Author' note: Okay quick note here, I was asked in one of the reviews why I added an extra chunk to my last chapter, well the answer is I just felt that I had not put enough into it and that I left things a little to short. I wanted to go back and add a few more things that I believed would fit in with the story, so if their is any other confusion please let me know.
After Caleb forced the drugged drink that James now realized was tea, Emily watched as he walks away and could be heard saying "That should give me some entertainment later." She watched helplessly as her friend fell in and out of consciousness as his eye's grew heavy, then light and back to heavy again.
James could feel the after taste of the drink he was forced to swallow, he recognized it as tea, really, really bad tea. He passed out a few times without realizing it; to him it was like being back in high school again, trying to shake off being sleepy in a boring math class. He could just barely see Emily across from him as he lifted his heavy eyes up for a few seconds then resumed having trouble lifting them. As he finally got to the half and half of the sleepiness, James saw a man standing in front of him; it was a hallucination of his grandfather dressed like he was before he died in 1988. James thought he was starting to go crazy cause of the torture before he finally realized the apparition before him was a hallucination brought on by the drugs Caleb forced him to have along with that god awful tea.
"What's wrong there Jr? You look a little down, probably shouldn't have had all that Belladonna in the tea." The hallucination of his grandfather said before vanishing, addressing him by his nickname. Then James asks as he mumbles in his words, till half-asleep and half-awake "What are you talking about gramps? What Belladonna?" much to Emily's confusion as she could not see his hallucination of the grandfather he once spoke so highly of to her.
"James, what going on, who are you talking to over there?" Emily asks, concerned that he had something done to his mind, like a psychotic break down, brought on from either the physical injuries from his torture in the cellar or the drugs he had forced to take along with the tea down his throat by Caleb.
The hallucinations reappeared to James, coming back a couple of seconds later, this time he was seeing his old buddy Damien Wilson, a friend he worked with in the C.I.A. for a while before dying on a mission. James took a look at the hallucination before hearing it say "Greaves, man you look like crap, kind of like that time we were in Kabul for the first time, only without any bruises on your face. What happened to you, I thought I trained you to be tougher than this." The hallucination of Wilson then looks back at Emily as she continued to try and reach out to him with her words as she repeatedly asked him who he was talking to and if he was okay. Wilson takes look back at James, with a half smiles, after appearing to take a good look at Emily saying "Wow, quite the looker you've got there Greaves." and then it asks "What's her story? She your girlfriend?"
James then frowns with annoyance at the hallucination and says "Oh be quiet Wilson, Jesus your giving me a head ache."
The still drugged hunter looks around at the chair he was restrained to by some rope around his hands, not that it was much of a problem, he was able to free himself from it in a few seconds with some quick work of his hands, and then he says "Damn that Belladonna crap." Causing Emily to asks "What was that James?" then he clarifies by saying "Atropa Belladonna, it's one of these plant drugs that can be found in Europe, North Africa and West Asia. In a large dose it can kill you, but if you put in just the right amount with something to wash it down then it can cause a few minor hallucinations as I just found out."
Footsteps could be heard coming from the next room, James looks to Emily and whispers "Act natural." and then pretends to still be restrained, Maggie walks into the room, finding James reawakened and says "Well aren't you a tough one. Usually takes someone about an hour or two before they finally come to after a shot of that stuff."
"Why?" James asks, just one word was all he said, demanding answers, then she asks "Why?" and James clarifies "Why did you kill all those people?"
Maggie then says with a laugh "Why? Cause its fun."
After hearing that James just shut down and remained silent as he was shooting Maggie an angry and hatful glare, Emily could tell by the look in his eyes that he wasn't faking it. James had only known they were his relatives for a few minutes and in that time he had come to loath and despises them more than an atheist does religion. Maggie then says grabbing onto some of his hair "What's the matter cousin, cat got your tongue?" then she grabs his M1911 and says "I guess that Gypsy bitch your grandpa married and your mother didn't teach you any manner when you were little, I guess I'll have teach you for them instead."
