The Dangerous Doors of Shannon Anderson

Chapter Ten

Fritz had produced a large knife from his belt which he was waving back and forth in front of me, haphazardly clearing a path through the greenery, and making a hell of a lot of noise while he did it. As the trees grew more densely and the sky continued to darken, I stuck as close to Fritz as I could while still keeping a safe distance from his free-flying knife.

"Aren't there wild animals in here?" I asked, glancing side to side, half expecting to see pairs of eyes glowing back at me through the dark shadows of the trees and thick vines. "Like panthers and snakes and stuff? Shouldn't we move more quietly?" The last thing I needed was to be mauled by a hibernating jungle bear whose slumber we had disrupted.

"A girl raised by pirates, afraid of the jungle?" Fritz said.

"I feel better out on the open sea."

"Not to fear," said Fritz. "I am an exceptional hunter. In fact, I won this knife in a shooting contest Father hosted for my brothers and I to commemorate our first anniversary in New Switzerland. Since then I have shot agouti, jackals, tiger cats, condors, kangaroos, muskrats, beaver rats, walruses, turtles, sharks, peccaries, bears, bustards, bluejays, parakeets, ruffed grouse, badgers, hares, cranes, monkeys, flamingos, and boar."

Jesus, I didn't know if I should be more astounded by the diversity and unrealistic breadth of animal species that inhabited this island, or the fact that Fritz seemed to have shot and killed one of each of them.

Before long, we came to a clump of palm trees which was surrounded on all sides by a troop of sweet little brown monkeys, some of them chattering in the path, others swinging and hanging by their tails from the branches overhead.

"Capital!" Fritz said, reaching down. For half a second I thought he was going for his gun, and I nearly had a heart attack. Instead, he picked a handful of stones up off the ground and tossed them at the playful monkeys.

"Hey!" I said. "Why'd you do that? They weren't bothering you."

"Watch," he said, pointing up to the tops of the palm trees to where many of the little guys had retreated. One of them shrieked wildly and coconuts began raining down on us from above as the tiny monkeys pelted them to the ground. Fritz braved the hail storm, scooped two ripe coconuts off the jungle floor, and dashed for the safety of a big tree with mangled roots that we had already passed. I jogged after him.

He settled into the nook between two protruding roots and patted the dirt beside him. I sat down next to him as he took his big knife and hacked one of the coconuts in two, careful to not let the juice spill. He handed me the halves and I sipped from it like I was drinking milk from a bowl of cereal. He hadn't lied - it was refreshing.

Fritz carved chunks of fruit out of his own halved coconut, spearing them with the tip of his knife, and popping them into his mouth.

"So, how has New Switzerland been treating you since I visited last?" I asked. "Still haven't been rescued, I see."

"Why should we want to be rescued?" Fritz said. "We have everything we need here."

That seemed unlikely. There was no internet, for starters. Not to mention no running water, though it was quite possible that they'd built a sewer system since the last time I'd dropped in.

"We've been living in Rockburg for more than a year now, according to Father," Fritz continued.

"Rockburg?"

"That's what we christened the salt-cave that we carved out for our new abode. It's much more secure than Falconhurst, being that it's made of rock. It's even got a library."

"Sounds fancy," I said, just as something wet and heavy plopped onto my head.

At first I was afraid a monkey had pooped on me. I looked upward for the offender at the exact moment that the sky broke open and the most torrential rain I had ever experienced began pouring down from the heavens. It was like standing under a waterfall, or one of those big buckets they have at water parks that dump water on you by the gallon. In an instant I was soaked to the skin.

Fritz sprung up at once and shouted something, but thunder boomed and lightning cracked, even brighter than the lightning that had struck the house and started all this nonsense, and I couldn't hear what he said.

"What?" I called through the downpour.

"We have to find shelter!" Fritz hollered. "We're not far from Falconhurst - we can take cover there until the rain stops!"

Fritz was already heading up the path, back towards the coconut trees, farther away from my door. I'd never been even this far away from my door before, and in a place like this that was all trees and wilderness and confusion, it seemed all too likely that if I ventured too far away from the door I'd never be able to find it again. Fritz was hot and all, but he was kind of weird, and I didn't know how his story ended. What if he never got rescued? I didn't particularly want to be trapped here with him and his family for the rest of eternity.

"Fritz!" I shouted.

"Come, we must find shelter!"

"I have to get back to my ship! What if they leave without me?"

"No one would sail in this weather. Shannon, you are being foolish. Follow me, now!"

"I have to go back." What part of this was he not understanding?

I wasn't entirely confident I could retrace my steps back to my door; we'd walked for a while to find the coconuts, and I had been sort of preoccupied with Fritz' muscley shoulders at the time. But I had to at least try.

I started back towards where I thought we'd come from, running as if that could keep the rain off me. It was more like swimming than running it was coming down so hard. Protruding branches scratched at my arms and face as I went, twigs tangled in my hair, the mud beneath my feet was slick.

I could hear Fritz chasing me,and I knew it wouldn't be long before he overtook me. But before he could catch up, I hit aparticularly slippery patch of mud and went skidding forward. I stepped to try to regain my balance, but myankle wrenched the wrong way beneath me, and I crumpled.

A/N: Eek, do you think Shannon is okay? Will she make it back to her door? What will happen if she doesn't? Let me know with a comment! Thank you for reading. :)