Hours have passed since Hunter has disappeared and everyone at Prosperity was getting more worried by the minute. Timber led Marcus, Carmina and Jerome to where he got split up from Hunter. Timber led them just outside of the forest where they found a Deer's corpse laying on the ground with an arrow sticking out of its neck.
Marcus kneeled down to look at the Deer's body. "This looks like a Highwayman kill, judging by the body somebody likely killed it for sport."
Jerome kneeled down to look at the body also, but after looking at it for a moment he looked at the Captain and shook his head in disagreement at his statement. "I don't think so, I've never seen any Highwaymen that'd used bows before, they mainly use guns to hunt and I don't see anything here that proves it was a Highwayman. Besides Timber led us here so that means Hunter was here."
"If that's true then this kill is most likely Hunter's?" Marcus guessed.
Carmina kneeled down too to inspect the corpse, the Deer had an arrow in its neck, the arrow went clean through quickly, meaning it was a quick and painless death. "It definitely looks like Hunter's, quick and painless is his style when it comes to Hunting." Jerome said.
"Are you for sure that it's his kill?" Carmina asked.
"Yep, clean through the neck, that's Hunter alright." Jerome said, then looked at the arrow. "And this is one of his arrows."
"But, Hunter would never leave an animal corpse to rot without cutting it up first, and he wouldn't leave a perfectly good arrow behind either so clearly something must've happened here." Carmina stated.
Timber moved closer to sniff the body then looked around to try and pick up a scent.
"Do you smell anything boy?" Carmina asked the dog, Timber looked at her and gave a low whimper meaning NO.
"I don't think Timber here will be able to pick up a scent, this body looks like it's been here for a while, likely a few hours." Marcus said looking at the deer corpse.
"But, looks like it hasn't been dead long either, so we may still be able to pick up a trail." Jerome said.
"Alright, both of you stay here and see if you can find anything, Me and Timber will try and pick up a trail to see if we can find out where Hunter went." Marcus instructed them.
They both nodded. "Alright come on Timber," Timber gave a bark and followed Marcus, The Captain and Timber walked off to find a trail, leaving Jerome and Carmina to examine the Deer.
Jerome took a closer look at the arrow and pulled it out to examine it. "This arrow is still pretty sharp, Hunter always loved caring for his equipment." Jerome stated, looking at the arrow in his hands. Jerome looked up at the bright sky. "Hunter I pray to God that you're OK." Jerome muttered.
"Maybe he's out there somewhere, he probably got ambushed and dropped his radio." Carmina guessed, trying to come up with a scenario of what happened here.
Jerome nodded. "Maybe, but I wouldn't bet too much on it."
Carmina looked at the Deer's corpse and a tear of sadness filled her eye. "He can't be dead, can he?" Carmina said, sadly, she didn't want to believe something bad happened to her boyfriend, but it seemed like something did happen here and Hunter could be dead.
Jerome placed a hand on Carmina's shoulder. "Fave faith Carmina, I've taught Hunter how to handle himself well in this environment, I'm sure he's fine." Jerome reassured her but he was just as worried about him as she was, he raised Hunter ever since he was an infant, his mom Jess entrusted him to take care of her son and give him a life to live, he wasn't gonna break his promise to her now, he was going to find Hunter and bring him back home to his family.
"Hey guys over here, think I found something!" Marcus called out, waving his hand out to them, they both quickly got up and made their way over to Marcus.
"What is it?" Carmina asked quickly, wanting an answer.
Marcus pointed to the dirt and they saw two sets of footprints one pair was from a person and the other looked like they were from a bear. "I'm guessing a bear ambushed Hunter before he could skin the Deer over there and he ran as fast as he could into the forest to get away from it but it was hot on his tail."
Marcus pointed to the left where they saw another set of footprints. "There are another set of footprints over here, they're most likely the Bears."
Jerome kneeled down to look at the footprints, they were from a size 11 boot that were mainly worn by hunter's. "These other footprints are definitely Hunter's; those are the prints from his hunting boots." Jerome informed them.
