Dark Island

by Matt James

  It was as if the entire town had decided to bury the happenings. Mack even replayed a few YouTube videos on her phone. They all depicted a tall, long-haired Native American man. One video was of him causing trouble at a local bar. The videos had been uploaded by a few high school kids in the area, along with a name featuring five-too-many exclamation points.

  The most-riveting of the videos in question was titled “HOLY SHIT!!!!!!” It garnered an impressive half-a-million hits online, going viral shortly after being released.

  When Mack questioned the kid’s parents, they had the gall to laugh it off, saying it was fake. The child had been punished, but his mom and dad didn’t know how to take the video down. With no concrete evidence to go on, Mack was stuck in Sardinia, thousands of miles away from home, and worse yet, with no story. A lot of money had been wasted getting her there.

  Failed assignments didn’t go over well with her superiors.

  It was the first time in her career that she decided to spin something out of nothing. She wholeheartedly believed that something did, in fact, happen in Cabras, and she was prepared to go down with the ship to publish what little findings she had.

  “Fake News” was everywhere, and she didn’t think anyone would notice one more piece of kindling on that fire. She embellished where it was needed and filled in the holes where there were some.

  Basically, she lied.

  The Editor-in-Chief of the prestigious magazine was notified almost immediately after the article went live, not knowing of its fictionalization beforehand. Once the story spread, the mayor of Cabras called Nat Geo’s home office in D.C. and demanded to talk to the CEO. Needless to say, the public figure wasn’t happy with what he called, “a forgery and a sham.” Never had the current CEO been berated by a politician.

  Until Mack crossed the line.

  Mack was sure she was done for as she sat at her computer, expecting a digital pink slip. She even tried to present her bosses with another story, spending most of her own personal savings trying to right her wrongs. She traveled to Brazil in search of a mythical predator, partnering with the same long-haired asshole, albeit a handsome one, from Cabras, a man she grew to admire…then hate. They’d found their “monster,” but alas the mission had been a bust on her end. The last time she’d seen him, he was lifting off in a helicopter holding her prized notebook in his hand.

  Another game-changing story down the tubes.

  Thankfully for Mack, someone within the government had contacted her superiors and suggested that they pretend the whole operation in Brazil didn’t happen. The fact that her bosses agreed to cover it up was both shocking and refreshing. It wouldn’t go against Mack in any way. She was safe from any potential backlash.

  For now.

  After everything she’d done, Mack didn’t get sacked. Her work was beyond exemplary up to that point—the Cabras story, the Brazil event didn’t officially exist. She was known throughout the magazine’s historical division as a hard worker, someone the newly hired looked up to. So, instead of getting canned, Mack was suspended without pay for four weeks, and the “incident” was put on her permanent record within the company.

  She would be on strike two forever.

  One more and I’m out.

  She replayed part of the video conference in her head.

  “Sorry,” Mack said, “I guess I’m still getting over what happened. I may have jumped the gun and come back too soon. I panicked and did something stupid.”

  The woman sitting on the other side of the computer screen knew of Mack’s heartbreaking loss. Julia Hodges had worked with both Mack and her now deceased father, a former Nat Geo writer himself, for years.

  Peter Moore had written for the magazine for over thirty years and was hired only a few days after the magazine’s current editor, Julia, was brought on board. The two senior members of the company were very close, being in the field together for some time for she was moved to the editing department. Julia was the one and only reason Mack was still employed.

  Mack’s father was diagnosed with a form of early-onset dementia five years prior, and fearing the worst, had immediately moved in with her. The worst reared its ugly head six months later when he forgot their address, a home that had been in the family for decades. Then, a year and a half later, he was unable to recall his late wife’s name. Catherine, Mack’s mom, died peacefully overnight less than a year before her father was diagnosed due to a third bout with leukemia was too much for her body to handle.

  Mack vowed to take care of her father until his dying day.

  That day had been a little over a month ago now. He’d become frazzled one night and ran out into a downpour. Quickly losing his way, he stayed out in the deluge for hours. Mack had driven all around town the entire time he’d been missing. She eventually found him soaked to the bone in a gutter in front of her mom's favorite restaurant. The pneumonia he developed was hard-hitting, and he never recovered.

  “Mack,” Julia said, before ending the call, “what I’m about to tell you is as a friend. As your boss, I won’t lie and tell you that there’s not some trepidation about sending you back out in the field.” Mack’s eyes opened. “But I feel that I owe it to Peter, and you, to have you take a look at his last work-in-progress. Maybe it’ll bring you some closure and help you move forward with your life.”

  “What are you talking about?” Mack asked, unsure. She didn’t know of any open cases that her dad may have left behind.

  “Your father was working on something—something he wasn’t sure I would agree to publish.” Julia’s eyes got serious. “But there have been some rumblings in the area of question that might need some checking into.”

  “What kind of rumblings?” Mack asked, leaning forward. Her bladder was already tap-dancing from the near-firing. Now, it was doing the tango.

