Harry raised his head then, looked at Jen, and smiled enthusiastically. “You can count on us.”
“We’ll make sure to collect it all and mark it for retrieval,” Jen added.
“Good,” Sasha said. “I know you’ll be thorough. Go on ahead. Get started. Watch out for any washed-out portions of the trail.”
Harry and Jen bowed their heads, then turned and headed off down the dark trail. Despite their personal quirks, they were well-acclimated to the wilderness, so they could move lightly and fast, even in the dark. Sasha watched as they faded into the gloom, bent low like dogs sniffing animal tracks.
“Okay, as for the rest of you,” Sasha said, once they were out of sight. She signaled for the group to bunch up. They packed in together before her, seven people representing a variety of skills, experience, and personality types. She’d refined the group, trimmed off the fat and the useless elements. Every person that remained had something unique to contribute. “We’ve scored big this time, team, real big. I feel it in my gut, and you know my gut is never wrong.”
This caused the group to burst into giggles, like happy little schoolkids during recess. Sasha tolerated it for a few seconds because it was good for them. Then she held up both hands and motioned them to silence. The giggles ended suddenly, unnaturally, like someone had unplugged the speakers on a stereo.
“We can’t rush in there laughing,” she said. “This is a stealth mission. First, we have to deal with the people. Then, we can round up the cattle and supplies. Follow my lead and do exactly what you’re told at all times. Is that clear?”
She got a chorus of affirmations, but they were extra quiet this time. Sasha turned and scanned the sky around them. The storm clouds gathering in the west were impressive, but she was unconcerned. They were more suited to fighting in a storm than these outsiders.
Something drew her attention away from the dark clouds. Off to her left, far downstream, a thin trail of smoke rose into the sky, lit from the bottom by distant firelight. She studied it for a second. Daniel turned to see what she was looking at, pushing his hood back, as if that somehow gave him a better view.
“Well, now, that’s interesting,” she said.
“A campfire, perhaps,” Daniel suggested meekly.
“Of course, it’s a campfire. What else would it be? If I had to guess, I’d say at least one person from their party got swept downstream, and they are stuck way down there now, settling in for the night. The hapless loser must be drenched and freezing after that harrowing ride in the river.” She grabbed Daniel by the shoulder. “I want you to head down there and check it out. If you pass Harry and Jen, tell them to focus on the supplies. You find out who started that campfire. If you can, bring him to us alive, so we can question him. Break him first, so he’s not a threat. And if you can’t bring him back alive, so be it. Meet me back on the trail once you’re done.”
“You’ve got it,” he replied.
He started to leave, but she clamped his arm down tight, pulling him back. He glanced back at her. Didn’t he know better by now? She hated when she had to remind him to show affection in front of the others. It was important for the lead couple to set the example.
“Be safe,” she said, “but deal with it swiftly. We’re not hiring this guy. We have no job openings. I’d like to know where he’s headed, but it’s not that important. Don’t risk your life over it. Is that clear?”
“Of course,” he replied, and then he kissed her.
She let the kiss linger for roughly two seconds, and then she pushed him away. Just enough PDA to set the example, but not so much that it made the others squirm. Daniel stepped back, gave her a little bow of the head, then set off downstream. As he went, she saw him unzip his coat and reach inside. A moment later, he produced the antique single-action revolver that had become his own personal treasure. It gleamed darkly in the lamplight. They’d lifted it from some wannabe outdoorsman they’d found hiking in the mountains weeks earlier.
“The rest of you, fall in behind me,” she said, gesturing with her hands. “We’ll follow them until the moment’s right. Then we’ll strike fast and hard, so they hardly know what hit them. I don’t intend to lose any of you on this raid, got it?”
They seemed to like this, judging by the murmurs that went through the group. Yes, Sasha could be hard on them, but she was also aggressive about keeping them alive. She didn’t cut them much slack, bossed them around constantly, but they were all well cared for and in relatively good health. Some of them were former coworkers from her big-time, multi-level-marketing company, so they’d already learned to trust her long before the world changed. Others were useful people she’d found along the way and recruited. But all of them were a united team now, always at the beck and call of their fearless leader.
“Let’s get this done,” Sasha said. “We hit the jackpot tonight. I see a royal feast in your future, friends. Come on.”
And with that, she turned and started back up the trail, reaching back to grab her beloved X-Bolt Hell’s Canyon rifle out of a loop on the side of her backpack. As if to announce the coming violence, the storm gave another low rumble, and lights flashed deep in the clouds.
16
Greg had managed to create a nice little sweatbox there inside the small stand of trees, with his crackling fire feeding hungrily on the endless pine boughs. The world beyond his camp was dark and still; this part of the river was slow and quiet. Though he had no way to know the time, he felt like morning was drawing near. He felt his clothes, which were hanging in the trees near the heat, to test their dryness. His shirt, pants, and socks were mostly dry. The coat still had a bit of squishiness to it, but it would have to do.
