He eases me forward off his shoulder. “Set the rifles down. I’ll hold her up and you grab her.”
“Oh yeah! I’d love to grab her.”
My feet touch the ground and then there are hands on me everywhere—my breasts, my ass—I’m being groped. I put up with the hand on my ass while I was being carried, but now there’s no excuse. My head swims a little and then the hand on my ass reaches between my legs and starts rubbing. It is the other guy, the one who couldn’t wait to grab me. Shit to hell! My knee rises with a jerk and makes solid contact. There’s a grunt and the groping hand goes away. I shove the gun into Baritone’s belly. “Let loose of me!”
He looks down, sees his gun and lifts his hands away. I stumble back and he splits into two, and then into three. I back up another step and the entire forest spins. Suddenly there are hands on me again, but my mind is in quicksand. And then I am gushing out more vomit.
I am on my knees and elbows retching when I start regaining visual control of my environment. When the retching stops and my stomach settles, I roll away from my pile of vomit and lay on my back. The two men are standing near. The gun I had for less than a minute is in its owner’s hand, pointed at the ground. In his other hand is the flashlight. He points it in my face. The light hurts so I block it with my duct taped hands.
“Get up!” His voice resonates in my pounding head.
I struggle back to my knees and wait for the pounding to ease. He grabs me under an armpit. I jerk away. “Wait!” My mouth tastes like regurgitated dog food and it hurts to talk. I draw up saliva, spit, and then make my words slow and even. “If I get up too fast . . . I’ll get dizzy . . . pass out.”
“Give me a few minutes and I’ll carry her,” the other guy says. The tone of his voice tells me two things: he has nearly recovered from my knee, and he wants an excuse to get his hand on my ass again.
“No! I can walk.” I touch the swelling behind and above my right ear. “You didn’t have to hit me so hard.”
“Just get up,” says Baritone. His hand goes to my armpit again, but this time he doesn’t try to lift me. Putting one foot under me, I rise slow until I’m standing, and then use his hand as an anchor while I wait for the dizziness and double vision to pass. I mutter my thanks and say I’m ready, but we don’t move. “Which way?” he says to his buddy.
His buddy—a chubby little guy by comparison—slowly turns a full circle. “Which way did we come from?”
Baritone points his flashlight here and there. “We came from there. A little left you said, so we should go that way.”
“That’s what I was thinking.” Chubby has no clue.
With Baritone’s hand on my arm, we head out, the flashlight painting a path ahead of us. Slivers of moonlight break through here and there. If these guys were any kind of navigators they’d realize that when we were going in the correct direction, the moon was to the left. Now it is dead behind us and dropping fast. Will Baritone’s flashlight hold out through the darkest part of night when the moon is gone? I hope not.
I’m feeling better, snickering inside at these buffoons. My head no longer pounds, though the pain continues as a low, steady pulse. I can live with it. We break into a small clearing. With the moon and my cat eyes, it’s nearly as good as daylight. It is wet here; water springs from the ground form an invisible pool edged with ice, until you step in it. Baritone does and I stop short. He lets loose of me.
“Son of a . . !”
I turn around and come face to face with Chubby, who is still carrying both his rifle and Baritone’s rifle. I anchor one foot and prepare to come up hard with the other. Incapacitate him and I can probably run for it.
“Freeze!” Baritone’s order cancels the plan. I don’t have to look to know that he is pointing his pistol at me. I turn around.
“What! I’m not going anywhere.”
He says nothing as he slogs out of the bog. He takes a minute to analyze the problem, and then says, “This way.”
“Hold on,” says Chubby. We both look at him. “Something doesn’t feel right, hasn’t for a while now. I think we’re going in the wrong direction.”
“And what, pray tell, gives you that idea, other than the fact that we haven’t the foggiest idea where we are, thanks to you?”
“Fuck you, Gary! I think I have it figured out. Do you want to hear it or not?”
Gary? I like Baritone better.
“Why not? Lost is lost.”
“When we started out we had the moon on our left which means we were heading north. Now it’s behind us which means we have turned east. We are going in the wrong direction. We should be walking toward the setting moon not away from it, or at least a bit north of it to get to where Dan is.
