Point Last Seen | Full Thriller Movie | Linda Hamilton | Kevin Kilner | Mary Kay Place

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**Honey for Morning** **Don:** Morning, Frank. You out mighty early. How is she? **Frank:** Well, she's a lot better than I would be. A little girl's gone missing. **Don:** Can I see her? **Frank:** She hadn't slept in a week. I need her. **Don:** You hear anything? **Frank:** No, it's only 8:00 a.m. You're sweating already. **Don:** Hell, I got some trouble on the Cactus Springs Campground. A little girl’s disappeared. **Rachel:** You don't have to do this. **Frank:** How little? **Rachel:** N9. **Frank:** How long? **Rachel:** Her parents woke up about 6:00. She was missing. Everyone at the campground has been looking for her ever since. Can't find a sign of her. **Frank:** You call Elkwood County? **Rachel:** Yeah, they got a search of their own at Copper Lake. They can't get anybody down here for four or five hours. Predictions: 96, 97°. **Frank:** The little girl's name is Mandy. Mandy Ellis. Her mother and her sister are waiting at campsite 28. **Rachel:** I better go get changed. **Frank:** Rachel, I don't think you should do this, and I sure don't think you're in any shape to go out there. **Rachel:** Not doing anyone any good here. **Frank:** But that's not the point. **Rachel:** It is the point, Frank. Always has been. If I think I'm screwing up, I'll bring myself in. I'll be doing dispatch. I'll make sure any calls get patched through. **Frank:** Thank you. Should leave the door unlocked in case they get home before I do. **Rachel:** Okay, I got to go. I call the DA's office, make sure they have the number at search base. I'll see you soon. --- **Rachel:** Frank, I'm here. **Frank:** Rachel, I got an investigator on the line from the DA's office, and I'll patch her through. Go ahead. **Karen:** Rachel Harrison? **Rachel:** Yes. **Karen:** Hi, this is Karen Davis. I'm an investigator with the DA's Child Abduction Unit, and I have just been assigned to your case. **Rachel:** Why now? **Karen:** Well, your children have been gone for a week, and I think it's time we found them. All modesty aside, I'm the best. **Rachel:** How long were you married to this loser? **Karen:** Six years. **Rachel:** Did he abuse you? **Karen:** Yeah. **Rachel:** Do you have any reason at all to think that he might actually kill someone? **Karen:** I don't know. People have died. **Rachel:** All right, we're going to nail this bastard, and we're going to get your children back. I'll be in touch. **Karen:** I just want to hold them again. --- The process of getting lost seems lengthy and complex on the surface, but it is quite often nothing of the sort. Two steps off the trail and then two more—a wash that looks like a trail, a trail that looks like a creek bed—and you can be just as lost as if somebody had dumped you on the moon. The tracker's job is to find those first two steps, that first mistake, that disastrous detour. That's the place the finding begins. But tracking one's life, I suppose it's the same. I suppose you have to go back to the very beginning before you were lost. We call that the point last seen. --- **Rachel:** Are you Mrs. Ellis? **Rachel:** Yes. **Rachel:** Are you going to find Mandy? **Rachel:** Yes, we are. If you could just have a seat at that little table while I cordon off the area, I'll be right with you, ladies. If I could just ask you to step aside. **Rachel:** She's not here. We looked for hours. **Rachel:** Yes, I know that, ma'am, but she was here for two days, and that means she left a print somewhere. Do you know what she had on her feet? **Rachel:** Just tennies. **Rachel:** Just tennis shoes? You know, from the discount store? Old or new? **Rachel:** We bought them brand new for the trip. **Rachel:** And what size were they? **Rachel:** I don't know. You know the sizing is so crazy now. She must have tried on dozens. Size three. **Rachel:** Lisa, you don't really know that. **Rachel:** I saw it on the bottom of her shoe, and she was kicking me. **Rachel:** Did you see anything else on the bottoms? Something that would help me know that the footprint I find is hers? **Rachel:** Like these straight lines? **Rachel:** Mhm, like those. **Rachel:** She didn't have them. She only had diamonds with squiggles. Mine are much more better tennies. **Rachel:** Did you see anything else? **Rachel:** Gum. **Rachel:** She stepped in gum. **Rachel:** Well, that's a big help. Well, I see a lot of your straight lines. Did you like to follow your sister? **Rachel:** I just like to be with her. **Rachel:** Yeah, my little girl is like that with her brother. **Rachel:** You find one? **Rachel:** This was made this morning. **Rachel:** How do you know this? **Rachel:** The flower here that she stepped on has just begun to dry. **Rachel:** Mandy would never step on a flower. She wouldn't even step on ants. **Rachel:** Did she have a flashlight? **Rachel:** Yes. **Rachel:** Did