Chapter Three

With that final thought, I faded out completely. The sea around me was black once again, and my mind was black. I could still hear the voices, but they all seemed so far away that I didn't really care that they were with me. It was almost comforting in a way... even if they were all so angry.

Some were angry because they were lost. Some were confused. Others were scared. Then, of course, there were those who were just angry people in life, and those were the ones I was actually worried about.

The voices became distant then. I could still feel the water around me, but I no longer felt so cold. My stomach was warm, and a part of me started to wonder if it had all just been some horrible dream. Of course, maybe that was only what I wanted it to be. For it to be a dream- from the storm to the voices- would mean everything to me, but I knew it was anything but the truth. There was no escaping it. It was what it was.

Opening my eyes, I saw a blue sky over me. I was still floating, but even without being able to look around to see where I was, I was sure I was close to shore. I could hear the waves on the sand and the gulls that walked it in search of the food that the storm had brought them. "So I'm alive?" I whispered, my lips cracking with every word. "That voice really has to be something else... to have brought me this far."

Closing my eyes again, I fell back into unconsciousness. Not as far as I had before, but I was still gone. I wanted to come back and wake up again, but I really couldn't when I didn't have the strength for the waking world. The will was there, but not the energy.

Then the voices came.

At first i thought they were the same voices that I had been listening to throughout the storm, but when I couldn't hear what was being said- even within my own mind- I knew they were real. The kind that I truly wanted and even needed to hear.

"Please! Someone!" The voices stopped, but I still called even though I was still unable to move. "Come get me! I can't make it on my own, so please! Someone save me!"

"Quit screaming, will you?" I tilted my head back to try and see who was talking to be, but when I did, I was blinded by the sun. I could tell from the voice that it was a woman, but it still wasn't the voice from the ship. It was too sharp. Too spiteful. "We're right here, you idiot."

We?

"Come on, Natalie... Can't you see he's seriously hurt?" It was a young man, most likely younger than the girl by the sound of it, but I couldn't see him either. All I could do was listen as they knelt down in the sand beside me and feel someone hold my hand. "You'll be all right," he assured me. "There are two more of us here. We'll help you."

"Thank you," I choked out. "I'm... I'm Mark." I know I was being stupid by telling them my name, but it was all I could think to say. "Were you on that ship?"

"Yeah," the woman agreed. "We got knocked overboard just like you." I tried again to look at them while turning my head from side to side, but it was hard to make out much of anything. "What'd you do? Go blind or something?"

"I don't know."

"Hey! What'd you two think you're doing running off like that?" I winced as an old man shouted, his voice all but drilling its way into my head, but I kept still. "I told you to stay with your mother!"

"Come on, Gramps," the girl snapped back, the sand shifting under her as she stood. "We're not kids any more. We can take care of ourselves."

"I just wanted to make sure he was all right," the other explained. "He's kind of out of it, but... I think he'll be okay if we get him some food and water. He's been out there for a while." The grip on my hand tightened slightly, and it was then I realized it was the boy who was holding onto me. His hands were soft... but they were also small and weak. "Where's Mom at?"

"She'll be coming," the grandfather assured him. I could hear him walking towards us, but instead of two sets of footsteps, it sounded like three. "Just let him alone, Elliot. He might've hit his head along the way here."

"Father! Kids!" Someone else was coming then, and at first I thought I recognized them. It was another woman, this on being older than the one at my side, but from a distance, she almost sounded like the voice that came to me in my sleep. Almost, but not quite. "Thank heavens I found all of you," she breathed, coming to join them. Then she gasped. "Who is this?"

"He says his name is Mark," the girl explained. "He's from the same ship as us."

"Is that right?" She knelt beside my head, her fingers brushing over my hair, but I only winced when she touched my face. "Can you open your eyes for me?" I did as I was told, and although I had a hard time seeing the others when they first found me, I could see her clearly. She had a kind face and a warm, inviting smile and strawberry blonde hair that was braided like halo about her head. "Well, I don't think you have a concussion," she assured me, "but I think it'd be best if we moved you inside for a while."

"Thank you," I murmured, closing my eyes again. Maybe it was because I knew I was safe and no longer so close to death or because of the people around me, but while I began to fall into a more pleasant slumber, there were no other voices. No desperate cries for help, and no one calling from beyond. Of course, even without being able to look around me, I was sure I had found the islands. The only questions I had were why I had to be there, and if The Voice was the one to bring me there.

"Mark... I need you to get up." I woke with a jolt, my entire body throwing itself upright, but when I did, the woman only continued to smile. "You really need to drink something," she said while offering me a chipped glass. No doubt something they had found. "You were out there for a long time, and you still haven't drank anything."

I took the glass from her and put it to my lips, but I was still wary. Even when I began to drink the water, I took my time to look around me. We were alone, and night was quickly falling. My eyes darted around the room, trying desperately to take it all in, but it wasn't long before I felt her hand on mine and felt my whole body relax under her touch. She had a calming presence, that woman, but I still felt embarrassed.

"I'm sorry," I apologized. "I guess the shock is finally getting to me."

"I understand." We sat together in silence then, and while I drank what little was left of the water, I tried to take in the room for a second time. It was small with what looked to be a full kitchen and a dining room just outside the bedroom we were sitting in, and despite the few holes in the wall and no doubt the roof, it still seemed sturdy enough for the family to live in for the time being. "It's not much, I'm afraid, but it'll do for now," she said. "At least until we can get help."

"Is there anyone still living here?" I asked. After all, if there were other buildings like the one we were living in, then the place couldn't have been abandoned for very long. If at all. Even so, she still shook her head. "Are you sure?"

