Teenage Castaways

Chapter One || Pierre

We all said goodbye to our parents right before we boarded the boat. Little did we know it would be some of the last words we ever uttered to them.

When the boat crashed I got into a lifeboat with three other teens. We all had one thing in common: we were some of the only survivors of the sinking. We were in the only lifeboat that persevered, as all the others sank when a huge wave covered them and brought them down.

"I'm scared," a young-looking girl mumbled as she sat. Her hair looked a deep brown in the dark of the night.

"I'm in shock," another girl whimpered. Her face was soft in the moonlight. "There was so much screaming and crying... So much."

I nodded. Unable to do any more.

My friend, Yuri, ended up in a different lifeboat. One that sank with the waves. How was it fair that she was dead while all I was only soaked?

I curled up on my place on the bench and sighed. I was so tired. Sleeping would do me good, but, for some reason, I felt the need to stay awake. To wait out the night and see what would happen.

"What are your names?" I asked.

The girl with the soft face turned to me. "Emma," she said.

"I'm Adeline and this is Fawn. She told me before," the girl with the deep brown hair said. She looked over at the girl in the floral dress, Fawn, who nodded.

"Shall we take inventory?" I wondered aloud. There must be some things on the boat we could use. I knew my glasses could make a fire if we ever got on an island, but that seemed improbable. My clothes, the only other thing on me, seemed useless, besides covering me, of course.

"Sure," Emma said. "If y'all want to..."

"Yeah," Adeline nodded.

We got to work silently and immediately, lifting any hatches we could find and peering inside the dark spaces. By the time we were completely done searching the boat, the sun had risen.

The waves had calmed, and there was a dot on the horizon.

"What's that?" Adeline asked me; both our pupils trailed the little white dot bobbing in the waves.

"I don't know."

"What do we have?" Emma interjected, not noticing the conversation Adeline and I were having, not that I minded too much.

"Six gallons of water. Six sleeping bags. Six sleeping mats. Four sacks of dehydrated food. A tarp for the top of the boat... And a survival guide," Adeline said. "It's all cheaply made, but functional at least"

"I call two mats!" Emma said, before pressing her lips back together. Her cheeks flushed with red. "If that's... okay..."

"Sure," I said. "But to make it fair we all get at least one of the extra items. And everyone gets at least one of each item."

Emma ended up obtaining an extra sleeping mat. Adeline got an additional gallon of water and a sleeping bag. Fawn received an extra sleeping mat and sleeping bags. I ended up nabbing two gallons of water, instead of just one.

As we were sorting out our things, the little white dot got somewhat closer. It appeared in the shape of a lifeboat. One very similar to ours.

"What's that?" Adeline asked again, this time to everyone.

"Should we move the rudder towards it?" I suggested. "Or should we just leave it be? We could also move away, I guess."

"I think we should... should leave it be," Fawn said, her voice soft. I noted that the girl didn't speak much, but she still seemed nice enough.

"I would say so too," I said, with a nod at Fawn. There was not a chance another lifeboat from our ship was out here. It was probably something else. I wasn't too keen on finding out.

Everyone agreed we would leave the dot alone, unless the circumstances somehow changed. We spent the day passing around the survival guide and were about to settle down for the night when a loud voice broke the silence.

"CAN YOU HEAR US? ARE YOU ALIVE?"

"Who is that?" Adeline asked.

"The dot is talking to us," Fawn acknowledged.

We got up and walked to where Fawn was previously lying to peer over the boat. There we found the dot was another lifeboat. And it was only a few meters away.

"Uh... yeah. We're alive," I called back. "No injuries or death here. What about you guys?"

"IT SUCKS OVER HERE! MOST OF OUR SUPPLIES FELL INTO THE WATER AND WE HAVE A HASHTAG BROKEN ARM ALERT!"

I almost clapped my hand to my forehead. Just when my group was finally organized, a new group just had to show up. But it was alright; I would live. It just wasn't pleasant.

"We have some extra supplies, if you need them," I offered, bashing away any selfishness. "I don't know about the others but I have some water I could give you."

"REALLY?"

"Yeah, I have an extra mat... mat and sleeping bag if you guys want," Fawn offered. Adeline also chimed in and offered her extra supplies.

"GREAT! COME HERE AND HAND OVER THE STUFF!"

Ignoring the guy's somewhat haughty tone, I pulled the tiller to steer in the direction of the boat. When the boat was close enough, I reached for lifelines on the sides of the boat and pulled them into my chest. The boat slammed next to us.

"Thanks again," the guy, with light brown hair and a wicked smirk, said. "I might even repay the favor some night."

Ignoring him once more, I loaded up a gallon of water onto his boat. When I peered over I found five teens in the boat. One, a red-haired girl, was cradling a badly broken arm. She had wrapped it in some ripped cloth, but the blood still seeped through.

"We should stay close to each other," I said. I knew there was no way we could tie the life ropes to connect the boats, they were too short, but maybe there was some other way. At the very least, I wanted to stay within seeing distance.

"Yeah, sure," the guy said nonchalantly.

"What's your name?" Emma asked, her eyes trained on him.

"Killian."

"And the rest?"

"Jovie," the red-haired girl said.

"I'm Lexie," a blonde said.

"Ruby," another girl snapped.

In the back of the boat, a guy sat with sunglasses on. He was very quiet and only murmured a single word: "Chad."