by JT Sawyer
Pete scanned the area behind the juniper grove where Travis had motioned. The winding escarpment ran for miles and had deep furrows on the sides indicating numerous canyons. He could see the bright green foliage of cottonwood and sycamore trees whose canopies poked out, which indicated a good possibility of permanent water. In the wilderness beyond the canyon, there were more open dunes that unfurled to the east where they were abruptly pierced by a range of jagged mountains.
“As you know, if there’s reliable water and edible plants to be found, it would be there. And possibly some caves or alcoves to hole up in for a while. I agree. It’s our best option for now. This is pretty level terrain; we can make it there in a few hours,” Pete said in a faint voice, his energy low from lack of food.
Travis nodded at his friend as the rest of the group encircled them. “You missed out on the morning coffee, but I’m sure glad to see you all,” he said, making his rounds over each person’s face. “The rain has provided us with many drinking fountains to get tanked up on and these pools are about as close as you’ll get to a bottle of spring water. You all know the drill about hydrating from hearing Pete and me harp at you for many weeks, so get some fluids in until your belly feels beyond full, and then gather up your gear. There’s a canyon a short walk from here that will provide us with more resources than what we have in this location. We can rest there for a few days until we come up with a plan.”
Pete chimed in, “Does anyone have any food left? We should divvy that up so we can at least spike our blood sugar a bit for the walk.”
Everyone went through their packs and pockets. There were three flattened protein bars and half a bag of trail mix. “Becka, why don’t you divide that up and pass it around,” said Travis, who recognized the importance of giving a role to one who felt so powerless. “Everyone else, fill up your remaining water bottles or empty containers of any kind, and let’s depart in ten minutes.”
The walk to the canyon was a pleasure on the feet as the sandy terrain was far more forgiving than the heel-bruising rubble of the cavern. At first, the hike felt like many other exploratory ventures they had gone on together inside canyons during the river trip. But then the bitter realization that they were cut off permanently from the world they knew cast a tight grip on their senses. Everything they did now, every step, wasn’t driven by a tourist’s curiosity but a need to stay alive and take care of critical priorities. Their spirits lifted as they neared the canyon’s edge and saw a vertical oasis of large green trees lining the bottom and heard the sound of a stream meandering beneath it.
There was a faint mule-deer trail that wound like a thread to the floor of the canyon. Pete began the easy descent and when they reached bottom, led them under a thick swath of mature trees, where they rested. The ankle-deep stream, a creek by eastern standards, sported swathes of cattails waving in the wind. For now, the world outside this sanctuary could wait.
Travis surveyed the canyon floor in both directions. There were plenty of defensible positions and several small alcoves where they could retreat from the elements. Cottonwood bark hung like drapes from the massive skeletons of dead trees, and would be sufficient for bedding material, while there was ample wood for fuel. Banana yuccas lined the canyon walls, heavy with their potato-sized fruits, and further above were an abundance of pinyon pine trees full of calorie-laden nuts. The car-sized boulders, strewn throughout every level of the canyon, were home to plenty of small game. This place will take care of our needs for a while until everyone has recuperated, he thought.
“Let’s head over to that small alcove and make camp there,” Travis said, pointing down-canyon to a divet in the rock escarpment just above a ribbon of cottonwood trees.
They could already feel the rocks radiating heat from the morning sun as they clambered over to the shady alcove. It resembled a small amphitheater with its curved walls and arching backside that went twenty feet into the bedrock. On either side of the arching entrance were animal trails that led up to the canyon rim. Tangled logjams from previous flash floods were well below the lip of the alcove.
“We’ll make our camp here. I’m going to scout the ridgeline above and see if there are any nuts to harvest if anyone wants to come,” said Travis. “If you’re staying put down below, then we’ll need heaps of cottonwood bark to be gathered for bedding material. This place is going to be our three-star hotel for tonight.”
Katy and Becka followed on Travis’s heels as they scampered up the narrow trail a few hundred yards to an outcropping of pine trees. August and September were the best months for living off the land in the Southwest, and they were just getting to the tail end of that window of abundance. As they reached the row of short-needled conifers, they could see the brown oblong exteriors of nuts spread like shotgun pellets around the base of each tree. Travis knelt down and grabbed a few off the ground, cracking them one at a time between his teeth and spitting out the thin shell. The beige inner meat was oily and sweet. With nearly three thousand calories to a pound, these would be an important staple in their newfound diet and, unlike animal hunting, there was little chase involved.
Becka watched and then simulated the toothy removal method, looking up at Katy with delight as she downed more nuts in earnest. Katy threw her long hair back over a shoulder and knelt down alongside the young girl to join in the harvest.
After they had eaten and filled their hats to overflowing with nuts for the others, the three sat down alongside one another with legs extended. After a long silence, taking in the scenery and trying to process the last few days’ events, Katy leaned back on her elbows. “What happens next, Travis? Do we stay here? I mean, maybe we should get to a city somewhere and see if there are others like us who’ve survived.”
