Survival

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On the beach of the small coral island with no name sat all that was left of the schoonerPhoenix . It was a tiny wooden raft, six feet long and not quite four feet wide, and had once been the roof over the proud ship’s galley. Now it was scorched by fire, battered by weather, and encrusted with sand and sea salt. Barely visible through the battle scars were three letters: N-i-X. The rest of thePhoenix’s name, along with the ship herself, lay at the bottom of the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean.

On this piece of flotsam, four young people had braved seven days and nights at the mercy of the sea. Their captain was gone, drowned. The mate had deserted them, leaving them to die. Two of their companions were lost without a trace. Close to death from hunger, thirst, and the blazing sun, the four survivors had ridden the wind and waves. Three of them were in a desperate condition, the fourth deeply unconscious when they washed ashore on this rugged cay, six thousand miles west of Los Angeles, eleven hundred miles south of Tokyo, and nine hundred miles east of Hong Kong.

It was a tiny dot in the vast ocean, a dot that appeared on no maps, overlooked no shipping lanes, and was observed by no passing aircraft — an island with no name.

Day 1, 4:45 P.M.

They had survived forty-foot waves, an explosion and fire at sea, and a week adrift on a tiny raft. But now Luke Haggerty, Charla Swann, and Ian Sikorsky faced their greatest challenge so far:

A coconut.

It had fallen off a tall palm, missing Luke’s ear by inches. To three people who had put nothing but rainwater in their stomachs for seven long days, it represented what they needed most: food.

Charla, the city kid, turned it over in her hands. “Where’s the opener on this thing?”

“What do you expect?” Luke shot back. “A pull tab?”

It was a joke, but it underscored the tension and fear in the group. Will Greenfield, the fourth survivor, lay unconscious and unmoving on a beach not far away. He needed medical attention. Probably they all did. But they were far from any doctor or hospital, stranded on a — on a what? It had to be an island. But how big an island? And where? It was anybody’s guess.

Begrateful , Luke reminded himself. You’realive .

But he was not grateful. Captain Cascadden wasn’t alive. Lyssa Greenfield and J.J. Lane weren’t alive. Luke felt their absence in his every breath, an overwhelming sadness that weighed on him as heavily as exhaustion and dehydration.

What was so special about Luke that he deserved to live when others had perished? Why was he still here?

Good luck?

Or maybe the luck wasn’t so good after all. The hunger felt more powerful than death. Forget hunger pangs. Luke hadn’t felt those in days. Instead, there was a grinding hollow emptiness where his stomach should have been. The sensation was so intense that it seemed to go outside the limits of his skin. With it came a nervous trembling weakness that was only going to get worse.

And here was this coconut

“You have to break it,” explained Luke, banging it on the damp ground. “You have to get through that tough skin.” He snatched up a rock and began bashing it against the greenish shell. “It takes patience!” He picked it up and hurled it at a tree. “Open, you miserable, rotten — “

It bounced off with a thwack and hit the ground, unbroken.

Ian spoke up. “I once saw a documentary about native tribes who could crack coconuts with their bare hands.”

“Did you bother to find out how they did it?” Luke asked irritably.

Ian shook his head. “That was in Part Two. They showed it the night I left for this trip.”

The three exchanged a stricken look. It was hard to believe that, barely two weeks ago, they had been safe at home, packing for Charting a New Course, a monthlong boat excursion meant to help troubled youth.

Charla sounded slightly hysterical. “It’s like starving to death at Thanksgiving dinner!” she cried. She picked up the fallen coconut, spun around, and hurled it like a discus into the jungle.

Crack/

“It broke!” exclaimed Ian. “I heard it!”

They rushed into the dense trees, but their coconut was nowhere to be seen. Vines and underbrush snatched at their legs.

Luke grabbed a branch and began hacking away at the tangle. The coconut! The food! It had to be down here somewhere! He began to flail wildly, like a crazed golfer in knee-deep rough.

