Fade to Grey (Book 1): Fade to Grey by Brian Stewart

ran inside. What I found still makes me laugh. There he was, sitting in his
“gaming chair” with nothing but his underwear on, headphones wrapped around his
ears and his nose about four inches from the big screen. He was cursing up a
storm into the microphone, apparently chewing out somebody else in the online
game he was playing. He never noticed me standing there so I watched for a few
minutes, and right when his character—the guy he was playing in the game—went
into some dark tunnel or cave, I snuck up behind him and gave him a double five
fingered death grip on his ribs. He shit his pants. Literally. Well, I just
heard him yell so I’m going to run up and gave him a hand carrying our dinner
back to the fire.
     
    *click*
    It’s a little after midnight and Uncle Andy just left to go
back to the cabin; I’m not far behind. We spend most of the night feeding the
fire and reminiscing of days gone by. There’s something about staring into the
cherry red center of a campfire. The coals ebb and flow with waves of pulsating
heat and the little runners of flame dance and jump to their own rhythm. It’s
almost hypnotic. We heard a couple of wolves call this evening, and Max barked
back an answer. They were pretty far away though. About 10:30 PM or so, just
after the last mountain pie was eaten, Max alerted to something out in the
darkness. He gave a low growl and raised his hackles, focusing on something to
the north that neither Uncle Andy nor I could see, even with a flashlight. There
are a few bears up here, mostly black, but three grizzlies have been tagged in
the Turtle Mountains in the last five years, and we’re right on the outskirts
of the mountains. In any event nothing burst out of the brush and ate us, and
eventually Max settled down. I think I’ve peed about twenty times already this
evening. Uncle Andy brought down a large kettle that we used to make some hot
tea with lemon, mint and honey—lots of honey. I think I had about forty gallons
of it. Well, I’m getting tired, so off to bed now.
     
    April 19 th
     
    *click*
    We’re on our way to the meeting with Walter. We’re taking two
trucks again, just in case one of us has to come back to the cabin before the
other one. It was below freezing this morning, not much below, just enough to
make me put on a long sleeve Thinsulate layer underneath my ever present
sweatshirt. Max and I did a quick “ridge run,” which is just a made up name by
yours truly for the trail that starts behind the cabin and winds up zigzagging
back and forth through the woods. The total elevation rise along the trail is
maybe 600 feet, and we ended up jogging maybe five or six miles of it. When we
got back Uncle Andy had some hot oatmeal ready for me and him, and a big bowl of
dry dog food soaked in the warm juice that came off a venison roast he was
heating up to take into Walters for lunch. After breakfast, I knew I needed to
get started on the solar panel and battery installation, but something about
the lake was calling to me so I grabbed my rod for a few casts. Three casts
exactly. Let me tell you what, the northern pike are always hungry in the lake.
I caught three of the “water wolves”—one with each cast. No wall mounters in
the lot, but still, going three for three was a great way to start the day. I
released them back into the water and got started on the panels.
     
    *click*
    We’re on the gravel road heading to the marina, well, heading
to the road that goes to the marina. It’s kinda strange though, normally we
don’t see anybody on the gravel road. It’s not a private road or anything; it’s
just an access road/firebreak that has very little maintenance from the state
even though they technically own it. There are a couple of little gravel pull
off’s where you’ll occasionally see the car or truck of some fishermen who
doesn’t own a boat, but that’s about it. What makes it strange right now is
that we’ve just passed two RV’s that were pulled