Not seeing any other opportunities coming up and in a moment of pure rage at her insulting his true family James grabs hold of Maggie throwing her to the ground, disarming her of the weapon then begins to beat her repeatedly as the rage just seemed to come out all out once. Finally having realized what he was doing James grabs the barrel of his M1911 and with one hard strike of the handle of his gun knocks her unconscious.
James begins to stand himself up from the fight and says as he looks down at the unconscious murderer "My grandmother may have been a Gypsy and my grandfather may have turned his back on your fucked up family, but at the least they tried to raise right, to make me a better person. Not sure if I can say the same for your family or if they even attempted to raise you right."
He then puts on his shirt and slides his olive green jacket around his sides, still feeling the soreness of his wounds with every move his skin and limbs made. James then walks over to Emily and undoes her restraints. The first thing Emily asked as she was free and James returned her Glock 9mm "Do you have a plan here James?"
James then says as he grabs some supplies to be used for stitching himself up later "Yeah, get the hell out of this house and get as far away from this fucked up family as possible." Then Emily asks concerned for the statistics of it succeeding "That's your plan?" then James says "What, it's not suppose to be perfect, I'm making it up as I go along."
As they leave for the door, both Emily and James hear Lee's voice "Greaves, he's-" but before he could say anymore James fires a shot into his shoulder, knocking him back to the ground, groaning and cursing from the pain, and then he says "Run." Emily then followed behind him and following his instructions to the letter, not wanting to stop for nothing or risk having to take another trip into that mad house.
Emily could feel her heart pounding like the beat of a drum as she was running through the Minnesota forest with James running beside her. The Cannibal family chasing after her, firing rifles for their feet. She could see the shots land into the ground and hear them just barely missing her head and going by her ear.
She could hear the fire of James's Colt M1911 as he returned fire. She was still surprised by his ability to keep up with her as they ran. After all the things that Family had done to him, she at the very least believed he would have trouble moving without feeling extreme pain or have his insides hurting with every step he made as he ran like the Runner of Marathon. Though he probably would not die of exhaustion after yelling "victory!"
She would not stop running for anything. If James had dropped to the ground or tripped she would go back to help him, but that was it.
The Family of Cannibal's were a new thing for Emily in her time as a profiler. She had read up on numerous serial killers like Jack the ripper, Ed Gein even H.H. Holmes. All had things in their crimes that helped the team build profiles and to find a way to locate and arrest them. This was different though, a whole Family, a group of killers who derived pleasure from the thrill of the hunt and kill.
Spencer once told her of a Family in Kansas called the Benders who lived and owned an Inn and a small general store, killing other people mostly travelers. But these people were more horrid, it was like meeting the real life version of the Texas chainsaw Massacre, only without the Texas part and the Leather Face and the chainsaw.
"For a Family of Hunters, they sure do suck at the shooting part of the hunt." James says, mocking their inability to get in a decent shot at them.
Suddenly a bullet grazes James on the left arm causing him to curse "Sumbitch!" before they make a turn in their run in the wilderness and they both take cover behind a log.
"You think we lost them?" Emily hears James ask, and then she looks and sees him holding onto the graze on his arm as he breathed steadily. She then looks over reading her Glock 9mm as James checks his ammo. Then they both feel their hearts stop as they heard that voice, that god forsake awful voice. The voice of the one member who could have been the devil himself for all they knew.
"Come on now cousin. We finally get to meet face to face and this is how you do it? Beating my little sister up till she's out cold and then shooting uncle in the shoulder. Who does that? It's just not family like. I thought you understood Family like your dad did." He says.
Emily then looks to James, his face still having the look of shock and she asks in a hushed tone "How much to you got left?" and he replies "Three more in this magazine and my last one only."
This who situation turned into a real nightmare for the two of them. No back up. James friend were all back in town and so was Emily's team, if they were not hopelessly looking through the wilderness on foot. She may not have been a local, but she had seen this situation on cases and in horror movies enough times to know how it ends….someone dies and another is injured.
Every part of James wanted to firing every last shot in his new cousin, to just unload it all into Caleb's head, freeing him of a small part of this newly discovered hell hole he discovered his family left for him to deal with. He continued to feel the sting from his open cuts. He and Emily exchanged looks as they cowered behind the log, and then Emily asks in a low hushed whisper "You have any ideas for how to lose this guy?'
