Chapter 9: Misunderstood?

Perdition Island Day 2 – 3

Brenda POV:

This is actually ‘Day 3’, but, I hadn’t done any film of my second group that we’re calling the Mario/Markus group. For them, however, since they didn’t get off till last on the second day, this is actually their ‘Day 1’. Which was actually Day 2 of our story!

I know. It’s confusing and our numbering system may have to be revised!

So, here goes...

Since this group was on Ibera’s ‘Good-Guys’ list, they got a lot of leeway with regards to their comfort items and extra tools for their toolkits. They were also told of some of the ‘peculiarities’ of this island.

The older two guys, Markus and Sonny, were Marcella’s sons and the younger four, Mario, Enrico, Stefano and Lolita, were Vincent’s abused kids. Jonah almost granted Lolita, who was only 17, a pardon, but, she didn’t want to be left behind and chose to stay with her brothers unless they were pardoned too.

Which they weren’t. Abused or not, all three of them had committed terrible crimes.

They all showed promise of changing their ways and all six of them treated Ibera very respectfully, right from the git-go, thus earning special treatment.

Like, they were told; they weren’t going to be on Earth and that this planet rotated the opposite direction from what Earth did, meaning the sun was going to rise in the West and set in the East.

Only George’s group, previously, had that little tidbit of information.

They hadn’t been done any favors by getting put ashore late in the afternoon, however. This island was in the ‘Tropics’ of this planet and like Earth, subject to early evening thunderstorms ... AND frequent longer term storms.

They’d no sooner arrived and Markus sniffed the air, “Uhm, guys, we need to move fast. I think we’re going to get wet!”

He pointed at the dark clouds approaching over the mountains and instead of waiting around for their toolkits to arrive, they all broke up and began scouring the area for some shelter.

This group was sent to the far north end of the southeast quadrant of the island. Mario took it upon himself to run inland along the east-west mountain range, hoping to find a cave or something.

They all knew they weren’t going to have time to build a shelter or even erect a tent with their tarps.

His intuition was rewarded when he found a small cave just over 150 yards inland. The mountain was still fairly high here and extended out well into the water where it abruptly ended into a 300’ high cliff.

He began shouting as he ran back to the beach, trying to alert his companions of his discovery.

When he told everyone, he got several happy back slaps and they pulled their large boat as far inland as they could. They discovered, like most other groups did, that their boat wasn’t nearly as heavy as they originally thought.

Even though they’d moved it more than 100’ to a slightly higher location, they still pulled the anchor out and stepped it firmly into the sandy turf. They’d all talked about wanting to use it for fishing and were determined to take care of it.

Mario showed them the cave, then they all ran back to the boat to get their bags and backpacks. They were all hoping their precious toolkits would arrive before the storm. Mario and Markus even agreed they would brave the storm to avoid even taking a chance of losing their tools.

Stefano and Sonny went looking for some dead wood to build a fire while Enrico and Lolita started foraging the immediate area for food.

This group was very organized. And maybe even more ‘team-like’ than George’s group, who were the ‘models’ in my opinion.

The storm hit with a vengeance, but all six insisted on helping to retrieve their toolkits. They discovered that, like their huge boat, they weren’t as heavy as they thought. Even little Lolita had no trouble lifting her end of one of them.

While the storm raged outside, they soon had a small fire going inside. They pulled out three MREs, the large cast iron pot and the folding camp grill they had, thanks to ideas they gleaned from Mario’s ‘Boy Scout’ handbook. They all retrieved their ‘mess kits’ then closed up the toolkits. Since they were all soaked, after some initial embarrassment, they all stripped and laid out their clothes over the closed cases to dry.

They were down to their underwear when Lolita giggled, “Hey guys, you ain’t got nothin’ I ain’t seen before.” She pulled off her panties then grinned, “Hey, no fair, let me see what you got!?”

After some crude remarks about Lolita looking like a guy, they all slowly finished removing their wet undies.

Lolita was giggling and teasing them back the whole time.

Markus noticed a big stream of water running off the mountain that was going right over the entrance to their cave. He grabbed the big cast iron pot and let it half-fill with water to rehydrate their MREs. As the water started getting hot, they sat around the fire on their still rolled up sleeping bags to talk.

They concluded that while this cave was okay, it would be good to investigate and see what they could find maybe nearer to a water source. They agreed that they didn’t want to have to depend on downpours to get drinking water. (They’d also filled one of their 5-gallon water jugs since it was handy.)

They also felt that, since they had oars for their boat, they should explore the area a little and maybe do some fishing.

It had gotten dark outside, so Mario set his watch so he could see how long the night-time darkness would last.

