Are You The Complete Player?

3/3 THIS IS A COMPETITION, REMEMBER?

Krystupas shook his head, unable to hide the worried look from his face. He had considered the possibility of a mind game, or a physical challenge, but he had never thought about which other skills WIC might ask him to use. He’d dedicated his entire life to playing tennis, it had left him little time for honing other skills, such as carpentry.

 “Don’t worry, we’ve got this,” said Marco, already gazing around the sand to search for sharp shells to use as tools. “My dad and I like building cars together, it’s sort of what we do to bond,” he said, shrugging. “Putting stuff together is right up my alley.”

“Yeah, I think I could be of use as well,” said Borysko. “I mean, I don’t do anything as cool as building cars, but… I’ve watched a lot of survival shows, so,” he trailed off, blushing a bit, as if he regretted saying something so stupid. Krystupas gave him a pat on the back.

“I’m sure your knowledge will come into use, bro,” he said. “We need all the help we can get. Where do you suggest we start, Marco?”

“We need to gather wood for sure,” Marco said. “We, guys, can do that. Ladies, look around for seashells, the bigger and sharper, the better. Sharp sticks will work too. Keep an eye out for anything that can be used as rope, too. And leaves! Big, huge palm leaves. Gather as many as you can. Don’t worry, I’m going to get us out of here,” he said, flashing Carmella, Lucija, Galyna and Chloe a confident smile and wink.

Meanwhile, Mia was leading her team over to a spot behind some trees. 

“Why are you taking us here?” Luis asked. “There are bugs in here!” He made an annoyed looking face while slapping a mosquito off his arm.

“We need to work and talk in private,” Mia explained. “We can’t trust the other teams not to copy our strategy.”

“Yeah, it seems like we can’t trust ANYONE here at all,” Selene added bitterly.

Crina shot her a glare. 

“If you’re here to start drama, then do us all a favour and just sit this one out while we plan out what to do,” she said.  “Mia is right. We can’t let the others see how we build our raft.”

“Why not?” asked Adela. “I mean, I don’t think it’s wrong to share the knowledge. They will die if they fail!”

“WE will die if we fail at this competition,” said Crina, sternly. “This IS a competition, remember? I don’t know about you guys, but I’m here to win, even if it means others will lose.” 

Mia nodded. Selene rolled her eyes. Adela looked down, uncomfortable with the idea of letting more people die when she could do something to help them survive. Despite everything that had happened that night, she hadn’t given up on the hope that they could all somehow escape from this hell. That no one else among them had to die.

“Umm, what are you doing?” asked Jules, looking at Drew, who was removing his shirt. Luis laughed.

“Ooh, la la. I didn’t realise this was another strip challenge,” he said, smirking. 

“It’s not,” Drew said. “I’m making rope.” 

He bit into his shirt until it ripped and then he began shredding the fabric.  The others exchanged a glance and then Mia did the same, removing her shirt and stripping down to her bra. 

Over by the shore, Maxim was peering out at the water towards the other island. The wind had been gradually picking up, making the waves large and threatening. 

“Maxim!” Eliyaz shouted. He and Emerson had just emerged from the jungle, each carrying large branches. “What are you doing, bro? We need your help.”

“Dude, do you see how big the waves are? I was just thinking… why don’t we all just surf to the other island?”

Emerson and Eliyaz exchanged a glance.

“Surf?” Emerson asked.

“Yeah, bro, it’s a brilliant idea. We could all stand on the raft and surf to the island! We don’t have to do so much of that stupid paddling, we’d just let the waves do the work and carry us there!” he smiled brightly and nodded, truly believing in his “brilliant” plan.

“Umm, Maxim?” Eliyaz said, weighing his words carefully. “The waves are coming this way, like, towards us right now. If we paddle out there and ride there, won’t they just carry us back over here?”

Maxim squinted as he thought about this. Emerson rolled his eyes.

“Dude, just help us gather wood,” he said, shaking his head and dropping the branches in his hand before head back towards the jungle.

About an hour later, the wind was blowing heavily, and small droplets of rain began to fall across the beach. The sky was a dark, angry looking gray. Team #3 was the first to finish crafting their raft and was just about to set sail into the ocean.  

Team #2 was working together to pull their own raft towards the water when they spotted Team #3 already floating in it. 

“Adios, b’itches!” Luis said gleefully as he floated away with his team. He held up a peace sign. “See you on the other side!”

“How the hell did they finish before us?” Lucija asked in a perplexed tone. “Like, no offence but that’s pretty much the complainer s***h backstabber group,” she added bitterly, thinking of Selene. “How did they do it? Their raft looks decent too…”

Carmella wondered that as well. She felt good about their effort. Marco’s knowledge of building things had come in handy, and she thought they had created a pretty decent raft; however, it did not look as good as the one Luis’ team had built. She knew there was little time to think about that now, though. The storm wasn’t just close, it was already there.

