Survivors (Stranded) (3 page)

“Can you sit up?” Vanessa said.

Carter blinked several times and squinted into the hot sun. He wiggled his toes. Bent his knees.

“I think so,” he said.

As they got him onto his feet, it was a relief to find that he could walk on his own. The only real pain came from the throbbing cut on his hand. But that didn’t seem like much, compared to what could have happened.

The point was, he’d made it down in one piece.

They all had. And they’d done it together.

B
ack at camp, everyone flopped out in the shade. It had been a long morning. Vanessa could hardly wait to tell the others about the cove she’d found, but they had a story of their own to tell first.

Jane explained that a plane had flown by that morning. Vanessa had never even heard it from where she’d been.

It was the first and only plane any of them had seen since they’d been stranded here a week ago. Despite Carter, Jane, and Buzz’s best efforts, everything had gone horribly wrong. The tree bridge they’d been using to reach Lookout Point was gone now, and they’d never gotten a real chance to signal the plane.

Tears showed in Buzz’s eyes as he told his part of the story.

“I’m really sorry, you guys,” he said. “If I hadn’t fallen off the tree bridge, we could have gotten up there in time. We might have been on our way home by now—”

He stopped and bit his lip. That word—
home
—seemed to weigh heavily on all of them.

“You didn’t fall, Buzz,” Carter said. “The tree fell. And that was
my
fault.”

Vanessa stared at each of the boys in turn. It was the closest thing to an apology she’d ever heard from Carter. Usually, he was too stubborn for anything like that. But then again, Carter had changed out here. They all had. And it seemed like the perfect time for some good news.

“Listen, you guys,” she said. “First of all, it was stupid of me to run off like that. I’m really sorry, and I promise it won’t happen again. But you’re not going to believe what else happened. I found this cove up the shore. There’s an old wrecked boat, and—”

Carter raised his head from where he lay in the sand. “What kind of boat?” he asked. Jane and Buzz sat up, too.

“I don’t know,” Vanessa said. “Not a sailboat. Some kind of ship. I didn’t go on board.”

“Why not?” Carter asked.

Vanessa paused. The real answer was because she’d found the grave and skeletal remains before she could explore the ship. But the whole point was to focus on positive news right now.

“Because I found a freshwater stream,” she said. “And we don’t have to go through those nasty caves to get to it, like the last one.”

At that, all three of the others jumped up. The only fresh water they’d found until now was on the other side of a pitch-black maze of caves. Without any flashlight or torch to lead the way, it might as well have been on another island.

“Are you serious? Why didn’t you say so?” Buzz asked.

“Let’s go,” Carter said. “Right now. I want to see this ship.”

“I want a drink,” Jane said.

“I want about eighteen drinks,” Buzz said.

Vanessa stood and looked up the shore. It wasn’t far to the cove, but it was tough going over that long stretch of volcanic rock. The others were already exhausted from their climb down.

Still, that didn’t seem to matter, compared with the prospect of fresh water and supplies.

“All right, let’s go,” she said. “But just so you know, it’s not going to be easy getting there.”

Buzz had never explored the island’s shore in this direction. None of them had, except for Vanessa. She was right about the slow going over the rocks, too. It took the better part of an hour to reach the cove.

But finally, he stood at the mouth of the wide inlet, staring at the big ship Vanessa had told them about.

It was strange, seeing anything man-made here. Anything from the outside world. The ship was maybe twice the length of the
Lucky Star
. That would make it a hundred feet long. The whole thing was grounded along its starboard side, at the far end of the cove.

“Where’s the drinking water?” Carter asked.

Vanessa pointed past the bow of the ship. Behind it, water was seeping down a low, curved rock wall that formed the U-shape of the inlet itself. The stone was dark with moisture, and it was covered in the green moss and algae that seemed to grow everywhere in this quiet, shady spot.

All four of them—Jane, Carter, Buzz, and Vanessa—took off running. They splashed through shallow water, following the curve of the cove until they came to the stream at the back. It trickled down in several places. To get a drink Buzz pressed his face sideways against the mossy rock and let the cold water run into his mouth. It felt like suddenly waking up. Like a cool shower for his throat and insides.

For several long silent moments, nobody spoke. Carter and Jane had picked their own spots, where they gulped the water down in fast, loud sips. Vanessa stood back and waited for them to finish before she took her own drink.

Once he’d had his fill, Buzz turned his attention back to the boat. Its starboard hull loomed over the back of the cove like a giant metal wall. It looked as though it had been painted blue once, but most of it had gone to rust. A few black holes showed where the metal had corroded all the way through.

Five minutes ago, the idea of climbing up and exploring the ship had seemed overwhelming to Buzz. Now he was excited to see what they might find.

