WILDERNESS RAMPAGE

By

Terry Wright

            A mountain breeze rustled the pine trees surrounding Stillwater campground. Sam Mason lit the evening fire, and as smoke leaned across a nearby brook, he surveyed his Flattop Wilderness campsite. Earlier, he’d set up the family’s tent next to his Ford Explorer, which was parked just off the dirt access road. Being late September, they had the campground to themselves. Chilly autumn nights kept less-hardy campers away, and this time of year the weather was unpredictable. However, Sam was a seasoned outdoorsman. He was prepared for anything. As the sun dropped behind Trapper’s Mountain, he settled in for the first night of a week’s vacation.

His wife, Jean, emerged from the tent carrying cups and plates, which she arranged on the picnic table. “Where did those kids go now?” she asked, scanning the wooded hillside.

            “They’re at the pond,” he replied and stoked the crackling fire.

  “Billy,” she called out. “Jan, it’s suppertime.”    

            “I’ll get them.” Sam left the fire and walked a few yards up a knoll that overlooked a trout pond. There he found footprints in the muddy bank: tiny tennis shoes and bear claws. His breath seized as he scanned the shadowy forest, fearing the worst.

            “Daddy,” Jan sang, running toward him. Billy lagged behind, swishing a stick as if it were a sword.

            Sam exhaled. “Let’s get back to camp.” In haste, he led them away from the pond.

            After supper, as he helped Jean clean up, the kids went inside the tent to get ready for bed. A glowing lantern cast their small shadows on canvas walls. Sam smiled at his wife.

            “It’s getting cold,” she said.

            Just then, the rattle of worn suspension springs and a rumbling muffler clamored up through the forest. Sam looked down the dirt road where a pair of headlights bounced in the darkness. Then Heavy Metal music tore through the approaching din.

            Radio blasting, Clem wrestled the Chevy truck down the rutted dirt road to Stillwater campground.

            His brother, Clyde, passed him a bottle of whiskey. “They’ll never find us up here,” he said, referring to the statewide manhunt for the escaped killers.

            “Ma would be proud,” Clem said, guzzling booze. They’d stolen the truck from a fisherman on the Blue River: cut his throat for it. “Too bad the old man didn’t have no food.”

            Clyde grabbed the bottle from his brother. “This is better.” He took a solid swig. “Ma always said the good Lord would provide.”

            That’s when Clem saw the lighted tent up ahead. “Well looky here. Ma was right again. I bet them campers got food.”

            “Let’s go,” Clyde said.

            Stopping the truck behind a Ford Explorer, Clem left the engine running and got out. The knife he’d used to kill the fisherman was tucked in his pants. He felt no pity for the family in the campsite, only rage against society. Ma had taught him to prey on other folks. It was the way of the Lord, she’d told her boys. There were sheep, and there were wolves; it was better to be a wolf.

            When they left, they had a week’s supply of food and blood on their hands.

            The road to Stillwater wound up the Yampa Valley through some of Colorado’s most beautiful scenery. With the sun rising behind them, Paul Barnes and his wife, Sarah, took in breathtaking views through the windshield of their new 35-foot motor home. The turbocharged diesel made the climb easy, and Paul smiled with satisfaction. His one hundred ninety thousand dollar RV was his newfound symbol of success.

            “Did you see Sorensen’s face when we pulled up in this rig?” he asked Sarah for the hundredth time. Their next-door neighbor had scoffed at Paul’s little popup camper. After that, he set out to one-up the Joneses.

            “I love the kitchen,” she said. “It’s better than the one we have at home.”

            Paul agreed. Sarah’s kitchen had modern appliances and spacious countertops and cabinets. She kept it all spotless. They’d worked hard to purchase their new motor home, and now they could go camping anywhere in comfort, style, and safety.

            The cell phone rang. Sarah retrieved it from the console. “Hello, Jeffrey.” It was their eighteen-year-old son calling from Denver. “Yes, we’re having a wonderful time.”

            “Life is good,” Paul said, settling into his high-backed captain’s chair. As Sarah talked on the phone, Paul thought about their vacation. During the past two weeks they’d toured Yellowstone Park and Dinosaur National Monument. Now they had only enough food and water left for one more night. He was excited to spend it in the Flattop Wilderness Area, a place they’d visited many times before.

