“Let’s spread out,” Radek suggests. “That way we’ll have a better position to defend ourselves or at the very least, more of us can get away.”
The bear repeatedly snaps its jaws together and flattens back its ears. Its agitation makes the situation completely terrifying. Without warning, Aamon runs in the opposite direction. Instinctively, Sayda follows. The movement triggers the bear to attack. Faced with the charging titan, we all instantly scatter. I move behind a tree trunk, seeking any cover.
The bear follows Hadwin who circles a cluster of smaller trees. With a chilling growl, the bear raises itself and lunges forward, putting the force of its weight into a violent swipe at the trees with its front claw. The trees Hadwin hides behind shatter, with splintered fragments flying in all directions. My head spins. I am frozen in place by terror, helplessly watching as Hadwin is floored by the blow. A chunk of wood pierces his upper thigh, already turning red from the blood spurting out around it. The bear lumbers over him, lifting its claw to finish him.
Time slows. I yell out for my friend, powerless to stop this. If I had only not wasted all of my bullets before, maybe I could help. As the bear brings his paw and knife-like claws down toward Hadwin’s helpless form, a thundering blast rings out. I turn toward the source of the blast. It came from Radek. He has some bullets left and shoots at the bear.
The creature does not look injured by the shot. Instead, the beast becomes even more agitated than before. It forgets Hadwin and charges toward Radek. With the bear closing in on him, Radek does the only thing he can. He runs. Weaving in and out of trees he tries to slow the bear down by traversing a course too narrow for it. The constricted path only slightly slows the monster’s movement as it crushes the vegetation, rampaging its way to Radek. They both quickly disappear into the forest as Radek runs for his life.
As soon as the bear is out of sight, I run over to move Hadwin to a safer spot. He weakly clutches the piece of wood protruding from his leg, already becoming clammy with sweat pouring down his face. There is too much blood spurting from the wound. The awkward shape of the splintered tree trunk prevents me from putting enough pressure over the right spot to stop the flow.
“I have to pull this out,” I tell Hadwin while gripping the mangled shard.
He closes his eyes, preparing for the pain. I pull with all my strength. The shard comes out and, with it, Hadwin’s blood splatters all over me. The warm liquid soaks my hands and oozes from between my fingers as I press down hard on the exposed artery to halt the bleeding.
“We need to stop this bleeding, or you won’t make it,” I say, making him understand why I am being so rough. A scream mixed with a deep growl comes from the distance. I fear the bear has finally caught Radek. Ignoring the thought, I continue to help Hadwin. While figuring out a better way to keep pressure on the wound, something stirs behind me. When feeling the pressure on my shoulder, I wince and ball up, waiting for the attack. Instead of being mauled by the wild animal, I hear Sayda’s voice.
“Oh, Haddie!” she cries, now crouching over him.
Realizing it is Sayda and not an animal, I get back to helping Hadwin. We rip the rest of his pant leg off and tear it into lengths. Sayda helps me wrap the fabric around his leg to form a tourniquet. We tie the fabric in place, but cannot get enough force to slow the bleeding. The blood continues to stream out. Hadwin is running out of time when an idea strikes me. I grab one of the pieces of wood and loosen the tourniquet. I put the wood under the wrap then twist it. With each rotation it forces the fabric tighter and tighter around Hadwin’s leg. The bleeding stopped! I think to myself, relieved my idea actually worked.
“We need to get him out of here,” I tell Sayda while using another piece of the torn pant leg fabric to secure the makeshift tourniquet. She helps me get him up. We carefully move him toward Securus.
“Where’s Radek?” she asks.
“He led the bear away from Hadwin,” I tell her, feeling ashamed I did nothing to help either of them. “Last I saw, he was running through a tight path to get away from it.” I intentionally leave out the scream in the forest. There is no way to know what happened and she has enough to worry about already. “He knows where we’re headed, so he can circle back when it’s safe. What about Aamon?”
