HUNTED

Prologue:



The fog hung low across the dark nightmarish landscape, reducing visibility to mere inches in front of their faces. In the distance they could hear sporadic sounds of gunfire, and a series of minor explosions. Overhead an aircraft roared past, its powerful jet engine momentarily blocking out any other sounds. Seconds later it had receded into the distance and there was nothing but the sound of their own footsteps. The three figures hurried on, knowing not which way they went. The fog covered everything in a thick grey shroud, and every way looked exactly the same as any other. All three were exhausted and gasping for breath, but they knew they could not stop. Their pursuers were not far behind.
"Are we lost, Mother?" the girl asked anxiously.
The woman looked around helplessly in every direction. There was nothing to indicate whether they were going north, south, east or west. They could even have been running around in circles for all she knew. Her teenage children were looking at her, fear in their eyes, desperately seeking reassurance that they were going the right way. Far in the distance came the sound of gunfire once more.
"Let's go this way," she said, directing the two children on a course perpendicular to that they had just been taking.
She knew there was little hope of reaching what they had set out to find. Their only hope lay in escaping pursuit and finding somewhere to hide until the fog lifted. Every direction looked as good, or more accurately as bad, as any other. She had decided simply to get as far away from the distant sounds of battle as possible. They ran on, and as they ran she strained hard to listen for any sounds that might indicate an approaching threat. There had been no evidence of their pursuit for several minutes now. Perhaps they had lost them. Perhaps they were safe here. Then again, perhaps not. Perhaps the guards were simply circling round to trap them. They couldn't stop running until she knew they were safe.
Then she heard the sound she had been dreading most of all. It started as a dull thrumming vibration just on the edge of her hearing, then as it grew closer she could identify it as the sound of a Marauder trike's engine. The Marauder was the only vehicle that could operate out here in the hellish wasteland. She had taken the children here in the hope of escape, since the wilderness was virtually impassible.
"Hide yourself!" she yelled to her daughter, as she grabbed her son and threw herself on top of him.
The trike was on them now, its powerful searchlight piercing the thick veil of fog. The three of them lay on the ground as still as the dead, and the searchlight flashed over them. Her heart pounding, the woman waited to hear the yells of triumph from their pursuers. But the light moved on and they remained unseen. The trike turned and moved off in another direction. Only when they could hear its engine no more did the woman allow them to stand. She gave the children a moment or two to catch their breath, before they began running once more.
"Are we lost?" the girl panted once more.
The woman did not answer, for she had spotted something up ahead. Half-hidden by the fog, half-buried in the rocky mess before them, was some kind of structure. She did not allow herself to hope that it might be what they had originally been seeking. The odds against it had to be astronomical. And yet - and yet there were no other buildings left out here in the wilderness. Trying not to let her excitement get the better of her, she hurried forward to investigate the half-submerged concrete building.
Another aircraft roared past overhead, and in the distance they heard the huge explosion as it dropped a bomb on a target unknown to them. The trike appeared through the fog once more, its engine drowned out by the sound of the jet plane, and this time there was no avoiding it. Caught in the searchlight's glare, the woman knew she had only one choice.
"Mutant sighted!" a voice yelled.
"Open fire!"
"RUN!" she screamed to her children, as she turned to face the oncoming trike.
"No! Mother!" the girl cried, but her brother grabbed her arm and the two of them ran for their lives.
Pushing his sister down behind a rocky outcropping, the boy held his hand over her mouth and the two of them lay silent. Behind the rock they heard a crash that sounded as if the trike had fallen on its side, then the sound of gunfire. After that there was nothing. The two teenagers listened hard for the sound of footsteps, praying that their mother was already hurrying after them. There was nothing. Eventually they heard the sound of a crackle as one guard spoke into his radio, "We got this one."
"The other two are still out there. Let's finish the job."
The girl tried to scream but the boy kept his hand over her mouth. He knew they had to get away before the guards began searching for them. Pulling his distraught younger sister to her feet, he half-dragged her away the scene. As she stumbled, he knew they'd waited too long. The humans were alreadyon them. Bullets raked the earth all around them, but somehow the two young mutants remained unharmed. The boy pushed his sister to the ground, and spun round to face the onrushing guards. Both of his hands shot out, his fingers elongating into long, sinewy, rope-like tentacles, grasping the two guards around the throat.
"No! They'll kill you too!" his sister shrieked.
The guards struggled, but the boy was angry and tightened his grip, choking the life out of the humans.
"Come on!" the girl screamed, pulling him away.
Retracting his fingers to their normal length, the boy left the two guards clutching their throats and gagging desperately for oxygen, as the teenagers fled. They could hear the trike's engine as it pursued them across the open ground. The fog was their only protection now as the sound of the engine grew louder and louder, both mutants hoping it would roar past them and off in another direction.
They were not so lucky. The trike was bearing down on the two running figures, and the girl knew there was only one thing to do now. Grabbing her brother, she knocked him on to his back and covered him with her own body, calling on her power to hide her. The trike roared past where the two of them had just been standing, the searchlight sweeping the ground, the humans scanning the fog-shrouded terrain for any sign of their prey. To their disbelief, there was nothing. The empty barren landscape stretched in all directions as far as they could see, dotted by nothing but rocks, and here and there a stunted lifeless tree. A ruined building of some kind was half-buried by boulders, but it provided no cover that the kids might be hiding behind. The guards looked at each other in confusion. They searched for several more minutes, but found no signs of life. Eventually they had no other choice but to give up, package up the body of the mutant they had already killed, and head back to camp. When the fog lifted they'd send out more search parties. There was nowhere to go in the wasteland, and no food or water. Those kids would be found eventually, alive or dead.

When they were sure the trike was gone, the girl relaxed and her power dropped. She stood, and pulled her slightly dazed brother to his feet. He'd been grazed in the shoulder by a stray bullet, and she tore off a strip of her clothing to wrap around his arm as a bandage. Both of them were already looking towards the concrete building, wondering the same as their mother. Could this be it? Could this really be what they had set out on a desperate, seemingly hopeless journey to find? Could this really be where the device had been hidden for over twenty years?
It took them the best part of an hour to move enough of the rocks to gain access to the entrance. They paused every few moments to make sure that no guards were approaching. The fog was, if anything, thicker now, and that was good. If this place was what they thought it was, it was unthinkable to be caught when they were this near to escape. The guards didn't know what was in here. As they worked, both children fought furiously to keep their minds on the task in hand. Both of them knew their mother was dead. Both of them were devastated, shocked and terrified, but they knew they had no choice but to keep going. She had sacrificed herself to give them the time to get away, and they had to do everything they could to make sure that sacrifice was not in vain. Once the entrance was cleared, they cautiously stepped through into the building's interior, and began looking around for wherever it might be hidden. The structure was not large, and the device was not small. There could only be a few places where it might be kept.
It was the girl who found it, and her brother helped her manhandle it out on to a clear area of space. Both of them were surprised by the lack of dust on the machine that had not been touched in over twenty years, but then there had been nobody here to generate dust. Tentatively he flicked the activation switch, and both of them breathed a sigh of relief when they found that the device still worked. The screen flickered to life and the boy began tapping at the keyboard immediately beneath it.
"OK," he said. "Here goes..."