Pines

sixty feet across the breadth of the canyon at its most tapered point. Signage on the fence advised:
    HIGH VOLTAGE
RISK OF DEATH
    and
    RETURN TO WAYWARD PINES
BEYOND THIS POINT YOU WILL DIE
    Ethan stopped five feet from the barricade and made a thorough inspection—the fence was constructed of square panels of wire, the side of each square approximately four inches long. In proximity, the hum was even more ominous, giving the fence an authentic, not-to-be-fucked-with vibe.
    Ethan caught the scent of rot in the vicinity, and it took him only a moment to spot the origin. A large rodent—probably a marmot—had made the mistake of trying to crawl through one of the squares adjacent to the ground. Looked like it had been microwaved between the wires for eight hours. Charred pitch black. Some poor bird, apparently thinking it had stumbled upon a hassle-free meal, had erred in judgment, attempted to help itself to the critter’s remains, and suffered the same fate.
    Ethan glanced up at the canyon walls.
    They were sheer, but the handholds, particularly on the right side, looked feasible for someone who was both motivated and had the nerves to handle a little exposure.
    Ethan trucked over to the wall and began to climb.
    It wasn’t the best rock, and some of the holds felt rotten in his grip, but they were plentiful and spaced closely enough that he didn’t have to put his weight on any one for more than several seconds.
    Soon, he was twenty-five feet off the ground, a weightless, tingling sensation in his gut as the electrified razor wire hummed just several feet beneath the soles of his boots.
    He traversed a ledge on solid rock, carefully sidestepping as he crossed to the forbidden side of the fence. The height rattled him, but even more, the reality of what he’d just done—this illicit boundary crossing.
    A nagging premonition in the back of his mind whispered he’d just willingly placed himself in terrible danger.
    * * *
    Ethan safely reached the canyon floor and went on, the hum of the electrified fence growing softer as his system kicked into an intensified and disconcerting state of alertness. Same thing had happened to him in Iraq—a heightened level of sensory intake always seemed to hit him in the ramp-up to missions that ultimately went to shit. His palms would start sweating, his pulse rate would accelerate, his sense of hearing, smell, taste, everything ratcheted into overdrive. He’d never told anyone, but when he lost the Black Hawk in Fallujah, he’d known the RPG was coming five seconds before it exploded.
    It was lonely country up here beyond the fence, the rock all fractured and lightning-blasted.
    Empty sky.
    The absence of clouds only underscoring the mood of absolute desolation.
    After his time in Wayward Pines, it felt surreal to be this alone again, so far removed from other people. But in the back of his mind, a new worry had begun to eat at him. The canyon appeared to climb another thousand feet to a high, wind-ripped ridge. If his strength held, he might reach it by dusk. Spend another long, cold night trying to sleep on shattered rock. But then what? He would soon be out of food, and though water still bloated his stomach from the last drink he’d taken before the stream vanished, theexertion he was putting his body through would bleed him dry again in no time.
    But even more than the looming threat of hunger and thirst, he feared what lay beyond that distant ridge at the top of the drainage.
    Miles and miles of wilderness, if he had to guess, and though he still retained a modicum of survival training from his military days, when it came down to it, he was beat to shit and tired as hell. The prospect of walking out of these mountains and back into civilization struck him as beyond daunting.
    And yet, what choice did he have?
    Return to Wayward Pines?
    He’d rather freeze to death alone out here than ever set foot in that place again.
    Ethan made his way through a section of the canyon clogged with massive boulders, carefully hopping from one to the next. He could hear water running underneath him again, but the stream was invisible, unreachable, hidden down in the black space beneath the dogpile of boulders.
    High on the left-hand wall of the canyon, something threw a sharp glint of sunlight.
    Ethan stopped and cupped his hand over his eyes and squinted toward the blinding glimmer. From where he stood in the belly of the canyon, all he could see was a square, metal surface a good