“He’s over there.” Sayda tilts her head to the side, motioning toward him. Aamon sits on the ground next to a tree, in a daze, with a new welt closing his only good eye. He can stay there for now. If the bear comes back it can snack on him while the rest of us get away.
We move Hadwin as far down the steep sloping hill as our tired muscles will allow. The ground is loose and rough, making our progress more even difficult than before. When we finally stop, the trees are more spread out, denying us much needed cover. But we are farther away from the bear. That is good enough for me. After catching my breath, I return to get Aamon. He is barely regaining consciousness when I get there. I look around for Radek, only to find no sign of him.
“Get up, unless you want to be here when the bear comes back.” I kick him in the thigh, emphasizing my impatience.
“Just keep that crazy woman away from me,” Aamon mumbles while getting up.
As he dusts himself off, a deep, rhythmic thumping emanates from the forest. In our condition, I have no interest in finding out what makes the noise. I desperately want to go and look for Radek but we have no time. We need to go now before Hadwin gets worse or the bear finds us.
I try to move as quietly as possible, but with the scattered leaves on the ground, my attempts at a stealthy retreat are foiled. Each crunching step makes me cringe. The wild animals already have their own ways of tracking prey. I do not need to advertise my position to make it even easier for them. The pace of my retreat hastens. If we cannot be quiet, we may as well be fast. Aamon is able to keep up a lot better than I thought he would, even with his hands bound together and the limited vision afforded by his swollen eyes. He really did improve his stamina on those exercise machines.
The thumping sound does not seem to be following us as we continue toward Sayda and Hadwin. I slow down as the slope increases, checking the area before meeting them. There are no signs of predators or any animal tracks at all here. The uneven and loose terrain on this sloping hill makes it uncomfortable to travel on. That must act like a natural barrier keeping the animals away, or at least I hope it does. I circle back to where Hadwin and Sayda rest next to a tree. Hadwin lies on the ground with Sayda seated right next to him. His head rests on her lap and she looks into his eyes. Their conversation becomes audible as we draw near.
“Stay with me, Haddie. We’ll get you back and Kagen will fix your leg, just like Rana did my arm,” Sayda tells him.
“I’m fine. You can’t damage this fine-tuned machine,” Hadwin says, forcing a smile. Sayda holds her tears while resting her forehead on his.
“Hey guys,” I say, letting them know we are back. “I didn’t see any sign of Radek.”
“Is he off being a hero?” Hadwin asks.
“Yeah, he saved your life, Hadwin. That’s why the bear left you. Radek drew it away,” I tell him. With how fast everything happened and combined with his injury, Hadwin had not fully appreciated what Radek did for him. He may not like him much, but there is no denying the debt Hadwin owes him now. He looks surprised to hear Radek was the one who saved him, and is too fatigued to fully process it now.
“So what do we do now?” Sayda asks. We both know we need to get Hadwin back fast, except he is no condition to travel.
“I think the best option is for me to go and bring help back here. It would be too hard on Hadwin to walk back,” I tell her. “Can you keep an eye on Aamon too?”
Aamon looks away in disgust as I say it. Not only does he have to put up with being dragged around by people he sees as beneath him, he has to stay with the woman he knows will not hesitate to attack him if given the slightest provocation.
Sayda narrows her eyes, warning Aamon. “Yeah, I got it. He should know to be
have by now and if not, I’ll make sure he gets the lesson.”
“Okay, keep this in case I have a hard time finding you.” I hand Sayda the communicator. It cannot reach Securus this far out, but if I bring back another one we should be able to communicate.
Aamon tries to protest staying with Sayda, until she flashes her knife. He immediately turns quiet. I head down the hill, continuing east. If Hadwin could see the Solar Panel fields from the tree, it should not take long to get there if I keep a good pace. I glide down the hill, taking advantage of the slope. It is a lot easier to move with no one else traveling with me. Halfway down, my speed becomes difficult to control because gravity pulls me faster. Even after the ground begins to level off again, my momentum keeps me going at a rapid pace. I continue on until a flash of movement stops me. Crouching down to avoid being seen, I focus on the direction of the flash and hear footsteps close by. They are definitely lighter than the bear, but it could be a smaller predator like the wolves. I am in a bad position being alone in the open.
