Out of the Wild: A Wilderness Survival Thriller

by Hunt, Jack

  It felt like all of it was a lifetime ago. She’d become so entrenched in the aftermath of the accident, the arguments, the blame, that all she wanted to do was get away, start afresh, and forget. But in that rush, she’d done the very thing her mother had told her to avoid – getting caught up in the pursuit of self-interest, forgetting her roots, the things she loved, the things that mattered and made her who she was.

  5

  Frank Anderson finished looking over the numbers and thumbed through the paperwork as Hugh Callaway of Callaway Corporation gazed absently out the office window at the fleet of planes. He was an intimidating man of wealth and power who had known nothing but the silver spoon since his daddy had handed over the reins to the billion-dollar company back when he was only twenty-four. Middle-aged now, with a receding hairline, Callaway carried himself with a confidence formed from years at the helm — he was never one to turn his eyes away when speaking to you. That day, he was wearing a form-fitting dark suit, and a long gray tweed jacket with shiny shoes that were suitable for the boardroom, not the wild. His hands that hadn’t seen a real day’s work in his life were locked behind him, gloved in black leather.

  Across the table from Frank was Paul Ross, Chief Pilot, and a close friend of Callaway. He wore a bright orange vest with a thick plaid shirt below it. He had sunglasses pushed up into his wavy blond mop and a Glock 45 auto in a holster on his chest, with a candy bar and sunblock stuck in a pouch. He was a real piece of work, a guy who had at one time worked for Shaw’s, a man Henry had taken under his wing, trained for free, and helped to get his first plane. He was also the first pilot to have ever been lured away by Callaway, a man who had his fingers in everything from charter flights and hunting lodges through to oil. A businessman that was the face of the future for some, and the downfall for others.

  “So?” Callaway asked, curious.

  “I don’t like having this conversation behind Henry’s back,” Frank said.

  Callaway turned. “And yet here we are,” he said, walking back to the head of the table as if he already owned it. “I think you’ll find that number is more than generous in light of Shaw’s current predicament.” He’d had eyes on buying the company, the five locations, and the remaining fleet, for some time. It wasn’t the first time he’d approached them with an offer — and, had Henry taken it back then, they’d both be sipping beers down at the local bar instead of working their ass off.

  His timing was impeccable. “I think you know better than anyone there are only two ways this ends. You accept the offer or Shaw files for bankruptcy.”

  “Those aren’t the only options.”

  “Oh come on, Frank, you’re not fooling anyone. The writing has been on the wall ever since Henry got married and you know that.” Callaway stabbed a finger at him. “That was the beginning of this company’s downfall. It’s widely known Henry was financially sound, making good choices, hell, he had one of the state’s largest charter companies and then he teamed up with the save-the-animals lady and suddenly he stopped transporting hunters and even backed away from several of his oil clients. Now, I figured once she passed away that would change, but it seems it’s only gotten worse. I mean, look who’s handling business. Where is he?”

  Paul snorted. “Probably searching for gold. Isn’t that right, Frank?” His eyes drifted to Callaway. “Henry has this obsession about some lost gold.” He shook his head. “Spent so much time looking for it that he’s neglected the business.”

  “Actually, he’s visiting his daughter,” Frank said, scowling at Paul.

  “Oh, he’s come around, has he?” Paul turned to Callaway. “His daughter was responsible for the accident,” Paul said, clarifying for Callaway’s sake.

  Frank shot him a stern look. “That’s not true and you know it.”

  “From what I heard even Henry blamed her…”

  Frank leaned forward, sticking his finger out. “Careful.”

  “Or what?”

  Frank cut Callaway a glance, hoping he would intervene before he reached across the table and knocked Paul to kingdom come. Instead, he maintained his professionalism. “Look, are we here to talk about the acquisition or Henry’s daughter?”

  Callaway glanced at Paul and he shrugged, tapping a pen against the table. Frank had never really seen eye to eye with him. He had a way of presenting himself as having your best interest at heart but the second he was crossed he made it clear where his loyalties were. Callaway took a seat and took a sip of coffee.

  Frank looked back down at the paperwork. “Listen, if it was in my hands alone, I would sign today but it’s not, and I can assure you Henry won’t go for this.”

  Callaway offered a puzzled expression. “For what reason?”

  “The same reason he never accepted your offer at the height of the company’s success. You.” He closed the paperwork and slid it back across the table toward him. “I appreciate you coming all this way, Mr. Callaway, but like I told you on the phone, final decisions are made by Henry, and in the event of his death, his daughter, then myself.”

  Paul laughed. “Well, being as she never showed an interest in the company, and you’re his business partner, I’m sure you could persuade them.”

  “That’s irrelevant. As long as Henry is still the owner of this company, no one will be able to persuade him. No matter what numbers you put in front of him.”

  “So he’d rather go bankrupt than swallow his pride?” Callaway asked, looking utterly perplexed. “He’d rather suffer bad credit? Deal with the humiliation of it all? Because believe me, the press will have a field day with him.”

  “Money means very little to him now.”

  “A man searching for gold. You expect me to believe that?” Callaway asked.

