“Steve. I said Steve,” Jayden repeated, nudging Carter with a light body slam.
Carter was wrested from his thoughts and said, “Sorry, Brad, my mind got lost in that spectacular view.” He turned away from the volcanic peak and faced Jayden. They had decided to use bogus names when interacting with the group, including the tour outfitters, which they had paid in cash. Carter was certain Daedalus knew their real names.
The group itself was both boisterous and varied, a crazy assortment of people from all walks of life, totaling fifteen altogether including the three guides. There were Armenians, Turks, Americans, Europeans, and Japanese. The oldest was a man of 68, and the youngest a girl of 11. One couple even brought their dog along. Almost everyone had more than one camera, usually a Canon or Nikon DSLR, and then maybe a GoPro or cell-phone camera, even though there would be no cellular service after the first day of trekking up into the mountain. On the drive over, the guides had gone over the routines to expect, and now the group was ready to begin its ascent. For those heading to the summit, at an altitude of over 16,000 feet, it would be a six-day adventure all told. Carter and Jayden, who had made it clear with the guides that they would be going their separate ways when they reached the lowest elevation ark site, were warned by the guides not to attempt going too high on the mountain without acclimating for at least a day at designated lower altitudes, as the rest of the group would be.
They began hiking, with the guides passing out ski-poles to use as walking sticks. Both Carter and Jayden declined the poles, wanting to keep hands free and knowing they could make the climb unaided. Even all the way to the summit, the climb was not a technical one that required ropes or specialized gear. One could simply walk all the way up, if they were able-bodied and took it slow enough, allowing time to acclimatize. Carter had climbed California’s Mt. Whitney as a teenager, an elevation of 14,500 feet, and Jayden had ascended McKinley in Alaska, an elevation of 20,000, so neither were unaccustomed to the effects of altitude on exertion. Time passed quickly as they traipsed through the new scenery, the brisk mountain air invigorating to their lungs. In the distance were herds of cattle or perhaps oxen, and apart from their own group, they saw no other people.
They marched up a dirt track etched out of the side of the mountain, which still had the same boulders and grass, except now the ground was steeper and the boulders were covered with moss and lichens. The first day of hiking passed quickly with casual conversation, although most of the groups who had come together, especially the couples, stayed together. One guide took point, as Carter and Jayden thought of it, while another brought up the rear and a third roved around the middle, having brief conversation with each group to make sure everyone was happy. Any doubts that the trekking guides had done this same journey many, many times before were quickly dispelled when Carter saw how efficiently they set up camp. The first drifts of snow were on the ground, and the incline just a bit steeper when they reached the site where they would spend the first night on the mountain, at an altitude of 3,200 meters. A large mess tent was erected for the kitchen, complete with a wooden sign reading, MT. ARARAT CAFÉ. Each group set up their individual sleeping tents, including Carter and Jayden.
“Glad we sprung for the four-man,” Jayden said, pounding in a tent stake with a rock. “Don’t get me wrong — I like you, man — but not in a two-man tent kind of way, you get what I’m saying?”
“Feeling’s mutual,” Carter said, hammering in a stake on the opposite side. Dinner consisted of Harissa, a filling chicken porridge, prepared quickly with camp stoves as well as a small open cook fire inside a circle of stones. After dinner, there was even Armenian cognac to go around, and then the group stayed up long enough to watch the moon rise, its pale light glinting off the snow. They retired to their tents, exhausted after a busy day of travel and hiking. The guides pointed out that tomorrow would be a long, full day of hiking, and that they should get as much rest and sleep as possible.
Carter and Jayden had no problem with this, and retired to their tent, zipping up the flap for not only protection against insects and wind, but also added privacy for conversation. Jayden lay on his side of the tent in his sleeping bag, staring up without saying much.
“You think we’re on a fool’s errand up here?” Carter put out into the open.
“Could be. Seems too easy. Waltz up here and find Daedalus at a well-known Noah’s Ark site? It could happen, though, who knows?”
“I’m more concerned about the map,” Carter said. They could hear soft laughter coming from one of the other tents nearby, murmured prayers of the Armenian couple, still outside, for whom this trek was a pilgrimage to a holy site as part of their faith, and a light wind rustling the tent fabric. “I’d really like to recover it, since it’s an artifact itself, and our client retained us to deliver it to her.”
“I wonder if we would have had better luck figuring out where Daedalus was staying in Doğubayazıt, and just sneaking into his place and taking the map while he’s up here! Because you know he wouldn’t actually bring along the original. What’s the point of that? He’d just use a copy or the photos.”
“Finding out where he’s staying might not be so easy though, and breaking and entering is not a crime you want to be convicted of in Turkey.”
“Ture,” Jayden considered, turning over onto his side. “I rather like my head where it is — on my neck.”
“Yeah, same here. Even letting the government get wind that we’re looking for you know what is not in our best interest. Remember, we have no permits because everything happened so fast.”
“We don’t need no stinking permits!”
The next morning saw them in the breakfast tent and nursing steaming mugs of Turkish tea around the cook fire before first light. By the time camp was broken down and packed up and they had hit the trail again, the first pink hues of daylight streaked across the sky. The team dog was out front, rooting around here and there, and hikers wondered aloud if it would get too tired to make it the full day since it was running three times the linear distance. Its owners assured them that it would not, and a comfortable enough silence fell over the group as they trekked up increasingly steeper ground through the early morning. A Pair of oxen blocked the path at one point, but the dog came in handy, barking wildly until the hefty beasts lumbered off the path and downhill.
As they trekked, Carter and Jayden kept their gazes peeled, especially up mountain, for signs of other climbing parties, but so far had seen none. Despite the chilly air and patches of snow on the ground, the exercise created enough warmth that Carter unzipped his parka. He sipped water through the hydration bladder tube coming through his pack and clipped to his shoulder strap, and he wondered why so many in the group used water bottles, meaning they had to stop, set down their packs, pull out the bottle, drink, and put it away again and re-don the pack. Still, Carter reminded himself, these were not paramilitary operators, or even ex-military, they were outdoor recreational enthusiasts, and so he told himself not to let his and Jayden’s efficiency mark them for something other than what they represented themselves as. We’re just regular Americans on vacation, climbing a mountain for the thrill of it, that’s all….