Alter

by Jeremy Robinson

  “You fell from the sky?”

  “It’s nothing special,” I tell her, hoping she won’t suddenly think of me as some kind of deity. “Most people on Earth travel that way.”

  “Why have we not?” she asks. Her hand slips out of mine. “Why have you kept this from me? What else have you kept from me?”

  “What I have left unsaid is what I left behind,” I explain. “Who I no longer am.”

  “But you know about things like stars. And Earth. And Airplanes. The world is bigger than I knew. Bigger than any of the four tribes know. Tell me I am wrong.”

  I want to. “I can’t. But I do know that life here is better.”

  “How?”

  “It… It is more honest.”

  “Death is honest,” she says. “But not always better.”

  “Life is simpler.”

  “Because my people are dead. Aside from you and Oro, my family is gone.”

  “That’s why we are here,” I remind her. “To become Mapinguari, and then to avenge your family. We will bring peace to the four tribes, and we will rebuild your family’s legacy with children of our own.”

  “The children of a Mapinguari…”

  “No one will hurt them,” I say.

  “No one will love them.”

  Her response silences me.

  “Children should not be feared.”

  Something has changed. In all the time I’ve known her, Ashan has been steeped in anger. Even when placated by drugs, her mind never wanders far from thoughts of revenge. How could she want anything else? What she endured was unthinkable. That the men who committed the crime still walk the Earth makes me ill. To think of any other course of action before we’ve killed Mapinguari, Juma, and the men who helped him is…wrong.

  Unless…

  “I’m not the only one keeping secrets,” I say.

  In the feeble starlight of a moonless sky, Ashan is nearly impossible to see. But I look at her anyway, recreating her image from my memory of her sunbathed body. I saw her as the sun set, but I didn’t really look at her. Not with the eyes of someone trained to spot something wrong with someone.

  Is she sick? Is she dying?

  Aside from her weariness, there hasn’t been anything else abnormal.

  She did vomit, but after a day-long hike, and the nauseating effect of staring down on the world for the first time, it’s not entirely unusual.

  Then it’s something else? A lie? She’s been with me every day, all day, since our first meeting. What could she be hiding?

  “You’re right,” she says, but I still can’t think of—

  Holy shit…

  I see it all at once.

  The tiredness, the vomit, the change of heart, and the way she glowed beside me. It had nothing to do with the sun.

  “You’re with child.”

  Her silence is all the confirmation I need. I reach out and place my hand on her still-slim body. I didn’t see it in the light, but in the dark, seeing with my hand, I feel the slight bump.

  “My child.”

  “Not Mapinguari’s.”

  “Is that bad?”

  “It is not good,” she says. “If you become. You might not accept the child.”

  Male lions sometimes kill the cubs fathered by other men. When I’m Mapinguari, will I see my former self as a weaker competitor? Will I be so separate from myself that I could murder my own child? I don’t bother asking. Ashan doesn’t know. No one does. Because Mapinguari doesn’t have children. Perhaps this is why.

  The unanswered question rises from the depths, where it lurks.

  If I knew I would lose them, would I still make the journey and pursue my mission to its end?

  “I shouldn’t be here,” I say. “I shouldn’t have come. This isn’t what matters.”

  Ashan’s silence spurs me to explain further.

  “Your family’s murder is horrible. A crime of the worst kind. But taking revenge for them will turn us into monsters, too. Though we may live, we will not be alive. Not like we are now.”

  “What do you want to do?” Ashan’s question puts the decision in my hands, but I have no doubt about how she wants me to answer. Standing on the boundary between justice at a permanent cost, and living with temporary regret, with our growing tribe hanging in the balance, it’s not a hard call. Especially after making the wrong choice once before.

  “We’ll leave at first light,” I say. “Head south, and then west, into Peru. We’ll find a village on the outskirts of my world, where we can live at peace.”

  Ashan leans into me and whispers, “Thank you,” as though speaking the words too loudly will let the spirits of her dead know she’s abandoned them.

