He wanted to stay with her for longer, but after she'd slept soundly for half an hour he forced himself to get up and venture out into the trees. He really needed to search the island, on the off-chance that it might be inhabited. For all they knew, there could be a little holiday resort or a research facility or something out there somewhere. He had to hope. But for now, he couldn't go far. Couldn't leave for too long. He didn't want to be too far away if she woke up while he was gone. But they were going to need water. Clean, fresh water. So he needed to leave the X behind, on her own and sleeping, while he searched for water.
He found a means of carrying it before he actually found the water. After nearly ten minutes of wandering inland he stumbled into a vast patch of running bamboo. This kind of bamboo is a force to be reckoned with. If nature couldn't find a way to stop it, the tall stalks, each thicker than his considerable bicep, would quickly overrun the little island, consuming all the space and light and nutrients until every other plant was eradicated. Following that, the insects and animals would start to die, the food chain interrupted, until eventually the entire ecosystem of that tiny spit of land collapsed, all because of one simple plant. But it was this same plant that was going to keep the two stranded sailors alive. Because it was bamboo, and it was hollow, and it was water tight, and it was fire resistant. And it was exactly what they needed. The notches on the outside were where the bamboo was split into segments. Each notch represented a barrier on the inside of the hollow shafts, which could serve as seals to keep water inside. Like long, narrow buckets. With the aid of his pocket knife and a fist sized rock he managed to chop down one of the wider stalks and hack it into the lengths he wanted. When he had a hefty pile of hollow tubes he bound them together with lianas and slung the bundle over his shoulder, feeling considerably more optimistic than half an hour ago. Now all he had to do was actually find some water, and their biggest survival problem was solved. After that, all that was left was to find a way to get off the island.
As the bosun continued his wandering search, his mind inevitably did some wandering of its own. With nothing to distract him, the impact of what had happened on the beach that morning started to really hit him. Her cries of agony echoed through his mind, the image of her curled in pain, with tears making tracks through the dirt on her cheeks, haunted him. Had she moaned and whimpered in pain like that, when that scumbag had hurt her? Had she cried, her eyes shut tight against the reality of what was happening? Had it hurt back then like it did just now? Somewhere on the surface of his mind, Dutchy registered that he'd sunk to the ground against a tree, unable to walk or even stand any longer. All he could think about was the X writhing in pain, fighting him as he tried to help her in any little way he could. It wasn't going to be okay. Just finding water and bamboo and shellfish wasn't enough. She was hurt. Damaged, to what extent he had no way of knowing. What if she was torn and bleeding inside? What if her ribs were fractured or her windpipe half crushed? He knew she'd never voluntarily tell him. She was too independent. She needed to be in a hospital. She should have been in a hospital hours ago. But instead she was stranded on a miniscule island with him. He, who could do practically nothing to help her while they waited to be found by people who had no idea whatsoever where they were. The Hammersley must have noticed they were gone by now, but that did no good if they didn't know when or where or how they'd gone missing. It could be days, weeks even, before they were found by anybody. He couldn't stop the thought that entered his mind β the situation seemed hopeless.
An hour later he was feeling a little more cheerful. He'd found a freshwater stream and, after washing all the saltiness off his skin and out of his t-shirt, had filled as many of his bamboo containers as he could carry. After several trips back to collect more he had a whole mini-forest of hollow bamboo tubes, of varying sizes, all waiting to be set over the campfire to boil and purify their contents. He covered the open ends with large, rubbery leaves and tied them on with nettle cords, like jam jars, and once they were boiled he set them aside to cool. Somewhere along the route to the stream he'd found broad-leaf brambles growing, and filled his pockets with the sweet berries each time he passed them. The sight of the juicy little berries had given him an idea of something to cheer Kate up with when she woke. The last time he went to check on her he wasn't sure if she was sleeping or just pretending in order to avoid moving. He'd re-heated her hot rock and got her to drink some still-warm water, but she'd barely even opened her eyes. Between boiling the water and checking on Kate, he'd made frequent trips down to the beach to feed the signal fires and scan the horizon for ships, with poor results. But he had to keep finding things to do, because the moment his mind was unoccupied the haunting images of the X in pain, or unconscious and deathly, came rushing back to hit him like a ton of bricks. Whenever he had nothing else to do he sat a few feet from the entrance to the bivvy, where he could watch Kate, and twisted more nettle fibres into cord. By the time the sun had passed its apex in the sky, the tubes of water had all cooled to match the temperature of the air and Dutchy had the beginnings of an honest-to-god spool in his lap. Kate was still dozing on and off, pointedly refusing to acknowledge that he was watching her. He'd retrieved his shirt, which had been blackened with ash from the hot rock, and washed it with hot water in case she wanted to wear it later. It was hung over the drying rack by the fire, long since dried out. Her little surprise was waiting in one of the bamboo tubes, but he'd decided he'd wait until she chose to get up. A little reward for summoning the energy to face the world.
