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Stories: “RUN FASTER” by Elder Evans
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| In this past month, two of our young missionary brethren had a terrifying encounter with one of natures meanest creatures. This experience is told through the eyes of Elder Evans who witnessed the event.
We left early morning to hike to a river for some fishing. The hike is through bogs, swamps and marshes. We made the seven mile trek with no problems. The fishing was excellent, but soon the wind picked up and the temperatures dropped. Both Elders (being ex-boy scouts) decided it was time to head back to the car. About half way back we saw an animal in the trail, off in the distance. It looked like a dog to me. Elder Davis, my companion, wasn’t sure. But what ever it was we both had heard our share of Alaskan stories to have us more than a little worried.
Elder Davis lead the way as we left the trail, working our way through the dense brush to try and circle around the animal. The animal must have caught wind of us, because as we got back on the trail it was coming to investigate. Not knowing what to do we tried yelling to scare it away. This didn’t deter the creature, but actually made it more curious.
We decided that if we started walking away real slow, maybe it would lose interest and leave us alone. As we would move faster trying to escape, the “wolverine” would quicken it’s speed. Thinking we could outrun it , I bolted. At first it was a jog, then a full bore sprint. With every few strides I would turn to see if the animal was gone. I was hoping it was gone, but, NO! The wolverine was giving us chase.
Thinking I could run faster, I dropped my pack. My companion who was behind me yelled at me not to leave my backpack. I was not going to listen! I left it lying there in the trail. Elder Davis didn’t want me to leave my gear so he
slowed down and picked it up. With the added weight he could not run as fast and the wolverine was closing in. Davis turned and saw it coming.
It was time to stand still. Everything was in slow motion. My companion swung my bag at the animal, the animal leaped trying to hit Davis, but ran into the backpack that kind of formed a shield.
Davis was kicking and yelling and I was standing there not knowing what to do. I tried to find a weapon. My mind was in “overdrive” with millions of crazy thoughts flowing through my head. “What am I going to tell President?, What am I going to say to his Mom? I can’t leave him here or can I?” Of course I couldn’t leave him, he had the keys to the car!
There were no big sticks all the trees were small and weak. I was so scared. I did find some rocks. Thinking that if I hit the animal it would scare it away, I threw the first stone. It missed completely. (My aim was never the best.)
Elder Davis was still scrambling around on his feet swinging both bags, beating the wolverine. It now looked like the animal was attached to his leg. I got my second rock and let it fly . It missed the wolverine and hit Davis in the upper leg.
He let out a holler. With the third rock, I said a silent prayer asking for help to get out of this nightmare. With all my might I threw the baseball size rock. Right then , Elder Davis turned. I thought it was going to hit him again so I turned my head a little to look away. The Rock flew between his legs and hit the beast in the throat. The wolverine was stunned. It let go of Davis and backed away.
Davis dropped both bags and quickly backed away. No sooner had he done that than the wolverine attacked the bags .
It was clawing, ripping and chewing on them. It seemed distracted enough so we started backing farther away, then we turned and ran for it. We could still hear the animal making a ruckus as we went over a hill.
We kept a fast pace as we went back to the car and safety. We didn’t speak! We had a lot on our minds. The whole
ordeal lasted probably less than two minutes. As we got back to the car I noticed Elder Davis’s pants were in shreds and he was missing a shoe. I saw his foot had some dried blood. I asked, “Is that from the wolverine?” He said, “no”! The wolverine tore his shoe off causing him to run back to the car bare foot. He had scratched his foot up pretty good.
I looked at his leg to make sure it was alright and to my amazement he did not have a scratch, even though he had very little left of his pant leg!
The temperatures had been cool that morning so Elder Davis decided to wear his thermal under garments. The garments ended up protecting him from more than the cold. We both prayed and thanked Heavenly Father for protecting us that day.
You always hear stories that happened to other people and how they were saved. It is a lot different when you witness for yourself the power that protects us all. |
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