“It’s hot," the boy complained.
“Yes.”
“Why are we out here?”
Grandfather continued walking. The boy thought about the coolness back at the house. The old man stayed silent. The boy struggled to keep up. His legs were tired and his feet felt heavy.
“Tell me what animals you’ve seen," Grandfather asked, not turning. "Since we started."
The boy thought about this. Tried to remember back over the distance.
“I didn't see any.”
“Why is that?”
“It’s too hot.”
Grandfather stopped. He turned and looked back at the boy, through the shimmering heat and stinging brightness of the sun.
“The animals are smarter than us. They know how to survive in this heat. How would you, Grandson, survive in this heat?”
The boy looked around. The desert bushes were all as high as a man and higher. He was thinking of shade, but these plants did not offer enough protection. The sun blasted him, so bright in the blue vault of the sky. Nearly desperate, the boy spotted a solitary hump of hill about 50 yards to his left with jumbled rocks, some as large as a bus, scattered around the base.
“Over there,” the boy pointed. "The shade of that rock. Go there.”
Grandfather smiled.
“Take me there,” he said. “You lead.”
The two wanderers rested in the shade of the rock. The boy was amazed at how much cooler the temperature was in the shade. Soon he began to feel normal again as he sipped water from his pack bladder. Grandfather instructed him to always sip, not gulp, to train his body to become more efficient in how it utilizes water.
After a half hour, the old man stood and walked out into the blazing sun. The boy watched as Grandfather deliberately moved to a small cactus. It had bright red buds on top of flat green pads. He squatted next to the plant. The boy noticed how he talked to it, almost in a whisper.
Grandfather cut off a pad with one red bud on it, stood, and walked back to the boy.
“Prickly-pear cactus," he said, sitting next to the boy.
The boy looked. Grandfather pointed out the barbed spines. He had the boy hold the pad, to lose his fear of the sharp spines. Then, Grandfather cut the red bud off and trimmed some of the small hairs around the outside of it.
“Be sure to cut off these small hairs. If you don’t have your knife, roll the bud in sand or on a rock until they are off.”
He demonstrated by rolling the bud back and forth in the hot sand using two sticks as tongs.
Next, he cut the bud and handed one half to the boy. The other half he began to eat. The boy, unsure, cautiously bit into his share.
“This is sweet. And juicy,” the boy said, pleased with the discovery.
After eating the bud, Grandfather removed clumps of spines from the pad and used his knife to peel the green skin back and off a section of the pad. Digging into the soft, jelly-like pulp, he sliced off a fleshy chunk and handed it to the boy. They both continued to eat this pulpy part until it was gone, only the outer skin left.
“That tasted different."
“Because it’s not from a grocery store,” the old man said.
They both laughed.
“Now you know how the plant people will care for you when you need water or food," Grandfather said.
He carefully folded the outer skin of the pad over itself and gently placed it on the ground next to its home plant.
Chapter 29 - Skirmish
Shots! Gunfire!
The boy jumps, blasted out of sleep by shock waves of exploding sound. As he panics and tries to rise, he finds he is bound by something around his waist!
More shots. Closer now.
The panic screams in him to run, and he struggles to get free of this thing gripping him. Then he remembers. The rope. It's securing him to the cottonwood.
The realization brings him fully awake.
He remembers he's up off the ground, so that's good. More shots out beyond the tree. His eyes strain to see through the leaves. What the hell is going on out there in the desert? He can't see beyond the green cover.
More shots, then a blast like a cannon!
The explosive charge smashes his ears with its power. Truck engines roar. Smaller engines, too, maybe dirt bikes or quads. The racing engines and gunshots are everywhere. Dust drifts up and into the tree and covers him in a fine coat.
It's some kind of war.
The boy unties the rope as fast as he can, coils it, and stashes it in his pack. He tries to calm his shaking and stay balanced on the branch as he slings the pack on his shoulders and straps it on. The adrenaline is pumping fast. He squats on a branch and pushes himself back against the trunk.