He didn’t want to linger much longer. His family was out there somewhere. Hopefully, they’d reached the cabin by now. Either way, they were probably grieving his death.
Time to go, Greg told himself.
He pulled on his shirt. A difficult prospect, under the circumstances. His sore shoulders were stiffening up, but he persisted. Getting the buttons done took a long time, and when he was mostly done, he realized they were misaligned. Somehow, he just couldn’t bring himself to care. He pulled on his sturdy winter pants, which was a bit easier to do, and clipped the latch that served as a belt. Then he spent several agonizing minutes pulling on his socks and boots. To do this, he finally had to sit down—a thing he’d avoided thus far for fear he might never get up again. Once the boots were on, tying the laces became another ordeal, and he just couldn’t pull the knots tight.
Finally, he dragged his coat off its branch and pulled it on. The poor thing was ripped in a number of places, but there was nothing he could do about that. He zipped it up and pulled up his hood. Despite his many injuries, he intended to get to the cabin as soon as possible. He kicked dirt and rocks onto the fire until the flames went out, then he stomped on the embers until there was no more glow.
Only then did he finally turn and step out of the stand of trees. The languid river spread out before him, taunting him with its lazy water. Greg reached into an inner pocket of his coat and found the small pocket flashlight he kept there.
Please work, he thought. I’d rather not hike in the darkness.
He clicked on the flashlight, and a small beam of bright white light shone on the rocks at his feet. Using the light to guide him, he followed the riverbank, heading downstream across rocky ground. It was slow going. Every step required caution because of the growing stiffness in his body. Still, with the water to guide him, at least he didn’t have to worry about getting lost.
And what if you don’t find them at the cabin? he wondered. What if there is no sign of them anywhere? What if the river took them as well?
A horrible thought. Fortunately, he was so sore and stiff that his emotions seemed diminished. His mind was foggy as well. Periodically, his vision seemed to go blank, his mind half-conscious, while still walking. He looked up at one point while trudging up a rocky slope, and the river was far to hi
s left. It took a moment to clear his head, and then he headed back toward the water’s edge.
Eventually, the river, which was more of a shallow stream here, bent into the deep woods again, and he found himself pushing through heavy underbrush. Branches kept dragging at his coat, like grasping hands trying to stop him. He pressed on, and time seemed to blur again. The great trunks of pine, aspen, and spruce passed through the flashlight beam like a thousand mighty sentinels.
He’d lost sight the river, and he felt a moment of panic. It wouldn’t take much to get completely turned around in the wilderness without something to guide him. Then he realized he could still hear its roar to his left, so he headed in that direction until he caught sight of the churning water. He also spotted something else, something even better—the trail. There it was, a flat, gray path winding down the slope on the far side of the river. He was definitely headed in the right direction.
As he stared across the water at the trail, he thought he saw the broken remnants of a crude bridge. Perhaps it had been pulled down by the flood. And then his stomach lurched as he realized what he was actually looking at: broken pieces of the travois. The tarps had gotten stuck on large rocks, and the support poles were now bobbing in the water. A broken end of a barrel and other pieces were scattered nearby. A few boxes, however, were still intact, and the current had pushed them up onto the bank. Greg made his way toward them.
When he squatted down beside the river’s edge, the pain in every limb and joint made him cry out. The echo of that cry took a long time to die as it bounced out over the river. Greg began working the lids off the boxes. Inside the first one, he found blankets, towels, and toiletries. Inside the second, he found some of Justine’s clothes—all wadded up and smashed down into a disorganized pile. Finally, in the third box, he peeled back a plastic sheet to find his and Marion’s clothes, neatly folded and set side-by-side. He dug through the box, pulling out a clean pair of pants, a shirt, some clean socks. He found an old pair of winter boots at the bottom. They weren’t in great shape, but they hadn’t been battered to hell by flood debris like the ones he was currently wearing. Greg didn’t bother looking around to make sure he was alone, but immediately went to work changing clothes.
He then returned to the damaged travois and unfolded it, revealing more items trapped inside. Among them was an MRE that had been torn open, but some of the pouches were intact, and he shoved those in his pocket. However, the real jackpot was caught between the tarp and the crossbeam: the Winchester rifle! He carefully picked it up. The stock was dinged up pretty badly, so he gave it a quick inspection. It seemed to be in good shape. Still, he took aim at a distant tree, undid the safety, and pulled the trigger.
It was a mistake. When it fired, the butt of the rifle slammed against his shoulder, causing a sharp burst of pain. At least the gun worked. He slipped the strap over his shoulder, zipped up his coat, and resumed his hike downstream.
At least I can hunt for game, if I have to, he thought. Or protect myself from predator animals.
He went through every square inch of their scattered supplies. In the process, he found more toiletries, clothes, enamelware cups and bowls, even a few books. Most of this was dead weight to him now, but then he happened upon a few boxes of ammunition. He took one box of .270 bullets for the Winchester, sliding it into his jacket pocket. By then, he was carrying about as much as he could stand, so he left the rest of their stuff sitting there on the damp rocks.
