Zahrah the Windseeker

  Zahrah

  Once they mentally collected themselves, my parents would probably call the authorities that very morning and maybe even alert the press or something. Regardless, because Kirki is such a small, tight-knit town, by afternoon, the news would spread fast.

  "Don't look back," I told myself. "Not until you've succeeded." I focused on the plants around me. They grew progressively stranger as the hours crept by. The trees grew much taller, their trunks wider. I saw palm trees that grew so high that when I stood at their bases and looked up, their tops disappeared into the low-hanging clouds. Some of them dropped coconuts the size of large computer monitors. I made sure not to walk directly underneath these trees.

  I saw seven long-armed, slow-moving furry black creatures with small heads sitting in some of the treetops. They looked down at me with curiosity, their large red eyes glowing like yam festival lanterns. Their heads could turn all the way around. I was afraid of them, but I had a feeling I could easily outrun them if I had to. They seemed more interested in eating the blue flowers in the trees, anyway.

  Soon after that, as I was walking, I came across a very large pink frog with gold polka dots! The same frog I had seen while I was sick from the blue mango. It was real. The frog seemed to purposely stand in my way. Its skin was smooth and moist, and it had big golden eyes and stood in my path with no intention of budging. And if a frog's face was capable of frowning, this one was doing so. Then it spoke!

  "What do you want?" it asked in a very annoyed voice, as if I were the one standing in its way and not the other way around.

  "Uh, nothing ... ma'am," I said, trying not to stare. It spoke with the voice of a tall, demanding woman, sort of like an older, less polite version of Nsibidi. I instantly went into the mode that I use with adults despite the fact that I was speaking to a frog.

  "Yes, you do," she said. "You allllll do."

  "N-no, ma'am," I insisted. "You must have the wrong—"

  She sighed loudly and rolled her eyes.

  "You can't remember?" she said. "Look at'cha! You shouldn't even be here. Your legs are too skinny, your arms aren't strong enough. You're food for trees, the bushes, the soil!"

  Her words made my heart race with fear. She was right and we both knew it.

  "Now wait just a minute," I said in a shaky voice.

  "I don't have a minute," she snapped. "I don't have a second. I don't acknowledge time. I'm too smart for that. I know everything already, o."

  "What do—"

  "Annoying, annoying," she said, cutting me off and hopping away. "Never know that you want what you want until you figure out that you want it, and by then you've just got to have it, but before that you don't know anything. Not my problem. Your loss and your hardship."

  I watched her hop into a bush, still grumbling nonsense. When I was sure she was gone, I just stood there, my heartbeat slowing. Soon I was wondering why the frog so upset me. Maybe, I thought, it gave off some substance that caused me to feel irrational fear. Like the spiders and their body-stunning breath. I shrugged and continued on my way. Yet another peculiarity of the jungle.

  Some time later, I passed a plant with a large green and orange striped pod that reached many feet high. It sat between two thick enormous waxy leaves. Once again, I listened to my instincts and walked a wide circle around it. And once again, my instincts proved correct. As I looked at the plant, a brown horse pranced directly in front of it.

  In a flash, the plant snapped up the horse, its pod opening into a large, powerful mouth. The plant had no teeth, but judging from the crunching sound and the blood that dribbled from the pod, it didn't need any. I felt nauseated but quickly moved on, committing the deadly plant to memory and vowing to look it up in the field guide.

  Each time I took a break, I practiced levitating. It was more out of respect for Dari than my actually wanting to. I'd sit, close my eyes, and concentrate. I didn't allow myself to float too high. Still, I had to admit I was getting better at it, feeling less shaky and slightly more at ease each time.

  I also read a little from the digi-book, when I could get it to work. It helped keep panic at bay. Because I was being bombarded with so many strange, dangerous things, educating myself about the jungle helped calm my nerves some. But the elgort entry continued saying "error" whenever I tried to access it, and sometimes the digi-book simply wouldn't turn on. What if it never turned back on?

  The farther I walked, the more I realized I needed it. "The Forbidden Greeny Jungle is so alive that you shouldn't be surprised when what you thought was a rock starts to walk away," the book said one of the times I got it to work. To me, this meant, Be suspicious of everything.

