Mystery of Sawnerve Island Chapter 2 - Bananas and Eggs by Jijillian and Kyosuke

Chapter 2 - Bananas and Eggs

Jerry roused up a bit, wondering what had awakened him. He mulled that over without really waking up, until he remembered that he and Mitch were castaways on a desert island. "They're here for a long, long while," he muttered.

That woke him a bit more. He remembered waking up alongside Mitch, lying on the beach, itching all over from saltwater and sand. He still itched, only now it seemed concentrated in one area, or two spots really. Still mostly asleep, he reached up under his shirt to scratch. Ah, that felt better. Mmm. Pretty good. Now the other side. Ahhh. What in hell?

He sat straight up, suddenly wide awake, his hand under his now tattered shirt rubbing and squeezing something that really shouldn't be there. Two somethings.

Jerry's sudden movement roused Mitch from a comfortable dream in which his mom had agreed to let him fly her Air Force jet back to Los Angeles for a bag of In-N-Out burgers. "What?" he said as the cockpit and the burgers dissolved around him.

"Nothing," said Jerry. "I gotta go pee."

Mitch opened his eyes and looked at his friend as Jerry moved to stand up. They both saw immediately that something had gone wrong while they slept. "What the heck happened to your clothes?" Mitch asked.

"What the heck happened to my clothes?" Jerry looked down at himself then at Mitch and pointed. "What the heck happened to your clothes?"

They both stood up, staring at themselves and each other. Their jeans now ended a few inches below their knees, even more ragged than before. Their t-shirt-like utility shirts now ended at the waist and had shortened ragged sleeves.

"How long were we asleep?" Mitch asked. "It's Rip Van Winkle time!"

"I dunno," said Jerry. "Long enough that I gotta pee bad." He started off into the bushes behind the tree they had slept against, hoping that Mitch had not seen what he thought he had discovered under his shirt.

Mitch made to follow him. "I don't think we were asleep that long. I mean, wouldn't the grass have grown up around us."

"Don't follow me," said Jerry. "I want a little privacy."

"To piss?" said Mitch, surprised.

"I think I might need to take a dump, too. Do you mind?"

"Uh, no. I've got no desire to watch you shit," said Mitch. "Um, come to think of it, I'm gonna go find my own bush." He rubbed absently at his chest as Jerry turned away. He paused. He looked inside his shirt. He checked to see where Jerry had gotten to then moved off deeper into the bush in a different direction.

Both boys were gone for some time, finally stumbling back into the clearing at almost the same moment, looking dazed and upset.

"I don't think I want anymore of that booby fruit," said Jerry.

Mitch glanced at him. "Give you the runs, too?" Neither of them were going to mention the cookie-sized lumps they had found inside their shirts and especially not the even more swollen and darkened -- and itchy! -- nipples.

"Uh, huh," said Jerry, vaguely. "B-but, I am hungry again."

"Me, too," said Mitch. "Uh, I've heard of castaways eating birds' eggs. Maybe we should look for some?"

"And I've heard of birds, even small ones attacking people who try to raid their nests." replied Jerry. "Let's look for something we know is good, like coconuts, or something." As Jerry spoke, his hand moved up to rub his chest, but he jerked it away as soon as he realized what he was doing.

Mitch didn't seem to notice. "Coconuts are pretty hard to get down out of trees. I've heard of people being badly injured by falling coconuts. You've got to climb up and get the good ones and those trees are tough to climb."

"Well, let's keep following this stream, and we can see what we find." Jerry suggested.

The two boys started moving up stream again as they continued their friendly argument. Both boys were looking all around for things to eat as they moved along, and both of them noticed the banana tree at the same time.

"Great! Bananas!" Jerry exclaimed. "Full of potassium, helps prevent muscle cramps."

"Thanks,Just what I need." muttered Mitch. "An ongoing nutritional analysis of all our food." Then in a louder voice "Hey, is that a nest in the banana tree?"

"It's not a tree, bananas are just big plants, they don't grow on trees."

"Yeah, yeah, barf me an encyclopedia." Mitch examined what he thought might be a bird's nest up in the tree while Jerry looked at the big cluster of rather small bananas growing from a low hanging stem.

"They're a bit green, and not very big," Jerry said.

"Mmm. Green eggs and spam," said Mitch, using his extra few inches to get a look into the birds' nest.

"I meant the bananas," said Jerry.

"I meant the eggs, they're a pale sort of green." Mitch reached up and plucked something from the nest -- a denim blue thread. He held it out to show to Jerry. "And Ithink I know what happened to our pants."

"How'd they do that without waking us up!" Jack asked. "I guess we were really worn out after the wreck, and maybe the booby fruit had something that put us to sleep too."

"Yeah, maybe," said Mitch, as he rubbed his chest, then flinched.

"Well, we know that eggs and bananas should be good to eat," Jerry said as he moved to pick some bananas. "Mitch, take off your shirt and we can carry the bananas in it."

