Island, Round Six: By a fallen stake...

[Nova]

A group was starting to form on the beach. Hunter was just staring out at sea, thinking about his family at home. But then slowly, people started to join the group and started to talk, and Hunter knew this was his opportunity to get to know people. Even though at least one of them was a murderer, he knew it would be best to get onto the murderer's good side.

There was a flying angel who recently landed, a girl talking about her music, this delusional young lady who was building sand castles, and other individuals including a spoiled woman and someone who deserved to be in the country.

"Uhm...hello. My name's Mina Saelune. I..sing, some of you may know my music..."


"Hello. My name is Shani. I've not heard your music but I'm sure you're pretty good."

"Hey there. I'm Hunter Harris, and despite the circumstances, it's nice to meet you all. It's hard to believe what happened to the Captain though..."

[Deleted]

Mina nervously shook Shani's hand. Sure, it could be her, but then again, it could be anyone. Mina needed to know everything she could about her fellow survivors if she wanted to survive.

The girl's smile seemed sincere, so she smiled back.

"I'm not surprised you haven't heard of me," she replied. "I pretty much just travel around the world and sing stuff, you know, for fun. I play harp too...mine was lost with the ship...I really only have one recorded CD my sister made. She's good at that sort of thing."

Having said this, she turned to give a quick "Hiya" to the young man, Hunter.

[Lizzie]

"Uhm...hello. My name's Mina Saelune. I..sing, some of you may know my music..."

"Hello. My name is Shani. I've not heard your music but I'm sure you're pretty good."

"Hey there. I'm Hunter Harris, and despite the circumstances, it's nice to meet you all. It's hard to believe what happened to the Captain though..."

Sam looked up at the sound of people talking all around her.

"Hay, um, I'm Sam," she squeaked. There were so many people, including one with wings! People made her nervous, "I'm from Kansas. Nice to meet you."

Sam settled down next to an oblivious looking girl, the only one that she felt comfortable near so far, out of the people she'd seen. She looked like she had no idea what she was doing, and Sam liked that.

[selmette]

Selm hadn't actually witnessed any of the Captain's foolishness firsthand. But she'd definitely heard stories. Stories involving spoiled sushi and poisonous squid and bankrupt cruisers. He certainly wasn't commendable company, but did they really have to resort to murder? As far as she was concerned, which wasn't very far at all, he was of no use to anyone, dead or alive. She didn't really see much of a point to investing such precious energy and resources in homicide. People just don't make sense anymore, she mused to herself as she kicked a twig aside.

Where was she headed now? Nowhere in particular, really. Just avoiding the rest of her shipwrecked companions. Perhaps she'd stumble upon the Captain's dead body and have an opportunity to examine the damage? Try to learn the killer's style and perhaps apply it to one of her fellow cruisers? Maybe she'd be able to uncover the murderer before they could strike again. She managed a smile at the thought of having something to analyze, even if it was a dead, rotting body. It had been so long since she'd used her brain for something mildly productive. And she figured she might as well get to know the territory as well as possible; she had few survival skills to go by aside from her own common sense and instincts.

She would construct a rough map outline in her head. Find comfortable places to set up shelter. Make a few mental notes of the nearby surroundings, the types of trees, which fungus to avoid and which fungus was safe to eat in the case of starvation--heck, if she found the resources, she might even build herself a solar still. Her throat was awful dry, now that she thought about it, and the sun beating down persistently overhead didn't help much. Her half-smile broke into a full-out grin. This was actually kind of fun, she thought, in a rather twisted and life-threatening sort of way. Selm was an intelligent and capable young girl. As long as the others stayed out of her way, and she out of theirs, what problems could possibly crop up?

The most dangerous threats always went undetected, of course; the least expected, and thus the least prepared for.

[Rosalie Dylas (Maddy)]

Christopher Dylans was lucky to be alive.

