The scenery turns breathtaking when they ditch the asphalt and hike a few miles into the woods.
The trees are a scenic mixture of deciduous and evergreen, meaning there is a stunning contrast of emerald needles, and lighter yellows-reds from the shedding foliage. The air is so clean that every inhale is healing her from the exhaust-laden docks she worked in, and the temperature is just cool enough to wick the sweat from her brow without nipping her nose. Rich earthy smells permeate the air as well, from the spicy scent of sap, to the familiar scent of crisp leaves that are begging to be crunched underfoot. The mountains surrounding them are stunning, just waiting to be the muse of some burgeoning artist, and the sky is the kind of blue that only seems to exist on clear, early fall days.
"I'm sorry, what?" Mac asks, voice shrill enough to scare up a flock of birds. They flutter away with the sound of protesting cries and heavy wing flaps.
"Watch the tone," Victor growls, carrying absolutely nothing on him. Well, he could be carrying something in his diva jacket that she can't see, but there is no pack on his back, which really kinda pisses her off. Everything about the man pisses her off, especially now that she has a couple hours of actual sleep and real food in her
The beds and the halfway decent dinner should have been a tip-off, but she thought that maybe he was actually coming to the understanding that real people need food and sleep. She understands now that Victor was fattening them up and making sure they were good sport for the morning hunt.
Literally.
"Seriously, Victor. The Most Dangerous Game came out in like nineteen twenty-something. It's not original anymore. There's no more speak easies, and your aren't actually that old, so try-"
"Older."
Mac stops, her brows furrowing as she works that statement out.
"Shit, really?" Ana asks deadpan. Her dark eyes actually have hints of color in this lighting, spots of deep mahogany shining through. They make her seem more lively than she has been, even if her body and voice haven't quite gotten the memo.
"I worked on the railroad that runs through here," Victor informs them calmly, and Mac's mind whirls at the implications of that statement. If she remembers correctly, the Canadian Pacific Railway was built sometime in the eighteen eighties, which is roughly a hundred and twenty-ish years ago. Considering he'd have to look old enough to actually work the lines, he'd have to be at least an adolescent. Which means the huge asshole with the old timey sexism and assholeishness may have come by it honestly.
Mac glances at the man. He doesn't look older than his late twenties, early thirties maybe. Considering he's over a century old, she's kinda pissed. Stress has given her early crows feet already.
The man she's examining seems pleased, his face relaxed. The aspect of the little trial he has set up for them, some amalgamation of Richard Connell's novel and a field training exercise developed by the world most sadistic commanding officer, must ease some of the tension he has about...well, Mac has no idea why he's tense. He just seems calmer here, in the asscrack of nowhere.
Maybe the terrible evil in him is only at peace when he's in the woods, testing complete strangers on a whim.
The directions are simple at least. Survive, and if possible, try and incapacitate Victor before he incapacitates them.
No. He literally said that. Well, not incapacitate. His exact words were 'Go ahead and try and stop me, but if your aren't good enough, I'll kill you.'
Or something like that anyway. She's taken to purposefully not listening.
"Wait, you are a mutant, right?" Mac clarifies, part of her mind still stuck on his age.
Victor gives her a menacing look that calls her intelligence into question. She doesn't care for it one bit, because at this point Victor is so stuffed full of can't-kill-me powers he should fucking call himself an immortal demi-god and hang up the mutant title. Let the people who have scales instead of skin and levitation powers have their pride. His shit is next level.
"How was the Yukon gold rush?" she asks curiously. She may hate him with all the fury her five foot five body can produce, but she is also not about to throw away first-hand accounts of life in the past. History Majors would wet themselves for this kind of chance.
Well. Minus the hunting part. And probably the kidnapping part. And the threats and abuse part.
Maybe they wouldn't…
"Everyone either shit themselves to death or froze, if they weren't killed by somebody else or work first. Then they blamed sin and the injuns."
Mac struggles with the whole imagery of what he just said. He's not wrong, exactly, but it wasn't the detailed account she was hoping for. Also, the fact that he used such a slur. Honestly it's probably not the worst thing he's ever said even around them, but it is still a huge dick move, especially considering Ana. He really did go out of his way to create a brand new shit tier for them.
She's broken out of her musings by the sound of said friend snorting in amusement, and she looks over, concerned.
"Kidnapped by a racist Canadian mutant," Ana laughs monotonously, her eyes a little too wide. "Talking about people dying from crapping too hard over a hundred years ago, when he was apparently alive."
"Ana," Mac calls carefully, moving to brush her friends braid away from her face.
The hand that comes up to swat her palm away is not entirely unexpected, but the force is a little excessive. Mac pulls her stinging fingers back to her chest and watches as Ana's laugh tapers off into silence, and she swipes her own hand down her face, inhaling deeply.
