by Linda Mackay
Time seemed to stop moving and my fear mounted as every few steps I’d hear a horse stumble. We’d been forced to turn on headlamps, and I was surprised when I saw Mac raise his hand to halt. The rain was pelting our rain dusters and hats. The horses started moving forward and I heard the click, click, click of horseshoes on pavement.
We were crossing the main highway.
Arikira stepped onto the road and I sensed her relief from the walk over the treacherous ground. Everyone turned off their headlamp to minimize the chance of being spotted. I tried to see through the rain and darkness. Nothing. It was like being in a cave fifty feet underground. I was glad to give Arikira her head as I was disoriented from the complete blackness of the night. When Arikira cleared the road and stepped back into the forest, I clicked my tongue making a bird noise. Frank took the cue and started the group moving forward with headlamps back on.
The rain intensified and the wind decided to join in. Between the two slamming into our faces it was impossible to see or hear the horse in front of you. Frank stopped and the horses behind him stopped, pushing their unsuspecting riders forward like dominos falling.
“Crap.” The upper half of my body flipped forward onto Arikira’s neck. I squared-up my butt in the saddle and rubbed my twisted ribs. My headlamp lit the group passing messages along like the kids’ game of Telephone.
Mac got off his horse and walked back to mine. Rubbing Arikira’s neck he leaned in and looked me in the eye while covering the wind side of his face with his hand. “We walk.”
This should be fun. Less than a half-dozen steps later my cowboy boots, which aren’t made for walking on a slick trail, went out from under me and I landed on my butt like someone had pulled a rug out from under my feet. Arikira stopped with me sitting between her front hooves and looked over my head. I looked up. Be careful what you say girl.
I didn’t hear a response. But, I swear she had a look of embarrassment on her face that her former rider was such a klutz. She nudged her head against mine encouraging me to get up before anyone noticed. No worries in that department. Not a single person noticed I’d literally fallen behind. At least this time I had my duster on to protect my jeans from getting completely soaked in mud. I stood up silently cussing whoever was in charge of weather this week. Nothing is ever easy in the wilderness, and sometimes it pisses me off. Ahead of me, Mac leading Chimayo stepped off-trail into the trees. A lightning bolt lit the area briefly. I had to give Frank credit this looked as good as anywhere to hunker down. There wasn’t an ounce of positive thinking left in me. Unless you count I was positive we were going to be struck by lightning and a tree fall on our heads mashing us to pulp.
“Did you poop your pants?” Todd asked swatting my behind with his reins.
“I fell in the mud.”
“Again?” Amanda asked tying Blue to a tree so she wouldn’t bolt in the storm.
Todd bent over and looked at my ass. “Looks like poop to me.”
I backed my butt into his face. “What’s it smell like?”
“Holy toilet breath!”
“Awesome,” Amanda said.
Thunderstorms bring out the worst in me. Normally, I would’ve only pretended to put my ass in his face, but there is something about lightning that turns me into Cruella DeVil. If after all these years Todd hadn’t figured that out, then he gets an ass-face.
“We camp here until first light,” Frank said. “Tents and sleeping bags only.”
“Whatever,” Amanda said.
Frank stood over Amanda nose to nose. I wouldn’t have heard him if I hadn’t been standing next to them. “Anything else on your person or in the tent and you’ll never spend another night with free housing on my ranch. Got that Missy?”
Amanda shook her head yes.
Todd reached over and smacked Amanda on the back of the head. “What’s wrong with your brain, you’re not dealing with Jorie.”
“Hey, I resent that.”
Todd laughed. “It’s a well-known fact you’re a pushover.”
“Am not!”
“Are too.” Frank, Dad, Amanda and Todd said like a perfectly tuned choir.
I was too wet and too tired to argue. I unpacked our tent and sleeping bags, while Amanda pouted checking our horses were tied up but still able to graze. Mac and Todd hung the food packs, while Dad and Frank put up the other two tents. I took off my wet duster and quickly tied it across my saddle, which was in a pile with all the others. Without a word to anyone I joined Amanda in our tent.
