by Raylan Kane
“Get out of here!” She yelled, tears streamed down her face.
She stepped again slowly toward the truck. The animal, fully crouched, watched Jen from the edge of the swamp. Curiously, the cat pulled up one of its front paws and it began to lick and then swipe it over its ear. The cougar repeated the movement. Once it began to do it a third time, Jen sensed an opportunity and she bolted for the truck. She halved the distance to the 4x4 and saw the cougar jump from its position and run forward into the mud. Before getting too deep into the swamp the big cat hesitated a moment and watched Jen, who’d frozen again out of fear. Jen panted heavily. Another twenty feet, you can do this.
Jen put her head down and charged for the vehicle. She let out a scream as she saw the mountain line dart toward the truck. Jen ran up to the passenger side, she’d lost sight of the big predator. She pulled the handle on the passenger door and in a moment of sheer dread realized the truck was locked. The cougar let out a wicked howl. Jen almost dropped the keys as she pushed the unlock button, pulled open the door and hit her head on the vehicle’s frame as she dove into the cab. Her breathing intensified as she slammed down the door locks and watched in horror as the mountain lion leaped onto the bed of the truck and glared at her through the wide glass window. Jen pressed her back against the dash and kicked her foot toward the back window.
“Get the hell out of here!” She screamed.
She tried to slow her breathing. You can’t get me in here. Calm down, just calm down. Relax. The cougar stared at Jen through the glass for a minute, then sat on its backside and began licking its front paws. Without taking her eyes off the mountain lion, Jen slid herself over into the passenger seat with her back against the passenger door. She gently pulled the radio receiver off its hook.
“Bravo 5, Control.” She spoke softly. “Anyone read me?”
No response.
The cougar stood up again on all fours, continuing to stare into the cab of the truck at Jen.
“I know,” she muttered, “this is like looking at meat in a deli case to you.”
A burst of flying glass exploded into the cab. Jen instinctively shielded her face. The big mountain lion jostled in the bed of the truck and the whole rig shook. Two loud metallic bursts echoed as something hit the back of the truck. Jen uncovered her face enough to see what looked like a bullet hole smashed through the back window and out through the windshield. Another smash through the back window and the cougar ran and jumped from the truck and bounded off into the forest out of sight. Jen kicked her foot onto the steering wheel to sound the horn. She held her foot against the horn and crouched low with her arms over her head. She let her foot drop from the steering wheel and the truck fell silent. She poked her head around the headrest to peak out the back window of the truck and she saw a man dressed in camo with a rifle aimed high at the forest past the swamp to where the cougar had retreated. He side-stepped slow toward the 4x4 without taking his gaze off the forest in front of him. Jen felt around under her seat for the orange case containing the flare gun. She unlatched it and brought the gun into her lap. The man with the rifle was only thirty feet out. He didn’t look at the truck at all, just kept his gun trained on the woods and continued side-stepping.
Jen grasped a flare from the case and loaded the gun. She slid her bottom onto the floor in front of the passenger seat. She propped her head up against the bottom of the passenger door and aimed the flare gun out in front of her, waiting for the man with the rifle to open the driver side door. She could hear his feet in the thick mud getting closer.
“Hey,” the man called out, “I know someone’s in there. I saw your outline through my scope.”
“Yeah,” Jen answered. “I’m here. You almost shot me.”
“I’m going to open the door okay?” The man said. “You a cop?”
“Yes, and I have a gun.”
“Well, don’t shoot okay?”
“I’m not making any promises.”
“I’m here to help.”
“Why are you out here at all?”
“It’s what I do,” the man said. “Look, can I open the door or what? Are you gonna shoot me?”
“Go ahead.”
The man pulled the door open and got a glance at the orange flare gun pointed straight at him. He pointed the rifle at her, then thought better of it and took his hand off the stock and raised it overhead.
“Don’t shoot, alright?” He said. He smiled at her and it caught her off-guard. She couldn’t help but cry as the release of emotion washed over her. “You’re alright now,” he said. “The cat’s gone. Scared it pretty good I’d say.”
