The Year Without Summer: A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Thriller Read online

  Billy had been trudging through the forest for what felt like thirty minutes before he came across three elk grazing nearby. He dropped to a knee and breathed slowly as he raised the rifle. “Come to papa,” he said, taking his time to get the beauty in the crosshair. He peered through the scope, aiming for a spot one third of the way up the chest to get a double-lung shot. He planned on taking two shots because elk wouldn’t always drop right away. Many had run off, and covered more than a hundred yards before they gave up the ghost.

  He took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he squeezed the trigger.

  The round echoed in the valley.

  Sure enough the elk took off, and Billy ended up chasing it and firing off a few more rounds before it dropped. He had no plans of dragging the whole thing out, he only needed enough to last for a few days, and he’d brought with him a tarp, and burlap bags to store the meat, and some rope to drag it out. The rest he would leave for the wolves. Nothing went to waste.

  Out of breath from chasing after the beast he finally caught up with it and dropped down, placing his hand on the warm body. With it no longer breathing he went about laying the large tarp and then cutting through the hindquarter. He would debone it to take out some of the weight, and then wrap the rest of the meat in the tarp, leaving behind the bulk of the carcass for nature.

  Before beginning he got on the radio to check in with Wyatt and tell him to start a fire. “Wyatt, come in.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Should be back in about half an hour, though it might take me longer as I managed to bag us some elk.”

  “Take your time. All is good here. No sign of rangers.”

  Billy withdrew his hunting knife and started carving up the meat. He hadn’t been working on it for longer than fifteen minutes when he heard the snap of a branch behind him. Billy whipped around to find a ranger holding a rifle on him. He looked to be in his late twenties. Sharp features, a strong jaw, muscular, someone who obviously wasn’t going to be a pushover. His stomach dropped. Why hadn’t he heard him creep up?

  “You know it’s prohibited to hunt in Yellowstone,” the ranger said. “You could be looking at six months in jail and a $500 fine.”

  “It was already dead.”

  The ranger smirked and his eyes darted around. “Anyone else with you?”

  “Just me,” Billy said casting a glance to his rifle that was nearby. The ranger caught him looking at it.

  “Don’t even think about it.”

  “You law enforcement?”

  “What’s in the backpack?” the ranger said not answering his question.

  “Just a few things needed to survive out here.”

  “Which campground are you at?”

  “I’m not.”

  “You camping in the backcountry then?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where?”

  Billy was well aware there were 300 designated spots for backcountry camping, none of which were located in the area he was in. They were positioned closer to the twelve campgrounds.

  He lied and said the one he could remember. “Old Faithful.”

  “You’re a long way out. Toss over your backpack.”

  “No. That’s private property.”

  “So are the elk. Toss it over, and drop that knife while you’re at it.”

  Billy released the knife and got up slowly and walked over to the backpack. It had his wingsuit. “You know I have rights.”

  “So do the animals,” the ranger replied.

  “I told you I found it like this.”

  “Really, then maybe you can explain why I heard a gunshot?”

  “I don’t know, maybe I scared off the poachers.”

  “Poachers?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And yet here you are carving up this beautiful animal.”

  “Well no point in it going to waste.”

  He sighed and scooped up the backpack. None of the rangers knew what they looked like because they’d always made a point to wear their bandannas over the lower part of their face in their videos. If it got out who he was, he wouldn’t just be facing charges from Yellowstone; there would be multiple parks throughout the USA interested in pressing charges.

  Billy stood there staring back. “Look, shouldn’t you be showing me some kind of badge?”

  The ranger pointed to the patch on his arm. Billy held out the bag.

  “Open it.”

  “Not without a search warrant.”

  The ranger made a motion with his rifle. “Open it.”

  “You open it,” Billy said tossing it near his feet. The ranger gave him the beady eye before he dropped to a crouch. All the while he kept the rifle on him as he reached for the zipper with the other hand. Billy didn’t take his eyes off him. He was waiting for his moment, that split second when the ranger would look down, except it didn’t come. He remained focused on him so Billy walked forward.

  “Stay where you are.”

  “Why? It’s a free country. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “Stay where you are.”

  He shrugged. “I’m not the one armed.”

  One thing for sure, he wasn’t going in with him. The ranger latched on to the zipper and gave it a tug. He had no other choice but to look down to see inside of it. In that moment, Billy lunged forward knocking the ranger back. The rifle went off and they began wrestling on the ground for control.

  He knocked the gun out of his hand and they rolled across the ground, getting covered in dirt, leaves and twigs. The ranger managed to get behind him and tried to put him in a chokehold. Billy began coughing hard and he started to see darkness edging in at the corner of his eyes. If he didn’t get loose from his grip immediately it was going to be lights out. As they continued to roll on the ground, he spotted the knife. His hands clawed at the dirt, inching his way toward it.

  Darkness closed in.

