I took another drink. “How did she save your life?”
“When I first arrived here, I saw myself as I did out there. You know, in our world? I was strict with my men and demanded their obedience every step of the way. And when they didn’t comply, I reprimanded them viciously. We tried rowing ourselves out of here, but all we accomplished was getting several men dead.
“I thought myself high commander over everyone, including the ones who’d come here before me. I was put in my place, so to say, and cast out of South Village, which was nothing more than little shacks and tents at that time. Foolishly, I went into the forest.”
He said nothing more, only took a stirring spoon out of a jar.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Like you, I went searching for another way out. I climbed the island and encountered…things I wish not to share with anyone.”
I wanted to ask—oh, God, how I wanted to ask—but, I respected his wishes and said nothing.
“I’d gone mad. I don’t know how it happened or when. Days, maybe weeks later, I ended up in North Village. I was in and out of consciousness. I’d hear the villagers say, ‘He’s gone crazy. His mind is dead.’ Someone even said, ‘He’s a zombie. Let’s send him back into the woods.’ I tried to protest but I couldn’t talk.” He took a drink while stirring the crabs in the pot. Their hard shells scrapped against the tin. “But I didn’t have to. Eleanor spoke for me and told them to give me a chance to recover. If I didn’t make it back, I could stay there, like the other insane. They helped me, nursed me back to health. Eventually, I began speaking again and my mind returned.”
“How did you regain your sanity?”
“I don’t know. Many who’ve gone crazy don’t come back to their senses, but there are some who do.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “No one ever told me that before. Not even Eleanor.”
“It’s uncommon, very uncommon. I can’t say how I returned to the land of the sane.” He snorted and took a drink. “As sane as any person can be around here.”
“You didn’t run into the Vikings?”
“No. I suppose I was lucky. Speaking of which, I hope you found some good souls to help you tomorrow. You’ll need it.”
* * *
I didn’t get much sleep, despite the beer I’d indulged in. The horror stories about going insane took me out of my confront zone. I had to admit, I was scared. Physical damage can be tolerated to an extent. The body heals and you’re fine, depending on the injury, but a royal mindfuck was something else entirely. But what the hell else was I going to do? Settle down? No, I couldn’t live day after endless day reminded of Eleanor’s death every time her house came into view. And the only way to escape it was to move out of North Village.
What then? South Village was too cramped, despite how artfully constructed it was. And I’d be damned if I’d unload my luggage with the Obsoletes. The only option was to become a hermit, but from what I’d learned, safety was in numbers.
We gathered supplies—bottles of fresh water, dried fruit and vegetables, and Tupperware containers full of meat and beans. Travis, Khenan, and I sprayed ourselves with insect repellent. The soldiers didn’t, but they did bring an arsenal. I thought the guns Travis, Khenan, and I had would be enough for the trip, but in comparison to how much ammo the soldiers carried, it made us look like little boys with BB guns. The three armed themselves each with four handguns, knives, and two rifles. It was a lot of gear and I hoped it wouldn’t affect their ability to climb.
It turned out it didn’t. In fact, they climbed better than us. Khenan and I were the ones who lagged behind, trudging up the incline, trying our damnedest to keep up. The climb was steep but there was enough leverage to stand without holding onto something. The foliage was coarse and the fog was ever present. Heavy brush constantly clawed at our legs and large leaves covered dangerous rocks. My toes hurt from striking or tripping over them.
The trees helped with the climb. I grabbed one after the other to pull myself up. I couldn’t stop sweating. It got very hot and humid the higher we went. Then there were the bugs. Big ones, and they attacked me like kamikazes. The bug spray seemed to deter most from biting, but the ones that did left a hot sting.
After a while, we reached a twenty-foot-tall stone wall. I call it a wall because though the rock was part of the island, it appeared to rise up from the ground, its exterior nearly smooth. We found no footholds to use, nothing to grab onto other than some twig-like trees growing from the cracks or straggly grass dangling over the top. And there seemed to be no end to it. We walked alongside it for a while, trying to find a way up. I hoped the ground would have swallowed a portion of it during a landslide or something, but we didn’t find anything like that and we hadn’t brought any climbing equipment. We almost resorted to standing on each other’s shoulders for the first man up to find something for the rest to climb onto.
