by John Koloen
“How many people are involved?” Duncan asked, breaking the brief silence.
“Just a camera guy and a sound guy.”
“And you?”
“Of course. There could be a field producer, but I’m not sure about that,” Boyd said. “Anyway, they’re responsible for themselves.”
“Do you know these people?”
“Some of them. I’m not sure who will be with us. The company has more people than I met. I only know the people covering Thomas.”
“Oh, yeah, how’s he doing?”
“He’s already in the field, you know, at that village I told you about.”
“Shit. He’s gonna beat me to it,” Duncan said uneasily.
“Not if we get rolling,” Boyd said confidently. “We can get there tomorrow if we can put everything together today.”
“Is that possible? We need packs, tents, traps and specimen cases. How are we gonna get all that in a day?”
“We travel light,” Boyd said. “Thomas is doing day trips. Going out in the morning and coming back to the village before dark. The place they’re looking is only a few miles from the village, and they’ve got ATVs.”
“I guess that could work. But what if blaberus isn’t there anymore? Wouldn’t we need sleeping bags and tents anyway, if we’re going to spend the night in the village? They don’t have a hotel, do they?”
Boyd nodded.
“So you think we might have to camp in the jungle?” Boyd said.
“It’s just that it’s hard to believe that a colony of voracious insects would stay in one place for long,” Duncan said. “It took us, what, one or two nights to find them the last time.”
Boyd knew that the more equipment they brought, the more complicated the expedition would be. Who would carry all of the gear? Where would they buy it?
“Did I tell you Antonio will come with us?” Duncan said.
“Really! That’s good news.”
“He said he could get one of his cousins to come, if we need him. But I’m not sure if we need him.”
“Depends entirely on what we have to carry,” Boyd said. “We don’t want it to be like the last time. We need to travel as light as we can. But I agree with you, we need to have enough gear to spend a night in the jungle.”
With Boyd sitting at the desk and Duncan pacing, they drew up a list of the essentials. Lightweight sleeping bags, a lightweight tent, backpacking stove, cook kits, headlamps and other items. Boyd agreed to contact the helicopter company that Thomas had used. They couldn’t expect to find specimen cases on short notice. Instead, they’d have to settle for something jury-rigged, such as metal containers with secure lids that they could punch holes in so the specimens could breathe. They ruled out glass jars or anything that would likely break. With their limited knowledge of shopping venues, Duncan called Antonio Suarez. He filled him in on his plan to fly into the village and asked where they’d be able to find camping gear.
“At Bemol,” came the immediate response.
Duncan briefly outlined his plan, to which Suarez said he was ready to go to work at any time.
“Can you go with us to Bemol?”
“Yes, of course.”
Duncan said he’d rent a car and the three of them would buy what they needed. When Suarez asked if they would need his cousin, Duncan hesitated, whispered to Boyd who was on the phone with the airline. Boyd shook his head.
“We won’t need him. We’re gonna travel light. OK?”
“Yes, no problema.”
After ending his call, Duncan watched as Boyd frowned. He was having difficulty being understood. One thing was clear, however: the helicopter business was very busy at that moment. Boyd put his phone on speaker and set it on the desk.
“I’m on hold. The guy said, as best as I could understand—his English is only a little better than my Portuguese—all their choppers are booked.”
“What?! How can that be?”
“He didn’t say. Look, I’m catching only a few words. If you want to talk…”
Duncan waved him off.
“Maybe we can pay more to rent one.”
Another, louder voice, speaking better English, interrupted their conversation via the phone’s speaker. Identifying himself as the assistant manager he confirmed no helos were available. He said that flights were booked for several days. Boyd tried to bargain but the man cut him off.
“Are there any other companies with helicopters?” Boyd asked out of desperation.
“You might try to contact one of the airlines that fly into the bush. Some of them fly on a schedule. I’m sorry that I can’t be of more help.”
The assistant manager disconnected the call. Boyd stared at his silent phone.
“Shit,” Boyd said. “How do we even begin? I don’t even know the name of the village.”
“But you know where it is, right?” Duncan asked. “You can locate it on a map?”
“I’ve got the coordinates on my phone. But how do we find a plane? Maybe we should book a helicopter and wait a couple days?”
Duncan shook his head.
“Let’s not give up so quickly. Let’s call the helicopter Plan B for now. I hate the idea of wasting another day, but we’re not going anywhere without equipment. You need to get Antonio and buy the gear. Maybe we can figure something out later.”
As he prepared to leave, Boyd noticed the manila folder on the bed. One thing remained to be done. He handed it to Duncan, who gave him a quizzical look.
“You gotta sign the agreement,” Boyd said, matter-of-factly.
Recognizing that he had no choice, Duncan agreed to let a film crew follow him as long as they didn’t get in his way and as long as Boyd would serve as his assistant. Boyd assented to this but insisted that he would continue to serve and be paid as a consultant to the production company. Duncan expressed no interest in learning anything about the videos and signed the release without reading it after Boyd told him it was the same one that was used for all the shoots.
“If push comes to shove, I’m on your side,” Boyd said reassuringly.
