Black Sun Descending

by Stephen Legault

  “I know. All those bones. Listen, there’s been a development in the case.” Silas told her what happened. She was fully awake when he finished.

  “Did they get away?”

  “Yes. And I have no idea where to.”

  “I’m going to call Taylor. He can deal with logistics. Hold on the line.”

  Silas was driving the Chevy back toward Jacob Lake. He couldn’t think of anything else to do. Fredonia was deserted at one in the morning and he didn’t even have his sleeping bag.

  Katie Rain came back on the line. “Silas, Taylor is getting the Coconino and Mojave County Sheriff’s Departments up to speed. Where is Josh now?”

  It took Silas a minute to register the question. “He’s on his way to Kanab, Utah. There’s a hospital there.”

  “We’ll have someone there later in the morning to take his statement.”

  “Can’t we just leave him out of it?”

  “If we get these guys, and can’t make anything else stick, at least we can get them on attempted murder. Where are you?”

  “Just outside of Jacob Lake.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know. I just thought I’d keep driving until I fell asleep or ran out of gas.” He told her about the Chevy. He looked around it as if seeing it for the first time. It was a mid-sixties model, likely early in the decade. It had a bench seat, a well-polished steering wheel, and a long stick shift.

  “Why don’t you find a park ranger and report in,” she said. “You have information vital to this investigation. You’ve got to get with law enforcement, make a statement, and tell us what you know. I can’t do this. I’m not a field agent.”

  “Katie, I’m tired.”

  “I know, Silas. It’s almost over. Tomorrow we’ll get Paul Love and Chas Hinkley and find out what they know. Taylor is going to drop the net on the Arizona Strip. Within an hour there will be a hundred law enforcement personnel blocking every exit from that region.”

  “You and I both know that’s impossible. They could have gone north into the Escalante region or bolted for Nevada, or be halfway to Salt Lake City and the airport by now.”

  “Silas, we’ll get them. It’s what the FBI does. Drive to the gate at the North Rim. Use the emergency phone there. There’ll be patrol officers on all night. They can pick you up. You can give a statement and get some sleep at the bunk house or whatever they have.”

  Silas made the turn toward the North Rim at Jacob Lake. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

  “I’ll try to call ahead. Call me when you’re safe.”

  “You sound like my mother, Katie.”

  “Something like that.”

  NO ONE WAS THERE. SILAS had reached the gate at the North Rim at two in the morning. The single building was little more than a hut, where rangers collected entrance fees. Instead of continuing to drive he got out and used the emergency phone.

  “Grand Canyon Dispatch. Do you have an emergency?”

  “My name is Silas Pearson. I’m at the North Rim gate.”

  “The FBI has notified North Rim Law Enforcement. They should be there soon. They are on another call.”

  Silas hung up and sat in the Chevy and waited. He hadn’t been asleep long when he was startled awake by a tap on his window. There were red lights flashing on a white GMC vehicle emblazoned with the insignia of the National Park Service. A woman was standing next to the Chevy with a flashlight pointed at him. He shielded his eyes and rolled down the window.

  “Are you Pearson?”

  “That’s right. Do you mind?”

  The ranger lowered the flashlight. Silas could see her hand was rested on the handle of her Heckler and Koch P7 service weapon. “Step out of the vehicle, please.”

  Silas, weary to the point of being dizzy, opened the door and stepped out. “I called you,” he protested.

  “I’m going to search you now.”

  “You’re going to get pretty dirty.”

  She smiled for the first time. “I work for the Park Service, sir. We’re accustomed to that.”

  She did a perfunctory search and invited Silas into her patrol vehicle. “We’re going to the administrative office. You’ll be met there by the district ranger. He’ll interview you and pass on your report to Coconino County sheriff’s deputies.”

  “Are you part of the search for the fugitives?”

  “We’re on alert, yes. There’s only a half a dozen of us on the North Rim. Budget cuts. We’re waking people up.” Silas watched her. She was in her late twenties, with long dark hair tied in a ponytail. She was heavy across the shoulders, chest, and hips, and, decked out in body armor, pistol, extra magazines, radio, Mace, baton, and handcuffs, looked bulky but ready for action. They drove to the park entrance road and Silas watched as their headlights illuminated the eyes of dozens of deer grazing in the meadows that bordered the blacktop.

