When Tristan finally awoke, it was to the sound of a crackling fire. His skin was dry, and he could tell that his shirt had been removed, leaving him wearing only his pair of blue jean shorts that were still damp. The last thing Tristan remembered was opening the door to his room and looking out into the hall of the ship to be sucked up into the abyss. He wasn’t quite sure if it was a dream, or if he was now dead. Either way, the fire was warm and felt good, as though it were relatively close. Tristan enjoyed the fire for a few moments before forcing himself to end the dream and open his eyes.
There was indeed a fire, composed of what seemed to be several dozen pieces of wood, probably a good five feet in diameter, a decent bonfire. Three others were huddled around the fire, Tristan being the social outcast that he was tended to remember people’s faces, and recognized at least two of the three. The first was one of his teachers, a long time science teacher by the name of Kenneth Wall a man who was most likely in his mid forties though he had never discussed it with his students. Tristan had been in one of Mr. Wall’s classes and admired the teacher for his unorthodox teaching methods. Right now the older teach wore a loose fitting t-shirt, obviously not his own attire. Beside Mr. Wall was another older man, by the pants and shirt it was evident he had been a member of the ship’s crew. Finally, sitting beside Tristan was a fellow student he recognized as Laine Duncan. Laine was pretty enough, and currently wearing a tight fitting t-shirt, also likely not something of her own attire. Tristan had known Laine for his school year as they shared a class together, even though she was a year ahead of Tristan, Laine had been held back in some classes, and Tristan had occasionally let the girl sneak an answer or two off of him.
“Oh… Mr. Wall, he’s coming around!” Laine spoke in a quiet but excited tone. As Mr. Wall approached and Laine leaned in further, Tristan finally got a look at his surroundings. He was on some kind of vast beach, and there wasn’t just one bonfire around but several, along with various other school peers, teachers, and ship staff. In his own mind Tristan thought back to the first episodes of Lost, remembering the downed plane along the beach, though in this case he did not see any debris. “Hi Tristan, it’s me Laine… how are you feeling?”
“Be careful not to muddle him now Laine.” The voice of Mr. Wall approached Tristan as he darted his eyes between the two of them for a moment. The entire event seemed quite surreal to Tristan who looked at it as though he were some third party. Here was a fellow classmate, someone who he never really hung out with and a teacher looking after him following some terrible catastrophe. He blinked several times trying to wish himself back home, or even to his cabin on that accursed cruise, but no luck. Instead, Tristan remained on the bonfire and survivor filled beach of wherever they had come ashore. That was a good question in Tristan’s mind; ‘Where were they’, he held onto it for a few moments.
“Uhhh… where are we?”
“Come now Tristan; don’t be concerning yourself with that right now. Though if I had to guess, I’d say we got lucky and found one of those Polynesian islands.” Mr. Wall explained, his own answer prattled off just to keep conversation going for a few moments, and perhaps to try to ease the situation as best he could. As a teacher, Mr. Wall knew it was his responsibility to look after these children, and he intended to do so to the best of his abilities. The older man smiled shortly and nodded. “But it seems you’re ok, and that’s all that really matters.”
Sitting up, Tristan sorted his thoughts, barely paying attention to the arm of Laine that draped around him trying to support his back. “Thanks Mr. Wall. I uhh… wait a second… where’s my sister?” The stream of consciousness startled both Kenneth Wall and Laine, who shot each other quick glances of unease. “Wait, you can’t mean…”
“Look Tristan, there’s a lot of people still missing. We had about ten just randomly show up at our camp today. So don’t worry, your sister will be fine.” Laine attempted to comfort Tristan as his mind continued to piece itself together.
“Laine’s right, your sister probably just ended up on another part of the island. She most likely got here in a different lifeboat.” Mr. Wall added quickly, trying to cement fill the cut Tristan had dug into their hopeful beliefs. From the teacher’s words, Tristan gathered that he had likely been brought on a lifeboat as well, another quick glance around revealed several bright orange and yellow floating boats around, all of them well on the other side of the beach, away from the rushing water.
“Lifeboat? How many are here?” Tristan managed to push out, still desperately sorting through all the events that had happened.