"So do y'all think he could still be alive?" Carmina asked them.
Marcus looked at Carmina and nodded. "Maybe, but you both should prepare yourselves for the worst case scenario."
"No he's not dead!" Carmina denied, but there was hesitation in her voice. Given what has happened here it's logical to assume that Hunter could be dead or badly wounded, but there was still the possibility that he could be alive. Carmina really loved Hunter and she wouldn't know what to do if she lost him. He was her lifelong friend and more.
"Timber managed to pick up a trail so if we follow him he'll likely lead us to Hunter." Marcus told them.
"Then let's get moving," Jerome said.
Marcus looked at Timber. "Alright boy follow the trail."
Timber let out a single bark and began following the path.
As they were following Timber Marcus could see the worried look on Carmina's face, he understood that Hunter was her boyfriend and she loved him but if he's dead then it may affect her badly. Marcus knew that feeling well, he lost many friends before he came to Hope County, in many missions he had to watch many of his closest friends die, if Hunter was dead then he would know how to help her, Jerome and the others out.
They followed Timber for about 15 minutes and he led them to a field where it looked like a fight had occurred. "Looks like the trail ends here." Marcus informed them, he looked around and saw a bear laying on the ground. "Hey guys look over there." They looked at what Marcus pointed to and saw the dead bear laying on the ground. Carmina ran over to the bear to see if Hunter was laying near it but he wasn't anywhere near it.
Carmina looked around for Hunter but he was nowhere in sight. "HUNTER!" she yelled out hoping for a but there was no response. Timber walked over to Carmina and whimpered at her, Carmina looked down at Timber looking just as worried as she was, she kneeled down to timber and gently patted his head. "I know Timber, I'm really worried too."
Marcus and Jerome walked over to the Bear, hoping to find out what happened here. They kneeled down to see what killed the bear, they looked at it for a moment searching for wounds then Marcus found some arrow wounds on the bear. "Hey Carmina, Jerome, come here!" Marcus called, Jerome walked over to him as he was inspecting the wounds on the bear. "Find something?" Jerome asked.
"Yeah, did you?" Carmina added.
"Yeah, there are some arrow wounds right here on his chest, and his left eye was shot, so that must mean Hunter killed the bear." Marcus said, pointing to the two arrow marks on the corpse.
Jerome took a look at the wounds, they were definitely from arrows, so Hunter must've killed it, but a lot of questions still remain right now. "If Hunter killed the bear then where is he?" Jerome asked, looking around for him.
"And why wouldn't he report in?" Carmina added.
"Hmm the kill looks recent, it was likely killed about 30 to 45 minutes ago." Marcus guessed then said. "There must be more to this."
"Alright then let's spread out and see if we can find anything." Jerome suggested.
Marcus and Jerome spread out to find Hunter or anything that he may have left behind, Carmina continued to inspect the wounds on the bear's corpse hoping to find something they missed, as she looked at it she noticed that there was something underneath it. Carmina reached down and tried to grab it but it was stuck, she grabbed the bear and lifted it up as best as she could, she freed a hand and reached for the thing under the bear but failed. "Dammit." Carmina growled in frustration.
"Marcus, come here I need your help." Carmina called, Marcus responded and walked over to her. "You found something?"
Carmina nodded. "There's something under here and I can't get it out so can you help me?"
"Alright then, come on let's lift him up." Marcus instructed. They moved to the Bear to lift him up and get the object out. It took them a minute to free the object from underneath the corpse and when they finally flipped it over what was underneath was a surprise. They flipped over the corpse and finally freed the object. Carmina kneeled down to see what it was but her eyes quickly widened at what was underneath, it was a bow but it was broken in half. That bow belonged to Hunter.
"Oh my god, Hunter's bow." Carmina muttered, as she picked up his broken bow, she looked at it and saw traces of blood on it. "This looks like Hunter's blood."
