Man Hunt Read Free

were the men who lived on the very cusp of these two existences, for it is also true that every veteran was once an island child. Each had their own moments of triumph and transformation. These special few were hunted the most, for sport is nothing without challenge and challenge is heightened by the unknown. Still, even these men slept and dreamed, walked and schemed, ran and screamed.
    Yet despite their differences, these many men slept as one, united by the icons of death that rolled on four wheels. None could ignore that primal screech of tires that sounded so much like desire, and upon hearing it, all bent easily to their own primal need to run.
     
     

3
     
    Inside the fortress, nearly two hundred more men tried in vain to catch a few minutes of sleep. They had no idea what time it was nor how long it would be before the doors to their rooms would open and another round would begin. Two floors above them, nineteen women slept soundly.
    The women woke to the morning sunshine feeling refreshed, fed, and warm. It was by necessity that they all slept on the second floor of the massive fortress. Despite the disagreements that women living together inevitably bring, there was simply nowhere else available. The rest of this grand hotel from days gone by had been fenced, gutted, and utterly transformed.
    While the ground floor retained the closest resemblance to its former uses– offices, an impressive kitchen, and a large conference room were all still fully functional– it was the basement, of course, that had had the most extensive renovations. And while the third floor was technically the most unchanged, it was also the most disused. Only one corner office and the central foyer whose windows overlooked the front and rear lawns were ever used by anyone. All other rooms had been emptied and padlocked years before.
    Though each of these nineteen women had their own unique skills and island duties, each also maintained a physical strength that only touched upon their even greater strengths within. They had worked hard, most extraordinarily so, to overcome the demons that had brought them to this exotic, radical place and reach their current state of might and grace. But each had also suffered, of course. And ultimately this was the common bond that united them, for none ever forgot the abuse they had suffered by the hard hands and sharp tongues of the various men of their pasts.
    For most, their intense schedules made for an instant sleep entirely demanding of that recuperating rest which mysteriously keeps us all alive. The deeper, more relaxed slumber that allows for dreams, however, was assuredly rare. Yet when they did dream, these women, too, endured nightmares. True night terrors, in fact, because they almost always dreamed of days past and woke believing– for a few moments at least– that these pasts had returned and that their suffering had never been vanquished.
     

CHAPTER 2

DESIRE
     
     

1
     
    Each morning, somewhere within the city's dusty ruins, hours of pure and wonderful silence were broken by the sound of hard rubber squealing against old asphalt, and all manner of nearby men woke instantly, their eyes popping open in a simultaneous fight-or-flight response that is ingrained into us all at birth.
    One young man among them– a man on that very cusp of ignorance and experience– had been surviving for three months since his release from the training rooms deep within the island's fortress. He had been careful to follow the women's strict rules during that time, and found himself proud of having accomplished no infractions. Already he had been transferred to the second stage of his formal education. He could only hope to progress as quickly to the third stage and then, perhaps, home.
    When he woke, his eyes scanned for the vehicle that made the sound even before they could be of use. Colors flashed across his mind: brown-red-green, yet he identified nothing.
    Panic quickly surfaced and began its