by Raelyn Drake
“I’m sure we’ll think of something,” Micah continued, biting his lip.
“In the meantime, we need to do something about your arm,” Trevor said.
Both Trevor and Micah had gone through first aid training when they were learning how to climb. Several minutes later, they had managed to construct a makeshift sling out of Micah’s climbing harness and some climbing tape. It would at least keep Micah’s arm from moving around too much until they were able to get him to a hospital for treatment.
Micah, who already looked a little sickly after the painful first aid process, suddenly paled even more. “I just realized—no one knows where we are.”
Trevor felt a chill of panic in spite of the heat. Since they’d chosen to skip class today, neither of them had mentioned anything to their parents.
“Even if someone eventually notices we’re missing,” Micah continued, “they won’t know to search the park, let alone this park—”
“No, wait, it’s fine,” Trevor said. “My sister knows! I told her so she wouldn’t sit around waiting for me this afternoon.” Most days she drove him home from school. “I didn’t really think anything of it, but I did text her this morning. She knows we came to Golden Shadow Canyon.”
Micah heaved a sigh of relief, leaning his head back against the rock wall behind him.
Then an idea hit Trevor. It was a long shot, but . . . “Wasn’t that last geocache supposed to be somewhere nearby?” he asked excitedly.
Micah rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but we couldn’t find it,” he pointed out. “You know that already—you were there when we gave up looking for it, like, twenty minutes ago.”
“We couldn’t find it with the GPS,” Trevor said. “But what if someone moved it from the location marked on the map? Maybe it’s still around here somewhere.”
“I’m not exactly in the mood to look for a geocache while my arm feels like it’s going to fall off,” Micah grumbled.
Trevor had already started combing the nearby bushes and rock crevices. “I swear I saw a comment from someone saying their kid was disappointed because the only loot was a stupid plastic whistle.”
“It’s probably just some cheap party store noise maker,” Micah said. “That’s not going to be much louder than us shouting.”
“We won’t know until we find it.”
“Like I said before, someone probably just stole it,” Micah called.
Trevor ignored him. He had a good feeling about this.
Micah was silent for a moment, then he blurted out, “So, I know this sounds stupid, but the thought that went through my head when I was falling was that I never got around to asking Peyton out.”
Trevor paused his search to look at Micah. His friend’s face was creased with pain, but he seemed sincere. “Nothing to be embarrassed about,” Trevor told him.
Micah didn’t say anything else as he kept his head tipped back, looking up toward the sky. He took a shaky breath, and Trevor scrambled to find something else to say to distract him.
“How are you planning to ask her?” he asked.
If Micah knew what Trevor was doing, he didn’t let on. He cleared his throat and said, “Uh, I was just going to ask her the normal way. Why? Do you think she would expect some fancy promposal sort of thing? She doesn’t strike me as the type.”
“Hold that thought,” Trevor muttered, suddenly distracted by an unusual rock underneath a nearby bush. The canyon itself was mostly reddish-brown sandstone, but this rock was dark gray. When he picked it up, he realized it was one of those fake plastic rocks for stashing an extra copy of your house key in. It was a clever hiding place, but it was still surprising that so many people had missed it when it was right where the map had said it would be. He held it up as he walked back, smiling triumphantly.
Micah rolled his eyes. “Fine, you win! But I still don’t see how this is important right now.”
Trevor held his breath as he pried open the latch to a small box hidden in the underside of the fake rock, hoping that it had been worth it. Most of the time, geocache loot was some sort of cheap trinket: a beat-up book, a dollar store toy, a marble, or a temporary tattoo. But occasionally, they found something really cool or useful.
The only things crammed inside the box were a tightly rolled piece of paper that was most likely the geocache logbook, a mini pencil, and a bright orange whistle.
“Well, you were right,” Trevor said with a disappointed sigh, “it’s just a toy whistle.”
Micah suddenly looked a lot more interested in the contents of the geocache. “Is that an emergency whistle?” he asked. His face brightened.
