Part 6
The rescue team established its anchors uphill from the collapse. No one approached the opening until the ground had been checked from the stable side.
Mara Vance, the team leader, crouched beyond the marked boundary. Rain streamed from the rim of her red helmet.
“Caleb, can you hear me?”
“Clear.”
“Head injury?”
“None I know of. Left ankle pinned. Water’s rising. Lamb is on the opposite shelf.”
“Keep still. We’re coming to you.”
Flint remained beside the cedar, his lead pulled tight. Eli tried moving him farther back, but the shepherd resisted without lunging or barking.
“He’s been standing there since the collapse,” Eli told Mara.
A technician carrying an anchor line approached from the eastern side. Flint’s body went rigid. A growl rose low in his chest.
The technician stopped.
Near his next step, a seam appeared in the mud. A strip of soil slid soundlessly into the opening.
“Move the approach south,” Mara said. “Give that edge another six feet.”
Eli placed one hand against Flint’s wet shoulder. “That’s enough, boy.”
Ben Salazar descended on two lines. He landed above Caleb, tested the slope, and moved down carefully.
His first act was not to lift the timber. He connected Caleb’s climbing harness to the rescue system with an independent line.
“You’re secured before anything moves,” Ben said.
“Understood.”
Ben checked Caleb’s pupils, breathing, and circulation below the trapped area. The foot was cold but still had color and sensation.
June bleated.
“The training line is anchored above,” Caleb said. “Loop’s behind her front legs.”
Ben attached a second rope and worked a wide webbing strap beneath June’s chest from the stable side. When the team above began lifting, the lamb kicked and twisted.
“Slow,” Ben called.
June rose from the crumbling shelf, swung briefly over the slope, and disappeared through the opening. A voice above confirmed that she was secure.
Maple stood at once. Ben unclipped her line from the lower side of the anchor system and attached a rescue lead.
She returned to Caleb.
“Maple,” he said.
The shepherd pressed her shoulder against him.
“Go.”
She remained still.
Caleb put his hand between her ears. The dog had once placed an injured paw on his boot and waited for him to choose what happened next.
Now she was giving him the same choice.
“That’s an order, Maple.”
She looked at his face, then followed Ben to the rope. The team lifted her through the opening.
Only after she disappeared did Caleb release the breath he had been holding.
Ben positioned a compact lifting bag beneath the timber. As it inflated, the beam rose less than two inches.
“That’s enough,” he said. “When I move your leg, you don’t help.”
“I can pull.”
“You can bring the wall down.”
Caleb looked at the rope above him. Rainwater ran over his collar and beneath his shirt. Every part of him objected to lying still while another man took his weight.
Ben waited. “You with me?”
Caleb loosened his hands.
“Yes.”
Ben freed the torn fabric caught beneath the timber, stabilized the ankle, and drew Caleb’s leg clear. The wall shed a handful of dirt but held.
The team raised them one at a time. Caleb emerged into rain and white light, where hands guided him onto a stretcher beyond the unstable ground.
Maple reached him before the medic finished wrapping an emergency blanket around his shoulders. Scout placed both front paws against the frame, then dropped when Eli touched his collar.
Flint remained near the cedar.
“Flint,” Caleb called.
The dog looked back. Only then did he leave the opening.
Caleb reached from beneath the blanket and touched Maple, Scout, and Flint in turn.
“All three,” he said.
Eli understood. “All three.”
A low section of the exposed chamber slumped after they moved uphill. Mud and water covered the place where Caleb had been pinned. No one had remained below to see it happen.
At the hospital, X-rays showed no fracture. Caleb had a severe ankle sprain, deep bruising along his hip and shoulder, and mild hypothermia.
The physician ordered him to remain overnight and avoid heavy work for several weeks.
Caleb read the instructions with an expression the nurse recognized.
“If you ignore those,” she said, “you’ll be back.”
“I’ve been told.”
“By a physician?”
“Mostly by a farmer.”
“Listen to whichever one frightens you more.”
Eli took Bramble, June, and the dogs to his farm. When Caleb called shortly after midnight, Eli told him Scout had settled against the front door, Maple had curled around Caleb’s mud-stained jacket, and Flint remained beside the gate facing the road to Pine Hollow.
“They eating?” Caleb asked.
“The dogs or the sheep?”
“All of them.”
“Yes.”
“June?”
“Shaken. No serious injury. Bramble’s cut is clean.”
Caleb stared at the empty space beside the hospital bed.
“You still there?” Eli asked.
“Yes.”
“Good. Do the same tomorrow.”
Before Eli collected him three days later, he returned the dogs to Mercer Hill, opened the cabin with the key Caleb had given him at the hospital, and checked every gate. Bramble and June remained safely at the lower farm.
Scout was waiting behind the hilltop fence when the green pickup climbed the final bend. Flint emerged from beside the cabin more slowly.
Maple came through the open door last. She crossed the yard without running, placed her head beneath Caleb’s hand, and remained there.
Caleb lowered his forehead against hers.
“I came back.”
Eli unloaded supplies without turning around.
The county expanded the northern exclusion zone. Mark Ellison showed Caleb where the known workings crossed beneath the trees and where the storm had exposed an unmapped connection.
“The cabin and shed are on stable ground,” Mark said. “The north acreage will need permanent fencing. Some of the voids can be filled. That slope should never carry livestock again.”
Caleb looked at the bright stakes curving through land his deed claimed belonged to him.
For most of his life, losing ground had meant failure.
“Fence it,” he said.
“You’ll need someone doing the physical work while that ankle heals.”
Caleb glanced at Eli.
“I know,” he said…
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