The Hunted

Two stout men sat in silence behind the ticket window at 83rd Station.

The sun started to get low by then, and the cacophony of the bus station softened the jazzy song that the station radio croaked out.

Ten minutes had gone by at the window without any visitors. The eleventh minute brought by a bony, sickly-looking traveller.

“Where to?” The larger of the men asked, barely lifting his head to look at her.

“Woodstown.” Mika kept her voice low, carefully unloading a hoard of coins into the window slot. The copper smell of the money had been sharpened by the humidity—a midsummer quirk.

“Travelling light?” His glance landed on the bag draped on her shoulder before ticking the “No Luggage” box on her ticket. He slid the ticket through the slot and used his eyes to point the traveller to her bus.

Mika had grown oddly grateful of people like him. Those who understood that curt responses were enough and who couldn’t be bothered to look her in the eye. The short, unmemorable interactions were the reason she had made it as far as she did.

They couldn't give her whereabouts away if they didn't remember her.

The bus was an old-looking thing. Its engine sputtered every few minutes, teasing a breakdown. Each time, Mika wondered if the vehicle would stop and The Man would crawl out from the trees, or under the bus, or wherever he could fit his large frame.

The conditions had been ideal for her attacker. Save for two incurious passengers, the bus had been empty. A lady, draped head to toe in velvet, occupied the front seat, and the gentleman that Mika concluded to be Mr. Velvet sat on her right. If the need arose, a call to her defence would go unanswered on that vehicle—an offence she would be equally guilty of if the roles reversed.

The sputters, instead, resolved for jerking the vehicle forward and not for giving the man she was running from a chance to get to her.

A particularly violent jerk pushed the bag from under her seat into Mika’s ankles. The push, though gentle, jolted her awake; she stayed unaware she had even dozed off.

She followed two simple rules; don’t stay in one place for too long, and reserve sleep for the destination. She had foolishly and inadvertently broken the latter.

The journey had felt short. Woodstown lived up to its name. The evening sun barely pierced through the thicket that lined the roads. The shimmers of light that did make it through illuminated a mostly wooden structure across the road from the bus stop; the OAK MOTEL. The suffocating smell of the freshly painted letters followed her to the front desk.

...

109. She ran a finger over the pyro-engraved numbers on the motel room door. The place didn’t look big enough to have a hundred rooms, but the details were of no concern to her. She would be leaving soon anyway.

Hours had passed when a thump woke her, followed by another and another. A silhouette, visible through the curtains, crept to the door.

He had found her.

She knew neither his name nor his reasons for pursuing her. What she did know was the rhythm of his footsteps. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. The tune had chased her around the country.

She’d been careless, and that was the price of breaking the rules. It was the cost of dreaming instead of being watchful.

She had mastered the routine: closed windows and a bed as a makeshift door block. It was a risky move, but it was her only way to delay his inevitable entry. On terribly hot days, the idea of cracking open a window seemed tempting, but she would sooner die of heat exhaustion than at his hands.

Had she been bigger, or he smaller, she may have been able to fight her way out of his grasp. But thanks to her current nomadic lifestyle and poor diet, her body had shrunk all through the hunting. Everything she lost in body mass, she had gained in calculation.

She knew that it took three seconds to strip a motel table of its ornaments. It took an additional twenty to drag it into the bathroom and prop it against the closed door. The rest was up to chance and the size of the lodging. A matter of precision.

Mika counted sixty-six long seconds before the door of room 109 flew open. The hinges, which had been eaten away by rust, put up no fight. She cursed the humidity and the wretched town it made a home in.

She heard a shuffling sound as he made his way across the carpet, followed by a muffled bang on the outer side of the bathroom door. More bangs followed. She trembled as the sideways laying table inched closer to her with each hit. When the banging paused, she moved the table away from the bathroom door. The next big bang launched The Man and the door to the floor. He landed with his limbs sprawled across the detached oak, his head a hair’s width away from the porcelain bowl. An extra millimeter would have ended her torment. Unlikely, given her luck.

She lunged over his body and through the bathroom door. The giant followed suit, picking himself up in one swift motion. Mika wondered how his beefy body moved so fluidly.

He yanked the carpet backwards, causing her to stumble. He yanked it again to make up for his unsuccessful first attempt. Mika landed hard on the floor. She bellowed bitterly as he picked her up into the air, flailing her arms in protest. She pulled out the small steel blade she kept hidden on her person and dragged it deeply across The Man’s right cheek. It had been the first time any of her strikes landed. He dropped her at once, and she grabbed her bag—the bag that encased her entire being.

He grabbed his face and fell to the floor. He laid there, crying out and writhing in a pool of blood and laboured breaths.

A red-faced Mika bolted out of Room 109, down the stairs, and out through the Oak Motel gate. Her body burned. The damp, sweat-soaked clothes clung to her body. She had no time to catch her breath. She waved down the bus across the gate.

Her heartbeat slowed, slow breathing replaced the rapid shallow breaths, and she closed her eyes.

“Ticket, please.” A wide-eyed conductor nudged the snoring Mika on her shoulder. Within twenty-four hours, she had broken the same rule twice.

She had spent the last of her funds on 109, and she had no way to pay her fare. She shook away the cloud of sleep that shrouded her. When she gained consciousness, she attempted to string an excuse together.

“May I?” He interrupted her, pointing at the crumpled piece of paper sticking out of her right hand.

“Huh?” She looked down as the ticket man pulled the paper from her hand, catching sight of the barely legible W word scribbled in blue ink.

She bought it before her blackout, she thought; Her once empty pocket had, at some point, been refilled with the sum of the already spent motel money too.

She sometimes had gaps in her memory.

The bus coughed out one last sputter before screeching to a halt in front of the last stop.

“Woodstown, right?” The driver asked a barely reactive Mika. The exhaustion and hunger had started to shut her mind down. She staggered off the bus and across the road without registering his question.

A puzzled Mika stood still.

OAK MOTEL. The bold letters stared at her from the sign towering over her. The trip had been longer than she had previously thought, and the driver must’ve driven in circles. The conclusion was easy to come to. It explained the setting sun and the gap in her memory.

She had made it halfway back to the bus stop when she looked back and saw him again, smiling near the gate. He had ditched his usual dirt-stained ensemble for a checkered shirt and khaki trousers. She had studied his face many times before when she closed her eyes. Him.

To Mika, he looked strange standing there with a disarming grin plastered where his usual scowl resided. It sickened her to see the hunter smiling.

She ran for the motel gate, grabbing a small axe from a woodman’s tool cart on the way. Besides furniture, the tools were the best thing that came from a town overflowing with carpenters.

Up until then, she had never been the finder. She felt giddy at the thought of finally having the upper hand; at the chance to best him.

Standing at a distance close enough to maim him, she raised the axe above her head with both hands. As she launched the weapon at him, he turned to face her. He froze, terrified of the axe-wielding stranger in front of him.

Time slowed, and Mika examined his face. Beads of sweat cascaded from his bald head, down his forehead, into his eyebrows. Her attention, however, focused lower, to where her blade had broken his flesh the night before. In place of the gash she had left, a smooth-skinned cheek stared back at her.