“Oh, so that would explain why it’s traffic-cone orange,” Trevor said. “Are emergency whistles louder than normal ones?”
Micah grinned. “Just wait until you hear it! Give it here,” he said excitedly. He shifted his injured arm like he was about to reach with it and bit back a yelp of pain. He carefully tucked his arm against his side again. “Of course I had to go and break the arm I use the most,” he muttered angrily.
“So, do we just blow into it until someone hears us?” Trevor asked.
“Basically. Most people will recognize a whistle as a call for help. Especially anyone who’s out hiking in the desert.”
Trevor took a deep breath and blew on the bright orange whistle. It was much louder than he had expected, and the shrill noise echoed off the canyon walls.
“The sound will carry for miles,” Micah explained once the sound had faded. “Much farther than the sound of us shouting. We just have to remember to keep signaling with it.”
Trevor grinned. “I knew that was a good idea—”
Micah snorted. “Yeah, yeah, I take back everything I said. You’re an absolute genius.” He returned Trevor’s grin.
Trevor grabbed Micah’s good hand and helped him stand up. Even though Trevor did his best to support Micah as he stood, his friend still grunted loudly in pain.
Once he had staggered to his feet, Micah paused for a long moment, eyes squeezed shut, nostrils flaring as he took deep breaths through his nose. Trevor thought he saw tears glistening at the corner of Micah’s eyes. He couldn’t even imagine how much pain his friend must be in.
Trevor waited patiently until Micah’s ragged breathing evened out before asking, “So, do we wait here for someone to hear the whistle and come rescue us? Or do we try to hike out through the south end of the canyon?”
Micah frowned. “I’m not super thrilled about hiking with a broken arm, but it seems better than just sitting here. The southern end of the canyon is a lot closer than the northern end, if I remember the map correctly.”
“South it is, then,” Trevor said. He tucked the small bouncy ball they had brought with them as a trade item in the fake rock to replace the whistle. He jotted the date and their names in the geocache logbook. The people before them had written:
Sorry—all we had with us was this whistle. Kind of boring for geocache loot, we know. :)
It was signed Deb and Nancy.
Trevor resealed the geocache and bent to stash it back under the bush.
Just then, Trevor saw something dark lunge at him, lightning-quick, and he felt a searing pain run up his leg. Yelling, he tumbled backward in surprise, grabbing at his leg. He saw a scaly creature slither back between the rocks.
Micah apparently hadn’t seen the snake. “What, did you find another lizard?” he laughed. His smile vanished when he turned and saw Trevor curled up on the ground. “Dude, what happened?”
“I think it was a rattlesnake,” Trevor said.
“What?!” Micah’s eyes went wide in alarm. “Did it bite you? Are you sure it was a rattlesnake?”
From somewhere nearby, they both heard the unmistakable rattle of the snake’s tail.
“Oh sure,” Trevor shouted angrily at the snake, “now you rattle!”
“Let me see it,” Micah said. “If a rattlesnake bit you . . .” Micah didn’t finish his thought, but he didn’t need to. Both of
them had grown up in the Southwest, and they knew that snakebites were serious business. Neither of them had ever been bitten before, but what to do after a bite was basically common knowledge for locals.
Trevor was wearing shorts, but he had been holding his hands over the painful spot on his shin. He slowly lifted them.
The snake had definitely bitten him. There were two puncture wounds where the fangs had sunk in. Trevor’s breath snagged in his throat when he saw that the flesh around the bite marks was already swollen and bruised.
“That means the snake venom is spreading, right?” Trevor asked, even though he already knew the answer.
“Okay, now we really need to get to a hospital,” Micah said, tugging his good hand through his hair nervously.
“How bad is rattlesnake venom?” Trevor asked, trying to keep his voice from rising to a terrified squeak. “How long do you think I have?”