He roared in anger; it was stupid, he knew — a waste of valuable energy when there was so little left. But his frustration mixed with his hunger, and he didn’t care, couldn’t help himself

“Luke!” Charla grabbed him from behind. “Stop it! It’s only a coconut.”

“Guys!” came lan’s excited voice. “Over here!” ‘

They followed his call to a small grove of leafy tropical trees and shrubs. There the younger boy was gathering an armload of strange green fruits that had fallen to the ground.

Charla wrinkled her nose. “What stinks?”

“These are durians,” Ian explained breathlessly. “They have a strong odor, but they’re food.” He broke one open against a tree trunk and handed half to Luke. The powerful smell tripled.

Luke stared at it. “You’re kidding, right?” The thick skin was covered in spikes. It looked more like a deadly weapon than a fruit.

Charla accepted a piece, handling it as if it might explode. “But — how do we know it isn’t poison?”

Ian plucked out a gigantic seed and began to eat the grayish mush around it. “There was this documentary on TV — ” he began, mouth full.

Luke and Charla locked eyes. They had learned from experience that Ian was never wrong about something he’d seen on television. His stockpile of knowledge had saved their lives more than once on the raft.

They fell on the offering like starving sharks. It wasn’t good, Luke reflected. It wasn’t even acceptable. But in his voracious hunger, he barely noticed, gorging himself on fruit the consistency of gritty pudding, but with an odd garlicky flavor. Back home, he wouldn’t have given this stuff table room. But here he ate greedily, even crunching the rock-hard seeds because Ian said they needed the protein.

The feast soon turned into a frenzy. After no food for so long, once they started eating, they couldn’t stop themselves. The three stumbled around the grove in a fever of appetite, tripping and falling over the dozens of discarded rinds even as they rushed to break open new fruit. The rough spikes scratched their knees and shins, yet none of them felt the sting. Nothing mattered, nothing but the breathless race to get on the outside of as much nourishment as humanly possible.

As he stuffed himself, at long last Luke could feel his stomach again, back where it belonged and comfortably full. The sensation came along with something unexpected — sudden, overpowering sleepiness. All at once, his eyelids were so heavy that he couldn’t keep them from closing.

Drowsy panic. Had they poisoned themselves?

The others must have experienced it too. Just before he lost consciousness, he heard Charla say, “God, what did we eat? I can’t stay awake!”

Seconds later, the three of them lay motionless, the remnants of their feast still scattered around them.

Day 1, 10:50 p.m.

Locker inspection.

It flashed before Luke’s eyes in a series of still pictures: The assistant principal flipping through his untidy collection of books and sneakers. A pause to wave those sweaty gym shorts to everybody in the hall — the guy was a real comedian. And then

A small hard shape in his wadded-up backpack; stubby fingers drawing it out — a thirty-two-caliber pistol.

“It’s not mine, Mr. Sazio!”

Even now, lying unconscious in the jungle of a deserted island nine thousand miles away, Luke protested his innocence.

“Somebody framed me!”

And just like it had happened in real time, he was not believed.

The rush began: the trial, the choice — six months in Williston Juvenile Detention Facility, or a program called CNC — Charting a New Course. Four weeks of sailing aboard thePhoenix , a majestic schooner. There he would learn discipline, cooperation, and respect for law and order.

The images changed. He could hear the tremendous explosion, feel the hot wind of the blast on his face, see the approaching wall of fire

Something snuffled, and it wasn’t an explosion. Luke awoke with a start. It was so dark that, for an instant, he thought he was back on the raft. A sliver of moon provided the only light.

Then he saw the creature. It was just a few inches away, staring back at him with glowing red eyes.

Luke gasped in shock and revulsion. Instinct told him to back up. But flat on the ground, he had nowhere to go.

The beast retreated a couple of steps, snorting and puffing. It was four feet long, seemingly all head and bull neck, with a body that tapered to short legs and a tail. On either side of the flat snout curled small gleaming white tusks that gave the animal the appearance of sporting a well-groomed mustache.

