Blazing Summer

By Gordon Rottman

In a country sliding toward a dystopian future with dwindling resources and ineffectual meddling government, terrorists are igniting forest fires to disrupt the economy and force abandonment of towns and farms. 17-year-old Ashley Summers, in need of work, but harboring secrets, enlists as a wildlands firefighter. Underage and hiding a physical defect, she faces an everyday battle of life or death from man and nature. She has to deal with hazing, unwanted dates, being pressed into promotional gimmicks, and self-serving investigative reporters. Each fire grows progressively worse, and the danger increases from the terrorists merely sparking fires, to snipers, hostage taking, grenade attacks, and car bombs. The deteriorating situation saw soldiers assigned to protect the fire crews and Ashley has to deal with an unexpected romance under deadly conditions. Struggling to survive the vicious fires, injuries, exhaustion, stress, and raw fear, Ashley feels the pressure slowly crushing her. She knows she can rely on her crew, but can they rely on her?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gordon Rottman
• Release date: Jun 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463857687

Gordon Rottman

Gordon Rottman lives outside of Houston, Texas, served in the Army for twenty-six years in a number of “exciting” units and wrote wargames for Green Berets for eleven years. He’s written over 130 military history books, but his interests have turned to adventurous young adult novels—influenced by a bunch of audacious kids, Westerns owing to his experiences on his wife’s family’s ranch in Mexico, and historical fiction focusing on how people lived and thought—history does not have to be boring. His first Western novel, The Hardest Ride, garnered three writing awards and was a USA Today and Amazon best seller.

Book preview

Chapter 1

My ComPod chimed The Doors’ Light My Fire. It was Aunt Ruth. I let it ring and a few seconds later the screen reported, New Voice Mail . Maybe one day Ruth would learn to hyperText. She was so 2020, living with old technology.

Which would it be? Showing a client a house, which meant one more house she wouldn’t sell. Messages saying Closing on a house were becoming rare. Or if it might be said Meeting with a client—that meant she’d be home late and a bit tipsy—read as drunk—or she’d sleep-over with no telling who, especially if whoever had air conditioning.

I punched OK, and Aunt Ruth’s singsong voice uttered, Rebecca dear —she insisted on calling me by my real name—, I’m closing a deal with a client over din-din so do dinner without me, or you can have the bean soup I left in the fridge. Bye bye.

I’d finished the soup three days ago.

And breakfast as well, I added. Good, I could get this done without interruption, so long as I beat the power brownout.

Turning back to my laptop, the online form’s header read, Texas Wildfire LLC—Wildland Fire Crew Application. Wildland firefighting had become a lucrative business with the Warming Time.

Okay, here goes. I gulped and typed on the virtual keyboard. Candidate’s Name: Rebecca Ashley Summer.

The next part sucked. Current Position Title and Years in Current Position: None and 0. I didn’t have a smidgen of experience in one of the most dangerous professions alive, more deadly than catching crabs off Alaska, and I was applying for it. I leaned my face into the desk fan’s cooling airflow aimed at the computer. Gotta start someplace.

Education: High School I proudly typed, because I was among the thirty-eight percent who actually graduated from public high school and a year early owing to Advanced Placement and busting my butt. I would have graduated with honors, but they stopped granting Latin honors the year before I graduated, so the other kids’ self-esteem wasn’t bruised. Graduation Date. I entered June 1, a date exactly two weeks ago. Hobbies/Athletics: Cross-country, swimming, soccer, orienteering, wilderness backpacking, canoeing.

Related Training: Lone Star Wildland Firefighting School, Wildland Fire Suppression Orientation Course—40 hours. This had given me a Red Card, qualifying me for an entry-level Firefighter 2. I also listed Texas Forest Service Firefighting, Structure Firefighting and Forcible Entry, and Red Cross first aid on-line courses plus the Cypress Volunteer Fire Department’s CPR class. I also entered Outward Bound School and four years Venturing Scouts—I stayed with it because Mom and Dad would have wanted me too. I wasn’t going to let what happened to them, or myself, make me quit.

