Chapter 3: A Nice Day for a Stroll

I took the better part of an hour to reach the top of the ridge, but twenty minutes to get down the back side. Maybe I rushed it a little.

I stopped at the bottom. There was a frothing stream about ten yards wide. One of the lessons they had drummed into me in Wyoming: never get wet. The snow briefly lifted, and I saw my winning lotto ticket. There was a tangle of deadwood on the other side. A lot of wood.

I grit my teeth and plunged ahead. Again, I was lucky. Only my trousers and my long john bottoms got wet to mid-calf. I carefully laid a fire, my teeth chattering, and got it going. Soon, I had a small forest fire.

I took my time. I found a stout staff and pushed embers ahead of me either out of the way or further ahead.

About four thirty I was across, dry and starting up the next ridge. The snow was, if anything, coming down harder than ever. It was nearly full dark when I got to the top.

I would do O’Malley no good if I fell into a ravine, so I found a small fir tree whose thick branches brushed the ground. I sat on a few branches I’d broken off and tried to sleep.

The weak light of dawn woke me. I got up, groaning from sitting on my haunches most of the night. I pushed on ahead, then nearly killed myself when the ground dropped steeply into a road cut.

Still, I was enormously heartened. Visibility had improved after a few hundred yards along the road to about a quarter of a mile. I stepped out, even faster.

Faster than fast, the weather changed. Snow increased and after a few yards I had to rethink. There were highway markers along the road every hundred yards or so, not that I could see that far. Mostly they were invisible, but I knew how long my stride was, and I had a compass that I could follow.

It was bitterly cold and frustratingly slow. Every time I felt the urge to go faster the thought of O’Malley out there in this slowed me down.

I’d heard a million times that in the Pacific Northwest if the weather doesn’t suit you, wait an hour. I was slower than a turtle, trying to follow the road. Abruptly the sky lightened, the snow cleared and I could see a few hundred yards.

I fought the temptation to rush. Still, after ten minutes, I could hear engines behind me. I punched the sky! “Beat you!” I remember thinking.

It was a convoy of four snowmobiles, traveling fast. I jumped up and down, waving frantically.

The only time I was more surprised was when I realized on that mountain in Afghanistan that I wasn’t flying.

The lead vehicle swerved at me, and I saw an arm stick out brandishing an AK-47. You see one of those, and you duck and run. Seemed like a typical muj to me; the bullets went wide and I buried myself in the snow.

When I stuck my head up, they were vanishing in the distance, albeit tail end Charlie had firefly winks that showed him shooting at something. I never saw anything close to me.

When it was clear, I stood. I dug into my coat and came out with an ancient Colt 1911A1 forty-five caliber pistol that had been my grandfather’s in World War II. I coldly and deliberately worked the action to put a live one up the spout, and then I started forward, vowing vengeance.

I thought I was feeling my anger. I grew increasingly antsy, but even so I stopped and checked the map. I was, I thought, a quarter mile short of Pine Knoll. I’d never been there; Brian’s cabin was on the north slopes of Rainier and this was on the south side.

Still, I knew it was a ski village, with an inn and a ski slope a mile or so away. I moved slowly, staying in the forest verge, which was a fair distance from the road.

I didn’t get to the town for another half hour. I was feeling more and more odd, the closer I got. I had no idea what was causing it, but I’d been in combat. You ignore the little voice in your head at your peril.

Finally, I was standing just inside where the forest started, looking out across a hundred yards to a cluster of buildings. One was obviously a gas station. The four snowmobiles were pulled up in front of it, with one man filling the tank of the third one in the row.

It didn’t really impinge on me at first — he was black. A lot of our men had been black; it didn’t seem remarkable.

Another black man came out of the largest building. His voice was as clear as a bell. “If you want some slash, man, you gotta hurry. Ali’s wasting them like there’s a million more!” He laughed.

Hey, I had my pistol in my pocket. It came up, unbidden, and fired. The speaker went down in a sodden heap. The fellow fueling the vehicles rolled his AK off his back and started spraying.

I shot him. It’s spray and pray, you idiot, I thought. You forgot to pray.

Quite suddenly, the forest sighed. There’s no other description that fits. The sky turned a sickly yellow — and the forest sighed. I looked around, unsure.

Then it came. Wind. Wind like I’d never known. It knocked me flat.

The sensations I experienced then were actually worse than I’d felt in my short flight. The pressure seemed to let up for a second, and I scuttled forward on all fours. I aimed for the back of the main building. Honestly, the pressure was less in that direction.

The forest had changed. In the first puff of air, small branches and leaves flew. As the pressure increased, larger things were out and about.

Visibility that had been two hundred yards narrowed quickly. Narrowed all the way to zero.

I had a picture in my mind of a door at the rear of the building. I crawled towards the door, so dazed I never thought of crossing my fingers.

What kept me alive? The door was aligned with the wind direction. It was simple and effortless to go in the direction I was pushed.

I was lucky. I reached the building about ten yards from the door. I realized that if I’d been off that much in the other direction, I’d still have been going when it was too late.

Too late? I realized that the temperature was dropping. I reached the door and guessed right — it opened outwards.

I crawled inside and realized that I still couldn’t see. The power was evidently out. I felt to my right and felt a cold metal surface. Evidently a freezer or fridge. The kitchen! The room was pitch black, not the least bit of light.

Around me, the building was creaking and groaning. The temperature was still, I thought, plummeting. Mentally, I stood and saluted in O’Malley’s direction. It was past noon; his fire was likely out. He would die long before I could get to him, even with an unhindered path.

My jaw clenched. These clowns had just killed a man I served with. The mujahideen who had killed Patty and the rest of them had escaped in the confusion of my rescue. That wasn’t going to happen today.

I rose to a crouch, looking for any trace of light. There was none, just the wind and the creaks and groans from the building I was in. I felt around with my hands and swung my legs around in small circles.

There was a long table down the center of the room. To my left, it was noticeably warmer, obviously the stoves and ovens. Along the other wall were sinks.

It was a smaller kitchen than I had expected. With two walls known, the door to the outside behind me, I carefully explored the remaining wall. There was another table on the left side, with something that I thought was either a meat slicer or a KitchenAid product of some sort.

There was a door on the right. Yeah, it was a standard restaurant kitchen swinging door. There was clearly a diamond-shaped window at eye level. I studied it carefully, looking for any trace of light. I didn’t see any. I pushed on the door and opened it about an inch, listening hard.