‘We’re going to be fine, Bill, okay?,’ my father assured me, uncertainty clouding his voice. I nodded my head, shakily as the alarms blared, warning us of the rapid drop in air pressure. Suddenly, there was a loud, deep noise from underneath our feet. The pilot burst through the cockpit door, his face shrouded with despair. ‘He sat down on the passenger seat, and amidst the panic, clasped his hands together and began to pray.’ The co-pilot rushed in with the same expression of distress on his face. ‘Sir, we’ve lost control of both engines, as well as the rest of the plane. It’s over. Goodbye Mr. Walker’.
Panic built up inside me. I’ve never been in a situation that my father couldn’t pay my way out of. My father, being the ambitious and strategic man he was, sought to find a way out of the problem. There were parachutes on the plane, but the altitude was too low, it would mean certain death if we tried. My heart was pounding heavily in my ears. By now the plane had completely shut down and the lights had switched off. I felt a hand, my father’s hand, strapping the safety belt across my lap and a heavy thud as he collapsed on the seat beside me. ‘We-we’re going to be fine, right dad?’ He doesn’t respond.
Suddenly, we were lurched forward as the plane descended into a nosedive. My heart raced in my chest. I felt light-headed and weightless as the blood drained from my head. My only instinct now was to keep my eyes open, but even that failed and I blacked out.
I dreamt of my mother, with her luxury fur coats and designer perfumes, waving us goodbye as we board the private jet. ‘Remember Billy, listen to your father and call me as soon as you arrive. Oh, and don’t speak with the foreigners.’ ‘Relax, Martha, it’s only a one week holiday. We’ll be back in no time.’ As I stepped onto the plane, a warm gust of wind tinged my skin. At first, it was a pleasant sensation but it quickly became uncomfortable. The longer I stayed in the jet, the hotter and more stuffy it got. I felt my breathing getting heavier as I began to suffocate. I moved towards the exit but there was something restricting me. I looked back and saw my mother’s outstretched hand, holding me back. ‘Please, don’t go,’ she begged, tears streaming down her face, ‘Don’t go-’ I tried to answer but at this point I was gasping for air.
I woke up coughing, as a blazing inferno engulfed my surroundings. I felt sharp pains in my shin and my left shoulder was a bloody mess. I ignored the agony and surveyed the wreckage. My first instinct was not to escape, but to find my father. He would know what to do. I started crawling towards an indistinguishable shape on the ground. Suddenly, my palm dug into a soft fleshy object. The next moment filled me with such horror and anguish, that I nearly blacked out again. It was an arm. An arm with no body attached to it. An arm with a gold plated diamond watch.
My father’s watch.
I collapsed beside it and began to cry. The despair weighed down upon me, but as it became increasingly difficult to breathe, I was gripped by a strange sensation. An urge to survive. To breathe. To live. It filled me with a radiant energy and fuelled me to power on. Despite my body being slowly cooked alive, I wiped away the tears, grabbed the watch and crawled towards the exit, this time with an unwavering determination and urgency. On the way I passed a body. It was unmoving, but I refused to look at it. This way, I could never confirm that my father had not survived the crash. Finally I reached the exit door. The opening mechanism had molded shut due to the immense heat. I tried to kick it open, despite the agonising jolts of pain pulsing through my shins. Then I stood up and rammed my right shoulder into the door, I cursed as I began to feel lightheaded again. If I didn’t get some fresh air, I knew I’d pass out. The adrenaline was the only thing keeping my body from collapsing. My right shoulder was on the verge of breaking. Finally, after what felt like hours of pounding, the metal door fell outwards with a satisfying clunk. I ran blindly towards cool, fresh air. As my survival instinct faded away, there was nothing to hold back the pain. I became tunnel-visioned and blacked out for the second time that day.
As I regained consciousness I was met with the pungent smell of faeces. I quickly scoured my surroundings for any immediate danger. As far as I was aware, I was in a hollow cave, faintly illuminated by the moonlight. I could just make out the distinct shape of a leopard, prowling close to the entrance of the cave. Too close for comfort. I found that I was, quite surprisingly, not panicked. Instead, I focused my attention on the rest of the cave. It was quite spacious and judging by the visible rock layers, I presumed that it was a hollow in a mountain. Still, that didn’t seem to unnerve me. As I continued to scan the hollow, my gaze was met with two piercing white eyes, staring intently at me. I was taken aback, but I did not scream. My first thought was that the leopard had somehow slinked in, undetected, but as my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw that there was a humanoid figure standing directly ahead of me.
