“They lit the fires again,” Talia whispered. Her pupils were dilated, but maybe that was just because they were in the shade?
Sashi gave a strange sort of laugh and tossed some dirt. Being the smallest of them, and having drunk the most, if the root-water had intoxicating properties, it would affect her the most.
He was about to comment on the fires, and the water, when the relaxing effect of the tree’s water was undone by the sound of screaming, and then gunfire. Was it possible that their flight through the jungle had been uneventful simply because the Sentinelese were chasing the others? He was about to ask when Talia muttered a curse and started crawling out from their hiding spot.
“What are you doing?” Sashi asked.
“If they die,” Talia said, “the Sentinelese die.”
Sashi was aghast. “You still want to protect these people? I’m not even sure they are people. And I don’t think it will make a difference.”
Talia squinted at her. “Why?”
Before Sashi could answer, more gunfire rocked the island. Whatever was happening, Winston was putting up a fight.
Before Rowan could weigh in, Talia stood and slid into the jungle, comfortable and stealthy. He moved to follow her, but Sashi stopped him. “We can’t leave!”
“You should stay,” he said. “ We’ll come back.”
“What if you don’t?”
“Follow the plan. When you hear a boat, hit the beach. If it’s close, swim. If it’s not, try to catch their attention. Maybe find your scarf and wave it around. But we’ll be back.”
Rowan didn’t really believe it. Running into battle with the Sentinelese was probably a suicide mission. He’d much rather stay with Sashi, but Talia was his friend. He wouldn’t let her face the enemy on her own. He slipped his hatchet from his belt, handed it to Sashi, and said, “Be quiet and careful, and you’ll be okay.”
Then he chased after Talia, finding it ironic that, after being kicked out of the Rangers, his life would still come to an end in battle. Had he been a Viking, he might look forward to what was coming, but he was just a guy from New Hampshire, and he was just starting to feel like life might still be worth living.
24
Conflict defined humanity, at the pinnacle of civilization and in the depths of the wild, where the concept of civility had yet to be considered. Talia knew this. Had experienced the dark nature of mankind for herself, as a child, as a teenager, in the military, and in forgotten jungles with ancient secrets. But she had never seen anything like she’d witnessed on the beach. North Sentinel Island wasn’t just a dangerous place, it was sinister.
Talia had witnessed horrors through the lens of an anthropologist, analyzing the culture and history of a people, seeing how those things led to a path of violence. In that way, she could understand the acts of human sacrifice, cannibalism, and subjugation. But anthropology had nothing to say about men who were nearly impossible to kill, whose faces opened up, and who had four eyes.
She wasn’t even sure genetics or evolution could explain it. The Sentinelese had evolved separately from the rest of mankind for sixty thousand years. Natural selection on the contained island had kept their stature small, the tallest of the men being five feet, and the women four foot five. From a distance, their appearance wasn’t surprising at all. Even up close, she hadn’t noticed anything unusual.
Not until the man came back to life the first time.
There was no evolutionary benefit to having a face that could split open, or a hidden set of eyes, and nothing on the planet could return from the dead. There were animals that could regenerate limbs, that could freeze solid, thaw out, and go about their business, but once a man was dead—from a severed spine, from a knife in the chest or the head—it was permanent, unless you were friends with Dr. Frankenstein or Jesus Christ.
But the inhumanity of the island’s inhabitants didn’t mean they didn’t deserve to live in peace. It probably meant they would never be successfully integrated into the outside world, but exterminating them wasn’t the solution. If anything, they should be protected because of their differences. Of course, that meant they’d be kidnapped, put in laboratories, and studied.
The future of the Sentinelese people was tenuous at best, but she would help them if she could…if they didn’t murder her first.
Running through the forest should have been easy, but she found herself bumping into trees and stumbling over the tangles of roots that twisted across the ground like giant varicose veins. She’d crossed terrain like this before without any trouble, but her limbs seemed like they were on a timed delay. Her shoulder caught a tree as she ran past, the impact spinning her around. She dropped to her knees. Stopped the fall with her hands. Started laughing.
