A/N: Next part. (:

Disclaimer: I don't own this. Disney happens to own half the world.

Chapter One

The first sign that anything was wrong was the stomach pain.

Zack Martin woke in the middle of the night with a whimper, clutching at his abdomen. What was wrong with him? He never got stomachaches; he could eat anything. He'd always been called iron stomach. What was the matter now? He didn't understand, but he did understand that he was about to release the contents of that stomach - so he struggled from the lower hammock and staggered toward the shore. Once he reached the shore he bent over the water and waited for it to come.

What is happening to me? Zack thought as he threw up the meager contents of his stomach, not caring if he woke anyone. He rather hoped he woke the others up - maybe then they'd stop complaining once they saw the condition he was in. Zack took a deep ragged breath and, for lack of regular water, washed his mouth out with ocean water from a few feet further down the shoreline.

Zack laid back in the sand, water lapping at him. He could feel sweat dribbling down his forehead, and his stomach was still searing. Zack curled into a little ball, sinking into the mud-like sand, the tiny grains digging into his skin. He would have muttered something along the lines of ouch if he'd had the strength. Instead he settled for lying in the wet sand, not making any sounds at all, waiting for the end to come.

Out of nowhere a song popped into his head. Waiting for the end to come, wishing I had strength to stand. This was not what I had planned. It's out of my control... He might have snorted at how appropriate Linkin Park's hit was, but he couldn't. All he could do was think about how much pain he was in, how much he was sweating, how fast his heart was racing, how the sand he was staring at was tilting back and forth in such a funny and strange way...

Zack watched the sand dance, watched the landscape twirl back and forth, vertigo striking him again and again. He coughed several times but didn't throw up again. Every time he coughed his stomach contracted painfully. He curled into a tighter ball, focused on the dancing landscape, and did as Mike Shinoda sang, waited for the end to come, trembling.

Why wasn't Cody trying to help him?

Zack spent however many minutes it was lying there, feeling completely and utterly alone, fighting down loneliness and pain. But then again, he'd always been alone. Cody always blamed him. It wasn't his fault he'd been left out of the brain pickings. He felt like Gilligan sometimes - he always tried to do the right thing but never quite managed it. So he'd given up on that and did what he wanted. Somehow that was not very fulfilling. He always felt like there was something else, something else out there, holding out for him...

All right, now he was just being silly. Zack watched the sand move around some more, almost giggling at the comical sight. The sky grew lighter as he thought about it. Was he really being silly, trying to figure out what else there was to life? He didn't think it was silly - he didn't think it was silly at all. In fact it was kind of ridiculous to think it was silly. What was he supposed to do, sit down and do nothing?

Of course that was what he was supposed to do. Did he ever actually want to do something?

Yes. Yes, he did. He wanted to know what was supposed to be done with his life. He wanted to know what else there was to this. He wanted to know what he was supposed to do. He wanted to know whose orders to follow. He wanted to know how he could help. He wanted to know a lot of things, and he wanted to know them now.

Exhaustion was taking him, but he couldn't sleep, not with this horrific pain in his stomach. It ripped through him every time he tried to move. What was happening? What had he done to deserve this? He didn't know, but it must have been something really bad. Had he sleepwalked sometime and murdered someone in his sleep or something? Because stuff like this didn't happen to good people. Stuff like this only happened to the bad guys.

Speaking of bad guys, where was Cody? The sky was still lightening to a bright blue shade. Why hadn't Cody come to his rescue yet? Zack closed his eyes, willing to be dragged into the darkness of sleep, but his stomach kept coming back, pulling at him, telling him no, no, you have to stay awake, you have to stay awake and feel all this PAIN -

And pain it was. Ragged, tortured breaths. Sweating all over. Dizziness hitting him, wave after wave. Severe pain slashing at his abdomen. A searing headache. His teeth were chattering, and it wasn't even cold; was he getting muscle spasms now, too? This couldn't be happening to him, this just couldn't, couldn't, COULDN'T -

Zack tried to take a deep breath but only managed to hurt himself even more, making his ribcage rattle with the pain. "Stop it," he heard himself whine, as salt water splashed all over him, the tide coming back in. "Stop, please, stop..."

Why wasn't Cody coming? Why wasn't his twin brother, his flesh and blood, coming to help him?

Why?

WHY?

And on top of that, why were there so many questions he had left unanswered? This was past ridiculous, it was damn foolery! He was thinking about unanswered questions as he laid here in the sand squirming exhausted about to DIE -

The pain in his stomach grew to such a height that Zack yelped and rolled over. "Stop," he half-wailed through tears. "Make it stop. Please make it stop."

And then it did. Everything finally faded into blackness, although this blackness had a strange sense of finality to it.

When Cody Martin woke up he knew something was wrong.

He looked around. Something was missing. Someone, to be precise. Zack was gone from his hammock, and Cody had no idea where he was. "Zack?" he mumbled blearily, struggling to his feet, wiping sleep out of his eyes. He didn't have to ask the question again; he heard incredibly distorted and incredibly disturbing sounds coming from up ahead, by the water...

Cody stumbled toward the ocean, almost running. Zack was lying in the water, looking dangerously pale, looking dangerously dead. Cody dropped to his knees beside Zack. "Holy shit," Cody yelled. "Bailey! Somebody! Help!"

He grabbed Zack's wrist and felt for a pulse. It was there, but even as Cody felt it, there was something irregular about it, as if Zack's heart was doing jumping jacks in there. Cody lifted Zack's head. His breathing sounded off, and when Cody opened one of Zack's eyes, his pupil was dilated far past normality.

Bailey must've woken next, because she called from somewhere behind Cody, "You had to wake me up, too? Haven't you already done enough..." she trailed off as she caught sight of Cody leaning over Zack. Bailey darted over and bent on Zack's other side. "What do you think he has? What's wrong with him? What are the symptoms?"

"Dilated pupils," Cody said shakily. He hadn't released Zack's wrist yet. "Irregular heartbeat. Trouble breathing. Do you think he contracted some sort of island disease? It's not possible he has malaria, is it?"

"I don't know," Bailey answered helplessly. "What should we do?"

For once in his life Cody had no idea.