“You’re just a wimp! You’re just an emaciated, emollient fake! You couldn’t blow the pods off a daffodil if your life depended on it.”
Bring the hepers back.
“Tell us what’s going on!” he yells.
I spit blood out on the ground. It splatters the dirt, splintered, like a pigeon’s footprint. I close my eyes: everything’s still a washed-out white.
“They’re coming,” I say.
“Who’s coming?!”
“The hunters!”
There is a long silence. I can’t lift my head to meet their eyes.
Then we hear it again. This time not just a solitary howl, but a chorus of them.
My blood. They’ve picked up the scent already.
“Now you’ve done it, you idiot,” I say. “Now you’ve made it easier for them to find us.”
“No. To find you, not us.” Epap turns to the others. “I say we leave this guy here. We take off in the carriage. That will—”
“No,” Sissy says.
“But Sissy, we—”
“No, Epap! You’re right: we can’t trust him. There’s more going on than he’s letting on. But that’s exactly why we can’t leave him. We need what he knows.” She walks over, dirt kicking onto me. “He’s a survivor,” she says. “We know that much. If he can survive, then sticking around him will only increase our own chances of survival.” Her eyes blaze into mine. “So start speaking. What do we do?”
I stand up, my crestfallen heart suddenly galvanising. “We go toe-to-toe with them and fight.” I dust off sand from my clothes. “We surprise them by not fleeing. Because that would be the very last thing they’d expect from you. They think you’re weak, cowardly, disorganised. But to stand toe-to-toe with them, go blow for blow. That would catch them by surprise.”
Epap starts to interrupt: “We don’t stand a chance—”
“Yes, we do! Look, I’ve seen the way you handle the flying daggers and spears. You could inflict real damage. They never expected you to become so adept – those weapons were only supposed to serve a cosmetic purpose. And look at us. We’ve got numbers on them. There’s only three hunters left. And there’s six of us. And we’ve got five freakin’ FLUNs between us. We can do this. We can take them down. And then there’ll be nothing between us and safety, the Dome.”
“You’re nuts, you know that?” Epap shouts. “You have no idea what they’re capable of. One of them has the power and speed of ten of us. So we’re actually outnumbered, you idiot, thirty to six. Outnumbered, outpowered, outsped. Fighting them is pure suicide.”
Epap is right; I know that. There’s not a chance of defeating the hunters. But the only hope I have of rescuing Ashley June is if the hepers and I can somehow pummel past the hunters and make it to the Institute. And for that to happen, I first need to convince the hepers to dig in their heels and fight rather than flee. We flee, Ashley June dies. It’s as simple as that. But as long as we stay and fight, there’s still a glimmer of hope for her, no matter how small.
Epap spins around to Sissy. “We need to run. Right now. We leave this guy behind, he’ll buy us the time we need to get some distance between us and them.”
I’m already shaking my head. “You just don’t get it, do you? Running will buy you maybe twenty minutes, if that. Less. The horse is tired, it’s been running all day. They’ll overtake us, sooner than later.”
They grow quiet at that. They know I’m right. On the carriage, Ben starts to cry. Even the horse, gazing at the cloud, starts to whinny.
Sissy takes two steps towards me. “What about the map?” she asks. I’m surprised by the softness in her voice, how quiet she is despite the situation.
“What about it?”
“It shows a boat to the north of us. Tied to a dock. If we can get there in time, there might be a chance.”
“Are you nuts? You can’t trust that map. The Scientist was crazy.”
“Not to us. He seemed reasonable.”
I stare north, in the direction of where the boat would be. “If the boat is real, why didn’t he ever tell you about it?”
A frown creases her brow. “I don’t know. But what I do know is that everything else in the map is accurate. The ridges, the mountains, everything is where it’s depicted on the map. Even the boulders over there,” she says, pointing at them. “And so why not the boat?”
I shake my head. “Look, even if it exists – and it doesn’t – you’ll never get to it in time.”
“I’d rather die trying.”
