Apocalypse Machine (26 page)

Too late.

Using speed, gravity and weight, Ayers thrust the spear downward. It plunged into the Moyh-ma’s head, slipping through flesh until it connected with something solid. Ayers clung to the spear, and when his body yanked to a stop, the pressure shoved the sharp blade through the creature’s skull. By the time he hit the water, the Moyh-ma was dead.

Ayers stood atop the creature’s slick back, holding his buried spear for balance. “Survivors?”

He watched the tipped boat right itself, the four oarsmen still inside. A moment later, Yindi hoisted herself back inside the long ship. She stood up, dripping wet, and shouted back. “Survivors, all!”

28

Kaba

Invasions were nothing new for the Awáni people. Over the past few hundred years, their deep jungle territory had been visited by strange peoples with undecipherable languages and odd clothing, ill-suited for the jungle’s moist air.

Kaba had heard the stories told by firelight, while the tribe dined on fish, turtle and mango, her favorite dishes. Invaders came, sometimes for slaves, sometimes for trees, sometimes for sport, but they always left, turned away by Awáni warriors, whose understanding of nature made all the difference. Before newcomers reached the Awáni territory, they first had to fend off the jungle’s assaults. Biting insects, wild beasts, hungry fish and ceaseless moisture turned many invaders back before they even found the Awáni. Those who passed the jungle’s trials were greeted with kindness, but few reciprocated, and those who became violent, met their end at the poisoned tip of a warrior’s arrow.

Kaba, a woman of thirty and a mother of three, remembered the loggers, who had come to their jungle in search of trees, using iron monsters to cut down everything in their path. They destroyed the homes of Awáni and animal alike. They used loud weapons to repel warrior attacks. Kaba’s father had been injured by one such weapon. It tore a hole in his arm, from a distance, without need of an arrow.

She had been fifteen when the loggers had come, beginning what the Awáni referred to as the Desperate Times. Warriors died. Lands were lost. Hunger was rampant, and they were forced to expand their territory, bringing them into conflict with neighboring tribes.

One day, the loggers got inside their mechanical transports and abandoned their iron monsters. They never returned. The jungle reclaimed the land, swallowing up all evidence that the men had ever come. Then the skies changed. The jungle smelled different, like fires without a source. The Awáni had no contact with the outside world, though they knew it existed. They understood that something drastic had changed in the world around them. They felt the earth shake several times. The river swelled, forcing them deeper into the forest, where tribes fought for new lands. And then, over the course of many years, outsiders invaded once more.

At first, they came in droves, crashing through the forest in pitiful waves, most of them perishing from exposure and starvation. The rest were hunted. For a time, the jungle and its creatures fed on humanity, growing strong from the endless source of blood and flesh. The Awáni considered helping, but there were too many. If the new invaders learned to find food, they would take it all. So the Awáni kept their distance, watching from the trees, until the invasion slowed to a trickle.

In the past few years, the historical roles of the region’s sparse tribes and the invaders shifted positions. Neighboring tribes began taking survivors as slaves, bartering them, the way they might meat and fish. And the newcomers never complained. The tragedy that had befallen the world outside had broken their spirits, making them susceptible to influence, and the women submissive. As Kaba aged, she found that the men of her tribe preferred the more docile outsider woman, so she too was forced to marry outside the tribe. Her husband was kind, pale-skinned and weak. But his mind was sharp. He’d brought the river to the village, allowing them to grow crops and create a permanent settlement. The Awáni were no longer nomadic, and their strength and numbers had grown, while the surrounding tribes struggled to feed all of their new slaves.

As one of the original tribe, married to an outsider whose influence had improved their lives, Kaba was now regarded with high esteem. She regaled the tribe with stories of old, oversaw the fermenting of drinks and participated as an equal on hunts. But life had become busy, and she found herself pining for the nomadic days of her childhood. She sought refuge from her busy life, disappearing into the jungle for days, dependent on the trees for food and protection.

But there was one friend who never left her side. She had found Rapau when she was twenty-five, between her first two babies. His mother had likely been slain by outsiders. So she took him in and let him suckle alongside her middle son. And now, he was her constant companion, protector and guide. No matter how well she knew the jungle and how adept she was at moving through it, the howler monkey would always be better.

When she settled down for a rest, she knew the monkey would keep watch, and if danger arose, she would be warned well in advance. She placed her long bow and arrows down against the tall, winding root of a two-hundred-foot-tall Kapok tree. The coils of roots provided homes for frogs, birds, bromeliads and countless insects. But she wasn’t interested in the tree’s living bounty, she wanted its bark. Using a machete taken from a dead outsider, she dug a tall rectangle into the tree’s paper-like bark. The woody sheet peeled cleanly away. She cut off a small section and sat against a curving root that hugged her body and scratched the insect bites on her back. The sharp blade swept over the sheet of bark, peeling away thin layers of fiber with each pass, leaving behind a thin, flexible sheet.

Kaba dug her fingers into a small tobacco pouch that hung from the belt around her waist. It was the only article of clothing she wore, or owned, holding machete, arrows and tobacco. Everything else she needed was provided by the jungle. Fragrant tobacco crumbled out from between her twisting fingertips, lining the inside of the paper. She then rolled the paper between her palms, coiling it tightly. She licked the loose opening, careful not to cut her tongue, and then she gave it a squeeze. Traditionally, she would have had to make a fire using Achiote wood and a stick rolled between her hands, but that was no longer necessary. One of the many treasures left behind by the droves of dead outsiders was what her husband called a ‘lighter.’ She pulled the bright red device from her tobacco pouch, gave it a flick and lit the end of her smoke. She pulled in two deep breaths, flaring the tip to a bright orange, and then she leaned back.