  “Don’t assume that those who search for gold are seeking to get rich.”

  “What is it then, the applause for finding it?”

  Frank sighed and ran a hand over his granite chin. “This company means a lot to him. Indi meant a lot to him. She still does.”

  “But that was fifteen years ago, surely he’s gotten over her by now.” Paul chuckled. “I know I have and mine only walked out the door a few months ago. At least he doesn’t have to pay spousal support,” Paul said with another chuckle. Callaway found that amusing, especially since he’d been married three times. However, he’d been smart enough to get them to sign prenuptial agreements.

  Callaway nodded slowly and took the paperwork and looked down at it. Although his father owned numerous profitable companies throughout Alaska, what he’d failed to secure was strong ties within the community. That’s where Henry shined. He was the common man, someone who had started from nothing and created jobs, even if they’d had to lay off many in the last few years. They’d lost several pilots to jobs in the Lower 48 working for commercial airlines. There was less danger, better hours, higher pay, and good benefits. At one time Henry had a fleet of more than forty planes, and a location in each of the five regions. Over time that had been reduced to just two offices, one in Anchorage, and the other in the far north based out of Barrow. He still owned the others but no longer operated out of them.

  Paul leaned forward. “All right, let’s just say that Henry has other options on the table.” He smiled, finding amusement in their demise. “Striking gold, or a silent investor who’ll swoop in at the last minute to bail him out. Shaw’s air taxi and charters are stuck in the dark ages. And with a shortage of pilots, drones are the way of the future. Unmanned aircraft. It’s simple supply and demand.”

  “That’s what you think,” Frank said.

  “No. That’s what we know,” Paul retorted, tapping the table and cutting a glance to Callaway who was listening intently. “Gone are the days when Shaw’s ruled the roost. There is competition and better salaries are giving pilots and mechanics a reason to go to the Lower 48. Now I know for a fact that you guys have to hire multiple part-timers just to make up for one full-time pilot. Why would anyone stay up here working endless
seasonal hours when then they can go work for a commercial airline for a few hours at a time and earn more? You know as well as I do that Alaska tops the national average for fatal plane crashes. It’s far more dangerous hopping into one of those bush planes here than into an airliner down there. The plain fact is, Frank, and you know it — midair collisions and regular plane crashes due to weather are on the rise here. There is a lack of ground-based radio receivers to keep track of aircraft — hell, some of the pilots in this state don’t even have GPS, use a radio, turn on their ELT or file a damn flight plan.”

  “And your point?” Frank asked.

  “My point is those hazards, and the shortage of pilots has presented an opportunity for pilotless aircraft to handle the flying. I think Henry is the only company that isn’t seriously considering it.”

  Callaway added, “We have already worked with the University of Alaska to test out new forms of unmanned craft. It’s only getting easier to patrol pipelines looking for leaks and damage. And it won’t be long before we start delivering supplies and mail to villages.”

  “Yeah, and what about people? I think you’ve forgotten that part. You think a tourist or a local will agree to get into one of your larger unmanned craft?”

  “They will if proven that they will arrive alive,” Paul said.

  Frank smirked. “Yeah, if proven.”

  Paul narrowed his eyes.

  Callaway interjected again. “What Paul is trying to say is that the days of flying hundreds of miles and running into issues only to turn back because of bad weather, or perform an emergency landing, or crash into tundra or trees are nearly behind us. And we would like Shaw’s to be a part of that future. The buyout wouldn’t change the name. You would retain that, and all employees would stay on board. Because like you said in our phone conversation — Shaw’s knows its passengers, we want to continue that old age of intimacy.”

  “Yeah, sure you do. Until your drone aircraft systems take over.”

  A smile flickered. “There is a cost to safety, Frank. You can’t stop the future, but you can merge with it.”

  Frank took a deep breath. “And there is a cost to owning this business.” Frank rose from his seat, looking to end the conversation. It had already taken up hours of his morning and he still had planes to attend to, engines to be fixed, employees to manage. “I’m afraid, gentlemen, that is all the time I can give you. I’m sorry you had to come all this way for nothing. I will let Henry know you dropped by but I wouldn’t hold your breath.”

  Callaway nodded thoughtfully as he gathered up the paperwork and slid it into a brown leather case. As the locks clunked closed he lifted his eyes. “Avoiding bankruptcy isn’t the only benefit, Frank. You know that when I acquire things, I take care of everything, that includes the people that work for me, that includes any personal debt they have. I could take care of yours today.”

  Frank’s cheeks flushed red and he cleared his throat. “I don’t think I follow you.”

  Callaway smiled as he straightened up, confident like a lion. “No? I wonder if your wife would.”

  He swallowed hard. “How do you know?”

  “A wise businessman always makes sure to investigate what he’s investing in to avoid surprises.”

  Frank clenched his jaw, as Callaway got close to him and patted him on the chest. “Try again and see if you can persuade Henry. This is bigger than him, isn’t it, Frank? There are a lot of lives counting on you.” He gave a wry smile. “I want to get this wrapped up soon. I look forward to hearing from you,” he said before the two of them left the office, leaving Frank anxious and puzzled as to how he could change Henry’s mind.