We can’t flee, we must stay and fight, I remind myself. The only chance of saving Ashley June is to fight back against the hunters. I raise my voice: “And I’m telling you the only option for survival is to fight them head-on.”
Epap lurches forward. “C’mon, Sissy. Let’s go. Leave him here, already.”
The hepers aren’t stupid. They know a doomed fight when they see one, they know their chances are better if they flee. I need to come up with a plan. One that will convince them to stay and fight. I stare at the hepers. Fear has shrivelled their faces; they look tiny and vulnerable out here in the Vast, without the protection of the Dome around them. And then a thought occurs to me. The hunters don’t even know I’m with the hepers. They must think I’m alone, separated from the hepers, a solo fugitive, and there’s no reason for them to believe otherwise. And the smell of my blood, even across the miles of the Vast, now overpowers any trail of the hepers’ odour.
I look at the hepers, their weapons, the FLUNs. And at the boulders toppled atop one another, high and encaving. I blink. And there it is. A plan.
Sissy steps forward, stands right in front of me with a look of curiosity. “What is it? You look like you thought of something.”
I look at them in turn, locking in on each pair of eyes for a few seconds. “Tuck tail, run away if you’re too scared. But if you want to join me and fight back, I have a plan,” I finally say.
The night merges with black. Not a speck of light in the skies, the stars hidden by gargantuan dark clouds shifting above, bloated continents of brooding darkness. The eastern mountains are gone, their once silhouetted borders breached by blackness.
I am alone. Sitting on the ground, leaning back on a boulder. In my hand is a spear that Sissy gave me right before she disappeared into the darkness. I place the tip of the spear against the palm of my hand and pause. It is all emptiness before me, the Vast stretched in an endless grey that is not quite black yet. Only the boulder I lean back on keeps me company. Its surface is cold and brittle against my back, but in this endless sea of aqueous darkness, its solidity is strangely consoling.
I press the spear tip into my flesh and slice downward.
It leaves a small slash, and only a dribble of blood trickles out. But for the hunters chasing me down, that is more than enough; it is a lighthouse flashing in a sea of darkness.
And only a few seconds later, the cry of hunger slices across the Vast. Already so close, so much louder, the intonations of desire heightened. They will be here soon, in less than a minute.
I fist my hand and squeeze. More blood sluices out. Enough now to overwhelm their olfactory senses; not a chance they will be distracted by any faint heper odour. I feel the pulse of blood against the cut, a push-push of seepage, oddly unsynchronised with the rapid, frightful beating of my heart.
The hepers left me with this spear and nothing else.
A skittering sound, sand tossed harshly across the ground, whispery hisses lisp into my ears.
The hunters have arrived.
I stand up, my knees buckling.
A hazy flush of movement, darting from left to right. Then another in the opposite direction, just outside my cone of vision. Three shapes emerge from the darkness, faintly at first, then attaining definition.
Abs.
Crimson Lips.
Gaunt Man.
And then, solidifying out of the milky grey, two more shapes emerge, phantom-like at first, then all too horrifyingly real
.
Frilly Dress.
The Director.
I expected only three of them, not five.
All five of them are gruesomely naked, SunBlock Lotion whipped over their bodies like buttercream frosting. Where the lotion has worn off, open sores gouge their skin like volcanic craters, glistening red raw even in the dark. The effects of a whole day in the library with sunlight pouring in. It is their eyes that are the most chilling, the naked anger bristling behind their eyeballs, raw hatred mixed with a pulsating lust for my blood.
“Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” I say.
They edge forward, snarling at me. Slowly, a few yards at a time, creeping towards me.
Something is wrong: this is not how I envisioned the scene would play out. They are much too controlled; an unbridled feeding frenzy was what I imagined, bodies soaring at me, fangs bared, a race to get me, to tear through me. That I would be ripped into a dozen different pieces within seconds. But this seems too methodical.
“Did you not get your beauty sleep today?” I say. “Because you all look terrible.”
They start to spread out in a wide arc.