Everyone was looking forward to a relaxing night’s sleep after the chaotic conditions they had to endure in their cells. They discussed using the ‘special’ air mattresses that Ibera had given them that were supposedly ‘self-inflating’ and nearly indestructible. They decided to hold off, since there was a good chance they’d be moving in the morning.

“No sense wasting a ‘self-inflate’ just for one day.” Mario noted. “Especially since the ground in here is fairly soft, being mostly sand.”

After enjoying their spaghetti and meatballs, as the fire slowly turned into glowing embers, all six of them went to sleep.

Morning finally came and Markus went outside to find that Mario already had a fire going with their camp-style percolator brewing up a big pot of coffee.

“I decided to build the fire out here since it got kinda smoky with it in the cave last night.” He told Markus.

After a friendly backslap, “Good call, Cuz! Yeah, but, it was nice that we could even have one. We should try to conserve those MREs though, so, I’m looking forward to doing some fishing this morning.”

“Yeah, me too. Are we still gonna look for a better location to set up camp?”

“We probably should, but, I don’t see any reason to be in a big hurry. We’ve got all the time in the world, now that we at least have this cave. That water we collected last night should last us a couple days.”

They were joined, one by one, by the rest of their group who were stretching and rubbing the sleep out of their eyes.

“Ughhh! I slept like the dead last night!” Enrico chuckled. “It feels great to be alive today! So, are we gonna look for a better place this morning?”

Mario grinned, “Mark said we should, but, we both wanna do some fishing first, so we’ll hopefully save on using up those MREs so fast.”

Stefano stretched his shoulders for a second time, “Well, if you guys want to do that, maybe Enrico and I will stick around here and scout around a bit. I really wanna use those air mattresses tonight. That ground got a little hard come morning time.”

Lolita giggled, “Yep, you got that right. I wouldn’t mind checking out that boat and maybe doing some fishing, though. It’s been a while since we all went to the lake with Dad. If I remember right, I always caught the biggest fish?”

They all gave her some shit then realized they were all still naked!

Sonny finally came out of the cave sporting some shorts and a t-shirt, “Are you guys gonna turn this place into a nudist colony or what?”

Lolita giggled again, “Hey, it sure makes peeing a lot easier for me! I can stand up just like you guys do. Speaking of that, um, what do we do when we gotta, you know, go number two?”

Markus laughed, “Well, when we settle on a permanent site, we’ll dig a latrine and fix up some kind of seat. As for toilet paper, well, I think we’re going to have to improvise.”

Mario added, “For now, just grab some leaves, lean back against a tree and let it go. Just make sure you spread your legs so you don’t shit on your feet!”

Markus nodded, “That, or just go into the ocean and do your business. Then you can wipe with your hand and wash it off all at the same time! Easy-peasy.”

“Eeew! And we’re gonna eat the fish we catch from there?” Lolita groaned in disgust.

Sonny laughed, “Hey, just where do you think the fish shit?”

“Ohhh, I never thought about that. Eeew, now I wish you hadn’t told me. I’ll never get that image out of my head now!” Lolita had the cutest screwed-up look on her face as Mario ruffled her sparse, wispy hair.

They all put on shorts and t-shirts, then sat down to have some coffee.

After straightening up their campsite and cutting a few pieces of bamboo to use as fishing poles, Mario, Markus, Sonny and Lolita headed for the beach.

Enrico and Stefano busied themselves looking around, after arming themselves with their survival knives and machetes. They had the scabbards on a tool belt and looked like a couple of intrepid explorers. About 200 yards further inland they found a waterfall cascading down the mountain into a deep pool. The pool or pond, was nearly 200 feet in diameter and had a stream flowing southeasterly toward the ocean.

Less than 100’ further west they found a small cave opening. Enrico turned on his flashlight and the two nervously entered to check it out.

“Holy shit, Stef, this thing is huge! The ceiling has to be over 20’ high. Oh, oh, look!” He shouted as he turned off his flashlight. When they looked up, they saw where light was coming in through a small hole on one side of the cave. “If we build a fire over there, the smoke will have a place to escape so it won’t get so smoky!” Enrico finished, excitedly.

“Yeah, Rico, and that’s also the highest part of the cave. We can use the other side for our beds and there’s still plenty of room to store everything. Heck, we could store 10 cords of wood in here!” (A ‘cord’ is a stacked pile of wood measuring 4 feet by 8 feet.)

Highly satisfied with their ‘find’ they proceeded to further scout the area for any other useful items they might need.

Like food.

Down at the beach, Mario, Markus, Sonny and Lolita were stunned when they saw how much their boat had moved from where they’d left it.

“Holy crap!” Mario exclaimed, “Thank God we set that anchor good, or we’d be fishing from shore!”

“No shit, Cuz, the tide must have really risen last night.” Markus agreed, “See the shoreline? This whole area must have been under water!”

