“Who gives a fuck - I still have my leg.”
I wiped the area again and put a light bandage over the top just to be on the safe side, then let her pull her pants back up.
“It's a bit like our shelter,” she said, looking around at the coarse brickwork.
“A bit,” I replied. “I'm going out to lay some snares. I'll be back in a short while."
“Okay. Be safe.”
I smiled and got my wire from the pack whilst she began gathering snow to boil in the two pans. I didn't suggest going to the stream - already I was thinking in terms of risk to her, shielding her and I could see from her expression she wanted to do the same for me. How'd we become so close so soon? I couldn't understand it but deep down I knew it didn't matter. I loved her and we'd come close to never finding that out.
It took me about an hour to lay all the traps I could, following the faint spoor left in the layer of quickly falling snow that threatened to hide them from me. I set them a little higher than I would have done normally and I hoped that by morning we'd have a couple of kills rather than losing my snare wire to snowfall. When I returned to the shed, Riley had two cups of hot water waiting and half an MRE each.
“Beef stew,” she said, passing me a plate. “It tastes divine.”
“That's because we're hungry. Any other day of the week and it'd taste foul.”
“I'm tempted to try and bag us a deer. Did you see anything out there?” she said.
“There were some droppings that way,” I replied, indicating with my spoon. “We've only got the two rounds though.”
“Yeah, that's enough for me,” she replied, winking.
I finished my food and together we went back out into the cold, leaving the fire roaring to guide us back later on. Riley had the rifle in her hands and I carried my knife and pack, walking quickly to the place I'd seen the droppings, then slowing to almost a crawl as we began to search the woods for our next kill.
It didn't take long. We were prowling in the ever falling snow, heading a little to the east and following a single print that had survived the last flurry. The snow was reflecting the fading embers of the evening sun into our eyes and I could feel the strain of squinting taking its toll. Riley, somehow managing to wear her sunglasses, moved off to my left as I indicated a clearing near to the waters edge. From where we were I could hear the fast running stream and the sound of something cracking the thin layer of ice on its surface. I pointed in its direction and Riley raised her rifle, moving slowly and effortlessly across the snow.
The deer were drinking in the waning light, lapping at the cold water and they failed to notice Riley move into position. Just as she let out the breath she was holding, there was a sound to my right and I turned my head in time to see something emerging from the trees. It was shuffling on all fours - a great shambling shape that was heading straight for the stream.
I couldn't warn Riley for fear of alarming the thing but I saw that her head had turned from the rifle scope and was staring at the enormous form of the brown bear that came walking into the clearing, ambling its way across the snow to start drinking at the waters edge. The only reaction the deer had to the great furry stranger was a shuffling away from the stream to drink a little further up.
It was the most terrifying and fascinating moment I'd had out in the wilds and it looked like Riley was thinking the same thing as she settled on her haunches and watched the giant beast wade peacefully into the stream. There was a broad smile on her face.
Soon the bear had moved further down the stream and was lost to us but the image remained in my head all the way back to our shelter.
“Wow,” was all Riley could say as she sat down on the tarp, standing the unused rifle against the wall.
“What a creature!” I replied, adding more wood to the fire. “He cost us our tea though.”
“I couldn't shoot him, he was too beautiful and peaceful. Did you see how he moved? Do you think he saw us?”
“I think he knew we were there but the chances of him ever meeting a human before now, let alone a hostile one are pretty slim. He wouldn't have seen us as a threat.”
“Fucking awesome,” said Riley. “At least we know there are deer there if your snares don't work out.”
“Let's just hope they do or we'll be hungry in the morning.”
Thankfully we weren't and the snares had caught two meaty looking rabbits for us to cook over the fire before we set off. It was easier to eat as much as we could rather than try and keep some for later. I was confident that we'd be able to hunt for more and at worst we only had five days or possibly even less to walk before we reached the bunker. I tried not to think about what was going to happen after that.
We left the park and resumed the trail that led us further south. It was easier going and Riley was able to walk a little bit faster, though I warned her not to risk tearing open the wound again now that the stitches were gone.
"We're so fragile," she said. "If you think about it. It's amazing we've lasted this long."
"You must have seen some wounds in your time."
"Kind of. You always saw a bullet wound or a laceration but thankfully the serious stuff never seemed to happen around me."
"You don't think bullet wounds are serious?" I asked.
"Hey, when you're in the Army you see that many it just becomes the norm. You're like 'hey, you've been shot, big deal'. If it doesn't kill you it just becomes an excuse for everyone to make fun of you."
"Have you ever been shot?"
"Duh - yeah! Here, take a look." She rolled up her sleeve and proudly displayed a jagged circular scar in her right forearm. "Bullet passed straight through the muscle and out the other side. Took a while to heal but the guys never let me forget it. Thankfully it was only a small calibre round or I could've lost my arm. In my unit we had two guys who'd taken a bullet in the ass and one who'd been shot right through his balls. He was fucking lucky - the round went through the sack and out the other side when he was crouching behind cover. Boy did that guy suffer when he came back to active service. What about you? I don't suppose you get shot much out here on your own."