He scratched his beard and squinted at the horizon. He picked up a handful of pebbles and began tossing them one at a time onto the ground beside his boots. “All we know right now is the little picture around us from the small town we came from. We need to get some intel on what’s going on in the world to figure out our next course of action. My thought is we stay here for the next day and rest. Then, if it’s safe, we can head out to Prescott. That’s the largest city in these parts and there should be some form of makeshift agency in charge. After that, we can find out about getting folks back home, and I can get back to my son in Denver.”
Katy dined on some pine nuts and looked out over the canyon. “Yeah, we probably shouldn’t stay here too long gathering nuts; the poor squirrels will go hungry having Becka to compete with,” she said, nudging the girl.
The three rose and gathered up their hat-baskets of nuts and headed back to the group. The rest of the morning was spent building up a thick nest of bark in the alcove, drying out footwear, and gathering small-diameter firewood. Pete showed everyone how to use yucca root for soap, and this quickly provided the prompting for washing clothes and bathing. They made a fire at dusk to blend in with the ambient orange light of the setting sun like the Apaches used to do, using a tipi fire of non-resinous wood to reduce any smoke signature. They filled up on pine nuts and baked the bulbous yucca fruits and cattail roots in the coals of the fire until they were charred black.
Travis had everyone sleep in their footwear, with packs nearby and water bottles full, to expedite a speedy departure if needed. Each person took a two-hour shift on guard duty. Otherwise, they all slept on a thick layer of bark atop the sandy floor of the alcove, relying on the aboriginal method of staying warm by sleeping nearly on top of one another to maximize the sheer body mass of the group heat. From a distance, the intertwined bundle of arms and legs resembled the gnarled root system of a large tree. As Travis fell asleep, he heard the singular hoot of a long-eared owl and looked out beyond the lip of the alcove at the crescent moon, which hung in the sky like a tiny white fang.
***
In the morning, Travis began carving widget-style deadfalls for trapping rock squirrels. Twenty deadfalls, consisting of three support sticks each, were carved assembly
-line fashion in under an hour. With Becka’s help, they began setting these around the boulders near the alcove. Each deadfall was baited with a succulent piece of baked cattail suspended on the bait stick, which was held under tension by an upright slab of sandstone.
As they moved along a swath of boulders, he explained the mechanics to Becka. “In a forested region, with its many chokepoints on the game trails, snares would usually be the trap of choice. Out here in the desert, deadfalls rule. Each outcropping of boulders and rock piles should be viewed as a stocked refrigerator of small rodents such as squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits, and packrats. Trapping is far more efficient than making a bow and arrow and burning up precious calories searching for an animal,” he said, fixing a rock slab over a deadfall. “A minimum of a dozen traps set out here and you’ll be eating by morning, depending on the time of year and region. One time, I had up to sixty-five deadfalls set around my camp and I ate better than a hog in an apple orchard.”
Her slender fingers struggled at first to arrange the different pieces but she was a quick learner and by the third deadfall was getting more adept. “You’re pretty comfortable in the outdoors. No surprise I guess. Did you always grow up doing ranch work and being outdoors with your family?”
“Unfortunately, we only came out to my grandpa’s ranch during the summers. My dad hated cows and ranching so we lived in California, where he owned a landscaping business. We were always out somewhere around Malibu or up the coast, putting in stone walkways or pruning trees. The kids at school used to make fun of me because their parents all had high-paying computer jobs, while I came to class with dirt under my fingernails from helping my dad rake some rich lady’s backyard.”
This was the most he had heard her talk since they’d met. “Well, there’s nothing like working out on the land with your hands and yours show the signs of someone who’s no stranger to hard work. My father used to say, ‘Nature is a mighty fine teacher. She will always let you know where you stand as she doesn’t grade—everything is pass or fail.’”
“Is your dad still…was he alive before…” she fumbled for the words.
“No, my mom died when I was a youngster and my father passed on a few years ago. But they’re still here in my hands and my memories. Those are the things that never die, sweetie.”
Chapter 11
Jerome, Arizona, 94 miles southeast of Peach Springs
Tom Crawford surveyed the open desert below the weathered porch on the roof of the historic Grand Hotel, the highest vantage point in the former mining town of Jerome. The five-thousand-foot elevation above the Verde Valley provided an eagle’s view of the towns and wilderness areas to the north as well as the lush Verde River below.
A fourth-generation rancher, he had grown up in the high desert hunting dove and whitetail deer and poking around Anasazi ruins in younger days. His parched hands rested on the binoculars as he studied the chokepoints in the streets in the small town of Clarkdale, two miles below them. Crawford was how the locals referred to him. He was a retired lt. colonel who had spent twenty years in marine recon during and after Vietnam. It had left him a bent man, but he still strode with the presence of someone who was used to being in command. Now he was the newly appointed leader of the Verde Valley Alliance, comprised mostly of ranchers and homesteaders who carved out a life in the rugged landscape surrounding the fertile valley below.
He recalled the insanity of the last three weeks: chaos engulfing the world, the National Guard being crippled in Phoenix and surrounding areas, and surges of desperate survivors fleeing the large cities, inundating the small towns around Jerome. People showing up on foot, horseback, and in ragtag convoys bringing hopes of survival but also bringing the infected with them, reigniting the whole craze of madness and killing they had tried to leave behind.