I’ll come back for it someday, he thought.
Now that he was walking alone in the wilderness, he knew he would be more of a target for bears and mountain lions. And his uneven gait probably made him look like wounded prey.
The stream took Greg back into the woods and down an endless slope. At some point, it began to rain. He scarcely noticed the first drops, but it soon became a nagging drizzle, reaching him through the evergreen branches. By the time the first light of morning was winking through the trees, the rain had become insistent. The clouds were now a full curtain overhead, turning whole sky an ominous dark gray.
After another hour or so, he reached a large bend in the stream. Here it took a sweeping turn to the left, following the steepest part of the slope. As Greg approached the bend, he saw blood on the rocks. As he drew closer, he realized he was looking at bloody bones—the great curve of bovine ribs.
One of the cows had washed ashore here, but there wasn’t much left of it. From a distance, it looked like a pack of wolves had stripped it clean. However, as he drew closer, he realized it probably wasn’t the work of animals. The bones remained intact, along with the cow’s head and legs. A big pile of offal was piled to one side, already swarming with flies. The skin and meat, on the other hand, were completely gone.
Predator animals would have gone for the guts, he realized. And they definitely wouldn’t have dragged away the entire skin. This was the work of a person—or people.
He pulled the Winchester off his shoulder as he approached the carcass. The ground here was rocky, but in many places, large patches of mud revealed footprints all over the place. The soles of hiking boots, mostly. Yes, multiple people had been here, and the activity centered around the carcass. More than that, the tracks were relatively fresh, as the mud was still wet. And when he bent down closer to the carcass, he saw clear evidence of blade marks on the bones.
My family would not have been so thorough, he realized. This was the work of determined people. They took every bit of meat they could get.
He looked around, but he was clearly alone at the moment. Greg continued around the bend in the river, still clutching the Winchester. However, as he descended a steeper slope, he spotted a crude rope bridge stretched over the river. Here, the trail crossed over to the near bank and met up with another trail, before continuing into the woods.
The combination of human scavengers and the merging trails gave him a renewed burst of energy, the product of both fear and elation, and he managed a kind of stumbling jog down the trail. The rocky ground gave way to mud and patches of mountain grass, and he began to see boot prints again. The scavengers had headed down the trail after cleaning the carcass. Indeed, he saw drying splatters of blood along the way, even a few scraps of meat, as if they’d barely been able to carry it all.
Who the hell are these people? he wondered. In his mind, he envisioned wild mountain men, cut off from society for years, perhaps no longer recognizable as fully human, but of course, that was silly. They had the soles of modern hiking boots. Indeed, once they were headed down the trail, they seemed to move in a regular formation. Clearly, this was a well-ordered group.
Greg realized he would have preferred a group of wild mountain men. Gripping the Winchester tightly, he made his way to the point where the trails merged. As he drew near, he saw something that made his heart leap—grooves in the trail, parallel lines dug into the mud. A travois!
His family had come this way. Greg felt the first sting of tears, and he quickly brushed them away. Now, he could see the tracks of cows and horses as well. The herd was intact! Thank God. But his family wasn’t alone on the merged trail. The orderly boot prints of the strangers turned onto the trail as well, right over the travois lines. The boot prints seemed newer to him—they ran over the tracks left by his family. And this brought him to a sickening realization.
My family is being stalked.
17
Greg wanted to believe he’d misread the tracks. Maybe his family had split into two groups, one staying with the herd, the other taking the shorter trail to look for him. Maybe they were the ones who had come across the dead cow and carved away the meat to make some use of it. But his gut told him these were not his family’s boot prints.
If the strangers were so desperate for meat that they would carve a flood-bloated carcass down to the bones, then a whole herd of cattle would be an irresistible prize. Unfortunately, the merged trail was clearly designed to be safe, as it followed the course of least resistance, taking numerous twists an
d turns. That meant he couldn’t see far ahead, and he wasn’t good enough at reading the tracks to tell how old they were. For all he knew the strangers had already overtaken his family. Maybe it was too late for them.
You can’t assume that, he told himself. Your family isn’t helpless. They know how to defend themselves. You have to catch up to them as quickly as possible.
His family would still be going fairly slow, especially with all of the cows, their remaining supplies, and at least two of them on foot. The persistent drizzle would only add to the misery. Plus, Justine was very pregnant. She might need to stop from time to time. Greg knew he could catch them if he ran, but the prospect alone made him groan. He stopped and massaged his thighs and calves, hoping to work some of the stiffness out of them. However, he had so many bruises that the massage just caused more pain.
Finally, taking a deep breath, he attempted to run. He managed three long strides before his right leg buckled, and he fell. Slamming into the trail, he did an awkward somersault and wound up on his back, the Winchester clattering off toward the trees.
Idiot, you’re going to break a leg, and maybe break the rifle, he chided himself. Then what are you going to do? You know what happens to wild animals that break their legs. They hobble around until they either die of infection or become food.
EMP: Return of the Wild West Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 60
