Another AU story. This one is planned to be pretty straightforward, not the major arc that the last one was. Hope you enjoy.

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As usual, other than the characters I make up (who belong to me, I think) Star Trek and its characters belong to the corporations that last purchased all of their rights. I am borrowing them and will return them as soon as I'm done.

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The hunters advanced on her hunt partner, helmet lights shining on her. Taking opportunity of their distracted focus, she swiftly emerged from her hiding place, running silently up and around the slope to put as much distance as she could between her and them. She knew that when they were done with their prey they would come looking for her. She dove towards the shadows, quickly rolling over and over on the ground in a desperate attempt to escape the halos of light of their helmets. Her rush towards safety was interrupted by a hard but yielding object. She silenced her cry as she smacked against it, realized it was big enough that she could hide behind it, a massive tree trunk lying flat on the ground. Scrambling on hands and knees, she rounded the trunk, plowing through the pile of grass and leaves at its extremity, uncovering the hollow in the trunk. She quickly felt to confirm it was wide enough for her or she was small enough to fit in, it was an academic difference. Hastily she slid in, legs first, careful to pull the leaves and grass back behind her in a haphazard mass that would not give her away, then wiggling in as far as she could.

She heard her hunt partner scream, then coming from a distance the voices of the hunters, another scream, someone laughed, they were talking between themselves. The sound of steps made her try and shrink away. The steps kept coming closer, aimed straight at her. The trunk was tight around her as she tried to quiet her breathing, tense from the run and the knowledge she was lying out in the open inside a slim wooden sheath. She knew they couldn't hear her, but there was the everpresent risk that one in the party would sense her, in spite of the cultural hatred that made such sensing a deathly taboo. She needed to enter a trance. It would round out her brainwaves and hide them from detection. The quasi-meditative state was hard to achieve, she found herself grasping futilely at the logical construct that should have been second nature. But finally she managed to self-soothe and the world ceased to exist other than as peripheral information that wouldn't draw a reaction. The trance kept her still, would keep her still until they left, even when the hunters gathered around the trunk, finding it was a comfortable seat and would be a ready-found couch for a bivouac.

There were five hunters, five voices that she would grow to differentiate as the night grew deep and dark, and silent, and then turned into another day. One of the voices was younger, its timbre higher. The universal translator sewn into her collar was still working, both a blessing for she was able to learn where they would hunt next and a curse, for all she heard that she'd rather not. One man laughed, there was the shuffling on heavy boots as he told the party "I don't know about you, but I didn't think we'd catch her until morning, right?" Heavy laughter was the only reply, the shuffling boots walked away, and a couple of minutes later she heard her hunt partner scream. Heavy steps shuffled back into hearing range, and another voice, another pair of boots, got up and moved away. Minutes ticked by, and then the screams again. There was nothing she could do. There was nothing to be done. Interrupting the trance meant being found, and being found would waste one more life. She wouldn't prevail against five hunters.

The sordid dance of boots and screams went on. There was nothing to do but wait. She waited. Finally only three men were still seating on the trunk, their voices right above her head. They shuffled away. Silence fell. The night was deep. She debated breaking the trance and sneaking out. But military-inspired hunting men might have a sentinel on guard while the men were sleeping. The risk was too high. She waited. Her hair was in her eyes. Of course, it had been over a month already. First, weeks of captivity in the alien ship, not knowing where she was, then the arrival in a compound with hundreds of others, most of them sleek-looking aliens like her hunt partner, a few other aliens like her. And all of sudden the start of the hunt. Hunters and hunted were alike, a single species split by genetic happenstance into telepaths and non-telepaths. The scientist in her rued the primitive short-sightedness of a civilization unable to appreciate that this was a normal genetic variation, that culling all the carriers would never prevent its re-emergence in every tenth new birth. She had met her hunt partner early on, both intent on survival, and they had decided to join forces to reach I'Hy'Iuvh, the land of safety. Her hunt partner described it as a forest of some kind. So impenetrable one could could never come out. A refuge that wasn't. It reminded her of Hamlan, the forest at the end of the world. She couldn't pronounce I'Hy'Iuvh and it couldn't be Hamlan, therefore she called it by the closest foreign name, The Forest.

They were very close to the Forest, she could have seen it if it were light. There was the trunk in which she was hiding, a couple of hundred yards of rock and wallows, then a gold meadow of tall grass, and a mile or two away, the Forest. Her hunt partner must have triggered some sort of sensor when she forged ahead blindly on what she hoped would be the last leg of their run. But she herself had hung back, wary of the traps they had already avoided. That had played in her favor. While her hunt partner fell into the neatly laid snare, she had been able to escape, though her reprieve would be short-lived. The hunters tipped the scales in their favor, with cameras, sensors, lighting helmets, and air-and-ground craft. But no hunting animals.
She didn't know what happened to those who were caught. Capture was not foremost on the minds of the hunters, especially in the first few days. That had changed as the hunted grew scarcer. There had been no time to talk about such things with her hunt partner, each of them singly intent on surviving another day, another round, and reaching The Forest. The place that they would be given best if they reached. And that they could never leave.

