MissTaken: Ch4

 If you haven't read the previous chapters, I recommend you go to this page which has links to all the chapters as I post them. 

Chapter 4

Jessica woke in the morning chilled, stiff and sore. She moved to the firehole, threw some fresh fuel in, and gently blew the embers back to life. Huddling over the fire, she let it warm and loosen up cramped muscles.

A memory came unbidden to her mind, of camping with her family. Of waking in the morning and warming herself by the campfire her father had built—he was always the first one up. She could hear the sizzling of bacon and eggs on the cast-iron griddle and smell the aroma of the bacon mixed with wood smoke. Her mouth watered, and her stomach growled.

Jessica shook her head, clearing away the memory.  The pleasant aroma faded, but the pinch of hunger in her stomach remained. She stretched, took a few deep breaths of the morning air, then took a moment to orient herself.

She was at the bottom of a ravine which wound its way down through the mountainous terrain from northeast to southwest. She could see smoke to the northwest, maybe ten or so miles away, beyond the edges of the valley that she could see. Possibly a village on or above the river.  Or maybe a valley or two over. Difficult to tell what the terrain might do between here and there. No road close to where she was though. Nothing could be seen to the south that looked like people. Her exploration did find a better place to use as base camp. Up one of the draws just north of where she had camped was a steep hill, almost a cliff. At one point the cliff turned sharply, and in that corner was a small pocket. It was difficult to see, difficult to reach, and provided good cover, shade, and shelter. It seemed a good spot to lay low for a while.

How long would be long enough? How long before they tired of hunting her? For now, she needed to focus on thriving.

She made several trips back and forth from a wooded area near the water to her new hideout, hauling pine branches and dry wood.

Jessica used some of the branches to fashion a roof in the one exposed opening. This would prevent anyone seeing a fire from above, and it would let any rain run off the edge, rather than pooling in the sheltered area. She used more branches to create a soft bed.

Satisfied with her creations, Jess stepped out of her small pocket in the rockface. She squinted against the burning light. She shielded her eyes form the sun and pursed her lips. In all the excitement over the finding and setting up the new location, she’d neglected to make water her priority. Now she would have to handle that in the midday heat.

Reckless, Jess. How could you forget something so vital?

Unable to wait for cooler temperatures, she made her way down to the river again, bottle in hand. The water was clear, which was good. She filled the empty bottle, then collected one more load of dry wood and returned to the new base camp.

As Jess got a fire going and dropped the bottle in, she realized she needed to come up with a different solution for sanitizing the water, the bottle wasn’t likely to take much more of this treatment.

She peered out of the opening, scanning the area near the river. Dirt, rocks, brush, and trees. What could she do with any of those? She recalled a show she had watched on making clay. Could she do that? She would need to find dirt with good clay in it. Then extract the clay, shape it, dry it. Were there other steps she didn’t recall? How long would it take to find a clay deposit? Would she even be able to identify it on her own?

C’mon Jess, Keep it simple. What else would work? She sifted through other survival tricks she had learned or read about. She remembered a book she’d read explaining how native Americans made dugout canoes, by using fire to hollow out a log to make the sitting area. If it could keep water out, it could also keep water in, right? Fill a small canoe with water and it is a cistern.

Down to the river she went once more, searching for a log. It wasn’t long before she spied a recently felled evergreen tree. It appeared to have taken root on an unstable hillside, which had sloughed off. There were still green needles, but it was beginning to dry out. The base of the tree was roughly ten inches in diameter.

She set to work with the hatchet, clearing away branches, then chopping a section out at the base, she hefted the two-foot log in her arms and made her way back.

The log was too heavy and awkward to carry while climbing to the new hideout. She removed the rope from her waist and tied a loop around the log. Looping the remaining end around her waist, she tied it off. She then began the climb, allowing the rope to drag the log up behind her. She winced as the rope dug into her hips but continued upward. Once she cleared the ledge, she pulled the rope hand over hand to drag the log the remaining distance. Exhausted from the exertion, she lay on her back, breathing heavily.

“C’mon Jess.” she murmured encouragingly after a few moments rest, “You got this.” She needed water. She needed calories.

Using the hatchet Jessica cut away wood from the log to flatten one side, to keep it from rolling. Once she had a stable base, she began chopping at the top, roughly carving out a trough. The going was slow, and the inside was very rough.

She piled the shavings in the trough, and using a hot coal from the fire, she set the shavings ablaze. The fire was hot, she backed away a couple steps and shielded her face with her hands. As the burn progressed, the fire crept up toward the top of the trough. Jessica quickly grabbed a long stick and beat at the flames, keeping the fire back from the edges.

After the fire had burned out, she used the blade of the hatchet to scrape out the burnt wood. The inside of the trough was now deeper, and considerably smoother. She made one more trip to the water to collect a large handful of mud, which she applied to the edges of the trough, to keep them from burning. Then she filled the trough with more shavings and lit them.

