Hey,
thanks for the reviews. Nothing much interesting this time, but it's okay to get the story rolling... Please R&R.
Disclaimer: See Chapter One 'cause I'm lazy.
The first thing that Lori felt was a searing pain in her lower stomach. She tenderly opened an eye and was faced with darkness and the far away sounds of screaming. The plane… It had crashed! Oh god! She was drawn back to the pain and felt her way to the seatbelt, undoing it and something wet coated her hands.
Blood.
The plane had done some spectacular flipping, or so it seemed, and the seatbelt had dug into her stomach from the acrobats. She slowly got to her feet, and felt her way up and out into the aisle, grabbing onto the tops of seats as she saw the hole at the end of the plane.
Crack.
Lori felt sick as she realised she'd just stood on bone, and broken it. No sound came from the owner of the bone that Lori had just snapped, and that urged her forward as unexpectantly her stomach wanted to refuse it's current contents. Lori stumbled further down the aisle, towards the source of the screams. Eventually she fell out the end, landing in soft white sand.
Sand? Oh how lucky, how very lucky. She squinted through the bright sun to see a large vast of ocean before them, they could've landed in there, how did they… Nevermind, she thought, her attention once again situated to her stomach. Blood was soaking through her tee-shirt and she took a few experimental steps forward after she got carefully to her feet.
Where what should have been a beach island paradise, was a scene of wailing bodies and burning fuselage.
"Well", she murmured to herself, remembering the bruises. "Atleast I'll fit in…" She laughed, even though the situation didn't seem to be quite humorous for a man watching her confused.
Lori stumbled up the sandy beach, passing bloodied people and more fuselage before once again, passing out.
"Lori…Lori…"
"Hey Doc, how'd you know her?"
"I was sitting beside her on the plane", Jack informed the man he'd seen in the aisle. After getting his back stitched by that woman, Kate, he'd come across Lori's limp form in the sand. An impressive wound in her stomach had been successfully closed and now he was trying to rouse the girl.
"Lori… C'mon, wake up for me…" He smiled as he saw ice-blue eyes flutter open and she shot up, rubbing her skull and wrapping an arm protectively round her stomach.
"Oh, we're still here", she replied flatly.
"Yeah, it could be a while till the rescue boats come", Jack got up from his knees and eyed Sawyer apprehensively. "You'll be okay while I go check out everyone else?"
"Uh-huh", the girl shuffled uneasily. She hadn't really had someone so concerned about her well being before…
"I'll stay with her", Sawyer confirmed.
"Okay then", and with that Jack spun round and made his way through the sand.
The two sat in silence, Lori had collapsed quite far up on the beach, and they had a nice view of the plane wreck and the luggage splayed across the white beach. Some people were rummaging through it, trying to salvage their personal belongings so when the boats came they could get right on and get out of this nightmare.
"Don't you want to find your stuff?" Lori questioned uneasily, quite confused about Sawyer's sudden protectiveness over her. Afterall, they'd only met because Lori's head had been bashed into a wall… She was 16, she could handle herself.
"Naw, I might hold on till the boats come", he shrugged.
The boats… Lori's stomach tightened at the prospects, where would they go? Back to Sydney… To her Mother? Oh god, Lori couldn't face that. Her mother beat her for leaving the light on, what would she do if she found out her only child had left her sleeping in a desolate part of the airport and boarded the plane without her…
A small part of Lori hoped that the boats would take their time. Little did she know that was exactly what was going to happen.
"You hungry, dude?" A plastic wrapped airplane meal was waved infront of her vision.
"Er… Are you sure?"
"Of course, there's enough for all of us", he smiled. He was quite a large man, with long curly brown hair and an aroma that made you want to smile back at him.
"Okay, sure, I'll take one".
"Hmm", he mused. "Our specials tonight are Chicken and Lasagne".
"Ooh, a choice", she laughed. "I'll go for the Lasagne… Thanks", she accepted it and he dropped some plastic cutlery on top.
"Is there no-one with you?" He asked casually, hoping it was an okay question to ask all the sudden.
"No, I was on the plane alone", she shrugged, pulling back the plastic wrap. Sawyer had left to find his suitcase a while ago but she didn't mind. Lori liked being alone with her own thoughts.
"Oh, right; me too… I'm Hurley by the way", he offered her a hand and she shook it, rather quickly.
"Lori", she smiled. Though they seemed apparently stranded on a desert island, due to the previous circumstances Lori couldn't think of a better place to be.
After eating, she got up and stretched off sore muscles, walking in between people trying to sleep or holding their mobile phones high up in the air trying to catch the tiniest part of a signal. She walked past a man who in frustration threw it at the sand, cursed, and then picked it up again to try and different part of the beach.
A large, bright fire was burning, obviously a signal to any planes that might fly over. Many people were helping, throwing stuff in as the fire flickered round. Away from the fire, Jack and a woman Lori didn't know the name of were in discussion. Jack was holding a leaf, folded slightly into the shape of an airplane. He seemed to be re-enacting the crash, to make some sort of sense.
Lori smiled, it seemed okay that someone was as calm as she was.
