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Chapter 8: The Shadows
Every morning Ike made a hash mark on the wall of the cave. Each mark represented a day since the crash. On day twenty-two Zac woke up with the blues. It was apparent from the time he woke up that he was in a depression. He was quiet, an anomaly, for Zac’s exuberant personality. By mid-morning he had already broken down into tears several times. Each time broke down he shunned his brothers and went off by himself for a few minutes to compose his shattered emotions. During their study session he dissolved again into tears and this time when he ran off, his brothers followed.
"Zac, why don’t you tell us what’s wrong?" Ike ask.
The boy wiped his tears and shook his head stubbornly. "Nothings wrong, just go away."
Taylor sat down by his little brother. "Oh, I don’t know about that," he said honestly. "I’d say there was plenty wrong. Lets see, we’re victims of a plane crash..."
"Survivors," Ike interjected.
"Okay, survivors, then," Taylor agreed. "But, we stuck up here on this mountain, God knows where, because we don’t. We’ve got to eat the same thing over and over, day after day. We’re over educated, thanks to a brother that keeps our noses stuck in those books. We’ve supposed to be musicians but we’ve got no instruments. And, I don’t know about you but I miss Mom and Dad and family like crazy."
Zac sniffed and the tears ran freely down his face. "I miss them too." he whispered
"So do we," Ike said.
"But you guys are so older and bigger." Zac wailed. "I’m just being a stupid cry-baby!"
"Zac, don’t you think we’ve cried too?" Ike asked.
"You guys don’t cry."
"Yeah, we do," Taylor disagreed. "Zac, just because we’re bigger and older doesn’t mean we’re not just as scared as you are. We’re just as homesick, and we miss everyone too. But, we know we’re going to get back home."
"How?" he demanded.
"How do we know, or how are we going to get back?" Ike asked.
"Both." Zac ask, his eyes still wet.
"Well, I know we’re going home because I want to go home." Taylor declared. "I want go home to Mom and Dad and Jes and Avery and Mackie and baby Zoe. I am going home to clean clothes and hot showers and salad. Lots and lots of salad and fruit. And a piano."
"And a guitar." Ike added. "And, potato chips and TV."
"And drums, and French toast with lots of syrup, and video games," Zac added.
"That’s the spirit." Ike encouraged. "See Zac, we know we’re going home. We’re just going to take the scenic route."
"Scenic?" Zac yipped.
"Just think of it this way," Taylor suggested. "How many kids get to live off on their own like this. This is an adventure. "
"But, it's your Birthday, and we don’t have a cake or presents or nothing!" Zac complained with a wail.
"Is it?" Taylor exclaimed looking over at Ike. "I knew it was coming up, but I’ve lost track of time. Wow! I’m fifteen!"
"Happy Birthday," Ike exclaimed. "I wish we did have some way of celebrating."
"We’ll celebrate, big time when we get home." Taylor exclaimed.
"How?" Zac ask.
Taylor grinned. "Well just think of all the allowances that will be owed to us when we get back. You can buy me something really big."
Zac eyes opened wide at the idea. "Will we really get all our allowances?" he ask hopefully.
Ike laughed and grabbed his brother in a neck hold and rubbed his head. "I don’t know for sure, but its a good bet."
"Cool!" Zac exclaimed enthusiastically.
"But remember," Taylor interjected. "You owe me a big present!"
"Just point me to a mall!" Zac laughed. "Video games here I come."
Taylor and Ike exchanged looks. They had succeeded in cheering their little brother up. Now they had to keep his spirits up. They roughhoused with Zac for a few minutes just to make sure he was okay and then returned to their books.
Ike handed Taylor a piece of paper. "Happy Birthday."
Taylor read over the lyrics and smiled. "This is kind of different. More romantic."
"Its your song, maybe that will get you out from behind the keyboards."
"I like playing piano," Taylor said looking surprised. "Why shouldn’t I play?"
"Because, you’re a much better singer and sometimes you should be in the spotlight by yourself." Ike suggested.
"Ike, we’re a group, a team. Besides I like playing the piano."
"Tay you can put more emotion, more life and soul into a song with your voice than any other singer I know. Once in a while you should step forward and leave us in the background."
Taylor folded the song and handed it back to his brother. "Those words, and that vote of confidence are worth everything to me. That’s my birthday present. Thanks but no thanks, I want to be part of Hanson not a solo. It would be way too lonely."
* * * *
At the High Mountain Rescue headquarters, Captain Monroe had assembled the family members of the passengers of plane AY134. When the group was assembled he regretfully informed them that the daily searches for the downed plane and survivors was being abandoned.
