Three Wobans descend into the pit, each taking one of the prisoners: you, Gary, and the dead woman with the pith helmet. The body is hauled away once you reach the top, but your captors seem to have other plans for you and Gary.


The two of you are shoved toward the center of a large Woban village. It is late in the day, and the villagers seem to be preparing for a huge bonfire; there is a great heap of wood stacked near the center of town. Straw huts surround you, occupied by men, women, and children who for the most part wear only grass skirts and a few other simple adornments. Their village is situated beautifully in a valley high in the mountains; you can see forested slopes in three directions, each with its own cascading stream catching the evening light.


Above it all rises the island's highest peak, an impressive tower of rock that looms hundreds of feet above the valley. At the sight of it, your purpose here comes back to you. You remember now that the mountain is your destination; you were hired to find a way to the top and retrieve an item of extreme value. How ironic that the Wobans have helped you complete a portion of that journey.


"Didn't I tell you? I could spend the rest of my life here putting up new routes," Gary says, admiring the view of the mountain.


Your head is starting to clear, and you are coming to realize that your situation is dire. These people are known cannibals; if they are inviting you to a party, it's because you're to be the main entrée. As you are marched through the village, you sense the residents looking you up and down. Those extra eyes are no longer scowling; now they look eager, like they are assessing how well you might taste. The better to see you with, my dear.


The heart of the village is a big open space, with the pile of wood near the center, and a raised platform of earth upon which stands the largest hut of all. A man and a woman are seated before the hut, regally poised in feathered robes and wearing feathered headpieces. You and Gary are brought before the mound and forced to kneel.


"At least they haven't lost our luggage."


Gary nods his head to the left, and there before the mound is a small hut with an open entrance. Inside it you can make out a large backpack adorned with colorful rope and carabiners. You assume your modest book bag is in there, too. The packs seem unmolested, as if the Wobans have no interest in items they can't understand — or perhaps fear things they think are enchanted with dark magic.


The king in his feathered robe stands up and approaches the forward edge of the earthen platform like an actor on a stage. He looks over the two of you, all three eyes moving in unison as if assessing merchandise.


"Ua li'ili'i loa ka wahine," he says, his stentorian voice uttering words you have no way of understanding. "'A'ole lawa kana 'i'o e kako'o ia makou. Pono makou e loa'a hou na 'i'o."


The king gestures to one of the guards, who first forces Gary to his feet, and then you. Your talkative rock-climbing friend senses the gravity of this situation and remains quiet. The guard steps in front of Gary, eyes him up and down, and then does the same to you. When he's done, he grabs you by the back of the neck and shoves you a step closer to the king, who in turn subjects you to the most intense glare of your life. You can see now that in a staring contest with a Woban, you will always be outmatched on a three-to-two basis.


"Nau e koho!" he barks at you. "E koho i ka la au e makemake ai e make: I keia la? Apopo?"


You stand there waiting for him to continue; the king stands before you as if waiting for something from you as well.


"I keia la? Apopo?" he says more slowly.


"I think he's asking you a question," Gary says.


"I get that," you say. "I don't understand what, though."


"'A'ole hiki i keia holoholona ke 'olelo!" the king bellows to the gathered villagers, who respond with nervous laughter. Then he settles his eyes back on you. "He ninau ma'alahi ia. E koho i ka la au e makemake ai e make: I keia la? Apopo?"


His efforts to slowly enunciate the words aren't helping your ability to comprehend them. The best you can guess is that you are being asked to choose between two options.


"I keia la? Apopo?" the king says again, but this time he is stepping backward to rejoin his wife.


"I keia la or apopo?" you say.


"Ke pihoihoi nei keia," the king says, once more gesturing to the guard.


The warrior grabs you by your shirt. "I keia la! Apopo! E koho i keia manawa!" His words land like spittle on your forehead.


"Just choose one," Gary says. "Before they get mad. It's either 'i keia la' or 'apopo.' Your guess is as good as mine which is the right answer."


It's frustrating being forced to make a choice when you have no way of knowing what the consequences will be.


__________________________________________________

You apopo.

"Um, let's go with apopo," you say. "I can't really see what the difference is, though."


"Apopo?" the guard says.


"Yes, apopo."


The guard turns triumphantly to the king. "Ua koho ka holoholona e make i 'apopo, hiki ia makou ke 'ai i kana hoa i keia po!"


"Ua lo'ihi ka manawa i ho'oholo ai," the king says. "Lawe i ka holoholona ma mua o ka ho'ololi i kona no'ono'o." He gestures to a guard, who then grabs you by the shoulders again.


