Chapter 2

I guess "What in the fuck am I gonna do now?" isn't much of a question to ask yourself, but it was all I could come up with at the moment. I knew something was rotten in Denmark, or somewhere around where I'd been last night anyway.

Now that the fucking long toothed monster wasn't stealing my attention, I remembered the trees I'd seen outside this morning weren't even pines. I hadn't seen a damned pine tree at all. They were all oaks, hickories, or other hardwoods. No doubt I could walk as far as I wanted to and not find my damned pickup either. I was going to try it though - as soon as I had a better idea where the cat got off to.

Karen's behavior was odd as hell too, since the thunderstorm at least. I mean, I wasn't a bit upset about her getting naked and wanting to play hide the weenie most of the night, but she hadn't seemed nearly that hot to trot previously, and I hadn't even known her very long. And that's another thing; I'll swear she looked exactly like she knew what was going to happen just before she went up in smoke, or whatever she did.

Right about exactly now I started worrying over my own ass. I was a big man for sure and I was usually confident I could take care of my self, but that didn't include against ice age monsters. That's exactly what the cat had been too. A monster if there ever was one.

It doesn't sound so frightening when you call it a cat, but cat doesn't do it justice. It was a gigantic slavering monster with teeth and claws that could have ripped me to pieces if it had ever got a hold.

Seeing as how the only useful things I had on my person were a Bic lighter and a Buck knife I just remembered was in my pocket, I felt ill equipped for making a living in a cave, or even for staying alive in it. I needed to make some kind of weapon and see if I could find my pickup and a way out of here. First thing was going to be a fire in the entrance to this cave so other visitors would know the welcome mat was not out.

I went outside and started picking up squaw wood, fast. I didn't start the fire right away because the entrance wasn't that wide and I didn't want to get singed every time I came back with more wood. Of course squaw wood was all I cold get because my three-inch-blade Buck knife wasn't up to felling any trees. The best I could hope for out of it was sharpening the end of a stick. I figured that would be my next project.

Even if I was only half a mile from the biggest town in Texas, which I doubted, I still wasn't going one fucking place without some type of weapon. I didn't even dream I could protect myself from what I'd seen outside with a sharp stick, but I knew for certain I couldn't without one, and it was the only kind of weapon I figured I could make quickly.

I mean sure, with enough time I might be able to whittle out a crude bow and some arrows, but I damned sure hoped I wasn't going to be here, wherever here was, for that long. Not to mention I didn't have any idea what to do for a bow string. I couldn't whittle that.

Once I thought I had gathered enough wood to last for a while I started the fire by lighting a small twig and using it as a king sized match. I was careful not to let the twig go out because who knew how long the Bic would be the only way I had to defend myself at all. It was a full size Bic but it still wasn't going to last from here on.

As soon as the fire was doing well on its own I noticed I'd made a fuck-up in the placement. Some of the smoke was drifting back into the cave. I had vision of being forced out of my mostly safe cave by billowing smoke. Watching carefully I could see the smoke was not accumulating, but was drifting up to the cave's ceiling, such as it was, and then disappearing. I hoped that was good news. It was probably creating a smoky finger outside pointing right down to me, but I couldn't think of one thing wrong with someone finding me.

The fire put a little more light on the subject and it reminded me I hadn't done much looking around inside the cave. I remembered putting my rechargeable flashlight into the picnic basket yesterday afternoon before we left the pickup for our walk in the woods and so I went to see if I could dig it out.

After I found the flashlight I had a decision to make. I'd had it for a couple of years and was familiar with it by now. To charge, it plugged directly into a wall socket. That was great because it never needed batteries and it would last about three hours if fully charged. Since I'd pulled it straight from the wall plug before I left to get Karen yesterday I figured I had three hours of light. Did I want to use some of it now while exploring the cave?

Might as well. I should at least know what my new hideout was like back in the dark parts. When I turned the flashlight on I noticed the cave was much larger than I'd thought. It probably had around ten thousand square feet of usable floor space and the floor was surprisingly level and regular.

"That ain't natural," I thought.

Still, it was to my advantage. Another oddity was a surprising hole near the rear. Actually there was a sort of rocky partition that separated an almost closet like area. It hid the hole in the floor and there was also a small stream trickling down one of the walls. It ran into a little basin like projection from the partition wall and when it overflowed it ran down into the hole. There was a fairly good amount of water flowing, and I realized it would be handy as hell if it tasted decent and didn't contain anything harmful.

Well, it wasn't what I'd call an overwhelming stroke of luck, but it would be handy. Of course, I didn't have a way in hell of testing for contamination except trial and error. I took a small sip and waited. At least it had tasted like good fresh water.

While I was at it I took a leak in the hole. That could come in handy too if it was deep enough to keep what I put in there gone for good. I tossed a pebble in it and I could hear it crashing against things for several seconds before I couldn't hear anything else out of it. The hole was surely deep enough for an indoor outhouse.

That was about the extent of the lucky discoveries, except for the surprising amount of space available to me. The small entrance was nice too, since it wouldn't require more than a good fire to keep animals from wandering in. Still, it was a suspiciously convenient place for me to stay and with the other weird things, like the disappearing Karen, it made me feel a little spooky. Besides, a place to stay was the least of my worries right now. What I wanted was a way to leave.

I put my flashlight and picnic basket on the handy ledge we'd used to hang our wet clothes on and then slipped out beside the fire. I needed a weapon of some type and two wouldn't hurt me. I lucked out and found a broken off piece of oak limb from a big tree. It was about two feet long and around three inches in diameter. It would make a good club, especially after a little Buck knife work.

There were several saplings that might be good spears someday but I had no way to cut them down. Finally I picked one that was barely big enough to make a spear and tried to push it over and uproot it. It was easier than I'd expected, but not a lot easier. Of course the roots were still attached and I didn't look forward to trying to cut them off with my pocketknife.