“I’m counting on it,” Duncan replied.
61
NOLAN THOMAS WAS not pleased with the progress he was making in locating the insect colony. It was evident that Reptilus blaberus had thoroughly cleaned the area where his group searched. The pile of bones erected by the children was proof of that. However, he could not help but notice that the trees were filled with noisy monkeys and ground-dwelling creatures had already replaced the dead, though they remained hidden for the most part, scurrying away in the underbrush as the men approached. Having returned to the village before nightfall, Thomas huddled with his assistants around a table in the village’s common area, which was haphazardly lit by a string of low-wattage light bulbs powered by the village’s aging diesel generator. Outside, children played while a handful of adults milled about. Their guide sat with his peers in the shadows reporting quietly on what the Americans had done during the day.
Leaning over a large topographical map spread across the table, Thomas used a pencil to outline the area they had searched. Although they had found only a handful of carcasses, there was enough flesh remaining on the freshest skeletons to estimate that they had been killed over the past several days, well after the children had found the human remains.
“You know what this means, gentlemen?” he asked. His assistants thought it was a rhetorical question and refrained from speaking for fear of being wrong. Thomas did not suffer fools. However, since Thomas didn’t immediately answer his own question, Jason Gruber raised his hand.
“They’re covering the same area more than once,” Gruber said, tentatively.
“Exactly!” Thomas said approvingly. “Anything else?”
Gruber glanced at his three associates, who were staring at the map with great intensity, as if the answer lay hidden somewhere in its folds. Gruber had been Thomas’s chief aide since he came to Biodynamism. At thirty-five, he’d earned two master’
s degrees, one in biomedical engineering with specialization in molecular biology and the other in laboratory management. He was also enrolled in a largely online program leading to a Doctor of Science degree. His ambition was to run his own lab.
“It’s indicative of territorial behavior,” he responded, hesitantly.
“Exactly, once again. Very good, Mr. Gruber,” Thomas said, causing the others to release their gazes from the map.
“Can any of you tell me what this means?”
“It means they’ll come back,” Covelli said.
Thomas smiled. His assistants were paying attention, which pleased him.
“Tomorrow we’ll expand our search area to determine their range. This will mean that we spread out and work independently. Each of you has a copy of this map and you’ll mark on it wherever you find a carcass.”
“What about using the wireless radios?” Gruber asked.
“Yes, of course,” Thomas said. The others nodded approvingly.
Although the range of the devices would be limited by the terrain and the dense forest, they provided a psychological comfort in an unfamiliar and dangerous place. Everyone knew the insects weren’t the only predators in the forest. Although many entomologists had taken sides after the revelations about Howard Duncan’s ill-fated expedition, Thomas was convinced that the insects were predatory and represented a previously undocumented species, which is why he almost immediately organized his expedition after the news came out rather than waiting for a more complete accounting of what had happened. Unlike Duncan, who, having seen the horror of blaberus up close thereafter wanted to study the creatures in the controlled environment of a laboratory, Thomas wanted to first observe them in the field and subsequently return to his lab with specimens. Of course, Thomas knew nothing of Duncan’s plans while Duncan knew only what Boyd had told him about his competition.
Thomas asked if there were any questions as he ended the meeting. Gruber raised his hand.
“What if one of us finds the insects tomorrow? What then? What should we do?”
Having risen from his bench seat, Thomas pulled his hand along his chin sagaciously and looked at his assistant thoughtfully.
“Everything we think we know about them says that they travel in groups so, if you see one, you may see more. To tell you the truth, I don’t know what to tell you except to use your best judgment and watch your step.”
62
USING A RENTAL car and Duncan’s credit card, Boyd and Suarez spent the better part of the day purchasing equipment. Buying or renting a satellite phone proved the most problematic purchase as Suarez had no idea where to find one. After an hour of searching, Boyd complained to his companion that they were victims of Duncan’s lack of planning. Frustrated, he called Duncan.
“This sucks,” Boyd whined, “I can’t find any place that sells satellite phones.”
“Well, hello to you, too,” Duncan said.
“Sorry,” Boyd said. “We’ve found most of what we need, but the only place I’ve found sat phones is online and it takes at least two days to ship. Do you think we should wait?”
“No way,” Duncan said decisively. “Let’s just forget the phones. They didn’t do us much good the last time anyway.”
“You sure?”
“Look, it would be great if we could get a phone but if we can’t, then we can’t. It’s that simple. You think you got everything we need?”
“Mostly.”
“Good, then get back here ASAP. We need to figure out a way to get there. I saw a news program on TV and it looks like the press is chasing after Thomas.”
“Better him than us, right?”
63
BEFORE BOYD RETURNED to Duncan’s hotel, he met with the Broken Tree Productions staff to deliver the signed agreement. Although he was disappointed that he hadn’t been able to charter a helicopter, he took solace in the fact that he had two employers, that he was making more money than he had ever earned in his life, and that he had at least managed to purchase most of what they needed to conduct the expedition. The production company had booked several rooms—one of them cleared of its bed and organized into an office with tables, electronic and computer equipment and people he’d never seen before. The room was crowded and noisy. Field producer Carl Murphy emerged from the chaos to greet him. Boyd gave him the folder containing the agreement.