Am I high? she wondered, thinking about the sweet liquid they’d drunk from the tree. I shouldn’t have done that. I know better.
She flinched when Rowan’s boots stopped beside her. She looked up to find him smiling, too.
“You nailed that tree,” he said.
She snorted and said, “I think that tree root water is psychotropic.”
He tapped the side of his nose. “I’m not sure it was the tree juice.”
Talia breathed deeply through her nose. The fragrant scent of smoke filled the air. It was subtle, but omnipresent.
“Islands like this have their own weather systems sometimes, right?”
She nodded. It wasn’t uncommon for clouds to form over North Sentinel Island and nowhere else.
“So maybe they learned how to fishbowl the island.”
“A collective buzz?”
He shrugged. “There’s no Netflix here. No sports teams. No entertainment.”
“And no inhibitions,” Talia said. It made sense. Thanks to the coral reefs surrounding the island, food was abundant and easy to gather. As long as they had shelter and fresh water, what was to stop the Sentinelese from spending their days shagging and getting high? If that was true, aside from the starfish-face thing, North Sentinel Island was as close to a primal paradise as she’d ever seen.
But if that were true, why were the Sentinelese so violent? Had they evolved so far away from humanity that they viewed visitors as an entirely different species? The combination of modern technology, clothing, skin tones, and facial features, not to mention the strange gifts left by visitors, made that a possibility already. The just-beneath-the-surface physiological differences solidified the concept. How had they reacted upon seeing the undead man’s face peel apart? How would the rest of the world react? With guns, needles, and eventually carpet bombs.
She couldn’t tell the Sentinelese any of that. The best she could hope for was to prevent them from killing everyone and creating an international incident.
She lifted a hand. “Help me up.”
Rowan pulled her up without any trouble.
“You don’t seem to be as affected,” she observed.
“Because I’m angry,” he said. “I’ve been working hard to not feel like this. Don’t appreciate not being able to escape it.”
“Sorry,” she said, but she spoke the word with a smile she couldn’t control. “Let’s keep moving.”
“A little slower,” he said, and he took the lead. She followed without a word, placing her feet where his had been, staying balanced, and as a result, making better time than she had been able to while running like a human pinball.
There hadn’t been another gunshot, which was either a good thing, or a very bad thing.
After slowly climbing a slope and lying down at the top, they discovered the truth. Rowan lay down first, peeking over the top and then ducking down. He pressed a finger to his lips. The look on his face was so serious, she nearly giggled again, but she managed some self-control as she lowered herself and inched toward the crest.
The buzz faded some as she looked down on the scene below.
There were two Sentinelese men lying on their backs. One man, with a crescent of dotted scars on his forehead, had two holes
in his chest. The other, wearing just a bright yellow cord around his waist, had been shot in the leg, his heart, and his head. Blood seeped into the cleared forest floor, which absorbed the liquid like a sponge. Three more men wielding spears stood around Winston, who was bleeding from a wound on the side of his head. He was on his knees, hands slack at his sides, a surprising lack of fear in his eyes.
“The fuck are you people?” Winston asked.
Talia didn’t hear a ‘who’ or ‘what’ at the beginning of the question, but she would have liked to learn the answers to both as well.
The warriors ignored him, talking amongst themselves in a language Talia couldn’t understand, and which sounded like nothing else she’d heard before…or like everything else she’d heard before. There were sounds reminiscent of Chinese, Swedish, German, English, and several African dialects, all of which were very different, but somehow blended into something fluid. Something new. Despite Winston’s current predicament, she found herself smiling again.
The Sentinelese men kept their multi-pronged spears angled toward Winston, but they appeared to be discussing the bodies. They weren’t agitated, or worried.
They’re high, too, she thought. Chill with each other, but still capable of savage violence. But then, why was Winston still alive?
