Hunted (Dark Secrets Book 1) (4 page)

Get over it,
I thought.
At least it will keep me warm and full for the night.

I smashed the paper bag, lit it with my Zippo and dropped it onto the middle of the tracks. The flame burned fast, and I stomped it out to ashes with my boot. Then I assembled my Take Down and slung it, along with my quiver, across my back. I made sure to keep my hunting knife and hatchet close to my fingers. I strung a can of pepper spray over my wrist and gripped it in my fist. It would be another long night and I was grateful for the few hours of sleep I had gotten in Russ' truck.

Reaching into my pack, I grabbed my night vision goggles. They had been a gift from Jesse, a boy with the Underground. He gave them to me when he knew I was going on the run again. That was last year. They had always served me really well. I slipped them over my eyes, put away the case and zipped everything up. Then I rechecked my full water bladder and pulled the pack tight to my back. It would be a marathon night. I'd walk and run for as long as I could.

I stopped to look and listen for trains and then, with everything silent, stooped down and placed my hand over the steel beam. No vibrations. Good. The night was going to seem even longer with no iPod, but I needed all my senses alert
—not only did I have to listen for trains, I would have to be mindful of people with bad intentions hanging out down here. I pulled my compass out of my pocket. Fortunately for me, the tracks seemed to follow the highway, so I started a steady jog south.

In the quiet there was so much time to think. Five years ago the Takers had started showing up. At first I considered myself lucky
—it always seemed like they showed up in places I had been just a few weeks before. But as that pattern continued in the months that followed, paranoia washed over me and adrenaline pumped through my body. But this paranoia wasn't insanity; it was legit. The Takers hadn't hit anywhere in the country—or the world for that matter as far as I knew—except for the places I had been. I went over the mental math again.

The first year that the Takers had appeared: I didn't know much about them
—I was still pretty sheltered by my mother.

Second year: My mother had left me and I became more aware. I caught bites of info from newspapers and gossip. I learned that professional and organized squads were kidnapping groups of people
—especially young teen girls.

Third year: In April four men nabbed four girls (approximately 13 to 15 years of age) from a schoolyard in Baja California, Mexico. No leads. I had just left Baja a few weeks prior and had been sleeping in that same schoolyard. I hadn't thought anything of it at the time; bad things happen all the time.

Just a month later two girls, both fourteen, were taken coming out of a convenience store in Sonora, Mexico. I had shopped at that store just two weeks before. But again, I figured it was coincidence.

In June of that same year a news report explained that five men had rappelled from a Walmart roof in Great Falls, Montana, taking four teenagers. All four were females between 13 and 19 years of age. I had just stopped in Montana to restock my supplies nine days earlier. I had moved quickly on to Babb, where I stayed on the Blackfoot reservation with a few friends and then in Glacier National Park back country.

I heard of no other reports of the kidnappers anywhere until September after I hopped a bus through Cortez, Colorado on my way to El Paso, Texas to winter in the warm climate. I had spent some time in Mesa Verde National Park for a couple of weeks. Then I did something my mom had warned me not to do. I stopped at an ATM machine at some bank. I didn't have any money there to take—I just pretended for a moment that I was a regular person living a real life. I was only fourteen years old. I played with the buttons and touched the screen, but only for a few minutes. When I realized how stupid I was acting, I walked away. Ten days later a group of four young women and a man waiting in line at that same ATM were whisked away.

That's when the Takers got their name. They left no trace, no leads, and you always heard the same story from witnesses
—men rappelling from silver cords came out of the sky, clothed in identical navy blue suits with white button-up shirts and gray paratrooper boots. They were strong, young men between the ages of 16 and 35—at least that's what the reports said. And they had some sort of lenses over their eyes that made their irises violet.

Mexico's government blamed the incidents on drug cartels. Federal authorities in the U.S. searched for the Takers and the missing people with rigor for months, but soon it was only the families that kept their vigil, offering rewards and plastering photos of their taken loved ones across the country. After several more hits from the Takers with no ransom demands or responsibility taken, White House officials feared foreign enemies had developed a new deadly technology.

In October and November of that year, I hiked into the back country of Big Bend National Park on the Texas and Mexico border for the winter. I was out there for two weeks when I heard on my emergency broadcast radio that seven Takers had descended on Big Bend's Visitor's Center during a busy Saturday afternoon. Six tourists were snatched.

