by Nick Thacker
The skull, its eyeless sockets boring into Eliza's eyes as she walked closer to it, was sitting right next to the tree. The lower half of the skeleton's body was covered up by a drift of snow and leaves as if the forest had pulled a blanket over the body and tucked it in to keep it warm.
“Hard to tell how old it is,” Ben said. “You can see some bits of flesh, where the animals haven’t picked it clean yet.”
“Still, it has to be much older than the others, right?”
“I would have to guess three to four weeks? But it could be a week or two or a month or two. Really hard to tell.”
"Let's see if there's anything else around," Eliza said, thinking of the piece of clothing she had found and the identification badge Ben had found on the other body. She pulled out her camera and began fastening the flash attachment. The pictures wouldn't be perfect, but they would be helpful.
If there was anything of use here, she wanted to find it. All of these men or women that had died would be useful assets in her case against EKG. There was a minuscule chance these deaths were unrelated to the company, but she was willing to put a lot of money on the idea that they were directly related. The Grayson man, especially, had EKG’s fingerprints all over it: somebody at the company had hired that man to do some work out here, and for whatever reason, he had been killed for it.
"Not seeing anything right away," Ben said as she began snapping pictures. "But that doesn't mean there isn't something hidden under the snow. His clothes should be around here somewhere, you would think," Ben said. "Maybe under the snow or something."
Eliza began digging around in the leaves with the toe of her boot, but there was something else nagging at her, pulling her focus away from the dirt in front of her. She let her mind direct her attention back toward the skeleton, letting the image of it flicker around in her head until her attention was pulled toward the bones of its arms.
"Look at the arms, Ben," she said. "They've moved around and shifted, especially after the animals worked on them, but don't you think there — "
“They look like the others,” Ben said. “They’re pointing, making a line diagonally.”
That’s what Eliza had noticed as well: the bones of the arms and hands didn’t form a perfect line, but they seemed as though they had been dropped onto the ground diagonally, half of them on one side of the body and half on the other. It reminded her of the other bodies, as if the people had died sprawled out on their backs.
“What do you think it means?”
She had some ideas, but it all seemed too unbelievable — too crazy — for her to voice them aloud. If Ben were thinking the same thing, she wanted to hear it from him first.
Ben looked at her, then back at the bones, then back at her. Finally, his mouth opened to speak. “Eliza, I don’t know how it’s possible, but it sure seems like this is telling us where to go.”
She nodded, very slowly. It was uncanny. She had never seen or heard of anything like this before, so she had no idea how to make it all make sense. But she had to admit that what Ben said was true. It was what she had noticed as well, when they’d found the third body in the cave.
Whatever was happening here — whoever or whatever was killing these people — seemed to be doing it in a methodical, purposeful way. And they weren’t just killing them, either. They were staging the bodies in such a way that whoever stumbled upon them afterward would notice a pattern, would see the arms pointing them along the path.
He thought back to the other bodies that they had seen. Besides the one that Clive had found, she had seen with her own eyes that the bodies all had similar diagonally staged pairs of arms. And she tried to position herself in the cave and in the woods in front of each body, trying to remember where they had pointed.
It took a bit of calculating, but she was able to place the image of the skeletons on the ground and then trace a line from each one.
She looked up at Ben. He was looking back at her, and she saw on his face that he believed it, as well.
These bodies hadn’t just been murdered. They had been placed here and set up as signposts.
They were urging them along, pointing them directly toward some destination.
And Ben and Eliza had been following that same line.
44
Ben
Ben was about to respond to Eliza when he heard a rustling in the distance. He immediately dropped to the ground, resting on one knee as he raised his rifle up and examined the forest around him.
Eliza groaned in pain as she stressed her right leg, but she eventually sat on the forest floor next to Ben. “What happened?” she asked. “Did you hear something?”
“I think so,” Ben said. He didn’t want to speak too loudly, for fear that it was the same hunter who had been behind them. “It came from over there.” He pointed that direction with his trigger hand, keeping the rifle aimed that way as well.
They waited there for a full minute, and then Ben saw movement again. This time he was looking directly at the noise when it happened. Another rustling sound, and then the unmistakable look of a man, striding through the trees, perpendicular to their position.
“I see it,” Eliza whispered. “It’s… it’s the hunter.”
"It has to be," Ben said. "But, hold on —" he looked through his scope and focused the center of his sights on the man who was roaming through the woods, moving north. "I don't think he's alone," Ben whispered. "I think there is another — wait, two more guys — behind him."
Eliza looked for a moment and then nodded. “I see them,” she said. “What do we do?”
Ben thought through the possibilities. What he wanted to do — what he probably should do — was fire a few shots and try to take one of them down. Whoever these men were, they were almost without a doubt the men who had killed Clive. They were the ones who had been hunting them, and they had nearly won.
