The Hunters’ Eyes

Dave and Skye waited and hunted. The dogs came back for round two but the pair was able to kill two more. The rest of the pack was not stupid enough to keep pressing when they knew they could not win. Soon they fell back and headed back down the mountain in the direction they came.
“We won!” Dave said triumphantly. “I doubt the dogs are coming back any time soon.”
“Enjoy your victory while you can.” Skye commented. “They will return to the hunters.”
“Then what happens?” Dave asked. “Will they send more dogs like that again?”
“Unlikely.” Skye explained. “They sent out more dogs that returned and the ones coming back are injured. They will know we defended ourselves and that we are up here.”
“So they will come up themselves.” Dave agreed. “I don’t suppose you have any guns.”
“Guns I have lots of.” Skye commented. “Bullets on the other hand are harder to come by. They have a system, they regulate how many bullets they take with them at any time and are careful to count what they use. This way they are less likely to have their guns be used against them.”
“That is pretty smart.” Dave admitted. “It sounds like they have this figured out.”
“They have been doing it for a long time.” Skye admitted. “There has long been people that went against the state and there is a lot of interest in the upper class enjoying it.”
“Do they watch?” Dave asked. “Watch them hunt us?”

“Of course.” Skye replied. “You think they would do this just for the fun of three men? There are thousands of people watching from the comfort of the city.”
Dave looked around, paranoid that he was being watched. “How? Are there hidden cameras?”

“Don’t be stupid.” Skye replied. “They would not be able to get good shots everywhere. The hunters have a drone that follows them and thy each have bodycams. It is apparently not fun for the viewers to know where we are and might be hiding. They see only what the hunters see.”
“Well that is something I guess.” Dave replied. “But if they are coming are we safe here?”
“Nowhere is safe on this island.” Skye replied. “This mountain least of all. There are very few ways off this mountain other than the beach. We can afford to rest the night and eat what we can but in the morning, they will come up the mountain and we had better be one step ahead of them and try to get into dense jungle.”

“The jungle seems so far from here.” Dave admitted. “Wont that take days to go around the other side.”
“No.” Skye replied. “There is a faster way, A dangerous way.”
“Well I will defer to your judgment.” Dave replied. “I promised that I would.”

“Good.” Skye replied. “Because if you disobey I will kill you myself.”
Skye and Dave set up an impromptu camp as the sun set along the ragged horizon to the mountain. Though he knew that death and chaos awaited him elsewhere on the island he had to admit to almost feeling peaceful. Dave thought that even a day ago the idea of eating dog would have disgusted him…especially since he had been told by Digital Eden that dogs no longer existed. However, now that he was here he was hungry enough to consider what Skye made for him nothing short of a feast.
“You were surprised to see a dog, weren’t you?” Skye asked as she sat on the other side of the fire.

“Actually yes.” Dave admitted. “Though there are a lot of images and videos of dogs on Digital Eden they very clearly state they went extinct a long time ago.”

“You do not strike me as a man who would ever believe something like that.” Sky commented as she took another bite.
“I saw one as a kid actually.” Dave admitted. “It’s a very old and fond memory of my extended family. I even have…or had a photograph of the dog with us all. It was nothing like the ones that came after us today, it was old, small and friendly. I never found out what happened to it. I suppose that as things got stricter and stricter they got rid of them all…at least in regular population. Saving them for the mega rich…and hunters apparently. However, I kept that photograph like a prized position…I will never forget that dog.”

“They fear people like you.” Skye commented. “They want everyone to forget things that they cannot control. They have been systematically taking away everything unnecessary in order to make every person like everyone else. If everyone is the same then nobody will challenge them and everyone will just blindly believe anything they tell them.”
“Is that what happened to you?” Dave asked. “You said it was your brother that started it but I think there was more than that. You don’t strike me as someone who could willingly be that naïve.”
“I was never willingly that naïve.” Skye replied. “I just knew very well that I had to look that way. Even before stuff happened with my brother I knew there was something very wrong. When we were children our parents used to speak up against the lack of freedoms. They would have open dialogues and encourage us to ask questions and speak up. However, one day our father was…gone. Mother came back and no matter how many times we asked her about it all she would say is that he had an accident. The situation or the details were never offered but she seemed to prefer to say the same thing again and again.”

