Jamie Freveletti - Running from the Devil

“She’s able to move a hell of a lot faster than we are, I can tell you that.”

“She’s got to be tired, too. She’s only human,” Kohl pointed out.

“Kohl, her brand of tired is completely different from ours. She’s conditioned to run in the heat for miles on end. What she does can only be done by a handful of people in the world. It’s like trying to chase a Formula One race car in a golf cart.”

“I hate to leave her out there.”

Miguel sighed. “I know, but we can’t spare the time looking in different directions. We need to focus our efforts in a way that is likely to find the most passengers. And who knows? Maybe she’s following the guerrillas, too. Come on, let’s move out.”

Kohl turned away, a dejected look on his face.

Within fifteen minutes, they were jogging down the trail. Boris and Natasha ran in front; Miguel, Kohl, and the rest followed. Within an hour, Miguel was drenched. His clothes clung to his body. Thirty minutes later, he reduced his pace to a brisk walk. After thirty minutes more, he was walking even slower.

Miguel called a halt. He sat on a nearby tree stump and drank from his canteen. The wet heat felt like a blanket settling on him. The minute they’d stopped walking, the mosquitoes began forming into clouds. Miguel pulled out some bug spray and sprayed his arms. The unique chemical smell floated in the air. His arms felt sticky and he smelled like a chemical processing plant.

Great, he thought. He waved Kohl over. “What happened to the odorless bug spray?”

“We never had any that I know of.”

“Now my scent can be detected a hundred yards ahead.”

Kohl laughed. “Not by the guerrillas. They all smoke like fiends. Their sense of smell shut down years ago.”

“I hope the same can be said of the cartel guys.” Miguel’s voice was dry.

“They’re worse. They smoke weed. That smell will cover anything in its path.” Miguel stood up and ran a bandanna over his face. Kohl shuffled his feet and studied the foliage all around them.

“Well, look at that,” Kohl sounded excited.

Miguel rubbed the sticky chemical deeper into his skin before glancing up to see what interested Kohl so much. That’s when he saw the large X carved into the trunk of a tree. He gave a low whistle.

“Wonderful,” he said.

“It’s her!” Kohl’s voice was filled with excitement, and way too loud.

“Kohl, pipe down.” Miguel said. He walked over to the X. Ran a finger in the grooves. He didn’t care who carved it, he was just thankful that they did. He spun around. Kohl grinned a crooked grin and batted at a cloud of mosquitoes. “Time to go,” Miguel said.

They started forward again; this time, no one jogged, except Kohl, who seemed to have a new lease on life since seeing the X. Miguel figured they had four hours of light left before the men would need to eat. Each soldier carried a pack that contained food, water, a hammock, and mosquito netting.

Boris came to a dead halt. He stopped so quickly that Miguel stumbled over him. He landed on his knees next to the dog. It was then that he saw the thin nylon wire strung across the path. It disappeared into the tree line. Miguel couldn’t see where it stopped, but he assumed it ended on a spring-loaded mine.

“Everyone stop!” Miguel yelled to the men. They froze in place. Kohl inched forward and squat down next to Miguel. He eyed the line.

“Don’t you just love that dog?”

20

THE DAY AFTER JUAN APPEARED BABBLING ABOUT EL CHUPACABRA, Luis awoke to discover that three men had deserted during the night.

“We have a very big problem,” Alvarado said.

Luis was boiling with rage. He focused on the tall man.

“It is this man who causes us trouble,” he told Alvarado.

Alvarado gave Luis an incredulous look. “Luis, forget that man, will you? How could he be the problem? He is here the entire time, while these sentries see monsters in the dark.”

Luis swung toward Alvarado and poked a finger in his chest. “Or do you believe it is El Chupacabra, too?”

Alvarado shook his head. “I think it is some sort of animal that stalks us. A real animal, not a legendary beast.”

“How do we kill it?” Luis kept his gaze on the tall man, who was kneeling next to a passenger.

Alvarado shook his head. “I do not know.”

Luis watched the tall man talk to the passenger.

“Luis, focus,” Alvarado said.

“No more sentry duty. Everyone sleeps in camp today. If the beast comes, it will have to enter the circle to attack, and when it does, we will kill it.” Luis continued to stare at the tall man, then spun on his heel and walked away.

Alvarado stayed in the rear, brooding. Luis’s single-minded determination to complete this project and show the cartels his leadership abilities worried him. Luis was a man of little complexity and great, explosive anger. While he was known for leading the small band of losers well, Alvarado did not think he was up to the task of running any type of real organization. His anger always ended up creating a disaster.

Like his unprovoked attack on the tall man, whose machete wound had become infected. It oozed yellow pus. He still managed to walk with an easy motion, but Alvarado saw how his mouth was pinched with the pain. His hair hung in greasy clumps and his eyes were bloodshot. Alvarado thought the man looked slightly mad. He expected him to die from the infection, and this meant less money for all.

The loss of the tall man wouldn’t be their only loss, by far. Three other passengers were already sick. Two diabetics had lost their insulin in the crash, and their moods were fluctuating wildly as their blood sugar rose and plunged. One passenger had broken his arm and the swelling refused to lessen. The man kept it wrapped and held it close to his body. Alvarado wasn’t sure how long the man would survive if the swelling didn’t go down. He figured all these would die before they could be ransomed.

