The Explorer's Quest

A Pair of Eyes in the Darkness

A nice warm campfire was blazing calmly, lighting up the faces of Johnny, Grant, Hugo, Vanessa and Aryan. Johnny could feel the nice, soft warmth of the campfire on his face. He closed his eyes, and he could hear Aryan sharpening his machete.

Now, in India, the average temperature during the day is around thirty-two to forty degrees Celsius, and around twenty-five degrees Celsius at night. The campfire was perfect at this time.

They had used their backpacks as pillows, and had no blankets simply because they didn't bring any. Aryan had tied the elephants' leads to a tree close to the stream so that they could take a drink if they wanted to.

They had begun to settle down when Hugo reached into his backpack and pulled out a package of Luckies and handed one to each person except Vanessa, because she didn't smoke. Then he reached into his pant pocket and pulled out a match. He struck the match on a rock and lit his own cigarette, then passed the match to each man, who in turn each lit their own cigarettes.

Johnny leaned back, resting his head on his backpack. He gazed into the night sky, littered with sparkling stars.

The group did not speak, and they were enjoying the peace. Only the cackling of the fire could be heard. Silence can be relaxing. In some cases, silence is the most relaxing feeling a person could ask for. You see, what makes silence so relaxing is how it allows you to be alone with only your thoughts for a while.

And silence isn't just relaxing. It's also quite healthy in a certain way. Sometimes all one needs is to get away from all the business and chaos and relax with some alone time. And what's great about stopping and thinking for a long while is that you can come to some conclusions and even solve your own problems.

That was the case here, with Johnny, and Grant, and Hugo, and Aryan and Vanessa, all alone with their thoughts, not a care in the world. Each person was thinking something different from the others.

Johnny placed his cigarette in his mouth, inhaled, and then blew smoke out of his nose. The smoke floated up, disappearing more and more the higher it went, eventually blending with the smoke coming from the fire. As he watched it rise, he thought about the adventure that lay in his future. He is, after all, an incredibly adventurous person who dreams about nothing but exploring the world and staring Death in the face. Johnny thought about what could possibly come, anything that would make adrenaline burst through his veins.

Hugo, however, thought most about what he would do if ever faced with something life threatening. He didn't know how to shoot a gun properly, and this was a secret he would try to keep to himself for as long as possible.

On the other side of the campfire, Grant was thinking of his beloved fiancée Helen. He was scheduled to marry her in July, hopefully on a warm Summer evening. He was thinking of his future with her.

Vanessa stood up. Disturbing the relaxing silence, she said, "What's that?"

Johnny couldn't see or hear anything unusual. He said, "Where?"

She pointed into the trees. Everyone looked closely into the dark jungle, but couldn't find anything.

"Vanessa, there's nothing there," said Grant.

"No, really. I think I see something glowing," replied Vanessa.

Johnny stood up and walked closer to the trees so that he could get a closer look. At first, he still didn't see anything. But as a cloud moved out of the moon's way, it became clear that a large pair of eyes were watching the group.

"Grab your guns, now!" Johnny whisper-shouted.

Suddenly, the pair of eyes had lurched forward out of the trees and attacked one of the elephants, revealing to the group that the eyes belonged to a Bengal tiger. They heard a sickening wail, and then a Thud!, and as the group looked over, they saw that the it had bitten and clawed the elephants' stomach, revealing a gruesome image of its insides. The other elephant was spooked by the tiger, and had run off, breaking the rope tying it to the tree.