Dark Island Book 1 (Complete)

Chapter 15

Beads of sweat trickled down my face. Being chased by spiders and swinging across some canyon on a vine that could snap at any given second took 'nerve wrecking' to a completely new level. It would be a leap of faith... literally.
Harold gripped a vine tightly, until his knuckles turned white. He gave it a hard yank and then turned to face me. “It’ll hold your weight,” he assured me. When my lips pressed together in a grim line, he gave a vine to me. “You can do this.”
“Of course I can,” I whispered. I nodded and glanced over my shoulder one last time. Only feet away now, a myriad of eyes glared at me and in an instant, the spiders sprang. In one fluid movement, I clutched the vine, pushed off, and swung through the air. Cool gust of wind rushing against my face and whooshing in my ears. The rubbing of the vine and the creaking of the branch from the stress of my weight made me groan. If this thing breaks.
Ronnie’s shouts echoed in the air. Relief flooded through me as I landed on solid ground on the other side. I had not been liquefied into spider food and I hadn’t splattered like a watermelon at the bottom of the canyon. Letting go of the vine, I fell on the soft grass. My gaze drifted over to the spiders on the other side of the canyon edge. “Yeah, I’d like to see you try to jump that one!”
Harold smiled and held out a hand to help me up. Triumph flickered in his eyes as his wild hair was tousled by the wind.
“I know you’re scared of heights,” I said, “But you do it.”
“I didn’t have much of a choice. And I didn’t look down.”
“You did great.”
“So did you.” Standing a little too close to the edge, Ronnie shouted, “I don’t know what you are, but I’ll be sure to Google you when I get back. So long, suckers.”
“Isn’t gloating fun?” he asked. I smirked. “Come on. Let’s go.”
I focused all my energy on walking straight ahead and refused to look back at whatever else might be in the trees. The thought of anything squirming made me shudder. I scanned my surroundings again; just lush, green jungle. There was no sign of spiders but that didn’t mean they couldn’t be somewhere there, hidden in the thickest. I shuddered at the thought.
“Let’s try this way. We can’t let spiders keep us from finding water.” Ronnie gave me a pat on the shoulder.
“Hey, Jack. How’s your throat?”
My throat?”Huh?”
“We’ll, you were screaming pretty loud back there.” Ronnie put on his concerned look, but I could see the amused glint in his eyes. “If you want, I can take you back to the fires.”
“No way! I’m game if you are.” I pushed past Harold and stomped down on some enormous green and purple leaves. “Tell ya what. I’ll even lead the way.”
“Tough, strong and fearless. Now that’s the Jack I remember,” said Ronnie.
Yep Nathan Drake all the way. I hiked through ten-foot tall ferns and clusters of giant oval shaped leaves and finally found a way to cross back over, without negotiation a huge gap in the jungle, I breathed in the salty air.
“Smell that? We’re back by the ocean.” I smiled when the sound of rushing water echoed from our right. I craned my neck, trying to see over giant blooming plants. I parted the large fronds and peered through. My heart jumped. Winding deep into the tropical rainforest was a magnificent river. Crystal clear water trickled over moss-covered rocks. Tiny red and blue fish normal sized, thank gosh,- darted out.
“Check it out!”
Harold gave me a high five. Wasting no time, Ronnie knelt down and cupped water with his hands, taking a long drink. Harold held up a hand “Wait! Shouldn’t we boil it first? Maybe we could use coconut shells or something.”
Small smeared animal tracks lined the riverbank. I pointed down. “Look. There are footprints everywhere. If these animals are drinking it, then it must be safe.”
“I don’t recognize these tracks,” said Harold, studying the imprints in the mud.
“Because to they’re smeared.” I scooped up handfuls of water and let the refreshing liquid slip down my parched throat. Then I splashed my face.
“Just to be on the safe side, maybe we should still boil it.” Said Harold.
I shot him a exasperated glance. “Okay, but I highly doubt the size of those spiders has anything to do with this river. This is an awesome find.”
He nodded.” Yeah, it is. You can go up to three weeks without food, but only three days without water. And another thing...this could be our Plan-B. You’ve just got to have a Plan-B.”
“Plan-B? Asked Ronnie, washing his muddy shoes in the water.