"Uh, no," said Mitch. "Use your own shirt, I'm going to carry the eggs in mine." So saying, he pulled up the edge of his shirt a bit and deposited the four thumbnail-size eggs in the fold.

"What if there are, like, baby birds inside the shells?" asked Jerry.

"Protein," said Mitch.

"Yuck," said Jerry.

"We were stationed in Papua New Guinea for awhile, you won't believe some of the things the locals there ate."

"And I don't believe you ate any of it either," said Jerry.

"Well, are you going to get those bananas?" Mitch asked, looking innocent.

Jerry gave Mitch a dirty look, then looked at the remains of his clothes. "I'm going to use my jeans for the bananas, they're bigger and they've rubbed me raw a bit anyway. It's not like it's cold here or anything."

Jerry pulled off his jeans and tied knots in the legs. Then he proceeded to fill the improvised sack with bananas. He used his belt as a carrying strap, and the result was a serviceable pack to carry the bananas.

"Let's find another clearing," suggested Mitch, heading off along the stream again.

"Don't let any branches smash those eggs," warned Jerry.

Mitch glanced back. "You're the one walking around with just underwear, don't let any branches whack you in the huevos."

Jerry frowned. "I thought huevos were eggs, like huevos rancheros, in their native tongue."

"Huh?" said Mitch. "Yeah, but it also means balls, like testicles, you know?" Distracted by walking half-sideways talking to Jerry behind him, he pushed one branch aside with one hand, held the eggs safe in the fold of his shirt with the other hand and didn't see a springy branch that slapped him right across the chest. "Ow!" he said in a strangled-sounding voice. "Ow! Ow! Ow!"

"What happened? Something bite you?" asked Jerry, who hadn't seen the details.

"No," said Mitch. "Branch poked me ... in the nose." He took a deep breath.

"Huh," said Jerry. "And you were just warning me."

"Yeah, yeah," said Mitch, wishing he could rub the affected area. "Hey. Here's another clearing."

They both stepped out of the bushes into a wider clearing than the last one. Clearings can form in bush or jungle for various reasons but this one had an obvious-seeming origin. In the very middle of the open space, concealed by only a few bushes sat the wreckage of a USAF F4, half-buried in the soft jungle loam.

"Wow" said Jerry as he moved slowly toward the wreck. "How long do you think that's been here?"

"Don't know," Mitch mumbled still distracted by the pain in his chest. How couldtwo small -- growths -- hurt so much?

Jerry was starting to move around the wreckage when his stomach gave a loud rumble. Mitch's stomach rumbled, too, almost as if it were responding to Jerry's, and both boys realized that they were very hungry again.

"Maybe we should eat first," said Jerry. "I've heard that you really need to keep your energy up if you're shipwrecked."

"We weren't shipwrecked," argued Mitch. "We'd have had to have a ship to be shipwrecked. We've been boatwrecked."

"Dumkopf! Whatever you want to call it we still need to eat. Besides, it's going to be dark soon, and I don't fancy trying to eat this stuff when I can't see it," Jerry said. "There might be worms or something in the eggs."

"Yeah, yeah, I want to eat, too," Mitch admitted. "And we should find as much shelter as we can so we don't freeze to death tonight."

"You think it's going to get cold?" asked Jerry.

"You sure it isn't? There's a dry wind blowing from the north. I think. Northeast, anyway. It might get cold."

Jerry nodded agreement, looking thoughtful.

The boys checked the area a bit, but quickly wound up huddled under the wing stub of the old fighter jet. The eggs and most of the bananas were soon consumed, but even so the sudden night of the tropics had fallen by the time they finished eating. Unwilling to explore in the dark, they quickly fell asleep, unconsciously huddling together for security and warmth.

Neither of them woke up when a tall figure emerged from the jungle.

Interlude 2

The lean man seemed to be able to see in the dark. He apparently didn't worry about waking the boys, but strode up to their shelter and stood there in the darkness looking down at them.

"Not right," he muttered. "Not right, yet. You've got more work to do, idjit." He didn't really whisper, but he didn't talk loudly either. The voice had a slight American regional accent that either of the boys might have recognized.

He answered himself in a different voice. "I know that, I know that. This will take some time. We don't want to burn them up with too much happening at once, do we? Remember what happened to that big lizard!" The second voice sounded refined and educated, the voice of someone whose business is to know things, what and how and why.

"Humph," said the lean man. "No, thanks. I'm not hungry. I guess we waited a long time already; a few more days won't matter. But this will work, Prospero?"

"Oh, yes, it will work."

"Better than that fuckin' mermaid?" The rougher voice had a sneer in it, as one who does things sometimes sneers at one who simply knows how but has no practical experience.

"Oh yes, these two already know how to talk human." The second voice sounded wounded, not that an experiment had failed but that it had been counted as a failure of accomplishment by the other.

"And they speak English. Talk about luck."

"We make our luck, Caliban, old soul. We make our luck."

The lean man suddenly peered around, as if fearful of being discovered. Moving quickly, he eased himself back into the shadows of the jungle.