Stranger Realms

by Jarred Martin

  “It's a gar,” Wendell's dad explained, holding the fish out so Wendell could examine it. It looked terrified with its wide open eyes and the blood flowing from its mouth. “A spotted gar, I think. There's other species. They get as big as this boat, almost. Over three-hundred pounds. How'd you like to snag one of those, huh?”

  Wendell thought he wouldn't like it at all.

  His dad picked the pliers up again. “Too bad they're trash fish. They over-spawn and eat all the game fish. You can't eat them. At least white people don't.” A dark look came over Wendell's dad's face. “That's why we're gonna do this.”

  And before Wendell could react, his dad brought the pliers up once again, pried the gar's jaws apart, clamped the pliers around the top of its mouth and twisted. The bony, razor toothed upper portion of its face snapped off with a crack that turned Wendell's stomach. The gar's caudal fin curled, wrenched in agony, its wide round eye unblinking. Blood poured from its ruined mouth.

  Wendell's dad calmly tossed the gar over the side of the boat and it disappeared into the depths of the lake. “Now it'll starve.” He sat back and finished a can of beer, crumpled it and set it floating on the lake. “That's man's command over nature. We live. They die.”

  It all seemed so needlessly cruel to Wendell. He was overcome with emotions he could only articulate by way of the sudden hot tears spilling down his cheeks.

  Wendell's dad got another beer from the cooler. The crack of the tab when he opened it was so much like the snapping of the gar's mouth. He stared back at his son impassively. “You need to suck that back up, kiddo. You're gonna find something to cry about if you keep on making a bunch of noise, scaring the fish away. My old man would have already whipped a fishing pole across my eyes if I was acting like that. Maybe you need a little of the old medicine. I'm probably letting you down by not giving it to you.”

  Wendell wiped at his running nose.

  “Not a peep, son. Not a peep from here on out, understand?”

  Wendell sniffed and nodded his head.

  While his dad continued to simultaneously fish and empty the ice chest, Wendell quietly sat his rod and reel down on the bottom of the boat and just sat staring out over the water, which wasn't so different from fishing, really.

  Occasionally Wendell's dad's pole would twitch, and he would spring to life reeling in his catch. They were catfish, which were horrible gasping things with beady black eyes, and tendrils shooting out of their faces. They didn't have scales like other fish, instead they were covered with dark, mucus-oozing flesh. Wendell's dad held them by their flabby white bellies while he pried the hooks from their mouths. The barbs came out with nauseatingly crisp popping sounds, and more often than not blood would follow. He strung yellow nylon rope through their mouths and out their gills, and dangled them over the side of the boat, just below the water's surface. Whenever he had a new one to add to the chain, he drew them up, and they all worked their mouths, soundlessly suffocating in the air.

  Wendell's dad said that fish didn't feel pain. He said they couldn't think or feel fear the way people do. Wendell knew that fish had brains. They had brains, and they were vertebrates, just like people. They bled blood, it was just as red as his, he'd seen it himself. They must feel something. And if they didn't experience fear, then why did he have to be quiet? He knew better than to ask.

  When the wind died, the surface of the lake was smooth as glass, placid and brown, reflecting the glare of the sun. It was peaceful, but Wendell though it was deceptive, superficial. Almost like a lure; a lure with a hook waiting to snare someone unheeding. And looking out over that placid lake, with the wind still, the sun sparkling, that was when he noticed something impossible. Or at least he prayed it was impossible, because that would mean it wasn't really happening- that he was seeing an illusion, or something that could be easily explained.

  Several yards away, but still too close for Wendell's comfort, was a great black patch, a silhouette of something enormous below the surface of the lake. Headed right for the boat.

  Wendell felt a chill run through his body, still hoping that he was witnessing some bizarre trick of the light. He could not say how big the thing under the water was, he knew only that it was several times the size of the boat. It was deep under the lake, but he could see the shape of it clearly enough: bulbous anterior, tapering off, vague outline of pectoral fins on each side, powerful caudal fin propelling it along.

  “Dad,” he muttered. His voice cracked. It wasn't enough to get his father's attention. He only sat and hoisted a beer can to his mouth.

