by Robert Lyon
Mr. Mormus lay nearby still sleeping but his breathing had become noticeably labored. Chief Tony Casley felt sick and slumped over having spread his legs wide enough to stand stable, he looked as though he were going to throw up. BM3
Brock became enraged as well, and ran at the wall as though it were a tackling dummy and slammed his shoulder against it.
On the other side of the pentagon the mudslinging continued as they cursed their predicament and those that brought us here. Dave sat in his lean-to waiting for the moment to pass but this was far more than just a moment, the escalation continued.
I was on the beach, about three football fields in length or three hundred yards away from these ‘goings on’. Tommi
Grubble and I were lashing the logs together in a square shape like a pontoon boat, the refinement of a hollowed out section to sit in would have to wait. The net was being woven be Michael and Jennifer, Mike Elper joined in occasionally while Mitch
tended to the boilers, he had to fan the flames with a palm branch and remove full vases replacing them with the empties and refill the boilers with sea water he carried in the deep cups.
Once we had lashed the two logs and two long branches together he had to test it for buoyancy. Tommi and I pushed it through the surf more than a little concerned that it might be carried out to sea. Through the sound of the crashing waves I called to her with a laugh, “We’re going to need a pier. haha”
On almost exactly the opposite side of the island sat En3
Yodal and EN1 Cair sat on the beach talking and throwing rocks into the surf. Cair said, “I think they sank us on purpose…”and laughed, “there some things that went bad.” and he giggled.
Kelly Yodal asked, “Why…why would they do that?” Cair replied, “When these woman got here some of us got our asses chewed, we were sayin’ they’d have to come up to the Paul F
Foster’s standard. and the admirals jumped down our throats…sayin’ ‘up to the standard…up to the standard!!??’ it seems we’d been reporting we weren’t ready for operation number four four seven two something or other, something or other…we all voted to stay ‘not ready’ hahaha, it said it might hasten our deployment date.” Kelly laughed and said, “Fuck them then I wouldn’t want to deploy sooner for some bullshit op.” Cair said, “Ya…Ya, I know what you mean. But they gave that op. a name.” and again he trailed off into hysterical laughter. Kelly smiled and asked while laughing at Cair’s hysteria, “What was it…blue eagle, red beagle…Silver talon.”
Cair still laughing uncontrollably rolling around on the ground said, “No! Hahaha, better than that.” Yodal asked in all sincerity, “Was it a sub?” Cair started coughing he was laughing so hard and managed to grunt out, “No…even better. It was operation…hahaha….operation Desert Shield!!! Hahaha” Yodal
went pale and started sweating and uttered, “Oh, shit…we are screwed.”
Gsm3 Kresley paced back in forth near the pentagon and there in the sand it actually created a small trench. A full-fledged brawl had broken out on the beach, Hauldbalm sat back and watched what he referred to as a cat fight, and once Charlie
McCree tore Clarksons tee-shirt revealing her black silk bra everyone would have referred to that as a cat fight. Orbly had thrown mulner into the ocean and everytime she came out of the water he shoved her back in. Philip was throwing mud at the walls yelling, “Fuck you retarded officers! You dirty slack jawed red necked dog shit eating horse dick sucking monkey nut busting Khaki wearing Fagtards” Dave was taken back, even for a sailor stringing together that many insults into one was quite an accomplishment, he had awarded medals for less. Just as he dazed off trying to remember the reason for the last navy achievement medal he issued he was blindsided with a tackle
Larry Linscoe who kept yelling at him, “You fuck, you fuck, go fuck you, you fuck!” Scott Tinnel was beating Swishzel with a wet tee-shirt wrapped around his fist. And Washam and Ens.
Braun were attempting to strangle each other in such a way that it looked almost like a make out session. Dave struck Larry
Linscoe in the temple ringing his cathedral bell and unleashing the bats. After which Dave ran into the brush line to wait out the strife, and Larry started to mumble to his third grade teacher that he had done his homework but his dad needed it for work.
