Disclaimer:
I made all of this up. I do not claim to know anything at all about any of this. I made up the whole Xtabalz'n culture, the name of which I also invented out of nothing, intending no offence to anyone. I have no knowledge of anthropology, pre-Columbian cultures, South American islands, prehistoric religions, hieroglyphs, survival skills, predators, florae, fauna, fungi, WWII, the IRS, or the function of a consulate. This is ALL FAKE. Furthermore, all publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. No copyright infringement is intended.

This story is told in alternating points of view.


Chapter Two

Oh God, oh God, oh God. Why don't they just kill me already? Did they kill Mom and Dad? The last thing I remember hearing was Mom screaming. If they hurt her…

I woke up tied to a low-hanging tree limb, suspended from my wrists and ankles. Even though I wasn't naked, my ass felt exposed dangling like that. My fingers and toes were numb from lack of circulation. If I struggled, the rough ropes chewed at my flesh. I saw large black ants dabbling in the coagulating blood that stuck to the ropes, and I could feel the tickles that indicated the insects covered my entire body.

I overheard the voices and occasional laughter of the people around me, though I couldn't turn my stiff neck enough to see anything more than shapes drifting in my periphery. Apparently, life in the little community went on as usual even when a captive was being eaten by bugs in a nearby tree.

I hurt everywhere. Each body part I concentrated on hurt more than the last one as I mentally took inventory for damage. After a thorough accounting, I realized my head hurt the most. I wondered if they had drugged me with some primitive botanical extract. If so, I wondered if I could get the recipe for Mom and Dad.

I was clearly delirious.

It became obvious I wouldn't be lucky enough to just die quickly or at least pass out from the pain, and I started wondering how long I'd been there. Not long enough for my abrasions to fully scab or for me to suffer yet from dehydration. Though that would come soon enough. Luckily I had just eaten before the attack. I'd had almost a liter of that funky tea. It was strange I didn't feel the need to urinate.

Oh merciful heavens!

I realized then that the boggy smell I'd been trying to ignore was me. No wonder the people were keeping their distance. I stunk of sweat and piss and half-eaten open sores.

At that point I decided that if I got rescued, I'd just die of humiliation anyway.

Why didn't they just kill me?.

As if to answer my prayer, a shuffling footstep approached. A withered but fascinating face breathed over mine, emitting a low humming voice. She touched my dead fingertips with a hot, stinging liquid that seemed to revive my circulation momentarily. Great. This old lady was trying to keep me alive.

She chanted for a while and then I felt warm hard fingertips on either side of my mouth. She puckered my lips open and poured a thick, warm, mealy substance in. It was like a bitter berry gravy, I choked and coughed and felt it trickling over my chin and down my neck. I retched and writhed despite the ropes and pain.

It was all futile. For an eternity, the old woman kept at it, forcing as much of the stuff down my throat as she could. Each time I groaned or coughed or shook my head, I heard laughter from a small crowd behind her. I was the evening sitcom.

Finally she left and I let the heavy weariness and pain take me.

I woke to the return of gentle village noises, and a painful stabbing at my wrists and ankles. In the darkness, I just made out several sets of small glowing eyes.

Well, at least Dad had insisted on rabies vaccinations before allowing me to join the expedition. My wounds had become a buffet for vampire bats.

I watched the tiny flicking tongues darting as fast as hummingbird wings in and out of monstrous little mouths.

I froze in terror watching them, my heart rate threatening to cross the threshold from panic to arrest. Mercifully, I faded out again.

When next I became sensible to my surroundings, an umbered sunlight played peek-a-boo with my eyes. I felt less pain. I felt less of everything. I could no longer guess how many days and nights had passed while I hung withering from the tree.

I was weak, dizzy, empty, and hopeless. I stared at the trails of blood dried along my forearms. Between the bats and the ants, the cuts had been widened significantly. Why was I being fed and kept to suffer? Where had these people come from anyway? We had been on the island for weeks without seeing any signs of human life at all.

Suddenly, the gentle lazy murmur of voices took on a new tenor. The tranquil evening activities were interrupted by something. Something clearly agitating. Something that was approaching me from behind.

I heard a youthful shriek and several baritone voices uttering staccato syllables in a language I could not begin to decipher. And then I heard a low rumble.

The growl was a tentative threat. The big cat had probably caught a whiff of my reeking stench clear across the jungle and had come to investigate. I heard the slapping pads of retreating feet against well-worn paths as the villagers gave the jaguar all the space it demanded. I immediately sensed an understanding in this jungle. Respect the cats, and the toddlers don't get eaten. Tenuous coexistence.

I heard a chuffing breath and felt my shirt ruffle at my shoulder as I was inspected. I was able to tilt my head enough to see the massive black head looming just below me. I stayed quiet and willed my heart to keep beating without getting carried away. The cat nudged my butt and then leapt at the tree.

I couldn't help the small screech at the cat's sudden movement. Luckily, my noise didn't set off a violent reaction. With the cat above me on the branch from which I hung, I could see she was an old female, beautifully black, with a vague dappling on her limbs. In sunlight she would almost look speckled.

She sniffed at my wrists where they were bound to the tree. No doubt she was trying to decide if the blood from the stinging lacerations was tempting enough to eat. Her belly didn't appear either emaciated or pregnant, for which I was grateful. Either might have meant disaster for me. As it was, if she had eaten recently enough, she might leave me alone.

Indeed that seemed to be the case because she stretched herself out on the limb, allowing her dangling tail to slap lightly at my calves. Oddly, I felt like she was guarding me. I heard a mighty shuffling sigh escape her giant nose, and her chin fell to the wood just inches from my lifeless fingers.

Light faded, and my friend and I dozed as a seismic tremor swung me back and forth like a pendulum.

Sometime in the night, the jaguar left to pursue other entertainments, and I woke to the bats again, feasting painfully, nipping and puncturing voraciously. I vacillated for a moment, unsure if yelling to scare them off would enrage my captors, but in the end I couldn't take it. I'd been terrorized for God knows how long by people, ants, vampire bats, and a giant cat. I couldn't take any more.

I opened my mouth to yell, but before a sound escaped, a calloused hand clamped roughly over my lips and silenced me. The movement caused the bats to flutter upward, creating a gentle breeze.

A voice whispered low at my ear. "Hey kid," I barely heard. "You keep quiet and I'll get you out of here." A knife blade glinted as the ropes began to give.