  It was picking up speed, rising, growing darker as it surfaced. It left a wake of white foam in the water behind it. He could barely understand something so massive, but the closer it got, the more real it became.

  “Dad,” Wendell said again, much louder this time. “We have to go. We have to get off the water!”

  Wendell had once seen a lunar eclipse, a shadow moving across the surface of the moon. That was the only way he could think to describe the thing coming for them. It's size, the darkness of it, the deliberateness of its movement. It sent churning bubbles up from the depths as it continued toward them.

  “What are you talking about?” Wendell's dad slurred.

  “Dad, it's not safe. We have to get off the water. Start the engine. Start it before it's too late.”

  It was coming. A churning white foam in its wake, a greasy sheen on the top of the lake. Wendell could smell a pungent, fishy stench, a rotting smell.

  “Now!” Wendell screamed, and his voice echoed all along the waterfront, startling birds from their trees on the shore.

  It was rising. It was almost upon them. The sheer size of the thing was nearly like the lake itself. And Wendell knew that it was hungry.

  “What's gotten into you?” Wendell's dad took a look at his son and realized that he was deeply upset. “Fine,” he spun around in his seat, disgusted. “You carrying on like that is scaring the fish anyway.” He gave the outboard's cord a tug.

  Wendell cringed and gripped the sides of the boat. The thing was directly under them. It dove deep, and Wendell witnessed its massive tail, easily three times his size, break the surface before slipping back under. For a moment there was nothing but that awful smell and the white foam all around, and the only sound was Wendell's dad struggling with the motor. And then the surface burst beneath them, and the boat began to rise upward on the back of the massive creature as it crested the water. They both saw the massive black and heavily scarred hide of the thing lifting them skyward. They slammed back down on the surface, clinging to the sides for dear life, but still afloat. Wendell's dad stared back at him, breathless and wide-eyed.

  Below, they saw the massive thing diving, preparing to resurface again. The water boiled with grease and white foam. The air was heavy with the rotten smell of the thing as they witnessed the awful darkness rising to meet them.

  Screams split the air, the high-pitched sound of utter terror.

  It was coming from Wendell's dad. A continuous wailing alarm.

  Make all the noise you want, Wendell thought as the rising darkness eclipsed the boat. You won't scare this one away.

  Black Heart, Green Hell

  I'm from the city. The concrete jungle, they call it. The closest to nature I ever got was passing the pet store on the way to work, and that was as close as I was comfortable getting. I drive a taxi from nine till six in the morning six days a week. I see a lot of what people might call weird shit, but I never pegged it that way. It seems pretty logical to me. You keep all those people cooped up like chickens in concrete cages, some of ‘em are bound to get a little screwy.

  It never gets to me, though. It's all just a part of the racket. Cities make a racket, see? You either learn to ignore it, or you go nuts. I never thought I'd want to get away until I got the letter. I read it once and the next thing I know I'm on a plane headed for the heart of the Peruvian rain forest. Iquitos. It was a city I didn't know existed, in a country I cou
ldn't find on a map if you gave me a dozen chances, and suddenly I couldn't get there fast enough. That's love I guess.

  The letter was from my fiance Nina. She's an egghead, which might sour some fellas, but it never bothered me, and to tell the truth, I sorta respected her for it. She was a research assistant for her uncle Professor Leclair, a hotshot plant scientist. I call him a plant scientist anyway, what he really did I could explain about as well as I can sing Ave Maria in Portuguese, but apparently plant scientist sums it up for your average joe. But I understood the hotshot part well enough. He was supposedly the Isaac Newton of ferns. He was in the Amazon jungle digging up some root which he described as having 'uncanny properties,' whatever that means. Nina was assisting him, which meant I was all alone. As alone as a guy with seven-million neighbors can get, I guess.

  She sent me letters every week, which were mushy and full of sentiments Mills and Boon wouldn't publish. Still, it was nice to hear from her, and I tried to write back, although I was at a loss as to what to tell her. I guess I could have written stuff like 'today a souse got in my hack. He doubled over, and I thought he was gonna puke, but it turned out he'd just been stabbed in the belly. Love, Roger.' Somehow I didn't think she'd want to know about it. Mostly I just told her what I had for lunch, but I wound up having to embellish a little so she wouldn't know that I ate ham and eggs at the Greek’s twice a day.

