JANET OF THE JUNGLE

BY CHRISTOPHER TOILKIEN

[ part 1 ]

Sunlight rarely penetrates all the way down to the ground in tropical jungles. The densely packed trees form an almost impenetrable canopy as they contest with each other for the life-giving rays as much as their roots engage in constant under ground warfare for nutrients and water. Often winds high above sway the lofty branches, causing what light that does penetrate to flicker and dance.

But in spite of all these problems, the jungle flourishes. A rainbow of colorful blossoms disguise parasitic vines that crawl up aged diseased trunks and along still living branches to catch a little of the sun while leaching nutrients from its greater host. Ground level is often either relatively open as so little sunlight penetrates that far giving little chance of bushes or saplings to contest for it, or a tangle of vegetation gone wild as the death of a great aged one has temporarily opened a hole in the canopy. Innumerable birds of every size, description and colour squeak and squawk endlessly. Animals either are light and agile enough to move effortlessly from tree to tree or so dangerous to anyone else they can move around with impunity. And reptiles either slither or scamper in and out of the branches or undergrowth as their mode of motivation decrees. Insects, well they come in more varieties than anything else on this planet, and greatly outnumber anything else too. Everybody else either looks on them as something to eat, or something to kill because it is pestering you.

Man came relatively late to the jungles, as we are a hunter-gatherer of the savannas by nature. But as our neatest trick is adaptability, we came, we saw, we survived, but mostly we just took what we wanted and got the heck out. The jungle quickly reclaiming for its own, our structures, and even our rotting corpses back into its damp green bosom.

But we adapt and best of all we absolutely hate to loose and consider this lonely blue marble rock ours to do with what we want.

Lost and Found:

A dozen human males filtered through the jungle. Some were swarthy locals, others mixtures of native and Spanish stock. Some were deeply tanned and some just plain dirty. Ten of them wore a mismatched collection of regular army castoffs, or locally manufactured peasant clothing. Headgear ranged from an almost new baseball caps to crumpled cowboy Stetsons. Weapons were the ubiquitous AK47's and a machete. They looked lean and a little underfed. Once they had been part of a revolutionary army that did not win. Then degenerated into banditry and finally common local mercenaries, selling their guns to anyone who would pay them or even just house and feed them.

But keeping to the center of this motley crew were two who were distinctly different. Well fed of European ancestry, with modern sweat stained jungle camoe's, wide load distributing webbing, German SMG's, pistols, water bottles and communications gear, floppy matching headgear and an air of command. The elder one a classic bearded leader type complete with a chopped on half smoke stogy. His partner years younger, just growing probably his first beard and obviously brought along for his technical abilities as a lap top case was on his left arm were the other man supported an alley sweeper automatic shotgun.

"Were is that bitch now " Growled Dave, the elder man. "Those half starved local mercenaries we hired had better soon be earning their pay" He went on." I hope we can use them to drive her towards us and give me the pleasure of the kill. After we have all finished with her of course"

"She's probably still circling to our right" Carl, the younger man inserted.

"How close is the little bitch," The hulking leader asked. The younger man squatted in the ankle deep refuse of dead vegetation that covered the ground in this area, shucked off the unaccustomed weight of his web harness, and reached in its protective bag, removing his laptop, flipped it open and its screen illuminated his eager face.

"Still three hundred meters due west, traveling fairly quickly considering the terrain" The younger man replied, consulting the laptop screen in front of him.

"I told you she was raised here and can do the "Tarzan swinging through the trees" bit" The gruff leader.

"She has stopped, and appears to be bouncing from one direction to another as if lost" Carl said as he watched the satellite tracking display on his laptop.

"She had better not be lost for her sake" Dave snarled. "She's only still alive because her parents had taken her every year to that jungle city they had discovered" He said. "Rumor has it, there is a statue of solid gold in the temple at the heart of the complex. I intend on hauling it back to were I can melt it down"

Suddenly a sharp cry came from just ahead and a lone mercenary ran back and in the local dialect reported to the older man.