The Wildland Firefighting Course had set me back four hundred bucks and was my graduation present to myself. That dipped into the money saved from my winter job cutting firewood. That was a lucrative job, seeing that most natural gas went to electricity generation and there was not enough electricity to run home central heat. Yeah, I could see the irony, splitting wood for people to burn in fireplaces so I might go to wildland firefighting school and buy gear to fight forest fires. My cousin Mason, a Texas Wildfire assistant hotshot crew boss, had contributed a quarter of the course’s cost.

I could simply touch my left ring finger to the ident-pad and stream my data into the application. I silently thanked the Enhanced Identity Fair Privacy Protection Act. That law allowing us the choice of denying access to the legally mandated personal data on our own little embedded microchip. The only way They can access it without consent is if you’re dead, brain dead, charged with a felony, or declared mentally incompetent. I hoped this didn’t go that far. The Enhanced Manifest Bio-Electronic Device—EMBED—was basically a good idea. The libertarians, unions, and lawyers kicked up a fuss, so we had the option of not using it and could input anything we wanted, that was, we could still lie, like in the old days. I entered the usual personal info, my address in Cypress, Texas, then phone, Social Security number, all that. Sex: F, Eyes: Brown —mysterious I’m told, well, skeptical anyway—, Hair: Red —luxuriously so—, Height: 5’8" —no, I don’t slouch—, Weight: 146 lbs. —of finely tuned, agile muscle—. Disabilities, I intentionally left that blank.

Then, and it was a big Then. Date of Birth. I looked at the wall behind my computer. Peering at me from the virtual poster was a girl…a woman, a real woman. Her strands of dark hair hung from beneath an orange helmet. She wore a soot-stained yellow shirt and gripped a Pulaski handle like a queen’s scepter. Her face was smeared with soot. Sweat, or maybe tear runlets, streaked her gaunt cheeks. The woman’s lips were pressed together in grim determination—she is going to win this fight. Her eyes, they looked ever so tired, exhausted, but at the same time defiant. Behind her, a mountain burned.

I wanted to be that woman.

There was more to it of course. Wildland firefighting paid quite well. I needed it for college, especially since scholarships, Pell Grants, and student loans had dried up like Texas cattle tanks. The exception was athletic scholarships of course. It wasn’t because I had been taken in by the e-billboards— The New American Heroes—America Needs Wildland Firefighters. Join Now! Save Our Forests! I didn’t buy into the hype.

Next, I typed August 12, and then the first three digits of the year, paused and typed a number one year earlier than my actual birth year. You have to be eighteen to fight wildland fires. I wouldn’t be eighteen until August. I was now fraudulent, in two ways.

I again looked into the eyes of that unknown Hotshot crew-woman. I can do this. And with an abundant amount of guilt, I punched Submit. I’d beaten the rolling brownout, but did I understand what I was getting into?

A tall, thin girl in a powder blue running outfit static-jogged at a subdivision’s back entrance. I trotted past the blonde, and she fell in smoothly beside me. There were no greetings. This had been our routine for over two years. Sydney Bennett and I ran two mornings and three afternoons a week. Sydney was a soccer animal belonging to both school and league teams, and we were on the same swim team—schools were still allowed to operate pools, but they were no longer heated. She had an athletic scholarship locked in and both her parents worked—unusual that both parents had jobs seeing there were so few decent jobs.

An oversized black pickup sped past with its blaring horn followed by a lame wolf-whistle.

Nice! Very original. I shouted, hoisting a middle finger in acknowledgment. Enjoy it while you can! Those gas-guzzlers would be banned year after next.

What if one of those pseudo-macho guys pulls over and jumps out of his pickup, roughly the size of his ego, and comes at you, Ash? Sydney asked with mock concern.

I’d punch him out with my three-pound hand weights. I jabbed two fast rights and a left against an imaginary assailant.

I guess you would. You could probably outrun him anyway, even with your hand and leg weights.

Why would I run?

Mom keeps telling me you’re going to get me into trouble.

She’s been saying that for years, Sydney. Have I ever gotten you into trouble?

She rolled her eyes, Well there was that time we wrapped…

Never mind that. Your mom won’t have to worry her head about that much longer.

You did it? You applied? Sydney squealed.