  The more I traveled, the more I felt amazed at just how right Dari was, just how right The Forbidden Greeny Jungle Field Guide was. The people of Ooni all lived rn a very small part of Ginen. They were very limited. They were living in ignorance, I had been living in ignorance.

  But I'd been happy as long as Dari was around. The jungle had always loomed just behind my village, but I'd never thought much about what was in it. At least not that deeply. Nor did I wonder about how far it went. I used to think the same way as almost every other person in the Ooni Kingdom; now I felt silly for it.

  When I was lonely, I talked to my compass.

  "Good day," the compass said in its chipper voice. "You're exactly nineteen miles north of your village and two thousand miles from sanity. From the information you typed into me, you are a thirteen-year-old girl who seeks to find an unfertilized elgort egg for your friend?"

  I held the compass to my mouth and said yes.

  "Then you are truly mad."

  I laughed as I stepped over a small fallen tree. I probed some leaves to make sure no snakes were hiding underneath them.

  "No, I'm merely on ... a mission," I told the compass. "Yes, a mission."

  The compass paused, processing what I said.

  "It is exactly three-thirty in the afternoon," the compass said.

  "What do you know of elgorts?" I asked the compass.

  "Nothing, but you are nineteen miles from home," the compass said.

  "But you do know that they are from the Greeny Jungle at least, " I said.

  "I am only programmed with a little information on Ooni culture and literature, medical, gardening, and marital advice, anecdotes, and children's stories," it said. "Turn back. If you go five miles a day, you'll make it back in four days."

  "I'm on a mission," I said, looking through the trees at the sky.

  Then I stopped to look at an ugly yellow fungus growing on the trunk of a tree. It throbbed slightly, as if it were breathing. "Aren't you in the slightest bit curious about this place?"

  "No," the compass said. "I only know the miles within the Ooni Kingdom."

  I nodded. The compass had been programmed with the same philosophy that kept all people, except the explorers who wrote the field guide, from seeking life beyond the borders of Ooni. It was useful in telling me where I was, but at that moment, I turned the compass off.

  Chapter 15

  The Whip Scorpion

  For several days, I was sure the jungle was trying to kill me. That maybe those farmers had been right after all and that the jungle was some giant superintelligent beast manipulating its enormous body and thinking of creative ways to cause my demise. It had lured me in with its mystery, but once I traveled far enough into its body, it closed around me and showed me what it was really like. And when it was finished playing with me, it would just swallow me up. These were the days when I looked death in the face and, because of this, learned how to survive.

  For a while, I was still bothered by my dirty clothes, which I couldn't change because I had no other clothes. I broke out in an itchy rash because of the heat and lack of bathing. Whenever I stepped under patches of sunlight, the rash itched horribly! But in desperate times, even old habits die, I guess.

  I was from the north, and that meant that I was used to tidy, clean, and civilized attir
e. Back home, I went through great pains every morning to make myself look just so. My hair had to be neat, my clothes perfectly matched, my shoes scuff free. It's just something you learn as you grow up, like the slang of your community.

  Still, my habit of obsessing over my appearance started leaving me the minute I began my journey. I had no choice, really, with all the sweating and the dirt and no place to bathe. But it left me completely the moment I realized that I could be much worse off than dirty, that I could die a very painful, ugly death. And that was when I came face to face with the giant scorpion.

  It came clambering down from a nearby tree while I made a snack of a mango. I now know what it's like to feel absolutely sure that death is moments away. What could I do against this thing?! The scorpion was an ancient-looking beast whose flat disk of a gray body was bigger than a grown man's! It was a scurrying nightmare. The scorpion hissed angrily as it moved on many thick pairs of legs armed with double rows of sharp spines. It clicked its large, scissorlike mandibles, a yellowish saliva dripping from them. Even from where I stood I could smell that saliva, or maybe the stench came from its entire body. The strong acidic odor stung my nose.

