“So what do you think the other trainees are doing right now?” Jonas asks me.
We are sitting under a pine tree, being sheltered from the rain, waiting for the signal that the mission is over and we can head back out of this forest. This eery forest.
“I think Minea is pouting in the corner, and I think Stefan is out at the shooting range practicing as always, imagining it’s my head that he’s shooting,” I explain.
“Come on, he doesn’t hate you that much,” Jonas says.
“Everyone does. I’m just not that likable I guess,” I shrug.
“It’s only because you execute perfectly, they’re all jealous. And you’re on an actual team, and that makes you the best in training too,” Jonas picks at pine needles above him. He doesn’t have that kind of light, joking energy. He’s still annoyed and disgruntled by the fact that we’ve been sitting here for possibly an hour without doing anything.
We sit for a few moments, in our own thoughts.
“I hate this forest,” I shiver instinctively, looking around. I always feel like I’m watched here, like I’m surrounded or something’s going to jump out at me any second now.
“Here, I’ll check the time on my MBS,” he pulls out the little tablet, and frowns.
“What is it?” I lean over, but I don’t understand what he sees.
“It’s odd, the group we split from, their dots aren’t blinking anymore. That means something went wrong with them. And I can’t see any of the red dots, for the exiles,” he points out.
“Do you think.....” I trail off.
Jonas shakes his head, “No. I mean, it’s not possible, right? They would have said sparrow, or given us some kind of warning.”
“Do we know when their dots stopped flashing?” I ask, my concern growing.
“No. But it had to have been recent. Because if it happened a while back, Captain Sergate would have done something about it, and we would have heard,” Jonas’s mind is reeling, I can tell.
I sit there, watching him think.
Suddenly, there is a snap of a branch a little while off in the forest. Maybe it was just me, because every small twitch and sound in the forest makes me think the worst.
“Jonas, did you hear that-”
Jonas puts a hand up to his lips. I shut up.
The forest is quiet, except for the pounding of the rain on the trees and the forest floor.
Jonas whispers quietly, “I think it was just an animal-”
A man jumps out of what seems like nowhere and grabs my foot. I scream and kick him off, but he’s like an animal, fighting my kicking.
In another instant, there’s a gunshot, a few, and there’s blood everywhere, all over my legs and splattered in the mud. The man is slumped on the ground.
I’m still screaming, kicking the man’s body away.
“Hanna! Hanna be quiet!” Jonas grabs me and holds his hand over my mouth, his gun in his lap.
My screams become whimpers, and then Jonas lets go of my mouth. Our breathing is heavy now. We’re listening, listening for more rabid exiles.
“Okay, we just need to find out where the other group is, and maybe go there, and then we can contact Captain Sergate and tell her what’s going on, and then figure out what to do next. Maybe we can still catch the exiles, if we hurry,” Jonas rambles.
YOU ARE READING
The Hunt
ActionIn Surga, you are either a civilian living inside the city, or a criminal banished to the forest beyond the walls. The only people protecting the city from these exiles are the military's criminal management branch. Hanna is a member of this branch...