The Misplacement of Lexi Robinson

by Ky Tyrand

  And then the big one hit.

  Lexi thought her heart had stopped. That time had stopped.

  And then the boat suddenly righted itself, and she was no longer staring at the water.

  She didn’t remember collapsing, but found herself lying on the deck, staring up at the blue sky.

  Her heart must have restarted, for it was the only sound she could hear; thumping louder than everything else in the world.

  The blue sky suddenly vanished, replaced by the darkest of clouds.

  The blaring horn and the incessant screams were fighting to be heard over the sound of her heart breaking in two.

  Lexi tried to blink the blurry tears from her contacts.

  The boat tipped again, backwards this time.

  She’d never seen a cloud roll in like this.

  No. Not a cloud.

  It was a wall of water.

  The wave hit her like a train. Dragging her against the rocks. Lexi wished she had been prepared for it. She would have taken a breath.

  She was back in the swirling depths, looking for the bright light. It was there, right below her. The girl tried to swim for it, but she couldn’t kick her legs. She was tangled in her cover-up.

  Not her cover-up.

  This time it was her skirt. She hit the rocks again. Or was it coral?

  It hurt, whatever it was.

  Lexi needed to swim. To kick her legs. To breathe.

  She pulled at the bamboo belt. It was too strong to break, but too big to keep her skirt up. The girl wiggled out of it once and for all, kicking the clinging fabric free of her legs so she could swim down to the light.

  23

  The girl knew that getting to the light had saved her again.

  It was above her now. Warming her back.

  There would be no smelly little aliens this time, but she heard someone approaching.

  “Lex!”

  Parma’s voice.

  Lexi wanted to jump up and hug her best friend – to tell her how much she missed her, and how sorry she was for letting her fall.

  But it was all she could do to roll over in the soft sand, trying to ignore the stinging pain from the cuts and bruises all over her body, and stare up at her friend with a forced smile.

  Lexi had been willing herself not to cry, but hearing Parma’s voice made that impossible.

  “Lex!” Parma was shouting at her.

  Lexi couldn’t blame her friend for hating her. If she wasn’t so weak, she could have held onto her. A second longer would have been enough. The ship would have righted, and Parma could have climbed back up.

  “But it wouldn’t have stopped the wave!” Parma screamed. “I climbed up on that railing, Lex. And I fell. It was stupid. God, you’re acting like you pushed me or something!”

  “I couldn’t hold you,” sobbed Lexi, “I wasn’t strong enough.”

  “No, you weren’t,” agreed Parma. “But neither was I. I couldn’t hang on any longer than you could. But neither of us could have stopped that wave. Nothing we could have done would have made a difference.”

  Lexi couldn’t hold it together. She’d never cried like this before.

  “Here’s the thing, Lex,” Parma stepped closer. “You need to get stronger. Not for me. For them.”

  Parma didn’t clarify who she was referring to, but Lexi somehow knew. It was the little gray aliens. Smelly Uncle Bernie and his friends. They had been the light at the bottom of the ocean when the tidal wave hit the cruise ship. They had saved her life and brought her here for some reason. And they had died to do it.

  They had given up their lives for her; had given her two ‘Imperative’ items to protect. And I managed to lose them both.

  “You are connected to them, Lex.”

  Again, Parma didn’t clarify. But this time, Lexi didn’t understand what her friend meant.

  She was about to ask, when Parma crouched next to her.

  “You need to get up, Lex,” she demanded, “You need to get up NOW!”

  Parma’s blurry silhouette came into focus as she leaned in.

  Lexi had been trying to get the image of her friend’s horrified expression out of her mind, and now she finally could. Parma always had the most beautiful brown eyes …

  Now they were white.

  24

  HOLY CRAP!!!

  Lexi stuck her arm up the very instant the monster tried to chomp down on her, catching him – no, her; this zombie was a woman – under the chin. Lexi’s forearm was the only thing keeping the monster from having her for lunch.

  Her fatigue was overwhelming, but Lexi forced her body to move. She tried to fight her way out from under the zombie lady, but her attacker was surprisingly strong. Or Lexi was surprisingly weak.

  Either way, the girl was in trouble.

  She tried to scoot back, but the zombie was all over her, pinning her to the sand.

  Her face was against Lexi’s, their foreheads almost touching. As its white eyes looked through Lexi, the monster opened its mouth, baring long pointed teeth.

  Lexi saw a lake of drool ready to spill down on her, which was enough to make her lurch to the side in an attempt to escape it. The sudden movement caught zombie-lady off guard, allowing Lexi to tip her off balance and roll her off.

  Scrambling to her feet, Lexi spotted a length of wood in the sand, not far from her attacker. It was an oar from Lady take-me-the-hell-away-from-this-place!

  The zombie was back on her feet. There was a dagger strapped to the woman’s thigh, but she made no attempt to use it. Instead, her clawed hands were up, ready to slash.

  Lexi dove for the paddle, rolling in the sand like an action-hero, coming up with the paddle in hand.

  Zombie-lady took a swipe at her, but Lexi was now armed and dangerous, retaliating with a maneuver she would dub ‘Block and Clobber’.