James then saw a nearby rock and says as he takes it into his hand "I'm going to take this rock then use it with my two last shots to try and keep behind cover, while I do that you start running, I'll catch up with you in a few minutes."
"You can't just expect me to leave you here with that psycho." Emily says in her whispered protest to his plan. James then gives his riposte saying "We don't have a lot of options here. Look you don't need to worry about me, I can take care of myself, it'll only take me a few seconds then I'll catch up with you, I promise."
"I'm going to hold you to that." Emily said, just barely and reluctantly agreeing to his plan.
James throws the rocks a small distance, causing Caleb to face away from the log and towards where he rock hit, believing it was someone's foot step as they were running. James then fires his two shots, causing his deranged cousin to take cover behind one of the trees with his rifle.
Emily begins to run as James reloads his weapon and says "Walk away now Caleb, I'm only going to give you that offer once."
Caleb smirks from behind the tree he had taken for cover and says as he loads fresh ammo into his rifle "You really think you're any better than me, don't you cousin?"
"I'm not the one here who hunts people like big game and then kills them for just pure sport and god only knows what you've done to all those poor people's families with this sick little game of yours." James says, belittling Caleb on the way he wasted his life away and ruins the lives of others. Then Caleb's face forms and evil smile as he remembered what he knew about James and some of the things he had done with his life then he says "You've killed people, taken lives."
"I killed people in the Navy when I had to, that was it. You kill for the pleasure of it" James angrily said in his defense then Caleb says "I know what you did in Seattle, the night you ran away, the night when you first pulled the trigger on a man and knew what it felt like to kill, the only difference is that I took it all in and then loved it after I realized what I did, while you ran away like a coward."
In that moment, when Caleb brought up that night his life first turned into a nightmare and went down a spiral of loneliness and misery. The anger he felt back then came back to him and he opened fire with his pistol saying "I'd rather be a coward than a murderer like you." before he follows behind Emily. Caleb then could be heard yelling as they fled "Their over here!"
Emily had heard the conversation between the two, it was something she wished to ask him about, but decided to let it go for now and to wait until they were safe and sound from the evil place they had managed to find themselves in.
Emily was still far ahead of James to where they could barely see one another. It almost got her killed when Lee somehow was able to get in front of her with his rifle ready. Leo probably would have killed her, but before he even had the chance to pull the trigger James finally caught up with them both. He took aim with his pistol, shooting the barrel of the rifle causing it to fly out of his hand then James fires his weapon empty, wanting for the killer to be dead and to stay dead.
The shock the Emily wound up in lasted for a while; she could see the dead body as it remains on the ground after James shot the man it used to be. She then watched as James slowly walked over to the body and searched it, taking another pistol off of it and removes the ammo. Finding it to be using the same kind that his M1911 used. James then looks to Emily and asks "Emily, are you okay?"
There was no response at first from her, so he walks over to her and grabs her gently by one of her shoulders and again asks the same question again with different words in the question and a more nicer, tender tone "Hey Raven, you okay?"
She then finally snapped out of the shock and notices his face was in front of hers and she replies "Uh yeah, I'm okay James. Thanks for saving me." James quicklies replies with "Don't mention it, you would have done the same for me."
The next thing that happened was James and Emily heard Caleb's voice calling out as he was breaking through the woods. James then grabs the Winchester rifle that he shot out of Lee's hands and readies to take aim and finally as Caleb comes into view after a couple of seconds of searching for his target and then he opens fire on the monster. Hitting him in the shoulder, upon seeing that Caleb his target was still standing he cocks the rifle and fires another shot hitting him in the chest, not killing him, but knocking him to the ground groaning in agony from the two fresh wounds put in him, and then James says "Run."
He and Emily then take off, running through the woods, leaving the wounded Caleb with bullet still in his chest, having mist all his vital organs, and dead Lee miles behind them as they ran, feeling some safety in the knowledge that their killers were far behind them and they were both still alive and more or less unharmed.
Author's note: Well that's it for this chapter, if you have you have any thoughts or personnel notes to this part of the story please review and have a good day.