Despite his best efforts, Miguel was drifting in and out of consciousness. He was neither a night-owl-type nor an early-bird-type, but the type who prefers going to bed early and then a solid night’s sleep, until noon, if possible. So when Candace woke him in the murky pre-dawn hours to change her keeping watch, he was barely lucid enough to protest.

He'd give everything for a cup of coffee!

Or a can of an energy drink.

Or several.

In the world he left behind, his caffeine intake was rather substantial, and being cut off like this did not help him perform his night watch duty.

With no other way to keep himself awake, he kept walking the so-called perimeter, a small circle of fires and straw scarecrows they placed around their camp to ward off predators. He had no faith in it actually working, but then again, he was not in any more danger walking around than sitting by the fire. Any predator peckish for a snack could have easily snatched him up either way.

Sure, he had his 'scary' poncho on, and Candace gave him a torch and a bamboo spear to defend himself, but he had no illusions about his chances. While his fight-or-flight instinct was in high gear, his actual ability to do either was rather poor. He hasn't run or even jogged in over twenty years, and all his fighting experience was limited to being occasionally pummeled by Cartel goons for perceived tardiness in the production of meth. But he knew that curling into a fetal position and apologizing profusely, which worked on bored criminals, would not work on a wild animal.

All those thoughts sprinted through his mind within a single second, along with a sudden jolt of crisp alertness, when he heard the laugh.

A-hah. Yahaha yayhahaha… a sound that started almost like a peal of demented human laughter but ended with an ululating yelp.

“Candace. Candace!!” He yelled, not taking his eyes off the dark wall of the woods from which the sound emerged. “Wake up! These aren't fucking dogs, not dogs… O Madre…”

She bounced up, immediately awake, and grabbed her spear. So did Martinez, who took a handful of kindling and threw it into the fire. The flames burst higher, throwing light at the distant bushes. It reflected from a dozen pairs of eyes that shone like polished nickels.

“Miguel, get back to us. Slowly.”

He backed off until he stood shoulder to shoulder with her, spears at the ready.

“Behind! Behind!” Sveta screamed.

They turned around, only to see more dark shapes with shiny eyes skulk around the darkness on the opposite side of their circle of light. The shadows burst with more monstrous giggling, coming from all directions. They were surrounded. on all sides, except for the beach.

“Nobody makes any sudden moves,” said Martinez with icy calm. “Bunch up together, close to me and the fire. Spread your ponchos so you’ll look big.”

“Should we burn the fire higher? Scare them off?” Miguel asked.

“With what, Gordo? We barely have enough firewood to last until morning. We’ll run out.” Martinez did not look away from the shining pinpoints around them and tensed with the intensity of a raptor bird. “Besides, fire is only a small obstacle for them. We cannot count on it.”

“So what do we do? We fight them?” Miguel clutched the spear with a white-knuckled grip, unsure what to actually do with it if it came to a fight.

“No, cabron, we are not going to win a fight against a pack of hyenas. You run.” Martinez responded with a wry smile.

“But how... you can’t…”

“Yeah, you will leave me behind.”

“The fuck we won’t!” said Candace. “I ain't leaving you to be eaten alive!”

Martinez sighed. “Yes Candace, you will, and you know this.” he reached and touched her hand briefly. “If the hyenas attack, you must do the sensible thing, take these idiots and run. You would have no chance of fending them off, and only die pointlessly if you stay.”

“We can’t outrun them!” Miguel hissed.

“Oh, I know you can’t, Gordo,” Martinez smirked, “you don’t look like much of a sprinter to me.” He pointed at the river. “You need to outswim them. Dogs don’t swim all that fast, and I assume neither do hyenas. Your buoyant ass should be able to get away from them if you really push it.”

“I can't swim,” said Miguel, “at least not very good. I don't think I will be able to escape them.”

“Well, you’ll soon have an excellent opportunity to learn, and the motivation to do your best.”

“Maybe.. maybe the girls should go, and I should stay behind with you, try to distract them?” Miguel whispered, eyes downcast.

“Don't be an idiot, Gordo.. Look at those things, they’re fucking huge. Do you think you'd even slow them down? No. When the time comes, just leave me and run.” Martinez said, his tone calm, full of strange acceptance.

Miguel did look. Even in the predawn twilight, he could see clearly that the hyenas were enormous. The smallest one was already bigger than any dog he had ever seen, but some of the shapes moving between the bushes were closer to the size of a bear.