  The radio crackled. “This is NR6,” said the ranger. “Go ahead.”

  “This is NR4, what’s your twenty?”

  “I’m five minutes from Admin. I’ve got Dr. Pearson with me.”

  “Alright. I’m at the intersection of Cape Royal and Point Imperial. I’ve got a call out here.”

  “What have you got, NR4?”

  “Someone reported an abandoned vehicle off in the woods. I’m going to check it out.”

  “Alright. NR6 out.”

  Silas sat up with a jolt. “What was that?”

  “Abandoned vehicle.”

  “What make?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Jesus Christ, didn’t I just ask if you were in on the manhunt? They stole my Outback. They took my friend’s Jeep. So they had three vehicles. I think the third was one of those Toyota Cruisers. They must have abandoned one.”

  The ranger picked up the radio. “NR4, NR6.”

  Static.

  “NR4, NR6, do you copy?”

  Static.

  “Dispatch,” the ranger said into the radio as she stomped on the gas and flipped on her lights, “this is NR6. Officer needs assistance, intersection of Point Imperial and Cape Royal.”

  Silas wondered if this day would ever end.

  THEY REACHED THE JUNCTION OF the two roads ten minutes later after a harrowing race through the aspen and pine forest. The lights from the patrol vehicle reflected off the trees, creating a psychedelic blur enhanced by Silas’s fatigue. “You stay here,” the ranger ordered when she pulled up to where an SUV with the Park Service insignia and light bar was stopped next to the road. She had her sidearm in her hand before she was out of the door. Silas watched as she pulled her flashlight from her belt and cradled her gun hand over the light. He saw the flashlight bob across the road and into the woods adjacent to the SUV, its lights still orbiting.

  To hell with this, Silas thought. He opened the passenger side door and stepped into the darkness. His headlamp was still in his pocket and he slipped it on his head but didn’t turn it on.

  In a moment he was next to the second patrol vehicle. He could hear the ranger in the woods next to the road. She was talking in a frantic voice. “Officer down, officer down. I need an ambulance!”

  Silas rushed into the woods. He could see, in a narrow clearing lit by the moon, his Subaru Outback parked among the aspens, its hood sprung, its front bumper wrapped around a stout tree. As he approached, the female ranger turned, her service weapon in her hands and pointed at him.

  “It’s Pearson!”

  She lowered her weapon. Next to her on the ground was another ranger. Silas turned on his headlamp and came close. The ranger was dead. Blood was pooled around his head and body in the leaf litter. His eyes seemed to be staring into the canopy of stark aspen trees above.

  “They shot him in the head,” she said. There was a crackle over the radio and the ranger instinctively turned down the squelch.

  “NR6, what’s your twenty?”

  “I’m at the intersection of the Cape Royal and Point Imperial roads, twenty yards into the wood
s. Jon’s dead.”

  There was a long silence, then: “What’s your situation?”

  “I believe the reported fugitives are nearby. Possibly in a Jeep or a Toyota Cruiser.”

  “Secure the scene and sit tight. Do not engage or pursue. Help is on the way. Dispatch out.”

  “NR6 out.”

  “Can we do anything?” Silas asked.

  She looked at him and then scanned the woods. “Find these bastards.”

  “WHAT’S YOUR NAME?” SILAS STOOD next to the ranger, behind her patrol vehicle. They were facing the dark road toward Cape Royal. They had found a blanket in the back of her SUV and carefully laid it over the body of her colleague, and now they had positioned her vehicle in the middle of the road.

  “Amanda Gwyther.” She was aiming a shotgun over the hood of the SUV and watching the roads that led to Point Imperial and Cape Royal.

  “You knew this ranger well?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Point Imperial and Cape Royal are dead ends, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So we’ll get them, right?”

  “Yes, we will.”

  IN ANOTHER TEN minutes there were two additional park rangers on scene, as well as the district ranger.

  “Alright, who’s going to take Mr. Pearson here back to HQ?” asked the district ranger.

