Story Imp [Fanfic in the Tankiverse]

[Hippin_in_Hawaii 639]

 

Previous Chapters:

Hek

Cro

 

Imp

 

He hated to leave Hek and Cro behind, but the Mac situation had to be investigated, and Imp was the only one able to travel effectively. He took a compass bearing on the farthest tree he could see that was due west, and headed out.

Imp had been raised as an outdoorsman. Moving silently through the undergrowth came naturally to him, as did the unconscious observation that so puzzled his teammates. Imp’s brain excelled at piecing things together, and he did not like the shape that this puzzle was beginning to form.

That they had been sabotaged, Imp had no doubt. The ping of the stator locks engaging was a distinctive, unique sound; he wasn’t mistaken about that. Getting those locks to engage would require some fairly advanced hacking. He didn’t know this for a fact, and he certainly didn’t have the skills to do it, but it stood to reason. Multi-million credit aircraft simply don’t have a “ruin the engines” switch. So, someone on the plane wanted it disabled; wanted it to crash out here in the middle of the jungle. Why?

Then there was Mac. Mac had failed to respond to any communications traffic, despite being well within range. Had his ‘chute actually failed to deploy, or had Mac staged that, counting on the emergency ‘chute to get him down first so he could disappear? Imp didn’t have enough information to know, but the possibility was worrisome. If Mac were the saboteur, and Imp were to find him alone out here in the jungle, how might that encounter play out?

After a bit over an hour, Imp heard the sound of running water. Soon he was standing on the bank of a small river. The bank was steep, slick-looking, and riddled with tree roots; more of a giant erosion gully than a proper riverbank. The other side was only about five meters away. The water was smooth, but the bits of jungle flotsam on the surface were moving quickly from right to left. So, the current was fast, and the water was deep. The banks would be difficult to climb. Trying to cross this was clearly a Bad Idea.

Imp pulled out his NetHand. “Imp to Hek. Imp to Hek. Respond, please. Over.”

“Hek here,” came her feminine voice from the tiny speaker. “Go ahead. Over.”

“I’ve come to a waterway, flowing roughly from north to south. Not easily fordable. I’m going to send a few emergency pulses and see if I get a response from Mac. If not, I’ll scout around for a crossing. Over.”

“Acknowledged. Over.”

“How are things there? Over.”

“Cro is about halfway free. I’m setting up a camp. So far, we haven’t heard anything more. Over.”

“Copy that. Over and out.” Imp swiped over to the emergency beacon and triggered a pulse. He then backtrack a little to where he’d passed a Maracuya vine. Most of the fruits had gotten overripe and fallen to the ground; their pulpy masses covered in flies and ants, but a couple were still intact on the vine. He plucked one, sliced the top off, and squeezed the contents into his mouth. They’d never been his favorites: too many seeds. Still, free food was free food.

After 10 minutes had passed, Imp sent another emergency pulse. Seconds ticked by, turning into a minute. There was no reply.

Imp picked the other fruit and walked back to the river. Stream? It was narrow enough that the trees on either side still merged their branches in an unbroken canopy, so it couldn’t be seen from above. It was wide and deep enough that crossing it wasn’t practical. Imp looked thoughtfully up the waterway to the north, spending several minutes peering at the banks and the surface of the water. Then he did the same thing looking to the south. Neither direction looked particularly promising.

“When in doubt, go with the flow,” he said to himself, repeating folk wisdom shared by his grandfather. He headed south, sucking the contents from the fruit in his hand.

He heard the monkeys long before he saw them. They were chattering and having a fine time, close to the ground, not far ahead. Imp guessed they were playing in the river. Did that mean a calm place? Maybe a safe place to cross? The breeze, what little there was of it, was in his face; Imp slid forward with the stealth of cat.

A smallish tree had toppled into the river, its roots undercut by erosion. The monkeys were all on that trunk, using it as a ramp to get down to the water. The upper branches reached up through the water’s surface from the submerged bole; some of the monkeys were enjoying a bath, holding onto those limbs to avoid being swept away. A tree like that would make it easier to escape the river on this side, but it didn’t do much in terms of facilitating a crossing. Still, if Mac had tried to swim across from the far side, the current may have carried him here. There would be signs of his exit.

There were a lot of monkeys. More than 30. There were babies and children. Imp mentally sighed. He didn’t want to end up engaged in monkey combat. The large ones were big enough to pose a serious threat; their fangs were several centimeters long. Even if they weren’t in the mood for a fight, monkeys were notoriously resentful of intruders; the best he could hope for was to have them in the trees above him, flinging sticks and excrement, and urinating on his head.