My eyes are on all of them, but especially the Director, directly in front of me. He is the calmest of the lot, his breathing steady, his feet stepping with fastidiousness on the desert gravel. His long left arm is dangling down, his nails delicately tapping his kneecap, his right arm kept strangely behind his back.
“We’ve decided to play a game,” he says.
“Do tell.”
Gaunt Man is on my far left, hunkering lower even as he continues to move down an imaginary arc.
“I’m trying to decide what to call this game. The Sharing Game and the Savouring Game are probably the top contenders.”
Frilly Dress is rolling on my right, slowly, like a guttered bowling ball, her eyes filled with wet anticipation. Her mounds of fat loll downward off her body, like pregnant water droplets about to drip off. Her teeth are bared, a faint hiss sluicing out. She continues to roll right until she hits up against the boulder.
As does Gaunt Man on my left. Each of the hunters holds position; they look at the Director as if for further instructions. Then they edge closer, the circle shortening, tightening.
“See, we need to make an example of you,” the Director continues. “You’ve made a mockery of the Hunt, of the Institution, of the Ruler. And of me. My reputation has been irreparably damaged. What kind of heper expert wouldn’t be able to detect a heper right under his nose?” And for the first time, his voice betrays emotion. A hitch. “It is not enough to simply devour you. That would be too quick – for us and for you. So, we have decided – my suggestion, of course – to share you, to savour you. Slowly. Luxuriantly. One piece at a time.”
And still they inch forward, eyes swivelling back and forth, examining me, behind me.
Crimson Lips suddenly darts forward at me.
“Stop!” the Director yells, and Crimson Lips falls into a frozen crouch, her body erect, like a startled cat. And for the first time I see a FLUN in the Director’s right hand, pointed at Crimson Lips. It must be Ashley June’s FLUN, the one left behind in the library.
Crimson Lips retreats back into formation.
“It’s hard to play this game, sometimes our excitement can get the better of us.” He swivels his head about at each of the hunters. “Proceed,” he says.
They creep closer, the circle enclosing, everyone staying in formation. Eyes constantly on the move, scrutinising me. “We will take you piece by piece, each of your limbs at a time,” the Director says. “The two male hunters will rip off each of your arms, and the two ladies will rip off your legs, one by one. We’ll space it out, maybe five minutes between limbs? We’ll be sure to keep you alive through it all. It will play out so well for the book, see? Draw out this ending, really keep the readers on edge. A heart-thumping climax like no other.” He stares at me, his eyes glistening wetly over as if drooling. “Last to go will be me. I get your head.”
“And then what?”
The Director leans back like a wolf howling at the night sky, scratching his wrist with rabid delirium. “Did you really say, And then what?’ What does it matter to you? You’re dead!” He pauses, studying me. “Oh, are you concerned about your heper buddies? Don’t you worry about them. We’ll get to them eventually. Even in this large desert, we’ll find them.”
They don’t know where the other hepers are, I think.
“And then we go back to your girlfriend and tell her what we did to you!” Gaunt Man sneers, drool now leaking out of his mouth.
“We will do that,” the Director cuts in, shooting a cold look at Gaunt Man with the irritated expression of a man deprived of the punch line he’s been chomping at the bit to tell. “And, eventually, we will do the same to her. Limb by limb. The Savouring Game. Oh, I quite like that name, actually, I think that’s the name that’s going to stick.”
The circle encloses on me even more. Their bodies percolate with ravenous excitement now, heads bobbing up and down, arms twitching at their side, weird nipping sounds escaping their lips.
“Who do you think will scream louder, you or her? She’s got a lot of passion, that girl, so perhaps she’ll scream louder. But then again, she’s got quite a bit of spine, wouldn’t you say, what with that stunt she pulled? Not at all like you, running away like a squirrel and leaving her all by her lonesome.”
Abs cries out in frustration and impatience, “Enough talking, let us have at him already!” Her tongue darts across her scabbed lower lip, hard and insistent like a callus filer. “Let me in on him!” She crouches low, readying herself.
