by Gary Barnes
There was a swirling motion in the water right where Mack had disappeared. Then a massive V-shaped ripple headed directly toward Jed. The lone fisherman panicked and frantically tried to climb out of the water up onto the bank's overhand. He almost succeeded. When he was halfway out of the water, however, his legs were caught by something unseen from under the water.
Jed kicked and struggled in vain to free himself. He grasped and clawed at roots and branches, anything to hang on to, anything to keep from being dragged back into the water. But the rotting, soggy branches of the decaying tree limbs within his grasp only crumbled in his hands. There was nothing solid to grab. Terrified, Jed was dragged back into the river and pulled underwater. There was a swirling motion and ripples of something massive swimming slowly upstream, disappearing into the night.
*
That same night, about midnight, a backwoodsman was out hunting with his dogs. He had plodded through the dense woods for several nights, hunting for fresh meat to augment his meager fare but had nothing to show for his efforts. This greatly perplexed the hunter since he almost always came home with some type of game. But during the past several weeks, game had become more and more scarce.
Suddenly, the baying of the hounds in the distance indicated that they had picked up the scent of game. Finally, he thought, the chase is on. The man hurried as quickly as possible trying to catch up to the dogs, juggling his shotgun in one hand and a lantern in the other. He smiled as he contemplated the victory he would shortly relish; possibly a racoon, a rabbit, or even a possum. Already his mouth was starting to salivate at the thought of roast possum.
“Get'em Shep – tree that possum. Go on Lep – get'em boys,” the hunter yelled at his dogs, which were still out of sight and about one hundred yards ahead.
Suddenly one of the dogs yelped loudly as if hurt. A few seconds later the other dog yelped. Then there was total silence.
The hunter stopped his pursuit and cocked his head to listen. Hearing nothing but silence, not even the usual baying of his dogs, his wary instincts took over. Slowly he cocked both barrels of the old shotgun, then cautiously proceeded. He followed the game trail until he arrived at a small clearing near the river. There he found that the grasses and underbrush had been trampled, indicating that a struggle had ensued.
“Here Shep. Come on in boy. Lep, come here!” the hunter called.
There was no response from the dogs. The hunter bent down and raised his lantern to inspect the ground. A faint splattering of blood confirmed that the dogs had confronted something, but there was no sign of either them or their game. He studied the site for a moment trying to discern what had happened. Then a twig snapped behind him. He froze momentarily, but then quickly stood and turned, instinctively raising the shotgun before him.
Light from the hunter’s lantern shone on a creature the size of a large grizzly bear, only amphibious in nature, with a gimpy right front foot. It had only three toes because half of its foot was missing. When the creature rose to stand on its hind legs it exceeded the man in height by over two feet. Each of its four feet was partially webbed and the ends of each digit were tipped with sharp, retractable, three-inch long, curved claws. The legs were considerably longer and stronger than those of any earthly amphibian or reptile, allowing it to support itself on land and to outrun any prey, either upright on its hind legs or galloping on all fours.
The creature’s massive tail was longer than its torso, making the creature over eighteen feet long from the tip of its nose to the tip of its tail. The tail was thicker in height than width, providing a large, flat, surface area to propel it through the water when swimming. Its powerful undulations, combined with the side-to-side motions of the creature’s upper body, allowed the alien to gracefully yet powerfully navigate even the swiftest river currents with ease.
Its underbelly and the inside of its legs were a light green but the rest of its body was vibrantly colored. Its legs and tail were a light blue. It had a bright red head. Splotches of orange, yellow, green, brown and blue were evenly mixed throughout the remainder of its body. The wrinkly skin was thick and tough, covered with jagged lumps as if the entire creature was a giant mass of warts.
The massive head, though basically ovoid in shape, was flat toward the front, allowing both eyes to face forward. This gave it a distinct advantage in accurately assessing depth perception as well as determining the direction and speed of its prey. The eyes reflected the lantern’s light with an iridescent green flash and had the extreme focus ability equal to that of an eagle.