She repeated the process again and again, forming a smooth, deep trough. She continued to work into the evening. As the sun set, she opened the bottle she had removed from the fire a few hours earlier and drank deeply. Then she settled down on her pine bed and slept.

Next morning Jessica continued burning, cleaning, and deepening the trough in the log. By late morning, she estimated the trough was large enough to hold a little over a gallon of water. Now it was time to try out another trick her father had told her about on one of their family camping trips.

Jess made several trips back and forth, collecting water in the bottle and pouring it into her wooden cistern. She collected handfuls of smooth, clean, roughly golf ball sized rocks on each trip also, which she piled in the fire. Once the rocks were well heated, she used a couple of sticks to fish a few at a time out of the fire and into the cistern. After a few minutes she removed those rocks from the cistern and replaced them with a few more fresh rocks from the fire. In time, the water in the wooden cistern began to boil. Jessica grinned. It was working. She continued swapping rocks, keeping the water boiling for ten minutes.

Jessica smiled contentedly, giving herself a mental pat on the back. She had a process for producing a gallon of clean water—enough to keep her hydrated for a day. Next, she needed to work out a better way than the little bottle to transport the water. She would waste a lot of time and energy making so many trips to the river every day.

Another wooden cistern or bowl would be easy to make, but it would be heavy and awkward to carry. Jess chewed on her bottom lip as she considered clay pots again. She'd only seen how to do it, and it seemed like a lot of work, and they would probably be fragile.

She recalled seeing a jug made from rope, in a museum once. The placard had explained how they used pitch to make it watertight. She didn’t have enough rope to make a jug with, but she knew how to make rope from trees. She had done that with one of the old ranch hands once. He had stripped the cambium layer just under the bark from a tree and laid it out to dry. A few days later, he separated it into little strands, and then twisted the strands together to make cordage.

Of course, she needed to work out food also. That would probably need to come before more efficient water transport. Then again, perhaps she would be killing two birds with one stone by trekking back down to the oak trees she had gone through on her way to this spot.

A nice straight oak branch could be fashioned into a longbow, and a bowstring could be crafted from some of the cordage made from the cambium layer. She had watched her father and brother do that one summer.

Jessica’s brow furrowed as she chewed on her lower lip. It would take most of a day to get to the oaks. Finding a good piece of wood for a bow stave and collecting cambium would likely consume a day. Three days of walking, with no food, and very little water. She frowned, scanning the horizon.

There were clusters of evergreen trees here and there, just a few minutes’ walk from where she stood. She could collect cambium for cordage from them, which would work as well as oak, maybe better. And she was certain to find pitch on them as well. It would likely be harder to find a good, straight, knot-free piece of would for a bow stave, and the softer wood was almost certain to produce an inferior bow, but perhaps good enough.

She grimaced, frustrated by the indecisiveness she felt. In survival situations, the margin for error was often slim. She didn’t want to make the wrong choice.

She wasn’t even sure what there was available to hunt in Mexico. Probably deer. There were deer practically everywhere in the world, Some form of big cat no doubt, and some type of canine—wolf or coyote of some sort. Deer would be preferable. She wrinkled her nose at the thought of eating dog or cat. She wasn’t in a position to be picky just now, however.

There were probably plenty of smaller critters around as well – rabbits or squirrels or something. Maybe that was the place to start.

She spent the rest of the day building a few primitive figure-four deadfall traps using larger logs or big rocks for the deadfall, and smaller twigs and sticks for the trigger system. It was quick work notching them, and they were fairly easy to set up on worn areas near and leading to the river. She found herself increasingly grateful for her childhood on the ranch, and her father’s broad knowledge of bushcraft.

That night, once it was dark, she threw a handful of green material on the fire to produce smoke. Holding her breath and closing her eyes, she stepped into the billowing cloud to take a smoke bath. The smoke would kill the bacteria that had been colonizing all over her body for the past few shower-less days; not as nice as a hot shower and clean clothes from the dryer, but better than stewing in her own sweaty stench for who knows how much longer. It would also mask her human odors from animals.

* * *

Early next morning, Jessica checked the traps. She found a half-eaten rabbit in one trap, and nearby tracks that looked like coyote. She collected what meat she could and took it back to roast over the fire.

A quick, unsatisfying meal, a big drink of clean water, and she made her way to the nearest cluster of evergreens.

Jess set to work peeling away bark and stripping out large sections of cambium. She was careful to take only one vertical strip from each tree, leaving the bark mostly intact and running the full length of the tree. She didn’t want to kill the trees. 

Jessica was also pleasantly surprised to discover a few oak trees among the conifers. She found a stout, unblemished branch about five feet in length, and roughly as thick as her wrist—an acceptable piece to fashion a bow from.

Jess shouldered the strips of cambium along with the branch, and made a hasty return trip, arriving at her camp just before dark. She stoked up the fire, drank most of the water remaining in the cistern, and spread the cambium out to dry before settling into to her bed, exhausted.

