“If we can’t follow the stream, how will we know which way to go?” Tuck asked between heaving breaths.
“According to the map, we go due south to the river,” Eustace said, “and the river will take us out of here. So we just have to head due south. No big deal, right? We can circle around the rocks.”
He led them away from the stream, up the slope to more open land, and then turned again. From time to time, he paused, pulled out the map, and looked around, as if he could match their surroundings with some spot on the map. The guy probably just wanted to look like he knew what he was doing. After all, the forest was little more than a jumble of shapes and shadows. Everything flowed together, and Greg felt so completely turned around that it gave him a strange sense of vertigo.
I guess I wouldn’t make a good mountain man, he thought.
Afternoon gave way to evening, the light through the trees shifting toward violet and they needed to stop for the night. Everyone was exhausted and walking had gradually devolved into stumbling, as they fought to take each step. Emma began pointing out potential camping spots. Unfortunately, they had lost sight of the stream, so they couldn’t follow her suggestion of camping near water. Instead, they chose a small clearing where the ground was relatively flat. It was small enough that the canopy of leaves still mostly enclosed them overhead. However, they were able to set up the three small tents they’d brought with them, pile their gear nearby, and even dig a shallow firepit.
Emma was in the process of lining the firepit with rocks, and Greg was unrolling sleeping bags inside the tents when a light rain began to fall. Tuck was already sprawled out in his tent, while Tommy and Eustace unpacked some food.
“Oh, great,” Emma said. “I should have looked for kindling first. Now all the wood is getting wet.”
The rain grew steadily worse over the course of about half an hour, as Emma scrambled about the area and tried to find the driest sticks. Unfortunately, by the time she returned to the firepit, it was already becoming a small puddle. The rain didn’t last more than an hour, but it was enough to make everything significantly colder and more miserable. Greg had put his jacket back on, which helped, but he still had water streaming down his face and plastering his hair against his head.
Finally, Greg, Tommy, and Eustace squatted down beside Emma in front of the firepit. She had a box of waterproof matches in one hand, but she just held it there, glaring down at the puddle.
“That was really bad timing,” she said. “It couldn’t have waited to rain until the middle of the night or something? We won’t get a fire going, not like this.”
“It’s okay,” Greg said, patting her on the back. “We can go one night without a fire.”
“We should have put something out to collect the rainwater,” she said. “A bowl or something. I was too upset about the fire and forgot.”
“We have enough water for another day,” Greg said. “When we find a stream again, we’ll fill up.”
“It’ll have to be soon,” she said, tucking the matches into her jacket pocket. “You can get dehydrated up here really easy. Plus, we should probably boil any water we find. You shouldn’t drink it right out of the stream.” As she said this, she gave Eustace a pointed look.
“Yeah, yeah, I know, kiddo,” he replied, flashing his teeth through his thick, red beard in what seemed to be an embarrassed smile. “I got thirsty. What can I say?”
“We also need to ration our food very carefully,” she added.
Eustace and Tommy were both clutching a number of plastic food pouches, which contained freeze-dried vegetables and meat for soup, dried fruit, and a few servings of MRE food. Emma reached out and plucked four of the smallest pouches.
“This should be enough for tonight,” she said, setting them at her feet. “I suggest you put the rest back.”
Eustace and Tommy traded a look. They seemed both amused and perhaps a little uncomfortable at being told what to do by the youngest member of the group, but Tommy finally grabbed the other pouches out of Eustace’s hands and stuffed them in his backpack.
“So we should make finding fresh water a priority tomorrow,” Greg said.
“Yes, and we should dump more of our gear,” Emma said. “I think we’re still carrying too much. We have to travel light, Dad. People are already getting tired. Look at Grandpa. How is he going to last at this rate? The clothes on our backs, sleeping bags, tents, food, water, first aid kits, and basic survival gear—that’s all we need. You guys are still carrying blankets, tarps, some of the fishing gear, and a bunch of random knickknacks. The electronic devices and so on—all tech should be left behind. It’s useless now anyway.”