"Just ahead the way is blocked by a great stone wall built from cyclopean blocks fitted together to form a wall over fifty feet high" He passed on to his compatriot. They walked right into it as it is obscured by trees growing right up to it and vines growing on it"

"Get those overpriced mercenaries of their lazy ass's and over that wall" Dave's voice ordered. The sound of chopping wood was heard and then they saw camo clad men climbing onto the growth clinging to the wall. One chopped at a spiky vine with a machete and reeled back, hands holding his face and dropped down out of site. Then a single shot rang out, startling both birds and the relatively inexperienced at seeing death up close, technician.

"What happened to him?" Carl inquired looking at the now still fallen man who had been writing in pain. Dave, who was listening to the ears pieces of a communications headset, replied.

"The vines sap was acidic and the poor fellow was blinded and screaming in pain. So they just shot him to put him out of his misery"

Then a knotted rope fell and Dave, after putting back on his web harness and picking up his submachine gun, grabbed onto the rope and started climbing up. Carl picked up his heavy weapon harness complete with clasp knife, pistol, water bottle, ammunition pouches, communications radio and ration packs and at first slouched under the unaccustomed load. But reached out and slowly made his way up the knotted rope under the skeptical eyes of the two experienced mercenaries at the top of the wall.

Once there he starred amazed at the rows of huge pyramidal temples, squat residential blocks and stone paved roads stretching out in all directions. All encrusted with dying or dead trees and spiky vines. White bleached bones were entangled in the undergrowth everywhere. The stench of rotting vegetation assailed their nostrils.

Was this the lost city of the dead his disgraced ancestor had wrote about in his journals? Carlo had been second in command of a Spanish Conquistador army that had marched into the jungle in search of a fabled lost city of the dead and its great golden idols. A year later he alone stumbled back to their starting point. Burning from jungle fever and raving about skeletons wearing golden jewelry, lying in a jungle city encrusted with poison vines. Who's remaining inhabitants were all beautiful young females, enticing his men into their beds, then turned into jaguars and ate his men, sacrificing their still beating hearts to their golden idol god.

Death arrives in many Forms

Carl's thoughts were brought back to the hear and now when he stumbled over the body of one of the mercenaries. His ashen face and body contorted by a painful death.

"Poisonous fruit" One dusky mercenary explained, as he stripped anything useful from the body of the dead mercenary at his feet, squishing an apple sized piece of fruit with one bite out of it under his running shoe. After he was done, he led Carl down a wide stone stair carefully avoiding both spikes and the bright blue fruit.

"This is pre Colombian, possibly Toxemic, the Disappeared people" Carl said to no one in particular as he studied the intricate carvings decorating the side of the stairway.

"Never mind the long dead were is that little temporarily alive kid" Dave angrily inquired. "I need to get my hands on a young fresh one" He growled. "And I might even listen to what she can tell us of this dead cities treasure before I kill her slowly" He remarked.

"She is directly ahead but over five hundred n meters, possibly up on top of that highest vegetation covered pyramid straight ahead" Carl replied, but a dark shadows movement just almost seen out of the corner of his eye made his head suddenly swivel right, but it was gone.

"Did you see that?" He asked, but found the rest had moved on down the paved road at the bottom of the stairs leading towards the tallest pyramid, and hurried after. The mercenaries' examined the skeleton remains that were entangled in the spiky vines.

"Conquistador, What did you see before you died so far from home?" Dave inquired as he booted the rusted morion helmet off one into the blackness of the coffin shaped doorway of a windowed multi storied stone structure.

A few of the mercenaries chattered excitedly in their local dialect, and Carl observed they even went out of their way to examine the bodies for loot. One skeleton, long black hair still attached to his or her head, held a bronze looking dagger and had what looked like gold jewelry around its neck.

Then two of the mercenaries pushed him out of the way and reaching down crushed the neck of the skeleton with the but of his AK47, releasing the gold necklaces, each taking one and stuffing it in the rough rucksack they carried.

Carl noted they both had numerous scratches from the vines on their arms, hands and legs, but surprisingly they did not bleed very much. They grinned showing tobacco stained teeth and moved off to catch up with the rest, but keeping looking around for more skeletons. Carl shone his flashlight into a ground floor pyramidal shaped doorway, but except for bare stonewalls, walls covered by some faded Mayan style hieroglyphs showing people feasting, nothing of import, and finding he was Tail End Charlie again hurried on.

