Chapter Seven: Woodsmanship
"Uh-oh," MacGyver murmured, flinging up an arm to block Purdey and Gambit as he spotted a group of people gathered around their little car. "Looks like someone beat us to it."
"Stasi!" Purdey hissed, recognizing the uniforms of the German secret police as she peered around his arm.
"C'mon, into the woods!" MacGyver hissed. "We can hide out an' keep an eye on them; maybe they'll follow our tracks to the barn and we'll get a chance at takin' their car."
Making their way into the woods, they found a secluded spot on top of a rise that gave them a good vantage point of the road below, and MacGyver settled himself back comfortably to wait.
"How do you suppose they found us?" Purdey questioned, crouching on hands and knees to watch the men swarming down below.
MacGyver shook his head. "I told you I didn't need a doctor."
Purdey frowned, turning back to look at him. "What has that got to do — you think he was Stasi?!"
"Wouldn't surprise me. What did you tell him about how I got hurt, anyway?"
"Oh…just that we found you injured and unconscious on the side of the road, and you couldn't remember to tell us what had happened."
"But if he was warned to be on the lookout for us, he could easily put it together," Gambit put in.
"You didn't take the pain medicine he left," Purdey remembered. "You think he was trying to drug you?"
"Maybe. I don't like to suspect a doctor of giving a sedative to someone with a head injury, and I doubt he slipped me anything yesterday; I was pretty out of it on my own. But keepin' me that way would be a good way to make sure we didn't go anywhere."
"So how is the headache?" Purdey asked.
MacGyver shrugged. "Tolerable, long's I stay out of the bright sunlight."
"I still have the aspirin," Purdey offered.
"Yeah…oughtta be safe enough now…thanks." He accepted the tablets she handed him and swallowed them dry, then leaned back with his head against a tree.
The day passed slowly. Purdey kept up her post overlooking the road, reporting a constant activity of Stasi, but no indication of anyone approaching their hideout.
MacGyver and Gambit paid little attention to her. MacGyver dozed off and on, while Gambit played idly with his gun, spinning the chamber with his thumb.
"I don't suppose either of you brought anything to eat?" Purdey remarked finally, coming back to sit beside them.
Gambit aimed carefully into the tree above them. "How does squirrel stew sound?"
Purdey laid a hand quickly on his arm, seeing in the intensity of his eyes that he was serious. "Gambit. Don't. The sound of the gunshot would bring every Stasi in the area."
Gambit lowered his arm. "I guess you're right," he admitted with a sigh. "I'm hungry enough myself I'm almost willing to risk it."
"We don't have a pot for stew anyway," MacGyver commented. Purdey and Gambit glanced toward him, noticing for the first time that he had emptied several random items from his pockets and seemed to be fastening them together with some purpose in mind. "What are you doing?" Purdey questioned.
MacGyver grinned sideways at her. "Makin' a slingshot."
He had formed a pad of duct tape, with two pieces of string across the back to reinforce it. Now he cut a rubber band in half and fastened each half to one end of the string, then tied the rubber pieces to a small forked stick. He pulled back on the pad experimentally, testing the contraption's elasticity. "Should do," he murmured, digging in his pocket for one of Gambit's bullets. "Where'd that squirrel go?"
"There!" Purdey pointed. "Do you think you can hit it with that thing?"
"Dunno. I usta be pretty good with a slingshot when I was a kid. Anyway, here goes."
He closed one eye and aimed carefully before releasing the bullet. Moments later the squirrel dropped to the ground, proving that he hadn't lost his skill.
"Right through the eye!" Purdey exclaimed, running to pick it up by the tail. "I guess that means your vision is back to normal."
"Guess so; I hadn't been thinking about it," MacGyver admitted.
"But you said yourself we don't have a pot," Gambit reminded him, scowling slightly at the fact that MacGyver had been the one to bag the squirrel. "I'm not hungry enough yet to try it raw."
"Me neither, but we can roast the meat on sticks."
"Is a fire safe?" Purdey questioned, looking over her shoulder back toward the road.
"If we go a little deeper into the woods, a small one should be fine," MacGyver assured her. He got to his feet, shoving the slingshot into his back pocket, and with a sigh Gambit got up and followed MacGyver and Purdey into the woods.
With Purdey and Gambit helping find dry wood, MacGyver quickly built a small fire ringed with stones and lit it with a match from his pocket. He had just tossed the spent match into the fire when Purdey hissed at him. "Mac! Up there!"
Instantly spotting the squirrel she pointed out, he quickly pulled out the slingshot and another bullet and brought that one down as well. "Good eye, Purdey. One squirrel would have been pretty skimpy for three people."
He opened his knife and skinned and cleaned the two squirrels, then sharpened three sticks for skewers. Cutting the meat into chunks, he divided them evenly among the skewers.
"That fire still has to cook down a little; think I'll see if I can find some water," MacGyver remarked. "Purdey, mind if I borrow your purse?"
Purdey blinked at the apparent non-sequitur, but gave him her handbag without a word. "Hold out your hands," he told her, emptying the contents of the purse into them.
Purdey frowned at the lipstick and other miscellaneous articles she held. "What do you want me to do with these?"
"Up to you," MacGyver told her with a wink.
Purdey sighed. "Gambit, is there room in your pocket?"
"Dump them in," Gambit told her, holding the pocket open.
Purdey did so, then glanced after MacGyver as he disappeared into the woods. "Think he'll find any water?" she questioned as MacGyver disappeared into the woods.
Gambit shrugged, grinning and pulling her closer as if he didn't think it mattered much.
"Mike Gambit!" Purdey protested, going willingly to his side.
"You scared me, Purdey-girl," Gambit whispered in her ear, brushing back the hair that had long ago lost its bent clip. "You're not supposed to let yourself get captured without me."
"I'll try to remember that next time," Purdey murmured, and for the next several minutes they were aware of nothing except each other.
Next chapter coming next week!
I proofread all my stories at least once before posting, but if you see any mistakes I might have missed, please let me know!
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