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Post by gipsysmith on Mar 19, 2014 10:41:32 GMT -6
Well that is interesting, but not very informative.
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Post by sh1947 on Mar 20, 2014 5:59:55 GMT -6
It's the first day of SPRING!!!!!! Where is Einar?
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Post by 2medicine woman on Mar 20, 2014 13:27:20 GMT -6
It's the first day of SPRING!!!!!! Where is Einar? He is probably skinny dippin' in a glacial lake.  |
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Post by FOTH on Mar 21, 2014 15:47:19 GMT -6
Well that is interesting, but not very informative. More information is forthcoming... It's the first day of SPRING!!!!!! Where is Einar? He's up where spring doesn't come until the end of May, and the snowbanks sometimes don't ever melt out, entirely! Welcome to the forum, by the way.  It's the first day of SPRING!!!!!! Where is Einar? He is probably skinny dippin' in a glacial lake. How did you know? Quit spying on Einar!   |
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Post by FOTH on Mar 21, 2014 15:47:40 GMT -6
Voices, near and clear and they were speaking English. This stood in sharp contrast to the hushed, lilting whispers of the night, his past day’s musings on Andy and Hyon and the rest of it having brought the jungle to the fore of mind and memory, and in the night—cold and sleepless, but his weariness had served to distort things a bit more than he would have liked under the circumstances—the rocks kept taking on a strange appearance in the moonlight, bamboo over his head, pressing in around him, voices of his captors whispering between the stones and through the gustings of the wind, and he was trapped, had to fight hard to keep from clawing and shoving his way out from under there and take off running for the timber, and freedom…
Now he was awake, terror of the night fading and real danger only feet from the spot where he lay concealed. There were three of them, near as he could tell from a hasty count of legs and feet. From his position beneath the rock he could see no more, work boots, khaki pants and blue jeans not telling him a tremendous amount about the interlopers, but as he struggled to quiet his breathing and still the shivers that had seized him upon waking and were now doing their best to drown out all information coming in from outside, the conversation proved to be quite another matter. Two men and a woman, from their voices, and it seemed they must be looking at a map of some sort. Their words were at first unintelligible because of the wind, but then it calmed down and he could begin picking up snatches of conversation.
“…make another pass over to the West where we spotted…”
“Yes, we have to make sure we’ve covered all possibilities before we move on to the area beyond the lake, because once we move all our ground resources over there it will be hard to…”
Wind picked up again then, and when it again subsided sufficiently the woman was speaking, seeming to have a slightly differing plan which involved “splitting up and leaving four or five of us here, while you move the rest of the camp up to the lake. That way if they come down through here we won’t miss them, but the rest of you can be focusing on the lake, which we’ve all agreed is probably where we’ll end up picking up the signal.”
They moved on then, map rustling in the wind as one of the men struggled to fold it and Einar straining his ears after them, but unable to pick up any more shreds of conversation. Find them. That’s what he’d heard. These people were trying to find them, thought they must be up at some lake but wanted to leave a camp there near the canyon rim, in case they came through… All very easy for a wanted man to interpret as clearly pertaining to his immediate situation, and there were times when Einar would have done so, and acted without hesitation on the notion, but that day was fortunately not one of those times.
Question was, who or what were they looking for. The camp did not have the look or feel of earlier federal search efforts he had seen—and he had seen plenty. All parties seemed too causal, camp left apparently unguarded during the day and quiet at night, giving no sense that its occupants believed themselves the potential targets of an armed and deadly fugitive, as they well might, were they seeking him. What, then? And what sort of danger did the operation, even if unrelated to his presence and Liz’s, pose to their remaining hidden at the new shelter? Would these people, in seeking…whatever it was they sought on canyon rim and at a high lake, be likely to happen upon clues which told them some far more interesting and elusive quarry might be in the area? A whiff of smoke, some sign of human passage seen from above by one of the planes…that was the way things happened. The way they ended, and he knew he must know more about these people and their intentions, before taking his leave. Knew how he had to do it, too.
Having observed the camp through part of a day and an entire night and seen what appeared to be its complete lack of security, Einar found himself leaning strongly towards attempting a quick and very efficient incursion into the place, just far enough and long enough to determine with some certainty the nature and intent of their mission. It would be risky, but not, he was becoming convinced, more risky than returning home without more information.
