River of Nightmares

by Alex Archer

  It was Annja’s intent to get out of this cave, reach the authorities, and have them deal with Dillon’s goons. Roux had told her that he tried to call them on her satellite phone, but the charge was gone and he had no way to remedy that. It had been why he’d come after her and been subsequently captured. There was no other cavalry coming. They’d already been down here going on two days—or was it three?—and Edgar was right—he could starve by the time she or someone else could get back here.

  “So I’ll deal with tight boots, and I guess I’ll manage with my arm and the cold and—”

  “You’re breathing,” Roux said. “Be happy that you’re breathing.”

  “Yeah, and I’m in pain.”

  “Pain is your body’s way of letting you know you’re alive. Deal with it.”

  Annja smiled. Roux had used a similar line on her shortly after they’d met.

  Edgar continued to talk, but changed the subject to the rainforest and how Dillon had not been content to steal the plants from the Dslala but to steal emeralds from the Brazilians. She ignored his chatter and instead focused on the primitive paintings that lined the walls. She thought of the Chasing History’s Monsters crew and hoped they’d recovered by now from whatever struck them.

  At the section of the tunnel that grew wide and offered the three tunnels, Annja told them, “This one. It’s the one I took and heard the water.” She replaced the batteries in her light, leaving her with four. Roux’s light was starting to fade, and she passed him two batteries, which he pocketed. “Edgar, wait here, and I’m going to investigate these other tunnels. They might—”

  “You heard water. That’d be the way to go,” Edgar said.

  That had been Annja’s instinct, too, but... “The slope is very steep, like a sliding board, Edgar. If Roux and I get you down there, it might be too difficult to get you back up.” She had a difficult time making it back up herself. “I think—”

  “—that water’s the way to go,” Edgar persisted.

  “Probably. But you could do with a few hours’ rest.” Annja pointed to the ground, and she took off down the center tunnel. She was back four hours later; the passageway had ended in a dead end.

  There was one more tunnel to check out, and it, too, led to a dead end.

  “The water’s the way to go,” Edgar said. From the looks of the bags under his eyes she’d doubted he’d slept while she was gone.

  Roux’s light died and he replaced the batteries. She had only two spare batteries remaining.

  “Then let’s be about it, all right?”

  Annja led the way, and Roux kept his light off. Edgar kept his mouth shut, apparently concentrating on staying on his feet. More than once he fell, however, nearly bowling Annja down with him when the ground sloped so steeply and the rocks were too smooth to grab on to.

  “This is deep,” Roux said. “I’ve been in caves in Turkey, Annja, and I thought they were deep.” Did she detect hesitation in his voice? “I can hear water.”

  Annja could, too, but they hadn’t reached it yet. Still, the tunnel led down.

  She’d explored part of the Huautla cave system in Oaxaca, Mexico, during her Chasing History’s Monsters program on the chupacabra. Some of the area residents thought the chupacabra dwelled in the caves, escaping notice by all but a few ranchers working in the evenings. That cave had been discovered in the 1960s, and supposedly its seventeen entrance points and many different routes made it convenient for the chupacabra—Annja had never managed to see one. The cave was one of the deepest in the world.

  Though she had no way to measure this, Annja wondered if this one was deeper.

  Her light was dimming and her feet ached, her leg muscles burning by the time they reached the water, the sound of it a roar echoing against the close walls. It was black like oil, flat and flowing under a rocky ceiling they had to stoop to get below. It looked like water flowing through some irrigation tube. Her feeble light couldn’t reach to the other side, and so she replaced the last two batteries.

  “Holy crap,” Edgar said. “Don’t you realize what this is?”

  Annja registered that his once pain-etched face was replaced with a look of wonder. No, it had passed that. It was bliss. Like the young man had reached Nirvana.

  Edgar dropped down on his knees and touched the water with his good hand. He shivered. “This is amazing. Do you have anything that can take a picture? Cell phone? Camera? Where’s that video camera you had?”

  “Nothing,” Annja said. “I have nothing.”

  “So what is this?” Roux touched the tip of his boot to the water. “Some underground tributary of the Amazon?”

  Edgar nodded, his eyes still wide in awe.

  “Looks like a way out to me.” Annja wanted to be in the river and on their way. But a brief rest would do Edgar good. Let him continue to be amazed for a little while.

  Annja paid attention to the current. It didn’t look as swift as the Amazon far above them, but if there was an undercurrent, it might sabotage their escape.

  Edgar prattled on about how they were going to be in the history books. “We’re the first people in the whole world to see this.”

  But they weren’t the first. There were more of the primitive paintings down here, fainter than the ones above, the water and moisture taking their color.

  “Interesting,” Roux said. But his expression told Annja he wasn’t at all interested.

  “Let’s just hope this leads us to safety,” Annja said. Again she thought of Marsha and Wallace and the others.

  “It must join up with another tributary, or the source, somewhere.” Edgar stood, staring in the direction of the flowing water.

  “Yes, one could hope.” This from Roux.

  “The River Styx,” Annja mused. It was the main river in the mythological underworld. Acheron, Cocytus, Lethe and the Phlegeton, all underground water routes lost to time, but preserved in fables.