But he couldn't be sure. There was still a small trickle of doubt in his mind about who these men were. One of them could be the man who had punched him outside the bar, and while he certainly wanted to get him back for his shenanigans, Ben didn't think he deserved a bullet to the head.
Besides that, Ben couldn’t see any recognizable characteristics about any of the men; they were too far away and moving farther diagonally. They hadn’t seen Ben and Eliza, so Ben needed to make a decision: do they chase after them, or do they stay here and stay out of the way?
“Are we going to shoot at them?” Eliza asked.
“You are definitely not going to shoot at them,” Ben said with a half-grin on his face. “If these are the guys who killed Clive, we are going to get some answers first, before we get our revenge. Life can’t die for nothing, so we can’t go shooting wild shots in their direction, telling them exactly where we are.”
“But they’re getting away,” Eliza said.
“Don’t worry,” Ben said in reply. “They are looking for us, remember? No matter what we do, no matter where we go, as long as we are on this ridge with them, they are going to bump into us again. It’s just not that big of an area.”
"Okay," Eliza said. "But, I want to kill the bastard who killed Clive."
"I know how you feel," Ben said. "Trust me, though, the best thing we can do for ourselves right now is stay low and stay out of the way. I'm pretty sure we are within a few hundred yards of EKG, or at least where we thought it was. Let's see if we can find it, and find a way to get inside. Worst case, if we stir up some shit inside the headquarters, then we won't have to deal with these guys out here."
Eliza nodded, but Ben kept his eyes forward, watching the legs of the men as they marched on. They were getting farther away and keeping their trajectory. When the last in line had disappeared from view, Ben waited until the sounds of his crunching boots over the snow and sticks died away.
Well, he thought, they certainly aren’t trying to be quiet about it.
"It's strange," he said. "If they were hunting us — if they were looking for us, I mean — th
ey're not being very subtle about it. They didn't even seem to be fully aware; it's like they were just walking through the woods."
“But we know one of them shot Clive,” Eliza said.
“We do know that,” Ben said, “but we aren’t sure that they’re hunting for us. There still is something out here that’s bigger than all of this, something that EKG most likely wants to keep quiet, if they had anything to do with it.”
“So you think they’re hunting for this gorilla thing?”
Ben nodded. “That guy that roughed me up back at the bar told me they were going to be hunting out here. He told me not to be anywhere near this area, or else. As Clive said, there isn't any big game out here, especially not stuff as terrifying as what killed those men and spooked Clive. They're out here because they are looking for whatever that thing is, not because of us. The fact that we’re continuing to cross paths means we’re on the right track, and that they’re getting pissed about it.”
“I see,” Eliza said. “But I don’t like it.”
Ben waited another moment to make sure the men didn't circle back around their direction; then he stood up. "Okay," he said. "Let's get moving."
As he spoke, he looked over Eliza's head. Through the trees and away in the distance, he thought he saw a human-made structure. All he could make out was a section of what looked like a roof, the right angle of its bottom half looking strange against the curves and natural bends of the forest.
“Are they back?” Eliza asked as she stood up and stretched her leg.
“No, it’s something else. I think I see a building.” He pointed and let her look for a moment before taking a few steps toward the edge of the forest.
“Let’s get a little farther and see what it is. The edge of the woods will let us know if we are on the right track. There’s an open field about a hundred yards across, so we’ll have to be careful we don’t run into those men again. They’re heading slightly farther north than we are, so we might be able to get across before they reach the edge of the clearing.”
Eliza nodded and hobbled along next to Ben, who was still holding his assault rifle forward.
They reached the edge of the clearing in five minutes and Ben stopped by a large bush and looked through his scope. “Yep,” he said. “It’s a building. Two stories, like an office or small manufacturing headquarters. And there’s a fence around it.”
“Looks like the fence goes all the way around the property,” Eliza said. “It’s razor wire as well, so we definitely aren’t going over it.”
"Clive was prepared for that," Ben said. "When I was going through his stuff yesterday, I found the pair of wire clippers I told him to bring along when I was talking to him and his father at their shop. As long as that fence isn't electrified — and I can't imagine the energy cost it would take to do that, or that they would bother with it — we should be able to cut our way through pretty quickly."
“But it’s still out in the open,” Eliza said. “We’re going to need to hurry.”
Ben thought for a moment, then turned to look at Eliza. “Best case, it’s going to take me five minutes to get across the field walking quickly, and then another 20 minutes to chop a hole in the fence.”
“What are you saying?”
"Well, it's not my favorite choice, but I think it'll be safer splitting up for just a minute. You can cover me while I get across the field and start working on the fence, and then once I'm through, I can set up and offer you cover while you run across."
“You mean hobble across slowly like an injured antelope waiting to be eaten?”
“Hey, your words, not mine.” Ben smiled at her. It wasn’t ideal, but having injured her knee wasn’t ideal, either.
“Okay,” she said. “I can do that. As long as you think I’m good enough to offer cover fire for you.”