The tobacco, mixed with a few other dried plants, relaxed her mind and body. This was what she needed. Life in the tribe was hectic, but out here, alone in the jungle, she remembered who she was. Who the Awáni were.

Rapau chortled in the tree high above her. His booming voice echoed through the jungle. Distant monkeys cried out in reply. She glanced up at Rapau’s black form. He danced among the branches, shaking leaves free.

Is he alarmed, or having fun?

Rapau’s play often became overzealous, especially when he met other monkeys, so it was sometimes hard to tell. She would normally act on his cries, either way, but the smoke’s effect was strong, and she had just sat down. She held her machete in one hand, and puffed on her smoke with the other.

Ten minutes later, despite Rapau’s continued warnings, Kaba drifted into sleep, a trail of white smoke snaking into the trees above.

It wasn’t Rapau that woke her, or the stub burning her fingers, but the sound of voices, close and speaking a foreign tongue.

Eyes closed, she listened.

Two men. The baritone suggested outsiders, not tribal men. Her mind painted pictures of them: hairy, tall, bearded and overdressed. Were they newcomers or did they belong to one of the other tribes? She didn’t recognize their language, so she assumed they were new, which meant they didn’t know the rules of the jungle.

Clutching her machete, ready to swing, she cracked her eyes and found that she was only partially right. The men were tall, bearded and fair-skinned, but aside from the heavy packs hanging from their backs, they were naked. These two had apparently eked out a living in the jungle for some time. They looked comfortable in the wet heat, and carried spears and blades, weapons that would serve them well. They clearly had been influenced by neighboring tribes. But while they had adapted to life in the jungle, they had not truly become part of it. The packs they wore, while dulled with grime, were still bright red and blue. And their senses had yet to be honed.

They stood ten feet away, their backs to her, eyes turned up at the branches, where Rapau thrashed and howled.

Kaba’s tan skin helped her blend in with the surrounding terrain, but her weapons and lit smoke should have drawn them right to her. She let the stub fall from between her fingers, bounce off her flat stomach and fall in the mud beside her hip. She pressed it into the earth, leaned forward and stood without making a sound. She could leave without the chance of conflict, or perhaps invite them to join the Awáni. They appeared capable enough, and she had considered taking a second husband or two.

As she considered her options, the pitch of Rapau’s warning changed.

She tensed. The monkey had several different warning cries. One for friends. One for strangers. One for rivals. And one for predators. But the deep hoot tearing from his curled lips was unlike anything she’d heard before. The monkey wasn’t just calling out a warning, he was terrified. And then, he did the unthinkable. Rapau fled, sweeping through the canopy faster than she could move on land.

Feeling merciful toward the men, she snapped her fingers. When they spun around in fright, stepping away from her, she knew she had nothing to fear. Even if they worked up the courage to attack her, everything about the way they moved said that they weren’t killers. When the two men had settled down, she placed an index finger to her lips. She’d learned the sign for ‘quiet,’ a universal gesture all outsiders understood, from her husband. The men parted as she approached them, sniffing the air. The newcomers were rancid with sweat and their own waste. The scent of her smoke lingered. But there was something else. Something raw, and new.

She pointed at each of the men, then at herself and then to the jungle behind her in the direction Rapau had fled. They nodded vigorously, docile like most outsiders lost in the jungle, and they started in the direction she had pointed.

The repetitive thud of heavy footfalls stopped them.

When the two men started whispering between themselves, she placed her finger to her lips once more, but was ignored.

Fools
, she thought, and she planned to abandon them at once. But before she could leave, the footfalls doubled in pace. A guttural rumble rolled through the air, like a crocodile’s warning. The creature was attacking.

While Kaba dove behind a sheet of tall kapok root, the two men shouted in surprise, and then terror.

She looked over the root in time to see the creature attack. It had a body like a bird, but its featherless skin resembled a crocodile’s, as did its long, slender, sharp tooth-filled snout. The eyes, however, bobbled atop puffy sacks of flesh, as did several other organs, like transparent teats, hanging from its underside. The creature stood on two legs, a long sweeping tail providing balance. Before the men could react, the beast snapped down on one of their arms. As the man pulled away, the sharp, slender teeth slid through meat and bone, severing the limb.

The wounded man screamed.

His partner fled. And as he ran, two more of the creatures sprang from the shadows. They leapt onto his back together, crashing to the ground and silencing the man’s screams with a loud crack. A merciful death compared to his friend. Another two creatures arrived a moment later, the first biting the wounded man’s face, the second sniffing the air for a moment, and then turning toward Kaba. Unlike the two men, these creatures were perfectly adapted to living and hunting in the jungle.

She stood and raised her machete, slapping the flat blade against the tall, hollow root. She struck the root four more times, the rhythm practiced, the sound echoing through the jungle for miles.

And then, she ran.

And the monsters followed, leaving their two dead prey behind to chase down a third.

She fired her arrows while on the run, striking the neck of the creature closest to her. Each arrow stumbled a predator, but didn’t stop it. She sent her fifth and final arrow soaring at a creature’s bulbous eye, piercing the flesh with a wet pop that sprayed clear fluid. The predator moaned, staggered to a stop, and then began scratching at its head with one of its three-toed feet, tearing away the injured flesh.

Although it was slowed, it was quickly replaced by the remaining four pack members.

Kaba wound her way through the jungle, following paths that only she could see, and following turns only she knew were coming. Though the creatures snapping at her heels were larger and faster, her knowledge of the jungle kept her one step ahead of them. But after five minutes of running, it became clear that one step ahead was still several steps short of safety. The creatures split up so that the next sharp turn she made would still lead her directly into the jaws of a waiting monster. She leapt between two trees, forcing the closest predator to sweep around them, but it was right behind her, and gaining.