Backwoods (15 page)

“Only on the inside,” she’d assured.

“I just…the past couple of days have been
really cool, nice even,” he’d said, trying again. “I like spending
time with you and I’d like to continue. Spending time with you, I
mean.”

That hint of a smile had widened, melting
that awkward tension that had lingered between them. “I’d like
that, too.”

“I’m sure O’Malley’s fine,” Andrew told her
now, watching as she continued wearing a path into the floor
outside the dining room.

“This just isn’t like him,” she insisted.
“I’ve looked everywhere. I knocked and knocked on the door to his
room, but there was no answer. He’s not in the building and I’ve
asked around. No one has seen him since yesterday.”

“Didn’t someone mention last night that Major
Prendick had been looking for him?”

Dani nodded. “Yeah. But Prendick hasn’t seen
him, either. I asked. Thomas was treated for post-traumatic stress
disorder after he came back from Iraq. He told me he’d just gotten
out of some kind of hospitalization program with the VA. I’m
actually surprised they deployed him here.” Her brows lifted, her
eyes round and worried. “What if he’s had a blackout or flashback?
What if he wandered off into the forest, thinking he’s back in
Fallujah or something? He could hurt himself or someone else
or…or…”

“You want me to go?” Andrew cut in gently and
she stopped stalking long enough to blink at him in surprise. “I’m
a pretty good hiker. If you’ve got some maps of the area, I can
probably scavenge some gear from my Jeep.”

“That would be great,” she said. “You sure
you wouldn’t mind?”

He laughed. “It’s not like I’ve got anything
else to do this afternoon.”

The rear compartment of the Liberty had a
distinctive odor, Andrew discovered as he popped the back
hatch.

“
Eww.”
Dani wrinkled her nose, fanning
her hand in front of her face.

He recoiled momentarily, wincing as the
pervasive stink of mildew silt struck him. Though most of the
interior had dried, a thick dribble of sludge plopped down from the
edges of the hatch door to the garage’s concrete floor.

“You’re not going to find anything worth
salvaging in there,” Dani said, keeping a modest distance, out of
smelling range.

“My bag should be okay,” Andrew said, making
her laugh.

“What is it, a submarine?”

“No.” He found the pack now, wedged in the
aft compartment against the rear seatbacks. Grasping it by a
shoulder strap, he pulled it loose, grimacing as more sludge
splattered. “It’s a class five bag, fully submersible. It should be
fine.”

After checking the contents and finding
everything dry, he drew the padded straps of the backpack over his
shoulders. Cinching the waist strap into place around his midriff,
he shrugged a couple of times to get everything situated
comfortably. Meanwhile, Dani stripped and scrubbed down the .22
rifle he’d kept stowed in the Jeep, cleaning the bolt and chamber,
bore-brushing out the barrel.

“Think it will be okay?” he asked as he slung
the .22 over his shoulder. “It was pretty jammed up with mud.”

“Hopefully you won’t have to shoot it and
find out,” she replied, not instilling him with confidence.

She followed him to the garage bay door and
watched as he started off for the adjacent woods. “Andrew,” she
called out, and he paused, glancing back at her. “Be careful,
okay?”

He smiled. “I’ll be back before you know
it.”

Pine needles whispered as low-lying limbs
swung and swished back into place behind him. It was cool outside,
but not unseasonably so. Rain clouds, heavy and grey, draped down
toward the tree crowns, and the air felt humid with a lingering
haze of moisture. It had rained overnight and the ground beneath
his boot soles was soggy, his feet sinking deeply into the mud and
fallen leaves.

“Any ideas where to start?” he’d asked Dani
as they’d looked over the maps together.

“Try here.” Sweeping her fingertip on the
page, she’d indicated a broad circumference of space. “That’s where
we’ve been having some tactical maneuvers these past weeks, so it’s
someplace he’s familiar with.”

The area looked to be about an hour’s hike
from the compound, by Andrew’s estimation. Dani had given him a
general idea of where the soldiers had blazed a trail to these
training grounds, and presently, Andrew came upon a crude but
clearly delineated footpath winding into the woods. As he followed
its steep, crooked trail deeper into the forests, he breathed in
the moist fragrance of the forest air—pine sap and dried leaves—and
listened to the familiar sounds of pine needles and tree branches
snapping and crackling underfoot.