At that he laughed. “No, I know for a fact you’re not good enough to lay down proper cover fire for me. But I’m hoping that whatever you’re shooting at will be in a completely different direction than me, and it should be enough to at least hold them back for a minute or two.”
She didn’t look convinced.
“Besides,” he said, “I’ll still have my weapon with me, and Clive’s extra ammo. If you start shooting, I’ll know to drop everything and start taking shots as well.”
She nodded and checked her rifle. She turned off the safety and set down her crutch, leaning it against a tree. Ben watched her work, and when he was satisfied, he checked his own weapon and gear and retrieved the wire cutters from his pack, placing them in his front pocket. He looked around to the left and right, examining the meadow for any sign of human intervention.
He then stepped into the open field.
45
Ben
Ben jogged across the field, opting for speed over stealth. He’d rather make himself a harder target to hit than try not to be a target in the first place. He made it across the hundred-yard expanse in less than a minute, far shorter than he had anticipated. The distance had been deceiving, and he was now at the razor wire-topped fence.
There was nothing about the fence that told him there would be a current running through it. He had a brief flash in his mind of the scene in Jurassic Park when Dr. Grant approaches an electric fence and isn't sure how to test it, so he throws a stick at it. Ben knew that the scene hadn't been written to describe an effective way to check for voltage, so finding a stick would provide no more information to him than it had for Dr. Grant. So he took a breath…
…And then he touched the fence.
Nothing happened.
Relieved, he immediately started to work putting a hole in the fence. He hadn’t seen any overt surveillance cameras on the shed just beyond the fence, or anywhere else on the fence posts, but that didn’t mean there weren’t any. Still, there was no need for being discreet — he didn’t want to have to strain to get through the fence, so he made the hole large enough to walk through at a crouch.
He was halfway around the top arch of the hole in the fence, clipping the wires in front of him at chest level when he heard Eliza scream.
“Ben!”
He whirled around, dropping the wire cutters as he fumbled for the rifle he had set against the fence to his left. His pack, forgetting it was still on, swung around and smacked into the chain-link, which pulled him off-balance. He adjusted quickly, then dropped to a knee to make him a smaller target while grabbing his rifle.
By the time he had the rifle up and over his right eye, Eliza screamed again.
He saw her, running as fast as she could. Directly toward him.
She wasn’t moving quickly, and he could tell she was in a lot of pain as she stumbled through the meadow. What are you doing? Ben thought. Why are you running toward —
Then he saw it.
At first it was just a blur. Just a streak of white and dark gray.
Then it disappeared back into the woods, and Ben lost sight of it for a moment until it swung around a tree trunk and then back out into the meadow.
Ben’s jaw dropped. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
As Eliza was working her way toward him, the largest gorilla he had ever seen was working its way toward her.
It was still fifty yards off of her right side, but it was clearly aiming for Eliza.
“Eliza!” he shouted. “Get down!”
Either Eliza couldn't hear him, or she ignored the order. He wanted to get a shot off, and the longer he waited the closer the gorilla would get to Eliza. At this distance, he knew he was mildly accurate, but there was no way in hell he was going to accept the risk of shooting Eliza as well. With the rifle's rounds, any shot from any distance would be devastating and likely lethal to a human.
Guess it’s one-on-one, then.
He stood up, preparing to run toward the animal and Eliza. He threw his rifle over his shoulder, his eyes directed toward the scene unfolding in the middle of the meadow. Then, out of the corner of his vision, he noticed more movement.<
br />
This time it was from his right side, from the north.
Three men.
All staring at Ben.
What the hell is happening?
He wasn’t ready for this — they hadn’t been prepared for this. Both attacking parties — the animal and the men — had caught them both off-guard, at the same time. Dammit, Ben said to himself.
The men were all armed, and all were pointing their weapons directly at him. He wasn’t going to last long in a firefight out here, three to one, with no protection. He had seen enough westerns and he didn’t have a horse to hide behind.
That meant his decision had been made for him. He needed to get closer to Eliza to give her a fighting chance. Hopefully, the men would not be able to hit him as he ran, but they were certainly within range of getting close to him.
He ran anyway, aiming directly for Eliza, not bothering to run in a serpentine way to throw off the men's aim. He was halfway to Eliza in ten seconds; in three more, he had almost completely closed the distance.
He wasn’t going to make it. The gorilla, a massive, muscular specimen of silverback gorilla, was bearing down on Eliza.
And then it stopped. For just a moment, the massive male gorilla sat back on its haunches and stared at Ben. Ben made eye contact with it, breathing heavily, wondering if he could get his rifle unslung and aimed before the gorilla moved in to attack.
He knew he couldn't — that if the gorilla wanted to, it could be on Eliza and him in an instant — before Ben could even lift a finger.
And that still left the men to his right.
He heard a popping sound — the men were now firing. He ducked but kept his eyes on the gorilla. The gorilla seemed utterly unfazed by the men's fire as he examined Ben.