The CHANGI BULLET

Chapter 30 - Rescue

That night brought a couple of interesting challenges for Ezra. Firstly, where did they relieve themselves, given that there would be gigantic mosquitoes in the vicinity? He solved that by moving the fire further to the left, and backing the jeep up to the cave with the door open. A bucket in there and they had their own bathroom suite. Ridhima raised her eyebrows at the rudimentary idea, at first, but had to accept it. Also, the night before, Ezra had noted the quietness of the planet, but there had been some noise, distant and hard to pin down. Once he realized that what he had heard had been the soft splashing about of feeding fish, he realized that here on this planet they only moved in the river at night. They were nocturnal fish. So, he planned to do some midnight fishing, but needed to avoid the mosquitoes.

At dusk, he set out a series of decoy fires. He set these ablaze to keep the mosquitoes occupied. Then, with a fishing rod that he had crafted earlier out of an unknown type of wood, he crawled away from camp. A solitary mosquito did happen upon him but he fought it off with his rod and by stabbing at it with his knife.

He settled down under an overhanging fern leaf at the edge of the river and cast his line. He had not fished since he was a child, and had not enjoyed it much then, but he persisted and managed to bag several catches over the two hours that he sat there.

He stealthily returned to base, keen to tell Ridhima of his success. He didn't speak until he was crawling into the cave. He knew she might be asleep; she had certainly told him she was going to hunker down and not think about being alone.

In the gloom, with the flickering firelight, she was sitting up waiting for him. 'I got lucky. Fish for breakfast. Not fish you've ever tasted before, but fish, nevertheless.'

When she didn't reply, he dug out his lighter to make the space brighter. Sitting on the covered form of Ridhima was a mosquito. Ezra's heart almost exploded with the shock, and then it drained out with the fear that she was dead. Slowly he took out his handgun. He aimed and fired twice into the mosquito's head, splattering it against the back wall.

'Ridhima!?'

'Ezraaaaaaa!?'

She moved under the cover. He leapt over to bring her out into the air.

'Are you hurt?'

Ridhima was traumatized, but she was shaking her sweat-soaked head. 'No, no. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.'

He held her. 'It's gone. It's over. You're safe.'

She was shaking so much that he had to be firm in controlling her body. Gradually, she calmed.

'Don't leave me again, Ezra.'

'I won't, I promise.'

After a breakfast of grilled fish, Ezra suggested that they went in search of a place that was a bit more mosquito secure than their little cave, in case they had to spend a few more nights there. Ridhima needed to catch up on some sleep, but she had no intention of being separated from him again.

Ezra checked his weapons, then they headed out. They would not be moving more than a half mile away in a circumference. They would still be underneath to see the Izzati coming in. It was a nice day. There were no snail cows around to stink up the air. They chatted as they walked around. There were other rockface sites, but nothing better than what they already had. Ezra would be willing to build a shelter from wood, but he only had a shovel and the tire jack in the jeep, to go with his lock-knife. While listening to Ridhima talk about India, his mind was thinking about moving away from that swampy area, which probably accounted for the mosquitoes, getting across the big plain, and seeing if they could survive there. Just him and Ridhima. He had never been into reading books, or much into films, but it appeared to be quite a story if they were to remain there alone forever. People back home, and on the new world, would wonder what became of them - they would become legends. So many factors swirled around his head: weapons, ammunition supply, food, shelter, indigenous alien life.