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Tommy stared up at the face of El Capitan. His hands already ached with the familiar memory of how the next eight hours were going to go.
The route, Freerider, was one he had taken many, many times. To the point where he had set the record for being the youngest person to climb it a few days before his 15th birthday.
Now, two years later, he was back to set another record. Be the youngest to free solo it and in the process beat Techno’s record of being nineteen when he did it.
Free soloing was Tommy’s favorite way to climb. There was nothing to get in his way, and he just felt free. He was fully in control of every move, and the consequences that came from that.
Techno stood next to him as Tommy kept looking up at the path. His older brother set a hand on Tommy’s shoulder, without looking he knew that it would leave a chalk outline of his calloused hand on Tommy’s red climbing shirt.
“Do you have all your gear?” Techno asked for the millionth time.
Tommy slowly turned to look at Techno, blinding him in the face with the head lamp, and then slowly looked down at his gear. All he was wearing was his chalk bag, and climbing shoes after switching from the hiking boots that he had worn up to the rock face. “I’m missing my elephant.”
Techno just sighed. “I’m better than Phil. He made me take everything I might possibly need. Including the elephants,” he deadpanned. “Do you want gloves?”
Pulling his hands up, Tommy looked at the calloused skin on his palm and fingers. When he had first started free climbing without ropes, he had been so paranoid about grip that he’d worn gloves, but once he had figured out his style with crack holds, they had just gotten in his way.
“Wasn’t planning on it,” Tommy answered. “I’ve got chalk and last couple times I did a run of this path with the ropes, I didn’t use gloves.”
Nodding, Techno accepted the answer. “I put the stashes along the path like we talked about last night. Half way up there are some gloves, just in case you need them.”
Tommy nodded, mentally running through the six stops along the path. He had food, water and more chalk stashed at the for breaks while climbing. Since they were starting so early, before the sun had even risen, their headlamps were the only thing illuminating this conversation.
As his dad had drilled into him, Tommy wasn’t going for a top time which meant he had the advantage of breaks to make sure he beat Techno’s record. Most people took four days to complete this path, so he was already pushing it with an eight hour goal for completion.
“Are you gonna follow behind on the ropes?” Tommy asked, dipping his hand into the fresh chalk from his bag and walking over to the mountain side.
Watching him, Techno shook his head. “No. I’ll stay on the ground so that someone can have eyes on you till you hit the top where Niki’s waiting.”
“What? You want to make sure the rock doesn’t eat me?” Tommy shot back.
Techno just sighed and stepped away giving Tommy enough room to begin his climb. “No. I want to make sure the UFO full of aliens actually takes you back,” Techno drawled sarcastically.
Tommy shifted his grip so that only six or so feet off the ground, he could flip Techno off. He could hear his brother murmur something else sarcastically about how he should have said no and let Phil supervise this climb. Tommy bit back his remark since he was grateful that Phil had stayed home with their little siblings.
His dad was an amazing climber since after all that was who taught all three of them out here today their skills, but Phil was easily stressed on free solo climbs. Extra stress was the last thing Tommy needed here where every milinch counted.
“Be careful,” Techno shouted as Tommy got closer to ten feet up.
Tommy held his spot with his left hand situated in one of the easier grips, but his right hand and foot balancing delicately on the edge of their holds. His climbing shoes helped make this hold even possible.
Using this as one of the last safe holds to do this, he directed his beam from his head lamp down at where Techno stood looking up at him. “Have a little faith in me beating your record.”
Then, before he could hear a response, he resumed his climb wanting to get above the treeline before the sun rose.
There were a lot of really, really stunning sights Tommy had seen while climbing, but the sunrise here was something special, and he hadn’t gotten up at three am, hiked here and finally started climbing at six just to miss it.
As his hands moved from grip to grip, and he pulled himself up higher, the world started to fade away like it always did as he climbed.
That was why he had originally picked up the sport. He needed some way to escape the stress of school as he got older and Phil had always encouraged his kids to climb. Tommy doubted that Phil saw two of his four kids being in the record books when he started taking them to the gym with him.
Tommy knew one thing that the others had caught onto quickly that had made it something that Phil had pushed him to keep climbing. He was a loud, talkative teen who was frequently yelled at in class for not thinking through anything.