she take it? **Rachel:** It's missing, so she left before dawn. She stepped on this flower because she didn't see it. **Rachel:** Okay, I'm going to follow Mandy now. The other rangers and trackers along in a few minutes. If you could just stay put and show them what I found, that would be a big help. **Rachel:** Should you take a picture? Save it to show the others. **Rachel:** I'm sorry for all the trouble. **Rachel:** It's no trouble. There's nothing magic or instinctive about tracking. People tend to keep going about the speed they have been going. You establish their stride; you can narrow down where their foot next has to fall. All you need is a stick and patience and attention to detail and a willingness to spend a lot of time in the dirt. **Rachel:** The dirt part was easy. I grew up a tomboy on a small farm in Louisiana. The patient part was harder. I was born two months early, and for a long time, I saw no reason to look back. The attention to detail—that quality was hammered into me. I put the lace on myself; makes them look pretty. **Rachel:** That's good. One thumb with exactly— **Rachel:** Come here! Come here! You think you're safe now just 'cause I'm afraid of the dark? Rachel, I'm just trying to teach you. Isn't that what you wanted? That's what you said. Where are you going to go, huh? Your daddy said you make your bed, you're lying in it. --- **Rachel:** Tracker one to base, go ahead. **Base:** One. **Rachel:** I've cordoned off campsite 28 and have tracks isolated and marked all the way to the restroom. I'm trying to restart them from here. I found the girl's flashlight on the restroom floor, but I have not touched it. I don't know if she lost it or if there was a struggle. **Base:** Oh man, and base, there are cars going in and out of this campground left and right. I'm going to shut the park down and send Bale up in the sheriff's chopper to see what he can see. I'm heading down to do a perimeter cut on the campground. Copy? **Rachel:** You okay? **Base:** Perimeter cut shouldn't be done by one. I could really use some help here now. Jennings is sending two rangers. ETA 45 minutes. Base, over. **Tracker One:** Copy. **Rachel:** Get out of the truck, Kevin. You said no trouble. **Kevin:** This is no trouble. This is why we came, so I can get rid of you and take John and find a decent mother—God-fearing, obedient mother. **Rachel:** I'll shoot you here. I'll go right through them. No need to say goodbye. He won't remember you. **Kevin:** Come on, come on. You know those love poems I wrote that made you fall in love with me? I didn't even write them for you. And you move again, and I'll put a bullet in that boy before you take a second step. Come on, move! **Rachel:** Please move! **Kevin:** You're never going to get out of this place alive anyway. --- **Tracker One:** It's done. Come in, Don. It's Tracker One. We got Bureau of Land Management on the north, Elkwood Sheriff's on the south checking all vehicles leaving. **Rachel:** You weren't here when that baby went missing. That was my search. We never did find her. That piece of her skull turned up two years later. **Rachel:** Please, please tell me this little girl's still alive. **Rachel:** I'm doing the perimeter. It's going to take time. Cutting for sign is the hardest kind of tracking. Going on nothing but the fact that if someone is not where they were, they must have left. And if they left on foot, they had to leave tracks. By circling the campground, the theory goes, I had to intersect Mandy's path as she walked away from the campground. **Rachel:** The trouble is, even an obvious print is hard to see when you're coming at it from a 90° angle, and there's no guarantee a print is going to be obvious. And I only get one chance. I could walk a mile before I intersected those few lines with a gum smudge. And if I walked right by them, or if at that point she stepped on a rock and didn't leave a print at all, but only the slightest disturbance—maybe scattered sand, maybe a dislodged pebble—and I missed it, then from that point on, I'd be walking away from her, and she'd be somewhere behind me, gone. **Rachel:** Mandy and I had done that once before. I had missed seeing the right path, and now it was too late to find it again. --- **Tracker One:** To base, I've got fresh prints above campsite 7 and heading due north. **Base:** Tell her mom Mandy's here. **Search Base:** To hand Ranger, go ahead. **Frank:** I'm going to need a fuel truck down here for this chopper. Can you send one my direction? **Base:** We'll get on it right away. I copy. **Base:** To Allen, go ahead. **Base:** Jerry and France should be at your location any minute now to take over checking cars. You'll report back to base stat. We got a landing zone to prepare. **Tracker One:** I copied. They're pulling up now, and I'm on my way out. **Base:** This is Deep Creek training base. We got three platoons of ground troops in transit by convoy, estimated arrival 