When I saw that the louse wasn’t changing color beyond its current reddish-purple state, I decided it was as cooked as it was likely to get. I emptied the helmet, setting the creature belly-up on some leaves to let it cool. When I broke its shell, I found the flesh in the tail end was white and flaky. It smelled like food.
I put a small piece in my mouth. It felt like food. It tasted… like food. Not like the lobster it looked like, but somewhat fishy, and a little earthy, with a faint musty aftertaste. Not great, but after a few days of eating emergency rations and mostly inedible plants, it was considerably better than anything else I’d eaten since arriving at Wayworld. I had chewed and swallowed several mouthfuls before remembering that I was supposed to be testing it, and it could be poison! Regretfully, I spat out the piece in my mouth.
I gathered up my things and returned to Augie Field. The field still had a few animals but their numbers were waning in the midmorning. I checked the Beacon status; it was still broadcasting. I looked around me at my private kingdom. I looked at my bed. My back was sore from nights sleeping in the Augie.
Yesterday’s high winds started me thinking about weather. How long till help arrived, and how many days of bad weather till then? Did it rain here? It had been warm since I arrived, but how predictable was the weather?
I resolved to make a better shelter. At first I planned a simple lean-to, since anything else was beyond my skills and equipment, but then I realized that a lean-to wasn’t much, if any, better than my augie. Well, then, my skills would have to expand.
The better part of the late morning and afternoon I spent trying out my handmade axe on local trees, only to discover it was pretty lousy—still, it was better than nothing. I ended the afternoon with only a handful of branches. I was discouraged, but with any luck I’d have time to gather more before bad weather set in.
Of course, with any luck Lena would have returned my affection, and I wouldn’t have been catapulted across the galaxy to an undiscovered planet…
After a light lunch (I was nearly out of rations, but feeling optimistic about my latest food discoveries) I shifted my efforts to making a tent.
I lashed together branches to make a crude frame. My knot-tying skills were rusty, at best, and I used way more paracord than was probably necessary. My first square section collapsed several times. But after hours of trying and failing, cursing and kicking, I began to figure out ways to make it work. By evening, I had the barest beginnings of a large tent-frame.
I washed up with a helmet full of water, ate as little as I could get away with, and went to sleep. I was tired and sore and for the first time since my arrival fell asleep easily.
I woke several times in the night, once startled by a sudden rustling outside, but mostly random awakenings. I saw my two small moons and a shooting star. Something chirped, something growled, something gurgled.
I woke early again and went about my morning routine. I ate the last of my emergency rations and prepared for another fishing trip. I picked some pepper dill leaves, and caught a two more creek lice. I tried some of what I had cooked the day before, but decided it did not keep well. I returned to Augie Fields late morning and continued my work on the tent. I ate a lunch of pepper dill and creek lice, which went well together. After lunch I took a brief nap and returned to work. By the end of the day I had crude frame constructed.
One the next day, I caught nothing, but picked up a few new plants to try. One of my parachutes found a new life as a tent covering. I now had a sheltered square ten or twelve foot across, with the vent hole of the chute over my fire. I discovered that fire-roasting improved the palatability of leftover creek-louse. I had built up a substantial stone wall around my fire to protect it from wind.
I was tired of camping out. Camping with Dad had been fun, but only because it was the only time with just him and me. No stepdads, no stepmom, no bratty cousins. If I had cared about the Great Outdoors I wouldn’t have taken a job where I practically lived in space stations, and if I had wanted adventure, I wouldn’t have signed on as a low-ranking bureaucratic inspector. All I had ever wanted was something stable and reliable. No risks, no danger. Safety.
I was exhausted emotionally. I needed a shave and a proper bath. I needed soap and toothpaste. I needed a change of clothes!
At the same time, I looked at what I had done. I had survived an interstellar flight—I might be the first human to do so. I had survived in total wilderness for five days, found food and water, and built shelter. Not much food, and not a very good shelter, but still…
No one was coming for me, were they? The batteries of the augie were waning, the beacon fading, no doubt. If they didn’t come soon, there would be no reasonable hope that they’d find me.
