“Watch out!” I growl at Row, shoving him out of the way just before the frightened man can swipe a knife at him, thinking we’re trying to hurt him. We haven’t had to deal with too many other Prey in the last couple of days, most realizing we’re all just trying to survive. This one isn’t trying to avoid us. He’s just trying to get away from something behind him.

He swipes out his knife toward Achilles and the survivalist is too slow, earning a cut across his bicep that doesn’t look life threatening if we were on normal land, but out here in the jungle with no medicine, it could be a death sentence.

The man keeps running, not even daring to stop to see if he landed a blow. We wait expectantly for something to come out chasing him, but when nothing does, we relax. I’ll be honest. I expected a tiger or something wild like that. Maybe a stampede despite there being no large predators or animals here.

“What the hell was that about?” Row asks, staring in the direction the Prey disappeared.

“Fear,” Creed grunts. “Desperation. It’s what happens when people lose hope.” He glares at Row. “That’s on you and your people.”

I move over to Achilles and study the knife cut. “Shit, that looks bad.”

“It’s not really that bad,” he replies, reaching into his bag. “Lucky for me, I grabbed a first aid kit from those crates while everyone else was worried about guns.” When he pulls the box out of his bag, I blink in surprise.

“That was smart.”

“Of course it was, sweetheart,” he says, but the way he says sweetheart, it’s definitely meant to be derogatory. “Be a doll and grab the antiseptic ointment from there and a bandage. I don’t know what’s touched his knife but at least it’s a clean cut.”

I watch as he quickly disinfects and wraps the wound, making sure it’s tight enough to stay, before he puts the kit away.

“All better.”

I roll my eyes. “Pity.”

We walk another five minutes before we come across what the man was probably running from. A friend. A wounded friend. I can’t tell if he was wounded by the friend who ran or just bad luck.

The man is lying on the ground in the center of a small clearing, the jungle just a little thinner here. He’s clearly injured judging by the wrong angle of his leg. Broken. Even I can see that. It’s clamped inside of a literal bear trap, the big jaw things I’ve only ever seen on tv. Blood oozes from the wound, too much.

“Help me,” he says when he sees us, his accent one I don’t recognize. “Please.”

I move forward, intending to help, but Achilles stops me with a hand on my arm. “Leave him.”

“But he needs help—”