  Nobody said a thing. Finally Silas said, “I know what these people look like. Let me come along. I’ll stay in the car, but I can help you find these guys.”

  The district ranger nodded. “You stay with Ranger Gwyther. We’re not waiting on Coconino County Sheriff’s Department. It’s going to be another,” he looked at this watch, “hour before anybody from Page gets here. We need to box these guys in now.”

  THE DISTRICT RANGER and a colleague drove to Point Imperial while Gwyther, Silas, and a third man drove to Cape Royal. They proceeded slowly, scanning the woods and pull-outs for any sign of Hayduke’s Jeep or the Toyota Cruiser. By three they were at the parking lot for Cape Royal. The Land Cruiser was there. Gwyther radioed the district ranger and reported in.

  “We’re at Point Imperial. We’ve got the Jeep,” he said.

  “What if they’ve split up?” asked Gwyther.

  “There’s nowhere for them to go,” said the district ranger. “Keep the vehicle under surveillance but do not approach. Wait for Coconino and the feds. Sheriff’s deputies are at the park gate, about twenty minutes out. The FBI is also on the way.”

  “What is that ?” asked Silas, pointing to someone running across the parking lot in what looked like pyjamas.

  Gwyther grabbed the radio control of the patrol vehicle and spoke into the handset. “Park ranger. Stop where you are. Put your hands in the air!”

  The figure stopped. Gwyther adjusted the spotlight on the side of the vehicle and shone it on the person. It was a young woman, her hair in pigtails. She wore hiking boots, the laces undone, and a fleece coat but had on pink PJ bottoms.

  “She’s saying something,” said Silas. He rolled down his window to listen.

  “They’ve got Tommy!” the young woman yelled. “They took Tommy and they have him out on the trail!”

  Silas quickly looked at Gwyther. “What trail is that?”

  “Angel’s Window. It’s a dead end and it’s straight down, right into the canyon.”

  HER NAME WAS Cailey. Silas sat with the woman in the back of the patrol vehicle. He had found another blanket in the ranger’s vehicle and had wrapped it around her shoulders. She was crying and Silas put his arm around her and talked to her in a comforting tone.

  “Who are they?” she asked between sobs.

  “Bad people, Cailey. Bad people.”

  “But why are they doing this?”

  “I don’t know. Tell me what happened?”

  She sniffed and straightened up, her face to the window. She pulled the blanket around herself. “We were camped here. We knew it was illegal, but Tommy wanted to watch the sunrise from Cape Royal. There’s nobody here at this time of year. The road just opened. So it’s really quiet. I think he was going to propose to me.” She started to cry again. “I wasn’t supposed to know but I saw the ring in his backpack. We were just sleeping on the rocks out by the cape when these two fucking crazy people ran by. I guess we scared them because the woman started yelling at the man. He had a gun, and he grabbed Tommy right out of his sleeping bag. He wanted to know where the trail was. Tommy said, ‘What trail?’ They said the trail down to the river. But there isn’t one here. Only the North Kaibab Trail from the lodge and that’s a long way from here. They got really angry. Then we saw your lights through the woods and they took Tommy and ran off back toward the other path, the one that goes out to Angel’s Window. What’s going to happen to him?”

  “He’s going to be fine. The rangers are here. The police and the FBI are coming. He’s going to be fine.”

  AT SUNRISE SILAS was asleep in the passenger seat of the SUV. Cailey was asleep under the blanket behind him. He woke to a light tap on the window. He started, trying to remember where he was. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and saw Katie Rain. He quietly opened the door.

  “What’s happening?” he asked.

  She looked past him at the sleeping girl. “I’ll tell you. Follow me.”

  There were two dozen law enforcement vehicles in the parking lot. White park ranger vehicles, black and white Coconino County Sheriff’s Office patrol cars, and the black GMC Yukon vehicles Silas had learned to hate over the last four and a half years. There was a massive black armored vehicle parked nearby with the words TACTICAL OPERATIONS written in white on the side that Silas would later learn was the command center for a joint Coconino County–City of Flagstaff Tactical Operations Unit. The vehicle was nicknamed The Bear.