Eventually, we came across a tree. It reminded me of one of those large Ficus Strangulosa trees that grow on top of ancient ruins, breaking the building apart with its gigantic roots. This tree’s roots followed the wall down like squid tentacles, sinking into the ground by our feet.
“Bloody hell,” Travis said, wiping the sweat from his brow. “Would you look at that?”
“Damn,” a soldier named Phil said. “This goddamn island grows some peculiar things.”
I almost told them about the trees in South America. Hell, I’d even had a picture taken of myself standing by one, but I was too tired. This tree did have one distinctive difference from the others I’d seen. The whole thing, roots and all, was covered in a weird glossy purple substance.
“We can climb this,” another soldier nicknamed Point-Blank suggested.
He was the first to go up. Travis, Khenan, and I watched as the two other soldiers climbed the wide roots like panthers. I was about to follow when I touched the roots. The thick goo felt like wet gum. I wrenched my hand back. It smelled pretty bad, too, like worn socks.
I waited for someone to yell girly insults at me but no one did. Another soldier, Eric, yelled at us from the top. “You don’t wanna be coming up the tree, fellas.”
I raised my face to him and the others. Their clothing was drenched in the shimmering goo. I could imagine how funky they must feel.
“We’ll find ya somethin’ to climb up on.”
“Cheers, mates,” Travis called. To us, he said, “Good lads, eh?”
Khenan touched the roots. He made what little he had on him into a web between his fingers. “It’s sticky.”
I wiped the smelly crud off on a rock. I didn’t even want it on my clothes. Travis stayed clear of it altogether.
“Heath,” Gavin said beside me, “I dare you to taste it.”
I glared at him with a sickened expression.
“What?” Khenan demanded, standing right behind Gavin.
“I wasn’t looking at you.”
The best part about telling Travis and Khenan about Gavin was that whenever I spoke to him or acted somewhat out of character, I didn’t need to pull a quick lie out of my ass.
In no time, the soldiers threw down a line of rope they’d created from vines. The vines had come from another tree and were dry. Travis went first, then Khenan, and finally me. When we reached the top, we decided it was time for a break—far away from the stinky tree. We sat on a group of boulders and the three soldiers stripped off their tainted shirts.
“It’s been a hell of a day, eh, fellas?” Eric said, tossing his sticky T-shirt away.
“Have you guys ever been up here before?” I asked.
“Not this far,” Point-Blank said, scrubbing his torso with a wet rag. “It’s funny, now that I think about it. I mean, we’ve been here for, what, sixty-something years?”
“I guess after what happened to them boys and Worley, we just kept clear,” Phil admitted, shuffling through his bag.
“What made ya wanna come now?” Khenan asked.
“Dunno, reall
y,” Phil said, putting on a clean shirt. “Guess we thought it was time to overcome our fears.”
“No shit,” Point-Blank said, tossing away the rag. “I mean, the boys and I fought at the Battle of Iwo Jima. Why should we be afraid of a little climb?”
After they’d changed into clean clothes, we ate and loaded up for the climb ahead. We didn’t get far. About ten paces up, Phil dropped through the ground. He’d been leading and fell right in front of us. We rushed forward and dropped to our bellies.
Phil dangled by his pack strap hooked on a jagged piece of rock. He’d fallen too far for us to reach him. Point-Blank left to fetch a rope. The hole seemed to be bottomless. Loose stones clanked against the wall as they fell.
“Phil!” Eric called. “You all right?”
Phil looked up at us, somewhat disorientated, although he quickly adjusted to what had happened. He reached up for the rock holding his strap. “I’m fine. I just need to get a hold of this rock.”
The strap broke and he disappeared into the darkness below. The echoes of his screams followed long after his fall. Eric called after him.
