The Hunt

In his excitement, Walsh neglected for a moment to think about Jennifer. But from where she was kneeling next to a tree, Jennifer had caught some movement out of the corner of her eye. When she turned to look, she saw what had to be Walsh taking aim at Jim with some kind of rifle!

Startled by her would-be killer's sudden proximity, Jen hurriedly twisted around while she tried to remember what Jim had said about aiming the still-unfamiliar weapon in her hands.

Now he'd said something about a sight picture? What was that about again? Thinking about the picture Jim had drawn for her to show her how it was supposed to be, Jennifer brought the rifle up to her shoulder like he'd said, aimed the best she could, and --after making sure the safety was off -- started pulling the trigger. Her initial reaction was amazement at how loud her rifle was. She did wonder for a moment it she was going to be permanently deafened from all the noise. But it didn't take long for Jen to realize that being deaf could be the least of her worries.

Her first couple of shots didn't hit anything she could see. With a little trial and error, though, she quickly got the hang of it, and her next shot blew a chunk of bark of the tree Walsh was still leaning against.

Walsh, who was just about to put one between the eyes of that son of a bitch, paused when he heard a shot. What was that, he wondered? For a second, he thought that some ammo inside the dugout could be cooking off, but he quickly changed his mind when a bullet hit the tree he was leaning against.

Acting out of self-preservation, Eli threw himself to the ground and returned fire. If the janitor was out in front of him, then it could only be Jennifer Ryan shooting at him. From the sound of all the high-velocity lead coming at him, what was also painfully clear was that she wasn't using her pistol. It would seem that Eli's prey had helped themselves to his extra supplies. Eli had to admit he was impressed; he really hadn't thought that she'd have it in her.

Still lying out in the clearing, Jim didn't know what was going on for a moment. He was just about to pick himself up from his apparently futile attempt to blow up Walsh's supplies when the shooting started. From the sound, Jim guessed the first shooter had to be Jen with her M-4; then the return fire from Walsh's rifle had started too.

Not sure what was going on, Jim did know that lying out in the open wasn't the best place to be. So after grabbing his own rifle, he crawled as fast as humanly possible to the edge of the clearing in an attempt to just to get out of sight till he could take stock and see what the hell was going on.

Banging away with her rifle, Jen had to admit this was kind of fun in a terrifying sort of way. At least it was till the tree she was lying behind started to get chewed up by the bullets Walsh was shooting back at her.

Hearing those bullets thud into the wood, Jen quickly decided that maybe she should get out of here. She did hope that Jim was all right, but she sure as hell wasn't going to stick her head up right now to find out. She started crawling back further into the bushes.

After a moment, Eli finally stopped his firing. He'd thought that he had a good bead on where Ryan was hiding and had put a lot of rounds into it. But after firing his bolt action rifle dry, Eli had decided, in the face of the serious increase in fire power his targets had acquired, that it was time to discard his trusty long rifle in favor of something a little more suitable to his current circumstances. Opening up his pack, he pulled out one of his backup weapons.

It was true that Eli hadn't considered the possibility that one of his prey would find his stash of supplies, which he could see now had been a serious oversight on his part. It was also true that he had considered the idea that, since they were armed with semi automatic handguns, he might find himself in a tight spot and need more rapid firepower than his hunting rifle alone could be expected to provide. With that thought in mind, he'd taken steps and started carrying an MP-5 submachine gun. Unloaded and with its stock retracted, the deadly-looking instrument was easily small enough to fit into his pack. Now, after pulling the weapon and its necessarily limited amount of ammo, Eli got ready to deal with these two.

As he readied himself, Eli could hear the fire coming in from Jennifer stop. Though he couldn't hear any movement, Eli had no doubt that she was out there somewhere.

Quickly glancing out into the clearing Eli found, not unexpectedly, that Stillman was gone too. Oh well, a missed opportunity, he thought with a shrug. He started off looking for Jennifer, hoping to finish up with her before the janitor could get back into the action.

Eli, of course, wasn't foolish enough to follow directly behind her. She could be sitting out there just waiting for him to move so she could get another shot at him.