And where were Mahdi and Emmei?
The men became more animated, speaking and smiling down at the corpses. Talia didn’t understand why at first, but then she saw it for herself. The two bodies were being absorbed by the earth. They weren’t decomposing or splitting apart, they were simply sinking down, like the ground had gone soft. The dark earth wrapped around their bodies, sucking them downward until both men were gone.
Winston looked unnerved for the first time, shaking his head, and muttering to himself. At the same time, he was watching the men, never taking his eyes off them or their spears. He was waiting for the right moment. But for what? He was overweight and out of shape. What could he do against—
Winston moved so fast that neither Talia nor the Sentinelese men fully understood what was happening, until the wrenched-free spear was turned around and thrust into the chest of the man Winston had stolen it from.
The spear slipped out of the man’s chest. He dropped to the ground in a lifeless heap. Winston stood, facing off against the two remaining Sentinelese men, who hadn’t even flinched. They kept their spears raised, but made no effort to attack.
Winston stabbed his spear forward. “C’mon!” The blow was easily deflected by one of the warriors, while the other swiped his spear across Winston’s chest. The prongs cut through fabric and skin, but nothing close to being a mortal wound. All it did was incite Winston further. He spun the spear in his hand, like he was testing the weight, getting a feel for how it moved. Then he attacked.
Three quick jabs failed to strike either Sentinelese man, but did drive them apart. Then Winston spun the weapon, and his body in a surprising display that nearly made Talia laugh. He looked equal parts dangerous and ridiculous, like a hippo doing ballet, like Disney should animate it and put it to classical music.
And then there was blood, spraying from a slice in one warrior’s neck. The attack looked like it would miss, but as he withdrew the spear, Winston flicked in his wrist, putting a neat cut in the man’s jugular. He spun, crouched, and swept the spear out again, this time drawing across the inside of the man’s leg. The femoral artery.
More blood flowed.
The ground sucked it up. Thirsty for more.
Talia glanced at Rowan, who looked as stunned as she felt. He met her eyes, and she could see he was thinking the same thing. Who the hell is Winston? She pointed at the FN SCAR still over Rowan’s back. He shook his head and mouthed, ‘too loud.’ Did he want Winston to die? Or did he think the bulbous man could survive on his own, without a gun, which would draw more of the Sentinelese to them?
The latter proved true as the last Sentinelese standing went on the attack. He struck with a wild flurry that was uncoordinated, but impossible to predict and block. Winston tried, but was driven back. Then the man stopped, held his ground and waited.
Was this how the Sentinelese fought? Did they take turns? Or was the man simply trying to confuse Winston? If Sentinelese warriors took turns attacking and defending, the man would fare about as well against Winston as the Red Coats had against New England’s Minutemen.
Winston feigned an attack, forcing the man back. Then he threw the spear, aiming for the man’s chest. The strike was blocked, but Winston hadn’t stopped moving. He dove. Rolled across the ground. Came up with his recovered handgun, which he held like a pro. Pulled the trigger three times, two shots in the chest, one in the head.
Definitely not a filmmaker.
Winston stood, ejected the magazine and slapped in a new one without looking. He chambered a round and began tapping the bodies with his boot toe.
Rowan slid back behind the hill. Talia followed him. He used a series of hand motions that she thought must be some kind of Ranger hand speak. She didn’t understand it all, but enough to know that they were leaving without Winston. She wanted to argue, to explain that if Winston, or any of them, died on the island, it could be justification to kill all the Sentinelese, which appeared to be more doable than their first encounter suggested. But the look in his eyes said he understood something that she didn’t. At the very least, she would have him explain when they were out of earshot.
She climbed down a series of roots like a forty-five degree angled ladder, but she stopped short of the bottom. The smell of death cut through the subtle smoky fragrance that permeated the jungle. She heard, and then felt, footsteps.
She closed her eyes and pictured the island from above, their course south, into the jungle, and then east to find Winston. The sound approached from her left, from the north.
