by John Bolin
“Oh, come on,” Linc said, “a little music will do us good. And, no, it’s not country. It’s Bob Dylan.”
“You call that music?” Gator said, flipping the meat over with the end of a SOG combat knife. “You need to learn to play some real music. Maybe B. B. King or Louis Armstrong, that’s all I’m saying.”
“Give the guy a break, Gator,” Bogart said. “You wouldn’t know good music if it hit you in the face.”
Bogart was the short, muscular ex-Ranger on the far side of the fire, facing the river. Even when he smiled, he looked mean. His face was boxy, and he didn’t have a neck at all. His sandy blond hair was cut high and tight, and his facial expression always looked serious, even when he was asleep.
Linc smiled and kept playing. He leaned back against a dead log and played as the fire crackled and smoked. All the men around the fire were drinking some kind of jungle beer from hollowed-out gourds. Linc finished his song and began a new one.
Gator groaned. He stood up and motioned to the Indians. “He plays bad, very bad.” He added gestures and sound effects.
Skins interpreted, and the Indians laughed.
Peter leaned against an ancient tree on the edge of the camp, sipping coffee from one of the gourds, watching them laugh and drink and relax. They deserved it. The trip had come together faster than any of them had expected. Within two months after the call from Linc, he’d recruited Gator and Bogart and descended upon the Amazon.
Literally.
Three weeks ago, they’d parachuted into the jungle, along with the Peruvian guides and several crates of equipment. Jumping into the canopy proved tricky. Gator had almost broken his back, hitting a tree branch at thirty miles per hour. On day three of the expedition, they’d been attacked by a colony of army ants and lost nearly all their food supply. After that, they’d spent two days convincing the indigenous Indians that they weren’t devils.
Lots of adventures. But so far, no ghosts.
Big surprise.
After all, they were after the Yeti of the Amazon. Mutilated cattle and even some human deaths had been blamed on it. The native Quechua Indians called it the Mapinguari. Though accounts varied, most believed that the creature walked upright, had vicious claws and teeth, and avoided contact with people. When a slew of new reports hit the local media six months ago, the guys at the Discovery Channel thought it was as good a story as any to start with.
Still, even with nothing to show for it, they had plenty of great footage to put something together. For Peter, his interest in doing the show wasn’t about finding something so much as proving that it doesn’t exist. It was about adventure, risk, and myth, and Linc was confident they had all the shots they needed to seal the deal for the show. All that was left was rafting their way out of the jungle.
The jungle behind him exploded with sound. Before he registered a conscious thought, Peter’s gourd was on the ground and a Benelli rifle was at his shoulder ready to fire.
Beyond the glowing sights of the gun, an Indian scout came running into the clearing, screaming and covered in mud. It was one of the men from the second hunting party, but not Afanzo. The Indian was waving back toward the jungle and making clawing motions with his hands.
“It here! It here!” the man shouted in garbled English. He tripped over one of the perimeter vines and knocked over two torches. They instantly went out, smothered by the wet grass. He stumbled but somehow remained on his feet. There was a look of terror on his face. Peter advanced toward him and saw that it was not mud all over his body; it was blood.
The man lunged at Peter, desperate for help. Blood was pumping from his side and chest and running down his legs. What looked like giant claw marks ran across the length of his body, from his shoulders to his groin. Peter reached for him, but the man fell to his knees and slumped to the ground, unmoving.
Peter’s team grabbed their guns and ran toward Peter. The Indians stood wide-eyed around the fire.
From deep in the jungle came the sound of gunfire.
“Grab the camera!” Peter shouted, already running into the jungle in the direction of the sound.
Chapter 2
It was pitch dark, and Peter Zachary was alone on the trail, running at full speed, toward the sound of gunfire. He adjusted his night-vision goggles as he ran.
Branches slashed at his face and arms, and he had to work not to trip on the uneven path. Despite his pace, his breath was steady, rhythmic, as if he were more machine than man. His feet padded quietly on the trail, and he gripped a Benelli assault rifle in his hands, ready to shoot.
Vines drooped across the path. Massive trees shot up over a hundred feet on either side of the trail. The tops of the branches disappeared into the blackness, and their roots snaked in and out of the mud like prehistoric sea creatures.
The gunfire ceased, replaced by the sound of screaming. Not a single scream, but a constant cry interrupted only by pauses for breath. A sudden burst of noise followed by a bright flash of light erupted twenty yards from him. Gunfire. A man groaned in agony somewhere nearby.
Peter peered through his scope, sweeping across the terrain. He quickly spied the two Indians, the remaining members of the second hunting party, lying on the ground in the middle of the clearing.
He approached them slowly, gun ready. The moon cast a haunted white light on the two figures.
