Downpour(7) Upriver

7. Upriver

     Nick awoke to the sound of tools banging on metal. Sunlight streamed through the shuttered window of an airplane passenger window. Each hammer blow brought with it a painful reminder that he had spent the previous night drinking what was likely jet fuel.  For the first time in days, he felt rested, even if he could not remember walking back to the hut in the first place. The bed he slept in was made of shredded seat cushions, all piled into an upturned luggage rack. It had been one of the more comfortable nights he had spent in years.

     He looked around for Callum, but saw that the other bed was empty. The door, made from an emergency exit, hung slightly ajar. Nick wiped the sleep from his eyes and crawled out into the open sunlight. Even filtering through the jungle canopy, it blinded him momentarily. As things came back into focus, he saw villagers bustling about, carrying pieces of sheet metal and talking amongst themselves.

     Two men were walking down the street, arguing. Both were dressed in brown suits that had been cut off at the elbows and the knees. Vines had been tied to them as well to make them look almost camouflaged. “No sod, we need bigger boat. American man come with us. We sink if it’s no big. Go get big boat.”

     Nick might have been slightly offended, but laughed as they spotted him and scurried away. The early morning sunlight glinted off the many metal buildings surrounding him, and lit the town brilliantly. For a moment, Nick almost forgot that he was in the jungle, and felt as though he had stepped out into a small town. In the gaps between houses he could still see the dense green beyond, but he felt a certain safety in numbers. Everyone was dressed in modern-day clothes, albeit stained by the jungle. To Nick, it felt as if he had woken up on a rather bizarre episode of the Twilight Zone.  

     From a building across the street, Nick could hear Callum speaking loudly. “No, no, no. For the last time, that is not a term for a friend. We call friends mates.” He sounded exasperated.

     Nick walked over to the building and looked up to see it was labeled in crude letters: “School”.

     “Alright Tibo, why don’t you try?”

     Nick stepped into the room and saw Callum speaking with a small child.

     “Hello mate,” said the child sheepishly.

     “Very good!” Callum beamed and clapped his hands together. As he did so, he spotted Nick. “Ah, class, this is Nick.” Ten or so children turned in their makeshift seats to look at him. “Why don’t we all say hello to Nick?”

     “Hello sod,” the class said in unison, and then erupted into giggles.

     “Oh damn it all,” said Callum. “Everyone take a quick recess while I go and sort things out for our friend here.” The children bolted out of the classroom past Nick, eager to get out. “Sorry about that,” said Callum. “They don’t really want to learn. Chief thinks it’s important, but they couldn’t care less.”

     “Seem just like the kids back home,” said Nick.

     “Yes, but ten times as stubborn.”

The men paused in the entryway to the building. There was a certain level of awkwardness after their conversation the previous evening. Nick knew that Callum while friendly, did not entirely approve of what he was setting out to do.

Callum broke the silence uneasily. “Well come on then, no sense in wasting time. The hunting party is going to be leaving midday, and we should get you fed before you go.” He walked Nick out into the street and showed him to a long building made of an airplane hull. Inside, long tables had been set down. The room was crowded and full of conversation. At the head of one of the tables was the chief, who winked at Nick as he came in.  

     Callum served nick a bowl of what tasted liked steamed, mashed, bananas, and a cup of very dark coffee. After a few days eating cold military rations, Nick thought it was one of the best things he had ever tasted. He ate greedily until the bowl was clean, and felt life begin to rush back to his limbs. He took a sip of the coffee and savored the focusing feeling the caffeine had on him. Everything ahead seemed achievable, and once more, he thought he would make it through alive.

Once they had finished, Callum led Nick down to the river bank where he had found him the day prior. The jungle was alive, with animals running through the underbrush and swinging overhead. Nick looked around, wondering if any of them were dangerous.

Callum spotted him doing so. “Don’t worry, they don’t come near the tribe. There’s something about their scent that the animals don’t like. Doesn’t do much out in the jungle proper, but at least it keeps us safe here.”

     As they approached the river, Nick spotted a group of five men, wearing the same brown suits as the men in town. They were standing next to two large, metal boats that had been turned over. The bottoms were charred black, as the hunting party had tried to reinforce the makeshift welds that morning, in preparation for carrying ‘the American’.

     “You’re in luck again it seems,” said Callum, with a bit of an edge to his voice.

     “And why is that?”

     Two of the men standing by the river walked forward to meet them, and handed Callum an object wrapped in brown fabric. “They found this by the river this morning.” Callum handed it to Nick and looked glad to be rid of it. “I tried to tell them it’s not cursed, but it just turned up on the shore with no damage. I couldn’t convince them if I wasn’t entirely convinced myself.” Callum looked very uneasy.

     Nick unraveled the bundle and saw, to his delight, the black tome he had lost in the river. Well I’ll be damned. Your enchantments never cease to amaze me Henry. Nick was sure that if Henry had figured out a way to give the book legs and make it follow its owner, he would have. Somehow, the trinket always had a way of finding its way back.

The men continued to look at him uneasily.

“Oh come on now, no harm ever came from a book.” Nick had been in plenty of situations where various sorts of apocalyptic harm had come from books. Even saying it brought back memories of an ill-fated apprentice and a sea king. God those tridents were pointy.

     The men did not look convinced and muttered nervously among themselves.

“Well,” said Callum “This is where I’ll be leaving you. It’s almost noon, and I’ve got to help the chief do some repairs on his hut. You’ll help them portage the boat above the rapids and they’ll drop you at the next village up the river. It’s quite big and trader’s stop by often. You should have no problem bartering passage to one of the larger towns.”

     Nick looked at Callum and was sad to leave. “It’s been a surprising pleasure Callum. Thank you.”