I stayed in the park, living off the land, hunting rabbits and sneaking into campsites in the midd
le of the night to raid camper’s coolers and food storage supplies. I hated stealing, but I didn't see any other option. If I tried to get a job, authorities from Child Social Services would have scooped me up in a second. And my mother had sternly warned me that we were never to get involved with the system.

~

"Mom, why can't I go to school?" I had demanded. "I want a real house and real food! I hate rabbits!" We were cleaning and skinning jack rabbits that we had just snared in a California desert. I must have been ten at the time.

"You know why, Freya. We've been over this," my mom had answered patiently but with an exasperated tone.

"Right," I started rather sarcastically and then recited by rote, "because you worked for a government science program—the results of which put us in danger, and if we ever came out of hiding, or if they ever found us, they would want to hurt us."

"I know it's hard to believe, love. Trust me; it's just as hard for me to believe. If I could choose a different life for you, I would. But right now, this is the best thing I can do to keep you safe," she explained. I shut up and went back to gutting the rabbit.

~

I had stayed in Big Bend until spring, living off the land. I hadn't heard any news on my radio of any more Taker raids and from what I could tell most people were feeling as if the danger had passed. That was good. It was over. But, March in the desert gets hot, so I was off again.

This time I hitched a ride to Brownsville, Texas. The trucker that I had gotten a ride from didn't have Russ' manners. He attempted to extract payment from my body with his grabby hands in a Pilot parking lot! Instead of what he wanted, he got my knee in his groin. That's the last time I hitched. If the guy had pulled a knife on me or had overpowered me, I could have been a "girl found dead on the side of the road" newspaper story. That's when I began jacking cars and motorcycles. While I was in Houston, I had met a young Mexican girl who was a couple of years younger than me at a local's hangout. Her father had worked on cars before he found himself in a cell and had taught her. In turn she showed me. It was pretty easy once I got the hang of it.

After Brownsville, I lifted a Kawasaki and followed as many back roads as possible until I got to New Orleans, Louisiana. My mother had a friend there. They had attended university together. Her name was Scarlett, She was a midwife and ran a clinic for people without insurance. Once a year
—before my mother left me—we would visit Scarlett for a few weeks before we moved on again. Before my mother took off she told me that if I ever needed money or ran into trouble that I could trust Scarlett. So, that was where I was headed. I ditched the bike and slept anywhere I could find—under bridges, in doorways, under bushes at parks. I tried to stay in good areas. I was lucky to get a meal a day during those weeks. But I finally found my way to Scarlett's new address in New Orleans.

She and my mom had been really close
—like sisters almost. She had been overjoyed to see me and tried to talk me into living with her at first, but she lived on the fringes of regular society and knew that it wouldn't be possible to keep me safe. Authorities were always messing with her and her clinic, attempting to shut her down—not because she wasn't qualified, but because she was taking business from prominent OB/GYN's and doctors in the area. I would have been nabbed for sure there.

When she found out how I had been living
—without money and having to eat out of a restaurant's dumpster a few times because I had gotten so hungry—she gave me one of her ATM cards, made me memorize the pin number and told me, "Freya, wherever you are, whenever you need anything at all—whether it's a new coat, food, a backpack, transportation money or just spending money—wrap your mouth and nose in a scarf and withdraw some money from an ATM!"

From then on, although I lived on the run, I wasn't impoverished; I had cash at my disposal when I needed it. It was a tremendous new sense of security. That first night at her place, while sitting in her warm, cozy living room with feminine knickknacks and soft colored quilts on the wall, and while scarfing down an awesome homemade pizza and channel surfing, we landed on the evening news. That day in Houston, Texas, ten Takers had abducted eight teenagers, the majority of them girls, from the city library where I had used the computer to go on-line and get Scarlett's new address.

Now it was personal. For some unknown reason the Takers were gunning for me. I had broken down in tears and told Scarlett all of it. She came pretty close to reinforcing my mother's crazy stories of government conspiracies, which were absurd! Like I—a going-nowhere street kid hidden for my entire life by my insane mother—held some super secret. Scarlett may have believed my mother's stories to some extent, but I didn't to any extent.

~

Now, with my feet getting fatigued, I was starting to stumble over the train tracks I had been following for hours. The constellations shifted in the black night sky. I was just too tired to go any further. I stepped off the tracks and into a farmer's field to lay in the tall new growth of young corn stalks. After folding my tarp and laying it over the cold soft soil, I placed my blanket at the foot of my makeshift bed, placed my pack at the top for my head and lay down, tucking myself in with my weapons at fingers' reach. I laughed at myself a little—after all, probably the only thing I would have to fend off out here would be raccoons!

