In the silence of our woods your children will not be alone.
The cliffhangers are up bright and early in the morning, back packing on the trail with Jack and Jen leading the group. Jen squeezed her way up in front of Jack, annoying him a bit.
"Hey! You're kind of cutting me off here."
"Two is never a crowd" she tells him "Am I picking up some subtext here?" He asks and she just grins and keeps walking.
Behind them, Andie and walking with Hannah, "sometimes it just seems like things aren't getting any better, and I keep feeling the same way over and over again."
"Andrea, things get better. You came here six months ago and I've seen you every day since. I can tell you, you've changed. You've got tools you never had before. There's light at the end of the tunnel."
"Yea, I'll try to remember that." She said lowering her head and walking away from her. She went off to the side a little and clutched her side in pain while no one was looking.
"This is a day hike guys, just up and back" Hannah yells back to the group, noticing the lagers in the back. "Unless you want to get back while it's dark, I'd keep up pace."
"Don't look at me, talk to her." Joey says walking past Andie who is sitting on rock, digging her hand into her side.
"I don't think I can do this today." Andie whines.
"Andrea you were fine five minutes ago." Hannah says sternly because she thinks she's faking her injury.
"Well I'm not fine now!"
"Did you eat breakfast?"
"Yes, everything"
Hannah cocks her head to the side, showing her skepticism in Andie.
"She's not lying I saw her." Pacey said coming up to them.
"Stomach cramps?" Hannah asks, and Andie nods her head.
"Hey, this is for real right?" Hannah asks in a low voice, so the other can't hear.
"Maybe she just needs her daily barf" Joey says sarcastically, cause Andie has been known to whine and cry and fake illness to get out of hard labor.
"I'm not faking." Andie tells her again. Hannah sighs heavily "Okay, Katherine, I want you to take Andrea back down to campus and get her to Dr. Gibbs." Katherine just rolls her eyes as they both turn around to start walking back in the other direction.
"Hey what's your hurry?" Andie yells out,
"I have better things to do."
"Like what?" Andie asks
"Like not getting sucked into your little deception."
"Hey! I'm really not feeling well."
Kat finally stops and turns around. "Then let's get you to the doctor." She said just Andie sits down.
"I can't do this right now." She whines again.
Kat walks over to her and bend over, putting her hands on her knees "Come on Andie".
"Kat, I'm really sick."
"Do you want me to go and get help?"
"Do whatever you want." Andie replied slightly snobbish
"I'll take that as a yes."
"Take it however you want it."
"Alright! Just stay put. Wait by that tree and don't move. Got it?"
"Got it" Andie says softly scrunching her face in pain as Kat leaves.
Andie get ups and starts walking around because the pain is keeping her from being still but she miscalculates her step and she tumbles and slides down the hill, falling a couple of feet. She stands back up and dusts herself off and moans, "I just want to get back to my bed." She continues to walk around aimlessly when suddenly she steps over some old branches and straw that were cover up a hole, but her weight was to much and falls down into the hole about 20 feet.
Andie gets up slowly and starts yelling of help, but it's hopeless, she knows no one around to help and she really becomes scared. She crawls over to a corner and hugs her knees to her chest when she starts to hear to rocks falling around her.
"This isn't happening" She cries to herself. "What am I supposed to do?" She says out loud, trying to remain calm, she takes a deep breath and starts thinking through her training. "Um, I'm supposed to asses myself" She puts her hand to her forehead to feel the gash she now has from her fall, "Blood, sprained ankle….okay, access opportunities for rescue. There's got to be another way AHHHHH!" She screams as she looks over and notices for the first time the skeleton of a young girl.
xxxxxxxxxxxx
Finally Kat and reached Peter and they are hiking their way back to the spot that Kat left her.
"ANDIE!" Peter yells,
"Are you sure you left her here?" He asks motioning with his hands to the area that they are standing.
"Yes" Kat stress to him
"How was she acting?"
"She was upset."
"About?"
"Things, her stomach and having to walk, why didn't she just listen to me!? I should have listened to her, tried to carry her or something. And here I am talking to Hannah about wanting to be a counselor."
