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300 Rains

by Heather O'Malley

Geoff was an Anthropologist studying a newly discovered tribe in the Amazon. After getting a bit more involved in the tribe, he joined in on a sacred ritual. That is where things began to go very wrong a spiral out of his control. Now the tribe is gone and he is left with making sense of this until the tribe returns in 300 rains.

One

Aug 21

The roar of the engine was not as loud as the thoughts that rolled through his head, the most prominent of which was what the hell had happened to him? After recovering from whatever he had ingested somehow, all Geoff had wanted to do was make sense of the odd jumble of notes and recordings he had from what ever had happened there in the jungle. The journey downriver to Manaus and then the trip on to Bogata had only given his body time to recover from whatever had occurred, but it had not been enough time for him to fully understand what the hell had gone on with that tribe, a tribe that no one had ever heard of. His discovery was a bit tainted by whatever had happened and that didn’t make him all that comfortable. Roberto, the FUNCI rep, had heard nothing about this tribe in his work and his job was to deal with Brazil’s diverse native Indian population. But now, at thirty thousand feet, with nothing to do but struggle to make sense of things Geoff wanted nothing more than to make his way home.

He got up and began to edge into the aisle, squeezing uncomfortably past the passenger next to him in order to walk some. He moved slow, as the flu or maybe food poisoning like symptoms of whatever he had really had drained his energy. He was so wiped out but there really was nothing he could do, as resting did not seem to help with it. With his neighbor in the seat over asleep, Geoff was able to edge out with the least amount of trouble so far this trip. There was no one back in the rear galley area of the plane and he stretched some, enjoying the feel of his muscles moving, working out the slight persistent stiffness in them. His bladder reminded him of its existence and demanded immediate attention. Geoff shook his head and got into the cramped airplane stall, closing the folding door behind him.

The fact that oddly colored stuff was still coming out of him did disturb him greatly but he had some good doctors back at Rutgers University, where he worked that he was planning on going to as the doctors back in Manaus had no idea what was happening to him and their help had been less than helpful. The doctors back home could certainly sort things out with him and it would be nice to figure out what this was. This was certainly nothing like any other bout of the flu he ever had. He had never had multi-colored anything come out before, even with food poisoning, so this certainly was a great deal more disturbing than any other illness he had ever had before. Something was clearly wrong but he had no idea what. Geoff wanted a drink so he could get back to work and try to solve this puzzle, as his class load would slow that down once he got home in time for the fall semester.

He filled his hands with a little water, splashing it onto his face. It was still scratchy and he knew he needed a shave. He looked up at himself in the mirror, taking in the brown hair, the pale face, and the dark circles under his grayish blue eyes. He looked like crap and he knew it. Geoff grabbed a paper towel and dried off, trying to keep from falling over from the slight bit of turbulence.

Once done, he walked towards the Galley and asked, “Excusa?”

The stewardess, a black haired Hispanic woman who was sitting in a seat reading what looked like a romance novel, turned and looked back at him. “Si Senor?”

“Could I get a coffee please?” He smiled at the woman, politely. The odds were higher for better treatment if you remembered to be polite to the crew of the plane. He had tried to get that into his Grad Students’ heads, with mixed results.

The woman smiled at him, put her novel down, and rose from the seat. She grabbed the coffee carafe and poured him a cup. She looked over at him with her dark eyes and asked in heavily accented English, “Cream and sugar?”

“Si, gracias Senora.” She handed him some sugar packets and creamers. With that, Geoff took his leave, heading back down the aisle of sleeping people.

Once seated again and buckled up for safety, he maneuvered his laptop out and onto the tray table. While the system was booting up, he fixed his coffee, one sugar and two creamers. It was a luxury he had not had while they were traveling up the Curuca River, which was a tributary of the Amazon on the border of Peru and Brazil. They had been on fairly controlled rations on that trip and dairy products were out of the question. They had sugar, but no cream for his coffee and camp coffee certainly had a different flavor than this, probably had something to do with the Iodine in the water. This actual coffee always tasted so much better the first few weeks out of the jungle, as if his taste buds were becoming reacquainted with flavor again.

