Primal

by Serra, D. A.

  Ben returns fire as he takes cover. Alison darts into the woods reloading her handgun. Ben races to the shed and looks inside. Kent hangs limp harpooned to the wall. Gravel is dead on the floor. Ben’s whole family is gone because of her. He takes off after her. He is enraged! He will hunt her until she’s dead, and then, he will hunt her into hell.

  Hank bursts out onto the porch in time to see Curtis untying Jimmy. He falls on the ground and hugs his son.

  “Dad.”

  “Who are you?” Hank asks.

  Jimmy says, “He helped me.”

  Curtis says, “Get back inside.” Jimmy and Hank grab Curtis, haul him up the two porch steps and inside the lodge. All of the other hostages are free now. They are moving furniture, covering the windows, and setting up a barricade.

  Jimmy is crying hard for the first time, “Dad.”

  Hank holds him, “Yes. Okay.”

  “I saw mom. She’s…she’s…” There are no words to describe his mom.

  As they fortify the room Curtis tells them, “I got through to 911. They’re sending helicopters. There’s been some kind of manhunt for these guys.”

  Hank heads for the door as he asks Jimmy. “Where’d she go?’

  Curtis answers, “She’s out to get the last guy.”

  Hank finds this information hard to process. Why? What does he mean? On purpose? In the distance, shots are fired. Hank sprints for the door. Dan emerges from the kitchen with an ax and several butcher knives. Dan and Grant, both suffering from heartbreaking loss, are unwilling to sit and wait.

  “Let’s go get this motherfucker,” Dan says.

  Bella asks, “Are you sure you should go out there?”

  Jimmy implores, “Dad, don’t. Please don’t go.”

  Hank looks into his son’s face, “Jimmy, she’s alone.”

  “Dad!” Jimmy’s confused, “She didn’t look…normal.”

  Hank kisses his son on the top of his head and turns for the door. Bella steps forward and puts her arm around Jimmy. The three men head for the door.

  Grant yells back, “Barricade after we’re gone.”

  “Hey,” Curtis yells after them, “Don’t sneak up on her. Really.”

  Dan, Grant, and Hank run into the woods.

  * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  Alison glides surefooted away from camp, purposefully drawing Ben away from her family. Ben pursues. He will get her. He will absolutely get her. His rage is cold. Now, it is just the woods and them. Alison slows her pace. Where should she lead him? Ben listens for the break of a branch, the swish of a twig. He studies her tracks; deeper, closer footprints in the mud indicate she is walking now - strategizing. They begin a deadly mime dance for survival. She has one goal: to draw him as far away from Jimmy as she can and the farther she travels into the woods the safer she now feels. It is no longer her enemy, but her cover, her friend. The sky lightens. A red watercolor dawn spreads out along the horizon. The storm has ended. She dreads the light having come to rely on the erasure of night.

  Adeptly, Alison uses a few rocks as steps and propels herself up to a tree branch where she can climb a little higher and look around. During last night, long buried animal instincts crept to the surface of her, and she knows now that Ben is there, just as he knows she is near. A mighty cord has formed attaching them, bonding them. When they caught each other’s eyes, it was clear that both of them would not, could not survive: one of them will come to the end - and they must play it out - to that end - until it’s over. They are joined in an epic fight: eye for eye, family for family, one winner. Perched on this tree limb, she begins to feel the ache in her bones. Her head swims and she starts to break down. She tells herself that even if I die now they will have had time to prepare back at the camp. They will be okay. She could give in, let go, and suddenly that is exactly what she wants. What if she just lies down in the brush? Maybe he finds her, maybe he doesn’t. What if she just lies down still? She wants to lie down; she aches to lie down, please can she lie down and let be what will be. She is suddenly so tired. Her head falls forward. Her beaten body wavers on the branch. Her arms are too heavy to lift. Her legs throb. Emotion crawls up her parched throat. She’s done enough. Hasn’t she done enough? Two dark spots form in her mind’s eye. Slowly, the illusion takes shape - they are the eyes of Ben. The eyes she saw right before she ran. Then, she knows. He’ll go back. She knows this is the truth: he will go back and kill her family. He will drag back her body, show it to her son, and then kill them slowly. They do not understand him. She doesn’t know why she understands him; she just knows that she does - deep in the core of her she knows who he is, what he will do. She opens her eyes. Something moves! Over to the left. She strains to see through the wall of green. Yes, a body, Ben’s body moving cautiously because he senses her too, but he does not think to look up. This will end it. Her eyes clear and her hand steadies. She aims at his head. Confident. She will hit him. She pulls the trigger. Instead of the explosive bang she is expecting, a small clicking sound. She pulls again. It’s empty. She pulls and pulls. The gun is empty. She thought she reloaded. She looks down at the weapon confused. Ben heard it. Was it a cricket? No, the sound of an empty gun. He looks up and catches sight of her as she drops from the tree and disappears. Ben accelerates through the forest after her.