  “The volcanic and predatory kind.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Julia smiled. “Peter was investigating the recent increases in the seismic activity within Madagascar and the effects it was having on the surrounding ecosystem. He approached me for the first time after that monster quake hit the island seven years ago, remember that? It was all over the news.” Julia stretched her neck. “Anyway, Peter was preparing to travel there himself…” Her voice softened. “He was going to take you with him and tell you about his retirement.”

  Mack sat back, stunned.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, Mackenzie, I really am, but when your father was forced into leaving early… Then, with how fast things moved from there, I…”

  Tears dripped from Mack’s eyes. She wiped them away and smiled. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Julia. Thank you for telling me now.” She smiled as more tears fell. “I’d love the chance to finish Dad’s work.”

  Julia matched her smile, increasing the already heavy crow’s feet around her eyes. “Good. Make the necessary travel arrangements. I won’t be able to give you much in the form of a team, unfortunately. With everything that has happened…” her eyes narrowed, “with both of your recent adventures, I mean. I can’t go to my own superiors and request anything extravagant.”

  Mack really wanted to tell Julia what had really happened in the Amazon but knew it could come back to bite them both. The people behind the silencing of her company had some deep pockets and even deeper connections. For now, Mack would go along with the plan, but she did want to look into it again in the near future.

  She shook her head. “No, no, I understand. I’ll make my way there and hire who I can. Do I have my normal allowances?”

  Julia nodded. “Your expenses will be covered—to an extent, of course. You know how the game is played.”

  Mack smiled. “Yes, I do. No late-night parties or hardcore drugs.”

  Julia could only laugh.

  Then, her demeanor changed to one of excitement. “Oh, that reminds me—not what you just said about booze and drugs... There was a note in your father’s work journal about finding a man named�
��” She ruffled through some notes. “Um, oh, his name is Ian Hunt. He’s been telling some pretty outlandish stories and swears that he’s seen the, and I quote, ‘Devils of Madagascar,’ for himself. That was a few years ago, around the time of the big earthquake, but it might be a good place to start.”

  The rest of the conversation focused on what Mack’s dad thought was there and who else to ask for more information. There was a local with blood ties to the island nation, but he was considered unreliable. Either way, it was a shot-in-the-dark kind of story, and if anyone could piece it together, Mack was confident that she was the woman for the job.

  Mack undressed as she walked to her bedroom, dropping her pajamas on the wood floor of the upstairs hallway. Last night’s “jammies,” as her mother called them, consisted of only an old Nirvana: In Utero t-shirt and her underwear.

  The advantages of working from home, she thought, walking down the hall in just her lace boyshorts. Her steps were long and lithe, matching her physical build. At five-ten, Mack had the height and athleticism to play collegiate volleyball, something she did at a varsity level. It’s where her nickname originated. She used to spike the ball like a ‘Mack’ Truck. It just so happened that her name began with the same letters.

  Pure coincidence…until a ball left her hand and concussed someone on the other team, that is. Then, she became a legend. Unfortunately, so did the girl she laid out.

  Her shoulder-length, red hair and freckled face gave her a girl-next-door appearance. She sighed when she passed by the long hallway mirror, seeing her mostly-naked body. Her lean, toned physique and minimal bust sometimes made her seem like a boy-next-door to the guys back in high school.

  She liked men. She just never got along with the ones she met and tried to date. Most were too nice, too sensitive. The others were asshats, for the most part. She couldn’t seem to find “Mr. In Between.” Mack wanted someone who could appreciate her recent loss but also someone who wouldn’t dwell on it and dig her emotional ditch deeper.

  Mr. Right…

  She reached her office at the end of the hall and it was in total disarray. Mack, however, was a very organized person workwise, just not at home. A visitor might think the disorder was a temporary thing. It wasn't. Her mom was the neat-freak, not her or her father. They worked in what her dad called “controlled chaos.”

  Hence the Nirvana t-shirt on the hallway floor.

  The house initially belonged to Mack’s parents. She was going to move away but was hired by Nat Geo shortly after graduating from the University of West Virginia. Instead, she jumped at the chance to move back in with her folks, wanting nothing more than to work side-by-side with her hero, Peter Moore. They traveled together a lot, him acting as her on-the-job mentor—and then her partner in crime as she continued to emerge as a journalist in her own right.

  As the only child, her parents gave her the house when they felt they had to downsize to an apartment after the years went by. They had refused to sell the family home, instead having Mack watch over it for a while...

  Mack’s office was really their office. The only part of it that wasn’t dust-covered or cluttered with random junk was her father’s desk. She kept his space spotless. They had always sat facing one another, dead center in the vast, rectangular room. Bookshelves lined every wall, stopping halfway up to the eight-foot ceilings. The walls themselves weren’t blank, either, and were covered with maps depicting the countries of the world.

  “Madagascar, huh?”

  She entered the room and went straight to the map of Africa. It was her favorite place to travel, her father’s too. He especially loved the mysteriousness of the “Dark Continent.” She did as well, for that matter. New discoveries were being made there all the time and they—she—had the pleasure to tell the world about it.

