She pointed to herself. “Tarzeena.”
And in the center of it all, Tarzeena stood. Her hands were on her hips. Her chest was heaving. The jiggle slowly subsided, a dying earthquake. Tarzeena- Jiggle in the Jungle
She began to inventory her crash site. A shard of fuselage. A first-aid kit, popped open and mostly empty. A single, functional satellite phone, its screen cracked but displaying a faint, desperate sliver of battery. And a machete, still strapped to the side of a suitcase that had miraculously remained intact. She pointed to herself
It was the most absurd battle plan ever conceived. Her chest was heaving
She freed the machete. It felt alien and heavy in her hand. She was a woman of keyboards and binoculars, not blades. But as the low, hunting growl of something large echoed from the eastern ravine, she decided it was time to learn.
Jen was not the typical action hero. She was a primatologist, a woman of middling height and generous, comfortable curves, more accustomed to a dusty library in Cambridge than the sweaty, living heart of a rainforest. Her colleagues described her as “formidable in debate” and “unforgettable in a cardigan.” But here, stripped of her armor of tweed and intellectual certainty, she felt profoundly, terrifyingly exposed.
“Oh, for the love of... not again,” she mumbled, her voice a hoarse whisper.