  Darting left, she realizes that with no gun she must hide. Moving around is making too much noise and she looks for a place. Ahead a couple of downed trees and a few rocks form a bit of a covey. She settles into it. Minutes go by. No movement. No noise. Ben learns very quickly, how to place his foot on the center of the rock, as he moves so if it is unsteady it doesn’t buckle. He learns some leaves make crackling sounds when he steps on them and others are silent. He learns, like she learned, and at a staggering speed. Where Alison hides there is a small pool of rainwater in a cup of granite and it looks like life itself to her. Her throat is sticking together. She leans in and puts her lips to the pool. She drinks and it is heavenly as it soothes her. Ben sees a footprint near the fallen logs. Stealthily, he moves around the little cubby. From an angle to the right, he can get a view through some branches and he sees her bent over the water. He puts his weapon in his pants. He moves in. His hands itch. He needs to kill her with his bare hands. He will not deny himself that pleasure. He needs to close his hands around her throat and slowly strangle the breath out of her while she looks him in the eyes knowing what is happening. Alison lifts her head from the pool. The first rays of the rising sun break through the trees behind Ben and cast his shadow across the rock in front of her. He’s right there! She lunges out of the cubby. He dives and grabs her shin. They both go down. She bends at the waist over a log. He goes down hard on the granite. He reaches to grabs her other leg. She clutches a medium-sized stone into her fist. Eyes! Eyes! She whips her hand back and strikes him in the eye. He recoils for a split second. She crawls over the log and stumbles to her feet. She goes! He is right behind her. She breaks out of the woods and stops just short of sheer drop to the beach fifty feet below. Ben emerges from the woods and walks deliberately toward her. Taking his time. Step after slow step, he walks toward her slowly, because she is trapped and he wants her to feel it. She drops her hands to her sides. They stand looking at each other. His family dead. Hers soon to be. The waterlogged ground shifts from Ben’s added weight. She sees what’s happening. In his rage and triumph, flooded with the euphoria of revenge, he sees only her. She jumps with all her might sideways and catches a small limb of a baby tree with one hand as the ground triggered by his added weight gives way to a mudslide that carries Ben down the drop. She pulls herself up to solid ground. On her hands and knees, she crawls to the edge looks down. He stands directly below, his entire body black with mud, his eyes white fire. His hatred sears her skin.

  The roar of two helicopters interrupts the force field created by their keen singular concentration. They both look to the sky and see the police choppers zooming in. Then, locked eye-to-eye in a sco
rching intensity Ben speaks softly and even though his words are too faint to be heard over the roar and the distance, somehow, she hears him as if he were whispering directly into her ear. “It’s not over.” And in an instant, he is gone. Frozen on her hands and knees, she does not move. Her eyes remain glued to the spot where she lost sight of Ben. She waits. She watches. She could not tell you how much time passed before she hears something behind her.