  He was seconds away from passing out when he snagged it up and jammed it as hard as he could into the ranger’s leg, then withdrew it. He had no intention of killing him. That wasn’t his way but he wasn’t going to spend time behind bars.

  The ranger screamed in agony and released his grip.

  Billy rolled out from under his arm, coughing and spluttering. He took a second before scrambling to his feet and scooping up his rifle. The ranger looked at him with a pained expression, fully expecting him to shoot. Instead, Billy turned and fled.

  As he bolted, he heard the ranger shout over the radio.

  “Come in control, this is Hayden. I’ve been stabbed.”

  Chapter 8

  Fear shot through him at the sound of Hayden’s cry for help. Logan had been in the process of tracking down Hank when the distress call came over the radio. Hank wasn’t answering his phone, and he wasn’t making any headway getting a bead on his location in Death Gulch. Logan was the first to respond.

  “Hayden, what’s your location?”

  Static crackled over the radio.

  “Just north of Dryad Lake. I’ve activated the EPIRB so the station should have my position.”

  “Roger that.”

  “Logan, it was one of those two assholes. I saw the guy’s wingsuit in his backpack. He’d poached an elk. He’s around six foot one, wearing jeans, black hiking boots, a green Oakley V-neck T-shirt, and a black North Face windbreaker. He took off heading south towards the lake.”

  “Got it. How hurt are you?”

  “It’s bad. My leg’s wounded. I’ve tied it off but I’m bleeding out fast.”

  “We’re coming, buddy. Hang in there.”

  There were three medical centers in the park, one at Old Faithful, another at Mammoth and the third was at Lake Yellowstone. The staff was more than capable at stabilizing patients through all manner of injuries, though they tended to get far more incidents of chest pain and heart trouble, not stabbings. Depending on the injury, they could arrange a transfer to a nearby hospital.

  As soon as Logan finished speaking with
Hayden, he called the closest ranger station at Lake Backcountry just south of Fishing Bridge Junction to make sure that they’d picked up the EPIRB distress signal and that the search and rescue helicopter was on its way. Thankfully they were already on it and two rangers were en route. Logan was currently near the Canyon Backcountry Office so it would have taken him a good forty minutes to get close to where Hayden was, and then another forty to hike out. He figured whoever was responsible for the attack would be long gone by the time the two rangers got down there, however, that didn’t mean he would stand by and do nothing. Unable to help the rescue team he headed for the ranger station in Canyon Village to get in contact with the Investigative Services Branch and get their assistance with the apprehension of the two individuals. Among the many facets of protection that Yellowstone provided, the National Park had its own special agents who were on hand when required. As it stood, they needed as much help as they could to find this guy before anyone else got injured.

  Back in Mammoth, Catherine was dealing with her own battle, in the form of her thirteen-year-old son. “I thought we were going to leave?”

  “I never said that, Jordan.”

  “We just experienced an earthquake and you want to stay?”

  “Yellowstone has them all the time. I need to speak with a geologist friend of mine this evening.”

  “What? We’re on vacation. Is this for work?”

  “No, it’s because of what happened today. Look, I just want to make sure everything is okay. We just arrived here. If things are dangerous, we’ll leave. You have my word on that but I have to speak with him first.”

  Okay so she wasn’t exactly telling the truth.

  “Your word?”

  She nodded. Catherine knew it was risky making a promise. She’d done it before, for his middle school graduation, and once for a track meet — both times she was unable to make it. Though the graduation wasn’t her fault. Her flight was cancelled due to bad weather in Chicago.

  A few hours passed and they spent the remainder of the day taking in a few of the local sights like the Boiling River Trail and the Albright Visitor Center, before cooking up some steaks over the fire, and polishing them off with some cheesecake she’d picked up from the hotel. By the time the sun began to wane behind the trees, Jordan seemed more relaxed. There had only been a couple instances over the afternoon that gave cause for concern, and that was when two ranger SUVs shot by with their lights flashing. She told him that they had to do that even if it wasn’t an emergency. It was the only way to cut through the traffic. Strangely he bought it.

  Perched on the end of the picnic table, Catherine logged into the University of Utah and checked the seismic data for Yellowstone. The data was off the charts for the brief period that the quake had occurred but then had settled. She glanced over at Jordan and felt a twinge of guilt. It wasn’t easy to shut off her mind from work, and even harder after today’s incident. After the fissure in Grand Teton National Park and the swarm of earthquakes, Catherine’s nerves were on edge. There was only so much they could learn from the seismic, thermal and deformation monitoring, more often than not it required getting boots on the ground and seeing close up what was going on.

  “Jordan, do you want to stay here while I’m at this meeting tonight?”

  “No, I would prefer to come.” He looked around and then returned to flicking through his phone. Catherine hoped he would opt for playing games on his phone, as she didn’t want him to be within earshot of the questions she had for Hank.

  Unless there was something wrong with the borehole instrumentation at Yellowstone, the increase in seismic activity was disturbing to say the least.

