The War on Wildlife is free for everyone, but donations are always welcome! The War on Wildlife is the third in the wildlife series with these characters. If you enjoy this novel, the prequels, Spirit of the Wolf and Thundering Hooves are available in paperback! Click here to see all the episodes plus background information and the introduction! If you’ve joined the novel late, please click here to start with Episode One!
Episode Six – Daring Rescue
A sliver of the waning Harvest Moon provided a faint ghostly glow on the desolate landscape of the Sand Wash Basin as Caleb strode through the cold Colorado night. He shivered a bit as he zipped up the old military field jacket that he had brought home to California from the war years before. He was suddenly aware that he was like a speck of dust in the vast emptiness of the western Rockies, and he reached behind to assure he was accompanied by his trusty knife that he affectionately called JC. Someone asked him one time why the name JC and his brief reply was simply, “Just in Case.”
As he looked around he was struck by the fact that there wasn’t a trace of man made light to spoil the view of the canopy of stars overhead. It wasn’t difficult to understand how our galaxy received the name Milky Way. Billions of stars appeared so dense in the sky that it looked like someone had splashed a glass of milk from horizon to horizon. Soon his thoughts turned to Angie and Jessie waiting for him in the tent, and he quickened his pace. As he fixed his gaze on the trail before him, a pair of glowing yellow eyes accompanied by a low growl stopped him in his tracks. He wondered, “Was a bear blocking his path, or maybe a wolf or a mountain lion?” He knew it was most likely a coyote, but he was taking no chances and veered off the beaten path to avoid the animal with a more direct approach to the corral.
As he strode through the darkness he pulled out his flashlight for a quick look behind to see if the critter was stalking him. Seeing no sign of the predator, he exchanged his flashlight for the trail tracker GPS unit. Muscle memory guided his finger to the on button, and he powered up the device. He stopped and watched the display come to life as a satellite was acquired and his track illuminated. He clicked the zoom button a few times until the way points for the corral ahead and campsite behind were clearly defined. A wave of relief flowed over him as he saw that he was heading directly for the corral with a bright line clearly pointing the way back to the campsite.
With renewed confidence, Caleb charged ahead on his way to the mustang corral. With less than a quarter mile to go according to the trail tracker, he found himself at the base of a steep hill. Undaunted, he moved carefully ahead, hoping there were no unexpected ledges or impassable cliffs to block his progress. He felt safe hiking on the plateau with no flashlight, but now he felt a bit of LED illumination would be a better choice. Slowly he made his way up the hill, looking forward to the moment when he would see the magnificent wild horses charging out of the corral and running free once again.
Caleb stopped in his tracks as he neared the top of the hill. He had been worried that the feds would appear while he was at the corral, but was surprised to hear voices just the same. He crouched to the ground and moved in closer behind a large boulder where he could try to identify the men. Upon closer look, he could see two bearded men sitting at a campfire. They were passing a bottle back and forth, which Caleb guessed was filled with hard liquor. From the sound of their boisterous voices, he also surmised that they were quite drunk. “But what are they doing here?” he wondered. “They obviously aren’t feds.”
Caleb heard one of the men say, “Tell me again, who’s coming to pick up these horses?”
“We have a deal to sell them directly to some south of border rancheros.”
“What about the BLM. Aren’t they supposed to auction them off here in the states?”
“So what, how are they going to know if a few horses are missing. It’s not like they are branded or anything.”
“What do some Mexican ranchers want with a bunch of wild horses?”
“I don’t think they really want them. They sell them to the slaughter houses by the pound. Almost pure profit. All they have to do is send some hands to come and get them. We all make money and the vermin aren’t eating our grass anymore,” the first man bellowed.
“Well how much longer do we have to sit here?”
“I don’t know, they said they’d be here by midnight.”
