The ghats of Bhimashankar were yelling out my name as I introduced myself... they seemed to like me...

"Dan Brown rocks..."

"Dan Brown rocksss..." they shouted back!

"See, I told you everybody likes him" I told Lathika and she gave me a nutty look... I tried to catch up as she sped ahead with 1.64 times my pace.

"Obama is not waiting for your resolvent vote. Go slow." My vain words fell on her hair laden ears.

"Fuck Obama, the tigers are sure waiting for their dinner... and if we don't catch up with the crowd, the tigresses are goina reward them for the feast that they are goina fetch!"

"I need to pee..."

"Are you irritating me intentionally or do you have absolutely no reason to live?"

"I really need to go, Latty... I've been holding on for like 2 hours"

"One minute... I'm goina wait for one minute... and if you're late, find your bags by that tree"

"Gosh, why dyu need to be so rigid and finicky all the time?"

"Go!!"

I rushed out as if the inter college treasure hunt had just begun.

I was expecting people who were still lagging behind to catch up with us. Reason for me to go deeper and deeper in the woods. More shrubby... more bushy... darker... deeper... until I thought about the one minute deadline. 40 seconds were already up and I thanked God for the inventor of track pants, it took me another 10 to finish my job.

"Bitch!!" I spat on my Rs. 2300 camping equipment as I picked it up from the base of the destined tree. Loading it on my spine, I started scratching my way through the thorny saplings and itchy branches with a larger-than-usual twig. I was so busy cursing Latika, I did not notice that the only sound that enriched the neighborhood was of my gait, thanks to my tiffin carrier that dangled from one of the hooks on the equipment! The twig in my hand was merrily swaying to the tunes of the encroaching noise of the cicadas, when it suddenly touched something fleshy... The reaction happened in a quarter nano-second. Something slithery glided away from under the twig with massive speed. As it reached some 7 feet away from me, I noticed the roughly 12 feet long and 4 inch diametered Sand Boa.

My bronchus attempted a suicide in anticipation. And it had almost succeeded had not the Bonnet Macaque tried to steal my tiffin box. The shock of two attacks put me into panic mode. I withdrew a staff that i had used to raise my tent yesternight, from the bag... all set to defend myself! It was nearly dark... I wondered how I had behaved so carelessly to let myself wander off to unknown places! Latika was not finicky! It was me who was living upto my nickname - Miss Kamikaze!!

The sounds seemed pronounced now! There was some water flow near by... We never crossed the Bhima river, or for that matter any water body on our way in... I was totally out of my brains... How the fuck am I goina get out of this mess! Screw NGC for making me a nature lover! Screw Adventure Trails for arranging this camp!! And screw me for paying up for it!!!

Sensing no probable attacks in the next 12 seconds, I managed to rummage through my stuff to find my torch. I started in the direction of the water flow! The cautiousness made the weight of the equipment heavier by the minute. In some distance, I heard extra crumbling of leaves. I switched off my torch.

The noise was right in the direction in which I was heading. I continued taking small steps towards it covering myself behind trees, obviously after checking for more boas! The mosquitoes had started sucking me and never was I so gentle to shoo them off... I didn't want to attract whatever made those leaves crumble.

"GRRRR..."

The extra bazooka effect of the roar had my ears focused. I could see a panther slowly moving in my direction.

Had I eaten anything since morning, I would have shat in my pants!