  If Hank was concerned, she knew that he would have contacted the USGS. They would have been the first ones to have been alerted. Catherine flipped through her contacts looking for the name. She really didn’t want to contact her but she also didn’t want to waste her time this evening listening to lies.

  Her thumb hovered over the name, Rebecca Lyons.

  Chapter 9

  Answers. Logan wanted answers and he’d been told by Hank he’d get them at the meeting that night. It was to be held at the park headquarters in Mammoth Hot Springs at seven o’clock. It had been the second time in his career that he’d been called in to an official meeting with the superintendent; the last time was back in August of 2013 when the Alum Fire ripped through 7,500 acres. What a joke that was. Meetings turned into arguments as forest supervisors and park officials wrestled with the monumental task before them. Hundreds of firefighters from as far as Hawaii and Florida had been flown in to help, followed by the military. That event had been a prime example of how unprepared they were for evacuating visitors. They had to ride horses into the backcountry to alert them to the approaching fire.

  A blanket of acrid smoke had smothered the park and its gateway communities as troops of military personnel joined firefighters and helicopters dumped water. It was a disorganized mess and looked more like a war zone than the flourishing park that attracted millions each year. Back then they were fighting a natural fire, and even with over 9,500 firefighters and 115 aircraft, they still had a hard time stopping the fire and smoke from spreading. It had swept across thousands of acres in a matter of days, and Logan had seen the 200-foot flames force out the remaining tourists. Many of the backcountry fires that weren’t a threat to buildings were allowed to run their course while experienced firefighters put all their efforts into stopping the larger fires and protecting surrounding communities. Backfires were lit. Tourism was affected. Residents were angry, and thousands of firefighters were fatigued. Six days into September and over one million acres still raged out of control. If it wasn’t for the rain that arrived on the eleventh day of that month, they might have lost the entire park, and most of the surrounding communities. That’s what worried him now. If Yellowstone erupted nothing would stop it. Not rain. Not the government. No feat of engineering. And it wouldn’t spread slowly either. If it unzipped the way most expected, thousands within 500 miles of the park would die instantly. And it wouldn’t stop there. Scalding hot ash would move beyond that at hurricane speeds, breaking trees like matchsticks, killing people, plants and animals and crushing buildings. Even a few inches of ash would have the potential to shut down air travel, destroy farms, clog roadways, cause respiratory problems, block sewer lines and short out transformers.

  With all this in mind, he’d already had that conversation with the park geologist and his reply was clear — the only recourse would be to get as far away as possible.

  Easy to say if someone was already out of the hot zone, harder for those in Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, South Dakota and further afield.

  When Logan arrived that evening, he surveyed the concerned faces in the room. In attendance were Chief McDonald; the superintendent of the park, William Harris; geologist Hank Peters; Holly Reed, the head of concessions management; two employees who oversaw strategic communications; and Philip Weston, another park ranger.

  Hank was already in a heated discussion with Chief McDonald, and Harris was trying to intervene. Logan couldn’t tell what it was about but he was fairly confident that McDonald felt his manhood was being threatened. The guy didn’t budge an inch when it came to being told what to do.

  Harris threw a hand up, and pulled at his own tie with the other. “Calm down. Calm down. Let’s not lose our focus here.”

  William Harris was a small, ginger haired, overweight man who looked as if he was one cheeseburger away from a heart attack. He braced himself against the boardroom table and wiped sweat from his brow with a handkerchief. His cheeks were flush as though he’d just stepped off a treadmill.

  “As I was saying before I was rudely cut off,” Hank glared at McDonald, “I think we should contact the USGS to have them come down and assist us based on today’s events and my findings.”

  “Did those findings include the road melting?” Logan asked stepping into the room. All eyes turned on him. McDo
nald was quick to question what he was doing there. Logan answered, “I was invited, and quite frankly even if I wasn’t I’d still be here. I warned you eight months ago about the possibility of the caldera spreading but you wouldn’t listen.”

  “Oh, please, stop!” McDonald said. “Listen, we sympathize with the loss of your fiancée, Logan, and we are deeply sorry that accident happened but that was ruled a—”

  “I know what it was ruled but that doesn’t explain how it happened, and neither does it explain why the road over by Fire Hole is now melting.”

  “I already told you. The roadwork was given to the lowest bidder. There is nothing mysterious about it.”

  “No? What about animals fleeing the park in large numbers, or better still, why did an entire lake of fish die today? Huh? Should we blame that on the lowest bidder?”

  He stared back at them and they looked at Hank. Logan’s eyes darted between them.

  “What is it?” Logan asked, getting the feeling that they knew something he didn’t.

  Hank, a wiry man in his mid-thirties with a balding head, cleared his throat, adjusted his thick-rimmed spectacles and stepped away from a table he was perched on. “I found two grizzlies and their cubs dead over in Death Gulch today.”