Hunter, Prey
By Sapphire
Disclaimer in part 1
Chapter 9 – Resurrection"Gordon!" John screamed, not wanting to believe what his eyes told him.
Only seconds ago, Virgil had spotted three heat sources at the right side of the vault chamber, after switching the TV camera to infrared detection. As all hostages were supposed to be on the left hand side, the only conclusion was that some of the bank robbers had made it down here after all.
He had called out a warning to Gordon, who had already stepped outside eager to start working. But it had been too late.
Now Gordon lay in a crumpled heap just off the door from the Mole. He wasn't moving and John couldn't even say if he was still breathing. The bullet had hit him square in the chest. A fatal wound.
No, that couldn't be. Not Gordon. He couldn't be dead.
"JOHN!" a voice he had never heard before screamed in his left ear.
It was just enough to pull him out of his shock.
I CAN SAVE HIM
I CAN GET INTO HIM AND SAVE HIM
John blinked. Of course, as Hunter had saved his life after the underwater explosion, he would be able to save Gordon's life here.
John sprung into action. Crouching low, he reached for Gordon's arms and pulled him inside the safety of the Mole. New shots rang out, pinging against the walls of the Mole, but John ignored them. His concentration was fully on his younger brother.
Laying Gordon out on the floor, John placed his right hand just over the wound in his brother's chest, ignoring the blood that covered the uniform. Distantly he noted that the bullet had penetrated the left lung not far from the heart. He couldn't say if the organ was nicked or not.
"What the heck are you doing?" Virgil knelt next to him, his eyes wide and his face pale. What John was doing wasn't exactly standard operating procedure.
Gordon wasn't breathing. John didn't bother to check for a heartbeat. He knew there wouldn't be one.
Virgil gasped when suddenly clear water seemed to pour out of John's hand and mingle with Gordon's blood.
"What is that?" he demanded, but John ignored him.
The alien poured out of John even faster than the time he had gone into the bucket. In ten seconds he had crossed over from one body into the other.
The effect on Gordon's body was immediate. The blood stopped welling out of the hole in the chest, actually seemed to be drawn back inside. There was a gasp from the injured brother and he convulsed for a few seconds. John held him down.
"Please, save his life," he murmured. "Please."
Before their astonished eyes, the hole in Gordon's chest started to knit closed. Before it closed completely a small object was pushed through the hole and fell with a low clatter onto the metal floor of the Mole's cabin.
It was the bullet.
John picked it up, regarding it from all sides. Such a small thing. He was always amazed how something so small could cause so much damage.
Virgil held out his hand for the bullet and John gave it to him. He then searched for Gordon's pulse, finding it strong and steady. Gordon also seemed to breathe easy now, though he was still unconscious. Hunter would need some time to repair the damage, so this was to be expected. John had needed a little bit of time after the underwater explosion as well.
"Okay, John. Would you please tell me what this is? What was that stuff coming out of your hand?" Virgil held out the bullet and then pointed at Gordon. "And how did this get out of Gordon?" His voice was shaking in what was probably delayed shock.
John sighed. He hadn't wanted to tell anybody about Hunter until he was sure that everybody on the island was free of the other alien. On their travel here, Hunter had managed to check out Gordon and Virgil, and John had been relieved to find that both were free. All of his brothers were in the clear now. Still, he had wanted to wait until everybody else was checked out.
"He's an alien. He came to Earth to hunt for one of his own kind. When Gordon and I checked out that signal last week, he went into me to save my life after that explosion. They normally live in symbiosis with other humanoid beings, and that's how I ended up as his host. The other alien is probably inside somebody on the island. We've managed to check out Scott, Alan, Gordon, Grandma and you, but haven't found the other one yet."
Virgil looked at him as if John had grown another head.
"You're shitting me?"
"No," John simply said, pointing at Gordon. "He offered to save Gordon's life. What you just saw was the alien moving from my body to Gordon's. He's inside Gordon now, repairing the damage the bullet has caused."
