Author's notes to reviewers: Thanks so much for your reviews! They have inspired me to try to write as well as I can manage; better than my previous effort. I will not abandon this story.
Walt's head started to partially clear, acknowledging that he had lost the hopeless fight. Without much else to look at, the helplessly trussed-up boy stared at the nighttime sky, the pattern of constellations being etched into his brain. With his elbows bent at right angles behind his back, he couldn't even reach the ropes binding his ankles, much less try to untie those. "What had happened?" he thought. He was supposed to be "special." Locke told him so. His stepfather Brian had given a similar impression, but in an unfriendly manner. But what had Walt done in the last couple days? He insisted on going on the raft. He encouraged his father to fire the flare gun. And now those decisions may have cost his father and their two friends their lives, and sent himself into a lifetime of slavery. He wondered if some ancestor of his had been transported across an ocean like this, bound like he was, even dressed as he was, except for the Power Rangers part. Were the same stars, the same planets, the same moon, witnesses to a similar occurrence centuries ago? Something inside Walt told him the answer was affirmative, in fact possibly for several ancestors.
Snapping back to the present, a thousand thoughts bombarded Walt's brain. Why had so much misfortune befallen him? Why did his mother have to die so young? What caused her to marry that jerk of a stepfather, when his biological father was clearly the superior man? Why couldn't his real Dad have made more of an effort to see him? Why did he have to become separated from Vincent? What had he done to deserve this?
What evidence was there that he was "special"? A few lucky dice rolls in backgammon games against Hurley? He wished he could trade in some of his luck back then for some right now. Was there anything else? His brain throbbed with pain as he recalled developing his knife-throwing skills before the appreciative audience of Locke and Boone. Fat chance he would gets his hands on a knife now. What else was there? The noise inside his brain underwent a marked crescendo. Through the agony he recalled a funny-looking bird smashing into a window, right after he saw it in a schoolbook. The throbbing intensified further. Then there was the polar bear attack, after his father tossed his comic book with a polar bear in it into a fire. Something with animals? He had to visualize an animal. Some marine animal that might be in the area. What did he need, a whale? A shark? Maybe a giant squid? What did they look like? A whale might be too much. What did a great white shark look like? Walt wasn't sure. Then there was the hammerhead, more easily remembered because its head looked like a double-headed hammer. Feeling that he had nothing to lose, Walt desperately concentrated on an image of a hammerhead shark. The cacophony inside his brain reached excruciating levels as he fought to picture that particular fish. After several minutes of nearly unbearable pain, Walt was at the point of losing consciousness, when something told him he must brace himself against the back of the cabin. Half a second later,
BUMP!
Something large had just rammed the bow with tremendous force. The force of the impact sent the kidnappers hurtling forward into the ocean, taking the forward wall of the cabin with them. Being braced against the back of the cabin, Walt was only thrown upward a small distance, though the landing was still painful. He could hear wails of agony from the water as the boat was knocked off course and now traveled along a large circular arc. Then the realization hit: his father and his friends' lives may be hanging in the balance, and now he was the only person on the face of the earth who could possibly do anything about it.
Walt wasn't going to waste time trying to determine for certain the fate of those others. He pushed himself upward against the back wall of the cabin, managed to grab the door handle and turn it, and hopped into what was left of the cabin. The pilot's chair and steering wheel were still there, but not much else. There was no longer a forward cabin wall, just part of the sides and back. Somewhat shocked, Walt stood as the boat circled around to the left, trying to determine what he could do. Eventually he recognized the constellation pattern, and suddenly knowing in which direction he had to steer the boat, hopped to the steering wheel, leaned over and grabbed the top of it with his teeth, and turned it a bit to the right. This action painfully strained his neck, and the ride was choppy enough that he couldn't hold on for long. Then he found that by standing sideways, he could reach the wheel with one hand. One rather numb hand; Walt began to clench and unclench his fingers to get the circulation back into his hands. And then similarly with his poor toes and feet.
Walt next had to guess how long he had to go in that direction. It had seemed much longer, but probably was on the order of fifteen or twenty minutes. He started to count off the seconds in his head. He then thought about course adjustments. The boat had been circling counterclockwise, so he had to aim a little more to the left. But the stars would have moved some. In which direction? Let's see, sun moves from east to west, so facing north, that's right to left. So he had to aim a little to the right. He hoped the two course adjustments would come close to canceling, so he picked out a star and did his best to keep going in that direction.
For many agonizing minutes Walt saw nothing but the dim reflection of the stars and moon on the water. 600 seconds, 700, 800, … . Then as he reached 815, he caught a glimpse of something faintly glowing red, far ahead and way to the left. Hardly daring to hope, he turned the steering wheel accordingly, and the intensity slowly increased. The glowing began to appear more like a flickering, as of some burning object whose flame was about to go out. There could be only one object out here that could be burning. As he did maybe half an hour ago, Walt shouted "Dad! Dad! Dad!" at the top of his lungs.
… to be continued
