“Those of you who have been called to the survival course, see me after morning exercise. Snap kicks. Hajime!”
A brutal hour later, Nadia waited in the lobby as her teammates left the dojo to begin the several-mile-long run around campus. After a few minutes, Sensei joined her.
“Why is no one else here?” Nadia asked.
“Dean Shepard has issued a change of plans,” Sensei said. “You will depart individually for your solo survival courses. Teams will be divided, and the courses will be staggered. You will leave on Saturday, a student from another team leaves on Sunday, and so on.”
“What? Why?” Nadia asked. “You never mentioned this to me.”
“Nadia-san, please forgive me. Dean Shepard likely did not realize she was required to secure your approval.”
Nadia’s face burned as she bowed her head. “I beg your pardon, Sensei. Of course she isn’t. But Noah’s team all went out together. Why did she suddenly make this drastic change? It’s reckless.”
“Reckless?” A hint of amusement pulled at Sensei’s mouth. “Last semester, when your team completed the solo survival courses at the same time, what was the physical distance between each of you?”
“We were about eleven miles apart.”
“And what do you suppose a teammate could do to assist you from eleven miles away?” Nadia didn’t answer, so he continued. “You successfully completed your solo without a safety net. As with most things in life, you had the illusion of safety, not actual safety. Do you understand?”
“Hai,” she said miserably.
“I remind you: fear is nothing more than a chemical response to stimuli. You cannot control external stimuli, but you can control your reaction. You will be no more vulnerable than you ever were.”
She stared at the polished floor. “I just don’t understand why she’s breaking up the teams.”
Sensei’s words, more measured than usual, came slowly. “I believe Dean Shepard is currently in negotiations with Secret Service.”
“This is because of Libby?” Nadia looked up. Sensei remained silent. “They don’t want her to go?” Still nothing. “Shepard is fighting with them, right? And to avoid the appearance of conceding, she’s decided to send us out one at a time.”
He lowered his chin slightly. “That is one possible theory.”
“But Libby hasn’t even been assigned her own detail yet,” Nadia argued. “Obviously, she’s not in any danger.”
“Campus is quite secure. But perhaps the service feels the far side of the wall is another matter.” He straightened. “Now, I will retrieve a knife from the weapons room. In case of emergency, you may use the knife to make a bow drill. As always, fire is permitted only under the most dire circumstances. We do not wish to inadvertently spark a wildfire. Do you remember the password to the covert-ops room? It is the same as last semester.”
“Hai, Sensei. Abunai,” she said. It was a Japanese word, a warning that meant danger.
“Excellent. Please retrieve your tracking device while I select a field knife.”
Nadia trudged back down the hall to the mat room, then took the north hallway to the covert-ops room. Sensei followed. Farther down the hall was the shooting range, with the secured weapons room tucked in back.
She entered his password to the covert-ops room, and the metal door clanged as the lock released. Inside, recessed wall panels concealed the equipment. Nadia pressed one of the wooden panels, and the door clicked open, revealing packed shelves. She’d chosen the wrong panel; this cupboard contained single-shot handguns and other covert weapons.
Her eyes fell on the row of poisoned pens: her lifesaver. In front of the pens, the jar of liquid latex that Sensei had painted on the back of her hand last semester during a lesson. After shaking hands, he’d peeled the film from her skin. A perfect impression of his thumbprint remained on the rubber sheet.
She smiled and lifted the print from the shelf.
“That is not the correct cabinet,” Sensei said.
Nadia quickly replaced the print and closed the door. She turned to her mentor, who pointed to the other side the small room.
A few minutes later, back in the lobby with her tracking device, Sensei handed her a lightweight nylon backpack, a wool blanket, a knife, a water bottle, and a bag of peanuts and raisins.
She held up the small bag of rations. “That’s it? For three days?”
“It takes three minutes to die of blood loss, three hours to die from exposure, three days to die of dehydration, and three weeks to starve to death. You will be hungry, but you will survive. I will see you in a few days.”
I certainly hope so. Her stomach knotted as she bowed.
* * *
—
Saturday morning, as the girls dressed for breakfast, their resident assistant, Casey, knocked on their bedroom door. In her arms she held a lush bouquet of pink and white blossoms—tulips, lilies, ranunculus, peonies. “These came for you,” she said to Libby.
“Oh my goodness, thank you! They’re probably from my daddy. He thinks every girl should get flowers ‘just because.’ ” Libby’s smile froze as she read the note attached to the flowers.
“Is something wrong?” Nadia asked.
“No ma’am, right as rain. Let me go freshen the water in this vase and we’ll head out. You need to calorie-load before your survival course. Who knows when you’ll get your next decent meal.”
* * *
—
Later that morning the white van carrying its single passenger rambled along a series of bumpy, dusty roads. Nadia closed her eyes and leaned against the headrest. After an eternity, her driver pulled along the shoulder.
“This is it,” he said. “See you in a few days.”
