Evolve, p.16
Evolve, page 16
part #2 of Logan Reed Series
“It’ll take more than a little water to take down the captain and you can take that to the bank.”
“He’s right,” Fayng added. “From what we know about the river, it runs north for some distance. Years ago it merged underground with the Uele River. If we can find a way back to it from here, we may be able to locate him before he’s washed further downriver.”
That picked up Kiani’s spirits a little. She then looked past her and found an unconscious CJ still clutched in the giant’s arms. “How is she?”
Fayng shrugged. “She’s breathing.” She then turned and continued forward deeper underground.
Kiani’s nerves were shot. She clenched her hands tightly, trying to get them to stop shaking. As she did, she turned and found the tunnel entrance vacant. “It’s gone.” She calmly took a step back towards the cavern but was stopped.
Fitz reached out and grabbed her shoulder. “I seriously doubt Logan is still out there.”
She shrugged out of his grasp and attempted to take another step but jumped back as the Nsanga’s head reappeared, once again clogging the opening. Teeth snapped and its hot breath reeked of the dead.
She met Fitz’s eyes and nodded. Together, they left the beast behind and followed the others to god-knows-where. The walls were the same as the cliffs, ultra-worn and impossibly smooth.
“How long has this place existed?” she asked. The question was really just her thinking aloud but it got a response nevertheless.
“Millions of years maybe?” Fitz replied, running his hand across the glassy surface. “It was definitely underwater at one point. Only water can do this.
Kiani agreed. “Like the Grand Canyon.”
“Or the American Great Lakes,” he added. “Those were carved by glaciers, though. Either way, it’s pretty incredible.”
The path continued on at an ever-so-slight downward grade. They were going deeper and deeper as the distance traversed increased. How deep were they now?
The tunnel opened up enough for them to walk side by side and five minutes later, Kiani heard a moan and a scream.
“Cass is awake,” Fitz said, grimacing at the pitch and volume of her cry.
She kicked and thrashed, trying desperately to escape Baird’s unbreakable grip on her. Not until Fayng motioned for him to set her down did he obey. His face was hard and stoic, unchanging throughout the entire battle. Even now, Baird was as vigilant as ever. Everyone else was about to collapse, but not he, nor even Fayng, looked the least bit winded.
Baird stepped back from CJ as Fitz slid inbetween them, calming her. “You’re fine, Cass. Calm down. He was just helping.”
“Helping?” she asked, shaking her head. She winced and grabbed her pounding skull, trying to remember what happened.
“Logan… He pushed me—saved me from the…” she looked around. “Where’s my brother?”
The question went unanswered.
“Oh, God…” She feared the worst but Fitz and Ares filled her in on what happened.
“So,” she said, wiping her nose, “there’s a chance he survived the fall?”
“Possibly,” Fitz replied, unsure. “As long as Godzilla doesn’t go looking for him, he has a shot.”
He stood, offering CJ his hand. She took it and stood on wobbly legs. “Ugh…” Her hand went back to her head and closed her eyes. “My head is killing me.”
“Here,” Kiani said, removing her pack. She rummaged through it and procured a small pill bottle, puncturing its safety seal. “Ibuprofen.”
She tossed the bottle to Fitz who opened it for CJ, handing her three pills. CJ quickly tossed them into her mouth and drained the rest of her water bottle, nodding her thanks. Then, she lobbed the bottle back to Kiani who caught it and held it out to the group around her.
“Anyone else need any?” Kiani asked.
Everyone except the two Ru’kan accepted her invite. At this point, no one was without injuries.
“Where to now?” CJ asked, still holding onto the wall.
“Forward,” Fayng replied, motioning for Baird to continue. He did and they followed. Fitz and CJ brought up the rear, CJ having to use him and the wall for support. Her vision was starting to clear but they didn’t have time to sit around and wait. She’d have to make due while on the move.
“Do you really think we’ll find him?” she asked Fitz.
“Yes. We will,” Kiani replied sharply from ahead of them, her voice catching for a moment. “I have only known him for a short amount of time, but I have a sneaking suspicion that he’s been through worse and come out alive.”
She nodded and turned, moving off, leaving the two Aussies alone.
The only thing Fitz could do was flick his eyebrows at CJ and get a small laugh out of her. She winced again at the pressure built up in her head but kept on smiling after it cleared.
She tried not to laugh again as Fitz started muttering the lyrics to the Shania Twain classic, You’re Still the One.
21
He groaned as he woke, unsure of where he was. As he opened his eyes, two things stuck out to Logan the most. First, he was alive. How he survived was a mystery. He should’ve drowned. The last thing he remembered was hitting something hard and then…nothing. The sound of shuffling feet was the second thing that he noticed.
He wasn’t alone.
It’s what had woken him in the first place. As far as he could tell, he was laying on another shore of some kind. The river’s churning current had mysteriously gone silent too, but he could still feel its icy temperature around his ankles and boots. Whatever pulled him from the water, hadn’t finished the job.
Whispering broke out above him and he tried to tilt his head back to see what it was. The whatever was actually a whoever. It was the same odd language the other Ru’kan people used.
