Falls Like Lightning (2 page)

Silas gripped the trunk of a young pine. Shale slid under his boots.

“Chocolate pudding.”

The phrase bumped its way down the line. In summers past, after long dry-throated hours working in the heat and dirt, the phrase
Watch your footing
had made the easy audible jump. Out of the eight men on their northern California–based smokejumper crew, Silas hiked second from the front—behind Spotter Warren Adams. Shouldering a chainsaw in the back, JD bore the brunt of the tumbling objects.

Warren secured a grip on the edge of a granite outcropping and pulled himself up. Silas scaled the same ledge. Along the mountainside the stone jutted straight up, stretching out in a broad bulwark. Their safest route would be to hike along the side slope, winding up the mountain until they could round above the granite cliff. Slow going at best.

Warren cocked his head, listening.

Silas peered into the smoky draw below. “What is it?”

He put a hand up. “Something’s . . . This isn’t . . .”

The smoke swirled. A strong wind rushed up the canyon. Silas braced his footing.

Warren gripped the rock face. “Fire’s making a run.”

“It’ll bump that tower before we can get there.”

Warren glanced from the gully to Silas, lips pressed tight. “All right. What’s our LCES?”

Silas tied a bandana around his neck. “Lookouts—you’re the eyes. Communications—line-of-sight radio com with HTs.”

Warren set his goggles in place. “Good. Escape routes and Safety zones?”

“Down the opposite side of the hill, away from the fire.”

“Won’t help if we can’t reach the top before it.”

“Sidestepping along this hill isn’t going to be fast enough.”

Twisting clouds of smoke and dust veiled the rest of the crew below.

“No other way.”

“We won’t make it.”

Silas turned to the sheer rock face. He ran his gloves over the granite and swallowed. This wasn’t springtime top-roping with buddies. There was a definite difference between recreational rock climbing and stupid defiance of the forces of physics.

But that tech lay in the fire’s path and time was running short.

His fingers found a hold. Two more broad crevices emerged overhead.

He could do it.

He unlaced his boots.

Warren knelt at the rock edge, cupping his hands to converse with Peña and Tran standing in the smoke below. “All right.” He stood. “Here’s what we’re—What’re you doing?”

Silas tied bootlaces around a shoulder strap of his fireline pack. “I think I can make it up.”

Warren slashed his hand through the air. “Absolutely not. Put your White’s back on.”

“It’ll take a fraction of the time.” He shook off his pack and strapped his Pulaski to it. “I was first out of the plane, right? That makes me jumper in charge.”

“And I’m your spotter. Leave it.”

“Warren, you know we should already be there. Come on, I’ve free climbed walls much worse than this.”

Yeah, right.
Silas watched to see if he’d buy it.

Warren gazed at the rock wall and made a face like he’d stubbed his toe. He exhaled. “All right. But if you get in a tight spot, don’t push it. Just climb back down. I’ll leave Tran and Peña here to make sure you get to the top. Once you’re up, they’ll hightail it along the hillside and meet you there.” He turned and coughed. “I’ll take the rest of the crew to cut hotline below. Try and buy you some time.” He snugged his gloves tight. “I don’t know how many times I’ve had to tell you this. So far you haven’t let me down. Don’t go and—”

“I know. Don’t go and get myself killed.”

Warren drew a breath and shook his head. “I should’ve stayed on the plane.” He leaned over the edge and brought his gloves around his mouth. “Tran, Peña, bump up. Rest of Redding crew, I’ll tie in with you to cut line below.”

Warren disappeared into the twisting smoke. They set off to cut, chop, and scrape away anything flammable in a line between the fire and Silas. Grubbing down to bare mineral soil, their goal would be a firebreak at least a couple feet wide and as long across the hillside as they could get it.

Fighting fire without water.
That
was their M.O.

Silas shouldered his pack, pulled his gloves off, and clicked them onto a carabiner.

Peña climbed onto the outcropping. “All right, boss. What you need?”

Silas reached for a soap dish handhold in the rock. Keeping those guys to baby-sit him made no sense. They’d be wasting time watching him when they could be hiking up the hill. It would take them a lot longer to reach the top, anyway.