"You did the right thing Kat." Just then Hannah and the group are coming back from their hike and meet up in the same spot that they are. Hannah immediately notices the look on Peters face and goes over to him.
"What's happened?"
"We can't find Andrea" Kat tells her.
"You're kidding right?" Dawson asks "What do you mean you can't FIND her? " He asks again.
"She's vanished?" Jack asks.
"She's got to be around here somewhere" Joey says and Peter jumps in before Pacey or anyone else can say anything about the matter.
"Alright! Settle, wherever she is, she couldn't have gotten far. Sun's going down, we can't keep searching for her out in the dark, it's too dangerous, and we've got to get off this mountain."
"I'm staying" Hannah says
"Okay" Peter agrees.
"Me too, I'm not leaving with out her" Dawson says first and the other two boys chime in afterwards.
"No, we're all going down together. Andie knows to stay close, if she wonders back Hannah will be here." He says and guides the group back down. Joey quickly notices the somber look on Pacey's face and he catches her staring at him.
"What?" he asks quietly.
"Just observing" she says and starts walking in front of him, not wanting him to notice the look on her face, as she can't help but think about all the times no one ever came searching for her.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Andie's still sitting in the corner of the ditch afraid to move, especially now that it's getting dark. She can look up and see the stars above but it's still dark around her. She gets a glow stick out of her back pack and start to crack it so that it will provide her light, but it won't crack. She freaks out and bangs the stick on the ground crying
"Why is this happening to me!?" She yells outs but then cries softly "Please, I don't want to be in the dark."
She tries one last time and finally gets the stick on, and again sees the skull straight in first of her. She walks over to the bones and notices an Indian style wrap still lying on top of the bones.
"Some people say I'm too thin. Look at you." She says in a zombie like matter.
"Andrea" She hears her mother's voice in her head. Her eyes widen, she knows this is a figment of her imagination but it's still scaring her. "Andrea" she hears again. "Turn off that light."
She finally turns around "Mom?"
"I want you bright and sunny tomorrow morning, nails done, eye brows plucked, the works! Daniel's coming over"
"Daniel? The new one" She asks her mother.
"The only one."
"I'm not feeling well today."
"Then eat breakfast, but don't over do it because we're having lunch and I want you ordering and eating"
"I thought this was my weekend with Dad"
"I canceled it." Her mother says sternly.
"I wanted to see him." She pleads
"This is not about what you want. Your father's history, your step father's history, Daniel is our future." She says and disappears. "Why does she always make me feel like this?" She asks out loud into the night.
xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Back at Horizon, Peter's in the office with Frank and a wilderness guide, looking at a map of the grounds.
"There's canyon there, and a canyon there and a river to the north." Peter says pointing to different spots on the map.
"She couldn't have wandered off far." Unless she fell, or got dragged off by a wild animal." Curtis says.
"Curtis! Enough with the lion and bears thing, how about a glimmer of hope here?"
"Hey! Parks department has got a new trainer in their field office, supposed to be an expert on tracking. How's that for a glimmer?"
"Call him" Peter tells him. Curtis grabs the phone and goes out to the hall to make the call.
"It's going to be a long night for Hannah up there." Frank says.
"It's going to be a long night for all of us" Peter tells him.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Man this sucks" Jack says sitting on the couch with the rest of the group.
"So she didn't say anything to you?" Pacey asks Kat.
"Not much." She replies.
"So where was her head at?" Dawson wonders.
"Yea, was she like whinny Andie or pissed Andie?" Jack asks and Dawson hits him.
"What did you do that for?"
"Just don't diss her"
"I wasn't, her mood at the moment is part of a clue." Jack informs him.
"Now was she pouting or was she tripping?" Jack continues on with the questions.
"Both" Kat says somberly, she still can't digest the fact that it's her fault Andie's lost.
Jack sighs and continues on "Not good."
"Curtis says she could have been abducted." Kat tells everyone for the first time.
Pacey claps his hands together once loudly and in a sarcastic manner "That's great, so some hillbilly with a rifle rack takes off with her?!" He asks and swings his hand in a downward motion as if to say forget it.
