Blood Moon 2 (Haunted)

Into the Wild

Into the Wild

Liam had always wanted to be a Game Ranger. He loved the outdoors, he loved the animals and most of all, he loved the fact that he could disappear for days on end without anybody being able to find him in the bush. He suffered from severe social anxiety. Sometimes he even passed out when there were too many people around him. It made him dizzy and a loud buzzing sound would fill his head. Although he did enjoy taking tourists out on Game drives in the Parks safari vehicle, where he would point out animals, trees, droppings and tracks.

The only problem with the Game drives had to be the children of the rich tourists. They were spoilt and never really paid attention to anything he was telling them. “Brats” he would think to himself as he continued to attempt to get them to listen to him. Most of the time they would just look at him with blank expressions and either play on their mobiles or whatever new hand-held gaming system their parents had just given to them. All he could then do, was shake his head and keep going.

The African Bushveld is harsh and dangerous, most people know this. There is the scorching heat and drought in summer, the floods in the rainy season and lets not forget the vast amount of animals. From man-eating Lions, to massive Elephants who could trample a person into the dirt, to crocodiles hiding in nearby bodies of water, one couldn’t always see them and plenty of times a human or two has been dragged down into the waters murky depths. It would lie in wait, the only visible part of its body would be two tiny little nostrils sticking out just above the surface, it would wait till the time was right and then...

Hardly anybody ever survived these attacks, they were too fast and unexpected.

***

“Now if you look to your left, you will see a small pride of Lions resting in the shade. The Lioness does the main hunting for the pride, while the big male protects those in the group. Once in a while a younger or rogue male will challenge the Alpha and a life or death battle will ensue.”

He sat there with the tourists for a few more minutes before continuing their little Safari. Every now and then a hand would fly into the air and either a spoilt rich kid, who had taken his attention off of his newest game for a few seconds, would ask a dumb question, or a fat balding man, dressed in Khaki shorts and camo shirt would try and make it look like they knew better and would spit out some random fact anybody who took the time could find over the internet. This annoyed Liam the most, he had done the same job for well over fifteen years, so surely by now he knew what he was talking about. He knew this land like the back of his palm. Or so he thought.

Finally he started up the engine of the vehicle with a great roar and slowly moved on. It would bounce along the rocky dirt road, swaying ever so slightly as the tires maneuvered over and through the rocks. Liam would allow his eyes to scan the nearby bush for more signs of life. Stopping from time to time to point out a Zebra or Giraffe grazing off in the distance.

***

Sandy came running towards Liam just as he pulled into his parking space. A look of utter terror etched into her fine features.

“You need to go back out right now! We lost contact with the other vehicle two hours ago.”

Shrugging his shoulders, Liam grabbed his empty cantina from the passenger seat and started walking past the panic stricken woman. “Not my problem.”