John jumped off the trailer and ran at them. They tumbled backwards in a cloud of fur and claws, squealing and huffing. Then they regrouped twenty yards away at the edge of the ferns. Two stood on their hind legs and watched him.

John climbed back on the trailer and doused their dead mother with charcoal fluid. The flammable liquid ran down her rich fur like vegetable oil over a stuffed toy animal. A smattering of fluid pooled around her eye and dripped onto the trailer floor. He poured the rest of the fluid over the platform and the tarp. Back on the ground, he grabbed a corner of the tarp and lit it with his Zippo lighter, holding it away from his body.

Flame licked the tarp corner and raced across the head of the trailer.

The bears looked on nervously from the ferns, two of them standing and swaying.

The flames grew, seizing their dead mother. A massive flame shot into the air upon catching her fur. The skin of the bear sizzled and John wanted to vomit as the smell of burnt hair and flesh filled his nostrils. One of the bears cried out.

John approached the cubs, his back to the flames that now engulfed the trailer. Black smoke mushroom-clouded to the canopy. He stared down the bears, screaming at the top of his lungs, eyes bulging.

GO! GO NOW! WE KILLED YOUR MOMMA! GO!

The inferno roared behind his bulging, red face like the devil in hell.

GO NOW! GO!

Two of the bears sprinted off. The difficult bear stood on hind legs and swayed, catching the scent of his mother, the intense flames reflected in his eyes, deep and red. The cub let out a God-awful wail that echoed across the forest and down into the Black canyon.

The bear dropped to all fours and stared at John Kearns. Then the bear ran off into the ferns, forever.

Day 4

DAY 4

First light crept into the den, illuminating the packed dirt and dangling roots. Matt awoke startled, looked for the bear, and realized he was alone. The taste of soil filled his mouth, and he felt part of the earth in the most literal sense.

He crawled out of the den, pausing every few feet to listen. Frogs croaked deep in the bog, getting in a last call before fall hardened into winter.

Keep moving, he thought. He needed to reach Gibbons Road, which would give him a chance to travel uninhibited by brush or water. Seven miles down Gibbons Road was a series of cabins, which made up Stiemkel’s Resort.

Matt drank from the jug, watching the last of the fluid funnel down the clear plastic. For a second he thought about tossing the jug, but it might serve another purpose.

A bald eagle flapped its impressive wings across the southern horizon, looking more like a dinosaur than a bird. Upon seeing him, the eagle veered to the west.