My heart started to beat faster as the adrenaline pumped through my blood. I was expecting the figure to attack, but instead, it just stood there with its intense stare. I found myself taking a step towards it, even though I intended to slowly back away. I took a deep breath and started walking steadily towards the figure. As I anticipated, the man, as I was now close enough to tell, swung at me with a club-like object, but I was ready. Ducking as his weapon brushed my hair, I tried to hit him in his exposed abdomen, but he was quicker than I thought and once again I fell to the ground, unconscious.
I woke up the next morning feeling refreshed. I realized now as the dazzling rays of the sun blinded me, that I felt no pain in my body. My shins had miraculously healed and my shoulder, likewise. As I stood up, I was met with a panoramic, breath-taking view. It was the African savanna, but not with the man-eating tigers and constant thunderstorms that my mother had warned me about. There were trees, hundreds of them. Feeding on them were giraffes, towering three times the height of a man. There were also elephants, grazing peacefully beside them. The grassland extended beyond the horizon, where they were met with colossal mountains, brushing against the sky. Suddenly, I heard a noise behind me. I glanced back and saw an old, black, primitive-looking man wearing nothing but a loincloth. I faintly recalled an incident regarding him and a club, but I brushed it off as a mere consequence of all the head injuries I had received. He was cooking a joint of meat over a spit that gave off a mouth-watering, savoury aroma. I hadn’t realised earlier but I was starving and parched.
‘Did you- Did you heal my injuries?’ He glanced back at me but seemed to be too preoccupied to care. We ate what I later discovered was wild boar meat, and drank water from a little stream that tricked at the back of the cave.
As the days turned into weeks I discovered and experienced many things. The man, which I took to simply calling ‘dad’ was either mute or unwilling to speak to me. He lived a simple life. He taught me how to hunt, forage, locate clean water, avoid and protect myself from predators and most importantly - How to run.
Running, I learned, was not just a hobby or a sport. Running was the key to survival. He taught me that speed was the most important thing out in the wild. You could be the strongest animal or the bravest or even the cleverest, but without speed, you couldn’t catch any prey. You had to run to hunt prey. You had to run to avoid predators.You had to run to stay fit. Every day at the break of dawn, he would grab his favourite weapon, a club embedded with sharp thorns, and chase me around the savanna. If I slowed down, he showed no mercy. For an old man, Dad was extremely quick and strong. His training methods were not the kindest or the most motivative, but they were efficient and they worked.
Soon, any prey animal I set my eyes upon stood no chance. Even the cheetahs struggled to keep ahead of me. We didn’t take any more from nature that we absolutely needed. We foraged when we could and when food was scarce, we hunted. Even though we didn’t speak to each other, we had an emotional bond that didn’t need words to be expressed.
The life that I used to have, when food was served by professional chefs straight to my room, was completely gone, but I found that I didn't miss it. This way of life filled me with an indescribable feeling of freedom and vitality. It was true that there were days that I would climb to the tops of the tallest Acacia trees and take out my most valued possession - my father’s watch. There I would stare at it for hours on end, reminiscing about my memories of my father, though I would never cry. Those days where I was a vulnerable little boy were over.
It was at one of these days that I heard a peculiar yet familiar sound. Though I haven't heard it in seven years, I recognised it as spinning helicopter blades. I looked up and saw a distant but distinguishable outline of a rescue helicopter. All I had to do was climb down from the tree I was on, and I would be taken back to civilization. To my mother and my family. To gourmet food and the most comfortable lifestyle. I found that I was arguing with myself. I was conflicted whether I should jump off this tree right now or stay. Why should I continue to live in almost complete seclusion hunting for my own food?
The other side of my mind replied. Although it may not be the most comfortable, or the most pleasant at times, living here had brought out a different side of me. A side that I didn’t know existed. The way I felt here was unique and I had never experienced it back home. There was nothing like the thrill of running, the wind rushing past your ears, gently ruffling your hair. The fresh air revitalizing your lungs, filling them with a sensation of pure complete happiness. Here, one could truly be one with nature. The decision was unanimous.
As I walked back to the den, Dad came out with something I had never seen on him before.
A smile.
‘You have made the right decision, my son.’