Into the Trackless Woods

Previous Chapter: Trustworthy?

The target is a guy who apparently uses this particular tract of wilderness as a base from which to occasionally lash out at society. Sort of like the Unabomber or the DC sniper. He pops up at random intervals, kills, apparently also at random, then disappears. The last time he did this trick, he killed the daughter of my client. The client is easily wealthy enough to afford my services. Of course, I need to find some evidence I can actually locate this guy before I take the project on. That has been the problem so far. I have some aerial surveys that gave strong indications that the target is operating in this area, but so far I haven’t come across any spoor. It’s a little bit tedious. I need to conduct a grid search without leaving any traces of my own and without attracting any attention. It’s a slow, sometimes painfully so, process. The client had to pay a lot more for my up-front feasibility fee. I knew this one was likely to be drawn out.

Part of my strategy is to set up at a local high spot where I have a large field of view and can sweep the area using thermal scanners. In addition, I have (disguised) motion detector cameras scattered around some promising areas. I’ve assumed the target has exceptional field craft, so use more patience and subtlety than I normally employ. This area has lots of game. No doubt what keeps the target alive. I get a lot of false positives in my scans and motion detectors. I have a sneaking suspicion that the target is also employing some sort of ghillie suit, which means conventional pattern recognition may be defeated. I’m assuming the target is well armed and has no qualms about taking shots at anything deemed suspicious. Yet more reasons to be slow and cautious.

After ten days, I finally get what I think is a lead. It isn’t much. No prints, but a small thread that’s clearly man-made. It’s caught on a bramble on the side of a game trail. I occasionally see animal hair caught the same way and the thread is colored such that it will blend in very well. It’s possible the target left this and didn’t realize it. It’s also possible the target left this on purpose and is seeking to draw me into a position where he can take me out. I can’t get too excited and give myself away. I really enjoy this sort of activity. Hunting dumb animals is boring. Having the head of an animal stuck up on a wall as some sort of trophy to hunting prowess seems silly. Deer can’t shoot back. But this, this is fun! There are actual consequences to failure, not like hunting for sport. Hunting for food when survival is on the line is more interesting, but just because it’s succeed or starve. Even bears are no interest to me. While they can be dangerous, in my experience they’ll always run away if given the chance. Here, I’m doing real, visceral hunting of prey that is equally (well, hopefully a bit less so) capable of turning the tables and hunting right back.

I do some analysis on the thread and find out it has a certain characteristic pattern of light absorbance. That means, with the appropriate filters, I should be able to make him stand out clearly against the vegetation. Returning to my main camp, I carefully check all my tells to know if someone has been by. Then I modify my binoculars with the appropriate filters. To get a good view using this method, I generally need clear blue skies. Dusk, dawn or cloudy days don’t produce enough polarized light. No doubt I’ll need several days and a little luck to see if this was an accident or a setup. I decide the risk of doing a grid search is too high. I’ll stick with thermal viewing at night and use the filtered scanning during the day.

I find my attention coming back time and time again to Isabel. Tessa as well, but in the context of Isabel. Our last meeting gave me food for thought, ideal for times like these. I can scan the countryside whilst thinking these thoughts. The entire point of using thermal imaging, or now the filters, is to have a very high contrast so it’s a lot less tedious.

Tessa, and her charmingly cryptic comments about characters in movies and parallels with Isabel’s and my relationship, have been interesting to think about. The idea of “true love” is kind of meaningless to me, despite “The Princess Bride” being one of my favorite movies (“That’s Incontheivable!”) Sex has always been a purely physical thing to me, a way to satisfy chemical needs or to enjoyably pass the time. The idea of lust turning into love needs consideration.

I’ve studied psychology over the years. Some of my jobs revolve around psychological torture, and I’ve been curious about how my thought processes would be considered in a clinical environment. My understanding is people who easily kill humans are considered seriously damaged, but I don’t feel so. I do know that some people kill for reasons that would seem deranged, my current target is a perfect example, but I always felt that for me it’s just a job. I wonder, though, if I’m like the alcoholic who swears off drink as he awakes after a bender, only to shortly turn back. Do I “need” to kill people? I certainly enjoy the process, but I imagine some surgeons enjoy cutting people open and rummaging around in their innards. Does that make them psychopaths? Surgeons retire all the time and there’s no spike in people being cut up as they walk down the sidewalk, so it seems surgeons don’t “need” to cut people open.

