Wildfire Smokejumper Trilogy

Chapter 4-7

Laura herded everyone through the rental shop. The price for the outing included the rental of parka, snow pants, boots, ice axe, helmet, and crampons. It also included transportation up onto the snowfields.

They hiked through the meadow over to the base of the Magic Mile chair lift, most of their gear in lightweight packs and carrying their coats. At the lift she had them shrug into their coats, despite the warm day. The chair was a quad, seating four at a time and it would be much cooler a thousand feet up the mountain. And the Magic Mile was a fast chair generating surprising amounts of wind chill.

She sent the Austrians and the newlyweds up in one quad, the dad and his kids next, then she took Akbar and Grayson with her. Akbar offered her the outside, but she didn’t want this to turn into a mano-a-mano thing. The slightest shake of her head and he moved to the outside; if Grayson noticed, he didn’t let on. The arm went around behind her along the back of the chair. She had to hide her smile as Akbar apologized for accidentally whacking Grayson’s hand when he casually rested his ice axe between them.

She turned to try and mouth an apology for getting him in the middle of this. He cut her off with an easy smile and some stupid question about the skiing conditions at the top of the mountain.

One thing that was unique about Mount Hood was that the top of the Timberline Lodge Ski Area was open year round. The only area in North America that could make the claim, though the last couple of years they’d had to close from mid-September to mid-October. But the summer ski schools and Olympics training were running hot and heavy this August.

Between them, they kept the topic going for the whole ride.

On the upper stretches of a slope called Kipp’s Run, they practiced rope work with crampons—mostly how not to step on the rope running toward you from the person ahead of you to your own harness. Stepping on your own rope was an invitation to making an expected face plant as it jerked you unexpectedly by the waist.

The top of Kipp’s still had a good thick snowpack, but at lower elevations was completely melted out, so there were no skiers. Their little group owned the upper slopes.

The Austrians and Jeff had enough experience to manage well. And most of Jeff’s tips to his wife were correct. The kids were soon having so much fun that shrieks of laughter were echoing through the crystal clear air. To Akbar, this was obviously old hat. His rope work was at least as good as her own. Though the crampons were a new concept, he had the feel of them far sooner than even the experienced hikers. Grayson was, well, being Grayson.

Ice axe arrest training was always fun. They all took turns. The “falling” person lay flat on their back, head aimed down the slope—the hardest recovery position—while someone else held their ankles. At her signal, they were let go. Once they were skidding along with some speed, which only took a moment on this steep terrain, they’d grab the head of the ice axe with one hand, pull the long handle tight across their chest with the other, and lunge over to jam the pick into the snow. This flipped them onto their bellies. The pick in the snow, firmly clamped by their shoulder, caused their feet to swing downhill. Leaning into the ice axe and their now properly downslope-pointing cramponed boots, they were jerked to an abrupt halt.

Akbar did it perfectly every time once she’d demonstrated it. Even Grayson got it right reasonably quickly. The kids couldn’t get enough of it until the increased altitude combined with having to climb back up to their starting point each time finally slowed them down.

She moved the group to the head of the main slope, the first real traverse they’d do. She set up two five-man ropes. She anchored one and always picked the most able tourist to anchor the other. Akbar was the obvious choice. The only drawback was that Grayson and the family would make one foursome and the Austrians and newlyweds the other. Grayson had proven that he was the weakest, and she hated strapping him in with kids. No matter how she juggled it, that’s the way it came out.

Well, she certainly wasn’t going to put Grayson with Akbar, the man was already simmering. Both she and Akbar had been circumspect, but apparently not careful enough. Could she help it if her smile grew and her body started vibrating every time he got close to her.

So they roped up at the crest of slope, standing in a line along the top. Hers was: Tiffany, dad, Sammy, Grayson, then her. Akbar’s was: Austrians, newlyweds, and Akbar. Each person had thirty feet of rope between them connecting from one waist harness to the next.

“Remember,” she told everyone. “Keep close enough to the person ahead of you that there is always slack in the rope. That way it makes a big loop downslope from you and you won’t step on it.”

There were special duties for the person in anchor position and she started rattling them off to Akbar. His nods punctuated her list easily as fast as she could list them off. He already knew the job.