“So what, should we just leave you to die?”

“Yeah, but we’ll see once we get there, they are not attacking yet.”

Indeed, the hyenas did not seem to be rushing to attack them. Instead, they circled them lazily. Having their prey pretty much surrounded, they did not need to hurry. They kept moving around, yelping and barking as if purposely trying to keep the humans on edge.

The sun broke the horizon and covered the meadow in the predawn light. The hope Miguel had about fending off the hyenas was dashed. At first, he thought there were only a few of them, maybe eight or nine, but the sunlight showed easily over a dozen of the things, and the noises in the bushes suggested another dozen lurking nearby. In a fight, they would be torn to shreds in seconds.

Miguel prayed the pack would simply get bored and leave. But he knew how unlikely that was, they were juicy, defenseless targets only protected by their unfamiliar scent and billowing ponchos, which made the hyenas wary of approaching them.

For now.

The morning came, oblivious to the tension in the meadow. They burned the last bit of their kindling and sacrificed the teepee to the fire, but the flames started dying anyway. All the other bonfires burned to ash long before that, and the pack inched closer. The animals did circle away from the makeshift scarecrows, but only just so, more in wariness than fear.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

With the girls and Miguel keeping watch, Candace returned to the hopeless attempts to break the rock and release Martinez. They all knew it could not work, not without fire and steam they could not produce. Whenever any of them strayed more than two steps away from the group, either to find more firewood or to reach the river, the hyenas yelped excitedly and moved a few steps forward, in a complex, chess-like dance in which they kept circling them and trading places with one another, and almost imperceptibly moving closer, to a more favorable position.

The biggest one, a shaggy beast the size of a small bear, positioned itself in front of Martinez, staring right at him.

“Must be the Alpha female,” Martinez said.

“What?” Miguel noticed he had been crouching with tensed muscles for hours. Hearing someone finally speak up aloud almost made him jump.

“The big girl.” Martinez pointed at the shaggy beast. “I saw it on television. Hyenas are ruled by the biggest mom. Grandma maybe? Alpha bitch. Gotta be her right here. Sizing us up before they attack.”

Candace leaned closer to him, with a coconut-sized stone in hand . “Well, just like us, then. Should I show her who’s the baddest Alpha bitch around and pitch that rock at her cunt of a face?”

“Huh.” he hesitated. “I don’t know. I don’t think we should antagonize them. Not yet, at least. But we should definitely show we are not afraid. No cowering, no panicky moves, look straight at them but not like, an actual eye contact?”

“How do you know that?” Miguel asked. “You saw it on TV?”

“Nah. Had basic training about fending off attack dogs. Show no fear but also no aggression unless you really have to, and then go fucking apeshit on them. Dogs are animals, not machines, and are not crazy, they quit the fight before you do.”

“Raul, these are not dogs. These are damned pony-sized monster hyenas.” Miguel said, but he straightened up and looked around, trying to radiate confidence and menace.

And then, he heard the most unexpected sound. A whooping yell of joy came off the river.

People!

And then, to his absolute horror, several things happened at once.

The girls heard the whoop too, and, foregoing all caution, Nata started running towards the beach. Candace lunged after her, trying to stop and shut her up, but the sudden movement set the hyenas off. They rushed at them from all sides with a giggling battlecry.

She gave Miguel a quick, terrified look, and rather than trying to go back, pushed Nata towards the water, with two shaggy shapes crashing through the reeds to pursue them.

Miguel wanted to run after them but, realizing he would abandon Martinez if he did, stood his ground instead. Throwing his arms around, he let the poncho with the snarling face on it spread, and whirred his bamboo spear overhead.

“No!” he yelled at the approaching hyena, as it was a bad dog to be disciplined.

Amazingly, the beast stopped, confused, but it was all in vain, as its packmates circled around Miguel, giving him a wide berth.

“Grab Sveta and run.” Martinez whispered.

“But-” he started, but Raul gave him a quick, pleading look.

“I'm so sorry-”

“Go!”

Blinded with sudden tears, Miguel turned around and ran towards Candace and Nata, catching Sveta’s arm and pulling her over the shoulder. Fear and adrenaline gave him strength he never thought he had. He waded chest-deep into the water, and pitched Sveta towards Candace, who pulled the girl further.

