✦ ─── [JACK] ─── ✦
The Elder buttoned her shirt, movements quick and businesslike.
"So what's the plan?"
I buckled my belt. "Traps. Everywhere. Your men plant them on every approach to the settlement."
"Traps won't be enough."
"Don't need them to be. "Just need time."
She whistled—sharp, two-toned. Three men came running from the treeline.
"Pit traps on the north trail. Spike strips on the east path. Tripwires everywhere else. Anyone comes through that jungle, I want them bleeding."
The men nodded and turned without a word, already running.
She looked back at me. "And you?"
"I'm making the cave a grave."
---
I walked back alone. Goliath stayed with the Elder's men—she'd put him on patrol, and he seemed content enough.
The jungle had gone quiet. No birds. Even the insects had stopped screaming.
Took forty minutes to reach the cave.
Isaac was still on the cot, unconscious, skin hot with fever from the wound infection. Martha had done what she could—herb poultices, clean bandages, water—but he wasn't getting better.
David sat in his cell in the corner, back against the wall, silent, watching me with those dead eyes.
I walked to the supply cache we'd taken off the dead hunters and pulled it open.
Three grenades left. Fragmentation, military-grade, pin-pull detonators.
I lifted one.
---
I set the first grenade at the main entrance.
Tied fishing line across the threshold—knee height, almost invisible in shadow. Connected it to the pin.
Anyone walks through that door fast, the pin pulls, four-second fuse, boom.
Second grenade went to the back chamber entrance.
Pressure plate. Loose stone over the trigger mechanism. Step on it wrong, pin releases.
Boom.
Third grenade was trickier.
I pulled the remote detonator from the dead hunter's radio kit. Small black box. Green light when armed. Red button to trigger.
Wired it to the grenade's pin, set it in the center of the main chamber, and covered it with loose rocks and debris. Looked like rubble.
Pocketed the detonator and tested it. Green light blinked.
If they come here, I blow it remotely. Cave collapses. Everyone inside dies.
---
"Things don't look good, do they?"
I turned. Martha stood in the side chamber entrance, arms crossed, face tight.
"Worse," I said.
She walked closer and looked at the wires, the rocks, the hidden grenade. "What's your big move?"
I finished securing the last wire, fingers working the knot tight. "If we have two days, might work out."
"A new site?" She gestured at the cave walls. "Since you are turning this into a tomb."
I didn't answer. Just looked at her.
She exhaled and stepped back toward Isaac's cot. "We're fucked, aren't we?"
I stood and wiped my hands on my pants, then glanced at Isaac. Still unconscious, breathing shallow.
'He's not walking out of here.'
Eyes on me.
I turned. David was staring from his cell, silent, waiting.
I turned away.
---
I was checking the main entrance tripwire—making sure the tension was right—when I heard it.
Metal scraping. Quiet. Deliberate.
Then a voice—low, whispered.
I stood and walked toward the cells, then turned the corner.
David's cage was open, door swinging on its hinges.
Rachel stood in front of it, key in her hand.
David was gone.
---
"What did you do?"
She didn't run. Just stood there, shoulders sagging, chin up.
"I let him go."
I stepped closer. "Where?"
"I don't know. Into the jungle. Away from you."
My hand went to my belt. To the knife.
'No point. She's dead out there anyway. Both of them are.'
"He's my son." Her voice was quiet but firm. "You were going to leave him here to die."
"He tried to kill Isaac," I said. "Threatened to kill me."
"I know what he did." She looked at me, eyes red, face hollow. "Doesn't change what he is to me."
I stared at her.
'She freed him. He's loose. Armed with knowledge of this place. Vengeful. Dangerous.'
"I'm going with him," she said.
"You won't survive out there."
"Maybe not." She stepped toward the exit. "But I won't watch you kill him either."
She stopped at the entrance and looked back. "I'm sorry. For everything."
Then she turned and walked into the jungle.
I didn't stop her. Just watched her disappear into the trees.
Stood there alone.
---
I turned back to the detonator and finished the wiring. Tested the trigger. Green light blinked.
I found them in the main chamber—Chloe and Mia packing supplies, Sophie sitting with Lydia, Martha hovering near Isaac's cot.
"Everyone pack. We're leaving. Now."
Chloe looked up. "Leaving? Where?"
"The Elder's compound. We're consolidating."
Mia's voice went tight. "What about David? And Rachel?"
"They're gone."
Silence.
Chloe stared at me. "Gone where?"
I didn't answer. Just looked at her.
She understood—either I killed them or they ran. Either way, they weren't coming back.
She didn't ask again.
---
Martha knelt beside Isaac's cot. "Isaac can't walk."
"Then we carry him."
She and Chloe made a stretcher—two bamboo poles with a blanket tied between them. They lifted Isaac carefully. He groaned but didn't wake.
I took one last look at the cave. Remote detonator in my pocket.
'If they come here first, this whole place goes up. If they don't, I still have it as backup.'
I turned and walked out.
---
We moved through the jungle slower than my solo trips. Isaac's stretcher made it difficult, and Sophie struggled with the pace, but no one complained.
They knew something was wrong. No one asked questions.
Took an hour and a half.
The Elder's compound came into view. Her men saw us and opened the gate.
The Elder was waiting in the courtyard. She saw my whole group, saw Isaac on the stretcher, and raised an eyebrow.
"More mouths to feed."
"I'll do the feeding," I said.
She smirked. "I'm sure you will."
She gestured to her women. "Find them rooms. The wounded one goes to the medical hut."
Martha followed Isaac's stretcher. Chloe, Mia, Sophie, and Lydia were led to different buildings.
The Elder and I stood in the courtyard as people settled in.
I stopped.
Heard it—distant, low, rhythmic.
Rotor blades.
I looked up through gaps in the canopy.
Shapes moving. Dark. Fast.
Helicopters.
Not one. Not two. Four.
Flying in formation. Military precision.
They passed overhead. Didn't land. Just... scouting.
Then gone.
The Elder exhaled. "Fuck."
"They're here."
We stood there, watching the empty sky, listening to the rotors fade.
"That was recon," I said. "They'll be back."
"How long?"
"Hours. Maybe less."
We turned and started moving. Orders to give. Traps to check. Weapons to prep.
War was coming.