“Can we live here?” Jane asked.

“Why not?” Carter said. “It’s huge. And the water supply’s right here. We can’t keep hiking back and forth over those rocks every time we need a drink.”

Buzz liked the idea already. The boat would be dry, and there were probably real bunks on board. It also meant not having to rebuild their burned-out shelter.Trying to sleep on bamboo the last several nights had been like torture, anyway.

“Maybe we should look inside first,” Jane said.

“Let’s do it,” Carter said, and started toward the ship.

“Actually,” Vanessa said. “Hold on a second. There’s something else you guys should see first.”

Buzz looked at his sister. She had a strange expression on her face, but he couldn’t tell what it was about.

“What kind of something else?” Carter asked.

Vanessa pointed over her shoulder, to a clearing in the woods. It sat at the top of the rock wall with the stream, and overlooked the whole cove. As for what might be up there, Buzz could only wonder.

But Vanessa seemed intent on showing them. Already, she was climbing up that way.

“Vanessa? What’s going on?” he asked.

“Just come on,” she said without looking back. “It’s better if I show you.”

Carter climbed up to the clearing behind Vanessa, Buzz, and Jane. It didn’t take much effort, but by the time he reached it, all three of the others had stopped.

In fact, they’d gone perfectly still. And then Carter saw why.

Right there, stuck into the ground, was a handmade wooden cross. The wood was rough with age, just two cracked gray planks nailed together. There was no name, or markings of any kind.

“Is that a . . . grave?” he asked.

“I think so,” Vanessa said. “And there’s more. Don’t freak out, but there’s a bunch of bones over there—”

“What?”
Buzz asked.

“Actually, not just bones,” Vanessa said. “More like a skeleton.”

Carter felt a chill run through him. He looked in the direction Vanessa had pointed, but he couldn’t see anything.

She led them across the clearing and pulled back some low-hanging vines. What Carter saw there on the ground looked like some kind of movie prop, even though it clearly wasn’t. He’d seen skeletons before, at the Museum of Science and Industry back home in Chicago.

This one was definitely real. It was half sunk into the ground and mostly the color of dirt from however many years it had been here.

Jane reached over and took Carter’s hand.

“Do you think there are more?” Buzz asked. “That’s a big boat for two people.”

“It’s possible the others got rescued,” Vanessa said.

“Or maybe there’s more than one person buried under that cross,” Carter said. He looked down at the skeleton again and shivered. “This guy was probably the last one.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Vanessa said. “There wasn’t anyone left to . . . take care of him.”

Only Jane stayed silent. She pulled her hand out of Carter’s and knelt down by the remains. Slowly, she reached out and laid her fingers over the delicate hand bones of whoever this person had been.

“Don’t touch it!” Vanessa said.

“Why not?” Jane asked. She kept her gaze down, and Carter could see the tears on her cheeks.

“Jane?” he asked.

“We were so close to being rescued,” she said in a faraway voice. “That plane . . . it was right there. And now . . .”

She didn’t finish, but Carter knew what she was thinking. If these adults with their big ship had never gotten off the island, what did that mean for the four of them?

Carter’s thoughts churned while the jungle hummed with the sound of a million bugs and birds all around them. Finally, he spoke up again.

“We need to get real about this,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Vanessa asked him. “About what?”

He looked out toward the mouth of the cove, and beyond that, the bluest ocean any of them had ever seen. “That plane might have been our only chance,” Carter said. “If they were looking for us, then they just crossed this place off their list—”

“You don’t know that,” Vanessa countered. “Besides, it’s not the only plane out there. Beth and Dad are doing everything they can. You know they are.”

“Hold on, Vanessa,” Buzz said. “Carter’s right. I mean, we should definitely build a new signal fire and make sure we’re ready if another plane comes. But we need to think about what happens if . . .”

“If what, Buzz?” Vanessa asked stubbornly.

“If it never comes.”

Buzz was crying now, too. They all were. Carter could feel the tears stinging at the corners of his eyes. A week ago, he might have tried to hide them, but it didn’t seem worth it anymore.

“Why are you guys being like this?” Vanessa asked.

“We’re not being like anything,” Carter said. “It’s just facts. There’s nothing anyone can do for this guy, but we do need a place to live. And we can sure use his ship.”

“Actually,” Jane spoke up in a small voice, “there
is
something we can do for him.”

Carter stopped and looked at her. Usually when Jane spoke up, it was for a good reason. “Like what?” he asked.

“We can give him a funeral,” Jane answered. “The one he never had.”

An hour later, Buzz stood back and looked at what they’d accomplished. It had been tough work—he was covered with sweat—but he was glad they’d listened to Jane.