No, he was going to move off to the side and parallel her, hoping to get closer and then get his own shot.

Once all the gunplay had died down, Jim -- who had ended up hiding behind a tree stump after his mad dash out of the clearing -- found he was in the wrong place, with all the action too far out in front of him to allow him to really tell what was going on. Knowing that he couldn't leave Jen out there alone with Walsh, he started moving forward as cautiously as possible, hoping that she wouldn't get spooked in all the excitement and shoot him by mistake.

After making his way through the brush, Eli at first thought that Jennifer had managed to escape. Just about the time he was going to get more aggressive in his pursuit, however, he caught movement out in front of him.

Since the human eye is keen on spotting movement, the camouflage of the uniform Jennifer was wearing only worked if she stayed still. Now knowing where she was, Eli began to quietly close in for his shot. It was an unfortunate trade-off, but the very traits that made his current weapon of choice so concealable also worked against it now. With its short barrel length and its inflexibility in only firing pistol ammunition, it just didn't have nearly the range of his long rifle; the MP-5 and weapons like it were intended as more up-close-and-personal-weapons.

Eli did have to admit that this was unexpectedly turning into one of the most exciting hunts he'd ever been on. He made a mental note to consider the idea of arranging for future groups to find this equipment stash or something like it, since he had to admit that it had certainly added a whole new element to the chase.

Jim had finally closed the distance till he thought he saw Jen lying next to a tree trunk with her eyes focused forward. Jim took a look too but couldn't see anything where she seemed to be concentrating.

When the first burst of shots rang out from an unexpected direction, it startled both of them. The shots narrowly missed Jen, thudding into the ground next to her. With a glance, Jim could see the executive scrambling madly to get behind some better cover as the shooter (who had to be Walsh, even though he was using a different weapon) fired again. He must have missed again, since she kept moving, but Jim was now able to get a good idea of where that piece of shit was hiding.

Standing up behind a tree, Eli had let loose with a full auto burst, then another and another. Changing magazines as he moved to a different spot, he soon stopped to listen to the returning fire, which had started shooting up his last hiding place.

Huddled behind another tree and thoroughly frightened herself, Jen didn't know what the hell was going on. Walsh was using some kind of gun now that shot a hell of a lot faster than the one he'd used before. Jen was still huddling there, trying to make herself as small as possible and wondering how she was going to get out of this, when the shooting started up again. This time, however, it felt like someone had come up and suddenly punched a fist into the pack she was still wearing. Not feeling any pain, which she took as a good sign, Jen didn't dare check for fear of what she would find. Instead she concentrated on keeping herself alive.

The terrified executive was just working herself up to start shooting back in the general direction the shots seemed to be originating from, when all at once she heard a sound like a machine gun started blasting from somewhere behind her. Instead of killing her as she expected, though, the bullets passed harmlessly over her head.

Almost daring fate, Jen stuck her head up in time to see bits of bark, wood, and dirt flying from a clump of trees and dead leaves fall out in front of her. Realizing it had to be Jim shooting from somewhere behind her, she could also now see someone moving around behind the area that was getting pulverized. Realizing that Walsh must be trying to get away, Jen opened up on him too.

After the bursts of automatic fire from what had to be Stillman hit his hiding place, Eli fired the clip in his MP-5 dry. Stillman fired again, though, and Jen now also opened up on him as well, so Eli knew it was time to get out. It was just getting too hot out here for him.

At first crawling, then running, he took off into the undergrowth, hoping that he could get far enough ahead to set up his own ambush as well as consider his options.

Amid the smell of burnt gunpowder and the now defining silence that settled over the area, Jim changed magazines, and after not hearing anything from out front for a moment, he figured that Walsh had taken off. Jim didn't honestly think he'd hit anything. After all, all he'd been really trying to do was lay down some cover fire for Jen, which at least seemed to have worked.

Jim overrode his first instinct, which was to go immediately after Walsh. No, he had to check on Jen first.

Quietly leaving his position, he found her still lying behind the same tree and not moving. For a moment, he was worried that she might be actually dead. With all the lead flying around here in the last few minutes, it was a real possibility. But much to his surprised relief, she must have heard him behind her, as she quickly wheeled, rifle up, ready to fire.