“You talk like you’ve done this before,” Eustace said, ripping open one of the small pouches of dried meat. “You look like a suburban kid in Grade 9, but you talk like a wilderness explorer. You got some secret history you’re not telling us about?”
Emma averted her gaze, clearly embarrassed. “I just read a lot of websites before the trip.”
Greg thought of the dead sat phone in his pack. Maybe I’ll stuff it a little deeper into the pack, where Emma won’t see it and be disappointed in me, he thought.
11
As Tuck snored softly in his tent, the others went through their gear and let Emma recommend what to keep and what to dump. While rooting through his pack, Greg tried to shove the sat phone down into the bottom, but his daughter walked up behind him and thrust her hand into the pack.
“Dad, were you planning on keeping this?” she said, pulling the phone out. “It’s just a lump of plastic now. We should toss it, don’t you think?”
And with that, she tossed the satellite phone onto the discard pile. He briefly considered exerting his parental authority to reclaim it, but he knew she was probably right. Once they’d lightened their gear, following Emma’s suggestions, they reduced their total weight by almost a third.
Afterward, Eustace pulled out the map and studied it for a few minutes. Eventually, he called Greg and Tommy over, though Emma came as well.
“I think I’ve figured out a better route,” he said. “It’ll be more certain than following the river, and more straightforward.”
He pointed to something on the map. When Greg leaned in close, he saw a blue dotted line, very faint, cutting across the topography.
“What is that?” Greg asked, and just before Eustace answered, he felt a moment of trepidation. This was a gas company map, after all.
“One of our pipelines,” Eustace replied. “It’s not far from here, and unlike the river, it doesn’t zigzag all over the place.”
“What a smart idea,” Tommy said, giving a big grin that revealed he was missing a bottom incisor. “We should’ve done that from the start.”
“Well, I didn’t want to bring the company into it,” Eustace said, glancing briefly at Greg, “but if it’ll get us out of here faster, it’s worth it. What do you say, Emma? Greg?”
Emma shrugged. Apparently, her study of camping and wilderness survival hadn’t covered natural gas pipelines, but Greg was struggling hard not to let his feelings show. The case he’d been building against Eustace’s company was specifically related to allegations that their pipelines had contaminated local water supplies. He’d intended to use the camping trip as an opportunity to look for evidence which he could take back to build the case.
Now, however, their only real goal was to get out of the wilderness, and he couldn’t afford to make Eustace an enemy. More importantly, however, if the accusations were true, then sources of fresh water along the pipeline could be contaminated and unsafe to drink. Still, he tried not to give any indication of his thoughts, as he considered how best to respond.
Eustace noted his hesitation and slid a finger along the map to a small X in the middle of the dotted line. “There are way stations along the pipeline. Actually, the reason we keep maps like that in our choppers is so we can find the way stations. That’s the point of this map. Here’s one of them. We stock a lot o
f supplies there. Heck, we might even find some functional radio equipment, and if we’re real lucky, one of our emergency technicians will be on-site.”
It was like frosting on a crap sandwich, but Greg couldn’t pass it up. Way stations with radio equipment and technicians on-site. He nodded and said, “All right, I’m on board. Do we know how to get there?”
Eustace just stared at the map and said nothing. Greg looked up at the now-ominous canopy of leaves overheard and the tiny specks of gray sky that were visible through the gaps.
“We brought binoculars,” Emma said. “Shouldn’t a big pipe like that be visible from a long distance?”
Eustace hesitated a moment before saying, “Yes, the pipeline is visible, as long as you’re above the trees.”
“So, let’s look for a ledge above the trees,” Greg said.
“We can’t do that tonight,” Tommy said. “We have maybe half an hour of good light left. You don’t want to be stumbling around in the woods at night.”
Emma rose and started walking away. It almost seemed like Tommy’s words had offended her suddenly, and Greg started to say something. Then he realized his daughter was gazing upward into the treetops.