That's what he told himself every day, it was a comfort knowing that every moment he lived was a gift, because it made it easier to accept he would die eventually. When the ship sank, he should of died, but here he was alive. Talk of murder was spreading, the captain had been strangled, and Christoper wasn't really surprised. No one had liked Captain Milian. Christopher didn't have an opinion on him. Christopher had never actually met him, aside for on the life boat. Not on the ship, he just heard rumors about him from the other workers.

Christopher was part of the crew. He really had nothing to do with the ship, he just kept the floors cleaned and things of that nature. Christopher wasn't even sure how he was able to get a job on the cruise ship. He guessed the lady that hired him felt sorry for him and decided to take pity on him. Or perhaps she liked to dabble in the dark side of the law, seeing as he was twelve, and hiring him probably broke some child labor laws. That was one of the reasons Christopher didn't have any tears to cry when the ship sank, there was no one he knew on it. His mother was at home, in a rundown apartment, probably asleep regardless of the time. She was always asleep. Christopher suspected she was happy to get him out of her hair, which is why she ins tiedd he take this job. This very low paying, sail half way around the world, miss school job. It wasn't like he was learning that much at school anyway. It was a run down school, with second rate teachers, and delinquents that weren't going anywhere fast. They hadn't been able to handle Christopher's needs.


The murder didn't scare Christopher, because he was lucky to be alive. If there were murders on the island, it didn't matter, every second was a gift, a gift Christopher shouldn't expect. Every breathe was a nice surprise, at least that was what his mother drilled into his head."You are lucky to be alive, so very lucky. You are broken, yet you are alive. Be happy." she would say as Christopher drifted to sleep. His own form of a bedtime story or lullaby, and it did grant him some peace.


Christopher felt the warm sand between his toes. It wasn't calming or a nice feeling like you would think it would be, like everyone made it out to be. It was simply a feeling, more neutral than anything. Christopher could hear people talking, introducing themselves, and he made note of whose name went to what person. There was no spray of the ocean, so he supposed he wasn't to terribly close to it. The tangy sting of the ocean had not been a good experience for him. When the boat had been sinking, Christopher had been near the lifeboat, attempting to mop. Then he heard the screams of the captain. Christoper had scrambled to the lifeboat, which thankfully wasn't very far away, and stumbled into it. It was luck. If he hadn't been on the deck, if he hadn't been so near the lifeboat, if the Captain hadn't screamed, he would be dead.

Christopher made note of the conversations going on around him, but didn't think to join in. He was thinking about the rocking of the lifeboat, it had been so much stronger than the rocking of the cruise ship. Now he was back on solid land, expect the sand shifted beneath his feet. The change from his city, the ship, the lifeboat, the island, nothing had really changed. Nothing at all. He was still alone, despite being surrounded by people. He was alone, in a big black room, even though it was filled with people. He was alone in darkness.

Christopher Dylans would always be alone. He had been alone the day he was born, he would be alone the day he died. Christopher could never really be apart of the world everyone else lived in. Christoper was different. Christopher Dylans was blind.

He was lucky to be alive.

[Yoyti]

Gregory was becoming nervous. A crowd was gathering. He lost some of his mind when he was with crowds. He quickly wiped out his drawings and started making new ones. These seemed to have a sort of method to them, although they were disjointed and irregular. Gregory seemed to be spelling out a message.

Of course, what he was actually doing was calculating the square root of five, but who'd know that? Calculating irrational numbers generally helped to ease his mind. Sometimes he'd spend days doing it. Once, he spent an entire week figuring out one-thousand digits of e by hand.

[Terra]

"Oh, yeah, uh, my name is Cassie. I'm okay. I was just telling, um... her," Cassie pointed to the stiletto-heeled teenager, "About it. My m-mom was on the, eh, ship and I don't think she made it off."

"Oh," said Calista, suddenly at a loss for what to say. She felt like she should express sympathy of some sort, but how could she do that? I'm so sorry? My parents were on the ship, too? They're probably dead, too? I know how you feel? None of the responses that came to mind seemed satisfactory, but even if they had, she couldn't choke out any words.

"So, um, are you two any better?" said Cassie, smiling nervously.

