Chapter 9: welcome to the jungle
"How did we get in this mess?" Asuna asked Kirito. "Are you asking how we wound up traveling through deep space fighting heartless every day? Or how we crashed in a jungle in the middle of who knows where?" it all started while we traveling to the next world on our journey. Sora was arguing with Donald about piloting the gummi ship. Sora being Sora, messes with the ship's guidance system and and causes the ship to go out of control. The chipmunks initiated an emergency teleport and we were all sent to separate parts of this deep jungle. "Oh ha ha." Replied Asuna. We soon came across a camp in a thicket of bamboo. It seems that whoever made camp here had only recently arrived as there were a large number of unopened crates and brief cases.
We entered a large yellow tent we found not only Sora, Donald, and Goofy; but also three natives of this world. The first was a muscular man with long brown dreadlocks wearing only a loin cloth and carrying a spear. Sora introduced him as Tarzan. He didn't really talk much, but he didn't seem hostile or barbaric aside from his appearance. The other two were known as Jane and Clayton. Jane was hear on an expedition to study gorillas with her father while Clayton was a hired gun. Although Clayton was more interested in hunting gorillas than studying them. Clayton soon left to "patrol" and Jane welcomed us to their camp. Jane explained that Tarzan was raised in the jungle by the gorillas and that he was interested in where Jane came from since he had never seen humans other than himself until they arrived. Jane thought that if she told him about human society than Tarzan would be willing to share the location of the gorillas. She asked us to find slides for a projector they had brought with them to show him. We were happy to oblige her.
As we scoured the camp we found not only slides, but recipes for brewing potions and ethers. Asuna made sure to copy the formulas so we could make them ourselves. When we returned to the tent Jane started up the slideshow. The first picture showed a western styled castle. Sora stared at the castle feeling as if he had seen it before. It was strange because he had never left the island before. The rest of it was rather uninteresting, but Tarzan seemed fascinated by it. "Well, Tarzan?" Jane asked. "Where are my friends, Riku and Kairi?" sora asked. Kirito wasn't aware that Sora thought they were place seemed devoid of heartless, but there were still a lot of dangerous animals in the jungle. If they were then there was no telling what might have happened to them.
When Tarzan shook his head we could tell he hadn't seen them. "Then that just leaves one place." Clayton said upon his return. "Young man, we've been in this jungle for some time now. But we have yet to encounter these friends of yours. I'd wager they're with the gorillas. But Tarzan refuses to take us to them." His theory was farfetched at best, but it was their only lead at the moment. "Really, Mr. Clayton. Tarzan wouldn't hide- -" Jane tried to defend Tarzan, but was interrupted. "Then take us there! Take us to the gorillas. Go-ril-las." Clayton said as if he was speaking to a foreigner that didn't understand him. Tarzan looked at Sora contemplating whether he should reveal the gorilla's location or not. He decided to help sora as he had promised to do so earlier. "Tarzan go see Kerchack." "Kerchack?" Jane questioned. "He must be the leader. Perfect. I'll go along as an escort. After all the jungle is a dangerous place." He said with a sly grin.
After an hour of climbing trees and swinging on vines over a hundred feet from the ground we finally found the gorillas. Tarzan wanted to take a more scenic route in the hopes of losing Clayton along the way. It seemed to work as we hadn't seen him in a while. The leader of the apes was a large silver back gorilla. Tarzan pleaded with Kerchack asking them to aid us. However the gorilla seemed distracted by something and left before giving Tarzan an answer. Sora believed he was heading towards a tree house he had crashed into before. After more tree climbing we found a large two story tree house it was large enough to be considered an actual house, but it was old and had fallen into disrepair. "This place Tarzan's home." Tarzan said. "What happened here?" Asuna asked. This place looked like there was a lot of effort put into it. There was no way the owners just left. "Tarzan's parents… killed by sabor. Kala found me as an infant. And raised me as her own." Tarzan said. From the way he spoke it sounded like he didn't want to talk about it. Not that anyone could blame him.
We saw Clayton was there as well, pointing his rifle at a gorilla ready to mount it on his wall. Donald intervened by letting loose his usual angry scream at Clayton causing him to miss his target. The hunter made up a lousy excuse about aiming at a snake and how he was heroically saving the gorilla's life, but nobody believed him. When we returned to the camp and explained what happened with Jane she was livid. "How could you do such a thing!" "Now, Miss Porter, as I told you, I was not aiming at the gorilla." The researcher wouldn't take anymore of Clayton's excuses and forbade him from going near the Gorillas again. Seeing no way to escape his current predicament the hunter angrily left the tent. It was less than a minute before we heard the sound of Clayton's rifle being fired when we went to investigate it.
We entered the bamboo thicket where Donald and goofy had landed upon our arrival to this world and found a tobacco pipe belonging to Mr. Clayton, but nothing else. We heard a rustling in the bushes and soon a leopard pounced to attack us. "Sabor!" Tarzan exclaimed. Seeing the leopard that had killed Tarzan's parents was now aiming to kill us we were left with no choice but to battle for our survival. Seeing it was outnumbered, the leopard used the surrounding foliage to its advantage and used hit and run attacks whenever it felt threatened. When it was out in the open again we surrounded the big cat preventing its escape. Tarzan brandished his hand made spear and dealt the killing blow to the big cat. Satisfied with his kill, Tarzan took a fang from the beast and offered it to us. "But that's the thing that killed your parents. Why would you give it to us?" Sora asked confused. "Tarzan hate Sabor. Sabor gone now. Tarzan give reminder of Sabor to friends, so that Tarzan is not lost to hate."
