Path of Ranger: Volume 1 (20 page)

He had to be careful, he was an alien there, one wrong move could be his last. Bridgers got up slowly to take a better defense position. A need to know what was there grew inside of him. But the darkness wouldn’t reveal anything from its cover. JB went for the one of the large flaming sticks lying in the fire. If that was a predator, it might be afraid of fire. When the torch got in his hand, he pulled out a knife from the backpack. The gun would suffice too, but the gangster didn’t want to make noise. All armed, he stepped towards the hissing. His muscles were tense and his attention – sharp. Whatever might jump at him from the darkness, he was ready. The hiss wouldn’t stop, it repeated every ten seconds.

JB came closer to the source. It was right behind the next shrub. He put the knife it front of him, as a precaution. There still was no plan. The first option was to hit first and see what it was later. Yet, it could be some small creature, not menacing. So he would rather let it go. And he surely didn’t want to burn down the forest with that torch.

That’s it. Let’s do this…

His right hand squeezed the light tightly in preparation for a hit. The left one was moving apart the leaves, which blocked his view. He kept going cautiously, with great care. By that time, the inner clock of his brain recognized the pattern in timing of that hiss. It repeated again. That time JB heard it closely. Suddenly, the fear vanished. He removed the torch and put the knife on his belt. After a short search on the ground, Bridgers found what he expected. It was a radio.

When the device got into his hands, JB relaxed and went back to the campfire. Yet, he did look around once, just in case. He sat down to study the find. It was a wide-range transceiver. The model looked brand new, modern, with touchscreen and everything, probably from the plane. It was just in the process of scanning area for a signal. That was why it hissed, because of the absence of the connection. JB saw it as a great opportunity to try to find out if there were any other survivors. They could have some means of communication with them too. If there were any other survivors, of course.

JB knew few things about radios, but that knowledge was enough to look for pre-recorded frequencies and to ping each of them. The one obstacle was a weak battery charge, though. It looked like the transceiver was working for the third day in a row. Not much juice to work with was left.

The signal bars were at zero. JB tried to walk around in a search of a better reception spot. The bars went up to five percent a couple times, but they fell right away.

“Come on… Come on…” JB was mumbling while walking.

After a few minutes of unsuccessful tries, he thought of changing the method. A higher spot might work. So he decided to climb up on one of the trees. Not thinking too long on that matter, he took the knife and went to find an easier tree to climb on.

The climbing itself wasn’t an issue there. But getting to the canopy level was. JB knew from the ‘National Geographic’ show some things about rainforests. One of those things was a presence of fauna up there. Snakes and monkeys were just a start. And if something put him out of balance, he would fall down. Such a possibility concerned him.

The big guy picked a tree to his liking. It was close to the campfire and had lots of branches and vines over the trunk. He tucked the knife behind the belt. Then he studied the tree carefully, using the torch as his light source. After choosing a side from where to start a climb, he grabbed the vine that seemed strong enough. JB was ready. He planted the torch into the soil with one strong hit so it would mark the ground level. Then he tested the vine for its safety and went climbing.

Using his strong arms and legs, he was climbing upwards along the trunk. It felt unusual, but not too difficult. At some point, JB thought that all those years of physical training finally paid off.

He didn’t have to go to the very top, sixty feet would suffice. To be sure, JB went about seventy. He counted steps on the way, so the distance had to be more or less accurate. As soon as he encountered a proper branch, he got on it and looked around to make sure that nothing menacing was there. The branch was thick enough to hold fifteen men like him at least. So the big guy stayed there.

As soon as the spot was checked, JB pulled out the transceiver. He looked at the signal bars. The reception grew to thirty-five percent. It had to be enough to send a message. JB turned on the auto-tune mode. It went scanning.

