Cavemen Valley (eBook)

A Classic Pulp Adventure Series, Book 3

Andreas du Plessis (Autor)

Andreas du Plessis (Urheber)

Andreas du Plessis (Herausgeber)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
99 Seiten
Pieter Haasbroek (Verlag)
978-1-7764912-2-3 (ISBN)

Infos

A dying man's last words were not a fever dream.

They were a map to a world that time forgot.

A prehistoric valley where monsters hunt and men have become savage.

Deep in the mist-shrouded jungles of Tropical Africa, the legendary adventurer known as the Jungle Hawk discovers the final, delirious ramblings of a lost explorer. The tale speaks of survivors from a downed plane, trapped in a land of impossible creatures and brutal, prehistoric tribes.

Driven by a promise, the Hawk descends into the lost valley. He finds not only dinosaurs and reptilian birds, but a desperate woman, Elize Angeli, hunted by the cannibalistic Warempi tribe. Together, they must fight for their lives against threats that should have been extinct for millions of years.

But the valley's dangers are relentless. Every shadow hides a predator, from the monstrous Tyrannosaurus Rex to cunning cavemen who see them as prey. If the Hawk fails, the remaining survivors will be lost forever, their screams swallowed by a world that should not exist.

This pulse pounding, lost world adventure is a must-read for fans of classic pulp action and modern thrillers. Perfect for readers who love Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World, and the high-octane adventures of James Rollins.

Fans of pulp, action, and mystery will love this thrilling third book in The Jungle Hawk Adventures, Cavemen Valley. Start your adventure now!

Textauszug

3. CAVEMEN VALLEY

Chapter 1

STRANGE DANGERS

Aztec Calder stumbles and falls repeatedly along the narrow forest path. His long, gray beard hangs dirty and stringy, halfway down his emaciated chest. His clothes are in rags, and his arms and legs are thin and bony.

Gasping, he stops. The world spins around him. Weary, he closes his bloodshot eyes. He pulls the rifle, to which he clings like a treasure, closer to his body.

Aztec Calder is tired, deathly tired. Behind him are two years of utter terror. Two years in which death was his companion every second. For him, Alex Kromhout, Mimi Loloberg, Peter Couzyn, and Elize Angeli...

In those two years, the horror from prehistoric times overtook him and four other members of their group. Cruel, as only prehistoric times can be cruel, which in this strange valley in Tropical Africa has become a reality.

But Aztec Calder finally managed to escape. Escape? In his fevered brain, doubt grows. Escape to where? He wanted to seek help in civilization, but he has been stumbling aimlessly for days, without encountering a single human being.

Day by day, he felt his strength gradually waning, until he was eventually driven forward by sheer willpower alone.

Weakly, he wipes his sweaty forehead. His eyes burn like two coals of fire. In his chest, the fever already scorches and makes his legs weak.

And then he notices the male lion staring at him with devilish pools of light in its eyes. He tries in vain to lift the rifle, his eyes fixed on the king of the jungle. The lion’s tail twitches, as if it cannot quite comprehend the strange creature before it.

Aztec Calder’s breath rasps through his throat. Finally, the rifle trembles on his shoulder. His eyes drop to the sight. The bead sways before him. His legs buckle slightly beneath him.

The lion lets out a menacing growl, then lowers itself onto its belly and creeps a few steps closer. Aztec Calder’s finger curls around the trigger. The bead is on the lion, above him, then below him. The shot cracks loudly, and the bullet plows a furrow through a tree branch.

Then the lion leaps. Calder stumbles backward, falls, and blocks with a weak arm. He screams hoarsely and weakly.

And then his eyes widen. His thoughts gather at a point, but just as they begin to make logical conclusions, they scatter like water. He sees again the giant creature with its long neck in the valley, its awkward forelimbs, its tail dragging behind it like an oar, and its teeth gleaming in rows in its large mouth...

In his lucid moments, he sees the lion before him, spinning around and rearing up on its hind legs. He hears it roar, sees the gaping maw and the long claws in its forepaws... Then he sees the sunburned body of a white man on the beast’s back, his gleaming knife blade, and his blonde hair disheveled in all directions...

Later, he is aware of a swaying rhythm, of arms under his legs and around his back, of wonderful cool water dripping into his thirsty mouth, and of soft leaves under his feverish body. Then he raves again, sees the animals of that strange valley, the prehistoric men with their long, matted hair, muscular bodies, clubs, and pelts...

Again and again, he relives his death struggle with the creature with many teeth and the long tail. The massive beast that towered over him like a mountain, over him and over Alex, Peter, Mimi, and Elize... and also over Zato. He relives the gruesome moment when the beast grabbed Zato in its short forelimbs and tore him apart before the bullets hit its brain and sent it tumbling to the ground.

And beside him watches the strange white man, whom he vaguely remembers through his fevered brain as having fought the lion. In his lucid moments, he realizes that this stranger must have dealt with the lion.

Aztec Calder often raves. It is in moments like these that he shouts against that strange valley, against the cruel fate that landed them there.

And it is then that the white giant bends over him and listens... listens to his strange, confused story that unfolds before him like a telegram. He patiently listens to the tattered man’s tale of deprivation, suffering, danger, and to his and his friends’ attempts to escape from their terrible circumstances...