“If we climbed one of the taller trees, we’d get a pretty good view,” she said. She pointed at a particularly large tree nearby. “Some of these white pine and black spruce are huge. That one even has a few low branches I could use.”
“You?” Greg said, standing and moving to his daughter’s side. “Why would you be the one climbing? Leave it to one of us big guys. It’s risky.”
Emma looked from Greg to Eustace to Tommy, grimaced, and said, “Dad, none of you old guys are…I mean, I’m in the best shape for climbing. I’ve done the rock-climbing wall at school dozens of times.”
“Climbing a rock wall is not the same as climbing a tree,” he said.
“No, it’s harder,” she said with a smile. “Look at those big branches there. It’s practically a ladder, Dad.”
The biggest trees around them were towering behemoths, rising forty or fifty meters. It made him dizzy just looking up at them. How could Emma even think about it?
“She’s right,” Eustace said, picking himself up with a grunt and a hippo-like expulsion of breath. “We’re a bunch of out-of-shape old men. Not a one of us could climb that tree, even if we were being chased by a hungry bear.”
“Dad, I can do it.” Emma headed toward their packs, which were stacked together at the base of one of the larger trees. She rooted around inside and pulled out the pair of binoculars, slipping the strap over her head. Then she pulled out a length of nylon rope and held it up. “See? I’ll do it safely.”
“You don’t have climbing equipment,” he noted. “Just a length of rope.”
“I don’t even need the rope,” she said. “I’m just using it so you’ll worry a little less. Actually, it’ll kind of be in my way.”
Greg groaned. “Okay, fine, forget the rope. Just, please, take it slow. Carefully consider every move before you make it, okay?”
“Dad.” She laughed as she approached one of the biggest trees in the area. “This tree has a lot of big branches, and they’re all pretty close together. I’ll be fine.”
She dumped the rope, reached up to the nearest branch, and pulled herself up into the enormous tree. The black spruce had numerous short, compact branches tipped in clusters of green needles. Once she was in the tree, she almost disappeared behind the green, moving like a pale squirrel from branch to branch.
Greg glanced over his shoulder and saw Eustace and Tommy standing behind him. Tommy was gaping in amazement, showing off his mouthful of unhealthy teeth.
“She’s doing great,” Eustace said. “You should trust the kid a little more.”
“Let’s wait until she’s safely back on the ground,” Greg replied.
When Emma reached the top of the tree, she disappeared entirely, though he could still hear her moving around up there through breaks in the rhythmic snoring of his father. After a couple of minutes, she began climbing back down.
“Slowly,” he called to her. “Think about every step down before you take it.”
“Dad, stop,” she shouted back. “You’re distracting me.”
A sudden strange sound from behind him startled Greg and made him lurch forward. Up in the tree, Emma gasped, and branches shook. When Greg turned to look for the source of the sound, he saw Tuck dragging himself out of his tent, eyes wide as he gazed up into the tree.
“Is she climbing all the way up in that tree?” he croaked. “What’s going on here? I fall asleep for one minute, and you’ve got my granddaughter climbing a forty-meter tree like a lemur?”
Greg put a finger to his lips, but his dad came trundling over like a roused bear. “She’s a young girl. What if she falls? Whose ideas was this? Starting a campfire is one thing, but come on, Greg. Use your head.” He tapped a gnarled finger against the side of his head.
Emma had gone quiet for a few seconds, but Greg heard her resume descending, moving more slowly this time.
“She’s better at climbing than I was at her age,” Greg said. The irony that he was now defending her decision didn’t escape him, but it took a furious act of will not to respond to his dad’s grumpiness with anger.
“That’s not saying much,” Tuck said with a scowl, “seeing as how you fell out of the maple tree in the backyard and sprained your wrist when you were, what, ten?”
I’m surprised you remember, Greg thought, bitterly. I’m surprised you remember anything about me at that age.
