“Copy. Is there anybody in the air to scout?”
“Not right now.”
“I’m going to scout the fire again and I’ll let you know if it’ll be there or the eastern helispot. Over.”
“Yeah... uh, copy that, but I want you at the western helispot.”
“I copy, but I’m gonna scout the fire and let you know. I can’t take any chances. Willamette clear.”
There came no response.
Fast Horse returned the radio to his chest. “All right, everyone just stand by,” he said, and decisively turned in the direction of his tree.
“Um, Fast Horse,” Frank said unsteadily.
Fast Horse turned and looked at a nervous and sweating Frank.
“I... don’t know where Derrick is,” stammered Frank.
There finally appeared a slight crack in Fast Horse’s composure. “Shiiit!” he cried out. “Anyone see where he went?”
Jim answered indolently, “Yeah, I saw him head that way,” and pointed to a small opening in the forest.
“Shit!” Fast Horse said again, this time with his jaws clenched. “Derrick!” he yelled. There was no answer. “Derrrriiick!”
Again there came no answer.
“I’m gonna scout the fire and then go find him. I’ll call and tell you what helispot I’ve chosen.” Fast Horse quickly took out a compass from his chest pocket and examined its reading. “If it’s the one east of here, head on a reading of about thirty-five degrees. It’s slightly uphill from where we’re at right now. Shroeder, you’ve got the map.”
Shroeder, facing away from the crew, did not respond.
“When you get to the base of the hill, head up along that base till you cross the Wilson crew’s line. When you find it, follow it back till you get to their end point, which’11 be a helispot marked with flagging. Should be a flat area... right below a small rock outcropping on the hill, I think. If I tell you to go to the west, just follow the line back. Any questions?”
No one spoke.
Fast Horse tossed his compass to Julio, then dove headlong into the forest and was immediately out of view. The eyes of many of the firefighters looked in his direction longingly, listening to the fading crackle of sticks under his feet. For most of the crew ,the feeling of security and invulnerability left with him.
“Fucking don’t know why we don’t just go back to the helispot from last night like they ordered us,” Shroeder said, seeking to regain some of his lost composure.
“No shit. This whole thing is fucked up!” Jim grumbled.
Randy looked in Jim’s direction but said nothing.
“Old Slow Pony’s gettin’ a little senile in his old age,” George added.
Shroeder laughed unnaturally, and felt relieved that he was not alone in his rebellion.
“Yeah, time to put him out to pasture if you ask me,” John said gleefully.
“Shut up!” Frank said in disgust, displaying a fresh sneer of his own to match those of his foes.
“There he goes again! He’s a big man now! Fast Horse’s butt buddy,” Jim said bitingly.
“Man!...” Frank began, a loathing fueling his growing rage, “You’re some of the most ignorant motherfuckers I’ve ever met! No wonder you’re nothing but loggers back home! All I feel is fucking pity for you!”
As Scott’s laughter filled the air, the men of Squad Two, for the first time, did indeed look pitiful to the rest of the crew. They couldn’t fight back verbally without evidencing that Frank’s words had actually affected them. They stood stunned, and dangerously silent.
Shroeder tried to pick up the slack. In a hopeful voice he said, “Why don’t we all just go back to the helispot we came from? I’ll call it in on the way. Work seems to be done for the day. Our old crew boss is out tromping around looking for his crazy Indian relative, and obviously doesn’t give a shit about what the hell happens to us. Let’s face it - he’s basically abandoned the crew at this point.” Shroeder studied the blank faces of most of the crew. “And I outrank him anyway. So, is everyone ready?” Shroeder tried to raise his voice to a command. “Let’s line out!”
Shroeder was relieved when he saw Squad Two begin to assemble in a line. He wanted to take control once and for all, and, secretly, he was relieved that he wouldn’t have to try and lead the crew into unknown territory, as Fast Horse had ordered, relying on his years of untried map and compass training.
