A Myth Has It

The remote southeastern Alaska village on a small island had been entirely spared the hardships of the Pacific siege that was laying waste to the supply chain of North America. On the mainland, society was eating itself in a perplexing violent bid to acquire material items the people here contentedly live without.

The ocean provides hardship, and bounty. Among the richest waters on the planet are the cold waters along the Pacific Northwest. The kelp highway. An ancient foodie route where exploration, migration and colonization was guided by one’s stomach. Bone-piercing cold wet winters contrast temperate lush summers. No matter the season, food and fuel are abundant if you’re willing to work for it.

Without the habits of technology, and no job in any regular sense of the word, a person is left with a whole lot of time. Time to explore or tinker. Time to nature-watch or mend. Time to be bored, and time to think. Time to be obliviously uninterested in anything majorly amiss in the larger world.

Tara was not born here. Very few will brave a pregnancy in this remote landscape. She moved here to escape the trappings of American culture. The increasing scourge of willful illiteracy. The rush to do actually nothing and to go factually nowhere. Incompetence about anything practical paved a path towards helpless superiority. The general air of comfort and ease had become too unsettling.

Living way out like this isn’t like being trapped as some expect. There are irregular trips to town offered on a boat, or small plane by whomever was going. Wealthy tourists infrequently come and spend time at the lodges. A handful of radio stations tune in, and mail gets delivered every six weeks by float plane. That’s about it for outside interaction.

Being among the newer residents, Tara continued to be awestruck at the natural beauty of the area and challenged by the nuanced knowledge she needs to thrive. For her, there remained no shortage of new skills, information or observations.

The late August day was clear, sunny and perfect. Autumn is close. The ocean is calm, and there’s no wind to speak of. Tara was in her canoe with her husky, an unkempt blue-eyed outcast she had bonded with, before the sun had fully peeked from behind the cedar trees.

The long aluminum canoe had been fitted with an outrigger on either side for stability in changing wave conditions. As she paddled she considered her companion perched ahead in the front seat wearing a safety orange doggie life jacket. Yukon Cornelius. Yukon, for short. Most huskies are difficult to manage, wanting only to run and bark. They hate warm interiors and become a nuisance with too much pent up energy. It’s the state dog of Alaska. Champion of the iconic Iditarod Sled Dog Race. They are also the most dumped off, euthanized and mistreated breed living alongside humans in the Last Frontier..

It seemed to Tara that Yukon didn’t want to be a village stray any longer. He didn’t run off after porcupines. He didn’t really bark or howl. He seemed to understand what she expected and did it without any training whatsoever. She liked that about him.

She was still humanizing her pet, as one does, when a strange whirring sound caused her thoughts to cease. She was searching the sky for the source when a flaming ball of something with a smoke trail crashed into the evergreen rainforest ahead on a large island in the panhandle. During the lows of the lowest tides it isn’t an island. It's connected to the narrow strip of Alaska that borders Canada, north of Washington.

Aside from exposure; moose, mountain lions and bears are the biggest threats to people. A canister of bear spray and a little know-how is all a person needs. Luckily, there are no snakes or other venomous critters in the cool northern climate. Venturing inland is one of Tara’s favorite ways to spend time. She has grown accustomed to navigating the underbrush. There’s mostly ferns once the canopy of trees becomes dense enough to shade out the forest floor. She regularly forages a bounty of edible and medicinal goodies on her explorations of the region.

Today, that mysterious crash has captured her undivided attention. Maybe there’s an injured person over there? More likely, it’s bits of body parts to return to relatives living far from here.

Not silently, but without speaking, Tara beached the canoe and set out in the direction of the smoke. Her footfalls were heavy as she set a brisk pace and listened for calls for help. Yukon wasn’t a run-ahead sort of dog. He quietly shared her speed with an occasional stop to pee or sniff.

They had reached the openness of a fern adorned pine needle bed in prime Pacific Northwest rainforest. It's always damp under the canopy. The tree tops far above the red-brown trunks and moss smothered limbs are evergreen. Vibrations of sound are both carried and absorbed.

Movement in her peripheral vision catches her attention. Maybe a deer or spooked grouse taking flight? She slows and quiets her pace, still listening for sounds of a survivor. Something moved again. Her steamy breath caught and a large water droplet from a branch far above splashes loudly on her hood. She had forgotten she was wearing it and pulled it off her head.

Not much more than a hundred feet ahead at 2 o'clock was a large humanoid taking giant strides in the same general direction of the crash where Tara was heading. She stood still and took in the spectacle. It was at least 7-feet tall, very hairy and moved sort of like a gorilla.

Yukon didn’t bark at it. Apparently, he didn’t find anything alarming with the sighting, smells, or existence of a large unknown creature in the wilderness a thousand miles from the nearest city.

With an abundance of caution and an unhealthy dash of curiosity, Tara modified course and began to trail the large creature. It didn’t leave a single print on the needle covered ground. There was no musky smell of warning like bears often leave behind and it moved with natural stealth despite its lumbering size, like the moose do.

Tara and Yukon nearly crested a small rise in the terrain when Tara suddenly laid flat on the ground. The dog watched panting misty breaths nearby. She eased her head up to peek her eyes level among the citrusy smelling needles and earthy decaying leaves. Is that a … Sasquatch?