While he would have much preferred to do it at night, Einar was leaning towards making his raid during the daytime hours when everyone would—hopefully—be out of camp. Should the place be protected by cameras, said devices would almost certainly have nighttime capabilities anyway, and should they be linked to any sort of device which would alert the camp’s occupants upon their being tripped, he might well be unable to make his exit in time. Not without shooting, at least, and if anything would give away his identity and begin an intensive new search, it had to be that! Besides which, he had eaten up almost all his food already, and without anything to help keep his temperature up as he waited under the cold rocks, he knew he would almost certainly find himself too cold and stiff by dark to be remotely quick or agile as he inspected the camp.
Better, then, to do his trespassing during the daytime, if it appeared everyone had again left the camp. Things were looking hopeful, whole place mobilizing with daylight as breakfast was cooked on several camp stoves brought in for the purpose, Einar’s stomach cramping painfully at the smell of bacon and pancakes. He could even smell the maple syrup, imitation, no doubt, a strange concoction of corn syrup, caramel color and synthetic maple flavor, hardly even qualifying as food, but just then he would have been more than happy to lie there under his limestone boulder and drink the entire bottle…
Eighteen, in all, were the camp occupants Einar managed to count after squirming around into a better position and slightly raising his head, none of them appearing too official, with the exception of two men who wore what appeared to be Forest Service uniforms. He found it odd that these two men, far from directing things, appeared merely to be along for the ride. The trio who had conversed near his hiding place first thing that morning—he recognized them by their boots and the bottom foot-and-a-half of pant leg—definitely seemed to be in charge, spreading out maps on a folding table and pointing out to all present some key landmarks which Einar greatly wished he was near enough to observe. A brief time of preparation then, Einar learning-valuable bit of information—that one of the men who had been over near the plane and who seemed one of the three directing the day was indeed the plane’s pilot, for he returned to make a few routine checks on the craft before joining the others and departing off into the tall grass of the high meadow.
Einar was alone then, or hoped he was, not daring to move for quite some time as he lay listening and watching for any sign that someone might have been left behind. After an hour or so—smell of breakfast fading, but Einar remaining hollow and hungry after his long, cold night—he was satisfied that so long as no one remained asleep in one of the tents, the place was indeed empty for the day. He wanted to waste no time, aware that some part of the group might return during the day, and taking his pack along should he have to make a hasty and unplanned departure from the area, he eased out from beneath the boulder, stretching and shivering in the sun while he waited for a bit of feeling to return to numbed extremities.
Wouldn’t do to go stumbling and staggering about as he inspected the camp, making a racket and possibly getting himself seen. Wouldn’t do to be seen at all, he lacking any means to reasonably disguise the fact that he was a scraggly-haired, long-bearded mountain dweller who wore animal skins and ate a decent meal perhaps once every two months—though he did try his best, tucking hair up under his hat and beard into the neck of his parka and keeping his head down as he hurried towards the little knot of tents and tarps, meaning to keep any cameras whose presence he might have overlooked from getting a good image of his face.
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Post by icefire on Mar 21, 2014 20:07:25 GMT -6
Seems like the intruders are tracking animals of some sort...probaby some radio-collared wildlife that have been "reintroduced" to the area.
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Post by 2medicine woman on Mar 22, 2014 0:01:22 GMT -6
Well, at least Einar didn't jump to conclusions this time. He seems to have a few more brain cells online lately. I am thinking that is probably the physical activity has reduced and his eating has been quite regular (for Einar, anyway).
Now, if he can manage to do some spying without getting caught..maybe he will find his answers.
Another good addition Chris. Thanks again for your perseverance and talents.
