Separated

Chapter VI

SAM

Music: Speed from Salamander 2

When I come to, my vision and my mind are extremely foggy. I'm not entirely sure where I am. What I do know is that something is poking my back and it hurts like a motherf*cker.

"What the hell..." I mutter, sitting up. I wince from the pain given to me from doing so. It feels like every part of my body is aching, although nothing seems severely injured. I rub my eyes to get the tiredness out of them, and then take a look at my surroundings.

I am lying on what appears to be the shores of either a beach or an island. To one side of me is nothing but trees, and to the other side is nothing but ocean. Below me is a huge pile of plastic and junk.

It almost resembles a... wrecked raft.

Then it all comes back to me. The storm, the separation, everything. I try to piece together the details in my head, most notably who was on my side of the raft when it split in half.

"I swear to God, if I'm the only one still alive..." I mumble. At this point, I'm able to stand up. My pain seems to have died down a little bit, although I still have to be slow and steady with my footsteps.

Now that I'm able to get a better view of my location, I examine the shore to see if there's anything noteworthy. To my luck, I spot a body a few feet away from my location. It appears to be that of a guy, and he's lying down, either asleep or unconscious.

Heath.

I begin running towards him, and then realize my mistake immediately after doing so, so I slow down to a slow jog. When I reach him, I get down on my knees and examine him closely. I can see his chest moving slowly, so he's still breathing.

"Heath? Are you just sleeping?" I yell, shaking Heath lightly, then a bit less lightly. No response. So I proceed to bitchslap him three times. On the third slap, he shoots forward rapidly, sending me hurdling backward.

"Damn it, Sam, was that really necessary?" he sighs, rubbing his right cheek.

"Well, I wasn't sure how I'd wake you up otherwise," I reply.

"Whatever. God, where the hell are we..." he mumbles groggily, looking around like I did when I woke up.

"Pfft. Like you expect me to know," I retort. "All I remember was that we were in the ocean... and then that storm came... and then I remember reaching for Elle, and after that I can't remember anything..." A sudden burst of realization hits me then. "Oh God... Elle... I hope she's okay..."

Heath puts a hand of reassurance on my shoulder. "I'm sure she's fine, Sam. Besides, we kinda have our own issues to worry about here. We need to see if any of our other friends are here, and furthermore, if they're alive."

"Who was with us?" I ask, still unable to recall who was on our side of the boat.

"I think it was Skylar, Avery, and Mackenzie," Heath answers, scratching his head as if trying to recall who it was.

Music: In the Crane Game from Gokujou Parodius

I stand in thought for a few seconds. Then, I say, "Welp... guess we better get searching."

"Yeah, we probably should," Heath replies. And with that, the two of us set out into the trees.

HEATH

Sam and I's search actually starts out pretty smoothly. We begin by simply wandering through the vast collections of trees and plants, calling out each of the girls' names in an alternating fashion.