“How do you know the moon is setting?”
“Because I pay attention. When it sets it’ll be dark as shit, and all we have is your flashlight.” Chubby is smarter than he looks. “We need to conserve it, not have it on when we don’t need it, like right now.”
Baritone thinks about it for a minute, and then turns the flashlight off. “You’ve got a point. You sure the moon is setting?”
“Positive.”
Baritone looks at me. “What do you think?”
I’m surprised that he’s asking me. “I liked the way we were going.”
He grunts and turns back to Chubby. “You lead us. Here, take the flashlight. I’ll carry my gun and hold on to her.”
Damn! Baritone is not so dumb either. I should have eagerly agreed with Chubby. He wraps his fingers around my arm—I’m going to have more damned bruises—and we start back the way we came.
Chubby does have an amazing sense of direction, and a good mental picture of where landmarks are. Just when I expect he’s going to hold a bit too far south, he suddenly veers back on course. The moon is dropping fast, but not fast enough. I need pure darkness to make my break, but at the rate we’re going we’ll be in view of the helicopter within five minutes.
We stop. The flashlight beam starts bouncing about the trees?
“What?” Baritone asks.
Chubby eases back a step and whispers. “Did you see that?”
“See what?” Baritone is also whispering.
“Something. I think it could be one of those cats.”
Baritone’s hand comes off of me and his gun goes up to his shoulder. “I thought we had them all.”
My mind jumps to full alert. I reach and find . . . Yulya! He has come to save me, but the sabre-toothed cats hunt in pairs. He has no partner to work his prey with . . .
except . . . Roma! Oh, God . . . my friend, Roma. He survived! A shiver of happiness runs through me. What can I do? Yulya let them see him. Was that on purpose, a hunting tactic, or was it meant to alert me?
My captors have their guns up, noses pointing down the sights. Chubby’s flashlight is in the same hand as the barrel of his gun, pointing in the same direction, flashing back and forth in the trees.
“I don’t see nothing.” Baritone drops his gun from his face, and then brings it to his waist, his finger still on the trigger. “Probably a damned squirrel.”
“I don’t think squirrels are out at night; and this was a lot bigger than a squirrel.”
“Then a damned owl. They hunt at night for sleepless squirrels.”
And sabre-toothed cats hunt at night for stupid men. I bite my tongue to keep from uttering my words. Yulya is behind us and to our right now; Roma is behind and to our left. They know exactly what they’re doing. I reach deeper into Roma’s mind and then into the receptors of his eyes. I see the two men and me. He could attack the men but I am in the way. I watch myself step back until there is a clear path.
We creep closer, he with me in his head. I close my eyes because I can see through his eyes. The men don’t turn, intent upon the area directly in front of them, having no thought that their hunters would be smart enough to circle around them.
“You’re seeing things,” Baritone says.
“Maybe.”
“Let’s get moving before all the moon is gone. I’m tired as shit.”
Chubby eases his gun to his side, but continues to scan with the flashlight. “Yeah; me too.”
I allow my body to go limp as I ride with Roma on the hunt . . . the kill. Shit to hell! What am I turning into? In seconds these two men are going to be dead and here I am going along for the ride like a spectator watching it on the big screen with wrap around sound. Where’s my popcorn? Where’s my box of chocolate covered raisins?
No! I scream in Roma’s head, but he doesn’t understand no . . . or does he? He drops like a rock behind a scraggly bush. It hides his massive body only because it is dark.
“What’s with you?” Baritone’s voice is blaring in my face.
I raise my head and look directly into his eyes. I want to tell him that I just saved his life. “What do you mean?”
“You look weird . . . like you left your body or something.”
If you only knew. “I’m tired,” I growl back at him. “My head hurts. I probably have a concussion.”
“As soon as we get where we’re going we’ll find you a band aid and have a pity party.” He grabs my arm. I’m sick of men grabbing my arm. It hurts. “Let’s go, Chet.” He shoves me ahead and I stumble into Chet. The smell of filthy man-sweat fills me again and my stomach rolls.
