Dennis+H

== =__Isolation__=

__The Crash__ I was sitting in my seat as I felt a slight nudge on my shoulder; I gazed to the right but could barely move my head because of the acute pain in my neck. Kyle was trying to get my attention by repeatedly jabbing me in the shoulder. “What?” I questioned him. “Uhhgggg, when are we going to be there?” he asked. “We've been on this plane for what feels like days.” We were on our way from Chicago to Christmas Island for spring break to escape the cold city. As I got up to use the washroom, a stewardess interrupted me and told me to get back to my seat because of the upcoming turbulence expected by the pilots. Suddenly, as I was getting back, the plane started to violently shake in all directions. I found the closest empty seat to my left and strapped myself in, hoping the plane would calm down. The screams were heart wrenching. It felt as if my ear drums were about to burst. When I turned my head I saw the back of the plane rip off like it was paper and people without seat belts getting tossed around upwards. “Is this really happening to me?” I thought. Or am I in a bad dream and I would wake up in the next five minutes in my bed, sweating and relieved. But I knew that wasn't the case and the probability of me surviving was slim. I grabbed the life vest under my seat and attached it to myself. All I could do was wait and let destiny take over. The plane was swooping down to the Earth in a circular motion as if it were an eagle in the sky. I turned around to see Kyle sitting and grasping the arm rests of his seat. It all felt like a horrible roller coaster ride. Rapidly, it was all over in less than a second when we crashed into the concrete like water below. My whole body jerked forward, and I immediately saw the fuselage filling with water. Swiftly, I unbuckled my seat belt and swam to Kyle to try to save him. I could already see him suffocating so I got him out of the craft, attached a self-inflating raft to him and grabbed on, so we would torpedo up to the surface. When we got to the surface, we both gasped for air; it was mid-day and it looked as if a storm just passed. “Thank you,” Kyle said, still choking water from his lungs. “Don't mention it,” I replied. The plane by now was completely submerged as bubbles started to appear on the surface of the water; two more people shot up from underneath and were gasping for air like we were a minute ago. We paddled our raft towards them to see if they were ok. “Help!” they screamed. Scrambling, we pulled out the guys from the water (I never knew that human bodies were that difficult to pull; they make it seem easy in the movies). As they got on board, they coughed water as we did. The two guys seemed dazed, as if they didn't know what just happened. They were around our age, in their late teens, early twenties and regular build. “Thank you,” One of them said. “Are there any more survivors left?” Kyle questioned them. “Ummm...I'm not sure, probably not, it all just seemed like a blur,” the other one said. “Well, we're not going to risk your lives anyhow, trying to save other people, besides we have our own lives to save,” I exclaimed. “Oh sorry, we forgot to introduce ourselves. My name is Mike and this is David,” replied Mike. “Hi,” David said, “and thanks again for saving our lives.” “What should we do now?” asked Kyle. “I don't know,” I replied, “I guess we see were the current takes us.”



__ Storm __ I awoke in the early morning before anyone else had. I could barely open my eyes because of the blistering sun. Pulling myself up I almost forgot that we were stranded on life raft, lost like Earth in the universe. The thought of the plane crashing gave me chills. I thought about my family back home in Chicago and how they must be extremely worried since they asked me to call when I arrived. After letting my eyes adjust to the extreme sunshine, I looked around at my surroundings. Nothing but dark blue water till my eyes could see, except for the little speck of green, to what seems like the west. I repeated my thoughts. “A speck of green, a speck of green, Land!” “Hey!” I screamed, “Land Over there!” “What?” Kyle said, disorientated and half asleep. “Land over there, you see?” Mike and David were just getting up as I pointed in the direction of the island. To our luck the current was moving us in the same direction. “In around three to four hours we should be on dry land,” I estimated. About two hours later the gap between the island and the raft was closing and our excitement was getting stronger and stronger, but that wasn’t the only thing getting stronger, the current also picked up was we got closer. We gripped onto the raft like leeches as a five meter wave behind us approached. “Hang on!” Kyle shouted. We tightened our grips even more onto the life raft as the wave came crashing and accelerated our journey towards the island. Jumping out of the raft we got close enough that we could walk in the water. The island was small and seemed flawless, no foot prints, no civilization, and unaltered by humans. As I took the first steps, I felt each grain of sand wrap around each of toes and the warmth spreading throughout my whole body. “We made it,” Kyle said relieved. “What are we going to do now?” asked Mike. “I don’t know, we probably should set up camp, looks like a storm is coming in,” I exclaimed, pointing at the dark grey clouds. Dragging the soaked life raft on to the shore I noticed that in side, it had a survivor pack attached to it, it read in medium sized font, “Emergency Pack.” Inside, it had a first aid kit, a small tarp, knife and rope. “Hey, come over here!” Kyle, Mike, and David came running towards me. “What?” they asked. “Look, there are supplies in the raft,” I told them, “They could be put to good use.” “Here give me the knife,” Kyle said, tugging his arm forward, grasping the knife and pulling it from my hand. “Dennis, you and David get some dry, dead wood for a fire and Mike and I will get some //alive// trees, since //I have the knife.”// He stated. Kyle was grasping onto the knife like a mother grasping onto her baby. As we were heading into the mouth of the forest I noticed that the storm was closing in. So we tried to move as fast as we could. The forest was dark, I looked up and all I could see were the bottoms of wide palm tree leaves. David and I picked up some dead vines and dried out palm leafs and dragged them to the shore were we drifted in. There we encountered Mike and Kyle making our homes. “What are you going to help?” Kyle asked, “Or just stand there?” “What do you want us to do?” I asked, “And besides, what happened to you?” “Never mind that, and make the fire.” He demanded. Kyle seemed agitated with something, but I wasn’t quite sure what. “How should we make the fire? We have nothing” “I don’t know, find something!” I left because we needed fire but mostly because I wanted to escape Kyle’s bossiness. I was strolling along the shore as I found a small piece of glass the width of two of my index fingers and wondered if that was enough to get the fire started. I brought it back to give it a try. David was holding a small pack of dried weeds and bark as I focused a thin beam of sun light towards it. Almost instantly smoke appeared. We put the package down onto the sand and stacked the dry wood on top. Kyle and Mike were done the shelter as the clouds over top of us were coming in and the rain started. We all got in and wondered what was to come next.