I did indeed do the deed.

You told them you’re eighteen?

What would be the point of applying if I didn’t claim that?

I hope you don’t get caught, Ash. She was silent for a few paces. What would they do to you?

During the application process? I shrugged. Say thanks, but no thanks and don’t let the doorknob bump your butt. The thought of that made my tummy quiver.

But later, if they hire you?

Same thing, except their lawyers would scramble around seeing if my legal guardian has grounds to sue them.

And the other thing? she asked with an anxious glance.

I shrugged my shoulders. After all this time she still called it that other thing.

You were limping a little back there, she said snappishly.

A pebble. It’s shifted out of the way.

I was nervous, but I thought I had a good chance, so long as they didn’t pick up on my age. They needed firefighters badly, and I was in outstanding shape. That was something a lot of folks can’t say, regardless of the Safe and Healthful Foods Act and all the public service ads encouraging fitness, even though food quality was declining. People weren’t coming forward, even with decent paying jobs being as scarce as homes with working central air. It was wicked hard work and firefighters died.

They didn’t come forward because the bureaucrats and their human hairball supporters have kicked motivation and individualism out of them—The Government will provide for all.

Does your Aunt Ruth even have a clue of what you’re doing?

She assumes I’m applying for a receptionist job or some such. She’s clueless about what wildland firefighting is and that girls, women do it.

What’s she think you’ve been doing for two years working out like a Marine?

Sydney’s brother was a Marine; two tours in Saudi Arabia and one in Venezuela when they tried to cut off the oil. He’d run with us while on leave. His first time, he was woofing about Marine five-milers. At six miles he was huffing to keep up with us. The heaviest thing he was carrying was his Rolex knockoff, and I had my weights.

Ruth thinks I do this for cross-country. She doesn’t understand that I’m an obsessive-compulsive fitness nut and the school counselor —overweight herself I might add— thinks I’m trying to hurt myself.

Well…

I glanced sideways at my best friend. Don’t start.

I promise, she grinned. Not on the eve of your big adventure.

We slogged on in silence, the Texas humidity soaking us. Four in the afternoon was the hottest part of the day.

I can’t believe the two relatives closest to you haven’t figured out you’re underage for this.

I shifted my water bottle belt-pack and shook my head. It would never occur to Ruth that I’d try that or that there would even be an age limit. Mason assumes I’m eighteen since I just graduated. A typical cousin living elsewhere, he’s not kept up with b-days. I have to remind him of his own.

I only remember yours because it’s right before school starts.

I laughed and came back with, I only remember yours because it’s the day before Halloween.

Figures, Sydney muttered.

That hit a sore spot with both of us. Halloween had been banned by mutual consent among a wide range of social factions. The costumes contradicted the spirit of equity emphasizing social, financial, and cultural differences between families, suggested paganism and witchcraft, and forced American holiday traditions on new immigrants. They said that! It was now the Mid-Autumn Centric Festival. Trick or treating was banned because of poison, needles, and broken glass in the unhealthy treats and because some weenies claimed it encouraged mischief. Kids couldn’t bring treats to share with their class as it violated healthy food requirements in schools and emphasized financial inequality. They didn’t let us have fun anymore.

This company you’re applying to, I don’t understand this interagency stuff.

They contract to different government agencies for fire crews. US Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and so on. It’s mostly in Texas, but we can be sent anywhere in the country.

What’s the word on your fake driver’s license?

Not so loud, I glanced around tentatively.

Good grief, Ash, we’re on a country road with the nearest farmhouse a soccer field away.

You can’t be too careful. I glanced skyward with phony apprehension. Spy drones you know.

And you forgot your aluminum foil cap.

Right. I’m picking the license up at dinner. Wanna go?

What sleazily backroom do we have to go to?

"Restaurante los Compadres. Remember Armando, graduated last year?"

Yep.

He works there; knows someone who took care of it. As an enticement I sing-songed, They have an A/C permit.