“Watch where you’re going little gal,” Chet says. “Or you wanting some of me now? You change your mind?” All of a sudden he has me by my neck. I tighten every muscle and prepare my knee for another upward thrust. “You touch me with that knee and I’ll squeeze with every ounce of power I have.” He brings my face right up to his; his putrid breath gags me. “Then I’ll fuck your lifeless body and leave you for whatever wild animals are out here.”
A part of me wants to beg and plead, but the bigger part of me, my fear and anger, rages like a firestorm. I glare my contempt.
“Hey, Chet! Knock it off!” Baritone pushes an arm in between us. “We don’t need this shit.”
What I thought was a stomach reaction to Chet’s stink turns out to be the prelude to one of my visions. My chest tightens, which, with his fingers wrapped around my neck, adds to my difficulty breathing. And then the vision hits. Blood flies; a head separates from a body and my stomach manages to find something left to expel, straight into Chet’s face.
He was prepared for a knee, but he wasn’t prepared for a face-full of vomit; his reaction is reflexive. He eases his grip but doesn’t let loose entirely. I grab his arm with my bound hands—a handy brace—pull in close so he can’t turn away and then drive my waiting knee into his crotch as hard as I can. He grunts and his hand tightens. I dig my nails into his arm and ram my knee again and then again. Stars are floating in my vision and I expect at any second to feel the slam of Baritone’s gun alongside my head. He had backed off when I threw up and now I don’t know where he is, nor do I much care.
Just before I black out I send my knee up one more time. It’s not nearly the force of the previous three, but suddenly, Chet lets go and collapses, vomiting and groaning. I stumble away and drop to my knees, wheezing and gasping, gaining just enough awareness to realize why I lost track of Baritone, why he didn’t intercede. He and Roma were busy fulfilling my vision. When the oxygen returns to my brain and the floating stars fade away I realize that Yulya is lying on my right, waiting, worried. I look to my left. Only five feet away is Baritone’s bodiless head, an expression of shock and fear forever frozen on his face. Roma is standing over the shaking and moaning Chet, blood dripping from his sabre teeth. I tell Roma no, and then gag and dry heave for another five minutes.
Chapter 42
With the help of Chet’s knife—he is curled in a groaning ball, oblivious to his surroundings—I manage to cut the duct tape and free my hands. I find all their weapons and hide them under a bush a hundred feet away; except for the knife, which I keep. The multipurpose knife I had on my belt has disappeared. That pisses me off. I’m not about to go digging through Baritones pockets for it. It takes me a minute to get the scabbard off Chet’s belt. His weak complaint is quieted when Roma plants his face a few feet away. After I get the scabbard and knife on my belt, I try to take his jacket.
“No!” He crosses his arms, coughs and winces, his eyes never leaving Roma. “I’ll freeze to death.”
I extract the knife from the comfort of its new home on my hip and press it against his ear. “Take it off.”
“Please. Don’t leave me like this.” His anger morphs into a pathetic plead. “I can’t walk. I’ll freeze to death. Take Gary’s.”
I glance over at Baritone’s body, and then quickly away. His head is in my peripheral. I have done everything I can so far to avoid looking at it again. I’d already considered his coat but didn’t really want to deal with the site of his bloody stump where his head used to be. I had to do that once when I removed his gun. I turn back to Chet. “Wrong! I want yours. After I leave you can get his. And I didn’t hurt your legs. You can walk.”
“You have no idea what it’s like to get kicked in the balls over and over and over, do you? You really hurt me.” He closes his eyes and grimaces. “It’s no picnic.”
“Neither is rape and murder, both of which you threatened me with. I have no pity. You’re lucky you didn’t end up like your buddy. Now take off your jacket or I’ll cut off your ear and my furry friend will bite off your foot.”
He calls me a bitch. I ignore it only because he also gives me his jacket.
Yulya, Roma and I are on the move now. Just before disappearing from view I had glanced back. Chet was on his hands and knees, crawling over to Baritone. I have no doubt he’ll make it out, if he doesn’t run onto a grizzly or some other predator along the way. Personally I wouldn’t want to be running around in a jacket smelling of fresh blood. I lied when I told him I had no pity for him. Even scum suckers deserve some pity. It’s just that I have to think of my friends first.