“I got this, fellas. Start in on the path, and we’ll meet near the repeater.”

Tran made his feet beside them. “You sure that’s what Warren wanted?”

Silas ignored him. “Keep your HTs on local. If it gets too hot, bump out and cut yourselves a safety zone.”

Tran stared up the wall. “What about you?”

“I’ll beat the fire up there. When I do, I’ll grab the tech and contact you by radio to tie in on the flip side.”

Peña wiped a glove under his nose. “All right, then. Let’s go, Tran.”

Tran stepped backward, spinning his Pulaski handle in hand. “Don’t do anything stupid, Silas.”

Too late for that.

He found his first toehold and began the ascent.

CHAPTER

02

T
he smoke thickened.

Visibility reduced to a body length. A sudden, searing pain burned the back of Silas’s neck. He swiped at it, knocking a firebrand into the air.

Halfway up the wall the rock face tightened like a bedsheet. The holds shallowed out, forcing him horizontal.

He gritted his teeth. Nothing but a churning gray mass below. He let one hand free and dangled it at his side, shaking loose the joint ache and forearm pump. Erratic winds pressed against him, then shifted and swished in the space between his body and the rock. The smoke curtain beside him drew back, revealing a long vertical fist-width crack.

He worked his way over, gripped one edge of the crevice, and pushed off the far side of it with his other hand, directing his force from the center of it outward. He lodged his feet sideways and opposite of each other, the roughness pressing hard against his insteps. He curled his toes along the rock contours. It was a difficult maneuver without any gear—on the ground he hadn’t given much consideration to the weight of his pack, boots, and Pulaski. His arms shook, pain piercing his knuckles. He reached higher up into the crack and formed a fist. The skin on his hand pushed tight against the sides. An anatomical cam. It held his weight enough for him to let loose his other hand and shake it.

Keep moving, Silas. Keep moving.

He pushed on through the punishing next ten feet. Tasking and too slow. Tran and Peña were sure to beat him. What an idiotic choice. What had he been thinking?

His radio chirped. “Kent, Adams.”

He gritted his teeth and depressed the transmit button. “Go ahead.”

“The fire is about to hit our line. How’s progress?”

He lowered his head. His nose ran. He rubbed it on his shoulder and reached up again into the crevice. Deep into it his fingers felt wood.

A root.

He worked his hand around a root that looked to curl down from the cliff top. He yanked hard and it held firm with his grip.

He could do this.

Silas clicked his radio. “More than halfway there.”

“Copy that. Don’t dally. It’s bumping hard now.”

Silas worked his way up with one hesitant hand on the root at first, and then as it thickened he quickened his progress by pulling arm over arm, pushing off the granite face with his feet.

The haze overhead turned a dirty brown, charred wood chips flipping through the air. The root network curved, and soon the grass and earth became broad enough to stand on. He hoisted himself up and crawled to his hands and knees away from the edge. Spot fires from the wind flickered in the grass. The air hung heavy with heat.

He slid his bandana over his nose and mouth, untied his boots from his web gear, and shoved his feet inside them. Pulling on his gloves, he squinted through the smoke. About fifty feet away stood the triangular supports of the radio tower.

Silas tromped through scattered bushes. There his feet met a dirt four-by-four trail. A white Ford truck with a black grill sat unoccupied.

Silas checked the cab.

Nothing.

He scanned the area. “Hello? Can you hear me?”

He tried over his radio.

Still no reply.

A fierce wind descended on the hilltop. Ash and dirt peppered his face. Silas tucked his head and strapped his goggles in place.

Warren’s voice came scratchy across the radio. “Redding Jumper Crew bump out to a safety zone. The fire has jumped our line. Repeat, the fire has jumped our line.”

Heat itched at his neck. Smoke from the edge swirled and ignited in the air, twisting into a fire whirl. The cyclone furnace set bushes aglow. Choking air pressed down.

Silas scuttled to the tower and braced a hand on a steel support member, coughing and hacking. Light-headed, he wiped ash from his goggles, unable to tell if the ground swirled or just the smoke. He stumbled and twisted to his stomach. He scooped a hole in the dirt and stuck his mouth deep in it to suck cooler, cleaner air.

He had to get oxygen.