Geoff stirred the mix slowly as he pulled up the video files they had taken of the trip. He took the earbuds from his pocket and plugged those in to his laptop, not wanting to upset any one on the plane with the sounds of the videos the team had taken with these people. At first, he watched the initial meetings, where they had first made contact with the people. They were nothing like any other tribe he had encountered in the area before. The colors they wore, the patterns of their headdresses, so of the simple items all had a different look and feel. This tribe was clearly not any of the uncontacted Matse tribes throughout the region nor an offshoot of the Ticuna people as best as he could tell. They were a new tribe altogether and that excited him.

Roberto had insisted on contacting his superiors with his satellite phone when that fact had been realized. By then they had gotten GPS coordinates, lots of still shots, audio, and video and had begun working on trying to figure out their cultural aspects, trying to make inroads with the people. Thankfully, many of the basic tribal beliefs of the region still held true, so Geoff and his two Grad Students had managed to keep from stepping on any toes culturally, for the most part. The language was kind of close to Matse and Ticuna, with some differences that Alan was already compiling. Conversation had been stilted but they were able to talk with them. This was a career-making find and Geoff knew it. He had gotten his tenure early due to his ability to relate to the various tribes in the Amazon, even some of the more xenophobic ones and to the Funci representatives as well. His several journal articles and book on the variations within the Matse tribes hadn’t really hurt his standing in his Department either. In fact, it was that research which had prompted this trip and in that he was returning empty handed. However, finding a new tribe… that really would be a nice feather in his cap. It really didn’t happen much any more with the way the unexplored areas of the world were disappearing.

Granted that there were a number of tribes that had to exist in the Amazon Basin that had not made contact with any outsiders, but that number was smaller than thought possible. The deforestation had driven several tribes back, deeper into the jungle, or simply driven them off onto reservations where they had a limited space but still jungle to call their own. Those factors made finding a new tribe like this, seemingly untouched by the outside, a rare and wonderful treat. He skipped ahead to where this mess all began, the ritual he had willfully participated in.

Geoff had been asked by the head of the tribe to join in this ceremony, where the sacred smoke would be blown up the nose. The Yanomani people had a similar ceremony that he had taken part in, which used a mild hallucinogen to allow the participant to have ‘Spiritual Visions.’ While it was superstition, the drugs certainly had done a number on some of the anthropologists who had worked in the area. He had figured that this mix would be similar with similar effects. He should have know better by now than to make assumptions. 

Whatever had been in that mix he had taken was much stronger than the drugs used by the Yanomani and other tribes he was familiar with. This stuff had been amazingly potent and Geoff really didn’t have a clear recollection of events. It was like he had been going along with everything just fine and then he had blacked out. He had come to, back at camp and sick as a dog, with Roberto saying that the tribe was asking them to leave for now and to return much later. Things had been crazy in the days leading up to this flight home as he had gotten medical treatment and had tried to make sense of this puzzle. However, that whatever he had been given still was making him feel out of sorts, now a week later. Seriously, what had happened?

Geoff felt wrong somehow, as if his skin was not on right, or that odd feeling you got when an elevator was too fast or something. He had read of several cases where some of the visions had given people experiences of being animals like a Jaguar and some of them had mentioned a similar feeling afterwards. So what he was going through wasn’t unheard of, just merely unexpected. The odd itch under his skin occasionally had been thought to be a simple allergy by the doctor that he had talked to in Manaus. Benedryl was the basic drug of choice and thankfully, the team had some with them. The drug had sort of kind of worked but not really. However, what really mattered in this case was what had happened rather than how.

The images and sound on all of the recordings all seemed to be working along fine except up to a point where there seemed to be technical difficulties that cropped up that had not been present afterwards. When the image came back from the screen of static, it was of the women carrying him to the edge of the camp and he had been stripped naked, and covered entirely in mud. Roberto had talked to them about that, trying to see why that had happened and all they had gotten from them was a rough and kind of embarrassed, “The Mother speaks, we obey.”

No one had a clue what they meant by that but it was sure to mean something, as the tribe’s name translated to Mother’s Children. Apparently, something had happened at a point in the ritual that they couldn’t see and the tribe had followed the Mother’s dictates, whatever they were. If only they had a clue, Geoff would be able to sleep better and stop worrying about all the odd little things that this culture presented to see if they offered any help in this problem. All he had was questions and that really irritated him more than anything else did. Geoff wanted answers and that was what was eluding him.