"E ho'omakaukau i keia holoholona no makou e 'ai ai." This time the king is pointing to Gary, and as another guard grabs him some of the villagers step forward to get a closer look at him.


"Wait, what's going on?" Gary says. "I am not 'apopo'! I think you're confusing me for somebody else!"


"Ka ne'e, holoholona!" your guard bellows into your ear. You're not sure what you have just set in motion by choosing "apopo," but you and Gary are pulled in opposite directions. The last you see the rock climber, he is being steered through the crowd and into the cluster of huts. Meanwhile, your guard forces you back toward the pit on the edge of town. It is at least twelve feet deep, but rather than waiting to get pushed in headfirst you jump in on your own power. The landing winds you, and your momentum sends you sprawling face-first into one of the earthen walls that contain you.


"E 'ike kakou ia 'oe i ka la 'apopo!" the guard says before disappearing from view, leaving you alone at the bottom of the pit.


Without Gary to fill up this desolate space with his friendly chatter, it seems so much more empty and forlorn. You are surrounded by vertical walls of hard-packed dirt, with nothing that you could grab onto for the purposes of extracting yourself. Gary's metaphor about being the rubbish seems apt: you feel like you have just been discarded into the waster paper bin.


Although on second thought, perhaps the more accurate analogy is that this is the Woban's food pantry. After a moment passes at the bottom of this pit, when you figure out that you are not in immediate danger, it dawns on you what just happened up above when you were standing before the Woban king. That choice you were forced to make — apparently "apopo" meant you were selecting Gary for tonight's meal, and saving yourself for some other occasion.


This leaves you not only alone as you huddle in the dark at the bottom of the pit, but terribly guilt-stricken. The fact that you had no idea what you were choosing at the time doesn't change the consequences of your choice. You feel as sickened with yourself as you would if you were the one making the killing blow. For all intents and purposes, you are complicit in Gary's murder at the hands of these beastly cannibals.


At least you feel buffered from the grisly celebrations that are being conducted a short distance away. Down here, the tall earthen walls muffle most of the sounds coming from the village, and all you can see is the light of the bonfires illuminating the trees directly above the pit. The details are left to your imagination.


So instead of imagining, you try to occupy yourself by exploring every cubic inch of your prison, or at least those portions within arm's reach, starting with the floor. The space is about eight feet long and six feet wide, and if you tried to dig at the walls you'd either wear your fingertips down to bloody stumps or trigger a cave-in. Everywhere you turn, you are facing dirt. Hamlet was wrong; being bound in a nutshell does not make you feel like a master of infinite space.


One end of the pit feels damp, but not with water; you reel back when you realize that this was where the dead woman with the pith helmet had fallen. You have no idea who she was, and you never did get a good look at her. Gary was correct, though: the pith helmet was a rather cartoonish fashion statement.


Groping around the edges, you come to the spot where you're pretty sure your rock-climbing friend was sitting when you first awoke. Expecting to find nothing but more dirt, your fingers brush past something metallic pushed up against the wall — tucked in so tightly that you have to dig the object out a bit. You then discover there are two objects, each about eight inches long and wedge-shaped. Holding them up, you can see that they are rock-climbing pitons. Clearly they were left here by Gary, who must've had them in his pockets when the Wobans first tossed him down here. He then hid them in the dirt where he had been sitting, knowing they would be useful in escaping this prison. All he needed was to wait for the right time — which for him never came.


And so now it is you who are sitting alone at the bottom of the pit, holding the two pitons in your hands and examining the walls above you. Even with the pitons to wedge into the dirt, it is not going to be easy climbing your way out of here. But considering how unimaginable the price of failure will be, you see no other alternative.


__________________________________________________

Next page.

The trick will be to wait for the Woban festival to end. The only thing you can do is wait patiently for the glow of the bonfire to fade away, and the sound of voices to grow silent. Knowing you're only going to get one shot at this, the risk of getting caught trying to flee while there are still Wobans around who might see you is too great. You have no idea what the custom is here, but you hope that eventually even a three-eyed, seven-foot giant must sleep, and that after the party is over the people of the village will return to their huts for a night of contented sleep.


It is a long and agonizing wait, but your wishes to eventually come to pass. Keeping track of the time on your watch, the Wobans begin to lose steam well before midnight. Good — they're not night owls, living it up into the wee hours of the morning. The light in the trees directly above you grows dim, and slowly the sound of communal conviviality devolves into isolated banter. You momentarily panic when voices pass so close to the pit you can make out individual voices: "He ahaaina nui ia." "'Ae, 'o ka 'i'o ka tastiest a makou i lo'ihi ai." But when they pass, you can detect nothing but darkness and silence from the bottom of the pit.