Over the next couple days, the traps provided a couple of unrecognizable, partially eaten rodents. Jess scowled, as she collected the scraps.

“Stupid, lazy, good-for-nothing welfare coyote,” she grumbled as she stomped back to camp to cook the remnants. She ate the meager meal in two bites, and she wondered if she used more calories collecting and preparing it than she received from eating it. This coyote was making her life ten times harder than it needed to be with its opportunistic scavenging.

Jessica worked on shaping the branch into a bow, and on separating the cambium into long, thin strips, which she then twisted together to form cordage. She had to take frequent, short breaks to rest her weary eyes and sluggish fingers. Her mind was less focused with every hour that passed. She tried to keep her movements to a minimum to conserve calories as she worked, but her sparse diet was beginning to take its toll.

Selecting one of the best lengths of cordage, she fashioned a bowstring.  She had also found a few stray feathers in a nest while poking around in trees, and she had managed to locate a chunk of obsidian, from which she had broken off a couple decent, flat, triangle-shaped pieces. Using various shaped rocks, she experimented chipping and flaking off material to put a good edge on the triangles and to add notches at the bases to attach the newly made arrowheads to straight sticks. She used some of the finer cordage she had created to fix the arrowheads and the feathers firmly in place.

 She was able to manufacture a half-dozen satisfactory arrows with the materials she collected. She had a few more arrowheads and there was more obsidian left. Sticks were readily available—straight sticks somewhat less so, but enough time looking would turn them up. Feathers were a trickier problem. She saw birds occasionally, but she didn’t have a good way to catch them. The bow was not the ideal weapon for bird hunting.

Perhaps she could make a sling? She grimaced, remembering the time she had tried using a sling her brother had made a few years ago. Hitting the broad side of a barn required luck—for her at least. She would have to give the feather idea more thought.

For now, she took the bow and arrows out to the open space by the river and made several practice shots at a cluster of bushes, getting a feel for where to aim at various distances. She broke one of her arrows in the process but managed to recover the fletching and arrowhead for re-use.

After an hour or so of practice, she picked a good observation spot near one of her frequently pilfered traps and kept watch as night fell. There was good moonlight, so she had excellent visibility of the trail.

It must have been close to midnight when a rabbit came up the trail, triggered the trap, and let out an abbreviated squeal as the large boulder dropped, crushing the head. The body protruding from the rock convulsed briefly, then went still. Jess remained watchful from her post. Not more than an hour later, a coyote came into view. It made its way boldly over to the rabbit and began picking at it.

Jess nocked an arrow, drew, and fired. The arrow left with a twang, and she made a mental note to do something to dampen the string. An instant later the coyote yelped as the arrow struck. The coyote turned and made to flee; the arrow had struck its hindquarter in a glancing blow, tearing flesh, but not sticking. The coyote stumbled, trying to get its legs, then took off. Jess scowled.

“Oh well,” she muttered, and she walked down to the trap. “At least he’s not likely to mess with my traps again soon.” She collected and field dressed the rabbit, found the arrow, and returned to camp.

She slept well that night after a good, filling meal and dreamt of her home. She was sitting on the couch. Nobody else was there, save an old woman, sitting in an old rocking chair, knitting. She didn’t recognize the chair, but she’d seen the woman in a family history book. It was her three times great grandmother. Or was it four greats? Maybe five? She couldn’t remember. Her father’s-mother’s-something-something.

At any rate, she was definitely great. A frontiersman’s wife, she had lived on the ragged edge of civilization. Her husband had been a scrapper, family lore said he would have his horse walk on his back to loosen up tense muscles. Grandma Dalton was by all counts his equal in sheer strength of will, though not so rowdy, nor short tempered.

“Nice evening.” Grandma Dalton observed, not looking up from her knitting.

“Yes, mam.” Jessica responded. For some reason, she felt the ‘mam’ was important. This gentle, yet solid matriarch deserved respect, though she did not command it. “The stars are beautiful tonight.”

“How are you feeling?”

“A little tired.” Jess replied, “It’s a lot of hard work—lots to do around the farm.”

“Yes, dear, it is” Grandma Dalton looked her over critically. “Hard work keeping a house in order. You should get some rest child.”

“Yes, mam.”

“Off to bed with you, and don’t forget to say your prayers. Don’t let yourself get so busy running about that you forget to talk to God.”

“Yes, mam.”

As soon as Jessica woke the next morning, she got on her knees. “Dear God, I’m sorry I haven’t been taking time to pray lately. I guess I wasn’t thinking straight. I promise I will do better. Anyway, thanks for all your help. Thanks for that snake when I needed food, and for that perfect branch I made my bow from.”

Jess paused, “Please bless my family and let them know I am okay,” she paused again, “and please keep my roommates safe,” she whispered. She tried to find the right words to ask for a way for them to escape, her mind turning over a dozen implausibly miraculous scenarios, she finally settled for, “Please help them, Amen.”