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We started down the hill toward the beach, our guns at the ready, eyes peeled for any sign of an ambush.
Who who!
Zane paused, which caused Rix to crash into his back, Jorik to crash into Rix’s back and me to crash into Jorik’s back.
“It’s just an owl,” I whispered.
Zane shook his head.
Unease prickled along my arms, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Another chill wracked my body.
“Get down!” Zane yelled, and before I could even blink, five soldiers all in black popped up out of the bush, guns out.
But Zane, Jorik and Rix were too fast, and all five men were shot, their bodies collapsing into the shrubbery before the echoes of the gunshots had even faded off into the ether.
I inhaled, and that inhale brought an unfamiliar scent. I glanced back up into the trees to where I thought that owl had been, and that’s when I saw the red laser beam pointed directly at Rix’s chest. I lifted the Filton 390 and was about to pull the trigger when Zane swung around and shot. The sniper fell out of the tree, falling to the earth in a crunch.
I blinked.
There were too many smells. Too many sounds. Too many heartbeats.
I hadn’t been trained in an environment like this.
Yes, my senses were superior to the average human’s. They were more comparable to those of a panther, but I’d been raised and trained in a controlled, sterile environment. My entire brain was on overload right now.
I loved the sounds and smells of the forest, but they were clogging my brain and my senses and making it more difficult for me to distinguish the scents of fresh bear scat and a nearby soldier with a gun. The same went for sounds. Too many rustles and shuffles drew my attention every which way, so I was unable to focus on one particular sound, on one or two particular heartbeats.
How did I think I’d be able to survive out in the real world alone?
No amount of simulations had prepared me for this.
I was weak. I hated feeling weak. Not when I knew I was stronger.
The idea that simply being removed from my natural environment could be my demise made anger burn hot and acidic in my stomach. I was finally free. I couldn’t go out like this. This was not the end of my story.
Did Neffers know that all along? Was this all just a big setup?
The idea that I needed these three men to survive sat like a scalding weight on my chest, crushing me and burning me at the same time.
In a training simulation, I would have noticed that sniper before anybody else. Heard him, smelled him, sensed his heartbeat. But not out here. Out here I was useless. I knew what I felt was embarrassed, and it wasn’t an emotion I was comfortable with, not at all.
Out here I was overwhelmed. Unable to focus.
And it seemed these three quickly realized that, too.
The look Zane was giving me had me breaking his gaze and digging my nails into the heels of my palms. He saw me as nothing more than a liability. A hindrance to their freedom, despite the fact that had I not planned my own escape, they wouldn’t be free themselves.
“That’s not it,” Rix said softly.
Zane and Jorik shook their heads.
“There’ll be more down on the beach, and they know we’re here,” Jorik said.
Zane did a couple of quick finger movements and that sent Rix and Jorik in opposite directions, just like they had when we were approaching the survival pack with caution. Zane stayed with me, though his irritation at being stuck on babysitting duty was rolling off him in hot, caustic waves.
“Stay down,” he murmured.
I nodded, my gun at the ready.