Caleb looked at his watch and realized he was probably running out of time. He figured the men were so drunk they wouldn’t notice him sneaking behind the corral, but he thought he’d let them finish their bottle anyway. “Maybe they will just pass out,” he thought to himself. Soon the conversation began to ebb, and he heard the bottle hit the ground. He took that as his cue to sneak behind the corral and open the gate. Unfortunately though, the gate was locked with a chain and a padlock. There was a heavy bolt cutter in his pack but this was a big lock. He hoped it would be able to penetrate the heavy steel without too much effort.
Horses nickered as he worked, but the two men remained fast asleep. The lock proved to be too much for the cutter, so Caleb switched to the chain. The steel chain was also formidable, but wasn’t made of the same hardened steel as the lock. Now all that was needed was to pull the broken chain out of the fence, and he worked it through as quietly as possible. However the mustangs were starting to get excited, nickering more and stomping at the hard ground. “Please don’t wake them up,” Caleb thought to himself.
Soon the gate was open and the horses were stampeding to freedom. Caleb stood at the gate and watched as the herd ran past. The quiet of the night was shattered as horses banged into the metal posts in their frantic dash for freedom. He heard one of they men holler, “Hey, what’s going on! Who’s there?”
As the last couple of horses burst through the gate, Caleb made a run for it toward the west. One of the men scrambled to get his powerful flashlight, but by then Caleb was well out of range of the beam. He stopped to listen and try to figure out what the men were going to do. “Will they run for their pickup truck or will they chase me out into the sandy terrain?” wondered Caleb.
“Did you see somebody?” one man said to the other.
“I think so, I think he took off toward the west.”
“Okay, you go after him and I’ll circle around to the north and come up from behind.”
“What are we going to do if we catch him?”
“I don’t know, if he struggles shoot him.”
“Okay,” the other man shouted.
Caleb was well aware the men were drunk and would be unlikely to catch him, but he also didn’t want to give them a chance to get back to their truck and possibly find Angie and Jessie camped up the road. He circled around to the south and back toward the corral. When he reached the camp he ran to the pickup and checked the door. As he suspected, the door was unlocked and the window open. Caleb opened the door and reached down to release the hood latch. He scrambled around front to open the hood latch and quickly yanked the coil wire from the distributor cap. He didn’t want to take the chance of the men catching him and recovering the wire, so he heaved it as far as he could across the road toward the east into some thick bramble.
By then one of the men was already returning, bellowing obscenities all the while. When he saw Caleb he yelled, “Son of a bitch, get away from that truck. I’m going to kick your ass!” Caleb slipped behind the truck and waited to see which way the sheep herder was going to go. When the bearded drunk made his move, Caleb circled around the truck the other way. Just as the man turned around to confront him, Caleb sprayed him straight in the face with bear spray. He knocked the incapacitated man to the ground and delivered a devastating kick to the side of his head. The stunned man lay on the ground groaning as Caleb yanked off his boots and threw them across the road into the darkness as well.
The other sheepherder was soon approaching as well. “Did you get him?” he hollared. “Are you okay, are you there?”
Of course the downed man was unable to answer, and soon his drunken partner approached the truck breathing like a freight train. Caleb hoped he would keel over from a heart attack before he had to deal with the big bearded rancher, but it was not to be. Caleb readied his bear spray, and when the man ran around the truck Caleb blasted him right in the eyes with the wicked mix. The fat man ran in circles cursing and yelling and threatening Caleb, “I’m going to kill you!”
He had no idea Caleb was standing right in front of him, ready with a throat punch that left the sheepherder bent over and gasping for air. Another kick to the side of the head, and the second man was down as well. Caleb quickly disposed of his boots and spotted a cell phone attached to his belt, which also went the way of coil wire and boots. He made a quick check for the first rustler’s phone and gave it a long toss as well. By the time the two would be horse rustlers regained conciousness, Caleb would be long gone.
Caleb once again reached for his GPS unit, oriented himself and began jogging toward the way point indicating the campsite. About 15 minutes down the hill he burst into the campsite yelling, “Pack up girls, we gotta get going!”