65 minutes. Over. **Rachel:** I did leave Kevin finally. He'd begun choking me into unconsciousness nightly. After a month of that, I couldn't talk. I could barely breathe. My throat was so swollen, and I decided if I was going to die, I'd rather it be running than in silence in a corner of my own house. So I took the kids and ran. **Rachel:** When Kevin left us alone for 10 minutes, we made it to Montana, where John and Ruthie learned for the first time that other people didn't think my getting potatoes too brown was reason for a beating. For three weeks, for three wonderful weeks, we were free. **Rachel:** Don't work too hard now. Room and board ain't worth that much. **Rachel:** This isn't work. **Rachel:** Well, dang, those kids don't look like they ever saw mud before. Their daddy liked us inside spick and span. **Rachel:** Well, here, I got something they should like. Try and catch him, Ruie! Ruy, ruy, Johnny! Come on, Johnny! Come on inside! Come on, come with Mama! Come on inside! Get inside! Get inside! Don't say a word! Are you okay up here? Come on, come on! --- **Miss Harrison:** Name's Jameson. I'm a private investigator. Wonder if I might talk to you for a minute. **Rachel:** We talk? We talk with this here. **Jameson:** That's agreeable, ma'am. Your husband hired me to come here and find you. He told me you'd been brainwashed, that you ran off with another man. I've been driving with him for three days, and I know now that that man's dangerous, crazy. I don't think he's going to hurt you as long as I'm around. But if he should come at you and I'm not, you shoot him, ma'am. You shoot him dead. **Rachel:** The PI testified at the custody trial, but in Missouri, deserting your husband is considered a greater offense than splattering your wife's blood around the kitchen. The judge gave Kevin my kids. For years, I worked three jobs around the clock to make enough money to fight him. I fought and I fought, but Kevin was a charmer. Oh yes, and in the end, I had nothing—no custody, not even any visitation. And on the day the decree became absolutely final, when there was nowhere to turn, no more ways to try, I came to the desert where he had once dumped me, as he said, because here no one cares about the odd headless body. I came to a place that to my pinewood's eyes looked like Hellfire and Damnation brought to Earth because I couldn't bear thinking about what he was doing to my babies. I guess I came here to die. --- **Chopper One:** To Tracker One, come in. **Chopper One:** Tracker One, got a couple of Copper Lakers up here for you. **Tracker One:** There you are. Okay, there's a flat place below me. Are you okay for me to sit down there? **Tracker One:** Yeah, that'll be fine. Good luck, guys. **Tracker One:** All right, ow! Damn, things are high! **Rachel:** Jason, get the rookie. It's my kid brother. **Rachel:** Well, we appreciate you coming anyway. Hey, adrenaline's better than sex, right? **Rachel:** So where's the track? **Tracker One:** I just got a good one. **Rachel:** That's good. Textbook print. Okay, see how she's got that marked there? Right here's the stride, you heel the toe, you mark the diamond—all the stuff in there. You identify the print when you see it. **Tracker One:** Okay, got that. So I'll take point. **Rachel:** Sure. You ever work this terrain before? **Tracker One:** Yeah, we had a weekend immersion in the Mojave. Jase practically runs Mountain Rescue up at Copper Lake after repelling down a cliff to rescue two yo-yos out of a car if they rolled off the highway. This should be easy. **Rachel:** Easy but different. Why don't you take flank just till you're settled in? There'll be lots of time to switch off. She's got a five-hour jump on us. Our eyes are going to get tired. **Tracker One:** Speak for yourself. I'm raring to go. **Rachel:** Jason, Jason, you're on the track. **Tracker One:** I don't see a single footprint. **Rachel:** You don't always get prints in this terrain. Sometimes there's just breakage or shine on a rock, like here, there, and there. You see that? **Tracker One:** You know that chopper is going to spot her before we even get started. **Rachel:** As long as she's found. **Tracker One:** Go! She's going to be dead! All this screwing around—this is how it's done! **Rachel:** Oh right, so if you want your picture on the front page with a corpse, do not speak of her like that! **Tracker One:** You think you could do better? **Rachel:** I know I could do better! Here, here, and there, and there! It's easy! You see that? **Tracker One:** I don't see anything, Jace. That's why I'm taking point. **Rachel:** There should be prints here. Let Rachel keep the point. **Tracker One:** What point? There's nothing here to see! We've been looking at broken twigs and pebbles all day. We're going to have to cut a perimeter around what—all of this? It'll take us hours! **Rachel:** Well then, we better get started. **Tracker One:** Oh yeah, yeah, that would be just