SODIUM:1 Harbinger by Stephen Arseneault Read Free Book Online Page B

of the journey was beginning to fade as the exhaustion set in. I looked at the others and Bull and Allie were actually chipper and showed no real sign of being tired. Of course, they were by far in the best shape of our crew.
    One of the reasons Bull had invited us was so he would get a good feeling about the level of adventurer he could bring along. If Susi, Kyle and I could make it without too much trouble then it would open the door for a much larger pool of potential clients.
    I really couldn’t tell what Kyle’s level of fatigue was because he was just not a complainer. Had I been throwing rocks at him from behind he would have shaken his head at me and then kept on going. Susi, on the other hand, had a little bit of me in her and would pipe up if something was a bother.
    After lunch and a good rest Bull was once again ready to hit the trail. Susi and I both made our moves to lobby for an additional half hour of rest. We argued that we had made enough progress on the day’s hike to buy ourselves a reprieve. I could not have been happier at the time, but as it turned out the longer rest only made us stiff by the time our half hour was up.
    I slid on the pack, looked back down the trail and we once again started moving forward. At first I thought, “one foot after the other”, but as we continued my muscles began to loosen up and I got my second wind.
    The trail continued upwards, around and over boulders and fallen trees. In reality there was no trail to speak of. It was just a path through the wilderness that we had chosen. Except for the occasional appearance of it being an animal trail it was just as Mother Nature had made it; rough and rocky.
    After a while, talk once again surfaced about a rest break. We were just coming in to flatter terrain and I still had the suspicious feeling that we were being followed. So, I ducked behind a large rock and stayed crouched as the others proceeded. I figured with the flat terrain I would easily be able to catch back up if they got too far ahead.
    I waited a full five minutes behind the rock and then slowly peered around the sides back down the trail. If there was someone following us I was sure I would have caught a glimpse of them. After a few minutes of my spying I suddenly realized that I was all alone as the others were now out of sight.
    It’s not a good feeling to be alone in the wilderness where there are known to be bears, mountain lions and possibly hostile people roaming around, especially given the fact that my only defense was a ball bat. I slipped on my pack and made my best time to get myself caught back up to the others.
    Several minutes into my hurried pace I saw Bull coming my way at an equally fast jog. As he got close I told him of my spying game and that if anyone was back there they were doing a really good job of hiding themselves. As I reached him he stopped, took it in for a moment and then turned. We then made our way back to the others.
    This time we took a half hour for rest and my first course of business was to get out of my boots. I wanted to get my tired hot feet into some cool mountain water. As always, the initial feeling was of bitter cold, but after a minute it was soothing. As I looked down in the shallow water I could see little bits of something glimmering up at me.
    It was then that gold fever struck! I went over to my pack and retrieved my eating tin. I hurried back to the sand at the water’s edge and began to pan. There were real flakes of gold in there and I was determined to get them all.
    I had been fascinated with gold panning as a boy as there was a good bit of prospecting still done in North Georgia. Most turned up very little gold, but every once in a while you would hear a story of someone finding a good nugget.
    I was looking for my nugget, but all I seemed to get were tiny flakes. I dumped pan after pan of sand when nothing more than a smattering of flakes were visible. When I finally moved to another spot I took a moment