Out of the Wild: A Wilderness Survival Thriller

by Hunt, Jack

  The bear attack.

  It was beginning to make sense.

  Glancing around she couldn’t see footprints in the snow. Had Frank left them? Disappeared in the night? Gone to take a leak and fallen? As she was thinking that she heard a rustle, the breaking of twigs lower down the slope, she saw Frank emerge from the tree line, huffing as he carried an armful of branches and twigs up the hill.

  “Oh, hey. I didn’t want to wake you. I headed down and gathered some wood to build a fire. Figure we can try and signal a plane this morning.”

  She frowned, nodding slowly. “I thought you wanted to keep moving?”

  “I did. But, well, you must have been right about that grizzly. I didn’t sleep like you last night. I kept one eye open,” he said as he dumped the branches. They clattered against the dark rock. “I didn’t hear a bear. I think we are in the clear.”

  She nodded slowly as he put his hand out and she went to give him the water bottle. He chuckled. “No, your Leatherman. I’ll get the fire going.” She handed it over and Frank looked at her father. “How’s he doing?” he asked as he dropped to his knees, and used the blade to create a pile of shavings from a branch. He pulled off the ferrocerium rod and struck it a few times. Gold sparks made a flame burst to life, and seconds later he added more small twigs and then kept piling them up as the flame got bigger. After, he took some larger rocks and set them around the piles of wood as tongues of fire danced in the wind. Frank handed back the blade with a smile, then he sat there for a few minutes warming his hands. “Damn cold last night. Looks like we might be in for some bad weather.”

  “Yeah. Say… that fish you caught.”

  “What?” he asked, rubbing his hands over his arms.

  “The fish. You said you caught a fish?”

  “Oh, that. Yeah, damn thing got away from me.”

  She stared.

  “Right. That’s what you said.”

  Frank looked out, distracted.

  “And Callaway, he didn’t have any luck?”

  “Not that I saw.”

  “You sure?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, I mean, he might have. Why?”

  Frank frowned as she lifted the blanket. “Smell that.”

  He leaned forward and sniffed, then his features twisted. “Oh, that stinks.”

  “Exactly. Smells like fish but we haven’t had any and there wasn’t one here.”

  “You sure it’s not from Henry’s…?”

  “His wounds are fine.”

  Frank shrugged and turned back to the fire. “It looks like the blanket Callaway had around him. I don’t know what to tell you. Very odd.”

  “Yeah. Very odd,” she said before using the knife to cut off the portion of the blanket that reeked then tossed it into the fire to burn. “That’s why the bear wound up in the camp.”

  “From that?”

  “Their sense of smell is a hundred times greater than ours.”

  He stuck his hands under his armpits and sat back on his haunches, puffs of air appearing before his mouth. “Callaway. That bastard. He must have placed it in your father’s stretcher when we were asleep.”

  Kara offered a skeptical glance. “Why would he do that?”

  “Why wouldn’t he? The guy was planning on leaving us behind. I wouldn’t have put anything past him, especially after his outburst yesterday.”

  She stared. “I guess with him gone, any hope he had of taking over the company is out the window.”

  “It’s for the best,” Frank said. He threw a few more sticks into the fire then rose to his feet as her father began to cough.

  She gave him some more water and his eyes opened.

  “Still with us, Henry?” Frank asked with a warm smile before marching off, muttering under his breath, something to do with finding leaves that could be dumped on the fire to create smoke.

  Kara got close to her father and placed a hand on his forehead. “How are you feeling?”

  “As rough as an old dog.” His voice was scratchy.

  “You hungry?” she asked. She reached into her jacket and took out the last mushrooms that she’d collected the day before. At first, he waved them off but she said he needed to keep up his strength.

  “What’s happening?” he asked.

  “Frank wants to stay here and see if we can’t use smoke to get someone’s attention.”

  “We should keep going.”

  “That’s what I said but… he has a point. Maybe a plane will come by.” Kara looked up into the empty sky. They hadn’t heard or seen anything in over 24 hours. The chances of a bush plane were slim, especially since her father knew most of the routes companies like his took, and with it being October, and the tourist season over, most air taxi services had closed by the end of September.

  Kara lifted her eyes toward Frank. “Dad, do you know if Frank was against you selling the business to Callaway when he first approached you? You know, when mother was alive.”

  “No, he encouraged me. Said we could make a good chunk of money. I nearly went through with it but your mother had other ideas. Why do you ask?”

  “Must have burned him.”

  “Oh, he made a fuss about it but he soon got over it.”

  She narrowed her eyes and nodded, pondering the events of the evening and truly wondering how long they could survive out here. A day could feel like a week without the right gear.

  Minutes turned into hours as they waited for any sign of an aircraft. Nothing. Frank remained positive but Kara could see cracks in his facade. It was just a front. He was just as scared as they were. Higher up in the valley, the cold chewed away at their bones even as they warmed themselves around a fire. Eventually, Kara stood up. “We can’t keep waiting, we need to move.”

  “Someone will fly over.”

  “And in the meantime, my father is getting worse.”

