Path of Ranger: Volume 1

by RJ

  Sadly, there was just a sizzle coming from the speaker. After few minutes of monitoring that noise, he decided to change the approach. He put his fingers on the frequency knob to adjust it manually. He turned the knob clockwise – the reception got worse. Then he turned it other way, it cleaned the noise a bit. JB listened carefully. There was something coming in, sounded like a human voice, blocked with irritating sizzle. The voice disappeared. JB wasn’t sure how to react: to be glad that he heard that, or to get sad because it was gone. He tried to calm down, it wasn’t time for a panic. Still, it might be his only chance to reach out.

  Jerry's back numbed from a long staying in one pose. He shifted into more comfortable position and relaxed a bit. His sitting on the branch felt more confident by that time. Bridgers didn’t have to hold it with both legs anymore, so he put the left foot on the branch, bending the leg. It felt much better.

  After changing his position, the young survivor returned to the radio. He was sure that a fix was right there in his hands, he just needed to find it. He turned on the screen, the interface had a lot in common with the smartphones. He opened the settings, where a folder called ‘connection’ was. Then he followed to the ‘frequency’ option. A decimal number of the current frequency appeared on the screen. JB looked carefully to find the necessary adjustment option. Most of all he was afraid to break what he already had. When all options were studied, he switched to ‘auto bias tune.’ Then he tapped ‘use.’

  The sizzle was getting lower and lower. Soon there was almost nothing, some quiet sound of the signal, but no information. At that point, he would be glad to hear even an advertisement message.

  A half hour passed. All that time JB sat still with a radio in his hands. Waiting. He didn’t try to initiate the transmission himself, thinking that it would drain the battery. Plus, he wanted to know beforehand who was on the other end. If they were friendly. The gangster was tired, bored and losing hope. His hand got tense because of the tight grip that he held all along, and his head couldn’t find a suitable position against the trunk. His eyes closed up a long time ago. He almost fell asleep.

  In a few minutes, his head finally stopped and went still. The radio was tied to his palm with its strap so it wouldn’t fell off. It was quiet. A dream was forming in his sleepy mind when a sharp sound emerged from the speaker.

  “If anyone there, please, come in. Over,” an uncertain male voice said. “If anyone can hear this, come in. Over.”

  Once he heard that JB woke up and moved the radio to his mouth to answer, then stopped. He wanted to listen some more. According to the voice procedure, they had to name themselves.

  “If anyone can hear this, please, come in. Over!” a short pause followed. “We are survivors of flight ‘one-oh-seven,' please, come in. Can anyone hear this? Over.”

  Soon JB recognized Alex’s voice in that stranger. He was glad to know that there were survivors of his flight beside him. It was time to break the silence.

  “Hello, ‘one-oh-seven.' Are you still there? Over,” JB responded confidently.

  “Yes! We are here! It’s good to hear someone else! You’re the first one to answer for the last four days! Are you a rescue party? Are you from the mainland? Over.”

  “Rescue? Hm… The only thing I may rescue you from is a false hope, dude. And most of all I’d like to rescue myself from shooting that motherfucker whose fault it is that I’m here, yo! Over.”

  “B? Is that you? Are you alive? Oh, man, it’s so good to hear you. Over.”

  “Look, Lex, I have a nearly dead battery here, so listen carefully. I’m far from the plane, do not try to look for me. Tell me something, are you at the shore? How far is that from the fuselage? Over.”

  “Yes, JB. We’re at the north beach. It’s about seven miles from the plane. Are you okay? Over.”

  “Yeah, I'm all right. How many of you had left? Over,” asking that, JB didn’t care much about the number, mostly he was interested if El was alive.

  “There are thirt—” the voice got interrupted.

  The signal had been lost, and all that left was a soft sizzle. It didn’t last for long, soon even the noise faded. JB looked at the screen, it went dark. The battery was dead.