            The pavement ended, and the road became rutted dirt, proof that rain could turn the final mile to the campground into a mud bog. Paul slowed the rig to keep the rough road from rattling the dishes. After topping a hill, he began the winding descent into Stillwater Basin.

            “Oh, dear,” Sarah said, looking at the cell phone. “I lost him.”

            “There’s no signal up here,” he replied. “Just think, peace and quiet all night.”

            Sarah sighed and set down the phone.

            Soon, Trapper’s Mountain came into view. Storm clouds shrouded its slopes, and nestled in its forested bosom, a wilderness campground appeared. Alongside the road, two thin men sporting beards waved them to a stop. Paul noticed blood on their clothes and assumed they’d been hunting and gutted a deer. He rolled down the window. “You gentlemen need some help?”

            “I reckon,” the taller man said. “We need water.”

            “Our tank is almost empty,” Paul replied.

            “We don’t need much.”

            “Where are you camped?”

            “Just around there.” He pointed to the campground. “Looks like we’re gonna be neighbors.” He smiled an ugly, gummy smile.

            Paul looked at Sarah.

            She shrugged. “We can spare a glass of water.”

            “Sure,” Paul told the men, thinking he’d pass it to them through the open window. But when a sudden gust of wind shrieked through the forest and raindrops started hitting the windshield, he decided to be more neighborly. “You’re going to get soaked. Come in.”

            Sarah opened the coach door. Both men were there in a rush, the smell of alcohol preceding them.

            “Now ain’t this right friendly of you,” the shorter man said.

            Moving to the sink, Sarah drew a glass of water. Before it was full, the faucet spit air. “That’s the last of it.”

            Wind buffeted the motor home. Raindrops rapped on the roof.

            Paul turned around in his captain’s chair. He wasn’t concerned about the approaching storm, or even the lack of water, but he found the haggard appearance of his guests disturbing. “Did you guys bag an elk?”

            “Yeah,” the taller man said and glanced around the rig. “Nice setup you got. Me and my brother Clyde, we been lookin’ for one of these.”

            Clyde drank the water and handed the glass back to Sarah, his round eyes riveted on her breasts. “Will yah look at them hooters, Clem?”

            Aghast, Sarah stepped back, her hand on her heart.

            Clem honked out a laugh.

            Paul didn’t think it was funny. “You guys better leave.”

            A knife flashed in Clem’s hand. “You better shut up!”

            In one swift move, Clyde grabbed Sarah’s arms and twisted them behind her, the glass shattering on the floor.

            She yelped. “Paul!”

            “Drive,” Clem ordered, the knife at Paul’s throat.

            Fear stabbed his brain. “What do you want?”

            “This here motor home,” Clem said. “We’re in need of an upgrade.”

            “Don’t hurt us,” Sarah pleaded.

            Clyde smiled, showing choppy teeth.

            Clem jabbed the knife at Paul. “Now move it.”

            A part of Paul’s brain told him this wasn’t happening; it was just a distorted sense of reality, a mistake, but the point of Clem’s knife was sobering. Clenching his jaw, Paul engaged the transmission and moved the rig forward, thinking he wasn’t about to let the brothers take his motor home.

            In the campground, the dirt road branched off into several campsites, each complete with a picnic table and concrete fire pit. Ahead on his right, he saw a tent and a Ford Explorer. At first he thought it was the brothers’ camp, but when Clem ordered him to drive on, Paul noticed the Ford’s windows were shattered and the tires flattened. The picnic table had been overturned, and camping equipment littered the ground. To him, the scene looked as if a bear had attacked the camp.

            He knew there were bears in this wilderness, mostly black bears, but a few grizzlies had been spotted over the years. He also knew these bears avoided human contact, which left him with only one explanation for the destruction: the brothers, a revelation that knotted his stomach.

By now, the storm was bearing down on them. Rain pelted the roof like machinegun fire. At Clem’s insistence, Paul parked in a camping spot thirty yards from the tent and shut off the engine.

Lightning forked across the sky. Thunder cracked and rumbled away.

Clyde shoved Sarah onto the floor and started rummaging through the kitchen cabinets, sending their contents crashing down around her.

“Hey!” she shouted.

Clyde showed her a fist, and Clem snorted with delight.

