Primal Threat - Earl Emerson [95]
“The wind’s holding it down.”
“Let’s climb the hill. We get some altitude, maybe we’ll be able to see a route out of here.”
“Fine by me.”
They had climbed at least 6,000 and probably 8,000 feet already in their journeys, which made this 250 feet of altitude gain seem paltry, yet Zak could feel his quads burning and his back getting stiff with the work. His injuries didn’t help. The higher they climbed, the better the view to the south, until they stopped at the washboard corner that had given them so much trouble in the race.
Most of the roads below were masked in billowing white smoke. Obviously, the road back into North Bend would be impassable for hours, perhaps days. Muldaur stared at the burning valley. “It’s everywhere.”
“The wind must be twenty, thirty miles an hour in places.”
“I don’t see any firefighting crews.”
“Seems like all of eastern Washington is on fire. Two days ago the governor said crews were stretched to their limit and they were thinking of using inmates to work the fire lines. You don’t think they ran out of manpower and are planning to let this one burn, do you?”
“All I know is the best air’s going to be higher on the mountain.”
“Eventually Kasey and Scooter and the others are going to figure that out, too, and come up behind us.”
“That’s why we better go up now. Hopefully, Giancarlo and Stephens aren’t coming down, because I’m not sure they’ll have the strength to make the climb back up.”
“I’m not sure I have the strength to make it back up,” said Zak.
“Now, that I’m not worried about.”
They rode the next short, steep section and stopped at the Jeep camp, catching their breath while riding in circles around the abandoned barbecue. “I don’t get it,” Zak said. “Where’s Morse’s body? You don’t think they threw him off the cliff, do you?”
“Maybe they took it with them.”
When they went to refill their hydration packs at Panther Creek near their own camp, they found that their belongings had been stacked in a pile and set afire. Luckily they had their water purification kit with them. Zak kicked through the charred remains. He was sore from his crash and could feel air cooling the pus on his left hip and his left arm. As he walked, he felt pain in his right ankle he hadn’t noticed while pedaling. Three people and a dog were dead, yet seeing his own charred sleeping bag and Giancarlo’s scorched Bible made him feel as bad as any of it. Camp jays, crows, and chipmunks had been carrying away the scattered food.
Because Muldaur still had the relatively heavy Winchester braced across his handlebars, Zak offered to carry the walkie-talkie, which began crackling in his jersey pocket. “Commando One to Commando Two.”
“Two, over.”
“Did we ever find out what happened to Scooter’s walkie-talkie? ’Cause Scooter doesn’t have any recollection of where it went.”
“That’s a negative, Commando One. All I saw was Perry.”
“So for all we know they’re listening in.”
“For all we know.”
After a few moments of silence Scooter’s bombastic high-pitched voice came on the air. “Hear this, you redneck peckerwoods. We’re coming, and this time we’re not handing out any tickets for second chances. So you better start pedaling your asses off.”
“Do you think we should answer?” Muldaur asked.
“Like he said, I think we should pedal.”
They climbed six more minutes on the same road they’d already climbed once that morning, hoping all the while the Jeeps weren’t coming up right behind them, because this time they wouldn’t have a felled tree to stall them. There was no telling what Stephens and Giancarlo were doing. Zak hoped they were somewhere on top of the mountain, perhaps near the lake, and that they would run into them at the top.
Zak looked at Muldaur. “You know how to use that rifle?”
“When I was in the army, I was rated top marksman in my unit.”
“Let’s hope those rich boys behind us didn’t have private shooting tutors like they had for everything else.”
43
By the time the walkie-talkie crackled again, they’d climbed another mile on the single-lane dirt road, most