ISLAND

Chapter 4

Carter lay awake in his cot, replaying the day over and over in his head. He kept imagining Kevin's body hanging lifeless from the tree, he couldn't get the image out of his head. The worst part to consider was how he died.

He wished he didn't know, he wished he could be blissfully ignorant and believe it had been a quick death, but he knew better. The way he'd been impaled he had to have been alive up there for hours before he finally bled out. Whatever had killed him didn't even have the mercy to finish the job.

Carter hadn't liked Kevin but he certainly didn't deserve that. He came back to the same thought he kept having; what were these creatures? Where had they come from? He wasn't sure he wanted to find out.

His thoughts shifted to the moment they'd found him, the way he'd held Emily. He hoped he hadn't overstepped. Emily seemed to trust him and he certainly didn't want to breach that, his protective nature had just broken through, but he hoped he hadn't done the wrong thing. Even if she was okay with it he wouldn't want to give her the wrong idea. That was the last thing he needed after... He cut off the thought before it could form. Now wasn't the time to dredge up memories of why he wanted to leave earth in the first place.

There was a knock at the front pole of his tent, he rolled off of his cot and peeked through the front. It was Joseph. "What is it?" Carter asked pulling open the front flap and gesturing for him to enter.

Joseph held up a bottle of liqueur, "I confiscated this from a worker who smuggled it in, all of this happened before I could dispose of it." He paused for a second seeming troubled, "I... I slipped into the forest after hearing your story. I guess I just wanted to see for myself, ya know? It was... Well anyway, after seeing what you found I thought you could use a drink."

He passed Carter a large bottle of rum. Carter examined it for a second and then took a large swallow before passing it back. "Thank you." He said, "It's certainly not something I can forget..."

"I'm going to send some workers in there to get his body down. It's safe enough and at the very least he deserves a proper burial. Life was hard enough on him, I wish I could get his body home."

"Do you think he'd really want that?"

"No... No, probably not." He said taking a long drink from his bottle and passing it to Carter again, "But what's the chance any of us will get home after this anyway? If these... Creatures, whatever they are have gone unnoticed I don't see much chance anyone will find us."

Carter shook his head, drinking again. "We'll have to do our best to survive, but it doesn't seem likely we'll find a way off of this island. More likely it'll turn into a mass unmarked grave no one will ever get to visit."

There was another knock, both of them looked over to see Emily poke her head in. "Mind if I join you?" She asked in a shaky voice.

Carter waved her inside and held out the bottle. "Want a drink?"

She hesitated for a moment then grabbed it from him taking several gulps. She was clearly an experienced drinker. "I couldn't sleep." She said.

"The howling or...?" Carter asked.

Emily shook her head, "I think we're all getting used to that by now. Just what we saw... And Chris has been harassing me again. I just couldn't handle it tonight."

"I understand," Carter said gently. "You're welcome here as long as you want to be."

They continued to talk passing the bottle around until it was empty. There was a brief silence which Carter broke by laughing. Emily jumped, startled and swayed slightly, Joseph looked over raising an eyebrow, "what's so funny?" He asked.

"We're alive," Carter said. "We survive another night and I don't know if I should be thanking any gods above or questioning their sick sense of humor."

"I never know whether I should be grateful I'm alive," Emily said seriously. "Is another day breathing ever worth another day of pain?"

"You're still breathing so it must be to you, at least enough," Joseph said.

"I hold out for a better tomorrow. This certainly isn't encouraging."

"Well, nothing should seem too bad in comparison once we get out of here. That or we won't and we won't have to live with anything anymore." Carter replied.

"Well aren't you two just bundles of sunshine?" Joseph frowned.

"It's the middle of the night, on a deserted island with some kind of murderous creatures and no chance of rescue. If you want sunshine go to sleep and dream of your fantasy land where we're not all fucked." Carter said back.

"I think I'll do that," Joseph replied. "Goodnight." He said making a dismissive gesture as he left.

Carter turned to Emily. "So what makes your existence so painful?" He asked emboldened by the liquor.

She held up the empty bottle, "this is fancy compared to what my mom drank. Every night she'd come home with a bottle of the cheapest vodka she could get her hands on and get shitfaced before she'd even acknowledge my existence."

"I'm sorry..." Carter said. "That must have been a horrible way to grow up."

She shrugged, "it was never that bad as a kid, I didn't know any different. I just assumed everyone was taking care of their parents at that age. She used most of the money she made from the job she miraculously managed to keep on sustaining her drinking habit, the rest I had to sneak from her to make sure we had food. I always missed school to cook and clean so I didn't have any influence to know what parents were supposed to be like. It wasn't until I was 13 that I knew how bad it actually was. That was when..."

"What happened when you were 13?" Carter asked softly.

Tears started streaming down her face. "She started bringing this guy home... She was really happy with him because he was wealthy. Thought she could use her body to get his money. But it was never her he wanted, she'd pass out drunk like she did every night and he'd... He'd..." She started sobbing too hard to continue.

"Dear God..." Carter said. "Emily I'm so sorry..." He scooted closer to her and hesitantly put an arm around her. She leaned into him and cried into his chest, her tears soaking his shirt. After a while, she calmed down enough to take a deep breath.

"Every night..." She said. "At first I fought him, but after the first few times I just kind of gave up. He made it less painful if I just let him do it... 