That was until a noise racketed through the jungle; everyone jumped to their feet and stared round. Some eye's were wide in hope, other's in fear. The noise continued, it almost sound… Mechanical? But… what could cause such a sound?
A pregnant lady asked the inevitable question; "Did anybody hear that sound?"
Hurley got to his feet and moved forward, hesitating before responding, "I think… Uh… Unfortunately all of us did".
The sound made another grand appearance, causing some people to cover their ears to block out the awful sound. Everyone's eyes switched towards the jungle, as tall trees started to sway out of the ordinary.
The group of brave ones moved forward, Jack and the mysterious lady right in front as the sound seemingly crashed through acres of trees in mere seconds. Whatever it was seemed to be retreating. A Brit just infront of Lori voiced everyone's thoughts,
"Terrific".
Everyone was grouped together now, introduced and making conversation. They had been eying Lori quite strangely, even though a boy younger than her was lurking around too. Maybe it was because she was on her own? Or the bruises… No, she wrote off, everyone was bruised… Sortof…
"It wasn't natural, whatever it was…" A man named Michael trailed off, keeping a strong grip on his son's, Walt's, shoulder. It drew Lori out of her thoughts and she kept her silence, interested in what might be said in response.
"That sound it made", Rose, the lady Jack had been comforting on the plane when the turbulence hit spoke up, "I keep thinking, there was something familiar about it".
"Really? Where are you from?" Shannon, a tall skinny blonde woman who Lori had seen painting her nails, questioned.
"The Bronx".
"It could've been something like monkeys", Charlie, the Brit, voiced up nervously, making Lori smile a little at his suggestion.
"Yeah, I'm sure it was monkeys. It's Monkey Island!" Sawyer drawled, making Charlie nervously retreat.
"You never know, King Kong might have moved here", Lori shrugged, getting odd looks but Charlie shot her a grateful glance. Obviously, she hadn't said much and a reference to King Kong moving wasn't the best opening statement.
"Technically, you know, we don't even know we're on an Island-"
"We're on an Island", Sayid cut Hurley off. Yep, they'd blatantly ignored her. Oh well.
Lori shrugged, once more, seeing Jack and Kate, she'd learnt how name last night, having another hushed conversation.
"Well, does anyone have any ideas at all?" Lori asked, deciding to say something more intelligent this time.
"That's not for you to worry about Lori", Sawyer laughed, ruffling her hair. "You leave that to us".
"I'm 16, I'm not stupid", she huffed, pulling away and crossing her arms. "I just haven't seen any rescue boats on the horizon and was wondering if anyone had any other ideas than just to sit and wait".
The group didn't respond, nobody had a clue.
"Does anybody have any sunscreen?" Charlie asked, pulling up his sleeves and eyeing the group sitting in the sand.
Shannon leant forward past Lori and picked up her backpack. "Yeah, I do".
"So, I was looking inside the fuselage. It's pretty grim in there. You think we should be doing anything about the B-O-D-Y-S?"
Lori got up at this point, not exactly willing to wait out to see where this conversation might lead. She'd only sat over there since Charlie had gestured her over, probably for her backup against Sawyer, but it was nice to be slighty excepted after her quite stupid remark.
Jack was heading across the sandy plains and she walked over to him as he smiled, seeing her.
"Hey Lori, how's your stomach doing?"
"Uh, it's okay I guess", she slipped her hands in her pockets. "Hasn't really bothered me very much… Are you going somewhere?" She eyed his backpack.
"Yeah, I am. Come over here and I'll explain to all…" She followed him back to the group she'd just retreated from and Jack jumped right in the conversation.
"I'm going to look for the cockpit. See if we can find a transceiver to send out a distress signal. Help out the rescue team", Jack turned to Boone. "You're gonna need to keep an eye on the wounded. If that guy in the suit wakes up, try to keep him calm – Don't let him remove that piece of shrapnel. You understand?"
"What about the guy with the leg? Your tourniquet-"
"Stopped the bleeding. I took it off last night. He'll be all right".
"Yeah, okay. Cool… Uh, good job", Lori smiled at Boone, he liked to understand he had every
clue what was going on.
"Hey, I'm coming with, I wanna help", Charlie announced.
Jack rolled his eyes at this comment, "I don't need anymore help".
"No, I wanna go. I'm not too keen on keeping still", Sawyer sauntered over to the gathering in the sand. He pushed right past Lori after shooting her a wink.
"Yeah, this is genius. Going into the jungle, after that sound last night? The thing that moved those trees? Yeah. This is a great idea".
Kate made her grand appearance and asked the question, "What's going on?"
"Nothing", Jack shrugged, turning to Kate and looking over to the Jungle.
"Well, when they show up to rescue us while you're gone. We're not waiting around", Sawyer taunted, Lori frowned. He'd seemed so nice in the airport…
"Let's go", Jack ignored Sawyer's comment and started walking, barely catching Charlie's comment in response.
"Oh, she's coming too? Excellent".
Lori watched the trio depart into the woods and frowned as a flash of furry white vanished back into the jungle. She shook it off; she was tired, her eyes obviously wanted to play tricks on her.
Till Chapter Three, where Lori will make a very special new friend... Yay.
Please review.