Micah closed his eyes like he did when he was trying to concentrate. “Honestly, I have no idea. We don’t know how much got into your system, but I think this means we can’t wait around for help to find us. We have probably a couple hours before things start getting bad—really bad.”
“What are you trying to say?” Trevor asked, his mind buzzing with panic.
Micah huffed out a deep breath. “I’m saying we need to get out of this canyon as soon as possible.”
CHAPTER FOUR
micah
Trevor looked like he was going to be sick. Micah’s mind was racing. There’s no way we’ll ever make it to a hospital in time, and then Trev will die, and there’s nothing I can do about it— He cut off his train of thought. That kind of thinking wouldn’t do them any good. He forced himself to take a breath to try to calm his frantic heartbeat. That seemed like a good place to start.
“Okay, first things first, let’s keep your heart rate down,” he told Trevor. “The faster your heart beats, the faster it pumps the snake venom around your body.”
Trevor glared at him. “That’s not really making me feel better.”
“Just focus on slowing your breathing,” Micah said. “That should help with your pulse as well.”
Trevor heaved in and out. “The more I think about slowing my heart rate, the faster it seems to get.” He put two fingers to his neck to check his pulse.
“You should also probably avoid pushing yourself too much.”
Trevor rolled his eyes. “How on Earth are we supposed to get out of this canyon if I can’t push myself?”
“I don’t know,” Micah admitted. “Really you should try to stay as still and quiet as possible.”
Trevor raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, that doesn’t seem like it’s going to work, unless we can just wish ourselves out of the canyon and into the nearest hospital.”
“I know, I know,” Micah said with a sigh. “Here, give me the emergency whistle. I’ll try signaling again.”
Trevor handed over the whistle. While Micah blew three times, he could see out of the corner of his eye that Trevor was trying to take slow, deep breaths—with mixed success. His friend was no longer actively panicking, but his brows were knitted together in worry, and sweat beaded on his forehead.
“Fine,” Trevor said when Micah turned back. “Look at how relaxed I am. So incredibly relaxed. I’m totally not freaking out about the snake venom that’s slowly killing me. Nope, not at all. Because I’m so relaxed.”
Micah couldn’t really blame him for being terrified. But if they had any chance of making it out of the canyon in time to save him, they would need to stay calm and think about this rationally.
Granted, it was hard to think rationally when your broken arm hurt so badly that you wanted to sit down and cry. Or when your friend’s life was in danger.
No, Micah thought. I’ve got to keep it together.
Trevor glared at the nearby bushes. “Stupid, useless snake!” he said loudly. “I don’t want to see another snake for the rest of my life.”
Micah suppressed a grimace as the thought occurred to him that “the rest of my life” might not be that far away for Trevor. He tried to push the thought from his mind.
Trevor wrapped his swollen leg, being careful not to pull the gauze too tight and cut off his circulation. Then he covered the bandage with a layer of climbing tape. It was durable and water-resistant and would hopefully keep dirt and sand out of the wound.
While Trevor was distracted, Micah started the stopwatch function on his watch. The timer began ticking up from zero. He wanted to keep an eye on how long it had been since Trevor had been bitten, just in case.
“Do you think you can walk?” Micah asked Trevor once the bandage was in place.
Trevor looked doubtful but nodded. “I think so.”
With an effort, Trevor stood. Once he had helped him up, Micah looked away. He didn’t want Trevor to catch him staring at the way the skin around the bandaged snake bite was turning an ugly shade of purple. Every hour longer would decrease Trevor’s chances of survival. There was no way Micah was going to let his friend die, broken bones or no broken bones.
But Micah discovered a harsh reality as soon as he went to pick up his backpack. Every time he moved, stabbing pain shot up his arm like a jolt of electricity. As much as he wanted to ignore it in the interest of saving his friend, he knew there was no way he’d be able to carry his backpack. Trying to carry it over his good shoulder would just throw him off balance as they walked. And if he couldn’t handle his own gear, how was he supposed to help Trevor with his?
