One Way Ticket

Rachel opened her eyes, staring up at the blue sky through the branches of the tree. She could hear water falling against the rocks not too far away. She was suddenly aware of Cian lying next to her, still fast asleep. Then it all came back to her.

They had set up a temporary camp near the waterfall in the cover of a large tree. The fire Cian had started the night before had nearly gone out; it was nothing but a small pile of ashes now.

Rachel closed her eyes, wishing she was home in the comfort of her bed and safety of her house. With actual food to eat. She thought of her family-they must think she is dead by now. Tears welled up in her eyes as she thought about the one subject she has forced herself not to think about for the past few days. It had been over three days since the crash. With no sign of rescue, the rest of the world must think everyone on the plane was dead. She wrapped her arms around herself, breathing in deeply as she tried to force herself to think of something else and calm down before Cian woke up.

After a few minutes Rachel sat up, inching away from Cian towards her backpack. She pulled out one of the mango fruits from her backpack. She struggled for a moment, trying to get past the outer peel and eventually found her hands and arms covered in it's juice. She ate as much of it as she could before returning to the stream to wash herself off. When she straightened up, she saw Cian was awake and up.

"Better start heading back," Rachel suggested, looking up at the sky. There were still no signs of smoke from the fire anywhere. " Although I'm not sure how."

"We should have left a bit of a trail," Cian looked a bit concerned despite his words. He finished eating the fruit before turning to the stream as Rachel had. She washed off her face before filling the extra water bottles they had. She didn't know if they would be back to this spot, but they would have to save water for the others in case they hadn't managed to find any.

Rachel kicked some dirt onto the ashes although they weren't very hot; she didn't want to risk setting the jungle on fire. She swung her backpack over her shoulders, tying her rather greasy hair back into a ponytail. She wished for a moment she was back at the beach; at least there she could go swimming. Her gaze landed on Cian, who seemed to be looking around in the trees for something.

"Did you lose something?" she asked with an eyebrow slightly raised as she watched him pick up a decent sized stick that was fairly thick around. He stepped on the thinner end of it to break it off and she suddenly realized what he was doing. A walking stick.

"Ready?" Cian asked her. "We'll have to take it slow. If this is the only other source of fresh water around, we should leave a track we can follow later on."

Rachel nodded as she began to follow him back through the trees. She made sure to keep track of their surroundings this time, trying to keep track of certain points in the jungle such as a large rock or weirdly shaped tree in case she had to reply on that to find her way back.

The hike back was quiet. Rachel struggled most of the time to keep up; the jungle got thicker as they went on and it was difficult to follow. She noticed Cian was stepping down on some of the bushes so they lay flat against the ground to make it easier to walk through and find their way back.

About an hour later Cian finally stopped as they reached a clearing in the jungle. There was a steep incline of a hill up ahead.

"We can take a break up there, see if we can see the smoke," Cian called back to Rachel, who nodded back mutely and followed him up the hill. She was soon out of breath and collapsed once they reached the top, sitting in the long grass. Her body ached from the constant hiking and sleeping on the hard ground.

"See anything?" she asked as she took a drink of water. Cian was standing nearby, his hand up shading his eyes from the sun as he looked around.

"Nothing." Cian was starting to finally sound worried. "We should be able to see it by now. If I remember correctly, we just have to head up that way and we should reach the cliffs again."

"Do you hear something?" Rachel cut him off as she sat up, looking at the sky. There was a low humming noise in the distance, quite far off. "Do you think that's a plane?"

"I can't see it, whatever it is," Cian circled around the hilltop, desperately trying to see if anything was headed their way as the noise descended. "We should hurry back to the fire, they might've seen something."

Rachel nodded in agreement and stood up with new found enthusiasm. They continued through the hills and back into the jungle faster than they had been going previously. Despite their pace, it took over an hour until they reached the cliffs. Unfortunately, they weren't at the cliffs where the fire was.

"I don't understand. We should be seeing the smoke by now," Rachel frowned as she looked over the rest of the island below. Somewhere down the beach was the plane crash.

"Maybe it went out." Cian replied grimly as he began to walk along the edge of the cliffs, keeping away from the side.

"Don't say that," Rachel groaned as she followed him. They walked briskly along the cliffs for several minutes until Rachel began to recognize their surroundings. "We must be close."

A few minutes later their campsite came into view. There was a pile of branches on the ashes of the fire that had been burning when they were left, but the fire had completely gone out. There was no sign of anyone.

"Do you think they left?" Rachel asked Cian anxiously, who was walking around the fire grimly. "We didn't make it back last night-what if they went looking for us and left the fire?!"

"They wouldn't abandon the fire," Cian spoke firmly. "Only one backpack is here-someone must still be around."

"Taylor?" Rachel called out anxiously, circling the camp. She came to a stop to listen for anyone approaching before calling the girl's name out again. A few minutes passed in silence before Rachel heard some bushes rustling and spotted the teen walking towards them, slowly eating what looked like a plum. She froze when she saw Rachel and Cian.

"You let the fire go out?" Rachel exclaimed when she saw the girl's guilty expression.

"Where have you guys been?" Taylor demanded after she regained herself. "You said you would be back before night."

"Couldn't make it back," Cian replied, unable to hide the anger in his voice. "Where is Turner and Paige? Why did you let the fire go out?"

"I don't know, they haven't been back," Taylor took another bite out of the fruit. "It's not my fault it went out. I had to go find food. What, did you just expect me to starve to keep your precious fire going?"

"That precious fire could have been our ticket off this fire," Rachel snapped. "We heard something-a plane, probably- and we would have probably been rescued if they at least saw the smoke."

"I left enough wood on the fire to keep it going," Taylor said defensively. "I had to find something to eat and you didn't leave me anything to start the fire back up with." She sat down on the ground moodily as she finished eating. Rachel turned to Cian; it had been a mistake to leave the young girl alone.

"We'd better get the fire going again, Paige and Turner might be relying on it to get back," she said as she removed her backpack and dug around inside for one of the water bottles which she tossed to Taylor. Cian nodded without a word but she could tell by his expression that he was exceptionally angry as he turned away to start the fire again.