2. Ambrose
CHAPTER TWO
AMbrOSE
W ith my head tipped back, I focus on the darkening skyline, watching for signs of bad weather. The weather app predicts a nasty thunderstorm, and it certainly looks like the storm is coming to fruition.
As co-owner of this smaller logging operation, it’s my job to keep my crew safe. My brother—Alan—is the other co-owner, but he’s less involved in the field.
Not to say my brother has the cushy end of the business arrangement. He has his own headaches to deal with. Alan handles the science and corporate end while I manage the dirtier logging operations. It’s a lot between the two of us. In the future, when we’re more established, we’ll hire someone to handle the science end, preferably someone with a degree in forest science. For now, we manage.
My job is more labor intensive, but I prefer my position over Alan’s. The thought of sitting behind a desk all damn day hurts my back thinking of it. I enjoy working with my hands and being in nature. There’s something rewarding about seeing the timber you cut being stacked and trucked out of the work zone, knowing that spilling your blood, sweat, and tears has made the Rockies safer for nature lovers to enjoy for ages to come.
Each of us does the job we’re best suited for. It’s why our little logging business does well and continues to grow.
My brother works as our forest engineer, designing and directing operations for cutting from the comfort of headquarters. I’m the first-line logging superintendent on-site, managing the crew in the field. Thus, the safety of my employees is in my hands entirely.
This line of work is dangerous enough without Mother Nature getting involved. However, when she gets in a mood to conjure a storm, I need to be extra vigilant. Things can get ugly quick in these mountains. I need to be alert at all times to ensure my team gets out quickly and safely when shit goes south.
The rumble of thunder in the distance has me groaning internally. Damn weather, always screwing with the job.
With the fall leaves mostly on the ground, our busy logging season has begun. My crew has been putting in long hours, felling as much of the problematic timber before we move on to the next job. This storm is troublesome not only in terms of my workers’ safety, but for their pockets. Some of my men have been on unemployment for months. A storm this early in the season is the last thing they need.
Unfortunately, the weather is outside our control.
As soon as the first bolt of lightning streaks across the sky, I make the call to quit for the day. I notify my brother back at headquarters.
Alan answers on the first ring. “Let me guess. The weather is taking a shit on us?”
“Yup.”
“Damn. We knew it was a possibility. Still sucks to quit this early in the day, especially at the start of the season.”
“Better to not risk it.”
“Agreed. Have fun pissing off the crew.” And then he disconnects.
Using the safety alert app on my satellite phone, I send out a message to all of my crew.
We got lightning. You know the drill. Wrap it up and come back in safely.
The guys are going to be a mixed bag of emotions when they return down the hill to base camp. Some will be happy to call the day early while others will be spitting nails, mad about losing out on the overtime. Loggers don’t make much. If you have a family to support, every paying hour counts.
My men can be angry all they want. Dead loggers can’t support their families and I refuse to have blood on my hands.
My phone dings with an alert text coming through our safety app.
Brose, you need to come up here. We have a situation.
Nervous about my crew, my fingers quickly type out a reply.
Is someone hurt?
Not yet. But this fool’s gone and chained himself to a marked tree.
Fucking stupid-ass tree huggers. They’re always causing my crew issues and putting themselves in unnecessary danger. Considering this one has chained himself to a tree hazard, he’s a grade dumber than the usual lot. It could be the yurt-squatter the park rangers had warned us about. Some nature loving hippy would fit the bill for the type to tie himself to a dead or dying tree.
As the first of the heavy raindrops fall from the sky, I type out a fast reply.
On my way.
Grabbing the bolt cutters from our supply trailer, I climb into my truck and drive up the makeshift road we’ve cut and cleared during our operations here in the Rocky Mountain National Park. The road is already muddy. It will be a pain in the ass to navigate back down. I’ll need to make quick work of cutting this idiot loose before the road becomes a hazard for my men to travel on.
When I arrive at the site where my crew is working, I find my men circled around the marked pine. In the center is a man no older than his mid-twenties, chained to the goddamn tree. I’ve got a good decade on him in age and about a hundred years more in the common sense department.
Shaking my hardhat-covered head in annoyance, I approach the group with my bolt cutters.
As I get closer, one of my timber fallers—Wade—greets me.
“We tried reasoning with him, Brose,” Wade apologizes, hollering over the pouring rain. He uses his pointer finger to make small circles at his head. “The guy either has a few screws loose or he’s high on something.”
Great. A sober tree hugger is hard enough to deal with. I can only imagine how unreasonable a stoned tree hugger is to manage.
Muttering a curse, I approach the restrained man. “You must have a death wish, shackling yourself to a diseased tree. That pine is infested with the Mountain Pine Beatles. It’s rotting from the inside out and very unstable.”
The tree hugger either doesn’t hear me or is deliberately ignoring me. He sucks in a big lungful of air before he shouts, “I am the Gary! I speak for the trees!”