The facial muscles gave the creature the ferocious and vicious expressiveness of most carnivorous mammals instead of the immovable and expressionless face of earthly amphibians. Though it was amphibian, it appeared more reptilian, like a crocodile with a rounded mouth. It could walk on its hind legs while its front legs could be used as arms that could grasp and hold its prey.
Parting its lips and baring a double row of razor sharp teeth in its oversized mouth, the alien towered over the hunter as it growled and hissed in an extremely aggressive and threatening manner. The terrified hunter fumbled to get his finger on the triggers of the old shotgun. But before he could do so, the creature spit a thick, sticky, mucous substance onto his face. Immediately the hunter dropped his shotgun and lantern. Grasping his face with both hands, he futilely tried to wipe off the sticky, stinging substance, as he blindly staggered about.
The creature dropped to all fours and sprang forward, knocking the man into the bushes. The bushes thrashed for a moment. Then there was momentary silence, followed by the sound of a body being dragged across the ground to the river’s edge.
The creature grasped the hunter by the shoulder with its mouth and headed for the water. Arriving at the riverbank it splashed its way into the river and submerged. Ripples on the water’s surface revealed that it was swimming slowly underwater, dragging its prey upstream against the current.
=/=
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Shut-Ins
The next morning, after breakfast, Clayton and the group began breaking camp. As they carried sleeping bags and other equipment to their cars, Tina turned to Clayton and asked, “Since the fishing's so bad why don't we go to Johnson Shut-Ins for a day of swimming?”
“I've heard that it's the world's best natural water park,” responded Clayton.
“It is. I sort of promised my nephew and his friends I'd take them there today, so I've got to run into town and get them. Why don't I meet you all there in say . . . two hours?”
“We'll be there.”
Larry caught up with Tina as he carried two Dutch Ovens to the black Hummer. “Mind if I tag along?”
“I was hoping you would,” she smiled.
Getting into Tina’s Jeep, Larry pointed to the johnboat still tied up on the other side of the river. “I wonder what happened to our trot-line friends?”
“Oh, they probably had a jug of moonshine hooch with them and are passed out on the shore sleeping it off,” she replied.
*
Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park, located in the St. Francois Mountains, was one of the many phenomenal areas of the Ozarks. Tourists frequently came from hundreds of miles away to enjoy its beauty without stopping at any of the other Ozark scenic byways.
The Park Service had even organized a bird-watcher’s group and conducted daily tours throughout the many miles of trails and pathways in search of rare and exotic specimens.
The igneous rock which formed the deep bedrock of the area had been covered by dolomite and other sedimentary rocks millions of years ago when the area had been part of the sea floor. Following major uplifts of the entire Ozark region about 250 million years ago, the seas retreated. Rain and wind eroded away great volumes of sedimentary rock from the lithosphere allowing streams to carve downward through the soft sedimentary rock layers to the igneous rock below.
During the past 250 million years, swirling water followed cracks in the igneous rock scouring the chan
nel deeper and wider. Waters of the Black River became confined, or “shut-in,” to a narrow channel etched into the granite canyon. Waterborne sand and gravel carved potholes, chutes and spectacular canyon-like gorges. Today the area is classified as one of the country’s best natural water parks with the Black River cascading between large, smooth rocks, creating natural water slides and deep swimming holes.
*
About mid-morning Tina, Larry and the three boys arrived at the entrance to the Shut-Ins. The park had extensive camping facilities, but its day-use area had sufficient parking for only 100 cars. Unfortunately, since it was the peak of the summer season, hoards of tourists had already arrived, and the parking lot was totally full.
Park Rangers refused to admit additional cars unless a car in the parking lot left. Then, on a one-by-one basis, new arrivals were allowed entrance. It was not unusual for latecomers to have to wait two or three hours to be admitted into the park. The three boys were quite impatient and vocally expressed their disappointment.