Could use Kiani right about now. She would be able to translate for him. Probably has something in her backpack for this blistering headache too.
“Ugh.” He groaned again as he sat up on his elbows, keeping his eyes only halfway open. Any farther and the light in the room would worsen his…
Light?
He chanced a glance and paid for it but all in all, it was worth it. The scene around him wasn’t what he thought it would be considering what was back upriver.
Grinding his teeth, Logan sat fully upright and rubbed his head, opening his eyes a little more as he did. The pain wasn’t as intense but it was still there. It was like when you watched too much TV or sat at a computer for too long—a strain-induced headache. He reached up and prodded his right temple. It hurt the worst.
Logan’s fingers came away with blood.
How many knocks to the head is that so far?
Honestly, he didn’t really care. He’d been in worse shape before.
The whispers broke out again and he turned as fast as he could without killing himself, seeing two shapes in the shadows of the trees behind him. They seemed timid, almost fearful of him. It was a big change from the other Ru’kan. The last couple of groups wanted nothing more than to rip him limb from limb.
Are these even Ru’kan?
“Hello?”
The two shadows quieted and shrank even further into the darkness. Logan shrugged and turned back around, facing towards the river’s edge. He noticed something odd back upriver and it took him a second to figure out exactly what it was.
Is that a dam?
It was, and though primitive in design, it did what dams did best. The steady flow of the river coming from the waterfall was down to a trickling stream—as glassy as any he’d ever seen. It was being blocked by thick tree trunks attached to the walls around the tunnel’s mouth. Logan figured he must have flowed straight over the top of it while still unconscious. Then…
Grunting, Logan crawled to the water and cupped some of it in his hands, washing his face and neck. Satisfied and somewhat refreshed by the chilled liquid’s effects, he unhooked his travel bottle from his belt and poured out its contents, refilling it with the much colder water before him.
Greedily, he chugged it down, refilling it again. This time, he screwed the lid back on and attempted to stand. He did, but it was a chore. Blinking heavily, he did his best to once again take in his surroundings while trying to figure out if he needed to puke. The nausea was getting worse since he initially sat up.
Like a lot of drunken nights in his youth, quickly standing was never a good idea the next morning.
And then it came, Logan vomited the water he’d just consumed, stumbling forward and plunging himself headfirst back into the river. His body instantly freaked out and he shambled back onto the shoreline, cursing himself for being so rushed.
Whoever had helped him was obviously no danger. He needed to take his time and recover some more before attempting that again. He took a couple of deep breaths and started to feel a little better. Wiping the spittle from his lips, Logan was shocked to see blood.
“The hell?”
He wretched again, coughing up more blood. The sight of his own blood caused him to panic, not understanding why it was—he looked down at his forearm and saw it. The Nsanga’s puncture wounds were discharging a thick mustardy yellow fluid now. He was being poisoned to death by some type of infection. His body was trying to fight it off but it was clearly losing the battle.
Logan remembered Fayng’s reaction upon seeing the injury, saying he should’ve been dead. Now, it was coming to be, only much slower than what was expected.
“Help me,” he begged, looking back to the trees. “Please.”
He collapsed, barely staying conscious. Through blurry eyes, he watched as the two figures stepped into the light. They were both women, young by human standards, maybe in their early twenties and they were short but strongly built—like Fayng. They were the only other female Ru’kan he’d seen since they were first attacked he realized.
He lifted his head again. “Please, help…”
They hurried to him as he caved in on himself again. As he drifted in and out of delirium, Logan felt them poke and prod his injured arm, speaking quickly to one another.
“Help,” he pleaded again. He wasn’t sure if they understood him but desperation was a universal language. Plus, he figured they knew how to treat this type of injury since they lived here.
One of the women propped him up against her, laying his head on her lap. The other dug into an animal skin of some kind and produced what looked like a large folded leaf. Her fingers flew over the vine that kept it together, expertly removing it without spilling its contents.
Then came the gross part.
She stood and held his arm out to the side and squatted over it while pulling her bottoms aside, urinating on the wound. Logan was too far gone to care. He remembered learning about the ‘mythical’ method of curing jellyfish stings the same way while in surf school back home in Melbourne. He and his teenage friends giggled and gagged at the thought of pissing on each other. It eventually became popular knowledge after Chandler peed on Monica in an episode of Friends back in the late nineties.
Urine was supposed to neutralize the jellyfish’s stinging cells and whatever was in the Nsanga venom must have been similar in toxicity. Only, the Ru’kan must think it actually works with this type of poison. It’s not like they knew what television was.
The medic then unclipped Logan’s water bottle and looked it over, popping the top. He smiled at the simple act. They’d been watching him like a hawk, studying his every move.
She then poured the cold water on his arm, washing away the waste and whatever other filth amassed from a rip-roaring romp through the Congolese jungle—both of them. His body convulsed in pain as the chilling liquid flowed in and out of the infected bite marks but he calmed as two gentle, yet firm, hands held him in place.