Sarah glared at Clyde. Paul knew the look and hoped she wouldn’t do anything stupid.

Clyde turned his attention to the refrigerator, gathered up the eggs and a carton of milk, and then looked down at Sarah. “Fix us some breakfast.” His eyes wandered up and down her body. “Then we’re gonna have some fun.”

“You better not touch her,” Paul shouted.

Clem pressed the knifepoint to Paul’s throat, drawing a thin line of blood. “And who’s going to stop us?”

In defiance, Paul tightened his neck muscles and hissed through clenched teeth. “I will.”

“You’ll be dead.”

“Don’t hurt him, please.” Sarah stood. “I’ll make breakfast.” She moved to the stove, got out the frying pan and a spray can of cooking oil. As she lit the burner, Clem stepped beside her and set the milk and eggs on the counter.

It happened so fast, Paul didn’t have time to register the motion. Sarah had whipped around with the spray can and shot Clyde in the eyes.

He staggered back, hands on his face. Then she bashed his skull with the frying pan. He slammed into the counter, and dragging the milk carton and eggs down with him, crashed to the floor in a heap.

Clem sprang to his brother’s aid. At the same moment, Paul flew from his captain’s chair and tackled him. Clem’s head hit the counter on the way down.

Thunder boomed.

Heart racing, Paul got up, looked at both unconscious men, and then at the fierce glare in Sarah’s eyes as she held the frying pan over her shoulder like a baseball bat. He couldn’t believe their good fortune and started laughing.

“My kitchen is wrecked,” Sarah said, nearly in tears. “Why are you laughing?”

“You did good, honey,” he replied, and still chuckling, pried the frying pan handle from her grip. “Let’s get out of here.” He picked up Clem’s knife and noticed it was smeared with dried blood. Feeling suddenly ill, he realized how close they’d come to death. He set the knife on the counter and looked down at the brothers. “Help me put out this trash.”

Sarah opened the door. Driving rain came down in sheets. Torrents of water ran every-which-way, growing in depth and intensity, transforming dirt into mud. Paul feared he didn’t have much time before the road out would be impassable. He dragged the brothers to the door and shoved them outside. Expecting the rain to revive them quickly, he slammed the door, locked it, and jumped into his captain’s chair. Engine running, he threw the transmission into reverse and gunned the throttle.

The heavy rig moved twenty feet before its rear wheels bogged in the mud. Tires spun. Paul’s stomach clutched. He shifted to drive and revved the engine, rocking the rig forward, and then he slammed reverse and rocked it backward. The tires only spun, again and again, forward and backward, digging deeper and deeper until the motor home listed to the left and stalled. “Oh, no!”

Just then, there was a thump on the windshield. Clyde’s hairy face appeared, pressed against the rain-slicked glass, his demonic eyes blazing with anger. Teeth bared, he pounded his fists on the thick glass. Then Clem banged on the door, banging and banging, the handle jumping, the lock straining. Rain rattled on the rig loud as hail on a tin roof. Thunder cracked and boomed.

Sarah put her hands over her ears and screamed.

In desperation, Paul went for the cell phone, dialed 911, but got nothing.

Outside, Clem cackled like a hyena. “You’re both dead,” he shouted. “We’re gonna starve you out. You got no food left, no water. You’ll die with empty bellies, and for what, this here motor home? It’s gonna be ours anyway.”

Paul and Sarah trembled and clung to each other as Clyde pounded on the windshield, screaming obscenities.

The first night it snowed. Two days passed, then three, and now it was the fourth day of the siege. It had rained every afternoon. Temperatures plummeted at night, but Paul knew there was plenty of heating gas in the propane tank mounted under the rig. They were warm enough, though a brutal hunger burned in their stomachs. Thirst parched their lips. On top of that, the toilet tank had overflowed, tainting the air with the foul odor of an outhouse.

They sat on the canted kitchen floor, their backs propped against the cabinets, and took turns guarding the door. Paul wanted to sleep, but outside, the brothers sat at their campfire fifty feet away, playing loud music, drinking, and making merry. He thought it was a psychological ploy but swore it wasn’t going to work. The brothers weren’t getting his motor home.

Then oddly, scratching sounds came from outside the door. Wheezing came next, then a guttural snort.

The hair on the back of Paul’s neck tingled.

Sarah flinched. “What was that?”

