His throat burned, his eyes stung, and above all, his breath came in raggedy gasps as he attempted to grasp the current situation at hand. Well, it wasn't as if it took a genius to realize that they were stuck in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Yeah. Genius. Hikari rolled his eyes. They were all struggling to stay afloat, not to mention to stay awake. The strip of land just in their sights seemed to constantly swim, tantalizingly, out of reach.
And that girl just wouldn't stop talking to herself.
Asher began humming to herself, softly, a song that she listened to all the time at home. She kept kicking harshly, yet weakly, at the water. The sun was slowly climbing higher; she guessed it was about 10 AM.
She glanced at the island ahead of them. It seemed that, no matter how hard they kicked or how fast they swam, they got no closer. They were definitely closer now than when they had first gotten away from the burning ship, but...
"I want to see some progress!" Asher complained quietly, then went back to humming.
She knew, somehow, that she would soon lose her mind. She wondered, suddenly, whether or not an insane person knew they were insane. "Am I crazy?" she wondered in a murmur.
Jay was swimming near the back, making sure that no one fell behind. It would be simple to lose someone, especially if they didn't have the energy to call out. He realized he was a bit behind and quickly kicked harder. Yes, he had been trained to swim well, but even the best swimmers would be tired after what they had gone through. His throat burned from the salt that had poured in his mouth with the sea water when a wave came by. He saw one of the girls falter for a second up ahead, and then realized that she did have a piece of driftwood, it was just so small that he couldn't see it. He urged his protesting legs to kick harder. At least he could give her his piece of floating wood. "Hey..." He whispered, his voice hoarse. "Here, take my piece of wood. I'll take yours." That was all he said. His throat hurt too much to say more.
__________________
"If he dies, then it will be God's will."
"If that was meant to be comforting, it was not."
"Everyone dies eventually. Once you are born, you begin to die."
"That was not comforting either!"
"It is the way of the Creed. Usually our deaths are violent but quick."
Asher whipped her head sideways to look to where the voice was coming from. Suddenly, all approaching insanity gone, she snapped, "No, idiot, why would I do that? You need it just as much as I do. Besides, we're almost..." she trailed off. Ugh, my throat! she complained in her head. Looking away from the boy - Jay, was what she remembered his name to be - and back at the island, she said quietly, "I hope they have good food over there." She wasn't necessarily talking about the island. Honestly, she didn't know what she was talking about. Her semi-crazy mind was taking over again.
Jay cleared his throat, trying to get rid of what felt like piles blocking the way. "You need it more, because I...can still swim." He shoved his board under her arms and quickly took hers before he began to sink. He began paddling again, still keeping up with her, even though his legs were screaming in protest. Asher. That was her name. He remembered her yelling it out as they just began paddling away, to the little tiny dot on the horizon that couldn't be a big island, but was the only land in sight.
__________________
"If he dies, then it will be God's will."
"If that was meant to be comforting, it was not."
"Everyone dies eventually. Once you are born, you begin to die."
"That was not comforting either!"
"It is the way of the Creed. Usually our deaths are violent but quick."
'The water's too warm,' He thought lightly, 'Perhaps there are sharks?' This thought, of course, provoked a slight paranoia, and he dipped his head underwater to glance around the others' feet and legs. The salt stung, but the warm water caressed his unruly black hair, and Hikari felt, for the first time in forty-one hours, a soft sense of comfort.
That was before a sharp, stream-lined creature came shooting out from behind. He stayed in place, despite the urgent calls from his mind to get out of the water. Fast. Hikari did, however, come up for a bit of air, before looking down again. The gray blob was coming closer, but a friendly shift in its body language finally convinced Hikari that what he was seeing was what he imagined it to be.
"It's a dolphin," He said, voice raspy.
Propelling itself from out of the depths, the most intelligent creature in the sea burst from the waves of the ocean, and seemed to chuckle at the stranglers.
Asher's insanity left her again for a moment. "You stupid idiot! What, have you got crap for brains?!" she yelled. But she still clung to Jay's larger piece of wood. "Thanks, I guess," she muttered. She somehow sensed her brain slipping back towards the banks of the river of insanity. "No," she grunted, concentrating on the island ahead of them and on Jay beside her. The mental fog drifted away. "Haha, so there," Asher hissed jubilantly. She said to Jay, without looking at him, "I'm not crazy, by the way. I almost was. Now I just think I'm a bit delirious..."
"I think we all would be..." Jay's voice was just a hoarse whisper now. He barely heard one of the others, Hikari, say that there was a dolphin. Just as he turned to the left, he saw it leap out of the waters. "If you're just gonna tease us, can't you give us a ride little dolphin?" He asked it, as it leaped up again. He coughed once, to try and dispel the ever-present salt in his mouth. "Wish I could speak dolphin. It looks like he likes us.
__________________
"If he dies, then it will be God's will."
"If that was meant to be comforting, it was not."
"Everyone dies eventually. Once you are born, you begin to die."
"That was not comforting either!"
"It is the way of the Creed. Usually our deaths are violent but quick."
Charlie was kicking from his piece of wood somewhere in the middle of the group. Desipte just having been shipwrecked his gray eyes sparkled with excitment at the thought of this being some sort of adventure. Was he the only one whose heart was pounding because they thought this was fun? He shook his head side to side trying to make his fatasies more realistic. The dolphin that was swiming by teh others fasinated him though. Charlie grinned to himself about their situation. Perhaps when they got to the island, there might be places fro him to explore.
Maddie's eyes finally fluttered open, her head almost entirely under water, only her dianty, pale nose sticking out. She choked on the salt water climbing down her throat, struggling to push against the soft waves that lapped against the shore. A shore! Her hazel eyes enlightened immdietaly at the sight of the shore. Thrashing her arms and legs, she splahsed onto sand, coughing, but successful. She suddenly noticed the others ahead of her. "Hey, guys!" she choked out, collasping onto the ground again. She was so, so hungry... so weak...