Laine seemed to jump at the opportunity and started to talk. “Oh yes! Well after the boat cracked, a lot of people start piling onto some of the lifeboats. The waves were pretty strong, so a bunch of us got separated. Last time we counted, I think there were about sixty-seven of us here!” Realizing that she was talking a bit too fast, Laine slowed the pace of her speech down as she ramped up the statement.
“That’s right Tristan; in fact it was Laine here who helped pull you into our raft. Poor girl was quite mad with everything that went on, but I guess you gave her a goal.” The words of Mr. Wall followed Laine’s and the girl quickly turned away her face a bright shade of red. “Laine has been watching over you the entire day we’ve been on this island in fact. So I suppose you really owe her.” Mr. Wall’s further embarrassing statements finally prompted Laine to turn her head back for fear the man might continue talking about her.
“Look, it was nothing. I just didn’t want to see anyone hurt.”
Tristan was taken slightly aback, as the self-exiled geek of the school he rarely thought anyone cared enough about him to help; now a girl had saved his life. The shock of the moment was overcome by the realization that he might actually have a friend in this whole mess. “Thanks… I guess I really do owe you huh?” Tristan tried to smile, though the act was clearly faked, but it still gained smiles from both Mr. Wall and Tristan’s savior.
›
Tristan spent the next few hours getting acquainted with several of the survivors as well as assisting however he could. Most of the gathered people agreed that it would be best to keep the fires burning and dry out as much salvaged luggage and clothing as possible. Offering to help with that, Tristan went back and forth between the edge of the forest canopy and the beach, bringing stacks of wood. As he approached the forest’s edge, Tristan felt a strange urge to go explore, but he knew it could very well be suicide to go into the forest without others, so he pulled back. The temptation remained though, urging the shipwrecked youth to see exactly where he and the others had wound up. When it finally reached a boiling point, Tristan moved himself back to the camp and rested.
Seating himself beside Laine and another student who had been introduced to him as Bill Castor, Tristan snacked on a bag of chips salvaged from one of the pieces of luggage. Bill was a member of the school football team; a large brute of a man, he had a good personality and generally got along with most people. The three sat around away from one of the fires, since the heat of the sun was enough to keep them warm since their clothes had dried. Bill was boasting about his accomplishments in the past day, while Laine and Tristan quietly snacked as best they could while listening.
“I lifted like three times what anyone else did. Lucky you guys had me around, or these fires would have taken all day to get started!” Bill continued his self-important discussion as the other two looked at him and nodded. To Tristan, Bill was the kind of person who would never talk to him in school, and would likely join in a prank on him if pressured into it. Now the three sat on the beach snacking and chatting together in the aftermath of a terrible event. Bill bragged because he didn’t want to bring up the grim nature of their situation. Laine listened to the statements, smiled and made the occasional reply, hoping to keep the conversation on a happier note. Tristan was lost in his own thoughts, wondering about everything that had happened in the past day, and hoping to see his sister sometime soon.
Mr. Wall had met up with several other adults near the edge of the camp; the group was currently discussing how to move forward given the dire circumstances. All of the nine adults realized how relatively powerless they were given the situation, but they remained calm for the sake of the students. Some of the crew had basic training for shipwrecks, and the tropical nature of the island they landed on was a godsend. The current topic of discussion was about acquiring food and water, since the campsite had currently subsided on salvaged foodstuffs and cans of pop from what luggage that remained. Widely arguing, the group was almost perfectly split as to go in search of food or hold out on the beach until help arrived. Had it continued, the group may have come to some unanimous agreement, but that was not meant to be.
The first interruption came while one of the teachers was hysterically shouting about looking after the children, a comment everyone heard though quickly forgot once it was interrupted. It was a sound, initially resembling the sounds of heard at construction sites; a loud single ‘boom’ drowning out all other sounds.
Conversations stopped. People looked around, their eyes and heads slowly turning.