The immediate cry of outrage from parents and husbands and wives was loud and angry.
Captain Monroe held up his hands in defeat. "No one regrets this decision more than I do, but after a while it becomes a matter of priorities. We have searched for almost a month without a trace. Keeping a operation this size going costs approximately two hundred thousand dollars a week and the manpower requirements deplete every other department in the organization. We need those man-hours dedicated to rescue operations that have some hope of success."
"We still have hope of success. What if we finance our own search?" Walker Hanson demanded.
Captain Monroe shook his head at the idea. "Mr. Hanson, I’m sure you can find someone who would offer to continue to provide search services. They would be very glad to extort a huge fee for doing so, but, who are the experts in these mountains? These mountains have treacherous up drafts, down drafts and a variety of other aircraft nightmares. More than likely, we would wind up having to rescue them or worst. We monitor who is allowed to fly over these mountains very carefully. Just because someone has an aircraft license doesn’t qualify them to fly over our territory. We will continue to search, we will not give up, but it can not be our top priority and longer."
"What about our family members?" a woman ask, a sister to the missing pilot.
"To be honest, and I have been honest with from the beginning, chances of survival are probably a million to one at this point. If the plane had landed intact we would have found it by now. If survivors were out there, we would have seen some kind of distress signal or some sign of them. More than likely the plane disintegrated or exploded on impact. Smaller pieces of wreckage are much easier to miss, and much easier to be covered with snow. As I said, we will continue to search, but until we get some breaks in the weather or we get spring thaw I won’t hold out much hope on finding anything."
The group of family members that were holding onto the finest thread of hope, felt it had just had it severed.
Captain Monroe, held up his hands again. "Please, go home to your families, if anything, and I do mean anything of the smallest detail shows up, I will call."
Walker and Diana Hanson left the building undisturbed. The legitimate press had given up on the story. The tabloids were printing stories every week about the crash. They printed headlines screaming horrific details none of them substantiated. Every week the stories were printed, each tabloid trying to outsell the competition and uncaring of the inaccurate and blatant lies that were being printed.
The Hansons went to their own personal refuge to find peace. They went to the small church and prayed, neither had abandoned their personal hopes and their faith would sustain their hope. They would follow Captain Monroe advice. They had four other children that had been forsaken while they remained in Gunnison to monitor the search. Their other children needed also need them.
* * * *
Taylor was trying to move quietly through a patch of brush and small trees, close to the edge of what Ike called ‘the lake’. He had been very successful in finding rabbits in this area. Actually, rabbits were the only thing he ever saw. The trees were too small to house raccoons, and although he occasionally saw nests he never saw any squirrels. In his peripheral vision the boy saw something move and he froze. Whatever was moving was too large to be a rabbit. He turned slowly and saw a yellow-eyed, gray wolf skulking along the edge of the brush. The only time he had ever seen a wolf was on television or in the zoo. Those animals had looked like well kept and regal but this animal was bony and covered with mange. Taylor wasn’t quite sure how to handle this new development. Would the animal attack? Or was it just doing its own hunting?
Taylor watched the wolf carefully and with an arrow firmly cocked in the bow string, started moving forward slowly. The wolf seemed to be regarding him with just as much caution. After fifteen minutes of cautious standoff, the wolf was suddenly gone. The boy exhaled a relieved breath but kept a watchful eye. Any movement in the stillness of the snow was apparent immediately. That was one of the reasons he found it relatively easy to find rabbits. They would dart out of their hidden caches and run around in an erratic pattern for a few feet and then would stop to smell the air for predators. It was when they stopped, that Taylor was ready, he took aim and easily let go of the arrow shaft.
He didn’t let himself think about the killing any more. It was something that was necessary for their survival. Therefore he would do it.
There was no limit to his catch on any given day. The rabbits were small and scrawny, one rabbit for dinner left them still hungry, or they had to supplement it with fish, two was almost to much. Ike would take whatever was left and cut it into tiny pieces, dry it and carefully pack it away in case they needed it later. If he caught more than two rabbits, Ike would clean the extra and then climb up into the opening above the cavern and bury it into the snow. Ike was a worrier, always thinking ahead.
They could have survived on fish alone, but the rabbit meat gave them a little variety. Whenever the boys were out, they searched for any other sources of protein. One day they found a cache of acorns hidden inside a notch in a tree. They took them back, smashed them into a fine powder and made a very bad fried bread that they all ate with great enjoyment. It was a mystery to them where the acorns came from because there weren’t any oak trees at the that elevation. The few trees that were around were small and weather bent and now missing many limbs because they were using them for firewood.