Atlantis Chronicles: Prince of The Olympics

1983

Christian Haner walked wearily up the rocky path to his grandparents’ upper meadow, all but dragging the rifle Grandma had made him take with him. Whitney, his aging Golden Retriever, was leading the way, smiling in the cool rain, as she always did. It’d been wet all of August, rainy, overcast, and cool in the west foothills of the Olympic Mountains. Usually, it was Gramps that climbed up here to chase the stubborn sheep off of the upper meadow, a common practice in the cool months, but he was over in Lyndyn selling some of the spring lambs at auction. Grandma was home with Chris’ little sister, Ruthie, who had been up coughing all night. Fifth grade would be starting next week for Chris, and there hadn’t been any really good weather at all this summer. His thoughts turned to school as the misty rain increased. Chris raised the hood of Grampa’s rain poncho over his head, and continued the upward trek, unaware that Whitney had frozen in a growl not twelve feet up the path.

Chris was a fairly husky ten-year-old, but that didn’t help him a bit as he was knocked in the head, off the path, and over the bushes down hill of the path. Once he stopped rolling, and was able to focus. Chris recognized Whitney’s growling, and the cry of a cougar back up the slope.

Staggering back to his feet, Chris finally located Gramp’s 22 through blurry, muddy eyes. It was about halfway up the hill to his right. On his second step, he recognized the taste of blood, and stumbled

over some of those bushes. He raised up as he heard the fighting intensify, and noticed that his hood was tattered. The yellow rain poncho was covered in blood and mud. Chris struggled the last few feet toward the gun fighting to stay on his feet and conscious. As he reached for the rifle, he noticed rivulets of blood on the poncho. Then Whitney yelped.

“Whitney!” Chris grabbed the gun, stood, and charged up toward the path. He now noticed that he was quite lightheaded. Another stumble, was followed by another cry from the cougar, and another yelp from Whitney.

With his last conscious thought, Chris fired the gun.

X

“Grandma! Look! He’s awake!”

“Oh, Chris, dear! How are you feeling?” Chris watched as his Grandmother came over to him and cradled his head, Ruthie not far behind.

“Does it hurt?” Ruthie asked.

“Does what hurt?” Chris replied.

“Does it hurt where dat ol’ cougar bonked you on da face?”

“Now Ruthie, your brother just woke up. Give him a chance to remember what happened.”

“He kilt Whitney! Dat ol’ cougar kilt Whitney!” Ruthie blurted into sobs. “Dat boy dat brung you is up burrin’ her!”

Chris felt the tears welling up as he recounted his memory. A great disappointment came over him as realized that he hadn’t been able to help Whitney against that cougar even after she had helped him. The

tears started flowing, and just would not stop.

“There now!” Grandma hugged him close. “You’re a brave boy! Grampa wanted me to go up there, but with Ruthie’s cold, I thought I should stay. Oh! Christian! I’m so sorry!” Soon, the three of them were in tears.

X

Joseph Haner stood beside Whitney’s make shift grave. He had been awfully lucky this week. But for this old dog, and a neighbor that heard Chris’ shot, his only grandson, might have been killed. After a prayer or two, Joseph noticed some strange markings on a rock near the grave. He fetched out his reading glasses, but it was no use. There was a lot of what looked like p’s, q’s, g’s and j’s, but nothing that made any sense. It looked like some foreign words, but what would foreign words be doing in a stone on his family farm? After slipping his glasses back in the pocket, Joseph pushed his hat back on, grabbed his rifle, and headed back down the hill, wondering how you could tussle with a cougar, a tussle that killed your dog, and walk out of it with nothing more than a bruise on the cheek.

1990

“I’ve seen this before!”

“What’s that, Mr. Delby?”

“This! This log, Dr. Henderson. It looks a lot like the log that Brandon had back in . . . what was it? ’58 I think. A kid was lost in the Eastern Olympic mountains for nine days. Brandon Cross was his name. I was one of the party that finally caught up to him. The kid was fine. He walked out of there like he’d slept on a water bed the night before. When the doctors took a look at him, he seemed fine, but he told a story of falling down a cliff or something. He said a wrist, a shoulder, and a leg had been injured. Turns out the doctors x-rayed him when they got him back to Seattle. The kid’s leg had been fractured in two places! The wrist too had been broken. The shoulder had been separated. After the fall, the next thing the kid remembered was waking up all cozy and warm with some guy watching over

him. The kid felt hardly any pain at all.”

“Anyway, this guy made his camp on an alpine mountain ridge. He gave Brandon these logs, then took off before any help arrived. Turned out the log burned very hot for hours, and the higher the wind, the hotter the fire. I ran some tests. This guardian angel fella shredded some Ingora roots, ran them through some kind of sulfur paste, then added dried moss and grass. It was ingenious.” Rick returned the log to the museum storage tray.

“Well Mr. Delby, the folks I got this from have a similar story, but no broken bones, that I know of. They were caught high up on the north Quinault trail when that freezing rain hit last October. There

was at least eight inches of ice on the trail in most spots up there!”

“I wouldn’t think a rain forest would be a good place to be during an ice storm, Susan.”

“Doctor. Please.” Rick looked over the museum curator for a brief second. She stood about five and a quarter feet. Brunette hair pulled into a pony tail, intelligent dark eyes, and flawless skin. But, the days when he would make a play for a young woman like her were about twenty years long gone.

“Go on, Dr. Henderson.”