"Aliens" Jen says in her attempt to make a joke of a serious situation.
"Can never rule them out."
"Nobody took her alright!" Dawson says, now getting angry again. "There wasn't anyone up there except us." He says getting up off his spot on the couch.
"I always felt so safe up here." Kat says softly "Protected"
"Not like back at home." Dawson says.
"Home, where the heart….wasn't" Jack says.
"Well look whose here." Jen says just as Joey finally walks into the living room area of the lodge.
She clasps her hand together and puts on a big fake smile for everyone. "Hey, how about we cut the doom and gloom campers?" Joey asks everyone, but when no one replies she continues. "Look, we all know Andie is a drama queen who loves racking up attention. My guess is that she's gone into seclusion until it's time for her to make her GRAND re-entrance." She says and plops down on the only empty seat left.
xxxxxxxxxxx
Meanwhile it is now pitch dark outside where Hannah is sitting, hoping to just hear something that will lead her to Andie. She hears someone walking on the grass and immediately turns to see if it's her.
"Andie?" She says with a voice fill of hope.
"Brought you a sleeping bag, soup, and some company." Peter tells her, holding up a thermal containing soup.
"I'm not sleepy and I'm not hungry. Company I could definitely use." She tells him as he takes a seat next to her. "Peter, I shouldn't have left her with Katherine. She wasn't feeling well."
"Andie's been known to cry wolf, you couldn't have known for sure."
"It was real; I could see it in her eyes."
"You didn't DO anything wrong, I would have done the same thing." He tries to reassure her.
"Listen you know, you really don't have to stay here tonight. No sense both of us getting a miserable night sleep. "
"I'm staying. Besides I'm your boss, in case you forgot, I can do anything I please."
"Tell that to the kids too?" She teases "Left side or right side of the fire?" He asks. "Left." She says and they both set up their own sleeping bags. Peter gets ready for bed while Hannah just sits back down again.
"Hannah?"
"Yea?"
"Can't stare a hole into the darkness. Why don't you try to get some sleep?"
"Yea later." She says crossing her arms across her chest.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In cave below, Andie's flashlight has slowly died out, now only leaving her with the dim light from the stars above. She tried to lie down and sleep but she can't get comfortable on the hard ground so she sits back up and looks over to where the skeleton bones are. "No one found you in here did they?" She asks to no one in particular. "Is that what's going to happen to me?"
xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The next morning Hannah is up again at the crack of dawn looking of Andie. She's yelling out her name as loud as she can but hears no response. Peter slowly gets up and walks over to here with a pair of binoculars in hand. "She's got to be out here somewhere." She tells him.
"She is. We'll have her back by lunch."
"I can't imagine what's going through her mind right now. "
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Andie is now still eating the last of her nutrition bar staring at the bones, imagining what the teen looked like. She see's the imaging of a young Cherokee Indian girl smiling back at her and giggling.
"What?"
"What's so funny?" She asks and looks down at her bar.
"Your right, why would I eat now, we're going to be down here forever. You know that don't you?" She says and she see's the girl look down at the ground.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The cliffhangers are now gathered outside the lodge on the front steps. "What's taking search and rescue so long?" Dawson asks.
"They're professionals." Jen says.
"Give me a double pepperoni pizza and a barf bag and I'll have Andie back in an hr." Joey says just as search and rescue drive up. Two young attractive guys get out of the car and Joey stands up and walks over to them.
"Which one of you is search and which one is rescue?" she says flirtatiously moving her shoulders back and forth. The boys introduce themselves to her and the other one proceeds to ask for Frank. Katherine then steps up to walk over to them and offers to show them the way to his office. Joey stands there watching them leave as Jack walks over to her.
"Eh hm, you're drooling?" Jack says.
"And you could be bleeding"
XXXXXXXXX
"She was last seem approximately here." Peter tells the boys, pointing to the spot on the map.
"I saw her last, I"m not exactly sure where I left her." Kat informs them.
"Can you at least get close to were you split up?"
"Yes."