Lolita looked confused, “What does that mean? Does the water really go up and down that much? Yesterday our boat was over 100 feet away from the water.”

Markus nodded, “That’s right, but, it wasn’t much higher than the ocean. I’ve seen a place in northwest England, a few years ago, where the tide went up and down over 20 feet! We’re definitely going to have to move our boat a lot further up on the beach. And NEVER forget to set the anchor.”

The boys had a big net and were wading into the surf, trying to snag some small fish to use as bait.

Meanwhile, Lolita was on shore trying to dig up some worms.

Suddenly all three guys started yelling, “Lolita! LOOK OUT! RUN!”

Lolita stood up then froze in shock just as another of those huge birds swooped down and snatched her up like she was a worm!

I said ‘another’ bird, since this one had both of its talons and was now flying quickly to the southwest up into the mountains. Its cawing sounded almost triumphant!

I mentally summoned the whole gang to come and see this.

I don’t care what my husband says, we’re going to have to do something! Knowing that there are AT LEAST two of them, they could end up scuttling our entire project.

Why couldn’t these damn things have taken Lola and Marcella instead? Perhaps then, I may feel differently, however, they didn’t and with two abductions in two days, the rest of the prisoners could soon be next.

I continued following ‘Buzzard Bill’ and watched as he slowly approached the nest where the other predator, ‘Buzzard Betsy’, was moving off her nest to make room for yet another captive.

Annie slowly stood up from where she’d apparently been hiding under Betsy. When she saw the other buzzard coming with a screaming Lolita her eyes lit up. Betsy seemed to be trying to hide her from ‘Bill’, since she was attempting to keep Annie under her wing to keep ‘Bill’ from seeing her. Betsy squalled a couple times just before Bill dropped off his latest acquisition.

Within seconds, Bill flew off, most likely looking for some more ‘easy-pickens’.

I don’t think Bill even knew Annie was still there.

I watched with baited breath while Annie appeared from under Betsy’s wing and was now staring at a stunned Lolita.

“Holy shit!” They both said at the same time, before giggling for just a second.

Lolita asked, “How the hell did you get here?”

That caused Annie to laugh heartily, “The same way YOU did! I’ve seen you at Ibera’s, but I don’t know your name. Aren’t you one of the Normistronzo’s?”

Lolita smirked, nodding her head, “Yeah, I’m Lolita. My dad is Vincent, ‘E’ Norms brother. My three brothers and my two cousins were allowed to form our own group. Our camp is on the other side of the mountain, quite a ways north of here.”

She was pointing in the general direction of her camp while Annie got a confused look on her face. She pointed south, “I thought that way was north? “The sun comes up over there (She was now pointing west.) and everyone knows the sun rises in the East!”

Lolita scrunched up her face for a second then started laughing, “Ohhh, um, well, I’m gonna let you in on a little secret. Just between us girls, did you know that we’re not on Earth anymore?”

Annie scoffed, “Duhhh! No shit. There sure ain’t no birds like these on Earth! What does THAT have to do with anything?”

Lolita giggled, “Well, I overheard ... shoot, I might as well just tell you. Ibera told us, on the QT, that this planet rotates backwards from the way Earth does. That means that HERE the sun rises in the WEST and sets in the EAST. So, you’re actually pointing south and my camp is north of here on the EAST side of this mountain.”

Annie’s face showed that this concept had her totally befuddled. “Sooo...” She held her hand up, then reached in the nest and pulled out the knife she had removed from Betsy. She unscrewed the end and took out the small compass. “Okay, that explains it! I wondered why this damned thing wasn’t working right! So that way IS north!”

Lolita grinned, “Shhh, keep that to yourself. It’s a secret!”

Annie started laughing like crazy. “Wow! I actually know something the rest of my egotistical bunch doesn’t. They haven’t even considered that. There are some other groups that think the nearest land is that way.” She said, pointing west. “Gosh, are they ever going to be surprised!”

“Yeah, to get to land sailing that way is over 2000 miles!”

Annie stuttered, “Not that it would matter, nobody is EVER going to ‘find America’ without a spaceship! Since you told me a secret, I’ll tell you one. Ex-CIA Deputy Director Franklin thinks he can get us off this planet. Something about this strange device he conned Ibera into giving him. The problem is, he needs to find that ‘Chen’ guy to make it work. And nobody knows where he is. I don’t suppose you do?”

Lolita shook her head, “That’s the guy who we saw in that video who lost everything in that storm?”

“Yeah”

“Sorry, I have no idea. I just know one place he’s not and that’s by us. From what I saw on the video, I think it might be on this side of the island somewhere.”

“What makes you say that? From that video, how could you tell? The sun wasn’t even shining?”

“No, it had to do with the orientation. The shore seemed to be on the west side of the island to me.”