Scum suckers will be served last.
His jacket feels good wrapped around me, though many sizes too large. I didn’t realize how cold I was until I put it on. It slows me down a little, but the alternative isn’t acceptable. We stop inside the trees that surround the field where the helicopter and cages sit. Past them I can see a glow through the trees that mark the entrance to the cavern where Sheriff Dan is holding Mandi, Matt, and Sharon. Someone is awake, keeping a camp fire going. Not what I had hoped. Otherwise there is no visible movement. We circle to the north. This entire side of the mountain is in shadow. The moon has as good as set; a minor challenge to our visions.
The next time we stop I place my hand on Roma’s head and reach my mind into his. He is tired . . . very tired; and he is injured. I never even noticed, being too concerned with my own problems with Chubby and Baritone. His right ear is a blood scabbed mess. His right shoulder is swollen and he is walking with a lot of pain. I want to tell him to go rest, but I’m afraid I’m going to need him again. Even in his condition, with Yulya by his side, he is still a power house against Sheriff Dan and his merry band. He may have survived his waterfall ride out of the mountain, but not without damage. I dare not think about the fate of the two men who went with him. With Baritone, that’s five dead; five men dead because of greed. Do they have families? Children? If they would just stop and go away, this would all end. Leave the cats alone. Leave me . . . us alone. It’s not my fault that those men have died. I’m just trying to stay alive.
Don’t feel sorry for them, Reba. You heard what Sheriff Dan said. His plan is to kill us all. It’s us or them; simple as that.
Fine! I will not feel sorry for the sheriff if he dies. He’s a villain after all. The others are his gophers, along for the money.
Five dead gophers.
Add in those who died a year ago: Vandermill and his men, Matt’s dad, Sam . . . my mother. This is downright crazy . . . and depressing.
I sit cross-legged on the ground, my head in my hands, listening to the distant roar of the waterfa
ll, wishing I could walk away. Even if Mandi, Matt and Sharon were not in trouble, I still couldn’t walk away. I’m responsible for the sabre-toothed cats. I try to understand why, try to logic it out, but there is no logic to it. Why would a bunch of resurrected prehistoric animals rely on a defenseless human? Why would they protect her? How is it possible that they and I have this physic power with each other? Where did this physic power, which extends beyond the cats, come from? Why am I the chosen one? Will I pass it on to my children?
Will I live to have children?
Roma nudges me. He either shares in my gloom or he is reminding me that we have work to do. Probably the latter. I’m duty bound. But he is too tired, too injured. I tell him to go to where Edik, Nadia and kittens lie asleep, that he can keep an eye on them until they awake. He tells me that Vadik is already there, that he will not leave me. I hug him. “It’s you, me, and Yulya against the bad guys, Roma. Let’s try not to kill any more of them, okay?” Instead of heading out I lie down with my head against the big cat’s shoulder. I have no plan, so heading out seems rather . . . useless. And I am so tired.
I snap awake. Damn! I closed my eyes for only a second; didn’t mean to fall asleep. It is darker. The moon is completely gone, and so are the stars. Does the cloud cover mean rain, or does it just mean cloud cover? I turn on the GPS. It is 4:49. I’ve wasted too much time.
The GPS goes blank. Dead batteries. Spares are in my pack. There’s no time to get them and I probably don’t need the GPS for anything anyway. I put it away and stand up; Roma comes up with me. There is a light dizziness and my head pounds for a few seconds, but it all passes, or at least eases to something that I can ignore. I touch the bump on the side of my head and feel around my hair that is stuck in the scab and caked blood. If not for that and the growing kinks and aches throughout my body, and the lack of sleep, I’d feel good as new. I stretch and twist for a full minute.
“Don’t just stand there, do something.”
I nearly jump out of my skin at Mom’s voice. I look around. “Mom?” There is no one. I am alone with Roma. I was only replaying one of Mom’s favorite declarations in my head, my inner self using my mother to tell me to get to work.
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