Virgil obviously still had some problems grasping the situation. John couldn't exactly blame him. It had taken him some time as well to accept Hunter's existence.
"Mole, come in! Virgil! John! Gordon!"
The two brothers looked up. Both had basically ignored everything but their injured brother and only now realized that Scott had tried to reach them for some time.
"Mole here." Virgil picked up the microphone, rising from his kneeling position.
"Thank God. What is going on down here? I heard shooting over the link."
"Sorry, Scott, we got a little … distracted. Gordon's been shot, but I think he's going to be fine." Virgil neglected to mention how badly Gordon had been hurt and how it was that he wasn't dead right now.
"What about the hostages?"
John had almost forgotten the reason they were on this rescue to begin with. But now, with Gordon out of imminent danger, his mind returned to the problem at hand.
"At least three of the bank robbers are still here, shooting around. We're still inside the Mole, so we are safe for the moment," Virgil updated their oldest brother, while John went back to the infrared monitor.
The three heat sources had moved closer to the Mole. John guessed that they would try to get past the large machine and use the tunnel the Mole had dug to escape. The explosives that had gone off had blocked the old way out of the vault chamber, so the tunnel was the only way in or out.
John tried to sneak a look out of the still open door, but couldn't see anything. How the goons had been able to see Gordon in the darkness with all that dust and smoke still floating around and actually hit him, was beyond him.
Unless …
"They must also have infrared," he said half to himself, half to Virgil.
A grim smile crept on Virgil's face. John knew that smile. He also knew that whoever the smile was for would regret having crossed his brother's path.
Virgil got up and stepped around Gordon's body in order to reach a compartment in the rear of the Mole. For a moment, John wasn't sure what Virgil wanted from that compartment, as he wasn't quite as familiar with the rescue equipment as his brothers, but when he saw the flash grenades Virgil pulled out, he knew. Soon he wore a smile identical to that of his brother.
Half a minute later, a blinding white flash filled the vault, casting everything into sharp relief. John and Virgil, who both had known what was to come, had closed their eyes as the flash went off, but the three men sneaking along the wall towards the opening the Mole had made, had had no warning.
Cries rang out, and the men reached for the infrared goggles they'd been wearing, pulling at them to get them off. Due to the flash grenade the displays had overloaded, blinding the men effectively.
John and Virgil took careful aim and one robber after the other was hit by the knock-out pellets from their guns. Their cries were cut off and they all fell to the ground motionless. They wouldn't wake up for at least twelve hours, unless they were given the antidote to the fast acting drug in the pellets. John thought that he would probably forget to mention that option to the local police though. After those guys had shot Gordon, he didn't feel exactly charitable.
As Gordon was still out for the count, John offered to work on the explosive charges, while Virgil went to the vault with the hostages and started to cut his way inside. Soon all charges were disarmed, and Virgil had managed to cut an opening wide enough for the twenty-one people trapped inside to get out.
Giving the all clear, police and rescue workers started to swarm the vault chamber. The three goons were loaded none too gently onto some anti-grav stretchers, while the hostages were let out through the opening the Mole had left behind. John and Virgil coordinated the efforts, and it didn't take long for the last of the hostages to leave their prison.
"John?" a quiet voice at John's right shoulder said all of a sudden.
John almost jumped out of his skin before he recognized Gordon's voice.
"Gezz, squirt, you almost gave me a heart attack." He turned, smiling at his younger brother.
When he saw the confusion in Gordon's eyes, he quickly grew serious.
"What's the matter, Gordon?"
"How come I'm not dead?"
tbc
Okay, I didn't kill Gordon after all. I would never do that.
Next chapter will see some 'Explanations'
For the next couple of days I can't promise that I'll be able to post as regularly as before as I will have only limited internet access. I will try to keep the once a day schedule, but please don't be mad at me, if I have to miss a day.