Here is a larger chapter. It's been a while. I've been elsewhere working on a couple different things and suffering through some of the most stressful tests I've ever taken. I figured I might as well upload this chapter since I wrote it forever ago and some people have been waiting quite a while for this to update. I actually drew some illustrations to go along with this when I originally wrote it so if anyone is interested I might stick 'em on deviant art or something. Depends on if there is any demand. Without any more ado, here it is:
Everything was a blur for Helga. She'd gone numb. The crying and screams bounced off her, not even breaching her mind; her body was being dragged along by a pale freckled hand. If Lila were to let go, the blonde would most likely give up and wait for death to take her back to Arnold.
How she didn't manage to slip and tumble down the soaked askew deck was beyond her. Hell, everything was beyond her.
Arnold was gone.
The boat rocked violently and a tall man that neither girl recognized was flung from the deck. Lila choked back a sob. Helga didn't blink.
The noise was deafening; it wasn't long before the cacophony was drowned out by a screeching whine: single-pitched and never wavering, all Helga could hear was that whine. The redhead before her jerkily spun around, her mouth and jaw flexing feverently. She was shouting something but the blonde couldn't hear what.
Lila was knocked to the slick ground by a particularly strong quake and the blonde tumbled down with her. Pain raged in their bodies as only the freckled girl attempted to get up. The constant motion and slippery surface made getting any purchase on the deck impossible. They slid on their hands and knees with the rocking of the boat like loose cargo.
It was only after they rammed into a large wood-paneled crate that Lila managed to drag Helga and herself up to a standing position. Clinging desperately to the crate, the redhead kept a constant eye on her blonde friend, hoping to whatever or whomever that Helga wouldn't give up and let the water carry her back to Arnold.
The sea roared around them as their crate was rocketed from the ship like a projectile, taking the girls with it.
I hope this thing floats.
Lila had never let go of Helga's hand. Even as their unconscious bodies washed ashore and nestled in the baking sand, the redhead's fingers were still tightly laced around her once brash friend's wrist.
"Mr. Simmons!" A voice pierced through the Southern Belle's fog of unconsciousness. "I found Miss Lila and Helga over here!" Even as she couldn't move, the freckled beauty was still able to hear a barrage of stomps on sand approach. It tooks all of her effort just to peel open an eyelid.
Lila saw sand, glowing in the light of the morning sun. Atop that sand was a blonde sixth grader. Her damp flaxen hair had come undone from its pigtails and formed a chaotic wave spilling across her back; her pale face was lightly bruised purple and had a delicate coat of sand resting over invisible tear stains. At that moment her glacier blue eyes snapped open and, for a moment, the redhead saw the brilliant fire burning in them. Just as quickly as it had appeared, it vanished. Lila wanted to cry.
Helga made no attempt to move as they were surrounded on all sides and hefted up, she only blankly stared in the direction of the ocean. As though waiting. The Southern Belle had no drive nor energy to fight off the slumber threatening to return to her. She let her freckled eyelids drift closed while silently praying for Helga.
When the redhead awoke she found herself on a soggy pile of jackets. everything smelt of salt. Cautiously the Southern Belle rolled onto her side only to wince in pain. She had bruises everywhere; her entire body was one giant bruise. Bracing herself for the pain, Lila sat up.
All around her were the unconscious bodies of her peers. Sheena, Peapod kid, she could even see some seventh and eighth graders who had snuck onto Rhonda's ship. Speaking of Rhonda an outraged shriek caught her attention.
"What a useless hunk of junk! My family spent all that money just so we could crash on a bargain brand Costa Rica imitation?!" the heiress yelled loudly from quite a distance away.
They had crashed…
With that epiphany Lila forced herself to scramble to a weak stand in spite of pain. Where was she? Where was she? A spot of dirtied bright pink caught her eye.
