The first one I ever saw was dead, poached off the side of a dirt road outside La Junta, Colorado, before school started at the college. I was out driving with a couple of new friends, Carlos from my soccer team and his amazon girlfriend, Izzy, who was on the women’s team. I was half-hanging out the passenger window, holding a Tecate, trying not to rub my thigh against hers. I was from Puerto Rico and didn’t know the desert from the plains and where one started and the other ended. Grass clumps, buckhorn cholla, yucca, cottonwoods in drainages. Then a huge lump of fur off in some juniper trees, with buzzards and crows sitting on it. —Whoa! Is that a bear?!

Carlos stopped his truck and he and Izzy looked. —Nah ese, that’s a fucking mammoth!

I’d heard in general about them and their reintroduction around here—on the college website they even mentioned them as one of the interesting things about coming to our college out in the middle of nowhere. But I didn’t know, they sounded just as foreign as buffalo, and I hadn’t seen a buffalo yet either.

Izzy cracked another beer from the cooler between our feet. —Sometimes they wander off the Reserve. Let’s go look!

We got out, each of us still carrying a beer. The wind shifted and the smell hit us. We pulled our T-shirts over our mouths and noses, though that didn’t help much.

The buzzards hissed at us but flew away to a nearby juniper. When we got within fifteen feet, Carlos pointed out where the tusks had been sawed off. —That’s big money, if you don’t get caught.

I didn’t get it. —Like, who buys them?

He shrugged. —Anyone. I mean, anyone with money. Not around here. You get caught with that stuff in your home, you can go to jail, man. The fucking FBI busted some folks over in Wiley a few years ago.

The mammoth’s mouth hung open, flies and maggots swarming. The eyes had been picked out, more maggots in the sockets. The thing was partly buried in the dirt. Once we were closer we could see that something, coyotes probably, had torn open the stomach, and ribs were visible. Izzy thought it’d been dead for weeks, but Carlos said a couple days. The legs still were huge, thicker than my thigh, thicker than two thighs, though hard to tell with all that fur.

The smell drove us away. Izzy said the Reserve was ten miles away, that that this one had really strayed. —Not like a fence can stop any of those things!

I didn’t have a car, so couldn’t ever go explore over that way on my own, and nobody on the team ever wanted to go that far. I was curious, but busy—we worked out early in the mornings, then classes, then practice in the afternoon. Plus we had games on Thursdays or Fridays, sometimes taking a bus all day to go to other community colleges in Colorado or Kansas or Wyoming. August and September are hot there, hotter than home, so on weekends I was just happy to have time to rest, stay in my room and play video games. The only time we’d go outside was an arroyo out back of the school, hidden away from the sheriff and neighbors. We’d have fires down there—grabbing wood slats from behind the hardware store, or dragging juniper branches and logs over.

The second time I saw a mammoth up close was when I was out with Cassandra. She was on the women’s team too, from Nuevo Mexico, Ratón, and we’d hang out in the dorms and at the bonfires, and this was the first time we were alone, doing something alone. She had a car and we took a drive—this was October—a cool night with all the stars, tons of them, out. We mostly talked English around everyone else—this was the first time we could have a full-on talk en español—and she was making fun of my accent, like how I’d say “beer” but “el beer” instead of la cerveza, shit like that. We were cruising the back dirt roads, windows down but with jackets and the heat on.

She had a pipe and asked if I wanted to smoke. We weren’t supposed to—even though in Colorado it’s legal, the college could have tested us anytime—but I liked her, liked her teasing. Liked that she didn’t give a fuck.

She pulled onto a side road—a “two-track” is what they’re called there—then into a clearing with some small mesas and a little dry canyon. We got out and sat on the hood, keeping our butts warm, and lit up. The moon was rising right behind the canyon mouth, juniper shadows right in the whiteness and it was huge right at the horizon like that.

Crickets chirping, slight breeze. We stopped talking and listened and watched. Coyotes howled and yipped way off behind us closer to the town and something scuffled a hundred feet in front of us in the canyon, in the trees and scrub and I was fumado by then from la mota and the view and this huge shadow emerged from the trees, blocking out the moon.

