This is one of the ‘oldest’ chapters in Pleasure Island: I thought of it almost immediatly when I first had the idea for the story. Of course, it took me a while to find a good trigger point. Then, once I had thought of one, Vahktang came and gave me a much better idea... (References to it, a mild spoiler if you haven’t actually read the chapter, are at http://www.caske2000.org/survival/survivesea.htm#Water .) Which just gives me an extra trigger point to use somewhere else...
Pleasure Island: Ch. 5
Listening to the convoluted plans being hatched for ‘escape’, Mia laughed to herself. It was obvious none of these girls knew the first thing about surviving on their own.
City dwellers.
She thought about trying to inject some sanity into the conversation, then thought better of it. Summers as a wilderness guide on her home island of Lanai had taught her what happens when an ‘expert’ appears: everyone wants the expert to say their pet idea will work, and no one listens to what advice the expert may have. Worse, they all try to ‘help’ the expert out.
Mia didn’t want that type of ‘help’.
Sure, given enough time, and minor mistakes, eventually the expert gets listened to. In a planned and prepared trek those mistakes would be nothing, minor inconveniences only.
Escaping from this island was not going to be any preplanned trek. Certainly not a fully prepared one.
They would just get in the way.
Mia told the girls next to her that she was going to explore and see what was available on the island. Then she left.
The signs on her way back were mostly unnecessary: Mia would have found her way without them. Still, they saved time, and time was important if she didn’t want to get noticed by potential hangers-on.
She had signed on to this after being assured there would be plenty of room for an outdoor specialist to roam and work on the ‘untamed’ land. Mia had heard the quotes in the recruiter’s voice, and understood the implications, but no planning was absolutely perfect, ever. Especially on projects as large as this island.
And besides, she needed the money.
Being a tour guide in the summers had got her through college; studying ecology and biology, what they now called ‘Earth Science’, was a prerequisite for any true field work. Mia loved to show people what was actually out there, but she couldn’t handle the constant stream of idiots for long.
The truth was, she just preferred nature to human beings. They had said all assignments would be made only once on the island, but Mia had felt sure she could get some work helping to manage the (obviously artificial, she was sure) ecology there was on the island. And that experience would be enough to get her off the island, to a real job someplace.
And a tidy little sum to start planning her vacations with.
Well, they’d lied. Too bad. She was sure she could get off the island. Then...
Mia may not have preferred the company of humans, but she didn’t think what they were planning here was right either.
Mia’s first stop was the lobby: she wanted her bag. It would be too much to ask that they had also unloaded her suitcase, but her bag was enough.
A quick check told her someone had been rummaging through it, and that her juice boxes were missing. A glance behind the front desk gave her a good idea what had happened to them.
:Damn.: Oh well. They wouldn’t have been enough anyway.
:I wonder if she took them before or after they caught her?: The thought was an idle one: it didn’t matter anyway, anymore. The juice would be contaminated by now.
Shouldering her bag, she set out past the pool into the wilderness beyond. The paths led past a (empty, to Mia’s cursory check) stable/pasture area, then into the woods. Mia followed for a while, then veered off towards the shore.
The forrest felt odd, and it took Mia a moment to notice why: there was no evidence of large animals anywhere. No game paths, no broken twigs above knee height at all, nothing.
Well, that made sense. Large herbivores would have required large carnivores to keep them in check, and large carnivores would be a danger to precious guests.
Still, Mia wondered how they had gotten whatever had been here off the island: this island was big enough to have supported something of decent size. Had they just been wiped out? If so, it was at least a shame. Possibly more, if they had caused an extinction of a unique species.
One more thing for the island’s creators to answer for when she got back to civilization.
The beach was beautiful. Even a Hawaiian like Mia was stunned: the sand was pure white, and the water was the crystal blue that made the Caribbean famous. Mia stopped and just took in the view for a moment.
She was standing on a path. It was just back from the main beach itself, a barely noticeable swath of grass, but Mia knew it didn’t fit. This had been put in for human use. And that ment one thing: she was still too close to the lodge.
Mia headed away from the island’s point, away from the lodge, and into the wilderness.
The path continued quite a ways into the island: at least four miles, but it eventually looped away from the shore. Mia carefully kept along the shore, trying not to leave an easily visible track where she left the path. She wanted to be left alone while she was still here, and that could be a while yet.
It was another two miles along the shore before she found what she was looking for: a cove, hidden from the rest of the beach by the edge of the island’s central mountain, which extended down to the shore in a couple of small cliffs. The beach inside the cove was clear, with a small stream running to the center of the cove.
In theory, Mia thought the stream should be safe to drink from, but she wasn’t going to risk it.
The ocean on the other hand...
Everyone knows you can’t drink seawater. All you have to do to prove it to yourself is try drinking a glassfull: you will be coughing it up in no time.