One of the men, maybe twenty years old, was in the same condition as the one who had come running into the camp. The same giant claw markings scarred his body, except these crossed from his face and neck all the way to his groin. He was breathing shallowly.
It was Afanzo.
When Peter looked up, the second Indian stood pointing the remaining Benelli rifle at Peter’s face.
“It’s okay,” Peter said, lowering his gun to the ground. “It’s okay.”
The Indian was shaking. Blood oozed from deep gashes in one of his forearms. He edged forward and snatched Peter’s rifle. Peter thought about resisting, but the end of the rifle was pointed at his chest. The man whispered through clenched teeth.
“Anhangá.”
The word sounded familiar, but Peter couldn’t place it. He shook his head and pointed at his mouth. He didn’t speak Quechua. He edged closer but the Indian shook the rifle at him, muttering under his breath and motioning him away from the dead man.
Behind them, a howl sounded in the trees, an eerie call that was something between a man’s terrified scream and a predator’s feral cry. Both men spun toward the sound. The noise was unsettling. Peter was surprised that he suddenly felt vulnerable.
Something moved behind him. Peter turned back toward the Indian, but he was too late.
“Anhangá! Anhangá!” the Indian shouted, pointing at Peter.
Before Peter could react, the Indian pointed the gun at himself and shot. Peter felt the heat from the discharge and caught the man as he fell to the ground, a bullet through his head.
Peter lunged for one of the rifles as the man slumped to the ground.
“Pete, is that you?” a voice shouted in the darkness.
Peter looked up. A series of bright lights floated in the darkness. Flashlights. “Yeah, it’s me,” Peter shouted back, clicking off his night-vision gear. “Over here.”
A moment later, Bogart and Gator—armed and ready—led the group of Indians to Peter. Linc had the camera to his eye, and the Record light was blinking. A light mounted on the camera washed over the scene.
“Hey, is that guy dead?” Linc asked, zooming in on Afanzo.
Gator grabbed Linc by the arm. “Bro, have a little respect.”
“Afanzo!” Skins shouted, running to his brother’s side.
Bogart crouched next to Skins.
“What happened?” Gator asked.
Peter shook his head. “I don’t know. Looks like the same thing attacked Afanzo. I found the other guy here, scared to death. When he heard something in the jungle howl, he freaked and killed himself.”
“Amana wah, amana
wah!” one of the Indians blurted, pointing at Peter angrily.
“What’s he saying?” Linc asked Skins.
Skins stood from his brother’s body and spoke back and forth with the Indians for a moment. Then he turned to Peter. “They . . . they think you killed man.”
“What?” Peter said. “He had the rifle pointed at my skull. I set down my gun so I wouldn’t get shot! I had no idea he was going to go nuts.”
Bogart put his hands out toward the Indians. “Everybody calm down. Skins, tell them Peter didn’t shoot that man.”
Skins translated, but the Indians didn’t look convinced.
“You got anything else, Boss?” Bogart said to Peter.
Peter replayed the scene in his head. “He said something before he died. He pointed at the trees and said something just before he killed himself.”
Skins interpreted and then asked, “What he say?”
“It sounded like An-hanga.”
The Indians drew back as if the word had weight. They looked at each other and began to talk in quick short sentences. Their eyes flicked toward the dark jungle beyond the small circle of people.
Skins turned to Peter. His eyes strayed to his brother’s body. “They believe you. They believe he killed self but it not help much. Anhanga mean ‘devil.’ When jungle gods angered by strangers, they call devil to rid of strangers.”
A howl sounded in the trees, this one even closer than before. Everyone flinched.
Peter clicked the bolt of the rifle, snapping in two fresh bullets, and nodded to Skins. “Get your brother back to camp and take care of him. Tell them we’re going to kill the devil, once and for all.” He moved to Linc. “Keep the camera rolling.”
Chapter 3
Peter and Bogart advanced together, Bogart’s flashlight piercing the darkness. Gator and Linc were close behind. Peter adjusted a radio earpiece that Linc had had the presence of mind to snatch as he’d left the camp.
“What are you thinking, Boss?” Bogart said quietly as they eased down the path. “You do know there’s not actually a devil out here.”
Peter smiled. “I know. But we couldn’t ask for better footage. It didn’t surprise me that it happened the way it did. The Indians are superstitious about everything. You get sick, a demon did it. You get better, a spirit did it. It’s how they explain life. When the guy got attacked, it was natural that they’d somehow connect it with the supernatural.”
“Oh, right. I forgot who I was talking to for a minute. Mr. I’ll-Believe-It-When-I-See-It.”
Peter ducked under a low vine. “Oh, I believe. I believe there’s something big out here that’s developed a taste for blood, and now we need to take it down. If we don’t, it’ll only kill more people.”
