Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre(90)

What happened? What’s the next chapter of this story?

There are a lot of scenarios and they depend on who you ask.

Scenario One is that the surviving creatures regrouped for a counterattack. That’s what the scuzzbags at [website name withheld] believe. They think Kate and Palomino tried to hole up for the winter in the Common House until one day, or night, they were ambushed and taken away. I’ll admit it’s possible. She did write about several of them escaping. Scout and Princess, running up the slope after the explosions. One of the twins with all those javelin hits, although I’m betting he later bled to death. And the other two females, the new mamas. She didn’t write about them during the fight.

Yes, it’s possible they reorganized, then came roaring back out for a rematch. Possible, but not probable. Kate wouldn’t have let that happen. Not the Kate I’ve read about. Even when they buried the bodies, she would have been armed and alert. Those graves were dug right next to the Common House, which meant that any of those approaching fuckers would have to cross a lot of open space to strike. Kate probably had plenty of javelins waiting within arm’s reach, and her new spear.

That’s what I think she did with the Iklwa blade. Nobody ever found it. Schell was kind enough to make some discreet inquiries for me. Through all the wreckage, all the stockpiled supplies and homemade weapons in the Common House, they never found a knife with a Damascus blade.

That’s the key piece of evidence to back up her leaving. That and the soba-kiri axe. They never found that one either, and it would have been essential for a long trek. I can’t be sure about any other items. Backpacks, sleeping bags, cooking gear. I don’t know what else they had. She didn’t leave a list. She also didn’t leave a note, which is why some people suspect she was taken. I don’t buy it though; I think she wasn’t sure where she was going.

That’s Scenario Two, and it’s backed up by the fact that they didn’t have a map of the area. She wrote, more than once, that they didn’t know which was the best way out. It’s possible that they tried a series of day-hikes to get the lay of the land, and that she didn’t leave a note because when they stepped out the door that morning, it wasn’t supposed to be for the last time. They could have gotten lost or hurt, or stuck in the first storm of winter.

Remember how brutal that was? I mean, c’mon, God, give us a break! A contact at the USGS told me that those kind of one-two punches can happen, like the typhoon after Pinatubo. If she got caught out in that polar vortex, with the blizzard and bitter cold…Their bodies might still be up there now, half-buried in snow and ice, thawing and rotting as scavengers pick at any exposed pieces. That’s the ending of Scenario Two, and it’s a lot less attractive than Scenario Three.

In this one they make it! Found some cave somewhere in the mountains, kept a fire going, lived on melted snow and Sasquatch jerky. Then, when the weather cleared enough to get moving, they started off again and are right now about to walk out of the wilderness next to some busy road. They might have done that already. The two of them, in some hospital, too weak and traumatized to speak. Someday soon she’ll open her eyes, whisper her name to the nearest orderly. I love Scenario Three.

But my gut tells me it’s Scenario Four.

“We have to kill them all.” That’s what she wrote. That’s what she’s doing.

I’m not talking about revenge. This is deeper, more primitive. What if those poor dumb brutes flicked a switch in Kate that’s waiting in all our DNA?

What if she didn’t stop at driving those creatures away? What if she went after them?

She knew their tracks, their scent. Kate had winter gear, and I’m betting little Palomino did too. I’m also betting that the jerky we found was made for that purpose. It’s light, easy to transport, and if you add up all the meat the rangers found versus what those animals probably weighed, I bet the deficit would be enough to get them to their first kill.

And that kill would mean more food. That soba-kiri axe was perfect for chopping up bodies, roasting a nice juicy leg on a spit. I wish I didn’t think of her that way, sitting in the dark with Palomino, the two of them warming their hands by a roaring fire, stomachs growling at some steaming limb.

It’s also hard not to feel sorry for the surviving troop. Wounded, scared, cringing at any sound that might be the smaller hungry primates coming for them. Kate’s not the only one in our family with a vivid imagination.

I’ve pictured her stalking them, maybe using Palomino as the flusher. The little girl’d yell, beat the brush, make enough racket to scatter them in terror as Kate waits patiently for some straggler to blunder into her spear. I can even picture one of them. Princess, the youngest and most vulnerable, chattering in torment as Kate jams the Damascus blade between her ribs. I can also picture my sister “playing” with her kill, torturing her. Not for fun, that’d be a waste. She’d try for a Vincent Boothe tactic, hoping to draw out a lone rescuer. And maybe it’d work. Scout, running to help, turning in surprise to see his Achilles heel severed by Pal’s swinging axe.

And the others, the two young moms, holding each other, hearing the screams die, then smelling smoke and cooking meat. I hope their brains aren’t too advanced to imagine fate, to know their babies won’t live long enough to reach adulthood. I also hope they’re not intelligent enough to feel remorse. “What have we awoken!” If there’s anything worse than visualizing your own death, it’s knowing that you caused it.