Jeremy Robinson - Island 731

Joliet scoffed. “There’s no way to know that.”

The goat finished with the first of the two crunchy granola bars. Bray offered it the second, which it happily accepted. “Why would a plastic band that matches the one around this goat, which is accurately labeled ‘goat,’ identify a loggerhead turtle as ‘broccoli’?”

“There’s probably a hundred different possibilities,” Joliet said.

“Including that Kam lied,” Bray said. “You agree that the turtle had been experimented on. The tracker in its gut was proof of that. Given what we found on the beach, the presence of the dracos, and now a matching collar makes a pretty air-tight case that whoever screwed with the turtle is, or was, on this island. If they took the time to accurately label a goat, why call a turtle broccoli?”

“Could have been to throw off anyone that found the turtle,” Drake offered.

Bray nodded his agreement. “One of the hundred possibilities. But whoever experimented on the turtle didn’t expect the tracker to fail. They might not have intended it to live more than a year or two before recapturing it. Even then, I doubt they expected it to survive into adulthood. Just doesn’t make sense to me. It’s… unscientific.”

“Experimental science is full of code names,” Joliet said. “Especially those born out of the Second World War.”

“I’ll give you that,” Bray said as the goat finished the second bar. He stood up. “But I’m not sure ‘Project Broccoli’ has much of a ring to it, especially if we’re talking about Unit Seven thirty-one, whose members subscribed to the bushido code just as much, if not more so, as the soldiers who eviscerated themselves after losing a battle.”

Both sides of the argument made at least some kind of sense, but everything was based on pure speculation and Hawkins knew that did no one any good. “How about this? We’ll ask Kam when we find him.”

“Works for me,” Drake said. “It’s time we got moving and our guide is waiting for us.”

The goat’s bell jangled as it wandered to the hidden path at the edge of the clearing. It paused at the jungle’s edge and bleated at them.

Bray zipped up his backpack. “Hold on, Pi.”

“Pi?” Hawkins asked.

“Three fourteen,” Bray said. “Three point one four. Pi. It’s amazing you can tie your shoes, Ranger.” He stood and headed for the goat, which turned and entered the jungle.

“We’re being led by a goat,” Joliet said. “Great.”

“It’s not leading us,” Hawkins said. “Just happens to be headed in the same direction.” He chased after Bray, reclaiming his position on point. He paused at the clearing’s edge and peered into the canopy-dimmed jungle. Once his eyes adjusted, he saw the goat waiting for them twenty feet down a switchback trail. It stood next to a footprint.

Hawkins shook his head and thought, We are being led by a goat . And he was actually okay with that. The bell jangling around the goat’s neck would make it a predator’s first target, and would help disguise their approach to anything or anyone that recognized the sound. In fact, if they could get the bell off the goat, Hawkins thought it might be a good idea to take it. But for now, they’d follow the goat, as long as it didn’t start swinging from spiderwebs or sprout sea snake fangs.

As the group neared the bottom the switchback trail on the opposite side of the hill, Hawkins kept expecting an attack. The longer the goat’s bell rang, the more it sounded like a dinner bell. The high-pitched voice of his childhood neighbor calling her cat filled his thoughts. “Here, Draco! Come on! Time for din-din.”

But they were never bothered.

“Has anyone seen a draco-snake?” Bray asked.

“Not a one,” Hawkins replied. “Doesn’t mean they’re not there, though. I think they can hide pretty well when they want to.”

“It’s possible we’re out of their territory,” Joliet said.

Hawkins shook his head. He’d thought of that, too, but the theory had flaws. “Based on their size and the number of individuals we saw, I’d guess the whole island is technically their territory. Would have to be to support that many.”

“Maybe they just lost our scent when we went over the hilltop,” Bray said.

“I don’t think so,” Hawkins said.

Bray shook his open hands at Hawkins. “Then enlighten us, o wise wilderness sage.”

Drake’s voice startled them all when he spoke from the back of the group. “It’s the bell.”

“The bell?” Bray sounded incredulous.

Before Bray could launch into why he thought that was a stupid idea, Hawkins spoke up. “Actually, I agree. The dracos are either afraid of the goat for some reason, and the bell warns them away, or they’ve been trained to avoid the bell.”

“Huh. Like a Pavlovian response?” Bray said. “So instead of salivating when they hear the bell, they run for the hills, or the trees, in this case.”

“Something like that,” Hawkins said. “Either way, I think we should stick close to our goat friend.”

“Or take the bell,” Drake offered.

Hawkins nodded. “If we have to. But I couldn’t use the rifle. It would give away our position.” He motioned to the harpoon in Joliet’s hands. “We’d have to use that.”

Joliet looked mortified. “I’m not shooting the goat.”

“Her name is Pi,” Bray said. He sounded serious, but the grin on his face said otherwise.

“I’ll take care of it,” Drake said.

As Hawkins rounded a stand of palms at the corner of the last switchback, he froze. He thrust an open palm toward the others, stopping them in their tracks.

“What is it?” Joliet whispered.

Hawkins gestured with his hand like he was ringing a bell.

Eyes widened.

The bell had fallen silent.

With the rifle at his shoulder, Hawkins crept around the sharp turn in the trail. When he saw what lay ahead, he relaxed his grip on the rifle, but didn’t lower it. Pi stood at the center of the trail, her white tail twitching. She turned her head slightly and lifted her nose.

Hawkins wasn’t sure if the goat smelled something dangerous, or was tasting the air for a potential snack, but he suspected the first option. Pi hadn’t stopped eating the whole way down the hill. If she took this route often, they probably had her to thank for keeping the path so pristine. At times he felt like the path was part of some kind of nature park. That there were switchbacks meant the trail had been created by men, but its current condition was thanks to Pi, and any other goats on the island.

With a bleat, Pi expressed either her disinterest in the scent or the all clear. She continued her casual pace into the jungle, where the path leveled out and meandered into the distance.

Hawkins followed, but kept the rifle at the ready and quickly scanned their new surroundings. The scenery here looked similar to the jungle on the other side of the hill, but there were fewer palms and larger, leafy trees with tangling roots, branches, and vines. The air felt more humid here, if such a thing were possible, and the air lacked any trace of the ocean’s salty scent. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought they were deep in the Amazon jungle. Of course, the Amazon is alive with noise. Here, there wasn’t much to hear beyond the clang of Pi’s bell.

When Hawkins reached the spot where Pi had paused, he stopped and smelled the air for himself. There was a subtle change. A slight coolness on the breeze coupled with something fresh. Is this what the goat smelled? He looked down and saw a pair of bare human footprints. Whoever had left them, Kam or his kidnapper, had stopped here, too.

But why?