your style—slogging around in this crap in a circle. Admit it, you lost her! You've been jerking us around here for hours! **Rachel:** I have had just about enough from you! You are wasting my time, so I'm asking you to leave this search! **Tracker One:** Come on, all I know is that I've successfully completed over a dozen rescues this year, and you yahoos are famous for losing a three-year-old girl! **Rachel:** That was a long time ago, and since I became a tracker, we haven't lost anybody! **Tracker One:** Oh yeah, that's not what I heard! **Rachel:** I'm going back to base. Skip, you coming? **Tracker One:** Yeah, I'm coming. You better go with him. He might not find his way back. **Tracker One:** Might not be much of a loss. **Rachel:** I know you've got real troubles, like I just don't know how you leave him at home. --- **D to Tracker One:** Don to Tracker One, come in. **Don:** How's it going? **Chopper One:** NADA. **Don:** You sure she's here? **Tracker One:** She was here, Don. Mandy Ellis was here. **Don:** Okay, that's enough for me. I'll hold off the soldiers. Just find her. Over and out. **Base:** Tracker One, come in. **Base:** One, I got some trackers here from Lone Peak. I sure could use them. I got a perimeter cut on about three acres of rock, and we're losing light. We got to narrow down the search. Put any trackers you got along the highway to do a cut. If they don't see any of her tracks on the soft sand along the shoulder, then we got our western edge. If she got to the highway, don't you think someone would have seen her? Unless that somebody put her in the trunk of their car. **Rachel:** Oh Lord, send another team along the old mining road that runs out of the campground. Between that and the highway, we've got a quarter that's about a mile wide, and I'm right in the middle. **Base:** Got it. She's here. She's scared. --- **Tracker One:** Now, Tracker One over base to one. **Base:** Base to one, go ahead. **Base:** We have an incoming call from Karine Davis. Patch her through. **Rachel:** I can hear you. **Karine:** We've made some progress. Now we know that he drove from the courthouse to that takeout place on 26, but from there apparently he went right to the Coast of Verde airport, and then he flew to Vegas from there. **Rachel:** And my kids, Karine? Were my kids with him? **Karine:** Well, three tickets were used, so I'm saying yes. But after that, we cannot raise him. Do you have any idea at all where he might have taken them? **Rachel:** The desert. That's what he always said. **Karine:** Well, that's a lot of territory. **Rachel:** Well, if you get a point last seen, I know a pretty good tracker. **Karine:** Right, that's just what he wants anyway. Who'd be out there for that little girl? Who's out there for my kids, Karine? Me! Trust me, I know what I'm doing. **Karine:** Yeah, well, I get a sick feeling in my stomach when I have to say things like that. **Rachel:** Yeah, but you say it anyway, don't you? **Karine:** Yes, and you bring him back alive every time, don't you? **Rachel:** Not every time. Most times. **Karine:** So do I. Keep the faith, Karen. If you find a sign, I'm going this time. I'm going. **Rachel:** Hi, and I don't think he's going to show. **Karine:** He said noon. It's going on 7. **Rachel:** Don, don't shut me out of this, please. **Karine:** He said he was bringing me my kids. Come on, let me take you home. You don't want to miss it if he calls. **Rachel:** Kevin had one custody. He had my kids, but he continued to torment me even after I thought I had no more ways to feel pain. And then I met Frank. I think we both hoped that he could rescue me from this nightmare. Instead, I dragged him in. --- **Rachel:** Hello? **Kevin:** Well, I got held up. How about tomorrow? **Rachel:** Kevin, I've been out there for three days in a row missing work. You want your kids or not? **Kevin:** Yes, okay. Here's what you're going to do. You're going to go out to the desert. You're going to meet me alone out there. Show me that you trust me. None of your ranger friends, no one. And believe me, I'll be able to see them coming. You meet me alone, and I'll let you have your kids. **Rachel:** Where? **Kevin:** At the dirt road past Darby Dry Lake. Just keep on it. I'll be waiting for you somewhere nice, say in four hours. Okay? Anyone comes with you, you'll never see your kids again. You got it? Bye. --- **Rachel:** Tonight, up near Darby. **Rachel:** Okay, I'm going to go with you. **Kevin:** No, he said no. **Rachel:** I don't care what he says. I know this country; he doesn't. **Kevin:** He knows— **Rachel:** Hello? Um, you don't know me, but I know what your children say about you, and I had to warn you. He calls you a— but he calls me the same thing. **Rachel:** Who is this? **Rachel:** It doesn't matter. I've got to try and get away from him. God help me, and I'm sorry about what happened with your children. Whatever you do, don't meet him alone in the desert, 'cause