The need for real protein in my diet was dire. Lyssa may get on fine with only berries, but I could start to feel my muscle mass dwindling… My first clue to this was my posterior of all things. I had went to sit down on a rock for a short rest while cutting down trees to use for a proper hut when, for the first time, I could feel the bare stone beneath me almost making contact with bone. My pelvis was now guarded with so little muscle mass that it made it very difficult to get comfortable. And so Lyssa and I must set out.
The portion of the Island I had settled down upon thus far was a sort of peninsula, the beach wrapping around in a U-shape away from the tip to the West, and the shore running straight to a long cliff rising high above on the Eastern shore.
The Western, U-shaped shore would allow me to keep a proper eye on the camp and not venture too far, so it was the path I chose for my first official hunt for meat.
Brandishing my make-shift spear with Lyssa at my ankles, I set out around the beach. So long as I did not run, Lyssa kept up just fine, and I had no reason to run. After we were directly across the shore from the spot where our camp lay, a clearing between the trees seemed to set a clear path before us up a large hill away from the camp.
I looked at Lyssa skeptically, “Shall we brave it?” I asked. Before we made our way up the path, I stopped and listened for danger. The typical distant caws of birds, the high pitched tinkle of water sliding gradually back and forth along the shore behind us.
The path felt very much beaten, although it hadn’t looked as though it had been used much at all recently.
A way up the path and I heard a squawk I hadn’t heard on the Island before, and then an odd flutter or gurgle. I froze in place to listen for its direction, unsure whether my adrenaline should be used for fight or flight.
In the trees to my left, I saw leaves shift out of the corner of my eye at the same time I heard the gurgly flutter again. An oddly shaped bird was jambling out of the bushes, not unlike a chicken in size, but its proportions were off.
“Chicken?” I said to Alyssa, and before even looking for a response, I stepped over to it and skewered it with my spear. It let out a honking squawk of pain as it let out ts final breathe. I smiled to myself, pleased. That was easy.
Back at camp, I had set out plucking the chicken-like creature for the first time. I had never plucked a chicken, and at the start, had relished the new experience, but it gradually grew into tedious work, and by time I was done, I had wished I’d slain something without feathers.
Cleaning it was another matter… I was unsure whether or not I would truly want to cook and eat its innards, but could not bring myself to toss them, and so placed them in a make-shif bowl. Cleaning it and scraping out the guts was a nasty business for sure. Once I had properly placed what remained of the bird on a spit, I placed it carefully over the fire. Time to wash my hands.
Lyssa remained at camp as I walked down to the beach to wash my hands. The crystal clear blue waters provided a gorgeous view of the bottom of the small inlet and at times I had seen sting-rays, wildly colored and large fish, and the largest tortoise I’d ever seen, ever.
The blood on my hands created a dinge in the water where I rinsed them. Up to my ankles, I squatted in the shallow water and rang them beneath the surface.
Of late, I had noticed that there was no discernable Sun, but only light during the day. It shown directionally through the Island as if originating from the Sun, but you would not ever sight its source, the thought becoming increasingly alarming every time I noticed… It made me uneasy. A small splotch of blood was all that remained, high upon my forearm. I took another step further into the water to make it easier to bend down and submerge my elbow. As I did so, something fast in the water, struck out at me.
The pain was unbelievable, searing, stinging, piercing; and my arm gave a great lurch as I was pulled forward jarringly before a new pain ramped up my arm to my shoulder and I pulled my arm up from the water.
Devil eyes, and teeth like razors!
What I could only have identified as a piranha was chomping heavily into my fore-arm, deep and cruel, sending new blood and more murky red tint into the water. I could feel my face flushing, all color running from it and water spewed from my mouth, a horrible brownish-red, right into the unsuspecting face of the piranha, and instinctively, I grabbed the axe from the wasteband of my trousers and slammed the wedge hard at the piranha’s face, relinquishing its hold on my arm and it swam off just to circle around.
It circled around too late, for I had already retreated to the shore, but none-the-less, the axe to the face had not fully discouraged it.
My hands, my arm, shaking violently. I felt as though the pain shot into my bones… I was trying not to move my fingers in the injured hand, for they sent spurts of pain up my arm the like of which I had never imagined. I could feel tears streaming down my face, or maybe it was sweat. Seeing my arm mangled such as it was, I felt as though I might vomit again, but the shaking seemed to keep me stable.. My whole body was shaking, and I realized how cold I was getting. I was losing too much blood. The water of course did not help, making it run thin from the wounds.
I picked myself up with great effort, trying not to move even my shoulder as I stumbled up the hill to camp. A deep aching had begun in my collar-bone, and my feet were getting cold.
This is not good.
I rest up against a tree not far from the fire, and I removed my trousers, the only thing resembling bandage material I could hope for… Dirty and stained, trying to clean my wounds with it scared me, but bleeding out scared me even more. Naked in the sand, I ripped what remained of the legging parts of my trousers and started to carefully wrap the wounds.
As I started to wrap it, I could feel warmth and numbness starting to encase my midsection, my brain did not know how else to cope with sustained bain such as this. It seemed as though the second chomp was most dire, for as I began to wrap it, my hands started shaking less and I realized it was not quite as deep as I had imagined… I may yet survive this.
Lyssa meandered up to me, no real change in expression, but I imagined she was approaching with concern. I looked at her and sighed with a final taut pull of the dirty bandage and rested my head back. I looked over at the fire, the bird cooking nicely…
“Okay, so it wasn’t that easy,” I resolved to Lyssa. She lay her head upon my leg, looking up at me, and I drifted off to sleep against the tree.
Explorer's Wrotes 