Meanwhile, Bridgers thought about stars again. He hoped that a change of altitude would help him see them. There was nothing, a dark sky as before. No stars were seen, and no other light source was there. Still, Bridgers could see everything around. It seemed strange to him. Just a few minutes ago he was climbing in full darkness, and now there was a light. He looked up at the sky again. A small clearance appeared among the clouds. The moon was there, shining with its silver effulgence. It wasn’t much. The beams were cold, but it was the most beautiful thing that JB had seen in that jungle yet.

The moon was full that night. The big guy got charmed so much that he couldn’t tear his sight away from it. But something bothered him. The moon seemed unusual. Whether it was too bright, or the form looked weird, or he just had forgotten what the moon supposed to look like. He couldn’t tell.

Having got lost in that magnificent view, JB almost forgot why he had climbed there. Suddenly, the observation was interrupted by a beeping. A green light blinked on the screen. He looked carefully to see that it found the signal. Using one of the pre-saved frequencies, the transceiver received a message. JB turned the volume up and began listening.

Sadly, there was just a sizzle coming from the speaker. After few minutes of monitoring that noise, he decided to change the approach. He put his fingers on the frequency knob to adjust it manually. He turned the knob clockwise – the reception got worse. Then he turned it other way, it cleaned the noise a bit. JB listened carefully. There was something coming in, sounded like a human voice, blocked with irritating sizzle. The voice disappeared. JB wasn’t sure how to react: to be glad that he heard that, or to get sad because it was gone. He tried to calm down, it wasn’t time for a panic. Still, it might be his only chance to reach out.

Jerry's back numbed from a long staying in one pose. He shifted into more comfortable position and relaxed a bit. His sitting on the branch felt more confident by that time. Bridgers didn’t have to hold it with both legs anymore, so he put the left foot on the branch, bending the leg. It felt much better.

After changing his position, the young survivor returned to the radio. He was sure that a fix was right there in his hands, he just needed to find it. He turned on the screen, the interface had a lot in common with the smartphones. He opened the settings, where a folder called ‘connection’ was. Then he followed to the ‘frequency’ option. A decimal number of the current frequency appeared on the screen. JB looked carefully to find the necessary adjustment option. Most of all he was afraid to break what he already had. When all options were studied, he switched to ‘auto bias tune.’ Then he tapped ‘use.’

The sizzle was getting lower and lower. Soon there was almost nothing, some quiet sound of the signal, but no information. At that point, he would be glad to hear even an advertisement message.

A half hour passed. All that time JB sat still with a radio in his hands. Waiting. He didn’t try to initiate the transmission himself, thinking that it would drain the battery. Plus, he wanted to know beforehand who was on the other end. If they were friendly. The gangster was tired, bored and losing hope. His hand got tense because of the tight grip that he held all along, and his head couldn’t find a suitable position against the trunk. His eyes closed up a long time ago. He almost fell asleep.

In a few minutes, his head finally stopped and went still. The radio was tied to his palm with its strap so it wouldn’t fell off. It was quiet. A dream was forming in his sleepy mind when a sharp sound emerged from the speaker.

“If anyone there, please, come in. Over,” an uncertain male voice said. “If anyone can hear this, come in. Over.”

Once he heard that JB woke up and moved the radio to his mouth to answer, then stopped. He wanted to listen some more. According to the voice procedure, they had to name themselves.

“If anyone can hear this, please, come in. Over!” a short pause followed. “We are survivors of flight ‘one-oh-seven,' please, come in. Can anyone hear this? Over.”

Soon JB recognized Alex’s voice in that stranger. He was glad to know that there were survivors of his flight beside him. It was time to break the silence.

“Hello, ‘one-oh-seven.' Are you still there? Over,” JB responded confidently.

“Yes! We are here! It’s good to hear someone else! You’re the first one to answer for the last four days! Are you a rescue party? Are you from the mainland? Over.”

“Rescue? Hm… The only thing I may rescue you from is a false hope, dude. And most of all I’d like to rescue myself from shooting that motherfucker whose fault it is that I’m here, yo! Over.”

“B? Is that you? Are you alive? Oh, man, it’s so good to hear you. Over.”

