Dream Again

Day 565

A clear day comes. No sign of clouds. Red sky at night so no storms in the morning. And I start the game.
Brush fires spark easily. We've not had rain for weeks and tropical island isn't likely to burn. Not fast. But it will if there's fuel laid across rivers. Piled up on the ground. Slowly and strategically leading. They''ll smolder for a while. I start before dawn. One by one. Running from one end of the island, something like three miles, to the other, lighting little fires beneath piles of dried beach grass. Max will think I'm trying to lure him to one. So he'll go to the center of the island. He doesn't disappoint.
I go to the spring. the spring from the very second day. And I wait, whistling. The theme from kill bill. River taught me. She liked that movie too.
An arrow sings past my head. I duck, dodging away into the trees. It's hard to get a clear shot. Another one whips past me.
Another one comes. The air is filling with smoke. So I take a final breath and run through it, down towards the south beach. Smoke is now filling the air as the island begins to burn. The birds are chattering in the trees, terrified they take flight in masses. They're flying north. We though there was another island there. Just out of reach.
"What is this?" Max emerges from the smoke. Holding his bow. Oh that as his last arrow.
"Are you not entertained?" I laugh, holding my arms out. He drops the bow, a knife in his hand. He's in as poor a shape as I but much taller than me and I'm guessing stronger.
"We'll both die—you can't survive if the island is ashes," Max coughs his eeys are running from the smoke.
"I know," I say, "It's over now isn't it? Just what you said. It's you. And it's me. And I don't even know why. This is it. This is how we die. You're out of choices."
He runs at me, knife in hand, and together we staggar back into the frothy surf. The beach was growing too hot anyway, and the smoke is filling the air, choking us.
We both have knives and size each other for only a moment before charging.
I feel his knife slip into my belly as I drive mine into his shoulder. He rolls me off easily and we're both tumbling in the surf, struggling to stab again.
We leap apart, wounds stinking, I feel blood on my face and he's bleeding I got him in two places. We pant in the smoke filled air.
Then we dive again. He tackles me fully over. And we roll through the shallows. My knife goes into his thigh and I lose the grip on it in favor of blocking a blow to my face. My arm is split open and my blood in his eyes temporarily stuns him. I wriggle free, crawling backward in the water.
He stands, no knife now, blinking my blood from his eyes.
I feel my hand close on a rock and lurch forward, rock in hand, raised to hit his skull. He catches my arm and twists and we're both down again. Now we're rolling deeper into the ocean. He's far stronger than I, and much more experienced in combat. We're both rolling through the sand filled water, and his hands close on my throat. Too weak to strangle me, but with a knee in my belly he keeps my head under water, drowning me. His mud smeared, blood lined face is set with hate.
I can't get free. He's choking me and water full of sand and our blood clouds my vision. With my last final breath I dig my hands, not into his face, but into the place I stabbed his shoulder. He cries out in pain, and as my fingers rip his flesh it's enough for me to crawl free. I get a precious gasp of air as I try to slide away, bring my hands back to search for a rock.
He's upon me again, shaking me, back under water. My fingers find a rock an d I strike blindly but it's not enough. It's not enough. His blood is clouding the water and for a terrible moment I don't know which way is up. I can't strike him again. And I feel another knife enter my gut as water rushes into my lungs. He found one of the knives. He stabs me again, letting me float tot he surface in favor of driving a knife into my lungs. The air goes out of me. He raises the knife to my face, centered over my eye, with one shaking, mud covered hand.
Then he's gone. A great, clawed hand grasps around him, lifting him up and off of me. I gasp in smoke filled air as I look up.
Standing above me is the creature. A tree like terrible monster, eys glowing red. It lifts Max up in one huge clawed hand, and in a second I realize the claws are through his body.
It slings him away, into the ocean, limp as a rag doll.
Then it turns its gaze on me. And with one huge hand, reaches for me too. I brace myself for the claws to slide right through. Me.
But they do not.
The creature lifts me out of the water, and carries me back to the beach. It lays me there, nearly carefully, staring down in something like confusion. Then it straightens up. I can't breath, I try to reach out a hand. Thank it? Tell it to finish me too?
It doesn't.
It turns, and with that act of grace for its murderer, retreats into the burning forest.
I gasp slowly for breath. I'm bleeding out. But I can't move. One lung is collapsed. And above me smoke fills the air. I know I'm letting go. I clutch my wounds as blood bubbles through them. I don't know how to stop fighting. The smoke is choking me with each painful breath.
The blood is clotting on my hands. And the heat from the fire is enough to burn my skin, the sand beneath me is on fire. As the island burns. My own design.
I dare to close my eyes. Let go. Why won't I let go?