He squatted and pondered his options. Avoiding them was certainly possible. He could either circle around and continue scouting farther downstream, or backtrack and check out the upstream bank. But an easy access point like this deserved a proper look-see. If Mac had found this tree, there’s a fair chance he would have tried to cross here.

Imp eyed the sky, the tiny flashes he could see through the green canopy overhead. He had maybe two hours before he’d have to choose between rejoining Hek and Cro or overnighting alone in the jungle. What to do?

Suddenly the timbre of the monkeys’ noise changed radically. Where it had been raucous before, the sound of a large family gathering, it now sounded frantic. Imp slid forward to peer between some fronds. The monkeys had abandoned the fallen trunk. Most of them were up in the limbs of adjacent trees; a few were perched on the edge of the riverbank, screeching down at the water. Imp couldn’t see what they were yelling at, but an easy guess was that some water-dwelling predator had made, or tried to make, a quick snack of a monkey.

He settled further back into concealment. The monkeys would likely move on now that they no longer felt safe; he need only be patient. It was a shame he hadn’t seen the actual incident. Was the predator large enough to threaten a person? Had it been a black caiman? An anaconda? Maybe even a giant river otter? He would dearly love to see one of those!

Regardless, the presence of a river predator only served to confirm Imp’s assessment that crossing to look for Mac was a Bad Idea.

After maybe 20 minutes, he no longer heard any trace of the monkeys. Carefully moving forward, peering out through gaps in the foliage, Imp spent an honest five minutes surveilling the area before gently breaking cover and stepping out. There were no monkeys to be seen. He cautiously approached the fallen tree, looking for signs that someone may have climbed out of the river here.

The monkeys had done a bang-up job of complicating that task. Any subtle traces like a boot print or a drip trail would have been obliterated by monkey shenanigans. Imp instead focused on the outskirts of the clearing where a person would have to force their way into the undergrowth. He was careful and methodical, still mindful of the possibility that Mac may be trying to avoid detection. After nearly half an hour, Imp was sure that if anyone had been here, it was someone whose skills at woodcraft exceeded his own. More likely, though, no one had been here.

He toggled another emergency pulse then continued south.

Over the next hour, he did encounter a couple of other places were escaping the river on this side would be marginally easier than trying to climb the steep bank. Neither of them showed any sign of use.

“So much for downstream,” he thought to himself as he pulled out his NetHand.

“Imp to Hek. Imp to Hek. Over.”

“Cro … ...al weak… ver.”

Huh. The range on these little units was really pitiful. Imp swiped to the Morse app and began typing. It was a much simpler signal than voice or data, just a radio pulse, so should carry better. He carefully typed in “no sign stop return q stop over”. He set the transmit option to slow and the repeat for three times, then pressed the initiate button. Imp was perfectly capable of tapping out his own message, but why not let the device handle the tedium?

A few moments passed before a return message came in. Imp deciphered it in his head even as the NetHand provided a letter-by-letter readout. Dot-dot-dash: U. Dash-dot: N. Dash-dot-dot: D. “understood stop confirm return stop enabling beacon stop over out”.

Imp nodded and swiped over to directional tracking. The NetHand would lead him straight back to his teammates, taking the uncertainty of compass-based orienteering out of the equation. Actually, Imp reflected, since he had no map, it wasn’t even orienteering, it was dead reckoning.

“Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!” He quoted his grandfather to himself as he headed back.

 

 

 

Mahalo (thank you) for reading; I hope you enjoyed! This story is part of a series. Information on the series, and links to the other stories, can be found here.

[Lose 881]

nice one 

[TankiNoob2000 231]

Why I must say, muy bueno;)

[Person_Random 4,991]

My new catchphrase: PME.  Nice work!  Also, by the way, will all characters have three-letter names?  Also, I'd suggest more descriptive dialogue.  (How i get through these is by not adding dialogue, which is probably worse)

[shafter9 156]

Maybe the three-letter names are a sort of standardized call sign thing.

[Hippin_in_Hawaii 639]

The naming convention will become pretty clear in another chapter or two. The fact that all of the names so far lend themselves to three letter nicknames isn't significant, unless you're trying to figure out what the theme is. Imp, Hek, Mac, Cro... all nicknames. The real names are more of a mouthful.