  Edgar looked at Annja and then Roux, and back again. “Just wow. Wow. Who knows where this could actually lead?” He slapped a hand to his forehead and turned to Roux. “Do you know what this means?”

  “That we can get out of here.”

  Edgar made a face. “Well, yes. If it doesn’t slam us up against a wall of porous rock and kill us.”

  “Best pray that is so,” Roux said. “There has been a fair amount of death on this trip already. Try not to add to it.”

  Annja noted Roux’s frustration with Edgar, and their delay here. She was feeling the same about both.

  “I am. I am, believe me. We’ve gotta survive this... so that I can write about it, all of it. I know how to get back here...with cameras. I can go to the Nature Conservancy and write my own ticket. They’ll hire me in a heartbeat. Hell, I could probably get on with—”

  Annja nudged him. “How about we ‘get on with’ getting out of here?”

  Chapter 34

  This would be dangerous and desperate, but it would be their only chance. There’d be no chance if they stayed in the cavern and hoped someone would come rescue them. Dillon and his thugs had left them there to die. Joining the tributary would be exciting and frightening, too, and Annja had to admit that she was looking forward to that.

  A life lived on the edge was sweeter, and the sense of peril would help keep her awake and alert.

  She took off her boots and set them at the edge of the water.

  “I didn’t like these anyway,” Edgar said, pulling at his boots and kicking them aside. He gave her a weak smile. “Stiff boots from a stiff. Moons would’ve thought that was funny.” He had to work at getting rid of his socks. He declined Annja’s offer of assistance. “If we don’t make it back here some future explorer is really gonna puzzle over the shoes.”

  “We’ll make it back.” Annja was hoping to have the adventurous Marsha in
the film crew.

  Roux kept his boots on, but Annja saw him loosen the laces, probably in case they became too cumbersome in the river and he wanted to divest himself of them later.

  She stepped into the water and almost lost her balance; straight down it was an unexpected drop-off. Annja was suddenly in waist-high water. And it was cold, but after a moment she adjusted. Edgar accepted her help this time and he settled in next to her. She grabbed his hand and interlaced their fingers.

  “We stay together, all right?”

  He nodded.

  “The current doesn’t look fast, but—”

  “I know. There might be undercurrents.” Edgar frowned and stepped forward cautiously.

  Roux slipped in behind them. She saw the old man shiver.

  “We could walk, I suppose,” Roux said. “Shallow enough. Right here it’s shallow enough.”

  “Take too long,” Edgar said. “Take too much energy. Feel like I’m starving right now. And I’m so damn tired. And my arm hurts and...oh, never mind.”

  Annja certainly felt like she was starving. She hadn’t eaten in two, maybe three days, possibly four? Time was a blur. Maybe there were fish here they could eat. She’d been thinking about that, summoning her sword and spearing something, not worrying that Edgar would see the weapon appear. She’d had sushi before, could well eat raw fish to survive.

  Roux seemed to have the same idea. “Maybe there are fish that we could—”

  “No.” Edgar made a face. “I’m not eating raw fish. And I’m praying, actually, that there aren’t any fish in this place. Bad enough the sorts of fish in the Amazon. Piranha, to start with.”

  Annja’s dream came back in full force, the piranha that had bitten at her. That hadn’t been real, though, the fish and the caiman, all in her head and nurtured by whatever she’d swallowed in the shaman’s hut. She wished she was back in that hut right now, or that this was another dream.

  “Fish with teeth and—” Edgar droned on.

  Meanwhile, Annja was getting used to the feel of the current and walking with it. If there were any fish here, they would probably be small, about the size of her hand...blindfish, cavefish, she’d seen them when caving in other parts of the world. They looked almost alien in appearance.

  She led Edgar farther out, the cold water swirling around her shoulders now. Annja hadn’t expected it to be quite this cold. It smelled so different than the Amazon far above them. The water smelled fresh, no scent of dirt or plants and animals to compete with it. Stone, though, she could smell the stone. She breathed deep and even and started to float, tightening her grip on Edgar’s hand as she tipped her head back. He finally stopped talking; she felt the added turbulence in the water from his legs moving as he treaded lightly next to her. The light from her helmet played along the rocky ceiling and the far wall—the primitive cave paintings of the legendary mapinguari seeming to move in slow dance steps.

  She shared Edgar’s joy at the discovery of this place, though the cave paintings were far more significant to her. Those paintings...and the creatures who were only rumored to exist. They were a real treasure.

  Annja focused on the images here and pictured the ones she’d seen earlier that were particularly strong, the colors still reasonably bright. It was something to keep her mind occupied and away from the unfortunate possibilities of this water ride.

  How old were the images?

  That would take scientific means—radioactive carbon dating. Clay, charcoal and plants had probably provided the pigments in this cave. The very earliest paintings were all one color, so Annja guessed these were somewhere between twenty thousand and eight thousand BC...old.

  Annja wanted to survive as much to tell the world about these cave paintings as she did to stop Dillon. The man had to be locked up for the rest of his life. She had to survive, as she had work to do. Finding her way back to Arthur Dillon was at the top of her list.