you'll all die horribly. **Rachel:** Oh God, horribly! Please don't go! **Rachel:** Okay, we should call the police. **Rachel:** It wouldn't make a difference. The police can't stop him. **Rachel:** Well, I'm not letting you go out there alone. **Rachel:** It's not your decision! **Rachel:** He said that if I don't go, I will never see them again. **Rachel:** If you do go, he's going to kill them right in front of your eyes, Rachel! It's you that he wants, and he's going to keep them alive as long as it takes to get you! **Rachel:** Sweetie, their best chance is for you to stay away. **Rachel:** Where are you? I will not meet you alone! **Kevin:** Then your kids will always know you didn't love them or want them. Isn't that right, kids? You got that? Bye. --- **Rachel:** Oh man, Tracker One to base, go ahead. **Base:** One, I got a track. She has changed direction and is now heading well into the mountains. You got anybody on that mining road? **Tracker Team Three:** To Tracker One, we're on the mining road. We've done about a quarter mile so far. Be aware that the gum on her right sole is wearing down rapidly and might not be there by the time you find a track. You copy that, Search Base? **Base:** Okay, base out. **Base:** Base to one, come in. **Rachel:** Base, Rachel, I'm pulling you in. I want you to get somewhere the chopper can find you. **Frank:** No, Frank, I'm staying out. It's the only way I can make up time. **Frank:** Listen, you've been out there for almost 14 hours. You need some rest. **Rachel:** Frank, don't make me come in. **Frank:** Okay, but tell me where you are exactly. **Rachel:** I'm just above Coyote, well not too far from the old mining road. Tracker Team 3 is cutting. **Frank:** Got it. Team 2 finished the highway, so I've turned them onto the Fire Road Three. **Rachel:** That's good. That gives us the northern edge on the search field. How do you think she's holding up? **Frank:** I don't know. She's still stopping to look at birds. I'll get some rest. Good night, Rachel. **Tracker Window to Base** **Frank:** Do you copy? **Rita:** Sorry, Rachel. Frank's gone to a meeting at HQ. This is Rita. What can I do for you? **Rachel:** Better tell teams two and three that our little girl has crossed the mining road and has moved outside of our perimeter. **Tracker One:** This is three. What do you want us to do? We got to build a new box. **Rita:** Could you get to headquarters and tell them that we need more trackers? Temperatures topped 100 today; she's got to be fried to a crisp. Now it's cold, and we have to worry about hypothermia. **Rachel:** I'll run right over, hun. --- **Rachel:** Rachel, they've arrested him. The Missouri police found the house that he was staying in. They were very careful; they didn't want to rush him and give him a chance to hurt the children. They just waited till he came out, and then they nabbed him. **Rita:** Were my kids with him? **Rachel:** The kids weren't there. **Rita:** Rachel, is anyone with you? **Rachel:** My kids are with me. My kids are with me! **Rita:** Kid, Rachel, don't give up hope, okay? Now the police are questioning him, and whatever they find out, I will let you know. Call me if you need me. I'll be here all night. Please call me. --- **Base:** This is Track Team 2. Does the child have any food or water? **Rita:** None that we know of. **Base:** How long you figure she's been walking? **Rita:** 13, 14 hours. **Base:** Why hasn't she just dropped? **Rita:** Because it's so hard to examine. There's no way the desert doesn't heal the pain of losing one's children or even numb it, but the desert just doesn't care. And so you keep walking. Your terror passes for courage, and somehow in the midst of it, you realize that you are surviving. And then after that, you wonder why. --- **Tracker One:** Tracker went to base, come in. **Rachel:** Rita, any word from Elkwood? **Rita:** She's headed right up Quattro Summit. Elkwood says their search is narrowing down. They hope to have at least six trackers on their way to us by lunchtime. **Rachel:** Lunchtime? She'll be dead by lunchtime! --- **Tracker One:** M Charco went to base, come in. **Tracker One:** I found the place where she slept last night. **Rita:** Way to go! **Tracker One:** She wouldn't have left before first light, so I can't be more than three hours behind her. But Rita, can you reach her family for me? **Rita:** They're right outside. **Tracker One:** Good. Can you ask them a question? Did she have a Barbie with her? **Rita:** Oh my God! **Rachel:** Frank, what's up? **Frank:** There are all these tracks around where she was lying. If she has her Barbie, then she has to have her day pack. There was food in that and water. **Rita:** How much water? **Frank:** A whole big bottle. **Rita:** What size bottle? **Frank:** Um, like that—what is that, 24 oz.? **Rita:** How about food? **Frank:** She had those cheese and cracker packets, and there were three crackers and some of that