"Ana?" Mac questions carefully.
"No. It's cool. Last week I was a waitress, today I'm getting hunted through the woods I guess," she breathes. "I'm cool. I got this."
Victor eyes her, his gaze expression mostly unamused. Mac says mostly because he looks a little eager, and suddenly the conversation in the truck comes back to her. Maybe she shouldn't have hinted at Ana's potential when pushed.
"You got this," Mac assures her quietly, and Ana gives her look that is both thankful and apologetic.
Victor clicks his tongue a couple times, and they simultaneously turn toward the noise. A fresh wash of anger runs through Mac when she sees that amused smile on his face, just realizing that the noise was not unsimilar to the one a dog clicker makes. She trained her hound with one of them once, and she bets Victor is using the same principle.
"Touching," he drawls, rolling his head hard enough that she hears his neckbones pop. "But boring."
"We could talk about how you are apparently old enough to be our great-great-grandfather, if that's more to your taste," Mac fires back.
"Or the old base of whatever organization you haven't named that's somewhere near the lake," Ana volunteers blandly. Frankly, Mac is a little surprised she even sassed back. It seems that a little food and sleep went a long way for Ana. Actually, she's almost a little too feisty.
Mac narrows her eyes, but doesn't say a word. There's something Ana isn't saying, something that she's keeping hidden from her. She's touchy today, not that many would notice. Victor might put it down to the whole hunting them thing, but Mac knows Ana.
Knows that she's nervous because she's planning something.
"How about you two start running farther into the wilderness, or you die an hour into a trip that could have gone days."
Mac scowls, an acerbic remark about how they have been jammed into the car for actual days lodged into her throat, but shifts on her feets to start jogging. She doesn't know how long of a head start they may have, but she is going to utilize the time as best as possible.
It takes her a moment to register the fact that she can't hear any footsteps echoing her own, and when she turns around Ana is just standing there, staring at Victor like she's seriously contemplating quitting here.
"ANA!"
Ana must roll her eyes because Victor snorts in amusement at whatever she is doing. All Mac can see is the back of her friends head.
"Alright, we'll drag it out," Ana huffs, pivoting around and walking her way towards Mac.
"Jog, Ana!"
"For shit's sake," Ana curses softly, picking up the pace. Mac can already see what Ana's argument is before she even says it.
"Yah, okay, it's been a while. It's going to suck," Mac agrees.
"If we have to stop jogging a hundred meters away because we're out of shape, and Victor sees, I am going to offer you to him on a platter," Ana murmurs under her breath as she passes Mac by, begging to weave through the trees. The trees that Mac had planned on covering them if that exact thing were to theoretically take place.
It turns out to be a moot point anyway because Victor starts laughing in a way that manages to convey that yes, he totally heard them.
"Fucking hate you," Ana breathes, adjusting the straps on her bag to cinch tighter around her waist and shoulder. Her eyes are already narrowed in the expectation of what lies ahead, scrunching up the lines of her face.
"Hate me when we get out of hearing range of the super sensory douche," Mac pants, already feeling the pull on her calves. It has been far, far too long since they even went on a mock hike, let alone a real one.
She tries to have faith in Ana, because if whatever she's planning doesn't work out, they're fucked.
"A fire?" Mac asks her, sweat dripping down the side of her face. Her pale cheeks are flushed from exertion, and her breathing is heavy as well. They both have managed to push past the first awful hump of effort into the runner's high that they are desperately trying to keep alive.
The average person can walk about thirty-six miles an hour on flat, even terrain over the course of twelve hours with a full water supply and a good night's sleep. It can go down to around eighteen if the terrain gets rough, or the person has hindrances.
Ana would say they have maybe made it six on top of the six they did before. The fault lies in equal parts bad starting condition, steep terrain, heavy packs, and trying to cover their trail as best as possible with what they have. It's not good timing, especially considering that Victor never said how much of a head start he was going to give them.
This hunt is rigged-
"A really, really big fire," Ana responds flatly.
-but it might still work.
She's thought it from every angle she could. There's likely nobody after them, nothing they can do to outrun Victor, let alone kill him, and they don't have anything but camping gear they haven't used for years. At this point, the iodine tablets are probably out of date and any food they might eat has to be gathered by hand. In her opinion they were fucked before Victor even announced her would be playing tiger to their goat.
"How big of a fire?" Mac asks, trying to see Ana's point of view. It's always comforting to know that Mac at least makes the effort.
"Ideally?" Ana says. "The entire forest."
Mac gives her a long, lingering once-over, from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. She seems to mull it over in her mind a bit, and to her delight, she can see her partner working the details out without Ana even having to speak.