  Then the letters stopped coming. I got a little worried, but I figured maybe she ran out of things to say. Then I thought about it and she'd never let that stop her before. But when a letter did come, I tore it open as soon as I laid eyes on it. I could tell right away something was wrong. The handwriting was different than Nina's usual flowing cursive, and it was shorter than usual. Just a few words, scrawled in haste. 'Somethings gone wrong with uncle. I'm in great danger. Being held prisoner. I fear he might try to harm me. Find me! Save me!’

  I never considered myself to be what you'd call a hero type, but I was out the door before I got to the last exclamation mark. I got the soonest flight which took me as close to the Maranon river as possible. I knew they were somewhere near there, but I didn't know exactly, and I didn't know anyone who did.

  The city, it turned out, was Iquitos, Peru. I knew I'd lucked out before I even stepped off the plane. I could hear the racket. It was a city. Maybe not like I was used to, but it was city enough. I may not know my way around a jungle, but if a place can erect a high-rise, then I can navigate it. I flagged down the first cab I saw.

  Professor Leclair once laid out for me this Turk's theory that everyone in the world was only six people removed from knowing any single other person in the world. He called them degrees of separation. It made sense to me, only the Turk didn't seem to take cabbies into the picture. The way I see it, your average hack driver is no more than two degrees away from anyone in the world: There's a guy who knows, or a guy who knows a guy. The way I figure, a cabby knows at least one, if not both of those people.

  I was on the money, as it turns out, because it took the driver about twenty minutes to find me my man.

  Man was generous. He couldn't have been older than sixteen. He was dark-skinned and skinny as a noodle, but he spoke American okay, and told me he could get me up the river, through the jungle, and back. He said his service was guaranteed, and if I died along the way, he'd refund my money. I didn't think I'd get a better deal, so after getting some supplies and arranging a boat, we set out on the Maranon river. The kid's name was Narciso, and the boat was twelve feet of leaky timber that looked like it wouldn't hold up to a light rain. Narciso vouched for its seaworthiness, though. It had an old outboard motor clamped to the back that the kid seemed mighty impressed with. It was a little cramped with me and Narciso and the supplies. The kid didn’t seem to think so, because he also brought along a little baby goat. I asked him if we were gonna have to eat it, and he said no. I was glad, because I don't think I'd have the stomach to slaughter it. I named it Ramsey.

  The river was something else; a serpentine band of brown that cut curving paths through mountains and dense jungle that rose green and dark on both sides. You could hear bird calls from the jungle. There were other things I heard, screaming, jabbering things, roaring things. I didn't ask what made those sounds. I hoped I'd never need to know.

  It was a long trip down the river. I occupied myself by playing with Ramsey, trying not to think about how alien everything around me suddenly was. I chewed the fat with Narciso when I could. I asked him what part of the jungle he was from, and he nearly tipped the boat over laughing at me. Turns out he was a city rat just like me. He said people born in the jungle were a part of it like roots, and they could never leave. He told me not to worry, though. He'd been in and out so much, he knew it like the back of his hand. I admired the kid's nerve, even if I still wasn't sure if he was putting the shine on me or not.

  Somewhere along the river, I noticed the water next to the boat start to get frothy. I was about to say something to Narciso when something jumped straight outta the water, ten feet in the air. My heart would have gone the same distance had my throat not caught it first. The kid told me I didn't have anything to worry about. We'd run across a pod of river dolphins, which were lively and playful, bright pink things that looked like they'd each taken a good lump with a mallet right to the noggin. They were swell, jumping around and keeping up with the boat. I saw one of the little ones run up on a crocodile. It looked like a log floating there in the water. Until it didn't. It snatched the dolphin in its jaws and rolled under with it in a second. After that I sorta lost interest.

  Those crocodiles were everywhere, black, leathery, prehistoric things, some twice the length of our boat. I asked the kid if they were dangerous. He gave me a blowgun, which was basically a reed that fired darts when you blew in it. He told me if one got too close to the boat, shoot a dart at it. They were poisoned, he said, and it would sink a crocodile like a rock. It wasn't long before one came too close for comfort. I acted quickly and scored a direct hit! Only it bounced off the croc's hide without doing harm. Stupid thing didn't even know I'd just attacked it. Narciso nearly laughed himself out of the boat again. I would have tossed him over myself if I wasn't counting on him to live.