At three o’clock in the afternoon, Luis and his entourage reached the first checkpoint on their journey. Three flatbed trucks and two jeeps, covered with leaves and tree branches for camouflage, were parked at the beginning of a crude dirt path.

“Thank God,” Alvarado said. “We can ride for a while.”

Luis waved at the soldiers. “Get everyone into the trucks.” He turned to Alvarado. “At least we move the cows faster now, eh? I was ready to kill them all just so we could get here.”

Alvarado shook his head. “Fifty miles, and only a little bit faster. This road is a mess. Then more walking.”

“Fifty miles in a vehicle. Who cares how fast? It’s still much better than fifty miles on foot,” Luis pointed out.

Alvarado nodded. “True, but this part is dangerous. The gringos can follow the road from their Harpies.” Alvarado scanned the sky above him, looking for helicopters.

Luis watched, too. He slapped Alvarado on the back. “What goes up must come down, Alvarado. I’ve yet to see a Harpy you couldn’t shoot on descent.” Alvarado looked pleased at the compliment.

“But we throw out the sick ones here. We don’t have the room to carry them all,” Luis said. “Take that diabetic man out of here and shoot him.” He pointed at the weaker of the two diabetics. “The tall man, too. His infection will kill him in the next few days, and I am tired of looking at him.”

Alvarado frowned in disapproval.

“You have a problem with this order, Alvarado?” Luis glared at his lieutenant.

Alvarado pursed his lips, then shrugged. “The diabetic man will be in a coma soon.” He said nothing to Luis about the tall man. He thought the chances of him beating the infection were slim, but he’d survived this long, a near miracle. Alvarado snapped his fingers at a group of guerrillas that lounged against a jeep. “Take those two back on the path and kill them,” he said.

21

EMMA ROUNDED A CORNER AND SKIDDED TO A HALT. A SMALL group stood on the path thirty feet ahead. Foliage obscured her view, but she caught glimpses of the men between the swaying branches.

Three guerrillas stood in a semicircle around Sumner and another passenger. The extent of Sumner’s deterioration shocked Emma. He was unshaven, with five days’ growth of beard and a long red, swollen cut on his shoulder blade that oozed a yellow substance. He was naked from the waist up, his back was covered in bug bites, and his pants hung on his frame.

The other man was not much better off. His ashen face gleamed with an unnatural sheen, and he swayed a little. Sumner reached out and clutched the man’s forearm, lending what support he could.

The guerrillas passed a joint between them in silence. The pungent marijuana aroma wafted toward Emma. Each carried a rifle slung over his shoulder by a strap, one wore ammunition belts crisscrossed over his chest, and the third held a plastic water bottle.

They ignored the two passengers while they took their time smoking. The executioners, rather than offering a last smoke to the condemned, were taking one themselves. It was as if Sumner and the other man didn’t exist. As if the guerrillas thought the men were already ghosts. Emma felt a sense of dread just watching the silent group. She found herself staring at the guerrilla with the ammunition belts as he put the joint to his lips, inhaled with closed eyes, and then took it away in a slow motion. She knew that when his joint was over, something awful was going to happen.

The smoke curled into the air in slow patterns. The two guerrillas without ammunition belts sat down on the ground to roll another. The guerrilla with the ammo stayed standing, and continued smoking. Sumner and the injured man waited, swaying in silence.

Emma slid the pack off her back. She lowered it to the ground and carefully pulled out one of the pistols and a tiny bottle of scotch. She shoved the gun into her waistband, cracked open the scotch, drank half of it, and poured the remaining alcohol over the grease-soaked rag that she still had from her encounter with the guerrilla. She placed the neck of the bottle under her foot. The top broke with a satisfying crunch, leaving a jagged tip and a wider opening. She shoved the piece of cloth in the bottle and picked up the lighter. She crept toward them, until she was only fifteen feet behind the group.

The ashen man’s eyes glazed over, and he sank into unconsciousness, falling quietly onto the thick bed of rotted leaves that covered the trail. The smoking guerrilla removed the joint from his mouth, pointed his rifle at the prone man, and blew his head off. Bits of bone and brains splattered against the thick foliage. The blast set a group of monkeys screaming in the trees.

Emma gasped in horror and fumbled with the lighter, flicking it at the soaked piece of rag. While she did, the guerrilla raised the gun and pointed it at Sumner, who stared at it with a resigned look on his face.

The rag lit. A tongue of flame whooshed upward. Emma moved into position behind the guerrilla aiming the rifle. She shoved the barrel of her gun into the back of his head.

“Don’t even think about it,” she whispered in his ear.

She felt his body freeze. The other two leaped up with almost comical speed.

“Get down!” Emma yelled at the top of her lungs and threw the flaming bottle of scotch at them. They dove back onto the ground to avoid it. Sumner jumped over and yanked the rifle from the standing guerrilla’s hands. He trained it on the others. Everyone froze, like some grotesque sculpture.

Emma grabbed the rifles away from the other two, still lying on their stomachs. She now had four guns that she didn’t know how to use, three guerrillas she didn’t know what to do with, and one man with wild, bloodshot eyes on the verge of a nervous breakdown.