John Frum The Reluctant Messiah

Sure Beats A Sharp Stick In The Eye

He arrived to find the crude shack surrounded by a picket fence made of large bamboo stakes that had been sharpened at one end. The only other time he had seen something like it was on a prior trip with Aiden to New Guinea. The natives would construct a similar pen to trap and contain wild boar. Somehow John knew this was no wild boar pen, this was designed to keep humans from wandering off. As he got closer, he slowed at the sight of a large animal skin to the side just outside the handmade door. Just around the corner were three young women sitting on a wooden bench. They were dirty, naked, and tied to one another. Their feet were bound to the legs of the large, wooden bench where they sat in silence, their faces wearing the look of fear and dread. Their deadened eyes that of resignation. 

John quickly scanned them to see if Heylia was among them. She wasn't. These girls were a fair amount older than her but perhaps they could shed some light on where she might be. John stealthily made his way to the rear of the dilapidated shack and out of the girl's line of sight. He could hear the muffled sounds of someone or something inside the hut. He decided the best way to determine what was going on without setting off alarm bells was to climb one of the trees and peer down through the many holes in the run-down thatched roof. He found a loose picket in the fence, wrestled it loose and quietly placed it on the ground. He began to slip through when he glanced back at the razor-sharp bamboo. 

"That would make one serious weapon should I need one," he thought. He reached back through the hole in the fence and carefully pulled it back through. 

He made his way up the rubber plant and shimmied out a long branch that had grown directly over the top of the bure'. He could see the top of the head of a half-naked Neph who was staring straight ahead towards the far wall. John slid out just far enough to get a glimpse of what had so intently captured his rapt attention. Standing with her hands to her sides and head slightly down was little Heylia staring straight back at him trying not to cry. John was incensed, seething with anger and involuntarily gasped in horror. The Neph paused and then tilted his head as if listening for the sound to repeat. 

Instead, a new sound came, the sudden splintering of the very branch John was straddling. As if by reflex, John instinctively pointed the sharpened fence post downward to break his fall just as the creature looked up. With all his weight behind it, the pointed end entered his cow-sized eye and exited just behind his left ear. John flopped on top of him still holding the post. He frantically jumped up trying to shield Heylia from the grisly scene. He held her head into his chest and quickly shuttled her towards the front door.

"Are you OK?" he asked. She nodded "Juth Thcared," she lisped.

John pulled back, gently cradled her chin tilting her head up. He smiled at her. 

"Everything's gonna be alright now. Do you know that where I come from there is someone called a tooth fairy? And she comes and brings surprises for every tooth that's missing." She smiled as John wiped her tears with his shirt. "Go on outside and untie the other girls. We're gonna get you all home, OK?" 

As soon as Heylia turned from the doorway John walked back and stood over the Neph. He spat in his face. His anger boiled to such a degree that in a final parting gesture, John placed his boot squarely on his head, covering most of his face and with all his weight, firmly seated the fence post into the dirty clay floor beneath him.

Using the markers of the broken branches as his guide, John led the girls back to the spot where he had entered. Heylia assured him she knew the rest of the way out and with that the girls turned and ran the rest of the way.

His mother was somewhere back there, and he was determined to find her. He quickly made his way back past that horrid shack where he had found Heylia and was taken aback at how quickly the jungle reclaims its own. Flies had smothered the dead Neph's lifeless body with several inches of flies blanketing his form from head to toe, pulsating like a small, black wave over him. He turned away from the gruesome scene and the disturbing sound created by a thousand feasting insects and followed the distant sound of rushing water. 

He rounded the corner of a group of oddly placed granite boulders that tumbled into a calm pool of river water. There, gathering water from the small, secluded eddy into clay pots was his mother. He looked about, scanning the bush for any signs of Nephilim but she seemed to be alone. John took no chances however and quietly made his way to a thick group of magnolia trees directly behind her, shielding himself from view.

"Pssssst!" he signaled. No reaction. He tried again but this time louder and with more persistence. "PSSSSSSSSST!""

"I can hear you," she said without so much as moving a muscle, "and if you do it any louder, they will hear you as well." 

She continued looking straight ahead and John could see her cheek rising from the side in a smile.

"Are you OK?" he said as he continued to scan his surroundings for Nephilim.

"They're planning something," she said, still maintaining her forward gaze. "Something big, I don't know what, but they seem more agitated than usual. They've been prepping for something...which is why they left me alone here. They're never too far away but they seem too busy to care of late."

"Well, that's great because we're getting out of here now, today," John said.

"Oh, I'm not so sure we could-" she was cut short by John,

"That's OK because I am. I am sure. We're leaving right now."

"It's just that it's been so long since I've been on the outside," she said.

"I know, it'll be scary, but others are waiting, Professor Wharton is waiting," John tried to reassure her.

"Wharton? Professor...Wharton?" she asked.

"Yeah, so far, he's the only one that knows I'm in here, he's the only one that knows where we'll exit. I told him I was coming to get you." 

"Well, let's not keep him waiting," she said with a smile.  She left her vases at the riverbank and quickly followed John into the dense jungle.