Jen wiped away her tears. “Sorry,” she said. “Really thought I was a goner for a minute or two there.”
“Understandable,” the man said. “I’m Cain. Falstaff.”
“Jen Marsh.”
“Nice to meet you, Jen. That your partner over there?” Cain gestured to the old man’s body lying in the swamp a short distance away.
“No. It’s someone I’d found. I think he’s one of the missing people out here I was sent to locate.”
“Did you find him that way?”
“No. He was alive. He died on the way to the truck.”
“Sorry,” Cain said.
“Yeah well. There was someone with him. I think it was his son.”
“You know, you really shouldn’t be out here without a rifle.”
“I’m not, I couldn’t carry him and the rifle at the same time. It’s back where I found him.”
“Think we should go get it,” Cain said. “We’re burning daylight and it’s a bit of trek to my campsite.”
“You’re camping out here? By yourself?”
“It’s what I do,” Cain said. “You’ve never seen my TV show, ‘Hunter Extreme’?”
She examined his handsome features and his close-cropped blond hair. He looked like someone who should be on TV, or maybe the cover of a romance novel.
“I don’t watch TV,” Jen said.
“Fair enough. I’ve got my YouTube vlog too. You should check it out sometime.”
“What’s a vlog?” Jen said.
“A story for another time,” Cain said. “Maybe over some beers, but we should really get a move on. I say we put this guy’s body in here. Easy for your friends to find.”
“Yeah, if I could get a hold of them.”
“Does that radio not work?” Cain pointed at the receiver on the dash.
“It works, but I can’t reach them.”
“Try this.” Cain reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small black rectangle.
“Is that a sat-phone?”
“What can I say? I always come prepared. Why don’t you have one?”
“Sat-phones are a little out of the Branson Sheriff Department’s budget.”
Cain nodded as he glanced over at the man’s body lying in the mud. “So what happened to him, anyway? Cougar get at him?”
“It’s possible,” Jen said. “That’s pretty much how I found him. Shaking, bleeding, terrified.”
“And he mentioned his son?”
Jen nodded.
“What are the chances his son is still alive?”
“Out this close to Hiller Canyon?” Jen said as she crawled back up to the passenger seat from the floor. “Slim to none.”
“Yeah, I keep hearing stories about this place, this mythical canyon,” Cain said. “Everyone’s so afraid.”
“Spend enough time out here,” Jen said, “and you will be too.”
SIX
Setting up his bear barrels took Don McNeese the entire morning. Walking back into remote corners of the canyon along a thin, hard-packed trail, he came upon a pile of loose brush, a perfect secret hiding place to tuck into. He lifted the branches and shaped a cozy spot to lay down and keep watch over one his food-stuffed barrels. Earlier he’d thrown loaves of white bread into the barrel along with two entire jars of peanut butter and many blueberries sprinkled over the entire load. Don set
tled into his nest with the barrel of his rifle rested on a branch.
“Come and get it you bastards,” the old man said, feeling confident.
Don knew the grizzlies in the area had come out of hibernation, he’d been hunting the woods around the canyon for decades, he believed he had a sixth sense about these things. He knew they’d be at their skinniest after months of their bodies feeding off their stored fat in their dens and they’d be hungry for anything they could find. Don’s German Shepherd Reese accompanied Don on all his hunts. He laid obediently beside his owner. Don reached down to pet Reese’s back.
“There’s a good boy,” Don said. “Won’t be long now.”
