Boiling Pool

It was mid-evening in the jungle, and it was hot and hummed. The rain would come soon, thought Brain Bear, as he got his light poncho out of his pack. It would drop ten degrees in minutes, making it bearable for the night. He had been in the jungle for all most two months now. Most of that time he had been alone, but there were a couple of others that were sharing the main campsite along the Amazon River.

There were a few natives there also, and he was sure that it would be given a name soon as a settlement. He was not even sure what they were there for, never taken the time to talk with them. He had all ways been a loner, he did, however, know that two of them were some kind of professors. He had his own reason why he was there and didn’t want to share that reason with anyone, so he never asked about others. It had taken him years to arrange to get there, and many hours of making a fool of himself.

The rain began to fall, he slipped the poncho over his head, making sure his pack was covered. He still had ten days of supplies, and he didn’t want to have to go back yet for lack of food. He thought back on why he was there. His grandfather had been a world explorer for most of his life. He would tell him bedtime story’s whenever he was in town about his latest trips. He had been to the Gobi desert in China looking for dinosaur bones, to Belize and Guatemala in search of Mayan, and Aztec temples, but the ones he really liked were about the search for Giants in the Amazon.

The last time he had been there was in the 1950s sometime, and he had told Brain just when he was returning that a couple of natives had told him that they had actually seen the giant, and had sold him a map. He had contracted malaria a few years before that and when he had returned came down with about, and his exploring day were over with. In the Summer of 65, Brain had just turned 6 when he had passed away, his father had the old cabin where he had lived closed up, leaving it as grandfather still lived there.

He had never known his mother, she had run off when he was too young to remember her, so when his father past ten years later it hit him hard. It took him another year before he was able to get emancipated, and was able to get around to visiting his grandfather's cabin. He had received a nice sum of money from his father's insurance policy, so he was in no hurry to go through the cabin. Staying at the cabin helped him to deal with being only 18 years old and all alone in the world.

He spent two years going throw all the papers, and journals. He learned that the tales that his grandfather had told him were more or less true, and there was much that he had keep to himself that amazed Brain. His grandfather’s life had been about making sense of little pieces of information that he had gather from around the world and over the history of mankind. It was at this point in his life that he began to make a fool of himself.

There was still some water dripping from the trees when he took the poncho off. He had reached the top of a hill, and he could see out across a small valley, filled with trees that rose again to a low mountain range, some mile away. There was a small river at the bottom, that he was sure flowed into the great Amazon. He decided the hilltop would be a good place to make camp for the night. He was glad that the river was there, he could fill up his two canteens.

He had just enough water to cook dinner with, boiling some dry beef chips, adding them to a foil pack of beans. The only spice that he ever used was salt, it was needed when one was in the jungle. Without a supply of it, one could die of hypoatremia, not a pleasant way to die. At 61 he was in good health but had some arthritis setting in his joints, so he took a couple of aspirins, the only drug he ever used, before setting down and pulled out the only journal he carried.

It was his grandfather's last one and had a hand-drawn copy of the map he had gotten from the natives so many years ago. It showed that he was in the right area. He reread what was written by his grandfather for the hundredth time. ’I have come to the conclusion that after all, I have not spent my life in vain. My research has shown that at one time in the past there was a race that was worldwide in prehistory, and there is no doubt in my mind that it was by a race of giants.

It is to my regret that I will not be able to bring this knowledge to the world with proof that they not only existed but are still in the world today.’ It was this statement the first time he had read it that had changed Brain’s life. He had always read what he could on the internet and watched many videos about the unexplained events. There were a few that were looking into giants, and some of what they talked about were the same information that his grandfather had keep record of.

He began to send them some of the pictures and information, under different pseudonyms. He had a lifetime of information, and a lot of it had never been seen by others before. He kept the family’s name out of it, not wanting to have to put up with all the conspiracy theorists, who would debunk any information that didn’t fit into what they believed if it was real or not. He underestimated their ability, and soon his pseudonyms were traced to him, by his e-mail.

The accusations began to fly that he was out to make money on his grandfather's research, or that he was making up the stuff to become famous, and the whole time he had been trying to be anonymous. They went out of their way to bash him in every way the could. Some of the radio hosts had even shown up at the cabin demanding that he make a statement that he was a fake, but on the other hand, there were a few who wanted to help get the information out to the people of the world.

He laid a log on the campfire and watched the sparks fly up into the air, being careful not to have too many, after all, he didn’t want to start a jungle fire. They were many types of snakes that were deadly, and a bit out there would have been a death sentence. He was not worried about them so much, but he was concerned about the Jaguars, and less so with the wild boar. He did have his Glock 19, a 9mm semi-automatic, but in all the time he had been there he had never fired it. He had used his machete more than a few times to kill a few snakes and chopped a couple of tarantulas.

