Beneath a Winter Moon

by Shawson M Hebert

  Thomas shuddered when he thought of using his rifle. They were no longer on a hunt, which meant if he had to use it, it would be in a time of need. Up here that could only mean that they were being threatened by a grizzly or some other hungry or just all-around mean predator. They had not even taken one step away and already Thomas was reliving the previous night’s spooky sounds. He did not want to hear it again, whatever the hell had made that sound, and he could not bring himself to think of having to face whatever it was. Those thoughts made him a little more appreciative of the rifle on his shoulder.

  He was the best shot of the three friends. They had all been through sniper school while in the Army, but only Thomas had ever been assigned to a sniper position within a unit. While in that role, he had seen action on many occasions. Delmar liked to say that Thomas could shoot one bullet into the bull’s-eye and then the rest of his bullets on top of the first. Thomas appreciated the praise, but truth be told, he rarely looked forward to using the weapon. Sure, he enjoyed their hunts, but when it was over, the rifle went back on the rack and he didn’t so much as give it a second thought until the next year. He was glad that Delmar had not wanted to carry a rifle, which would have put Thomas in a position to have to leave his own with Daniel or leave Daniel with nothing more than Steven’s 9mm.

  The 30.06 Springfield was a staple for snipers and had been since World War II. There were plenty of reasons to gravitate toward the newer rifles with their arguably greater precision, but Thomas liked the feel of the rifle and liked that it was as good for shooting a deer as it was for going after something bigger. The rifle fired the massively popular 7.62mm round, thus ammo was never a problem.

  Their packs were not very heavy but carried enough weight so that the straps already cut into their shoulders and under their arms. They both wore polypropylene under loose-fitting cargo pants and shirts, topped off by a layer of the finest Gore-Tex camouflaged jackets and pants. Thomas was not wearing polypropylene leggings. He recalled too many occasions where his legs became way too hot while on the move. Sweating in these conditions could end up being fatal. Hypothermia was always just a few minutes away from the careless mountain traveler, whether it be the summer or winter months.

  Jenny came out to say goodbye and wished them well and told them to hurry. Daniel shoved Delmar hard and called him a “sorry bastard,” but it meant nothing more than be careful and was typical of their relationship.

  Saying goodbye to Jack had been the hardest. He held the dog close and buried his face in the cold, soft fur while he promised to be back soon. He told his furry friend to guard the helicopter. Daniel had smiled and said Jack would get royal treatment while they were gone. Only the best for the Husky, he promised. Still, Thomas hated leaving the dog behind, but thought it would be best.

  The two men waved once more to their friends and then turned and headed northwest toward what they hoped would be the quickest way to bring help in for Steven. It was 6:15pm by Thomas’s watch, which meant about five hours of daylight—maybe four and a half if they were in thick trees. He would be counting down the minutes and hours, wishing that the darkness would not come.

  The snowfall was heavier, the flakes as big as a half-dollars as they made their way through the forest. Neither had said a word since parting with their friends some thirty minutes ago. Finally, Thomas spoke up. “So, it’s time to fess up to whatever is going on inside that satellite that you call a head.”

  Delmar chuckled as he ducked a low pine branch that was heavy with snow. “It’s not in my head, Hero.”

  “And?” Thomas prodded.

  “I hate to tell you…you and Daniel more than anyone. I hadn’t planned on telling either of you…I guess I knew I would have to…but not yet.”

  Thomas suddenly worried for his friend. This did not sound good at all.

  “I’ve got pancreatic cancer, bud. It’s inoperable. This will be my last hunt…my last adventure, my friend. I’m sorry.”

  Thomas froze. Delmar stopped just ahead of him and turned. They looked at each other for a moment.

  “Jesus,” Thomas said. He was in agony for his friend and his heart felt like it was going to burst right out of his throat. He was a grown man but he was on the verge of bawling like a little kid. Delmar had been his mentor in the Army and had been a trusted and close friend for so long that he could not imagine this world without him in it.