I talked to myself, to see if I still had a voice. My own voice, having uttered nothing but grunts and sighs for days, sounded foreign. “Anton Diggory,” I said, “you’re never going home.”
Home. Was this home now? Would it ever be home? How long could I live like this? How long would I want to? I wasn’t ready to lie down and die yet, but how long?
“No! You don’t know that!” I shouted at myself. “You can’t know that! Lena will come! Somebody will come!”
“And I don’t know that, either.”
“Fine! Somebody might come!”
Great. Now I was arguing with myself. My second step-dad used to tease my mom (who talked to herself a lot), saying that talking to yourself was the first hint of madness, answering yourself the second, and by the time your were having discussions with yourself it was too late. Dad, however, joked that it was the sign of a complex mind. Right now, I was betting on madness.
Over the next several days I kept myself very busy. I had gathered more stones and wood to improve my shelter. I used my crude tools to shape them as well as I could, and laid out stone for the boundary. I ate mostly pepper-dill and lousters (my new name for creek-lice, a portmanteau of “lobster” and “louse”). I tested many new plants, and found a small speckled red fruit that grew in abundance on the east edge of the field, that tasted a little like citrus, but with a metallic tinge to its flavor, and went down well. I discovered the feather-ferns actually had an interconnecting root system with tuberous-looking sections, but they smelled and tasted strongly of vinegar and stung the mouth a little. I found a clutch of small eggs in a nest of dark brown sand: smooth, green, and round, the size of peach-pits. I don’t know what kind of eggs they were, but they hardboiled just fine and tasted like eggs.
I scavenged the augie for small pipes, tubes, and wires to use as nails and lashings for my shelter. I discovered the now-empty rations box was air- and water-tight and suitable for storing water.
The next day, I discovered the beacon on the augie was dead. I plopped myself on the ground and did nothing for rest of the day. I did not hunt, eat, or build; I just sat on the ground and felt sorry for myself.
I wallowed in anger: at myself for my stupid attempts at heroics; at Lena for rejecting me, and lying to me about her maintenance flight that made me think she was on that stupid ship to begin with; at LodeCorp for building an FTL ship that was probably still illegal; even at my parents, whose divorce, according to a high-school counselor, inspired an aversion to risk (maybe that’s what made life as an inspector seem like a good idea). Then I beat and kicked the augie and kicked over part of my nascent stone wall, stubbing my toe and causing me to fall back to the ground, where I lay until darkness came.
My fire was barely smoldering when I woke the next morning. I revived it and skipped breakfast to repair my wall, such as it was. I set myself to work to keep my mind from the fact that I now had no reasonable hope of rescue. I definitely did not dwell on the fact that I was building what might be my home for the rest of my miserable, lonely life. What was a life totally alone worth, anyway?
Anger and frustration fueled me. I rolled the largest rocks I could find to my field. I banged rocks against each other to break them to manageable sizes. I chopped at branc
hes and logs until I broke both my axes and had to repair them. I worked through the noon and into the afternoon until I felt dizzy from heat and hunger. I hadn’t gathered any food, and all I had was a few wilted pepper dill leaves and a little day-old louster. I ate what I could and drank lots of water. Then I got back to work.
The next day I was still angry and grumpy, and a little bit sunburned. I forced myself to make my trek to the creek to hunt. The lousters were abundant in many places during the morning, though few were as big as the first batch I’d discovered. I plucked more pepper-dill leaves and ate a late breakfast, picked some of the speckled fruit, and returned to the field. By nightfall I was feeling sore and hot, and chided myself for over-working.
The following morning, I realized it wasn’t the work. I woke late feeling hot and cramped. My head hurt and my throat was sore. I barely made it out of the augie before vomiting profusely and repeatedly. I collapsed on the ground next to the puddle, disgusted by the smell, but too weak and shaken to get up.
