They stopped for the night at the junction of the Asperity River and the lake. They had skirted the reservoir all afternoon, and to Tim's relief it hadn't appeared to be rising terribly fast. It wasn't drowning he feared – his brother had been right, he knew, when he'd pointed out the huge amount of liquid it would take to fill the area beneath the force field – but rather added difficulty. They were handicapped as it was, and the last thing they needed was to find themselves stranded on a quaking mountaintop and surrounded by water.
Leaving Dick near the edge with their stove and the makings of dinner, he retreated inland to set up the tent. There had been no wind all day, and he suspected that there wasn't likely to be any due to the barricade overhead, but he staked the sides down anyway. The way our luck's going, there'll be a tornado tonight, he rolled his eyes as he worked. ...Maybe I shouldn't think that too loud, he added a minute later when the spike he was pounding in with a rock came right back up in his hand.
A sharp bark drew his attention. Thinking that it might have been a cry of pain from his brother, he craned his head back over his shoulder. The older man seemed to be stirring the pot without difficulties, though, and Tim frowned. Then what...?
The noise repeated itself, and this time his ears were able to pinpoint the source. "Whoa...um, hi."
The prairie dog that had appeared above the ground a few feet away watched him for a long moment. Then it barked a third time and dropped back down into its hole. ...Okay, then. It occurred to him that he might have placed the tent over one of the creature's exits from its underground labyrinth, and he paused. He could pull out all of the stakes, lift the tent, and check, he supposed, but after a moment's deliberation he decided against it. Even with as tired and sore as he was, he couldn't imagine himself not seeing an opening the size of his fist while he was rolling everything out; the animal must have just been assessing the threat he posed to the colony, that's all.
Shaking his head at himself, he turned back to his task. The final bit of aluminum went into the earth easily, and he straightened with a groan. Now that they were down to one ground pad and one sleeping bag between them, it was easy to lay out their bedding from a standing position in the doorway. The way they were abandoning gear and huddling together at night, they might have saved on weight and just bought a one-man tent, he grimaced. It was too late for that now, of course, so all he could do was hope that they wouldn't end up needing the extra material to make a hang-glider or something else equally ridiculous.
It was as he was bending forward to put his pack inside where it would be safe from the gnawing teeth of the prairie dog that another aftershock struck. There was no warning tremor, just a solid roll of the earth that threw him forward mercilessly. He landed atop the sleeping platform he had just made, but it did little to reduce the pain that flared when his knees took his weight. "Aaah!" he screamed as he felt the fresh scabs that capped the joints break open. "Shit!" Can't bleed on the bed, he lectured himself, scrabbling forward. Can't bleed on the bed...
He fell twice more before he managed to get out of the tent. As soon as he was clear of the structure, the focus of his worry shifted. Dick. Dick's by the lake. The drop-off that they had overcome with their cord earlier in the day had slowly tapered off until it was a bare two feet high, but he still didn't want his brother tumbling over it. If his leg was too stiff to let him hike up a hill then it was definitely too locked up for swimming, and the other man didn't need any more injuries besides that.
Before he could begin trying to crawl towards where he'd left him, the worst of the motion ceased. There was still a faint shivering going on beneath his feet as he stood shakily, but that was better than the punches the planet had been throwing. Scanning the empty shoreline, Tim felt a too-familiar hand coil itself in his guts. "Dick!" he shouted.
Dick's head popped up as if he'd seen the prairie dog, too, and was trying to imitate it. "Yo!" he hollered back. "You okay?"
"Yeah! You?" His muscles unclenched. You look safe. Good…
"Um...well, I'm making something else for dinner now, but I'm okay other than that."
If a batch of food was the only casualty, Tim thought he could live with it. Waving to show that he'd gotten the message, he glanced back to check on the tent. "Ah, hell." What had been a sleek dome was now a half-collapsed mess of rip-stop material and lightweight supports, at least one of which appeared to be broken. "...Screw it. I'll come back." Dick had said he was fine, but he wanted to see for himself. Besides, there were warm trails running down his shins again, and he didn't want to drip around camp any more than necessary.
