Hunter Walker

Hunter Walker 2

The young RCMP officer listened impatiently to what he wanted her to do.

She’d introduced herself in the cruiser and then given him the brief, and how the contact protocol would be conducted as he was handed off to the local office.

He quietly suggested a straight shot getting him to Banff would bring a solution quickly and there’d be no need to get everyone all stirred up and anxious. He just needed to get to Sulphur Mountain as soon as possible.

After explaining to him why that wouldn’t happen, she listened.. then a bit more carefully as he explained why she needed to make it happen.

“He seeks refuge.. has a story to tell .. and will only tell it to the right person. And he’s chosen me as the right person. So I need to get there and listen. This is all he wants.. his actions are very clear.”

“We’re sending you in to find him because you’re the best. He didn’t choose you. We did. And when you find him.. we’ll go in and take him down.

“I see the sign differently.. and the note he left behind spells it out.”

‘What sign ? You aren’t even close to him yet.. why, you just found out his name !”

‘He’s left clear sign all down his pathway and his reasons and actions are obvious to me. He’s doing this, leaving an obvious trail with a clear purpose for me.”

He lightly but adroitly shushed her next objection with a slight hand gesture that indicated ‘pause’ and simply looked down the road with a light smile.

It had been an interesting gesture she thought, smiling herself. An eloquent polite signal delivered instead of words. Perhaps there was more to this unusual man than she really understood. They drove on very quickly in an easy silence until he spoke again.

“Its quite unusual just for that, the coded message, and leaving track everywhere. Letting himself be spotted. And he knows you’re passing all of it to me, using you as the messenger. He’s taking high ground with a lot of good things on his side. Small town in a National Park, lots of unusual jurisdictions and regulations to slow down the authorities. A lot of tourists, hikers everywhere. He’ll have phones, wireless, lots of food and water, shelter … and cover. He needs the cover, and the high ground. It’s a fortress up there, and that’s where he’s gone. He’s there already, and just waiting for me.”

“Where ? This Sulphur Mountain ? How can you know this? He could be anywhere, Calgary by now, even Edmonton or Regina. And what do you mean, he’s using us as his messengers?” 

“No.. its Sulphur Mountain, he’s in the upper terminal and he’ll have shut it down by now. You can call them in Banff and see that its so.. he’s chosen the ground.”

He gave another slight hand gesture, almost resigned it seemed, and she again accepted its meaning and fell silent.. driving hard down the road with perhaps a more intrigued belief that she might have a good part to play in a rapidly developing confrontation.

‘There won’t be any storming the heights or a takedown full of glory Miss..”

She turned her eyes to him, surprised, and found herself lending a nod as if to say ‘go on’ It was sinking in that the legendary man had something important or useful to say that she should hear.. and he did have a way with reading her mind, it would seem.

‘Short of a ground attack F18 or a smart bomb drop there’s nothing you can do to him, and he knows this, and with just a single hostage that will never happen. Can’t be approached by an assault force in a helicopter because he can shoot it down a long ways off. He can put a bullet downrange over a mile and spot his own shots for correction. You can’t get at him from the backside or from the frontside because he’d pick you off anytime he wanted. Send a hundred up that mountain and they’d never make it. He broke into that hardware store in Golden and it wasn’t for hammers and nails. It was for ammo. He’s probably got two thousand rounds or more.”