It had been over a day since his last meal on the Hammersley, and since then all Dutchy had eaten was baked nettles and shellfish that morning. Hence, his stomach was growling. He'd thought of a way to get food earlier that morning, and set it up, but now he was putting off going to see if his plan had worked. The idea had been sketchy at best, and he wasn't sure what he'd do next if it hadn't worked. So he'd been ignoring it, much as Kate had been ignoring his gaze.
He came to the end of the most recent bit of nettle cord, tied it off and tossed it down with the rest. He toyed with the idea of going down to the beach again, but it'd only been ten minutes since his last trip. Sighing, he resigned himself to traipsing back up to the stream to see if his idea had worked. On arrival at the water's edge, he was pleased to see that the lianas he'd strung across from one bank to the other were at least still in place. Squinting through the glittering surface of the water, he thought he saw dark shadows, and his heart sped up a little. Had it really worked? Splashing excitedly into the middle of the stream, not giving a damn how wet he got, he knelt to examine the first of the four lines. Each line, strung horizontally above the surface of the water, had several thinner lines made of nettle cord dangling down into the water, at regular intervals across the stream. At the end of each nettle line was an acacia thorn, serving as a hook, which had at one point during the day held a squirming worm. Altogether there were twelve thorn hooks, on twelve nettle lines, which hung from four lianas stretched across the stream at intervals totally twenty feet. And by the time he'd examined all the lines and pulled them all onto the bank he had three fair sized fish. Using only nettles and thorns, he'd caught three fish. Dutchy grinned. Charge was going to be sick with jealousy!
Dutchy killed the fish and reset the fishing lines, and strolled back to base camp with his haul, unable to hide the slight swagger.
Back at the camp, he looked in on Kate, who at least seemed to be sleeping, then de-scaled and gutted the fish, buried the gash, stuffed the fish with nettle leaves, wrapped them in larger leaves and buried the resulting packages in the hot ash under the fire. Feeling immensely proud of himself, he gathered up an armful of wood and made a quick trip back to the beach. There was still no sign of any ships, but the signal fires were still going strong and he wasn't going to let the lack of rescue dampen his good mood. It had been less than a day, after all. Someone would come, eventually.
A little later he checked on the fish baking in the hot ash, and decided they were cooked enough. Which meant it was time for Kate to get up, even if he had to drag her out of the shelter.
"X?" He got no response as he peered into the entrance. Flecks of light burst between the leaves and danced across her hair. "X, I know you're awake. Nobody sleeps that long unless they're in a comfy bed and extremely hung over."
"Uhhh, m'tired . . ." came the faint protest. She shifted slightly, burying her face in the crook of her elbow.
"I know you are, but you have to eatβ"
"Oh god no, not again!"
"Yes, you do. So shellfish didn't agree with you. That's okay. Just wait 'til you see what the master chef got for you this time."She didn't move, just made a faint grumbling sound and went quiet. His voice dropped in warning, "X . . ." Still no movement. He grabbed her feet and pulled, and she slid neatly out of the shelter with a yelp, dragging half of the 'bedding' with her. "Well, look who's out of bed!" Dutchy said brightly, grinning at her scowl, "Since you're up, fancy some lunch?"
"I hate you."
"I know."
Begrudgingly, she followed him over to the campfire and watched as he served up his catch.
"How on earth did you catch those?"
"Well," he said, passing her a pile of tender fish and steaming, somewhat stewed nettles on a large, rubbery leaf, "If you can force yourself to face the sunlight long enough, I will show you the genius that is Dylan Mulholland."
". . . Ew."
"Shut up. Ma'am."
She just smirked and popped a bit of fish in her mouth.
They ate in silence again, but it was more or less a contented silence. Dutchy presented her with his little surprise β a container of hot, sweet, brambleberry juice. She rewarded the gesture with a shy smile, and seemed to enjoy the homemade beverage. It was better that lukewarm river water at any rate. He was just glad to have seen a glimpse of the old X back again, even if it was only for a little while. She stopped eating after just a few small bites, despite his encouragements, but at least this time she didn't turn green. She insisted that she wasn't hungry, and in the end Dutchy finished her share just so it wouldn't be wasted.
After, he re-boiled one of the larger containers of water and took her out to the river. He pointed out his makeshift fishing lines, showed her a secluded spot to bathe, and gave her the flask of hot water so she could try and get the blood out of her clothes. He offered to wait out of sight in case she needed him, at which she snorted and pointed out that she was unlikely to suddenly so overcome with pain that she would drown in barely a foot of slow moving water. This seemed only to make him more worried, and a moment later she had sharply ordered him to go back to the beach.