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Post by FOTH on Mar 24, 2014 15:15:07 GMT -6
Icefire--it would seem so, about the wildlife Well, at least Einar didn't jump to conclusions this time. He seems to have a few more brain cells online lately. I am thinking that is probably the physical activity has reduced and his eating has been quite regular (for Einar, anyway). Now, if he can manage to do some spying without getting caught..maybe he will find his answers. Another good addition Chris. Thanks again for your perseverance and talents. Not getting caught would be a very good thing! Yes, eating now and then is probably helping his brain functions to be a bit better... Thank you all for reading! ____________________ No sign of any camera, or of men remaining in camp, either, but Einar was wary, moving quickly across the open space between his shelter-rock and the first tent, a good-sized wall tent which had appeared to be the center of operations and a place where everyone gathered. Without hesitation—he who hesitates gets seen and identified—he slipped into the tent, blinking at the strange, blue-filtered light inside and hastily confirming that he was alone. A folding table, coolers lining the walls, apparently used for gear and food storage and doubling as seats, but it was the maps spread out on the table which really caught his attention, sectionals of the area, sharp drop into the canyon clearly showing and large areas of the mesa highlighted in blue and green. He could see the lake they must have been talking about, but the thing that really caught his eye was the band of cliffs that reared high and sheer above the far side of the water. There, laid out in blue highlighter marker, was a tight grid which seemed to effectively confine itself to a section of rock no more than a hundred feet in height, and traversing nearly half the span of the cliffs. Each little square had been assigned a number, and on the edge of the map these numbers were listed, each matched with a name. The names, he presumed, of the people at the camp, and he quickly glanced down the list to see if he might recognize any of the names. Which he did not, until nearly the bottom. Darren. A local man he had known from his caving days. That name hadn’t come to mind for several years, not since early on in the manhunt when the feds had contracted with the well-known caver to show them around the limestone bands and cliffs of the high country. That relationship had ended badly, as Einar recalled, and he rather doubted the two parties would be working together again. This has almost got to involve caves though, if Darren is along. What are they doing, scouting for new caves in those cliffs Can’t be as simple as that, not the way I heard them talking about “picking up the signal,” and things coming down from the west and such. Got to be tracking critters, here. Or people. Don’t think they’re tracking us. None of this setup makes a lot of sense if they’re up here tracking dangerous human-critters, the lack of security, nobody armed, the casual way they’re conducting it all. Looking like some sort of wildlife operation, and I’d better be getting out of here in a pretty big hurry as soon as I can confirm that, so it doesn’t accidentally progress to something more! Like it would if they happened to find me raiding one of their tents, and I had to take some quick evasive action…
Wanting some slightly more conclusive proof that the intruders were, indeed, simply in search of wildlife—some new species of cave-dwelling salamander, perhaps, though he had a hard time salamanders being fitted with devices which emitted a signal, and the men had spoken of picking up a signal—he carefully inspected the row of coolers that lined one wall of the tent, choosing one at random and using his sleeve to open it, wary of leaving prints. Well. Wrong one. His chosen cooler proved to be two thirds full of egg cartons and packages of bacon, with ice packs beneath. The odor of the chilled meat assailed him with an almost physical force, and he closed the lid in a hurry before the temptation could become too great. The crew was apparently eating quite well, but that discovery—though interesting Einar more than he might have liked admitting, at the moment—did not solve the riddle of their being on the high plateau, in the first place. The next cooler yielded no better clues, packed to the brim with what appeared to be the remainder of the crew’s food supplies, and Einar shut it with equal haste, pressing an elbow into his grumbling stomach and moving on. The third one—some distance from the others, as he didn’t particularly want to keep finding more food—looked a good bit more promising, its contents packed in plastic and ice and not appearing in keeping with the sort of fare the camp-dwellers apparently preferred to eat. Bats. Dead, frozen bats, at least a dozen of them, each carefully wrapped and labeled with date and location of collection, and—still using his sleeve so as not to risk leaving prints—Einar glanced quickly at each one, purpose of the camp becoming more clear. Tiny radio tags existed, he knew, that could be fitted on birds; there were even GPS tags smaller than a dime which had been used to track the movements of bats, in the past. If these researchers were seeking signals while at the same time apparently giving special attention to the possibility of discovering as-yet unknown caves or limestone features, bats seemed an almost certain