  “Alison?” Hank approaches with caution because while he can see it is his wife, something unnamable warns him to be careful. Alison doesn’t move from the edge. Dan and Grant hang back as Hank crawls out to her on the shifting mud. Gently, Hank pulls her back to him. He looks into her expressionless face. He gathers her up in his arms and rocks her back and forth. He is crying. Her pants are ripped and what’s left of her shirt is stiff with Gravel’s dried blood. Her right eye is swollen almost shut. Her face and body are cut, bruised and filthy. They sit wrapped together in the mud. He does not feel her hugging back. He assumes this is exhaustion. He cannot see her face. If he could, he would see her eyes are still on the spot where Ben disappeared. She is still looking for him. “Alison.” Hank holds her with all the force he can without hurting her further. He tries to reach her, “Alison…Allie?” Finally, she turns her attention to him. She sees him. It is Hank. He sees a flicker of herself in her face. He holds her rocking back and forth. “Jimmy is fine. Jimmy is fine.” Hank scoots her back from the edge. Dan quickly removes his shirt and places it around her. She cannot move. And so no one moves for quite a long time. Dan and Grant sit down now too, and begin to grieve in earnest for their lost friends. They are a profoundly pained little group sitting in the mud. Just sitting. The three men crying. Alison staring, but not crying.

  When they can, they start back. Alison, who is unable to support her own weight, is being physically supported between Grant and Hank. Dan has walked ahead clearing an easy path. They emerge into the small clearing by the lodge. The police are already in high gear. Each of the hostages is giving statements. Yellow tape surrounds the shed. Hobbs, Mike and Bruce’s bodies are laid-out and covered respectfully with blankets while they wait for the body bags.

  In a chair on the porch, Jimmy has been watching the woods, traumatized. And then, he sees them. He flies out of the chair. “Mom!” He runs into her arms. She falls to her knees on the ground holding her son fiercely. He cries. She does not.

  “You’re hurt. You’re so hurt. Mom, are you okay?”

  “Are you?” she asks him. These are the first words she has spoken and it gives Hank a little solace to hear her voice.

  “They killed Hobbs and Mike and Bruce, too.”

  “Yes. Terrible. Terrible. But you’re okay.”

  “I’m okay, Mom.”

  Alison notices Curtis sitting on the edge of the lodge porch. She takes Jimmy’s hand and she walks over to him.

  “Hey.” He nods at her.

  “Hey,” she responds.

  He almost smiles, “You sure can kick-ass for someone unprepared.”

  “You sure can haul-ass for someone immobile.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah. I thought your hero days were over.”

  “Some people never learn.”

  “Come back with us. You can stay in our home until…”

  “Until I get back on my feet?”

  “Metaphorically.”

  “And leave all of this?”

  “All of what?”

  “I think I’ll run Hobbs’ camp for a while. Break my way back into the peopled world slowly.”

  A stretcher passes them holding Kent’s dead body. His chest is ripped wide open where the harpoon had penetrated and been removed. Jimmy grabs his mom around the waste and buries his face in her side. It is so gruesome, Hank and the others glance away. Alison stares like a predator. Curtis watches her and feels a little alarmed by it. She keeps her eyes on Kent until they have laid him on the ground next to Gravel. Then, she looks back.

  “Excuse, me, Ma’am?” A young policeman approaches with Detective Coby. She moves her gaze slowly. She never lets go of Jimmy’s hand. She never breaks down; she never cries; she never shows any emotion at all. Hank takes her hand in his. He is completely bewildered about what to say or do. He is helpless and he desperately wants to clutch her in his arms and let her cry, but something stands between them; something unseen has taken shape and is fixed between them.

  The Detective begins. He is at a very high energy level. The scene in the camp is overwhelmingly gory even for a veteran Detective. “Ma’am, there seems to be some confusion.”

  “And a shitload of dead bodies,” The young policeman adds. He gets a derisive gaze from the detective. “Well, there are.”

  Alison waits. She emits a strange vibration: an icy, unnerving fatigue.

  Detective Coby prompts her, “I was told that you may know what happened to those two men?” He indicates Kent and Gravel. They walk a little way toward the two Burne brothers. When Alison begins to speak everyone quiets down to listen. Everyone wants to hear. Even hearing it from her mouth, it is hard to fathom. Dan, Grant, Ed, Julie and Bella move closer. Alison explains with a lifeless flat tone.

  “I shoved the first one off the cliff.” She points.

  “There’s another one?” He indicates for the policeman to check it out.