  After thirty minutes of lying in silence, staring up at the stars, Ashan asks, “What is that?”

  “What is what?” I ask. She doesn’t sound concerned, but Ashan not being able to identify something in the jungle is a little disconcerting.

  “You were humming.”

  “I was?” and then I hear the song in my thoughts, the words drifting to me from another lifetime. “It’s a song.”

  The music composed by Amazonian tribes is rhythmic and powerful. The chanting often tells a story, and invokes powerful emotions, but it’s rarely calm, never romantic, and reflects the primal life-and-death reality of the jungle.

  The song that’s found its way into my thoughts, as I lie beside Ashan, is in stark contrast. Despite that, and knowing she will ask, I sing her the chorus of Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars. I sing about lying here, her next to me, and forgetting the world. It’s a simple image, but a big concept.

  “What does it mean?” she asks, and I sing it again, this time translating it for her. Via the final lyrics, I ask her to lie with me and forget the world.

  She holds me a little tighter and says, “I will.”

  We settle in for the night. With Ashan wrapped in my arms, and a smile on my face, I slip into a dream knowing that my life is about to evolve beyond the chaos of the modern world, and the darkness of the Amazon basin. I’m not sure what the morning sun will bring, but I look forward to facing it with my family.

  37

  “Daddy! No peeking!”

  “I’m not,” I insist, while looking through a gap in my fingers that’s wide enough to provide a clear view of the park and the playground. It’s a bright fall day, the air crisp and full of children’s laughter.

  “I can see your eyes!” Juni, dressed in a blue sundress, small fists on her hips, scowls at me with a deeply furrowed brow and pinched lips. She’s a cute ball of demanding fury, which was my goal. She’s rarely more adorable than when she’s angry.

  “Okay, okay. See?” I close my fingers and turn away. “See?”

  “No peeking,” she warns. “Count to forty.”

  “One, two, three.”

  I stop counting aloud when I hear the sound of small running feet. By the time I reach a silent ten, my hand taps my hip, my subconscious making sure the phone is still there.

  Is the ringer on?

  Did I miss something?

  I dig out the phone and check the screen. Two missed calls. Two messages. I’m not on call today, but I have several patients who might need urgent advice. Juni’s been waiting for our date for several weeks. I had to cancel our last outing because of a soup kitchen emergency.

  The first call is from the office. The second from an unknown number.

  I listen to the office message first. It’s from the service that handles messages for my practice on the weekend. “Hello Dr. Zekser. This is Rachel from the MediCall center. Your patient, Mr. Phillip Clinton called regarding an expired prescription. The pharmacy won’t fill it without your authorization.”

  The message continues with the details, but I’m familiar with Mr. Clinton’s condition, his medication, and his pharmacy. The second call is from Phil himself. I’m not sure how he got my number, but he’s the most resourceful eighty-year-old I’ve met—unafraid of technology and in love w
ith Google.

  My first call is to the pharmacy. After a few minutes of waiting, and then speaking to the pharmacist, the prescription is refilled. My call to Mr. Clinton, while good news, feels like a shouting match. Every word needs to be spoken loudly and clearly enunciated. I smile and nod to a few mothers watching me, attempting to put them at ease.

  “Yes, Mr. Clinton. You can pick it up now. It’s ready for you.” I put a finger in my free ear to block out the sound of crying, listening to Mr. Clinton’s questions, most of which have been answered in the past. “No, it’s not a controlled substance. Yes, your son can pick it up. No, you have diarrhea because you won’t stop eating dairy. The government isn’t doing anything to the cows. I have to go now, Mr. Clinton. Yes. Okay. Have a…yes. Have a good day. Goodbye.”

  I hang up the phone fifteen minutes after checking it. Mental exhaustion directs me to a nearby bench. Head in my hands, I try to clear my head, but a child’s grating cry frays my nerves.

  As I open my fingers to find and level a cold stare at the child irking me, I remember what I’m supposed to be doing.

  My hands fall away from my face.

  Juni is thirty feet away, sitting atop a wooden castle. I can only see her dress, but it’s her crying that I hear.