answer. Einar’s theory was confirmed when, easing the bat cooler closed and moving on—wished he might take a frozen bat or two with him for his travels, if he could not help himself to a dozen of the eggs in the first cooler, being at the moment quite hungry enough to devour it raw, wings and fur and all, but he knew he must leave things exactly as he’d found them—he discovered on a clipboard beneath a stack of maps a document entitled, Colony Interaction and its Role in the Spread of White Nose Syndrome. Ah. That was it, then. His intruders appeared to be a group of scientists attempting to link the spread of the often-deadly white nose disease among bats to interaction between various colonies, which explained their need to seek out new caves in order to catalog their occupants. Bats. The planes had all been because of bats, and bat researchers, and barring some chance sighting that happened to strike one of them as suspicious enough to report—great billowing plumes of smoke from the area of the shelter, or some such—he figured they had little to fear from these people or their operation. Unless they were to return and find him in their tent… Time to leave, and he was in the process of doing it, making one final sweep of the room to insure that he had not left anything out of place, when he heard the sound. Freezing in his tracks, hand on the pistol in his belt he listened, heard the noise again and this time recognized it as a tent zipper, not, thankfully, on the wall tent but not too far distant, either. Someone, he realized, must have returned early. He took one final glance at the cooler full of bacon and eggs, suppressing a wild urge to grab some of its contents and stuff the down his parka before flattening himself against the ground and breathing a silent prayer of thanks that the wall tent did not have an integrated floor, which would have prevented his leaving through the side as he was about to do. Had to do, for the tent door—closed behind him, and he was glad he’d attended to that little detail upon entering—lay on the side from which the sounds had come, and he knew he mustn’t attempt to leave that way. Could only hope that the early arrival was alone, no one out there to see him as he left. No speaking, so he had reason to hope, gingerly pried up the bottom of the tent wall and turned his head to the side for the best view. Saw no one, knew he mustn’t wait lest the returning party decide to pop into the wall tent for a snack or to do some record-keeping. Speaking of which, there was the zipper again, footsteps approaching the wall tent and without another moment’s hesitation Einar was under the wall and out, rolling quickly to the side to attain a distance from which his form would no longer cast a shadow on the fabric and again freezing, scanning the camp and seeing no one. At first. |
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Post by 2medicine woman on Mar 24, 2014 20:39:48 GMT -6
Ah ha! Bat studies. Now it sounds like Einar might get discovered yet. Maybe the caver will be so resentful of the feds that he will help Einar. (or not) LOL Love the story. I think I have said that a couple times.
Thanks for the new post. I was going into withdrawals. Kept checking and checking.
Be well. Be safe Chris.
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Post by icefire on Mar 25, 2014 21:12:10 GMT -6
Let's hope Einar makes a clean getaway! As for the bats, white nose syndrome is a very serious issue. Back where I was in PA, white nose syndrome was decimating bat colonies in the area. There was evidence that the syndrome is caused by a fungus, but more research needs to be done to determine how it is spread. Hopefully they will be able to pin it down...those bats are mosquito and other bad-bug-eaters without equal. We need them!
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Post by gipsysmith on Mar 26, 2014 10:09:41 GMT -6
Nice to see they are still hanging on but they need time to really start to thrive and prosper free from torment.
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Post by kaijafon on Mar 26, 2014 18:22:33 GMT -6
Let's hope Einar makes a clean getaway! As for the bats, white nose syndrome is a very serious issue. Back where I was in PA, white nose syndrome was decimating bat colonies in the area. There was evidence that the syndrome is caused by a fungus, but more research needs to be done to determine how it is spread. Hopefully they will be able to pin it down...those bats are mosquito and other bad-bug-eaters without equal. We need them! they are actually studying this aggressively at the university where I work. It is a fungus and is spread because the bats "huddle" so close to each other in caves. It was found to be spread at first by 'cavers'. People who go into the caves would "pack it out" on their equipment. They would go cave to cave carrying the fungus spores. Also bats like to breed and sometimes they will breed outside their 'colony'. It gets passed that way also. The fungus actually irritates the bats and won't let them hibernate deeply so they keep waking up and using up their fat resources. The bats actually starve to death. They are trying to rig up a mister that will mist the bats as they leave the caves and come back, which will deliver a "antidote" to the fungus. The bats that live under tree bark and such are not having this problem (so far). So those bats will still be good skeeter |
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