James Rollins: Ice Hunt

Matthew Pike faced the grizzly from fifty yards away. The massive she-bear eyed him back, chuffing into the breeze. Her yearling cub nosed a blackberry briar, but it was too early in the season for berries. The cub was just playing in the brambles, oblivious to the six-foot-two Fish and Game officer standing, sweating, in the afternoon sun. But the youngster had little to fear when watched over by his mother. Her muscled bulk, yellowed teeth, and four-inch claws were protection enough.

Matt’s moist palm rested on his holstered canister of pepper spray. His other hand slowly shifted to the rifle slung on his shoulder. Don’t charge, sweetheart…don’t make this day any worse than it already is . He’d had enough trouble with his own dogs earlier and had left them tethered back at his campsite.

As he watched, her ears slowly flattened to her skull. Her back legs bunched as she bounced a bit on her front legs. It was clear posturing, a stance meant to chase off any threat.

Matt held back a groan. How he wanted to run, but he knew to do so would only provoke the she-bear to chase him down. He risked taking a single slow step backward, careful to avoid the snap of a twig. He wore an old pair of moosehide boots, hand-sewn by his ex-wife, a skill learned from her Inuit father. Though they were three years divorced, Matt appreciated her skill now. The soft soles allowed him to tread quietly.

He continued his slow retreat.

Normally, when one encountered a bear in the wild, the best defense was loud noises: shouts, catcalls, whistles, anything to warn the normally reclusive predators away. But to stumble upon this sow and cub when topping a rise, running face-to-face into Ursus arctos horribilis, any sudden movement or noise could trigger the maternal beast to charge. Bear attacks numbered in the thousands each year in Alaska, including hundreds of fatalities. Just two months ago, he and a fellow warden had run a tributary of the Yukon River in kayaks, searching for two rafters reported late in returning home, only to discover their half-eaten remains.

So Matt knew bears. He knew to watch for fresh bear signs whenever hiking: unsettled dung, torn-up sod, clawed trunks of trees. He carried a bear whistle around his neck and pepper spray at his belt. And no one with any wits entered the Alaskan backcountry without a rifle. But as Matt had learned during his ten-year stint among the parks and lands of Alaska, out here the unexpected was commonplace. In a state bigger than Texas, with most of its lands accessible only by floatplane, the wildernesses of Alaska made the wild places of the lower states seem like nothing more than Disney theme parks: domesticated, crowded, commercialized. But here nature ruled in all its stark and brutal majesty.

Of course, right now, Matt was hoping for a break on the brutal part. He continued his cautious retreat. The she-bear kept her post. Then the small male cub — if you could call a a hundred-and-fifty-pound ball of fur and muscle small —finally noticed the stranger nearby. It rose on its hind legs, looking at him. It shimmied and tossed its head about, male aggression made almost comical. Then it did the one thing Matt prayed it wouldn’t do. It dropped on all fours and loped toward him, more in play and curiosity than with any aggressive intent. But it was a deadly move nonetheless.

While Matt did not fear the yearling cub — a blast of pepper spray would surely stop it in its tracks — its mother’s response was a different matter. The pepper spray would be no more than a tenderizing seasoning when her pile-driver strength pounded down on him. And forget about a head shot, even with his Marlin sport rifle. The bear’s thick skull would only deflect the bullet. Not even a shot square through the heart was a safe bet. It would take ten minutes for such a shot to kill a bear, and the shooter would be bear scat by then. The only real way to kill a grizzly was to aim for the legs, bring her bulk down, then keep on shooting.

And despite the personal danger, Matt was loath to do this. The grizzlies were his personal totem. They were the symbol of this country. With their numbers dwindling to less than twenty-five thousand, he could not bring himself to kill even one of them. In fact, he had come to Brooks Range on his own personal time to help in the cataloging and DNA mapping of the parkland’s population of awakening grizzlies, fresh out of winter’s blanket. He had been up here collecting samples from hair traps stationed throughout the remote areas of the park and freshening their foul-smelling scent lures when he found himself in this predicament.

But now Matt was faced with the choice of kill or be killed. The cub bounded merrily in his direction. His mother growled in warning — but Matt was not sure if she was talking to him or her cub. Either way, his retreat sped up, one foot fumbling behind the other. He shrugged his rifle into one hand and unholstered his pepper spray.

As he struggled with the spray’s flip top, a fierce growl rose behind him. Matt glanced over his shoulder. On the trail behind him, a dark shape raced at him, tail flagging in the air.

Matt’s eyes grew wide with recognition. “Bane! No!” The black dog pounded up the slope, hackles raised, a continual growl flowing from his throat. The dog’s keen nose must have scented the bears…and maybe his own master’s fear. “Heel!” Matt yelled in a barked command.

Ever obedient, the dog halted the charge and stopped at his side, front legs braking, hind legs bunched. With one resounding bark, he crouched, teeth bared. A wolf cross, Bane was broad of chest and bulked out just shy of a hundred pounds. A short length of chewed leather tether hung from his collar. Matt had left Bane, along with his three other dogs, back at his temporary campsite while he went to freshen the scent lure of a nearby hair trap. The lure — a mixture of cow’s blood, rotted fish guts, and skunk oil — drove the dogs crazy. He had learned his lesson this morning when Gregor had rolled in a freshly laid lure. It had taken repeated baths to get the scent off the dog. He had not wanted a repeat of the event this afternoon and had left the dogs behind. But always his companion, Bane had clearly chewed through his lead and tracked after him.

Bane barked again.

Matt turned to see both bears — mother and cub — frozen in place at the sudden appearance of the large dog. The she-bear snuffled the air. Up here in the Brooks Range, she was surely familiar with wolves. Would the threat be enough to chase the bears off?

Closer, only fifteen yards away, the cub danced a bit on its feet. Then with a toss of its head, it bounced toward them, heedless of any threat. The mother now had no choice. She opened her mouth and bellowed, dropping down to begin her charge.

Matt thought quickly. He jammed the can of pepper spray into its holster and snatched a jelly jar full of blood lure from the side of his backpack. He leaned back and tossed it with all the strength in his arm and upper back. The fist-sized bottle flew with the accuracy of a Yankee pitcher’s fastball and shattered against the bole of a cottonwood thirty yards up the trail. Blood and guts splattered out. Usually two thimbles of the contents were enough to freshen a lure, capable of attracting bears from miles around. With the entire bottle emptied, the concentrated scent immediately swelled out, ripening the air.

The cub stopped its ambling approach, dead in its tracks. It lifted its nose high, sniffing and snuffling. Its head swung like a radar dish toward the source of the delicious smell. Even the she-bear interrupted her charge to glance toward the smeared cottonwood. The cub turned and bounded up the slope. For a hungry cub, fresh from hibernating in its winter den, the reek was a thousand times more interesting than blackberry briars or a pair of woodland strangers. The cub loped happily away. His mother eyed them warily still, but she sidled back on her haunches, guarding her cub as it trundled past her toward the fouled tree.