“Look, Lex, I have a nearly dead battery here, so listen carefully. I’m far from the plane, do not try to look for me. Tell me something, are you at the shore? How far is that from the fuselage? Over.”

“Yes, JB. We’re at the north beach. It’s about seven miles from the plane. Are you okay? Over.”

“Yeah, I'm all right. How many of you had left? Over,” asking that, JB didn’t care much about the number, mostly he was interested if El was alive.

“There are thirt—” the voice got interrupted.

The signal had been lost, and all that left was a soft sizzle. It didn’t last for long, soon even the noise faded. JB looked at the screen, it went dark. The battery was dead.

The connection was lost, JB didn’t have his answer. El’s wellbeing stayed a mystery to him. Yet, there was something in Alex’s voice that gave him a peace of mind, he didn’t sound distressed. At least, JB wanted to think so. There wasn’t much use of that transceiver left. Without a charge, it was just a piece of plastic filled with microchips. The big guy hanged it on the belt. He made a deep breath and leaned on the trunk with his eyes closed. Coming down could wait, he wanted to stay up there for a while.

Several minutes passed. Jerry had enough time to think everything through. His conclusion was that the group was safe and he could move on. But, considering his healthy skepticism, he thought that maybe he didn’t have to think about that at all. One man couldn’t make a big difference anyway. And even if he could, there were dozens of miles between them.

He had to keep to his mission. Those thoughts about others were too much of distraction. JB assured himself to keep to the current task. He had already made a choice. Now he had to determine a new mission…

Silver light glowed around, JB could feel it even with his eyes closed. When he opened them, the view brought a bit of a shock to him. It was truly beautiful and he was sure that no one else before him had seen something like that. Everything there was illuminated. And the source wasn’t the moon. The light was coming from the leaves itself. The inner side of the leaves glowed with a pale silver incandescence. It was almost unnoticeable on a single leaf, but in a combination of thousands of them, the view became unforgettable.

JB looked at the front side of the leaf, it didn’t glow, just the inner part. That aura was coming from the moon, he thought. The moonlight seemed to initiate a bioluminescent reaction. Soon, such silver light filled all the air around. JB’s head went spinning, he felt a change in oxygen. The vegetation that produced it had to enrich the air with some kind of soft neurotoxin. It was the only reason he could imagine explaining sudden dizziness.

It was an incredible adventure. JB had seen so much in that rainforest. Things that he couldn’t imagine. He stared upwards, enjoying the view. The moon charmed him, he couldn’t remove his sight from it. Everything was quiet. Unwanted thoughts passed, so his mind finally got free. Nothing bothered him anymore. It was just the moon, something still felt wrong about her. She induced awareness. It grew. Shortly the agitation got so high that it provoked an itch in the back of his head. JB looked at the moon so carefully that his eyes dried out. At some point, he had to blink, and that very moment he saw something. At least he thought he had seen it. It flew before the moon, covering her up for a brief moment. At first, it looked like a bat to him, but it couldn’t be, because of the distance. There weren’t such gigantic bats. That thing was big, fast, and scary. JB’s skin covered in bumps.

A time went on, and no explanation came to his mind. Perhaps, it was just a product of his imagination. After all, one couldn’t survive such a catastrophe and be perfectly sane. The tiredness was nothing to him, occasional vertigo could be acceptable, but hallucinations… That was a clear call for help. JB admitted to himself that he wasn’t fine after all. He needed time to recover.

“Damn flying monsters…” he said out loud. “Ridiculous!”

Just as he felt safe and calm again, a sudden loud roar rolled through the valley. It came from the direction where that shadow flew. The roar was long and unusual, it started with a low base and then went up high almost to a sonic wave. When JB heard that, his heart stopped and hair went up. He wasn’t surprised, though.

The place from where it sounded was in several miles away. His altitude didn’t allow him to see what was going on there. And he wasn’t sure that he wanted to witness that.