Fight, Flight, or Freeze: The Healer's Story
Chapter 125: The Hunt Begins

Chapter 125: The Hunt Begins

There had to be easily 200 Reavers living and working at Camp Hell. Many of them weren’t seen, taking shifts guarding the perimeter or out getting supplies, but it didn’t matter what they did at the camp; when Alpha called for a hunt, they responded just as the rest did.

It was only Rip who didn’t feel the need as much as the others did, but if he was going to play nice with the others, he needed to pretend he did.

The need to respond to the Alpha’s call was weird. It was like how a wolf had to do whatever his or her Alpha told them to do. There was no choice to disobey, just a ringing in their heads that didn’t stop until the Alpha called them off. It was enough to drive a person crazy... or crazier...

And if something happened to the Alpha... then the call was never laid to rest.

Rip raced through the woods, miles ahead of any other member of the horde. He needed to find this male... this human... who thought he could get away. His actions impacted Wang Tian Mu in a negative way, and that was not going to be tolerated by Rip.

And he wasn’t willing to take the chance of the man getting farther away.

This hunt couldn’t end until every last member of the horde had tasted a piece of the fighter’s flesh, and while most of the Reavers were salivating to that command, Rip was strong enough to disregard it.

Wang Tian Mu had healed him enough that the idea of eating human flesh was somewhat repugnant. But if the bastard kept him away from her any longer than a week, even Rip would feast.

The woods were becoming thinner; the trees spread out more as they approached the highway. The fighter must have been planning this for a while since most people who tried to run normally go in the opposite direction, toward the lake.

Nope, this fucker was either really smart to take this route, or really dumb.

"The cars will meet us on the road," growled the Alpha a few feet behind him.

And that was why the human was dumb. Here in the woods, the Reavers had to hunt on foot, the branches and dead trees slowing them down. On the open road? Well, that was another story altogether.

Rip grunted that he had heard the man as he jumped over a fallen log. He refused to slow down for a second.

Breaking through the woods, he stopped on the side of the road, looking left and right.

He lifted his nose up and took a deep breath, trying to get the scent of the human.

"Right," he grunted as Alpha came to a stop beside him. The leader of the Camp lifted his nose as he, too, took in the scent.

He nodded his head in agreement and, just as the rest of the horde approached, pointed to the right.

The fucker had to have planned it. Left was up the hills and eventually just stopped. Right was the way toward City I and whatever was left of civilization.

Rip tilted his head from side to side, trying to calm himself down. He hadn’t even been gone for 15 minutes, and he could feel the need to turn around and go back to his woman. The idea that she was there, vulnerable in a cage without food, was enough to cut through the bloodlust that the Alpha had instilled in them by calling the hunt.

However, he knew if he turned around and went back, the Alpha would take it as him being disrespectful and kick him out of the Camp.

That was fine for him; he didn’t need the Camp to survive. But Wang Tian Mu did. If he took her with him, then the Alpha would call a hunt for her, and then there would be no place to hide.

There was a rumbling of engines just off to their right as the vehicles Alpha had torn down the road from the camp and shot out onto the road behind them.

They looked like something out of a fucking Hollywood movie, and Rip had no idea how they made them work. But they did.

"Get on!" grunted Alpha as he jumped onto the front car and climbed up the ladder until he was at least ten feet above the ground. He gripped onto the handlebar beside the driver and just hung there, taking in all the scents.

Rip slowed down just enough to jump onto the hood of another car. Once upon a time, it might have been an SUV of some kind or other, but now there was a cowcatcher hooked up to the front that provided cover to the hood and front window.

Gripping onto the bars in front of him, Rip let the catcher shield him while still getting a good view in front.

The lead car slowed down now that Alpha was on it, and Rip’s SUV took the lead, moving all of the dead cars and bodies that they came across to the side as the convoy pressed forward.

He didn’t understand how the human could have gotten away so fast; it should have been impossible for them not to have caught up by now.

The human had about an hour’s head start, if not more, so it was reasonable that he was ahead, but he was on foot while they were driving.

They should have caught up by now.

Rip let out a low growl as he ducked down, the catcher hitting an abandoned car hard enough to cause the other vehicle to flip up and over the SUV.

The cars behind swerved, not one of the drivers hitting the brakes.

Death was preferable to slowing down.

He continued to scan as far in front of him as he could, as well as sniffing the air. They were going in the right direction, he knew that, but he couldn’t see the human.

Realizing that this hunt was not going to be as easy as he originally thought, he sat down on the hood and got comfortable.

He was going to take great pleasure in tearing the man apart once he got his hands on him. And every moment he was kept away from Wang Tian Mu was one more moment to figure out the best way to deliver the most amount of pain in the least amount of time.