Chapter 106- An Alliance of the Hunted part 2

"What's your plan?" Wilson asked, standing beside Dash, with Sofia peeping from behind them. She was shivering from fear but stood upright; bold and strong. Wilson was impressed. It wasn't easy to not lose one's calm in the face of danger.

"Well, first of all, we need to hide Sofia. We can't have them finding her." Dash began.

"True!" Wilson agreed.

"I already set up some trip and landmines on our way here. That should delay them and buy us some extra time to set the other traps up."

"Nice!" Wilson nodded. Now was not the time to be stingy with his praise. Dash ignored and continued:

"On our way, here, I noticed that some trees were hollow inside. This tree is one of them."

He was referring to the tree they had stopped at. Wilson knocked on it and confirmed it sounded hollow.

"Oh! I did not notice." He said. Normally, it would have been a good avenue for Dash to insult him, but just not now. The situation was too serious for that.

"Yes! It surprised me too. We will hide Sofia in one of these at that far end. The biggest one." Dash said, pointing at a conspicuously huge tree some distance away. He handed Sofia a ring and told her to activate it if she heard footsteps near her. He turned to Wilson and told him to help hide her in the tree.

"There should be a small opening, big enough for her to squeeze through. Sofia, as soon as you are comfortable inside, you activate the barrier. I will be here setting up the traps.

"Wilson, when you are done, stay just three trees ahead of her. Right over there." Dash pointed at another hollow tree that looked especially old; about twenty-three meters ahead of the huge tree Sofia would be in.

Wilson nodded and carried Sofia princess-style, towards the tree according to Dash's instructions.

***********

Ten minutes later, Wilson and Dash were in an underground bunker which had dim lighting and monitor screens that pictured the stellite view of the entire forest. Dash zoomed in one monitor and counted the red dots in sight.

One, two, three... eighteen, nineteen, twenty... twenty-seven, twenty-eight.....

thirty-five....

Wilson's mouth was open ajar.

"Are those people?" He asked.

"Yes. They are the hunters!" Dash answered.

"How many?"

"Forty-three!"

"Oh dear mother!" Wilson exclaimed.

"How long has this been going on? All this looks too well planned to have been set up recently." He asked.

Dash sighed and replied, his eyes not leaving the screen.

"My late maternal aunty had this ability where she could see possible futures of people. They are actually quite accurate. Not long after Sofia was born, aunty kept having these nightmares of a little girl being violated, you know. But it was not until dad got involved with the wrong people that the image of the girl became clear. It was Sofia. That was five years ago...."

Sofia and Dash's mother fell very ill; a terminal illness and their father tried everything in his power to save her. In the end, he was unable to, but by then, he was already indebted to these bad people. Their father was devastated by his wife's death and could not bring himself to do any kind of work. The deadline arrived when he needed to pay them back but he had no money. So, the benefactors gave him an offer; He would fight for them and must always win until his dues were fully paid. He had immediately agreed.

At that time, it seemed like a great offer. He got to vent and at the same time, pay back his debt and for a while, things went well, until he fought against someone with dual abilities and lost, nearly losing his life as well. He somehow managed to escape death and ran away.

What he did not expect though, was that these people would ignore the rules of Tiger City and actually killed someone - the aunty that could see the future possibilities - in the city.

It was during that time that Sofia was first noticed. The lecherous men wanted her even though she was still too young and Dash, being a good big brother, picked her up and ran as fast as he could away from them and had been on the run ever since.

"I came across father a week earlier and he gave me a map and some passwords. He made me master everything in it and then, destroyed the evidence of its existence. He said he was going to atone for his sins but not by sacrificing his own children.

"He gave me all of these things and told me to run away with Sofia to Forest Garden through this forest while he faced off against his evil creditors.

"Apparently, aunty had warned him of possible future events. He had just not listened." Dash finished.

"I killed someone named Dash in an underground wrestling ring." Wilson started.

"I know!" Dash cut in. "That's our father. He is Dash Sr, I am Dash Jr."

Wilson's mouth hung open. He had suspected as much. He really wanted to apologize but the words would not come out. Dash did not care for an apology.

"Don't bother. That's what he wanted; Death! That's what he deserves." Dash said.

"I'm sorry!"

"I said don't bother! Someone else would have killed him, if you didn't. It makes no difference."

Wilson sighed and shook his head sadly. Such a tragic story. He looked back at the screen, then, a thought struck him. If he had killed someone who was supposed to die anyway, then, why was he being hunted? Hadn't he just done their job for them? Something felt fishy about this. He was about to ask Dash but the latter spoke first.

"They have reached the open space."

Wilson looked back at the screen and soon they heard it.

*Boooom* *Boooom* *Boooom*

Explosions rang out. And so did the yells of pain.

"waaaah!"

"save me!"

"....my leg!"

"Aaaah! I'm dying!"

"It hurts, it hurts so much!"

Then, shouts of confusion followed, adding to the chaos and explosion.

"The f*ck is that!"

"what the hell?"

"They are throwing bombs."

"Sh*t, we have been trapped."

.....

Unfortunately, someone watching from behind realized what was happening a little too soon for Dash's liking.

"Stop! stop! They are merely mines. Mines!"

Upon hearing that, the bounty hunters stopped and spent quite some time digging out the landmines and finding the trip mines. It was already late into the night by the time they were done.

As soon as they were done, they continued their hunt. This time, it was personal and they were filled with rage. Curses incessantly flew out of their mouths, not because a whole dozen of them had died (they did not care anything about that), but because they knew it could have easily been them that died in the explosion.

As for the dead, they did not give a f*ck. They were not their families. In fact, their death meant that they could get a higher percentage after the hunt was over.

Dash was displeased. He clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"Tsk. I miscalculated. Ten more should have died." He said and turned to Wilson.

"Looks like we will have to hunt them using the darkness to our advantage. I will give directions and as long as you follow them, you should be fine."

Dash was finally revealing a dark, calculating side of him that neither Wilson nor even himself knew he had.