My clothes were soaked so I had no choice but to remove them all and climb in the sleeping bag naked. The storm continued to rage like a rodeo bull wanting out of the chute, so I assumed the men had also sought refuge in their tents.
“I don’t really think you’re a pushover,” Amanda said.
“I love you too, Pouty Puss.”
Chapter 15
The sun dawned over Lake Yellowstone leaving only a few clouds from the overnight storm. We rode out early and were nearing a high point overlooking Mary Bay and the explosion. I’d been listening to the voices of the animals since I’d climbed on Arikira’s back and not once did I get a feeling of danger or movement other than the usual morning ramblings of wildlife in their natural environment.
“Everything is back to normal.” I finger-combed my hair trying to get out some of the tangles.
“What do you mean by normal,” Mac asked.
Dad answered for me. “She means the animals are telling her when we reach the top of this hill and get our first glimpse of the bay, there won’t be any activity other than what goes on every day.”
Frank was the first to crest the hill, quickly followed by the rest of us. We formed a line on the ridge like an old west posse. No one said a word. I’m not sure anyone could.
It may have started as a normal day for animals, but it wasn’t going to be for humans. In front us lay the remains of what had been a stunning blue-water bay that burbled steam from hydrothermal vents. Gone was the pebbled beach often filled with tourists photographing a grizzly on his walk along the shore. Never again in our lifetime would anyone walk this shore. What remained was nothing less than a total remake of the landscape. The narrow swath of land between the lakeshore and the mountains had disappeared, taking the road with it and leaving behind only water, boulders, and trees blown from their roots. Before and after pictures would be shared for generations. This was not just the scene of an assassination; it was the aftermath of a mass murder and an obliteration of nature. Looking at the destruction I couldn’t imagine anyone surviving the blast.
There wouldn’t be much of an investigation. And there wouldn’t be any witnesses from the blast area.
“Marty!” I said.
“Holy shit!” Frank said.
“Why?” Dad questioned. “I’ve known him for years, we had dinner last week.”
Mac dismounted. “Everyone back away from the ridgeline. If they’re watching they know we’re here, but I prefer we weren’t an easy target.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Amanda asked.
“We’ll explain when we get in cover.” Mac walked Chimayo a short distance into the trees, then turned ninety degrees and led us behind some boulders.
Arikira followed the other horses. I was incapable of giving her any signals; my body was frozen in place. I didn’t know it was possible to be temporarily paralyzed from shock. My brain was telling my body to move, but nothing responded. Arikira stopped next to Chimayo and after telling my legs to move numerous times they finally managed to swing off the horse. My feet hit the ground and the rest of me collapsed on top of them.
Uncharacteristically, Dad came running to me. “Sweetie, are you okay?”
“What?”
“Are you hurt?”
“No, just in shock.” Dad helped me stand; we locked arms and joined the others.
“Someone start talking because I’m lost,” Amanda said.
“You know the ranger we ran into
yesterday,” Mac began.
“Sure, Marty Thomas.”
“He didn’t say a word about the magnitude of the explosion. He was coming from a scene of annihilation and didn’t give us any indication the bay was gone and obviously hundreds killed.”
“I’m still lost.” Amanda flipped a twig in the air. “So he’s not Chatty Cathy…oh shit.”
“There it is,” Todd said. “Give her brain cells long enough and they’ll catch on.”
Amanda started crying. “Why would he do this? He’s the nicest man, always laughing and helpful to even the biggest idiots in the park.”
Mac rubbed her shoulder. “Right now I’m more concerned about where he really went after leaving us and if he’s getting reinforcements before giving us a lecture about his reasons, then adding us to the death toll.”
“People do that?” Amanda asked. “I mean explain themselves like in the movies.”
“Unfortunately, that part of the movies is often true.”