"Jerome over here, we found something!" Marcus called out to him.
Jerome quickly ran over to them to see what they found and he gasped as soon as he saw Hunter's broken bow in Carmina's hands, he walked over to Carmina and took the pieces from her hands. "Oh Lord."
"If his bow is here then where is Hunter?" Carmina asked.
"If that's his blood then he must've been wounded. Let's keep searching, there's probably something here that could lead us to him." Marcus suggested to them.
Without a second thought they all spread out again and looked around for any more clues on Hunter's whereabouts, then after another moment Marcus took notice of something weird by a tree that looked red, the Captain slowly walked over to it and he was shocked at what it was, it was a small pool of blood.
"Holy shit." Marcus muttered, he knelt down and looked at the blood pool and saw a few bloody hand prints and a knife by it. Marcus reached out and picked it up then looked at it, he recognized the knife it was Hunter's. Whatever happened it was clear that Hunter was badly wounded and bleeding badly. "But where is he?" Marcus wondered, he took a closer look at the pool and saw some bloody footprints going but they weren't from Hunter the size was bigger and it didn't match Hunter's boots so somebody must have found Hunter and took him.
"You guys might wanna come take a look at this." Marcus said, they walked over to the Captain and they gasped in horror as they saw the pool of blood on the ground.
"Oh my god." Carmina in horror as she brought her hands up to her mouth. "Is that-"
"Yep that's Hunter's blood, it looks like the bear got him good." Marcus informed them. "But, I don't think he's dead."
"What! Are you sure!?" Carmina asked.
Marcus looked at Carmina and nodded." Yeah, these are his hand prints." Marcus pointed to the hand prints then pointed to the bloody footprints."But those aren't his foot prints, someone else was here."
"If that's true then who helped him?" Jerome asked.
Marcus shrugged. "I don't know, but he left a trail, if we follow it then we can probably find Hunter and this person."
"Then let's move." Carmina said following the trail. Marcus, Jerome, and Timer followed.
In a bunker a few miles away the Judge of New Eden sat on the floor next to a bed where the boy he saved slept quietly. The Judge carried the boy for almost half an hour until he found this old bunker, he didn't know where else to take him;New Eden wouldn't help the Sinners and if he took him to Prosperity they would've killed him on sight so this bunker was the best option.
When they arrived at the bunker the Judge quickly searched for any medical supplies to help the kid and found a first aid kit that fortunately had a needle, thread, and some bandages. The Judge did his best to clean and stitch up the kids' cuts, fortunately he knew a lot about how to clean and suture wounds thanks to someone he knew from his past. When he was done cleaning and closing up the kids wounds he decided to leave the room and fix the boys clothes to allow the kid to rest peacefully without any disturbance.
The Judge sat on an old couch of the Bunker sewing up the last claw mark in the hoodie, it was very easy for him to sew them up, he's had to sew his own clothes so many times that it didn't take long for him to fix a rip. Most times were from gunshots he got in fights and some were from wild animals he hunted. After he was done with the hoodie he went to work on sewing the kids shirt, but he suddenly heard something coming from the Bunks, he quickly shot up from the couch and ran to the Bunks.
The Judge ran over to the kid to see if he was OK, he was still laying in his bed unconscious, but he was breathing repeatedly and sweating. He kneeled down to look at the kid, he removed the glove on his right hand and brought it up to the kids head to feel it, his head was starting to burn up which means there must be an infection. The Judge moved over to the boys bandages and undid them to look at his wound, the kid's wounds looked mostly fine but small parts of it were starting to get a little infected, that wasn't good. The Judge cleaned his wounds as best as he could but he must've missed a few spots.
The Judge put his glove back on and realized that if those infections weren't treated soon then the kid will die, he went over to the First-Aid kit to find any antibiotics but there wasn't any medicine in there, and there wasn't anything else in the bunker that could help with his wounds, however if he could find some herbs he could make an ointment out of them that he could use to treat those infected wounds.