  I had encountered a scorpion once back home. It was standing quietly on the side of a tree, black, shiny, and smaller than the palm of my hand. I'd run inside and got my father, who flicked it into the bushes. Scorpions are deadly when they sting, but they sting only when attacked.

  This scorpion, though, was nothing like that scorpion back home. Aside from being far more aggressive and many, many times larger, it had no stinger. Instead, it had a large gray whip. And at the tip was a sharp piece of white cartilage the length of my arm that could slice more efficiently than the sharpest metal knife!

  I stumbled back, hunching low. I'd scrambled up a tree twice to escape a pack of bush dogs and outrun a small wild boar, but in this case, that wasn't going to help. This creature was obviously an adept tree climber. Unlike regular scorpions, which had eight legs, this one looked like it had a thousand! All of them very strong and nimble. My heart felt as if it would leap from my chest, and every part of my body quivered with adrenaline.

  The scorpion was only a few yards away, moving softly side to side as it studied me and prepared for the kill. It flicked its whip three times, sending sliced leaves and branches into the air. Yes, entire branches! It was that strong. I had to be quick, no matter what I did. It snapped its mandibles and cocked its tiny black head. The scorpion's large, shiny black eyes didn't fit the small size of its head and looked like bulbous black mirrors.

  Mirrors, I thought. I took in a short breath. Aha! I knew what I would do. It started coming just as I dropped down and grabbed the first large rock I saw. Still, I focused on getting the rock in my hand and didn't bother getting to my feet. I locked in on the rushing scorpion and threw the rock as hard as I could, aiming at its large mirror eyes. Then I rolled back.

  The rock connected perfectly with its target, and the scorpion's left eye burst on contact, oozing a black liquid.

  "Yeah!" I shouted. But what I'd done wasn't enough. It hissed, shaking its head, and wobbled forward. The beast kept coming, whipping its tail uncontrollably back and forth, slicing off more leaves and branches. I'll never forget the sharp whistling sound that it made. I threw myself back and shielded myself from the falling foliage, but not before the scorpion's whip flung forward and sliced my arm.

  "Ah!" I screamed, tumbling back farther.

  The scorpion's oozing eye must have been horribly painful, and because it couldn't see through it, it grew angrier. Its whip swung about faster and harder. I felt warm blood flowing from my wound, but I didn't have time to think about that. Even if it was confused, the scorpion still had one functioning eye and was much faster than me. I was too slow to get to my feet, so I rolled. But before I knew it, I had rolled myself into a tree and was cornered. I impulsively curled up.

  The scorpion hissed loudly, its sour mandibles dripping with yellow saliva. Even in pain, it anticipated a meal. I was breathing hard, very aware of my helplessness and doom. This thing would have no mercy with me. It must have thought I'd be an easy meal, and instead I had half blinded it. It snapped its whip only inches from my curled body; I could not only smell its breath but feel it. It was cool, like the mist that sometimes comes after the dry-season rains.

  This is the last thing that I'll remember, I thought. That this monster isn't warm and alive on the inside, but dead and cold. I curled into a tighter ball, hoping that this position would make whatever it did to me less painful. At least I got one good hit in, I thought. After it eats me, it'll never forget me. Maybe it'll think twice about attacking other human beings.

  My eyes were squeezed shut when the loud roar came. I didn't open them until I realized that moments had passed and I was still alive. I opened them just in time to see the scorpion's head drop at my feet, its burst eye still oozing. Then I looked up and screamed. I was almost eye to eye with the head of what I could only describe as a giant tortoise! The size of a large car! Its eyes were as big as dinner plates, the whites white as glow-lily pollen, and the irises a deep turquoise-blue like ghost flies. Its skin was a papery light green, and its jaws were so strong that it could snap off a scorpion's head with one chomp.

  But this wasn't its only head! It had two! Its other head was busy with the scorpion's whip. Another chomp, and the thick whip fell to the ground like a dead tree branch! After I screamed, I could only gawk as the giant tortoise cracked the scorpion's hard shell with its powerful jaw and began to feast on its now limp body with both of its heads! The wet meaty sound and inky color of the scorpion's blood, which covered the tortoise's mouths and oozed out of the scorpion's body, made me gag with disgust. I looked away from the tortoise's heads and focused on the rest of its body. Its legs were stocky and its shell was covered with lush green moss and many leafy purple orchids and vinelike roots. I focused on the orchid flowers, too terrified to run away or even move.

