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Lying in wait.

Ready to impart more torment on Elena.

I refused to allow him to do it.

The farther that I climbed, the more the sound of the rest of my crew faded into the distance.

Everyone dispersed on different trajectories as we scattered into the night.

Finally, something caught my eye to the right. A flash of a shadow in my periphery. I shifted course and drove myself in that direction.

Movement wisped through the trees.

A shape of a man.

My blood drummed. A crash of barbarity that blasted through my being.

I had my gun out, my flashlight in the other hand, my wrists crossed so the beam would illuminate my target.

“You might as well fucking stop because there’s no chance you’re getting away!” I shouted.

My command shattered through the leaves, but it didn’t slow him.

I ran the way he’d gone, cutting through a cramped thicket of pines. Bark scraped across my upper right arm as I cut between.

Another flicker of movement to my left, and I surged that way. My heart screamed with the exertion. The pound of my boots on the soft earth thudding with each manic beat.

He was right up ahead.

Darting back and forth between the trees.

A gunshot suddenly pierced the air.

Pinged into a tree trunk just above my head.

I dove to the ground, and the scent of mulchy, decaying leaves flooded my nostrils.

Fury pumped like a sieve.

I was back on my feet in a second flat, though I killed my flashlight so he wouldn’t have clear sight of me. I ducked and darted between the trees and rocks.

Hunting the pathetic scum as he fled.

Another shot ricocheted against a rock, and little shards of stone splintered six feet above my head.

“Fuck,” I wheezed beneath my breath, trying to gather my senses.

To keep my cool when the flames consumed.

When I felt him start to run again, I whirled out from behind the boulder, keeping low as I hustled up on the right side of him.

He started firing, shot after erratic shot.

But he couldn’t quite make me out in the drone of the night, and I quickly erased the distance between us.

The shouts of my brothers boomed through the air, no doubt turning course and coming my way with the sound of gunshots.

Backup, though I had to be at least half a mile, if not a full one, away from them.