The medic then slathered his arm in a purple powder and quickly rewrapped the septic area in a fresh skin. She pulled it tight, getting a whimper out of Logan, but again, the other woman—the nurse, Logan decided to call her—held him in place. Once his new bandage was secured with a long loop of vine, Logan was laid back down to rest.
He breathed hard, laboring through the pain the best he could.
“Thank you,” he said, reaching out a hand.
Neither women took it at first, but after a beat the medicine woman did, squeezing with a firm grip. The nurse just patted his shoulder and stood, moving off to the river. She scrubbed her hands and like Logan did earlier, she drank.
The various fluids that were mixing with the water made Logan’s nose curl in disgust, but nevertheless, he was thirsty. He pointed at his water bottle, getting it handed to him. Half its contents were left and he guzzled it down, swallowing hard.
Laying his head back, he blew out one long puff of air. As he refilled his lungs, he found the pulsating pain in both his head and arm begin to dull. Wow. He sat up and coughed hard as both women immediately gestured for him to lay back down, pointing at the ground.
He waved them off.
“I’m okay,” he said but shook his head. They don’t speak English, mate.
He quickly repeated the thanks in Swahili in hopes they at least understood that. It was like any language around the world. If you visited a country enough times, you at least picked up on its more common words. Hello, goodbye, please, and thank you were the first ones CJ had taught him upon arriving in Africa.
The medic eyed him. Apparently, she did understand at least that.
“Rest,” she replied.
More than just the basics, I guess…
“You speak, Swahili?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Some.”
Logan was relieved. It was better than nothing. He was going to ask where she learned it but decided it was at the end of a laundry list of questions. First up was, where the hell was he.
“Where are we?” he asked, motioning to the space around them with his good arm. It was smaller than the other cave, but what it lacked in size it made up for in peace and quiet. As far as he could tell he was alone with the two women. He’d need to properly recon the area to make sure, though. But for now, he was content with his ignorance.
She shook her head, not understanding the question.
“This place,” he said, gesturing to the cave they sat in, “where are we?”
She nodded. “Home.”
Logan’s shoulders slouched. “Right…home.” It wasn’t exactly the answer he was looking for, but again, it was better than nothing. Home usually meant no monsters.
Usually…
He pointed up with his thumb, wanting to stand. The medic nodded and helped him to his feet, holding on tightly to his good arm. He balanced himself and looked around, seeing the place in a new light.
He hadn’t noticed the low line of shrubs blocking his view before and across the twenty-foot-wide passage of water was a row of huts made from a type of palm. He wasn’t sure why they needed roofs underground, though. It was just another unsupportive inquiry, one that could also wait. He counted a dozen of the cylindrical huts and assuming the Ru’kan didn’t room together, he suspected there were ten more of them nearby.
He quickly checked the area nearest to him but found this side of the river undeveloped and mostly empty. Whatever society lived in this section of the cave network resided on the larger of the two banks. The only thing over there were trees lining the cave wall.
“Are there any of the men around?”
No answer.
“Ru’kan?”
Her eyes went wide but she shook her head, no.
“I’m sorry,” Logan said, patting his chest, “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
She replied with something that Logan took as forgiveness. She seemed scared, but not at him. Just mentioning the tribesmen was enough to make the woman uneasy.
Right, don’t mention them again.
He hoped he wasn’t going to regret his next question.
“What about the Nsanga?”
She didn’t understand that either.
“The Nsanga…” he then pretended to bite himself on the arm, mimicking it with his free hand, spreading his fingers into something that resembled jaws.
There was a look of understanding and a shake of her head.
No lizards, good.
He grabbed at his shoulder and then looked at his feet and realized he was missing his rifle. “Bloody hell…” It must have washed away or sunk somewhere back upriver. Gingerly, Logan reached down to his thigh holster and felt his Glock, sighing in relief. His chest mounted Bayonet was also in place as were the pistols’ two spare clips on his belt.
“Okay, Logan,” he said to himself, “you’re not completely screwed.”
He drew the gun with his right hand, noticing that whatever the medic had applied to his forearm was acting as a fast-moving painkiller and anti-inflammatory. He opened and closed his hand and found it almost back to full strength. There was only a slight discomfort now.
“Impressive stuff,” he said, getting another confused look. “Never mind…”
Checking his weapon, Logan was pleased to see it was in good condition. He felt better about his predicament knowing it was still intact and he was absolutely thrilled to have the use of his arm.
He lifted the bandaged limb and smiled, showing her that it was feeling better. She smiled back and reached for the vines, untying them. Next, she carefully unwrapped the skin and smiled again. What Logan saw both shocked and confused him. The puncture wounds were totally healed.
No…that wasn’t right…
The bite marks weren’t just healed, they were completely gone.
* * *
His body felt like it was on fire and he wasn’t sure of where he was. The last thing he remembered was being tossed around like a dog’s chew toy. Thankfully, when the female grabbed him, it was by his pack and not his actual body. Then, the world went dark as he was slammed to the unmoving ground, blacking out from a blow to the head.
Where the hell…?
The first thing he noticed upon waking was the air. It smelled of blood and smoke. The ground beneath him was slick too, feeling like it was covered in… Oh, right. He brought his hand up to face and saw the dark stain of blood.