  Several minutes passed as the tortoise ate. I felt like I was frozen in time, and I didn't want time to start up again because once it did, I was surely next on this beast's menu. Then the tortoise raised its heads, gave a grunt, and ran its gooey-looking tongue over its lips. And turning, without so much as a glance my way, it lumbered back into the bushes.

  I sat listening to it stomp away. The jungle had gone completely silent, and I could hear the tortoise for several more minutes. As I listened, tears dropped from my eyes and snot dripped from my nose. The air smelled of the scorpion's acidic blood and freshly cut leaves and branches. I was still shaking and felt very cold.

  "How!" I whispered, slowly uncurling myself. I averted my eyes from what was left of the very creature that had just tried to eat me. I was alive only by chance! "How am I going to do this?" I said aloud.

  I sobbed and for a moment was overcome by my shaking body. I wrapped my arms around myself. This was only the beginning. I wasn't a trained explorer, and my friend was in a coma. Anything could eat me. I was on the same rung of the food chain as a minor rodent. If even that. Easy prey. And no one could save me. No one even knew where I was! Only a few days before, I was home safe with my parents, hanging out with Dari on the network; now I was alone in a place where it was "kill or be killed" or "be killed while trying to kill!"

  For a long time, I sat there in the dirt shaking and sobbing. My eyes grew puffy. My nose ran onto my sandals. My head throbbed. What was left of the dead scorpion began to smell more bitter and acidic in death, but still I didn't move. All I thought about was Dari and how helpless I felt. And all I could do was wallow in my misery, self-pity, and shock.

  But after a while, I quieted and grew more still. I could hear the caw of a palm-tree crow. Palm-tree crows were also common in Kirki, and the sound helped bring me back to reality. The reality was there was no turning back, and if I wanted to live, I had to move on.

  "At least it's dead," I said to myself as I slowly stood up. "And it didn't kill me."

&
nbsp; As I straightened up, I felt slightly dizzy and a little off balance. I looked at my bleeding arm, peeking underneath my dirty, now ripped shirt. The cut wasn't that deep, but I could smell a little of the acidic odor coming from the wound. Another wave of dizziness hit me. I shook my head and fought back more tears as something really bad dawned on me. I stepped over to my satchel and bundle, which were still under the tree where I'd left them. The satchel was open and all my food was gone. Bush cows must have got into my things as I was being attacked.

  But I had a feeling that that was the least of my problems. With trembling hands, I picked up and opened the field guide to find out if what I suspected was true. Thankfully, the field guide turned on after the second try. It was easy to find the entry on the scorpion.

  If you've survived an attack by a whip scorpion, congratulations. There's hope for you yet. This is really one of the first truly deadly Greeny Jungle creatures you'll encounter. Sure there are also bush dogs, carnivorous plants, and flesh-eating maggots, but the whip scorpion is not only lethal but highly intelligent. You can't escape it. You must murder it or be murdered. And bringing one down is not easy. If you had a gun, you must have aimed for the eyes. If you had a bow and arrow, you must have aimed for the eyes. If you had a barbed spear, you must have aimed for the eyes. If you had none of these, we have no idea how you're alive!

  They forgot to consider sharp rocks, I thought. And the help of a disgusting, giant, plant-covered, two-headed tortoise with a big appetite. I yawned, feeling extremely tired. Suddenly, all I wanted to do was sleep. I skipped several paragraphs.

  If you're cut by that infernal whip scorpion's whip, you have good reason to worry. Whip scorpion poison is lethal. If it's a big gash, well, you will probably die in a matter of minutes from the bleeding and poison combined. But if it's a small cut, a tiny blue rash will appear around it and it will be very itchy. Do not scratch. If you scratch at it, you'll get poison under your nails. Most of us will agree, itchiness under the nails is agony.