  Lexi thought it was a finishing move, but it barely slowed Miss Pirate Cove. What was she going to do without the Imperative Rod?

  The girl backed away, keeping her distance from the approaching slasher with the length of the oar, while going through the list of things rumored to stop a zombie attack:

  - Head shot … THUNK!!!

  - Double tap … THUNK!!!

  Huh. Both of those should have worked.

  - Triple tap … THUNK!!!

  The pirate-lady-zombie-thing finally went down, but continued to claw and chomp her teeth at Lexi.

  - Quadru … wait! Though much stronger, this zombie woman wasn’t a lot bigger than Lexi.

  Her vest looked similar to the others’, but of a substantially smaller size. And underneath it, she had a white silk shirt. She wore tall sleek boots, pants that looked way more comfortable that anything the men wore, and a pair of long gloves that might be useful against a biting zombie …

  Lexi couldn’t believe she was even considering this, but … she wanted those clothes.

  Yet, if she killed the zombie woman, Lexi assumed that the corpse would grow into a tree, just like the last three had.

  Or was it the Imperative Rod that was making them do that? Or was it just a guy thing?

  Lexi couldn’t risk it.

  You need to get stronger.

  Parma’s words gave her some encouragement.

  Did she mean physically, or mentally?

  After dodging a slash, Lexi snatched the dagger from the sheath on the woman’s thigh.

  The next few moments could not soon be forgotten, no matter how hard Lexi would try to force them from her mind.

  It felt terribly wrong, but necessary at the same time.

  There was a struggle, and there was blood. But in the end Lexi had the clothing she had wanted, with the exception of the silk shirt that got so torn and sodden with blood that the girl gave up her attempt to claim it.

  Partway through, urgency arose when Lexi heard splashing and groaning in the water behind her.

  There were more of the zombies making their way onto the beach. They had come after Lexi when she was in the wa
ter, and now they’d been washed around the end of the peninsula.

  The girl’s blurry vision allowed her a count of seven.

  Without the Imperative Rod, it would be suicide to try anything but escape.

  Parma had told her to get strong. Not get dead.

  Ignoring the pain in every part of her body, Lexi scooped up everything she could carry and scurried back into the jungle as the dripping pirate zombies tromped past the newest tree growing on the beach.

  25

  Lexi didn’t look back until she reached the creek. The zombies were out of sight, but she could hear them trudging along behind her. She had no doubt that they could follow her scent. Hopefully the stream would throw them off.

  It was getting dark, and the girl had no interest in facing these monsters. She could feel that her back was cut to ribbons. Her whole body was. And fatigued to the point that it seemed a miracle she was still standing. And the armload of gear was getting too heavy to carry.

  Lexi knew that she wouldn’t be able to stay ahead of the zombies if she had to negotiate the slippery creek bed in bare feet. And the safest place she could think of going was straight up this waterway.

  She looked at the clothes with disgust.

  The girl had hoped to find a way to clean the zombie off them. To sterilize them somehow. But she didn’t have time for that now, and wasn’t willing to leave them behind. Not after what she went through to get them. So Lexi quickly rinsed them in the creek, which did little more than get the sand off them, and suited up as quickly as she could.

  She was surprised at how well the pants, vest, boots, and gloves fit. She couldn’t have gotten any luckier with who she had to – don’t think about it!

  The pants even had a belt! Lexi had planned on cutting the long one down, but now she didn’t have to. This one was still a bit big for her, but she was used to that with her skirt, and it would be easy to drill another hole in it when she had a chance.

  Lexi quickly strapped the dagger to her thigh, just like zombie girl had it, and slung the long belt over her shoulder so that the telescope dangled at her hip. With her drenched outfit on, the boat oar firmly in her grasp, and the sounds of white-eyed zombie monsters closing in from behind, Lexi was on her way upstream, wishing she had have spent a few extra seconds to rinse the sand off of herself before climbing into her new outfit.

  It never occurred to Lexi that it would be more difficult to walk up the creek, than down it. Shallow areas weren’t too bad, but some spots were deeper than her waist, and pushing against the current was exhausting.

  The girl actually found herself using the oar to help paddle herself forward in places. She thought it probably looked silly, but it seemed to help.

  The muscles she’d used rowing, and swimming, and fighting Miss Pirate Zombie, felt so fatigued that Lexi didn’t even know how she was able to keep going.

  Because if I don’t, I die … Dummy.

  She sure wished she hadn’t lost the Imperative Rod. Lexi didn’t know what she was going to do without it. She’d gotten so used to having it – both as a tool, and for security – that the thought of being without it was utterly devastating. The darker it got, the more it bothered her that it was gone. There were sounds in the jungle that she hadn’t heard during the day. And the girl couldn’t see a thing.

  The moon was out – God it’s a weird color – and at least it reflected off the water at times. Otherwise everything was practically black. Lexi had no idea if she was going to walk straight into a zombie or a crocodile. Or if a dragon or a tiger was going to jump on her head. The only way she knew she was going in the right direction was that her feet were still wet.