Yup. Definitely high.
Wade snickers beside me. “What in The Lorax is this shit?”
My men can’t help but laugh at the absurd display.
With a tired sigh, I lift the bolt cutters off my shoulder.
Mister Lorax’s eyes widen in alarm. “You can’t cut down this tree or the one up ahead. I made certain of it. The trees are one with the land and need to remain that way.”
“Dude, we cut nothing that isn’t a threat to humans or the wildlife,” I say, trying to reason with the guy. “Clearing them out makes room for fresh growth. This tree needs to come down before the parasite inside of it infests other neighboring trees. Do you want more trees to die?”
He shakes his head with defiance. “We must preserve all life, including the insects that live within them.”
With a roll of my eyes, I clamp the bolt cutters on the chain and cut the lock clean off. The chain spills around the guy’s feet. The tree hugger looks in shock at his chain on the ground like I performed some magic trick.
I motion with my hand for the guy to follow me. “Come on. I’ll give you a ride down the mountain.”
The tree hippy stomps his foot on the wet earth like a disobedient child. “No! I can’t leave her.”
“Leave who?” Is there someone else here with him?
“Her!” He motions at the diseased tree I freed him from. “If I leave, you’ll take her down.”
“Nobody is taking down anything in this weather. It’s too dangerous. Now you either come with me willingly or I’ll drag you out.”
The stoner’s face puckers in anger. “Fuck you.”
Fine. We’ll do this the hard way. Whatever gets my men to safety faster.
I grab the dude by the front of his jacket, yanking him with me. He’s a wiry man, all stick legs and scrawny arms. He tries to fight me, but he’s no match for my strength.
When you grow up in these mountains, working the land from sun up to sun down, you develop a different toughness, one built on brute strength and determination. Considering I’m a sixth generation logger, I’ve got a sextuple dose of steely grit in my veins. No one on my crew fucks with me without getting yeeted off the mountain. And this deluded nuisance is no exception.
The tree hugger uses his gangly nature to lean forward with his arms out in front of him before dropping to a crouch, slipping out underneath his jacket.
Hippy boy bounces on his toes with his fists in the air like he’s some twiggy version of Rocky Balboa. “Ha! Suck it, you logger bitch. I’m not leaving this mountain.”
With a frustrated growl, I toss the vacated coat on the sodden ground and stalk toward the idiot. I’m not above knocking some sense into the fool for being a safety risk to me and my men.
When he sees me coming at him, his eyes bulge. He quickly backpedals into the bug infested tree, hitting it with enough force to knock loose a baseball bat size limb. It falls right on the top of the dude’s dome with a thud , splintering apart. The tree hippy’s eyes go cross before he falls, face first into the mud with a splat .
Awesome. Just what I need—a dead person and a crime scene investigation on my work site. That will go over great for future contracts with the Colorado State Forestry Services.
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I curse. “Someone check to see if this moron still has a pulse.”
Nathan—my crew’s choker setter—bends on one knee in front of our tree lover. He rolls the unconscious man face up, pressing two fingers against the side of his skinny neck.
After a hot second, Nathan looks at me with a shrug. “He’s fine. Just out for the count.”
Good. “Makes transporting him a ton easier. Wade?”
“Yeah, Brose?”
“Take the jackass to the hospital, will ya?”
“Sure thing.” Wade grabs the tree hugger under his armpits while Nathan grabs him by his ankles. The two of them walk the unconscious man to the bed of the company pickup truck before tossing him in the back like a sack of flour. The dude lands with a hard thunk , groans but doesn’t wake.
While Wade and Nathan drive down the mountain in the pouring rain, I address the rest of my crew.
“Show’s over. Head on back to headquarters and clock out for the day. If the weather reports are correct, this storm is only going to get worse.”
They don’t argue with me when lightning spider-webs across the sky. Shit is turning wicked fast. We need to get off this mountain— pronto .
Like any good logging superintendent should, I wait for my men to gather their equipment, load the trucks, and drive off before heading for my vehicle.
As I’m opening my door, I hear a feminine wail on the wind coming down from higher up the mountain. I think nothing of it as I climb into the cab of my truck. The acoustics on this rocky landscape can have the wind playing tricks on you.
I’ve got the truck in drive when I recall something the tree hippy said.
“You can’t cut down this tree or the one up ahead. I made certain of it.”
What did he mean by the tree up ahead? He couldn’t make certain we wouldn’t cut it down. It’s not possible to be in two places at once.
The wail on the wind echoes in my mind like a call for help.
Sonofabitch!
My foot slams down on the brake, jolting me forward in my seat. I throw my truck in reverse before spinning around in the mud and exposed tree roots to head back up the logging road.
Regardless of my conscience not willing to leave a person in a dangerous situation, if there’s another idiot connected to a marked tree, I will lose my shit.