Cassandra dropped her pipe and grabbed my arms and said something. Maybe she swore, maybe she just whispered, —Dios mío!

The mammoth walked right towards us, getting even bigger, the dark white tusks swaying slightly. I mean, were looking up at it. Twelve feet? Fifteen? I could hear it breathing and its musk scent surrounded us. I know it saw us. I don’t know why it came at us. The pot? Fifteen feet from us it lifted its trunk and pointed. Maybe it was really smelling us. Maybe the pot hid our smell. But it snorted, once, loud, and ambled off to our left, paralleling the mesa wall.

And twenty feet behind it, or her, appeared a little baby mammoth, a calf, about Cassandra’s height. It, or he or she—they—didn’t stop to check us out, just kept walking after their madre.

And they vanished in the junipers.

Cassandra and I stared after them for like, twenty minutes. It was probably only two, but felt that way. We looked at each other. She looked like I felt—kinda scared but also kind of in awe.

I later did a research paper for my comp class and learned how the mammoth had been reintroduced by splicing mammoth genes with regular elephant genes, and how that rich dude, the one who owns all the private land out West, started his own herd, which led to the feds designating all the nearby National Grasslands into the National Mammoth Reserve, and how some people thought it was messing with God’s creation, while others thought it was right, that this was bringing back a species like we’d brought back the wolves. The idea tore even Indian tribes apart, some encouraging mammoth herds on reservation lands, others opposed. The whole controversy didn’t seem to break down along liberal or conservative politics—but locals, some of them, didn’t like them at all, because mammoth take over deer and elk (and even buffalo) habitat.

I didn’t know all that then with Cassandra, but I knew the awe. There was beauty. Maybe danger. The mom and her calf were both scary and beautiful, but mostly beautiful.

Cassandra maybe saw more scariness. She finally said she wanted to go home. We didn’t talk much at first. I tried to laugh. —Did we really see that?!

—I know, right? We could’ve almost died!

That hadn’t even occurred to me. —Nah. I don’t know so. I think she was just curious.

—About what?

—About us? I don’t know. They don’t get hunted, right? So like maybe she’s really tame.

Cassandra was driving with both hands on the wheel and we rolled up the windows. —I don’t know. That’s fucking big.

—Can you imagine? A whole herd?

—You’d get killed! Trampled!

—Maybe.

—Como maybe?

—Well, I hope they don’t get shot or something.

I didn’t say anything to anybody when we got back, but Cassandra did, and I kind of disliked her for that, because then everyone wanted to drive out to see the mammoth that next night. She didn’t go. I didn’t either, but the next week another poached mammoth was found. Not sure if it was the one we saw, no young one was reported, but I had wanted to keep that secret with Cassandra. Our secret. But I guess you can’t keep something that big a secret.

I transferred to University of Colorado in Boulder, majoring in fire science, fighting wildfires in the summer, first for Boulder Open Space, then for the Forest Service. The third time I ever saw a mammoth up close was my second year as a squad boss on Pikes Peak Helitack, when I was thirty.

The National Mammoth Reserve, the part on federal land, was and is treated as an effective Wilderness Area, but even more so—visitors are not allowed in most of the area, only from around the visitor center, and only with tour guides in large buggies in the dry summer months. That summer, that decade, was super dry—the whole West was (and still is) in drought conditions, and we’d get seasonal Chinook winds off the Rockies. We were actually at a helibase north of Fort Collins for a complex of fires in the mountains to the west, though when monsoons sent dry lightning through the area, we were placed on standby for initial attack—and when the lightning strike maps showed two right in the middle of the Mammoth Reserve. Normally and mostly, any fires in there would be treated as “let burn” and be monitored by satellite and drones—but with the winds and dryness, no one wanted to make that call and have the fire literally blow up and either push off federal land and burn structures or grow and kill a bunch of federally protected mammoth.