  He was coughing more frequently and she feared he’d get an infection.

  “If we keep moving, they won’t spot us. But up here, it’s just a matter of time.”

  “He doesn’t have the luxury of time like us,” she said. “Now I figure we have maybe another two days’ walk out of here. If we keep moving, walk through at least one of the evenings, we could be at the river by late tomorrow.”

  Frank scoffed, sitting on a log, his legs crossed, his hair a tangled mess. “I think you’ve forgotten, we still have to traverse those mountains. How do you expect us to get him through?”

  “The same way we got up here. One step at a time.”

  “No, we stay. We should have stayed by the plane.”

  “He’s not dying out here and neither am I. You want to stay, be my guest but I’m moving on,” she said, turning and pitching sideways to head down.

  “I think you forgot someone,” he said, jerking his head toward her father.

  “I’m not leaving right now. I’m going to see if I can find some more mushrooms and berries.” Some traps could be created to catch small wildlife but it would be a waiting game and she no longer had the patience to sit around. “Do you want to give me a hand?”

  “And your father?”

  “We’re not walking far,” she said.

  “No, I should watch over him and the fire.” Frank looked up into the air. “Anytime now.”

  “Suit yourself.” As Kara made her way down, trying not to lose her footing, a few small rocks rolled out from under her feet. A huge bird wheeled overhead and disappeared out of view. Once she was farther down the slope, in the tree line, out of sight, she peered up, observing Frank for the better part of five minutes before she shook her head. No, she’d known him since she was a young girl, he and his family would have them over for meals. He was her father’s closest friend, the one person that would go to bat for him no matter what.

  Her encounters with the likes of Callaway and Paul, her father getting injured, and being stranded in the middle of nothingness was beginning to toy with her mind. The wilderness was unforgiving to the sick, and the th
ought of losing her father only added to the duress she was under. Hikers who were later found dead had been known to have made odd decisions. Some had stripped down to nothing in cold weather. Tossed away their bags. She pushed the worst from her mind and focused on finding and collecting enough food to get through the rest of the day while staying near to the camp. She didn’t want to stray so far that she was out of earshot.

  Ten minutes passed. She’d filled her pockets with various berries, and was on her knees, pulling mushrooms off a fallen log, when she got a sense that she was being watched. The hairs on the back of her neck went up and she almost didn’t want to move. A flashback of the bear’s face, its head pulled against its shoulders, the pounding gallops as it launched forward. Instead of making even the slightest movement, she lifted her eyes and found herself face to face with an Interior Alaskan wolf.

  At first, it couldn’t have known she was there as it moved toward her, its massive paws spreading over the ground, moving gracefully, with almost a bounce in its step.

  As soon as she looked up, it stopped.

  Its unwavering amber eyes were fixated on her, revealing more than words could ever convey. Its striking black fur with shades of gray contrasted hard against a blanket of white snow, and gray rocks on a rising slope. It was a majestic animal that seemed to hold wisdom that few would ever know. Where there was one, there were usually more but where were they? Although some adults survived alone, they were stronger in packs, holding ground in territories up to 300 miles, and communicating through body language, howling and leaving their scent. Kara had never seen a wolf this close, she’d seen them from the air and behind the bars at a zoo but that was something else.

  Here she was no farther than twenty feet away.

  She didn’t feel fear like with the bear yet she knew the wolf could be dangerous.

  Wolves were considered apex predators but contrary to what was portrayed by films and many hunters, they were cautious around humans. Seeing one this close up was rare, even rarer were tales of attacks. Most if not all were steeped in the mistakes of hikers, runners, and locals not paying attention to their surroundings. The wolf was an opportunist, testing its prey, registering and sensing weakness by observation.

  What was it sensing in her?

  Lost in its eyes, almost captivated in a trancelike state, Kara almost didn’t hear the familiar sound of an engine, distant, approaching. She turned her head for but a few seconds toward the camp and when she looked back the wolf was gone as if it had simply vanished. She couldn’t even see tracks in the snow. It was as if it had never happened.

  How could that be?

  The drone of the engine got louder and she bounded to her feet, hearing Frank yell.

  “Plane!”

  25

  It was like music to her ears. Kara burst out of the tree line, scrambling on all fours up the rocky slope, hands grasping scrubby grass because the wind was too harsh, and the land too exposed for plants and trees to grow. Frank was loading the pile of thick spruce branches he’d collected earlier on top of one another, layering them to create gray smoke that was barely forming.

  Above, farther away than it sounded, a bush plane soared, not much more than a speck on the horizon, gliding through the sky effortlessly. She lost her footing twice on the way up and had to use her hands to climb, grasping at rocks, scraping her knees.

  All the while, Frank was waving his arms like crazy. “Hey! Hey, over here!”

  He ran along the ridge like a madman. When she made it to the top, she was just in time to see the plane bank left then disappear between the mountains.

  Had it seen the smoke? Would it circle back?

  Without saying a word to each other they looked on, waiting on bated breath for it to reappear, for the rumble of the engine to get louder as it circled and made its way to them.

