by David Boyle
“You gettin’ up?”
“Oh… morning, Bull. I thought you were asleep.” Tony slumped on his heels. “It’s gorgeous out, so I thought I’d stretch my legs and get the coffee started. Want some?”
“Sure,” Charlie mumbled, burying his head under a shirt. “Just don’t go bustin’ a nut on my account.”
The forest sparkled like freshly scrubbed jade, the breeze sweet and fragrant. Birds chattered merrily, flitting among the still dripping branches, and far off, dinosaurs bugling. Puddles were everywhere, including their rocky circlet of a fire pit. The diversion channels they’d dug beside the tents had gotten a workout, and without which he and Charlie and everyone else would have ended up very, very wet. Nice to think that something worked the way it was supposed to.
The river was up, and by more than he expected, muddy water rushing along the bank and swirling in the lee of the big stump above the landing. Logs, branches, and what looked like whole trees twirled past as if on a liquid conveyor toward the buzz saw growling downstream. The swollen rapids sounded angry.
He got the cookbox and stove from under the tarp, and, after carrying them to the Tripper, searched for the water jugs. Sodden black fingers poked from the fire pit, the puddled grime a stark reminder of how quickly their supposed limitless supply of drinking water could go sour. Even if the river dropped as quickly as it had risen, it could be days before the silt finally settled.
And if it rained in the meantime? What then?
Tony stared past the tents at the river. Such a basic thing, water.
An embarrassing observation, Mark and Hayden would no doubt be amused if he were to admit such a thing. “It’s why we don’t let you do the planning,” he could hear them say. Their two largest water jugs were mostly full, so drinking water wasn’t a problem. Save what they’d brought for drinking, and scrounge water from other sources for cooking and cleaning, and Tony was confident they could keep it that way. In the meantime he’d try to remember to work on emptying one container at a time. Fill it far enough ahead of time and even the muddiest of water would settle.
He got the coffee pot from the cookbox, and thinking about their water situation, went to the landing and checked the canoes. They fortunately hadn’t turned them both, and while not ideally located to catch the runoff, the Rockfinder had the look of a bathtub. A rueful smile curled his lips.
They’d been two days on the Flambeau River in Wisconsin when a major storm caught them on the night prior to heading home. The morning was cold and drippy, and like now, coffee was high on their agenda. Whether intentional or not, Hayden had managed to leave his camera in its waterproof bag in the bottom of the canoe he and Mark were using, and while heading for the pump to get water discovered that the bag had leaked and ruined his camera. More importantly, all their captured memories had been ruined as well.
So long ago….
Then again, perhaps not. He still carried many of them in his head.
Tony shook the thought away, and after skimming the surface clear of leaves, dipped into the Grumman with the pot, careful not to stir the boot prints on the bottom.
They’d leveled the Tripper reasonably enough, and with a few properly positioned twigs, Tony got the stove situated so it wouldn’t wobble. He fired up one of the burners, then set the pot to boil. Voices from the tents said others would be up soon, and until then he had the campsite to himself. A growl sounded across the river, sharp and clear—a chill tickled his spine—and hopefully distant. Time for a smoke.
He wiped down one of log piles that served as seats and got himself settled, the growl sounding again as he lit up.
Closer…? No, just his imagination playing tricks again.
He puffed out a smoke ring, enjoying the buzz that came with the first drag of the day, the ring swirling in the still morning air. Nearby, their clothes hung dripping from the line. At least they’re clean.
Certain the water would never boil if he watched, Tony soon found himself padding aimlessly about the campsite. Wheajo was nowhere in sight, and he was wondering where the alien was when a lizard skittered out from under the woodpile and stopped short of the ferns bordering their clearing. More than a foot long, blue with yellow stripes, the lizard darted into the greenery when Tony went to investigate.
Many of the ferns were over three feet tall, and finding the lizard was probably impossible. But what the heck?
A leaf twitched. Drops splattered down.
Maybe not so impossible after all….