  “Taylor is joint-incident commander for the Cape Royal team. Walt Kennedy from the City of Flagstaff police commands the joint tactical unit with the county so he’s sharing command. They have jurisdiction over this part of Coconino but have asked for our help. We’ve got Coconino–Flagstaff SWAT team members on the ground at Cape Royal and Point Imperial. Our SWAT team from the Phoenix FBI office, along with the Crisis Negotiation Unit, just arrived and are setting up.” Katie spoke quietly and quickly. “Balin and Terry Aldershot are holed up on the Angel’s Window overlook. We have eyes on them from the main approach and three places on the rim. They have the young man with them. They’re hunkered down, but we can see all three. They are all alive.”

  “What about Point Imperial?”

  “Nielsen is there with field agents from Flag, along with the district ranger and a smaller team from the Coconino County Sheriff’s Office. No hostages, and no cars in the parking lot except the Jeep, so we don’t believe anybody from the public is in danger. James Zahn has gone down into the canyon. There’s a rough trail there. We’re letting him walk it out. We have a second SWAT team inbound from Salt Lake City. They should be here in the next hour. When they are assembled, we’ll go in after him.”

  “Hell of a place to have to wait it out. What about Hinkley and Love?”

  “Ortiz is with a third team down on the Colorado.”

  “Big day.”

  “Yup. Are you alright?”

  “I’ll be fine. What about the girl?”

  Katie pointed to a woman standing next to an adjacent patrol vehicle. “Dr. Pamela Frost. She’s a counselor who does work with our Flagstaff office. She’s watching for when the girl wakes up. She’s in good hands. Come with me. The sun’s almost up. It’s showtime.”

  They walked between the various patrol vehicles toward the rim. In the thicket of juniper and piñon pines Silas could see heavily armed men moving. Katie had her badge on a chain around her neck and led Silas along the path. They found Taylor with two other agents crouched down behind some cover overlooking the edge of the canyon. The morning light had started to infuse the stone with an otherworldly glow. Katie whispered something and Taylor turned around.

 
“So, Dr. Pearson, looks like you’ve managed to stay out of trouble,” he said quietly, his dark skin almost invisible in the early morning light.

  “I caught you Jane Vaughn’s killer.”

  “Hasn’t been caught yet, and we’ve got a pretty tricky situation right now.”

  “We’ve got some movement, sir,” said one of the agents next to Taylor. He had binoculars trained on the promontory of stone.

  Silas looked across the gulf of space between the canyon rim and the buttress of stone that extended into the Grand Canyon. Angel’s Window was a narrow reef of rock that protruded from the rim in the vicinity of Cape Royal; below the promontory was a massive arch that allowed viewers from the rim to see right through, creating the “window.” It was surrounded on three sides by a precipitous drop five hundred feet straight down to talus and scree. It was just a few feet wide in places but had a trail that, with seemingly inadequate handrails, allowed those with no fear of heights to walk to the end of the jutting sandstone and experience the Grand Canyon in all its dizzying glory. That was where the agent’s binoculars were trained now.

  “All teams, ready,” a voice reported over Taylor’s radio.

  “Walt, this is Taylor,” said the FBI agent. He was addressing Deputy Chief Kennedy, who was stationed in The Bear, coordinating communications between the agents on the ground, the Hostage Rescue Team, and the Crisis Negotiation Unit. “How are you set?”

  “Good, I’ve got eyes and ears on. All teams report in position.”

  Silas wished he had his binoculars. His backpack had been left in the back of Ranger Gwyther’s vehicle, but he suspected they had been damaged by falling rock in the mine shaft. The morning’s quiet was broken by the sound of a helicopter overhead.

  “We’ve got eyes on them from the bird,” said the agent next to Taylor. He held up a tablet computer for Taylor to see. Silas stole a glance over Taylor’s shoulder and could see three people lying facedown at the end of the peninsula of stone. He couldn’t make out who was who.

  “Dr. Pearson,” said Taylor, turning around. “You have spent more time with Mr. and Mrs. Aldershot. Who would you say is in charge in this relationship?”

  “No doubt—it’s her. Terry Aldershot is in charge.”