He was asking us to share the load with him. Tarzan had only known them for so long, but he had grown to trust us enough to share his struggles with us. "Okay. We'll help you carry this burden." Kirito said. Asuna what Kirito meant when he said that. He knew what it was like bearing other people's negative feelings. He proved it when he made himself the focus of resentment towards the beta testers in SAO so that he'd be the only one targeted. He always tries to bear the weight of the world on his shoulders. The best thing Asuna thought she could do was be there to support him. Tarzan handed the white fang to kirito and he stuffed it in his pocket.
We returned to the camp and gound several monkey like heartless making a mess of the place. Their movements were hard to predict as the orange and yellow ones jumped around scratching wildly at whoever was near, while the pink ones with bows carried sling shots to shoot at us and oddly enough banana peels to make us trip. After dispatching the heartless we went back to the tent to see if Jane was okay, but she was missing. Tarzan suspected they had taken her to the tree tops and we followed him. Tarzan's hunch proved reliable and we found Jane and a gorilla were trapped in a cage of vines. There was a large black fruit and Tarzan told us to destroy it if we were to save them. When we smashed the fruit to bits the vines imprisoning Jane had receded. To our surprise Jane told us that Clayton was leading the heartless on a one man hunt for the gorillas
. We hightailed it back to the bamboo thicket and saw Clayton was indeed leading a pack of heartless and had gorillas trapped between himself and a cliff. Sora distracted Clayton by telling him to stop and gave the gorillas enough time to escape. His prey gone, Clayton turned his attention to us. "Clayton?" sora said confused as to how he had suddenly gained control over the heartless. "Not Clayton!" Tarzan said. He then said something in gorilla that we couldn't understand. "*&&x%!" "Not Clayton!" soon the battle began with us fighting off the heartless while avoiding Clayton's gunfire. Clayton leapt from vantage point to vantage point shooting at us whenever he could. However his anger made him a terrible shot and we soon defeated him. But that wasn't the end of it as the cliff behind him was blown to smithereens by an unknown force. Clayton was then floating in the air as if carried by an invisible mount. Tarzan tried to attack Clayton, but was knocked back by an invisible arm. The real fight had just begun.
We attacked Clayton's invisible mount until it revealed itself as a huge chameleon. With its cover blown the creature bucked Clayton off its back and onto another platform and he supported it with covering fire. We copied their change in tactics by splitting into two groups of three. Sora, Donald, and Goofy took on the Heartless while Kirito, Asuna, and Tarzan went after Clayton. Clayton wasn't tough to beat without his mount, but the Chameleon proved to be a different story as it fired beams of light from its eyes that chased after us. And when we got to close it let loose a blast of razor sharp wind from its mouth. It let loose a loud cry and Tarzan took the moment to leap into the air and thrust his spear straight down its gullet. The spear pierced the creature's stomach and stabbed into the ground affectively pinning it. The chameleon's eyes spun around wildly as its body faded and the heart it captured was released and Clayton's own body disappeared with it.
Sensing the danger had passed the gorillas returned to the thicket and looked at their saviors. The silver back gorilla Kerchack, approached Sora believing the boy could be trusted. He grabbed Sora by the arm and then tossed him high into the air so that he would land on top of the cliff near the waterfalls. The gorilla looked ready to do the same to us. "Um no, no, we're good, we'll climb." Kirito said, but the gorilla grabbed him anyway. "We'll CLIIIIIIMMMMB!" Kirito screamed as he too was thrown into the air. He landed on the cliff with a hard thud. "Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow." Kirito said as he was about to get up. However he was soon on the ground again as Asuna was thrown and she landed on top of him and he screamed in pain when she did. "Are you okay" Asuna asked? "I think my back is broken." Kirito replied. "Are you saying I'm heavy?" Asuna said in a teasing tone. "Could you please get off already?!" Kirito asked. "Fine." Asuna replied and left her position atop Kirito.
They had entered a cave that led directly behind the waterfalls. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous as they made their way across the series of vines and rock formations. At the top of the hidden cavern they found an entrance that led to a chamber deeper inside. The small cave was covered in moss and was home to a large number of blue butterflies. The insects departed from their position on the tree to reveal a keyhole like the one we found in wonderland. Knowing what to do this time, Sora used his keyblade and once again discharged another beam of light towards it. In similar fashion there was a locking sound followed by another nav gummi. "Sorry about what I said." Sora apologized to Donald. "I'm sorry too." Donald replied. Goofy laughed and placed both hands on the two. "All for one huh?" when Sora and Donald settled their argument a gorilla entered the cave and cozied up to Donald. "I think someone has a new admirer." Jane joked. Soon everyone was laughing at Donald as he shook his hands frantically. "No, no, no! Daisy would kill me!" his pleas went on unheard as they all continued to laugh at his expense.