“Shh.” Paul crouched, made his way to the door and peeled back the window curtain. Outside, the brothers’ campfire lit the night with a flickering glow. Flames backlit their silhouettes and illuminated a Chevy pickup. “I can see them both.”

More scratching came at the door.

“What is it?” Sarah whispered.

“I can’t see...”

With a roar, window glass exploded in his face. Gaping jaws and ivory fangs snapped thin air. He leaped back, his heart seizing with fright.

Sarah screamed.

A bear’s face had breached the opening: coal black eyes framed in brown fur, saliva slinging to and fro. The rig teetered under the grizzly’s ferocity and weight. Paul feared they’d be torn to pieces before they could make it to the rear emergency exit window. However, the moment of panic passed as he realized the bear couldn’t force its bulk through the small window frame. Choking down fear, he grabbed Clem’s knife and stabbed the bear’s mouth. The blade clicked on thrashing teeth and sliced its tongue. Roaring, the bear backed out and lumbered off into the darkness.

“Paul...your face!” Sarah cried.

He wiped trickles of blood from his left cheek. “I don’t understand why the bear did that. Normally they stay clear of humans. They’re hardly ever seen.”

“Something has it riled,” she replied, dabbing a towel to his cuts.

“I wonder what that could be.” Paul moved again to the busted-out window, this time cautiously staying back, every nerve in his body on high alert. He couldn’t see the brothers anywhere, but he heard them shouting inside the pickup, a meager fortress, Paul knew, in light of the damage to his motor home.

Returning to Sarah, he said, “The fire is keeping the bear away from the brothers’ camp. They’ll be passed out drunk by dawn.” He handed her the knife and pocketed the cell phone. “Come first light, I’m going up the road where I can get a signal.”

“But what about the bear?”

He held her shoulders and looked into her eyes. “It’s probably on the other side of the ridge by now.” A lame probability, he knew, but he had to ease her fears.

“Don’t leave me alone.”

“You have to watch the fort,” he said. “Besides, it’s the only way we’re going to get out of here.”

She put the knife aside. “Forest rangers are bound to come around soon.”

“We can’t count on them,” he said. “They make their rounds only once a month during the off-season.”

“You mean we’re on our own up here?”

“Yes.”

She slumped to the floor and glanced around her kitchen. “Look at this mess.”

He sat with her. “It’s all fixable.”

“I’m hungry,” she said. “I want to see Jeffrey again.”

“We will.” Even though he said it, he wondered.

“Where did we go wrong?” she asked. “Our beautiful motor home, our vacation, ruined.”

“We’re not whipped yet,” he said, sounding strong for her sake. “They’re not getting our rig without a fight.”

“We’re fighting for our lives, Paul. What’s more important, our lives or the rig? Let me go with you. We’ll hike down the valley...”

“Abandon ship? Out of the question.”

“We have to, Paul.”

“Not if I make the crest of that hill. I’ll call for help: the sheriff, Rocky Mountain Rescue, a tow truck. I promise.”

At that, she picked up the knife. “Then I’ll watch the fort.”

On the fifth day, dawn came gray and fitful. Paul slipped out the door. The mountain air was icy, damp and still as death. Nearby, smoke swirled up from the brothers’ campfire. They were in the truck, sleeping off a stupor. Satisfied, he trudged down the muddy road through the campground and came upon the wrecked campsite.

Thinking he might find food inside, he approached the tent, which was now caved in on one side. Bear tracks in the mud gave him cause for alarm, but hunger drove him forward. As he neared the tent, a sickening stench fouled the air as well as a buzzing sound unlike anything he’d ever heard. Carefully, he pulled back the tent flap. Nothing could have prepared him for the horror he found inside: human bodies, torn and disemboweled and covered with a thick mat of black flies. His hand shot over his mouth. He staggered back from the tent. Now he understood why the rogue bear had attacked them. It had acquired a taste for human flesh. More determined than ever to escape this wilderness hell, Paul returned to his laborious trek up the muddy road.

He didn’t get twenty feet from the tent when a grizzly lumbered out of the tree line thirty yards away. It stopped on the road, sniffed the air, then rose on its haunches and roared. Paul’s heart almost failed him. He knew he couldn’t outrun the bear, so he started waving his arms and stepped sideways toward the trees.