"You'd be surprised," I said. I rolled back my own sleeve and showed her the mess a dog had made of my forearm.
"Holy shit!' she said, running her fingers over the hard, lumpy scar tissue. "What the fuck did that?"
"We were tracking someone through Leeds city centre when we were ambushed by a pack. We made it to the top of a flight of stairs in some office block that was ready to collapse, but before we could shut a door behind us one of them burst through and clamped itself to my arm."
"I bet you were shitting your pants," said Riley.
"I was more concerned about what I'd catch from its bite. Dad clubbed it to death but by then it'd taken a lump out of me. He patched me up as best he could and as soon as we got back he radio'd in a US medic to take a look. If it hadn't been for that we probably wouldn't be having this conversation."
"Fuck."
"It was first time I'd actually seen my Dad worry. When he saw my arm I could tell he was as scared as I was - maybe even more so. Normally nothing could upset him, he always had a positive outlook no matter how bad things got."
"He was scared for you. Scared he'd lose you."
"Yeah, but it was also the fact that he wasn't in control. He couldn't decide the outcome. You see, it was one of the most important things in his life - being in control."
"What, like a dictator or something?"
"No, not in a bad way. He always had a word - autonomy - that he would hammer home to the soldiers he was teaching, and to me when I was growing up. He was proud of the fact that he didn't have to rely on other people, that he was his own man. Does that make sense?"
"Yeah, it does. I feel the same way. It's easy to get carried along by other people, to just follow the crowd and depend on others to bail you out. I always wanted to be Captain of my own ship," she said.
"You'd have liked my Dad then. I think
that when the dog tried to have me for lunch he had to come face to face with a situation that was new to him - one that he wasn't in control of. He knew at that point that he couldn't fix me. He couldn't stop this kind of infection with his own skills. Now he had to rely on someone else and I think it shook him to the core."
"He probably realised that he couldn't always save you, either. That one day he wouldn't be there to protect you, his baby boy."
"Yeah," I said, feeling the weight of that. "You're right there. That's exactly what he said to me when he was dying."
We walked through small villages without much incident and we stopped by a gaping hole in the ground where a sewer system had caved in on itself. It looked like a giant tear in the road and ran for half a mile, west to east, but thankfully I'd led us to its eastern edge so we could cross it safely.
“There are loads of these around,” I said, pointing down into the chasm. “That's why I hate driving. I have nightmares about speeding head-long into one of them.”
“I can see why,” said Riley taking a long pull from her water bottle.
“We'll break off to the right soon and go across the motorway. It's quicker than going through the town and safer too.”
“Then what?”
“More fields, more villages and then the bunker. Another few days yet.”
“I didn't realise how hard this would be,” she said. “I thought it'd be a physical thing - like running a race or something. But it isn't, is it? It's all about your mind and keeping yourself from wanting to quit. The body doesn't really speak as loud as my bored fucking brain.”
“Yeah, I tried to teach my classes that. The only way they'd learn was to get out there and do a three or four day walking trip. Then it got to them. Their exercise didn't train them for it in that way.”
“I can believe it.”
I was in that zone myself at that point - wanting to quit and take her home. I thought it might have passed by now but it hadn't. Every time I looked at her I felt like turning and heading back - back to a warm bed and a roaring fire in the hearth. To nights curled up with a glass of wine on the settee or whatever couples did when they lived alone in the woods. I didn't really know what that looked like yet but it had to be better than risking our lives to find two people who were more than likely dead now. But that was where years out in the wilds paid off. I was able to turn it down, to force those whispers into the back of my mind and focus on finding the people that had families back home, that had people who cared about them, and their only chance of knowing anything rested on our shoulders.
Riley gazed across the landscape and sighed. Then she looked at me and tried to smile but it was forced.
“Let's keep going,” I said. “Then we can curl up by a fire and sleep.”
“It's fucking tough, Miller,” she said, shouldering the rifle. “Tougher than Ranger training, maybe tougher than anything I’ve known.”
“It's not finished yet,” I replied.
“Yeah, ain't that the truth. Then we have to walk back. Great.”
I set off and held my hand out for her. She caught up and took it, pulling me close to her side so she could lay her head on my shoulder for a moment.
“We can do it,” she said in that lilting accent. “Then we can go home.”
“Got it in one,” I said.
We pushed on through the next few difficult days. I could remember times I'd been out in the wilds for a few weeks but now that I'd got a reason to go home, now that there was something more than just hunting trespassing kids, each day got harder and harder to cope with. I don't think it helped that we both believed our mission was a waste of time now, that being attacked earlier by people we'd thought were on our side had now taken the stuffing out of us and we lapsed into long periods of silence as the last few miles went by under our boots.
