Birch in Africa: Innocent Beginnings

By Gert Van Staden

The name is Birch. Nothing fancy I know, but a great many people will one day know me, even if it isn't by that name.
Right...I live in, well I have never been in any particular place for very long, but I suppose you can say I live in Africa. The reason why I live in Africa, and in the wilder animal covered parts at that, is because I have little choice. See I'm not a normal person. I have abilities that most people believed died in their legends and myths.
I was happy you know, living there with my parents. Then again, I suppose what came afterwards was simply bound to happen.
...Life huh?

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Sep 30, 2013
• ISBN: 9781477270462

Gert Van Staden

Gert van Staden has been writing for over six years and has finally brought out his first book. He has undergone various writing courses to refine his skills in writing and make his work more enjoyable for the reader. It was his frustrations with the lack of classic style fantasy books in this day and age which brought about his writing career. As soon as he started it became nearly impossible to stop. Writing Birch in Africa in the space of two weeks. Originating from South Africa, he now lives in Brisbane Australia. His love for nature and books is what inspired him to start writing and it is still what drives him to write. His knowledge in those areas are shown often in his work.

Book preview

Prologue

This is my story.

The name is Birch, yes as in the tree. Yea I know; my mum was going through her hippy phase when she named me. It could have been worse; I mean my second name is Andrew. At least it’s not Willow or something like that.

Sorry getting side-tracked… right the name is Birch Andrew Swart and I pretty much live in the middle of nowhere.

I live in Africa, more specifically, smack damn in the middle of the equator. You know I am not one for complaining, but between the malaria and other diseases where I live, I think that there could be far better places to live. Don’t get me wrong. I love all the animals and stuff, but having no people my age or school restricts my social life to an almost non-existent point.

Why the hell am I living in the middle of Africa you ask? Like I know; well yea, I do, but it doesn’t mean I can’t pretend I don’t. See my parents are an odd bunch. Mum is a researcher. She studies wildlife in all its forms. Dad was a volunteer in one of those outreach programs they always have in Africa. They met while mum was on her first trip to Africa. Ironically, that is where I was made. They married when they went back to Europe, but ended up coming back to Africa. Why did they come back? Who knows, maybe they caught something that compels them to come back. Hope I never catch it.

Sorry, going off track again. Well I live in Africa in the middle of nowhere with no one my age and doing home schooling. Would you believe that I was happy?

See I have always had this connection to wildlife. It is not just because my mom loves anything that moves. You see I can understand animals. Hold on before you go shouting that I’m crazy. It’s not as if they talk to me, well not with words like humans do at least. I can just tell what they are thinking and want. Sort of like reading their body language, I suppose. Mum can’t get enough of it.

Now this is the one thing that I will not blame you if you say I am crazy, but I can do things. I have no idea how or why, but hell, why should I complain? Now the things I can do don’t seem to have any connection to one another, which makes it that much weirder. For instance, I can change my form into that of other living things. Then I can also control fire, as I want. Then there is the little thing about me being way too strong.

See what I mean? Absolutely no connection between one or the other.

Now I have never told anyone about any of this, though the strength thing is kind of hard to keep under wraps. Like I have to be careful when Mum asks me to open a bottle or something similar. Because sometimes, if I’m not careful, I break the lid.

See the way I see it. It is probably a good thing that I am in the middle of nowhere, because if I was in some big city I was bound to screw up so many times that someone was bound to notice.

So, that is me in a nutshell I suppose. Well, now I can tell you how things just seemed to get worse.

Why can’t things ever just stay good? Or simple for that matter?

Chapter 1

Birch!

The shout roused me, grumbling, from my sleeping bag. As I do every morning, I manage to fall out of the damned hammock. For the hundredth time I wonder why I insist on sleeping in the damned thing instead of the camping bed Dad had bought. Probably because I had made the thing myself, using my own hands. Thabo, mum’s guide, had taught me how to make one.

I pulled on my glasses then the world became clear once more. Funny how having glasses doesn’t bother me. You know everyone complains about glasses, I don’t.

Right… glasses check. Now clothes… I ruffled through my stuff carefully. This was Africa after all. The odds are that while you were sleeping something else had decided to make their home in your clothing, or shoes. Today I was lucky, only an agitated gecko barked at me as it fled the safety of my clothing.

Remember to wear something nice!

I heard my mom’s call and remembered why she said that. Right… nice, well that narrows it down to… absolutely nothing in my wardrobe.

Is that the best you have?

Well what do you expect Mum? We live in Africa in the middle of the bush, I replied when I walked in with my brown canvas materiel pants, green canvas materiel button up short sleeve shirt, my knee high wool socks, and waterproof leather hiking boots.

Who are we meeting again?