“Thanks for the ride.” She gathered her pack and climbed from the van.
Nadia felt uneasy from the moment she stepped onto the desert floor. Bad enough she’d been tossed out here alone, but to make matters worse, a strong and constant wind blew across the open land, kicking rough, hazy sand high into the air. The particulates shrouded the sun and blocked the horizon, severely diminishing visibility. In the vast wasteland of desert, limited vision was extremely unsettling. It was only two in the afternoon, but the darkness surrounding her made it feel much later. She hiked along the low base of a small mountain range, following the rocky ridge in lieu of the skyline.
The wind picked up, muffling the typical desert noises of quail calls, crunching gravel, dry leaves blowing across the earth. She lowered her head to protect her eyes from the sand and continued on.
A few hours later, fatigued and thirsty, Nadia reached a rapid, narrow stream. She filled her bottle and, seeking protection from the scratching wind, crouched beneath a desert willow. She rubbed her eyes, trying to clear the sand. Resting her head against the trunk, she surveyed the landscape. Still cloudy with the dust storm, and now the sun was setting. She was thinking about making camp when, forty feet away, a covey of quail flushed from the earth and shot into flight. They flew haphazardly out of formation.
; Chills covered her arms. The birds knew they were prey.
So where was the hunter?
She rose quietly from her spot and eased farther into the brush. She headed uphill, hoping for a better vantage point. When she reached an outcropping of rock halfway up the hill she paused, looking down onto the stream. The dust blew thick across the desert floor.
She wasn’t searching for a rattlesnake or a coyote. She was looking for something taller, more sinister, and much more deadly.
She was looking for Damon.
Two weeks after their initial meeting, Damon got the go-ahead from Roberts.
“My man inside tells me your target’s up in the rotation. Her survival course starts Saturday, so keep a sharp eye.”
For this reason Damon was parked along a dirt path halfway up Coyote Mountain with his binoculars trained on the only road leading away from Desert Mountain Academy. He’d been waiting for hours, and if Roberts had received bad intel, he’d come back next weekend, and the one after that.
Damon found himself curious about Roberts’ inside man. Had he missed someone last semester? Or was the inside man one of the newcomers to the Academy—maybe the new dean or political science professor? Whoever it was, he obviously didn’t have the strength or ingenuity to deliver Nadia to Agent Roberts. This worked out well for Damon; if he still served a purpose, his mom would—at least temporarily—be kept alive.
The wind picked up, and along with it the dust. Visibility lessened, and the crispness of the mountain range farthest from his position faded. After another twenty minutes, he couldn’t see the range at all.
At a little past 1100 hours, Damon’s patience paid off. The white van carrying his ex-teammate pulled into view. He loaded his gear back in the car and left the spotter’s nest.
Damon moved through the mountains using unpaved access roads. Occasionally he stopped to get a line of sight on the van, then continued his pursuit from a safe distance. This went on for a few hours before the van pulled over to release the first passenger. Damon zoomed in, expecting to see some random student, maybe his replacement.
Instead, he saw her.
Nadia jumped down from the running board and turned to grab her gear. She pulled a lightweight rucksack from the cabin and threw it over her shoulder. Damon tightened the range of the binoculars. The van pulled away, temporarily obstructing his view.
Not in a million years would Damon have guessed she’d be first out of the van. The driver would drop the next person off a few miles away, then the next, and so on. She used to want the safety of a teammate on either side. Good for her.
When Nadia reappeared, he held his breath.
She dropped her pack along the road and pulled the ponytail holder out of her hair. Her long, dark waves blew across her face. She turned into the wind, then gathered her hair together and twisted it into a loose bun. The wind picked up and blew her clothes against her body.
She’d stayed in shape over the holiday.
Damon watched until she was out of view, then packed up and waited for another hour. He drove toward the spot where she’d gotten out, pulling off the road into a stand of chaparral. It was a good location: the brush thick, the dust storm thicker.
He double-checked his bag: handcuffs, Glock, two cell phones, GPS, four bottles of water—one opened, a couple power bars, knife, duct tape. Damon locked the car, placed his keys on the front left wheel-well and arranged a military-grade desert-colored camo net over the car.
The wind and sand had already erased Nadia’s tracks. No matter, it wouldn’t be hard to figure out what went on in her head. He knew she had a lousy sense of direction—and she knew it, too, which meant she’d use a landmark. No way she’d stumble off into the desert when she couldn’t see the horizon. He followed the base of the low-lying hills.
In less than two hours, he caught sight of her through the haze. She wasn’t making great time, but still moved at a decent clip. She hiked for another hour before stopping to rest. Twice he had to slow down to let space grow between them.
As she bent to fill her water bottle, Damon crouched on the desert floor, well hidden by the low growing plants. He watched her stretch, her lean body lengthening toward the sky.