Don pulled a can of beer from his pocket, cracked it and downed a few gulps. Gotta love the canyon, he thought to himself. He was smug in his ability to hunt illegally and never get caught. He’d filled his freezers with every kind of animal Alaska had to offer over the years and the Sheriff’s office was none the wiser. He’d killed elk, moose, deer, caribou, black bears, grizzlies, beavers, squirrels, foxes, bobcats, cougars, wolverines, every kind of bird in the sky pretty much including bald eagles and even rare cranes and swans. He was shameless in his exploits. He figured God put all these critters out here out here for a reason. He’d also fished the waters in the canyon for everything with gills. Even once ate a turtle. Could be that maybe Sheriff Lake knew of Don’s exploits, but Don knew better than to brag to his friends about his year round hunting. He knew the Sheriff had a reputation for being fairly sharp, he didn’t miss much and the people of Branson just loved to gossip. Tom’s powers of perception were something he’d hoped never to test out. The retroactive fines alone would break him, let alone the jail time.
Don finished the last of his beer and let Reese lick the lip of the can.
“There you go, buddy,” he said. “You can’t be a true hunter without a bit of brew.”
A true hunter. That’s how Don viewed himself. A pure man of the woods. His wife used to complain at all the time he’d spend away but had gotten used to the time alone, and she certainly didn’t mind whenever she looked at the abundance of food the man brought home. Don kept the grocery bills light.
The old man laid his empty beer can on the ground and lightly gripped the stock of his weapon, ready for some unsuspecting grizzly to find his barrel trap. A crow exploded out of the woods in a clearing a short distance away and crossed overhead.
“Damned thing,” Don growled under his breath. It startled him. He’d shot plenty of crows before, the years the ducks and geese proved elusive. They made for easy targets against overcast skies. They made for greasy eating though. Reese looked up at his master and poked his wet nose in the air.
“You smell something boy?” Don asked.
A low rumble rolled through the forest floor. Don could feel the earth shake beneath him. What the hell? Moose charge? Reese let out a whimper, but knew better than to move from his owner’s side. The rumbling soon sounded like stomping. Heavy stomps, like a great piledriver was mowing through the wilderness at breakneck speed. Don felt his body lift off the ground a half-inch then slam back, repeatedly. His eyes widened and his body tensed. What could cause the shaking? He kept a death-grip on his rifle. Then he saw it appear in the distance. A giant hulking brown mass against the sky. A bear as big as a jumbo jet, it’s head the size of a dump truck. The massive animal knocked trees flat wherever it moved. The noise was incredible. Don’s chest ached as his heart throbbed a mile a minute. Without knowing what else to do, Don laid himself flat in the brush pile. Reese jumped to his feet and barked at the monstrous beast.
The bear noticed the tiny dog yipping away far below. The great animal reared up on its hind legs and towered over the treetops. Don’s eyes were as big as dinner plates. The thing let out a guttural roar that sent the dog running from the old man’s hiding spot. Don’s bowels let go, his eardrums burst at the deafening sound and his heart gave out then and there. Sensory overload. He laid dead as the giant grizzly swatted at the barrel that sent the food inside flying. The bear cleared the brush pile with its Volkswagen-sized paw. Reese bolted off into the woods, away from the towering menace. The grizzly took the old man’s body into its mouth, leaned its head back and crunched Don on its giant rear teeth. The remnants of the old hunter slid down the bear’s gullet. Reese ran deeper into the woods without looking back.
SEVEN
A bead of sweat rolled down Jen’s neck as she followed Cain up a steep rise comprised of jutting rocks and tree roots. The late afternoon sun, obscured by clouds, began to disappear beneath the horizon. The deep woods darkened by the minute.
“How much farther?” Jen asked.
“Almost there.”
Jen gripped her rifle tight and snapped her head around at every forest echo. She’d placed her trust in this stranger walking ahead of her, she was unsure if it was the wisest move. Her mind kept replaying the events of that afternoon. Regret rolled around in her brain. I should’ve been able to do more for him. Regret is an easy emotion in the face of death. Jen was hard on herself at the best of times. Watching a person die with seemingly no way to help had Jen reeling, wallowing in despair that only added to the arduousness of the hike back to Cain’s campsite. Flashes of the vicious cougar’s face jumped in and out of Jen’s thoughts. Her breathing intensified, she grabbed the trunk of a tree and leaned against it for a moment. Cain sensed Jen was no longer right behind him. He turned around and saw Jen bent over at the tree, clearly upset.