His next step snapped a twig, a slim head with glittering eyes up an instant later and staring through the ferns, the half eaten lizard writhing in its jaws! He stumbled back, the cigarette tumbling from his lips.
“There’s a dinosaur on the island!”
“A what!?” a startled voice asked from a tent.
Tony splashed across the clearing. “You heard me! There’s a dinosaur on the island!”
The tent fluttered, the zipper flew open, Charlie out an instant later in his underwear. “Where?” he asked, head swiveling as he ran and snatched his bow from its hanger. “Which way?”
“It’s… it’s over there…. Or it was a second ago.”
Arrow at the ready, Charlie crept cautiously toward the woodpile, Tony tip-toeing behind him when Ron hobbled bare-chested from his tent. “How big?” he asked, the rifle pinned under an arm while he fumbled with the zipper.
“I’m not sure,” Tony said, peeking around a massive shoulder. “Two feet, maybe a little taller. I never saw how long it was.” Charlie stopped, his eyes mere slits when he turned to Ron, then Tony.
“Two feet?” they asked in unison.
Tony nodded. “About,” he said, still searching.
“You idiot!” Charlie snarled, the back of his hand sending Tony nearly sprawling. “You got us hyped up for a lousy two-foot dinosaur!”
Tony rubbed his shoulder. “I didn’t say it was big.”
Mark burst out laughing. “That was perfect,” he said, near choking, a still-learning-the-ways-of-the-humans alien propped beside him in the tent. “The look on your faces? Damn, that was priceless!” Mark toppled onto his sleeping bag, wincing at the cramp in his side.
“Screw you, Bennett!” Charlie snapped, a white-knuckled fist crushed to his hip. “After yesterday, it coulda been anything.”
Ron laughed at his muddied feet and cuffs, then looked at Charlie and laughed even harder.
“What the hell’s so funny?”
“You’re standing there… barefoot… with a bow and arrow in your hand… in your shorts and you gotta ask?” Ron smiled at Tony. “Try being a little more specific next time.”
Jeans on, Mark grabbed his hat and followed Wheajo out of the tent. He swiped his cheek, still chuckling, and looked about the campsite. “That was super, Tony. Really. You couldn’t have planned it any better.” He peeled off his glasses and wiped his eyes, then walked over and checked inside the tent. “I give up. What did you do with Prentler?”
Ron shrugged. “I thought he was out here.” They called out, but Hayden didn’t answer.
“I didn’t hear him leave, so he had to have gotten up early,” Tony offered quietly. “With how much the river is up, could be he’s down by the rapids.” Too distracted until now, it took mere seconds to realize how much louder they were.
“Yeah, that’s a good bet.” Mark paused. “I’ll take a run down and warn him about the monster on the island.” He winked at Ron, a none-too-happy Charlie then flipping him the bird. “Okay if I take the pistol?”
“Knock your socks off. Should be in the corner somewhere.”
A quick search located the handgun. “Got that blaster of yours handy?” Mark asked, stepping clear of the mosquito netting and buckling the gun belt around his waist.
“Blaster?” Wheajo hesitated, then made the connection. “Yes, I have it.”
“Come on then,” Mark said, and started for the woods.
Ron cracked the bolt, glancing, then latched i
t closed again. “You and me are going to take a walk,” he said to Tony, Charlie sulking toward his tent.
“So Mr. Revere… what color was this beastie of yours?”
“Go ahead… rub it in if you have to,” Tony said, blushing. “I’d have to say lavender. Blue too… and with black markings. And don’t forget, I only saw him for a second.” Screeches sounded as they started across the clearing. “Oh, and another thing.”
“What’s that?”
“This one had feathers too.”
The pot was steaming, the jar of instant awaiting its first customer when Charlie emerged from his tent, again safely ensconced in camouflage. He grabbed his bow from beside the tent, and, reconsidering when he noticed the Tripper, put it back before heading for the cookbox. The trees were still shedding, the drops splattering the ground at times drawing his attention, and he was hoping some coffee would calm his nerves. He got a cup from the cookbox, the roar of some unseen monster pealing in the distance.
