Nonfiction/Historical Fiction Contest Entries

SmackDown No Eliminations!

We were only meant to get fish, to spear them from the ocean and bring them home to our wives and children.

We were only meant to be away for a week, fishing and spearing and providing for our community.

It has been two weeks and it is unclear whether or not we will ever get home.

A storm hit - a terrible storm, the worst we think we've ever seen. Muir says that perhaps he saw one like it in his youth, perhaps it took his father. He cannot remember.

We are huddling in an alcove by the sea, slowly eating the fish meant for our wives and children. We will have to spear more before returning home, but not during this. Not while the waves rise higher than our heads and the water is too choppy to watch without feeling ill.

Muir says he has a cough. None of us can afford to get sick, not in this small cave.

But the days pass and the storm does not relent and he says yes, he is sick. So we need to find a way out of the cave, a way to get him home. Or else Muir will die.

Before the cave drops into the sea, there is a small rock wall. None of us are strong in that area, none of us are like the goats that quickly and easily jump from invisible ledge to invisible ledge. And with the wind and the rain and the waves, we might not make it.

We have to make it.

One by one, we brave the rock wall. One by one, we slip, almost lose control, nearly go tumbling into the chaotic sea below.

One by one, we reach the top, even Muir, who is gasping for breath and leaning heavily on whoever is closest.

He says he is very sick. He says he has to go home.

We have given up hope of spearing more fish. Even if the storm lets up now, we already have a grueling journey ahead of us.

The world is dark, always dark, as if there has never been light. We are soaking, always soaking, as if we have never been dry.

We cannot tell which way is home. We cannot remember which direction we ran into the cave, desperate to escape the sudden downpour, unaware that the space would become our home for the next handful of days.

One of us speaks up, hesitantly, quietly. He does not want to lead us astray, but he points in the direction he thinks is home.

We have no better ideas, no better memories. We follow his lead.

We walk despite the wind attempting to knock us flat. We walk despite the rain blinding us.

We walk until Muir says he cannot anymore and we are secretly all relieved.

There is nowhere secure to set up camp. We have nothing that has not been soaked and ruined by the storm. So it does not really matter where we put our heads, where we close our eyes and pretend to be sleeping.

There is no need for someone to keep watch tonight. We could be surrounded by an entire village of fearsome warriors and the rain would prevent us from clearly seeing them until it was too late.

We cannot tell whether we sleep or if the storm just covers us in a blanket of noise and sound and confusion so thick that we cannot tell up from down, right from wrong.

In the morning, the storm continues. It has calmed a bit. We still don't have time to wait it out.

Despite the freezing rain, Muir is painfully hot. He shivers and clenches his teeth and none of us quite want to touch his disease but all of us feel obligated to help. We have to get home, all of us.

We forge onwards. Sometimes we stop. Sometimes we fall. Sometimes we sleep. Sometimes we nibble on the few fish we have remaining, not even thinking of starting a fire in this downpour.

Days and nights pass as one and the same. Or perhaps they don't pass at all. Perhaps we have only been walking and sleeping and eating for a few minutes since we left the cave. We should never have left the cave, that space where time was linear, when life made sense.

But here we are, trapped, taking two steps forward without even being sure that our legs are moving at all. The rain is getting quieter and we are not sure if that is because it is letting up, or because we can no longer hear its roar.

When the first of us sees the outcropping of stone on the horizon, none of us want to believe him.

And then, one by one, we see it, too. Even Muir lets out a weak shout of joy upon identifying our houses.

We stumble forward, energy renewed, hearing restored, hope reborn. We are not going to die out here, wasting away to nothing, gnawing on raw fish as our comrades fall. We are going to be with our wives and our children again.

We stumble down into the rock, into our houses, scaring our women and children. They think we are monsters, horrible, dripping monsters from the storm, and when they realize who we are, their screams change from fear to joy, and they rush to help us out of our clothes. They hang them up to dry and swaddle us in blankets like we are newborns and hug us close as our children leap around our feet, exclaiming about our adventures.

In here, the storm seems distant. Like it couldn't touch us if it tried. Like it hasn't been beating us down for the better part of a week.

We are told we were gone for five days. We had only fished for one before getting caught in the storm.

Our wives and our children do not care that we do not have much food to bring back to them. They are content to have us home, safe and sound.

And slowly, the four days of worrying, of fear from both sides, is pushed to the backs of our minds.

Slowly, the storm disappears.