The Expedition

by Chris Babu

  The life vest gradually pulled him up.

  He needed air! He kicked his legs.

  Catrice! She can’t swim. Oh God.

  His head popped up above water, wind and rain pelting it. He sucked in a huge audible breath. “Cat—”

  A wave tumbled him underwater all over again. This time he swallowed a giant mouthful of salty seawater.

  I could die right here.

  He still needed to tell Catrice he loved her. He had to return to New America, to see Wes and his father. He couldn’t die yet. He had too much to do. After kicking and kicking, he breached the surface of the water.

  Voices. Yelling. Wood scattered everywhere, the boat in pieces.

  He latched onto a plank of wood and held on tight. “Catrice! Catrice!” He started hyperventilating.

  Another wave toppled him, but he held onto the plank and swiftly resurfaced. “Catrice!”

  A hand squeezed his shoulder. It was Charlie, his eyes giant discs.

  “Charlie, where’s Catrice?”

  “I don’t know!”

  Despite the absolute blackness, frequent lightning illuminated the sky. When it did, it struck pure terror into Drayden’s heart. Each flash provided a snapshot of fifteen-foot black swells, splintered wood floating, and heads bobbing in the water.

  “I got her!” Eugene yelled from somewhere.

  “Drayden!” she shrieked, sounding distant.

  “Where are you?” he called out.

  “Drayden, I have her!” Eugene yelled.

  “Where’s Sidney? Sid!” Drayden shouted.

  “I’m okay!”

  The next flash of lightning illuminated Sergeant Greaney bobbing in front of Drayden and Charlie. “We need to swim that way!” he said, flashing his eyes to the right.

  “Eugene!” Drayden yelled. “Help Catrice swim!”

  “I got her! Don’t worry!”

  Drayden clutched his plank of wood like a kickboard and pumped with every frozen muscle he had. His legs felt weighed down with cinderblocks. Up the crests of waves and back down again.

  Swells repeatedly crashed over his head, hammering him back underwater.

  He was out of breath and freezing. “Charlie! Where are you?”

  No reply. The subsequent flash of lightning revealed Charlie fifteen yards ahead.

  Based on their former trajectory, they should have been roughly half a mile off the shore of either Rhode Island or Massachusetts, provided they were swimming toward the shore, and not further out into the ocean. By his calculations, they’d capsized near the border between the two states.

  A monstrous wave pummeled Drayden, thrusting him underwater again. Another mouthful of seawater plunged down his throat.

  When he popped back up this time he vomited. He gagged, swallowed, and struggled for air. His legs were cramping from the strain of kicking and the frigid water chilling his muscles. Hypothermia was setting in. He stopped hyperventilating and his breathing became labored. He’d lost track of time.

  Another burst of light illuminated land ahead—close, a hundred yards.

  “Catrice! Catrice!”

  No answer.

  Underwater again. Exhaustion overcame him. Getting back to the surface this time was more arduous. He couldn’t catch his breath. So, this was how people drowned.

  Push, dammit!

  He kicked furiously, and pumped with one arm, gripping his safety plank with the other.

  A rapid flutter of light this time. Thirty yards to go, and silhouettes standing on a beach.

  His numb legs refused to kick. They shut down.

  Hopefully the waves would push him in.

  Lightning.

  Two people swimming toward him.

  Darkness.

  Charlie and Eugene grasped him by the arms, and he released his plank. They swam him in the rest of the way.

  Quaking, Drayden crawled onto the beach. He collapsed, resting his cheek on the frosty, wet sand.

  CHAPTER 15

  The disgusting taste of bile and salt water caked Drayden’s mouth.

  After he stopped vomiting seawater, he lumbered to his feet. “Catrice?”

  “I’m here!”

  Although it was pitch black, he found her with the frequent bursts of lightning. He wobbled over and embraced her. “Thank God you survived,” he said. “I was so worried.”

  “Thank you. If Eugene hadn’t grabbed me, I would have died.”