Just beyond the tower stood a large metal control box.

Silas army-crawled toward it and scrambled over rocks. He collided with the box and shuffled around to the leeward side.

The wind lessened.

He slumped in the sheltered pocket, gasping. His vision cleared. His mind focused.

And there beside him in the dirt lay a man, facedown and unmoving.

CHAPTER

03

S
ilas knelt by the tech and tilted open his airway. A slow breath met his cheek. His right leg twisted at unnatural angles.

Silas looked up at their sheltered side of the control box. A Jeep trail ran parallel to them and across to the far side, where it curved toward the encroaching fire. A quick glance back at the truck showed flames licking at its sheet metal roof and snaking along the underbelly.

With three sides of the hilltop engulfed by fire, Silas squatted low and surveyed his last escape option. He worked his way forward in the smoke, feeling with his boots for the far edge of the cliff. Several road widths away, the ground cut off, diving toward a sprawling forest far below. A couple spot fires punked around in the ground cover.

Silas swallowed against a parched throat. Maybe half a hose length down, the smoke thinned and a ledge jutted out from the granite hillside, a platform big enough for two.

He duck-walked back to the radio tech and dropped his fireline pack. The man’s chest moved with shallow respirations. Silas threaded out a hundred-foot length of quarter-inch rope from an unzipped pouch. He scurried to the nearest leg of the radio tower, wrapped the rope around it four times, and tied it off. He pulled the rope back to the control box and fought for breath, resisting the urge to retch.

An explosion erupted. A fireball mushroomed above the truck.

No time to waste.

Mucus ran from his nostrils, soaking into his bandana. His lungs tightened. He wrapped the thin rope around the spine of a spare carabiner that he clipped around the belt and shoulder straps of his web gear.

This was about as down and dirty as rappelling got. No eight plate. No rack. The only source of friction to keep him from plummeting down that cliff came from a thin rope wrapped around a thinner piece of composite metal.

Silas crouched by the tech. No time for splints
.
He took the man’s arms and pulled up his torso. From one knee, Silas tucked his shoulder toward the man and worked him into a victim carry. He shifted to a crouch, pushed with his glutes, and rose with the dead weight on top of him, thighs burning. He spread his legs for balance and clipped his last carabiner between his pack harness and the man’s belt.

The rope in front of him pulled taut, anchored to a radio tower leg no longer visible. Silas belayed with one hand, keeping the other on the tech’s legs.

Hot wind blew against his face. Brilliant flame lengths shot over the control box, rearing like a wild horse. Silas fed the rope through the carabiner until they reached the cliff edge. A heat wave hit the front of him, cooking his fingers through the gloves and stinging his ears. He leaned over the precipice and took one look down the gaping draw.

He pushed off the edge and sailed down the cliff, rope zipping through his gloves, burning his palms.

Silas fought to slow the descent. He angled up hard on the rope. It twisted and sucked his hand into the carabiner. They bounced to a halt. Silas shouted in pain. His fingers twisted at contorted angles, bearing the weight of them both.

The ledge still lay a few stories below. The figure-eight knot that marked the end of the rope dangled by Silas’s feet. They didn’t have enough to reach.

Silas winced and grunted. He pulled on the rope to relieve the excruciating confinement of his trapped hand. It gave marginal respite. He blew out a pained breath. His shoulder carrying the tech felt numb. They swayed, the rope creaking.

He had to get the weight off his hand.

He reached back to his pack and pulled from it a length of thinner rope. Holding the remaining end of descent rope between his legs, he used his free hand to tie a Prusik knot onto it with the thinner rope, leaving a dangling stirrup for his boot. With some difficulty, he worked the ball of his foot in and pushed up, immediately relieving the pressure on his hand.

Silas huffed in relief. He worked his hand free and the tangled rope let loose, dropping them a foot lower. The tech listed sideways. Silas grabbed him and wrapped his other leg around the rope for stability.

Now to just get down.

The fire swirled overhead. Increasing smoke rose from beneath. Silas twisted around to get a view of the hill below. Ground cover in the once-serene tree stands now erupted in a coalescing flame front. The bushes would soon ladder up the smaller trees to the evergreen crowns.