"I'm fine," said Calista stiffly, finally managing to speak, even if she was lying. She tried to arrange her face into something calm-looking, or at least not upset-looking.

She was saved from having to think of a longer response when a woman in her early twenties approached.

"Uhm...hello. My name's Mina Saelune. I..sing, some of you may know my music..."

"Hello, Mina," said Calista. She thought she remembered Mina singing on the ship, and she envied her talent. Calista was very good at playing the piano, but she hated the sound of her own singing. Ordinarily, she wouldn't have minded that much, but considering that they had no access to a piano on this deserted island...

"Hello. My name is Shani. I've not heard your music but I'm sure you're pretty good."

Calista looked around, startled. There was the angel. The extremely intimidating angel. Calista tried not to let her nervousness show, though she had a feeling that she was failing. She had to learn better self-control.

A man approached. "Hey there. I'm Hunter Harris, and despite the circumstances, it's nice to meet you all. It's hard to believe what happened to the Captain though..."

Calista remained silent and simply listened as the others conversed. Another girl, Sam from Kansas, joined them. Calista couldn't think of anything to say, and she was used to remaining in the background, in any case. People usually regarded her as an annoyance when she spoke up, so she decided to stay quiet for the moment.

[Robyn]

"Oh, wow," were the first words that Moonflower Journey uttered after stepping onto the beach.

Of course, she had been on the beach for about fifteen minutes already, but she hadn't actually spoken until just now. She had been more than content to just stand there, waves lapping cool over her feet as the sand sucked out from under her toes, and take in the energy of this new environment, to really let her soul open up and absorb all there was to soak up of this island's natural spirit. There was so much magic here. She could simply feel it.

And so Moonflower stood, thick eyelashes brimming over themselves in smiling contemplation as she let her fingers fan out beside her. Her fawn hair rolled long and free in the briny wind, and the turquoise feathers and beads off of her headband tickled against her cheek. All the birds and the trees and the ocean and the sun...all this communing and harmony was so great that it was just about too much for her to take! In fact, it was probably the best she had felt ever since she'd mistaken that cruise liner for the Greenpeace boat. That place was a corporate nightmare, a temple of greed and gluttony. Her aura had never been more off balance than it had once she'd stepped on that saddening deck, but now she was finally starting to feel at one with the universe again.

Disregarding all the killings, that is. Moonflower was trying her best not to let the recent loss of all those poor people on the ship, as well as that captain. He'd seemed like a kind spirit. Definitely a free spirit, at least, and she could dig that. She hoped his karma was aligned properly, but deep down she knew that everyone that had been 'lost' were not really gone, as they were all part of that big ethereal web she called the soulosphere. They were all always part of the soulosphere. This thought really got her in touch with her center, and serenely, she opened her warm grey eyes, half-lidded and calm.

She felt nearly as calm as when she was on the lifeboat, visualizing herself as a whale cresting the waves.

The only thing Moonflower really missed at that point was her favorite healing crystal necklace, which she noticed was gone, more than likely swallowed back up by the great Mother Ocean. She wasn't particularly bothered (easy come, easy go, she thought), but it felt strange without its familiar weight against her chest.

[Jayeee]

“Oh, whatever am I to do now?”

Thomas Everington flung himself out of the shelter he’d been taking a nice little nap in and practically threw himself onto the floor in exasperation.

“How could something like this happen?” he called out to nobody in particular and beat his hand onto the sand. “Of all the worst things that could happen, this is THE. WORST. POSSIBLE. THING!”

“Which one of you despicable people did it, hmm?” He cried, lip quivering as he looked up to the sky dramatically. “I know it was one of you. ONE OF YOU HORRIBLE HUMAN BEINGS IS CAUSING ME NOTHING BUT PAIN! Daddy is going to hear about this when I get home, you can all be sure of that.” Thomas stood himself up shakily, and jumped back into his shelter, where he began rummaging through the belongings he’d stolen from dead people on the shore. He’d made himself quite a nice place to live in, and he’d be darned if anybody was going to take that from him.