  6

  Anchorage, Alaska

  The set of journals had been authenticated as belonging to Mad Trapper Johnson. How they had made their way into an antique store in California only came to light when Henry arrived to collect them.

  It was common for fur trappers to send letters and keep journals, rarer to find them still intact. If they had survived the sands of time they were often held by a museum or found inside a dusty old box hidden away in the corner of a family attic. This is where it was believed these journals had remained until the owner moved from Alaska to California sometime in the 1950s.

  Once that family member died and their home’s contents went up for auction, someone else had come into possession of the set of journals and eventually passed it on to an antiques store among a box of various items.

  Henry never would have known it was in that store if he hadn’t come across the owner attempting to clear out a backlog of items he felt were of little to no value. To most, it wasn’t. It was nothing but the daily accounts of a trapper. So, when he came across the set of journals among a listing of various other Alaskan and Yukon items on a message board, they were touted as a collection.

  For years, he’d been scouring the net, contacting thrift, book, and antique stores searching for anything that was related to Sir Francis Drake or Mad Trapper Johnson. Those searches had led him to have a programmer friend show him an app that sent him alerts of any mention of trappers in Alaska or the Yukon. He’d purchased a few diaries that way but they had amounted to nothing.

  Though he didn’t think the journal would have a map or specifics about gold, that wasn’t what he wanted it for. It was for a timeline, locations, a means of being able to pinpoint if the rest of his research was correct.

  On the roughly five-hour flight back from L.A. to Anchorage, he’d devoured most of the contents, underlining, making notes on anything significant. The writing was legible, and for the most part, the style was conversational, covering the years between 1931 and 1932, the year the writer’s death was recorded. Most of it detailed day-to-day activities in and around Alaska and the Yukon, providing a clear image of his life as a trapper.

  However, it was the last few journal entries that were revealing, identifying a few key locations and some familiar names of prospectors that were found murdered. Henry was keen to get home to read some more and see what could be matched to his theory.

  He’d flown into Ted Stevens International Airport, the same location as his business, which was situated on the edge of Lake Hood; he’d parked at his business to avoid any high parking charges. On his way to collect his vehicle, he looked up and saw Gareth, one of his pilots, the one responsible for training Jay Davidson, an up-and-coming kid out of Minnesota who reminded him of himself. Gareth came out of the hangar shaking his head and hollering, “You need to be more careful, that’s all I’m saying.” He had a bag over his shoulder. He glanced at Henry for but a second, gave a nod and hopped into his 4 X 4 truck, and peeled out, leaving Jay standing in the hangar.

  Jay was twenty-seven, a good looking kid, full of life and eager to obtain the 250 flight hours and instruction necessary to get his commercial pilot license.

  “What happened?” Henry asked while making his way over.

  “Oh, everything, and anything. Too high, too low, banking too hard. Take your pick. I should probably throw in the towel.”

  Gareth was usually patient, something had to have rattled him to get him so worked up. “Ah, it’s all par for the course. You’re training. That’s what it’s about.”

  “But I’m getting worse.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself, leave that for Gareth.”

  He laughed. “But I nearly wrecked the plane. I was flying the Cessna 172 Taildragger, I set it down on a gravel sandbar and the tail barely missed a boulder.”

  “But you didn’t hit it.”

  “Well no but it was damn near close. You could see where the rear wheel touched down. We’re talking five inches, Henry. Gareth was right to be mad. I could have killed us or we could have found ourselves stranded.”

  He snorted. It wasn’t like he hadn’t heard it before. Everyone who flew in Alaska had a few close run-ins and every learner had been chewed out by their instructor. It was the nature of their business. Flying in Alaska was very different from flying in the
Lower 48. Even in the summer months, the conditions were extreme, the topography — challenging. It wasn’t for the faint of heart, that’s for sure, and there was little room for error. “Wait until you’re iced up, lose control because of the weather, or get hypoxia. That’s when the real fun starts.”

  Jay grimaced. “Ah, I don’t know if I’m cut out for this.”

  “Maybe you are, maybe you’re not. But Jay, you know why I offered you a place to stay and a way to get those hours?”

  “Because you’re crazy.”

  “Probably.”

  They both chuckled.

  “No, it’s because you remind me of me. All young and ballsy. That’s what we need up here. Too many pilots are settling for the easy life. As soon as things get hard they duck tail and run.” He pointed up as they walked over to his truck. “The fact is, takeoff, landings, and up there — all manner of things can go wrong. It happens to the best of us. Doesn’t matter how many years you’ve been flying. You know that midair collision that happened a few weeks back, and the crash in the mountains, those were all pilots who had been flying for far longer than you have. Should they have known better? Sure, but the fact is Alaska is beautiful but very unforgiving. One choice not to turn around because of bad weather, a slight distraction and it’s hello Lord, and goodbye earth.”

  Jay shook his head. “I don’t know what it is. Sometimes I feel calm and focused up there and then there’s this pressure to perform and well…”

  “You worried about money?”

  “Well, I’m not exactly rolling in it. Paying for an instructor, getting the ratings, it all adds up.”