Fast Horse wasted no time in finding the tree he had climbed a half an hour earlier. He climbed it to stand out on the same limb, bracing himself against the wind that now rocked its trunk. His eyes opened wide in witness to the distant spectacle. “You fucking bastard!” he said slowly in a small voice, his eyes fixed on the inferno. His mind temporarily lost all sense of the tasks at hand. He could only stand and note the properties of the young plume. Flashes of multicolored flames writhed up to two hundred feet inside it, sometimes leaping skyward as if dancing with abandon, temporarily able to escape their earthly origins. Also visible from such a distance were softballsize orbs of fire which were being hurled out of the inferno’s glowing orange and red center like lumps of spinning magma.
Fast Horse forced himself to return to the concerns at hand. He looked at the sky and noted with alarm that the smoke was being whipped by the wind in the crew’s direction and towards the creek they had crossed that morning. He craned his neck further to look directly overhead and noticed the faint tracings of dark ashes in the sky. He kept himself from panicking, but knew that the situation was quickly approaching critical. There was no way he was going to order his crew back to their original helispot under a thick blanket of smoke being churned out from inside that forbidding column.
“Shroeder, Fast Horse,” he quickly said into his radio.
Shroeder eyed squad two and, almost mockingly, replied, “Yeah, Fast Horse? “
“We’ve got to head to the east helispot. We’ve got one hell of a blowup beginning, and the wind’s whipping the smoke towards the creek.”
Shroeder looked up at the sky, which appeared clear in his narrow field of vision. He made it visible to the rest of the crew that he was suppressing a smile. “Naw, I think we’re heading out to the old helispot. They ordered us there, if you remember...” Shroeder paused, and then resumed his transmission with a more serious tone, closer to befitting his position and rank, “You think you’ll be able to make it out of there, don’t you?”
“I’m ordering my crew to go to the east, never mind about me!” Fast Horse roared. “Julio, Randy, Frank, you take your squads out east! That’s an order!” As he shouted into his radio, the branch upon which he stood cracked slightly.
“Copy, Fast Horse!” Frank responded.
“Copy!” said Julio.
Randy looked at his squad warily and said, “Copy.”
“What the fuck do you think you’re trying to pull?” a seething Frank loudly demanded of Shroeder, who was putting the radio back on his chest and shaking his head determinedly.
As a strong gust of wind swayed the trees around him, Shroeder yelled at Frank in a near-frenzied voice, “Me? What the hell do you think you’re trying to do? Obeying Fast Horse is a breach of command. And if you all ever want to fight fires again, you better listen up: we’re going west! I’m not going to sit in the middle of the fucking forest disobeying my supervisors’ orders while everything burns up around me! To the west we’ve got a safety zone, a creek, and a ready-made, safe helispot! Why should we go east into who the fuck knows what?”
Smoke suddenly obscured the sun slightly, and the forest was cast into semidarkness. The firefighters looked up as small ash flakes drifted down around them like black snowflakes. They could hear the roar of the fire for the first time. It sounded as if it was blasting through the forest like a huge blowtorch.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Randy said ominously, hoping his squad would turn and j
oin him facing east.
“I’m with you, Shroeder, let’s get the fuck back to that creek!” Jim said, as if the words Randy had just uttered carried no weight.
Randy looked Jim in the eyes. He then examined the rest of his squad members in turn. He saw only tired, hard expressions, displaying an intent to defy. He didn’t agree with the stance they had taken, but he understood. He knew he had been beaten; they had been beaten. He forced himself to accept it. He wouldn’t abandon them, not now, not ever. His posture slumped, and he felt only the urge to leave the scene as quickly as possible as small, flat ashes continued to drift down upon him.
Shroeder began walking west with Squad Two, with Randy as it titular head.
“Randy! What the fuck, man?” Frank cried to the back of the departing man. “Look at the conditions! Use your fucking head!”
Randy turned slowly and said with a slow, solemn voice, “What do you expect from a bunch of ignorant loggers... College Boy?”
Frank threw down his tool and ran over to face the men. He couldn’t allow anyone to disobey Fast Horse. They halted as soon as Frank blocked their path. “Don’t be fucking stupid!” he yelled in a quavering voice to the squad as a whole. “This idiot Shroeder is gonna lead you? What the fuck is wrong with you!”