"I'll get a feed on her from there." Hank says looking back at Frank
"Finding her is the easy part, see the rock platform contains pockets of limestone, and water channels turn those into sink holes...we might not find her above ground."
Xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Andie slowly tries to stand up since she's been sitting all night to stay off her sprained ankle. She cries out a little but then pain soon goes away. "You know what's so funny about pain?" She asks the girl "It's all mine, I can start it and stop it, it's all mine, I own it, you know what I mean?"
"Are you cutting yourself again?" She hears her mothers voice ask her. "Are you!?" She asks demanding an answer.
"No."
"What about your calorie intake?"
"It's what we agreed to" Andie replies and she sees her mom walking closer to her.
"I want my diet pills back Andie, you promised me you wouldn't get this way again."
"I didn't mean to." She says crying a little bit.
"You want me to put you back in the hospital?"
"No!"
"You want them to shove that tube back down your throat and be forced fed again?"
"Nooo!"
"You're making Daniel really nervous. Are you trying to blow this for us? Are you listening to me?"
"Yeeeeessss!" Andie yells back at her mother through tears.
Xxxxxxxxxx
"Andie!" Peter yells down a hole.
"Sure she's down there?" He asks and Curtis the police officer tries to get closer but Hank, the search and rescue ranger stops him.
"More of it will give way if we get to close. I'll go down there on a rope.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"I despise you when you get this way." Her mother tells her.
"Use your tools" The Indian girl tells her. "Make her stop." Andie cries as her mother keeps nagging.
"Use the tools Hannah taught you."
"I wont listen to this." She cries out to her mom
"take control." The girl says "Tell her, tell her the truth."
"I"m sick! You have no right, and I won't allow your abuse" She yells out and her mothers imagine disappears.
"Good, you took control, she can't hurt you anymore, your free." The girl says just as Hank reaches out his hand to her and pulls her up so the other can pull them out of the hole.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Back at Horizon Andie has now gotten clean and is sitting with everyone in the cafeteria, but she's the only one with a plate of food as the rest of the group has already eaten. But still everyone surrounds here as they all want to hear about her experience.
"I was afraid. I mean, I was lost down there, it was dark."
"Never fear the dark." Jen tells her.
"Then, my MOTHER….my mother and all her tasks on me, it started coming back down there. I saw her down there." She says and looks over at Hannah. "I did!" she reconfirms even though no one has denied her of her visions.
"Your mother?" Joey's the first to question her sanity, even though the rest are thinking it.
Andie just nods her head.
"Andrea, we're all really proud of you." Hannah tells her.
"Yep, you did exactly what we taught you." Peter says trying to reassure her. "Now I want you to eat, and spend the rest of the day recouping in your dorm. Okay?" He asks her.
"Where is she?" She immediately asks.
"Where's who?" Peter asks.
"The girl with the shawl."
"You mean the bones? Dr. Gibbs is taking a look at them."
"Those bones must have really spooked you out? Huh Andie?" Jack asks her.
"Noo." She says shaking her head and smiling but looks down at her food.
"She was with me. She helped me, she stood up for me." She finally looks up at everyone.
"Alright, let's let Andie finish eating and the rest of you, off to class." Peter tells them.
"No way." Dawson whines.
"I do think we've already put in a full day." Joey says.
"This entitles us to some free time." Pacey says.
"At least til" Jack starts but Jen finishes for him. "Lunch." Peter just chuckles and says "Grumble grumble, go to class, now." And the group hesitantly gets up from the table. Hannah notices that Andie still hasn't taken a bite of her food. She puts a hand on her shoulder and tells her that she needs to eat.
"Where did Dr. Gibbs take her?"
"Science lab."
"She saved me, you know."
"Sweetie, do you want to talk about this?" Hannah asks.
"I just did." Hannah sighs softly.
"Okay well, just uh, just finish up then."
"And back to the dorm." Peter adds. She just nods and plays around with her food again as they leave the table.
Andie leaves the cafeteria and heads over to the Science lab. She walks in just as she see Dr. Gibbs zip the bones up in a black body bag.
"Your not going to leave her in there are you?"