A boar/ Luke thought. Awild boar/ And he was lying here helpless

All in one motion, he rolled away and scrambled to his knees. The boar was startled and thundered into the jungle, its massive head pumping up and down like a piston as it ran.

Luke squinted around the clearing, making out the shapes of his two companions, still lying there asleep. At least, he hoped they were asleep. He stood up and felt a paralyzing cramp grip his stomach.

He doubled over and tried not to panic. “If it were poison, you’d be dead already,” he told himself out loud.

They had eaten some very weird stuff — too much, too fast after a week of no food at all. That had to be a shock to the system, and Luke’s stomach was letting him know it.

An itch on his cheek took his attention from his digestion. He reached up and scratched. Bumps. At least a dozen. Bug bites, all over his face. His eyelid was starting to swell. There were welts on his arms too, and the bare part of his legs below his ragged shorts. On his head, even, beneath his thick brown hair! While he’d been sleeping, he had provided a banquet for the local island insects. He could hear the buzzing in his ears. He flailed his arms, but the sound didn’t go away.

Charla stirred and immediately curled into a ball. “Oh, my stomach! What was in that fruit? Cyanide?”

“I think we just overdid it,” Luke groaned.

She was unconvinced. “Are you sure? I’m breaking out in a rash. I itch all over!”

“Bugs!” Luke exclaimed, slapping and swatting. All at once, a thought came to him that made him forget insects and stomach cramps. “Will!” he exclaimed in horror.

Ian sat bolt upright. “He’s awake?”

“We just left him there on the beach!”

“Well,” began Charla, working hard to sound calm, “it’s not like he can go anywhere — “

“I saw a wild boar tonight,” Luke said breathlessly. “It didn’t hurt me, but Will can’t defend himself. We’ve got to get back there!”

They ran through the dense brush, stumbling with heavy legs over the spaghetti of vines. Luke tried to will his feet to step higher, but he couldn’t seem to summon the energy.

“Hold it! Hold it!” Charla grabbed him by the arm and stopped him. “Do you remember how to find the beach? I don’t.”

The three looked around, struggling to sharpen senses that were dulled by fatigue and discomfort. In the darkness, all directions seemed equally possible.

“I can’t see it,” Luke said finally. “I can barely see you guys.”

“Be quiet,” ordered Ian. “Now, what do you hear?”

“I hear mosquitoes, and lots of them!” moaned Charla. “Let’s get out of here!”

“Listen to the silence,” Ian insisted.

This time Luke fought the impulse to run from the insects that were devouring him. Instead, he forced himself to open his ears and mind. There was the buzzing, sure. Against a backdrop of nothing, it seemed as loud as a squadron of planes. But slowly, he became aware of other, quieter sounds — the scurrying of small nocturnal birds and animals; the rustle of the wind in palm fronds; and, over it all, a distant, rhythmic pounding.

His brain was working in slow motion, so there was a delayed reaction. “The surf!” he exclaimed finally.

Ian pointed. “This way!”

A few minutes later, they broke out of the trees. Running had served to clear their heads a little. Luke offered up a high five that Charla took a weak slap at. The celebration was short-lived.

An indentation in the soft sand showed the spot where Will had been lying.

Their friend was nowhere to be seen.

Day 1, 10:35 p.m.

When Will Greenfield finally regained consciousness, it was sudden, with a start. One moment he was in a faraway, dreamless place, and the next he was sitting up, awake, alert. Wired, even.

“Where am I?” His voice was hoarse, scratchy. Man, he was thirsty! Hungry too. And what a headache!

It was pitch-dark, but he could feel the sand beneath him and hear the ocean.

What was going on? Had he fallen asleep at the beach?

He tried to think, but he couldn’t focus on anything past the pounding of his head and the relentless gnawing in his stomach. His brain was in a fog. He could almost see it — waves of silvery gray mist.