The ape-like creature squats examining the wreckage. It picks up a piece of sky-debris, smells it and tosses it down. It tastes other pieces as it analyzes the crash site. Tara notes that it bears a striking resemblance to the folklore most Americans have been raised on. Except, it has a thigh-length bit of tail and is faintly green. Its coat is sloth-like with a shaggy texture and green tint.

It snatched up a section of wreckage and bolted for the trees looking like a chimpanzee in a nature documentary. It ran on two legs and effortlessly bounded up a fir tree using only one hand. It sat perched on a thick mossy limb-stump to examine its find.

Up there in the tree, it looked very much like grey-green lichen. Tara realized the secret to Sasquatch’s elusivity has been in the camo all along. If it laid still on the ground, it would resemble the lump of a long-decaying log. It has had many vantage points to spy on us this whole time and we have always walked right by. Tara wondered how many times it had watched her pee, or listened in on her private conversations with Yukon.

The wreckage was still smoldering. There were no flames nor signs of a person in need. Being unfamiliar with any of the technology progress from the last four or so years, Tara could only guess that it was from low orbit rather than flying like an airplane.

The night sky has been becoming more active. Satellites, jets and who-knows-what orbit Earth behaving in ways stars and planets do not. Here, space junk twinkles like glitter within the eerie green light of the Aurora Borealis. Far away from the light pollution of civilization, isolated communities have watched progress from far below, largely unconcerned with whatever was driving this activity. It plays no part in filling the dinner pail.

Tara paused all considerations of everything she was experiencing at the sound of a helicopter. Bigfoot did the same. It clutched onto its prize and leapt with powerful legs 20-feet or more to the next tree and the next. It used the sturdy tail for balance and even swung one-armed from a limb once like Tarzan before vanishing into the greenery.

The helicopter sounds got louder, imminent. Soon, it was looming over the wreckage above the canopy pulling and whirling green needles off of branches, dead leaves and soil tossed about the tumultuous hovering of the aircraft. Should she run for it?

Using the canopy between them for cover, she backed away from the scene for a few yards and decided to break for the canoe.

“Over there!” a man’s voice yelled from behind. Tara looked back to see him suspended by a rope hanging above the wreckage, below the treetops as debris was flung haphazardly in all directions pointing directly at her.

She turned and ran harder with Yukon right there matching the stride, never uttering a bark in alarm nor defense. They lept logs and sprinted through clusters of fern from the dangers of this unknown threat towards the beach. There’s a black raft next to the canoe ahead. Yukon lunges with a snarl to her right and takes down a man in black she hadn’t seen. With the ferocity of a creature who has had to fend for and defend itself, the blue-eyed canine ripped at the face of the flailing man on the ground.

Tara looks around to assess her situation. There’s two more men in black uniforms on her trail. She pulls out her bear spray and tags both pursuers square in the face from 15-feet, rendering them blind and cursing. Tara says, “Yukon.”

The first, and only, word she’s had to speak all day brings her bloodied beast to heel and they make for the canoe. She launches against the breaking waves and paddles towards their home village, hoping at least to secure a witness to her demise.

The helicopter closes in. The pilot attempts a maneuver that would capsize an unsupported canoe and fails thanks to the support of her outriggers. She struggles to retain the oars in the wild winds of the rotors. Tara squints her eyes, bears down and paddles with all her might as frigid ocean water whipped up in the chaos stings her face.

The helicopter tries again to undo her efforts at escape and instead catches a blade in the water. Two slices. Chop… The second blade heaves to complete its circle, hits her canoe square in the middle sending her air born into the frigid waters. Through the whole ordeal her head is barely submerged. She’s alert and present to experience the helicopter sinking – there are no signs of the pilot as hot mechanical parts sizzle and air bubbles up.

Each end of her canoe individually bobs on the surface as they're designed to do. Tara easily locates Yukon floating in his orange vest. He has a gaping cut across his head and an ear is sorta hanging off.

Tara grasps one bobbing end of the canoe, secures Yukon’s life vest to the tie off and begins kicking towards home and away from the bubbles of the helicopter.

The water isn’t just cold. It is always precisely two degrees above freezing. She kicks on her belly, rolls over and kicks on her back. She tried a sideways butterfly stroke while clenching the doggie life vest straps in her teeth. She kicked her way towards home reminding herself the exertion of kicking is keeping her alive.

Despite the physical effort and all the positive self talk a person in the ocean paddling for their home on the horizon could muster, she began to feel like an ice cube. Not heavy, but solidly buoyant. Movements became more tense to manage. She struggled to kick her heavy legs.

The sound of an engine between the swells of rhythmic waves began to drone closer. Then even closer, louder than the sounds of the ocean. Tara was numbly kicking her way towards her warm wood stove with an unconscious husky in tow when the black raft pulled up abreast.

She woke up on a beach. Warm. A man in a black uniform did not ask her name, nor about how she was feeling. He did not care.

What happened to the black box?

“What black box?” she asks with recollections of her bizarre day coming into focus.

“The black box from the crash you just ran from.” he irritatedly explains as though he had repeated it one-hundred times already and she should know what he means.

Sitting up onto one elbow into a more wakeful position Tara says, “Well, you fellas are not going to believe this, but... Bigfoot took off with it.”