The Director lifts his head, scans the scenery, an establishing shot for the viewers back home. “Very well, then, remember to take only the left leg and nothing else. Everyone else stay in line,” he says, tapping the FLUN. “You’ll have your turn. And now, for the pleasure of the Most Excellent Ruler and for the delighting of his good citizens, I now—”
And even before he’s finished speaking, Abs is bounding towards me, on all fours like a rabid hyena, her hair streaming behind her in impossibly straight lines. And though she is moving with lightning quickness, everything seems to slow down. I see everything: her lips pulled back, her face nothing more than a yawning black hole of sharp teeth, her eyes burnished with a red glow.
And I see the other hunters, a split second later, leaping forward as well, their bodies unable to resist, their back legs uncoiling like a cheetah’s, propelling their streamlined bodies through the air, their nails and claws finding traction in the desert gravel as they land and then push off again, sailing towards me with a grace that belies their violent intentions.
I see the Director, his face bland but eyes filled with seething anger, lifting the FLUN at Crimson Lips and Abs, his hand shaking with rage and surprise.
And Abs launches herself at me for the final time, arms stretched out, soaring through the air, saliva and snot flailing behind her, her opened mouth turning sideways as it homes in on my Adam’s apple.
A harsh beam of light, then a brief white blindness. A scream pierces the night. The stench of burning flesh fills my nose. A second later, I see Abs curled on the ground, screaming, a hole burning where her collarbone is. Used to be.
The Director, staring dumbly at his FLUN, does not understand.
Another beam of light shoots out, from behind and above me. From someone standing on the boulder. This one hits Crimson Lips in her upper thigh just as she is taking off for me. “Cha!” she yells, reaching down uselessly with her hand. Smoke shoots out from her thigh.
“Gene! Get down!” screams Sissy.
And I fall to my knees just as Frilly Dress soars towards me, her momentum carrying her over me, her nails ripping the back of my shirt. She lands on my other side with an efficient somersault, starts coming at me again instantly.
Another shot from above, this one wildly off target, hitting empty desert ground.
From the periphery
of my vision, I see a dark shape – Gaunt Man – leaping up the boulders. “Jacob!” I shout. “Watch your side, he’s flanking us on your side!”
Frilly Dress is leaping towards me, her snarling mouth like a smile.
Someone screams behind me – David? Ben? – naked fear ringing out.
Another beam shoots out, this one from the far side of the boulder, a complete misfire into the sky. I hear Epap – “Sissy! Help me over here” – his voice whittled with fear.
Then a series of flashes creates a strobe-light effect: Frilly Dress’s lunge at me is staccato-like and jagged. And then she is suddenly flying above me, descending with her terrible size and weight. Her eyes are fixed on mine, intense and focused as a lover’s.
A circle of light flashes from above; her head is instantly haloed by a nimbus of light. Halfway down, her body goes limp.
Her body crushes over mine, sagging. I pry her off, the smell of charred flesh rancid and nauseating. Smoke billows out from the back of her head. I glance up. Sissy stares down at me, then turns to Epap at the sound of his voice: “I’m out, Sissy, I’m out of the first FLUN!”
I spin around, scan the scene before me. Only Frilly Dress remains prostrate on the ground; Abs and Crimson Lips are leaping to their feet now, their bodies scorched with burns but adrenaline and anger and hunger propelling them off the ground. They’re running to the boulder, launching themselves up.
Jacob, atop one of the boulders, is bent over his FLUN, uselessly pulling and pulling on the trigger. The safety switch, he’s forgotten to disengage the safety. He hasn’t fired off a single round; that’s one reason the plan is failing so miserably. Yards away, Gaunt Man has crested the top of the boulder, is beginning to leap for Jacob.
Nothing is going as planned. Because of the hepers’ inability to use the FLUNs, all advantage is gone: a crisp ambush from the hidden recesses of the boulders – gone; the element of surprise – gone; an overpowering, coordinated attack – gone. My plan is now torn to shreds. As we all likely will be soon, unless something is done. And quickly.
The Hunt Page 25