Crybaby - Chapter Ten
Chapter Ten of the blockbuster new novel, Crybaby by best selling, multi-award-winning author Mark Watson...
CRYBABY
©Copyright 2024 by Mark Watson
CHAPTER 10
The Cave
Ahanna walked back to the car. The forest behind the cruiser glowed a bright red from the taillights. Although the beams from the headlights were blinding, she didn’t signal Raj to lower or turn them off. Instead, she stayed within the path of light they cast. Raj watched her as she walked—stiffly, mechanically, her arms at her sides. She wasn’t hurrying, but she moved with as little unnecessary motion as possible. The door thudded shut as she climbed back inside.
“I saw him.”
“What? Who?”
“Crybaby,” she said, before bursting into tears.
Raj wrapped his arms around her to comfort her as she sobbed, but his gaze remained fixed on the forest illuminated by the headlights. The woods seemed to take on a menacing presence, as if the giant elephant could come thundering out at any moment. Detaching himself from Ahanna, he quickly started the engine, turned the car around, and headed back toward town.
“Wow,” Ahanna said, laughing hysterically through her tears. “You guys were right, huh? That thing’s a monster.”
“What happened? Are you alright?”
“I was searching out back, and there he was, just standing there, staring at me. No more than a couple of feet away.”
It was Raj’s turn to say, “Wow.” He couldn’t think of anything else.
“He was looking right at me, but he didn’t kill me. He just stared for a while, then went back into the trees.”
“Should we turn around? Maybe we should try to shoot it or something?”
“Fuck no,” Ahanna replied. “Get us out of here.”
That night, the weather unleashed its full fury, and the heavens opened in a torrential downpour. Sheets of rain lashed the dense canopy of the rainforest, the rhythmic drumming blending with the deafening roar of thunder. By morning, the storm had shown no mercy, continuing its relentless assault, drowning the fields, and turning every path and track into mud.
Nobody dared to venture outside. The villagers remained huddled indoors, listening to the rain hammering against their thatched and tin roofs. The storm, fierce and unyielding, mirrored the fear that already gripped their hearts.
Trucks struggled along the sodden roads, making their way to the quarry, delivering planks and scaffolding poles for Rahul’s tower. But the storm had halted all efforts to build it. No work could be done in this ceaseless deluge. The rain poured down and the huge black clouds overhead showed no signs of parting.
At the Onion House, Crybaby’s last sighting outside the shaman’s hut was logged, but there would be no hunt for the elephant—not today.
Ahanna, still shaken, called one of her contacts at the Elephant Specialists Group and breathlessly recounted her encounter with the rogue bull tusker. The image of the elephant remained vivid, replaying every time she closed her eyes. It wasn’t just an animal—it was a huge, lurking presence, a manifestation of fear that made her shudder whenever she thought about how close she had come to death, and how powerless she had been to stop it. She needed to understand why it hadn’t killed her.
“Why didn’t it kill me? I was barely two feet away,” she asked.
“Who can say?” her contact, Dr. Patel, responded. “Rogue elephants, especially those in musth, are unpredictable. Sometimes they attack, sometimes they don’t. Unpredictable means exactly that. I can only guess that it was tired, low on energy, and because you stayed still and didn’t present a threat, it saw no reason to harm you. You did the right thing—you’re very lucky, I think.”
“What do you think it’s doing now?” Ahanna asked, mentioning the heavy rain and the waterlogged village.
“Rain is God’s gift,” the doctor replied. “Not just for us, but for the elephants as well. Your bull will be drinking and feeding, so it’s unlikely to attack the village today. You should use this lull to prepare. When are your own elephants arriving?”
Domesticated female elephants were used to track down rogue bulls, as they were the only animals capable of covering the necessary distances through the rainforest while carrying the rangers and their equipment. Until they arrived, there wasn’t much the rangers could do except protect the village. The heavy rain had rendered the thermal imaging drones useless, so the rangers occupied themselves by reinforcing the walls of the Onion House with more plastic sheeting—not to keep Crybaby out, but to keep the rain at bay.
“Yesterday they told us today. Today they tell us tomorrow,” Ahanna replied with a sigh. “We’re pretty isolated up here.”
One of the rangers, the Communications Officer, suddenly sat up straight, his focus on the radio. He snapped his fingers to get Ahanna’s attention.
“I have to go,” she told Dr. Patel before hanging up.
“What is it?” she asked, approaching the Communications Officer.
“There are people in the forest,” he said quietly, listening intently to one earphone. “I keep picking up fragments of chatter. It sounds like short-range walkie-talkies.”
"Fuck Rahul and fuck this," Deepak muttered under his breath. He was soaked to the skin, terrified, and utterly miserable in the rain-soaked depths of the rainforest. He wasn’t even sure where he was anymore. He had spent years trying to get noticed by the bandit leader, hoping for a life of adventure and riches. And yes, he had seen plenty of gold—including the bars delivered just the day before—but he hadn’t managed to get his hands on any of it. Now, instead of glory, they’d sent him out with the other new recruits to search for a killer elephant. A ten-ton, killer fucking elephant with tusks like spears, by all accounts.