  Lexi wished she were back in her fort already.

  She was beyond tired, and scared, and had sand in her boots, pants, cuts, and places that sand just shouldn’t get.

  She’d lost her fish, and was hungry.

  She’d lost her water, and was thirsty.

  She’d lost her Imperative Rod – How could I lose that! Idiot!

  This sucks.

  Just when she thought that it couldn’t get any worse, Lexi tripped on something and splashed face first into the water.

  Grrrr.

  The creek was mostly filled with small river rock. She didn’t remember any big obstacles on her way downstream.

  The girl picked herself up and kept going, trying to ignore the pain she was feeling from the rocks in the ocean.

  Lexi didn’t make it more than a few steps before she was tripped up again.

  What the …?

  With the end of her oar, she poked around the bottom of the creek. Something was solid down there, but it didn’t feel like a rock. It was rougher, not smoothed out and slippery like the rest of the creek bed. Lexi felt along it with the edge of her boot, and realized that it was quite long, snaking a fair distance just under the surface.

  There was suddenly a huge shadow in front of her, right in the middle of the creek.

  The girl froze, trying to remain as silent as she could with water trickling off her clothes. She had her oar in hand, but was in no condition to fight.

  The shadow didn’t move, it just stood there in front of her like a … like a tree!

  This was Braidbeard’s tree!

  I’m here!

  Lexi turned, and walked to the shore. She couldn’t see anything. But she could feel all the vertical culms of bamboo. This was it! The girl felt her way along, trying to recognize the pattern. It wasn’t until she bumped her foot against the short stakes she’d piled up from her fish trap that she was able to reason out exactly where she was in relation to the entrance.

  If it weren’t for Braidbeard’s tree, Lexi never would have found this place in the dark.

  Inch by inch, she felt her way through the maze of bamboo columns. The only problem was that Lexi had been so confident that she would never return here, that she hadn’t put any of the diagonal cross-pieces back in. She wasn’t overly concerned that anyone – or anything – would have come in her while she was gone. But it did mean that she would have to find them again. There was no way Lexi would be able to get any sleep tonight if she didn’t. Every time she felt an opening but tripped on a short stump, the girl wiggled each stalk in the area until she found one that was loose, and stuffed it between the culms behind her.

  Satisfied that she’d found them all, Lexi edged her way around the perimeter of her camp until locating her platform, upon which she collapsed.

  It took every bit of effort to get out of her wet clothes and boots, hanging them onto the tripod in hopes they’d dry. She’d have done anything to have her Imperative Rod back, so that she could start a fire and feel secure.

  The girl knew that she had some serious cuts and bangs. But it was too dark to check them, and too dangerous to go to the water and try to clean them.

  She would worry about them in the morning.

  Everything could wait until the morning.

  Lexi put her head back on the bed of bamboo, thinking about her vision of Parma on the beach.

  She didn’t know if it was really her that Lexi had been communicating with – before the zombie tried to eat her, of course – but she was finally sure that Parma did not blame her for what had happened on the ship.

  Lexi closed her eyes.

  She didn’t care that she was lost and trapped in some foreign place, surrounded by zombies and dragons and who knew what else.

  She didn’t care that she’d been beaten up worse than she’d ever been, and would most likely be scarred for the rest of her life.

  She didn’t care that she didn’t have a roof over her head, and it would most certainly rain.

  She didn’t even care that she had lost the Imperative Rod, and had no way to defend herself or make a fire.

  For the first time since watching her best friend fall into the ocean, Lexi Robinson was happy to be alive.

  26

  You are connected to them, Lex.

  When Lexi opened her eye
s, the Sun was already well up in the sky. She was thrilled to see the daylight again. It was so dark here at night without a fire or the Imperative Rod.

  The girl forced herself up with a groan that reminded her of a sound the pirate zombies would make.

  Perhaps she was turning into one.

  Suddenly Lexi wondered if it had been wise to put on a zombie’s clothes when she had open wounds from being ground against the rocks.

  Probably not.

  She checked herself over, finding her skin to be covered from head to toe in bruises and scrapes. She had a nasty gash on her knee, and her back felt raw. But even her worst cuts were no longer bleeding. That was a good sign.

  What muscles she did have hurt as much as her injuries.

  Lexi had never gotten this much exercise in her life.

  And at least she was dry. Last night was the first that it hadn’t rained.

  Things were looking up!

  The cooler morning air smelled fresh and clean, and sounded so much safer than the night. Having the spooky noises of the dark replaced by the friendly chirping of birds was exactly what Lexi needed.

  She was anxious to get up and start her day, but forced herself to remain on the bench.

  Lexi needed a plan.

  The plan is, get out of this stupid valley and find your way back home!

  No.

  Small steps.

  Forget about getting out of here for now. That would have to wait.

  First things first: Survive.

  Lexi had a water supply, but she was sure that she should boil it.

  In order to do that, she needed to get a fire going. But she no longer had the Imperative Rod. That would be a challenge.

  She needed food. The fish were a perfect source of protein. But Lexi would need more than that. She would have to gather berries and figure out all of the things she could and could not eat in this jungle.