Then the crack of a weapon echoed along the stones, and the person nearest them gave a soft cry. Bubbles heard the slither and thump as he fell, and the ragged breathing louder than the stifled moans. The other footsteps came back at a run and paused; even from behind the rock, Bubbles could see the glow of light as the hunter turned on a torch.
“Got one,” he said, this time loud enough for Bubbles to hear; she assumed he was talking into his comunit. “By the tattoo, it’s one of the preeves.” The comunit crackled and muttered back to him. “Right,” he said. “I’ll bring the IDs. No sign of the others.” Bubbles heard the click as he shut the comunit cover, and then a grunt and thump as if he bent to set down his weapon and lean over the body.
Then—“Got one too,” said the other man, in a harsh voice thick with pain. The hunter squealed, then gasped, and Bubbles heard the fall of another heavy body, the thrashing of limbs, the rattle and clatter of equipment banging on the rocks. The light went out. Then silence, but for a final few noisy gasps.
For the first time in her life, Bubbles envied those of her friends who had a religion: they would have had some deity to swear to, or at, or on. “We can’t stay here,” she said quietly. Her voice surprised her; it sounded as calm as if she were in her mother’s drawing room discussing the weather.
“He touched me,” Raffa said. Her voice, too, was quiet. “With a stick or something, when he prodded the briar.”
“We have to go,” Bubbles said. “They’ll send someone.” Through the gap in the stones, the smell of blood and something worse rolled as if on a stream of water. Her stomach churned.
“How can we? We can’t see anything. . . .”
“We have to. It won’t be so dark out from under this briar. Turn around and let me get past.”
“You’re not going that way?” The calm seeped out of Raffa’s voice, leaving honest fear behind.
“I want his weapons,” Bubbles said. “And his comunit, and his night goggles.”
“But then they’ll know someone came after,” Raffla said. Bubbles paused. She hadn’t thought of that. As it was, they might assume that what it looked like was indeed what happened—a victim not quite dead who killed his careless killer. If she took anything, they’d know someone else had been there. But it didn’t matter.
“They know we’re here,” she said. “They’re going to hunt until they find us. His things will give us a better chance. You stay here—we’ll go downhill afterwards.”
Out from under the briar, starlight gave a faint glow to the standing stones; in the distance, the sea glittered. Bubbles paused in the gap between the stones, listening. She could hear nothing. When she peeked out, she could see the tangle of dark forms that must be the two men’s bodies. Quickly, before fear could overwhelm her again, she forced herself to move out onto the path. Her foot slipped, and when she put her hand down it was into warm, wet, stinking slime. She choked down her nausea, and wiped her hand on the nearest body. They were dead; it didn’t matter now. She fumbled at the bodies, expecting every moment the shot that would kill her, the hiss of gas that would paralyze her.
The bodies were still warm; she hated the feel of the skin, the stiffening texture of it, as she felt around for the hunter’s night gear. Goggles around his neck, on a thong—he would have dropped them before lighting his torch. They felt wet—blood? She cut the thong with her knife, and felt around for the torch. She risked a quick flash of it. The goggles were covered with blood, which she cleaned off with the dead hunter’s shirt-tail. There was the comunit which she scooped up, and there the man’s rifle with its targeting beam. Her own hands were covered with blood, and one foot would leave bloody footprints until it dried. She flicked off the torch, and called softly to Raffa.
“Come on out—if I go back through, I’ll leave a trail. . . . We’ll leave the main trail farther down, and have this hidey-hole again later if we need it. Bring my box.” She put the comunit in her shirt pocket.
A cautious rustle, and Raffa came out with both knapsacks. Bubbles handed her the rifle, and put on the night goggles. Now she could see well enough without the torch to finish rummaging in the dead hunter’s pack. He had carried a backup weapon with a removable stock in his pack; she took that and his needler, and the dead preeve’s knife. Unfortunately the hunter had not carried an extra set of night goggles. Finally, she did her best to clean her bloodiest hand and foot, so they’d leave no more traces than necessary.
Then she led Raffa southward down the trail. Neither of them questioned who should lead; it was her island, and her duty to protect Raffa if she could. There had been a series of parallel trails down the west side of the ridge, long ago; as she recalled, you could go down almost anywhere. She ducked between another pair of standing stones, and fought through a tangle of vines, and then found the next gap downhill. To her enhanced vision, the broken slope below was empty of anything but crumbling rock and low scrub; Raffa, behind her, said, “How is it?”
For answer, Bubbles passed her the goggles; she felt suddenly blind when she took them off. “See for yourself. Pick a route, stay low, and don’t hurry. We’ve got to be quiet.”
“You need these.” Raffa passed the goggles back; Bubbles pushed them away.
“It’s your turn, and I’m supposed to know this place. I’ll go first; then you can find me. Not too close.” Her eyes were adjusting; she squeezed them tightly a moment or two, and when she opened them found she could just make out the larger rocks. Slowly, carefully, she edged downward, placing each foot with precision so that she could test the ground before putting her weight on it. She remembered reading her brother’s service manual on this sort of thing; she had found it funny. She had imagined the dapper George crawling about in the dark counting his steps on zigzags and getting dust on his impeccable trousers, or slithering on his stomach. And here she was . . . wishing she knew if crouching was enough, if she should be down flat, crawling, if the zigging and zagging from one rock to another was actually doing any good, or only taking longer. A pebble rolled out from under her foot with a faint clatter. She froze. She could hear nothing now but her own pulse beating. She took another step down, and another. The black line of trees rose toward her, welcoming.
Chapter Fourteen
“Well, well . . . hello, darlin’.” It was not a voice she wanted to hear, that confident male purr. “A gal could get hurt, wanderin’ around in the dark like you are. . . . You better let me give you a hand.” A blot of nearer darkness rose from the trees and moved toward her, boots scraping on the rock; she could see a narrow gleam that might be starlight on the barrel of his weapon.
“No . . .” She hadn’t meant to say anything, but fear left no room for the breath in her lungs.
“C’mon, hon,” he said. She couldn’t tell quite how far away he was—two meters? Three? “Wasn’t that your flitter crashed on the other side of the island? Your dad sent us out to find you. . . .” For a moment relief washed over her, but she couldn’t believe in it. Still, if he thought she didn’t know, he might not kill her right away. And if he thought she was alone, if he hadn’t seen Raffa, perhaps Raffa could still get away.
“You’re . . . one of the outrange patrols?” she asked. A confident chuckle came from him.
“That’s right, hon. And you’re gonna be fine, now. Just come along with me. . . .”
For the third time that night, Bubbles heard death close by. This time she heard the bullet smack into him an instant before the loud crack from upslope, where Raffa was. The impact threw him back, to land with a crash in the low vegetation of the slope. A few loose rocks clattered on downhill. Bubbles doubled up, retching. It was too much. She had little in her stomach to lose, but wanted none of it. She could hear Raffa coming down, much faster than she had, with the aid of the goggles.