Island Of The Cryptids

14

Chris Tucker floored the accelerator on the Explorer so hard, his foot went numb. The shadows of the trees danced around again, and rain slapped the windshield. But Tucker was too focused to care. His narrow eyes carefully scanned the road ahead as the Explorer hiccuped over dense patches of mud.

He couldn't wait to be back on the plane, in a dry room, with other people surrounding him. More than that, he couldn't wait to be back on the plane, flying back to the mainland, or better yet, on the mainland. It would land him in quite a predicament, having to explain what happened to Captain Philip, but he wasn't worried about what they would say about what happened. He was worried about what actually happened.

The stories he had heard were just stories, nothing more. He hated horror stories as a kid, and as an adult. It made him feel more powerless than he already was, being scared. Now that he was in the heart of the story, driving into the unknown, he felt just as powerless.

The pistol rest in between his legs, handle facing towards him, barrel facing away from him. With a quick movement of the hand, he could reach down, grab the gun, and shoot. He wasn't confident that it would do much, but it calmed him down.

His elated nature had subsided into him, and he became all business. That's what he did in serious situations, ever since he was a kid. The way he was raised forced him to be that way.

His parents were alcoholics. They drank until their minds melted into putty and then yelled until their throats ran raw, and punched until their knuckles bled. Sometimes the victim of the barbaric barrage was a sheetrock wall, other times it was Tucker himself. They would scorn him with hideous lisps of rage and torment, then return to bashing on each other.

The house Tucker lived in was a small cottage that was surrounded by a row of other houses, which was then bordered by a ferny outcrop from a plateau of sorts. The patchy asphalt road ran between the two rows of houses, then stopped abruptly at the cliff. The other end of the street wound over the hillsides, snaking across the country towards the city. A small town popped up at the fork in the road.

The house itself had cobblestone siding, plastered together by a grainy adhesive that looked like mucky cement. The roofs were slanted diagonally, layered with choppy shingles and laden with dirt. The windows were covered with creaky blue shudders that completely contrasted the rest of the house. The house formed an L shape, and in between the two walls grew a wilting garden.

The Tucker family was notorious for keeping the whole neighborhood awake, and Tucker never saw the end of the ridiculing in school. Everybody heard the arguments, and everybody knew their secrets.

Tucker would come home from school and be greeted by his lack hearted parents, get fed a crumbly piece of cake, then manifest in his room, with the door shut. He would hear the clanking of glasses downstairs, the sound of liquid being poured, and the contemptuous chuckles that followed.

Then when the screaming began, Tucker would crawl to the closet adjacent to his room in the hallway. He would listen to the ruckus with his ears plugged, but the conversation and screaming was so loud he couldn't escape it.

Then when they got tired of each other, one of them would trudge up the steps, search Tucker's room, and if he wasn't there, head immediately to the closet where they would yank him out and beat him.

As Tucker grew older, he tried to mask his depression and looming anger for his parents. He tried to be cheerful and helpful whenever he could, and disguise the fact that he felt crippled inside. The cheeriness continued, and Tucker felt a faint sense of happiness.

Then one day, when he was twelve, his life changed.

He and his parents were walking home from the store, surprisingly not drunk. His parents had made up about their fight, and were trying to help Tucker out. They got him his favorite ice cream, strawberry, and a small toy gun with explodable caps to put in it.

He remembered his father's gruff face, flinching in the wind. His mother's graying red hair flying back and her subtly yellowing smile. His tight grip around the plastic store bag that he called his.

A man was walking on the pathway towards them. None of them noticed him, probably because he was insignificant. They grew closer. Tucker's dad stopped. Shouted something. The man ran at him, a small butterfly knife gleaming in his hand. Tucker's father ran forward and threw a fist at the attacker, only to be met with a swipe of the blade. It sliced into his wrist, and hot blood jetted out onto the sidewalk.

His mother screamed as the man jousted the knife into his father's ribs, once, twice, three times, then advanced towards his mother. She screamed again.

"Chris help me please!" she shouted, and the man drew closer. His mother tripped over her heels. The man passed Tucker by, avoiding eye contact. Tucker didn't run. He didn't care, either. It felt good, even, to watch this man return the pain to his parents.

The man reared his knife up, approaching his mother. Tucker looked into her eyes, unblinking, and watched the life get drawn out as the man stabbed her in the throat. Blood pooled around the body. The man quickly pillaged their pockets, and on his way running out into the field, he murmured;

"Sorry, kid," and ran off.

From that day forth, Tucker never complained when he recieved anything. He took nothing for granted, and portrayed himself to be a compassionate person.

But deep down, nothing erased what he had been through. Every time he got scared, he relived the twelve years of torture he had to endure. The horrifying night where his parents met their demise.

The rain sounded like popcorn cooking now as it splattered the windshield. Tucker felt mist in his eyes as he drove. Darkness surrounded him. It was so thick that the high beams barely penetrated it. The jungle felt like it was swallowing him up, wrapping around him like a dark veil, constricting tightly to close him in.

All of a sudden, the car jerked forward and Tucker found his head slamming against the steering wheel. He cursed and massaged his forehead. He tried pressing the gas, and the car whirred, but it didn't move. Mud splattered the side windows from both sides. He cursed again, finally conceding to the weather and stepped outside after switching the car into neutral.

Rain soaked him yet again. His clothes had just began to dry from the warm air of the Explorer's heater. He felt his body lurch downwards into the mud, then he sighed, his eyes darting around rapidly at the towering walls of the jungle trees that surrounded him. Each gust of wind sounded like a whistle, and the whispers returned, beckoning him to come explore. He shook off the feeling.

The wind yelled at him, screaming through the trees. He felt the presence of his family. He knew they weren't there, but his mind put them there. Persecuting him for not acting. Blaming him for what happened then and now. He gulped.

He placed his hand on the back door window and moved himself to the back of the car. He planted his shoulder on the space in between the frame and the window of the trunk and pushed with all his might. The mud churned below him, and the car slowly inched forward. With a groan he pushed it out of the small divet of mud that he was in, and then stopped to catch his breath.

He thought he saw the forest shift next to him. The blackness seemed to move, as if the jungle were alive.

Chris Tucker quickly jumped towards the Explorer's driver's side door and got inside, shifted into drive, then floored it.