Tina’s Jeep was the tenth vehicle in line waiting for a spot to open up, though there were at least thirty-five other cars backed-up behind her.
“Is it always this crowded?” asked Larry.
“No, sometimes it’s worse, usually when you big-city boys are in town,” Tina responded.
“Ouch!” said Larry, “I guess I deserved that.”
The comings and goings of visitors delayed them, but within thirty minutes they had worked their way through the line, paid their entrance fee at the Park Ranger’s guardhouse gate and miraculously found an empty parking stall right next to Clayton’s H-2. They got out of the Jeep and loaded their arms with their picnic lunch and beach towels.
The three boys then raced ahead while Larry and Tina strolled hand-in-hand past the Ranger Station and camp store and headed down the tree-lined boardwalk.
For almost a quarter-of-a-mile the boardwalk paralleled the Black River so that tourists who did not want to get wet could stroll along the riverbank or watch as others played in the shallow water. During the hot summer months of the tourist season the park was always thriving with waders and swimmers wanting to cool-off.
“Believe it or not,” Tina teased, “we’re only ten miles from the highest point in the state.”
“Really?” Larry said, assuming that she was setting him up for something else to tease him about. To his surprise however, she was totally serious.
“Yeah, Taum Sauk Mountain. It’s a granite peak with a summit of almost 1,800 feet.”
“You call that a mountain?” Larry chided. “The Rockies get over 14,000 feet.”
“True, but the Ozarks are an old mountain range, like the Smokies. They’re worn down. In one of my geology classes I learned that Taum Sauk has never been covered by the ocean or glaciers, and that’s something that even Everest and McKinley can’t claim,” she proudly proclaimed.
They continued talking about geology, though Larry would have preferred a different subject. Tina pointed out various topographical or botanical points of interest as they strolled along the boardwalk beside the Black River.
The water in the river, which at that time of year was no more than a large creek, splashed over boulders, rushed through narrow chutes and crashed down two-to-six-foot water falls in a half-mile section of the river called the Shut-ins. There was no gravel, sand, or mud on the bottom of the two-hundred-foot wide river bed; only smooth, slick, polished granite, which formed natural water slides that dropped sliders into pools a foot to eight feet in depth.
At the top end of the Shut-ins the shallow riverbed had only a two percent grade in its slope, a fairly gentle drop creating an ideal, shallow-water setting in which toddlers and young children could play without their parents being overly concerned for their safety.
But the last half of the Shut-ins was quite different. The river dropped almost fifty feet over the course of a quarter of a mile creating a wonderful and more challenging water playground for adults and adolescents.
Large granite boulders were strewn about the riverbed. The river channel had scoured and carved out large slides, chutes, pools, recesses and drops, giving the exposed riverbed the appearance of a very steep hillside that had once supported a large granite building which had been knocked over by a giant, scattering the building blocks in heaps as they tumbled down the steep hill. The same illusion was presented at Elephant Rocks State Park a few miles further north, except that Elephant Rocks had no river winding amongst the gigantic granite boulders.
Waders and splashers were spread throughout the Shut-Ins, but were particularly congregated around the many natural water slides. At one of the larger slides Larry, Tina and the boys met up with Clayton and Welton. For the next two hours they frolicked and slid on the polished granite water slides, splashing each other, and climbing around on the gigantic granite boulders.
After two hours the three boys tired of this revelry and abandoned the slides, heading for the large swimming hole at the base of the Shut-Ins. Clayton and Welton, on the other hand, seemed to have reverted back to their childhood as they continued to enjoy themselves on the slides. Eventually they joined a group of college-age youth in a modified game of water polo.
Larry and Tina retreated to a large boulder in the middle of the river’s flow where they sunned themselves while leisurely eating their picnic lunch.
“This place is more fun than any water theme park I've ever been to,” Larry noted.
“I knew you’d like it. I could never be penned up in a big city for very long,” said Tina.