Sydney and I, still running-grungy, finished off a platter of fajitas. Sydney rolled chicken strips in her tortillas, and I snarfed up the beef strips. They didn’t have beef every day—the endless drought. The beans, rice, pico de gallo, sour cream, and guacamole were all but gone, and we were on our third artificial lemonade refills. That’s one of many things I like about Mexican food. To meet the requirements of the Cultural Identity Preservation and Protection Act, Mexican restaurant menus could keep their traditional offerings and not have to comply with the Safe and Healthful Foods Act. The SHF Act hated Mexican and most ethnic foods, but these days you couldn’t be bigoted about anything.

Armando sauntered over, turned a chair and sat with his arms crossed over its back. "I never see two chiquitas eat so much."

We’re growing girls, said Sydney, daintily wiping her lips.

We chatted about school with Armando asking after some of his old teachers. He laid a black folder on the table and tapped it. I appreciate the tip. I pick up when you ready.

I opened the folder and glanced at the Texas driver’s license under the check. My birth date was incorrect. Exactly what I wanted. The tip was one hundred and twenty dollars. They’ll ask for my Social Security card too. I’m glad it didn’t bear a birth date.

I finished up my kettle-weight routine before calling Mason up in College Station.

Hey, cuz! How’s my favorite Aggie? Mason was attending Texas A&M, working on a forestry degree. He’d worked the fire season for the last four summers for Texas Wildfire LLC in Bryan. Bryan and College Station abut one another. My almost-a-brother was a wildfire crew assistant superintendent, in other words, the assistant crew boss of Crew One, which was also the company’s Hotshot crew. That meant the elite of the company’s seven fire crews. Piney Woods Hotshots was the handle they went by.

It’s going, Ash. Did ya do it?

I done it, I said and followed with a laugh. I compared my real driver’s license to the fake; both overprinted in red: UNDER 21. The only discernible difference between them was the more recent photo on the fake and the illegitimate birth year. Perfect. The state had wanted to embed readable personal data in driver’s licenses to make fake licenses impossible, but fortunately, the state’s shoestring budget didn’t allow it, plus the libertarians and seclusion-libs screamed unfair.

I’ll hand-deliver my recommendation letter in the morning, straight into the hands of the most powerful personage in the company, Ron’s secretary herself. I’ve been talking you up to Ron.

Excellent. I paused. Mace, I can’t thank you enough for going out on a limb like this. If I don’t cut it, you’ll end up looking…

Enough of that kiddo. I know what you can do, and I know what the gals up here can do, all five of them. You’ll do fine. I imagine they’ll want to interview you by the end of the week. They’re adding a new crew. It’s a given that it’s going to be another bad season with the drought worse than last year. And who knows, there’s Qisas threatening to set more fires. He pronounced it Kisses like everybody.

That was a sobering thought. Not the terrorist threats or another bad fire season. Qisas—Retaliation, an eye-for-an-eye—is the spinoff for the old defunct Al-Qaeda. Took me a long time to get over what English teachers always told me, Q was always followed by U. Qisas—pronounced kay-sause.

There were seven twenty-man crews with only five women, besides me. I sincerely hoped we’d be counted as six women.

Hey, could you bring my old Kindle Blaze with you? It’s in my old room, top left desk drawer. I want to transfer some books to my Blast-Star.

Can do, Mace.

I curled up in the recliner in front of the TV. I wasn’t in the mood for yet another special report or documentary on the Warming. Vampire Alley, Season Ten, was on, but I turned it down, so the shrieks and screams were barely heard. That effect of XHD 3D blood splattering on the camera lens is jarring enough. Mason was going further out on a limb for me than he realized. I felt bad about that, felt like I was wrongly using him. Mace was the closest thing I had to a brother. If I was discovered, I’d declare I’d pulled the wool over his eyes and would give the inattentive cousin story…that he’d not paid attention to my age and was misled by my early graduation. The other issue, well, if they found out my age, the other thing won’t matter. It was my sole responsibility. I was to blame, the blame for it all.

Chapter 2

Three sad years ago. Everything around me oozed a surreal feeling. It all felt out of kilter to this fourteen-year-old outdoorsperson. I didn’t care about gender neutral stuff. Outdoorsman sounded better. For the past two days, it had looked like rain clouds to the north, but nothing came of it. The dark clouds had cast a gloom over our little band of backpackers. There was no reason for it. We’d welcome rain, but it was there, the gloom. Maybe we were too used to endlessly sunny days. And my ear hurt like heck.