Angie stuck her head out of the tent rubbing her eyes, and said “Caleb, what are you talking about. It’s the middle of the night!”
“I know, but I had some trouble at the corral, and we have to get going.”
“Going, go where?”
“Anywhere but here. Wake up Jessie and let’s just throw everything into the hatch. We can sort it out later.”
Angie yelled, “Jessie, wake up, we have to get going!”
“What, seriously?”
“Yes, right now. Caleb says there was troble at the corral and we need to get out of here.”
“I need to get dressed.”
“No, there’s no time for that. Just throw on a t-shirt, you can get dressed in the car on the way.”
“On the way where?” Jessica asked as she emerged from the tent, while struggling to get into a long t-shirt.”
Soon the trio was packed and on the road and Angie asked, “Where are we going to go?”
Caleb handed Angie the GPS and said, “Let’s go out the northeast side of the Wash. We can get on Highway 7 and head back to Steamboat for the night.”
He showed Angie how to work the trail tracker and said, “Find us a road heading east.”
“Okay, which way is east?”
Caleb pointed to the right and Angie said, “I think there is one coming up. It’s about a quarter of an inch, how far is that?”
“I don’t know, probably not far. Just keep an eye on the moving dot and let me know when we start to get really close to the turnoff.”
A voice came from the backseat, “Shit, I need to get some pants on!”
Angie laughed and said, “Now all of a sudden you are all shy?”
“Well, I just feel stupid back here with no pants on.”
Angie handed her a jacket and said, “When we get turned east, I’ll go dig around in the back and see if I can find you something.”
“Okay.”
“Okay Caleb, slow down the turn is coming right up just ahead.”
Caleb made the turn onto a fairly wide dirt road, and it looked like they were home free with only a few miles of wash board surface before reaching Highway 7.
As they cruised through the night Angie asked, “So what happened back there?”
“When I got to the corral there were a couple of sheepherders camped out and drinking hard. They were talking about selling the horses out from under the BLM, and said there were some Mexican ranchers coming with a truck tonight to haul the animals over the border for sale to a slaugter house.”
Jessie asked, “What did you do?”
“I just waited for them to pass out, and then I cut the chain on the gate and let the horses go. I’m pretty sure I saw Swift Thunder in the group.”
“Well didn’t they chase you?”
“They did, but I got them with bear spray. I stole the coil wire from their truck and took their shoes, so it will be a while before they will be getting out of there.”
“They let you take their shoes?”
Caleb laughed and said, “They weren’t in any mood to argue with me at the time.”
“Did they see you?” asked Angie.
“I don’t think so. Once I got them with the bear spay they struggled a bit, but before the bear spray wore off, they were back to their nap.”
“They just fell asleep?”
“Sort of,” chuckled Caleb.
Angie looked down at the GPS unit and commented, “We are getting close to Highway 7, so get ready to turn.”
“Okay.”
Soon the intersection became visible in the glow of the headlights, and he slowed to make the turn. Angie climbed into the back seat to look for some clothes for Jessica, and Caleb settlied in for the long strretch of dark highway into Craig.
“We’ll need to stop for gas in Craig. I guess we could look for a motel there, or we could keep going on to Steamboat.”
Angie replied, “I’m really tired. Maybe we should just stop there and get some sleep. It’s already the middle of the night, and it’s not like we need anything other than a bed to sleep in.”
Jessica added her opinion, “I’m for stopping in Craig.”
“Craig it is then!”
Soon Caleb could tell by their breathing that both Angie and Jessica were asleep. He would probably be sleepy as well, were it not for the adrenyline still pumping through his system from the confrontation earlier. He opened the driver side window to let in some cool fresh air, and set the cruise control for just below the speed limit. He was well aware that there would be animals on the highway at that hour of the night.
Episode Five - Discovery in the Sand Wash ←- —> Episode Seven - Terror in the Sky