  “You’re sorry?” Thomas said, almost choking up. “Christ, Delmar, how long have you known and why the hell didn’t you tell us?”

  Delmar lowered his head a little and took off his Russian style, fur-lined hat and shook off the snow. “I found out too late, Thomas. There was nothing that could’ve been done. It spread too far and too fast. Hell, the doctors didn’t even argue when I refused chemo.”

  “You refused chemo? But—wait…you got other opinions, right? My sister knows this great doctor…”

  “I got a second opinion…then a third,” Delmar gently cut him off, holding up a hand to silence him. “The conclusions were the same. The only thing they could not agree on is how long I have left. They said it was hard to pin down, but they did give me an idea. And they told me what to expect…and for how long, once I begin to get weak and am in too much pain to get around.”

  “Why the hell are you here?” Thomas exclaimed, holding out his arms wide and gesturing at the forest around them. “You should be—I don’t know—resting or something. You sure as hell should not be traipsing around in the damned mountains in the middle of a fucking snowstorm.”

  “Come on,” Delmar said. He was a little amused, not having heard Thomas use so many epithets in a sentence for quite some time. “Let’s keep moving.” He started off again, with Thomas close behind. “I am not going to coop myself up while I am still strong enough and feeling well enough to move. Hell, it won’t do any good, anyway. Maybe add some days on my ticker, but I would rather sacrifice a few days and have a good time, especially with my friends, than sit around in some empty room, reading and watching the clock as the days go by.” He turned and looked at Thomas for a second, and then kept walking. “No sir and no thank you. I’ve thought about this for a while and I am doing exactly what I should be doing, exactly where I should be doing it, and with exactly the right people.”

  Thomas kept silent trying to comprehend. He had to admit he found it easy to agree with his friend. He placed himself in Delmar’s shoes and quickly realized he would feel the same way.

  “I can’t believe we didn’t know…that we couldn’t see it.”

  Delmar slowed again, but didn’t turn around. “You’d have figured it out. Can you imagine it? I always thought I was too damned mean for something like cancer to stick to me. But you have to give me your word that you are not going to go on and on about it. I’m up here because this is what I want to do…well…I hadn’t figured on the bad landing or Steven being hurt, but you know how much I love it here. Hell, I just might stay for a while.”

  He pushed his way through some thick, dead vines and took a look at his compass. “I know that we didn’t have to leave the helicopter, but it made sense to me and I could not stand it back there. All I could do back there was sit and look at Steven lying there…and all I could think about what was my next few months will be like. I had to get out of there. I’m sorry as hell for Steven and you know it, but I couldn’t stand it…not when there was reason to leave.”

  Thomas understood.

  “Damnit,” Delmar groaned. “I lost my pace count.”

  The two men trudged through the snow, each taking turns at wielding the compass but both men kept up a pace count. The two men knew how many paces it took them to reach one hundred meters. There would be a different pace count with a rucksack or other heavy load than without, and weather also played a part. Each individual would have a different pace count in snow and in mountains rather than on normal ground—and it was the same with rain or in jungle or desert environments. Soldiers always knew their pace count. Witho
ut it, they would have to rely on only the terrain to determine how far they had traveled…and using old topographic maps very often made that tricky at best. Knowing one’s pace count also paid off if you spent days out in the wilderness, navigating on foot.

