The InditeCircle

“You’re kidding me, Terrance.  This is beyond ridiculous.”

Four right hands clasped at right angles, forming the spokes of a human wheel.

“Randy…Just do it.  We need a clean start.”

A reluctant fifth joined the web of palms and fingers, ruining the symmetry and weighing down the whole.

“We will work together.  We will be rescued. We pray for strength, resolve, and fortitude.  We steel ourselves against fear, infighting, and divisiveness.  Let us begin as one.”

Finally beginning to emerge, the sun beat down first through cracks in the clouds and then spaces between the five arms.

“Preachy and longwinded, Brad.  I think all we really need to do is agree not to kill the pig, slit its throat, or above all spill its blood. Cool?”

The four originals dropped in concert, leaving the fifth hovering by itself, providing a few more seconds of shade before it too retracted.

“Wouldn’t now be a good time to stop being a jackass, Randy?  At least while we figure out how to help Keith?”

Four pairs of gentle hands cupped his body, spacing evenly around him to give maximum support.  Shutting his eyes as he ascended, he felt himself swaying back and forth, the darkness sloshing around his head.

“Wouldn’t now be a good time to stop being a permanent PMS bitch, Linda?”

The eight hands gripped almost imperceptibly tighter, but the rocking continued, as did the smooth, womblike glide.

“There is no time to act like children, Randy.  I suggest you bite your tongue if you are able…I think that is far enough.”

He started to sweat in anticipation of the landing, soft though the hands were trying to make it.  When the impact came, he tried to scream, but found that his mouth and lungs would not cooperate.

“Interesting phrase there, Brad.  Should I bite hard enough that we can have ourselves a nice, flopping little dinner?  Or does somebody have a better idea of what we’re going to do for food?  What do we have, one knife between the six of us?  Does anyone even know where the hell we are?  What about you, Mr. Acting Captain?”

A long, slow stream of air was inhaled and exhaled near his feet.

“You’re pushing it, Randy, you’re really pushing it… We’re all tired, we’re all scared, and we’re all damn near punching your dumb ass.  Will you stop being so fucking selfish for five minutes, for Keith’s sake if no one else’s?  Alright?  Our first priority is cleaning him up… Being an idiot is secondary.”

Snorts of disgust came faintly from the distance as a hand brushed his temples. 

“Aye-aye, Cap’n Crunch.”

“Randy, I swear to God—“

“Boys! Cool it!...Thank you…George, that flap of your uniform is about to come off.  Could you tear it so I can use it as a compress for Keith’s forehead?  It feels way too hot.”

An assenting grunt, a rapid ripping, a damp cloth.

“So what do we do now, Cap’n?”

“Randy—“

“Ignore him, Terrance; we need to get moving.  I’ll look after Keith.  Why don’t Brad and George go find something to eat while you work on making a shelter.  And if Randy will cut the bullshit, he can help.”

The voices around him began to fade, still audible but only just.

“This whole situation is bullshit.”

“So stop adding to it.”

“Randy…Linda’s right: we do need to get things going…Is everyone ok with what she suggested?”

“You’re the Cap’n.”

“God dammit, Randy!  Will you stop—“

“Shit, I think Keith stopped breathing!”

The pain roared back, and the darkness deepened.  


Log: Day 2 - Terrance

Unsurprisingly, this was the only bag the storm didn’t pop the seal on; we don’t have any real food, but we do have a notebook.  Hot damn…With any luck, though, this will be the first and last entry.  The Citizen’s Brigade always looks after its own, and even with all the chaos, that last transmission went through.  No question.  They know where we are, and we should be off this rock in a day…two tops.

Which might not be soon enough to keep someone from strangling Randy.  Fucking moron…but he did manage to patch together a decent lean-to.  And George and Brad found a few roots and berries Linda swears are edible, so we’re getting by…I’ve already walked up and down the beach three times this morning looking for wreckage we can use.  That scene in Swiss Family Robinson where they raft out to the sinking ship and float back barrels and livestock keeps playing over in my mind…Why can’t it be that easy?

Keith looks a little better, or at least he’s breathing easier.  Hopefully he’ll be able to talk again, soon…and maybe be captain again.  I’d at least like to get his advice on a few things…Not that he’s had any more training than the rest of us for this…Once folks start waking up maybe we can brace the lean-to and explore the area (island?) a little and find the best spot for a chopper to land…And maybe figure out where this damn war took us.  If I’d known joining up would mean dealing with 



“What the fuck, Randy?  Why the hell are you so god damned inconsiderate?  Jesus, man…I can’t believe you just did that!”

