People on Earth taught me an expensive lesson of not valuing the free things, look at what they did to the precious Earth. This lesson proved to be expensive because not valuing free nature is affecting all of us, including me, indirectly. Because not valuing free things started slowly affecting the universal abode, I decided to not follow this expensive lesson further but unfortunately, I’m not the only one living on this Earth that if I stop following something, all the destruction stops. My point is, these humans who agreed to join us in this survival are the same, most are the same. They got free food from us and they are not respecting firstly the free food and secondly us, the ones who gave them the food, well it was Xavier but never mind, they should be appreciating us not screaming at us.

First of all, they suck, and second of all, I shot the Russian woman with a tranquilizer dart to make that hostage kid stop crying. I did a good thing for free and the prize I got was suspicious and scary looks from others, even the parent of that hostage kid pulled their kid away from me and hid him behind their back.

Zain showed them the dart and they had the relief that no murder took place in their hideout then the companion of that Russian woman had to step up and start turning everyone against me. She got them into believing that I might kill them for my own selfish reasons. I swear the convincing power these women hold is worth saluting, even I believed that I might kill someone in their sleep if I’ve to.

Xavier stepped up in my defense like I needed one and he explained to them that it was a harmless tranquilizer dart that I shot to save the kid and still they suspect me to kill them in their sleep.

“She herself said that she won’t hesitate to kill anyone if it keeps her safe. She can’t stay with us”, the Russian woman says eyeing me suspiciously.

She’s right, I might let someone die and not help them and run away if that’s the thing that ensures my safety. There’s a difference, I won’t use anyone as my shield to protect myself from the bullet, but if they get shot in saving their asses then I won’t stop to help them too. We must survive in our own bubble, that’s my point.

“They shot me too when I went to fetch water”, the dad of that hostage kid slash the man whom Zain and I shot near the waterfall spoke up to add fuel to the fire.

“I bet she’s hiding weapons and food in her bag”, that Russian woman said with confidence.

Normal innocent people would open up their bag and show them all the supplies inside to prove their integrity but I ain’t one of them. I’m having weapons and food and I ain’t proving anything. If I wouldn’t be having anything then also, I wouldn’t have opened up my bag to prove anything.

“Show us your bag if I’m wrong”, she asks with a half-smirk. Oh, she’s a villain!

“I’ve weapons, food, and liquor in my bag and I ain’t giving anyone any of it, if you want the bullet then piss me off”, I say and make my way to the rifle that was lying on the ground.

The nerves of my brain clenched tightly that its effect reached down to my lip and my mouth parted slightly in shock that Kelly stepped back instantly in fear when I bent down to pick up the lying rifle. What I don’t understand is why they think that I would kill them? I thought Kelly was among the minority, guess I was wrong.

My inner self feels uncomfortable to continue living with them in this hideout. If they fear me and think I'm the one they should be scared of then let them think that, I won’t waste my time in proving my point. We’ve got the map, we can find another hideout.

Tossing the rifle to Zain, I asked him to follow me up out of the timber cave. “Xavier gave you the food which was meant for us three and I resisted this idea, nonetheless he did so you can thank him for this humanitarianism and I was thinking of myself and that’s how it’s supposed to go in survival”, I explain my personal opinion that I hold for survival to them. I won’t stay in a place where I’m not welcomed.

I tossed the blueprint of the island to the Thai guy not giving him any reason to ask it from me or insult me unnecessarily. He caught the blueprint with his incredible reflex and fixed his locket considering something. I hope that he’s not considering joining these people in taking out his frustration on the target, the target is currently me. Ignoring him and everyone else, I half crouched to start the crawl.

“How can you be selfish?”, an American man asks when I was about to start my way up the timber cave.

“Why can’t I?”, I ask with a mocking and disappointed smile. Now I’m leaving from here and still, they have problems with me.

I understood the pattern, they are frustrated and they need someone to take out their frustration on and I’m the target they made. They will resent me, talk behind my back and do everything they will to feel better about themselves.

“I don’t know, because you are a woman”, he scoffs and I laugh at his answer.

By this time, I started my way out of the cave, and Zain came beside me to stand with me. Hearing this discriminated response from that man I stopped and turned back to witness him shrugging off.

“Is there something like a myth that women should sacrifice every time?”, Zain asks in a disgusted manner to that man.

Understanding the situation that I’m leaving from this place, Silver looked to the crowd and ran towards us holding her bag tightly in her arms.

“No, but we usually put others first”, the Russian woman stood up to support that discriminated answer and kept her eyes on Silver to watch her run towards me.

“I know, right? Women are full of love that they lack love for themselves”, I say in a sarcastic tone. This shut them up.

I ain’t digging my claws in their throat to fight with me and still they keep on finding the reasons to argue with me. Maybe they argue because they saw the courage in me that they lacked or maybe they are just those thoughtless teachers who ask students to leave from the class when they knew that they won’t win a losing argument against the student.

Xavier took out the tin of beans from his bag and gave them to two Indian men who were sitting silently in the corner, not minding any of us. “May God keep you safe”, one of them gave his blessing touching Xavier's head and Xavier whispered something in his ear.