He took only a single step before he heard another low bark. If it had sounded like the previous ones he would have ignored it, but there was a pathetic tone to the cry that pulled him around with a moan of denial. "What now? Oh..." His brow furrowed. ...Where did the prairie dog burrow go?
As he studied an odd zig-zagging depression in the dirt not far away, he realized what had happened. While he had no idea how the colony had survived the initial temblor and all of the rumblings since, it was clear that this particular tunnel had finally given out and collapsed in on itself. Another, fainter bark called out, and he sighed in resignation. Rescuing wild animals wasn't part of his job description, but he couldn't just stand by and let the thing suffocate under his feet.
"Hold on," he muttered as he maneuvered himself down into the dirt. Digging at the loose soil where the prairie dog had shown itself a short while before, he uncovered the remnants of the subterranean passageway. After a minute his fingers brushed something warm and solid. It kicked, and he latched onto it as gently as possible so that he could pull it out. "Don't bite me," he ordered as the little creature slid into the open air. Its fur was full of dust, but it shook it off easily and gave its face a swift cleaning. Then it looked at him for another long second, its nose twitching and its sides heaving. "Uh...I guess you can go now, if you want," he shrugged at it. "I mean, I don't exactly need a pet or anything."
The dog gave a little sneeze, flicked one ear, and then took off into the grass.
I'm getting as bad as Dick is about animals, Tim determined as he stood up once more. Talking to prairie dogs like they're people...jesus, maybe I hit my head in that last one...
"Everything okay?" his brother looked up as he approached.
"Yeah. Sorry, I had to..." He hesitated, reflected once more that he must be losing his sanity, and finally continued. "I had to rescue a prairie dog."
"A prairie dog was in trouble?"
"Yeah," he verified as he sat down beside him. "Its burrow collapsed on top of it. It started yelping, and...well, I couldn't just walk away. I mean, it didn't cause the earthquake."
"Sure." An arm stretched across his back and tugged him in. "I'm glad you're not hurt, Timmy," Dick whispered just above his ear. "...And I'm glad you're such a good person, too."
He blushed, embarrassed. "It was just a rat-thing. It's no big deal."
"Sure it is. Lots of people would have just left the little guy like that, but you made a special effort to help. That says a lot about who you are, little brother; don't be ashamed of it. I know I'm not."
"Well...thanks," he murmured. The heat in his cheeks increased at the compliment, and he had to turn his head away to make it go down. It was what you would have done, Dick, he thought. So...I'm glad I did it. People can do a hell of a lot worse than to imitate you, that's for sure. The world would be a much better place, in his opinion, if more people followed his big brother's example. The problem was getting them to realize as much.
Their meal was ready before another shaking episode could knock it over like the first batch. With as many calories as they were burning and as far as they had to go it wasn't good that they'd lost an entire evening's worth of food to the dirt, but there wasn't much they could do about it. Tim knew that he certainly didn't want to try and scrape the stew out of the grass in order to eat it. If worst came to worst they would have to take time to scrounge for wild sustenance, but for now they still had rations – and good ones, at that, he smiled as the bag of cookies made an appearance.
They had stopped earlier tonight than the evening before, and as a result the sun was just beginning to set as they were wrapping up dinner. Dick insisted on cleaning Tim's knees out for him again, joking as he did that it was much easier this time. When that was done, they tossed what they could of the spilled stew into the water, where it was less likely to draw animals of the tooth-and-claw variety. Then they picked up their cooled stove and made their way to the tent.
It was obvious that Dick was beginning to flag from the way he clung to Tim's shoulder the entire way, and the younger man was careful to give him a hand in lowering himself to the ground once they'd reached their destination. "Bedtime?" he urged. You've got rings under your eyes. I know you're tired.
"Don't you think we ought to fix this thing first?" a thumb was jerked towards the crumpled shelter.
"I can do it, I was just putting it off." To prove his point, he began to fiddle with it.
"Here, let me help-"
"No," he waved him back down. "You rest. You cooked two dinners without my help, the least I can do is set the tent up twice. It's not a big deal."
"...Okay, but-"
"I'll let you know if I need help, I promise." Rest, you dork, a tiny, affectionate smile crossed his lips. Just relax.
