The birds sang and insects fluttered near the undergrowth, sunlight filtered through the trees.
Without the intention of letting the light continue bothering me, I decided to get up, but to my surprise, my body wouldn't move.
Or rather I didn't want to move, I was so sore that it was hard to turn around, I was very hungry and thirsty, I couldn't say it easily, but just the rations I took yesterday were clearly insufficient, I needed to get up and make breakfast.
Looking to the side, I saw a delicate figure resting sleeping peacefully, the sunlight didn't touch her face, but it did her bare shoulders, her white blonde hair scattered on the ground gave an unsettling naturalness in the way she was sleeping.
For a moment, I remained looking at her without thinking about anything, like when a computer gets formatted and needs to start its primary programs to be able to enter function.
For some reason that sight gave me tranquility after so much time running on the tightrope, not walking, everything was chaos, and I wasn't allowed to doubt, just run forward and not fall in the attempt.
The eyelids moved upon feeling a cold breeze that passed through the place, making her involuntarily touch her arms trying to grab the thermal blanket.
When she managed it, she opened her eyes slightly, there our gazes met, for some reason at the beginning I didn't feel any panic, her gaze made me feel comfortable somehow.
And as if it were the same, she held the gaze, at first a little bewildered by the person observing her, it was 3 seconds, so short that they weren't even felt when a sudden feeling of tranquility overcame her. It could be the warmth of the thermal blanket that covered her and that she shared with Emily, but no, it wasn't that.
The interaction was maintained until Emily's arm flew to one side and hit Cloe in the face, causing the unique atmosphere to break.
For some reason a little laugh came out of my mouth, not knowing if she had heard it, I changed my gaze upward and after making sure that I could move some of my joints I got up.
It was time to eat.
***
Everyone was near the almost extinct campfire, each one took a bag of military rations that we had brought, luckily Caleb's group had brought their own rations and wouldn't have to ration in case of an extreme case.
The distance to Junin on foot would be barely 1 hour and 45 minutes, for 9 kilometers it was close, however, the problem wasn't that simple.
There were no roads, only dense forest, wetlands everywhere and the winding river called Cara Paraná.
Its length was a pittance compared to the Putumayo river that was by Victoria port, nevertheless, for us it was an obstacle that interfered while we went down south to the village.
The district men we would meet would never arrive because they would go to the only available road nearby which was the west exit, even if the explosion was huge, they should have gone around it and gone with their squadrons in the same route to meet with the MÁSTERS.
There was a possibility of meeting them, but very low, and more because at the moment Rudolf and the group reached the shore, the district had already mobilized towards the west avoiding the main explosion zone, so when they arrived, no patrol was waiting for them.
With all the obstacles they had ahead, they would arrive in 3 to 4 hours, much more than in a normal route of 9 kilometers.
Once everyone had everything ready, they began the journey through the Amazon jungle.
The biggest challenge for Heiss was informing which animals were poisonous to touch and which paths they should or shouldn't take. They could risk crossing the river only if there was no sighting of caimans in the area.
The Yacaré is a type of caiman that inhabits those waters, it can reach 3 meters in length.
By no means did Heiss intend to add fighting a caiman for his survival to his list.
You could see Herons and night herons, types of birds peculiar to the area, demonstrating that the area had its own rhythm of life.
The journey was mostly silent, no one spoke more unless Jesús got scared by some snake or spider.
He also had the paranoia that there were piranhas in these waters because of the amount of movies he watched, but I had to clarify that they didn't inhabit these places.
Finally, after 3 and a half hours of a long walk through wetlands, the river and swamps, they spotted the houses and campfires of the village
It was time to really rest.
***
When Heiss arrived in the village, many of the villagers took him with great caution, they had been threatened in the past by drug trafficking, they didn't want dangerous people in their place.
But upon seeing that we were mostly young people and that the weapons we carried we didn't use to threaten them, they changed their attitude.
That and of course the money we gave them for allowing us to stay in one of their cabins, it was far from a luxury, but we were all happy not having to sleep on the ground.
Each one was exhausted, and we would use that day to stay and gather strength before asking for a ride to take us to Victoria port.
***
We couldn't bathe, and the time we used for ourselves was a matter for each one, and yet we all made excuses in the cabin.
The only way was to wait for the ride that would arrive tomorrow so we could travel.
Some of Caleb's group explored the village in search of what they could eat for lunch or out of simple curiosity at knowing practically nothing about the culture of the villagers, some indigenous and others simple farmers.
For my part I stayed observing the structure of the roof, made of straw, there was nothing else, I had already slept all morning and I still couldn't shake off the feeling of tiredness, despite everything that had happened, the heat won the battle and I decided to keep conscious and move so that the blankets wouldn't stick to the sweat on my back.
The fan didn't work and for a second I felt the despair of the nights when I couldn't wash myself when they tortured me, it was simply heat at its maximum expression.
In Colombia there are no 4 seasons, only winter and summer, we were in October, near Halloween, closer to November which is known as the rainy season, and yet the heat didn't drop a degree.