Our Venturing Scout crew had been cranky after twelve hours of driving all the way from Houston to North Texas near Amarillo. We’d left in two vans before dawn, and it was dark when we’d arrived at the campground. We were bored to numbness staring out the windows at hundreds of miles of the featureless simmering flatlands of the Texas Panhandle.

The rest of the crew had missed what I’d experienced my first time coming upon Palo Duro Canyon. In the unending flatness is was a jolt to come up on the Grand Canyon of Texas gouged eighty miles through the boundless prairie.

Instead, they’d awoken to find themselves down in an eight-hundred-foot deep gorge and saw no inspiring vistas. That would change once we took to the trails.

The first couple of days’ short hikes had been fun, winding through gorges and along ridges. We saw deer and javelina, and a scarce coyote just as surprised to see us. We didn’t see any antelope. They had repopulated the area with them. Maybe later.

We’d heard thunder last night and saw an occasional flickering flash. And my ear hurt more.

What’s cooking? asked Sydney Bennett. I was sitting on an outcropping watching the new cloud, the gray one. It slowly bellowed up beyond the canyon seeming to change directions gradually. It filled the sky.

Is that a brush fire? Sydney asked.

I think so.

Sure is big. How far away you think it is?

I don’t know, but the wind’s blowing toward it, not this way.

We watched the smoke a while until Dad called that we were about to leave for the much-anticipated Lighthouse Trail hike.

Jen—Jennifer—and Jerry had the twelve of us organized. Newly married, they had met in the Venturing program and were now advisors like Mom and Dad.

Devin Muller, the Crew President, took the lead. We had a couple of VPs for programs and administration and a secretary and treasurer, all elected by the crew. On the trail, they were only part of the crew like anyone else.

I had what I thought was the best job, Crew Guide. My job was to mentor new crew members, help them get started, suggest the gear they needed, and helped them with trail skills… like what to do when nature calls, trail cooking, and the best way to bed down. I always brought up the rear of the column with my shadow Sydney. I made sure no one got separated or was left behind after a break.

I felt like I wanted to bang my head against a rock my ear hurt so much.

Mom and Dad weren’t geared up.

What’s up? You guys sitting this hike out?

Nope, honey. We’re running into Canyon. There’s a pharmacy there, and we can pick up another prescription for the antibiotic you left at home.

Dad had a subtle way of making me feel guilty.

I’m sorry, Dad. I can’t believe I left it.

And then he softened it. "Not a prob. We’re picking up hotdogs and fixings for tonight anyway.

I didn’t ask him to hurry even if it felt like a hot icepick was being gently jammed into my ear.

So there’s going to be dogs and beans and all the trimmings waiting for us?

You bet, honey. A break from freeze-dried.

It was funny to me. The healthy food Nazis in Congress were trying to outlaw hotdogs, bagels, and whole milk. The more noise they made, the higher store sales jumped.

Mom asked how I was holding up. She knew my ear was bad.

I’ll make it. If I don’t die when my head explodes.

Mom and Dad rolled out of the parking lot, waving to the crew. Mom leaned out the van’s passenger window, blew me a kiss, and gave a thumbs up. I watched the van turn onto the asphalt road.

Let’s go, gang, shouted Devin.

Everyone answered back, GreenCon—Condition Green—All’s good.

I slung on my daypack. Sydney fell in ahead of me. You making it girl?

Sure. I’d taken another pain tablet from our medical bag, a pretty potent one. I didn’t like taking any kind of pills, but this wasn’t any old headache.

This was an all-day hike seven miles in and seven out. It was rated only as three on the one-to-six difficulty scale. It was up and down on ridges and into canyons with an almost one-thousand-foot elevation change.

The trip had been quickly planned. The Cypress-Fairbanks School District outside of Houston only announced three weeks earlier that school would close for the summer two weeks early because of serious electrical power shortages. Schools had A/C. So, instead of closing at the end of the first week of June, they closed at the beginning of the last week of May. We planned the trip to take advantage of May’s more or less mild weather. From June on, people could die out there.

