Drunken Monkey Hypothesis
Marguerite’s head was pounding. Even without a hangover the sweltering, breathless heat of the forest and its dank air would make anyone’s head stuffy and heavy. The air was muggy, impossibly close.
“It’s a fucking sauna,” said Ernesto as he spat on a patch of moss.
The ground underfoot was a mess of overlapping branches, sweaty leaves, and gnarled vines. Trees towered on every side, the few gaps in the overhead leaf canopy growing smaller and rarer the further they ventured into the forest. The group consisted of Ernesto, Marguerite, Paul, Stavros, and Julianne. All researchers, now that the local guides had left them behind at the edge of the rainforest’s thicket of dewy vegetation.
“Maybe that’s why the natives don’t venture in here anymore,” Julianne said.
She smiled at Paul, who shoved another jagged branch aside and frowned.
“The locals,” he replied, “Don’t come in here for the same reason they don’t want us growing in here. Some stupid superstitions.”
Ernesto nodded, hopping over a tangle of roots. Something scuttled from between them, darting from one side of the overgrowth to the other, never slow enough to be visible. Marguerite shuddered, cold sweat pooling on her bare neck.
“Same reason they’re striking in the plant,” Ernesto added, “They think prohibition ‘sullied the soul’ here, and they won’t harvest crops from a forest that we’ve ‘cursed,’ according to them.”
“I don’t see why management doesn’t just tell them that picking fruit is the only job going,” Julianne said, shrugging.
The tendril of a vine brushed past Marguerite’s shoulder. She shivered, the leaves like little fingertips.
“They did!” Stavros yelled, indignant, “The company bribed them, threatened them, said they’d burn down their shit-hole villages if they didn’t get with it. Idiots still haven’t gotten the message.”
“So that’s why we get the glamorous job of picking fruit,” Paul, “As our once-in-a-lifetime internship.”
“A Bachelors in Genetic Modification Research well spent,” said Julianne.
A shadow skittered among the trees overhead, startling Marguerite. No one seemed to notice, or if they did they didn’t flinch, the party walking further into the dark center of the forest.
“It’s just a gene that stops the rotting fruit from producing ethanol,” Ernesto said, “What, exactly, is it that makes these morons think that’s an affront to the gods?”
“I mean, it’s an affront to the monkeys,” Paul noted.
The group didn’t respond, but he continued unabated.
“They used to wait until the marula crop was rotting and eat the overripe fruit to get drunk,” Paul said in his smug, self-satisfied nature documentarian tone, “I’m sure the spider monkey population of this forest are more than heartbroken that we’ve stolen their annual piss-up out from under them.”
“Drunk monkeys ought to thank us,” Julianne said, “Maybe they’ll evolve a bit quicker without the option of getting shit-faced.”
Marguerite felt something pelt her neck, a hard, small knot. She whipped around but must have been too slow, searching the forest floors and surrounding trees but seeing nothing.
“Yeah, maybe the next generation of spider monkeys should get themselves a Bachelors in Genetic Modification Research,” Ernesto said.
“So they could grow their own?” Stavros asked.
“No,” Ernesto replied, “So they won’t be arrested for having a shit ton of ethanol at their disposal.”
Marguerite tried to smile at that but, despite the group’s best attempts, the after-effects of last night’s “cocktails” (raw fruit slices, ice cubes, and watered-down lab-grade ethanol) was taking a toll on everyone’s heads today. Another rock, or nut, or something hard and round, pelted the back of her head.
“What the fuck was that?” Paul barked, wincing as he slapped a hand to his neck, “Who threw something?’
Marguerite opened her mouth to comment but was hit with another hard blow to the temple, this one leaving a stinging welt. She heard a chittering rising around them, snuffling laughter that she recognized from somewhere. Nature documentaries. She stared up at the trees, following the rustling leaves in search of the thing (things?) moving between branches.
The cacophony of shrieks came all at once, the noise surrounding the party. In Marguerite’s hungover head, the chattering was louder than machine-gun fire, a high-pitched caterwauling that called from one side of the forest to the other. A blur of limbs leaped from tree to tree over their heads, faster than anyone’s eyes could follow.
“Shhh—” said Paul, holding out a hand to silence the group.
Something grabbed his hand, yanking his arm behind his back and dragging him to the dark forest floor. Stavros reached for his machete, a reflex, and found an empty holster on his sweating waist. Marguerite heard a hammer cock, the noise of a gun familiar only from movies. She turned slowly, staring at the spider monkey watching her from a nearby branch. The small animal held Ernesto’s small revolver between his two paws, flanked on either side by fellow tiny primates bedecked in disguises of leaves and twigs.
A trio of monkeys bolted back and forth across Paul’s back as he lay on the forest floor, dissembling the straps of his backpack and using them to tie his limbs together in a string of intricate, well-rehearsed motions. A spider monkey strode into the chaotic scene, and some sober, faraway part of Marguerite’s fevered brain noted that it was odd to see a mature Ateles Paniscus walking on its hind legs. Then again, it was odder to see the primate raise a hand to silence their comrades as the rest of the pack rooted through the expedition’s packs, their guards still training guns and machetes on the small, frozen group.
Cathal Gunning is a writer and poet whose work has appeared in (string of reputable locales).