by J R Hogan
I rested my foot on the log and shifted my weight. Heart hammering, I moved my center of gravity onto the natural bridge.
It was surprisingly sturdy. The bark was fractured and warped enough to provide an easy grip, even though my shoes were still slightly muddy and slick.
I stepped again. Vertigo washed over me as I could see a steep drop on both my left and my right. But I kept moving.
I was about halfway across when I realized that I was going to make it to the other side easily. I moved with confidence, crossing the ten-foot gap in just a few seconds and emerging onto terra firma.
The duffel lay just ahead.
“There are signs that their trail continues on ahead of here,” I called back. “But nothing to indicate that we’re being watched. Come join me on this side of the ravine, and we can keep moving.”
They approached me without a word.
I’d spent years trying to convince college undergrads that they needed to work hard if they wanted results. It always felt like an uphill battle. But watching the five of them follow without hesitation brought me no satisfaction or joy. It meant that any potential negative fate would come directly from the fact that they trusted me when they shouldn’t have.
I don’t think I’d be able endure that much pain.
I shook the idea from my head and focused on helping them across. “Chastity, you won’t mind going first and showing them it’s safe, will you?” I asked as though requesting a cheery favor.
She stared back, her face ashen. “Of course, Mark.”
I smiled and looked toward the others. “Keep your weapons ready in case we get surprised. I’ll make sure everyone crosses safely.”
Jessica nodded as the rest of them tightened the grip on their weapons.
Chastity slipped the pistol into her lab coat and knelt down on the log, clutching her heels in one hand as she slid her crotch along the wood. Inch by inch, she pulled herself over the log while clamping her knees around either side, grinding her hips as she moved.
She was halfway across before I realized that my dick was straining painfully against my jeans while I watched her writhe.
Fuck flashed through my mind as tried to focus. Of all the survival situations to feel betrayed by my hardening dick, this had to be one of the five worst so far.
I offered my hand as she scooted to the edge of the wood. Chastity took it, and she stepped off like I was helping her alight from an elegant car. She hugged me close - too close – and pressed her hips against mine just hard enough to let me know that she knew.
Clenching and unclenching my jaw, I turned to the other four. Sarah was whispering to Daisy, who nodded back and hugged her. I was torn; I wanted to win their trust by respecting their privacy, but I wanted to keep them safe and burned to know what they were thinking.
I was still debating what to say when I realized that they didn’t need me at all in that moment.
Daisy had holstered both pistols and mounted the log just as Chastity did. Sarah, her sword strapped to her back, moved in right behind Daisy as though they were on the same motorcycle. I fought hard against the feeling that my focus was being tested with tantalizing acrobatic erotica and forced myself to keep my mindset in combat mode.
That was easier said than done as they slid forward, inch by inch, closing the gap between us as Ling and Jessica watched from the other side.
They were nearly to the other side as I told myself over and over that we were safe from immediate danger: I’d scanned the ravine below, and there was nothing in front of us or behind to cause concern. I’d checked everywhere.
A low, deep moan reverberated through the trees. It was unfamiliar, but it was unambiguously wrong.
Oh, shit.
I’d checked everywhere but up.
A lightning glance was enough to see that the tallest tree was toppling right toward our bridge, giving me three seconds to act. “LEAN!” I screamed while jumping onto the log. I grabbed Daisy’s arm in my left and Sarah’s in my right before launching the three of us backward onto the dirt.
The tree hit the log just as we landed. Our little bridge exploded into a million tiny splinters as the tree cleaved it and crashed in the ravine.
“Ling, Jessica, are you okay?” I called across to them.
“Yes,” Jessica called back, “but what the hell just happened? Are you okay?”
I stood, pulling Daisy and Sarah to their feet. “We’re unhurt, but not out of harm’s way. Guns up, someone’s nearby!”
“What’s going on?” Sarah whimpered. “How do you know they’re here?”
I lifted the spear and stared at the place where the tree had once stood. “That was timed too perfectly. They wanted to kill someone on the log and split our group in half. It would be a one-man operation if they cut most of the trunk ahead of time. Fuck! He must be over there, let’s surround-”
“Mark, A SECOND TREE IS FALLING!” Chastity screamed.
I looked up and was reacting before I could think. I slammed Daisy into Chastity, knocking them both back, then wrapped Sarah in a bear hug and tackled her. The tree landed with a deafening boom, separating Sarah and me from Daisy and Chastity.
I sprang to my feet, terrified that one of them had been hurt. “Are you okay?” I screamed, unadulterated panic racing through my chest. “TELL ME YOU’RE NOT HURT!” I shouted as my first tears began to form.
