Night of the Bat Page 8

  Jake was under the net he’d had the men rig over the river. He turned up the beep beep of Gizmo. He wanted the bat to fly into place beneath the rope web.

  The bat was screeching, outraged circling around Jake.

  “Fly over here and get me!” Jake yelled. “I’m waiting for you! Come on, you big cowardly chicken!”

  The bat flew straight at him. The creature came fast, and Jake yanked the trigger vine. He’d planned that there would be time to pull himself clear—to be out from under the net as it fell like a cloak onto the creature’s head and wings.

  But his hands were slippery with sweat. His grip failed, and now the net was falling onto him and the bat. The night mist had moved on a breath of wind, and Jake kicked out at the bat, but the wide, weighted net was already covering both of them. It trapped the two of them, and they began to fall.

  Jake screamed.

  Like a torn parachute, the fluttering wings of the shrieking bat slowed their fall, but they hit the surface of the river with a great splash. Jake felt the pain on his back, as if he’d landed very badly off a high diving board.

  The bat’s wings, ebony and streaked with blood, loomed over him. He and the bat began to go under.

  They both shuddered and gasped desperately for air, struggling to free themselves from the net. Their cries were chilling, frenzied, and Jake was certain they’d drown. For a stark and eternal second, Jake and the bat’s eyes met.

  Now—suddenly!—the bat was biting fiercely at the net, fighting to tear it with its teeth and talons. Jake shouted, wanting only to keep clear of the gnashing teeth. He threw off Gizmo and the power belt, and tried to dive under the net, to find a way out by going deeper.

  The trap held firm, and when Jake surfaced, the moonlight was dazzling. He could see that the bat had managed to put a long tear in the net. He grabbed for the opening and emerged free into the current. Jake swam toward the sound of the truck motor, toward the camp, and didn’t look back until he was closing on the shore. His feet touched the muddy bottom.

  Exhausted, he made his way slowly into the shallows. When he was closer, he thought to look behind him. There was no sign of the net or the bat. A rejoicing began to fill his heart. He began to compose a kind of prayer, to shape his amazement at this survival.

  The bat was gone. The ordeal was over. …

  He emerged from the water near the truck chassis and its running engine. He was thankful its gasoline hadn’t run out, but he didn’t want to think about that. His mind needed to think of nothing. It needed to rest and eat and sleep and—

  SPLASH!

  Jake spun around. The bat, near shore, had burst upward from the surface like a phoenix. It rose high, so high that Jake thought it would be airborne, as a missile in a sea launch. But the bat hadn’t enough strength yet to fly. It fell back onto the surface. The horror was clawing, floundering toward him. With each stab forward of its wings, it gained strength.

  Jake thought he might run. He would try to make it to the main hut. But the cough of the truck engine resonated in his brain. Instinctively, his hand shot out and shut off the gas feed, the lifeline to the engine, and the motor stopped.

  He looked across to the opposite shore. There was the flickering of silver fish as they easily, speedily, followed the blood trail of the bat. Seconds later, the bat began to shriek in agony. The fish had reached it. The water around the bat began to boil scarlet. The creature desperately, pathetically, swung its wings upward in a last attempt at flight. Dozens of frenzied piranha had already fastened themselves to its skin.

  More piranha came, as if the whole river were filled with the hungry fish. The bat’s shrieks grew louder and angrier. Finally its cries were hopeless. Its winged forearms became skeletal, its skull was stripped of flesh, and the creature sank, slowly disappearing into the blackness of the river.

  For a while Jake rested on the riverbank near the camp. The moon was high, and at the horizon the first glow of dawn began to creep into the sky. By daylight it was clear that the river was rising, and he would have to leave in the last pirogue. A family of sea otters came downstream in the first wave of the flooding. They stopped and played in the slowly drowning mangrove roots, the younger ones sliding down the last crest of the muddy bank. The largest of the otters hunted for fish in the new shallows.

  Soon Jake’s strength returned, and he started out on the trip home, the trip downstream. The entire camp would be beneath the swelling river. As he launched himself in the pirogue, he could sense in his heart that his father was safe. Somewhere safe. The men would have made it to the village. An army helicopter would have come. His father could even be at the hospital in Manaus.

  But there would be many of his fathers men, his workers, still at the village when Jake drifted out of the river mist in the small dugout. He knew the workers would be watching for him. They would tell the village. Jake would be embraced by them, and there would be a gathering. There would be a fresh roast boar, and something cold to drink. He would be invited to sit with the men around a campfire. They would sit and listen as he told them about the end of the night of the bat.

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  About the Author

  PAUL ZINDEL (1936-2003) wrote more than 40 novels, including The Pigman, one of the best-selling young adult books of all time, and Pardon Me, You’re Stepping on My Eyeball! His Broadway play, The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, won the Pulitzer Prize and was produced as a film directed by Paul Newman.

  Mr. Zindel taught high school chemistry for ten years before turning to writing full-time. His work as an author brought him to exotic destinations around the world, from Australia’s Great Barrier Reef to the monkey forests of Indonesia. Drawing from those experiences, he created The Zone Unknown series—packed full of horror, humor, adventure and bravery—with reluctant readers in mind. It includes six titles:

  Loch, The Doom Stone, Raptor, Rats, Reef of Death, and Night of the Bat.

  Fans can visit Paul Zindel on the Web at: http://www.paulzindel.com/

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Thanks to Arleen Perkins and her Sweetie Pies at Grover Cleveland Middle School for helping me decide between Night of the Bat and Bats as the title for this book. It was driving me batty.

  Also, my appreciation to Janet Walker at St. Mark’s School of Texas for launching me into the electronic and encyclopedic literature of the mammalian order of Chiroptera.

  And to the Smithsonian Institution for its extraordinary research and photography reporting the scientific benevolence and majesty of bats.

  Last, but not least, my gratitude to Francesco, the gentle bat that chose to roost on the ceiling of my porch for the duration of the writing of this book.