The campsite was suddenly smaller, invisible eyes peering from behind every tree, every bush.
Charlie glanced from the fire pit to the tent, and knew immediately what he needed. He strolled the edge of the clearing, knife in hand, and from among the trees nearby hacked out a pair of nearly identical Y-shaped branches. Whittled to length and cleared of twigs, the upper ends were then rounded and the lowers brought to a point. A spot near the fire was located, and the first of the crafted branches shoved into the ground. He next got his compound and rested a limb on the support, and after checking where it would contact the opposite one, jammed in support number two. Finally with both limbs seated in the Ys, a similarly prepared twig was fitted to the bowstring such that his two-wheel compound was held horizontally a foot off the ground.
With his compound positioned and an arrow on the string, Charlie stole from the log cuttings stacked beside the Tripper and created a seat of his own by the fire. He sat down… relaxed… then made a quick stab for his bow. Down, up, and at full draw in barely a second, he swung side to side, staring along the arrow and checking for obstructions. Satisfied there weren't any, he carefully reset his trap. The sky glinted off the finely honed edges of the four-bladed broadhead.
“Okay, now I’m ready. Trot on in here again, dumbshit, and I’ll put a hole through you big enough to drive a truck through.” His preparations complete, Charlie went to the Tripper and fixed himself an overdue cup of coffee.
*****
Drenched before they’d gone a hundred yards, Mark paused to look for an easier, hopefully drier path. “While I’m thinking about it, how many shots you got left in that blaster of yours?”
Wheajo ignored the human’s phraseology, and though initially hesitant, got the dawzon and checked its power reserves. “At its present output, thirty-seven.”
Mark ducked beneath an overhang, drippy leaves peeing down his neck when he straightened up prematurely. “That’s it, huh? Thirty seven?”
“The charge remaining is but partial,” Wheajo retorted, adding that the dawzon’s output was serially adjustable. When asked by Mark whether he could at some point be taught how to use the weapon—‘You know, just in case’—Wheajo was forthright, if noncommittal: “I will consider your request.”
The human, not surprisingly, was still groping for answers, and Wheajo used the ever-intensifying rumble to deflect his line of questioning. “The rapids ahead sound significantly more powerful than earlier. If required, are you yet able to negotiate your craft through such water?”
“Can’t tell until I see what’s up there,” Mark said, glimpsing a tail before its owner vanished around a tree. “In open boats like ours, there comes a point where you’ll swamp no matter how good you run them.”
“Which would neutralize its buoyancy.”
Mark climbed onto the rain slicked trunk of the deadfall. “Yeah, and it gets worse after that. Need a hand?” Wheajo flexed his legs, and with seemingly little effort sprang lightly onto the trunk. “Guess not,” Mark said, searching ahead.
A maze of varied green stretched away, shafts of light slanting through the trees. They hopped down and pressed on through the tangle, the throbbing rumble soon a sonorous roar. Even the ground seemed to be shaking. Thickly intertwined with vines and bushes, the forest at times required them to hack their way, the last yards so intractable they were forced onto their hands and knees until eventually clawing their way into the sunshine.
The roar was deafening, the rapid extending across the river in a frothy mass of pure magnificence. Mist hung in the air, tongues of froth wagging from between the countless boulders for hundreds of yards downriver. What had yesterday been a sandbar peppered with boulders was now a torrent, with only the heads of the largest poking above the swirls. Twiggy bits and branches spun in the eddies, some destined never to leave, the rest carried away and into the maelstrom.
Parts of stumps and a handful of boulders the size of Volkswagens poked above the floodwater, with Hayden perched atop one of the latter a few scant yards from the drop. His fingers laced behind his neck, and naked save for his cap, Hayden was relishing the sunshine and the rush of water licking at his feet. Laying nearby across a rock was a large and leafy, fruit-laden branch.
“Yeo, Prentler!” Mark yelled above the roar.