  My walk of shame to the castle is observed by the same gaggle of mothers who watched me take the call. They weren’t concerned by the volume of my voice, they were watching me ignore my child.

  I’m an asshole.

  It’s the truth. I spend far more time at work than with my family. The money I make pays for a good life, but it’s mostly without me. I take care of sick patients who need me. When half the people I see on a given day are falling apart, it’s hard to remember that my healthy kid needs me, too.

  But there’s so much to do. The practice. The soup kitchen. In two weeks, I’m leaving for the Amazon. Those people need me, too.

  I don’t bother trying to explain this to Juni when I step up to the castle. She wouldn’t understand. “I’m sorry.”

  “You forgot me,” she says.

  “I know.” A list of excuses tries to bubble out of my throat. Right or wrong, she won’t understand them. I swallow my self-defense and accept her verdict.

  She stomps her foot when I reach for her. “You always forget me!”

  Her claim riles my defensive nature once more. But she’s right. This isn’t the first time I’ve left her hanging to take a call, or to run to the office, or to help at the soup kitchen. Life is busy, but I’m helping people. She might not see it now, but someday she’ll understand, and hopefully emulate the way I live.

  “You’re right,” I say. “I’ll try better.”

  My three-year-old daughter doesn’t argue against the lie despite damning evidence to the contrary. She doesn’t need to. We both know she doesn’t believe me, and that she shouldn’t. I scoop her off the castle and carry her to the car, checking my phone one more time en route.

  When my eyes open to the morning light, I know what I’ve just seen was a memory, not a dream. The shift in my mission—from vengeance to survival—along with the knowledge that I am to be a father, has roused a part of me that had been dead and buried.

  The part that is a father already.

  I forgot her.

  Again.

  Tears trickle down the sides of my face as I lie on my back, staring up at a cloudy sky. I lower my hand to my hip, searching for a phone that is not there. Feeling the bare hip, I consider trying the phone still in my backpack. But such a thing would disturb Ashan, and I’m not sure how I would handle it.

  She’s forgotten me by now, I think.

  How long have I been here? How many seasons have passed? I’ve lost track. It doesn’t matter. I can’t go back. Not after what I’ve experienced.

  Not after what I’ve done.

  The animal I’ve become has no place in the modern world.

  I drown out the memory with thoughts of my future with Ashan, our child, and Oro. To consider anything else, to give the memory of my past and the people in it my full attention, would tear me apart.

  I wipe my tears and turn my head to the side. This close to Mapinguari’s home, we’re not safe. We need to strike out now and not stop for several weeks, taking great pains to cover our tracks. Only then will we truly be free of the darkness in which we’ve been steeped.

  But Ashan is no longer beside me.

  Oro is missing, too, but that’s not unusual. She’s typically up and hunting before the sun. Then again, Ashan rises early, too. I often wake to find a fresh killed or picked breakfast waiting for me. But in Mapinguari’s backyard, that would be foolish. Something Ashan is not.

  I sit up, scanning the area. “Ashan?”

  Wind sifting through the trees behind me is the only response. I hadn’t noticed the night before, but the jungle here is mostly silent, as though the animals know to stay quiet…or are missing.

  “Oro,” I call. If the cat is within earshot, she’ll come.

  “Ashan!” I flinch at the sound of my own raised voice. Any louder and it could echo through the valley below. “Where are you?” I whisper, and I decide that if she won’t reveal herself, I’ll have to go find her.

  The memory of Juni slips past my defenses. I was supposed to find her, too.

  I’m not that person anymore. I’ll never put myself, or others, before the people I love most. The trappings of the modern world have lost their hold on me.

  Instead of looking at the surrounding jungle, I turn my attention to the earth at my feet. The patch of compressed earth where Ashan had slept is easy to spot. As are the footprints disturbing it.

  Two sets of footprints.

  There are no signs of a fight, but someone else was here, and now Ashan is not.