  It was all so eerie. For a change Edgar was not talking; the only sound was the water carrying them and lapping at its limestone banks. The noise was loud at times and distorting. Her ears filled with water, slightly uncomfortable. She wished she’d thought to ask Edgar or Roux the time when they went in, so she could tell how long the trip was taking. She could ask them now, in the event one of them had a waterproof watch...but that might only cause depression. She had a feeling this trip was going to take a while. It occurred to her that she should be more frightened than she was, that she should be contemplating death. But she wasn’t, and she didn’t.

  The tunnel changed direction, angling steeply away and rising, the speed of the current increasing. It went faster still when the cavern widened to give the tributary more room and the ceiling rose so high Annja couldn’t see it. The smell was awful and she breathed as little as possible and heard Roux making a gagging sound. There were bats in here; she heard them flying. By the sounds and smell she guessed there were hundreds or maybe thousands. She tried to swim toward the edge, while still keeping hold of Edgar, figuring that the bats would have gotten in here somehow. He was dead weight, passed out and floating; her fingers ached from holding on to him.

  “Edgar!”

  He stirred.

  “Come with me.”

  “God, that smell!” He cooperated and they headed toward the river’s edge. It looked like there was enough of a ledge to crawl up on. Maybe the bats had come in through the ceiling somewhere. That possibility was something Annja wanted to explore.

  “The ground is too slick to grab onto,” Edgar said, trying to climb up on the ledge.

  Annja changed her mind and tugged Edgar back toward the center of the tributary.

  “Okay. That was a mistake.” Annja took small quick breaths; they were all she could handle.

  The stench was from the guano, a rancid, overpowering ammonia smell. Enough of it and it could rot sheetrock, and it harbored disease.

  “That was lovely, Annja,” Roux said. He was treading with one hand cupped over his mouth. “Let’s not repeat that, all right?”

  She leaned back and let the water carry her. It felt as if it was going slower; ahead the channel narrowed. Edgar squealed when he was battered up against one side of the rock wall. Annja was scraped, too. The channel curved abruptly, straightened for only a short distance and then followed an “S” pattern. At the same time the ceiling came lower and lower, her light brighter against the stone. The air was fresh, but close.

  And then everything went dark when the batteries died.

  Now, Annja allowed more fear to seep in. Her heart beat faster.

  “Crap,” Edgar said. He squeezed Annja’s hand tighter. “Just crap.”

  Everything sounded louder, though Annja figured that wasn’t really the case, just that she was perceiving it that way because she couldn’t see. D’jok had been right—limit one sense and the others magnify what they take in.

  “Roux?” She wanted to make sure he was nearby. “Roux!”

  No answer.

  Again she was thrown against a rock wall and felt like a discarded doll battered by cruel elements. Edgar let go of her hand and she flailed around trying to find him.

  Nothing, nothing...there! She grabbed his shirt and pulled him to her. He wasn’t moving on his own and she shielded him as best she could from the wall as they continued through the channel. Holding him with one hand, she felt his head with the other, making sure he stayed above the surface. She could feel warm blood. He’d hit his head.

  “Edgar!”

  Definitely unconscious, but he was breathing. Annja concentrated on keeping Edgar’s face tipped up. The blood flowed over her fingers; it was a bad wound. His broken arm floated free; the belt that had held it close to him had come undone. Nothing to be done about it, she knew, just keep him from drowning.

  “Roux!” she tried once more. “Can you
hear me, Roux?”

  Still no answer, only the sound of the water. Annja lost her hard hat the next time she struck the wall, and her hair floated free, tangling in front of her face. Had she been foolish to talk Edgar and Roux into this? Had there been another way out of Dillon’s deathtrap, and she’d been too exhausted to see it? Should they have waited in the cavern and hoped for a rescue from some outside source... would her Chasing History’s Monsters crew have let the authorities know she was with the Dslala? The Dslala somehow coming to their aid? Should they have waited?

  “No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path.” The words had been attributed to Buddha. One of the caretakers at the orphanage in New Orleans had been Buddhist. Annja had found comfort in those words as a child, and that quote in particular had always stayed with her. “No one saves us but ourselves.” The river had been their best opportunity. Waiting for any help could have meant waiting to die.

  She couldn’t judge the time; it felt like hours had passed, maybe more...maybe days. She felt numb from the cold and lack of food, the water seeming ethereal as it carried her. She’d managed to angle herself so she was floating on her back and didn’t have to tread; her legs had gotten too tired. All her effort was directed at staying awake and keeping her and Edgar’s heads up. He floated limp next to her. Sometimes water filled her mouth. It was fresh and clean, cold, and she gulped it down. Let it fill her belly and trick her body into thinking she’d had something to eat. Wasn’t that a dieter’s trick? Drink water before a meal so you don’t eat as much? Your stomach thinking it’s already sated? Annja had been blessed with a metabolism that made counting calories unnecessary.

  Her mind started to wander, images of the orphanage popping in, some of the children morphing into miniature Buddhas. “No one saves us but ourselves,” they chanted in unison. Then Charlemagne and his army thundered on horseback through the streets of New Orleans and chased the little Buddhas away. Hallucinating. Delirious.