I'm not using my real name for obvious reasons, and I'm leaving out the exact park and team.

If you're in the southwest, you can probably guess. It's that big one where the stone glows red before the sun actually rises,

where ravines are so tight your radio starts sounding like it's underwater,

desert on the flats, twisted juniper and pinion on the benches,

and then deep cold slots where a headlamp

beam looks like a cigarette in fog. This was my first real search and rescue callout as more than

a training shadow. I'd done litter carries on easy rescues, directed tourists back to the trailhead,

helped an old guy with heat cramps hike out at two in the morning.

I'd taken the courses, map and compass, low angle rigging, desert medicine.

I was fit, enthusiastic, and a little too excited to prove I wasn't just another weekend warrior.

I had a new pack, borrowed a team radio, checked my Garmin four times, and told my girlfriend

I'd text on the in-reach if it went long. You know the type. That was me. The call came over

group me at 527 on a Saturday. Overdue party of four. Last contact yesterday 1830. Influencer type. Loop trail, 8 miles rated moderate. Tempts

overnight. 32 to 36. No storm cell. The coordinator asked for a hasty team to go to the PLS,

point last scene, then leapfrog along spurs and side canyons. They needed bodies to search audible first, then visual.

I replied, available before I'd finished reading. Five minutes later I was driving, the sky just

starting to smear from black to iron gray, coffee steaming in a travel mug that tasted like

dish soap. At incident command, it all felt legit, grown up. The whiteboard with the grid,

trackers pinning last phone pings, the burnt-smelling propane heater, the morning knots of quiet

conversation. The coordinator, Gray, was in a fleece with the team patch worn almost white.

He looked like a retired wood shop teacher.

Calm, methodical eyes. He paired me with two veterans, Tino, compact and careful,

...