  I'll admit, I was a little sullen for awhile after that. I felt like a rube. Like an idiot smiling in the back seat while he circled the block and ran the meter up, which I sometimes did to out-of-towners. There wasn't much time to stew on hard feelings. Narciso steered the boat toward the bank. I asked what gave and he told me there were rapids ahead that would smash the boat to pieces before we went a hundred feet. From that point on, he said, we'd have to go through the jungle.

  There wasn't a boat dock or anything, so we had to wade through the water and climb up the bank. I was about to slip over the side to do just that when the kid stopped me with a grave look. “Don't be a fool,” he said. Sometimes a guy ain't got a choice to be anything but. The kid scoops up Ramsey. I'm thinking it's a Peruvian thing, maybe they got a baby-goats-and-women-out-of-the-boat-first policy. Out comes this big knife, and Narciso draws it across Ramsey's throat. I couldn't believe it. He held the dying goat over the side, blood draining out of it, coloring the water. I sense this sort of churning beneath. Splash! In goes poor Ramsey, and the water doesn't just churn, it boils.

  “Hurry,” says the kid. “While they're distracted.” While what's distracted, I don't ask. I grab my gear and follow Narciso about as fast as my legs can take me. I get up the bank just in time to see what's left of Ramsey. Whatever was in the water had stripped him to clean white bone. The boiling continued for a few seconds after his head slipped under, and then the water stilled as if nothing happened.

  If I'd known that was going to happen, I wouldn't have named him.

  It was sobering to see that. I started to realize how dangerous the trip was going to be. My concern for Nina doubled. I must have been crazy ever letting her come to a place like this. I swore when I found her, she'd never go anywhere more danger
ous than the Sunday swap meet.

  Narciso secured the boat and we started on a long trek through a hell I could barely imagine. The heat was sweltering like the dense canopy of leaves overhead was keeping it from rising, and it had nowhere to go but back down. My clothes were soaked through with sweat, sticking to me in seconds. Swarms of insects buzzed like live wires and stuck to my damp skin. I swatted at a mosquito, and the kid reprimanded me. “Don't slap. They're full of blood. You burst them on your skin, it attracts a hundred more.” I was miserable. If a bug lands on you, you smack it. Just letting ‘em crawl all over your skin, the Inquisition couldn't have come up with a more excruciating torture.

  It was slow going. Narciso handed me a machete to help clear a path, but since he was clearing the way in front, I sorta felt like I was a kid watching my old man fiddle with the car engine while I “helped” by holding his crescent wrench. It wasn't just the overgrowth. The forest floor was a mass of tangled vines, and if a fella wasn't careful, he could snap his ankle like it was made of ginger bread.

  I'm walking along, following the kid and making like I'm clearing the bush he already cleared, trying not to think about the colony of mosquitoes making a buffet out of the back of my neck, when the vines beneath me start crawling up my leg. I look down and it ain't vines. I'm standing right in the middle of a nest of vipers. The floor is writhing with hundreds of them, all slithering and wriggling in a tangled heap. I can't see my feet from where I'm standing, just a single, pulsing horde of scales. They're crawling all over, up my legs, not a one of these things under twelve inches. I froze. I'd like to say that I held it together, but instead I let out a high-pitched yelp, not at all exhibitive of my sex. And just then, something long and black darts at me from high above in the trees. I see jaws open wide as my head coming at me, an endless tunnel of pink about to swallow me face first. And then a blur of motion, and the head falls away to the forest floor, spasming and twisting, jaws snapping as it oozed blood. I turn and see Narciso holding his machete and shaking his head at me. They were just pythons, he says. Most of them were babies. Non-poisonous. Like I'd said, I stumbled into a nest of 'em. Before that I had no idea the phrase 'just pythons' existed. I chance a look back and see the one Narciso had severed in two, the mother, he tells me, had to have been twenty feet long before the kid took a few feet off of it.