"If I so much as hear a twig snap anywhere near this spot, I'll have you on watch duty for the rest of your life. You'll never see shore leave again. Got it?"
"Yes, ma'am," he said seriously, "I will make absolutely sure that I don't step on any twigs." He ducked away before she could smack him, and, laughing, headed out to check their signal fires again.
Kate waited several minutes, standing on tip toe and watching until she was sure he was gone. Then it was like she snapped, like a damn inside her broke and she had to sit before she fell. Her breathe rushed out of her as if she'd swum a mile underwater. Her mind reeled with the sheer ludicrousness of it. She'd slept practically all day, yet the effort of smiling and joking and just talking for barely half an hour made her feel as though she hadn't slept in a week. With leaden limbs she forced herself to her feet and walked fully clothed into the water, finding just enough forethought to toe off her boots and let Dutchy's shirt flutter to the ground where it was dry. The chilling water instantly raised goose bumps all over her, reawakening the flesh-crawling feeling of hands touching her β his hands touching . . .
Ignoring the bite of the cold, she sank down and let herself slide under the surface. She stayed there, eyes squeezed shut, until her lungs screamed in protest and her blood pounded like an earthquake in her skull. She surfaced, gasping, tears mixing with the water so that they couldn't be seen. Then she pushed the emotion down, and firmly grasped the hem of her shirt.
She wasn't sure what she expected to see when she stripped away her clothes and observed her own skin. Red marks where he'd touched her, scores of bruises in the shapes of hands, something like that. In truth, there weren't many bruises. Few that she could actually remember getting. She'd been too weak at the time from the cyanide poisoning; she hadn't put up all that much of a fight. She traced the faint marks with her fingers. A little on her thighs, which she didn't want to think about. Some on her hip; she had a pretty good idea where they were from. Her breast. She remembered getting those bruises well enough. Her eyes drifted from her fingers to her wrists. Now they really were bruised. Livid purple rings, like twisted bracelets. She touched her throat, felt the tenderness there, and imagined it looked much the same. No wonder Dutchy had been looking at her strangely. She'd caught him looking at her several times, with his face hardened into a dark scowl. He never realised that she saw him, but she did. He was scowling at the marks. She'd seen the look many times before, right from the first day she met him. For a long time she'd thought it was because he disliked her. Now she knew better. Now she knew that it was an expression of pain, the kind of pain that no amount of medicine could ever stop.
She sighed, and spent the next fifteen minutes ridding her skin and clothes of all the itchy salt and dirt and grime. She made a vague attempt at getting rid of the bloodstains with the hot water in the bamboo container, but knew that it wasn't going to do much good. The marks faded, but she'd never be able to get rid of them properly without soap. Finding that she didn't really care if she had to walk around in bloodied clothes, she got out of the water and dressed in Dutchy's shirt, which was still dry, and thanks to Dutchy, reasonably clean. She jammed her feet back into her boots, collected the bundle of her wet clothes, and trampled wearily back to their camp. Dutchy wasn't back yet, so she hung her clothes on the drying frame and went to look for him, combing her fingers through her wet hair to get some of the knots out.
She found him sitting in the shade of the tree line, watching the horizon. The sea twinkled in the distance, as if it hadn't been a frothing raging monster the night before.
Dutchy craned his neck to look at her as she took a seat in the sand next to him. He took one look at her, dressed only in his shirt and her heavy combat boots, and snorted.
"Cute."
"I'm your senior officer. I am not 'cute'."
"Right."
"Shut up."
He just smiled and turned his gaze back to the horizon. After a moment, he sighed.
"So. How are you?"
"I'm fine."
"Still in pain?"
"I'm fine."
"What about the bleeding, has it stopped?"
"Dutchy, I'm fine."
He turned to face her, and she steadily avoided his gaze. "X, you can't pretend it didn't happen. You have to talk to me." Still, she ignored him. "Kate." Her eyes shot up to meet his, shocked. He spoke softly. "Please talk to me."
She looked away, chewing on her lip. He thought that was it, she was shutting him down, but out of nowhere, so slowly it might have been acting of its own volition, her hand slid across the sand to touch his. Her hand didn't hold his, just rested there on the sand, fingers overlapping.
As he watched, she let out a long, shuddering breath.
"I don't remember . . . all of what happened. A lot of it is just a blur. We were escorting the FFV back to port . . ."
You know what I'm going to ask. I got some great reviews for my last chapter, hence the reasonably prompt update. But you all know the drill. You gotta give a little to get a little. So PLEASE review!
Thanks for reading.