  Delmar’s condition was all that Thomas could think about as they pushed onward through the snow and the trees. He contemplated various possibilities for Delmar’s future… from stuck in hospital rooms to finally succumbing fully and resting in his home, relying on some stranger to care for him. There was something else, too. Thomas could not escape the nagging feeling that his friend might do the unthinkable and take his own life when the symptoms advanced. He realized, then, that he did not know what the symptoms were. He had ideas about what it was like for a cancer patient, but most of those were from documentaries and television dramas. Thomas had never known anyone who had terminal cancer, regardless of the type. He recalled once, during a heavy firefight that each had sworn to “take” the other out rather than prolong the pain of a fatal wound. Of course, buddies and team mates throughout the military would likely deny such promises, but the fear of being mortally wounded, alive but in unimaginable agony, perhaps lying in your own blood and gore while being overrun by the enemy—is surely enough to drive men to swear the oaths. Thomas tried to imagine whether he could make the choice to kill himself if he were faced with the pain and suffering that Delmar would, by all accounts, likely have to deal with. He pushed the thought away. There are plenty of awesome pain meds out there and besides, Daniel and I wouldn’t sit by and do nothing while our best friend suffers. He shook his head and breathed in the icy mountain air. He smelled pine fur and snow. This really is a beautiful place.

  They didn’t talk much as they continued on. They traversed rocky outcroppings, large clearings, and areas of the forest that were so thick with snow-covered deadfall that the encumbered men climbed more than they walked. The shortest distance between two points is a straight line—and so they did their best to wade right through obstacles rather than take the easier, longer way around.

  The shoulder straps were digging into Thomas’s shoulders and under his arms. He had equipped the straps with some special padding but they were not helping much. Occasionally the two men would stop long enough to loosen their straps and then bend over and scoot their backpacks up high on their shoulders. They would enjoy the reprieve for a few minutes and then start moving again.

  It seemed like only a short time had passed, but the shadows were taking over the mountainous forest, becoming taller and thicker until it was almost dark. Thomas called for Delmar, who had moved about ten paces ahead of him, to stop. He walked over and placed one hand on the tall man’s shoulder. With the other hand, he pulled a release on a strap and rolled the big pack off of his back and into the snow where it sank several inches.

  “Let’s do a map check and try to make a call on how long it will take us to get to the cabin.”

  “Man,” Delmar grunted, “I should have listened to you about these damned leggings. Starting to sweat like a dog. I believe I better take them off while we still have a little light.”

  Thomas arched his back and groaned. “When do you think we’ll be too old for this?”

  As soon as he realized what he said, he muttered a hurried apology.

  “See,” Delmar said as he plopped down to sit on his backpack. “That is exactly why I didn’t want you to know. You are going to spend half your time apologizing for this or for that. It’s nuts.”

  Thomas sat down on his own backpack, placing his head in his hands and rolling his Gore-Tex hat off of his head. Thick steam rose from his scalp. He nodded at his friend and muttered, “Yeah, yeah.”

  Delmar fought with his boots, finally getting them off. “This is the tough part,” he said as he stood up in the snow.

  Thomas chuckled as the big man scrambled to get his belt unbuckled. “I should have done all of this before I stood up!” He quickly sat back down after yanking down the Gore-Tex leggings.

  Thomas could not help but laugh. “It’ll be dark within twenty minutes,” he said. “Hand me the map and I will pinpoint where we are.”

  * * * * *

  “Oh, it’s you,” Samuel said, seeing that it was his son at the door. “I was sleeping. Your mom is over at Anne’s house watching TV.” He reluctantly motioned for Alan to come in. “Ours quit on us.”

  Alan would have been offended by the less than welcoming greeting—if he wasn’t already so used to it. He stepped inside. He looked around and saw that nothing much had changed since he had visited several weeks ago. Same cracks in the ceiling and in the sheet rock walls, same old kitchen sink missing the hot-water knob, which had been replaced with a small pair of vice-grip pliers. The place still smelled like stale beer and mildew. He felt a sharp pang of guilt that he had not been able to talk his mom into leaving and moving in with him. It wasn’t the trailer that was the problem… a lot of folks lived in them around Hope…it was the lack of any upkeep. He wanted his mom out of here so she would be away from his father.