At that moment the girls arrived at the camp with plates made of clay, on top came large fish with a very pleasant appearance, in a matter of seconds the cabin was filled with the smell of roasted fish, which made the heat more impregnated.
"Let's eat outside, it's too hot in here", said Emily while telling everyone to get out of the cabin.
Each one got up with lethargy, it should be noted that we were paying for all of this with the money collected from the narcos, so we were more than happy to have a different experience than eating canned military rations like all the time we spent there. Even more time for Lucius and company, who had been working for the traffickers for some time.
We sat in a circle and each one grabbed a beer that they had brought, for my part I asked for water, not because I was a coward, but because I had simply quit beer out of a promise made in the district.
In any case, having those drinks here wasn't that simple, the costs had to be high to bring such things to the Amazon, if it wasn't because several of us know the prices, they could well rob us like many foreigners who come and pay a fortune without knowing what they're buying.
"The inhabitants here said it's called Dorado, it's a famous fish in the area"
I knew it because I learned about many types of fish, it wasn't exactly a hobby, one would have to know what you could eat in the jungle when deployed, whether here or in various parts of the world, but somehow it became a recreational way to pass the time on the long plane trips we made from one place to another.
This fish was a very valuable source of food, without holding back a little and with hunger still rumbling in my stomach, I grabbed the plastic cutlery and began to eat.
The face of everyone was comical, their eyes opened wide, the tender meat that came out easily when you pricked it, the smoked and homemade herbs flavor, the taste of lemon and cilantro and onion permeated the fish heavily.
I immersed myself in the food and wished to be in that position forever, when I finished, I looked at the others who were still finishing.
Among them, Jesús was fighting with the fish bones, it was hard for him to remove the skeleton to flip it over.
Approaching him I gave him a hand showing him how he should do it so he wouldn't mess it up.
"Thanks boss"
Personality #4: "No problem, just make sure you memorize it for next time"
"Next time?", Jesús's face decomposed at the idea of suffering the same thing again.
Everyone laughed at Jesús's now dead hopes.
When I finished, I lifted my head to look at the others.
They had already finished, Ethan was touching his stomach as a sign that he couldn't take anymore, Caleb was waving his hand towards Emily to see if he could ask for more.
Emily was getting intoxicated with the bitter beer, saying something like "It's not to my liking, but it's not bad".
And Cloe was the only one taking a soft drink instead of beer, she seemed happy in some way seeing Emily's reaction and talking to her.
It seemed Emily was very talkative, Cloe just listened to her in silence nodding from time to time.
At that instant, I felt that someone was watching me and I turned to see who it was, upon meeting my gaze, for some reason I felt a strange itch, I changed places and stopped looking at her.
I felt something strange, not like before when we woke up, it was….shyness?, looking at the clay plate, my expression changed as I remembered something.
{You haven't gotten over her, right?}, said #10
'No', it was difficult to continue every time I remembered how she treated me in the past, for a moment I thought about trying to get a stable partner in the future, and without waiting her memories before going to that mission in Cambodia hit me like a hammer in the temple of my head.
Leaving the plates in a bag and throwing the cutlery away, I thanked them for the food and decided to take a walk around the place, I didn't want to be depressed in front of them.
Without Heiss noticing, a gaze of pale blue eyes, so pale that they looked almost translucent or gray, depending on the angle of the light you looked at them; followed him until he was no longer seen around a hut.
At that moment Emily spoke to him "Hey, Cloe, are you listening to me?", with her gaze still lost in his last position and with her eyes with a little disgust, she turned around and looked at her, "yes", was the answer she gave, all while an involuntary hand of hers tightened the ground where she was sitting.
***
The day passed and night arrived, after getting some information from Victoria port I was returning to the cabin when I heard the sound of a television, peeking into a person's house, I realized it was a store, those where people live and at the same time sell merchandise to survive.
"Do you want something?", it was the store lady, an elderly woman who offered me something of my liking from the local.
Looking among the objects, I noticed they had cigarettes, I asked for one.
I thanked her and said goodbye, I settled on a log outside the cabin, took a lighter and lit the cigarette.
I left it to the side while it burned.
"Do you smoke?"
I turned to whoever was talking to me, it was the same girl with whom I had coincided gazes.
Personality #4: "I don't, but for a friend maybe yes", I lit it as tradition, he said that all evil that damages the body is bad, and yet, he lit one every month, reminding us that there was always something that damaged us, that it was just part of the choices we made.
I never saw him smoke one.
"Is that so?, that's good"
She sat next to me, and we contemplated the dark night, full of stars that in the cities couldn't be contemplated.
Neither of us said another word all night, we stayed until the cigarette burned out, and as if we understood, each one went to their bed to rest.
Before falling asleep I said some words in my mind, 'when was the last time I felt so comfortable with someone?'
With that, I fell asleep.
The next morning we got transportation and set out on the journey to Victoria port.