The road finally entered a great paved plaza. Progressively taller and greater in size stepped pyramids marched down each side. Wide stone stairways lead up to the single small structure on each ones flat top. The dead spiky vines ran everywhere and leafless great trees thrust great roots into and between the stones as their lifeless branches thrust defiantly towards the sun. In the center of the plaza a great square silent pool of black liquid glistened in the afternoon sun. Dave walked around it as the mercenaries searched for and grabbed the gold from any skeletal remains they found.

Carl stopped, knelt down and examined the liquid in the pool. It looked more like oil than water, but even with a light breeze, not a ripple marred its surface. What appeared to be a set of very big cats paw prints appeared to lead away from it, as if it had come up out of it not to long ago.

He was just about to stick an index finger in it when he heard heavy boots walking back towards him.

"Well, were is she now?" Dave said, walking right up to Carl.

"It shows she is still on top of that great pyramid right ahead" He replied.

Carl was becoming more convinced everyday that Dave was not the German archeologist he had claimed to be when he had tracked Carl down in the Madrid University library, where he had been working as a lowly researcher. Dave said he knew of Carls ancestor and his jounal. Dave had told him his deceased partner had been travelling upriver when a sudden strorm forced them to run the paddlewheeler up to a rocky lined shore. Next morning as they were about to push off, he discovered the rocks were actually a stone pier. Further investigation showed a small viillage hidden in the jungle composed of stone structures built of blocks so carefully crafted and fitted together, a pocket knife coild not be slipped into the cracks. And surprisingly most of all the remains of a paved road leading off into the jungle.

That village was the one described in his ancestors jounal and he had convinced Carl to acompany him back to that South American jungle. Both to start his own reputation as an archeologist and repair the memory of his disgraced ancestor.

"Then we had better push ahead and climb that pile of rock" He ordered turning to face the six remaining mercenaries, indicating with his arms an encircling and capture movement "It will be a safe place to spend the night. Especially since we will have a little snuggle bunny to play with Carl". The mercenaries smiled, Carl wondering what at, as they only spoke the local mixture of Spanish and Portuguese, and Dave had spoken to Carl in their native tong, German. And were the seventh and eight mercenaries, searching for more skeletons to rob? Why are the remaining six not worried about them being missing?

They started off, the mercenaries splitting into two three man groups and circling the pyramid to climb the side and rear stairways. Dave led up the main front set, with Carl lagging behind. As Carl struggled to climb the steep stairs, Dave, though older was getting farther ahead. Half way up, Carl just had to stop to catch his breath, Dave striding like a colossus continually upward.

When Carl reached the top, there was no sign of Dave. Carl walked around the fifty foot by twenty foot, by fifty foot high building at the top of the pyramid and discovered it was the only one with just a set of stairs up the front. Looking down, he could see no sign of the mercenaries anywhere, climbing up the sides or walking around below. The sun was setting and Carl entered the windowless building, torch illuminating the interior. Dave had been right, a huge gold statue with arms outstretched, holding a golden bowl at its belly height.

Carl walked around the statue to see if Dave was behind it, and was startled when a slim young girl with long coal black hair walked out.

"Are you looking for your companions?" She inquired.

Somehow Carl just new drawing his sidearm would not be a good idea.

"Yes, do you know where they are?" He haltingly replied.

"They hearts are in the sacrificial bowl" She replied looking up into his face with her deep blue eyes " I think you should stay up here overnight and start back to your homeland in the morning"

"Why should I?" He retorted. Surely one little girl was no match for him. But she was gone, and jumped when a coal black panther slipped out from behind the statue and down the stairs. Carl followed it to the top of the steep stairs and froze.

He never forgot the sight and never told anyone what he saw. One crazed Spanish ancestor in a family was quite enough.

The base of the stairs was full of black shapes and just as that one reached them, they all looked back up at him.

He new what a mouse felt like when he sees a cat watching him. Hundreds of pairs of cat's eyes glowed in the dark as they looked back up at him.

He now knew what had happened to the Lost People all those hundreds of years ago.