"It's me! It's me!" he told her quickly, still hoping that she wouldn't shoot him.

"Jesus, I though you might be dead!" she exclaimed.

"Nearly was, except for you. Thanks," he said, clearly remembering her earlier work at giving him some cover fire.

"I think I got shot," she told him, and Jim's brief flirtation with a good mood evaporated.

"Where?" He asked all business now.

"In the back. When he was shooting at me, I felt something hit me in the back, and now it feels wet."

"Hold on," he told her and quickly knelt beside her, pushing her face down to the ground. He proceeded to run his hands over her sides and back up under her pack, feeling for a wet spot. Finding one, he took his hand away to find not the expected sticky red stain of blood but instead a clear fluid. With a tentative sniff and lick of his dirty fingers, he confirmed, much to his relief, that it was water.

"How bad is it?" she asked, not sure whether she really wanted to know the answer. Jen had never been shot before, so she didn't know what to expect, but it didn't seem to hurt as much as she would have thought.

Jim didn't answer her directly but instead started digging through her pack. He pulled out one of the large collapsible water bottles she was carrying, to find it mostly empty with two holes from where the bullet went through it.

"Looks like you sprung a leak." he told her, showing her the mortally wounded bottle. Her own relief was obvious as Jim took the cap off and drank from what was left inside.

He held the water bottle out to her. "Thirsty?" he asked, with a relieved smile.

Part 5

After Eli had put some distance between himself and his would-be prey, he stopped for a moment to take some time to think and take stock of the situation, which was far from ideal.

He was now seriously outgunned by his pursuers. There were two of them, and he was alone. They would undoubtedly have plenty of supplies, while his own supply situation, while not critical yet, wasn't what he would have wanted it to be.

Considering all that, Eli knew what he needed to do. He needed to get back to the dugout to see what was left and grab what he could. However, Eli also felt that he would have to lead his pursuers further away first before he could double back in anything like safety, since he certainly didn't want them to trap him in there. Having decided on a course of action, he set out to put it into effect.

After getting Jen back on her feet, Jim got them moving in pursuit. Even after their first shoot out, they both still had plenty of ammo, and neither food nor water food was going to be a problem for days at least. Jim, for one, knew that this thing was going to be over long before then; regardless of what Hollywood thought, firefights didn't usually last more than a few minutes at most. All they had to be was lucky once and their problems were over.

Following along behind Jim while trying to move as quietly as she could through the trees, Jennifer found herself almost having a good time out here. With the sounds of battle still ringing in her ears, she felt more alert and awake than she'd been in a long time.

In college, Jen had taken psychology as part of her requirement, and the class had talked about the effects of combat on human psychology, not only the highs during battle but the letdown after. She had passed the class easily, of course, but she had never fully understood what they had been talking about till recently.

Now here she was after having been kidnapped, right out of her own office, hiking through the forest in pursuit of a man who would kill them in an instant if they didn't kill him first. She was covered in dirt and mud. There were twigs and god only knows what else caught in her long hair. She was holding a rifle in her hands that she had already fired at another human being with every intention of doing him harm -- a weapon that, this morning, she didn't even know existed -- and she found to her amazement that this was the best she'd felt since -- well, she couldn't remember when. How could that be, Jen wondered? She considered all these things as she continued checking behind the two of them and to the sides just like Jim had told her.

Carefully moving along the forest floor, Jim knew that Walsh was going to have to try an ambush somewhere -- hopefully soon, since he'd have to be worrying about the coming evening as much as Jim was. But it was already past noon, and there was still no sign of him. Jim was really starting to become concerned that Walsh had somehow been able to give them the slip.

Though at first he'd left a lot of very obvious signs of his passing, as time went by Walsh's tracks got fewer and fewer and a lot harder to find. By now, Jim was basically guessing where Walsh was going.

Finally calling a halt, the two of them knelt down back-to-back to watch all the approaches around them.

"What's the matter?" Jen asked.

"I've lost the trail," Jim told her quietly.

Rather than the recriminations that he was expecting, he just felt her sigh. "So what do we do now?"

