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Caught on Camera
Photograph: Island
A campfire glowed brilliant yellow upon a sandy beach. Its warm light danced across the ocean waves like ripples of honey. Not much else could be made out of the landscape, but the two figures huddled together by the fire under a single large blanket…
. . . . . . . . .
"You're not mad, are you?"
"…No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Your face says otherwise."
Shinichi's eyebrow twitched, but he said nothing. Instead, he remained where he sat in the sand with his arms wrapped around his knees, gazing out across the endless rise and fall of the waves.
The waves that stretched all the way out to the horizon in what seemed to be every direction.
"You just had to go skydiving, didn't you?" he said, finally breaking the silence.
Seated next to him, Kaito tilted his head. "I do it all the time."
"Which is why, I'm sure, you thought it would be a grand idea to go skydiving on our own instead of through a skydiving agency."
"Again, I have done it before."
"And then you just had to make it more exciting by doing it on an unusually windy day. A day that was supposed to have a storm."
"Well, actually, the storm warning didn't come in until after we'd set off."
Shinichi grunted but conceded the point. Weather was, after all, an inexact science. Still…
"Now we're stranded on an island who knows where, with only the supplies we had on us and no way to get back to civilization."
"Aww, are you saying you don't like being stranded on an island with me?"
"I don't like being stranded at all," Shinichi huffed. "How can you joke around at a time like this? We're in serious trouble here."
"I wouldn't go that far. I'm sure Jii-san will have told someone we need help, even if he couldn't have flown the plane after us while the storm was still blowing. And now that it's calmed, someone's bound to come looking."
Heaving a heavy sigh, Shinichi rested his forehead on his knees. "I hope you're right."
Grinning, Kaito patted him on the shoulder. "I am. You'll see. Now come on, let's take a look around. We need to find food and water. My granola bars aren't going to last us very long."
Shinichi gave the sea one last, long look, searching in vain for any sign of passing ships, before clambering to his feet and dusting the sand from his clothes. "Right. Let's go."
The island was not a big one even if it wasn't tiny, and it turned out to be un-obligingly devoid of edible plants. There was, however, an extremely tiny spring of fresh water near the very heart of the island's bushel of vegetation. There were also several tide pools further up the beach where the sand gave way to a series of rocky ridges. So though the land had no food to offer, the sea did. And, even if the plants weren't edible, they did provide fuel for a small campfire. Kaito provided the matches, knife, fishing line (reluctantly), and an assortment of other random little knickknacks that Shinichi was both bemused and grateful to learn he had.
"Okay, I understand the compass, but why were you carrying a star chart?"
Kaito shrugged. "It just seemed like a good idea."
Shinichi eyed his friend suspiciously. "You didn't plan all this, did you?"
His question earned him a pair of raised eyebrows. "Do you really believe I would plan to have us stranded alone together on a deserted island?"
"Yes," Shinichi said without hesitation.
"With so few supplies?"
That gave the detective a moment's pause. Eventually, he admitted that no, Kaito would not have been so ill-prepared if he had planned this sort of excursion. In some ways, Shinichi was disappointed. No, this was not because he harbored any weird desire to be stranded on a deserted island with his best friend. The reason he was disappointed was because that meant they might actually be in serious trouble here. If Kaito had planned this then Kaito would have made sure they had a ride home. As it was, they would have to keep their fingers crossed and pray that Jii brought help or some passing ship or plane came to their rescue before they expired. Which, he thought, wouldn't take long if they were unlucky. After all, though they had food and a fire (for now), they had next to nothing for building a shelter with. One good storm passing directly over them would likely be the end of them.
And so, with little other choice, they settled in to wait for jii.
They toasted crabs they had caught in the tide pools for dinner with a side of half a granola bar each. Then they spent quite some time staring up at the admittedly dazzling night sky and working out via the stars where their little island in the middle of nowhere might be for all the good it did them.
They took turns keeping the fire going throughout the night on the off chance that a passing ship would see the light.
They spent the next day doing nothing very much, which really wasn't all that surprising. Kaito produced a pack of cards, but Shinichi declined the offer of card games in favor of hunting up some seaweed. He washed what he found as best he could in the spring then laid it out on the rocks to dry.
"We'll have to eat some kind of vegetable eventually," he explained. "Since none of these island plants look edible, this is pretty much our only option."
Kaito gave the heap of slimy, black algae a long look and wrinkled his nose. "Let's hope Jii gets here before that becomes necessary."
By noon, Shinichi had to give in, and the two spent several hours playing every card game they could think of. Then they invented a few new games that were all their own.
"You know," Kaito said speculatively as they sat side by side that evening, watching the sunset blaze over a sea of gold. "It's rather peaceful out here. Relaxing."
With his arms wrapped around his legs and his chin propped on his knees, Shinichi gazed at the gently rippling sea and thought that Kaito might have a point. On the other hand, the middle of nowhere was still the middle of nowhere.
By their third ay on the island, Shinichi had a splitting headache from lack of caffeine, and he was seriously beginning to worry. He knew without a doubt that Jii would have immediately alerted their parents to what had happened. He would have had to wait for the storm that had blown them off course to die down before setting out to search for them, so there would have been a slight delay, but that storm had long passed. Really, their island—oh god, had he really just called it their island?—had only ever been on the very edge of that storm. So why hadn't anyone come to rescue them yet? Could Jii have mistaken the direction in which they had gone? Was the island just too small? Had Jii himself met some kind of accident before he could make it back to shore?
Questions and worst case scenarios spun through his head until he wondered aloud if they should be contemplating some way to leave a last message on the island—scratching their names on the rocks or something of the sort.
"Don't be ridiculous," Kaito admonished, though even the magician looked subdued. "It's not like there's anything blocking us from view. They'll find us."
Shinichi's breath left him in a sigh. "You're right. Sorry."
And silently, he wondered if he would ever see his second year of high school. Naturally, that was when the helicopter made its glorious and noisy appearance from above like an angel from heaven.
. . . . . . . . .
…Or a demon. A big, black metal demon beast carrying a quartet of devils.
"I can't believe you guys!" Shinichi exclaimed, outraged. "You were there and you just—sat around and watched for three days?!"
There lay the evidence before them in full color—an entire series of photos documenting his and Kaito's misadventure taken via some extremely long range lenses.
"Oh come now, Shin-chan," his mother said n what she probably meant to be a soothing manner. "We could see you two had things under control."
"That's no excuse!"
"I'm with Shinichi on this one," Kaito said flatly.
"We just thought you two might like some time alone together," she insisted, pouting. "We were doing you a favor."
Fuming, Shinichi flipped the page, still muttering about people with no common sense.
TBC