11.
It was only when we began to hear the far off sounds of machinery and the glow of artificial lighting in the evening haze that we felt the urgency to find out what had become of Alex and Saska once more.
“How far are we from the entrance?” asked Riley.
“A mile, maybe two. Half an hours walk that way,” I said, pointing towards a hill in the distance beyond the forgotten skeleton of a farm house. “I think it's there - from the best understanding of Dad's notes I can muster.”
“Well it looks like the sound is coming from half a click east and that's where the lights are too. We should find somewhere to lay up and use the night to our advantage, maybe investigate after dark.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I said. “I've got us here but now it's your turn. This is your field.”
“I thought you'd say that. The thing is...”
“What?” I asked.
“It's been bothering me since that patrol was sent out to make sure I was dead.”
“What has?”
“They sent kids. And they sent them days after the event.”
“I thought it was odd too but what conclusions did you come to?”
“I have a couple and I don't like either.” I indicated the farmhouse and we began walking towards it. “It wasn't just unusual - it was downright fucking sloppy. They sent nobodies to track me down in case I'd survived, days after the fact. Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Which tells me that Corban, or someone, expected me to have lived and sent kids to be captured and interrogated in order to throw us off the scent, to give us false information.”
“Possibly,” I said.
“And by killing them and making it look like an accident, they'd know I was alive and had gotten the message.”
“So the helicopter pilot would have taken the information back. I'm with you so far. How does this change things?”
“I don't know. I was taught to plan for what my enemy could do, not what he might do so I don't want to entertain too many theories. NSU?”
“Why, though? Piotr told us that the NSU were aware of what was going on and had only sent him. Why the elaborate lie?”
“You trusted him?” she said and there was no hint of suspicion - it was more a method of checking we were both on the same page.
“Yeah, I did. He'd no reason to lie,” I said.
The farmhouse looked worse up close and I opened the gate that led to a long, gravel path running to the front door. We followed it, wincing at the noise the stuff was making.
“Any theories then?” she asked, stepping inside.
“Only the simplest one,” I said. “Corban's in charge and he sent a few worthless troops to satisfy his own curiosity after a few days of worrying. When the report got back to him that they'd died he probably dismissed it, but deep down thinks we're still on our way here and will have increased his security.”
“Okay, then what?”
“Then he'll continue to use that machine to drill down into the bunker because he can't get through the doors. He's kicking himself thinking that killing us was a big mistake because the only reason he's here is us.”
Riley was smiling and shaking her head. “You've been thinking about this from the start, haven't you?”
“Yup. Here's what happened - Corban watched to see which direction we took after you came to my house. When we went to the first bunker he wasn't interested - he knew it wasn't that one.”
“Why?”
“Because it was the site of one of his other failed experiments - one they'd sealed shut killing everyone inside. They were his drones we saw and they were the ones monitoring us all the time, just at a distance. It was only when we started moving in this direction that he attacked us - why? Because he got here before us and when he discovered it was the correct bunker, he gave the order to have a drone wipe us out.”
“I'm happy with that so far,” she said. “But what makes them think it's this one and how are you sure it's a drill we can hear?”
“It's the only machinery it could be. And I'm sure that the moment they arrived and entered their own codes in they would have realis
ed the system had locked them out and the codes had been changed in the last six months.”
“Alex and Saska."
"Or our mysterious third party."
The farmhouse stank of mould and dust and the windows that'd survived all this time were thick with green filth. Most of the furniture had rotted into fragments but there was a steel bed frame in one room with the springs in tact and a metal chair.
“Cosy,” she said, sitting down. “It'll do though. None of it's been disturbed until now. We just need to be careful about snow prints.”
“I think the rain might take care of that for us.”
“Rain?”
“The sky looks like it's gone a few rounds and tapped out. That's rain if ever I saw it.”
“Nicely timed,” said Riley. “When?”
“In the next hour or so,” I replied.
“I'm heading out tonight then. The rain'll be a perfect cover for me. I might even be able to get some supplies if I see any. God knows we could do with some.”
“What's your plan?” I asked.
“To confirm or deny your theory,” she said, laughing. “If you're right then Corban is operating outside US control - he's gone rogue. That means those guys are there because he chose them and they might not even be soldiers.”
“That's a good point. How will you know?” I said.
“I'll know. I’ve worked with enough mercenaries in my time to recognise one. I suspect he's dressed them up in uniform to put off any NSU attention but there'll be signs.”
“Like spoor,” I said.
“Exactly like spoor,” she replied. “Guess it's my turn to hunt then?”
“It'd look like it.”
We waited until nightfall before going down the side of the hill away from the farmhouse. We found a secluded spot and sat in the damp grass listening for any patrols. The rain had started earlier than I'd guessed, coming down in great sheets that quickly turned the snow into slush and we'd both seen it as the time to move.
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