Things like, why the mud? Were there some sort of healing properties in it? Moreover, when he had vomited up the first time, why had there been a fish, a frog, some bugs and various plants and fungi all mixed together in there? That was it in terms of clues. There really had very little to go on in order to solve this particular issue. Thankfully, Alan, his most senior graduate student, had thought to get samples of everything, to see if there were some sort of biochemical thing going on. Yet, without a sample of the drugs used to start things off, no real picture could be made by the samples alone. That could have worked as a catalyst of sorts but there was no way to know. Hopefully, those clues would at least give them some guidelines in figuring out where they had to be searching next in order to understand what had happened.

If only Alan had been allowed to watch the ceremony or even Roberto, who was a bit of an ass but good people, then they would at least be able to reconstruct what had occurred in their village that night. Such information would help him with his problem but it might also be a key in finding out more about these people. It was frustrating, but they did have a little over a hundred of hours of video and audio of the people, with their stories and aspects of their daily lives that should be able to help shape a context for the events they had witnessed. It had been a wild five days and with that context they just might be able to figure out what had occurred by cultural analysis, besides that’s what he was being paid for and what he loved to do.

Geoff smirked at the screen and closed down the files. There was time enough to figure out what was going on. Before he shut off the computer, he pulled up some photos of his family back in Highland Park, across the river from the school. He smiled softly as he looked at pictures of his wife and daughter. In all honesty, Geoff was looking forward to seeing them as he had missed them greatly. He loved going out to the field and loved coming back home to his family. Thankfully, that only happened over the summer and even then, for a few months at a time, otherwise he just might break his daughter’s heart. Heidi was eight, getting close to her ninth birthday in September and he was glad that he would be able to be there for that. Fae, his wife, had been planning a party for over a month now and from what he had heard it would be something pretty special.

He drank the last of his coffee and shut off his laptop, waiting for it to power down. Exhaustion was taking its toll on him and sleep was slowly dragging him down. This whatever he had was making him really tired and that sucked. He wanted to catch some sleep before the plane touched down in Miami, since customs and immigration was always so much fun when you showed up with all the sorts of things they had carried out of the jungle and brought back with them. He wanted to be on his toes for that and yawning did not help Homeland Security feel any better towards you. Perhaps a few hours would do him some good.

*        *        *        *        *

Nature’s call woke him, his bladder feeling full to bursting. Thankfully, the person in the seat next to him was still totally out of it. After a quick run to the bathroom, Geoff managed to get another cup of coffee from the stewardess and an update on how far out from Miami they were. Now knowing that there were two hours to go until touchdown, he headed back to his seat, growing happier the closer he was getting to home. Due to work back in Brazil, he already had all the documentation ready to get them through things with the minimal level of trouble. Besides, he could already throw Alan at them for a little bit if he needed some air. Alan knew more about this part of things anyway. Apparently, taking a year off before College to work for the TSA had given him all the experience he needed to smooth the way for Geoff on any of these trips. That certainly made Alan practically invaluable on any flights, not to mention his academic ability to figure out the meanings of various designs and patterns many of these tribes used, which helped to identify various meanings of tools and items. Alan was his right hand man and he would be at a loss without him.

Geoff had some customs forms already and he walked over to where Alan and Philip were sitting on the other side of the cabin. Philip was still sleeping, his blond hair hanging over his face, mostly hiding his scruffy attempt at a beard. Alan, on the other hand, kept his black hair cut short, avoiding facial hair all together. The graduate student already had some coffee, working on his notes and listening to some of the audio they had taken. Geoff cleared his voice and said, “Alan.”

The young man looked up, his dark eyes looking tired and red. He had clearly been doing this for a while. Geoff frowned, “Did you actually get any sleep?”

 Alan shrugged slightly. “Only a little. You know I have a thing about flying over the ocean. Too many plane crash movies, I guess.”

Geoff chuckled a little at that. Alan always had this fear of a plane crash in the ocean, which had made some of these trips to South America pretty interesting. To deal with it, Alan worked through the flights, hoping that the plane did not fall to pieces around him. Geoff lifted his hand and the forms he held, “Well, here are your customs forms. Remember to have Philip fill his out.”

“No problem Doctor Greenfelder. I’ll make sure he gets that taken care of before we land.” Alan took the two forms and set them on his tray table. “Anything else? You might want to get back to your seat. They are about to serve what passes for breakfast.”