Grunting wildly, the bear reared up and down and pounded the ground with both front paws, a typical display of aggression. Paul wondered why it was so agitated then realized he was caught between the bear and its tent full of human carrion. Fighting panic, he kept moving and flailing his arms.

The bear charged, its fur rippling like wheat in the wind, a beautiful sight, yet terrifying, powerful, and probably the last thing he’d ever see. He fought the urge to run, knowing it would only trigger the bear’s instinct to give chase. Hot adrenaline spilled into his bloodstream. Still moving sideways and now shouting at the bear, he prepared to drop into a fetal position and play dead, but the path was now clear to the tent, and the bear veered toward it.

Paul made the pine trees, well off the road. His heart beat so hard it hurt. He watched the bear charge inside the tent. A black cloud of flies escaped.

 Suddenly, the brothers’ truck rumbled to life, spun four wheels in the mud, and fishtailed up the road toward him. Paul knew the smart thing to do now was run. Crashing though bushes along the brook, he ran headlong back toward the motor home.

The truck left the road and, careening through the campsites, smashed picnic tables to splinters, bouncing along a course that would cutoff his escape. But the drunken brothers’ recklessness became their undoing when they hit a concrete fire-pit, destroying a tire and launching the truck into a parts-hurling rollover.

Paul kept running. Out the corner of his eye, he saw the bear evacuate the tent and hightail it into the forest. The truck crash-landed on its roof, wheels spinning. Within seconds, the brothers wriggled out busted windows, cursing.

By that time, Paul had reached the motor home. Sarah flung open the door. He leaped inside, collapsed on the sloping floor, and gulped thin air. “Did you see that?”

“I don’t understand.” She locked the door and dropped beside him. “The bear ran inside the tent. Why?”

The explanation was simple, he thought. The bear only wanted its easy meal, but Paul couldn’t tell her that it was feeding on a young family. “I don’t know,” he said instead.

“Please get us out of here.”

At that, Paul struggled to his feet and made his way into the tilted captain’s chair. He started the engine and again tried to free the rig from the mud, but to no avail. Defeated, he shut off the engine.

With a startling bang, a rock cracked the windshield. Then one after another, rocks began bashing the rig. He figured Clem and Clyde had gone completely mad. Now more than ever, the brothers needed the motor home. It was the only operable vehicle and the only haven from the bear.

“Give it up,” Clyde shouted and heaved a rock.

A window shattered in back. Paul jumped from his seat and stumbled to the bedroom to inspect the damage. Shards of glass lay strewn across the slanted bed; a rock rested on a pillow. He looked at the broken window, which was sectioned off in steel-framed panes as a deterrent to burglars. A release latch allowed the removal of several panes at once, making an emergency exit possible.

Again, a rock slammed in, smashing a lamp. Paul bent to the hole of glass and shouted, “You’re not getting our motor home.”

“It’ll be junk when we’re through with it!” Clyde threw another rock.

“Stop it,” Sarah shouted.

Clem joined his brother, rock in hand. “We’ll make you a deal,” he said. “Give us this here motor home, and we’ll let you walk away.”

Clyde laughed. “Sounds like a no-brainer to me.”

            Paul looked at Sarah. The thought of giving up sickened his stomach, but her pleading eyes told him she’d rather take the deal than fight any longer. He had to admit, victory seemed hopeless. However, he was sure the brothers wouldn’t risk letting them leave and alert the authorities; and even if they did, there was still the rogue bear out there with a taste for human flesh. He turned again to the broken window. “We’re staying.”

            Sarah gasped. “How will we survive?”

            “This is the safest place on the mountain.”

            The brothers started throwing rocks again, an insane bombardment that went on for hours.

The sun rose on the seventh day. Paul hadn’t slept all night. The brothers had built a fire ten feet from the motor home and kept it stoked with plenty of logs. Every time something had spooked them, they’d scrambled up the luggage ladder to the sloping roof. They’d kept watch in shifts, ate and drank in plain view of their captives, and taunted them with rocks and threats. Paul didn’t think he could stand another day of it. Hoping for a solar flare or an act of God, he tried the cell phone again, but he got no signal and put it back in his pocket.

Sarah stirred on the floor beside him. Her skin was pale, her eye sockets dark and baggy. Air wheezed through cracked lips. “We’re never going to see Jeffrey again,” she said softly.

