Footprints. Alex Archer

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СКАЧАТЬ stay warm, too. Joey here is going to lead us all out.”

      “Can he do it?”

      Joey looked as if he was going to punch the person who asked, but Annja held him back. “Yes, he knows these woods better than anyone.”

      “What if we get lost?”

      “You won’t,” Annja said. “And I’ll be bringing up the rear so I’ll make sure no one gets left behind. Now, are we ready?”

      They all nodded. Annja breathed a sigh of relief. If she could just keep them focused on the task at hand, getting back to the safety of town and away from here, then they’d be all right.

      She looked at Joey. “You all set?”

      “Of course,” he said.

      “All right, then. Lead on.”

      Joey started off down the trail. One by one, the students fell in, forming a ragged line. Rain continued to drench them all. Annja knew she’d have to find shelter pretty quickly if she had any hope of surviving long enough to find Jenny.

      She figured the trio of gunmen were probably watching them leave. She hoped they would think that Annja had just wanted to get everyone out in one piece. Hopefully, they would believe that their threats had worked.

      Even though they hadn’t.

      The trees seemed to reach in over them as they walked down the trail. Overhead, the long spindly branches with leaf shoots and pine branches deflected some of the rain, but it was still getting very squishy on the ground. Annja’s boots left footprints behind her that quickly filled with water.

      The trail was turning into a muddy mess.

      “Joey?”

      He turned back, hearing Annja call him. “Yeah?”

      “Thanks for your help.”

      He frowned for a moment and then simply nodded. He understood that Annja would simply take off on her own at the right time and not announce her departure. The quieter she was, the better. The last thing those kids needed was something else weighing on their minds.

      Annja did find it peculiar that none of them had asked about Jenny’s welfare. But then again, when faced with mortal danger, most people do end up only considering their own personal safety.

      Jenny was on her own.

      Well, not quite. As Joey led the group around a bend in the trail, Annja saw her chance and quietly stepped off the trail. She crouched low and then slipped behind a thick pine tree.

      The rain continued to fall and the light in the sky seemed to be dimming by the second. It was already late afternoon and the addition of bad weather meant that she was looking at spending a truly dark night in the woods.

      Annja, soaked and not really knowing where she was or how to even begin looking for Jenny, was facing the very real threat of staying warm enough to survive her first night out here.

      She smirked. Funny how her bad haircut paled in comparison to the dangers she faced now.

      3

      If Annja had initially believed that the rain would taper off as the evening progressed, she was wrong. Indeed, as the sky continued to darken, the rain increased until sheets fell from the clouds above her. The forest floor ran with mud and debris while a strong wind howled around her.

      If I stay here, I’ll die, Annja decided. The good news was that the weather was a great equalizer. The men with the guns would also have to seek refuge from the storm. That meant Annja could risk setting herself up properly without fear of them showing up to shoot her dead.

      She hauled Jenny’s tent out of her backpack and immediately got it staked into the sodden ground. There was no guarantee that the tent wouldn’t fly away at the next gust of wind, but she was grateful she at least had something that would keep her reasonably dry.

      Her next task was fire. Annja could already feel herself starting to shiver. And she knew from experience that the onset of hypothermia would render her useless very soon. Her system would literally start to shut down, as her core drew heat away from her extremities and her brain.

      She pulled out her knife and started scraping at the bark of the tree closest to her. The exterior of the bark was wet but the interior would still be reasonably dry. Annja produced a handful of shavings that would easily catch a spark. She put them into a plastic bag and then in her pocket to keep them as dry as possible.

      Twenty yards from her makeshift camp, she spotted a downed tree. Closer inspection showed it overhung a fairly large area and provided substantial shelter from the rain. It was almost dry under the canopy of the dense pine. Annja could see the splintered trunk and reasoned it must have come down during a recent thunderstorm.

      She hurried back and pulled Jenny’s tent from the muddy ground. Back under the canopy, the ground was much drier. It wasn’t high enough to set up the tent under the branches, but she could stretch the tent out and use it as a tarp. It was perfect to further protect her from the elements.

      Annja also found a large pile of deadfall and the branches were almost all dry. She hacked several into smaller lengths and then scraped out a fire bowl depression in the ground. On the bottom she laid the tinder bundle and set some thin kindling sticks above it.

      Here goes nothing, she thought. She scraped her fire starter against her knife blade and saw the sparks fly into the tinder bundle. They caught almost immediately, and even with the cacophony of noise from the rainstorm, Annja could still hear the snap and crackle of the wood as it caught.

      Heat radiated up toward her and Annja shivered again, as if trying to throw the water off her skin.

      I need to get these clothes dry, she thought.

      She added more wood to the flames and set two of the thicker logs nearby to begin burning. When she was satisfied she had a sustainable fire going, Annja removed her clothes.

      Her jacket was still fairly dry, but she’d gotten wet pretty much everywhere else. She stripped off all of her clothes until she huddled around the fire nude, feeling the wood smoke curl up around her, wrapping her in its warmth.

      On the branches above her, Annja draped her clothes, letting the heat and smoke dry them out.

      The area was littered with pine boughs and Annja knew that sleeping on them could be almost a luxury if they were soft enough. The spring growth hadn’t occurred yet so they were obviously dead leftovers from before the winter snows. Still, when she gathered enough of them and lay down, it was quite comfortable.

      The wind howled around her sanctuary. I wonder where Jenny is in this mess? Annja frowned. She knew there was a chance that her friend would not survive the night without any of her camping gear. The wind, rain and falling temperature together could kill even an experienced outdoors type.

      Still, Annja knew that Jenny was remarkably resilient. And she also had a lot of training. Annja rooted through her pack and found the energy bar she always kept there along with the bottle of water she’d packed. Some feast, she thought, but at least she had something.

      The rain continued СКАЧАТЬ