SURVIVIAL OF THE FITTEST

By Susan Zell

Disclaimers: See Chapter One

CHAPTER FIVE

"Choices"

Malone couldn't help but stare into the approaching darkness as the light faded from the sky. The night seemed to swell around them. Part of him was comforted by it and the rest of him was terrified by it, because he could not tell where the enemy was hiding. His rifle was at his side as he tugged along another of the thorny bushes toward the cliff. Veronica was hacking her way through another section, her knife rising and falling with a fervid rhythm. They were running out of time. At any moment, the sabertooths could converge on them. If they were to hold their ground here, then they needed protection.

Malone found it hard to believe that some thorny bushes could hold off these cats, but Veronica had explained that cats don't like complicated matters. It was a matter of making them work that much harder for a meal. It wasted their reserves of strength and sometimes, just sometimes, the cats would weigh one against the other and decide on conserving their energy for simpler prey. That was their only chance now. The fact that the big cats were starving didn't play well in their favor, but she had to hope that they were getting weaker, enough so that they were too exhausted to rush the barrier and the fire.

So much to consider just for a few hours time. So much to learn about just surviving. Everything here was about the difference between living and dying. Rarely was anything simple. There was no quick taxi ride from the hotel to the theater. No pondering of a delicious menu. Here it a journey, complete with weapons, provisions, equipment and complex knowledge of what they could come up against at any given moment. It was like having an adrenalin rush twenty four hours a day. How long could someone keep that up without making a mistake?

But then he saw the woman before him, determined and forceful. She had lived here twenty years and survived. Could she do it another twenty? And then another? Could he?

He reached for another tangle of bramble. "God, what I wouldn't give to be sitting in a café in London drinking a tonic right about now."

She paused a moment in her hacking and then continued on. "Right now, me too."

"Really?" He was so surprised he stopped his dragging. "You'd come to London?"

Veronica sighed. Leave it to Ned Malone to take that out of context. "No, I meant that I would rather be doing anything mundane than fighting off sabertooths all night."

"Oh. I thought--"

"I know what you thought, Malone." She straightened and grabbed a heavy load of thorny excess and proceeded to drag it away. Malone dutifully followed with his own stack.

"I just think you'd like London."

"I'm sure I would."

"Then why won't you even consider--"

"Because I'm needed here. I don't have time to waste sightseeing."

"Maybe it wouldn't just be sightseeing. London might win you over."

She snorted her thoughts on that matter.

It was so frustrating to Malone. She wouldn't even consider the fact that she might like London. Compared to this steamy, danger infested jungle it would seem like Wonderland. He remained silent, fuming at her stubbornness.

A sudden snap of twigs off to his left brought his attention back full focus on surviving again. The two of them hurried back to Roxton with their burden.

The hunter allowed the blood to flow for a bit down his leg. It was fascinating to watch in a way, with rivulets diverging around the muscles. He tried to clean it as best he could using the limited water from his canteen. Pulling bits of cloth and grass from the wound kept him concentrating for many minutes. So it surprised him slightly when Veronica and Malone crouched beside him, the zareba nearly complete. Malone was starting a fire beside him.

"How bad?" Veronica inquired.

"Bad enough," was the flat reply. "Though by morning, infection could set in. Cat claws are never clean." The hunter was more annoyed by the situation than in pain. He hated being labeled a liability.

Veronica scanned the darkness beyond the zareba. "I'll be right back." She rose to her feet.

Malone grabbed her arm. "Where are you going? You're not going out there?"

"Yes, I am. I know what Roxton needs to ward off infection and a fever. It's out there." She pointed into the darkness. "We passed by it when we were scouting."

"I know what else is out there right now. Big hungry cats! This isn't London. You're not running to the nearest pharmacy!"

She frowned at Malone, her brow creasing with annoyance. "That's right, Malone. This isn't London. This is my home. I know what I'm doing here." She shrugged off his hold. "You best get used to it."

She walked to the cliff wall at their backs and started scaling its rocky face. When she was about ten feet up she began crossing horizontally to the left. It wasn't long before the inky night swallowed her form. It made Malone ill to think she was going out there alone. Eventually rock would give way to grass and Veronica would be easy prey.

Malone stood at the zareba's edge with a rifle clutched in his hand, desperately searching for any sign of a sabertooth stalking Veronica.

"Make some noise," suggested Roxton, his head resting against the stone, his brow pinched with pain.

"What?" Malone looked back at the hunter in confusion.

"Keep the cats' attention on us, not her. Let's look appetizing."

"How?"

"Talk. Move around near the zareba's edge. Stagger a bit."

"Won't they charge us then?" Malone gripped the rifle tighter.

"Possibly. But wouldn't you rather have them come at us than at Veronica?"

That settled the issue. Malone would do anything to protect Veronica even if it meant risking his own safety. Of course, every time he did that, she became angry. Every time he mentioned London, she became angrier. Actually, most everything of late made her angry. And he didn't know why. Perhaps Roxton knew.