But climbing? He was the complete opposite. Tommy climbed silently. Once he hit the twenty foot mark, he rarely opened his mouth and that chance was even lower when free climbing. The motion of climbing made him think about so many things and about his next four holds.
It slowed his mind down.
Some climbers had a radio down or up to their teams, but Tommy never did. It was an extra weight he didn’t need when climbing calmed his thoughts down enough.
The gentle sun glow started to cast against his skin meaning that it was almost seven. Looking up, Tommy could see a stash about twenty feet along his route to his left.
That meant he was about eighty or eighty-five feet in the air after an almost hour of climbing. Not the best pace, but it was a fine pace for the fact that it was without his ropes.
Pulling himself up onto the small ledge above him, Tommy hung there a second, watching out over the scenery as the sun rose.
The light cast the golden rays across the rock face as Tommy realized he had to get moving. The first hold wasn’t that far off now at a hundred feet.
Reaching his right hand toward an edge hold to get back moving on the path. The last couple feet up to the stash was the most annoying part of the lower climb. Tommy was the only one of his group to take this part of the path. The others went up more to the right and crossed higher up over to the stash spot.
Lifting his foot up to a ledge hold, Tommy shifted his weight totally against the wall to make sure he had enough of an angle to get a crimp hold for his left hand.
It was the most annoying hold because it required that his balance be pretty much perfect and that his fingers held.
The stone dug roughly into the skin of his finger tips, tearing at the calluses worse than usual. Stealing a quick glance at the hold, it seemed smaller than even normal. Sure enough, part of the hold must have chipped away in the two weeks he had been away from the rock face.
Taking a deep breath, he put even more weight in his left hand to move his right hand up higher in preparation of pulling his left foot up to a hold right below him.
Pushing up, he grabbed at the right hand hold, pushing all the weight into his left hand.
The tips of his right hand scratched at the cup hold it was reaching for, but before he could grab it, there was the heart stopping feeling of his left hand holding nothing but air.
The only sound he could hear was the rocks falling past his leg. The rocks that he had been holding onto.
Rocks that just a few heartbeats ago had been attached to the wall.
Falling backwards, Tommy desperately tried to find another hold, but his hands were only met with sharp points scratching into his skin and flat rock.
There was nothing to grab.
Looking back for just a split second, Tommy felt his heart race even more.
This wasn’t back at the gym.
There wasn’t mats or ropes to catch him.
This was it.
He’d made the mistake and he was going to face the consequences.
There was a single consequence of failing to get a hold correct at the height Tommy was at, and it was death.
Which is why Techno could see his little brother start to lean backwards, he froze.
He was powerless on the ground to only watch as Tommy fell.
Techno was trained in first aid, which is why he knew there was nothing he was going to be able to do.
Tommy was too high. The impact alone was going to kill him.
Niki wasn’t surprised when she looked over the edge and didn’t see Tommy. It wasn’t that unusual, since parts of the rocks would block her view.
Then the scream came.
A scream like any climber, no matter their skill level, knew.
Reaching for her radio and sucking in a slow breath trying to avoid panicking. Her finger hovered over the button for just a second as if her mind didn’t want confirmation for what her heart knew.
Pressing down the button, Niki steeled her voice. “Techno. What happened?”
There was static over the radio as Techno held down the button but didn’t actually respond.
“Techno, I’m coming down,” Niki decided, knowing that Techno needed help.
The static broke for a second as if Techno let up on the button before pressing down on it again. “Before you do, call Phil.”
“And tell him what?” Niki asked slowly.
It sounded like some sort of choked whimper came over the radio. Niki couldn’t believe that’s what it was though. In all the years she had grown up with Techno, from when they were little kids climbing trees to when they were young teens climbing in the gym, she had never heard her friend cry.
Yet, deep down, she knew he was.
It was only confirmed as his deep voice came back over the radio.
“That Tommy died.”
Nodding even though there was no way Techno could see her, Niki closed her eyes. “I will.”
Letting go of the button, she reached for her phone. Surprisingly she still had enough of a signal to be able to make the call.
A call she had hoped to never have to make for one of her friends.