Miguel was about to kick off and try to swim after them, when he heard a thump and a string of angry cursing.

“Hey, you bitch-ass whore cunts, over here! Come at me, you fucking shits!...” Martinez lobed another big chunk of rock at the Alpha hyena, hitting it on the massive shoulder. It yelped, and the whole pack homed in on him, snarling.

Miguel froze, unable to look away. A ring of hyenas closed around Raul, who kept throwing stones at them. For a second, the beasts paused, the Alpha and Martinez staring at one another tensely.

Then, without a warning, the smallest, scrawniest hyena burst from the circle, and attacked Martinez from behind, trying to catch him off guard.

Which was what Martinez must have been expecting.

He twisted around, as far as was possible with his legs stuck in the rock, and slammed the pouncing hyena in the head with a melon-sized stone.

It impacted with a wet, meaty crunch, and the animal staggered away, then fell to the ground in dying spasms.

Miguel saw Martinez flash a predatory smile of victory, almost as scary as a hyena’s snarl.

For a second, the meadow was still and silent, save for the low whine of the dying hyena.

Then the whole pack pounced at once, crushing their opponent with a dozen bites that tore him apart nearly instantly.

“Gordo, come on!” Candace yelled.

He turned around and readied himself to dive forward.

He was not a swimmer.

Not at all.

But he only needed to not drown for a little bit, barely float…

And just as he was about to jump head first into the current, he felt powerful jaws close on his flank, cutting through skin and flesh like it was soft butter. He fell face-forward, with a heavy beast on his back, pressing him underwater.

He tried to scream, but it only made him inhale water.

Pushing against the bottom, which suddenly moved under him, he managed to surface.

The hyena lost its footing too, and was frantically trying to keep its head above the surface without releasing its prey.

And then he heard an ear-splitting scream.

It was not his scream, even though he was in agony.

It was a defiant, if terrified, roar of three enraged women. And then a bamboo spear passed by his shoulder and stabbed into his tormentor, soon followed by an enraged Australian Amazon who pushed at the spear hard enough to nearly pole-vault over both of them.

The hyena, having its snout pushed underwater, panicked and released him.

And Miguel, despite the debilitating pain and fear, did something he never tried doing before in his life.

He fought back.

The beast was far stronger, far more dangerous, and likely a better swimmer than he was.

But he was much heavier.

He grabbed it by the neck, in the strongest two-handed grip he could manage, and keeping away from the snapping maw, pushed its head down, putting all his weight into it.

As they struggled, the current pulled them away from the shore. Miguel was drowning. Keeping the hyena under the surface meant he also had to dive underwater on top of it, and in all the tumbling and panicking, he filled his lungs with water.

He was losing his strength. The only reason the hyena had not yet torn out of his grasp, resurfaced, and savaged him, was because it was panicking just as badly as he was.

And then he felt a tug and lost the grip on it. But his enemy did not surface. He saw it splash a bite at empty water and then disappear underneath.

“Candace!” he coughed, spitting water. He tried floating on his back, because, with the ragged hole in his side, actual swimming was out of the question.

He saw Sveta and Nata bobbing further down the river.

He felt weak and dizzy.

Something burst out of the water and grabbed him. He yelped and tried to push it away.

“Gordo! It's me! Calm down!” Candace pulled him closer and put him in a rescue grip, keeping his face over the surface.

“Where is it?! Candace…”

“Calm. Down. It’s dead. Drowned.” she said.

“What?”

“You got the right idea. They're shite at diving. I grabbed its hind paws, pulled the fucker under. It ran out of air before I did.”

“It bit me…” he croaked, his mind at the edge of losing consciousness.

“No shit, mate. You bleed like a fucking tampon failure.” She pressed at his wound and managed to pinch it close, making him wheeze in agony. “We’ll patch ya up somehow.”

“The girls?” he was getting limp, overcome with a strange calm.

“They fine as apples. We’ll catch up to them soon. Don’t ya faint on me Gordo. Ain't hauling your unconscious arse ashore.”

“Martinez…”

“Shut up about him.”

“But…” he could see the scene of Raul’s death in his mind. It played over and over.

“Shut. Your. Gob,” she growled. “Not a word. He died. Girls did not see it. But I did, and I wish I didn’t. He died a fucking hero, end of story.”

Miguel silently agreed.

It was his last thought before he lost consciousness.