A sense of caution tells you to wait a little while longer to be sure — there may be other Woban voices you can't hear way down here — but you've been trapped so long in this pit that you can't sit still any longer. With a piton in each hand, you reach as high as you can and thrust the wedges into the earthen wall. There is a trickle of dirt from each impact, but the pitons hold as you lift yourself up. Immediately you can feel the stress this going to place on your upper arm muscles, so you kick at the wall with the toes of your boots. With some effort they carve out a slight toehold, letting you stand a short distance above the floor. A moment later you pull the right piton out of the wall, reach up, jam it in, and pull yourself up another few inches. Next you do the same with the left piton.


In this method, progress is made by a factor of inches. Your biceps are burning, and your fingers feel bruised as they tightly grip the small steel wedges — but this momentary discomfort is far better than the alternative. So rest on your toeholds when you can, and inch your way upward so that you may live to see another day.


The village is indeed dark when you are first able to peep over the rim. This is good, because at least there will be no witnesses to this graceless final maneuver to pull yourself over the top. You first hoist your torso onto the level ground, your feet still dangling in the maw of the pit. Then you swing one leg up and roll over, above ground but extremely worn from the effort. You try and let go of the pitons, but you have been gripping them so tightly and for so long that your hands are locked into position around them. Begrudgingly your fingers open slightly and the pitons slip away. You can see the red indentations they have left on your fingers and palms.


It takes a few minutes to work some life into your arms and hands. They have done a yeoman's service tonight, and now it's time to throw the rest of your body into your escape effort. You stand up from your position beside the pit, flexing your fingers to try and restore movement. Below you are the two pitons, right where you dropped them. Your first impulse is to pick them back up and keep them as souvenirs of your epic climb to freedom, but instead you kick them back into the pit. You probably lack the articulation to grasp them and place them in your pocket anyway, and the next occupant of this pit will probably need them as much as you did. Pay it forward, as they say.


So now you are standing on your own two feet, with nothing but a dark village before you and not a Woban in sight. All you have to do is slip into the jungle and put as much distance as you can between you and this place. But a thought has been nagging at you for a while now: Gary the rock climber, and the fact that he had just completed an "epic climb." He said that he had been hired to take pictures, but what if like you his real purpose was to claim the Stone of Vul-Kar? Where else would he have climbed other than that main summit?


If this is true, the gem that you seek is no longer in some ancient temple, but right here in the village. Therefore despite your sense of self-preservation, which wants you to leave this place immediately, you creep toward the huts, back toward the center of town where hours ago you uttered the fateful word apopo.


You hear snoring in the huts that you pass, the sounds of people shifting in their sleep, incoherent mutterings in the dark. If you are going to do the exact opposite of what common sense says you should be doing, then you might as well do it quickly. So instead of creeping, you shift gears and jog toward that small shelter near the king's "palace." The wood pile is now greatly reduced in size, and there is a smoldering heap of coals and embers. The hut you are seeking is just as you remember it, and there is Gary's pack with its ropes and carabiners, visible in the dim light of the setting moon. You open up the top, and the first thing you see is a purple crystal.


__________________________________________________

Next Page.

So this is the Stone of Vul-Kar? It is certainly a large and hefty crystal, but more like a hunk of colored quartz than a priceless gem. But hey, it's Walter Berringer's money, and he can spend it on what he chooses. Right now you are just grateful for Gary Gaffney doing all the hard work for you, sparing you the need to climb the mountain. He deserved a better fate than what he got.


You have nothing to carry it with, though, so you turn to see if your borrowed book bag is in here too. But what you find is even better: your brand-new green REI backpack, the exact same one that Meredith stole.


It looks a little scuffed up, but otherwise it is still in good shape. You open a side pocket and find a six-inch knife that you've had since forever, and the folded-up military maps that Berringer procured back on Oahu. This is how you know beyond a doubt that this really is your own backpack, and not just someone else's look-alike. But that means…. You never got a good look at the woman in the pith helmet, but now with your stolen pack back in your possession, it makes sense that you had briefly shared the bottom of the pit with Meredith's broken body. You feel a chill go through you at the thought of it, but your employer will probably be pleased to hear the news.


So you place the Stone of Vul-Kar in your own pack and prepare to embark on your return journey. Meredith messed up all the strap settings, but that is easily rectified. What a doubly awesome discovery! You are reunited with your gear, and your mission is a success! Now it's just a matter of getting out of here.


