Tecno

Flores Girl: The Children God Forgot
By Erik John Bertel
Copyright 2005, 2009

Publisher
Millennium Writing
PO Box 7
Centereach, NY 11720

Published 2008
ISBN: 0-9822576-0-0, 78-0-9822576-0-9
No part of this novel shall be copied, broadcast, or used in any manner without the express
written permission of the author Erik John Bertel or Millennium Publishing
This is a work offiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. This
is purely a work for entertainment, and any similarity to any real or fictional person or event is
purely coincidental.

Version 1a

Dedication

To My Nancy,
You gave me the opportunity, and that is all anyone could ask.
Your Loving Erik

Prologue
On October 28th, 2004 scientists made an announcementregarding a startling fossil hominid find
they had recently made. Their discovery, called Homo floresiensis, was seemingly a dwarf
variation of an early human ancestor called Homo erectus, who inhabited the Indonesian Island
of Flores some 18,000 years ago. The adults stood three feet tall and they lived on the island
with modern humans for thousands of years. Perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, theislanders
also have a local folk legend regarding a dwarf race of people that they called the Ebu Gogo.
Since the announcement scientist have been in a fervent debate as to whether or not the hobbits,
as they were called by the press, were a new species or were, in fact, a group of diseased human
beings. Anthropologists are now scouring the island trying to find where Homo floresiensis madetheir last stand when faced with the continuous onslaught from humanity. This is one account of
their rediscovery, and the repercussions of introducing such innocents to our less than brave new
world.

The most important scientific revolutions all include, as their only common feature, the
dethronement of human arrogance from one pedestal after another of previous convictions about
ourcentrality in the cosmos.

Stephen Jay Gould (1941 - 2002)

Flores Girl: The Children God Forgot

Page 1

Sarah’s Island

“Why am I here?” Sarah cried aloud to herself while shaking her head against the
spiraling winds. To her embarrassment, she observed the two native guides watching her, and
she wondered if they had overheard her lamentable outburst. Damn it, she didn’t want tocreate
a scene, not now and definitely not during this furious storm. As the dark clouds encircled the
boat, Sarah could only look up and silently exclaim, “Just my freaking luck!”
As the guides looked back, they could see that their passenger was uncomfortable, and
was doing all she could do to hang onto the side of the small boat. The storm chop was
worsening, and the spray washed over theopen boat in a continuous, unrelenting shower over the
boat’s occupants. The small American brunette, dressed in her customary khaki long sleeve shirt
with shorts, was soaked from head to toe. When the first spray soaked her shirt, Sarah was
initially concerned about giving the guides an unintentional show as the wet shirt clung to her
breasts. Now, her only concern was to survive this ordeal.Goose bumps covered her exposed,
tanned legs due to exposure from the cold ocean spray, and she fought hard to avoid shivering.
She could hear the boat struggling against the swells, and a dark, pungent diesel smoke
poured from the ancient motor. Supar looked back at Sarah, and he observed how sad and lonely
she appeared. Sarah, in turn, caught Supar watching her and she managed a small, bravesmile
for him that said everything was going to be all right.

Sarah’s Island

Page 2

As the vessel bounced from swell to swell, Sarah refused to relinquish her grip on one of
the old rusty cleats. The grey, violent storm was rapidly closing in about the small boat, and
Sarah was seriously questioning her sanity for agreeing to go on this research trip in the first
place. What sane...