5

There is no river that flows into Lake Telle and no river that flows out of it. It's a swampy hole to hell and everyone knows it. The survey was supposed to hit the southern tip of it, but they were definitely not walking through a cross species mating ritual with seven foot tall, weapon wielding apes, so they had to walk around. About a mile from the actual lake, the ground became a peat-moss mush. What was interesting was that the closer they got to the lake, the less smaller animals there seemed to be. Water meant an oasis in the jungle, but the birds, the monkeys and everything else small seemed to be vacant. The only animals that seemed alright with the idea was the larger ones. What they saw instead were Buffalo and Elephant. They were everywhere. It was almost surreal how many herd dwelling large beasts came to the lake.

From everything that they knew, the apes of these parts lived a gentle and harmonious life on the ground with those around him and they should be here too. Western Lowland Gorillas were the most numerous of all four of the species of Gorilla and they were all over the Congo, but you wouldn't know it. The only apes here were the five humans.

On the second day of walking, just as they had moved around the northern horn of the lake and into more of an eastern path, they encountered a very large herd of stampeding elephants. Of the five, only Moise had seen elephants running in the wild, usually they were very gentle. Courteous even. The silent slogging stampede that faced them was more than a little freaky.

At this point around the lake, the underbrush was as thick but the ground was spongy. What they heard first was the crashing of leaves and branches. The only thing to do was find the biggest tree and place your back to it. Something crashing like that would not be a predator and it was easy to use a tree for protection against, say, a charging Rhino. Fortunately there was a large Kapok tree nearby that all five of them were able to squeeze into the vertical folds. They ducked down and held on in the face of the oncoming stampede.

When it came, the earth didn't shake like it did on the savannah. A sound and violence so loud, quick and unnerving that you would think that the world is spilling down around you, without the actual vibration that you would associate with it. This is what happened to our friends. If you would like to believe it, it felt as if almost all of the Elephants in Africa descended upon them. In truth, it was around seventy-five... And something else.

The cause for stampede was anything out of the ordinary. It could be wasps, a tree falling, or even a predator, like the infamous Elephant Killer: Emela-Ntouka… Which it was in this case, and which came in last place in the great elephant race around the lake. Although, he wasn't so much participating as much as he was just eating the other racers.

The elephants had rushed by, one or two of them nicking the tree they were hiding in, and that gave everyone a fright. The last elephant was the one that the Emela zeroed in on. And this happened directly out of view from where they were crouched down. In an almost comical scene, all five of them slowly lifted their heads from the wrappings of the Kapok, only to see the ungainly form of the Emela devouring a smaller elephant. It was not a calf, but probably a juvenile.

As if on cue, they all sunk their heads behind the root. The slavering and snapping from the mastication was almost as loud as the stampede had been, but more savage. Crack! over and over as the bones of the ribs were gone through and the Emela gorged on the innards.

The parts that weren't covered in elephant blood were dark purple and pale orange striped. Often, the orange was white in places and the purple was mainly on it's snout and forepaws. The stump-like paws held retractable claws. With these, it held on to the sides of the elephant as it dug its face and terrible horn into the beast.

After the initial shock of the splashing and crunching Tugg reached quietly into his bag and handed out the gas masks. Quietly he showed the men how to place them on their head and then held up five fingers with his right hand while he held a grenade in the other. Furiously waving him off, Hezzy pointed to his watch and then put his hand across his throat. "Wait! Stop!" he signed. Tugg nodded, pointed to the tree above them. Moving silently, but with an unearthly grace, were the smaller beasts they had seen two days ago. They climbed and swung from tree to tree with one long arm, their other arms holding something.

Slowly they arrived above us and in the trees all around the area. They waited to get in position. They were quiet as they all raised their arms in a frozen position, then all at once, it was raining stones.