Perhaps I’m addicted to the thrill of killing people? I don’t really have many vices. I smoke cigars occasionally and like to pick up women for one-night-stands (or used to, anyway). Other than that, I don’t think I have anything I would miss. Well, I like eating great meals. But I guess I don’t “need” to do that either. When I’m on a job, food is just fuel; I barely taste it. Am I addicted to an adrenaline rush from my job? I recall going on jump training in the military. I certainly got squirts of adrenaline when we were jumping out of planes! Particularly at night! However, I never recall any strong desire to replicate that activity. Since my stint in the military, I haven’t once jumped out of a plane. I do enjoy rock climbing, trail running, etc., but can’t recall any time I felt any extra thrill I associate with adrenaline. I don’t get any adrenaline rush when I kill someone. Can’t get addicted to something you don’t experience, right?

...

I’m not getting anything but false positives with my thermal scans. Then again, I’m not spending the entire evening watching. The target might not be moving at night, or might be moving in irregular and wide spaced intervals. Of course, he might be in a stationary location trying to catch me and we both might grow old and die waiting for the other to make the first move. While watching during the day, there are plenty of intervals where, suitably camouflaged and limiting movement that would draw attention, he could move about fairly freely. Mornings and evenings are the best time to move around without being seen; surely he knows this. There are also those occasional weather periods where the skies are gray and there’s little contrast. I might need him to be impatient about something, leading to a mistake, to find him.

...

I’ve thought about those feelings after my encounter with those two lovely Asian ladies several times, but didn’t get anywhere. Suddenly my subconscious dredges up the explanation: guilt. I recall a definition:

“Guilt is a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes—accurately or not—that he or she has compromised his or her own standards of conduct or has violated a moral standard and bears significant responsibility for that violation. It is closely related to the concept of remorse.”

I don’t think I’ve ever felt remorse either, not on the job or associated with my manifold sexual encounters. Yet, thinking about the definition of remorse, I do believe I’m feeling that associated with my sexcapades on this occasion. It isn’t a very interesting feeling; I’m not sure, having experienced it, that I care to repeat it. Trying to understand this feeling, it seems to me that somehow I now feel mentally/morally obligated towards Isabel and thus my subconscious feels I’ve “cheated” on her by sleeping with those ladies.

I never got the impression from our discussions that Isabel felt any sort of proprietary interest in me. Thinking back, though, I recall a strange tightening around her eyes when I mentioned my “extra service” with Agatha. I didn’t give it much thought at the time, but I can’t recall ever giving any of this any thought until recently.

It’s funny, though, I don’t associate this weird feeling with Tessa.

...

It’s nigh on two weeks since I started this job and I think I finally have him. It’s a clear blue sky and my routine scanning of the area indicates a patch of movement that, due to the filters, is likely him moving around. I get my high powered spotter scope and take a look. It’s certainly a human going to great lengths to remain undetected by other humans. I follow his movements, trying to learn if he’s too-ing or fro-ing from his base of operations. I’m having trouble seeing the face of whoever this is. He’s wearing his own ghillie suit and it blends admirably with the scenery. Indeed, I think without the filters I wouldn’t have ever detected him. He’s careful to move in such a way that the motion matches background movement. He’s moving steadily. Now that I can study him, I think I’ll be able to recognize him via his suit in the future. The pattern of the ghillie suit is a distinctive mixture, designed to blend seamlessly with the current environment. However, that generic nature has certain characteristics that stand out.