“If this isn’t resolved in a timely fashion you’re all-oh,” his voice changed and he skipped out of his shelter with glee, proffering a red toothbrush in hand. “It’s always in the last place you look. Funny that.” He chuckled.

He noticed that many of the survivors were having a little chit-chat together, getting to know names and the like. He wasn’t one for big groups, unless of course it was bossing around daddy’s employees – he was the new executive after all. But one thing he prided himself on was always knowing what was happening around him. If Thomas Everington didn’t know what was occurring, then occurring it was not.

He saw a strange girl blissfully building a sandcastle, and bounded over to her. He sat down on top of her sandcastle and dramatically placed his hands onto her shoulders.

He took a big breath, sounding grave and serious even before he spoke. “Hello, my name’s Thomas Everington, of Everington Cakes Limited. We’re a very high class establishment so I forgive you for not knowing of us beforehand. You really should try it out some time; did you know I’m an executive. Yes, it’s true. Youngest one of my generation, I’m told. Those horrid people often say it’s because daddy is my boss, but that isn’t true at all, I got it all on my own, and I often tell daddy what to do anyway. Daddy’s going to buy me this island when we get off of it, isn’t that smashing? I think it is. Maybe I’ll employ some of you people to work here, turn it into a resort. Wouldn’t that be lovely? Oh I would love that ever so much. I’m sure that we’d make so much money. And isn’t that what everything is all about – money? I certainly think so. But all of those poor people, oh aren’t they ghastly! One of daddy’s workers had the cheek to tell me that she had to leave because she was having a baby. I mean, REALLY, whatever was she thinking? It’s far beyond me to know the ins and outs of other people that’s for sure. But anyway, I just cannot believe that we’re stuck on this island. I saw some very interesting wildlife over there – isn’t it interesting? If my phone wasn’t jammed right now, I’d call up daddy this instant and demand that he buy me a zebra and a bear and a pony and a giraffe and a parrot and an otter and whatever it was that I saw flying around earlier today. It was very curious indeed. They certainly would all go well in my home zoo, don’t you think?”

He panted a little to catch his breath after speaking so much and so quickly. He often found himself out of breath after talking; he couldn’t imagine why.

“But anyway, that’s not the reason I came out here to talk with you. As I said before, I know everything worth knowing wherever I’m at. And I’ve heard a bit of juicy gossip that I think you should know.” Thomas looked left and right before continuing. “Apparently that drunken old sea captain has been murdered.” He gasped dramatically. “Oh isn’t it just horrible. We’re stuck on an island with hooligans,” he exclaimed. “But that’s not all. I hear he was secretly having an affair with Melanie Baruch - whoever she is - but she was seeing Hunter Harris – whoever he is - behind everybody’s back. Isn’t that WILD?! And that’s not all, either. You know all these kids that are running around the place? Well I thought it mighty strange that such a lot of children found their way onto the rescue boat; you know what I’ve heard? I hear they’re all the illegitimate children of that dead captain of ours.”

Thomas stood up and shook his head. “THE PLOT THICKENS,” he screamed dramatically.

[Deleted]

"Hello Sam, Calista," said Mina. She looked around again. There were more people joining her. A crewmember, and a very beautiful young woman with long eyelashes. There was also a young man who was droning on and on about his cake company and spilling what seemed to be everyone else's secrets - well, lies. If she knew rumors, she knew about three-quarters of them were lies.

"Don't listen to him," Mina said. "He doesn't know anything about us. I've certainly never seen him before."

She took a look at Calista. She had seen her watching her sing...the poor little girl must be very lonely, she thought. Mina felt sorry for her. Who knew how many family members she had lost onboard?

Mina hadn't really been considering being a mother just yet, but things did tend to go an unexpected route...

[Lizzie]

Sam looked around at all the newcomers.

"Oh, wow," a girl said dreamily, and Sam looked over at her. Her first opinion was, of course, that she was a hippie.

"I love it, don't you?" she said happily.

Next thing she knew, a boy had come up, and took the girl she was sitting with by the shoulders, ruining the girl's sandcastle.