As I sat on a log trying to paddle with my legs and arms in unison with Tommi Gruble with her crotch was right in my face as we attempted to paddle around ensuring we had control of the
‘boat’ the landing further down the island, came crashing down.
Sn Syre came running down the beach toward the rocks jutting
out dividing the beach between the landing side and our work camp site with a bloody nose and a handful of brown hair.
Tommi sat up changing the balance of the boat, I uttered as I tried to stabilize the logs by shifting my position, “I think I was better off with your honey pot in my face.” Tommi looked at me with her usual look of disappointment and pointed at Syre and said, “What the hell happened?” I replied, “I think it’s time to figure out if getting this thing back to shore is going to break our necks in the waves.”
We landed the boat and the lashings loosened slightly, we’d have to review our methods. But Syre was trembling and looking at us asking, “Can you get us out of here?” she had nearly killed herself trying to climb over the rocks that jugged out of the brush; I replied, “No” she then asked, “Are you just crazy too?” I responded, “Who’s hair is that?” she then asked with a scoff, “How long were the two of you out there?” I then asked her, “Syre…what’s going on over at the landing?” She retorted, “You weren’t over there? They’re all over there and they went fucking nuts. Artimus had us build him a fort he calls the fucking pentagon!” I looked at her distressed demeanor and said, “We’ll take you over to the boiler” Syre said, “Boiler? is that where that water came from? Do you have more?” I responded, “It’s a work detail and this damn thing is supposed to help us fish.” She sprint over and helped us pull it further onto the beach as she said, “I’m good to work, especially if I get food and water.” Tommi interjected, “That’s what we’re working towards.”
We headed back to the work camp with Syre in tow the blood from her nosed had dried on her face. We had left the pontoon boat where it lay. Michael saw Syre’s face and the blood and said, “I guess you’re here to help with the fishing
net.” Syre shook her finger and replied, “That’s exactly it!” and sat down where the net was being woven then asked as pleasantly as possible, “Do we have any water left?” Michael replied, “Ya, you need to use one of the reeds as a straw.” Syre responded, “Okay.” and she went over and drank some water.
Mike watched her drink and commented, “We are making more now but we’re still rationing, do they need more over there?”
Syre finished drinking and said, “I didn’t take too much, but you probably don’t want to head over there right now…they’re killing each other.” There was a look of dread from everyone there and I commented, “Ahh…ya, we really have to wait that out. I had shore patrol in japan and did some security work in great lakes; if they are rioting we have to wait until they are exhausted.” Mike added, “Especially since we’re unarmed.”
We sat working on our tasks as quietly as possible. Mitch sat kneeling at the fire box of the boiler that would need fresh wood first and I commented, “The charcoal will burn hotter and cleaner than the wood. We need to make paper and wrap the charcoal in it.” Mitch didn’t look over to me he just shook his head and waved his hand. After a long pause with us still tending to our tasks, Mitch said, “I don’t know how to make paper and how many dead?”
Cair and Yodal started to walk back to the landings tossing rocks and drift wood into the ocean waves as they walked. They came around an out cropping of trees and saw the crew standing at odds, one crew member would rush at the other crowd and the crowd would shove that person back. It looked like a drinking game from scott
sland. Captain Artimus walked out between the two crowds and said, “I think we’ve had enough violence for today, now a good tussle can…” just then the two groups joined
lifting Dave up and rushed him over to the crashing surf and threw him in.
Chapter Six
The Green Reed Cabana
With Syre having joined us it was definitely time to build the cabana. Our workforce was growing and soon we would be fishing Hawaiian style, spear and net from a pontoon canoe. Michelle Syre was an attractive blonde girl with a sway to her hips and beautiful breasts, she had managed to keep her tee-shirt as well as her dungaree shirt, she did make the mistake of losing her socks, and her boots wafted with a definite odor. It was a shame, a week on the ocean without so much as a floatation device and she had managed to keep her boots, but with the loss of her socks her boots were just an excuse to develop athlete’s foot.
