Chapter 21: Survivor
JJ shifted his weight, rifle pinned to his shoulder.
Little Bear eased forward first, shotgun high. Another faint, choked cough came from the darkness beyond.
Little Bear’s jaw tightened. He reached out with the barrel of the shotgun and lifted the vines. JJ slid in behind him.
The space beyond was a short service passage, narrow concrete that dipped slightly downward. The air in it was warmer and drier than the air behind them, and it smelled like dust and old metal. A shape flinched at the far end of the passage. Little Bear's light shone on a human form pressed tight against the wall beside a metal utility door. The flashlight beam caught wide eyes, a pale face streaked with dirt, and hands shaking hard.
“Don’t,” the kid rasped.
JJ lowered his rifle a fraction. “Easy,” he said. “We’re here to help.”
The teen blinked hard, trying to focus through the beam. His lips were cracked. His throat worked like sandpaper. “You’re… you’re real?”
Hector’s voice drifted from behind, low and impatient. “Kid, do we look like ghosts?”
Loni glared at Hector. “Shut up.” Loni moved in, examining the young man.
“What’s your name?” JJ asked.
A beat. “Samuel,” the teen croaked. “Samuel Briggs.”
“Hi, Samuel. I’m Loni.” She told him as she worked.
Samuel nodded too quickly and winced. He tried to straighten and failed, sagging back against the wall.
Loni’s light flicked over him, face, chest, hands, then dropped to his left side.
Blood. A dark, smeared band across his shirt. Dried in places, wet in others. A makeshift wrap had been tied around his ribs with torn fabric, but it was loose now, slipping.
Loni put two fingers against the cloth near the wound with gentle pressure. “This yours?”
Samuel’s breath hitched. “Yeah.”
“Okay.” Loni’s voice stayed calm. “I’m gonna need to redress and tighten this; it’s going to suck.”
Samuel managed something that might’ve been a laugh. “Go…go ahead.”
Loni pulled a proper bandage from her kit, removed the ruined cloth, cleaned the wound, and cinched the bandages snug around his torso with quick, practiced motions. Samuel’s jaw clenched; his knuckles whitened against the wall. He didn’t scream. He just breathed shallow, eyes squeezed shut.
Hector continued to watch the passage behind them. “How long have you been down here?”
Samuel opened his eyes, blinking sweat. “I don’t know. Hours. I think.” His voice trembled on the last word. “It’s… It’s dark. Times…been hard to track.”
JJ looked past him at the utility door. “You’ve been hiding behind that door?” JJ asked.
He nodded. “I… I found it open…crawled in.”
Little Bear’s flashlight slid down to the concrete at Samuel’s feet.
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JJ crouched to Samuel’s eye level. “How many of you came up here?”
Samuel’s throat worked. “Six. Cassy… Jake… Clark… Sandra… Maria… Emilia.” His eyes flicked up. “Maria and Emilia… they… they stayed behind…At…Visitor Center.”
“They’re Safe,” JJ said. “We already extracted them.”
Samuel’s eyes flooded, and he blinked them away, embarrassed. “Okay,” he rasped. “Good.”
JJ kept going. “Where are the others?”
Samuel stared at the floor, then looked up like he had to force his brain to remember. “We…we stopped at the ridge. We were… looking.” His mouth twisted. “Cassy wanted proof. Like…like it mattered.”
“What happened next?” JJ asked.
Samuel swallowed. “Clicking.” His voice quavered. “At first, we thought it was birds. Then it got closer. Then it was everywhere.”
Hector’s expression tightened. He didn’t interrupt this time.
Samuel continued, voice breaking and steadying and breaking again. “Something small ran out. Fast. It didn’t hit us right away. It moved around us.”
Samuel’s eyes went unfocused. “Clark shoved me. He said “run”. Then Sandra screamed and… and…” Samuel’s breath stuttered. “And then Cassy… Cassy yelled at us to stop screaming like idiots and…”
“And?” JJ pressed.
Samuel’s jaw clenched. “And something big was breathing. Like… like a horse.” His eyes flicked up, wild. “It didn’t roar. It just… was. And the small ones ran. Like they feared it too.”
Samuel let out a shaky breath. “We ran. We ran back down, but we got split. I saw Jake for a second, then he was gone. Clark…Clark tried to grab Sandra and…” Samuel shut his eyes hard. “I heard him hit something. Like a wall. Then… nothing.”
Loni’s hand stayed on Samuel’s shoulder. “You did well,” she said quietly. “You survived.”
Samuel shook his head like the word survived offended him. “I didn’t… I didn’t see where they went. I just ran and ran, and I found this door, and I crawled in, and I held my breath until my ribs felt like they were ripping open.”
JJ leaned in slightly. “Did you see any signs? Any doors? Any labels?”
Samuel blinked. “C.T.” he whispered. “I saw it on a sign down the slope. I…I didn’t know what it meant. I just followed… tunnels. Anything that wasn’t jungle.”
More Click sounded faint and distant, then more from somewhere behind them.
Little Bear’s head tilted. Hector shifted at the mouth of the passage, covering the intersection. “They’re back.”
JJ kept his eyes on Samuel. “Can you walk?”
Samuel tried to push off the wall. His legs wobbled. He made it upright, breathing hard, exhausted from the attempt.
Loni tightened the bandage one last notch. “He can walk. But we need to get him to a hospital soon.”
JJ stood, rifle coming back up. “Let’s go. Sam We’re gonna need you to move as fast as you can.”
“I’ll try…my best.” As Samuel took his first step forward, the clicking grew louder, more insistent.
“That doesn’t sound good jefe,” Hector said nervously.
“Hector pops two flares and tosses them down the tunnels. Fire is fire that should give us a few minutes.”
JJ thumbed his receiver. “Challenger, this is Muldoon. Send J-2-0 my position.” He rattled off the ridge clearings' approximate coordinates. “We’ll mark with smoke.”
The reply came a moment later. “Copy Muldoon bird on the way.”
“Let’s go, people, as fast as we can,” he said. They started back toward the intersection with Samuel between them, while the sounds in the dark began to echo around the concrete.