  The connection was lost, JB didn’t have his answer. El’s wellbeing stayed a mystery to him. Yet, there was something in Alex’s voice that gave him a peace of mind, he didn’t sound distressed. At least, JB wanted to think so. There wasn’t much use of that transceiver left. Without a charge, it was just a piece of plastic filled with microchips. The big guy hanged it on the belt. He made a deep breath and leaned on the trunk with his eyes closed. Coming down could wait, he wanted to stay up there for a while.

  Several minutes passed. Jerry had enough time to think everything through. His conclusion was that the group was safe and he could move on. But, considering his healthy skepticism, he thought that maybe he didn’t have to think about that at all. One man couldn’t make a big difference anyway. And even if he could, there were dozens of miles between them.

  He had to keep to his mission. Those thoughts about others were too much of distraction. JB assured himself to keep to the current task. He had already made a choice. Now he had to determine a new mission…

  Silver light glowed around, JB could feel it even with his eyes closed. When he opened them, the view brought a bit of a shock to him. It was truly beautiful and he was sure that no one else before him had seen something like that. Everything there was illuminated. And the source wasn’t the moon. The light was coming from the leaves itself. The inner side of the leaves glowed with a pale silver incandescence. It was almost unnoticeable on a single leaf, but in a combination of thousands of them, the view became unforgettable.

  JB looked at the front side of the leaf, it didn’t glow, just the inner part. That aura was coming from the moon, he thought. The moonlight seemed to initiate a bioluminescent reaction. Soon, such silver light filled all the air around. JB’s head went spinning, he felt a change in oxygen. The vegetation that produced it had to enrich the air with some kind of soft neurotoxin. It was the only reason he could imagine explaining sudden dizziness.

  It was an incredible adventure. JB had seen so much in that rainforest. Things that he couldn’t imagine. He stared upwards, enjoying the view. The moon charmed him, he couldn’t remove his sight from it. Everything was quiet. Unwanted thoughts passed, so his mind finally got free. Nothing bothered him anymore. It was just the moon, something still felt wrong about her. She induced awareness. It grew. Shortly the agitation got so high that it provoked an itch in the back of his head. JB looked at the moon so carefully that his eyes dried out. At some point, he had to blink, and that very moment he saw something. At least he thought he had seen it. It flew before the moon, covering her up for a brief moment. At first, it looked like a bat to him, but it couldn’t be, because of the distance. There weren’t such gigantic bats. That thing was big, fast, and scary. JB’s skin covered in bumps.

  A time went on, and no explanation came to his mind. Perhaps, it was just a product of his imagination. After all, one couldn’t survive such a catastrophe and be perfectly sane. The tiredness was nothing to him, occasional vertigo could be acceptable, but hallucinations… That was a clear call for help. JB admitted to himself that he wasn’t fine after all. He needed time to recover.

  “Damn flying monsters…” he said out loud. “Ridiculous!”

  Just as he felt safe and calm again, a sudden loud roar rolled through the valley. It came from the direction where that shadow flew. The roar was long and unusual, it started with a low base and then went up high almost to a sonic wave. When JB heard that, his heart stopped and hair went up. He wasn’t surprised, though.

  The place from where it sounded was in several miles away. His altitude didn’t allow him to see what was going on there. And he wasn’t sure that he wanted to witness that.

  Now the adventure didn’t seem a game anymore. It all felt real more than ever. Like never before JB g
ot an idea of the danger that surrounded him. One wrong step would be the last. He had to move on, and the faster his pace would be, the better.

  JB looked down at the fire. His only source of light and warm became a threat now. The monsters might notice it. If they hadn’t already. It felt dangerous to get down during the night, but there wasn’t much choice. Everything was the ground: food, water, and, most importantly, the backpack with the gun in it. Now it was his only hope for survival, nothing else mattered that much anymore.