I follow the movement toward a place I hadn’t yet covered with my grid search. I get the feeling this is a return trip. The suit seems to be covering a backpack. Once the movement settles down, I start to memorize the surrounding terrain, rocks, streams, the species of trees and shrubs. Anything distinctive I can make out from my vantage point. Tonight, I’m going to make a careful visit to get a much closer look. I take a nap for a few hours, setting my internal alarm clock to wake me after midnight, when people tend to be their most relaxed. Being careful where I place my feet, I’m far from the only dangerous thing moving around in the woods and want to avoid the many poisonous snakes, I quietly make my way toward the location I memorized earlier. As I get closer, I get increasingly careful looking for traps, tripwires and other early warning devices. I start to find a few, which assures me I’m at the right place. They’re basic noise makers on strings stretched across the typical travel paths. Nothing high tech or electronic.

Earlier, I made the choice to ruin my night vision by using image enhancing thermal goggles. As long as I’m wearing them, and the batteries don’t run out, I have an advantage. Woe betide me if I’m discovered and the goggles fail! As I get closer to the location of interest, I slow down even more. Sometimes taking a minute just to move a few feet. It could be tedious, but I’m at my most alive at this point. This period is better than sex. My awareness is at its height. I’m fully present to the situation. All senses at high alert. This is the ultimate game against the ultimate quarry with the ultimate stakes: kill or be killed. No excuses. No second chances. Live or die. It’s like a breath of fresh air in my brain. All competing thoughts banished. Crystal clarity.

After a few hours, I find a small heat signature artfully concealed such that it’s impossible to find at any distance. Whoever this is, he certainly knows his field craft. An idle thought runs quickly through my mind: perhaps I should study his methods, I might learn a few things. I carefully approach, seeing my quarry “in the flesh” as a thermal image that’s clearly human. At first I think he’s asleep. There’s no movement. As I glide silently forward, it’s clear that I inadvertently gave away a tell or missed an early warning device or something: he reaches for what appears to be a gun. As he brings it to bear I fire a single shot. As usual, I’m using a sound suppressing mechanism. In the natural cacophony of the woods, there’s barely an audible sound.

After verifying he’s dead, I explore the area in case there’s more than one person. All indications are the camp is set up for just this one guy. Dawn is not that far away. I decide rather than risk a light, which can be seen clearly for miles, I’ll wait. To avoid the depression of sitting next to a corpse, I start going by touch through the materials in the camp, feeling for anything that isn’t directly related to survival. My goggles help somewhat, but image intensifiers need something to intensify, and there’s almost no light here, and the thermal aspect depends on temperature differential, and most of the objects have the exact same temperature. I find some notebooks and collect them to one place. I find a fairly well stocked larder, securely protected from animals. The trees growing over the location have been bent and interwoven to create a living screen and the sheltered place is probably quite comfortable even in the dead of winter, as it’s well out of the wind. All in all, an excellent bolt hole. If you enjoy camping all the time.

Gradually, the sky lightens, and I’m able to do away with the goggles and get a detailed look at my victim. Upon close examination it’s clear: I’ve found my intended target. This was supposed to be an exploratory mission to set a price to take him out. However, I charged enough for the job, even if I can’t squeeze out any more money from the client, it’s still time well spent. My understanding is they have some fingerprints and a bit of DNA as well as the couple of pictures I was given as evidence linking the crimes. I’ll take his fingers back with me as proof, as well as a number of photographs. I’ll also record the coordinates where I bury the body, though it’s difficult to guarantee that animals won’t get in and scatter bits about.

It takes me several days to get back to civilization. I bring my collected notebooks. Perhaps someone will be interested in what the target wrote. After skimming through them, I note he had some artistic skills: there are several well-done drawings of animals and plants. I notice a drawing of a woman repeated a number of times. No doubt that image was important. I communicate with my client and ask for more money, though am upfront and tell him the deed is already done. Happily, the client is fine with the extra payment. The client suggests I send my collected materials to a certain investigator with whom he’s worked. Since I knew the material was going to wind up outside of my control, I’ve been scrupulous to ensure I left no traces on it. The fingers I removed are all stored in salt, an excellent preservative that doesn’t harm DNA in any way. I package it all up, then take a several day trip to mail it from a location far from my base of operations. Several days later, I notice some comments in the news about there being new leads in the investigation. I wonder how they’ll handle things. It’ll only be random happenstance if I ever find out. I never set out to look into past exploits.