Welcome to Jungle Fever. I can't get this idea out of my head. If you have a chance, learn about Palm Oil and the heartless destruction of the forests and jungle in Borneo and Sumatra. Orangutan will be extinct in the wild if we don't stop them somehow in the next 15 years!

Chapter 1: BABY

"Shut up, please, just shut up Jane. If I hear you tell me about the miserable Mr. Darcy again or his ambitious plans for global domination in the worldwide palm oil market, I will vomit on the phone. You know what the mosquitoes out here will do to me if throw up right? Ill be eaten alive before I get off the phone and get back to the lodge...

"Oh, and did I tell you about the injunction his silver plated lawyers just hand-delivered to me? Do you know I found them driving around outside the reserve trying to figure out where to deliver it? As if they expected to drive through the jungles of Borneo? What part of ecological wildlife sanctuary did they not understand? It was like they expected to find paved roads out here...what a joke these idiots are!

"If I ever get the chance to meet that man, I plan to douse him in his beloved palm oil and light up the forest with him just like his stupid cronies do to the animals. Maybe then he'll know the pain and suffering these animals endure when they destroy habitats and burn whole families of orangutans alive, all in the name of forest clearing...

"Oh wait, I forgot, he knows and doesn't care. I'll...yes...what?

"Oh, I know I'm preaching to the converted. You should see the new little orphan one of the scout teams brought back yesterday. I don't know how she survived. She was just walking around in a daze, circling her dead mother, they told me. But we already have her eating, and I hope one of the other moms in the reserve will adopt her eventually."

Her sister Jane assured her that her work did matter. She also assured her that their mother would not take kindly to her daughter spending the rest of her life or her marriageable and child bearing years in a jungle prison, so to please be careful on her quest. Jane was telling Liz she would speak to her again in a day or two as Eli was thinking to herself..."See that Darcy, we saved one. Burn that you Asshole."

When Jane and Elizabeth Bennet finally hung up, Elizabeth or Eli as she was known locally had already worked herself into a near rage. She was 25, hot, bothered and sweating out her future in the jungles of Borneo trying to save orangutans from certain extinction at the hands of powerful palm oil production conglomerates. The most powerful one apparently owned by a corporate greed hungry self proclaimed loner known only as Mr. F. Darcy. As Google turned up less than a page, calling him a social misfit or rather an antisocial misfit seemed almost kind.

After spending the last two years running the research and rehab center she had founded and created with her own trust fund, she was no stranger to the finer things in life, but she simply chose to spend them on causes she felt gave her life purpose and meaning instead of designer shoes and purses like most of the women of her acquaintance and social strata.

Of course her mother would like nothing better than if she gave up her "monkey dreams", came home, got married and starting producing grandchildren, but Eli had different plans. Alerted to the terrible tragedy of the only remaining wild orangutan populations, she had set out with a plan to rescue entire families of the animals before they were knowingly burned to death by deforestation, to make room for more palm oil trees that fed the make-up needs of western women would stop slathering it on if they knew beautiful monkeys had been burned alive to make it, no? The subject actually got her so angry, she was willing to violate her own beliefs about the effectiveness of non violent protests over it. Although she made absolutely certain no one could ever prove the sabotage efforts were her doing.

She felt this last action on behalf of Darcy and his law firm of Bingley, Nether & Field pushed every one of her buttons and had finally pushed her over the limit.

How dare he ask her to pay for each animal she rescued from his land? To add insult to injury, he was now claiming she had to pay an extraction fee per animal to cover his habitat destruction expenses? It was clear to her that the man was insane, cruel and selfish. Now she just had to hear from her lawyer Charlotte, a friend from Uni that sympathized with her cause what she could possibly use to counter sue. Surely, the government had to see that orangutans, scientifically the closest animals to humans and incredibly intelligent couldn't be purposely burned in their jungle homes just to clear the forest. Maybe the government would realize that deforestation wasn't temporary, but a permanent decision to destroy billions of years of ecology and evolution and could not be reversed?

If not, she would have no choice. If drastic measures were needed, she had already decided she would save these animals at all costs.

She had heard that Darcy was due to make a personal tour of a new oil production facility his company had opened recently on the other side of her jungle later that week. Eli had the feeling that a visit from a family of lovable furry orange friends might be just what he needed to finally change his mind.

As she started to plan how to gate crash his arrival in just the right way, one of her best friends appeared on the scene. As if on demand, "Baby" jumped into her arms for a cuddle. An orphaned baby orangutan now approaching her second year in the refuge, she had a face no one could dare refuse, not even someone as dour and cold as the stodgy Mr. F. Darcy no doubt was.

For a few moments she wondered about him. His age, his temperament, his feelings towards pets –she then dismissed those worries. Surely, he was old and stodgy, but Eli was convinced some hugs, cuddles and laughs could somehow change his mind in their favor. After all she mused, who wouldn't love to find a bed full of monkeys on a boring work trip?

Liz examined all of her options and felt this was a surefire way to get his attention and change his mind, or at the very least, change his work habits. In addition, knowing only too well that she was rather faster than she had budgeted, running out of much needed funds to keep her animals safe, she certainly had very little to lose...

Thanks for all of the support and interest so far!

I can't wait to tell the rest of this story.

I always write faster with reviews and such, but please, be honest! Your thoughts, ideas and critiques help me improve! I will as with Nemesis try to post twice a week.

Cheers,

Lady M