Geoff smiled as he returned to his seat. The breakfast was not all that appealing to his mind but he felt a good bit on the hungry side and this might just tide him over until they landed in Miami. He had arranged their flights in order to allow for plenty of time to clear customs and to make it to some place for a more filling meal. The airport did not have much but it would certainly be enough sustenance to get them home. Back in New Jersey, they would go out to eat and celebrate their return in classic fashion, with pizza, with extra cheese, with beer. His wife was making those arrangements so he was not particularly worried about everything. She never really failed at anything she did. Every day he was more and more impressed with her.

When he was settled back into his seat, the person next to him seemed to be waking up. Geoff checked his laptop bag, making sure everything was in there, and that he had his passport easily accessible. It was a bit of a bad habit, not trusting people on planes, but it was not as bad as Alan’s obsession with the plane crashing and burning in the Caribbean. At least the odds favored people being bad over planes splashing down in the Caribbean.

Everything was still there. He pulled out his laptop and worked on compiling his notes, making sure he had included date/ time stamps with the relevant footage. He wanted his initial write up to be clean and concise, as that would make pitching a book easier as well as getting published an maybe even getting the National Geographic to come back with them next summer. He had already called Russell, the Department Chair, to let him know of their discovery. Russell had been very excited, even mentioning that this could be worked up into an excellent presentation to both the school as a whole and at one or more of the Conferences. He had gone off on how good this could be for the University and how rare such finds were. It was nothing that Geoff did not already know, but that was they way Russell was. He was just pleased that the head of his Department was happy over something he had done. That was always useful.

He put things away when food arrived, not wanting to spill anything on his laptop, again. Due to spilling food, beverages, and other things three or four different times, Geoff had already gone through a few of these computers on various trips. In addition, these were the durable laptops, used for trips to the middle of nowhere and almost to the level of Military approved. It seemed to be his special knack with things. This was no necessarily a skill he was proud of having.

After he finished his very small breakfast, Geoff filled out his customs form. He had bought nothing while in Brazil or Peru and that made things easier. The University supplies they brought with them had their own forms already filled out and attached to their cases. They were ready to make it through customs with the minimal amount of fuss, just the way that Geoff liked it. It is not that he liked everything in his world to be neat and orderly, it is just that he really did not like things to be problematic. It was usually a great help when they were not.

After the landing and exiting the plane, the three of them headed towards the customs area with their carry on luggage. They were heading for the baggage claim area, as they had to pass through customs to head towards the domestic flight area. At some point Philip took Geoff’s laptop case from him as the walking was wearing him out, making him slow down. Maybe he hadn’t recovered as much as he had thought? That was eminently possible, as Geoff had wanted to get back home as soon as he could as he would rather be sick and miserable back in his nice cozy bed. He felt horrid and wanted the comfort of home and to be pampered by his wife. It was still possible to go back later to try to find the tribe again, most Amazon tribes had a small range that they migrated through, so it would be a doable thing. They could start at the camp they knew of and move on from there, which would not be a problem.

Alan got them through customs easily enough after chatting with the TSA agents and they made their way to the café that Geoff liked in the concourse near their gate. He sat heavily into the chair as Alan and Philip went up to get the food, as he felt wiped. Alan knew what he wanted, since they had been working together for a few years now and had stopped here on every trip home. It was nice and stable and not jungle. He ordered the same thing time and time again, as he felt like it was a good transition meal. After a while in the jungle, Geoff longed for buildings and open space, being able to see clouds and the sun. It was almost a claustrophobia kind of thing down in the deeper parts of the Amazon, but he usually coped pretty well by telling himself that he would be going home soon. It seemed to work every time.

“Here you go Professor.” Philip sat down the tray of food, with a croissant and fruit and scrambled eggs and sausage, along with a large coffee. It all looked pretty good and Geoff’s stomach gurgled in anticipation.

“Thanks Philip. Ah, the smell of real food.” He took a sip of his coffee and sighed. This was certainly a step up from the airline coffee and Alan made sure to make it right. Geoff was hating the fact that Alan would be graduating soon, but it was well deserved. The young man was a great scholar and had a great career ahead of him. Geoff really didn’t want to hold his favorite student back, but rather was looking forward to things moving from teacher student to colleague.