Daisy responded, voice shaking, “I – I think I’m–”
“The log is rolling, it’s forcing us toward the cliff!” Chastity yelled. “MARK, PLEASE DO SOMETHING!”
The panic solidified in my gut as the enormous log, weighing several tons, inched toward Daisy and Chastity, trapping them near the cliff’s edge.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
TOC
The log was at least six feet in diameter, so I had no hope of jumping over it. I grabbed it as it rolled, but quickly let go as I realized that holding on would simply pull me over and crush me on the other side. I fell to the ground.
Panic ran through my body like a poisonous snake. The dread of losing one of them was both impossible to fathom yet seemed inevitable. I couldn’t even see them over the top of the log as it sped toward the edge.
I suddenly remembered what had saved me when I almost fell off the cliff, and was speaking before realizing that I’d chosen to act. “These cliffs have roots coming out of the walls, DROP OVER THE EDGE AND GRAB THE ROOTS!”
I could only hope that they heard me as the log spun across the lip of the cliff and sailed into the abyss. Three seconds later, a sickening crack told me that the tree had been obliterated on the rocks below.
I dove to the edge, sliding across the dirt and grass. I didn’t want to look, but I couldn’t stop myself. Every second of not knowing was agony. “Daisy, Chastity, WHERE ARE YOU?”
Vertigo threatened to pitch me into the chasm as I realized just how far down it was. My head swam; everything felt wrong.
Then I saw and arm. Two arms, attached to two different people. They were holding onto the roots that poured out of the dirt wall, five feet below the edge.
“You grabbed the roots!” I screamed. “You’re okay!”
“Help me!” Chastity moaned. “I can’t – it’s too hard-”
“Hold on,” I yelled, “just hold on, I’m on my way down. Daisy! Can you hear me?”
“There’s no way…” she whimpered, “I’m slipping…”
The fear of tumbling off a cliff can miraculously evaporate when inaction will kill a loved one. I pressed my fingers into the loam and hung my legs below. My stomach dropped as I reached for branches and found none at first; the magnitude of the cliff truly sunk in. I was protected by nothing more than my tenuous handhold of dirt.
Then I kicked and found a root.
I lowered my weight onto it, letting go of the edge and attempting to balance on the small protrusion.
I failed.
My heart, stomach, an
d balls seemed to vacate their resting places I pitched forward into empty space.
Then I caught the root with my hands and swung like a pendulum. My shoulder muscles strained in protest as I pulled against the rotation. Hanging upside down, I looked up at the ground above and nearly vomited.
I closed my eyes.
I had to get this just right. I couldn’t live with anything less.
Wrapping my legs around the branch, I pulled myself into a sitting position. I grabbed Chastity’s branch as I balanced myself, then seized the opportunity to snatch her arm.
That’s when my branch cracked.
I had just enough time to leap as it broke off, sending me once again toward an adrenaline-fueled spiral into vertigo.
Chastity and I were now dangling from the same branch. My left arm was draped over that branch, and I held her elbow with both hands in a vice grip.
“Don’t let me go,” she sobbed quietly. “Please, Mark.”
I understood, in a distant sort of way, that she had broken enough to expose more vulnerability than she ever had before. But I had to compartmentalize that fact and focus on the task before me. “Daisy,” I called, “I’m going to reach for you-”
Daisy screamed as one of her hands slipped off, and she flailed at the end of a root with just the other hand still holding on.
I moved without thinking, letting go of Chastity with one hand and swinging toward Daisy to catch her wrist in my right hand as she lost her grip. My arm came down hard on the root below, sending a jolt of pain through my shoulder.
It was precarious; my arms were draped over two different branches, with a woman dangling from each hand. My arms burned in agony as the bark dug into my skin; all three of us were resting most of our body weights on my elbows.
But we were stable.
Then Chastity lost her grip on the branch, sending a flame of pain through my left arm as I kept her from falling.
Both women begged me not to let go.
“We need to plan,” I gasped, “a way up.” I huffed. “I can’t… hold this… forever.”
They dangled their legs in fruitless desperation. The slow, burning edge of panic started as I failed to see a way out.
I closed my eyes and focused. I didn’t have much time, but I could come up with a plan.
I had to.
“MARK!” Chastity screamed in my ear.
I opened my eyes.
A few feet away from Chastity, a man was climbing the roots. Two things were immediately obvious.
He was heading for us.
And he wanted to hurt us.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
TOC
I’d never seen the man before, but the look on his face was very familiar: he saw something he wanted, and was delighted at the prospect of hurting someone to get it.