  My heart races as I follow the prints, moving, one set in front of the other. The trail leads downhill, toward Queshupa.

  The first set of prints leaves long, scraping depressions. That’s Ashan, I decide. She’s not injured, just leaving an easy-to-follow trail, which means she’s in trouble.

  Mapinguari has her.

  It’s the only explanation.

  But why would a monster renowned for its ferocity not simply attack? If the beast found us sleeping, why not poison us as we did the men sleeping in the Arawanti village?

  Because she is not a sleep-killer.

  “Oro!” I call, but the cat does not respond. She is either out of range, or… I search the area for blood or signs of a struggle. Oro was not here when Ashan was taken. “Where are you, girl? I need you.”

  Seeing no alternative, I move to gather my meager gear. My bow and arrows are missing. The satchel and the machete on my hip are all that remain. Ashan’s belongings are also missing. I open the satchel and check its contents, digging past the remaining pot, the scraps of meat, the money, the notebook, and my collection of jungle knick-knacks. The gun rests at the bottom of the bag, fully loaded.

  Wielding the weapon goes against my heightened sense of nobility. If Tikuna were still alive, I’m sure he would mock me for using it, but fuck Tikuna. Fuck Mapinguari. Fuck nobility. I no longer want to become the monster, but I’ll kill her if she forces me to.

  I follow the path, gun in hand, telling myself that everything will be fine, that I’ll find Ashan, that I’ll kill Mapinguari, that we’ll leave together and never look back. I tell myself this over and over, but I don’t believe it any more than Juni did my promise to never forget her again.

  38

  The descent toward Queshupa is arduous. At times steep and covered in jagged rocks, I’m forced to return the gun to the satchel and concentrate on my foot- and hand-holds. Despite the natural obstacles, the path is easy to follow. Ashan drags her foot every few steps, leaving a broken line. While I’m glad for the trail, it’s also unsettling. Mapinguari is allowing Ashan to leave a trail, meaning my pursuit will be expected.

  Another trap.

  Mapinguari is less of a monster than she’s been made out
to be. And that, I think, makes her more dangerous. To be a monster takes savagery. To be a hunter takes skill. But to fool entire peoples into fearing you, sacrificing to you, giving you tributes and a privileged life? That requires intelligence and cunning.

  When the trees thin, I slow my pursuit. As much as I want to find Ashan, stepping on a poison dart isn’t going to help either of us. The jungle is silent here. Even though I’m adept at moving silently, every footstep lets out a subtle crunch of dry leaves. The only sound aside from my feet is the gentle hiss of wind through leaves. Branches sway, providing me with glimpses of the blue sky and the mountains surrounding us. The peaks are bathed in the morning sun, but the valley into which I’m descending is still cloaked in cool shadow.

  Uneven ground trips me up as I watch my surroundings. The rugged terrain is different from what I’ve grown accustomed to. But it’s also unnatural. The way the trees grow. The way things are spaced out. It almost looks cultivated.

  Then I see it for what it is.

  Walls of stone, crumbled over time, have been covered by earth and vegetation. Mentally removing the growth, I see foundations. Walls. Streets. An empire once flourished here. The Incans populated much of Peru, up to the Andes, but they were adept at building mountain cities, like Machu Picchu. Finding a new city at the edge of their known borders isn’t intellectually surprising, but it leaves my mouth agape until I remember why I’m here. The Incans are long since dead, and the woman I love—perhaps a descendant of the great Incan people—is at risk.

  I push through the outer city’s remains and follow the trail—now a worn path reminiscent of a game trail—around a tall hill contained by a wall of stone. It’s not a natural formation, though. Massive rocks, pulled from the soil and smoothed down, have been fitted together like a perfectly seamed puzzle and raised as a kind of retaining wall. I look up at the steep rise. The wall could also be the side of a structure, now covered in plant life. I’m not sure, but the surface has been kept clean by human hands.

  I’m getting close, I think, reaching into the satchel. My finger brushes up against the Ziploc bag containing all that remains of my previous life. I linger for a moment, and then grasp the gun.