There ain’t no God to save us, if there would be God out there then what bad deeds did we all do to run through this survival. They say it’s all karma, I understand that I ain’t a good or a bad person, I’m just a human then what about this little Silver? What bad karma did she serve to witness this all?

After handing the tin of beans to those Indians, Xavier too ran towards us. Zain nods towards Xavier to appreciate his support. I held Silver's hand to guide her out of the tunnel. Taking one last look at the cave, I crouched down to start crawling my way out of this place that I never wanted to visit. Behind me, Zain helped Silver to crawl inside the tunnel. So it’s just us four now. Four better than three, I guess?

“They will die out there”, “They are foolish to think that they will successfully steal out food from the facility”, I kept on hearing those judgmental and disappointing comments from the majority. I heard it less clearly because it stopped echoing not too soon when I saw dim lights hitting the timber tunnel.

That’s human nature, they always do dirty to the one in the spotlight. Till the person in the spotlight do good things or help others, they applaud them but as soon as they make a single mistake or others throw dirt on them, it suddenly takes over the whole world like a tidal wave and people will start criticizing them forgetting their good deeds, people will criticize them without even knowing the story of the innocent one.

I was stupid to help the hostage kid, I was stupid to divert their focus on the major problem, I was stupid to not punch Xavier when he agreed to come here and I’m still being stupid by listening to their comments, the comments which can bring our confidence down and stop us from doing the apparent.

“Maybe we are foolish to assume that things will work out in our favor, we presume because if we don’t then we would be you and I would feel lily-livered if I’m you”, I hear Xavier shout scream from behind. Hearing him say those words to them had me smile proudly thinking that he finally is adapting to his surroundings or maybe he had enough of them. Being good is good but sometimes being selfish is mandatory.

I know that my absence won’t matter to them because my presence always bothered them but still they might regret their actions sometime soon. Not the choice of not following us but targeting me, in particular, to take out their frustration, I wish they do admit their guilt to this.

This crawling got my knees dirty again and I felt the disgust of what the circumstance is making me do. Following the light, I made my way to the end of the tunnel, or might it be the starting, whatever. Before letting my body out in expose to get shot, I peeked out and looked at the sides to make sure that it was safe for us to go out. When I was satisfied by the dead silence of the surrounding, I limped out of the tunnel and checked on the surroundings again keeping the rifle in my hand.

“Little help”, Silver squirmed. Bending down, I reached out my hand for her to take it and move out from the little society down there. The little society that would’ve killed this innocent kid with their words alone.

Soon Zain and Xavier made their way out of the tunnel and I was surprised to see the Thai guy following behind them. I would hate to admit this but he is a practical and smart person to make reasonable decisions. If he would’ve stayed with the little society then they would’ve silenced him before listening to his idea of going through the map. So we are five now.

“Little help please?”, I heard a familiar voice from the tunnel. When Zain moved out of the way to look behind him, I saw Kelly holding out her hand. She’s following us too?

Zain and the Thai guy helped her out of the timber tunnel and pulled her up to her feet. “I ain’t burning with them”, she says with a laugh thinking that it’s funny what she said.

I conclude that she meant for the little society to be plastic and it’s burning soon, slowly but soon enough to spread its dirty ashes all underground for the new generation to suffer, and she ain’t burning with them.

“So?”, the Thai guy asks when no one laughed at Kelly's irony.

“Heather. To Heather”, I say and gesture for the Thai guy to open up the blueprint of the island.

I saw this Heather place on the map and it is the nearest place with tree huts and hopefully food. In the blueprint, Heather was shown as treehouses so I guess it’s the home for the tribal. I wonder if we will get to meet any tribal there, I highly doubt it.

The Thai guy took out the map from his bag and opened it wide for everyone to see. “It’s near and we don’t know. It can be dangerous too”, Kelly concludes. “Any better option?”, I ask her with a straight you don’t have any ideas then shut up face. She shook her head in refusal and kept mum.

The Thai guy kept on studying the blueprint carefully. He looks intelligent and maybe he is logical. I want to ask him how he got his hands on this map but I'll wait. When he’s considering something he looks like he’s the smartest person here and maybe he is because he made the practical decision to follow us.

“I think Heather is good to go. If they are trying to kill us then they would’ve killed the tribal too I guess and if there might be any tribal then they would be working with the killers. Because we are dealing with humanoids here and we know that they lack the survival instinct, we can conclude that they are killer machines, rifles or guns won’t take them back. We can check the presence of humanoids by throwing something like a doll if we’ve got one because if they would be there then they would be waiting for any human to go there and because this is the nearest place to use as a hideout the chances of them waiting there for us are low because they might have left already by waiting yesterday and today”, the Thai guy concludes after calculating this whole situation. I nod in approval. “I’ve got a doll”, Silver informs taking out a penguin stuff toy from her bag. The Thai guy takes that stuff toy and nods in approval.