  The old man seemed to despise everything about Alan. Samuel didn’t hate him, Alan knew—but he damned well begrudged him everything. Ever since Alan was a teenager and started doing things on his own, becoming a pretty good athlete at the high school, becoming popular with girls his age…plus keeping good grades to boot—that was when his father seemed to decide Alan was the enemy. When Alan chose not to go to college and mustered up funds for a down-payment on a repossessed Cessna, things really went to hell. His father had thrown him out of the house and they hadn’t spoken for months afterward. Alan could not understand it. His parents were quick to say that they could not send him to college, and Alan had told them that he was unsure if he wanted to go anyway. So, when he started his own business, he thought his father would be proud. Instead the put-downs and sarcasm increased until Alan reached his breaking point.

  “You need something, Alan?” Samuel’s tone dripped with sarcasm.

  Alan shook his head in frustration at the implied insult, “No, Sam, I don’t need anything. I came over to ask you something about last night.”

  That got Samuel’s attention. He tried to hide his expression, but Alan saw it. “Did anything unusual come up last night? Anything at all?”

  “Nope, not a thing.” Samuel said. He sat down on the dilapidated sofa, his heavy body sinking deeply into the worn out cushions.

  “Nothing from Jenny or Steven’s camp or while they were in flight?”

  Samuel liked that question. He could say no all day long when asked if he heard from Jenny or Steven—or even Kyle, the truth be told. “I didn’t hear anything from them. Now tell me why you are asking. What is this about?”

  Alan debated how much to tell Samuel and decided to keep it at a minimum. “It’s just that I saw a real mess around his camp when I flew over it today. That and no one can get an answer from any of them.”

  “What do you mean by a mess?”

  Alan walked into the kitchen. “Well, looks like a fence was broken down around a new stable and corral he’d built…and the helicopter wasn’t there.”

  “Well, he can fly that thing anytime he wants, you know.”

  “Yeah,” Alan said as he grabbed a beer from the refrigerator. “But no one’s been able to contact him for over 24 hours and it doesn’t add up.” He twisted the top off and took a drink. “It’s weird.”

  “How does anyone ever contact him when he’s on a two-week hunting trip?” He didn’t give Alan time to answer. “They don’t,” he said.

  “That’s true, but this is different. I know for a fact that he was supposed to start this hunt from the new cabin right there on the lake.” Alan studied his father’s face but saw nothing unusual, but he did wonder why Samuel wouldn’t look at him. “You didn’t even catch any garbled transmissions or hear any scuttlebutt over the air?”

  “I already said, no. What the hell has you so stirred up about a broken fence, anyway? You Steven’s keeper,
now? Your nose got so big that you can’t keep it in your own business and out of everyone else’s?”

  Alan was unable to make up his mind about how big of a lie the old man was telling him. Samuel was holding something back…that was for sure. Alan walked over to his mom’s recliner and sat down. He leaned forward, his thumb and finger playing with the sweat on the neck of the cold beer bottle. Deciding to take a chance, he said, “You’ve been at the airfield for a long time now. I’d hate to know that some little thing like an unanswered…or even just a missed call got you in trouble—maybe even fired.”

  Samuel was furious. Was this cocky little shit who hadn’t been on the planet long enough to have had any real responsibility, threatening him? He tried to jump up off the couch but merely succeeded in lurching around until he could finally managed to stand. “Get out!”

  Alan stood and set the beer down. “Alright, Sam.”

  “And don’t fucking call me Sam, smartass! The next time you need to ask me something, do us both a favor and don’t. Otherwise, use the damned phone if you want to talk to your lazy mother. I don’t want to see your face!”

  Alan had been through it all before. He walked slowly to the door, fuming over the insult to his mother but knowing that he would only make things worse if he said anything in her defense. “Tell mom and my little brother that I love them.”

  “Your little brother is twice as smart as you and could have had a bright future, too…but it seems he listened to your lazy ass one too many times. We will be lucky to get him to finish the school year. Now, get out.” He pointed to the door.