Slowly, the days drag by. Calder gradually becomes stronger, his delirium less frequent, and his appetite greater. But he is still just skin and bones, an emaciated, pitiful figure.

It was a week later when he sat up for the first time. Above him was a roof of leaves, tree bark, and vines. Beneath him was a floor of bamboo. Through the open door and windows of the rough hut, strange sounds drifted in. Sounds that he later, after overcoming the dizzy feeling in his head, identified as those of birds and monkeys.

Calder slowly pushes himself up. The dizziness threatens to overtake him repeatedly. He looks around. In the corner are his rifle and tattered clothes. He glances down at his body and sees that he is wearing strange leather clothes.

He vaguely remembers that a strange, half-naked white man was constantly by his side. With his arm against the rough bamboo wall, he pushes himself upright with a strenuous effort. Everything goes black before him, but with a stubborn willpower, he keeps himself upright. Slowly, he stumbles towards the door. The dim sunbeam filtering through the leaves pierces his eyes like daggers. He closes them and blinks a few times. Around him, above him, and below him are branches, vines, creepers, and also fluttering birds.

He stumbles into the rough opening that serves as a door and peers down. He sees only gray depths, branches, and vines. Calder feels dizzy, nauseous, and lightheaded. He tries to step away from the opening and stumble deeper into the hut. His legs give way the next moment. In his mind, an urgent warning sounds. He wants to scream, grab the bamboo wall, and falls backward. Then he plunges forward. He is aware of a strange sensation, as if he is flying. His bony body strikes a branch, hovers on it for a moment, slides off, and then plummets further into the depths... Aztec Calder is dead...

Up to this point, he could follow Aztec Calder’s erratic trail. Before him, the vegetation is now sparser and the rocks more numerous. His piercing blue eyes scan the steep mountainside, which rises from the jungle to the heavens, until the cliffs disappear into thick mist clouds.

An unyielding world, where even the birds are silent, and the animals slink away in shame, as the old native had told him the previous day. An old, gray native who wanders alone in this area...

The young man, naked except for the leopard-skin loincloth around his slim waist, suddenly shivers and wonders if it’s from the cold that’s pushing down the damp mountain slopes. He shakes his broad shoulders, runs his hand over his long, blond hair, which is tied back at his nape with a pigskin thong, and looks back in the direction from which he came. Far to the west, thick, dark banks of thunderclouds hang, with long streaks of rain falling from them. Behind him lies a sea of green vegetation. Somewhere among those countless primeval forest giants, Aztec Calder is buried, now two days’ journey away.

And now he is on his way to the strange valley with the strange creatures from bygone days. A valley he had never heard of in all his many wanderings through the mighty Congo forest.

Was Calder in his right mind when he mumbled those things? Was his mind so clouded by fever that he saw and experienced all sorts of hallucinations, possibly confusing them with reality?

The young man shakes his head, adjusts his bow and quiver, weaves his fingers through the long grass rope, and begins to climb the mountainside. The journey is difficult and slow, the cliffs he struggles up with tense muscles and gripping fingertips are damp and brittle. Above him, the mist lives, at one moment thin, then thick and opaque again, as the wind constantly shifts it around, tearing it open, only to have it gather once more the next moment.

As the cliff recedes, a steep climb lies ahead before the next cliffs disappear into the mist. It’s cold and unpleasant. A fine, misty rain spreads over his bare chest, sending small, cold streams running down his body.

Between the rocks grow long, tough grass tussocks, whose sharp, spear-shaped tips pierce his skin and leave fine streaks of blood.

He stops before the second mass of cliffs. His keen, expert eye wanders from side to side, searching for the easiest place to climb. Slowly, he moves along the base of the cliff. There is no sun here, just the swirling mist close above him, the fine spray droplets, and the cold wind.

Far below him, the jungle stretches to the horizon, threaded with silver streams winding in all directions.

For three hours, he struggles against the cliff in the thick mist. Sometimes it’s easier, other times, it takes him minutes to climb just a few feet higher. His fingers are already stiff from the cold, and he rubs his hands together for a long time.

When he finally lands on a narrow rock ledge and catches his breath, he sees that his view here is limited to no more than twenty paces. Above him, the black cliffs stagger away into the mist blanket. He drinks a few sips of water from a thin rock stream and then resumes his arduous climb.

Dusk had already begun to set in when the young man finally reached the mountaintop and gratefully settled under an overhanging cliff. He is tired and cold, but a quick survey convinced him that there is no possibility of making a fire here. The only comfort is that he can at least spend the night out of the biting wind and miserable mist rain. A thin layer of snow...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 22.9.2025
• Reihe/Serie: Jungle Hawk
• Illustrationen: Andreas du Plessis
• Mitarbeit: Zusammenstellung: Andreas du Plessis
• Übersetzer: Andreas du Plessis
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Science Fiction
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• Schlagworte: Action and suspense • ancient times stories • cavemen • cavemen stories • cavemen valley • ebook stories • English Adventure • jungle hawk • jungle hero series • lost city in Africa • pre-historic times • Pulp Fiction Thriller • tarzan-type survival • Valley
• ISBN-10: 1-7764912-2-X / 177649122X
• ISBN-13: 978-1-7764912-2-3 / 9781776491223