My only complaint was that there were more hikers than we’d expected. It was still pretty hot, the nights were nice, and the humidity was low. The vegetation was mega dry. The grass was as brittle as uncooked spaghetti. There was a Red Flag fire warning in effect. A park ranger had come by and said they just about had the brush fire to the east contained. It was safe west of the park road where we were. Hmmm. There was as much smoke as yesterday. More. Was it closer?

Jerry asked him if they were closing the park. The Ranger said it was policy to keep it open so long as possible. He didn’t sound very enthusiastic about the policy.

The first mile was pretty bad with each step shooting a jolt through my skull. I thought about turning back. Ashley Summer doesn’t quit.

During the first break, Sydney said, You’re not wimping out, are you?

Not as long as you’re still walking.

Sydney and I had always kept each other going in cross-country and swim meets. We competed, but only to push one another. We’ve been besties since third grade.

Halfway to the Lighthouse, we heard sirens, barely, from the park road. My ear was merely an annoying ache now. The pain tab had kicked in. I was enjoying the painted canyon walls slashed with bands of red, sierra, umber, tan, ochre, and beige. The ridges and canyons were checkered with the gray-green and hard greens of sage, mesquite, cottonwood, cedar, soapberry, and hackberry.

I found Brian Beller kneeling over his rucksack.

What’s wrong?

Shoulder strap broke. Stitching tore loose.

I gave him an exaggerated glare of disappointment. Now what’s my dad say about gear?

We repeated Dad’s mantra, It’s okay to skimp on gear, a shower curtain for a ground cloth, Sterno instead of a backpacker’s stove. But don’t skimp on your boots, sleeping bag, or backpack or you’ll be cold with sore feet carrying the pack in your arms.

We both laughed.

He’s right, Brian said with a frown.

Gibmeit.

I pulled out my rolls of duct tape and black electrical tape, a spool of thick nylon thread, a saddle needle, and a punch. Any backpacker’s gear can be repaired with that stuff.

Your dad teach you all this?

Yeah, and from books. You outta buy American-made gear.

He watched me stitch. Hey, Ash. Would you kinda like to go to a movie or something after we get home?

I looked at him. I liked his green eyes and sloppy blond hair. I can’t date until I’m fifteen. Three more months. I smiled. Maybe. Dad says not until I’m twenty-one.

Your parents are strict.

Yeah, pretty much.

What’s your B-day?

August twelfth. Why?

Puttin’ it on my calendar. He pecked on his ComPod.

We’ll see. Okay, shoving the pack toward him. I’ll reinforce it tonight.

Thanks, Ash. You’re totally fab.

That’s what I’m here for. Groan.

We made the Lighthouse in good time. It was going to be a harder return trip as we’d already walked seven miles and it would be hotter.

The big cloud from the fire was hanging over us. I don’t know if it was coming toward us. The winding trail had us looking at it from different directions. We could smell the smoke.

The Lighthouse was pretty neat. I’d only seen it from across the canyon my first trip here. Now I was standing at its base. It looked like a crooked three-layer wedding cake, a big cake. It was an eroded shale and sandstone pillar almost fifty feet high, about thirty feet across the base. Guidebooks claimed it was three-hundred feet, but that was above sea level. It was perched high on the end of a ridge-finger, way above the valley floor, making it look like a lighthouse on a spit of land beside the sea, a very dry sea.

The four guys in the crew talked about climbing the five-story pillar. I think they were only woofing to impress us. Not easily done. There were more girls in the crew than guys, and I thought we were pretty neat. We knew our stuff too.

We were fixing lunch after having a couple of other backpackers take our group picture clustered at the Lighthouse’s base with all our ComPods. Sydney and I were cooking up freeze-dried chicken teriyaki with rice when a Ranger galloped up on a horse.

Ya’ll need to get back to the park road. The fire jumped the fireline, and it’s approaching the park road where they’re starting another fireline.

I didn’t know what all that meant.

He was all nervous looking. That didn’t make me feel good. He dismounted and talked to Jen and Jerry, pointing at a map.