At which point, he drew to a curious halt,
his head cocked, his brow arched.

There are no other sounds,
he
realized.

On the day he’d wrecked his Jeep, he’d been
trekking through basically these same woodlands, and the air had
been thick with the sounds of wildlife—the last waning cricket
songs as summer shifted into fall, the fluttering coos of mourning
doves, the resonant
tap-tap-tap
of downy woodpeckers, the
distant, overlapping cries of ravens and blue jays, chattering from
chickadees and sparrows, sweet refrains from warblers and mocking
birds.

Where are all the birds?
Frowning,
Andrew looked up, panning his gaze through the trees. Other than
the sounds of his own footsteps, which were now silent, the woods
lay shadow-filled, mist-draped and quiet.

Something’s out there.

“O’Malley?” Slowly, cautiously, he pivoted in
a circle, studying the terrain surrounding him. “Corporal O’Malley,
is that you?”

Because he received no reply, his next
thought was unequivocally
predator.
As he stepped, he gave
his shoulder a subtle little shrug, letting the strap of his rifle
droop, the gun lowering so he could take it in hand. All at once,
he had a nagging hunch this was no bear. They were opportunistic
feeders, not stealthy hunters, so he doubted one could lay low and
quiet in the underbrush for long if it was near.

But with cougars on the other hand,
stalk-and-ambush was pretty much their forte. The cats preyed on a
variety of species, including mule- and white-tail deer and would
thus not have been particularly intimidated or dissuaded by
Andrew’s size. Not the sort for a trial by combat, they preferred
to overpower their prey using the element of surprise, attacking
from behind and delivering a suffocating and potentially crushing
bite to the neck.

Moving slowly, Andrew spared a downward
glance, making sure he had a round chambered in the rifle. He
gripped the weapon deliberately, carefully, his index finger
slipping against the trigger. He turned in another circle, then
drew still and held his breath, listening.

Snap!

A twig breaking beneath the weight of some
unseen passage to his right immediately drew his gaze. When this
was followed by a soft, but distinctive, rapid-fire
rustle-rustle-snap-SNAP
from this same direction, Andrew
brought the rifle up, trailing the sound with the barrel sight.

However, he didn’t fire. The sound
disappeared and when it didn’t immediately recur, he relaxed,
releasing his breath in a long, slow huff. Lowering the gun again,
he studied the shadows and trees, frowning thoughtfully.

Had it realized his awareness and run away,
whatever it was? He waited, counting in his mind.

One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three
Mississippi

He counted to sixty then started off again,
but that heavy, peculiar silence lingered. Even as he ventured more
deeply into the forests, it was like the birds and other woodland
animals knew something he didn’t—or at least, of which he was only
dimly aware.

Twenty minutes later, and a good half mile
further along the trail, he heard another distinctive series of
rustles. These were quiet enough that he might have ordinarily
otherwise missed them had it not been for that oppressive lack of
any other sounds. He’d opted to keep his rifle in hand and was glad
for it as he turned in a startled semi-circle, eyes flown wide.

“O’Malley?” he called. There was no reply,
but out of his peripheral vision, he caught a sudden hint of
movement and swung again. “Who’s there?”

There was no answer, only that permeating
stillness, devoid of any rustling, any bird songs, any life. This
time, when Andrew started to move again, he broke into a broad,
swift stride, weaving among the trees, ducking to avoid low-lying
limbs.

From behind him:
Snap-snap-SNAP

He turned, rifle readied, but saw nothing.
Then, from his right, the crackling of leaves under heavy foots;
from his left, the staccato patter of breaking limbs. He whirled
around, rifle raised, his heart racing.
They’re all around
me.

This was no cougar, no pack of coyotes on the
prowl.

“Who’s there?” he shouted, his voice hoarse,
somewhat shaking. At another quiet yet somehow ominous rustle, he
pivoted and caught sight of something to his left, moving swiftly
among the shadows and tree trunks—large and definitely upright,
bipedal, it was little more than a fleeting glimpse, but still
distinctive.