A big enough fire has several advantages. For one, if it really gets going, then it draws people to the area. Nobody gives a shit about two kidnapped women, but a whole lot of people care about a wildfire eating up habitat and property. Hell, if there is a mysterious base near the lake, it might even piss off the organization that Victor won't name because all of their shit will be either on - or surrounded by- fire. For two, Victor has the senses of a bloodhound with hawk eyes on a gorilla's body, or something. Which means that nitty gritty smoke and hot, hot flames should fuck him up double time, covering their trail better than slogging through a trickling creek ever could. Three, Ana is mildly cold and upset, and she really, really wants to start a fire.
Eagerly, knowing it's the best chance they have, she awaits Mac's approval.
"Is that what the aluminum foil you packed was for? Just in case he took the lighters and strikers?" She asks after a long, long moment.
"Actually, it was for really shitty thermite," Ana admits. It's also what the rusty trinkets and coffee powder were for. She didn't suspect the shitty rust on her knife would work right, nor did she think the could get the aluminum small enough for anything good. The magnesium strikers aren't exactly ideal either.
Chemical reactions are fairly forgiving, but there are some things that can't be skewed. It won't be thermite, but she has more than enough in her pack to start an incredible inferno, especially with all the dried leaves and underbrush.
"Ana, I thought you were gonna stab him in the eye in the car to be honest," Mac admits after a long moment, looking a bit morose. "I thought you had given up, and I was waiting for him to push you-"
"I did give up Mac," she interrupts before her friend can get started with the whole gross guilt thing.
"But-"
"I gave up, but you didn't. Your gross hero complex meant you couldn't leave me. So now I'm starting a bigass fire in the middle of the Canadian wilderness not to save my myself, but to save your dumb ass," Ana says, unbuckling the strap around her stomach. Immediately she can feel the increased weight of the rucksack on her shoulders, and she grunts at how heavy it seems. This is light gear, too. This should be easy.
Man, they really let themselves get out of shape.
"Ana," Mac says slowly in a manner that lets Ana know that she is both deeply touched and also very worried. "How bad have you been depersonalizing everything?"
"As hard as I possibly can," Ana admits freely, not feeling a damn thing but numbness.
Mac sucks in a sharp breath, letting it out in one long steady blow.
"I'll kill him," Mac says softly, and Ana's lips quirk upward in what could have been a smile in any other situation. Mac kill someone. What a joke.
"Is that a yes to the fire?" she asks curiously.
"Will it make you happy?" Mca asks her in return.
Ana can't really say that it will make her happy. However, she can say that it might make her feel something other than nausea inducing terror and headache causing stress. She hasn't started crying yet, but the moment she gets to be alone where she knows for a fact Victor can't hear and Mac can't see, it's gonna be a gross, half laughing, half sobbing flood.
Or she can do it the old fashioned way and drink until the world turns glassy. She would stab some in the neck for some gin right now.
"Maybe," she hedges truthfully.
"Then savor the moment Ana, because I would like you to start a forest fire."
So Ana does savor the moment. Just for a second she breathes in the clean mountain air, sucking in a lungful of smoke-free oxygen. The breeze is soft against her skin, and she thinks it will work wonderfully to fan the flames once she gets them high enough. Not only that, but Mac is agreeing with her, which means she had a genuinely good idea with the fire thing, and it wasn't her justifying and impulse.
"Awesome," she breathes.
Then she sets to work, slinging the bag off her shoulders and digging through it for everything she has stashed away.
The key to a good fire is three things. Heat, oxygen, and fuel. The key to a really, really big fire in a short amount of time in a somewhat cool environment with thinner air is actually a great incendiary device. Since Ana does not have one of those ready made, she has to cobble something together that may sort of kinda work.
A dust explosion, while admittedly really cool, isn't going to cause a lasting fire, so the coffee creamer -a high energy, low oxidizing combustible- can probably be used to make generate a lot of heat. The aluminum foil she planned to grind up...well, she still might, just in case she wants to throw aluminum powder around and fuck up everyone's sight. The lighters she can use to her benefit in various ways, and though she is loathe to do so, the limited tampons they have will make great fire starters. She wanted more than just one box, but Victor ruined that idea a while ago. Which leaves her with a magnesium striker to get started with.
"Tinder and logs," Ana asks, already clearing a space out for the first fire. If she can get a campfire big enough to engulf the underbrush, maybe even get the flames to the canopy, the wind should take care of the rest.
"Already on it," Mac says, still within line of sight. Her own bag is open as well, and she lobs a clothing roll at Ana. The taller woman catches it easily, but the trust in the action is huge. She is willingly sacrificing her clothes for this noble cause.
Ana looks her straight in the eye as she undoes the sock tipped ends of the roll.
"I love you," she says earnestly.
"Tell me that when you are aren't exhausted and about to commit an international crime," Mac drawls.
