Page 7 of Milk
Jason pulled the handbrake on his red pickup truck as we parked near the bottom of a small hill at the edge of Henderson’s land. Their farm bordered the Sunshine Sanctuary property on the side further away from the road connection. There was no lost love between Henderson and the company that had bought a couple of his neighbor’s small farms after they went out of business due to failing crops. All Jason and I had to do was to tell him we wanted to take them down, and old man Henderson had let us drive through his property without follow-up questions.
As we walked up the hill together, I took a moment to catch my breath after the short ascension. Jason adjusted his backpack, placing his hand over his eyes to scan Sunshine Sanctuary’s property, just downhill from us.
The edge of the property was surrounded by a tall fence that screamed ‘keep out.’ It was made of corrugated metal sheetsoverlaying each other, without a gap in-between. It was eight feet high with an added three feet of barbed wire on top, leaning at an angle both inward and outward of the farm in a V. In the distance, we could see bland concrete structures, which we guessed were the stables. There was also a large central building with chimneys that ought to be the main packing plant. It was right in the middle of the grounds, obstructed by distant terrain and trees.
“It’s useless, we can’t see from here,” I said, not really understanding what Jason wanted to find. We’d visited that spot before and always complained about the unhelpful view.
“Well,wecan’t…” he said, kneeling on the ground and placing his backpack in front of him. “At least with our own eyes.”
He pulled out a large remote control and a black drone. He motioned to take a step back after setting it on the ground, just to make sure there was no stupid accident before we got started. As the drone began to spin its rotors, I saw the screen on his remote light up and show the hill in front of us, seen from the drone’s camera.
“Oh, clever. Where did you get that?” I asked.
“Online, of course. Anyone with two hundred bucks can own a spy drone with a hundred times magnification camera these days,” he bragged as he started to fly the vehicle towards Sunshine Sanctuary’s land.
“Huh,” I said, folding my arms as I watched it go.
Jason flew above the fence and allowed the drone to hover in place for a moment, using a small stick on the remote to rotate the camera without turning the drone. He focused on the facilities in the distance and zoomed in. We could see them in better focus, but no secrets revealed themselves.
“I’ll need to fly a little closer. Luckily, this thing has a half-mile range,” he said, moving the drone forward.
The spinning noise of the rotors became quieter as the drone moved further away from us and closer to the first tree line within the company’s property. The zoom was already becoming clearer over the packing plant. We could make out six or seven white milk trucks parked in front of large loading bays. Nothing unusual there. Jason turned the drone towards the ‘stables’, but all we could see were the windowless side wall and roof.
Jason huffed. “I’ll need to get just a bit closer and-”
He suddenly stopped talking and wiggled the joystick on the remote frantically. The drone didn’t respond; it simply stood still for a few seconds. I looked down at Jason’s camera feed, it said ‘no signal.’ Then, the drone fell from the skies like a brick. I saw the distant little black dot plummet into a small thicket of woods not too far from the fence.
“Should’ve sprung for a better drone,” I said, “that was definitely not half a mile!”
“Not even close,” Jason agreed, frustrated, still issuing commands to the hopelessly crashed drone for a second before sighing in defeat. “That’s so weird. It had such good reviews. I tried to fly it at home a couple of times, and it was fine.”
“Sorry, Jay,” I said to him with a hand on his shoulder.
“I was hoping I could keep an eye on you with the drone when you were in there and you could keep me updated with your phone. Maybe we could somehow map it” He shrugged and looked at me with more concern. “That you wouldn’t be alone.”
“It was a good thought. But I think we’ll have to do this a little more low-tech.”
“Aren’t you scared, though? Going in?”
“Not really,” I said, partially lying. “Worst they’ll do is kick me out.”
“Or call the cops,” he reminded me. “Federal Agent?”
“Oh. Right.”
I could’ve done without the reminder, but that didn’t change my conviction. Something was going on in there and I was going to find out what. If everything was innocent and by the book, why surround their perimeter with such a tall fence? Clearly, if we didn’t investigate, no one would.
I checked my phone. I didn’t have long until I had to go to my ‘fake inspection’ appointment. I didn’t want to be late. It would just give them more of a reason to question my cover.
“I’ll try to get closer to the fence. Maybe I can get a better drone signal. With any luck, it’s on the ground, not stuck on a branch. Then I can get it flying again,” he said, hoping against hope.
“Alright. You try that, Jason, but keep your phone near you,” I requested, even though I doubted it would do much good. “I need to get going now.”
“I’ll drive you.”
“No, thank you, there’s no need. I’ll get old man Henderson to give me a ride until I’m closer to the facility. I don’t want them to see me arriving in any car, let alone yours.”
“Good thinking. If you need me to pull you out of trouble, it’s better that I’m not on their radar.”