  She continues indicating Kent, “I shot that one with the harpoon in the shed.” Then pointing to Gravel, “That one, I stabbed but then I shot him over and over in the stomach and then once in the head.” She looks at Detective Coby. “One got away.” There is a silent pause as this sinks in. Then she says with powerful intensity, “You need to get the other one now. You have to kill the other one.”

  “We’re searching. We’ll find him. There’s no way off here.”

  The policeman yells from an unseen spot in the woods, “Yeah! There’s another one down there. A big one.”

  Detective Coby looks at this petite woman and all these corpses. It doesn’t make sense and he asks, “Ma’am, are you a police officer?”

  “No.”

  “Armed forces?”

  “No.”

  “Do you mind if I ask what kind of training you’ve had?”

  “I’m a mother.”

  She takes Jimmy by the hand, turns around, and leads him away. Detective Coby asks after her, “Ma’am…”

  “It’s Mrs. Kraft, not ma’am,” Hank corrects him.

  “Right, well,” he starts after her to regain her attention. “So, Mrs. Kraft?”

  She keeps walking toward the porch.

  Hanks steps forcefully in front of Coby. “My wife is in shock, injured, and exhausted. Your questions will wait.”

  Alison sits down on the edge of the first porch step. Jimmy sits on the ground between her legs and rests his head on her thigh. One by one, all of the hostages stop talking and walk over. They settle in all around her. They are all damaged, and they all know no matter how impossible it seems, they are alive because of Alison. Dan rests his hand softly and in comfort on her shoulder. Bella places her hand on Alison’s knee. Julie sits behind on the second step with her knees up against Alison’s back. Ed puts his hand on Alison’s hand. Grant rests his palm on her other shoulder. And in silence, they sit and breathe as one, forming a human bandage around Alison.

  * * *

  Chapter Eighteen

  The Coast Guard boat cuts effortlessly through the lake water. It is nothing like the trip to the island: with the storm spent, the lake is placid, almost friendly. Jimmy sits between his parents and all three hold hands. Alison has received some first aid. She has a butterfly bandage closing the gash by her right eye, and several sterile pads covering wounds on her knees, her elbows, and her stomach. Although she has changed into her sweat clothes, it is not enough because she is cold from the inside and so she is wearing Hank’s coat, and still, in the bright sunlight, she shivers. Most of the mud is gone, but not all.

  Back at the cabin, Hank had become con
cerned when she had stepped into the shower. He checked on her and he found that she’d forgotten to turn on the hot water and was standing inert and oblivious in the cold pour. He jumped in, wrapped his arms around her naked beaten body, and held on as he cranked up the hot water and waited for it to come through the pipe. Tenderly, he washed her body and her hair as best he could while cursing the teeny travel shampoo bottle that kept slipping from his hands. Jimmy yelled in every minute, “You okay, Dad?” He did not like that he couldn’t see his mom and dad. He sat with his back up against the shower door waiting.

  As the boat carries them along the water, Alison’s head is angled back so she can watch the island recede. The others on the boat sit and stare at the floor. Grant’s eyes brim with tears and Dan comforts him with a pat. His broken wrist is vigilantly wrapped. These two will never lose touch. They will know each other for the rest of their lives.

  “Dad?” Jimmy whispers, “Mom’s not okay.”

  “She needs some time, Jimmy. We all do.”

  Hank squeezes her hand. She does not respond. She can’t take her eyes off the island. She wonders, where are you? I know you’re there. I know you’re watching. I feel you.

  The Coast Guard vessel pulls into its slip. Coast Guard Officer Frank steps out and extends his hand to help the others get onto the dock. Once they are all off the boat, they begin the walk toward the Station House. Coming from the end of the dock a mass of reporters race toward the group. They are yelling. They’ve done their homework fast and know exactly which one is Alison Kraft. Coast Guard Officer Joe leaps quickly onto the docks and joins Frank. The two try to shelter and shuttle the group toward the building.

  “Mrs. Kraft?”

  “Alison?”

  Guard Frank says, “Who let these guys in?”

  Guard Joe responds, “Freedom of the press.”

  Hank yells, “What about her freedom?”

  “This isn’t freedom. It’s harassment,” Dan adds.