“Yeah. We can follow the river if help does not come. It might lead us to a village or something.”
Harold knelt down and swirled his hands in the water. He had probably come to the conclusion this was the closest thing we were going to get to a sink...a tub...or even a shower.
“Works for me,” said Ronnie.
I dipped my hands into the cool river and rinsed off my arms and face and then splashed water on all the dirty spots on my shirt. The gross green spider goo came right off, and it was a good thing, because the thought of spider guts being smeared on me made me gag, Nathan Drake or not. Harold’s gaze swung to me. “What do you think of my plan?”
“Sounds like Plan-B to me, as long as we don’t run into any more of those spiders.” I bit my lip as a thought occurred to me. Following that river wouldn’t help us one bit if this island was uninhabited, but I was sure that didn’t matter. We’d be rescued soon anyway. As I bent to tie my shoe, hard object jammed into my hip. I reached into my pocket to retrieve my cell phone. My heartbeat sped up; I had forgotten I even had it. If it worked, then there would be no need for boiled water, coconuts or a Plan-B or anything! I flipped it open and stared at the black screen. Even pressing the ON button didn’t work. I felt like screaming and tossing the useless cell on the ground, all at the same time, maybe even stomping it to pieces. “It’s dead... completely waterlogged,” I said aloud. Ronnie’s shoulders lifted in a shrug. “Guess texting for pizza is out of the question.”
“I was thinking more along the lines of an exterminator myself.” I smirked as I removed the battery and dried off the phone with my damp shirt. “All kidding aside, there’s still a chance the phone might dry out. It’s a waiting game now.” Leaning against a tree, Ronnie blew out a breath. “What does it matter? No way will we get a signal out here in the middle of nowhere.”
“We can still use it to flag down a rescue plane,” said Harold.
Ronnie gave him a puzzled look. “If it’s fried, how’s that going to happen?” Harold reached for the phone and ran his fingers over it.
“The outside is silver. The sun will reflect off of it, and we might be able to signal a plane. A flash of light can be seen from fifty miles away.”
“Really? That far?.” I asked
“Yeah, and you can use anything shining too, like a belt buckle or canteen.” He handed the cell back to me. I slipped the phone and the battery into my pocket.
“Okay guys, so what’s the very first thing a group of castaways should do for survival?”
Harold brushed his hair out of his eyes and smiled. “Start a fire.”
“You got it.” I motioned around me “Lets start collecting some tinder, twigs and lots of wood. We’ll make a big, giant, blazing fire- so big that even a satellite from space will see it.”
“Great idea. Let’s get a pile going.” Harold began picking up some smaller sized logs. Ronnie blinked. “Tinder?”
“You know...grass, leaves, bark- stuff to start a fire. You do watch Survivor right?”
“Yeah, but we won’t need a fire until tonight when it cools down...if we’re even here that long.”
“Fire will scare away any spiders or predictors- not to mention that smoke can be seen for miles and miles during the day.” I paused to pick up an armful of dry, twisted branches and the continued. “The sun will set, and then what? Nothing sucks more than making a fire in the dark, especially with no matches or a lighter. So let’s get started, because I swear I’m not staying the dark out here.”
“After what we’ve seen, I think we should just stay on the beach. No more venturing off into the woods. We have no idea what could be on this island “
I nodded.” I agree. We shouldn’t have left in the first place. But we desperately needed water. And now we know where a river is.”
“It was a good find. Something that can save our lives if we’re stuck here longer than we want to be.” Harold took a few steps forward and motioned toward the beach. “The international distress signal is three fires in a triangle thirty to fifty feet apart. Does not matter what country we’re in. Every rescue worker knows it. At the first sign of a plane or helicopter, we’ll smother them with palm leaves so they’ll smoke well.”
“Wow,” said Ronnie.”  You have that Mr. Einstein thing nailed down.”
Harold smiled, a twinkle in his eyes. Because of his easygoing nature, he never took Ronnie seriously. He was proud to be a jock as well as a brain.
I reached for another branch. My shoulders ached and I could barely see over the high pile in my arms as my thoughts drifted back to my brother. I never dreamt that I’d be this close and yet still so far away from finding him.
I bet he is out there...
I still believe he is out there...
I have to believe he is...alive?