“If someone goes down, it’s your job to shout ‘Falling!’ as loudly as you can and then plant yourself hard, crampons and ice axe. Even if they arrest in the first five feet, you don’t release until they’re back up and in position.” He nodded at that. She could see the pure professional in him. He was taking this far more seriously than even her grandmother which was saying something.

Then she turned and Grayson was glowering down at her. Upset that Akbar had the anchor position? Apparently Grayson had figured out that was a position of strength and importance. Or maybe his brain was addled enough to decide it was a position of especial favor. He turned and went to stomp off.

But instead of departing in high dudgeon, Grayson stomped on his own line. His forward momentum tripped him on the suddenly trapped line and he went down. He landed on his back and in moments was tobogganing down the slope head first and gathering speed fast. His ice axe remained stuck in the snow behind him. He hadn’t even been wearing the leash to attach it to his wrist as he’d been instructed several times.

Laura barely had time to squawk out a warning before the lines connecting Grayson to both her and the boy snapped taut and jerked them off their feet. In a moment, the whole line was down. Out of the others, only the girl at the head of the line still had her axe in her hands, though she too was tumbling. Everyone else had been focused on roping up and their axes were now dragging along behind them, dancing about at the far end of the three-foot leashes attached to their wrists.

Laura managed to get her axe in position, roll, and dig in. But the group’s momentum was too much. When the line at her waist snapped tight, with the momentum of four people falling, all it did was flip her up and slam her down brutally on her back.

She positioned her axe, repeated the twist and lunge. She saw Tiffany at the far end of the rope make the same effort. But again they were both snatched loose without any help from the other three.

Kipp’s had a steep section that normally ended in an easy run out. Now, in mid-summer, it ended in a boulder field.

She was readying herself to try again when something came flashing toward her.

Akbar, down on his belly, arms and legs up as if he was a gull flying down the slope.

“On three!” he shouted at her as he came close.

She got her axe in position.

“One!” he pulled even with her.

“Two!” he was past her, snagged the line, and slammed it into a carabineer clip on his harness.

“Three!” In unison, they rolled, dug in their axe points, were flipped belly down, and then dug in their feet and leaned their shoulders into the ice axe handles.

The rope snapped taught, slammed the harness into her gut.

She let out a yell of rage from somewhere deep inside and managed to hang on.

She and Akbar dragged to a halt and the rope jerked hard again, then they were still.

Laura was almost sick with the pain of where the harness had cut into her. She kept her face down in the snow for a moment.

“You okay?” he was close, so close. And she’d never been so glad to hear anyone’s voice.

She managed a nod.

“You got the anchor?”

She pulled her face out of the snow and looked around. His face was b****y from dozens of small ice nicks.

“You gotta be more careful about how you shave.”

He raised a hand to his face and then inspected the dots of blood on his palm. Then he smiled at her. She felt the warmth wash away some of the chill of pending disaster.

“At least your pretty face is fine.”

“Rest of me feels like shit.”

“You got the anchor?” he repeated his question. He’d done exactly as she would have, given her a moment to recover before returning to the urgent question.

She looked around to assess the situation. She had to squint because the sun was blinding on the snow; who knew where her sunglasses had gotten to. Tiffany and her dad had managed to plant their ice axes well enough to keep them and the young boy off the rocks. The boy and the father looked about ready to have a breakdown. Tiffany was getting her brother to plant his ice axe and take some of the load.

“Think I’ll offer that girl a job as junior trail guide.”

Akbar nodded, still waiting. Still dug in.

Grayson wasn’t anywhere to be seen. She became aware of the tension still on the line attached to the harness digging into her gut. There was slack in the boy’s rope, so she had all of Grayson’s weight, wherever he was. Probably down a crevasse or a melt out hole. They’d fallen much farther down the slope than she’d ever intended to bring the group. She could just see the other four members of the group still perched at the top of the slope exactly where she’d left them.

“I told them to dig in and not move until I came back for them.”

“Yes,” she focused back on Akbar. A man who seemed to do everything perfectly. “Yes. I confirm I have the anchor.”

Akbar gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder and eased off the rope slowly. The load on her increased, but she could hold it, no longer having to fight the momentum of the racing slide.

“You three hang on there, okay?” Akbar shouted over to the family. “You’re doing great! Awesome job, Tiffany. You were right on the ball.”

Laura put her face back in the snow. The man had saved them, and was now proving he was great with kids. What couldn’t he do?