I look for a weapon to use. The only things around me are loose sticks and scattered rocks. Well, it’s better than nothing, I think to myself while grabbing a couple of fist-sized rocks, preparing to heave them at anything moving. A dark brown blur darts behind a tree. It is getting closer but remains hidden. I shield myself behind a tree, not sure if it has seen me yet. Either way, I need to draw the creature out to see what it is. With all of my strength, I throw one of the rocks toward the direction of the movement. The rock collides with a tree trunk, sending a reverberating thud through the forest. Something is startled by the sound. It moves out from behind its cover, looking for a safer spot. That is when I realize what it is.
“Radek, is that you?” I call out to him.
“Oh, it’s you, Kagen. I thought there was another animal out here.” Radek comes out into the open. He is covered in mud. That explains why he looked like a brown creature to me. A glistening, deep red streak breaks up his muddy cloak. Radek is injured.
I go over to examine the wound. “What happened?”
“I tried to weave through the trees, but the bear caught up to me. It grazed me with its claw, knocking me down into some sinkhole. After I fell in, a bunch of mud collapsed on me. I was too deep for the bear to reach me, so he stomped off. After he left, I dug myself out.” Radek braces his left ribs from a spike of pain. “I sprinted this way hoping to find you. How are the others?”
“Sayda caught Aamon, so he’s more beat up than before, but still alive. She’s fine, physically at least. Hadwin’s hurt pretty badly though. He lost a lot of blood from a leg wound. I went ahead to get help from Securus,” I say while brushing the dirt off his wound.
There are two deep gashes in his skin where the bear’s claw struck him. The laceration goes all the way to his exposed ribs. We have nothing to clean or suture the open flesh with, but he should be able to make it to Securus without a problem. When we get there, he can go to the infirmary while I get a rescue team together. I look back up at him and involuntarily flinch from the anger in his eyes.
“You left Sayda out there?” Radek demands from me.
“I don’t like it any more than you do. But you know damn well she’ll do what she wants, no matter what I say. Hadwin’s too injured to move right now and there’s no way she would leave any of her friends alone. Someone had to go ahead. She either had to stay there, or she would have to make it to Securus alone. I can make it back faster, so I made a decision,” I tell him.
“I guess you’re right,” he begrudgingly admits, turning away from me, clearly upset with the situation. “Let’s move.”
We both start trotting eastward. None of us have any time to spare. We have to be getting close to Securus. Help will come soon. If not, our troubles will only get worse.
Chapter 28
As we go through the forest nearing Securus, the seemingly unfamiliar terrain bothers me more and more.
“Does this look like the same area we left from to you?” I ask Radek.
“Not really, but we’re probably coming from a different angle.” Despite his injury, Radek pushes us to a faster pace, making it hard for me to keep up. The adrenaline rush I was riding has now worn off. The fatigue of nearly two days without food and deep ache pulsing in my leg with every step has taken a toll on me. That doesn’t matter now, I can recover later. We need to get help to Hadwin and Sayda, I remind myself, searching for the strength to pushing forward.
Radek runs in front of me. His gun remains buried in the mud back in the forest, leaving his holster empty. Our lack of weapons makes it even more imperative that we hurry. With both of us tired and injured, we have no chance to survive another animal attack.
Soon the edge of the forest comes into view. Seeing the end, I run even faster. As I do, Radek grabs my arm, causing me to spin to the ground. My body tumbles for a few feet before coming to a stop. When I turn around to yell at him, he pounces on top of me, putting his hand over my mouth to silence me. Is he conspiring with Aamon? Could he really have hid that intention this whole time? It doesn’t make any sense. Why would he be attacking me now and not before? The thoughts race through my mind. While fighting to get back up, the look in his eyes stop me. He is not trying to kill me. He is trying to get me to understand something. I stop fighting. When Radek sees my understanding, he slowly removes his hand from my mouth.