“Nobody leads us,” Jim said. He stepped around Shroeder to spit words, more venomous in content, at Frank’s face. “We do the leading, and you and your bitch and all the rest of you fuckheads better start getting that straight!”
Frank lost his most of his composure. His quivering face turned a deep red. He lurched forward blindly and grasped Jim’s arm, unsure of his next move. His eyes bored into his foe until there emitted sparks of rage.
Jim recognized the look on Frank’s face, and dropped his tool. He stepped forward and used momentum to hurl his adversary to the ground, on the fire’s side of the line.
Frank’s empty yellow hard hat clattered noisily on the ground after he made contact with the forest floor. He sat up quickly, dazed and enraged.
Jim wasted no time in picking up his tool and joining Shroeder and the rest of his squad, claiming victory in retreat. They again marched forward in unison.
Frank scrambled to his feet and screamed in a quaking voice, “Fuck you all! I don’t give a shit what the fuck you do! You can burn your fuckin’ asses off as far as I’m concerned! Just go back to the shithole you crawled out of!”
There came no rebuttal, or even an acknowledgment that any of the departing men had heard Frank’s words. The distance between the severed parts of the crew continued to grow until each was out of sight of the other.
Frank watched in silence as a live red ember drifted to the floor of the forest on the green side of the line. Almost immediately, from between the brown pine needles, a small stream of white smoke meandered upwards while Alice, Scott, and Julio, with his squad behind him, ran over to Frank and looked at him questioningly. The three read his expressionless face as if words were boldly printed there. Julio held his arm out in front of his men, stopping their advance. They stood slightly behind Frank and watched the smoking spot give life to small flames. The dry, drought-stricken forest, and everything exposed within, was now slated for incineration.
The wind began to change course slightly, heading in more of a westerly direction. It pushed the infant flames across the forest floor, helping them to grow in size as they continued their loud feeding. Soon they began to crawl with an increasingly fast pace in the direction that Squad Two and Shroeder had taken. The motionless firefighters observed as the fire spread to some dead brush, which quickly exploded with a shortlived chorus of popping noises, as if hundreds of small firecrackers had gone off in the span of several seconds. This new energy gave the young fire the strength to climb one of the nearby trees, and the crewmembers felt the heat on their faces as it was frantically devoured in front of them; the red sparks shot upwards reflecting in their hard, proud eyes. The adolescent fire then inexorably rolled forward on its wind-driven path, as if nothing would stop it from growing and traveling wherever it desired.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Frank said softly, breaking the spell the fire had cast. What remained of the crew turned away slowly and walked east, zombielike, with Frank in the lead.
“McDaniels, Sinclair.”
“Go ahead, Sinclair.”
“Yeah, just got a report from the air. Pull everybody outta there to their nearest safety zone or helispot immediately. Sounds like it’s blowing up, and swirling winds are making it spot all over the place. I want everybody out ASAP. Over.”
“Copy that.”
“I’m sending three ten-person ships, and one five person to help evacuate. Sounds like we gotta get the Willamette crew out first. ETA twenty minutes. Over.”
“Copy.”
“Sinclair clear.”
“McDaniels clear.”
“Fast Horse, this is Frank.”
Fast Horse stopped his snakelike weaving through the trees. “Yeah, go ahead Frank,” he said between pants.
“Squad Two and Shroeder went back to last night’s helispot, but the rest of us are still on the way to the eastern one as you ordered.”
Fast Horse shook his head slowly and growled, “Shit!” He raised the radio to his mouth again and said, “Copy that, Frank. You know what to do.”
“Sure do,” Frank said with forced assurance.
“Fast Horse clear.”
Fast Horse quickly flipped the knob on his radio. “McDaniels, Willamette crew.”
“Go ahead, Willamette.”
“Yeah, part of our crew got separated. A group of six, including the Liaison, is heading back to last night’s spike camp to the west. I’m worried about spot fires cutting them off. I advise keeping a tanker overhead and note that there’s a safety zone cut in the middle of the line about a mile from the creek. The zone is big enough to get a ship into. The remaining eleven are headed to the eastern helispot. Over.”