__ The Cave __ It was the middle of the night as I woke up. The only light that illuminated the island was from the moon. I felt myself shivering as I realized that I was soaked from head to toe and the shelter was destroyed from the storm that came earlier that night. Waking everyone up, I knew that hypothermia could kick in, in minutes. “I’m freezing,” David said with chattering teeth. “Probably, the storm last night ruined our shelter,” I explained to him. “We should go look for somewhere to rest for the rest of the night; I think I saw a cave when I went looking for fire wood,” Kyle said. As I got up from sitting, I knew it was early morning now because of the lighter sky. We followed Kyle into the mouth of the forest to show us the cave. The forest was dense; we had to move every vine out of our way. Kyle was leading, and through the cracks of the trees I could see a stone structure up ahead. As we got to the structure, that seemed to be a mountain, I saw an opening on the side of it. We all gazed in, thinking that some sort of animal would come out. Kyle took the first step in, followed by David, and then Mike and I. I gazed around; it was pitch black with no light. I could slightly see the texture on the side of the cave wall; it was bumpy and hard. By now the sky had lighted up and we could see inside the shelter. It was medium size, with enough room for us to stand in. As I touched the side of the wall, I felt a slight trickle of water wrap around each of my fingers. I tasted the water for saltiness. It reminded me of back home, when I always used to buy the expensive “Fiji” water, which could cost up to five dollars a bottle. “Now I could have my own “Fiji” water on this island,” I thought to make myself feel better. “Hey,” I exclaimed, “there is fresh water in here.” “We can’t just live on water,” Kyle said rudely. “We need something to eat.” “Yea, I’m starving,” David said. “We should go explore the island for food.” “At least someone has a good idea,” Kyle bluntly said. “What’s wrong with you, Kyle? You’ve been acting strangely lately,” I asked Kyle. “I’m just saying, we can’t just live on water. Who knows how long we’re going to be here,” Kyle said. “Dennis, you and Mike will stay here to finish setting up camp, and David and I will go find food and explore the island,” Kyle demanded. As I watched Kyle and David walk away into the distant forest, it reminded me of the last time I saw my family as they dropped me off at the airport and how the distance between us was getting larger and larger. “Dennis,” Mike said, interrupting my day dream, “whatcha thinking about?” “Nothing,” I replied. “We should get back to work. I don’t think that Kyle would be happy to see that our shelter isn’t made.” I took the emergency pack and pulled out the tarp to hang in front of the entrance like a makeshift door to keep the rain out on a stormy day. I attached it by taking small sticks and pulling them through the rings of the tarp and wedging them into the small cracks of the cave. Mike helped me get some more fire wood and we started the fire with the piece of glass that I had found the day we washed up. As Kyle and David came back, I saw that they had brought some coconuts and some other strange fruit that I couldn’t identify. “Here,” Kyle said passing me and Mike a coconut each, “They won’t fill you up but there’re better than nothing.” Kyle had one arm behind his back, and had a grin on his face. As I was about to ask him what it was as he pulled his arm from behind his back, I gasped in astonishment but also in disgust. “I caught it myself,” he explained proudly I looked into his eyes but I couldn’t see my friend that knew before we crashed on the island. I didn’t know what was different about him, but I knew something was. Later, at around noon (I estimated according to the sun) we ate the animal that Kyle caught and set up half coconut shells along the side of the cave wall to collect fresh water. Kyle never went anywhere without his knife attached to his side. I took a bite of the identified fruit and spat it out. It tasted bitter with a milky nectar. “Oh you get used to it,” Kyle said as I watched him eat the same fruit while his face cringed. My stomach started to hurt and I got acute pains in my legs. “Uhggg, I think…..those fruits are poisonous,” I grumbled, as I laid on the ground in extreme agony. Everyone was in pain. The pain started to really kick in later that night as I lay on my back looking up at the rough ceiling of the cave as it got further and further away.