  That was the harsh reality. He should have been thrilled she was alive, and he was, of course. But if Eugene hadn’t saved her, Catrice would indeed be dead. He was the only one strong enough. That wasn’t Drayden’s opinion, his fear, or his insecurity. It was a fact.

  “Eugene,” Drayden said, “thank you for rescuing Catrice. You really did save her life.”

  “Guardians don’t leave our people behind. Ever. We’ve done extensive water training. I would’ve died myself before I abandoned someone out there.”

  “Thanks for coming to get me too,” Drayden said.

  “You’re welcome, bud. Even if I die tomorrow, this trip was worth it for me, to get the chance to save you and Catrice.”

  Goddamn this kid is special.

  “What now?” Sidney asked.

  The lightning revealed an immense, arched beach.

  Drayden felt like walking over to Captain Lindrick and punching him in the mouth. He was taking control of this disaster rather than waiting for Lindrick to assume command. “We need to figure out where we are, and we need shelter. We’re obviously on a large beach somewhere.”

  “Look up there.” Sergeant Greaney pointed up the slope of the beach. “There’s a building, like an information center or something.”

  They headed up the beach, which was quite rocky, a blend of pebbles and sand. Rotted wooden stairs led up to a dilapidated structure resembling a cabin. The middle part was open to the air and covered by a high roof. Fully enclosed rooms flanked it on both sides.

  “There’s an old sign here,” Catrice said. “It’s too dark to read. Let’s wait for lightning.” The sky lit up. “Horse…something,” she said.

  Lightning flashed again.

  “Horseneck Beach State Reservation.”

  “First things first,” Drayden said. “We need to make a fire. Charlie and Sidney, see if you can find anything dry to burn. Twigs, wood, old paper, anything. Search this building, or outside if you find areas that are covered. Sergeant Greaney, it’s too wet to do it here, we need to build it inside one of these rooms. We need ventilation though. If the windows aren’t already broken, can you bust them?”

  “Yes, Private. Lieutenant, gimme a hand.”

  That left Drayden, Catrice, Eugene, and Captain Lindrick standing in the open section of the building.

  “Still think we shouldn’t have pulled ashore, Captain?” Drayden asked.

  “Watch it, Private. You and blondie would both be dead if it weren’t for my corporal here.”

  “Yeah, but we’d be alive and have a boat if you’d followed my orders, like you were supposed to,” Drayden said. “There’s a reason Premier Holst put me in charge of this mission.”

  “Don’t mess with me, son. You don’t want to start a fight you can’t finish.”

  Charlie and Sidney returned with armfuls of material.

  “We found a trash can with lots of old paper in it,” Sidney said. “And the other room had a few wooden chairs. They might burn.”

  “Well done, guys,” Drayden said.

  The sound of glass breaking erupted from the other room.

  Drayden walked in, followed by the others.

  With their rifles, Greaney and Duarte were smashing the crusty windows, which sat high at the tops of the walls.

  “How are we going to start a fire?” Charlie asked. “O
ur matches are ruined.”

  “Luckily, I was paying attention in science class last week,” Drayden said. “Can you break up those chairs and pile up the wood in the center of the room? And crumple up those papers.”

  “Eugene, can you gimme a hand breaking these chairs apart?” Charlie asked.

  “Sure thing.”

  Drayden and the other privates set their packs down along the near wall. The Guardians collapsed in a fit of shivers with their backs against the far wall. While they retained their weapons, they lacked packs because they hadn’t donned them before the boat broke apart.

  Drayden rummaged through his pack to find what he was searching for: one AA battery and a paperclip. He also found a flashlight in there, as well as tons of extra ammunition.

  Something else gave him pause. The food and maps. The privates had both and the Guardians had neither. Given how the journey had played out, and their current predicament, he realized this could create a situation. Possession of both critical items gave the privates leverage, which he had no intention of forfeiting. They would have to share the food, obviously, but perhaps they could do so without revealing how much they had.