Our light helicopter got the order to go in and look for smokes, and if so, to put them out as quickly as possible. Part of our safety briefing was the possibility of mammoth in the area, but a biologist from Fish and Wildlife assured us that they would move away from both fires, and our helicopter. I was up for it, and so was Savannah, who was only twenty. She was new to helitack but not to fire, though she came from northern Michigan somewhere.

We flew out to the GPS coordinates, actually right over a herd of mammoth—maybe fifty. Our pilot, Brook, flew low and buzzed them, scattering them. He and our manager, Donnie, laughed and talked about hunting them over the intercom. I didn’t say anything, though I could have, and should have, even just as a safety issue, for taking an unnecessary risk in flying so low.

The Mammoth Reserve is so big that it crosses I-70 using massive wildlife overpasses, north up into Wyoming, in a long corridor up into the Black Hills—part of an arrangement when the Sioux finally took back jurisdiction over them. I won’t say where we were exactly, but in a small mountain range. There was one smoke, down in a long canyon, though the other GPS point farther east upcanyon had nothing that we could see. They were close enough that Donnie told us to check out the second spot later, just in case.

Since our smoke was in that canyon, wind wasn’t an issue, at least not until later in the day when winds could shift, or become downslope. We had a single burning tree—a ponderosa actually—there were some growing in the canyons around there, though not as big as over in the Rockies. Brook was able to land in a clearing on a ridgeline right above it and Savannah and I unloaded our packs and tools and chainsaw. Donnie said to call for a bucket if needed, but there was a little stream nearby. We were to sit on it for the day and make sure no smokes popped up. He smiled back at us, his helmet hiding most of his face. —And call if you get trampled by a mammoth!

Fortunately he couldn’t see me roll my eyes.

The helicopter rose into the air, roots whipping trees and shrubs. I held one hand over my nose and watched it rise, turn and head off, then called Dispatch to let them know we were on the ground and making our way to the smoke. We switched out our flight helmets for hardhats, leaving them in the flight bags at the spot. Savannah carried the Pulaski and combi and I carried the chainsaw, a Husqvarna, on my shoulder. We could see the tree smoking from the ridge, and hiked down to it in twenty minutes.

The tree was smoldering at the base—the lighting strike had ripped off bark in a spiral down the trunk, and the bark bits were burning in needlecast around the roots, with a black catface about three feet up, not very deep. I ditched my pack, so as to be able to run if necessary, and started the chainsaw.

An easy cut: the tree had a slight lean already, downhill. I simply did the pie cut at waist height, and used the cat face as part of the backcut—the tree fell right across the stream. Savannah dug a line around the base of the tree while I cut it in rounds, rolling the unburned ones away. While she proceeded into mop-up mode, I used my hardhat to collect water from the stream and poured it over the embers, stirring in dirt with the combi. After the base cooled down, I low-stumped the rest of the tree and we both poured more water on it and the whole area. I called Dispatch and gave an update—contained, with control time set for later in the afternoon.

In the meantime, we hiked upcanyon to the other strike.

The GPS said only a half mile, though there wasn’t any real trail near us, just game trails through the brush, until Savannah pointed some smashed brush on the other side of the creek and uphill a little. —Holy shit! Is that a mammoth trail?

It was, multiple tracks, though from what either of us could tell, not fresh—but definitely a single opening through the underbrush, curving around pondos and juniper.

Savannah looked at me. —Should we go up there? I mean, is it safe?

I nodded, trying to act confident, since I was the squad boss and Incident Commander. —I think it’s fine. I could just go up quick and you could stay here and watch this fire, if you want.

—No way! I’m coming with you!

We followed the path—stepping on and over tracks in the soft dirt, huge round ones bigger than our boots. Multiple mammoth had been both up and down what we called our Mammoth Highway. I admit I was scared, but also curious, and also wanting to do my job and check on the other spot.

We saw nothing around the general area of the strike, doing a two-person grid of the area. Savannah found the strike—another pondo. Bark shredded, but no flame. We felt gloves off for any kind of heat, but nada.

We waited and had lunch. The Mammoth Highway continued, though maybe less used farther up the canyon. Savannah went off to pee, but came back quickly, whispering, —There’s something upcanyon!