One of your Mum’s colleagues, his wife, and his two children, Morning B, my dad said as he walked in still buttoning up his own canvas shirt.

Morning Dad, I said after giving him a bear hug. I was now already a bit taller than he was, They have kids?

Yes, the girl is about a year younger than you and their son is two years older than you, Mum said as she placed my plate of breakfast in front of me. I was not sure how I should take this news. I didn’t pay attention when Mum had told me about them before. Keeping my secret is going to be hard with two nosy people. Then again, the company would be nice. I wolfed down my breakfast and even went for seconds before I stood up.

Alright I’ll meet you there, I called behind my shoulder as I walked out of our makeshift kitchen.

Don’t be late, Mum called to my back.

Mum when have I ever been late?

With that, I ran into the thick bush. As soon as I was out of sight, I stopped. Now… what is it going to be today? I felt like flying, yes flying sounded great. I looked for a tree I could climb easily. You don’t want to be what I am going to be on the ground. See it is too hard to take off from the ground with all these trees around.

Right, when I was as high as I could get I started to focus. See in order for me to transform into another creature, I have to understand them. That is why I haven’t tried to turn into another human yet, too damned hard to understand, besides I’m already human so I don’t think it would work anyway. Animals, animals are far easier to understand.

Now the creature that I was picturing in my mind was one of the biggest of its kind. A golden eagle, see I saw him when we went to the zoo in Europe. As I formed the image in my mind, I could feel my body change. I could feel my clothing sink into my body, as my body also shrank in size. Now, not to gross you out, but this is really not cool to look at. It is also really, really painful. As nerves, bone, and muscle move it causes a fair amount of pain. I let out a low sound of pain that already resembled the sound of an eagle more than a human’s voice.

I nearly fell out of the tree as my hands disappeared, but my talons closed on the branch and I was able to stay in the tree.

The last thing that came was the feathers and beak. The sensation of the feathers sprouting from my skin was indescribably painful.

Now complete, I took a moment to adjust my thoughts and senses. See, even my train of thought changes a bit with the transformation. I shook myself, letting my feathers stand on end as my mind adjusted to the new flow of this body.

Right, I thought, let’s see if we can find Mum and Dad in their tin antelope, err their 4x4.

With that thought, I took to the air. It was harder than I thought. The place I had chosen did not have any drafts that could help my large bulk with its ascension. See the golden eagle is huge, its wingspan larger that my own outstretched arms. It was probably even longer than I was tall, though I remember reading somewhere that you are as tall as your outstretched arms in any event.

With huge wing beats, I took to the air. My vision was so sharp that I easily picked out our campsite. Suddenly my wings flared with warm air as I struck a thermal. I circled up and up as the world below became smaller. Soon I saw the breadbox of a vehicle clambering down the trail. With little effort, I passed it and flew on. It was not far to the small airport, if that is what you could call it. It was really nothing more than an airstrip, with a large shed for storing the plane in overnight.

I was just approaching the airfield, almost in what I assumed would be human sight, when I heard it. The sound of an aircraft behind me. Without thinking, I jerked to the side as the plane blasted past me, sending me tumbling round in the air. I managed to right myself and screeched at it in indignation.

How dare this still wing intruder, I thought.

Before I could stop myself, I was in a dive in pursuit. I reclaimed my senses just in time and flew out of the dive just as I was about strike the wing.

See what I meant with my train of thought?

For good measure, I called announcing that I would not tolerate another intrusion. My sharp voice pierced the air.

I could not see into the plane because of the glare, but I was sure that right now our visitors were gawking at me. Probably because I think golden eagles aren’t meant to be found here. I silently prayed that they didn’t have the knowledge to tell if I was indigenous or not.

As the plane made its decent, I too descended, further off into the bush. Flaring my wings in front of me as I came in for the landing slowed me down almost to a standstill, allowing me to reach out with my talons. My vice-like talons closed on the branch and… Houston we have a successful landing!

As soon as I was comfortable, I started changing back. Luckily, even though the transformation hurt all as hell, it did not impede my train of thought. I could still focus, like when my fingers appeared I remembered to grab hold of a branch. The transformation complete, I took a shaky breath.

I looked around, Brilliant, Birch you idiot. Why did you have to go landing at the top of a rainforest tree? How are you going to get down?

See I don’t know if you know this, but rainforest trees are such that you need rock-climbing equipment just to climb up and down them. They have almost no branches until you get to about eight or nine meters up.

I was still contemplating my problem, when I was smart enough to release my grip on one of the branches. A gust tipped me off balance and there I went.

I smashed into the ground with the sound of, well something falling from really far up.

Guu, I breathed, Ouch… good thing I don’t break easy.