However, that might be easier said than done. You are, after all, alone and in the dark of night, on an unknown part of the island. The quarter-moon will set soon, and when that happens you will have to fish out your headlamp if you don't want to grope your way through the lightless jungle. The Wobans must maintain several trails leading out of this village, but where do they go? Which one leads to safety, and not just into another trap?


The sound of moving water behind you catches your attention, and you turn to see a wide path leading down a bank. It brings you in a few hundred feet to the side of a wide stream — probably the combined output of those three waterfalls that you saw earlier, back when you and Gary were being led to an audience with the Woban king. This is interesting; all streams on this island logically must flow to the ocean, and the ocean is where the Big Papi is patiently waiting for your return. Therefore you have just found your way off the island! Even if this stream flows to the opposite coastline, all you need to do is make a quick call on the satellite phone to arrange a pick-up with Berringer.


The trail seems to turn and follow the small river downstream, right where you want to go. But then you notice that what you assumed was a log lying on the bank is actually a dugout canoe — a small craft for use on a small stream. This almost seems even better than the trail! Considering your poor luck so far following the Wobans' trail network, maybe you would fare better on the water. Sooner or later the Wobans are going to come looking for you, and you'll be harder to track if you aren't leaving footprints all over the place.


But who knows how navigable this stream is? The trail might lead you to more Wobans, but at least it will be easier to find your way.


__________________________________________________

You take the canoe.

The last time you tried following a trail on this island, it led you straight into the predicament that you are now trying to escape. So if nothing else, the canoe seems attractive just for the sake of variety it offers. But more than that, you expect the canoe will allow you to put greater distance between you and the people who want to make you their next supper. And when it comes to avoiding cannibals, distance is a good thing.


The canoe is upside-down on the grassy bank, so the first thing you do is flip it over. From what you can tell in the dim light, it was made from a single log hollowed out by fire. There is no seat, so you assume the occupant is expected to kneel on the bottom, using the pole tucked inside to steer and propel the craft against the current. It is big enough to hold only a lone occupant, which suits your purposes just fine; you assume this is someone's fishing boat, and you could care less what they think about you taking it.


You stuff the backpack into the rear of the boat, slide the log hull into the water, grab the pole, and then gingerly step into the canoe. It wobbles at first, but seems more stable once you're inside. From what you can make out, there is a long section of stillwater here, a place where the river is calm like a linear pond. The mountains are silhouettes against the starry sky, and you can hear the distant waterfalls. That is not the direction you want to go, so you point the canoe downstream, where no hills block the horizon. That way lies the most direct route to the coast.


There is a slight current, so you don't need to push very hard with the pole to put the canoe in motion. Mostly you just need to steer, shoving the pole into the water until it hits the bottom, and then giving it a good push. You have no idea how long this stillwater extends, although you doubt it goes very far; the river must get rougher as it tumbles its way out of the mountains and down toward the ocean. The question is, how much rougher does it get?


An answer to that question comes soon enough. The current becomes swifter just minutes after you set off, and you can hear rapids up ahead. Considering that it is nighttime on an unfamiliar waterway, it seems prudent to land the canoe and seek your refuge on shore. But you've only just started; you didn't haul your way out of that pit only to huddle in the dark just a few hundred yards away from the village. So far this stream seems manageable, and you'd prefer to take all the distance it can give you before you call it a night.


But the current is only just starting to pick up steam, and soon you are getting buffeted against rocks you can't even see in the dark. OK, so this is starting to get too intense. You try and push yourself to shore with the pole, but at first you can't reach bottom. Then it gets wedged in something in the water, and the next thing you know the canoe is spun around backwards.


You clutch onto the pole as dearly as you did the pitons, but the river's current is very insistent. Given that the strength in your arms has long since been spent, there is little you can do to improve your situation. And when the pole snaps in half….


Now you have no ability to control yourself, no ability to see where you're going, and no knowledge of what lies ahead on this river. So maybe the canoe wasn't such a good idea. The waves are getting bigger, and you are getting drenched in spray. Perhaps you should consider yourself fortunate that the canoe is still upright. You resolve to get out of this thing as soon as you get kicked out of the current and drift to shore — hopefully before you reach the source of that unnerving roar ahead of you, which is getting louder and louder by the second.


But the current doesn't cooperate. It pushes you over the edge of a tall waterfall, which plunges over volcanic rocks into a boulder-filled pool below. Both you and the jewel are lost forever.


THE END