"We've looked everywhere," she explained. "Well, as much as we can. The bridge to the west is out, and there's a large boulder in the way of the path leading to the east. It seems this island is just as lost and lonely as we are... Not that that's such a bad thing." The woman- whose name I still didn't know- was smiling as she said it, but I could hear the sadness with which she spoke. "Oh, I never introduced myself, did I? My name's Felicia Phillips."

"Mark Smithers," I said with a smile, "and it's a pleasure to be stranded with you."

"Ugh, and he's got a lousy sense of humor, too." Even if I didn't mean anything by my comment, I still felt my face warm. "You do know she's my mom, right?"Well, it was hard not to tell.. seeing that they looked so much alike. Natalie had her hair and her eyes without a doubt, and even though her attitude was drastically different, she was still clearly her mother's daughter.

"Now, Natalie, he was just being nice." Felicia shook her head again and sighed as she came to stand up from the bed. "Where's Father and Elliot?" The girl only shrugged. "They wouldn't have gone very far... Would they?"

"Probably took the road up from the house. Gramps was all serious about going up there, but I don't see why. It's just a big field with a bunch of branches and rocks laying around. No big deal if you ask me." She might not have looked all that impressed, but she certainly sounded as if she was more than a little interested. "Gramps is just plain weird."

"He's perfectly normal," her mother insisted. "Just easily excitable is all."

"Yeah, no kidding." I frowned slightly, wondering once more just how such a girl like her could be the daughter of such a calm and reassuring woman, but unfortunately for me, she clearly saw it on my face. "Quit staring at me, will you? Don't you know how to be polite?" A lot more than you do. "You're a man, so why don't you go and see what they're doing?"

"Please understand that she's worried about them," Felicia whispered, still smiling. I nodded, but as far as I was concerned, I would just be happy with getting away from her. "And please don't mind Father. Like I said, he's just very excitable during times like these."

I did my best to smile back when leaving the house, but once the ramshackle door was closed behind me, I scowled. Not because of what had just happened, but because of my surroundings. What with the hollow buildings with their doors opened wide like gaping mouths and the late winter fog spilling out from the windows and onto the overgrown lawns. It was rather sad, really, but it was even more frightening.

Especially for someone like me who could all but feel the decay with my own body.

The island was quiet, though, and I was more than grateful to walk in the silence. Sure, it made things all the more eerie, but as long as I was unable to hear the voices that no doubt lingered in the buildings around me, I was happy. After all, it meant I only had my own thoughts to distract me, and that was more reassuring than anything else after what had happened.

"That'll do it!" I jumped, not having realized I had found them so soon, but even if I hadn't meant to stumble upon them just yet, standing there and swinging about a wooden cane was the old man with his grandson seemingly being lost. "Now look at this here, Elliot. Isn't this a fine farm?"

"Well... it could be," the young man replied. "With some work."

"Of course! Nothing worth havin' if you don't work for it, Elliot. Remember that!" I chuckled to hear just how passionate he was about the whole thing, but when he snapped his head around to look back at me, I immediately felt a cold chill run down my spine. "And here's the man to run it!"

"What? Oh no... I don't think-" Before I could protest any further, the grandfather was all but dragging me behind him as he continued to ramble on. He guided me through the debris ridden field and the small shed at the front entrance while telling me of everything he was thinking it could be. From the barns and the animals that lived there to the crops I could- and would- grow, all the while turning a deaf ear to my weak resistance. "But I don't know anything about farming," I tried to explain. "I don't even know your name."

"Taro," he said with a curt nod as he turned back to face me. It was the first time I had gotten to see the man, but with it being so dark, I could only make out a white shirt, a pair of overalls, and a large, bald head. "And you may not know a thing about farmin' like I do, son, but you'll learn soon enough."

"I'm afraid I don't have a clue what you're talking about..."

"He wants you to start up this farm," Elliot explained, coming to join us. He was a little shorter than myself, but he still stood taller than the old man. "I told him we needed to ask you first, but he likes to make his mind up about these things on his own."

"You just don't know a thing about potential," Taro insisted, stamping down the end of his walking stick into the clay earth. "Mark here will do just fine."

"Shouldn't we be trying to get help?" I asked. "I mean... we were shipwrecked."

"I guess so," the young man agreed, sounding a bit embarrassed as if he had forgotten the circumstances of our being there. "It's just our family was actually looking to find a place like this to start a shipping company," he explained. "Nothing big, of course, but something a small family could run on their own."

"And you want me to run a farm to get things going?"

"That and you'll keep us alive until someone happens to come along and find us," the old man assured me. "I managed to find some seed bags over in that house by the path. Seems to be in mighty fine condition if you ask me."

"The seeds or the house?" After all, the way he talked, jumping from one thing to another, I really had no way of knowing which one he was talking about. I was just lucky he laughed instead of hitting me since I wasn't so sure I could put it past him not to knock me over the head with the large knot at the top of his staff. "This all just seems so sudden..."

"Just have to man up about it is all," Taro replied. "Anyhow, I figure we can sort this all out in the morning, so why don't you go ahead and see what the girls managed to find for us to eat. Working men can't live on an empty stomach!"

With that- and a shrug and a sigh from Elliot- we were off again. However, just as we were about to leave the farm to the growing darkness, I stopped abruptly. A sudden chill had fallen on me, one that made me shiver and hold myself for warmth as my breath began to cloud in front of me. I knew what it was, but even with that being the case, I had never had the sensation be so strong before. Almost as if whatever it was was standing right beside me and breathing down my neck...

"Welcome to islands, Mark..." she whispered in my ear. "Welcome."