Point-Blank returned with the rope and stood at the edge, looking down with a wide-eyed expression.
“We gotta go after him,” Eric exclaimed, getting to his feet. “We have to go down and get him!”
I wanted to tell him what a bad idea that was, but Phil was his friend, a friend he’d fought next to during one of the bloodiest battles of WWII. A bond such as that was as solid as a mountain. But I didn’t need to talk sense into him. Point-Blank did that for me.
“He’s gone! There’s nothing we can do for him.”
“We can’t leave him down there,” Eric argued.
“He’s dead, soldier! There’s nothing we can do!”
Point-Blank surprised me. I guess it’s the stiff heart of a warrior that made him practical. The longer they lived, the more friends they must have seen die.
We pressed on, taking the vine rope with us in case another hole opened up underfoot. When the gray sky darkened, we made camp. Travis made a fire, while Khenan cooked dinner. As I helped Point-Blank set up the tents, Eric stood as a lookout.
“What exactly are you looking for anyway, sport?” Point-Blank asked.
“Answers,” I said simply, hammering a pole into the ground. “I want what everyone else wants—to find a way out.”
“And you think you can find what others before you couldn’t?”
I was growing tired of that question but I understood where he was coming from. His sharp tone underlined his agony of losing his friend. I guess he directed his anger at me because the journey was my idea. He was pissed, so I didn’t return the attitude when I said, “I don’t know. But living here forever isn’t an option for me.”
“Rather die fighting than live with a head quietly bowed, eh? I can respect that.”
* * *
Everyone but Eric ate. He went into the tent the moment they were assembled and never came out. No one spoke a word. After a while, we turned in. Khenan took first watch while I shared a tent with Travis.
I couldn’t say how long I slept before I heard voices outside our tent. It was still dark. When I sat up, every nerve tingled like blood rushing back through a limb after it had fallen asleep. My arm felt heavy as I reached for the tent flap.
“What the hell is wrong with me?” I asked out loud. The question echoed in my head. I pulled the flap back and peered out. Eric was sitting by the fire, talking to himself.
“We should’a gone after him. We shouldn’t have left him down there.”
At first, I believed his words were repeated inside my head, like my own, but his moving lips told me otherwise. I exited the tent and asked if he was okay.
“Is no use, mon,” Khenan said. He was leaning against a tree trunk, holding a pistol by his side. The tree was slightly slanted on the steep incline, allowing him to lean comfortably with a leg propped up on it. “‘e’s been out ’ere mumbling dat shit fer some time now an’ ’asn’t stopped.”
Something like a twig snapped nearby. I couldn’t tell. When I turned my attention to the sound, Point-Blank stood just beyond the light of the fire. His body rocked slightly from side to side, his back to us. In each hand, he held a knife.
“Dun worry, mon,” Khenan said, “I been keeping a close eye on ’im. ’e’s been like dat fer awhile.”
Even with Khenan’s calmness about the situation, I was unnerved by Point-Blank’s and Eric’s behavior.
“I feel strange,” I said. At least I think I said it.
“Someting’s ’appening to us,” Khenan said. “Someting bad.”
Chapter Twenty-five
The way Khenan said that frightened me. I had a feeling it would prove true enough. Nearly everything was whirling and the slanted ground didn’t help the situation. Eric’s muttering freaked me out, so I sat down beside the tent and buried my face in my hands. Glowing shapes visible through my eyelids were like a bizarre light show. They spun around, dipped and rose in a coordinated fashion. I thought if I didn’t move and didn’t fight it, I’d be okay. Maybe I’d be able to come down eventually. If I came down. I did my best not to think about it.
“Heath, it’s me.”
It had been years since I’d heard that voice, but I recognized it immediately and raised my head to find my grandmother sitting in front of me.
“You got yourself into quite a pickle, haven’t you?” she said.
Just go with it. “Yeah.”
I hoped Khenan couldn’t hear me. Although I had no idea what his state of mind was or what the hell he was seeing, he seemed to be alert. I had to believe he’d defend the camp if Point-Blank attacked. I even thought about getting my gun from inside the tent.