He thought of the thing he thought he’d seen
on the night of his crash, the bipedal creature that had been
scuttling across the road, that had screamed at him in furious
challenge less than a second before the Jeep had slammed headlong
into it.
Not a bear,
he thought.
It wasn’t a bear and it
wasn’t a cougar, and unless it was my imagination, I don’t think it
was human, either.

“Shit.” Andrew heard more rustling and then
turned, began to run. Based on what he’d heard, there were at least
three of the things in the woods—one behind him, one on either
side, all moving in on him quickly, deliberately. And he had no
intention of sticking around to find out why.

His boot soles skittered for uncertain
purchase in the slippery carpet of leaves and brambles. Twice, he
lost his footing, falling onto his knees, his ass, and he scrambled
upright as fast as he could. When at last, he came to a stop, he
pressed himself against the broad trunk of a pine tree, winded. He
wanted to gasp, to gulp greedily to reclaim his breath, but pressed
his lips together instead, listening.

Did I lose them?
he wondered. He’d cut
a zig-zagging, erratic path through the woods on purpose in the
hopes of shaking off anyone who’d tried to follow him.

He poked his head around the side of the
tree, listened and waited.

One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three
Mississippi

He didn’t even make it to ten-Mississippi
before he heard footsteps crashing through the brush, coming up
fast.

“Shit!” Andrew ducked out from behind the
tree and ran again, pumping his arms, his feet pounding against the
muddy ground. He ran like he’d never in his entire life, until the
frantic cadence of his heart left him feeling as if it would leap
clear out of his chest, until his breath was so ragged, he was
nearly gagging. He ran until he felt something catch against his
ankle, something that drew abruptly snug as he bolted past, and in
an instant, just as he realized what it was…

Snare line!

…he was jerked off his feet, whipping ass
over elbows into the air, caught in a rope trap that left him
swinging in a wild, swooping arc at least twenty feet in the
air.

“Shit!” Andrew screamed, because everything
in his line of sight was now topsy-turvy, looping and circling, and
all of the blood was rushing into his face, his brain.

“Shit!” he screamed again, his rifle tumbling
from his hands to the ground below. It hit the forest floor and
bounced off the carpeting of leaves and pine needles. He’d
chambered a round earlier, and now it discharged with a sudden
cloud of smoke and a thunderous
BOOM
that seemed deafening
in the otherwise quiet woods. In its aftermath, as it reverberated
through the trees and against the low-lying clouds overhead, Andrew
heard the rustle of footsteps again, this time running away. From
his vantage, upside down and dangling, he caught sight of four
figures, little more than shadows, darting away from the clearing
below, fanning out into the woods in opposing directions.

“
Shit!”
he screamed a third time, as
he careened face-first into something dangling upside from the tree
next to him. He didn’t even realize what it was at first. All he
knew was that he struck it headlong and it stunk like all hell,
pungent like soured milk or some putrefied sort of cheese.

Andrew put his hands out to push it away from
him, and as he swung back in a wide arc, he could see it now—the
desiccated remains of a human being likewise strung up by the
remains of its ankle. Its parchment-like flesh had peeled back and
fallen away, exposing blackened tissue and underlying bone beneath.
The head and torso had decomposed enough to leave the skull almost
entirely exposed, open and empty eye sockets glaring, its toothy,
skeletal mouth hanging wide. Scraps of hair, scraggly tufts poked
out of what was left of its scalp, and as Andrew swung back toward
it, helpless to stop himself, screaming the whole time, he could
see the corpse wore the tattered remains of an Army uniform.

He yowled in disgusted horror as he plowed
into it again, sending it twisting and turning by the short length
of its tether. The recent heavy rains had left the corpse heavy and
sodden and this time, when he pushed away from it, his hands
punched through the husk of its chest cavity. His fingers splayed
into damp, spongy flesh beneath and released a tumble of wayward
beetles and maggots, the last stragglers of what had surely once
been a ravenous infestation.

“Jesus Christ,” Andrew cried, flapping his
hands wildly, trying to get the putrid flesh, the slimy remains off
him. He felt his stomach wrench and he gulped, choking on bile,
struggling not to vomit.