To make matters worse, they hadn’t even given him a gun. The gang didn’t have enough rifles to go around, so they’d handed him a machete and a walkie-talkie, with orders not to kill the elephant but to find it and report its location to the others so they could come and shoot it.
“The rangers won’t go out in this weather,” Rahul had told them that morning at the hideout. “So we will.”
"We," of course, meaning not him, Deepak thought bitterly as he hacked his way through the forest, gripping the machete in one hand and the radio in the other. He’d been out here for hours and was thoroughly miserable. The forest wasn’t as drenched as the village—the canopy shielded some of the rain—but in this kind of downpour, nothing stayed dry. The trees shook violently with the wind and thunder, and the day was as dark and bleak as he’d ever seen.
And then there were the scorpions, the snakes, and god-knows-what-else lurking in the shadows. His biggest fear wasn’t missing the elephant; it was actually finding it. Imagine that—him, face-to-face with a massive killer elephant, armed with nothing but a machete.
Deepak’s radio crackled. “Anybody see anything yet?”
“This is D. Nothing. Over.”
“Where are you, D?”
“I think I’m in the hills,” Deepak replied. He was pretty sure he was somewhere overlooking the village, if only because he’d been traveling upwards for the past hour.
He squinted in the gloom and saw something that made him smile. He’d reached the rocky part of the hill, and there was a cave—or at least an overhanging rock—he could shelter under.
Even better, the rainforest had opened up a little, giving him a partial view of the village below. Though partly obscured, he could still see the far western fields and the quarry. What a vantage point—and no need for more trekking through the forest.
He quickly scurried under the shelter of the overhanging rock and pressed the button on the side of his walkie-talkie.
“Hey, this is D. I’m on the western side of the village. I can see the quarry, over.”
“Good work, Deepak,” crackled the radio. In the Onion House, the Communications Officer wrote DEEPAK on his notepad and, next to it, QUARRY.
“I’ll stay here and keep watch, over,” Deepak whispered into the radio. He set the machete down and hunched under the overhanging rock, shifting slightly to get a better view through the sheets of rain sweeping across the valley.
As he peered out, something small and furry tumbled onto his foot, scrabbling and mewling.
Deepak quickly moved to the side, then looked down in amazement. Next to his foot was a tiny tiger cub, no bigger than his hand, so young that its meows sounded like tiny peeping noises. It crouched, shaking its rump as if preparing to pounce on his foot.
He picked up his radio and activated it again. “Hey—” he began, but got no further.
Behind him, in the shadows of the overhanging rock—deeper than Deepak had realized—the cub’s mother, a full-grown and fiercely protective Indian tiger, had been silently creeping up on the intruder. She had been sleeping under the rock with her cubs when Deepak’s noisy squawking into the radio had woken them.
Deepak froze, his breath catching in his throat as he realized the immense danger he was in. The tiger cub let out another tiny mew. Slowly, Deepak turned his head, just enough to catch a glimpse of the tigress—her golden eyes locked on him, muscles tense and coiled.
She struck like lightning. Her massive jaws clamped down on Deepak’s face and neck with a sickening crunch. Deepak flailed on the stony ground, his legs kicking uselessly. Desperately, he reached out, scrabbling for the machete. At the same moment the little cub pounced, sinking its tiny teeth into the flesh of his hand.
The radio crackled to life. “Say again? Say again, over.”
A couple of hours later, the CO had a few more names on his sheet.
“We’re not exactly dealing with the A team here,” he remarked to Ahanna.
“Who are they?” she asked.
“Could be men from the village or the quarry. There are rumors of a bandit gang nearby, too, but nothing certain. Whatever the case, they were out there in the rain hunting for Crybaby. I got that much from the chatter. Seems the one called Deepak didn’t return. Now they’re out looking for him.”
Ahanna sighed. She had been expecting this. The mayor hadn’t exactly been subtle in his desire to see the rogue elephant dead, not captured. More often than not, survivors of an elephant attack took it upon themselves to hunt and kill the beast before the rangers could step in. Adding to that was the remoteness of the area—they hadn’t had a proper chance to track the elephant yet. To do that, they’d need their own domesticated elephants, which were supposedly en route, pulled from another mission likely at the other end of the state. God only knew when they would arrive.
For now, all the rangers and police could do was sit, wait, and hope that no more fatal attacks occurred. Fortunately, rogue elephants often disappeared as soon as they were hunted, so Ahanna was fairly certain they wouldn’t stumble across it in the next day or two, at least.
When Raj and Ahanna had returned the night before, they’d been informed that the body of the thief had been recovered from the ravine. Another life claimed, and if the rains held off tomorrow, there would be a large-scale cremation. The thought made Ahanna sick. How had one rogue elephant managed to claim so many lives? And why had it spared her?