The croissant was tasty, flaky, and buttery, and the fruit, which was mostly melons and pineapple was succulent. The eggs were okay but the bite of sausage he had turned his stomach. He loved sausage normally but it just smelled and tasted repulsive. A napkin was handy so he spit it out into that. His stomach rebelled for a while but it settled after having some more of the fruit and such. What was going on? Sausage was a favorite of his and he could not eat any? That sucked! Maybe there was something wrong with the sausage or maybe he was still sick and reacting to it? It was easy enough to ignore that one thing and eat what else was on his plate. He felt lightheaded all of a sudden and was glad to be sitting down. This illness he had picked up was really concerning him.

“Are you alright Professor?” asked Alan. “We can get help easily enough. I am fairly certain we can get you to a clinic if we need to.”

“No, no… I’m fine. Just feel a bit weak and my stomach is still playing with me. But I’ll be fine.”

Alan nodded and went back to his ham and eggs, spearing a few potatoes onto a fork. After Geoff was finished, he got his cellphone out and called his wife. After a few rings, while he stepped away from the table for the illusion of privacy, she picked up. “Hey there.”

“Hey.” The sound of her voice helped him to feel better. His heart beat a little faster and felt like it moved up in his chest. It made the concourse filled with people a little brighter. “So, were in Miami and getting ready to head to the flight home. Should be there in a couple of hours, unless there are some flight delays. Could you make sure that there is some pizza without sausage? I got sick down in Brazil and my stomach is still a little jumpy.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Is it pork in general or just sausage?” He could tell in her voice that she was concerned and he felt bad for worrying her.

“As far as I know it’s just sausage. But if there is something with no pork at all then that ensures that I will be able to have something to eat.”

“I think I can manage that. Gino’s has a really good vegetarian pizza that I can pick up for the both of us. I need to get going so I can get everything done in time to pick you three up from the airport. I love you and will talk to you soon.”

“I love you too. See you soon.” He hung up somewhat reluctantly, but aware that he would spend the night next to her and that would make everything all right. Sometimes he hated these trips because of the time he was forced to spend away from his wife.

The flight up to Newark was uneventful, thankfully and amazingly enough, all the bags arrived with them. It was one of the few times where the University’s luggage made it back together in one trip, rather than being misplaced somewhere between Brazil and New Jersey. There was usually a bag or three that were misrouted to somewhere but this was a nice sign to Geoff.

Fae was waiting for them just outside of the security area. It was a fairly easy trick for him to spot her dark hair, even in crowds. He went into her arms and hugged her tight. Geoff often lifted her up at times like this but he was too tired to even attempt that this time. She fitted against his shoulder nicely, as if she was meant to fit there, as if this were meant to be. He sighed, relaxing, feeling centered and happy.

They let go of each other and kissed again before parting. The two assistants took all the luggage out to the SUV, wanting to get back home as much as Geoff did. Fae hung on to one arm as the two of them walked to the car. It was hot outside of the air conditioned building but it was certainly nothing like the sticky oppressive heat down in Brazil, for one thing there was less humidity here. Jungles were sweltering places made of heat and humidity, and the nice nearly dry heat of Jersey was enjoyable. It felt almost good, comparatively. Geoff stood out in the sunshine and just basked in it for a moment, savoring the light. The jungle was dark down at the ground level and it had felt like they would never see much of the blue sky ever while they were under that canopy of green, and they were right. But now, back home, they had plenty of light and open areas, not to mention the glory of air conditioning.

Fae drove them back to Rutgers first, dropping off Philip and Alan off at their apartments before heading home themselves. She pulled into the driveway and the two of them got out and headed inside. The luggage could wait. There were far more important tings that needed to be taken care of first. The two started kissing and groping each other the moment the door closed behind them. Geoff broke off long enough to ask, “Where’s Heidi?”

“Friends house. I made sure to give us enough time to ourselves before she gets back. Now, shut up and kiss me!” She was pulling at his shirt as they moved mostly bedroom ward.

Geoff responded by kissing her more and making it to the bedroom in stumbles and staggers as clothes were pulled loose. The two of them quickly undressed, tossing the clothes all over and fell onto the mattress, kissing and laughing and generally making up for lost time. It was certainly a good thing to be home. Geoff could worry about other things later.