“Well, Mr. Delby, the ice added so much weight to many of the branches that they were breaking off and falling all over the place. The five hikers were very lucky that no one was hit by any of the falling debris. They made a makeshift camp on the rocks at a bend in the river, which was the only clear area they could find. At least there, they’d be safe from the branches. Then some guy strolled down

the trail with some of these logs on his back, and made camp with them. They said his name was Manuel, but said he wasn’t Hispanic.”

“That’s right! But Brandon called him Manny!”

“Hmm. Well, the story is that once Manuel arrived with the fire, even the weather turned for the better. A couple of the hikers even tried to leave the camp a couple of times, but they had to turn back

both times due to the ice and cold. Two days after the thaw started, they all packed up and left. Manuel went up trail, the others down.”

“So how long were they there?”

“Six days. Manuel would have been there . . . four or five.”

“Any descriptions of this Manuel?”

Dr. Henderson grabbed her notes. “I was told that he was pretty young. Maybe early twenties at the latest. One hiker had him pegged as a college student. Strawberry blond hair, gray eyes. Slight

build. Closing in on six feet. Spoke with a slight accent- possibly European.”

“Sounds like Manny”

“Sounds like it. But this is thirty-three years later, Mr. Delby.”

“A technicality, doctor. A technicality.” Rick turned to leave, then stopped.

“Dr. Henderson, thank you for opening the museum vaults for an old man. I do have one more question for you. Was there anything truly amazing or downright unbelievable about this rescue?”

After a few seconds, Susan Henderson threw her notebook on the table, removed her glasses and rubbed her tired eyes.

“I took a climatologist friend of mine from WSU up to that camp a few weeks ago. The damage from the ice storm was pretty extensive throughout that area of the rainforest. At the camp site, however, very little. My friend says she has never seen that happen before! Ever! Anywhere! Either prayers were being answered, or something was keeping the storm off our hikers.”

Rick Delby added, “Yes. Something. Or, someone!”

2001

“Olympic Park dispatch, this is Ranger Gene Sartonni, Over.” Gene listened through the static.

“Hey, Sartonni, What’s going on? Over.”

“Heyya, Jordan! How’s that pretty daughter of yours? Over.”

“If you really wanna know, she kept Deb and me up all night with her crying. Over.”

“Yah, but a smile from her just melts your heart, don’t it? Over.”

“Don’t I know it. So. Whatta ya need? Over”

“Jordan, I’m about a couple of miles west of Dodger Point trail, where Carrie Creek joins up with Long Creek. We’ve got ourselves the mother of all log jams, just above the tip of the valley. I was

hoping that you could round up a few volunteers and head on up. Over.”

“Roger Geno, I’ll check over the roster and get back to you. Out.”

Gene Sartonni put the hand held radio back in his belt, and looked over the expanse of the log jam. There were six, no, eight trees that had fallen in the wind, all shoved into a stack by the fast water of

the spring and summer rains. Added to that was branches, strips of bark, leaves, cones, needles, and other debris. It was all a pretty good barrier. The creek water was pooled up behind it, and barely

trickling through the jam.

It was now mid September. If Autumn, with its freezing nights, wind and rain, started in earnest before this was cleaned out, it could set them back months downriver. Fish habitat could be destroyed, riverside vegetation would be ripped out, hiking trails could be washed away. ‘This is why rangers were put in charge of wilderness, to manage it for the rest of America,’ his dad would say.

With a crew of ten, Gene knew he could have the log jam sitting by the side of the creek by quitting time. A crew of four would take till nightfall. One long branchless horizontal log in the center of

the jam looked to be the real trouble maker. It was sticking out at a very strange angle.

“Geno, come in please. Over.”

“Yessir, Jordan. Over.”

“Listen, that’s a big negatory on the volunteers, my friend. We’ve got school groups lined up for two weeks. The trail crew is out of the Hoh office for the next eleven days. We could probably get you a

big crew by then. Over.”

“Jordy, would you do me a favor and assign me a crew as soon as you can for this? Otherwise, I think we’ll really be singing the blues. I’ll need ten, and equipment, for one day. Over.”

“Will do, Gene. I’m filling out the paper work as we speak, over.”

“Sartonni out.” Knowing how much park volunteers loved work crews, Sartonni knew that it could be a month before they’d get up here. He pulled off his day pack, grabbed a length of rope out of it, and a small hand wench. He then set to work. He’d have to find some way to at least get the water flowing past the jam. That one tree at the weird angle, a cottonwood, would be perfect if he could move it. It

was just close enough for his short length of rope. The other end would go around that young Douglas fir just off the north bank. He was ten minutes into hanging the rope into place, when the radio

cacked to life again.

“Sartonni, come in please. Over.”

“Jordan! What’s up? Over.”

“Well Gene, I want to know your ETA. It turns out that I’ve got Gene- senior, and your brother down here. Over.”

“Truth be told Jordan, I’m still looking over this jam. I’m still three or four hours away, plus, I have more work to do here. Tell them I’ll call as soon as I get off the hill. Over.”

“Now Gene, I don’t have to tell you about rookie mistakes do I? If you are by yourself, you document problems. Don’t try to fix them! Over.”

“Are you done? Because, I’m trying to do my job here. Over.”

“Hang on.” Gene used the time to pull his rope taut.

“Good news, Geno! Your little brother has a couple of chain saws in his pickup. He’s going to dig them out, then he and I are on our way up. Over.”

“Say, that is good news, Jordy, but who is going to take over at dispatch? Over.”

“Why, the great Sartonni himself just volunteered for the afternoon. Over.”

“Thanks, Poppa! I’ll see you guys after lunch then. Out.”