From the beach.
25
Mahdi was alone. Normally, he’d welcome the solitude. It meant he was safe. Unfound. But on this island, after the things he had witnessed, he would have welcomed company. Then again, company could mean a hunting party, or Winston, and he wasn’t sure which was worse.
After fleeing the beach, and the hideous man who would not die, Winston and Emmei had followed chaotic paths, neither knowing where they were going, nor concerned with the other’s direction. A moment of indecision, unsure of whom to follow, had left Mahdi alone in the dark. He had considered back-tracking to Rowan and Talia—they would have stayed together—but that meant passing the man on the beach, and risking contact with any Sentinelese summoned by the gunshot.
In the end, he chose to head in the general direction he’d last seen Emmei running. The man might not know the island, but the jungle’s fauna would be familiar to him. If he’d spent much time living in the Andaman jungles, Sentinel Island might not be too dissimilar.
Twenty feet into the dense jungle, his plan had been consumed by darkness. So he found a tangle of roots and young-growth trees just ten feet from the beach, crawled inside and somehow fell asleep.
He was mortified when growling woke him to the morning sun. He spun in his hiding spot, searching for danger. When he found none, he remembered that he snored.
After a cautious emergence from his hiding spot, Mahdi searched the area, found two sets of footprints and followed the shallower of the two, hoping it would lead him to Emmei. Which of the two men was better suited to surviving the island was debatable. His distrust of Winston was not.
After just fifty feet, Emmei’s trail became harder to follow. The forest cleared, leaving no opportunity for bent or broken branches. The cleared earth was tangled with roots. There was plenty of soil to walk on, but if you wanted to move through the jungle without leaving a print, it was possible, and Emmei seemed to be doing just that.
Mahdi scurried from tree to tree for what felt like an hour, heading in the direction the last foot print was headed. He spent a portion of the time moving, but the majority of it looking and listening. The jungle seemed quiet. Th
ey had seen birds from offshore, but he hadn’t spotted any in the trees above or heard any morning songs.
He was about to give up on Emmei, and head toward the shore, when he found the trail again. It wasn’t hard. Emmei had shed one shoe, and fifty feet beyond, the other.
Mahdi paused at the second shoe, considering Emmei’s choice. Mahdi had slipped on a few roots, and he frequently heard the clunk of his shoes when he stepped. It made sense. Mahdi shed his shoes, collected Emmei’s and buried them in the crook of a tree. He started out again and came across a trail of clothing. Emmei hadn’t stopped at his shoes. Over a hundred feet, Mahdi found the man’s pants, T-shirt, and then underwear.
Emmei wasn’t young, nor short, and a first world resort diet had given him a round belly, but maybe he could pass as Sentinelese? Was that the man’s hope? Mahdi doubted a close inspection would end in Emmei’s favor, but maybe he could move through the jungle unmolested if he looked like one of them. Or perhaps he was hoping his dark skin would help him blend in?
Mahdi looked down at his own body. He’d shed his white shirt before abandoning the Sea Tiger. His skin was deeply tanned, far lighter than Emmei’s, but his pleated khaki shorts would stand out. He knew what Talia would do. Rowan, too—and apparently Emmei. When evading a violent tribe trapped on an island, clothing wasn’t optional, it was dangerous.
But the shame of nakedness was powerful, ingrained in the human psyche for about the same amount of time the Sentinelese had protected their island from outsiders. He opted to keep his shorts, but promised to shed them, and the purple underwear beneath, should it become prudent.
Now shoeless, Mahdi found moving through the jungle far easier, and quieter. He could hop from root to root, leaving no trail behind him. Emmei had been less careful after shedding his clothing, leaving an easy to follow path of bare feet. Mahdi thought he was overconfident in his ability to hide in plain sight, but at least Emmei seemed to have a plan, and a direction. His path never wavered. Never showed any sign of stopping.
Forbidden Island Page 17