“I. I. I can’t talk. I may never be able to speak again.”
“Enough.” Frank said holding up his hands before the rest of us could contribute to the veracity of her statement. “We need to talk about something we can control.”
“Well it sure isn’t my bowels!” Todd ran into the trees.
Mac took a deep breath and slowly blew it out. “Joe, let’s start with exactly what information we managed to pass to Marty.”
“We told him we found a dead body.”
“We suggested he check Trail Creek Cabin,” Frank added.
“He knows we think something is wonky.”
Mac drew lines in the dirt like he was keeping score. “He knows there are six of us and we’re moving towards the bay instead of away.”
“He knows you’re a fed,” Frank said.
“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Wait a minute.” I said kicking the dirt where Mac was counting. “What do you mean we found a dead body?”
“Lucky for you I am a spy, and know you never tip your hand to anyone.”
“I knew it! What else have you been keeping from us?”
“Hush, Jorie.” Dad said loud enough to silence every living thing in the area, and too end any interest in further conversation.
I grabbed binoculars from my saddle pack and walked back to the top of the hill. How do you start functioning again after your entire life changed? You’d think after the turmoil of the past six days nothing would faze me. However, as crazy as our course had been, we were moving forward. Now I couldn’t decide which tree to pee behind, or if that tree was plotting to fall on me while I peed.
Sound stupid? Well, try living it. Mac, Dad and Frank weren’t having any trouble functioning; Todd was pooping, Amanda was mute for once, and my muscles still refused to do what I asked. Three had military training and three needed training pants. I had no idea you could be trained to function normally in the middle of complete insanity. Oh sure, intellectually I knew Spock could handle anything because he was Vulcan with no feelings, and Captain Picard was hot and looked so good in his jumpsuit that I swear it gave him super powers. But, what was a 130-pound geophysicist supposed to do? Pick up rocks and give a lecture on them?
Maybe that is exactly what she’s supposed to do.
I walked back to the rock outcrop and saw no signs of Todd or Amanda. The other three were deep in an intense discussion.
“We can’t stay here,” Frank said.
“We have to outmaneuver these guys.” Mac was back to drawing in the dirt.
Dad took a bite from a sandwich. “First, we need to find the detonation site, it holds the information this wasn’t an accident.”
“We need rock samples first.” Three pairs of eyes looked at me like I was a monster with two mouths. Which honestly would be beyond awesome since you could have conversations with yourself and not have to put up with crap from other people. “Maybe part of the answer is in what’s missing – what didn’t happen. There could also be answers in the expelled material that could prove the difference between a natural explosion and one man-made. The expulsion was massive, and I’ll bet not expected to garner so much energy from the vents below. I think Dad could be wrong about all evidence of concrete being gone. And it’s possible some of the rocks could contain traces of explosives.”
“That’s absolute bunk.” Dad flung his arm in air and interrupted me. “Even if you find concrete you can’t prove it isn’t from the embankments along the road.”
“Yes I can!”
“I’m listening,” Mac said.
“The concrete poured in the last few months will leave a different signature than the concrete from embankments.”
Dad shook his head. “You still can’t prove it was poured in the vents instead of used in the road work from last fall.”
“I think I can. The mix used to make concrete capable of being poured in water is different from what is used in roads and buildings.”
Mac stood up. “Joe, don’t brush off the forensic possibilities. Our labs are extremely sophisticated today.”
“I’m telling you it was all blown to smithereens.” Dad harrumphed and walked away. Giving in wasn’t his strong suit. As intelligent as Dad was, he was still from the old guard where advanced technology was mostly overpriced toys.
“Jorie, how many samples do you need?” Mac asked.
“As many as we can safely collect. Until they’re tested at a lab I won’t know for sure if we collected viable ones. Obviously, if we don’t pick up enough aggregate samples we won’t be able to return to look for more.”
“Someone find Todd and Amanda. They and Jorie are going to the edge of bay. The rest of us will stand guard.”
