Hunted Down Pt.1
Dusk settles over the foothills. The sun is almost gone, its last stubborn rays clinging to the horizon, and Bryony can barely make out her teammates as they flee. Bullets snap past. One splinters the tree above her. There weren’t supposed to be any troops stationed here. It was meant to be an old, abandoned base.
A hand grips her leg. Bryony swallows a shriek. It's Maddox. He crawls faster, digging into the dirt, overtaking her.
Another shot whizzes past her ear.
“Kat!” she says into the comms. “Let me cover. ”
Katya turns back. Her face is smeared with grime, her eyes wide and desperate. She shakes her head.
Bryony pushes forward, lunging until she can catch Katya and force her to stop. They tumble together behind a low rise, panting.
Her leader is trembling, exhausted. Bryony looks at the ridge above them. It's a perfect vantage. A one-way trip.
"01," Bryony says soothingly, her voice dropping to a calm she doesn't feel. "It's okay. We had a good run."
Katya shakes her head, silent. She grips Bry's vest, tries to drag her forward, but Bry catches her foot against a root and holds still. "I can hold them from the ridge. You know the math, Kat. No one leaves this place unless I stay."
Katya doesn't reply anything. Just clasps Bry's shoulder tight, pulling her into a hug. Then she lets go.
Bryony settles prone on the rocky outcrop, red braid tucked under her helmet, becoming unnervingly still. She takes a deep breath, and readies her weapon. She waits for a silhouette. She squeezes the trigger.
Bryony has reloaded her rifle two times already. She has one more magazine left. She takes a moment to think about her team. She hopes they've all gotten out now, but she won't check the comms. Not now.
She readies her weapon and fires, one, two, three. There's a muzzle flash nearby. She fires, again, and scrambles backward. The edge crumbles under her weight— she slips, bringing part of the rocks down with her as she tumbles.
For a few horrifying seconds, she's sure that this is it.
Then she lands. There's a crack and her world explodes in pain. She screams, and curls. Her hand is on fire. She opens her eyes — when did she close them? — and prods at her right arm. There's a bone sticking out. She looks away quickly.
A flashlight sweeps over the trees, and the voices get closer.
Bryrony doesn't wait for someone to find and shoot her. She cradles the broken arm closer to her chest, and runs.
The world narrows to a tunnel of pain and pine needles. Every footfall jars the fracture; bone grinds against bone like a rusty hinge. She bites down on a scream until she tastes copper, and uses the taste to stay sharp. Branches whip her face, but she doesn't slow. Behind her, the voices spread out. They're fanning the slope, sweeping downhill.
Stupid, she thinks. I should've just stayed prone, picked them off. At least I can distract them from the team a bit longer.
Guilt hurts her more than the arm. She was supposed to buy the Fools as much time as she could- if she got lucky, they'd be far enough away that they wouldn't be caught when she was killed. Instead she's bleeding, and making too much noise, drawing the hunters deeper into the woods her team, her family has just fled through. If they catch her, they'll make her talk. She knows how that goes. She's seen the after reports.
She veers left, toward the dry creek bed she remembers from the topo brief. The shore is sandy — there'll better footing, less noise. Her vision swims; black spots bloom at the edges of her eyes. Shock, some distant part of her brain notes. I have to keep moving - or pass out.
A suppressed whimper escapes when her boot catches a root. The sound is tiny, swallowed by wind, but she freezes anyway. Listens.
Radios crackle uphill. Closer than before.
She forces herself forward, shallower breaths, counting steps like a cadence. One-two-three, don't think about the white-hot poker in her arm. Four-five-six, don't think about capture. Seven-eight—
Static hisses in her earpiece. The comms. Did she accidentally switch them on? For a second there's no sound, and she thinks it's her imagination. Then Maddox's voice, low and urgent: "Red? That you?"
She doesn't answer. She can't risk them coming back for her.
More static. Then nothing.
She reaches the creek bed, slides down the bank on her hip to spare the arm. She lands on a branch. It snaps in half. A flashlight shines in her direction.
"There," someone calls in accented English. Flashlight beams stab through the trees above.
Bryony presses her back to the rocky wall, good hand fumbling for the sidearm on her chest rig. There's eight rounds left. Maybe nine. Enough to take down some of them, and one for her. She won't betray her team.
The first silhouette appears at the lip of the creek bed, rifle raised. She's shaking, but the distance is close enough.
She aims.