  “Please!” she said quietly, clenching her fist so tight the nails on her fingers cut into her palm. Slowly but surely the drone of the plane could no longer be heard.

  Distraught, Frank dropped to his knees.

  “No. No. Come on!” He placed both hands over his head, crying out.

  Out of breath and panting hard, Kara looked at her father who was straining his neck to see. Although smoke was now beginning to thicken and rise above them, spiraling upward, it was too late. Instead of the fire being ablaze like she’d seen before walking away, it had been reduced to next to nothing.

  “It must have seen us. It had to,” Frank said.

  “It might have had you kept the fire going. What the hell, Frank! You would have heard that plane before me. Why did you wait until I was coming up before you started loading branches on the fire? You said you wanted to stay to watch over the fire, then why was it nearly out?” she bellowed hard. Frank looked at her but said nothing. “Huh? Our one chance. One chance to get out of here and it’s gone!” She walked back and forth, running a hand over her face, trying not to lose her temper but this was testing her patience. She stopped and looked directly at him. “If I’m not mistaken, I would think that you didn’t want us to be found.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Frank said, rising to his feet.

  She lifted her hands. “Oh, I don’t know, it seems a little convenient that you let my father do the preflight check when you knew he was having memory issues. A little convenient that there was no flight plan filed, no GPS tracker, no survival kit in the plane, no gun, no PLB, and a tampered ELT.”

  Frank offered back a confused expression. “Are you saying I wanted this? To almost die in a crash and get stranded in the wilderness?”

  She shot back fast, stabbing a finger at the ground. “I’m saying that there is a lot that doesn’t make sense about this situation. I might not know how to fly a plane, Frank, but I grew up around them and the one thing my father always stressed was safety. It was the one thing he took seriously. There is no way in hell our plane would have been missing all of those essentials or that he would overlook them — or better still… you would.”

  “Kara!” her father said trying to chime in.

  Frank took a few steps toward her, his features twisting. “Maybe you’re the one with memory issues. I think you’ve forgotten that Callaway conveniently showed up hours after and attempted to leave us stranded if we didn’t sign paperwork. Or that Paul had taken issue with being fired by your father. Now I’m no detective but it doesn’t take a degree in criminology to connect the dots.”

  She shook her head. “Alright, let’s say I believe that.”

  “Kara, drop it,” her father said but she wouldn’t.

  “Maybe I can buy Paul tampering with the plane but not Callaway. He needed my father, you, even me to sign off on that paperwork. What could he possibly hope to gain if we were dead, as let’s face it… unless he could guarantee that you could land the plane safely, he would be taking one hell of a risk.” Frank studied her. “Sure, he was an asshole but he was a businessman and a savvy one at that. And one thing men like that have in common is they understand risk management. When to invest, and when to pull out. Because as he said, he liked to hedge his bets. Now if you were working with him, maybe that was him hedging his bet.”

  Frank scoffed as he shook his head. “I’ve known you since you were a baby, Kara. I’ve known your father even longer. Do you think I want us to die out here? Listen to yourself.”

  “I don’t know what you want,” she replied.

  He got closer, narrowing his eyes. “Why would I place myself here with you? Huh? I could have just let him fly or sent someone else. Do you want to know the survival rate of passengers on planes that crash? You talk about risk management. Do you honestly think I would go to that extreme?”

  “What about the blanket with fish oil on it?”

  “I told you. Callaway.”

  “That’s very convenient especially since he’s not here to defend himself.”

  “Oh, what, so now you think I want to kill your father? Is that it?”

&nbs
p; “Well, I hardly think Callaway wanted him dead since he needed his signature.”

  “Can you hear this, Henry?”

  “Kara,” her father said.

  She glanced at him, he coughed hard and then shook his head.

  “A fine woman you have grown into, Kara, your mother would be proud.” Frank walked past her and sat down by the fire, stabbing the embers a few times with a stick. She looked at him then at her father. What was he thinking?

  Kara let out an exasperated sigh as she brought a finger and thumb to the bridge of her nose and squeezed it, feeling a tension headache coming on. Her frustration with being stuck out here was getting the better of her. She wandered over and tapped her hand against the side of her leg, feeling the awkwardness of the moment. It was conjecture on her part to think that he wanted them dead or wanted them to be in this situation for some arrangement he’d made with Callaway. “Look… I’m sorry. I… I just want to get out of here.”

  “As do I,” he said, his gaze bouncing between them.

  She nodded, looking off into the distance. “Then perhaps we should keep moving. There is still plenty of daylight left.”

  “No, they’re unlikely to find us if we leave now.”

  “Who’s they?” she asked. “No one is looking. No one knows we are here.”

  “You don’t know that. There’s a chance that plane could come back, or another will come by.”

  “After what Callaway said, you know the odds of that are low, Frank,” Henry said. “Besides, low clouds and fog work against us. There are fewer planes now the tourist season has ended. There might be one or two that pass by this way delivering mail to a town but you know that would only occur once or twice a week.”

  “No!” he bellowed. “This is the surest way of being found. It’s a system that works. It’s what they always advise. We have no flares, so we stay put and use the fire as a signal.”