Tom Isbell - The Prey

“No blood,” I said, confused.

“Rubber bullets,” Cat explained. “Not meant to kill. Not at first, anyway.”

It was a game: four men with assault rifles versus six LTs with none. Predators vs. prey.

With Cannon supporting his injured friend, the LTs continued running. When they’d covered a good quarter mile, the three men revved their engines and took off. They weren’t letting the LTs go; they were merely giving them a head start. For sport.

Far behind them sat the Man in Orange, arms crossed, observing from a distance. He was their guide. The hunt master.

The men steered the ATVs to the outer rim and corralled the six LTs, shooting wildly. Another boy went sprawling, clutching his face. When he pulled his hands away I saw a slick coating of blood dribbling down his cheek. A bullet got him in the eye.

The ATV whizzed away in search of moving targets. More challenging game.

One Less Than jumped into a stream. He lost his balance and fell face-first into the water with a splash. A four-wheeler followed, coming to a stop directly on top of him. The LT’s arms flailed as he struggled for air, his head below water. The driver laughed.

Two more were brought down in quick succession. Pop! Pop! They lay motionless on the ground.

One of the remaining LTs ran for a scraggly pine, leaping for its outstretched limbs. He swung his legs up over the branch and began to climb.

The men treated him like target practice and riddled him with bullets. When the LT fell, his body sailing through twenty feet of air, he landed hard atop his head. There was no mistaking the sickening sound of his neck snapping in two.

Only two were left: the boy with the missing eye, and Cannon, standing by his side, shielding him from further bullets.

The men seemed intent on prolonging the moment, orbiting the two LTs in ever-closing circles. The heaviest of the group reached into a back compartment and pulled out a jug. They passed it around, each taking deep gulps from whatever homemade brew it contained. Only when the sun settled behind the far ridge did the shooters put away the jug to finish off the LTs.

But when one of them lifted his rifle, Cannon cocked his arm as though making that familiar throw from third to first and gunned a rock forward. It hit the rifleist square in the face. Blood gushed from his nose like a fountain.

While his two companions looked on in a drunken stupor, Cannon raced forward, kicked the wounded man off the ATV, and hopped on himself. He picked up his injured friend, and the two of them went zipping across the pasture, wind sailing through their hair.

When the two other shooters finally understood what was happening, they began to fire wildly. The alcohol made them too unsteady to get off a decent shot.

Cannon and the wounded LT inched closer to the far edge of the valley. They were going to make it. It took everything in my power to refrain from cheering.

I had forgotten about the Man in Orange.

He gave his head a weary shake, and uncrossed his arms. Removing his rifle from its scabbard, he placed Cannon squarely in his sights. From a distance of half a mile he pulled the trigger. Smoke plumed from the barrel; the crack of the rifle shot followed a full second later.

The bullet struck Cannon in the back of the head and both LTs went flying.

By the time the other two men raced forward—now no more than ten yards from their quarry—Cannon had pushed himself to a standing position and round after round landed in his abdomen, his arms, his legs.

He remained standing longer than any human could under such circumstances. He refused to be brought down. Finally, a bullet exploded in his face and he flew backward, landing hard on the ground. This time he did not move.

The Man in Orange joined the others. When he was a couple of feet away, he finished off Cannon and the other LT himself. We could see the bodies quiver with each shot.

The shooters made their way to Cannon’s corpse. One of the men posed with the body as though it were big game he’d brought down on safari. His friend snapped a picture—the camera flash a miniature lightning strike.

When the four ATVs rode out of the valley, their sport completed, they left behind the corpses of six Less Thans, each only a year older than me.

Then the red pickup returned, jostling to a stop when it reached a corpse. The two Brown Shirts went to the body and swung it back and forth until they had enough momentum to fling it into the truck’s bed. Thud! They drove to the next bodies and repeated the process— thud! thud! —their movements weary and nonchalant. As if they’d done this a hundred times.

When all six dead LTs were loaded in the back, the truck bounced back the way it’d come, its red taillights shining like devil’s eyes before disappearing into the darkness.

Just like that the valley returned to its peaceful self.

“Who were they?” Flush demanded as Cat led us back to camp.

“Hunters,” Cat said.

“But why’d they do that?”

“’Cause you’re a bunch of Less Thans.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re not only less than normal, you’re less than human.”

“So what’d those LTs do that got them punished?”

Cat stopped. “You’re not listening. You all are prey, and your camp is one big hatchery. Those six LTs did nothing more than have the bad luck to get sent here. Period.”

“A hatchery?” Flush repeated.

“A place where fish are raised, then released into rivers so fishermen have something to catch. You’re just a bunch of Less Thans—being raised to be hunted.”

“So why teach us anything at all?” I asked.

“’Cause otherwise it’d be like shooting fish in a barrel. If it’s too easy, it’s not sport. There’s gotta be some challenge.”

In its own sick way it made a kind of sense.

For the next hour no one spoke. We descended through dense woods, moving as quickly as darkness allowed. Skeleton Ridge was no place to be at night. I don’t think I took a breath until we caught sight of the camp far below, its lights sparkling.

“How do you know all this?” I asked.

“Because I’ve been on the run. I’ve seen people. I’ve talked to them.” His eyes grew suddenly distant. “Before I came here, I stayed with a man and his two daughters. They put me up in their cave. They told me things—like how afraid they were of the Republic and its Brown Shirts. They were running from soldiers. Everyone’s running from soldiers.”

“But that doesn’t—”

“Listen,” he said, his piercing blue eyes cutting through the dark. “All of this is true—the proof is right under your nose. Or under the Brown Shirts’ noses. You rescued me in the desert, I told you about the Hunters. That makes us even. What you do with this is up to you—I don’t give a shit. I’m getting the hell out of here and going to the next territory.”

With that, he turned and scrambled down the mountain.

That night my mind was reeling. I dreamed of her again: the woman with long black hair. We were running through the field of prairie grass, the air so pungent with gunpowder it wrinkled my nose. Behind us came the same awful sounds as before: screams, explosions, the sharp crack of bullets.

Only this time there were others running, too. Cat. My friend K2. Cannon. All running for their lives.

The old woman pulled me low to the ground, and when she opened her mouth to speak, I didn’t force myself awake. This time I let her talk.

“You will lead the way,” she said.

I waited for more.

“I—I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I stammered. “ What way? And who on earth will listen to me ?”