The man was nearly naked. Dirt and mud caked almost every square inch of his pale skin, including his frizzy beard and matted hair. He stared at the women with a lustful hunger as he picked his way nimbly along the roots.
“Please,” I heaved, “don’t hurt us, we need… someone to help.” I was too exhausted to be coherent.
He ignored me. Of course, he was almost certainly part of the group that had stolen our supplies, led us through the jungle, attacked us with dinosaurs, and felled trees in an unending assault. This entire journey had been a plot to force us into the weak spot where we now found ourselves.
My arms screamed in protest as I continued to hold two people, light though they were.
I wanted to cry, but even that meager task was beyond my ability. I was simply stretched too thin.
All I could do was watch as the man reached for Chastity.
The man howled in pain as blood exploded from his hand. He dangled precariously as a second attack lopped an exposed root off the cliff, denying him a support point.
We gawked upward to see Sarah, eyes ablaze, raising her katana for a third strike.
She brought it down on another root, lopping it off and sending it tumbling into the river below. The man now had no way to reach Chastity. His attention had shifted, however, to his bleeding hand.
That attention changed on a dime when Sarah reached over the edge to cut through the root he’d been grabbing. The man yelped and reached for another handhold as the root fell to the bottom of the cliff.
He looked up at Sarah and seethed in unambiguous hatred.
Then he climbed downward and out of sight.
“Professor!” she screamed. “I’m coming down to help you!”
What could I say? That she couldn’t get there in time, because my strength was almost out?
No. I didn’t even have the energy for that.
Daisy screamed as she started to slide through my fingers. I leaned toward her, but the counterbalance caused Chastity to slip away from me.
It was now an extreme effort just to breathe.
“Mark,” Chastity begged, “Mark, look at me. You have to make a strong choice. Mark. Look at me.”
I rotated my neck slowly to meet her gaze.
She stared back, frightened yet determined intensity shining through her glasses. “Mark, this is going to be difficult, but you have to be sensible.”
Both women slipped another inch.
Chastity let out a tiny scream. “Mark,” she whispered as we stared at one another, “you have to let her go. You can help me out of this, but only if you make a hard decision.”
I groaned.
“I know it’s not what you want to hear, Mark,” she pressed in a soothing voice, “but you’re too smart not to know it’s true.”
I shook my head.
“Mark,” Chastity drilled. Her voice was calm and focused. She wanted me to know that there was no time left: I had to decide now. “Mark, drop her. More than anyone else, you need me alive. If you want to survive in this place, you’re going to have to understand that you can’t save everyone. You’ll endure if you accept that fact right now.”
The first tears finally found their way down my cheeks. “You’re right, Chastity.”
She screamed as I let her go.
And with my left arm no longer holding Chastity, I was free to swing on my right elbow and catch Daisy just as she slipped away. She wrapped her arms and legs around my torso and neck so tightly that my pulse strained against her grip.
“You have to let me breathe,” I wheezed as I scrambled to grab another root.
She relented just enough to keep me alive as I grasped a branch and wrapped my knees around another root. I was able to relax just enough for the pain to start receding from my arms.
“Don’t come down here, Sarah,” I called up in a meek voice. “I’m going to need you to help me over the edge in just a second, because I sure as shit am not dying today.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
TOC
I waited a minute for my muscles to recover before reaching for the branch above me. “Hang on tight,” I said to Daisy as I pulled us both up.
Her lithe, tiny frame was hardly much extra weight – but I was exhausted by the time I had climbed just a few feet to the top of the cliff. Sarah grabbed my shoulder and pulled us both up as my strength dwindled to its final drop. I crested the edge with a loud grunt as I rolled over Daisy and onto the grass. She pulled me into another tumble and we were kissing as she refused to let go, breathing in my air like a second’s relent would be fatal. We tasted everything in each other: fear, anger, doubt, rejection, exposure, vulnerability, shortcomings, and triumph by way of brokenness. She rolled on top of me and spread her thighs wide, pressing her waist aggressively onto my crotch as she peeled off her shirt.
A dust cloud of fear, horniness, loss, and triumph swirled in my mind. I tried to pluck a coherent thought from the storm. “We can’t, Sarah’s watching.”
I was dimly aware that it was an asinine concern, but was too depleted to say anything sensible.
“Lucky her,” Daisy c
ooed as she bent down to kiss me once more. Her bra scratched my shirt in the softest yet most powerful way, and the last of my mental clarity vanished.
“She didn’t draw straws,” Jessica’s voice floated from somewhere above.
“We all know what you two did while hunting the Troodons together,” Ling snapped. “She needs to take a turn so that we can start over.”