“That’s horrible.” Dave responded. “My parents died in an accident as well. I was already an adult and one day a guy is just like…hey your parents had an accident…thought you ought to know, get back to work.”
“Even if you pressed them for information it would all be lies.” Skye replied. “My brother found bits and pieces. My parents assumed, rather foolishly that the government would not actively silence people. But they had been doing it in secret for years and really started to ramp up their game. They likely executed my father for his political beliefs. Our best guess is that he confessed to all of it on order to spare my mother. The reconditioned her, brainwashing her to say nothing but what she wanted. So, she knew about her husband’s real death but could not reconcile it, her real questioning mind trapped in a brainwashed prison. It was about a year before she killed herself just to escape the pain.”

“I think that is similar to what harpooned with my parents.” Dave admitted, thoughts that were still very fresh and wounds that were still raw coming into his mind. “They didn’t back down so they were just made to disappear. However, as I am sure this was not the intent, it just strengthened my desire for answers. I tried to forget it…I really did but it always nagged at me.”
“I tried to forget too.” Skye admitted. “I wanted to pretend that things were fine because I was truly terrified of the alternative. I became pretty good at it too…pretending to be the perfect girl who did not ask questions.”
“But your brother wanted no part of it, did he?” Dave guessed. “He needed answers.”
“He did.” Skye replied. “And he disappeared. After that I could not pretend. I thought of what more they could take from me and it built a rage up from deep inside me. I could not keep it down and I got sloppy…and then I found myself here.”
“I’m impressed by your survival skills.” Dave responded. “You seem like you have been here awhile.”
“I literally have no way of counting.” Skye admitted. “I should have like carved notches or something but it didn’t occur to me until later. I just took the rage, the resentment for helplessness and tempered myself with it. My rage and hate for the system has made me stronger.”
“That makes a lot of sense.” Dave admitted. “I have a lot of anger in me and can only hope it strengthens me as such.”
“Well we will find out.” Skye said as she moved closer to the fire and curled up. “Rest now…we go through the graveyard in the morning.”
“Graveyard?” Dave asked as he laid down on the other side of the fire.
“It is kind of a grotesque trophy garden.” Skye admitted. “They take remains, effects, and all manner of things there to serve as a grizzly reminder to any that live awhile of what they do here. It is at the base of the mountain to the south. I think they assume that it discourages people from going through it and makes the mountain a better trap. You fear death, you fear that place and you will join them.”
“I will keep that in mind.” Dave admitted, not wanting to admit how incredibly tired his body was.
“You better or you will be dead.” Skye admitted. “Makes no difference to me…I will survive either way.”

Dave sighed, admitting that he did not feel safe enough to be comfortable but his body craved rest nonetheless. He let himself fall asleep, only able to hope that he would survive to live another day.
In the morning, the pair got up with the sun. Whether it had been from the action the day before or the sleeping on rocks, Dave had never felt sorer in all his life. He shook of his stiff limbs, not wanting to show weakness to his new…and only friend. They packed up quickly and started the southern decent. Skye seemed confident that the mountain paths would preclude the hunters from coming across, meaning they would have to go up and come back down from the way they had come.

Dave was cautiously optimistic, his mind steeled for this graveyard that was to come. As the group reached the bottom of the mountain they came to the edge of the Impromptu graveyard. Beyond he saw grand piles of parts and pieces from things left behind as well as grandiose makeshift graves. There was all manner of grizzly sights of crucified skeletal remains and lines of skulls nailed up to the trunks of trees. Dave could not help but be amazed in the level of effort it must have taken and whoever did it had the soul of a really messed up artist. Behind them they could hear the inhuman howls and growls of dogs with the hunting party. The Tiger would need their senses and certainly the surviving dogs had not forgotten to the rest of their pack . Dave forced himself back to the task at hand putting his hands on his hips, taking a deep breath to ready his nerves before he went on. This was not going to be easy and he knew it, even with Skye at his side there was a potential of death or worse around every corner. Skye and Dave began to move slowly, silently, even with the head start they knew if they were seen and heard from the cliffs it might cause the hunters to make a faster pursuit.

“There are several paths down.” Skye whispered. “With some luck, they will assume you saw this one and were scared off. It will give us a head start we can use to get to better places to hide.”
“Here’s hoping.” Dave replied in a similar whisper.
Dave tried to keep from looking at any of the gruesome makeshift graves with too much detail, instead focusing on Skye’s feet ahead of him as he walked.

“Why are you barefoot?” Dave asked. “Is it not dangerous?”
“I was in heels when they took me.” Skye responded. “I lost those shoes fast you can imagine. By the time more shoes made themselves available I was used to it.”