Trevor seemed to have had the same thought. “Here, we can put all the supplies in my pack.” He experimented with putting weight on his poisoned leg and winced. He bent awkwardly at the waist so he could start transferring items from Micah’s pack to his.
“I can’t let you do that,” Micah protested. “The last thing you need right now is to make this hike harder on yourself than it already is.”
“We need this stuff—we can’t just leave it. And besides, I’m going to have to push myself no matter what.”
“I guess so,” Micah agreed reluctantly. “I can’t think of any way around it.” He tried to ignore the pained expression on Trevor’s face as his friend put on the doubly heavy backpack.
“Do we still want to head toward the southern end of the canyon?” Trevor asked. “It’s closer, but it might be a harder hike.”
Micah bit his lip. “I think it will be worth it if it can save us some time. But we’ll walk slowly. I’ll keep blowing the emergency whistle. Lots of people hike and climb around here. There’s bound to be someone around, and then we can use their phone to call for help.”
“It’s a Friday,” Trevor commented glumly. “Most people are at work or school, and the families all visit on the weekend. No one will hear us until it’s too late—”
“Oh, shut up, Trev,” Micah said kindly. “Being pessimistic makes the venom spread faster too.”
Trevor snorted. “That sounds real scientific.” He gave Micah a small smile. “I guess we’re more likely to run into someone if we get closer to a park entrance.”
“How long would your sister wait before telling someone we were missing?” Micah asked. “What if she thinks we’re planning to be at the park all day?”
Trevor thought about it for a second. “She would probably be worried if I wasn’t back by dinnertime.” He wrinkled his nose, then shrugged. “I made her promise not to tell our parents, but that wouldn’t matter if she thought something bad had happened to me.”
“That’s better than nothing,” Micah said. He forced a smile for Trevor’s benefit. Dinnertime was still at least four or five hours away. And by then it really might be too late—at least for Trevor. Micah knew their best bet for survival was to take matters into their own hands instead of waiting for someone to save them.
Trevor took a step, limping on his injured leg. He smirked. “If I didn’t know any better, I would say that all of this was the universe getting back at us for skipping class.”
Mi
cah laughed. “I don’t think the universe cares whether we miss a chemistry quiz or not. If it did, I know some kids at school who would have been bitten by snakes years ago.”
They set out in the direction of the southern end of the canyon. Micah just hoped it was also the direction of rescue.
CHAPTER FIVE
TREVOR
Trevor stopped short before they had gone ten feet. An idea had just occurred to him, and it seemed so obvious he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it before.
“Wait,” he said, turning to Micah. “Why don’t I just climb out of the canyon here and get help? That one bolt is missing, but the rest look secure enough.”
Micah frowned. “But I could never handle the brake line with my busted arm. Plus, the rope snapped. There’s not enough rope to make it to the top. You’d have to free-climb.”
Trevor sighed. He had completely forgotten about the broken rope after everything that had followed. “And free-climbing would definitely count as pushing myself, right?”
“Uh, yeah, that would probably be the worst possible thing you could do in your current situation.”
“I figured,” Trevor grumbled.
Micah adjusted his sling, wincing. “But you might have a point. Maybe I should walk ahead and get out of the canyon while you wait here. I’ll be able to go faster on my own, and then you can rest and keep your heart rate down.”
“No!” Trevor said so quickly that Micah raised an eyebrow. “What I mean,” Trevor said, “is that I changed my mind. Now that I think about it, it’s a really awful idea to split up when both of us are injured. Strength in numbers and, er, stuff,” he finished lamely.
He didn’t want to tell Micah the real reason he was so against the idea—he was terrified of being left alone. The thought of sitting here by himself in the dim canyon, staring up at the strip of blue sky just out of reach overhead, while the poison worked its way through his body, slowly shutting down his organs and nervous system . . . He couldn’t help shuddering.
The way Micah was looking at him, Trevor kind of suspected that his friend had already guessed the real reason.