I tried to tell my mom but she just screamed at me... She said that this was her one chance at a break, that she didn't care what she had to do to stop struggling, and that I needed to stop ruining it. After about a week I ran..."

"Where did you go?"

"Anywhere. I didn't care I just needed to get away... I begged for food, stayed at shelters whenever I could, I survived. After months of living that way, I met a boy... He was 15 at the time. A bad boy type. He'd run away too, But he'd managed to pass for 18 enough to get a job and an apartment from some people who didn't ask many questions. Or at least that's what he told me..."

"What happened with him?"

"He gave me a place to stay. He brought food home each night. We never asked each other about our pasts and he never talked about what he did for a living. He took care of me, kept me safe. I had never known what it was like to feel safe. I'd never been secure. As those things go we ended up falling in love.

"Both of you?"

"Yes. Despite the situation and our backgrounds he truly did love me. And years later when we started having sex it was by my own accord, not forced from me as it always had been. He never tried to force or push me into anything, he never used me, I don't understand how he could even exist in such a situation. But how, why, where he came from, those are answers I'll never have..."

"Why's that?" Carter asked as gently as he could.

She stopped crying then, add though she was grieving beyond tears. "One night he didn't come home... He'd said something about a big meeting that day. I went looking for him and eventually I found him in an alleyway... He was on the ground bleeding from a bullet wound. He was still breathing... Just barely. When I got close to him he tried to pull me closer. I kneeled down next to him in shock and he whispered 'I did it all for you. Never forget me.' I tried to get help... I called 911 but they couldn't save him... The police didn't care, they just saw one less drug dealer. I didn't know what he was doing to bring me food every night, I just knew he always cared for me and was the only one I could trust. I've never told anyone... I've always just tried to stay ahead of the pain."

"Then why tell me now?"

"In a strange way, you remind me so much of him I can't help but remember..."

Carter nodded. "Thank you for opening up to me. I'll never share this with anyone." She slowly leaned off of him and he stood, "I think you better sleep here tonight. You're in no condition to find your way back to your tent in the dark, Especially not of Chris has been bothering you." He laid out a blanket on the ground, "you can have my cot. Try to get some sleep."

She nodded and collapsed onto his cot. "G'night," she said already passing out.

"Goodnight Emily," Carter replied laying down on the floor and falling into unconsciousness.

When he awoke Emily had already gone. His head was throbbing, he wondered how Emily had managed to wake up before him. Slowly standing he went to go find water.

Water turned out to be a problem, they had used up the last of it and ended up spending the next two hours building distillers to purify the ocean water. Then another hour to gather enough firewood to fuel them all, which they were very careful to stay only at the outskirts of the forest. Once all of the distillers were boiling properly they spent a further 30 minutes retrieving Kevin's body.

Three workers carefully climbed the tree while another 4 stood at the base ready to catch the body. Carter and Joseph oversaw the project as the three on the tree carefully slid Kevin's body off of the branch, the sickening sound of wood sliding against bone unsettling before falling to be caught. They then carried it back to the shore and began digging a grave in the sand on the outskirts of the camp. There was only one small spade shovel in the supplies so most of them had to use their hands and sticks, it took up most of the evening before they had a suitable grave.

Once the grave was complete the workers lowered him into it and the rest of the survivors gathered around as Joseph stood at the top of the dune to pay his respects. "Most of you didn't know Kevin, even I didn't really know him. I think we all noticed his recklessness and the fact he got on everyone's nerves. He may not have been popular but he was still a man with his own background, his own pleasures and his own pain, his own life and his own story. He didn't live a good life but I hope that somewhere in his final moments he found peace with himself." Joseph knelt and holding the shovel upside down threw three shovelfuls into his grave. "It's a Jewish custom. He renounced his faith after his father got drunk and crashed his bar mitzvah, but it just feels right." With that, he stepped down and the workers finished filling his grave. Everyone then disbanded back to the bonfire for dinner.

"We have a problem," Joseph said as everyone finished eating. "Those were our last rations."

Everyone went deathly silent.

"We knew this would happen," Carter said. "We shouldn't be surprised."

"Yes, but what are we going to do about it?" Someone asked.

"Well presumably unless we all decide you look particularly tasty we're going to go find food."

"And where do you propose we do that?" Someone else asked.

"Hmm, let's see." Carter said searching around animatedly, "we have an ocean that way, and a forest that way, and another ocean over there, and... Yep, more forest. Now I'm no expert but I'd say we're either going to find it in the ocean or the forest."

"The forest is out of the question." A man said with obvious fear in his voice.

"We don't know what actually lives in these waters, we have to cover all of our bases." Carter said, "we've observed a very distinct pattern, so long as we go into the woods in daylight we won't encounter those things."

"How do we know they're not just quiet in the daytime?"

"Carter's right." Angela stepped forward. "Whatever those creatures are They're clearly nocturnal."

"You willing to bet your life on that?" Someone challenged.

"We're all going to starve anyway, why not?" She retorted.

"It's decided then. Tomorrow Angela and I will search the forest for anything we can hunt or forage, and the rest of you can try to figure out how to find some fish out there. You might need some rafts to get into deeper waters. In the meantime let's all get some rest, we'll need to be up As soon as the sun rises to make sure we'll have plenty of time to explore while the forest is safe." With that everyone made their way back to their tents just as the familiar howling began anew.