After several minutes I struggle to my hands and feet and crawled over to the augie. I was shaking and chilled, but feverish also. My stomach heaved and cramped, but nothing else came up, yet. What did I eat? was all I could think. I hadn’t eaten anything new for several days. How long did it take for food poisoning to set in?
Standing was hard. I leaned against the augie and retrieved some water, which I drank slowly. It came up a few minutes later, along with more of yesterday’s food. I doubled up with cramps. I lay on the ground, I don’t know how long, nearly unconscious, barely awake enough to suffer. The cramping came and went and came again. I huddled on the ground and longed for sleep, which at long last arrived.
I woke and passed back out many times. I’d sipped water when I could. I vomited again and again. I couldn’t think straight. My skin burned and my body ached. I didn’t know if it was day or night, hot or cold. This is how I die, I thought as I faded painfully into oblivion.
Chapter 3: The Recovery
Someone was shaking me. A bright light blinded my eyes. I woke in an overheated room surrounded by men and women in LodeCorp flight suits. Rescued? My mouth was too dry to speak and I could still taste the vomit. I was trying to ask for water but no one could understand me, nor did they seem to care. A man with a harsh expression was questioning me, but I could hardly understand him. I was looking around for Lena. She must have sent them. They had come for me. Was she here?
“Where were you?” said the harsh-looking man. “Where is our ship?”
“Lena…” I managed to croak.
“Where were you?!” he shouted. “Where is our ship?! You stole it from us!”
“Water…” I whispered, still unable to speak properly. The man was shaking me. I was too weak to fight him off. It felt like my brain was rattling loose in my skull.
“Anton,” someone spoke softly in my ear. “Why did you go to Wayworld?”
“Water…” I whimpered through cracked lips, barely able to move my tongue. “Please…”
“What are you eating?” came the soft voice, barely audible through the man yelling “Where is our ship?!”
Suddenly I was jostled from all sides: men and women asking me questions, the man shouting about me stealing their ship, and the whispered question again “Why did you go to Wayworld, Anton?”
I woke from the dream with a start. I remember hearing myself say “Lena, please come get me…” before fading back to my fevered dreams.
I woke later to find my face dry and crusty. I had thrown up on myself. I struggle to stand, but was too weak. My body burned and ached. My head pounded. I dragged myself across the ground toward water to slake my dry mouth and throat. I barely moved before exhaustion claimed me again. Every time I woke enough to crawl I inched a little closer, every move evoking cramps in my abdomen, forcing me to give up and rest again.
Eventually, I came to with my face and chest wet from having spilled a helmet full of water on myself. I felt less parched, so I assumed I had managed to drink some, but I didn’t remember doing so. My stomach was still cramping, but not as badly as before. I managed to sit up and, with difficulty, crawl to a water bottle and drink. Again I vomited, this time nothing but bile and water. How many times had I thrown up? My chest hurt from the contractions. My throat was raw. I was so hot, so tired.
The day wore on with me getting no stronger. I was scared. I was dying, wasn’t I? Wayworld had proven to be poisonous, after all. I force myself to eat small portions of the pepper-dill. One of two things was going on: either I needed to get my strength back, or else I was just poisoning myself faster. It might have been a bad idea, but I had no better one. I ate as much as I could manage, but it wasn’t much. I lay down in fever and pain.
I have no idea how long it went on. I woke and slept, but couldn’t tell time. It got dark, then light, but I couldn’t be sure what was real and what was a dream. The disease had worked down into my intestines, where the results were painful and messy. Occasionally, my body would try to vomit, but there were only dry heaves. My head pounded. I cried dry sobs and passed out again.
I woke next in darkness. My fire was nothing but barely glowing embers. I struggled to get up and build it up. I would die without fire, but then I thought Would that be a bad thing? I was in misery. Where was my spear? I would end it now. I found the spear and used it to help stand against the augie. I planted the butt of the spear in the dirt and place the tip against my ribs over my heart. Sobbing and whimpering, I heaved myself with what little strength I had against the spear.