“I'm thinking I may never go back. And to think that all this water comes from one big aquifer,” Larry reflected.
“That big pool down there . . .” Tina said as she pointed downstream to the swimming hole where the boys had gone. It was a small lagoon about seventy-five feet wide by one-hundred feet long, with an eighty-foot high cliff which rose from the water's edge on the far side. As the Black River wound its way down through the Shut-Ins to the swimming hole, it finally tumbled over a six-foot waterfall plunging into the forty-five foot deep pool at its base. “. . . is fed not only by the water from the river, but right where the river drops into the lagoon there’s another large spring.”
*
Major Reid was standing on an observation platform at the end of the boardwalk high up on a cliff, watching Clayton and the group eighty feet below. He was speaking into a handheld military radio, reporting to General Branigan.
“Yes sir,” responded Major Reid. “This should be the last of my reports. Dr. Clayton seems totally absorbed in his environmental pollution work and has shown no interest in returning to the alien crash site. In fact, he was just a quarter mile from it yesterday and showed no signs of returning to it. . . . Affirmative sir, the entire town has forgotten about the incident. . . . The containment team completed the cleanup operations two days ago and did an excellent job of camouflaging the area. . . . Yes sir, the disinformation we spread is working. . . . I’ll be heading back to Cheyenne Mountain this afternoon sir; I should be there by morning . . . very good sir. We can consider this case closed.”
*
A young girl, Susan Henderson, age eight, played in ankle deep water in the exit stream of the swimming hole at the bottom of the Shut-Ins. The stream was about twenty-feet wide, but no more than a foot deep and meandered through a tree-lined course before disappearing into the depths of the forest. Susan bent over to pick up a “pretty” rock. Her almost waist length, straight, blond hair fell forward from her shoulders forming a shimmering curtain through which the sunlight danced before it hit the water where it sparkled radiantly. She threw the rock downstream to see it splash. Then she turned and ran to her mother, who was sunning on the shore of the swimming hole barely thirty feet away. Susan grabbed a large inner tube. “Mommy, watch me!” yelled Susan as she began to wade out into the swimming hole with the inner tube.
“Don't go out too far honey - stay close to shore,” scolded her mother.
<
br /> Susan climbed into the inner tube and began to paddle out to deeper water. “That's far enough! I said stay close to shore!” her mother yelled again.
Susan laughed, and kicked to drive the inner tube out farther.
*
At the far side of the swimming hole Johnny was snorkeling near the bottom of the falls. The water was full of bubbles created from the churning water. It was difficult to see anything very distinctly in the clear but bubbly water. As Johnny lazily swam along the surface in the forty-foot deep water something brushed his legs. He spun in the water to see what had just touched him. Screened by a curtain of bubbles, he looked through his swim mask and saw only an indistinguishable image receding into the deeper water.
He raised his head out of the water and saw a turtle swimming across the lagoon. He decided to pursue it. Kicking with his Aunt Tina’s flippers, which were much too large for him, he quickly closed the gap and for a moment it appeared as if the prize would soon be his. But just as he was about to reach out and grab it, the turtle suddenly dove and was lost in the sea of bubbles.
Then Johnny remembered the eerie feeling of the object that had brushed against his leg and a sudden shudder ran down the back of his neck.
*
Underwater, two large amphibious creatures swam along the bottom of the lagoon. Neither of them had an injured right front foot. They split, one swam toward the cliff and the other toward the shore where the waders were splashing in waist-deep water.
*
People were sunning themselves all around the edges of the west side of the lagoon where the water was relatively shallow. Extending across the pool, the water got progressively deeper. At the far side, the lagoon was about forty-five feet deep. A sheer granite cliff rose majestically from the deep pool forming a slightly concaved, horseshoe curtain extending a hundred feet along the shoreline. The top edge of the cliff angled upward such that the right side was about forty feet above the pool. The other end was a little over eighty feet above the water.