She sat in silence while the guy-- Thomas?-- talked about nothing she cared about, although she looked like she was interested.

Instead, she looked over at the shore, where a bunch of things were washing up.

She wandered over and started pushing the things out of the way of the waves, one by one. She grabbed the items out of the way once they were on dry sand, gathering them in her arms like only a farm girl could.

Sam grabbed a crystal necklace, a life alert necklace with the name 'Dean' written on the back with sharpie, a wallet with the name 'Nelly' inside and tonnes of cash, a pumpkin, clothesline, several wooden boards, a cardboard box, even more piano keys, a severely waterlogged pillow, and...

"Is that my purse?!" she yelped, grabbing it from the waves and grinning. She had dropped it into the waves by accident while they were on the lifeboat, and she was glad that it had returned. A bit wet, but it had returned.

Near that girl with brown hair-- Cassie-- a DEAD HUMAN BODY washed up. The body, which was quite obviously a woman, looked to be in about her late thirties, probably about 40. The body had short and really honestly wet hair, turning it black, although Sam guessed that she could have brown hair like the girl it washed up near. It was wearing a(n also wet, obviously) dark blue dress that was held on with thin spaghetti straps, though one had broken in the waves.

Sam was disgusted.

[Yoyti]

Gregory had had enough. He leaped to his feet and shambled towards the singer. "You're a musician?" he asked, mispronouncing most of what he was saying. It might have been an accent. More likely it was because he was used to speaking in mathematical shorthand. "D'you know this tune?" and he started singing something in 6/8 time. "Shteyt a bochur un er... well you know the rest. Or maybe you don't! Do you speak English?"

Then he turned and saw the cake man. He gasped loudly, extending a finger, and dramatically sunk to the ground. "Assume the contradiction!" he screamed hoarsely. "Fight fire with a colder, darker, negated fire!"

[Deleted]

Mina gasped in horror when the dead woman washed up on shore. It looked like...an older version of her, especially with that dress color...though Mina would never wear something so revealing. Her own dress had nice sleeves.

Well, it wasn't Katrina, her sister. She was only about 2 years older than Mina was. And she hadn't even been on the ship.

Near the pillow was...a page of music? Mina ran toward it and looked it at. It was one of hers, all right. It was nowhere near finished. She'd only gotten to the third verse, where the rivalry of the twin sisters in the song began.

[gold]

"Is that... oh, it is!" Comwell said, rushing to the shore. He picked the Life-Alert out of the pile, and started pushing the button and speaking into it. "HELLO? I'M ON A DESERTED ISLAND. HELP ME."

Dean Comwell was never quite sure how it worked. His dear wife had made him get one before she passed away a few years ago, and this was the first time he had ever tried to use the thing.

It occurred to him that it being soaked in seawater for almost a week and being out in the middle of nowhere might affect whether or not it actually did anything, but he had hope. IT MIGHT WORK, OKAY.

[Luna]

"I'm fine." The young girl had said, seeming a little nervous.

Cassie looked at her then noticed she turned her attention to another person, and Cassie returned her attention to her wrist and the sea.

She heard all the people talking, and took in them all by there voices, not turning her sight from the ocean. A man was yelling dramatically, and she silently judged him from her distance. She also heard the group of people behind her talk and give names.

She saw something coming onto shore. What was it? A bo...A...

No.

NO.
She screamed in her head. It couldn't be...

It was a body that matched in her brain with a person she knew.
Loved.

Her mouth parted open as the body come to shore and was still. It was wearing the same blue dress as her mother. Had the same hair style.

She pushed off the sand quickly and ran over to the body. She recognized her mothers face. She felt tears come to her eyes. She fell to her knees and touched her mothers slightly rotting face.
Cold.

"No, please no..." She looked at her mother over and over trying to deny the simple fact that had washed up on shore. She was dead. Completely dead.

"No no NO." She yelled out and ran her fingers through her mothers hair. She had figured her mother was dead, but this was a far worse thing.
To actually see her dead and cold.
Tears slid down her face and landed on the sand and body.

Her heart felt like it had shattered inside her.