But a college classmate of Mia’s, Kevin Marshell, had introduced Mia to the studies of a Dr. Alain Bombard, who had proven it was possible to drink small amounts of seawater for fluid. If you started early, while you were still fully hydrated.
Many doctors still disagreed, but Bombard’s willingness to put his theories to the test by sailing across the Atlantic with nothing more than a survival raft lent quite a bit of weight to his arguments. Especially since he survived.
The nannites couldn’t live in seawater. Mia was sure of that. If they did, they would infect the whole world, and Mr. Byerson was not the type to put himself at risk like that.
Still, no need to take on more risk than necessary. Mia walked to the far end of the cove, where she could see the sea coming in towards the small bay, then scooped up a small cup of water and drank.
The saltwater had an odd taste, tingling the back of her mouth, but it went down easily enough.
After a moment, Mia realized she was holding her breath. She let it out slowly. Nothing had happened to her. Drinking seawater wasn’t exactly heathy, but it would keep her alive, and met her most pressing need.
And it would keep her herself.
It was still mid afternoon, coming close on the hottest part of the day. Mia knew she had a lot of work ahead of her, but working during the day was not the best plan. For one thing, she would work up a sweat faster, loosing precious water. Also, she would be easier to find in the day. She needed to find a place to hide out the sun, preferably where searchers wouldn’t find her.
Mia was looking out to sea as she went over what she needed next, and her eyes caught the cliffs before she looked back at shore. They looked fairly porous, and extended well past the rest of the beach...
Digging her binoculars out of her bag, she soon found what she was looking for, and hadn’t hoped to find: the perfect hiding spot. There was a small cave, just above the high tide mark, on one of the cliffaces. It wasn’t reachable by land, but should be by sea.
No time like the present to find out.
Her shirt and jeans went in her bag; her shoes Mia kept, the better to walk on the rocks. Holding the bag above her head she started to wade out to the cliffside.
The bottom dropped out quickly, and Mia soon found herself actually swimming, trying to keep her bag as dry as possible. She managed to throw the bag into the cave from a ways away, but the actual approach through the cross currents was not easy. She hoped a storm did not come through while she was still on the island; it would make the hidaway totally inaccesable.
Of course, it would probably flood the cave too.
Climbing in, she was surprised at exactly how deep the cave was: it easily extended a dozen feet into the stone.
Well, the better for hiding in.
The bag had kept fairly dry, though the outer layers were soaked. Her clothes she spead out to dry, taking off her underwear and bra as well. She had a spare shirt in her bag which managed to stay mostly dry: this she bundled into a pillow and used to fall quickly into a deep sleep, curled up on the silted stone.
Mia half-awoke several times, to dreams of fish and coral, and the endless vistas of the sea. The last scared her, but excited her as well. The rest... it felt odd. Like coming home for the first time. Welcoming and familiar, but new at the same time. Those were the pleasent dreams.
There were nightmares too, but it was harder to put a handle on them. Attacks by monsters, being trapped... They were a blur.
Still, they only disturbed her sleep slightly. After a moment each time, Mia slept on.
It was nighttime when Mia finally woke. Deep night, with the three quarters waxing moon low in the sky. Mia sat up quickly, then cursed as she hit her head on the low roof.
Most of the night was gone! She wouldn’t have much time too start her preperations for escape...
The thought was oddly unimportant.
More important was her hunger: Mia felt like she hadn’t eaten in weeks. She moved to the entrace of the cave, draging her tail behind her.
The feeling of the rough rock scraping the firm muscle made her look down. She most definatly had a tail: the flukes were broader than her shoulders, and trailed off in streamers that Mia somehow knew would reflect rainbows in the sun. Above the skin had no hint of the legs once there: even the texture was different, though it wasn’t quite the scales Mia half expected. The skin ended just above her hips, in what would have been a very low cut had it been a swimsuit. Feeling the edges, Mia found the center opened up, revealing her normal, human, clithood.
Which reacted very enthusiastically at her light touch...
Reluctantly she drew her hand away: another type of hunger was more pressing at the moment. She dug the granola bars out of her bag, and wolfed them down. That quieted her stomach for the moment, but just bairly.
Mia looked down at the sea, and experianced an odd longing. She wanted to swim.
A quick dive put her in the water, and a quick flip of her tail sent her streaming through the water. It was a rush, like nothing she had ever experianced. Her mouth opened in a cry of joy.
The rush of seawater surprized her, and she swallowed without thinking about it. She felt small flaps on her back open, expelling the water, as she swum on.
Gills! Mia laughed, underwater. She was a fully functional mermaid, tail, gills, lungs, and all. Nothing but the best.
She realized she had always loved the sea...
Pleasure Island’s mermaid swum off, looking for her first meal.