“Are you okay?”
Jen gasped for air. She took a drink from her aluminum water bottle. “I’ll be fine.”
Cain walked over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. She wasn’t big on over-familiarity. She glanced at this handsome stranger’s hand and looked up at his face. She didn’t have the energy to shrug him off.
“You’ve been through a lot today,” he said, “a good meal and a night’s rest will help.”
“Okay,” Jen said with a nod.
“Of course, we can talk about it too,” Cain said. “If you want. If that’ll help.”
“Let’s just get there, to your site.”
She pocketed her water bottle and stood up straight. Cain turned and started walking again up the incline, Jane followed.
A half hour later, in the faintest of the dusk’s light, they arrived at a small clearing where Cain’s small two-person tent stood. He’d built the site on a slight decline to allow water runoff should it have rained. He kept his food in bear-proof black canisters hanging from a tree branch. There was a small circle of ashes where he’d had a fire a short distance from the tent in the alcove where two big logs intersected.
“Welcome to Casa de Falstaff,” Cain said.
Jen dropped her pack and stepped near the makeshift fire pit and sat down with her back against one of the big logs. She let out a long exhale and tried to push the events of the day out of her head. She laid her rifle across her lap.
“Here, I’ll hang it up with mine,” Cain said motioning to her rifle. “Over by the tent.”
Jen looked at the man suspiciously and gripped the weapon tight.
“It’s okay,” Cain said. “What? You think I’m gonna shoot you?”
“You almost did.”
“I was,” Cain thought better of arguing, “fine, hang onto it then.”
Jen stretched out her legs and leaned her back so she was almost laying down against the big log. She closed her eyes and relaxed her breathing.
“I’ve got some smoked salmon and dried cranberries. Fry up some beans for dinner too if you’re interested,” Cain said.
“That sounds good,” Jen said without opening her eyes.
Cain cranked up his portable electric lantern and sat it on a nearby stump.
“Can I get you something to drink?” He asked. “I’ve got water and whiskey.”
Jen wasn’t much of a drinker, but the thought of sweeping away everything with alcohol appealed to her in that moment.
“C
an’t believe I’m saying this, but after a day like today, I’ll take the whiskey.”
“Whiskey it is.”
Cain pulled a medium-sized metallic canister from his pack and an empty metal flask. He carefully poured the booze into the flask, closed it up and tossed it over to Jen.
“Go easy with it,” he said. “This stuff’ll curl your hair.”
“I’ll be alright.”
“I’ll be back. Gonna grab some brush for a fire. Don’t shoot me when I come back.”
“Don’t come back as a cougar.”
Cain chuckled at the comment. This attractive woman was tough and she had a sense of humor too. He grabbed his flashlight and wandered off into the woods. Jen could hear branches and needles crackle with Cain’s every step. The sounds gave her anxiety and with every pang of nervousness she downed a hit of whiskey while running her hand over the rifle.
Minutes later, Jen could hear the crackling sounds come closer to the campsite. She saw the flashes of light bounce through the trees.
“It’s me,” Cain said in a reassuring tone as he neared. “Successful mission.”
Cain dropped a pile of branches and twigs next to the ash pit. He formed a bunch of them in a small pyramid and lit them with a match. He took a small metal grill he’d had leaning against a tree and placed it over the fire. The night air was chilly and Jen welcomed the warmth from the flames that made her feel on the outside how the whiskey had started to make her feel inside.
“How’s that whiskey treatin’ ya?”
Jen couldn’t stifle a smile. “Nicely.”
“Well go easy,” Cain said. “How much have you had.”
Jen sloshed the liquid around in the flask. “Half?”
“Jesus,” Cain said. “You’d better have something to eat.”
Cain emptied a can of beans into a metal pan. He used a tin spatula to push them around to avoid burning. He handed her a packet of smoked salmon and a handful of cranberries.
“It’s good,” Jen said.
“Bet your ass it’s good,” Cain said, swallowing a bite. “Got it in Anchorage.”