cheese food. That should help, don't you think? **Rachel:** Everything's helpful. She's still playing with her Barbie. You're going to find her, aren't you? She's been out there a long time, all alone. **Frank:** Yes, we are. We're going to find her. --- **Rachel:** I could have told her the truth. A human needs a gallon of water a day in this weather; that 24 oz. was long gone. Who was I protecting, her or me? I was on my hands and knees tracking a Barbie, but this Barbie was smart and tough. She realized she could follow her own prints backwards. Barbie did it, and then suddenly Mandy realized she could do the same thing. Excited, Mandy jumped up to try, but this mountain was no place for the first lessons of a beginner. The only tracks were too subtle to be easily seen, and in the snappings of twigs and the circle of confused scuff marks was written how her hope slowly failed—where she sat in despair, where she was growing dizzy, where she got up and staggered on. --- **Rachel:** They say it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved, but I think the opposite is true of hope and losing it. Mandy had discovered lost hope was worse than no hope. She'd begun to die. --- **Rachel:** Hey, it's Rachel. Leave a message. I'm giving you the kids back. I'm getting married. I figured it's time they knew their mother. What can I say, Ra? I guess love mellowed me out, so we're setting out tomorrow. Let you get them enrolled in schools before September. I'm drawing up this paper giving you custody—total custody. We'll call again from Dallas, someplace I got. --- **Rachel:** Okay, you got it. He said he's bringing the kids back. That's—oh my gosh, they're so big! Hi! Oh, let me look at you, Ruthie! It's mama! Hey, Ruth! Come on, Ruy! Get out of the truck! Mommy! **Frank:** Oh my gosh, you're so big! **Rachel:** Yeah, they're growing like weeds. Thank you, Kevin. I figure they can visit me summers, holidays. I don't want to entirely lose touch. **Kevin:** Whatever you say. **Rachel:** Well, I got a long trip back, so better get going. You going to say goodbye to me, kids? **Kids:** Goodbye, sir! **Kevin:** All right, you be nice to your mommy. --- **Rachel:** You got it, yes sir. This must be Frank. Nice to meet you, Frank. **Kevin:** Finally staying around these parts? **Frank:** No, I want to clear the desert by nightfall. I don't much like deserts. **Rachel:** I've been seeing y'all. It wasn't so bad. **Kevin:** No, no, take e. Come on! I'll kill myself before I go back with him! --- **Rachel:** I taught myself tracking not long after I came here. The head ranger asked me to. There wasn't a single tracker in all of the park, and I had nothing else to do. I read a book on the basics, then I went out into the desert—solitary time, no distractions, no breaks, no visiting. Hundreds of hours of just me out there following whatever tracks I could find as far as I could follow them in all kinds of weather, in all kinds of light conditions. I followed ants and kangaroo rats, little kids, old people, big horn sheep, coyotes, rattlesnakes, lizards. I followed them to their homes or their watering holes or their stalking spots. I learned to recognize the marks they left on the earth as they passed. I stepped on branches and grass, memorized the spot, and came back 30 days in a row to watch the coloration changes a plant goes through while it's healing. There were no words to describe what I saw, but I saw it and remembered it. --- **Chopper One:** Tracker One, come in. **Dale:** Where the hell are you? **Chopper One:** I'm a half mile east of Quattro Summit. Is there a place to land? **Dale:** Yeah, it's pretty flat. **Chopper One:** I lay on the earth and I watched it healing, and I wished there was a way my life could be healed too. **Dale:** Oh yeah, I see you coming in. We brought you some help. **Rachel:** Hi! **Dale:** You okay? **Karine:** Karine called. She's very worried about you. **Rachel:** You know what my mama said once? She said, "Why don't you just go back to him? Give us all some peace." My cousin was there, and she said, "If she goes back to him, he kills her right off, and those sweet little children." And my mama said, "Well, then it'll be in the hands of God." **Dale:** I'm bringing you in, Rachel. Elid search and rescuer here. They're going to take over your search now. **Rachel:** I'm staying out! **Dale:** You're bleeding and you're exhausted. You think I'm jeopardizing the search? **Rachel:** I didn't say that, but I'm ordering you now to get in the helicopter. **Dale:** I don't take orders from men anymore. **Dale:** Okay, I'm begging you. Please get in the helicopter. **Rachel:** Not until she's found! **Dale:** And what if you don't find her, Rachel? It took us two years to find the remains of Sarah Newber. **Rachel:** I got time here. Drink this. **Frank:** The carer's office wants to know if they should be standing by. It's been almost 32 hours. **Rachel:** Yeah, but tell them to wait