"Just for transportation, the bones need to be examined more thoroughly. You were right by the way. It is a she. And she was probably about your age when she died. Which I am guessing, was probably around 100 years ago."
"And what's going to happen to her now?"
"That is for somebody else to decide." He says leaving the lab so that she could have a moment alone.
After a little while Peter walks asking her why she not in her dorm.
"I'm not leaving her; I'm not going until I find out what's going to happen to her."
"I don't know." Peter tells her honestly. "They have to examine the remains; there may be some type of historical significance."
"No, no there's nothing like that. She fell in a hole and couldn't get out. She curled up in a corner and waited to die, what's the history in that?!"
"They have to establish legal rights"
"Legal rights? You can't let them mess with her! Screw her up like my mother did to me, you can't let them do that!"
"My hands are tied."
"NO! You're always talking about trust and about consequence for our actions. Well I'm trusting you to do what's right! She took care of me, and now it's my turn to take care of her. We have to its only fair! " She starts crying when she gets that last sentence out and Peter goes to hug her and lets her cry for a moment before getting her to Hannah.
He walks over to the lodge where Frank is seated out on the front porch. "Where is she now?"
"Hannah's got her settled back in the dorm."
"Is she sedated?" Peter shakes his head
"Hannah didn't feel it was necessary."
"Tell me, how do you feel?"
"I hope she's right."
"Peter, you know we've been down this road before. Now if there is a clear crisis, we need to intervene."
"Andie isn't violent or dangerous to herself or others."
"Her file says she has a history of cutting herself!"
"She hasn't done any of that since she's been here Frank! She just made it through a major crisis, it might actually be a good thing."
"Might be!? Ohhh" Frank says and puts a hand over his eyes, as if to shield himself. "Peter, it is not a failure on our part if we give her professional psychiatric help."
"Just give us a little time; I think we can help her."
"Twenty four hours, and I need to see some improvement!" He tells him as Peter gets up. "You will" he says and pats him on the shoulder as he walks away.
Peter walks back over to the girl's cabin and walks in to find Andie sleeping and Hannah sitting on the bed next to her just watching her. She turns around when she hears the door open and she gets up off the bed when she sees that it's Peter. "How she doing?" He asks. "Sleeping I hope."
"Frank's right, if we don't see some improvement this is going to be out of our hands."
"Well maybe after she gets some sleep her head will start to clear." Hannah says looking back at Andie's sleeping form.
"I hope so." Peter says, neither one knowing that Andie is in fact awake and listening to them.
Peter leaves the cabin and goes out to find Hank to talk about the bones. "How did you find me?"
"You think you're the only one with tracking skills?" Peter jokes and Hank laughs and asks what's up. "It's Andie, you saved her once and maybe you can save her again."
"I can try. What do you need?"
"What if we were to bury the bones?"
"Too much red tape."
"How about we don't notify anyone."
"I can't do that." Hank says sympathetically.
"How about you listen to my 'what if' proposition."
"I'm listening."
"What if, we perform a ceremony and bury the bones in the cave, it doesn't matter who's entitled to the remains." Peter stops when he sees Hank shaking his head no. "Listen to me." He urges,
"I am listening but I'm also bond by my job to follow procedures."
"Procedures? The right thing to do here is to give this girl a proper resting place. To pray for her and to honor her memory, I think that's what she deserves."
"I think he's right." Hank's partner tells him and Hank nods his head reluctantly in agreement.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Meanwhile the cliffhangers are on kitchen duty and are working to clean the dishes. "I hate kitchen clean up." Joey complains as she works on scrubbing a big pot. Jen walks over and hands her a newer clean sponge. "Gee thanks. I don't suppose you'd be interested in"
"In your dreams" Jen interrupts her, knowing that she was about to ask for help. At that moment Hannah walks in goes over to talk to Joey quietly. "I need to talk to you."
"If this is about my attitude, I'd really prefer not to talk about it right now. If you don't mind?"
"It's not about your attitude." She says and turns to head out of the kitchen, knowing Joey will follow her. She stops right outside the doorway and waits for Joey. "It's about Andie."