  His head finally cleaned up. The gangster prepared to act. He grabbed the vine and jumped off the branch. His hands skillfully lowered him down the tree, without even help from his legs. JB felt the crank pumping through his blood, and he sort of liked that feeling. In the thirteen years of his criminal lifestyle, he hadn’t experienced anything like it. He wanted to try something new. A great force awakened in him.

  Without even getting to the end of the vine, the big guy released it to go into free fall. He made a backflip and landed on his feet.

  Not wasting a second, JB ran towards the fire. He picked up one of the water-fruit to tear it apart over the flames. The water poured on the fire to kill it immediately, turning liquid into steam. The hiss from it broke that perfect silence that used to be there. The light faded into darkness. JB closed all of the zippers on the backpack and threw it on his shoulders. He was ready to leave that jungle. The break lasted for too long. It was time to return to the original plan – to run without pause.

  SAY ‘HELLO’ TO THE DEVIL

  Two months later…

  The group of survivors kept living on the north beach in hope of rescue. Many weeks passed while they were waiting for a ship, or a plane, or anything that might save them. It was worthless, nobody showed up. They were left on their own.

  Life was hard on them lately; a tragic plane crash, a loss of close ones, who had never made out, a tough survival in the wild. And help didn’t come. So the people had to stay alone on the island, which they hated with all heart. Time passed, it healed some of the damage. Somehow most of them made peace with all those terrors that had happened to them. Each one had to get used to the island in their own way.

  Perhaps, if the situation was different, the group might even love that place. After all, if looked at objectively, it was a beautiful location; white sand on the beach, crystal clear water, and tropic jungle around. Lots of people dream about a piece of paradise like that for their entire life. All they needed was to settle, and it could be better. The jungle was full of food, so was the ocean. Not far from the beach the guys had found a small river with fresh water. Surviving became much more comfortable.

  The captain of the plane, Josh Skyman, remained in his leadership, and Steve Wash became a good friend and advisor of his. The relationships in the group were more or less democratic. All the main decisions were voted on and anyone who wanted to had an opportunity to participate in discussions. The idea of surviving was a concrete basis for peace and order for a long time. Unless the priorities changed, it would be that way for a long time.

  After three weeks of waiting for a rescue mission, some of the survivors realized that no one was coming for them. An alternative had to be found. They built a solid camp on the beach. As construction materials, they used anything, from parts of the plane to jungle trees. The palm leaves were perfect for making hovels. Ivy and vines replaced ropes. The group had built a large water reservoir with bamboos and rosin that held about fifty gallons of liquid. There were shifts among people to bring the water from the jungle. Everyone had to contribute.

  Thus, people who couldn’t imagine their life without the endless fuss of urban rhythm had to learn how to deal with their only task there – survival. With time, labor had diverged. Men, students mostly, became pioneers, builders, and hunters. They were making most of the runs in the jungle, supplying food, searching for plane parts, et cetera. The women took care of the signal fire, watched the horizon, and picked up fruit at the nearest areas.

  It was evening. A thick cloud cover, as usual, held upon the island, turning the sky into a solid black background. A warm oceanic breeze brought a freshness to the beach. The weather had changed in the past few days. The air got warmer and the humidity rose. It was gasping. People felt strange, they hoped for it to pass, just like a season happening. But each of them was caught in shivers when thinking of an alternative. Humans, like any other species, can sense danger. It’s like a madness in the air that roils the consciousness. Yet, on the contrary, people find it hard to believe in what they can’t see. The group had already made it there for more than ten weeks, so they didn’t consider the possibility of something ending that.

  Tina and El were spending their time around the campfire. It was their shift on ‘signal fire duty.’ They had to keep the flames up and watch the horizon in case a ship showed up. If a vessel came by, they would light up a big fire that was not far. That actual signal fire was about eight feet high and had enough firewood in it to produce a light that would be seen from long miles away.

