Out of the Wild: A Wilderness Survival Thriller

by Hunt, Jack

  Callaway was hesitant to eat any of it. He stared at it all as they chomped and swallowed and waited a few minutes to gauge if they might curl over before he filled his trap as fast as he could.

  “So where did you learn this?” he asked, bringing another handful of blueberries up to his mouth. She jerked her head toward her father. They weren’t survivalists or anything that extreme, but they knew the basics. Often that was all that was needed. And yet so few pilots or those living in Alaska had taken the time to gain those skills. Many relied on technology. What was the likelihood of them crashing? Why bother when someone would find them within 24 hours? Some said they would be found within an hour before they even had any need to crack open a survival kit. Her father wasn’t convinced. No, survival didn’t require knowing every plant, berry, or mushroom that grew in the wild, just a few.

  Once they collected enough for the evening and their bellies were full, a spark of hope reignited, lifting their spirits.

  It was short-lived.

  In all the confusion of being chased by the moose, getting dry, and searching for food, they’d found themselves questioning their position.

  “No, it’s that way. For sure. Look, you can just make out the sun. We were heading southwest, we crossed the river to the south side, and…” Kara stopped for a moment, a frown forming.

  “You don’t know, do you?” Callaway asked.

  “Of course I do.” She pointed. “That way.” They continued to climb, not speaking to one other to conserve energy. A blustery wind attacked, bringing a sharpness that made her cheeks sting. Trudging behind, Frank was using the knife to sharpen the end of his walking stick, convinced they might have to use it against a bear, moose, or wolves. Her thighs protested as they ascended, dragging her father, and having to stop every ten minutes just to catch their breath.

  “I think we should’ve stayed by the river,” Frank said. “We keep having to stop.”

  “Do you want to run into another bear or moose?” Kara replied.

  “Who says we won’t come across one up here?”

  “Listen, there’s a chance that a pilot flying might see us if we make it to the top of this ridge,” Kara said. “We no longer have that flare so we’ll have to rely on a fire and besides the mountains in the distance, that’s the highest point right now.”

  Callaway slumped down beside Henry, exhausted. “For an old man, you sure as hell weigh a lot,” he said. He rolled his shoulder and groaned as he rubbed the back of his neck. “Your turn, Frank.”

  Frank had other plans. “It’s cold here and it will be even colder the higher we go. We are already dealing with October temperatures and if there is a shift in weather, we could freeze.”

  The trees had thinned out, the ground was mostly shrubby grass and boulders.

  “He has a point,” Callaway said. “Besides, I don’t know about you all but those mushrooms tasted like ass. I say we try to catch some fish.” He turned to Frank. “You still got that wire?”

  He took it out of his pocket and held it up, and showed them some small pieces of metal from the plane that he’d taken to use as a hook.

  “See what you can form out of this, it might work better,” Kara said, taking one of her hairpins out and handing it to him. “That scrap of metal will be okay for a weight but you’ll be hard-pressed to convince a fish to latch on to that.”

  She clattered together two walking sticks to alert any wildlife. Though the chances of running into a bear this high up were slim.

  “There isn’t much shelter up here. It will be dark soon. I don’t like the idea of freezing and being open to the elements, I think we’ve been soaked enough for one day,” Callaway said.

  She glanced at her father. “We can go down a little, into the trees, find a stream for water and see if there are any fish.”

  “Agreed.” They descended back into the thickness of trees and the natural protection from the wind. They didn’t go all the way down, not back to the rushing river, but instead stayed about halfway up and continued hiking through yellow and green trees.

  There were only a few hours of daylight left so they settled down beside a small waterfall, about ten feet tall, that flowed in two directions at the bottom like a snake’s tongue. Several branches were in it, the water gushed over rocks, clear and wild. The rest frothed aggressively, plunging down the hillside and merging with the larger river. Before them was a rocky bluff, boulders covered in green moss, and short leafy undergrowth.

  “This should do for the night,” Frank said. “I’ll see what I can catch if you start a fire,” he said to Kara. “Give me a hand, Callaway.” Callaway nodded then strolled out of earshot. They had covered some good ground, not as much as they hoped but it was at least a quarter of the journey. She searched for wood to make a fire.

  Later, as Kara struck the rod to create sparks, her father watched her.

  “You know, I thought you had lost that.”

  “No, I kept it in a box,” she said. “Along with some of mom’s things.”

  “Oh yeah, like what?” She didn’t look at him as she added another layer of twigs and smoke rose around her face, bringing a pungent smell of damp pine, and earth. The fire hissed and crackled.

  “Keepsakes, awards, photos mostly.”

  “Kara… I…” It sounded as if he wanted to say something important, something that might have been related to the passing of her mother. Much of that time after had been a blur, with him drinking, and things said in the heat of the moment. He’d made her feel as though it was her fault that she was dead. The truth was that even if her mother had been behind the wheel, the outcome would have been the same, maybe worse if she hadn’t swerved. The road was narrow on that stretch, it was dark and the suddenness of the truck barreling around the bend caught her off-guard.