After the Judge replaced the kids bandages he left the Bunker and headed out into the forest to find some herbs, the Judge knew these woods well and where some Herbs could be found, the New Edener's often hunted in these woods their talents made it easy for them to fight off predators or poisonous plants and if they were to be attacked the forest would make it easy for them to escape or disappear from their attackers sight and ambush them back. The Herbs weren't hard to find, it only took a few minutes for him to find and locate some herbs. The Judge found a small patch where a few medicinal herbs were growing, he knelt down, and began picking the herbs and putting them into his bag.
As the Judge was picking the herbs he suddenly heard the bushes near him shaking, the Judge shot up from the ground, quickly pulled out his bow, loaded an arrow and took aim. He looked around and sensed that someone was watching him, The Judge aimed for his mysterious stalker, but whoever it was was moving fast. Before the Judge could get a fix on his stalker an arrow suddenly shot out from a bush hitting him near his stomach, the shot made him drop his bow and arrow, he brought his hands to the arrow that was embedded in him, letting out a grunt of pain. Another arrow quickly flew out of the same bush hitting him clean through his left arm, and a third one quickly followed hitting him near one of his lungs causing him to fall to the ground.
The Judge let out a monstrous roar of pain as he laid on the ground bleeding,the arrows hurt the Judge badly, so bad that they made him fall to the ground. This person was very skilled with a bow and may actually kill him,but he wasn't gonna die here with a kid that needed his help so he quickly got up and looked for who was shooting those arrows and saw someone emerging from the bushes carrying a bow in his hand, readying another arrow and casually walking over towards him. The Judge took a closer look at the person and realized that it was the mysterious woman he saw some time ago. She aimed her bow at his head, and released another arrow at him, the arrow soared through the air heading for his head but the Judge quickly grabbed the arrow before it could and threw it aside, he then looked down at the arrows that were still in him and quickly ripped all of them out of his body.
Removing each arrow from his body really hurt, but the pain didn't really bother him, after he got all the arrows out of him he looked up at the mysterious woman who looked a little surprised at him for pulling out the arrows, but she quickly fired another arrow at him but he quickly grabbed that arrow too and tossed it aside and began angrily walking towards her, letting out an angry growl.
'The mystery woman kept firing more arrows at the Judge, but he just kept dodging and hitting the arrows. The Judge noticed that she was beginning to look scared through her bandanna, as she was about to fire another arrow. The Judge quickly ran over to her and smacked her bow out of her hands, he delivered a hard punch to her face sending her to the ground. She quickly got up and tried to deliver a punch to her face only to have him block it and smack her hard in the face, she let out a groan of pain and brought a hand up to her jaw, then looked up at the Judge and kicked him in his crotch causing him to release his hold on her arm.
The Judge brought his hands to his crotch and clasped the spot where she kicked him letting out another groan of pain. The woman reached into a knife holster on her leg, pulled out her knife and raised it up to stab the Judge but he quickly recovered and stopped her arm squeezing it until she dropped her knife. The Judge delivered a few more punches sending the woman back onto the ground this time he didn't give her the satisfaction of getting up, he quickly ran over to her and kicked her in the face, stunning her. Before she could even move he grabbed her and picked her up by the neck and carried her to a tree and slammed her head hard into it knocking her out,he let her go and she fell to the ground. The Judge looked at the masked woman for a moment, as much as he wanted to kill her right now, he quickly remembered the kid, he needed his wounds treated right now, so he ran over to his bow and bag, picked them up and ran back to the Bunker, leaving the masked woman alive.
The Judge jumped down into the bunker, closed the hatch, and went over to the kid, he was just how he left him. The Boy was still asleep on the bed, he was still feverish and sweaty. The Judge quickly got to work in mixing the herbs into an antibiotic ointment, then undid the bandages, applied the ointment onto his wounds when he was finished he closed the bandages. It would take awhile for the ointment to do its job so he stayed and sat right by the kid to see if there would be any signs of improvement. Given how much blood the kid has lost it would be awhile before he wakes up, but he couldn't stay here forever Ethan would take notice if he's too long.