  Charlie and Eugene had built a miniature mountain of wood and paper on the cement floor in the center of the room.

  Drayden pulled out his knife. “Hey, Charlie, can you shine the flashlight on my hands?”

  He took Drayden’s and switched it on. “I wish I knew we had flashlights about ten minutes ago.”

  Drayden leaned in to whisper in Charlie’s ear. “Don’t say anything about your map or your food. I’m going to tell the Guardians the maps were destroyed in the water. Tell the girls, quietly. If you can do it without the Guardians noticing, burn the maps in the fire.”

  Charlie nodded.

  It was a huge gamble to destroy all the maps except his. But if he had the only map, and the Guardians didn’t know about it, he would effectively be in charge of the mission. They would need him to show the way, after he announced that he knew it.

  The battery fire trick wouldn’t be so easy given Drayden’s shivering. With the battery negative side up, he cut away some of the casing around the metal cap. He pried the cap up a smidge, exposing a thin layer of cardboard, then positioned himself close to the crumpled-up paper. After unfolding the paperclip into a straight wire, he stuck one end underneath the cardboard.

  Immediately the other end of the paperclip burned his finger.

  He yanked his hand away, shaking it for second. He pressed the hot tip of the paperclip into the paper and waited.

  It smoked and smoldered for a few seconds, then burst into flame, like magic.

  Drayden swiped some of the other papers, lit them, and stuck them under the pieces of wood. Within a few minutes, the fire raged.

  “That was impressive, Private,” Sergeant Greaney said.

  Everyone gathered around, savoring the heat, struggling to dry off and warm up. The smell of seawater saturated the air as their sopping clothes baked in front of the flames. Smoke filled the room, but the broken windows allowed enough ventilation to breathe.

  To Drayden, the warmth of the fire was heaven. “We’re at Horseneck Beach State Reservation, which is around the border of Rhode Island and Massachusetts,” he said to the group. “Unfortunately, our maps were destroyed in the water, but I studied them very carefully before we left. It’s about eighty miles to Boston. I know the way.” He guessed at the distance, and he roughly knew their location before they sank.

  After removing his life vest, he pulled his knife out and hacked at the blue fabric.

  “What are you doing?” Sidney asked.

  He popped out one of the empty plastic water bottles, which even had caps on them. “Besides the water bottles in our packs, the rest of our water sank with the boat. We’re gonna need more.”

  Drayden glared at the Guardians. “I suggest you guys do the same, since you didn’t think to put your packs on before Captain Lindrick drove the boat into a rock.”

  Each vest contained eight bottles, which was way too many to carry. The opening at the top was also a bit small for collecting rainwater.

  Drayden tugged on his left ear. How about using the extra bottles to make funnels? He cut a bottle in half and flipped the top part upside down, taping it to the top of a full bottle. Problem solved. He repeated the process with three other bottles, creating four bottles with funnels on top. When they were ready to go, he set them outside in the rain.

  After watching, everyone else copied him, the Guardians borrowing supplies from the privates.

  In the ensuing burst of activity, Drayden noticed Charlie depositing a stack of maps wrapped in some old paper into the fire. Charlie winked as he returned to his backpack.

  Drayden set his pack down flat to use as a pillow. He discreetly removed his maps and eased them into his pants’ pocket, before lying down. Catrice would probably want to cuddle with Eugene the hero, so he might as well get some sleep.

  But she dropped her pack right next to Drayden’s and laid beside him. She wrapped her arms around him and nestled into his shoulder, her soaked blonde locks smelling like the sea.

  Sidney set her pack down a few feet away and collapsed. Charlie plopped his alongside hers.

  “Eugene, do you want to share my pack as a pillow?” Sidney asked.

  “Yeah, thanks a lot.” He crawled off the floor and stretched out adjacent to her.

  When Charlie tried to scoot closer to Sidney, she elbowed him in the head.

  “Ow, fine, sorry,” he said.

  “You wanna come snuggle with Sergeant Greaney, sweetheart?” Lieutenant Duarte asked Charlie. He made kissing noises.