I stared up at Sagittarius chasing Scorpio across the dramatic expanse of the sky. I remembered it was during that two month visit with Scarlett that I had first gone to the Underground
—a kind of secret society hangout that had been set up in the Warehouse District of New Orleans by a wealthy benefactor. It was located beneath an old warehouse that looked unloved and unused, with broken windows and water-stained walls.

It was at the Underground that I met a group of cool kids (and some adults) that Scarlett was acquainted with. A few were like me, having lived on the streets; others came from regular and wealthy Louisiana families. There were a few talking about forming a group to fight the Takers. They took it personally because the kids who were taken were their ages. A leader of the group was, then seventeen-year-old, Jesse Thomas (the boy who had given me the night vision goggles). I think he had liked me in a romantic way
—he paid a lot of attention to me—but I was just sixteen and was more concerned about my circumstances than boys. If he was still there and if they had formed some kind of militia for battling the Takers, Jesse would probably be a general or something—he was smart and a bit of a hothead.

I continued to think back. During the next year and a half, Takers had hit random locations that almost dispelled my idea that they were after me, except that they still tagged every place I had been and only missed me by about a week. The bookstore was the first time they had ever come so close
—I was still there!

It had now been almost five years since the Takers first appearance, and they had taken almost two hundred victims. There had to be a reason! Why were they after me? Why had they snatched all those innocent people? What were they doing with them? Or to them? And how in the world did they know where
I
was? The only link I could come up with was that they only tracked me when I was in populated places—maybe each time I had gone by a camera or a satellite had picked up my image. Or maybe I was just as messed up as my mother.

Now I felt scared. I hated feeling scared
—it made you seem small, defenseless and weak. I tried to close my eyes but I couldn't until I took my hatchet in my palm and closed my fingers around the handle. I started to wonder how Theron was. But before I could really delve into those thoughts, I fell asleep. All night long I dreamed I was running—running for my life.

I woke up to the blaring of a train horn. I snapped up fast with my heart pounding in my chest. Some alarm clock! No way I was going back to sleep after that, which was disappointing because the spot ended up being relatively safe. Oh well. I packed up and took off walking. The temperature had dropped and it was biting cold. I checked my watch
—four-thirty a.m. The moon floated, suspended in a sea of blackness.

I would have to take some transformational measures. There was no way I was going to walk all the way to New Orleans, but I walked for two hours until I came to Central City. I made my way into the sleepy city just as it was waking up. Newspaper kids were tossing the day's rolled offerings onto front porches and into doorways. Delivery trucks and early workers dotted the roads. A couple of joggers ran past. When the next jogger ran by, I stopped and asked where the nearest 24/7 grocery store was. Kroger was two blocks down and around the corner on West Main Street.

I was glad to get into the store. In the early morning the bakery was churning out the most delicious aroma and the store was so warm. I took off my gloves and rubbed my hands together. I hit the bakery first. I picked up two fresh-from-the-oven bagels (one poppy seed and the other sesame) and a fresh baked cinnamon roll. Then I stood in the front of the aisles, reading the hanging signs above them. Aisle nine—beauty supplies.

There were always so many hair colors to choose from. I had been blond for almost a month now, but I had black hair before that and light brown before that. Deep burgundy red caught my eye
—a little punk and rebellion. Perfect!

Darting around the produce aisle, I got an apple and a pear and started toward the
register when a display rack with an Ole Miss black ball cap caught my eye. It would be different from the green and blue caps I'd been interchanging. I grabbed it, brought all the stuff to the register and took out a bottle of Starbucks mocha latte from the cooler at the checkout.

"Do you have a phone book?" I asked the saleswoman.

"Sure, honey." She walked out of her booth and behind the courtesy center and produced a bulky phone book for the area, which included both the yellow and the white pages. "Need paper and pencil?"

"Thank you," I said, opening the book. I found the listing for the Greyhound bus station, then looked up the YMCA. It would be nice to have a hot shower. I wrote the info on a little receipt paper she gave me from the register.

"How can I get to McCormick Avenue?" I asked the saleswoman as I handed her back the thick book.

She answered as she rang up the stuff. "A city transit bus stops out front of the store every twenty minutes; if you hurry you could make it."

