Hope White - Mountain Hostage

“Did you hear about the hiker who disappeared at Crystal Mountain last weekend?” Bea asked.

“Got buried in an avalanche?” Leslie recalled.

“The dogs found her in less than twenty minutes. Fast.”

Jack listened. He wasn’t much for small talk, didn’t know how to execute it effectively or, for that matter, what the purpose was. Another reason he’d hired Heather.

“I think Cooper’s got something,” Bea said.

The three humans watched Cooper zigzag up ahead. Something sparked in Jack’s chest, a familiar pang whenever one of the dogs caught scent and went into a hyperfocused state.

Maybe this would be an easy rescue, unlike...

Hope dissolved into frustration as the memory surfaced. He shoved it aside. There was no added value in remembering his failure.

Romeo raced ahead of Cooper and stopped, nose in the air, tail up, intently focused. The team caught up to Romeo on the snow-covered trail, where the dog stood over a red scarf. Jack praised him for the find, then Romeo sat, awaiting further instruction.

“Think it belongs to the victim?” Bea said.

“It’s possible.” Leslie reported their finding to Command. “Let’s continue up the trail.”

“If the victim was seen falling from the Prairie’s Peak area, how would her scarf end up here?” Bea said.

“Maybe it’s not hers,” Leslie said.

“Or she was coming down the trail when she fell,” Jack finally said.

The women glanced at him, as if they’d forgotten he was there. Jack liked it that way, dissolving into the background, watching, listening, so he could better understand people.

Another twenty-one minutes passed as they continued their ascent. The snow had let up a bit. Jack naturally hiked ahead of the women due to his tall stature and long gait.

They had gone silent, probably not wanting to interrupt the dogs’ focus, especially now that they knew they were on the right track. Another reason Jack liked being part of this group was the singular concentration required by the work. The ability to multitask mystified him as much as small talk. When he directed his attention to something, it became his sole focus.

Like today’s mission.

“It’ll be dark soon,” Leslie said.

Her words hung in the cold air between them. Although the team was skilled at making camp overnight, the woman who’d fallen and was potentially injured would be ill-prepared for the drop in temperature.

Romeo started a zigzag pattern, then abruptly stopped. His ears pricked.

Jack took a deep breath. Suspected what was coming.

Romeo took off into a full sprint, and Jack followed, frigid air filling his lungs. It was senseless to tell Romeo to slow down. Once the dog caught scent, nothing would stop him. It made him an excellent search-and-rescue dog, but sometimes his enthusiasm made Jack nervous. He feared the hardworking dog might lose his footing and slide off the edge.

Jack pushed harder to catch up to Romeo. The dog was trained to return to Jack’s side and pull on his toggle if he found something. Back and forth, back and forth, until Romeo united his handler with the missing hiker. Instead of exhibiting his trained indication, Romeo frantically paced at the edge of the trail up ahead. Jack interpreted this as him being in scent, but unable to make physical contact with the subject. Cooper ran up to Romeo and exhibited similar behavior.

Jack approached the dogs and glanced at what sparked their excitement.

A person in a royal blue jacket lay on a plateau.

“Good boy, good.” Jack played a quick game of tug-of-war with Romeo as his reward as he radioed Command. “I think we found her, over.”

“Status?”

He peered over the edge, sensing Bea and Leslie come up on either side of him. “Miss?” Jack called down to the prone hiker. “We’re with Mt. Stevens Search and Rescue!”

Silence.

“Unresponsive, over,” he said into his radio.

“Location?”

Jack opened his tracker app, took a screenshot and texted it to Command.

“We’ll send a medical team,” the command chief responded.

“Roger, out.”

The search-and-rescue K9 team hovered on the trail in stoic silence.

“You think she’s alive?” Bea asked.

Leslie glanced up at the mountain. “Depends on how far she fell. If she hit anything...” she hesitated “...critical.”

More silence.

“I’m thinking this is a recovery, not a rescue,” Bea said.

“Miss? Miss, can you hear me?” Jack shouted, not liking the direction of the conversation.

Romeo barked as if he was also trying to get her attention.

Jack hated this, hated feeling...out of control of a situation.

Romeo must have felt the same way, because his barking grew more insistent as if he were saying, Open your eyes already!

“Romeo, stop,” Jack commanded. The dog quieted and flopped down beside him.

Jack glanced at the horizon, realizing they had less than ninety minutes before they lost natural light. Rescuing the woman in the dark would present its own set of challenges.

“Wait, I think she’s moving,” Leslie said.

He snapped his gaze to the plateau. The victim started to get up.

Jack whipped out his binoculars. Peered below. He had to try to get a read on her expression even though that wasn’t his particular strength.

A bruise formed across her right cheek and blood seeped from her lip. Her eyes rounded with fear as if she suddenly realized she was in a vulnerable, dangerous spot.

“Don’t move!” he called. “I’m with Mt. Stevens Search and Rescue!”

She acted as if she didn’t hear him, as if she were disoriented beyond rational thought, which meant she could accidentally fall even farther...

To her death.

“Medics are on the way!” he tried.

Ignoring him, she dropped to her knees and glanced over the edge of the plateau. What on earth was she doing? It seemed like she was trying to figure out how to climb down. A decision that was both unrealistic and potentially deadly.

Then again, she could be dazed from a concussion and not know what she was doing.

“I’m going down,” Jack said.

“Wait, shouldn’t you—”

“He’s right,” Leslie interrupted Bea’s protest. “Who knows what she’ll do? Besides, Jack’s done this before.”

He had done it before, although not with favorable results.

Pulling rope off his pack, he anchored it to a nearby tree root jutting out from the mountain. Romeo shot him a look, like, Don’t go without me .

“Stay,” Jack said, in case the dog got any crazy ideas. He shouldered his pack, gripped the rope with gloved hands and let himself drift so he’d land gently on the plateau, about a hundred feet down.

He wouldn’t be too late this time, wouldn’t let any harm come to the woman in the blue ski jacket.

A few moments later he landed on the small ledge. Her back was to him and she acted as if she hadn’t heard his landing. “Miss?”

Startled, she turned quickly, her eyes wide with fear. “Don’t touch me!” She stepped back, precariously close to the edge.

He instinctively reached out to grab her arm.

“No, don’t—” She stumbled backward over the edge of the cliff.

Jack dove and caught the woman’s arm. It wasn’t too hard, considering she waved both of them like a helicopter trying to take off, or in her case, a woman trying to stop the momentum that would catapult her down a mountainside.

He landed on his chest, and air rushed from his lungs, but he didn’t let go. He grabbed her arm with his other hand, as well. Considering his size versus the petite victim’s, he calculated a more than 50 percent chance of hoisting her safely up.