  “I’d rather go for a swim right now; thanks,” Charlie said, mumbling “jerkoff” under his breath.

  Catrice kissed Drayden on the cheek.

  The spark may be fading, but it was still there.

  Drayden awoke cold and disoriented. His chilly, wet clothes clung to his body like they were painted on.

  The sun shone into their cabin through the broken windows. Waves crashed on the beach outside, and the smoky smell of ash suffused the room. The Guardians had already left the cabin while the privates were asleep. Catrice was curled up in a ball facing away from Drayden.

  He stroked her hair, which remained damp.

  She awoke with a startle, her blue eyes sparkling in the sunlight.

  “Time to get up,” Drayden said.

  Charlie had managed to snuggle up to Sidney overnight, spooning her.

  Drayden tapped Catrice on the shoulder. “Watch this.” He walked over to Sidney and gently shook her arm. “Sid, time to wake up.”

  “What?” She rubbed her eyes and yawned. “Okay.”

  Wait for it….

  She looked behind her, and elbowed Charlie in the stomach. “Get off me!”

  “Ow!” he yelled. “What the…what’s going on?”

  Drayden cracked up. “Sorry, Charlie.”

  Charlie scowled at Sidney. “Why do you keep hitting me?”

  “You were wrapped around me like a giant baby monkey, you idiot,” she said.

  “Hmm.” He giggled. “Then it was probably worth getting elbowed.”

  Sidney threw her boot at him. “That’s why girls keep kicking you in the shins, because of shkat like that.”

  Charlie propped up to sitting. “You’re right, I should be more like Eugene, so innocent, so nice. ‘Hey, let me be your friend! That’s all I want!’ Yeah, right. At least I’m upfront about it.”

  Drayden could have kissed Charlie for saying that. He hoped Catrice was listening.

  “Hey, what’s the deal with the maps?” Sidney asked quietly.

  Drayden scanned the area before answering. “The Guardians don’t have a map and I’d like to keep it that way. I have the only one, which I need t
o study since I have no clue where we are. Charlie, can you watch out for the Guardians?”

  “Yeah, bro.” He strolled to the doorway barefoot and leaned against the rotting frame.

  Drayden carefully unfolded his large map and Catrice joined him. A few different options popped up.

  After a few minutes, Charlie loudly cleared his throat. He covered his mouth with his hand. “Coming,” he coughed.

  Drayden hastily refolded the map and stuffed it in his pocket.

  Captain Lindrick entered the room, the other soldiers in tow. “Good morning. We’ve organized your water bottles for you, they’re outside. Clearly the rest of this mission will occur on land.”

  Brilliant observation.

  “Captain,” Drayden said, “we need to think about food before anything else right now. That water will probably last us until we reach Boston. Since you guys left your packs on the boat, we don’t have enough food for the eight of us. We’ll certainly share everything we have, but it won’t be enough.

  “Here’s what I think about the rest of the journey. We have no idea what the roads are like. I bet most of them are overgrown, so I suggest we hug the coastline. It’ll take a little longer, but we have less risk of getting lost, and we can try fishing along the way. It should take us four days to complete the hike.”

  “Well done, Private,” Captain Lindrick said.

  “Let’s eat first,” Drayden said. He and the other privates pulled a small amount of food out of their packs and shared it. Everyone ate one apple, some nuts, and a carrot. The bread was still soaked with seawater. Hopefully it would dry out and be edible later.

  After, Drayden jammed the water bottles into his pack, leaving it too full to zip. He kept the M16A4 rifle locked into it and strapped the pack on his back. If he needed a gun he’d draw his Glock from its holster, but he couldn’t hit anything anyway. Sopping wet, and now loaded with water, the pack felt like a refrigerator on his back. Lugging this thing around would be like giving a friend a piggy back ride for eighty miles.

  Lacking backpacks, and with rifles to carry, the Guardians were having a tough time figuring out how to carry their water.