Once in a Lifetime

45

Lori Talbot walked up behind the Jeep. "Lori..." Scott began.

She cut him off. "I found this." She held up a bloody lacrosse stick. "It's Brett's, and he's missing, and I hear gunshots."

Scott frowned. "How do you know it's his blood?"

Lori met his eyes. "Because he's my brother. It's mine too."

She led Scott and Tabitha to Brett and Liam. Malia joined a short time later. Liam found an arrow. "Here."

Scott turned to Lori. "I think he set a trap. He's fighting back. And now we know he's alive."

She nodded. "But he's still hurt. We need to find him. He needs to know we're here."

She prepared to howl, but Malia stopped her. "You want the hunters to know we're here too?"

Liam frowned. "He's new. We can take him."

"What if Brett howls back?" Malia countered. "He'll lead the hunter right to him."

Scott shook his head. "No, we can find him. There's no human that can track sounds faster than we can. And we've got the advantage; we've done this before. We know what we're doing, guys."

Malia focused on catching a scent and frowned. "How come I can't catch his scent?"

"He's masking it," Lori told them.

"Can someone tell him not to?"

Liam noticed a set of tracks. "He went this way."

Lori followed Liam while Tabitha, Scott and Malia remained behind.

Scott turned to his friends. "His trap didn't work."

Malia shrugged. "Maybe this hunter is not such an amateur."

"Or maybe he's still learning."

The trio caught up to Liam and Lori who were still searching for Brett's trail.

Malia stopped. "The trail's gone."

Scott frowned. "Uh, maybe he just stopped bleeding."

"God, I think we should split up," Liam suggested. "Lori and I go this way, you guys go that way. Tabitha goes with one group or the other. Or maybe we go in four directions?"

Tabitha shook her head. "Right now we have the advantage. It's five against one."

Liam met her eyes and began arguing. "Not if we split up. Right. I've been doing this the past three months without your help. I think I can make a decision."

"Sure. Maybe you can, but you've never dealt with hunters before."

Malia frowned. "Well, if you're deciding to do something stupid and die, then go ahead."

"It's one hunter, one amateur who doesn't know what they're doing," Liam reasoned.

"Scott?" Malia called, seeing that he'd stopped.

Tabitha knelt next to Scott as they looked at the tracks on the ground. Scott met her eyes. "There's another."

"Two of them?"

Scott turned to Lori. "Maybe more."

"How many hunters have you seen out here before?" Lori asked.

"A lot."

Malia glanced at Liam. "Still wanna split up?"

Liam shrugged. "We can deal with it. We just need to find Brett's trail."

They trekked on and Lori stopped in front of a pile of rocks. "No, we don't. Rock balancing. Satomi taught us. It's him, and I know where he's going."

As they trudged through the tunnels, Lori's panic worsened. "He's been poisoned. That's why he's not healing. What if he only has a few hours left to live?"