“Cat’s claw vine.” She turned to him. “Pierce your gloves?”
Dan grimaced and had his glove peeled down. “Bastards went straight through.”
“Yeah.” She held it out, showing him the half-inch hooks at the base of each leaf stem. “Evolved to stop them from being eaten. But they’re big and sharp enough to pierce boot leather.”
“Okay, spray it, slap a bandage on it, and let’s keep moving.” Ben waved them on.
Dan held up his bleeding hand. “Little sympathy here.”
Jenny quickly leaned in and kissed his cheek. “There, all better now?” She tossed the vine out and away from them.
By late morning, the drizzle continued, and in the spaces between the overhead branches, there was only a thick cloud cover showing. Steve was now taking his turn leading them out. He was also the first one into the heavy bog.
“Crap.” He tried to pull on his legs, but they were mired to the knees. He grunted and managed to lift one leg up, but it forced the other deeper.
Ben was only about twenty feet behind him and came as fast as he could but stopped before the oily-looking area Steve had wallowed into.
“Lay flat,” Ben said. “Might be quick mud.”
“Ah, Jesus.” Steve turned about, obviously not wanting to get coated in the oily sludge. Close by was a tree with one limb hanging out fairly close to him. So instead, he strained to reach it.
“Stop there!” Ben yelled, freezing the man.
By now, the group had hauled themselves closer but also froze. Ben pointed to the man. “Lower your hand, and lay flat, now.” He followed the tree branch up the limb and then higher.
Steve did as he was asked, lying out on his belly. “What? What is it?”
Jenny narrowed her eyes. “Bullet ants… in the tree. Very bad.”
Ben had spotted the machine-like insects on the tree limb — he’d met them before, and Jenny’s summation of very bad didn’t even begin to describe the little monsters. The inch-long ants had enormous jaws and a sting that felt like an electric shock. Their nests were usually on the ground, but they spent their time in tree canopies. Any perceived threat to the ants, the nest, or the trees, elicited an overwhelming and sometimes deadly attack.
Steve was just a head and neck showing now, and he tried to turn to look up at the branch. “Do they —?”
“Yes, and damn painfully.” Ben dropped his pack in the sludge and pulled it open, dragging out some rope. “You grab that branch, they’d swarm down onto you.”
He threw one end to Steve and handed the rest to the team. “Stay flat and swim towards us.” He half turned. “On three, two, one… heave.” They tugged, sliding Steve out of the bog.
The young carpenter got to his feet, coated in the thick, oily mess. “Thanks.” He scowled as he wiped himself down. “Nothing a shower and a couple of margaritas won’t fix.” He held something up that was dripping with mud.
Andrea giggled, and Steve immediately brightened. “What did you find?” she asked.
Ben shook his head. Great idea; take a team of novices into the Amazon — what could possibly go wrong? he thought.
“There was something in there,” Steve said, showing them what looked like a broken bowl.
“Let me see that,” Jenny said, pushing forward.
Steve scraped more mud from the shard and handed it to her. Jenny got her water bottle and splashed some on it.
“Hey,” Ben said sharply.
“Just a bit,” Jenny said, rubbing at the pottery, and then holding it in front of her face. “Old, very old.”
Dan grinned. “You just found yourself a souvenir, buddy.”
Steve wiped more greasy mud down from his shirt. “Yeah, definitely worth it.”
“So, there were people here once,” Emma said.
“A long time ago maybe,” Jenny replied distractedly. “This looks Mayan, but not as stylized. It’s more primitive.”
“More primitive?” Dan scoffed. “I thought those guys were first here about 4,000 years ago. How could it be more primitive than that?”
“Maybe it’s not. Maybe they were here after the Mayans — a separate race.” Jenny rubbed more of the mud from the images carved into the bowl.
Ben came in closer and saw there were small figures, many tied together by ropes around their necks. They were being herded towards some sort of large slit-eyed gargoyle thing.
“Reminds me a little of the carving on the rock face in the stream. Might be the same people.”
“Long gone now, I’d say.” Emma looked around. “Might have been washed down from somewhere.”
Jenny handed the pottery back to Steve. “Well, someone had to be here originally to start all the myth-making.”
Steve took the bowl and went to take his pack off his shoulders, but Ben shook his head.
“Leave it, Steve. You don’t need the extra weight right now.”
“Aww.” He looked at it again. “Might be valuable.”
“And if it is, then our antiquities department will never let you take it from our country.” Nino shrugged. “Sorry.”
“I’ll pay any duties on it,” Dan said. “He swam in quick mud to rescue that; he deserves it.”
“Yep.” Steve searched for a moment and then selected a large tree where he placed the bowl at its base. “I’ll see you on the way back.”
“Finished?” Ben sighed and then waved them on. “Come on, and everyone keep their wits about them, and touch…”
“Nothing,” they said back in unison.
In another hour, Ben broke from the swamp and out into a landscape of tree ferns that reached onward and gradually upward into the distance. He shook off his backpack and gloves, and wiped his brow. Even with his large and battle-hardened frame, he felt a little dizzy with fatigue.
“See here.” Nino crouched just at the edge of the forest. There was a ring of stones, and at its center burned remains of a fire as well as some fish bones. He dipped fingers into the ash and rubbed them together for a moment before standing.
“Less than half a day.” He walked slowly around the stones, contemplating the ground. “Three, four people, all big men.”
Ben pulled out some field glasses and surveyed the distance. There was nothing showing, but even though they were leaving the canopy cover of the jungle, the plain of tree ferns still grew to a height of about 10 feet, throwing out broad umbrella-like fronds.
“This was their camp before they headed off up the slope. We’re not far behind.” He put his glasses back in their pouch. “But means they’re in front of us.”
“Question?” Dan held up a finger. “What happens when we actually catch up to them… or them to us?”
Ben grinned. “That all depends on whether they’re the ones who have my map.”
“Oh yeah.” Dan saluted with a grin. “Then you’re in charge of negotiations.”
The slope became steeper, and the climb more energy sapping. After another few hours, it leveled back out and they took a quick break. Looking back down from where they had just climbed, they could see the near endless jungle from which they had just trekked. As Ben expected, though they had traversed a river and stream for many miles, both were invisible below, and the jungle looked dense and unbroken.
“Hey.” Steve had out his GPS and turned one way, then the other. “Same with my compass.”
“What’s up?” Emma asked.
“Look.” He held out the device. “It says signal interruption. And the compass is just going haywire.”
They crowded around, all offering advice, suggestions, and possible solutions.
“Oh shit.” Ben quickly tried his phone and found that there was no reception, even though he should’ve been able to pick up any communication satellite anywhere with the new phone he specially obtained. “No signal on the phones as well. What the hell’s going on?”