He tried not to kill anything, but sometimes it had to happen. He strung up his hammock, just to the side of the fire, about four feet off the ground. He laid back and studied the hand-drawn map if it was to be believed he will find the stone runes of a city just on the other side of the river. He wondered what type of people could had built a city in a jungle-like this. The natives there now only had small groups of a dozen or so mud, and stick homes, or just stick platforms with grass roofs.

They had a simple life, but by no means were savages, they knew how to live in the best way for the jungle they lived in. He had guilds the first few times he had gone into the jungle and learned as much as he could of how they lived. He was all most at home there by himself. He knew just how much wood to add to the fire, before turning in for the night.

The sun was just coming in to view when he woke, he shook his head. He thought that he heard the sound of drums, just before his mind reached full awake, but knew that there were no tribes out this deep into the jungle. He throw some small sticks on to the red embers of the campfire. The morning air was a little cool but it would get warm fast. He looked down into the valley that still had a lot of fog mingling with the tress, he thought this a little odd.

The morning was a peaceful time in the jungle, the only things moving were the birds, looking for what they could eat, and singing about it. He used the last little bit of water to make a weak cup of coffee to sip as he packed up the camp. He hoped to reach what he thought were the ruins before noon. Braking up the few remaining embers with his machete, he was sure there was no fire threat before he moved off into the valley.

He chopped his way, thinking of what his grandfather had told him about how he had found a stone ax head, that was way too big for anyone to have used in the desert of Nevada, and to add to the mystery of it all, it was near what is known as area 51. It was what had made him began his search for anything about giants. There was, of course, the mention in the bible of them, but there were tales handed down over the generations of Native Americans. He had even visited the Lovelock cave in Nevada.

He had visited many of the mounts of the Ohio valley, and no matter where he would go would find something that was out of place, tools way to big for a normal man to use, or structures that were more advanced than that of indigenous occupants of the areas. He had not started out to prove there were giants, it just happened that he kept finding evidence of their existence.

He cut a vine against a tree trunk and he had startled something that moved so fast the was not even sure what it was, but he thought it was a lizard, but it had wings. It was as little as a hummingbird and fast so, he could not be sure he had seen what he thought. He stopped and stood there for a few minutes, in hopes to see it again. The jungle was quiet here, only a bird making an unanswered call to its mate every few moments.

He started hacking again, and it was not long before he cut his way to the edge of the jungle along the banks of the river. As he stepped from the bushes, he saw something slid into the water downstream. It was what he thought was the tail of a huge snake, startled by his appearance. As large as it would have been it should not have been scared of anything. He looked upstream, there on the other side of the river was the ruins that were on the map, but they were not ruins at all. It was a well-maintained wall, a good 35 foot tall, with the river running along its edge. This was an inhabited stone city, he thought.

He backed into the jungle, when his shock wore off, the map had said they were ruins, but it was clearly not with one glance. He had not seen anyone on top of the wall, but he had the feeling it was not deserted. He wondered why he had not seen any fires or smoke rising from it last night or this morning. A civilization able to build a wall like that would have used fire for sure, he thought. He found a place to sit down, and he pulled out the journal.

The cave that was where the giant was to live was on the other side of the river and the wall. He wondered if the wall ran the whole two miles to the mountains cliff, and if so was it in as good a condition as the riverside was? There were many questions that he had no answers too, like who were the inhabitants, were they Natives of the Amazon river basin, he didn’t think so, or at least not the ones who were there now.

He was not sure what he should do now, whatever it was, he could not take the risk of trying to cross the river in the daylight, and he sure didn’t want to run into whatever he had seen slid into the water earlier. He need to get some water from the river, he didn’t have any, but he would have moved downriver so not to be seen from anyone who may be on top of the wall. He could find nothing about there being anyone living around where the giant’s cave was. The one who sold the map to his grandfather had never mentioned there was a city of people there. Could they been lying about there being a giant?

Other than that fact the map had been accurate so far. There was a bend in the river two miles south, so he decided to move there, and try to cross. He tried not to cut any more than he had too, for fear that someone may hear him. When he was about haft-way to the bend, he pushed back the vines and not 15 feet in front of him were a couple of the little hummingbird size lizards, dancing in the air, they had emerald green bodies, and fast-moving turquoise wings, that made them look as if they floated under light blue clouds.

Without thinking he made an O sound in disbelief, seeing him they moved so fast in opposite directions, he had no time to follow either with his eyes. Wow, he thought little dragons, too bad he had not had his camera ready, but of course, they would have said he faked them anyways. He thought that it was a beautiful sight, and he stood as still as he could just in case they came back, but when a big green spider dropped on to his arm, from the trees he brushed it away and moved on.