Instead of saying this, he shrugged it off and turned away. Talking about childhood memories with the father who had largely ignored him for so many years would only stir up his worst feelings.
“Emma, don’t let them talk you into doing crazy stuff,” Tuck shouted up into the tree. “They should be looking out for you, not risking your life.”
“I’m fine, Grandpa,” she replied, her voice trembling slightly. “Don’t yell at me. I’m trying to concentrate now.”
A nice way of asking the old man to shut up. Tuck seemed to take the hint, as he grunted and planted his hands on his narrow hips. Emma continued her descent, and Greg could see now that she was very carefully picking her way from branch to branch. His father’s outburst had induced a potent mix of bad emotions, and it made him restless. He began to pace back and forth, his hands crammed deep into the pockets of his jacket.
I’d really like to punch something, he thought.
His back was turned when Emma reached the ground, so he didn’t realize she was there until she spoke. And then her voice was so close that it startled him again.
“Why did you climb a maple tree when you were a kid?” she asked.
He turned to see his daughter standing at the base of the tree, spruce needles stuck in her hair and dusting her shoulders. He noted a small tear on the sleeve of her jacket.
“You’re safe,” he said.
“Yeah,” she replied, in a tone that said, Of course. “Why did you climb that maple tree?”
“I was…” He had to cast his memory back for a second. “I believe I was trying to rescue the neighbor’s cat.”
Tuck barked a laugh and flapped a hand in his direction. “There was no cat. He was showing off to his little buddies from down the street.”
“Okay, Dad, okay,” Greg said tightly. “Let’s drop it. Emma, what did you see up there?”
She turned to Eustace and said, “I spotted your pipeline. It’s almost looks like a…a scar or something cutting through the forest.”
Greg could tell by her tone of voice that she hadn’t meant this as an insult, but Eustace winced.
Scar, Greg thought. You chose the right word, Emma. Good job.
“It’s that way,” she continued, pointing off to her right. “Not far. It looked pretty big.”
“Oh yeah, she’s a beast,” Eustace said. “Good eye, kiddo. We’ll head off that way in the morning, guys. What do you say?”
“Best break camp right at sunrise,” Tuck said. “It’ll be a heck of a long day tomorrow, I imagine.”
And with that, the leathery old man turned and shuffled back toward his tent.
When Greg crawled out of the tent at first light, he’d already been awake a couple of hours. A long day of walking had worn on him, but the magnitude of what they were dealing with, of the long road ahead, of what his wife and son might be going through, had made it a restless night. He’d tried his best, tossing and turning until the forest around him emerged from the gloom. Then he’d given up any pretense of sleep and began packing up their gear for the long day ahead of them.
He made no attempt to be quiet, and the noise began to rouse the others. Tommy and Tuck had shared a tent, and they emerged together like two gnarled butterflies from the same cocoon. Then Eustace gave a deep rumble and joined them. Emma was last. She had finally removed the last remnants of makeup, and it made her look younger.
They ate a small breakfast in silence, everyone bleary-eyed and stinking, then tore down the tents and set off in the direction indicated by Emma. The ground here was carpeted with enough leaves, needles, and old twigs to give a bit of spring to each step.
Though Emma had pointed the way, Eustace quickly took the lead again, the compass in his left hand, the machete in his right. According to the compass, they were headed roughly southwest. Tuck and Tommy brought up the rear. They’d walked maybe a kilometer when Tommy suddenly called out and dashed to one side.
“Where you going?” Eustace said.
Tommy stopped and squatted down between two trees, pointing at something on the ground. “Guys, someone come and tell me if this is what I think it is.”
Greg and Emma walked up behind him. It didn’t take long to see what he’d spotted: a pile of animal droppings among the leaves. They were tubular and coiled, dark brown, and there was enough of them that Greg knew they had to have come from a large mammal of some kind.
Survive the Fall (EMP: Return of the Wild West Book 1) Page 8