He leaned back on the pillow of leaves and sand, watching the latest drama from his shady vantage.

“You asked me for some kindling.  I got you some.”

“You know what I fucking meant, Randy.  Twigs, god dammit.  Fucking twigs…Why are you such an ass?...You’re this close, asshole, this fucking close—“

“Randy, why are you always starting something with somebody?”

Looking back down, he resumed drawing with his good arm, re-tracing the lines where the sand had trickled back in.

“He burned fourteen pages of the journal, Linda.  Fucking burned them…Ripped them out and used them to start the fire…I didn’t realize until I saw the last page crinkled up and all black…Jesus, Randy.  What the hell’s wrong with you?  Seriously.”

He glanced up, reacting to the sharp, meaty noise of a slap.  Randy was recoiling with a bemused look in his eyes, his hand pressed to his jaw.  Linda’s fists were balled up at her hips.  He went back to his sketch.

“How on earth can you be such a prick?”

“The signal fire’s lit, right?  So who cares?  And it’s not like Terrance is Robinson Crusoe or anything.  No one will care what we write, because no one’s going to find us.  Or anything we leave behind.  The whole damn world’s probably killed each other off.”

“Don’t let him get to you, Terrance.  Terrance?  Terrance!  Cool it.  And self pity doesn’t give you the right, dip shit.”

“I think you’re overreacting, Linda.  And it’s shocking, really shocking.”

“Fuck off.  That journal is maybe our last link to civilization, and you’re igniting it while you spout off another retarded literary reference.  It’s as sad as it is stupid.”

The conch shell was distinguishable now, though each groove still needed to be redefined.  Wet sand would be easier…But there was a certain charm to the constant renewal, the ongoing negotiation with his medium…He stayed where he was.

“The fire’s lit, Miss Priss.  Get over it.”

“You fucker—“

“Randy, I’m through with your lip.  No more, not to me, not to Linda, not to anyone.  Just shut up and leave us alone, alright?”

He had heard the derisive laughter too many times to wonder about its source.

“Aye-aye, Cap’n.  Enjoy the fire.”

More of the laughter, but it was receding…Detailing the shell would be difficult, though.  Unless he made it bigger, much bigger, so large that a few stray grains of sand sliding back into the lines would not matter.

“…Let him go.  He’s a dick, but at least he brings in more than his share of the food.”

“I can’t believe he did that…Fucking idiot…”

“He’ll come around eventually.  And even if he doesn’t, who says we ever have to see him again once we get out of here?...Have you seen Brad and George lately?”

“No…keep losing track of them…He fucking burned them…”

Feeling a yawn welling up, he called it quits and reformed his pillow.

“Don’t let him get to you.  We’ll need him less when Keith gets healthy.”

Lying back, he closed his eyes, humming softly with the rhythm of the surf.  

“If he ever does…”

“Don’t say that.  C’mon.  Let’s go for a swim.”

“…Alright.”

The island’s sheer wealth of inspiration was exhausting.

Log: Day 23 (?)    Brad

Our prospects for rescue grow dimmer by the day, and I for one have stopped holding my breath.  Life on an island paradise suits me better than academia ever did, and is so far beyond a draftee’s lot in the military that I can not even make the comparison.  I have trouble envisioning a return to “civilization” as we knew it; I have stopped praying to be saved.  I think we already have been.  If only the rest of the group felt the same way.  With Randy in the mix, though, I doubt we will ever enjoy real harmony. 

But I have learned to deal with acerbic characters before; Keith is the companion really beginning to trouble me.  As indeed he has been worrying us all, each after our own fashions.  He grows more self absorbed by the day, more introverted the longer he goes without speaking.  And it seems clear he should be physically capable of conversation; he is withholding, though it is anyone’s guess whether it is a conscious decision.

Even Randy seems to be concerned, despite his all too prickly way of exhibiting it.  Terrance at least has found a common spirit in Linda, as I have found solace with George, but Randy has no clear cut partner.  And so he seems to have elected Keith: without his constant direction, our former captain would never eat, wash, or do anything to maintain himself in the slightest way.  If we could all remember that, I think relations would be a little less strained.