Dad turned around and gave us one his I’m the boss looks. “I’ll be collecting samples too.”
Mac wasn’t fazed. “No, you’ll be standing guard. We need three lookouts and it certainly won’t be one of the other three.”
I should’ve been offended by Mac’s insult that the youngsters weren’t capable of standing guard, but seriously we weren’t capable. Hell, I didn’t even know where Todd and Amanda wandered off too. But, I’d stake my diploma they were doing something inappropriate to the situation like looking at wildflowers. The three guys hadn’t moved. I was smart enough to hypothesize they were leaving the search to me.
“Take a gun,” Mac said.
“Don’t need it.”
“You’re carrying bear spray.”
“Of course. Never leave without it.”
“Then pretend the bad guys are a bear, and the gun is your deterrent.” Mac smiled at me. “Just in case.”
“Oh for heaven’s sake.” I took my .44 out of the holster hung over my saddle horn.
I hadn’t walked far when I saw Todd leaning over a big rock. Amanda was popping up laughing from the other side like a Jack-in-the-Box. I had no idea what they were doing, but apparently Todd’s bowels had recovered and so had Amanda’s voice. Watching them I wondered if my idea to potentially put us in harms way to collect rocks was brilliant or stupid. I wasn’t going to take a vote on it because I wasn’t sure how I’d vote.
One thing I was sure of; rocks are amazing at how much they talk. And yes, I talk to rocks. But like all things they talk back in their own way. It’s up to humans to learn their language. We’ve done a great job learning the language of layers and how those layers tell age, past volcanic or earthquake activity, or when a river or ocean laid on top of them. What I was asking the rocks to tell me was a lot more complicated and certainly couldn’t be determined by looking at them.
Ever since Yellowstone was discovered people have been trying to figure out what caused the caldera-forming eruptions. No one has the definitive answer yet, but one thing we’re pretty sure of is pressure in the magma chamber more than likely exceeded the gravitational pressures overlying the rocks. What I now need to figure out is how much man-made pressure was put on the overlying rocks to cause such a massive explosion. Was it really possible to use hydrothermal
pressure vents to help escalate a bomb and hide an assassination? One fact supporting the possibility was the high temperatures in volcanic areas expand the volume of rocks and makes them highly fractured. Meaning, it’s a lot easier to blow up a ton of marbles than a one-ton boulder.”
“Hey, Scooby and Scrappy, what’s up?” I asked.
Todd rolled off the rock. “Amanda found some spent shell casings and she’s throwing them up to me one at a time.”
“Stop that!” I said. “That could be evidence.”
Amanda came from behind the rock. “We know. That’s why we’re collecting it, like we’re CSI.”
“Well geniuses, crime scene investigators wear gloves so they don’t mess up the fingerprints.”
“Crap. We didn’t think of that,” Todd said.
“To late now.” I said.
Amanda looked behind the rock. “Yep, we’ve collected them all.”
“Don’t quit your day jobs. Let’s go.” From the sagebrush we heard a rustling sound followed by the low whine of a canine. “Quiet.”
I stepped carefully toward the sound. Over the hillside was a wolf pup trapped in fishing line. Some jackass had thrown their old line in the brush instead of packing it out and a wolf pup had managed to become completely entangled in it. I didn’t hear or sense any other wolves, but I was pretty sure the mother was not to far away. I started walking toward the pup.
“What the hell are you doing?” Todd asked.
“Don’t worry, there’s no other wolves in the area, they left this little one behind.” That was probably a white lie, or a big fat I’m-about-to-die lie. But there was no way I was going to leave the pup to die a horrible drawn-out death.
Mama, I’m not going to hurt your baby. I can free it if you will let me get close enough.
I kept repeating this in my head, while moving forward. I had no idea how any adult wolves secretly watching were going to react but eventually I had to concentrate on the pup. As it rolled around whining I could see it was a little girl. Pretty girl I’m here to help you, but you must lay still.