She sat under a tree. Her face was hidden, and Damon felt a strange ache. He wanted to see her eyes. He inched forward, straining his neck, and carelessly disturbed a covey of quail. They exploded into the air—straight up, left, right, feathers beating wildly as they flew. Damon’s legs shot out behind him as he hit the dirt, face down.
He held his breath. He didn’t dare look up. The flapping of wings receded across the sky, and still he remained flat on the ground.
No way she’d missed that.
Damon maintained his position. He checked his watch. 1715. He closed his eyes and breathed as gently as he could, desperately trying to keep the dust out of his mouth.
Mercifully, as he waited, the wind began to die. At 1800 hours Damon eased into a crouched position. He brushed himself off, then rose to resume the trail. It was dark now, and she’d be a whole lot harder to find.
The dust had ebbed, leaving instead a clear sky filled with glistening stars. He pressed through the chilled night air, walking slowly and quietly across the terrain. She wouldn’t have gone far.
Not this late.
An hour later he spotted movement. He ducked down and watched. Nadia spread her blanket out onto the ground. Before she lay down, she removed the knife clipped to her waistband and tucked it under a nearby bush. On the ground she rolled over once, pulled the blanket over her shoulders, sat up, tucked the bottom of the blanket toward her knees, lay back down, and continued rolling.
Priceless. Damon smiled. She dropped her weapon and then rolled herself into a burrito.
Four hours later Damon unsheathed his knife and prepared to make contact.
“Wake up.”
The whispered words pulled Nadia from sleep. A heaviness pressed against her chest, squeezed the air from her lungs. It must be a dream, but the sharpness of detail—the weight, the warmth—it felt too real. She tried to move but found her arms pinned at her sides.
“Wake up,” he said again, a little louder this time.
She opened her eyes. A body stretched across her own. She felt the cold metal of a knife blade against her throat. Moonlight shone on the shaved head leaning toward her. A breeze rustled the branches of the Palo Verde tree silhouetted against the sky.
Damon. He’d come to kill her.
“Did you miss me?”
Fear shot through her body. She opened her mouth to scream. Damon clamped his hand over her open lips, partially covering her nose, suffocating her. Panicked, Nadia thrashed under him.
“Knock it off,” he said, adjusting his hand.
She inhaled deeply, the chill of midnight burning her nostrils.
“I’m gonna move my hand,” he whispered. “You will not scream. Do you understand?”
She nodded under his weight. He moved his arm and she sat up, kicked off her blanket, desperately tried to free herself from her wool cocoon. She scrambled backward, feeling around for her knife.
“Please,” Damon said, holding up her knife. “Not my first rodeo.”
“What do you want?” In the darkness she scanned the ground, searching for anything to use as a weapon. Dead leaves and a few branches gathered at the foot of a sage bush to her left. Nadia lunged for a branch.
Just as quickly, Damon pounced, spreading his body over her. He pinned her down, his arm across her throat, his legs lead weights on hers. “Knock it off.”
She struggled under his weight. “It wasn’t my fault!”
“What wasn’t your fault?”
She tried to roll to the side, to push him off.
“Stop it,” he demanded through gritted teeth.
“Everything that happened to you. I didn’t turn you in. They already knew.”
Damon moved his head closer toward her. He looked at her mouth, then to her eyes. He whispered
, his breath hot against her lips. “And how does that help my current situation?”
“Please don’t kill me,” Nadia said.
Damon released his chokehold. His arms straightened as he lifted himself into a push-up position.
Nadia struck the inside of his right arm at the elbow, then rolled out from under him as he collapsed. She scrambled to her feet and raised her arms, one hand blocking her face, one across her stomach—Sensei’s fighting stance.
Damon sat up, brushed the dust from his legs, then rested his hands on his thighs. “Put your hands down. If I’d come to kill you, you’d already be dead.” He relaxed his posture.
After a minute or so, she lowered her hands. The cold began to seep through her clothes. She grabbed her blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders. “So what do you want? Just stopped by for old times’ sake?”
“I came to ask for your help.”
She laughed. “That’s how you ask for help? Holding a knife to my throat?” She shook her head. “Whatever you need, the answer is no.”
“Nadia, I’m desperate. And I only used the knife so you wouldn’t scream in my ear.”
“Damon, you’re a traitor. You tried to frame me for treason. There is no way I’m helping you with anything.”
“Just sit down and let me explain.” Still on his knees, he clasped his hands together, pleading.
She looked at the horizon, now blacker than the night sky, and remembered something Dean Wolfe told her last semester about Damon, how he’d given everything up to save her life. She sighed and sat down in the dirt. “I’ll listen, but I’m not going to help you.”
Damon reached into his bag and pulled out two bottles of water. He opened one and handed it to Nadia. “You want a power bar?”
She hesitated. Outside snacks were definitely not in keeping with the spirit of the survival course. She smiled as she realized the absurdity of that thought—consorting with known traitors was also probably frowned upon. “I’d love one. Peanut butter?”