  It just happened to be at the time she was learning to drive.

  The truck driver, well, he denied any wrongdoing, leading her father to believe that she was at fault, even if he didn’t say it outright. However, once the police had completed their investigation based on skid marks, and another driver who had witnessed the truck veer over moments before the accident but didn’t stop and returned later to inform the cops, they were able to conclude she wasn’t at fault.

  But by then the damage was done.

  “About Callaway. You need to be careful.”

  “Why?”

  “I saw the way he looked at you earlier.”

  “I was naked. He’s a guy.”

  “No, it’s just…”

  She scoffed and shook her head as she rubbed her ankle. “I’m twenty-nine, Dad, I can take care of myself.”

  Across the way, Frank yelled out, “I caught one. Holy crap, I got one!”

  She smiled. At least things were looking up.

  “I didn’t mean it like that.” He coughed hard, as she called out to Frank to fill up the water bottle. “What I meant to say is if I die out here, you need to...”

  “You’re not dying. Okay? We’re getting out of here,” she replied, cutting him off.

  Kara collected larger, longer sticks to build a lean-to.

  “I hope so but if I do…”

  She waved him off. “Stop talking like that.”

  “Why not? I’m being realistic. If I die, you…”

  “It was also the press clippings of the accident.”

  “What?”

  “What I kept inside the box.”

  She just wanted him to stop. To get out of that headspace. There could be no room for thinking like that whether it was true or not. Those who died mentally had given up long before they took their final breath. And she had no intention of dying out here.

  It worked. His chin dropped and she returned to building a shelter.

  22

  Kara’s heart pounded in her chest at the sound of the sickening cry. At first, she thought one of them had been attacked by a bear but it wasn’t that. Callaway had slipped on the slippery moss-covered rocks and fallen in
to the ten-foot waterfall. Frank, brought her up to speed as she raced over.

  “He wanted to fish. He leaned too far forward.”

  Water gushed over Callaway nonstop, making it hard to speak or even breathe. Gasping, head low like someone under a hard shower, he flailed his arms trying to latch onto the rocks but it was too slippery.

  Frank was down on his belly trying to pull him out but Callaway wasn’t going anywhere. How long could anyone last under that water? At the latter part of the day, and this far up the mountain, it would be freezing.

  “Get in there, Frank,” she bellowed but either he wasn’t listening or he refused to.

  Throwing caution to the winds, she stripped down to her underwear, took her Leatherman with her, and cautiously stepped out, holding on to the rocks while feeling the rush of the water swirling around her ankles. Her ankle was swollen from her fall but over the last few hours, it had improved. Kara gasped as water splashed her, and she reached down to see what was holding Callaway. Water billowed, frothy, and white. She tugged on Callaway’s pant leg but that did little to dislodge his boot, which was trapped between two large boulders. Meanwhile, his body was being battered and he was getting tired of holding on to a rock. She could see Callaway gasping for air like a surfer breaching the surface of the ocean only to have another wave roll over them.

  Seconds, she figured that’s all he had before he either succumbed to the cold or let go. She did the only thing she could, she pulled open the knife and cut the laces on his boot. “Pull up on his arms, Frank!”

  Frank got on his knees and pulled back while she used every ounce of strength she could muster and pulled up on his leg. A second or two and boom, it came loose, and Frank was able to haul him up out of the river. He was unconscious. Scrambling to the other side, she yelled for Frank to turn him on his side so any water could drain out of his mouth and nose but he was just staring at him, shock, maybe?

  Kara pushed him out of the way. After checking Callaway's pulse, she cleared his airway, then began mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. She breathed four times into his mouth as she pinched his nose, this would get past any of the water trapped inside. Another four times blowing and she placed an ear near his mouth and observed his chest to see if it rose or fell.

  She had to do this two more times before he began coughing up water and she turned him over on his side. Although he was breathing, he was in danger of hypothermia, and that wasn’t the only threat — infection, pneumonia, heart failure, any one or more of these could kill him.

  “Hey, hey,” she said. Looming over him, clicking her fingers.

  The very second he managed to catch his breath, his eyes bounced between her and Frank. “You bastard. You tried to kill me,” he said, scrambling to his feet only to fall over the moment his brain registered the pain in his ankle. It had already swollen badly, changed to a deep purple, and there was a deep gash that exposed the white of his ankle bone. It didn’t take a medical degree to tell it was broken.

  Frank staggered back. “I didn’t do anything, you fell in.”

  “You pushed me.”

  “You are delirious.”

  “I know what happened.”

  “Stop it! Just stop!” Kara yelled, her voice echoing off the rocks. “Frank. Help me get him over to the fire.”

  Frank stood there staring.

  “FRANK!”

  He nodded but was wary to get too close. Kara grabbed Callaway’s arm and looped it around her. Frank tried to do the same but Callaway refused. “Get off me. Get your stinking hands off me!” he bellowed.