After being out on the water Tommi and I were zonked. I laid down near the net work and there was the odor of
Michelle’s feet. I sniffed around trying to figure out what had died nearby and she noticed the facial expression. Michelle said with a giggly smile as she wound threads and strings, “Can you smell my boots? Disgusting isn’t it?” She laughed and reached into her boot to scratch her foot. I said, “Don’t worry about it” and yawned. Then she scratched my nose with the same fingers she had scratched her feet with and laughed. So I lunged up and started tickling her, she tickled me back saying, “You know you liked it.” I was coughing badly and gagging and replied, “I liked it so much, I’m gonna’ wash your feet for you!” She giggled and said, “Okay.” as she blushed. I took of her boots and threw them as far away as I could and carried her down to the wet sand and
scrubbed her feet as she laid back and fondled her breasts. I thought ‘well this is new’ as long as the smell was gone and I got to watch her play with her breasts everything was just awesome after all, things are looking up.
I grabbed the short section of rope I had made from fibers palm tree bark material and said, “We probably should have used this for a net, so let’s reinforced the net with these bark fibers.” Jennifer blurted out, “More work…no food, more work for the same results.” I replied, “I’ll take a spear and size up what we’re looking at out there and maybe I can get one or two with just the spear.” Jennifer responded, “Whatever.” Mike said, “Ya, you go superman.”
They were irritated and hungry the water purification was going well and it would be time to deliver more to the landing soon. So I looked for a stick suitable for a spear and figured I could keep a fish on the spear or once it was killed but it in my shirt as I swam back; I could only hope there won’t be a rip tide, we had seen any evidence of one but I had my experiences on the beaches of southern California in my childhood. Mitch brought me one of the deep cups full of water and I drank some then passed it to Michelle. I found a stick and tried to break it into a jagged pointed edge, after that a struck it with a jagged stone. I could see the tip itself would break off easily hopefully it would pierce the fish before it broke off. I realized I didn’t have a belt for my coveralls so placing the fish in my coveralls even under my tee-shirt wouldn’t work so I took my tee-shirt off and tied the sleeves into a knot the neck opening
I wasn’t sure about so I left it open, odds are I would only be surveying the nearby waters to figure out how far we’d have to take our pontoon boat out to successfully fish, and I headed to the water.
Tommi yelled, “Aren’t you going to use the boat?” I replied, “I’m just seeing if there are any fish out there at all, but we will definitely need the net with the boat.” The water was relatively clear and shadows in the water would have concerned us only if it were large enough to be a shark and we hadn’t seen anything that large. Mitch asked Tommi, “You going with him?” she replied, “Well, help me get the logs out” and they headed over to the area of the beach near the rocks that divide the shore front . I walked pushing my way through the surf it pounded my chest and the sand gave way to slippery rocks I used my spear like a rhino horn or a sword fish nose and swam without the use of my arms moving my body in a wave, it would have been nice to have some flippers. I got out pasted the surf and tried to stay stationary to make sure there were no currents I would be fighting, but we hadn’t been tracking the tides.
I managed to not drift too much so I began short dives;
I would float just low enough that I could feel the pressure on my ears, spread eagle as though I were dead. I griped the spear with one hand and could feel the cool water flow around my hand. I let myself slowly rise and watched for any fish. The water was very clear and I just had to risk hours of swimming to get back; I was still no further out than I had been in Pismo beach in California in my childhood so far out when I looked to the beach and I became nervous, but the pier wasn’t too far away. Now there was no pier and no help if I were in distress .