I stood. —Like what?

—I don’t know, but I heard something moving.

We stood still, listening. And yes, there was something, some kind of movement and brush moving.

—Shit. Shit. Is it a mammoth?

I shrugged. —I don’t know. I’ll go check it out.

—Fuck that! What if it attacks us?

—It doesn’t seem to be moving. Like it’s just staying in one place.

—Maybe it’s a deer? They do that back in Michigan sometimes.

—Look, I have a chainsaw. If there is something, I’ll just start it. I heard about a smokejumper up in Alaska doing that with a grizzly.

—A mammoth isn’t a grizzly.

—I’d take a mammoth over a grizzly any day.

I carried the chainsaw in front of me, ready to start it. Savannah carried her Pulaski up over her right shoulder, like she’d raise it over her head and bring it down on anything that sprang through the brush at us.

We walked slowly up the Mammoth Highway. Obviously it led right to the thrashing, up a side canyon, which narrowed quickly, rock walls fifteen feet apart, for a little bit, until opening back out into a clearing. There it was: An adult, male, laying on its side struggling and moving all four legs, though it stopped to raise its head and look at us sideways. But what caused Savannah to suck in her breath was maybe not that, but the bones—skeletons, mammoth skeletons, lay all over the clearing, with single bones scattered (dragged?) everywhere, including fresher ones still with bits of clinging fur.

The clearing was maybe fifty yards right there, with more bones visible among the wall of pondos and lodge pole. Tall rock walls encircled us.

Savannah whispered. —Oh my god.

The mammoth continued to watch us, snorting through his trunk, using the bottom tusk to help prop himself up. Or that’s what it looked like, since both were so huge and curved. Tongue half-dripping out of his mouth.

Savannah leaned closer to me. —It’s a graveyard.

—A what?

—A graveyard. Like the elephants do. Like an elephant graveyard!

—A mammoth graveyard?

—Yes!

The mammoth lay his head down, his side rising in a deep inhale, with a long, clogged exhale. His small tail flipped once.

Flies swarmed around us. Around the whole clearing. I held my hand over my nose and watched the mammoth. —They come here to die?

—Yes!

The mammoth raised his head again to look at us. Almost like it understood. Even laying on his side, he was our height.

Savannah pulled my Nomex shirt sleeve. —We should go.

The mammoth’s head sank down. His trunk flopped twice. I nodded.

We backed away slowly until out of sight. The mammoth didn’t move again as far as I could see and hear.

We turned at the narrows and walked fast back out to the main canyon, and took the Highway back down. But at our fire, or tree, we heard branches breaking. Like, a lot. I motioned for Savannah to cross the creek and hide behind the cut tree rounds. We crouched down just as the first of a line of mammoth trundled by.

There were twelve—ten adults and two calves. A few of them turned their huge heads to look at us—we weren’t fooling anyone. But they didn’t startle, just snorted out their trunks and kept ambling.

After the last little calf had walked up the highway, we stood and stared at the hole in the brush, the Highway twice as wide, listening to branches and twigs snapping.

Savannah looked me. —It’s a funeral.

—I think you’re right. But how’d they know?

She sniffed, and I realized she was crying. Which made me want to cry, but I resisted because I’m a man. She wiped her nose. —It’s so sad.

—But at least that first one will have his family and friends there.

—Did you see the tusks? Back there? At the graveyard?

I hadn’t thought about it, but remembered yes. —We can’t tell anybody about this.

She nodded. —I know.

—Our secret.

—Absolutely. I’m so glad you agree.

We checked our fire again. I fully expected more mammoth to walk by, but nada. We put more water on the area, dowsing it. I called Dispatch and did something a little unconventional, though not unheard of: I called the fire out. Hopefully they’d just check with a drone for the next two days. No one said anything on the radio anyways. I called for an early pickup and Savannah and I agreed we’d just say the fire was small to begin with. Anything to minimize the chance of anyone coming back.

We loaded up our tools and hiked up to the helispot. Both of us kept turning to maybe see the herd, or just one last shambling furry brown giant, trunk extended towards us, through the trees.