When Terrance is not letting his buttons be pushed, however, he has shown a remarkable capacity for leadership.  He no longer looks to Keith to resume command, and sounds a little more confident and authoritative with each insightful order or explanation.  It is a pity that he stopped penning his reflections after Randy’s ugliness, but I am glad he was kind enough to relinquish the journal when I felt the need.  I will have to convince George to partake in this release; it is a soothing exercise, even if it is as worthless as Randy claims.
A final comment before I exceed my self-imposed space limit (and what will we do when we fill these pages from cover to worn cover?): food has become a remarkable minor issue of late.  The island is unbelievably bountiful, and the recent anthropological studies suggesting that a hunter-gatherer lifestyle requires only a few hours a day of foraging seem to be true.  Randy in particular has proven adept at bringing in a steady stream of sustenance.  We do not lack for meals: the question is what to do with our free time.

Not a bad problem to have, and I doubt we should be asking for anything more.



He whistled in anticipation as he punched the last hole, pressuring the boar’s femur with his improvised awl until the bone gave way.  After satisfying himself that the final aperture was uniform enough, he set the awl down and brought his creation to his lips.  He
breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth, and his fingers began a busy dance.

“What the hell is that eerie noise?”

“Now that is something…Keith was manufacturing a toy from the bones of that pig Randy butchered.  He probably made himself a wind instrument—our former captain is growing more resourceful by the day.”

Closing his eyes as he leaned his head back, he breathed faster, danced harder.

“If it brings his mind back, I’m all for it.  At some point it would be nice if he started pulling his weight around here…”

“We’re managing without him, Terrance.  It’s not like he eats much; I’d say we were spoon-feeding him if we actually had spoons.”

He paused for a few moments, listening to the call of the tide.  Nodding once, he resumed dancing.

“I would say he is more than doing his part if he keeps producing music of that quality.  A beautiful melody, if a bit haunting.”

“It doesn’t bother you that he’s gone off the deep end while we do all the work?”

“Terrance…”

“Not if the results are this transcendent.  In fact, George should hear this.  Did he say when he would be back, Linda?”

“Afternoon, I think.  He and Randy were going to check all the traps and set some new ones.”

His speed accelerated almost beyond his ability to maintain it as he felt himself beginning to really tune in.

“Ah well, hopefully he can hear it from where he is.  Will you let me know when they reappear?  I think I will rest a bit if nothing more is needed, Terrance.”

“Go ahead.  And we’ll let you know.”

Stopping once more, he cocked his ear, waited until he was sure, and started dancing again, slower than before, his eyes still shut.


Log: Day 38 (maybe) Lisa

I wish there was a way to bring the two camps back together.  We’re so polarized now, and it’s not like there’s any reason for it, more just that we’ve drifted in different directions the last two weeks.  Mutually grown tired of each other I guess.  Once Randy so eloquently convinced us we might as well give up on the signal fire, we basically went our separate ways.  Which I guess is what we were all secretly waiting for, because how else do you explain giving up hope after only a few weeks?

Brad seems more than happy with this life, as long as he’s not far from George.  And Terrance has been a lot more laidback now that he can set his responsibilities aside.  But Keith…if anything could bring us back together it would probably be him reviving.  I think that’s another lost hope we’re all resigned to, though.

Actually, I guess it’s three camps now.  It’s funny how much it slips our minds, but Randy has really been good about looking after Keith, and he seems so proud of him.  He was the first to notice that amazing carving in that gnarled, old tree, and he called us all over to look at it.  It’s surprising how fatherly he seems sometimes.  Such a contrast.

I’m glad this journal still ties us together (or at least the first two camps); making the trade every few days is the only time we really see Brad and George anymore.  I think I’m right in saying that it’s an unspoken rule not to read each other’s entries, or at least I hope it’s been one, but flipping back through my own is comforting somehow.  It’s not like we’ve come that far, but we’ve definitely made progress.

But what happens when we run out of space?



The knight definitely looked better in wet sand; the shift from the dry had been worth it.  But the breastplate actually seemed a little too bright now…Those darker shells.  There.  That gave the armor the right level of rust.

Standing up, he surveyed his two dimensional warrior, picturing how the tide would lap away the sand supporting each interlocking circlet as it eased in.  A white greave would flutter here, a crimson gauntlet float there, and the whole suit would inexorably fissure, drifting back to its beginnings in a hundred pieces.

Beautiful…But the knight still needed a weapon.  A sword?  That strip of wood…He walked over to it, bent down, and studied with his eyes and fingers.  Dull and rotten…Once it was sharpened, it would fit nicely.  Scrambling up and down the beach, he looked for the right sized shell, located one, and shattered it on a half-submerged rock, unconcerned when razor edged shards exploded outwards.

“Keith?  Keith!”