Sitting silently alone at the water's edge was the fearsome Helga G. Pataki. Her drooped shoulders and tired slouch only radiated a sense of defeat. For all of her fighting, all of her loud words and fist shaking and all her metre and rhyme, life had finally bested the poor blonde. Lila was going to cry.
She hobbled her way over to the empty husk of a human being and gracefully folded her legs under herself to sit in spite of her gentle winces of pain. The redhead tried to see what the once bully saw but nothing on the horizon caught her eye. Gulping, the Southern Belle reached out a pale, freckled hand to clasp her friend's limp one.
"It is going to be okay," Lila whispered, trying to be an optimist. Optimist. It clicked as Lila urgently twirled her head to look back out to sea. Arnold was out there. And if the redhead wasn't careful then Helga might try to join him. Forcing back tears, the freckled whispered, "I miss him too."
Her blonde friend did not rejoice, nor turn to her and hug her, nor give a comforting smile, nor burst into tears, nor even whimper a "yeah". She only stared straight ahead into the ocean, her hand tightening around Lila's.
Gerald hadn't moved and Phoebe didn't know what to do. Nothing came to mind. She was utterly lost and had no idea how to even so much as approach the problem.
The two most important people in her life had crumbled in a single night. The same night she'd gotten her first boyfriend.
It'd been late, not as late as the storm but briefly before curfew. He'd taken her small hand in his large, warm one and dazzled her with a marvelous tale of the most beloved couple at PS218 middle school. Two people so different apart but when together made perfect harmony. The couple had won 'cutest couple' in the yearbook eight years straight, even after they'd moved up to high school. The athlete had turned to her then and looked at her with those deep, dark eyes, beautiful like the night sky, and said, "I bet we could give them a run for their money."
Everything had been right, everything had been perfect. And then they had heard Helga's words on the deck in the very early morning.
"A-Arnold… He-he's...dead."
Gerald pulled Phoebe into his lanky arms and choked back sobs, The Asian girl wrapped her arms around his and told him to cry. For an hour her boyfriend held her and wept into her hair. And then the boat shook and the couple had to find their way to safety.
After the catastrophe with the yacht, Gerald had stopped crying. He ceased nearly all functions except breathing and staring down angrily. Phoebe wrung her hands in worry as she glanced between her best friends and boyfriend.
Oh Arnold, if only you could come back...
As every last person struggled back into consciousness Mr. Simmons called for attention. "Okay kids, we've landed on an island. Now, it is important for us to know who is here so with this," he held up a scavenged sharpie and a wrinkled Forbes magazine, "we'll keep track of everyone. Please form a line and state your name."
The line was long, more kids than expected had apparently snuck onto the boat. Lila gently directed Helga into the forming line. Behind them arrived the bulky seventh graders, Wolfgang and Ludwig. The blonde boy eyed the depressed girl for a moment before addressing the redhead.
"Whats up with the blondie?" He asked without a hint of concern. Lila barely managed to hold back a scowl.
"Someone she knew," the Southern Belle paused to find the right words, "didn't make it." Wolfgang winced.
"Oh." He muttered.
"Tch," Ludwig rolled his eyes, "so what? I don't see some of my boys here. Do I look like I'm about to cry?"
Faster than any of their eyes could follow, Helga whirled around, socked the brunette seventh grader in the jaw, and turned right back to stare out into the Ocean. Even as his friend cradled his chin in his palm with a look of shock on his face, Wolfgang couldn't hold his tongue.
"Now you do," he said with amusement. The blonde boy glanced back at the muted girl before deciding to say something. "Sorry about your friend, uhh… Hellen?" The seventh grader tried a name.
"Helga." Lila corrected, her warm brown eyes never leaving the blonde girl's face.
After everyone had gone through the line, Mr. Simmons cleared his throat. "It seems I'm the only adult who washed up on this side of the beach- N-not that I don't think the others aren't okay, they're just uhhh… elsewhere. Anyway, I'm going to be in charge of all you special children until we're rescued, alrighty?"
There was a collective groan heard from a mile into the forest.