It cut my skin, but did not pierce. I cried out in pain and stumbled down. The spearhead was far too dull to impale myself without more force, and I was too weak to hold it steady. I would need a running start. I was too weak to run, and even if I could, there would be no way to reliably guide the spear. As miserable as I was, I wouldn’t take a chance of another botched suicide. The acute pain in my chest dispelled any illusion of ending my misery quickly and painlessly. I was too wretched to kill myself.
Hours (or so it seemed) of swinging between freezing and burning went by. Noises shuffled in the dark, but I was too spent to move to the augie. Slowly the sun rose. I barely summoned the strength to pull myself up the augie to retrieve the first aid kit and did my best to doctor the cut I’d given myself. It was jagged and long, but not deep enough to gape open. I cleaned and bandaged it sloppily. I drank water and collapsed again.
In time I fell asleep. I woke hours later, judging by the position of the sun. My fever felt less severe, and my cramping less intense. I drank water, more deeply than before. It stayed down. After some rest, I hazarded a trip to the patch of shrubs where the speckled fruit grew and plucked some and sat down to eat them. More rest, than gathered more fruit in my shirt/bag, then returned to my camp. The fruit stayed down, as did the water. Exhausted by my brief excursion, I slept again until early evening. I woke and ate what little I could, then crawled back into the augie and slept.
I woke after a poor night’s sleep. I felt clearer headed and less feverish. I had to get more water today. I took some food and my blanket and leaned heavily on my spear to make it to the creek. I didn’t know if I had the strength to get back. It was dangerous, but probably not as dangerous as dehydration. I rested as my water boiled. Once it had, I filled the rations box and boiled more. I did this until the rations box and water bottles were full.
After a short nap, I gathered some pepper-dill and found a few more eggs. I made a slow journey back to the camp, stopping to rest often, and immediately passed out upon my return. The day was ending when I came to, and I returned to the augie to sleep.
Over the next few days, my strength built slowly and my fever subsided. I ate a little more and drank lots of water. I returned to spear fishing. In time, I managed to spear a eel-like fish, only to decide it wasn’t a fish at all. It had neither scales nor gills. Two nostrils topped its flat head. I cleaned and gutted it. I think I saw lungs. Its meat was greasy in texture, but had a
not-unpleasant flavor that was entirely un-fishlike.
I was finally strong enough to return to building. I had considered moving my camp closer to the creek, but decided against it. There were no better build sites, and the augie afforded me protection.
The stone wall was little more than an elongated pile of rocks. I lacked any means to fasten them into place. I gave up on this means and turned to wood. I built up the frame of my tent with stouter branches and lashed them with paracord, wires or vines. Pipes from the augie were re-purposed as nails. I built up the walls of branches and packed the numerous gaps with mud mixed with dried ferns and leaves. The roof was topped off with dried ferns sandwiched between two layers of the parachute. If a demented drunken beaver had tried to build a lodge based off designs by Picasso, it would have looked considerably better than my makeshift hut. But any port in the storm…
Each morning I patrolled the creek and gathered plants, hunting lousters and lung-bearing eels. I tried new plants. A handful of berries made it to the eating stage and caused vomiting, but once it was out of my system, I recovered quickly. I found minty tasting tree leaves and the occasional egg. A fleshy root joined the menu, tasting dirty when raw, but mellowing when roasted on the fire.
Late morning I would work on the hut until the mid-day heat, then work on my tools or shaping branches and stones in the shade of an awning I had fashioned from some of the parachute. When the heat had passed, I would either work on the hut or forage for plants and eggs.
I slept well enough most nights, and would wake early in the morning. I was growing accustomed to Wayworld’s longer days and greater gravity. The cut on my chest was slow to heal, and looked infected. I cleaned it daily the best I could, quickly using my limited medical supplies.
Diggory's World (Wayworld Book 1) Page 5