     Callum smiled and shook Nick’s hand. “Good luck out there. Maybe I’ll see you again someday.” He turned around and walked back toward the village.

     Nick for one had no plans of ever returning to the jungle once he had found his way out, but still hoped that somehow they would see each other again. “Goodbye sod,” yelled Nick. The men standing around the boat laughed and repeated the phrase.

     Callum lifted his finger in a rude gesture, and walked into the jungle chuckling.

     The men lifted the boat. Beneath it were six leather bags and six spears. One of the men picked up a spear and tossed it to Nick. He was barely able to catch it as he was surprised by its weight. The spear was similar to the chief’s. It was constructed entirely from metal, only it did not come to a tri-tipped point at the end. Instead, it was a long, flat blade that eventually contracted to a single point. Nick was happy that he was not on the receiving end. Couldn’t hurt. Being that everything in the jungle was out to kill him, he thought that any form of protection would be helpful.

     “You help carry,” said one of the men, gesturing one of the boats.

     Nick grabbed one of the bags, shoved the book inside of it, and then went to the edge of the boat. With surprising ease, he and the other man lifted it onto their shoulders. Though it was constructed from metal, Nick could not help but think the boat almost felt light. Shipwrights back home could take note of this. He thought about selling the design of an all-metal canoe to an outdoor store and making a fortune.

Two men lifted the other boat, and the third walked ahead of them into the trees. They followed suit, and were soon passing beneath the dark canopy of the jungle. After the first half hour, Nick’s arms burned with exhaustion. It had become easier walking through the jungle was much easier with someone who knew the way, but he still felt out of shape. He decided to strike up conversation, to distract himself from the pain in his back and forearms. “How do you avoid getting lost?” Nick asked one of the men who was carrying the boat.

     “Lost?” the man asked, as if the thought had never even occurred to him. “We follow the animal road,” He said, gesturing to the packed ground beneath them. “Follow right back to river, then go home. Can’t get lost.” He laughed, as if the question had in some way been a joke.  

Their ease at moving through the jungle now became clear to Nick. The villagers walked the same game trails as the animals, and when they were in numbers, the predators didn’t bother them. This beats any Paul Mansen documentary I’ve ever seen. Nick began to daydream about being rich from his own TV show and nearly dropped the boat after tripping on a root.

     By mid-afternoon, they had brought the boat to just above where Nick had fallen into the rapids. A memory flashed back of the large green snake moving across the forest floor, and Nick felt momentarily sick. It was nowhere to be found and he breathed a sigh of relief. They lay both the boats down by the water and set their packs inside.

     “We leave now. Get in,” said one of the men, and Nick obeyed. It wasn’t meant to be a command, but more so reflected the little vocabulary that they had been taught by Callum. Nick barely had a chance to sit down before they were shoving off into the river.

If he had expected a cool breeze on the water, Nick was wrong. The sun reflected off the surface, and off the interior of their metal canoe, baking them. The men didn’t seem to mind, but Nick had already begun to sweat profusely, and his thoughts once again returned to how much he hated the jungle. The others dipped their spears into the water and began using them as oars. Nick followed suit, and soon they were moving up the river at a fast pace.

     Paddling upriver was difficult work. While the river was not flowing as fast as the rapids, it was by no means easy to work against it. Luckily, the packs they had been left contained small rations of smoked meat and fresh water. In the afternoon, they stopped in a shaded alcove of the river and sat on a bank to eat and drink. The men chatted with each other, and did their best to converse with Nick. While he never felt that they reached any real common ground, it still beat trekking through the jungle alone.

     “How far to the village?” asked Nick.

     The man he was sitting next to looked up at the sky. “When the sun go down,” he said matter-of-factly and bit into a piece of the smoked meat.

     They paddled for the rest of the day, the men talking to each other and singing songs as they went. Never once did they see another soul on the river. By the time the sky had begun to glow red, Nick felt exhausted again. Why couldn’t we have brought some of that home brew with us? His arms ached, but he continued paddling, not wanting to be shown up.

     After what seemed like an eternity in the murderous heat, the sun began to set and a disquieting chill set over the river. The men grew silent, no longer talking like they had been. The river grew thinner, and they found themselves weaving through meandering curves. The nighttime sounds of the jungle echoed over the water.

As they moved further upriver, a mist began to cling to the water’s surface. It was thick, blocking the surface of the water from view, making it feel as though they were paddling through clouds. The men whispered nervously to each other, but continued to paddle. Every minute or so, they would look back at Nick, and then down to the bag containing the black book.

     As the mist grew thicker, Nick grew apprehensive as well. “What’s the problem?” he asked, hoping it was something as simple as avoiding hidden rocks or hazards in their path, but knowing likely it was something far worse.  

     The men did not respond, but Nick thought he heard one of them murmur the word “Yacumama”. The mist grew to be waist high, and then after a time, enveloped them. Nick couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of the boat. The men looked around in the water nervously, paddling faster than they had been before. Nick heard the word “Yacumama” more clearly, and saw the villagers copying the crossing motion that Callum had made.

     Nick scanned the water but found it difficult to see anything. The surface of the water next to them rippled, and Nick was reminded uncomfortably of his time spent on Loch Ness. The men were muttering louder, and had stopped paddling to point their spears into the surrounding mist.

     Nick reached for the book and they cried out in protest. “Oh sod off, if there’s something out there; this is the only thing that’s going to help us get rid of it.” Ignoring their pleas, Nick opened the book and began to flip through the South American legends. He had just found an entry labeled Yacumama, when ahead of them there was a massive splash, and waves rocked the boat. He had enough time to read the top line that said “giant river serpent” when a large, smooth patch of scales passed in the water next to him.