Ulzai said, “It must be hungry. Or crazy. It should have stopped.”

“It hasn’t?” I asked.

“It’s getting close.”

“Ratshit,” I said in English.

Ulzai threw the spear.

Something roared, and I glanced around. The animal was behind us. My God, almost in the boat! The enormous body twisted. I saw a pale belly and a dark spiny back. Ulzai’s spear stuck out of the back like yet another spine, long and narrow. The animal opened its mouth. Teeth and more teeth. The animal roared again.

I must have stopped paddling, though I wasn’t aware of having done it. The boat rocked—turning, caught in an eddy, going sideways to the current.

“Fool!” Ulzai cried. “I told you—”

The boat went over. I went into the cold and rushing water. A moment later the river went over a drop.

I tumbled. My mouth filled with water. The river sucked me down. I didn’t fight. Fighting would kill me. The rule was—go with the undertow. In the end it would surface. The rule was for swimming in the ocean.

God, it was hard not to struggle! My lungs hurt, and something was happening to my brain. A sense of pressure. A darkening.

The river went over another drop. I spun around. Aiya! Damn!

The current slowed. I was able to swim. Up. Up. I broke through the surface, spat out the river, and inhaled.

Ah!

I floated. The river carried me. I breathed in and out. My arms hurt and my shoulder and my lungs.

But I was alive. I lifted my head and saw fog. The water around me was gray. It rippled slightly. Ahead of me trees loomed: shadows, barely visible. An island. I was too exhausted to swim any farther. I let the current take me toward the trees.

There was driftwood on the upriver side. A great tangle. Branches and roots extended into the water, reaching out. I was going to pass them. I swam a few strokes, four or five—I couldn’t have managed any more, grabbed hold of a root, and hung on. The current pulled at me. I breathed. In. Out. So. Hum.Gradually my heartbeat slowed. My lungs no longer hurt so badly.

The pain in my arms was getting worse. I was going to lose my grip on the root. I closed my eyes and prayed to Guan Yin, the goddess of mercy, the bodhisattva of compassion. Get me out of this alive.

She, standing on her lotus blossom, smiled and gestured reassuringly.

I pulled myself hand over hand into the tangle of wood and wedged myself there. The branches held me half out of the water. Aiya! I relaxed. My arms fell, and my hands went into the river. I rested for maybe an hour.

The fog burned off. In front of me the river shone blue-green-brown. A bird, a large one, paddled on the water. It dove and surfaced, then dove and surfaced again. I couldn’t see if it caught anything.

At last I pulled myself entirely out of the water. I began to climb through the tangle of roots and branches, heading toward the shore of the island.

By the time I reached the shore I was exhausted again. I sat down on a beach of pale gray sand. In front of me was the driftwood: a white and gray wall that hid the river. In back of me I looked around: trees and bushes.

After a while I thought, what about the others?

I had seen Derek doing laps in the big pool on the ship. He was good in the water, almost as good as I was, and I had grown up by the ocean. He might not know as much as I did about rough water, but he’d survived a lot of really nasty situations.

As for the natives—I had no idea if any of them could swim. The river might have gotten them. A terrible idea. I shivered, though the sun was hot and my clothes were almost dry.

I decided to take an inventory. What did I have? A denim shirt. Jeans. Underwear. My boots were gone. One sock remained. I searched my pockets and found a lighter that didn’t work. Maybe water had gotten into it. I’d try it later. A folding knife. A round gray stone with a fossil in it. Some lint.

That was it, except for the AV recorder on its chain around my neck. I touched it. It felt warm. There was a transmitter in there, a small one that broadcast a tracking signal. It didn’t reach far, but the people on the ship already knew approximately where I was. If they decided to search for me, they’d find me. All I had to do was stay alive and hope that they came looking.

In order to find me quickly, they’d have to use machines: power boats or airplanes. I tried to imagine Eddie agreeing to a search like that. It was hardly likely. But he wasn’t the only person on the ship.

I took off my one remaining sock, folded it, and put it in a pocket, then stood and brushed the sand off my clothes. Time to go exploring.

I went around the perimeter of the island, keeping as close to the shore as possible. I found no trails: a good sign. It meant there were no large animals on the island. It also meant I had to push through vegetation. I climbed over logs and under the branches of trees. Vines grew everywhere, forming lianas that were almost tropical. Bugs hummed around me. They did not bite.

A couple of times I came to foliage that was too dense to penetrate. I took to the river, wading through shallow water. Tiny fish darted ahead of me.

When I was halfway around the island, I cut my foot. I wasn’t sure on what: a sharp stone or the shell of a river animal. The cut wasn’t deep, but it did bleed. I kept out of the water after that.

By the time I got back to my starting point, it was late afternoon. Shadows extended across the beach, reaching the tangle of driftwood.

I sat down. What had I learned?

The island was below the rapids. I had gotten a glimpse of them while climbing through the bushes at the north end.

To the west were other islands. The water was quiet there, and the river shore was distant. I wasn’t even sure that I was seeing it. That dim line might be a marsh or still more islands, their edges merging in the late summer haze.

To the east was the main channel of the river. The water looked deep. The current was swift. It had cut into the island, forming a steep bank, almost vertical. Trees grew along the top. Their roots extended into air, reaching for dirt that had vanished, and many leaned out over the water. A few had fallen in. The river rushed past them, tugging at yellow leaves.

The channel was not especially wide. I could swim to the mainland. But not today. I was tired, and the cut on my foot had not stopped bleeding. I didn’t want to meet another lizard. A good night’s sleep and I’d be able to get across the river. Maybe I’d find people. Nia. Derek. The oracle. Ulzai.

O Bodhisattva, Compassionate One, save those people.

I went to the edge of the river, scooped up water, and drank. It tasted funny, but it wasn’t likely to kill me, and I had already swallowed plenty of it. I drank some more, then went to the edge of the wood and sat down, leaning against a tree.

Bugs woke me. They hummed in my ears and crawled on my face. A couple bit me. I brushed them away. It did no good. They came back and bit me again. I got up and walked along the beach. The sky was ablaze with stars. I could see the Milky Way clearly: a wide, glowing ribbon of light. A meteor fell to the east of me. A lovely night!

Except for the bugs. They followed me. They were much worse than they’d ever been before. Why? Had I finally found a species that liked the odor of humans? Or had I begun to smell like the natives? I’d been eating their food for more than sixty days.

I reached the edge of the river and looked out. I could wade in. The bugs would not be able to bite me if I were underwater. But lizards were there.

I turned and walked back the way I had come. There had to be something I could do. Cover myself with something. Figure out a way to build a fire.

I remembered a line from a teacher in college: “Always remember, in a society with a pre-industrial technology, everything takes far longer than you think it will. Everything involves a lot more work. And there are almost always a lot of bugs.”