“He signed it,” Boyd said happily.
“That’s great,” Murphy said, leafing through the contract, nodding approvingly at Duncan’s signature. “So, when do we start?”
“Well, we’ve got the equipment we need, but we’re still trying to find a way to get there. The soonest we could get a chopper is a couple days from now.”
“Really? That won’t do. We’ve had problems, too. Seems like everyone and his brother are booking choppers. We didn’t plan for two crews so we only booked the flights we needed for Dr. Thomas. Let me make some calls. We’ve got folks back home who work miracles. Maybe they can find something for us.”
“That’d be great,” Boyd said enthusiastically. “I got no idea where to look.”
“When you do what we do, you improvise a lot. So, Dr. Duncan is good with this, right? He understands what we do and what we expect of him? Right? No surprises, right?”
“I told him to read the contract. He signed it. He didn’t ask many questions. He’s on board with it, as long as I’m part of his group.”
“That’s fine,” Murphy said, distractedly. A staffer was trying to get his attention. “Look, I’m pretty busy here…”
“You got my number. Let me know how things turn out with the transportation,” Boyd said.
Boyd was ecstatic as he and Suarez drove to Duncan’s hotel, the car stuffed with camping equipment. Why didn’t I think of that in the first place, he wondered. Let them do the work.
He was earning every dollar he was being paid, from both bosses.
64
OVERNIGHT, THE QUIET village of thatch-roofed huts alongside the slow-moving river was transformed into a staging ground for journalists and camera crews. Their object was to follow the exploits of Nolan Thomas and perhaps capture the first close-ups of a tiny insect that had taken on gigantic proportions. Few, if any, of those who arrived that day gave thought to how vulnerable they were should they encounter Reptilus blaberus in its habitat. As the headlines screamed of killer cockroaches, the widespread belief was that the insects could be easily crushed underfoot. News directors and producers armed their crews with insecticidal sprays guaranteed by the manufacturers to kill cockroaches on contact.
Thomas’s group had left just after dawn, riding two ATVs from the village’s small inventory, each pulling carts filled with equipment and their operators. Thomas rode in the lead vehicle, his four assistants sharing its cart filled with specimen boxes and daypacks. Field producer Carl Murphy sat behind the driver in the second vehicle with soundman Jack Walker and a young videographer named Andy Wilson, who had freshly arrived from Broken Tree Productions’ headquarters in Santa Monica, California. He had assigned the cantankerous Joe Robinson to Duncan’s group. One less problem to deal with.
Silvio Santiago, the old man who managed the village’s administration building, was overwhelmed by the requests for ATV rentals. A handful were known to be in operating condition. Santiago sent children to fetch the owners, most of them his relatives. Media who had arrived earliest anxiously protected their place in the imaginary queue as they negotiated prices with the manager. Prices were high and only cash was accepted. This stymied several of the crews who were accustomed to a world of credit cards and wire transfers. For extra money, the owners would drive and act as guides.
Thomas would not have cared had he known the struggles he was putting the media through, and all that Murphy cared about was that his crew had exclusive rights to Thomas’s expedition.
Thomas had outlined his strategy the previous night. Assuming blaberus was territorial, his assistants would fan out from where the childr
en had erected the mound of remains. The object was to determine the size of blaberus’s territory by locating additional carcasses, which he was certain they would find. He did not expect anyone to encounter a colony during this survey.
He would remain near the mound like a commander overlooking a battlefield, along with the drivers and the field producer.
“You’ll contact me periodically so I can mark your location on the map,” he had told them. “I realize your observations will be imprecise unless somehow you can get a GPS coordinate, but at least this will give us a rough idea of the size of their territory.”
Nudged by one of his colleagues, Thomas’s chief assistant, Jason Gruber, spoke up.
“You know, Dr. Thomas, we’re assuming they’ve moved on, right? What if they haven’t? What if they’re at one end or another of their hypothetical territory? What do we do then? I think we’re all a little worried about it.”
Thomas saw the concern on their faces.
“Maybe we should team up.” Covelli said. “I think we’d feel safer.”
“We could do that,” Thomas said, looking at the field producer and knowing that anything he said could end up in the show. Generally regarded as an autocrat in his lab, he was not unaware of the impression that he would make on television. Instantly, the four assistants brightened. Pairing off, Gruber and his partner headed north while Covelli and his partner headed south.
Standing on a hill, Thomas had a commanding view of the forest floor, which was shaped like an elongated bowl flanked by sharply rising, loamy slopes. Brush, low-lying vegetation and vines covered much of the area with trees rising like towers blocking out much of the sunlight.
Once the assistants were out of earshot, Murphy asked, “Do you think they’ll find something?”
“I hope so,” Thomas said.
“I don’t mean dead animals. I mean the bugs.”
“I don’t know,” Thomas said quietly. “For all we know, they could be around us right here. Just look at the ground. How hard do you think it would be to see a dark brown, four-inch long insect in this environment?”