up at Victory Pass. I don't want the family to see them. **Frank:** I want you to know that I love you very much. **Rachel:** I love you, Frank. --- **Frank:** All right, guys, she's staying. She's exhausted. Take good care of her. **Jim:** Good luck! **Rachel:** Thank you very much, Jim. **Ed:** Hey, Rachel! **Rachel:** Ed! Hey, appreciate your help. Let's go get her! **Ed:** So what do you got? **Rachel:** She came off the mountain here and headed off that way. **Ed:** How old are these tracks, you figure? **Rachel:** Couple hours. We had some wind beat them up pretty bad. She looks pretty beat up too. She's all over the place—real erratic. She's not going to last much longer. We need to cover some ground. We ought to jump the two flankers, go way out, and then converge about a quarter mile or so ahead of the point man. **Ed:** You'll be the one who finds a track. We all jump. **Rachel:** You've never done it before? **Ed:** No, I usually work alone. **Rachel:** Well, why don't you stay on point? I mean, you followed her this far; just see it through. I'll take the left. --- **Rachel:** I became a tracker to be alone. I know that now. The hours of tramping about, the precise observation, the demands for intense physical and mental exertion—none of them needed another human being. And then something happened. Going to the desert to escape people, I found myself searching for them again in the most literal way imaginable—following their tracks. But there was always something behind it—the hope that one day the tracks I followed would lead me to my own children, back home with me, safe and unharmed and happy at last. --- **Rachel:** I'm thinking I just want to have a little—what do you think about that? **Voice Mail:** We can't come to the phone right now. Please leave a message. --- **Rachel:** Okay, so what I've decided is that my family is going to be together for Christmas, so I'm coming out. I've decided to get married. It's stupid—no need for that. I already got a wife and kids, so I'm coming out so we can all be together. What God joins together, let no man put asunder. **Kevin:** No, we've made other plans. **Rachel:** Unmake them, Kevin! We haven't been married for seven years now. We're not family! **Kevin:** You really think you can get away from me so easily? Make sure those kids are spotless and do it fast. I'm on my way. --- **Rachel:** You got it, John! Ruy, come on! Come in here! What's the matter? Let's go, folks! **Kids:** Why won't you come with us? **Rachel:** Because we're safe! Or if we're all split up! But what if he hurts you? **Kids:** He won't! **Rachel:** He won't bother with me if he realizes that you're gone. He won't find us, Willie! No, honey, he won't! Be brave! But don't call me! You can't call me here! I'll find a way to call you! --- **Rachel:** Frank, I think I got something! I'm at 2:00! **Frank:** Rachel, coming! **Rachel:** There's no detail, but it's the right stride—towed in right foot. Yeah, that's her! **Frank:** All right, we're closing in. Is it hers? **Rachel:** Yeah, so this is good. She's still thinking she's lightening her load. She doesn't know she dropped it. **Frank:** Well, you can't know that for sure. She might have left the backpack behind in the garbage. **Rachel:** She would never leave her Barbie! She doesn't know it's gone! **Frank:** I'm going to have to take your word on that one. --- **Rachel:** Okay, let's do it again. Bandy! Bandy! I was sure there was no question in my mind. If we could know when we were about to lose what we most love, we wouldn't do it. We would die before we let it slip through our hands. **Mandy:** Mommy! **Rachel:** How is Grandma? **Mandy:** Grandma wasn't so bad. **Rachel:** Good! It's a strange place for that car to— **Rachel:** Why don't you guys just get down in your seats, just in case? **Mandy:** Oh God! **Rachel:** Stay down, guys! I'm so sorry! Help! I need help! My ex-husband's trying to kill us! **Officer:** Joe, yeah, where is he? **Rachel:** He was at my house! **Officer:** Have you got a restraining order, ma'am? **Rachel:** A restraining order wouldn't work! You need to talk to a judge first! **Officer:** Door on the left! **Mandy:** Mom! Mom! He's here! **Rachel:** No! Kevin, no! No! --- **Rachel:** Although the courts had failed me before, I tried once again to ask for protection, and this time the judge believed me entirely. He believed that Kevin had abused us, but he also thought the kids should know their biological father. He gave Kevin eight hours unsupervised time with John and Ruthie, and that was the last time I saw them. --- **Chopper One:** Tracker One to Rachel! That's no place for a snooze! **Chopper One:** Tracker One to Ed! Rachel's down! She needs some help! She's in a wash just south of your position! You better check her out! **Ed:** I'm okay! I'm okay! **Chopper One:** I can't land there! Get to someplace flat! **Rachel:** It's okay, Chopper One! I'm with her! I'll let you know if we