She now felt like a survivor, and though she hadn’t been trampled or gored, she understood why so many people who had close encounters with rogue elephants carried some form of PTSD for years afterward. Ahanna had grown up around elephants. She had begun her career caring for the domesticated pachyderms the rangers used for transport and tracking other elephants. She had always found them gentle and intelligent, playful and loving.
But Crybaby had terrified her. When she looked into its eyes, she hadn’t seen any of the gentleness she was familiar with in her own small herd. All she saw was hatred and—she hesitated to even think it—evil.
The day after, the village was heavy with a somber air as preparations for the cremations of Crybaby's victims began. The rains had subsided, leaving the village slick with mud, but the brief respite from the weather did little to lift the weight of grief that hung over the people. From waterproof stores, they brought wood and kindling for the pyres, their faces etched with exhaustion and loss.
The cremation was not just a ritual but a release, an acknowledgment of the havoc wrought by the rogue elephant, Crybaby. The victims—so many victims, including the thief from the ravine, the shaman, the elderly mahout, and Nisheed, the chief constable, Crybaby had killed—were laid on bamboo frames, wrapped in white cloth. Families of the dead stood by, hollow-eyed and shocked, struggling to grasp the cruel reality. Many of the children had once ridden, laughing, on Crybaby’s back, never imagining that the gentle giant they adored would one day bring such horror.
The cremation site, set on higher ground outside the village, offered a safe space for the fires. Despite the gloom, garlands of marigolds adorned the pyres, their bright colors contrasting with the bleakness of the scene. The local priest chanted prayers, guiding the rituals as the families tossed flowers and rice into the flames. The air grew thick with the scent of burning wood and incense.
For the villagers, this was more than a farewell—it was a plea for peace after the terror Crybaby had unleashed. Elephants, revered as symbols of wisdom and grace, had taken on a darker meaning. Crybaby, now seen as a demon rather than a sacred creature, had shattered their beliefs. Grief was mingled with anger; the villagers felt a deep violation of something sacred as Crybaby tore through their lives.
Ahanna stood back, watching the pyres being built, the weight of the moment pressing on her. The sight of the bodies wrapped in white and surrounded by flowers churned her stomach. These weren’t just victims of chance—they had been murdered by a creature she loved, one she had dedicated her entire life to saving. Crybaby had transformed into something unrecognizable, and she couldn't shake the feeling that her own survival was inexplicably tied to the rogue elephant.
Why had she been spared?
Raj stood apart from her with his young, pretty wife and the remaining policemen, his face streaming with tears. The flames struggled against the damp wood at first, but soon enough, they took hold. People stepped forward, dropping their offerings as the priest’s voice rose and fell in rhythmic chants. The wind shifted, fanning the crackling flames, sending plumes of smoke into the air, where it mixed with the lingering clouds. It was meant to be a release, a way to honor the dead, but Ahanna couldn’t escape the bitterness creeping into her thoughts. The loss was too raw, and Crybaby’s shadow still loomed large over them all. This wasn’t closure—it was a reminder that the evil remained, dangerous, unrelenting, and waiting. All of the villagers had one eye on the ceremony and the other on the surrounding forest, expecting the ravaging monster to come thundering out of the trees at any moment and attack them in their grief.
As the pyres burned, Ahanna couldn't help but wonder how long it would be before more bodies joined those already consumed by the flames. Crybaby was still out there, and until their own elephants arrived—delayed again, she’d been informed that morning—they were helpless to stop him.
The cremation rites stretched into the evening, the flames reducing to embers as the sun began to set. Ashes were collected to be scattered in the river, following Hindu tradition, to bring peace to the souls of the departed. The villagers left in a slow procession, led by Rahul, the mayor. Heads were bowed, and hearts were heavy.
Though the ceremony provided some solace, it was clear that the fear of Crybaby still hovered over the village like yesterday’s storm. The cremations marked an end for the dead, but for the survivors, it was only the beginning. Crybaby was still out there, lurking in the forest, and the trauma he left in his wake would linger long after the flames had sputtered out.
Deep in the forest, away from the eyes of the villagers, the killer elephant stood and watched the funerals, his eyes burning with the fires of the pyres, the fury of the shaman coursing through his veins. He stood as still as a statue, resisting the powerful urge to charge into the crowd and trample them all. For the last day, he had skirted the village, avoiding the clumsy, foolish men who hunted him in the rain, watching them from afar as he slowly made his way around the outskirts to the deeper eastern flank. He had slipped by like a huge, grey ghost and made his way to the river, where he drank, washed, and ate, replenishing his strength. He wasn’t done with this village yet, but he needed to put some miles between it and himself. The huge, deadly creature was intelligent and far-sighted, and now, imbued with the fearsome spirit of the murdered shaman, he was cunning beyond the normal scope of his kind.
As the fires died out and the villagers moved away, so did the elephant. He headed away from the village, but only for the time being. He would be back, and the destruction he had caused previously, the lives he had claimed, would be nothing compared to the havoc he would wreak when he returned.
THE END OF CRYBABY: PART ONE
NEXT CHAPTER: CAT AND MICE
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