He wasn't gonna leave this kid to die but Ethan would punish him if he isn't back, but he could lie. His desire to protect the young was stronger than his loyalty to Ethan or Joseph but he still needed to report in so he decided to lie. The Judge looked at the boy and stroked his hair, he would heal him and get him back home.
The Group followed the blood trail for awhile and it eventually went cold they tried to find a single trace but whoever rescued Hunter probably covered their tracks so nobody could follow them. It was getting late and they couldn't continue the search any longer today, the forest was very dangerous at night do they left and went back to their car to head back to prosperity.
"We can't just leave! Hunter is still out there!" Carmina argued as they were approaching the truck.
Marcus opened his door and looked at Carmina."I know you want to continue this search, Carmina, but it's getting late and we won't be able to find anything in the darkness of night." He replied.
"He's right Carmina, that Forest is also very dangerous at night. We're no good to Hunter if we end up getting attacked by predators." Jerome added.
"Whoever this person was, we don't know who they could be. It could've been a Highwayman or someone else." Carmina argued.
Marcus sighed and walked over to Carmina placing a hand on her shoulder. "I'll see if the Highwaymen have him tomorrow, and you can continue the search too, but right now we have to go home and you're exhausted."
They argued for a little longer then they managed to Convince Carmina to come, they drove for awhile until they made it back to Prosperity. They walked through the Front Gates and when they were inside they found Kim waiting by the entrance.
"Did you find anything?" Kim asked worriedly.
Marcus nodded and said. "We found a trail we followed it and it led us to a bear corpse, we also found this" Marcus pulled out the pieces of Hunter's bow and showed them to Kim, her eyes widened in horror. "Oh my god." She muttered incredulously, she took the pieces from her hand and looked at them for a second then looked back up at them. "Was this all you found?"
"No" Jerome replied."We also found a pool of blood that was Hunter's, but he wasn't there. The Bear that attacked him badly wounded him."
"But, there were another set of footprints that belonged to someone else, someone must've killed the Bear, and helped or taken Hunter, but we don't know who." Carmina added.
"So he's alive?" Kim asked.
"We don't know for sure." Marcus answered her.
Kim looked at them for a moment then said. "Alright, see what you can find tomorrow, just get some rest for now."
Everyone complied and went into the house to get some rest, tomorrow would be another long day.
Carmina tried to get some sleep but her worry prohibited her from sleeping at all. Carmina got up from her bed and looked at Hunter's knife that layed by her bed, she grabbed it and looked at it, the knife was still covered in blood and dented a little. Since she couldn't sleep she stood up, walked downstairs, and over to his Dad who was in the Garage working on a car, Nick stopped and looked at his daughter who still had the worried look on her face as before. "Hey Kiddo, what are you doing up?" Nick asked.
"I-I-I couldn't sleep." Carmina replied,rubbing her eye.
"I heard about your search, don't worry sweetie I'm sure wherever Hunter is he's just fine." Nick said as he was working on the engine of the car.
"But, how do you know for sure?" Carmina asked.
"Because, that boy is strong and he can handle himself well." Nick said proudly.
"But, he was wounded and was taken by someone who probably killed him." Carmina said as tears of sadness began running down her eyes.
Nick looked at his daughter and grabbed her wrapping his arms around him, she buried her face in his chest crying."Don't worry kiddo, i'm sure Hunter is just fine he's tough and can handle himself, just have faith. I know you love Hunter but he wouldn't want you to kill yourself over this."
Carmina wasn't gonna stop until she found her boyfriend.
And that concludes this chapter of the New Dawn.
I apologize for the long wait, but I've had some Writers Block so it took me awhile to figure this out. I will come back and make improvements to this chapter.
And you all know the drill, please leave your reviews and tell me what you think.