“We’ll ask them about it later, right now we have to worry about ourselves,” Krystupas said, echoing her own thoughts. 

Despite having what was possibly the strongest team, team one was the last to set sail. All of the members were strong and intelligent but possessed little knowledge on building things and it took them a long time before they created something they thought could withstand the trip to the other island. It was unfortunate that they had left so late because the storm was really raging now. 

“EVERYBODY HOLD ON TIGHT!” Miroslav shouted as he paddled with all the strength he could muster. Marek was paddling on the other side, just as hard. The wind was blowing at a speed of at least 70 mph which was rocking them back and forth furiously. Everyone was drenched in water and scared for their lives. Grace screamed as she lost her grip on the raft and almost toppled over into the water, but she was caught by Estere and Pietro who were both quick to react and reach out to her.

“Thanks,” she breathed gratefully. The fact that Mira made no move to save her did not escape her mind, but she decided not to dwell on that now. What was important was surviving.

At the same time, Carmella’s team was a little more than halfway to the island, just slightly behind Luis’ team.

“We’re almost there, we just have to hang tight, we can do this,” Krystupas said, more to convince himself than the others. He was excruciatingly exhausted between the lack of sleep and the physical exertion this challenge was taking to complete. 

“Paddle faster, guys!” Marco shouted. “Maybe we can still get ahead of them!”

Somewhere behind them an earth-shattering scream was heard. Artem glanced back in time to see the members of team four frantically reaching for Eliyaz Gruber who had fallen into the water. 

“Oh my god, somebody help him!” shouted Joanna frantically. 

“DUDE! ELIYAZ! GRAB THE PADDLE!” Emerson yelled, holding his paddle out towards Eliyaz who struggled to reach it but eventually grabbed on. Emerson began to pull him back towards the raft when a gust of wind knocked him sideways and sent him straight into the water as well.

Everyone from their group yelled out in a panic. Maxim made a movement like he was about to dive into the water to save his friends but then remembered that he had tied his ankle to the raft in case they decided to use it as a surfboard after all. The raft was drifting further and further away from where Emerson and Eliyaz were swimming, fighting for their lives. Suddenly, a gigantic shark jumped out of the water and bit them both in one bite. The water around them bled red. 

“HOLY CRAP! SHARK! PADDLE FASTER! PADDLE FASTER!” Basil screamed as the girls shrieked. “WE HAVE TO KEEP GOING!” His eyes were brimming with tears at the loss of his two colleagues, but he couldn’t give up, the rest of them would die too if they didn’t keep moving. 

Luis’ team made it safely to the island just as the storm was going from bad to worse and the nine of them ran inside hurriedly. 

“Congratulations, team #3, you’re the first to arrive,” said the voice of WIC. “It’s not going to be such an easy arrival for the rest of the teams…” it added in amusement. 

The members of team #2 were paddling their hearts out as they neared the island shore. Galyna suddenly let out a huge shriek. 

“OH MY GOD, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?” she yelled.

The others yelled as they saw what she was looking at. Hands, rotting, waterlogged, human hands were reaching out to them from under the water, grabbing onto their raft. 

“Oh, god, is that…” Lucija started but couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence.

It was the rotting bodies of Liam and Freja, back from the dead, but clearly with something else, something sinister, possessing their souls. They were smiling creepily as they reached out, trying to grab at them to pull them under the water with them. Borysko shut his eyes tightly in fear.

“Don’t look at them, don’t look at them, oh god, don’t look at them…” he repeated to himself. 

Carmella screamed as Liam’s disgusting hand grabbed a fistful of her hair. 

“Carmella!” Krystupas yelled and then used his paddle to beat Liam over the head with it, causing him to fall back into the water. He then proceeded to do the same thing with Freja’s…. zombie version, or ghost, or whatever it was.

“KEEP PADDLING!” he yelled to the others.

Team #1 had gained some speed and had already long surpassed Team #4. They were almost catching up to Team #2 when a hand reached out, grabbed Pietro and threw him right into a shark’s mouth. 

“PIETRO!!!!” Aimilie yelled in fear. Her eyes widened, not believing what she was seeing. The thing that grabbed Pietro was the rotting image of Rodica Baciu, who smiled at her as she floated in the water, a slimy black goo dripping out of her mouth. It reached out to her just as Estere pulled her close focusing her attention away from that thing. 

Up ahead, they watched as Team #2 safely made it to the island. Behind them, Team #4 was still struggling after having lost two members. It didn’t help that Adam Evans had been paralysed with fear after Astro’s corpse had risen from the water and grabbed his wrist. He was able to fight him off, but the encounter shook him too hard to make him useful for the rest of their journey.

The storm raged on as Team #1 made it to the shore, and then lastly, Team #4. They arrived, shaken, and freezing cold, only to hear WIC’s annoying laugh greeting them.

“How’s that for an island GETAWAY?”