At first, when the plane crashed, Kalei Mahi'ai was confused.
Everything had become a blur to her from the moment the plane started shaking. The next thing she knew, Kalei was in the water.
Luckily, Kalei was an excellent swimmer. It wasn't even an exaggeration, she truly deserved the title of excellence. She kind of had to be a great swimmer, growing up on Oahu. An island not unlike the one she was trapped on now.
The crash was a few days ago. Two, maybe three. She had lost count.
Nineteen people who were in the tail section were alive. Hopefully, people in the middle and front of the plane were alive as well, just on a different part of the island.
She had this problem where she didn't remember intense events all that well, even if they happened recently. The crash of the pane, and the aftermath that followed was probably the most intense few hours of Kalei's life, so it was only natural to her to block it out. There were a few things that stood out to her, like swimming to the shore, rescuing people who couldn't swim or couldn't swim well, doing her best to help the injured.
She remembered meeting Charlie Hume.
Everyone had been running around on the beach, in complete chaos. Kalei was busy trying to pull a man from out under the fallen tail of the plane when a boy with dirty blond hair bumped into her.
"Sorry, I'm sorry," He apologized quickly, his voice bearing an odd mix of a Scottish and British accent, as he backed away. Kalei had been immediately annoyed at the fact that he just ran away from the problem at hand.
"Hey!" She had yelled, stopping him in his tracks. "What's your name."
"Charlie, Charlie Hume." He answered, seeming a little scared. Kalei had been confused, since she wasn't a particularly scary or intimidating person. Still, she persisted.
"Well Charlie Hume, do you think you can help me save this man's life?"
And that was how she had gained her co-leader.
Kalei had been surprised at herself more than anyone at the fact that she had become the default leader of the tail section survivors. She was only twenty-one years old after all, barely an adult. But her actions on the day of the crash caused everyone to look to her, and she stepped up to the challenge.
And, somehow, Charlie Hume stepped up with her.
However, the more she got to know him, she realized that her first impression was a little wrong. He was actually a pretty kind person, from what she could see. Yeah, he was a little annoying and he was weirdly obsessed with some band called Drive Shaft, but the good outweighed the bad. Most of the time, at least.
"Hey, Lei!"
Oh, and there was that nickname that Kalei hated, but Charlie wouldn't drop the nickname until he was dead.
"Is there another crisis that we have to solve?" Kalei groaned. She had been sitting by the edge of the beach, just looking out at the ocean waves, and it had been nice for her to get a break.
"We're running low on water," He explained. "And food. And basically everything." She sighed, not at all liking where the conversation was going. Food wasn't as big of a problem since they had already managed to gather some of what grew it the jungle, and they would be able to do it again. One person had even managed to kill a rabbit using a sharp piece of the plane that had broken off. Water though? That was going to be a big, big problem.
"What about the injured man?" Kalei asked. Most of the injured had died from their wounds, but one was still alive. "The one with, you know, the arm." By arm, however, she mean lack of one. A piece of falling debris from the plane had damaged his arm so badly that there was no option but to cut it off. Kalei had not been present for that horrible event.
"It's not looking good," He sighed. "Honestly, Lei, I think that we're gonna have to make a choice soon. We can't keep wasting supplies on him, and he's in so much pain. Is it worth it if we can't save him?"
"What then?" She replied. "We just kill him?" Charlie, it seemed, had no response to that. The two of them were silent for a moment, neither of them having anything to say, and not really wanting to speak.
Kalei looked out at the water, wishing once again that she was on a different beach, one in Oahu, where she didn't have to worry about finding food or water. Yeah, she and her family had some financial struggles, but there was always food to go around.
"Alright," She said, standing up and pulling her brown hair into a messy ponytail. "We should talk to everyone else, see what they think." Charlie hesitated for just a moment, but he nodded and stood up as well.
Once it seemed that he, and Kalei too, was ready, they walked towards where the rest of the tail section survivors were doing various tasks, trying to keep the rest of them alive.
"Hey, everyone!" She shouted once they were close enough. "Can we have your attention for just one second?"
Sixteen pairs of eyes went right to Kalei, everyone except for the injured man and Charlie. The attention and pressure made her want to shrink into the background, but she knew that they were looking up to her,
"We're almost out of water," Charlie said, saving Kalei from the burden of having to deliver that news. "Until we find more, what we have is all we have left. I know a few of you set up a rationing system, so everyone needs to follow that starting right now."
"There's also the problem of food, although that should be a little easier to get," Kalei continued, picking up where Charlie left off. "We need to have people going into the jungle to gather what they can every day, and if any of you have any hunting experience, now would be a great time to use it."
Then there was the not-so-small matter of the last thing they had discussed. The two leaders looked at each other, neither of them wanting to take the burden, but both of them wanting to save the other from it.
Kalei, in the end, was the one who nodded and stepped forward, signaling to Charlie that she would take it from there.
"We also need to talk about the man who lost his arm," She began. "We've been using a lot of medicine and water on him, but we don't think he's going to survive. Without a doctor and the proper medicine, he won't make it if we don't get rescued. So… I know it's hard, but we all need to decide if it is worth it, in the long run, to keep him alive or not."
She looked around at the faces of the people she was leading. Some looked like they were conflicted, some clearly had their minds made up. It was their decision, and she was going to stand by whatever they chose.
That night, Kalei Mahi'ai killed someone for the first time in her life.
…
"I'm sorry ma'am, there aren't any available flights to Oahu at the moment."
Kalei sighed, running her hand through her hair. She had flown all the way to Australia in order to interview for a job, and the man in charge had told her to not even bother checking back.
"Alright, fine," She gave up. "Are there any connecting flights I can catch?"
The ticket agent at Sydney Airport typed something on her computer, and Kalei heard a loud ding ring out.
"There's a flight going from here to Los Angeles to Oahu," the ticket agent said. "Oceanic flight 442."
Kalei groaned. She didn't want to make a stop-over in Los Angeles, and that was going to be a lot of hours in the air. However, she didn't have any other choice, and she wanted to get back to her home.
"I'll take it, then."
A/N: Hey everyone, just letting you know that I will be adding Sunday updates to the update schedule for this fic!