It’s safer here, off the ground. Thank god he chose the tree to sleep in. He pats the trunk of the cottonwood in thanks.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The cannon goes off again. .50 caliber, he thinks. That's a big gun. Grandfather took him to a gun show once, down in the city. They had .50 calibers there. And they were menacing.
The war rages around him; flashes of dust and vehicles appear through windows in the leaf canopy. It's total madness out there. Best he can make out, one group is on his side of the wash, the other group on the other side. It's a brutal scene. He's getting his first real taste of fear's power to destroy. The violence beyond the leaves pulses against his skin each time the guns go off.
A flash of something appears through a small opening in the leaves of the canopy. A small truck. A man stands in the open bed, swinging a big gun on a tripod. Repeated explosions from its muzzle, flames spouting from a dragon's mouth, spray the desert with .50 caliber bullets. The noise is almost unbearable!
The bullets spray the trees. The boy sinks back into the notch of the cottonwood, aware of his exposure to the projectiles. But the bullets hit at ground level, the trees trunks and lower branches become the victims. He feels pain for the beautiful cottonwoods taking this senseless abuse. The pain hits him in his gut and he wonders at this. Can he feel the pain they feel? Do they even feel pain? Strange questions.
A small engine, at full throttle, grabs his attention, below him, on his side of the wash. It approaches from the east, straight out from where he's trapped, reckless sounding. He looks down between the notch of branches just as a quad comes into view. It races past his tree, just missing the massive trunk, and launches into the air off the ledge. The boy's stunned at what he sees.
Hunched over the gas tank and handlebars, a body flops in slow motion. Lifeless.
As the quad arcs through the air, it seems time slows, and the floppy rider appears strangely relaxed. When the front wheels smash into the rocks of the streambed thirty feet below, time goes back to normal. The quad flips violently on floor of the wash, tossing and slamming the body into the ground mid-turn. Crumpled in the sand, face down, the body still looks relaxed: a bizarre sight. One arm is bent unnaturally above the head and brilliant red spreads across the back and pours into the sandy soil.
Death.
He stares at the lifeless form. The skirmish on the desert rages on in intensity, oblivious to the still body in the wash, but the boy notices something is changing. Vehicles start to fade in two separate directions. The dry wash is the boundary. One group fades south toward the Death Camp. The other to the northwest.
So the desert wars are starting, the boy thinks, just as Grandfather predicted. He sits in the quiet of the tree, unable to move. Nowhere is safe, including his perch in this tree.
He looks down at the crumpled body. It's a boy. Maybe the same age as him. Blood soaks the clothing. Blood soaks the sand. No one stayed to claim him. It's too dangerous to claim him now. But, they might come back for him later. If he's here when they come to claim the body, will they look up into his tree?
He looks down at the quad. It's stalled, the engine not running. How much time does
he have? He looks west at the sun. He holds up his fingers between the sun and the ground, horizontally. Four fingers fill the space: an hour until dark.
Leaving while it's light is risky. Waiting until dark, and their return, is risky. He takes note of his gut. At first, it felt tight. Now it's easing. He plays each scenario in his mind. How does it feel to leave in daylight? How does it feel leaving after dark?
When he thinks of the second option, his stomach tightens. Imagining leaving in daylight, not so much.
Okay, the gut wins. Soon, he will go.
The boy scrambles down the trunk to the first branch, stops to listen. At the lower level, the battleground comes into view. Chaos. Torn up brush, dirt, and blown away tree trunks of all makes and sizes are everywhere. Here, he feels naked and exposed. But he has to chance it.
Nothing moves on the desert as he scans to the south, to the north. East, west, it's quiet. Even the birds have fled.
He takes a deep breath, exhales, and drops to the ground. Ignoring his vulnerability at being exposed, he quickly scans in all directions. Nothing. He jumps over the edge of the wash and slides down to the streambed. He has to walk past the body, and its destruction pulls his eyes like a magnet. Some perverse curiosity compels him to stare, to take a deep breath, as if he can smell its death.