The strike team leader’s voice retained its officiousness, but finally took on a tone of urgency. “Copy that. We’ll pick up the ones to the west with the ten-man. We’ll send another ten-man and a five-man to the eastern helispot. ETA sixteen minutes. Advise getting there as fast as possible. It’s closing in fast. I just got a report from the Wilson crew of some spot fires near you, and one is spreading quickly. Over.”
“Copy. Willamette clear.”
“McDaniels clear.”
Randy heard what he thought sounded like the roar of a huge waterfall, but the noise was from behind them, from the direction in which they had just come. He dropped to the side and searched the forest behind them. A blast of hot wind slapped his face. He saw the black smoke and the fiery red glow, and knew they were in trouble. “Let’s move, boys! Fire on our tail!” he yelled from the rear of the resting squad, with a voice closer to that of a scared child than of a grown man. “We’ve got to make it to that safety zone quick!”
The squad stood up and looked past Randy at the alarming signs of fire in the distance.
“Fuckin’ A!”
“Son of a bitch!”
The group marched quickly down the line, checking behind them continually. They soon picked up their pace to a full run.
***
Randy couldn’t accept the fact that he was actually scared and running from a fire. This was the last thing he ever wanted to be doing. He had finally fucked up. He knew it would pain him when he thought about it later. But there was no time now to worry about what should have been.
The men came to an abrupt halt. Randy yelled from the back, “What the fuck? Let’s go!” He then fell silent and joined his squad staring transfixed at the horror that faced them. A solid wall of flames, with a height that varied from ten to fifty feet, ran perpendicular to the line in both directions, seemingly without end. The men reeled in fear, and as they turned a
round, they had their first terrifying glimpse of the battery of flames coming at them from behind. These flames too marched in an uneven but wellconnected and formidable line. The firefighters realized they were fast becoming surrounded.
“Let’s make a run for it downhill! We’ll hit the creek!” Jim yelled frantically, through the din of the fires.
The rest of the squad looked at him questioningly as their eyes widened with fear and helplessness. Panic was next to set in. “Come on! We can do it!” Shroeder yelled, and then cast aside his tool and started running madly through the brush, dodging trees. Jim followed suit, and then three more bolted like frightened young elk, blindly running in the same direction. Only Randy remained.
“There’s no fucking way you’ll make it!” Randy yelled, looking at the saws lying discarded on the ground near his feet. “Use these saws and cut us a zone!” The words fell faintly on the ears of his retreating squad, without effect. He stood in desperation, fists clenched, the rubble of his world at his feet. He broke free of his torment and streaked through the forest. His eyes focused ahead as steadily as those of a determined predator making a charge at fleeing prey, and soon caught up with the pack of scurrying squad members. He picked his moment and leapt forward, throwing all of his weight upon the Kid. Both fell to the ground together.
Randy quickly hopped back onto his feet. “Come on! Help me clear a dirt spot here!” he commanded as fast as he could get the words out.
John, a little dazed and slightly confused, raised himself to face Randy. Unlike the others, he still clutched his tool, having been too scared to notice the others discard theirs. He turned from Randy and looked in the direction in which the rest of the crew had run. The men were already out of sight, as if the smoke had swallowed them alive. He dropped his confusion, stooped, and began scraping the earth. Randy left momentarily and returned with a saw in one hand. He started it in one pull and began madly cutting, swing the saw and pushing over small trees in one repeated motion. Next, he sliced through nearby bushes, whipping his spinning saw recklessly, abandoning all caution.
The heat from the walls of flames was quickly approaching a dangerous level as the men continued their fight against time. Through smoke-induced tears, John looked to see if his hot shirt had caught fire, but was surprised to find it hadn’t even changed in appearance. He then stared in the direction of the inferno to the east. It was only tens of yards away and boiled outwards furiously, thick red tendrils of flame whipping up at the trees, the limbs of which flapped at the sky like wings of giant birds unable to take to the air. He stopped scraping and crouched in fear as he was blasted by an ember-laden gust of wind.
When a Fire Burns Hot Page 35