As he worked it occurred to him that he should have checked the nasty wound in his brother's leg again after dinner. I'll do it first thing in the morning, he swore as he used a bit of duct tape to fix the broken pole. Uncovering the injury near the tent might increase the smell of blood in the area, and he didn't want to risk that, especially after he'd probably left traces of the substance on their bedding. I'll look at it in the morning.
"...Hey, it's raining," Dick commented just as Tim was finishing up the repairs.
"What?!" Oh, no. Not rain. That's the last thing we need... He felt no drops on his arms or head, though, and frowned. What on earth was Dick talking about?
"Look up," a bit of advice came as the older man seemed to read his confusion. "It's raining out there, but not in here. Weird, huh?"
"Oh, hey..." Abandoning what little was left of his project – they were in trouble anyway if a strong enough wind came up for them to really need the last two stakes to be seated – he sat down at his hiking partner's side. High above them, the previously clear dome was beginning to develop splatters and streams as the falling rain hit it and succumbed to gravity. It reminded Tim of afternoons spent watching the rain land on the sunroof as Alfred drove him home from school. This was infinitely prettier, though, and it became even more so as the hidden sun grew closer to the horizon and turned the undersides of the clouds into a painting. Every blink unveiled a different hue, a new whorl in the hovering banks of moisture, or a fresh river rushing down to the ground. "...Hey, Dick?"
"Uh huh?"
"This is the best rainstorm I've ever been under."
"They're not nearly as unpleasant when you don't get wet from them, right?"
"Exactly." There was much more to the happy swelling in his chest than just that, but he sensed that he didn't need to say it out loud for it to be understood. Everything had gone wrong on this trip, but the show being put on above them almost made it all worth it.
Eventually it got too dark for them to see what was going on. They crawled inside, and while Dick made himself as comfortable as he could on the narrow pallet Tim busied himself with digging out their headlamps. "Here," he tucked them both into the small mesh basket suspended from the crown of the tent. "With all that cloud cover it's going to be pitch-black out there. If we need to get up for something, we'll want these."
"Gooooood thinking," a complimentary yawn sounded. "Now c'mere."
He curled against him without complaint and let the sleeping bag be pulled up to his chin. They had left their small camp pillows laying with the second sleeping bag as part of their effort that morning to save space and weight, but Dick's arm served as a decent enough substitute. As soon as Tim's head hit it, his eyes slipped closed. "...Night..." he whispered, and was out.
Hours later he snapped awake and found himself staring up at the roof of the tent, which in the dark was just as invisible as the barrier locking them away from the rest of the world. A bark sounded, and for a moment he thought he was dreaming about the events of the previous day. Did you get stuck again, you silly prairie dog? he groaned.
"Tim!" a harried hiss made him start.
"Huh?!" Groping over, he found Dick's spot empty. "What...Dick?"
"Timmy, get up and get the bear spray out!"
"Huh?!" He was dreaming, he had to be. Bear spray? "What do you need...?" he asked blearily as his hands fumbling towards his pack.
Another bark rang out, this time carrying a strong note of warning. Somewhere in the distance there was an answer. Oh, good. He's not the only one left, he mused in satisfaction. Wait...bear spray?! Oh, god… "Dick?!"
"Get the spray, Tim, now!"
That was when he heard it, a low chuff that was far too throaty to have been made by any prairie dog. Panic seized him, and he rolled upward in order to scrabble through his supplies faster. A second huff reached his ears, and his blood ran cold. Where is it, where is it, where is it?!
"Tim, c'mon!"
"I'm trying!" He was trying, but he couldn't find it. He couldn't find it, and judging from the sound of things the bear was getting closer.
"Tim!"
He couldn't find it. He couldn't find it, and he let out a disbelieving cry. After all of that, everything they'd gone to, everything they had planned to put themselves through still, they were going to die as a bruin's midnight snack. It was unbelievable, entirely unbelievable. Shoving his arms deeper into the body of the bag, he flailed through his clothes. Where is it?!
"Tiiiim!"
Author's Note: I put a picture of a prairie dog up on my blog this morning, because I think we all need something cute to take our minds off of the bear in camp. Happy reading!