The quad has minimal damage: a slight bend to the right-side handlebar and a broken brake lever. Not a problem. He can use the foot brake. There’s nearly a full tank of gas.
He's ridden these before, at a friend's house back in New Orleans. He’s often read magazines on dirt bikes and quads for fun. This one's a 250cc four-stroke. Not as noisy as the two-strokes. Thank god for that.
The boy rights the machine, climbs on, and tries the electric start. Nothing. The key is still there and in the "on" position. Again, nothing. Down to his right he spots the kick-start bar and swings it out with his foot.
One. Two. Three. On the fourth kick, it starts.
Careful not to gun the engine or make it race, he listens to its idle. It sounds good. He clicks it into first gear and angles it up the wash. His best guess is the wash ambles north toward his target, the far mountain range. At the least, he thinks as he bumps up the wash, he's moving away from the Death Camp and battle zone.
As he travels the streambed, the boy glances at the bank tops on either side of him, then behind. The cottonwood trees are fading as the murkiness of early evening grows stronger. Still, the tracks of the quad are visible even in the gloom. Nothing to be done now. Night might hide them long enough for him to get distance. But then what?
He must reach the mountains as soon as possible. Before sunrise. And he needs to be far away from this quad when the hunters find it. Taking the quad is not a clean move, but quicker and less exhausting than running all the way.
Traveling with no headlight proves difficult in the dry wash. The boulders are getting larger, and he feels the streambed angling northeast, to his right and away from his target. Finally, a gentle slope appears on his left and he rides up and out of the wash onto the desert floor.
The boy stops and turns off the motor. What if it doesn't start again? Too late now. He turned it off out of reflex. One thing at a time, he reminds himself.
Straining to hear, the boy straddles the quad and looks back at his back-trail. He hears only the night sounds of the desert all around him.
He kick-starts the engine, and it runs! He works his way through the desert brush, toward the looming mountain range. Close up, the range is larger than he guessed. Steep, too. The steepness will keep the hunters from following on their machines. That's good. He guesses there are several hundred feet of elevation to scramble up. The boy doesn't like the thought of crawling over loose rocks in the dark, but it's his only chance of losing the hunters. And they will come, once the light of day returns, to get their machine.
He ditches the quad behind a boulder. Erase the tire tracks? Not enough time to do the job right. The hunters will know it came this way anyway, so it's wasted effort.
The boy glances at the night sky. The stars are still red. Will he ever get used to that? Useless thinking now. He must focus and get to the top of this mountain, or he'll be caught.
He sees a large gap near the top. Dim moonlight makes it stick out as a darker place against the lighter mountainside. He thanks the moon for its light, and climbs.
Chapter 30 - First Mesa
When he reaches the gap, the moon is only beginning to swing down in the night sky. No hunting party has appeared down below yet. He takes a pull on his bladder tube, and after only one mouthful of water, starts sucking air. He's out of water.
Damn!
He turns away from the ledge and starts out across the mountaintop. Up here it's flat, and he's relieved not to have to climb anymore.
After a time, the ground starts to rise on his right. Out of the rock face emerges an alcove. The boy stops and examines its interior. It has a sandy floor. Breaking off a creosote branch, he sweeps the floor nearly clean, down to the rock layer. Any scorpions or other small creatures should be gone. He sits down. This will do.
Soon, the boy slumps over and falls asleep, oblivious to the hardness of the stone floor. He sleeps in spurts, tossing and turning. After a few hours, the hard stone hurts too much for even fitful sleep, and he awakens and stares into the murky night sky. The half-moon is waxing. That's good and bad. More light to move. And more light to be seen.
At full daylight, he's exhausted and thirsty. But he has no water. He does eat some of a homemade protein bar. It feels like he's eating sawdust.
He has to find some source of water.
Erasing sign of his rest, the boy continues walking north, through rocky country dotted with small yucca and creosote bushes. Mesquite trees are scattered in thickets. He knows he can eat the flowers of the prickly pear and get water from the green pads, but he sees none up on this mountaintop.