Hayden spun around, startled, and slipped discreetly off the boulder.
Mark skidded down the incline and into the ankle-deep water. “Wild, aren’t they?” he shouted, marveling at the rapids. He made room for Wheajo, then tossed a twig and watched as it shot downstream and vanished in the turbulence.
Hayden slipped on his trousers, then tapped one of the orange colored fruits. “You guys up for a snack?”
“You’re kidding, right? I mean seriously, you do know that just because something tastes okay doesn’t mean it can’t kill you.”
“Your friend is correct,” said Wheajo. “The majority of plants so far analyzed have been found to contain a variety of toxins, the effects of which would not necessarily be immediate. If provided a sample, I can perform the necessary analyses.”
“You guys are like mother hens.” Hayden reached for the branch. “And as long as you’re here, let me borrow that Bowie knife of yours. Some of these are a lot harder to get off than others.”
“I got a better idea.” Mark pulled out his pocket knife. “This one’s smaller, but it’s got different blades you can use.” He cautioned his partner—“Do not drop this”—and flipped it to Hayden.
Hayden wacked loose one of the fruits, then tossed it to Wheajo. “Sharp little bugger. You need this back right away?”
“Na. Hang onto it for now. And I wouldn't call it a Bowie knife, but I’m good with this one.”
A rust-colored fuzz ball some five inches in diameter, the fruit had a dimpled skin with a greenish halo around the stem. Wheajo studied the fruit, then pierced the skin with his fingertips and, with a twist of the wrists, tore it roughly in half.
“That was slick,” said Mark. “Maybe later you can teach me how to do that.”
Wheajo’s pupils were mere slits in the sunshine. “I am afraid your anatomy and mine differ in ways that make that qite impossible,” he said, handing Mark the pieces and wiggling his near-equal twin thumbs.
“Right… I forgot about that.”
Wheajo slipped the yaltok from its conformal pocket, and after entering the activation codes, had Mark hold out the fruit. A quick sweep of the pulp and he initiated his analysis, Mark using the time to more closely examine Hayden’s find.
The skin was nearly a quarter of an inch thick, the pink flesh holding dozens of seeds in a star-burst pattern radiating from the center. Similar in texture to a cantaloupe, only harder, Mark gave the thing a tentative sniff. “Does smell good. Kind of like… I don’t know… fruit punch?”
Hayden was enjoying the sunshine. “Wait until you taste it.”
“Your morning constitutional, I presume.” Hayden shrugged. What else could he do? Mark peeked over Wheajo’
s shoulder, the instrument displaying lines of symbols. “Well? Is it okay?”
Wheajo turned with an oblique look. “Are your kind always so impatient?” Mark pulled away, long-faced and silent. New symbols appeared when Wheajo fingered the controls. “The sample contains multiple high molecular weight hydrogenated compounds, a variety of lipids, and numerous minerals.”
“Those are all good, yes?”
“Extremely so. While bioanalysis does not fall within my realm of expertise, I can say with assurance that it is rare for naturally occurring flora to be of such high nutritional value.”
Mark pulled his hunting knife and, after checking the blade, wiped it on his pants. Seldom one to try anything new, he carved a tiny portion from the fruit and gave it a try. He nodded, then tried another. “Yeah, this is good. I think even you’ll like it, Wheajo.”
The alien took a bite, tilting his head in a curious fashion. “While I am not fond of herbaceous foodstuffs, this is most pleasurable. Somewhat reminiscent of the uamta on Tyrni 5.”
Mark leaned against a polished root poking from the turbid water. “How many more you got?”
“Seven or eight,” Hayden said, chewing. “And there’s more over there.”
Mark blocked the sun with his hat, staring. “Which way?”
“By those palms. See that big deadfall? There’s at least two branches like this one hung up alongshore.”
Mark was still drawing a blank when Wheajo leaned close. “There is one, and there, and there,” he said, pointing out the separately snared branches.
“If you say so,” Mark said, less and less phased by the alien’s radical features. “You given any thought to what to call them?”