"I don't understand her sometimes. Everything I do seems to make her mad lately."

"You represent change, not always an easy thing to accept."

"Change? You mean taking her to London? You'd think she'd be excited to see some place new. She's never been there."

Roxton grinned sympathetically at the bewildered young man. "I think she wants to go; but she doesn't want to stay."

"I'm not asking her to, but I know that once she saw what she was missing, she'd love it. I mean, the theater, the trains, and restaurants. All the things she's missed all her life."

"She doesn't feel she's missed a thing."

"But she has! This world is so barbaric compared to ours. Can you imagine never having to sleep in fear? Never wondering where your next meal is coming from? Never being the next meal? She's just stubborn, afraid of the unknown."

"Afraid? I wouldn't say that. She's not some wallflower, Ned. She's not Gladys."

Malone cast a hard glare at the hunter. "I know that."

"I'm just saying she wants different things from life. Veronica's not interested in a cozy life. She's content where she is."

"Well, she should just come and look at London. Her heritage is there. It's where her parents were from. You'd think she'd be interested in seeing their home."

"She'd rather see them, in the flesh, safe and sound. She can't do that in London. That would be like admitting they're dead. You're making her choose between you and her parents. Don't go there, Neddy boy. You won't win."

Malone's temper waned. Suddenly he understood a little bit better the force of nature he was attempting to persuade. He had made a serious blunder on that front. He hadn't even thought about the implications he had set up with his innocent statements. What a fool, he was.

"I see what you mean," he admitted to Roxton. "I didn't mean it that way."

"I didn't think you did."

"But you think Veronica might have gotten the wrong impression?"

"It would explain the reaction you got." Roxton bent his head and retightened the tourniquet. His face twisted with pain in conjunction to the hard twists he gave the belt. The bleeding ebbed again. But it drained from his face as well. Malone made a move to come over to him, but the hunter waved him away. "I'm fine. Just stay there and keep looking appetizing." His words came in short, hard pants, but soon evened out. He leaned back against the cool stone again and fought off a shiver, despite the fact that his face was coated in a thin sheen of sweat.

"You know I would never mean to imply that her parents were dead. I just wanted to show her London."

"I know that and I think on some level she does too."

"I'm wouldn't try to stop her from coming back," Malone insisted.

He was gamely trying to keep an eye out on the brush and one eye on Roxton who was steadily looking worse. Not to mention trying to get his point across to Roxton. It wasn't often they had these kinds of talks, man to man, about...well....women.

"Of course not." Roxton had his eyes closed and his breathing was slowing, though his hand still clutched his leg in a vain attempt to hold back the agony.

"It would be only a short visit."

Roxton opened an incredulous eye. "It takes months even to get to London. That's no short visit. You're talking a half a year if not more in travel alone. That's if things go smoothly."

Malone looked sheepish. "But don't you think she's missing all the wonderful things we could show her?"

Roxton understood the lad all too well. There was a side of him that wanted to show Marguerite to his family, his friends, and London society in general. What heads would turn at the vision of her on his arm! But he also knew that it was probably the last place a woman like her would want to be seen. There was something incredibly mysterious about Marguerite Krux that defied every stature set down by society. And he had to bow to that fact and put aside his own fantasies. As would Malone.

"It's fleeting and fanciful, Malone," he said out loud. "You wouldn't be able to keep her there and you know it. Her mind would always be here."

Malone hung his head and heaved a great sigh. Of course, he knew it. Somewhere deep in his heart he knew it. But it didn't ease the wanting of her in his world. If only he could just show her a bit of it, maybe she would know what she was missing. He continually wondered what it would be like for her in London, or even in New York City. What would London think of her? What would the world? Would they tout her as jungle princess or as an oddity? And what about Gladys? What would she think? And would he care?

So many questions burned in his mind. He knew he wanted to go back, just in order to see what London thought of Challenger's findings. It was the reporter in him. But would he stay? Or would he be courageous enough to come back to this savage land that always wanted to kill them? Would he be satisfied so long as he was with Veronica?

His heart cried yes! But there were doubts also. Doubts about himself. Like whether he could survive in this land? Whether he was man enough to exist here without Veronica's constant help?

It was a question of his ego. True enough. If he had the fortitude and survival skills of Roxton, it wouldn't be such an issue. But he didn't. It had been almost a year and he still felt as ineffectual as ever. He was a liability more than a help. If something happened to Veronica, God forbid, after the others returned to London, would he ever be able to survive here alone? He was too afraid to even contemplate it right now. But if he was to decide to stay on the Plateau when the others finally found their way off, it was something he would have to eventually consider again someday. He'd have to know whether he could survive out here on his own.

What a complicated mess it all was, he thought.

He scanned the night listening for any sign of Veronica or the sabertooths. What was taking her so long? His gut continued to twist with worry.

Tbc

A/N: By the way, thanks everyone for reviewing. It means a lot.