“Don’t talk like that.”

“We’re dying, Paul.”

She was right. At the very least, they needed water. The pond was only thirty yards away, but he knew he’d have to kill the brothers to get to it. Then the charging bear came to mind, its wild display of aggression, its ruse to clear the way to the tent. With that thought, he picked up the knife. “I’ll be back.”

“What?”

He retrieved the empty milk carton from the floor. “I’m going to the pond.”

“Paul, don’t...”

Ignoring her, he unlocked the door and stepped out, brandishing the knife in front of him.

The brothers stood at the fire, their crazy eyes wide with surprise. “Looky here,” Clem said and spit. “A real live hero.” They started toward Paul, arms at their sides like gunslingers, but carrying rocks instead of revolvers.

“Stay back,” Paul rasped, lunging forward with the knife.

They didn’t even flinch, just grinned and kept coming.

By the time he realized his ruse wasn’t going to work, Sarah stepped out the door with a kitchen knife in hand. “You’ll have to fight us both,” she croaked and stumbled the few steps to Paul’s side.

“Go back inside,” he shouted hoarsely.

“We’ll do this together,” she said.

“But...”

Clem reared back and threw a rock. It came at the speed of a pitched baseball, striking Sarah’s arm. She hollered and dropped the knife. Now Clyde cocked his arm and let loose a rock, which just missed Paul’s head as he bent to catch Sarah’s sinking body. He dropped the knife and milk carton in favor of having both hands free to help his wife.

The next few seconds were complete chaos, a hail of rocks bashing them with fury as he rushed Sarah back into the motor home and locked the door. “Are you okay?”

She moaned.

Outside, Clem shouted, “We’ve had it with you people.”

Moments later, a bang came from under the motor home. Then the odor of gas started seeping in. A hot flush crept up Paul’s neck. The brothers had broken the gas line at the propane tank.

“Come out now,” Clem shouted. “Or die.”

The gas began diluting the already-thin air, starving Paul’s lungs of oxygen. He hoped the broken windows would supply enough ventilation to keep the situation from becoming deadly, but the gas was coming in too quickly. He began to gag with each breath.

Sarah started coughing.

“What’s it going to be?” Clem demanded.

“All right,” Paul shouted out the broken window. The brothers were standing side-by-side, now both armed with knives. He swallowed dryly. “We’re coming out.”

Clem grinned. “Nice and easy like.”

Sarah wheezed. “But they’re going to kill us.”

Coughing, Paul said, “It’s certain death if we stay in here.” He grabbed a towel and wrapped it around his left forearm, a slim defense against a slashing knife, he knew, but better than nothing. “At least we have a fighting chance out there.” Then he armed himself with the spray can of cooking oil. “It’s the only way.”

Grimacing, Sarah retrieved the frying pan. “I’m going with you.”

Paul hugged her a moment, hoping it wouldn’t be their last embrace. Then he gritted his teeth and shoved the door open.

Without warning, the grizzly charged out from the tree line, huffing and grunting, its massive body on a collision course with Clem and Clyde. They shrieked and lunged for the open door.

Paul and Sarah scrambled to the back bedroom. The brothers barely made it inside when the bear crashed through the doorway and landed on them. They screamed. Jaws snapped bones and claws ripped flesh. The motor home rocked on its springs as if a terrible storm had been unleashed inside.

Choking on gas, Paul unlatched the emergency exit window and kicked it open. He helped Sarah get out and then jumped. When his feet hit the mud, he hurried around to the door and slammed it shut.

“It’s trapped,” Sarah said, holding her injured arm.

Paul knew it was only temporary. The bear would tear the rig apart to get out, and then it would hunt them down before they could summon help. There was only one solution. From the brother’s campfire, he retrieved a flaming log and pointed Sarah toward the pond.

“What are you doing?” she asked, stumbling backward.

“Ending it, once and for all.”

“But our motor home.”

“It doesn’t matter any more.” He tossed the burning log through the broken bedroom window. Ten strides away, the motor home exploded. A booming concussion knocked him to the ground and hurled debris in every direction. Flames leaped into the air.

Struggling to his feet, he looked for his wife.

“Sarah!”

Moments later, he found her kneeling at the trout pond, gulping down water with cupped hands.