“He is smart to not mention the use of the rifle to check for any presence because the humanoids do not react to gunshot sounds. They might react on seeing the doll and by the time they start chasing us, we could hide in the nearby abandoned facility there, it’s named Catalyst on the map. If we get caught by the humanoids at Catalyst, then it will be the dead end. Fight or die situation”, I add to the strategy, making clear that we’ve got only two options.

If we are to explore this island together to survive then we ought to be honest about the options, let it be bitter. If they are afraid then they might crawl down to the timber tunnel right now. I personally think that this underground cave is safer than wandering around but after I lived in there for something like three hours, I understood that being in clear is safer than being in a group with the little society.

Kelly shrugged and bit her lower lip in nervousness. She might be considering the options. Sighing loudly she opened her bag with great agility that diverted everyone's focus to her. “Fuck it. We will survive”, she curses out loud enough for us to hear and zipped up her bag after she took out a beer tin, the same beer tin I’ve.

She might need a booster to overcome her fears that’s why she’s gulping down the liquor in one sip. She kept on gulping down her fear and we all watched her do it, I am watching her because I have no better thing to do at this particular moment and others are watching her because they are waiting for her to say something after she’s done gulping her fear down her throat. “Daebak”, she moaned by burping out a little and wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Anyone?”, she asks holding out the tin if someone is in desperate need of a booster.

When no one accepted her offer, she shrugged and continued to finish the tin. “We should be moving”, the Thai guy asks looking at me and I nod in approval. Kelly shows a thumbs up and burped again. “I’ll finish it”, I offered and she smiled before handing me the tin.

I gulped down the 33 percent of remaining liquor and threw the tin in the bushes nearby. “Let's get moving”, Xavier asks. The Thai guy mentally thanked Xavier and took the lead.

Heather is about 18 miles away from the hotel. The waterfall is about 13 miles from the hotel. We walked for maybe 2 hours from the waterfall to this underground timber cave so it makes for 6 miles from the waterfall to this timber cave. We are on the west side of the waterfall and Heather is in the middle so it might take a maximum of 30 minutes from here, 1.5 miles. I should’ve focused on Physics more to calculate the exact miles and hours but I had to ignore Physics thinking that I would never get stuck on Arbmtys with humanoids hunting us around, only if I knew than I would’ve respected Newton more.

“I gave the last two tins to those Indian men, the two who were on fast. They were praying for survival by staying hungry”, Xavier starts the conversation.

Maybe he’s explaining his actions because he couldn’t justify his philanthropy after how we were treated. Xavier was the one who argued for me, same with Zain, I was the center of taking out their frustration.

What’s special today to fast? Full moon? Nah, it was new moon day yesterday. Still, going on a fast at times like this? “The way they preach is absurd. Why should I starve myself to make God happy? If starving AKA fast was the way to please God then the beggars, homeless and stray people would be the richest”, I speak out my thoughts because I want anyone to argue on this topic with me.

I thought that I'd get into a debate on this topic but to my surprise, no one disagreed with me, they agreed with me. Seems like we are creating a non-superstitious, practical, and democratic society. This ain’t society to be realistic, we are in solo survival here, we are just continuing in the group because we’ve no other option and society can’t be this rationale, if it’s rational then it ain’t a society.

This is such a stranger thing I’m doing right now, not being solo. Seems like I’m really adapting this time. I was right about the thing that being with strangers will make this harder than being with enemies. At least enemies know us more than we do and being with strangers means we need to start all over again from the confidential. Being with a stranger means not knowing if he’s a human or a humanoid. I do wonder what got into anyone to create humanoids but I ain’t going to find these answers to why or else I will hesitate.

It is said by Zain the great that the least tolerant should avoid alcohol, Kelly should’ve dragged her ass from America to India to listen to these wise words from Zain back in 2020. This has to be the moment where I’m least cautious because Kelly is stealing all my focus by walking trippy. To ease her biggest problem of walking, I held her by her arm and guided her to follow the Thai guy.

Silver has to be the most intelligent kid I’ve ever met, besides I never engaged with any kid before, she understood that I’m helping Kelly to walk properly because she’s drunk so she took off Kelly's bag from her back and hold onto it.

“Give it to me”, Zain asks pointing to my bag and I scowl at him. He’s already holding his bag and the sniper case, where is he supposed to hang my bag, on his ear?

He scrunched his nose in annoyance and bent down to match Silver's height. “Don’t be like her when you grow up”, he whispered loud in Silver's ear. Silver laughed at this and the Thai guy turned around to glare at two kids. Zain kept his pointer finger on his lip making Silver do the same and they walked quietly afterward.

I was somewhat correct by the time I estimated of 30 minutes and the distance of 1.5 miles, it took us exactly 36 minutes according to the digital watch on Xavier's wrist, to cover the distance from the timber cave to Heather. Holding half of Kelly’s weight made me sink down to make the distance of 1.6 miles. She reeks of alcohol and it’s my favorite smell. Kelly is not exactly passed out or drunk, she’s somewhat in her senses to keep mum the whole time or maybe she’s crapulous to be the contrary of her sober personality.

The Thai guy stopped in his track when he saw tree huts from distance. I suppose we ain’t crossing over the bushes for now. “We are here”, the Thai guy announces to make this news official.

****