The Amazon was known for having many unknown species, that the Natives have known of but science was unaware of. He had seen many insects he was sure he was the first to see. The little dragons could be just that, an unknown species of lizard. When he stopped for the night he would be sure to record the encounter in the back of grandfather's journal. He had never thought to start his own.

Out of the sighed of anyone on the wall he walked right up to the river and was surprised that the water was warmer than it should have been. It wasn’t as hot as he like his coffee, but it would be about right in a bathtub. He filled his canteens but left the lid off so the water would cool off. Seeing how it was as warm as a bath he decided what the heck, he might as well take one. He removed his clothes, folding them up neatly set them on a rock.

As he was about to jump in, he remembered the tail of whatever it was he had seen sliding into the water upstream. It would have been huge, and he sure didn’t want to be something dinner. That thought was pushed out of his mind when he heard a rock behind him hit ageist another. He turned around expecting to see some kind of animal, but what he saw almost made him jump into the river, but he knew it would not have helped him.

Standing where he had placed his clothes were three men, for lack of a better term to call them. They stood between 3 or 4 feet tall, were all white, no hair on large heads, and big black eyes. Each held a spear in one hand that only had three long slim fingers. They had no real lips to speak of, and their smiles showed sharp teeth. He hoped that he was not going to be their lunch. The tallest of them point at his stuff, the other two pick it up and with the pointed end of his spear motion him to start walking upstream. They were going to take him to the city naked.

As he walked, he kept turning back his head to look at them, could they be what were called the grays, he thought, but he doubted it, they were too white for that. He tried to remember if his grandfather had ever mentioned them, but could not really think straight, being worried he was now going to die if he was lucky. He pointed at his boot and then his feet, hoping they would understand what he wanted. They didn’t get the idea or didn’t care as they were barefooted, but they had loincloths on.

He noticed that as they reached the wall there was still no one on its top. The river bent around the wall, and they reached it he could now see a rope bridge that reached across the river, but still, he saw no others. For some reason this made him feel more uneasy than being naked. He had to bend down to enter the opening in the wall. If the wall was as thick as the tunnel was long, it was a good 15 foot. He came out into an empty large courtyard.

In the middle of the courtyard was a stoned ringed pool of boiling water. He wondered how it was being heated up. He had heard of the La Bomb river on the north side of the Amazon that was said to be the only boiling river in the world. This was no river but it was a pool of boiling water. The taller of the man things point to a door across the yard. He opened the door, it was a big empty room other than a makeshift bed. He walked in, the teller one look at his clothes deciding he had no weapons, throw them in.

He gathered up his stuff and was surprised that they had not taken his Glock 19, who or whatever they were, had no idea what a gun was. They did, however, take his small hand ax, and his hunting knife. He got dressed and was glad to have his boots back, the walk had made his feet hurt. They had thought enough to put the lids on his canteens. He took a drink from one of them. The water tasted a little sweet, he thought.

There was one small window in one wall, and a small opening in the door. He looked out the window, and the only thing he could see was a patch of sky. He could see the boiling pool out of the hole in the door not much else. He ate some beef jerky as he sat on the edge of the bed. He tried to figure out what the man things were, and where they come from. He could not remember anything like them in anything he had read. Maybe they were aliens, or maybe subterranean from the hollow earth.

All of a sudden the door swing open and a women was pushed hard into the room, she landed hard on the dirt. He jumped to his feet and ran to her as the door was slammed shut. She was crying, he helped her to the bed. She laid down crying into her arm. She was Caucasian no more than 25 or 26 years old, looked as if she would be at home in a big city, and nowhere near the jungle. He had no clue what to do to make her feel any better, so he left her alone to cry to her self.

It was getting near dark when the door opened again, and one of the man things bring in two plates of fruit and sit them down on the ground, he thought about jump up and using his Glock, but he thought he should wait and see if he could get the women out with him. The shape she was in at the moment it would not be a good idea. He picked them up and went to the bed and said, “Hey, think you can eat something?”

She looked up at him with watery eyes, then at the plates. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and sat up. She reached out and took one of the plates. “Thank you.” She said in a sweet low voice. He noticed that she was a pretty young woman.

He took a bit of a mango, and asked her, “My name is Brain Bear, what’s yours?” He smiled.

She looked at him a moment then said “Lily. Lily Bork, from New York.” He didn’t want to pressure her any, so he just sat there and ate. When he had finished he found his flashlight in his pack and turned it on. He set it on the floor pointing up and lit up the now darkened room. It wasn’t a lot of light, but it was better than the overall dark.

