I looked at the remote control-like gizmo in her hand, confused. "Wait. What are we supposed to be tracking, exactly?"
"The flock, of course!" Camille said, with a tone that clearly asked, what are you, dense?
Not wanting to sound ignorant, I just nodded awkwardly. "Of course!"
"If this is your first time at the center, it's your lucky day," she continued, her hands moving animatedly as she talked. "We've been tracking the Big Sur flock all day, and I'm about to go back to the bluffs. We're expecting to see three, four birds, maybe even more."
Birdwatching? It wasn't exactly my idea of a good time, but Chewie was rapt. "And you'll teach us how to use that thing?" he said excitedly, pointing to the 'ghost detector.'
She smiled. "That's right."
"I gotta huddle with my buddies for a second, here, okay?" Chewie turned back to us. Lowering his voice almost to a whisper, he said, "Guys, you've gotta go with me on this one."
Sky's nose crinkled. "I don't even know what this is all about," she said, sounding skeptical. "Birds, I guess?"
"I thought it was the girl," Kev said. "Or the ghosts. Which was it, again?"
Chewie shrugged, his shaggy hair bouncing around his face. "If we're lucky? Both."
Birds and binoculars weren't quite the thrills I'd expected on my rock tour assignment, but if it was to help Chewie?
I turned to Jax, hoping for some kind of reaction to the idea—positive or negative. "Jax? What do you say, do we go with or do we skip it?"
His tone was flat. "Whatever. It's better than more sand. Probably."
Maybe something was going to get through to Jax, but this wasn't it. I turned to Camille with an apologetic grimace.
"Follow me this way and we'll get started," she said, looking totally unflustered. I still felt a little embarrassed by Jax's antisocial behavior—and concerned about the emotions that could be causing it, especially since the convertible had left us with no privacy to talk about anything significant.
As we walked down the sidewalk away from the center, Camille held the radio tracker up. "How many of you have ever seen a California condor before, either in the wild or at the zoo?"
Everyone was quiet, except Sky, whose voice tentatively called out, "Didn't condors go extinct?"
Camille surprised me by nodding in response as she adjusted the antenna. "You're right, actually. They did go extinct in the wild—all the way back in 1986."
Sky looked confused. "But that means . . . "
"See?" Chewie said triumphantly. "I told you that thing was a ghost detector. Man, this is what I love about California."
"Condors aren't ghosts," Camille said, looking amused. "I said they went extinct in the wild. Twenty birds were left in captivity, and we've reintroduced their chicks—and their chicks—to the park and the areas beyond."
She moved the tracker antenna through the sky. From the cliffside, we could see rocks jutting from the water below and ancient trees clinging to the shore, but I didn't see any birds. "You kind of did bring them back from the dead, then, in a way," Sky said, sounding a little awed.
"Not from the dead. Just from the brink." Camille smiled as she slowly turned the antenna on its axis. Suddenly, she stopped and pointed. "There! Right over that curve. See him?"
Sky peered out, her hand shielding her brow. "See who?"
"Amigo! You can see his wings, he's heading straight toward us."
Squinting, I looked out toward the horizon until I made out a black shadow that grew bigger and bigger until an impressive wingspan fanned out over the beach below.
"Whoa, guys, check that out!" Chewie said excitedly. "I see him! Hey, Amigo, que pasa?"
Camille's voice called out to us. "Amigo's actually a very lucky bird. Not too long ago, we weren't even sure he was going to make it."
Kevin's brow furrowed as he tracked the condor through the sky. "Wow, what happened?"
Amigo swooped toward the beach as Camille handed the tracker to Chewie. "He got into a bad accident," she said. "He was recuperating for a very long time."
"You hear that, Jax? Sounds kinda like you." Chewie turned to Camille with the tracker in hand, practically skewering her with the antenna until she redirected it gently back toward the beach. "My buddy Jax here just got out of the hospital."
Jax looked up at Camille and Chewie for a long moment before letting out a grunt and looking back down.
Camille gave a concerned look to Chewie. "I'm glad you're feeling better," she said to Jax evenly, keeping her voice professional. "We're all really happy at the center to see how well Amigo's doing—especially because he had to do it largely alone."
"Alone?" Kev pointed to other winged shadows below. "But I see other condors right there."
"He's got the flock, that's true," Camille said. "But his mate left him while he was still recuperating."
Kev glowered. "Wow, what a bitch."
Camille shook her head. "No, it's not like that. The animal kingdom's a different world. Condors are so rare, it's important for them to find a mate who represents a good investment of their time. Unfortunately, Amigo's mate decided an injured partner was just too much to deal with."
I glanced nervously at Jax. Someone leaving their partner because an injury was too much—it was the kind of fear I worried he might have after the run in with Darrel, and I found myself hoping he wasn't listening, even though the story was just about birds. Fortunately, he still seemed too involved in his games to notice.
"After that," Camille continued, "Amigo's been a fine bird, but not really the same. We've been hoping for years that he'd find a new mate, but it seems like he only had eyes for her."
As I watched, Jax's expression only cracked once—just once, and just for a second, but it was enough. Even as he looked down at his tablet, his fingers swiped faster, agitatedly. Sky gave me an anxious side-eye, mouthing two words in a silent plea: do something.
I glanced toward Camille, who seemed totally oblivious to the sudden chill that hung in the air. In a single, fluid motion, I swiped the remote tracker out of her hand. Her mouth opened with surprise, but I gave her a broad grin, hoping she'd mistake my nerves for enthusiasm. "How about that one?" I asked hurriedly. "That bird over there? What's his story?"
One of her eyebrows lifted, but she didn't seem fazed by my sudden interest in condors. "Oh, that one," she said, her eyes flicking down to the readout on the tracker. "You're looking at The Great One. It's funny, we never thought he'd be good at living in the wild."