Tommi and Mitch were launching our log square we were calling a boat. Mitch yelled, “This is crazy.” Tommi yelled back, “This is the fun part! Having your ass in Lyon’s face is the scary part!” Mitch laughed. The lashings held a second time and the logs held their form, it was at least becoming a boat. Mitch and Tommi both sat on the larger log on opposite ends as they
searched the surface for me. Tommi’s thighs in wet dungarees gripped the log firmly and her soft hands rested flat palmed on the log stabilizing herself in a forward lean causeing her round full buttocks to prominently present atop that log as though she were a work of art on a pedestal. Mitch’s dark skin beaded with sea water and glistening from the early afternoon sun shaded his well-defined muscles as he supported himself with his rugged hands upon the log and rested his hips at the end of the log leaving his legs in the water to kick. Michelle stood on the beach shading her eyes with her hand looking as though she were saluting and pointed in my direction. Mitch waved to her showing he had seen me, she waved back and unbuttoned her shirt and fanned her chest by billowing the cotton fiber of her tee-shirt just before she turned back and went to work on the net with Michael and Jennifer. Mike sat at the boilers as he replaced wood in one of the fireboxes and I floated with an occasional kick still looking for any fish with the spear protruding up in the water.
Mitch called out to me, “Hey, bro…over here!” I swam over to them and asked, “She any fish?” Tommi replied,
“Just you.” Tommi glanced around and then froze perfectly still and started whispering, “Over there…over there…” I looked over and saw something swimming around a silver and blue silhouette, so I slowly submerged. I allowed myself and the spear to slide under the water and tilted bring my legs up behind me the fish didn’t respond. They were about a foot long and silver with green and blue fins. I laid there horizontal in the water. Tommi whispered to Mitch, “The only reason I’m not freaked out is because he sunk so slowly, because he absolutely looks dead.” I struck at the fish with my spear and it swam down lower, but it swam sideways I did hit it, but only wounded it. It
kept trying to swim sideways so I had to chase it, I tried to swim past it to scoop it up but its pattern of movement was unpredictable, I snatched at it and missed as though a created a current pushing it away and again I tried to scoop it up as I swam past it. The pressure on my ears was very painful and I was running out of breath so I expelled some of the air I was holding. I was at the point of no return, give up for air or risk my life and possibly miss, the pressure was too much and I knew if I went down to far I black out or get the bends so I turned upward for the surface looking back at the fish, but it was swimming upward as well, so I rested and as the fish swam past me I scooped it into my coveralls and swam up cradling our dinner.
Once I reached the surface, Tommi saw the look on my face and said, “It was just a first try we’ll get one next time.”
I replied, “We did get one but this method isn’t good, I nearly drown.” Mitch asked, “Where is it Rob?” I said, “I put it in my coveralls, you got a rope, string or bag?”
Mitch replied, “No dude.” I said, “We’re all going to have to carry spears for this, we totally got lucky, let’s take this one in and head back out again.” Mitch said, “Give me the spear and you swim that one back in and I’ll get some more.” I handed Mitch the spear and he rolled of the log into the water and that shifted the balance of the log and Tommi fell in. Tommi popped up and said, “Damn it.” I replied, “Grab the logs Tommi; I’m still holding this fish in my coveralls” Tommi grabbed the logs and climbed back up as I swam back.
I swam in on my back through the waves and anxiously scooted up the sand on my back, Mike ran over and looked at me dismayed, he asked, “You alright dude?” I said, “I think so, if this really is a fish in my coveralls I’m gonna faint though.” Mike said, “Well check.” and I said, “I need to be
further up the beach.” Mike responded, “You really do have a fish don’t you.” I coughed and said, “Either that or I gutted myself and have been hallucinating.”
Once I was well up the beach I opened the zipper on my coveralls and there it was. Mike said, “That’s a small fished dude” Jennifer, Michelle, and Michael ran over, Michael saw it and turned as he cried out, “shit!” Jennifer looked over at
Michael and then to mike and said, “That’s a good foot long.”
Michael said in a hush, “Ya, that’s what we’re thinking…it’s a descent fish and that’s got to feed us all.” Jennifer said, “I’m sure he’s going to share” and Michelle said, “Your god damn right he’s going to share.” and I interjected, “of course we’re splitting it, Mitch is still out there I have to head back out and you guys have to finish the net. But this could be all we get today.” I handed the fish to Jennifer and Michelle said, “Now get the hell back out there.” I said, “I’m going…I’m going but we need more spears.” Michelle ran over to where she had been sitting and then ran back with a good long spear and said, “Take mine but I want it back” I laughed and said, “Okay” she said,