"Her?" Joey asks with a frown on her face she rolls her eyes and looks back at her group still cleaning in the kitchen. She then looks back at Hannah and asks "How is she?" with genuine concern. "Needing a friend."
"If she needs a shoulder to cry on I volunteer Kat."
"Actually, I think the call on this one is for tough love. Done with REAL sensitivity."
"That, you know I don't do."
"You do it in group all the time Joey. You seem to have a talent for pushing exactly the right buttons." She tells her and walks away to let her think about it. Joey sighs knowing she's going to do it, because as mean as she tries to be to her peers, she does care about them and considers them her family. She's just afraid of letting anyone get to close. She takes off her rubber gloves and walks toward the group to throw her gloves on the table in fron of them. "I am out of here." She says with a smile "I'm on a rescue mission, save me some ice cream?" She adds and walks over to the girl's cabin.
xxxxxxxxxxxx
She enters the cabin and sees Andie lying on her side with her back facing Joey. "Ehhhmm. " She says as an attempt to let Andie know it's her but Andie doesn't move. "Cut the act, you're not sleeping." Still no response. "I said, you're not sleeping." She says and walks over to Andie's bed and pulls out a cigarette.
"Wanna smoke?"
"No." Andie says, finally acknowledging her presence.
"Good there bad for you." She says and sits on the foot of Andie's bed so that they are still not facing each other since Joey is looking straight across, and Andie is still on her side, and Andie just sighs heavily.
"So what's this all about anyway?" Joey asks.
"I don't want to talk about it."
"Two words GET A GRIP. Okay make that three."
"You don't understand"
"So enlighten me."
"Something happened to me."
"Was it a good thing or a bad thing?" Joey asks.
"A life altering thing."
"Great, so you life's altered. Like I can really see some improvement here. You're acting like the same old 'poor me' twig, like you always do."
"There going to take her away" At this Joey finally shifts to turn and face Andie's back side,
"They who? She who?"
"The girl I found. My friend"
"Your friend? Listen Andie, I've seen the dead, trust me, once their dead, their no longer your friend. "
"You don't understand. Just go away, leave me alone" She says and clutches onto a teddy bear she had laying near by.
"Uh oh, there it is, the new life altered Andrea." Andie finally turns on her back to face her.
"Why are you in my face?"
"Because I take joy in provoking people, call it a vice, call it a virtue." She says sarcastically and Andie sits up in her bed leaning her back against the wall. Andie looks her in the eyes for the first time and Joey looks down soften her face.
"I'm a mess. Why am I a mess?" Joey shrugs a little
"Good question. That's why we're here. It could always get worse. Like turning into a size 14 AHHH" She says jokingly and gets a small laugh out of Andie.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Meanwhile Hannah's outside the door waiting for Joey to come out when Peter walks up to her.
"What's Andie doing?"
"Ummm, Joey's in talking to her." She says, almost afraid of Peter's reaction.
"Joey? That's like shock therapy, isn't it?"
"Well, under the circumstances I thought it'd be the best thing." She says just as Joey opens the door and walks out to find them staring at her. She smiles at them and begins to walk right past them back to the main lodge when she hears them call out to her.
"Well?"
"I got a glare out of her, and a smile. I've had worse therapy sessions." She says and walks back to the lodge to get her ice cream.
xxxxxxxxxxx
Meanwhile Hannah takes Peter back to his office to talk to him privately.
"What's going on?" He asks her.
"I'm leaving Horizon Peter."
"Hannah we've been throught this, you're needed here"
"Jerry and I have decided to give our marriage another chance, in Seattle. He wants to make it work Peter, he wants to have kids…..so do I. Your heart is with those kids Peter, it always will be. Healing them, it somehow heals you. It makes you whole. It's not like that for me Peter, their pain becomes my pain, I carry it with me and I can't do that anymore."
"You need someone, someone to share this with, share your life with. You've been a wonderful friend Peter. Something I will always cherish."
"Can I hug you goodbye?"
She nods and they embrace and head back outside her office to join the rest of Horizon at the ceremony of the bones. A memorial they are doing for the young girl whose life was lost