I caught some of what he said. Something about Park Service suits holding off on ordering people out of the park. Image and keep the paying visitors there I guessed. The National Park Service had taken over many of the big unique state parks, what they then called affiliated parks. The tree-hugger environmental groups didn’t think state governments were capable and worthy of managing the nation’s wilderness treasures. Instead, they opted for centralized control with funding fights between parks and regulations that didn’t allow for local circumstances.

He rode off, telling us to pass the word to any other backpackers and mountain-bikers we ran across.

Jerry called us all together. Eat up and pack up fast, guys. Don’t bother washing your utensils. YelCon. He was trying to use our crew’s condition codes. "Instead of taking the Lighthouse Trail all the way back, the Ranger said to take the mountain bike trail branching off to the south. It’ll take us back to our campsite but will keep us further from the fire. I thought they said it was under control and not to worry.

I took another pain tablet. We moved out fast. Smoke made everything hazy. That was enough to encourage us to move it, but the sappy smell of burning brush was a bigger motivator and the not so distant sirens too.

We tromped toward a ridge when someone yelled, Look at that!

An airliner was coming in like it was going to land beyond the ridge. A pink-red cloud bloomed beneath it.

Fire retardant, said Jerry.

I’d seen those tanker planes on TV. The red cloud bellowed beyond the ridge, and the jet engines screamed as the plane powered out of the canyon. Awesome! This was getting serious.

We came across a few other backpackers, and they followed us. At four miles we turned onto the mountain bike trail heading south and curving back to our campsite. Mom and Dad would be there and would no doubt have both vans ready to go. We could forget the anticipated hotdogs. We’d probably go to one of the campgrounds to the north, Jerry guessed.

The trail angled up the ridge side. Being a rutted bike trail, it wasn’t easy on hikers. The smoke was heavier and stinging our eyes.

Going up for a look-see. Devin and Clark dropped their packs and scampered straight up the ridge-side to the crest. As they stood up there, another tanker dropped its load. Both of them had their ComPods out.

Back on the trail, we clustered around them to watch the tanker-dump video. It showed the flames at the base of the ridge, but some flames were creeping up the slope.

Let’s move it! shouted Jerry.

The trail approached the crest, crawled over, and then down the other side. Smoke poured up like an avalanche in reverse.

We’re not RedCon yet, said Sydney, but is there an OrangeCon?

Cresting the ridge, we were smothered in thick smoke. We couldn’t see the fire down-slope. Jerry shouted to wet our bandannas and tie them over our noses and mouths. My eyes stung, a lot.

There was a crackling roar. Suddenly flames shot through the smoke, right below us. The super dry clumps of brush exploded like gasoline was thrown on them. Between the smoke and dust, it was impossible to see. We stumbled down the trail. It smelled like a barbeque gone bad. The flames gushed uphill, faster than I could have imagined.

Chapter 3

Isaw something moving to my left— in the fire. Its scrambling shape took form. An antelope. Ohmygod. Bursting from the flames, it was charred black, hairless. Its legs crumpled. Its head rose straight to the sky, its mouth open in a silent bleat of anguish. Its black eyes were dead. The animal died that way, head stretched upright. A sickly sweet roasted meat smell.

Even though downhill from us, the flames rose above our heads. It was the most incredible thing I’d ever seen, a wall of whirling flames consuming everything, instantly. Unstoppable, insatiably hungry. Fingers of flames jabbed into the sky.

Back up the ridge, everyone! Jerry yelled in near panic.

Terror cut through us. Abandoning the trail, we scrambled up the ridge-side, slipping on the crumbly, gravely dirt. Burning twigs and leafy limbs rained down igniting bush around us. A twig landed in my hair, and I yanked off my ball cap to beat it out. Burnt hair smelled like sulfur, horrible.

My legs shot out from under me, and the top-heavy backpack knocked me flat. I slid downslope toward the roaring flames. Sydney slid into me with a short screech. I jammed a boot into the base of a mesquite bush as Sydney clasped onto me. She made it to her knees and pulled me up. We tore our way up the slope, slipping back a foot for every three we clawed upward. Everyone else had disappeared over the crest. The heat was