The locals had blown several bridges along the interstate in an effort to stem the flow of infected refugees coming north out of Phoenix. Mountainside embattlements of razor wire and observation posts were placed over the steep hillsides above Jerome, making this the last refuge in the area with outposts in Sedona and Winslow, along with a few small settlements on nearby mountaintops. By the end of the third week, stragglers from the large cities ceased arriving, having succumbed to the virus or holing up in remote wilderness hideouts elsewhere. Military action had come and gone as the armed forces were crippled from within, and the joint chiefs and presidential cabinet went silent, the halls of those bureaucracies screeching to a halt and the airwaves shuddering with static. Ham radio was now the main method for obtaining intel, along with the numerous ground patrols that were sent out each week. The former forest service fire watchtowers were manned by Crawford’s people, who used radios to relay any movement in the region.
Crawford realized that the smaller fortified towns were the key to maintaining some semblance of authority and having a chance of defending against both unwelcome thugs and the lurking hordes of undead. Most small towns in the Southwest were islands surrounded by miles of wilderness that could provide a buffer, compared with the larger cities like Tucson and Phoenix. With a relatively small population in the Verde Valley from the onset, and with most people pursuing a self-reliant rural lifestyle there, he knew they had a chance if they banded together atop Jerome.
Situated on their mountainside retreat were numerous freshwater springs, miles of old mining tunnels, and a decent arsenal of weapons brought in by the scores of locals who joined him, which numbered around three hundred individuals. The biggest problem was keeping enough food laid in. With winter on the way and most gardens depleted, they would have to rely on the numerous cattle still roaming the countryside, along with elk and deer.
As Crawford was glassing the area to the north, he heard the familiar footsteps of his second in command enter the room. The oldest of Crawford’s three sons, Brian, was a former marine who had recently returned from Afghanistan to find his country in even greater turmoil than the region he left. “We have one patrol to the northwest of Paulden that radioed in about two bikers that were captured. They want to know how hard to push with interrogations about their location and activities.”
Crawford continued scanning, unflinching. “Regrettably such times call for actions that leave one…well…with regrets.” He paused, lowering the binoculars and taking a deep breath. “Tell them to proceed with whatever means they need to use. We have to know movement patterns, numbers, and intel on locations,” he said, placing his deeply tanned hands on the splintering wooden railing of the balcony.
“Yes, sir.”
“One more thing—I need to go up to Paulden myself and see what’s going on there, and get some boots on the ground near Chino Valley to see if that area is still contained. Last thing we need is a huge army of thugs or RAMs coming up over the western flank.” He preferred to call them undead, but the early news reports had coined the term for the blood-drinking zombies, reanimated mutants or RAMs, and the term had stuck with his people.
“I can go instead, sir. No need for you to…”
“No, you stay here and take the reins while I’m gone. I need to see firsthand what the situation is like and check on a few ranchers that decided to stay put. I’ll leave in the morning with a small group and infil via the helos, southwest of Paulden in the backcountry.” A small luxury they had was access to two helicopters from an air-ambulance crew that had retreated after the collapse of Phoenix. The helos were Bell 206s that could carry six people and fly as far as three hundred twenty miles on a tank of fuel. With fuel being rationed, Crawford only used them for maintaining contact with the remote outposts. Otherwise, they relied on footpower or horses. They had lost too many horses and riders to RAMs in nearby towns, and he reserved them only for trips into remote wilderness areas where the threat of the creatures was almost non-existent.
“Get Alpha Team ready and have the other teams meet tonight in the main lobby at 1800. I want to go over plans for the coming weeks and discuss the growing threat that our scouts to the
north have indicated about Flagstaff.”
A few weeks back he had thought the RAMs were the main enemy to contend with, then the massive wave of thugs coming from survivors out of L.A., Phoenix, and Vegas had arrived, adding a whole new element to their warfare efforts. Along with the collapse of the already porous border along Mexico, the arrival of fleeing cartels, who were striving to get to higher elevation towns like Flagstaff and Santa Fe, were becoming a growing menace he couldn’t afford to ignore. The main chokepoint that kept the Flagstaff gang in check was found at the outpost in Sedona, where a contingent of close to one hundred sixty people guarded the narrow passage down from the rim country. The serpentine route that wound down from Flagstaff through Oak Creek Canyon was the key artery that provided access to the Verde Valley. Numerous attempts by the Flagstaff thugs had already been thwarted in part by the guerrilla warfare tactics employed by Crawford’s fighters, but also by the geography.
Crawford’s wife, Clara, entered the room and stood beside him. She was a tall brunette with rough hands and deep squint lines around her eyes. “And what is my husband planning now?”
“We’re living in a fishbowl up here. I need to know what’s happening to the north. I’m concerned that our greatest threat right now isn’t the virus or the RAMs. It’s the wave of cartels from Mexico. The Sedona outpost has already reported numerous encounters with them.”
“What about the coming of winter? The harsh weather and lack of power in that town should cause some attrition from hypothermia. Most of those folks are from the city and lower deserts and not used to livin’ in the elements. That might give us the advantage, come springtime.”