Dave nodded, it made as much sense as anything in this place did. The pair moved quickly but cautiously, making it past several cleverly hidden traps, they were blended in with the trees and bones, probably catching many a person lost in their fear of the place. Dave knew that he and Skye would be done for if they were to set one off, not just from the potential injury but it would alert the hunters to the fact they were down here. Dave realized that the graveyard stunk of death, this affronted his senses before it occurred to him that it would disguise their scent from the dogs. He considered confirming it with Skye but decided it was probably best to leave her be and let her concentrate.
Another dog howl was heard, this sounding much closer than the last. Skye grabbed Dave and then ducked into the body of an old jeep to hide. As they hid they heard their sniffs and grunts of a dog and man not too far behind them. It was shocking to Dave just how fast their persuers were following them.

“They must have split up.” Skye whispered. “There are three main paths here and they have three hunters.”
Dave leaned out ever so slowly, careful to stay obscured as much as possible within the jeep. At first, he saw nothing but soon motion caught his eye. It was one of the hunters, not the Tiger and with him he lead one of the surviving dogs. “It’s not the Tiger. One man and one dog.”
“We stay put.” Skye replied. “With luck, they will go right past us.”
“We can fight him.” Dave replied. “We can team up on him.”
“I don’t fight the hunters.” Skye replied. “Anyone who fights them gets killed. I have survived so long as I only go after the dogs…they have forgotten about me.”
“Well I don’t think he is going to go past.” Dave admitted. “I have an idea.”
“What kind of idea?” Skye asked. “It better be good or we are done for.”
“Well they are hunting me not you.” Dave replied. “That gives us an advantage.”

They had but moments to get ready and Dave hastily gave his plan to Skye, she seemed not to like it but the chances of getting caught in the open were worse. The hunter was now on ground level and hey had a few moments of being obscured by the trees. Dave found a trap, a long wooden rod with nails in it. The idea is that when triggered it would come out and skewer the ankles of any in its path. Dave made sure he was out of its swing and kicked it. The trap swing widely and stopped at the end of its arc. Dave screamed at the top of his lungs, trying to simulate the pain of it if it had gotten him. He then pulled the arm back as far as he could, bracing his legs against a part without nails and holding it at bay. He laid back and did his best impression of a man in extreme pain and waited.

Moments later the man came into view, he let go of the dog’s leash and let it run in first. With the hunter, a few meters behind the dog came toward Dave in a run. It had death in its eyes and looked hungry both for flesh and revenge. Dave lifted up his legs at the last moment, letting the attack arm of the trap swing out again, this time at the dog. The nails dug into the dog’s front, making it yelp out in pain as it was pinned against a nearby tree.

“What are you doing?” The hunter demanded as he stopped right before Dave, simply looking down and trying to figure out what happened with the trap.
“Surprise!” Dave shouted, buying another moment of deep distraction for what was to happen next.

Skye lepta in from behind, formally hidden in the bushes. She leapt onto the hunters back and began to stab at him with a knife. The massive hunter managed to get an arm up and protect his neck. He staggered back, slamming Skye into a nearby tree, trying to dislodge her. Skye called out, she was tough but the hit knocked the wind out of her. All she could do was hold on, the attack being too much as she struggled to catch her breath.

The hunter reached down and drew a handgun, he drew it up, seeming to intend to try and shoot Skye with it. Dave got up in a flash, running forward and plunging his own knife into the man’s stomach. The hunter called out in pain and instinctively tried to aim the gun at Dave. Dave grabbed the gun, trying to keep it from turning toward him and off to the side where the shot would make no difference. He struggled but the man, even injured seemed monumentally stronger than both he and Skye. Little by little the man forced his guns barrel toward Dave. It did not take any experience to know that once that nozzle was pointed at Dave it was all over. Dave needed a plan and he needed it fast. Dave twisted the knife as deeply and painfully as he could in the hunter’s stomach. The hunter lost focus and called out, giving Dave but a second of movement. Dave shoved at the gun, making it face the hunter as he pulled the trigger. A gun shot went off and for a moment Dave froze in shock. Had it worked? The hunter looked down at Dave, hatred in his eyes. However, the hatred rapidly faded as all life left the man’s eyes. The hunter then slumped onto the ground. Dave staggered back, the gun in his hands, held by the barrel. There was blood all over Dave’s front. He looked down, in shock of what had happened…he just killed a man.
“Snap out of it!” Skye shouted as she struggled to strip the man of his weapons and gear. “The others certainly heard that shot and will be heading here soon if they haven’t arlready.”
“Right!” Dave replied with a nod, moving to help Skye get the gear. Within minutes both were off toward the forest. Dave still was trying to reconcile what had happened but one thing was for sure. They had drawn first blood and proved that they were fighters. They still had the odds stacked against them but had proven that those who would hurt the helpless, could bleed, and could die.