He stops in the shade of a low outcrop of rock and pulls out the small journal Grandfather made for him. He holds it closed for a few moments, aware it is a part of Grandfather.
Grandfather’s last words were to not lose this journal. Untying the rawhide strap that keeps it closed, the boy flips through the pages, full of words and drawings. In the front is a list of contents with page numbers, broken into five major sections: Shelter, Water, Fire, Food, and Additional Notes. Grandfather handwrote everything himself, including the page numbers.
The boy flips to the Water section.
"How to filter water" is the first topic. But he has a small water filter in his pack, so he continues flipping. With no water, the filter is meaningless, anyway. One page explains water sources, seeps, sandy soil, springs, and how to locate them. He looks up and scans the barren landscape for any indication of water sources. Nothing even looks hopeful. He's going to have to walk to find water.
As his eyes wander across the landscape, it dawns on the boy that what he thought was a mountain is not a mountain, after all. It's a broad, barren mesa.
The boy stands and puts on a floppy hat Grandfather tucked into the pack. He arranges his bandana under the hat so it hangs down the back of his neck for more sun protection.
Springtime is not a bad time to be out here—he guesses it's in the nineties now, at the hottest part of the day. It's bearable. But when the scorching summer months arrive, this mesa will not be a good place to be.
Again, none of this matters if he doesn’t find water. He puts the journal in his pants pocket, the pack on his back, and starts walking north.
By late morning, he comes to what looks like the end of the mesa. A change in the landscape. That's good, he hopes.
All the boy can think about is water. He wants it, needs it. Never has he felt such need. In all the training Grandfather did with the boy, nothing was this brutal.
He is tired. His body aches. His steps are heavy. He can walk, bu
t hammering into his mind is the thought that he might die of thirst, and soon.
At the edge of the mesa, the ground drops down at a reasonable slope for about fifty feet, not as steep as his climb last night. The sun's straight up in the sky now. The air, still, and hot, and dry. At the bottom of the slope is a small valley and . . . buildings! A ranch! House, barn, corral, fences.
He drops to the ground, a full-body drop, and retreats from the edge. He forgot to stay alert. Did someone see him? He has to know.
Slowly, he crawls back to the edge. He removes hat and bandana before peaking over the edge. His body tingles all over. He needs water.
Looking down, the ranch looks quiet. No detectable movement. Maybe he's safe. Quickly, he scans each building, ignoring the throbbing in his head. There's a truck in front of the ranch house, driver’s door ajar. Nothing else seems unusual. It's quiet. Very quiet.
Near the corral, the boy spies a windmill and tank. There's water in it! For the animals, he guesses. On the side of the house must be a spigot with clean water. Can't see one yet, but his preference is the spigot. If the tank's all he has, he can do that too. It's just a matter of not being seen. Or caught. The boy starts shaking with anticipation.
He takes a deep breath to settle back down and focus. What about people? The truck's door is open. Someone must be down there. His eyes move from the house to the barn to the corral. In the corral, a horse is on the ground, on its side. Sleeping? Seems weird. Over at the barn door, a dog, also on its side. Sleeping?
Then it dawns on him. Grips him in its harshness. He's looking at death. Again. The quiet, his mind finally grasps, is the silence of death. The horse. The dog. Maybe even the people. Dead. And now it feels to him like it's riding on the wind, up the mesa wall to him. He even thinks he can smell it. Or is it his thirst for water that has him imagining all of this? Regardless of what is real and what is fantastical, he feels like it's reaching out to him.
He shakes his head. How it hurts without water. But the shaking seems to clear his mind some. Why sickness way out here, like in the city? This is too far out in the wilderness. It doesn’t make sense. Unless, he thinks back to Grandfather's words. Unless it has mutated and can survive long enough to travel to the wilderness looking for hosts. Nothing makes sense anymore, except that he needs water or he dies.
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