need you! **Ed:** Thanks! She can't be far! --- **Ed:** Oh, this doesn't look good! She can't be! **Rachel:** You need to find some shade! Come on! Come on! **Ed:** You're lucky I make house calls! Any vomiting? No cramps? Yeah, you've been drinking straight water all this time? **Rachel:** I have some banana chips! **Ed:** Yeah, but you haven't been eating them! Here we go! This tastes foul, but it'll boost your electrolytes! **Rachel:** Ed, I got a print about a thousand feet out here at 10:00! **Ed:** Copy! No, she couldn't make it that far! We don't have footprints now! She's crawling! **Rachel:** Ed, come on! We're closing in! **Ed:** All right, all right! I need to check it out! Call the chopper down! --- **Rachel:** Okay, it's—she's here! Mandy! Mandy! Mandy! Mandy! **Mandy:** Mommy! **Rachel:** Yes, honey! Oh yes, Mandy! Yes, Mandy! Yes, honey! Yes! Yes! I got her! **Ed:** Temperature 106.9, blood pressure is 65. **Rachel:** You copy that? **Ed:** Yeah, that's correct! About 20 minutes! **Rachel:** I don't know how to thank you! **Ed:** It's my job, ma'am. This way on in! **Rachel:** Hey girl, next time we do the whole hike together! **Mandy:** Be brave! --- **Rachel:** Tracking means learning to walk alongside other people, caring enough to reach out with no guarantees you'll ever meet, with no guarantees they'll live or die despite your best efforts. Tracking means being willing to try. Above all to me, tracking means sitting quietly and watching my own existence, trying to understand the significance of the tracks each of us leaves behind as we move through life, facing memories and fears head-on, facing the end of hope and somehow continuing past it—learning, in short, to walk alongside myself. Tracking brings more than the lost child home. --- **Rachel:** Hi! **Ed:** Okay, one stitch! Roger's big on overkill! **Rachel:** Well, at least he got you to slow down! So how's Mandy? **Ed:** She's badly sunburned, but I don't think there'll be any permanent damage. Her spirits are better than her body. She can't wait to get out there again! **Rachel:** So you tell her why she left the camp? **Ed:** She went to the restroom, then she took off after a bunny, then she followed a lizard, then she saw a flower, then she saw a bird, and then she realized—and I quote—her parents were lost. **Rachel:** Somebody should disabuse her of that notion. **Ed:** No, I did! I did the whole ranger drill! **Rachel:** Yeah, me too, except I've been doing about five different languages! Seems like every time I turn around, somebody's sticking a microphone in my face! I did like a half hour for Japanese television! I just looked at it, and they've cut it down to one sentence! --- **Rachel:** If you realize that you're lost, you should just sit! **Ed:** I'm sitting! **Karine:** Yeah, just on her way to Missouri. Kevin's cousin says that he knows where Kevin put the kids—alive or dead. **Rachel:** I just be guessing. I don't know how long ago—five hours ago. But if she had tried to call in, it would have been impossible. This place has been a zoo! **Frank:** When you're out there, you have to see the bad signs as well as the good signs, or you're not seeing the truth. **Rachel:** Frank, don't shut me out of this, please. **Frank:** Rachel, would you like some help? **Rachel:** Wait, here is Rachel! **Frank:** Yes, she is! She's inside! **Karine:** Thank goodness! Oh, you must be Karine! **Rachel:** Hi! I'm Frank. **Karine:** Hi! Yes! God, we've been everywhere—headquarters, search camp, the hospital, and now here! **Rachel:** You people check your machine? **Karine:** Well, no, not today. It's been a little bit of a— **Rachel:** Come on! Wake up! You're home! **Mandy:** Oh baby! Oh babies! You found them! **Rachel:** Well, I got to go! Thank you! Thank you! See you guys! --- **Rachel:** Okay, home! Jes, thanks again! We all like happy endings. I used to think if I would only tell and remember the good times, perhaps I could draw more of them to us. It doesn't work that way. Kevin got out on bail. Our house was broken into 16 times in the six weeks before his trial. Felony kidnapping charges were reduced to a misdemeanor if he promised to leave us alone, and he did. The three of us haven't seen him in years, but he continues to haunt us. Our phone rings at 4:30 in the morning, and no one's there. We've changed our names, our addresses, our phone numbers so many times we've given up trying. Most recently, the phone started ringing only when Ruthie is home alone. Nonetheless, we have learned to walk on anyway, putting one foot in front of the other for as long as it takes, counting on things working out all right for all of us. It's a tracker's brand of hope on a trail that in the end we all walk—each of our lives representing an unbroken chain stretching back to the beginning of time, each of our tracks embedded in a web that stretches to eternity. None of us walks alone.

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