Jim had been thinking about that himself. On the one hand, now that they could really defend themselves, he was tempted to try to signal for help, but with Walsh active out there somewhere, he still didn't like those odds. Walsh was going to be back -- he couldn't just let them go -- but where and how would he come back at them that was the question?

Now, if he were Walsh, Jim realized suddenly, what he might do -- depending on his situation -- would be to try to double back to the dugout and see whether there were any weapons or ammo he could salvage. After all, how much extra ammo could he be caring for that machine pistol he was using now?

That got Jim to thinking more about the situation. They'd covered a lot of ground so far, and all of it -- as near as he could tell -- was leading away from the supply dump. Suddenly realizing what Walsh had been up to all along with this little chase, Jim suddenly felt very stupid.

"We're going back," he told Jen. He immediately got to his feet and started back the way they had come.

"What? Why?" she asked, not understanding.

"Because that's what Walsh is going to do. He's been leading us away so he can double back and get some more hardware."

"If we're really lucky, we might be able to catch him inside that hole and trap him, so let's move."

Eli had thought that he'd finally gotten clear of his pursuers and had turned back to rearm. Setting the fastest pace he could without risking being heard by his pursuers, who would still be out there somewhere, Eli hurried on.

He wasn't in such a hurry that he wouldn't take the basic precaution of stopping occasionally to look and listen, but he couldn't detect anything. Perhaps he really had lost them, he thought. But after he considered that for a moment, he discarded the idea like an ugly shirt.

No, his pursuers were still out there. What he had to do now was stay ahead of them long enough to do what he had set out to do.

At last reaching his destination, he paused just inside the tree line to take one last look around before he headed into the dugout. Eli was just relieved that the unexpectedly resourceful Mr. Stillman hadn't left any surprises waiting inside for him.

Quickly looking the situation over, Eli could see that the grenade that Stillman had used did cause some damage but nothing too extensive. It looked like he'd tossed it in with the extra ammo for the rifles. Fortunately, though, it hadn't detonated any of it. Knowing that his time was short, Eli went deeper into the dugout and brought out another crate of ammo that was harder to find.

He quickly loaded up his pack with extra food and water and, most important, ammo, since this thing was really turning into a gun fight. He grabbed his gear and turned to leave, pausing to look out the door for a moment to make sure that he was still alone. Not seeing anyone, he moved quickly into the welcoming embrace of the trees and disappeared from view.

Jim had gotten the two of them back to the dugout as fast as he could. He knew, though, that if Walsh had any kind of a head start, he would have gotten here first and was probably long gone. That is, if the sneaky bastard wasn't just waiting for them to show up so he could kill them both, Jim thought gloomily.

Kneeling at the edge of the tree line with that happy thought, Jim knew what he had to do whether he liked it or not. "I'm going over to check out the dugout, and I need you to cover me," he told Jen. "So just stay here and keep your eyes open. Walsh could be around here somewhere, and if you see him start shooting, do not hesitate," he emphasized. Getting her nod of understanding, Jim tried hard to swallow the lump in his throat.

Sincerely hoping that he wasn't about to get drilled, Jim started forward at a zigzag rush, wanting to get to the entrance as quickly as possible.

Almost to his own surprise, he didn't get shot as soon as he stepped out of the trees. Jim was out in the open about halfway to his destination when Walsh, who had found a spot with a good view of the area around the dugout, had at last opened fire.

Stillman's sudden appearance had surprised Eli for a moment. Walsh hadn't detected his prey there before but knew they could be in the tree line somewhere; since doubling back to the supply dump had been an obvious move, he expected his pursuers to show up eventually. But even knowing all that, it still caught him by surprise when he suddenly saw Stillman come out of the trees and rush toward the entrance of the dugout.

This surprise caused Walsh to recklessly rush his shot, but with the more dangerous of the two remaining of his quarry out in the open, Eli didn't want to miss his chance to bag him here. After that, he could always take his time with Ms. Ryan, who had to be nearby as well. As Walsh fired, he knew instinctively as soon as he pulled the trigger that he'd missed and was already adjusting his aim and firing again.