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28 - Complete And Utter Insanity

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Suni

Light. Light! Beautiful, burning, bright as anything I’d ever seen. It’d been drawing steadily nearer as we’d run, the Thick slowly emerging from darkness around us as the canopy thinned. And then we’d broken free, plunged through that last wall of foliage and stumbled, gasping, cheering, shouting, into the light of a new day just rising on the horizon.

“Ahhyeaah!” Gabar shouted, turning to roar at the Thick. He jabbed at it with both hands. “To hell with you! You shit excuse for a jungle.”

Maritza joined him, pumping her fists a few times, then unleashing a stream of profanity that left even Elpida blushing.

It was enough to make me smile, seeing the old helmswoman so excited. And why shouldn’t she be? We’d survived! Somehow, we’d survived.

But at what cost? Senesio... gone.

“Alright, alright. We’re not safe yet,” Elpida urged, driving us forward, as ever. “Five paces out of the Thick isn’t nearly enough.”

I turned to follow, then stopped.

No.

Senesio was still in there.

I hadn’t heard any screaming, but I hadn’t exactly been listening during our sprint. And besides, who knew how far we’d traveled from where he’d left us? Could we even still hear him if he did call out?

As if in response something exploded in the Thick. The foliage was too dense to show flame or a flash of light, but still a great boom thundered, shaking the earth. A shockwave rolled through the trees, leaves blasting into the air, then fluttering back down, trailing streams of smoke as they did. As they fell, more smoke rose to meet them. Dense and black, it vented through the canopy in a hundred thin plumes, seeping into the open sky through any gap it could find.

“Something tells me that was our last javelin-charge detonating,” Elpida said, squinting towards the blast.

“Son of a swindler,” I cursed under my breath. Had Senesio blown himself up? Tried to take the wendiguars with him? I hated to even imagine it. To think of him, alone, in his final moments and taking his own life...

I took a step forward, then looked to the side at the other survivors. Then back to the rising smoke.

I’d only met Senesio a few days ago but since then he’d become ever-present. He was so bloody boisterous, so loud. He made his presence felt. And now that it was gone... I didn’t know how to feel.

The man had saved my life on two occasions already. But now there was no way I could ever make it up to him. He was gone.

Dead.

Except, what was that? Even as I accepted Senesio’s fate, the madman broke through the tree line. He was trailing smoke, with soot blackening his arms and chest as he sprinted toward us.

Oz cheered. And then Maritza and Gabar. And then the whole group. I joined them, unable to contain the exhilaration racing through my veins. The madman had done it! Somehow, against all odds, he’d done it!

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Except, he wasn’t alone.

The cheers turned to screams.

A wendiguar was hot on his tail. It faltered only a step as it broke into the blinding light of the morning. Its skin was cracked and burned and its overly large eyes were inflamed and shot through with streaks of red.

“That’s... that’s unexpected behavior,” Oz said, mouth agape.

“It looks like he royally pissed it off,” Elpida said grimly.

“He’s not going to make it,” Maritza muttered. And she was right. Even as we watched the wendiguar closed the gap, then flung itself forward and tackled Senesio. The two went down in a great rolling heap of man and beast, burned flesh and burned cloth.

When they stopped rolling, the wendiguar had come out on top, one claw poised to strike.

I didn’t hesitate. Adrenaline surged through my veins.

I ripped the shield from Theo’s hands and sprinted forward.

The wendiguar’s first slash came down in a blur and I was too far away to stop it. Senesio pushed his forearm up and into the wendiguar’s own arm as the slash fell. He caught it in the wrist, driving it off target. The blow fell mostly high, but I could see it clip his ear before thudding into the ground and ripping a chunk of soil and grass free. Dirt sprayed into the air. Senesio coughed and blinked, then winced as the next blow fell.

He leaned away as best he could, which probably saved his neck from being torn apart. Nonetheless, the wendiguar opened four long future-scars from his shoulder to his waist. Thankfully, the claws found his belt buckle and caught on it, instead of sinking into his guts and disemboweling him.

Senesio cried out, then cursed. His fist caught the wendiguar in its eye and sent its head bouncing back like a child’s ball. Not that it did much to stop the next attack.

The wendiguar hissed and reared back, raising both claws this time and no doubt aiming for a lethal blow.

But too late. I’d reached them now. I was acting on instinct, without control of my body. Almost as if I was dreaming.

I came silently, flying through the air in a full-on dive, shield held out before me.

The wendiguar just had time to raise its eyes before I introduced the shield to its face. I slammed into it with a thunk so heavy it lifted the creature from Senesio’s chest and toppled it over backwards.

The world spun end over end and the wendiguar and I separated as we fell, then ended up a pace or so apart. The creature pulled itself to its feet, somewhat more slowly than it’d been moving before, and hissed.

I rose as well, shield still grasped in hand, sucked in a lungful of breath, and hissed back at the beast.

Now I knew I was dreaming.

The wendiguar, as well, seemed taken aback. Blinking through its bloodshot, and now bruised, eyes it cocked its head to the side as if confused.

And then I screamed. Or, more appropriately, roared.

I flung the shield to the side, swung my arms back, thrust my chest out, stomped forward, and full-on roared at the creature. My voice burst forth with all the strength of a person who’d forgotten fear, or self-preservation, or any of mankind’s more enfeebling characteristics. Spittle flew from my mouth, rage burned in my mind, and my arms shook with a barely restrained fury.

If, for me, this was a dream, for the wendiguar it was a nightmare. Between its burned flesh and seared eyes, bruised face and the blaring sun from above, it was having a particularly terrible day. The fearless human in front of it now was too much. It took a hesitant step backward, then another.

I pounced on the weakness and pressed the attack, stomping forward every time the wendiguar gave ground until the beast finally turned tail and—impossibly—retreated.

It ran. The ancestors cursed thing ran. From me. I’d never seen anything run from me except maybe loose paper, caught in the wind and whisked away when I forgot to weigh it down.

And yet, the wendiguar was running. It moved with all of its usual speed and in a matter of moments, was back into the Thick.

Only then did silence descend on the area.

I turned to find Senesio’s mouth hanging open. He took a tentative step toward me.

For a singular moment, I felt my mouth curve up into a smile. And then a cough burned through my hoarse throat. And another, and once more. My body shook and then, just like that, whatever had come over me was gone. I felt myself shrink, felt myself slump back into my normal meek self.

“Suni... ” Senesio said. He seemed, for perhaps the first time in his life, at a loss for words. “That... that was absolutely incredible.”

I looked down at my hands, then over my shoulder to the Thick.

“No, it was complete and utter insanity.” I backed away from the jungle the wendiguar had disappeared into. “What was I thinking?”