  The girls sat in two seats that had been found in the jungle few weeks before. They kept it quiet for a while. Tina was reading a book, enjoying the warm light from the flames that brought comfort to her mood. Only the heat occasionally distracted her from the storyline, but whenever that happened, she took a deep breath and went back into the world of her favorite characters.

  On the other side, El didn’t look like herself. From the very first day of the crash, she tried to find any work she could. Doing something useful helped to take her mind off the problems around. Sometimes she contributed to making the fishing nets or joined the food gathering parties. Lots of time she and her bestie spent discovering jungle flowers to bring them to the beach. There was a lot to explore in that forest, especially for noobies.

  It was obvious that El worried about something that night. Tina had noticed that at once, but she blamed it on the heat. Yet, after El spent the better part of an hour staring at the fire, her friend decided to say something. She finished the chapter, put a bookmark between the pages and closed the book. The brunette looked at the blond. She didn’t react at first, but one could tell by her expression that El knew what that was about.

  “Hey, are you alright?” Tina asked softly.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” El replied staring at the fire.

  “You look unhealthy, girl. Do you feel well?”

  “No... I mean, yes. I’m okay. It’s just, I feel a bit dizzy. This heat is driving me nuts.”

  El finally turned to her friend.

  “Here, have some. You’re going to feel better,” Tina picked up a bottle near her seat to hand it to El.

  “Thanks… Do you still have hope for someone to come?”

  “Yeah, sure. A little bit more and the rescuers will come for us. We have to hold on,” Tina radiated optimism.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course, I’m sure. But that’s not why you are sitting here like a stone for the whole evening, right? What’s wrong? Tell me.”

  “It’s just… No, I can’t, it’s silly…”

  El’s lips were shaking, Tina saw that it was serious.

  “Come on, we’ve known each other like forever. If something is bugging you, then it’s bugging me. I promise I won’t think that it’s silly.”

  El made a deep breath.

  “Alright. I’m thinking about that call from Jerry when he talked to Alex.”

  “So that’s it? You’re worried about your boyfriend?” Tina smiled. “Come on. I had already thought that it was something big.”

  “First of all, he’s not my boyfriend. I just have a bad feeling about it.”

  “Come on, El. You’ve promised yourself to forget him, remember? And about that call… Lots of time passed. He knows where we are. He would have joined us a long time ago if he wanted.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. The connection got interrupted, why? And he has never made it here, why? Something could h
appen to him. He may be lying there, somewhere, injured, with no one to help…” Each next word made El’s voice tremble more and more.

  “I think he’s okay. There may be thousands of reasons why Jerry didn’t come here. No one knows what that guy has on his mind. Even if everything is as you say, we can’t really do anything, can we? Don’t worry so much over nothing.”

  “Can’t you see, Tina? It’s our fault. We were there, our people searched the plane for survivors. And we left him there. They took him for dead when he was alive. Think about it. We left him behind. It’s on us.”

  “I remember that day as clear as possible, one can’t forget something like that… The captain said that he personally checked his pulse, he didn’t breathe. No one knows how he could’ve survived. All we can do now is to hope for a better thing to happen.”

  “Perhaps you’re right. We really need to take care of ourselves.”

  After a talk with her friend El felt better. She even forgot about the heat for a minute. It was just a fire that took over her thoughts. But that kind of state didn’t last for long. Soon she went back to thinking about JB. Tina, on the other hand, opened her book again to keep enjoying the evening.

  While the girls were talking, they missed that moment when another person joined them. A dark silhouette of a man came out of the shadow to join them. It was Wash. He moved one of the stumps, nearby, closer to the fire, to sit with the girls. Steve's hand pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket.

  “Here goes the remains of luxury… I found them in the jungle just a few days ago, and now they’re all gone. Huh…”

  He exhaled sadly and continued twisting the pack in his hands.

  “Better for your health," El said.

  “Well, it depends on how you look at it. The people in modern society always treated smokers with prejudice. But take the eighteenth century, per se, smoking then was considered a noble activity for the elite.”