After I paid for my items, I thanked the cashier, grabbed my bag and moved quickly through the automatic door and to the bus stop at the side of the street. Just as I got there, the transit bus pulled up. Perfect timing. I climbed on and took a seat.

The bus meandered through the city. I scarfed down the sesame bagel and downed the cold coffee in seconds.

The YMCA was small, and a bunch of fitness fanatics were chatting with friends in front of the welcome counter and flashing their user passes. I put my head down and snuck in behind the crowd.

I found the door labeled "Ladies Locker Room" and let myself in. I brought my pack into the shower stall with me and took out my towel, soap and hair dye. About a half hour later I was clean and dressed in a different outfit: green cargo pants with pockets on the sides, a T-shirt and a dark blue thermal top. I packed everything I had been wearing (which all now needed washing) into a plastic swim bag provided by the Y and zipped it into my pack.

I went to the large mirror to brush my hair.
I came in a blond and am leaving a fiery and rebellious red head. Cool.
I dried my hair with the Y's built in blow-dryer, braided it in two long braids on either side of my head, secured some stray hairs with a couple of bobby pins and tossed on the Ole Miss ball cap.

Ready
, I thought to myself as I headed out to catch the next transit to the Greyhound station.

I waited a good fifteen minutes (with my iPod to keep me company) in the small plastic-sided booth then took a seat near the back of the transit. I stepped out of the bus a few blocks away from the Greyhound station and walked the rest of the way.

I purchased a ticket to Jackson, Mississippi. Once I got there, I would switch it up again to get to New Orleans another way. Buses were so slow, and they made like a million stops along the way, but at least I could chill out and not have to be looking over my shoulder the entire time.

I sat down on one of the benches. It would be about forty minutes until my bus for Jackson would take off.

I sat with my music on low volume and watched every person around me from under the safety of my hat brim. It was exhausting, really, being so suspicious. I couldn't wait to get into another forest or national park. I could handle wild animals—wolves, bears, mountain lions—they liked to keep to themselves just like I did; it was people that I had to watch out for and worry about.

It never ends
, I thought depressingly.

"Are you all right, honey?" A woman's voice said next to me.

I panicked as I realized I had tears streaming down my cheeks. An elderly woman was standing over me.

"Boy trouble," I answered.
As long as she doesn't offer me an apple I should be safe.
"I'm fine really. Please, excuse me." I got up and made a beeline for the restroom to wipe my face.

And another stupid move!
I accused myself.
Suck it up, Freya!
I stared at my new, rebellious red hair in the mirror.

Rebellious,
I rolled the word over my tongue.
Embrace it
.

I sat on the closed toilet seat and locked the stall door.
I'll take no more chances,
I thought and took out my journal and pen to pass the time. The worn brown leather cover was soft and supple and was etched with a star. Yeah, it seemed silly for a secretive girl to own a journal, but I tried to put only non-secretive information in it. I wrote down my dreams and aspirations and about where I had been and how I felt about the area. My name was absolutely not written in it. And I certainly wasn't going to write about my mother's delusional episodes.

I spent a moment jotting down my experiences: leaving Piper, the Takers at the bookstore, a note to call Jodi when I got someplace safe. I thought about writing Theron's name, but didn't.

I turned back a bunch of pages to read some older notes.

I want to learn guitar, but I can't carry one with me, way too big and noticeable.

I want to be a journalist
—
I think.

I still didn't know what I wanted to be since I hadn't had enough chances to experiment with different ideas. I sighed deeply. If I could keep in front of Social Services for the rest of the year, I'd be eighteen and out of their age range. But then what? I didn't even have a birth certificate.
And
my mother never told me where I was born.

Maybe I could get a professionally faked ID and birth certificate. I've read books, so I know it's possible.

Hope,
my mother would say.
Even flowers hide under the earth in the fall only to return gloriously in the spring.

Maybe
… if I could stay out of reach of the Takers,
I thought.

"Greyhound Bus number 79 to Jackson, Mississippi now boarding. Please have your ticket in hand. Thank you," came the announcement, full of static, over the loudspeaker throughout the station.

I left the safety of the stall, walked through the building with my head down and handed my ticket to the driver. He used a hole puncher on it and passed it back to me. "You'll need to show this at the station when you re-board," he instructed. I climbed the steel steps into the coach.

The bus was pretty empty. I sat in the middle next to an escape window and settled in, placing my backpack on the seat next to me, hoping to deter other passengers from sitting there. The ride was quiet. I sat alone, watched the scenery and chose a random book on my Kindle to pass the time.

