Dream Again

Day 217-298

Reconnaissance takes a while.
First of all spying on the society has to be done in absolute secret, besides which fact any of our activities are hampered by the number of hours a day we have to devote to just staying alive, gathering food, cooking, washing up, preparing fire wood. We still keep fires burning all night. By River's best count we've been on the island just shy of a year. Which is honestly I think kind of quick to turn to cannimbalism or an HBO adaption of 'Most Dangerous Game', but nobody asked me at all. In fact I was told directly to shut up about it.
We observe when we can from the safety of the trees. And for a while our information is actually not at all encouraging.
Everyone loose seems complicit in whatever's going on. The captives appear to be getting food and water. So to that end I point out we need to find out if they're actually captive totally against their will. If they were suicidal and either submitted to or are being held for their own good, then it's a different moral argument. Now I woudln'T personally hold people like that. If they wanted to walk into the sea frankly let them it's not as though we're currently being rescued. But even so it hardly means we should set them loose.
Our observations also show Max is still in charge, Ivan lurks around. They have make shift and some real weapons that likely washed up. A whole lot seems to have washed up as it happens. That's neither here nor there but really all it means is they're decently armed. It looks like Max did succeed in shooting a few boar because they have the hides and meat.
I maintain and River agrees, we don'T actually know what the captives did, including turning to cannibalism, to cause their imprisonment, in which case it's none of our business.
After over a month of observations we do finally get a reason. None of the good ones I brought up while I was trying to be mature no.
"They're eating them," Luke whispers, horrified, as I try to cover his eyes.
"No," I say, dryly.
"They're using them as bait," River says, equally resigned.
Max stands by, whatching critically, as two of the men slit the throat of another. As he bleeds out someone scurries forward to catch the blood in a coconut. Then Ivan sets to work with a machete. He both arms off, then both legs. Then once the bleeding corpse has fallen into the sand, the head. The white sand is clotted red adn thick with blood, an area of the beach where now most of the sand is stained and ugly deep brown, rivers of blood flowing back to the sea.
We happened to observe at the right time. and find that the survivors are executing the others, admittedly humanely with a cut to the throat, and chopping them up for parts. Lure for the wold boar, as well as it looks like fish bait. I'm going to guess the wild boar lure is also intended for the creature.
"Oh my god I can't believe watched that. Oh my god that was disgusting," River says.
"Well now we know what the end goal is," I mutter, "We still don't know why they got picked but yeah not a good dispensation of justice."
"We have to help them," Luke reiterates.
"Yeah that's what we're doing kid," I sigh, watching the blood mingle with the coming tide, turning clear water to red.
Together we return to our camp on the far side of the island to plan.
"No crime is perfect without a proper escape," I say. I wish I had a shitty PowerPoint to go with this. A shitty PowerPoint is exactly what htis situation needs.
"It's not a crime, they're hte bad guys," Luke says.
"And they established themselves as the law and authority therefore they are the law we are the criminals, stop caring about societal expectations of right and wrong, focus on morality, if we can will it. To be universal law therefore it must be so," I say.
"Someday I'm going to get you to fully explain why you talk like this and I don't think the answer is you're British, like that's not enough," River says.
"I'm ignoring you. Now, the first step is a good escape. No point in the crime if we can't get away. Sadly we are on a FUCKING ISLAND," I slam my fist into a tree, "So it's not possible to totally disappear. However, because we are on a FUCKING ISLAND, everyone else is in the same boat as it were, there's a finite number of places to hide but they've got no way to track us either. Best case once it's all said and done then we retreat to the sea caves. That means we need food hidden there for a few days, let the aggressors search the beaches, once they have exhausted the search then and only then do we emerge and pick a safe spot to fish, but from then on out it's cat and mouse with Max and Ivan and everyone else on his side.
