Chapter 7: Green Pastures
Ravi entered into his garage and removed the piece of cloth covering the hover car and said, “jump in.”
We did as he said and waited patiently in the hover car for Ravi who went inside to do something. He took quite a while but he eventually came back and jumped in with his jersey back to front and his zipper down.
“Your flytrap’s open,” Megan said.
“Oh shucks,” Ravi said while zipping up his pants. “I had to pee.”
“Yeah, pee,” Rajiv said sarcastically.
Ravi ignored the comment and started the engine. “Allyuh want to hear some good float music?” He then switched on the music player and out of it a song came on that went something like this: “Get off the ground get ready to get off the ground. This carnival get off the ground. Start jumping and get off the ground. I tell you we not staying down, we getting off the ground, we not staying down. Everybody make your rag and start to hover. Spin your rag and start to hover. Now everybody start to get off the ground get off the ground get off the ground float like Superman get off the ground get off the ground get off the ground……….” [3]
Ravi sang along to the song as we hovered through the dark Twin Republic skies. It wasn’t annoying because we all joined in and started to sing along. It was fun. It was a necessary distraction from the terrors around us. We sang along to the same song over and over until we arrived at the gate in Siparia. Ravi shut the music off as we neared. There wasn’t anyone at the gate but Ravi still threaded lightly. We made it over the gate without any interference.
“That was easy,” Ravi said.
“Too easy,” Said Megan.
We made our way over the Columbus Channel but Ravi ensured to keep the hover car as close to shore as possible. We couldn’t really see the ocean in the dark of the night but we could have seen a few coastguard vessels on the sea that didn’t seem to pay us any mind. We travelled all the way from the Columbus Channel to the Atlantic Ocean till we arrived over Sangre Grande. Everything seemed to flow smoothly.
“Oh shit!” Ravi said.
It confused us all. What could have possibly been wrong?
“Look behind,” Ravi said.
We turned around and behind us there were three coast guard hover cars shooting at us. Ravi maneuvered his hover car from side to side in an attempt to dodge the bullets. He successfully dodged most of the shots but the coast guards refused to relent as they keenly followed after us like a lion chasing its prey.
“This is not good,” I said.
“No shit!” Ravi snarled. “Here what to do. It have three parachutes in the back. Take it and jump out. They can’t catch all of we. We have a mission to accomplish. Go meet the Prime Minister. I’ll try to join allyuh after I deal with this nonsense here. Let we just hope I don’t get arrested…..Or killed like them people back in Point Fortin.”
It was a really big call but he was right. If we jumped out the hover car the coast guards wouldn’t be able to find us especially since it was night. It was definitely a plan. We had to get to Port of Spain so Megan, Rajiv and I each grabbed a parachute and jumped out the hover car.
The feeling of falling was something I wasn’t used to and my insides knotted up and rose up. It was a terrifying fall but I reached the ground safely. I didn’t know where I was or where Rajiv and Megan were. All I knew was that I landed in a dark forest with no vision. I didn’t have a torchlight or any kind of light for that matter. My nerves acted up and my imagination went wild.
“Megan! Rajiv!” I shouted.
No response.
I shuffled through the forest holding on to every piece of bark that I could have felt. I kept shouting their names but there was no response no matter how much I called. In the distance I heard a river flowing so I decided to walk away till I couldn’t hear the river anymore. Even though I was thirsty, my father always told me that the worst place to be at night was by a river. Wherever there was water, there was a higher chance of finding a snake, a frog or maybe even a wild hog. When I thought that I was safe. I sat down at the bottom of a tree and fell asleep.
I woke up early the next morning in the same place where I was the night before. I was alive! I touched myself just to ensure that all my limbs were still intact and that a wild hog didn’t run away with my legs or something. My legs probably weren’t really that tasty but the animals didn’t know that. All I saw around me were green evergreen trees, kiskadees, and hummingbirds flying around singing their daily songs. A hummingbird came up in front of me flapping its wings at a million flaps a minute. It hovered in front of me moving from side to side as if it was inspecting me or something. I tried to touch it but it quickly darted away never to be seen by me again.
I didn’t have much survival skills so I was basically like a fish out of water fishing my way through the dense forest. I decided to head to the river that I was so eagerly avoiding in hopes of rejuvenating myself with some water on my skin. I had no intentions of drinking the water unless it was my very last option. I knelt beside the river on the bank and washed my face with the river water watching my reflection that looked horrible to my sight for some reason. My eyes looked heavy and my cheeks looked skeletal. I kept washing my face in hopes of washing the tiredness and ugly from it, suddenly I felt a sharp pain across my head. Someone or something then grabbed me behind my neck and shoved my face down in the water. The person was strong. I couldn’t breathe and the person showed no evidence of showing me any mercy. I struggled attempting to get myself free from my attacker. I picked up a rock from the river bed and threw it behind my head hoping that it would hit the person who was trying to drown me. I missed. I kept trying until the person finally decided to let me go. I was free but the person wasn’t done with me yet. I felt a kick against my ribs which sent me rolling along the river bank. I coughed so loud that I thought my lungs were about to explode. When I looked up I saw Rajiv standing there with his hands cupped over his forehead in pain. It was probably from one of the stones I threw. I didn’t understand why Rajiv wanted to kill me. It wasn’t like I did him anything wrong. He picked up a piece of bamboo that was on the ground and started off towards me. I knew that he wasn’t playing around. His intentions were to hurt me and to hurt me badly. I scooped myself from the ground and sped off.