Another sound filled the beach, though this time it was more like the breaking of branches. Eyes made their way towards the forest line, and no sooner than they did, another loud ‘boom’ echoed along the open campsite, clearly coming from the forest’s edge. A cloud of dust and particles shot out from the edge of the forest within a second, coating everyone along the beach; some coughing in response while others remained motionless. The dirt floated in the air for several seconds before eventually receding; mixing into the sand of the beach as quickly as it had appeared. The dark shadow over the group remained.
Everyone who looked up saw something different, though they were all clearly looking at the same thing. The teachers and crew saw something they knew was impossible, and reacted accordingly with gaped jaws and open mouths, unable to process it. Many students reacted differently, though for a good number of them, this was the moment they were sure was a dream. Laine’s mouth opened wide and she reached out and grabbed Tristan’s shoulder without ever averting her gaze from the same thing everyone looked at. With the same simple nature that defined him, Bill dropped the bag of chips he had recently grabbed to snack on, the contents wastefully spilling out onto the dust filled sand. What Tristan Riverton saw was probably the most horrifying sight any of them witnessed, and even with his imaginative mind the boy had difficulties coming to terms with what loomed before him. Tristan Riverton saw his sister.
The creature perfectly imitated Angela Riverton, dressed in the same blank tank top and black skirt the girl so often wore. Even the long knee-high boots with matching black buckles and straps were mimicked perfectly by whatever was standing before them. Unkempt wet black hair dangled around its shoulders, and upon closer inspection it was quite evident this Angela simulacrum’s clothing was damp from being submerged. Indeed Tristan did recognize this strangely similar being as his sister, with the simple exception that compared to her him and his campmates were the size of bugs.
There was no time for terror or shock to set in, only the briefest of seconds before the Angela-Giant spoke. Her words loud and echoing, just like the footsteps that heralded her approach. Had the survivors been truly attentive they would have been able to understand the words she spoke, but instead the thunderous speech came out as inaudible to them as they stood in complete silence. “Any luck finding anyone” would have been the proper translation for the giantish speech that was first spoken, and some of the campsite members thought they might have heard that, though none would ever say they were quite sure what was spoken at that moment.
Heads turned away from the Angela-Giant when another thunderous cacophony came, this time from the north of the beach. Adjusting their fields of vision, except for Tristan who kept his eyes transfixed on the blown up image of his sister, the survivors were greeted with another creature intruding on their domain. How this massive being had approached without giving herself away only gave a small hint of the grace she possessed. Where the Angela-Giant could be easily compared to a demon due to her black attire and dour looks, the other creature was far more divine in nature. Much taller than her companion, the other being was draped in far less clothing, having only two fine pieces of white cloth to her name. To many below it seemed as though a goddess of legend had been snatched from the stories and put into reality, at least until they realized it was a perfect match to Stacy Decker.
After hearing the reply of her peer, a moment of genuine anger came from the Angela-Giant as her building long foot rose up and stamped into the forest she towered above. Dust and debris flied over the camp and some people even had the common sense to duck, but for the most part they all remained paralyzed in fear at this inconceivable sight. The following cry from the Angela-Giant deafened all below as hands quickly moved to cover ears. In the following second, the black clad creature stamped off out of sight muttering loud bit of unintelligible profanity. Relative peace came over the camp until the quakes resumed, though this time in much greater intensity and speed. Whipping around once more to change views in this strange freak show, the members of the camp all witnessed the Stacy-Giant begin a quick dash to follow her companion.
No one spoke for almost a minute before the two had disappeared from sight. Laine could now feel the trembling throughout Tristan’s body as he stared blindly off into the distance. Bill’s hands still remained frozen in place with one cradling what would have been the discarded chip bag, and the other holding a chip midair in front of his gaping mouth. When conversation eventually started up again it was not actual conversation but more screams and tearful cries. The sight simply broke many of the present students, for who could possibly have believed what just happened? Giants certainly didn’t exist, but two of them had just casually strolled by without even noticing them. Adding to the mounting hysteria, the giants were people known to most of the students present.
Things finally reached a breaking point when one student pointed towards a grim discovery; a large depression in the ground that that Stacy-Giant had created in her dash to catch up with the Angela-Giant. The depression was in the exact spot the teachers and crew had been assembled.