“I thought you were attacking me,” I whisper to him.
“There’s something out there.” Radek points in front of us, beyond the end of the forest.
We both get back up and scramble to a fallen tree near the edge of the forest to help get a better view. From behind it, we look out to the Solar Panel fields. The scene before us is incomprehensible. There are at least thirty people out there. There’s no way so many people should be outside, unless Caelum has come to kill us! The horrifying thought springs to my mind. But if that is what they are doing, why are they up here and not inside?
I look around more closely, struggling to make sense of this puzzling scene. The people are spread out. They appear to be working on something. Behind them are the Solar Panel fields, but even they look different than they should. There seems to be a different pattern to the placement of the towering panels than before. If the irregular arrangement were not confusing enough, for some reason, the central spire in the secondary field is nowhere to be seen. With the golden light reflected by the monstrous mirrors, the tower should be clearly visible, but it is not. Nothing seems right. Could they have already destroyed so much?
“What the hell’s going on?” I ask Radek.
“I don’t know.” Radek continues to watch the people, his head tilted as he studies them. “Why are they wearing bio-suits?”
I had not noticed the bio-suits while taking in the rest of this odd sight. I look again. He is right. They really are wearing bio-suits. We do not even have that many suits in Securus. Scrutinizing them more closely, I notice a subtle difference compared to the suits we wore on the Solar Panel detail. Some of these suits have the old Leadership insignia on them. Now that I think of it, the people with the insignia appear to be overseeing the others. The area they are in has plants on the ground they are tending to. They are working in a garden, one far larger than ours. Finally, I realize why so much of this is off.
“This isn’t Securus,” I tell Radek. My own words feel like they batter my weary body. I turn my back to the garden and sit against the fallen tree.
A spark of recognition crosses his face. “You mean this is…” Radek’s words trail off as he looks back out at the scene before us.
This place has to be Munitus. There was supposed to be hundreds of miles between the facilities. I guess the distance was another one of Caelum’s lies designed to keep us in isolation.
“That’s why Aamon was so helpful with our direction. This had to have been part of his escape plan all along,” I say, finally understanding his motives when dashing into the forest.
“What do we do?
” Radek asks.
I do not have an answer to his question. We need to get Hadwin help, but the people here are obviously under the control of Caelum. If we bring Hadwin here, we would likely condemn all of Securus, and maybe even Munitus along with it. That must be exactly what Aamon was planning for us to do. There has to be another way.
“I have an idea,” I tell Radek. “It’s dangerous, and we’re gonna have to get closer to them than we should if it’s gonna to work.”
He looks at me expectantly, not at all dissuaded by my warning. I explain my makeshift plan. We may be able to find a landmark to guide our direction. To my surprise, he agrees with the idea.
“That’s better than what I was thinking. What about Hadwin?” Radek asks, remembering my reluctance to move him.
“We’re gonna have to carry him as much as we can. If the tourniquet holds, he’ll be okay as long as we make it back soon. But we can’t waste any more time.”
Despite his consent, Radek is skeptical. I do not blame him, we have a better chance to get caught looking around than to find our target. Undaunted by the grim chances, we move back into the forest and veer off to the left. There are fewer workers in that area, making it a good spot to begin our search. We are careful to use the natural cover of the forest as much as possible. When we get further to the side, the reason the secondary Solar Panel fields were hidden from us becomes clear. There are no other Solar Panels fields. They must not be tasked with supplying power to Caelum. I am sure they have another unique burden.
We are going to have to risk leaving the cover of the forest soon. I slowly move to the edge of the trees, crouching down to keep hidden. The area looks clear. Radek and I stand up to continue until a voice freezes us in our tracks.
“Who are you and where are your bio-suits?” the man demands of us. Whoever it is, his authoritative tone is undermined by the hint of fear and uncertainty in his voice.
The Controller (The Securus Trilogy Book 2) Page 27