atoll
*************************
Jack stirred. The sun was warm on his skin, and the ocean air was fresh. Warm, fine sand cushioned him gently as he started to wake up. As the seconds passed and his mind started working, his eyes darted open and he sat bolt upright. He looked around, seeing he was on a sandy beach.
The ocean lapped at the sand in one direction. From the other, he could barely make out a small rise in the land, although he could not tell how far away it was. It looked like the land was fairly level, but started to slope downwards a few hundred feet away.
He rushed inland and stopped, taking in his current environment. He was not on an island. The land surrounded a large pool of crystal-clear water. An atoll then. Jack looked around, seeing the beach surrounded by ocean and surrounding the lagoon. He had no idea where he was, or how he had gotten there.
He began jogging around the ring of land, searching for any hint of where he was. All he found was sand and some small grasses. His heart pounded in his chest, and his arms began to shake. There was no hint of anything. No boat, no plane, no signs. Not even footprints in the sand other than his. And as he made the loop, he discovered something else. He was alone. Completely alone on a relatively small ring of sand and water.
His knees gave out from under him, and he lay in the warm sand. His mind raced, thinking of what had happened. Nothing had been out of the ordinary. He had gotten up, went to work, went home. He had not gotten any phone calls, nor were there any unusual emails. Absolutely nothing to indicate how he had gotten where he was.
He curled up and shook, suddenly feeling cold despite the warm sun. He barely kept panicked tears from coming. He lost track of time as his mind raced, running through everything that was probably going to happen. He would starve to death, or he would get sun stroke, or any number of other ways he could die. All that was certain was that he would be dying alone in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by ocean.
At some point, something inside of his mind clicked. He clenched his fists and looked at his surroundings. He was going to die, that was certain. But how was that different from any other time? Even at home, a random drunk driver could end his life in an instant. He could not let that control him. For now, he needed to figure out what to do to survive as long as possible. If the lagoon held fresh water, he was set there. Food was next. He could go into the calm water and see if there were fish. Even some seaweeds were edible, so that was possible. Shelter would be harder. The first big storm that came through and he was done. There were no trees around, so maybe digging one out of the sand?
He went through the many, many things he needed to do. Once he had a solid list, he stood. It was time to get to work. He would find a way to either escape the atoll or find a way to signal help. But for those to happen, he had to survive first. He took a breath of the salty air and got to work.
*****************************
If you do a search for atoll, you come up with some really nice pictures. Really pretty environments. That has nothing to do with the story, but it's nice to know.
No comments:
Post a Comment