“I miss being alive,” Grandmother said, rubbing her hands together as she had when her arthritis had bothered her. “Death is boring.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You just wait. You’ll know what I mean soon enough.”
I didn’t want to hear about dying. I didn’t give a shit if I could learn the answer to the big mystery. I couldn’t handle that kind of heavy trip.
“I don’t think you’re my grandmother,” I said, shutting my eyes tight. “She wouldn’t talk like that. She’d encourage me to stay alive.”
I opened my eyes, hoping she wasn’t there, but she was. Her wrinkled lips pressed together and she blinked several times. “I have something in my eye.”
I readied myself for what she was about to do. Her glass eye would pop out when she rubbed it and she’d say, Oh no, I lost my eye again. But she didn’t rub it. She rubbed the real one, and it fell from its socket to hang from its optic nerve.
“Oh no, Heath, now I’ve lost my other eye.”
My stomach turned inside out. Since coming here, I’d seen plenty of gruesome things. This wasn’t the worst, but it was still a nightmare.
I buried my face in my hands and rubbed so hard the skin could have slid off my bones. When I lowered my arms, I almost didn’t look up. But I did and I saw a very pale man behind a nearby tree with his eyes on me. I couldn’t look away. I said nothing and didn’t move. For what seemed like forever, we focused on one another. Then he moved toward me. I started to advance as well, but then stayed put, watching as he observed me. I tried to keep in mind he wasn’t real.
He crept toward me, waddling a few paces until he stopped half an arm’s length away. “Dustan. My name is Dustan.”
“Heath,” I said thickly.
“You’re the first one I’ve ever spoken to.”
I could swear he was speaking in an accent that wasn’t American, but I couldn’t distinguish the nationality. Then again, I didn’t really try.
“I like it up here,” Dustan said. “But it’s frightening. One day, I’ll stay here with the trees and rain and never go home.”
“Why would you want to stay here?”
“It’s far better than where I live.”
“Anywhere is better
than here,” I grumbled. I couldn’t believe I was arguing with a hallucination.
He snorted. “I wouldn’t say that.” He waddled back to the trees and vanished into the darkness.
I couldn’t take any more after that. I stood and went back to the fire. Khenan kept his casual position against the tree, watching the fire and holding his pistol at his side. Eric still talked to himself and Point-Blank never moved from his Michael Myers pose. Other than Eric’s mumbling and the crackling fire, everything was eerily quiet, motionless. I didn’t see the spinning shapes anymore but the colors remained. Acid bubbles bloated my gut. I looked into the flames. They swirled in pink, blue, and bright green, and relaxed me.
“Da fire is wicked, yeah?” Khenan said.
“Yeah. Are you seeing colors too?”
“Yeah, mon.”
“What’s happening to us?”
“Dun know, but we need to keep our ’eads ’bout us an’ stay put fer a while.”
“He’s wrong, dude,” Gavin said urgently. “You need to go. Now!”
I looked around but didn’t see him. “Do you think we should wake Travis?”
Khenan didn’t answer. I don’t even know if he heard me.
“Heath!” Gavin shouted. “Move your ass. They’re coming!”
Behind me came heavy footsteps. When I turned, three short but well-built men wielding axes and swords emerged from the thicket. One had a large club.
“Shit,” I said.
“Run, dumb ass! Run!” Gavin yelled.
“Vikings!” Khenan exclaimed, firing off a shot.
When he did, I thought the Viking closest to me had shot me.
“You haven’t been hit,” Gavin reassured. “Go! Go!”
I nearly tripped over myself trying to get away. The Viking with the axe swung at me but missed. I leapt over the fire. Khenan was gone but Eric sat unmoving.
I heard another shot from the tent. Travis came out and cocked his rifle back. The faster everything moved, the more blurry it all became. Travis called for me but I couldn’t understand him.
“He’s telling you to get your gun,” Gavin barked. “I’m telling you, you need to run!”
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