The sun was beginning to sink below the tree line again when the first drops of rain hit him. Great. Probably best he find somewhere to call it a night. The sooner he did so the earlier a start he could get in the morning. He stopped and looked around. A few feet from where he stood was an incline covered with various foliage and shrubs. It was as good a place as any.
He pulled himself slowly up the bank, taking care to step where he could better mask his footprints. Eventually near the top he came across a fallen log half-hidden in brush. Perfect. He sat a minute, catching his breath. His right leg was completely stiff; he grabbed hold of it and swung it over the log followed by his left. He then sank down so he was covered by the brush. Definitely better; while rain still occasionally made its way through he would be drier here.
He closed his eyes and let out a deep sigh. His head was miserable; his legs too. He pulled up the tattered remains of his pants and stared at his legs. They were a mess of bruises, scrapes and cuts. None seemed terribly serious yet taken together certainly explained why his legs hurt. His arms, too, were cut up and bruised. He couldn't stop his mind from wondering just what would happen if he didn't reach civilization and got treatment for his injuries. How much longer could he hold up like this?
As long as it takes, that voice in the back of his head asserted.
He leaned his back against the log again. His eyes closed. The pattering of the rain was strangely soothing. He was nearly asleep when he heard something above the rain. Voices, he realized, from behind him. Someone was coming. He scrambled to turn so he could see the bank, at the same time bending lower so he was covered more completely. Part of him hesitated. Maybe whoever was coming could help him. Another, stronger part of him said to stay where he was. It could be them.
He lifted his head as the voices grew louder just high enough to peek over the log. Branches and leaves blocked most of his view, yet in one of the small areas within his sight stepped a figure. It was a young lady with light brown hair. Something about her struck him as familiar yet he didn't recognize her. He resisted the urge to chuckle. He could have seen his own family at that moment and not recognize them. Then he realized it; she was the girl from his dreams. So she was real. She was even wearing the same outfit, the one which seemed to match his own.
The young lady glanced around as she walked, pausing to look back further up the bank. "See anything?" she called.
He couldn't see who she was talking to with the branches between him and the bank, but he heard a muffled male voice call back, "No. You?"
"No," the girl said. She frowned and looked around again. "Maybe he didn't come this far. Why is he still going downstream?"
This time he didn't catch the response. He held his breath as he watched her walk around the bank. While he knew – or at least suspected – she and her companion were looking for him, he could only guess for what purpose. Dread began to rise again and something else. Not fear but... anger maybe. He had no idea what was going on, or any clue on loyalties. The last thing he wanted to do was take a chance and be wrong. He hated this feeling. It was like being dropped into someone else's life, with him having to clean up the mess they had left behind.
After what felt like much too long the pair moved on, walking upstream. He turned around so he was on his back. The rain grew heavier. He closed his eyes again.
The images came at him much quicker than before. They swayed and shifted, like film being rewound or skipped as someone searched out particular scenes from it.
He was back in the woods, this time in a clearing. All around him was debris. A plane. He was near a plane, one mangled and burning. Before him appeared two men, their backs turned away from him.
The woods morphed away. The strange room. Another, darker room with a cage. A cage?
The faintest of sounds begin. Crying; but who? It turned to laughter, coming from a computer screen with a face. It was mocking him.
"Go away!" he yelled, but it only laughed more.
Back to the clearing and the plane. Someone was in the wreckage, lying much too still. He could see light hair but the face was out of focus. He heard voices.
The school, but this time a stage. People pointing and laughing. Back to the cage. A man with spiky hair stood outside of it.
Yet again he was in the clearing. Danger. The two men turned to him and he saw they weren't men at all. It was the young man and woman from before. The girl pulled a gun and pointed it at him. He stepped backwards, his hands raised and the world spun, faster and faster, into darkness and nothing…
He startled and opened his eyes. How long had he been asleep? Sitting up he found the faintest of sunlight shinning through the trees. The rain had stopped. That was a relief at least.
He uncurled himself with a muffled groan. His body was definitely not appreciating this treatment. Of course, he couldn't disagree. He sat up and settled back on the log. He wasn't particularly anxious to get back to the river, especially if those two people were following him. Inwardly he shuddered, his mind attempting to put what he had seen together as questions filled his mind. Was that what had happened? If so why was he had a plane crash site? Who was the other man? The person with light hair in the wreckage?
Maybe he should reconsider his current strategy and come up with a new one to getting out of this… mountain, his mind offered. He was in the mountains. He frowned.
Stupid brain. Much help as always. Ugh. It was the truth though. He still knew nothing of real importance about himself. The vast depths of his mind had given up some tidbits; something about a plane crash, the name Davenport Industries, some sort of training, the fact that he was in the mountains. All of this, however, did not amount to anything substantial. Yet even then there was comfort in the information his brain did surrender. It was in there. He still had his memories. He just for reasons unknown couldn't access them.
Rubbing the remaining sleep from his eyes he stood. The people from yesterday had gone in the opposite direction he was moving. Plus, if his already aching limbs were any indication, he was in no real condition for any sort of real hiking. The river it was he decided.
Every step was near agony. As he reached the bank again a familiar thought crossed his mind. Longingly he glanced at the water. What was that disease one got from drinking contaminated water? Which was worse, getting sick or dying of thirst? Then again considering what animals had possibly been doing upstream…
He sighed, decided he wasn't all that thirsty, and limped back into the water.
For hours he kept moving, willing his feet to just go forward. As he slipped and ended up sprawled in the river for what felt like the millionth time, the dejection increased. He was making no real progress. He was hungry, thirsty and completely exhausted. The river had gotten deeper; now the water came above his knees and was moving much quicker than it had when he had started.
He took a deep breath, ignoring the dull ache in his side, and returned to his feet. Still he didn't move. The water rushed all around him. He pushed his sopping hair from his brow and again took in his surroundings. A rather large rock sticking out from the river's middle ahead caught his eye. Make it there, he told himself. Then you can rest. Now come on!
The rocky ground provided his feet hardly any traction now which meant no real chance to make sure steps. Still he went, hardly noticing the water growing deeper. He took another step when the riverbed suddenly slopped even deeper. He flared about and yet the current was too strong, pulling him under just as his eye caught something up ahead. There was a sudden edge to the water, and a fierce noise he instantly recognized just as he fell below the surface.
He was headed straight for another waterfall.