See this sort of goes with the strong thing. I am a lot more durable than other people are. Skin is thicker, stronger… and all in all, I don’t break easily. Never even broke a bone.

I pulled myself up and looked at my handiwork. The impact I had made was a fair sized one. I quickly pulled off my shirt to see if it was dirty on the back. Surprisingly, it was not, only a few leaves that I brushed off. My rear end was also surprisingly clean. I brushed off the leaves there too. I winced; my butt is going to be sore tomorrow, back too.

I pulled on my shirt and walked into the direction of the airfield.

As I came into view, I saw that our visitors were already unloading the plane. I couldn’t see them well from this distance, even with my glasses. Now I know what you’re thinking. How on earth do I still have my glasses? Well you see they disappear into my skin as I transform same as my watch and necklace. However, even with the fall my glasses always seem to stay on my head. I know it’s weird, but I won’t complain. Not like, I want to go looking for them in the bush.

I was now close enough to see them. Now, I think they probably looked like an average family. You see I am not a good judge since I haven’t seen too many people in my life. Well, except for the times we have been to Europe.

The one that caught my eye, I bet you can guess, was the girl. Now like I said, I haven’t seen too many people. The last time I went to Europe I was twelve and more interested in things other than girls. Now at eighteen, well I at least thought she was beautiful. Not sure why she was wearing a dress though. Not very practical here, but at least she had the sense to wear good solid shoes.

Hello Rupert, I called as I approached.

Ah hello lad, why am I not surprised eh? Parents here yet? The old grizzled pilot asked as he shook my hand.

I shook my head in reply, They won’t be much longer.

Brought your supplies, Rupert replied as he hauled one of the many crates out of the back of his plane, And more, he continued as he dropped the crate on the ground and patted his hands on his pants. Come and introduce yourself.

I walked with Rupert the few steps to the family. I was really nervous for some reason.

Birch, may I introduce to you the Lewis family, Rupert said. He smiled at the family and then me and then left to unload the rest of the crates.

Angie said you would be the first person here, the father said as he reached out a hand in greeting, I am Garrus and this is my wife Sarah, my son William, and my daughter Angie.

Angie?

Yes named after your mother actually, Garrus informed me as I shook his hand.

I received a hug and a kiss on the cheek from his wife, which surprised me. I shook William’s hand, he had a firm grip, and his smile seemed genuine, though I was no judge. When it came to Angie I was not sure what to do, but she solved the problem for me by giving me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. I was glad that my skin colour was olive, because it probably hid my blush to an extent.

Nice to meet all of you, I stammered, I’ll go help Rupert with your luggage and our supplies.

I’ll come help, William said to me as I turned. I smiled at him in thanks and waved him to come with me.

There were still several crates that needed to come out before we could get to the luggage. I grabbed a crate in each hand and piled them outside.

Wow, your stronger than you look, William commented as he struggled with one crate, these things weigh a ton!

Yea I think they go around thirty of forty kilo, I said not really thinking.

And you can carry two at a time, he exclaimed as he finally dropped his burden on the pile.

Err work here makes you strong, I said lamely, berating myself for not being careful with my show of strength.

I bet, he said as he watched me haul another two before he lifted his own new burden. Well I figured the damage was already done, no point in trying to hide it now, will only put more attention on it.

Mum and Dad pulled in saving me from having to reply. Mum burst from the car and gave all the newcomers crushing hugs.

Oh how you have changed! It is so good to see you, she exclaimed.

Glad to have an excuse not to participate in the conversation I hurriedly started loading the luggage and cargo into the ‘tin can’ as dad referred to it.

You have grown a strong lad there, I heard Garrus say.

Oh you don’t know the half of it! He ran here, and he made it here before we did. I still don’t know how he gets here so fast, Mom replied making me nervous.

A regular athlete, Dad added, not sure where he got the genes from. Neither Angie or I are exceptionally athletic.

Dad, I called.

Yes B?

Were not gonna have enough room, I said as I fit in the last of the cargo and tied in the luggage on the roof.

Really?

Yep, I said grimly as I looked at it. I had to fold up the other seats in the back. So with a press three people could fit in the back seat, but no more. I can walk back like I do, but that still won’t make a difference.

How many can we fit? Dad asked me.

Five at most, I said.

I’ll walk with Birch, Angie said.

Oh don’t worry dear I’ll walk with B, Mum said.

That would be a punishment to Angie, I heard Garrus say with a smile, Why do you think she is wearing those shoes with a dress? I couldn’t persuade her to wear anything other than those.

My mum still looked concerned, You have your GPS tracker B?

Yes Mum, I answered pulling out the GPS hanging around my neck.

GPS?

Yes, see mobile phones are next to useless here, Dad answered Garrus, "B carries a GPS