There was nothing to do so she told him how she and her fiance was on a cruise on the Amazon, and Jim the fiance wanted to hunt a wild boar. They had gotten lost, wandered for days in the jungle. They were taken prisoners by a tribe, who left them tied to posts as sacrifices to some god, and the white man things came and got them. Jim had tried to run and was killed.

He could see the tears began to fill her eyes again, so he pulled her to his shoulder, and let her cry. They both fell asleep before he could tell her about his plan to get them out of there, and how he would have to count on her to do as he told her. There was no telling how long they were asleep when the door burst open, the three-man things stood there. The taller one motion for them to come out over the room.

Lily didn’t want to go but he told her don’t worry, he pattered his holstered Glock. She looked at him with surprise. He was still not sure what he was going to do, but the three things didn’t stand a chance with him in a gun. The courtyard was lit from torches that ringed around the walls. They were stopped at the edge of the boiling pool. One of them stood behind them.

The other two walked over to what looked like the wall of the building, each of them took their spear, and slipped the points into slots in the wall, they turned them, and the wall made a noise and began to move to one side. As the wall moved open the two re-turned to the others facing the opening across the boiling pool. There was a deep yawning sound from within, and then some rustling. Brian looked over at Lily who had the look of pure terror on her face. He looked at the man things behind them, they were all smiling, if that meant showing all their teeth was. He looked back at the opening just as what could only be called a giant step out into the torchlight.

It stretched, then yawned again, as it looked at them. The thing was a good 15 foot tall, long shaggy black hair. Wow Brian thought, it was a male, he was sure it only ware a loincloth. There was short black wiry black hair all over his muscular body. He was quite impressive standing there in the torchlight. He rubbed his chin, and in his mind, Brian heard, “Well, what do we have here?”

It shocked him to hear it in his head, and in English. This was not how he had thought to encounter a giant and had never thought it would want to talk with him let alone know English. He looked at Lily to see if she had heard him too. “She did not. Are you here to steal my treasure.” The voice this time was more a growl.

He shook his head no, “Never ever crossed my mind.” he thought truthfully.

“Then why are you here?” He asked as he sat down on the ground crossed legged.

As fast as he could he thought about his grandfather and what he had learned, hoping that the giant was able to read it all. It didn’t take long to do. Two of the man things went to the tunnel opening. The other went into a door in the wall. ’Well, now that is a good story to hear, it's nice to know that some know of how great the giants once were.” The man-thing returned carrying two large pails of water and set them down in front of the giant. It sat down not far off, as the giant drink each pail down.

The man-thing got up and took the pails back inside. “Come to this side of the pool.” He said. Brian saw this time Lily had heard him, she first looked at him, he nodded his head, she followed him around the pool. “Sit I will hear more of this world you come from.” This time he had spook out loud.

“How do you know to speak our language?” Brian asked.

“I just learned in the few minutes I was in your mind. You may call me Tussin. Now tell of what it's like in your world.”

For the next two hours they each told Tussin of life out of the jungle. When Lily was telling him about riding on a train, in Brian’s mind he heard Tussin “You do know that what you call the man things will not let you leave alive right.” He nodded his head just a little. “I do believe you can take them with that thing you call a Glock. Just like you, I too am a prisoner. As long as they live I can not leave here either. They had meant to feed you to me. If you kill them I’ll let you go your own way, or better yet you could take me with you.”

What he thought, that would prove to the world that his grandfather was right all along. He didn’t have any time to think about it, he noticed that there was a man thing on each side of them, there spear at the ready. The third one came from the building and with his spear motion than to the boiling pool. They wanted them to jump in, he thought.

There was fear on Lily’s face as Brian got to his feet, hand on his Glock. The taller one step forward spear point out to make him move closer to the pool, but that wasn’t going to happen. As fast as he could he pulled the Glock from the holster, pointed it at the tall one, who looked at it bewildered. He started to step closer, so Brian squeezed the trigger. The noise was loud in the courtyard. He pointed and squeezed the trigger two more times.

Tussin was smiling from ear to ear, and Lily was still sitting with her hands over here ears. He looked at the bodies and didn’t feel too good about having to kill them, but it was the only way. He reached down and took Lily’s arm and helped her to her feet. “It was the only way.” He shook his head.

“Yes it was, they would have killed you. I’m in your debt. I was unable to kill them my self. I was under their spell to keep me here. I was there captive God so to speak.”

“It will be dawn soon and I want to get as far from this place as I can.” Brian said.

Tussin stood up and said, “First I must feed.” He smiled down at them. Brian squeezed the handle of the Glock, ready. Tussin reached down and picked the tall man thing up.

Both of Lily's hands went to her mouth as she said in horror “Not raw!”

Tussin laughed, toss the body into the boiling pool, and said “No boiled.”.