David Golemon - Primeval

"I believe I am beginning to know how you think, Colonel Collins; as they say, know one's antagonist and you shall know yourself."

"Word games at this stage of the trip, Henri?" Jack said still hearing the rush of wind through and around the trees, his eyes moving at every twitch of movement.

"Yes, I do play games, except at this very moment, I am not. You, Colonel, are thinking about ordering everyone here to remain, while you, afraid for their safety, and ever the good commander are going to go it alone, as you Americans are fond of saying."

Collins kept his features neutral, but knew the Frenchman was far more intelligent than his file said he was. Director Compton had tried many times to tell him that, but Jack had always figured one way or another, Farbeaux could be outsmarted. He was now learning that little task may not be possible.

"If you attempt to go into this wilderness alone, you will die, and your sister will perish with you. It's that simple, Colonel. And I dare say that I will not get my reward for you playing the hero, and your own people will nod and agree to do what you order them to do, but in the end they will follow you after you have left. So, let's save us some time here, and not even bring that suggestion up."

"If you're going to follow those bastards, everything you need is in that supply shed in the back. All of my son's guide equipment is in there. He had a small arsenal of hunting rifles and ammunition — he stocked up seeing the fact that we don't live right down the street from Walmart."

Jack and Farbeaux had not noticed the old woman and her granddaughter as they stood just inside the door. Punchy was there also, wrapping his right hand with gauze. He acted as though he didn't care to hear what was being discussed.

"I'm thinking that we should use a boat to get down river and get some authorities in on this," Collins said, more of a test for the grandmother than a statement of what he was truly thinking.

"Authorities?" the old woman said with a smirk. "They killed all the authorities north of Jackson's Bluff if you hadn't noticed." Marla placed a hand on her grandmother's arm and tried to get her to calm down. "I don't fancy leaving them Russians to the authorities. You seem like people who have dealt with this sort of thing before; just do what it is that comes naturally to you folks. I want those pigs out of those woods."

"We'll need most of what you have if we are to go north," Farbeaux said before Jack could say anything.

"You can have everything we can spare. While you are gone, I will send some of the boys down river to round up whatever 'authorities' they can find, and get them up here as soon as they can."

Jack nodded at the old woman as she gestured for them to come back inside. "C'mon, we have a hand-drawn map in here that's more accurate than anything you boys have studied, and I think I know where those bastards are heading."

Sarah, Mendenhall, and Charlie saw what was happening, and followed the four people into the store. Jack turned and saw them.

"Start getting enough food for at least five days — move!"

They quickly started following Jack's determined orders.

Collins turned away and saw that Marla had stayed and waited for him.

"My grandmother is determined to give you a fighting chance; she's angry and maybe should stop to think about what it is she is doing. Where you are going, the land is unforgivable. More than a few dozen have gone up the Stikine in just my lifetime and never came back. And that was without people out there that wanted to kill them."

Collins didn't say anything.

Marla held eye contact for a moment, and then stepped aside when she saw the determination in Jack's eyes. She lowered her head and then saw Mendenhall taking several canned goods from the shelf.

"Put those down, you'll have to travel light because we only have two boats in the shed. The freeze-dried stuff is back here, enough to feed an army."

Mendenhall, arms brimming with canned soup, salmon, and chili, looked deflated. He glanced over at Sarah and they both rolled their eyes.

"I could have gone all year without hearing that you carried freeze-dried rations." Mendenhall slowly started placing the delectable canned goods back on the shelf.

"Someday, we have to buy stock in the companies that make that crap," Sarah said as she, too, started placing cans back where she had gotten them.

"I kind of like the freeze-dried food," Charlie Ellenshaw said looking around and pushing his glasses back up to the bridge of his nose as he saw Mendenhall shaking his head.

"Why doesn't that surprise me, Doc?"

"Now, we are here," the old woman said pointing to the fishing camp. "You won't have to cross the river; stay on this side, and you'll end up on the northern Stikine all the way up to where those people may be."

Jack watched as her finger pointed to the rounded bend in the Stikine more than a hundred and twenty miles north of their current location.

"And how do you know that is where they'll be?" Collins asked.

The grandmother turned to face the Frenchman, the American, and the Canadian. "Because that's where that damn L. T. Lattimer said he found his gold — that is what they are after, right?"

"I didn't think Lattimer was that well known," Punchy said as he popped four aspirin into his mouth.

The old woman smiled as she turned fully to face the others. They all could see that at one time in her life, the heavyset jovial lady had been as beautiful as her young granddaughter, but age and time had caught up with her, but to her credit, she looked as if she really didn't care that her looks were gone. She looked around until she saw the thin man she had seen enter the store. Charlie Ellenshaw was looking at a large can of bug repellant, reading the ingredients closely.

"L. T. Lattimer was an arrogant, untrustworthy man who was a cancer to this part of the Stikine, a most unreliable sort. We learned of his possible fate from that tall and soaked drink of water right there," she said pointing from the back room to where Charlie stood.

Ellenshaw scratched his butt and then felt the eyes on him. He turned and saw everyone in the small office looking his way. He turned his head, thinking that someone was behind him, and then he realized it was indeed himself that was the center of attention. He was about to ask what it was he had done, when he saw the old woman. He squint his eyes and then recognition lit his features.

"That's right, you — I remember everything. The way you came back here with the rest of those hippie boys and girls, talking about Lattimer."

Charlie placed the bug repellent down and nervously smiled. "I remember you. You warned us to watch ourselves with Lattimer. I also told you about the animals that lived in that area. You didn't ever deny that anything that remarkable could live there."

Charlie swallowed as the memory of those days returned. He shook his head and felt weak in the knees.

"As I was saying, he knows more about that area than I do."

"Tell me, madam, did anyone ever go back and look for Mr. Lattimer?" Ellenshaw asked, getting himself back under control.

"My boy spent a month looking for L. T. and never found a thing. Never found your monsters, either," she said turning back to Charlie.

Ellenshaw looked down at the floor, still feeling the others looking at him. He knew they weren't believers in his story of what the world called Bigfoot that inhabit this part of the world, but he didn't care, either; he knew what he had experienced that summer in 1968.

"It's okay, boy, you did real good back then just getting the rest of those students out of there, and back down the river, that's more than most would have done. You have nothing to prove to me," she said and when Charlie looked up at her, she winked. That made him feel better and he looked away, embarrassed.