  Her finger tapped the words Serengeti National Park and then traced a line southeast, down to the world’s forty-seventh largest country—an island, no less. She’d done some preliminary research on Madagascar in the past but was by no means an expert on the subject. What she did know was that the island was enormous, the fourth largest in the world. It also contained an ecosystem like nowhere else on Earth.

  “Can it be true?” she asked herself, again recalling her conversation with Julia.

  “Your father seemed to think that there was a species of carnivorous bird-like animals living near the heart of the country. No one knows for sure, though. It’s why your father wanted to investigate it on his last hurrah. If it turned up to be nothing then, so be it, at least he could report on the quakes in the area and throw in how it was affecting the current wildlife. Either way, pass or fail, he was calling it a career.”

  “And you were okay with that?” Mack asked. “You were okay with him coming back with nothing except some seismic readings and a couple of interviews from some local crackpots?”

  Julia shrugged. “We owed Peter as much. He never failed us before, not in thirty years. Why would we start believing he would now?”

  “And me?”

  Julia snickered. “It’s because this is your father’s work that we’re allowing you to take it on.” Her face dropped a little. “No offense.”

  “None taken. After what I’ve done…”

  “Water under the bridge,” Julia added. “But that doesn’t mean it can happen again, are we clear? If you foul up like that again, you’re out, okay? This is all I can do for you.”

  Mack nodded. “Redemption.”

  Julia smiled. “That’s my girl. I’ll email you what we have. Good luck.” Mack was about to sign off but was stopped. “Hang on, Mackenzie, I have one more thing for you.”

  She watched the older woman type and pound the enter key a little too hard. Julia had a problem with that over the years. It was something Mack would comment on every now and again to try and get the older woman’s blood pumping. Julia had gone through her share of keyboards over the years, blaming of the shotty quality of the product and not herself. However, today, Mack had decided to stay quiet about it considering everything Julia had done for her.

  “Sent it to your personal email. It’s what got your father started on this whole thing in the first place. Included is a photo that was taken eight years ago. The picture was immediately labeled as a counterfeit, but Peter seemed to think differently.” She smiled. “Maybe it’ll help.”

  The screen went dark.

  Mack blinked hard. “Madagascar…”

  She was lost in thought, staring through the laminated poster in her office. “Huh?” She didn’t notice it before, but there was a black “?” next to the island. Her father would routinely scribble notes on the posters surrounding them. It’s why he insisted on having them laminated. There was always a dry-erase marker nearby too.

  “Has this been here the whole time?”

  Mack hadn’t done any work on the continent since before her dad died, so she didn’t think to ever look at it closer and had only given it a passing glance. The question mark made her grin. Never had she taken her father’s work and put it squarely on her shoulders. He would help Mack with her assignments, and she’d gladly help with his.

  She laid her hand flat on the center of the poster and closed her eyes.

  “I’ll make you proud.”

  She turned and moved to her desk, waking her computer with a quick jiggle of the mouse. Once it was ready, she double-clicked her email, opening the newest addition. Julia had, indeed, sent her a large file.

  The first thing Mack did was select the photo her dad believed was real. It showed the bones of a creature found at the base of the eastern cliff face of the Andringitra Massif. The remains were measured at around five feet in length and sported a feeble set of wings and a mouthful of smallish, dagger-like teeth. The particular species… “Um, Rahonavis ostromi,” she pronounced aloud, was known to live in the territory that would eventually become Madagascar.

  She quickly read some of her father’s notes beneath the photo scan.

  Mil
lions of years ago. Right…

  Two things about the body in the photo stunned her as she referenced her dad's notes. Firstly, it was much too big to be the Rahonavis found thriving within the territory all those years ago. Secondly, the remains in question weren’t from eons ago.

  They were fresh.

  2

  Ivato International Airport, Antananarivo, Madagascar

  One Week Later

  While her employer picked up the tab for nearly every expenditure necessary, the hot, steaming cup of black coffee she’d just ordered wasn’t one of them. Her multiple coach flights were, well, something she didn’t want to relive. She was already dreading the return flights home. Thankfully, the local brew looked strong as hell, blacker than night. It would be perfect. She could combat her mood with a brew instead of looking like she had a hangover. Well, she did, it was just a sober hangover

  Her destination was the Andringitra Massif mountain range, or rather, the small towns and villages encompassing it. It was a good 230 miles away from the airport and the only way to get there was to rent a car or take a bus. Not wanting to navigate the mostly unpaved roads herself, Mack decided that public transportation was the best way to go. She probably could’ve made the drive safely, though. The dirt roads were in heavy use and looked hard and flat, but she ended up deciding against it just in case.

  What if I break down out in the middle of nowhere? She didn’t want to deal with the possibility. It had happened to her once before in the Australian outback. She was stuck for six hours while she waited for someone to pass by.

  Mack hefted her duffel bag onto her shoulder and headed for the curb, adjusting her backpack as she did. Finding a place in the shade, she dropped the heavy load at her feet, and stood, stretching her legs, waiting for the hopefully air-conditioned bus to arrive. The last thing she needed was to ride inside of a mobile sardine can with a group of likewise, sweaty mongrels.