"Working backwards. To make our escape we must flee when we get the chance, do not wait for each other. Either of you do not come back for me you've lived iwth me almost a year you know for a fact I'm not worth saving. You run trust me to get out. And we meet in the sea cave. We know the trails of this island pretty well by n ow shouldn't be terribly hard to make it out. If we are delayed and forced to flee through the night, stick to the trails. We've had no trouble with the creature so far it seems mostly benign, while ti's nocturnal which is odd it has every ability to approach us it doesn't seem to care. Move slowly and smoothly we shouldn't have problem. Similarly the boar haven't been terribly aggressive. This is just like we talked about with swimming, so long as you move confidently and non-threatening, the monsters aren't really going to want to eat you they aren't really interested in you just don'T startle them or scare them, moving on to the heist itself—," I'm using arranged pebbles to make my point it's not really working we needed a shitty PowerPoint in this situation.
"Heist? Tell me the truth did you seriously spend your whole life up till now sitting your room watching crime movies?" River asks.
"Something—similar to that actually yes," I smile nicely, "Moving on to the heist itself. What every job needs is a good distraction."
"If one of us tries to do something like talk to them, then they're going to know that we're stealing from them—again," River says.
"Yes, but a mostly naked bloody person screaming is generally really distracting. Like you can't go wrong. Someone's covered in blood people immediately go to look it's instinct," I say, "Luke, you have the knife. River, you help him. The two of you go and set the captives free. We dont' care where they go, not our problem. Let them go, and I will distract everyone. In the confusion of the prisoners getting out, I'll escape as well," I say.
"Simple," Luke frowns.
"Best heist's are. It's not actually a trick is it?" I ask, holding up a playing card. I flip it neatly behind my fingers, then twist my hand ot have it appear again the center of my palm, "You're not trying to make them believe that the card ins't really there. You're making them see what they truly want to see. They want to believe in the magic. So you give it to them. They want to believe things will go right this time. It'll all work out. They don't need a miracle. The card doesn't really h ave to disappear. But if it looks like it does, that's hope. And that is how we destroy them."
"But they have everything they want," River says.
"Not entirely. They want us to fail. That's why Max is still looking for us. He doesn't want us to survive without. Him. That''s proof he's irrelevant after all. So we give it to him. He sees me, covered in gull's blood, babbling some story that I've had to resort to cannibalism—well, he's going to want to believe that. He might not believe it long enough, but a few moments is all we need. The prisoners escaping will create some confusion, which should be enough for me to make my escape. But you're not to worry about me, the two of you let them go, then get out," I say.
"It should work," River shrugs a ltitle.
"Best I've got, I'm open to suggestions," I say.
"If there's time we absolutely rifle through Max's stuff. A lot washed up on that beach some of it could be ours," Luke says.
"Good idea—what did your checked bags look like?" River asks me, "We'll look."
"I didn't have any checked bags," I say, "I travel light."
"Who doesn't—okay whatever what kind of backpack did you have?"
"I found it already, it was ruined, that's where I got the shirt, just my electronics," I lie, "That was like first couple of days."
"You do travel light," River says.
"Hm, yes," I smile.
"We'll look for our stuff. My dad and I had equipment, and like knives and stuff, we had a tent," Luke says.
"Find a tent I'll leave you my fortune when I die great deal I'll probably die soon, however it's all in off shore accounts so good luck guessing hte passwords when I've got no fucking clue what i did," I quip.
"Why would money be off shore?" Luke frowns.
"He's making it up, he doesn't have that," River says.
"Tax reasons is the answer, taxes are different and governments don't know you got it," I say.
"Crux of the joke being he's saying he has like smuggled funds like sort of business owner and he clearly doesn't he's in high school," River says.
"Yeah exactly, anyway, the last step of the plan is—we need a good day to do it. Start mid afternoon so it gets dark quickly, and preferribly when a storm is rolling in," I say, "If there's a storm, they really can't follow us, and we'll be safe in the sea caves."
"And it makes it harder tracking us through the forest the wind and rain will shake down branches and the dirt' ll turn to mud, covering our tracks," River says.
"We can usually tell when a storm is going to roll in," I say, "A decent sized one. So till then, we wait, and be ready to strike."