  He held on to Kara but wouldn’t let Frank near him which only made her job that much harder. Still, he hobbled using his one good leg and her as a support, and they made their way further downstream until it narrowed and it was safe to cross. With Frank farther up, back at the camp, Callaway stopped and asked her to set him down for a second so he could catch his breath. She lowered him onto a boulder and he looked at this ankle in dismay. Were those tears or water streaking his cheeks? Clenching his fist he banged it against the rock and yelled at the top of his voice, letting out his frustration. Breathing hard, he lifted his eyes.

  “We need to get you warm.”

  “What’s the point? We’re not getting off this mountain, are we?”

  “Of course we are.” She offered him a hand but he swatted it away.

  He started to chuckle. “I guess this is karma, right? Life’s way of getting back at me for my choices. That’s what your mother would say, isn’t it?”

  She didn’t reply.

  “I didn’t agree with your mother but I admired her. It’s a pity.”

  “What is?”

  “That they didn’t look closer after the accident.”

  That confused her. Why would he say that?

  “What do you mean?”

  He shivered. “She deserved better, that’s all I’m saying.”

  She had to wonder if the cold was affecting his mind. Not waiting, she slung her arm around him and helped him up. “Why are you helping me?” he asked as he hobbled back to the camp.

  “For the same reason my mother did what she did. It’s the right thing to do.”

  They shuffled back up to the campsite. Her father was all questions. As she sat down across from Frank, warming herself by the fire and getting dry enough to slip her clothes back on, she noticed his gaze bounced between her and Callaway. It didn’t take long before the accusations resurfaced. “Don’t think for a second I don’t know what you were trying to do,” Callaway said.

  “You’re confused.”

  “You wish. I know you would like nothing better than to see me out of the picture.”

  “Why would I? You’re saving this company.”

  “I’m saving more than that for you.”

  What did he mean by that? The silence fueled her suspicion.

  Frank got up and collected the makeshift fishing rod. Saying he would try again, as the fish he’d caught had gotten away from him.

  Callaway shivered hard, rubbing his hands together. His ankle was a mess. As time passed, it got worse, more swollen, and now he was short a boot. “Frank, why don’t you make him a crutch?”

  “Don’t bother,” Callaway said. “I don’t want anything from him.”

  Her father looked on, a quiet observer, his eyes darting between them. Kara opted to make him a crutch using a straight, thick branch that was around four and a half feet in length. She took a little bit of the foam from inside her father’s stretcher and used one of the extra T-shirts she was wearing. She wrapped it around the top then took some of the plane wire and tied it off. Next, she took a look at his foot. It needed to be immobilized. The rule of thumb was if the ankle was sprained, splinting up to the next joint was key.

  However, as she tried to help, he wouldn’t let her touch it. “It’s too painful.”

  “Then take an ibuprofen.”

  “No.”

  “Now who’s stubborn?” her father asked.

  He scowled, stuck his hand out and she gave him two pills. He knocked them back and gritted his teeth as she went to create a support for the ankle. Before she could put it on, she had to wait until his pants were dry.

  “Well this is going to screw things up,” he said.

  “It’s not ideal but we’ll work with it.”

  Callaway shivered hard. “I won’t be able to go up and down the mountains. You’d best leave me behind.”

  “We’re not doing that.”

  “I get you want to help, Kara, but I’ll slow you down. You’ll need Frank to help.”

  “No. You use the crutch and you hobble, but you move. It will soon be freeze-up, snow will fall, you won’t survive out here and if we don’t get back then no help is coming.”

  He nodded and she set him down beside her father. The two of them began to talk so she ventured off to see what Frank was doing. He was down by the water filling a bottle. “What happened?”

  “I told you,” he said without
looking at her. He sank the bottle and let it fill. “He slipped and fell.”

  “Then what was he talking about when he said he’s saving more than that for you?”

  Frank snorted. “What do you think?” he asked, rising and screwing the cap on. “He has a God complex, Kara, he likes to think he’s saving more than a company. Sure, he can help us out of a bind if we continue on the same trajectory but that’s all. Don’t listen to his bull crap. He blames everyone except himself. Your mother, your father, hell even Paul.”

  As he went to walk by her, she turned. “My mother?”

  “What about her?”

  “You said he blames her?”

  Frank shrugged. “And?”

  “Why?”

  “Your father never told you?”

  “Told me what?”

  He lifted a finger and thumb. “Your father was this close to selling up. Years ago when Indi was alive, Callaway Corporation approached us with a buyout deal. He nearly took it. It was your mother who stopped him. She called it blood money.” He shook his head. “Your father turned it down. So yes, he blames your mother.”

  He had taken a few steps away when Kara asked, “Do you?”

  Frank looked at her. “It will be dark soon. We should finish that shelter.”

  And with that said, he walked back into the camp, leaving her to ponder.

  * * *

  Little else was said as they bedded down in front of a fire, their backs to the wall of the huge cliff. Kara chewed over the evening and thought about the impact her mother had on her father, his business, and Alaska.