Halfway to Jackson, we made a stop at another station. Everyone was required to exit the bus while they gassed it up. The driver let us know it would be fifteen minutes. The station was in a business district. There was a sub shop across the street, along with some retail shops, banks, law offices. I went inside the station, but the only things in it were a few metal folding chairs and an ancient soda machine. Soda sounded good, so I walked over to it and slid a few quarters into the slot. I pressed Sprite and heard the can drop into the hold. Coke. At least I liked it. I popped the top, took it outside and sat in the little bit of green grass in front of the station.

It was a busy afternoon. All sorts of people were walking about. Businessmen and women in their gray and black corporate business wear headed quickly back to work after their lunch breaks, a bunch of customers at the sub shop sat at outside umbrella tables, and a couple was holding hands coming down the sidewalk. They held their heads close to one another with smiles on their faces like they were sharing secrets. I averted my eyes quickly, feeling like I was trespassing on their moment. I thought of Theron.

"
Yeah right!
"
I spoke out loud to wake myself up, pushing the thought out as quickly as it had come in.

I peeked back at the couple. I couldn't help it, they looked so happy. They were probably in their early twenties. As they passed my bit of lawn, the man picked a sunny yellow dandelion and tucked it behind the woman's ear. She blushed.

A mother pushing a stroller walked by, cooing at her fussing baby.

"Greyhound Bus to Jackson, Mississippi is now ready to board. Kindly have your tickets ready for the driver," a male voice boomed through the outside speaker.

About twelve of us got into line. I had been a bit lazy, staying in the grass, and was stuck toward the back of the line. A new driver approached the bus door and began punching holes into people's tickets. His dark gray uniform was a bit too tight and his silver buttons strained against the fabric.

"He's eaten too many doughnuts," the guy behind me sneered jokingly to his friend who sniggered back.

Suddenly, a Taker appeared out of nowhere, landing on the driver and folding his crumpled form to the blacktop. Five more Takers rappelled down from the top of the bus. I instinctively turned to run and was faced with a perimeter of six more. Eleven Takers! Surrounding us. Surrounding me!

Before I had a chance to react, the woman with the stroller scooped up her fussy child and bolted into the middle of the road. Cars and trucks came screeching to a halt
—some cars plowed into others. The man and woman who had been so romantic with one another were instantly wrapped in silver cord, despite their struggling, and vanished with their Takers. I watched as the broken dandelion fell to the grass.

I turned in another direction to escape when I felt my backpack being grabbed from behind.

"No!" I screamed as I struggled against the inevitable, like an animal caught in a snare.

My attacker spun me to face him as if I were nothing more than a rag doll. He looked like a hot young actor who was supposed to be attending a red carpet event in Hollywood instead of a thug pulling off a kidnapping
—they all did in their dark blue suits.

I instantly planted my knee into his groin, but my kneecap met with a hard armored shell. I peered up into his hardened face and stunning purple irises as a wide sinister smile spread across his face. I tried reaching for the hunting knife at my hip, but before I could get to it he grabbed hold of both of my arms and pinned me against his body. I was embraced in some grotesque lover's dance.

My hat was pushed off of my head as my cheek was crushed against him. I could feel the armor across his chest and stomach under his clothing.

He began to tie me up with the silver cord. I wriggled my arms up and, thinking quickly, pulled a bobby pin from my braided hair. You can do a lot of damage to an assailant by jamming a bobby pin into their ear canal. I plunged the bobby pin hard into the tender opening and slammed it with the palm of my hand, forcing it in as far as it could go. The Taker howled in pain and dropped me to grab at his injured ear.

I pitched myself to the side and away from him as he got tangled in his own cord and disappeared.

I scrambled to my feet but my foot slipped, tearing at the earth beneath me. Instantly, I was hoisted by my upper arms into the air by a tall, fierce-looking Taker. He looked like he had seen what I just did to his buddy and was going to kill me for it. The hate on his face was intimidating and palpable, while his grip held me like a vice. I couldn't take a breath.

My mind panicked as I thought,
This is it, the fight is over.
My legs and feet dangled uselessly underneath me.

Then, impossibly, I saw Theron running hard at my Taker from behind. His visage was full of aggression, surpassing even that of the enemy about to kill me. Theron threw himself into the air above my assailant like a human missile and came down on top of the Taker with a forceful blow from his right fist to the side of the Taker's head. The Taker lost his grip on me as he was driven to one knee.