The rustle of sounds rose from the camp, announcing the start of a new day. She heard her hunt partner shriek again. Then heavy boots shuffled back within range, coming very close, too close. They kicked the tree. Her body prevented it from sounding hollow. Heavy boots must have assumed the tree had recently fallen. She sensed more than felt the weight of the man who wore them suddenly plopping himself on the trunk. He started speaking. A higher voice answered and came closer, the two voices soon interlacing in a dialogue. Father-son? There was the sound of other boots walking away, followed by more screams. A voice rang in the chill of the morning. "Now she'll make a good pleasure slave." It was answered by a round of brutish laughter. A wave of anger and fury raised within her, spurring her to burst through the trunk and do away with them all. The cooling waters of logic were nowhere to be found. The trance prevented the active suppression of emotion, instead holding back the anger and revulsion and delaying the synaptic response. Any feelings would have to be worked through when she arose. In the meantime, the weight of the trance thankfully kept her still.

The deeper voice was talking, the universal translator catching each word as it fell from above. "You know the funny thing?" it was saying. "The hunted, they see I'Hy'Iuvh, they see the meadow, and they figure they're going to go through the sides, through the trees and bushes alongside, right? Because they can hide in there and not be found, right? What they don't know is that's where the sensors are. There are no sensors in the meadow. What's the point? Nobody takes the direct route. But if they were to just take a run, there's a good hundred yard, hundred-fifty yards band, all the way through the middle of the meadow, where there are no sensors." He laughed at the irony, followed by a younger-voiced chuckle.

The deeper voice receded as the man got to his feet. "All right, men, we've got a good one. Let's go and get her tagged."

"There was another one with her." Another deep voice answered.

The first voice sounded again. "We'll have plenty of time once that one trips the sensors. They always do. Especially in this stretch, they're all over." That triggered chuckles all around. There was more shuffling, the sounds of a camp being packed, heavy boots climbing on board a vessel of some kind, the sound of an engine, its whine disappearing in the distance, and then, slowly, silence.

T'Pol turned on her back inside the trunk, breaking the trance. Her eyes were wide open. She knew how to get to the Forest.

The question was when. She had no idea what time it was, but the hunters would have woken up early, with the dawn. Counting the two hours to decamp, the sun would be across the morning sky. The hunters would be back at dusk lest a tripped sensor alerted them early to a newfound prey, the main camp close enough they could be back in minutes. The prey didn't move during the day, waiting for the shadows of the evening before trying their chance at surviving. If she waited until then, the hunters would already be on the prowl. If she waited until then, the rising shadows would hide potential hazards over which to fall, and to fail. If she waited until then, she would be even more famished, her energy levels compromised from days on the run. Two months before, she could have run the distance across the meadow with breath to spare, head high, hardly feeling the effort. Two months before, when exercise on Enterprise was a regular and required occurrence. She could still run, her confidence was not so high that she could reach The Forest before the hunters reached her. The decision was irrevocable as soon as it was made. She would try during the day.

She carefully looked outside of the trunk, using the leaves and moss as cover, checking that nobody was around. There were no sound to be heard. All the hunters had gone away, secure in the knowledge that their prey would wait until dusk or the sensors would alert them. The sensors. Her eyes narrowed. There were probably too many for all to be avoided. If she triggered the sensors too early, the hunters would already be on the ready, their vehicles still in the air, they would be back before she succeeded. She needed to wait until they had all converged on the main camp, to process captives, handle supplies and equipment, eat and then rest. If surprised during their rest period, the hunters would take more time to get under way, yelling at each other in the chaos of crafts and bodies, more time for her to run unchallenged. Any second gained would be measured in yards of freedom.

The rest of the day was spent in meditation, clearing her mind of emotions. Emotions could cloud the higher cortical functions, lead to the wrong move, a foot out of place, a knee twisting on uneven terrain. She stripped away all memories, everything to do with Enterprise, everything that was her, until all that remained were two miles across a golden meadow. Almost the same color as his hair. She could not be distracted. She stripped away Him. All that was left in the end were two miles of rough ground. And the Forest. The thought fleeted by that she did not know what was in the Forest, that she may be running to safety as easily as to her ruin. The echo of that thought were what actions would be hers if she failed and were caught without the quick release of death. There were many other ways to one's end, especially when one was a Vulcan, and her mind paid scant attention to the matter, there would always be alternatives.

Finally enough time had gone by, the sun was high in the sky, the hunters would be sleeping off the long hours spent on the run and for some the debauchery of the night. She crawled out of the trunk, careful to minimize her movements and delay triggering the sensors. And then she took off, running from the very first step, easily down the two hundred yards or so of rough ground to the grassy meadow, then through the meadow, fighting the tall grass, struggling not to fall, lifting her knees over treacherous clumps of dirt, running as fast as she could manage to, running, running.

She was about midway through when she heard the first distant whine of an engine. She pushed harder, trying to run even faster. She could see the edge of the forest, exhausted, great pants of air insufficient to soothe her burning lungs, her legs turning to wood, pain radiating as she struggled to bring them up, forward, up, forward. She heard yells, the whine of an engine coming nearer, it was getting closer, she had yards to go, they were getting nearer, she had feet to go, they shouted at her behind the report of guns, she dove into the forest, rolling forward as quickly as she could, trying to get in as deep as she could. There was a small depression in the ground. She flattened herself against it, chest heaving, muscles trembling.

Time stood still.
When the heaving in her chest died down she finally heard the silence. She raised her head ever so slightly, glancing towards the meadow. The engine noise was gone. There were no signs of the hunters. She had made it to the Forest. She sat up, still groggy from the exertion. One danger was gone. Another one rose ahead.
She let the memories come back to her, everything that she was, everything that happened. She let it sift through her mental fingers, the conflation of events that had led her to this precise place at this precise time.