Peter stopped short and held his hand to his mouth, signaling quiet. He switched off his light and adjusted his night-vision glasses. He and Bogart stood alert, listening. Linc and Gator stopped behind them, ready to cover them.
Guttural croaks filled the jungle. Green images skittered across Peter’s view. He heard a distant rustling sound, and something else: the same feral call, this time fifty or sixty yards away. They were close. Peter turned and gave the signal for them to split up and surround whatever was in there.
“Stay on com,” he whispered into his radio as the three other men vanished into the green underworld. Peter double-checked his rifle, clicked on the infrared scope, and lifted it to his eye.
He scanned the woods. Several smaller animals dashed by, frightened by the call and the scent of the strangers. The trees were too thick to see much past twenty yards. If he could flush it out of the trees, he could give his men a better shot at it. He moved forward, like a ghost.
As Peter moved, a strange sensation fell over him. If he hadn’t known better, he might’ve described it as a growing sense of dread. The urge to turn and run was almost overwhelming.
Impossible. He was a soldier, a Ranger. He’d fought terrorists with his bare hands and watched men die in his arms. He was a trained warrior. And he was a scientist. He knew there was an explanation. Had to be. This howling thing in the jungle was only some kind of animal.
And he was going to prove it.
A metallic taste filled the air. He paused and looked up, just as thunder clapped over his head. Lightning flashed, illuminating everything around him like a strobe.
Peter hit the dirt.
Night birds took flight from the branches, fluttering in the sky. The air itself was thick and wet. Peter’s shirt was soaked in sweat and mud. His hands felt clammy on the stock of his rifle. He stood and eased deeper into the trees.
Another cry echoed in the night, closer. Peter spun around, spying through the lens. He was sure he saw a shadow move, then nothing. It was the same creature, no doubt about that, but this time it sounded more human.
The sky opened above him, and rain began to fall through the branches of the trees. The noise of the rain splattering made it harder to focus. It added a haunted quality to the other sounds of the jungle. Peter’s heart was beating faster; he was breathing harder. What was this thing?
Then, another call, humanlike, just as the previous one, only deeper and more breathy. It sounded like it came from behind him. He was standing in the middle of a circle of trees, in a small patch of low ferns. He spun around, scanning the trees with the scope to his eye. Still nothing.
For reasons he couldn’t exactly place, his mind flashed back to his childhood. He’d been sent to the cellar to get a jar of apricot preserves. The cellar was outside, fifty yards from the farmhouse. He remembered running through the rain, pulling back the hatch, dropping into the dark hole, and grabbing the last jar. As he pulled the swinging twine, the light to the cellar popped off, leaving him in the dark.
He was halfway up the stairs when it struck him: a paralyzing sense that something was down there with him. He couldn’t move. He screamed and dropped the jar, smashing it on the concrete floor below him.
Now, back in the jungle, the sound came again, this time from the opposite side. Peter turned.
The call came again and again and again, seemingly from all directions.
A shadow blurred through his scope. It was an animal—a big one—moving on all fours.
He hesitated for an instant and then fired.
The muzzle flashed, lighting up the clearing.
Another cry, this time more pain than fury.
“Comin’ in, Pete,” Bogart said.
“Hold your position,” Peter responded, his finger to his ear. “I don’t want to scare this thing off. Wait for my signal.”
“Got it,” Bogart said.
He’d hit it, whatever it was, but it wasn’t enough for a kill shot. His hesitation had cost him the shot. He worked to control his breathing. He closed his eyes and strained his ears.
He heard it again. But there was something familiar about the call now, something different. He opened his eyes and shook the rain from his face. Suddenly he knew exactly what it was.
No way.
The call wasn’t vicious, like before. It was the same creature, he was sure of it, but this call was different. He recognized the pattern in the sound, the rise and fall of the pitch, uneven breaths. He was sure of it.
It was laughing at him.
Short wheezing sounds, like laughter, mixed with the sound of the pouring rain. As if it had sensed his hesitation and was amused. Then he was back in that cellar, feeling the personality of a presence he could not see. Peter sensed something building at the base of his neck. Fear.
No. Not today, not now.
Something in Peter churned, pulling him out of his paralysis. From a deep well he’d visited a thousand times, he pulled his courage and drowned the fear. His heart was beating wildly. He was alert, more alive then he’d felt in a long time. “All right!” he shouted. “Come out, you coward!”
The rain let up slightly. The creature was quiet now. Peter turned again, his eye on the scope.
With a sudden impact
of heat and power, the rifle was knocked from his hands and Peter was thrown to the ground. A searing pain shot through his arm. His earpiece was ripped from his face and dangled at his side. He pushed it back into his ear and scrambled to his feet.