His blood began trickling out into the ocean in the most amazing, amoeba-like patterns.  He did nothing to stop its flow, engrossed in the way his sluggish vitality pulsed with the surf.  Now receding, lengthening.  Now advancing, compressing.  Always the shade of sunset, whirling languidly around his feet.  Backwards and forwards, diluting and replenishing.

“Jesus, Keith…That looks pretty bad.  Here, hold this on it until I can get some bandages together.  I’ll…No, keep it on there.  Like that; we need to keep the pressure steady.  I’ll be right back.”

So beautiful.



Log: Day 45 George

Things have been shook up since Randy saw the plane yesterday.  The fool couldn’t make out the markings, though.  Or more likely didn’t look for them.

The meeting last night was the first with everyone in two weeks.  Minus Keith of course.  He’d made himself some kind of drum.  Sounded alright, but then it usually does.

We all agreed to get the signal up and smoking again.  But after the rain two nights ago wiped out our fires, even my covered one, it meant burning the journal.  The wood was so wet it still didn’t start easy, but it did start.  Might’ve been a waste, but we did agree to save one entry each. I didn’t like any of mine, so this is my one.  They left me too much space, though.

The way I see it, either we’re rescued in a few days, or we’re here for good.  And who knows why the plane was even in the area.  Maybe the fighting’s spread this far south.  Which means they won’t be looking to rescue people right away.

We’ll see.


He watched the twisting flames, picking out the disparate tendrils that combined to form the larger fountain of fire.  The setting sun seemed to cede its lesser cousin some of its dying brilliance, urging it to shine brighter and outstrip the moon.  Remarkable…

Standing transfixed until the sun was swallowed by the horizon, he rose and strode to his cache of supplies.  Once there, he turned back, and stared for another long while, focusing on the hollow between the dusty boulder and the miniature dune. 
It could be done.  He had all the materials now. The gourds, berries, charcoal, shells, bones, pebbles, stones, twigs, sticks, bark, clay, feathers, skins…It was time to begin.

He ground, he dipped, he brushed, he stroked.  He dyed, he set, he traced, he grooved.  Running, walking, stooping, squatting.  Stopping, sighing, reflecting, resuming.  Applying the finishing touches.  Done.

Leaning into the wind, he imagined the waves slowly eroding his heels as he rocked back and forth at the water’s edge and judged his product.  The signal fire at the piece’s center cast its shadowy brilliance over the crafted sand, sparking here and there as it caught a colored grain at just the right angle.

He would not surpass this.  After soaking it in for a few moments more, he turned and walked away.



Log: Day Who Cares - Randy

The last entry in the Bible of the Abandoned, neatly coinciding with my first.  It’s too bad I don’t have the heart to close this off the way it should be done.  But I’ll try:

A one man hybrid-flyer touched down just off the coast this morning and skimmed up to the beach.  The pilot woke up Linda and Terrance, and for once they were screaming together instead of taking turns.  That brought the rest of us running, and once we got there, we screamed with them.  If I had been the pilot, I would have hightailed it right then.  But the guy was so distracted he didn’t care: he was looking for “the giants in the dark.”

Stuttering poetry, he forestalled our shipwreck stories by blurting that what looked like “two titans m-m-making love in the n-n-n-night sky” had drawn him to our island and away from his reconnaissance mission.  He thought he was hallucinating, but he couldn’t make himself turn aside.  Eventually we led him to the signal pyre, and found exactly what he’d described, with the fire itself marking the meeting point between the two enormous pairs of lips.

Still awed, he’s off radioing for help while he tries to control his voice.  Brad, George, Linda, and Terrance are wolfing down the delicious bits of candy bar he was kind enough to throw our way.  And Keith has vanished. 
No one wants to leave without him, without our mute saint, our addled little Jesus.  But I think we’ve all more or less accepted that he won’t be found when we look.  Our little prophet has flown this sorry coop.

I sit here writing these last lines as I gaze at his final (?) creation.  I hear the dull thudding of an approaching chopper, and I feel the wind picking up.  Keith’s mural in the sand is being swept away, grain by grain, his gargantuan, androgynous lovers hovering in a haze of flickering colors and specks of brilliance before floating away forever.

Our rescuers are jumping onto the beach, laughing as they land.  Shiny boots, close-cropped hair, homogenous camo-outfits.  Gilligan’s theme song keeps jingling in my head.

I could care less who’s winning the war, or who won if it’s over.  Who makes sense of the few fraying pages still intact in this journal.  Or whatever.  Whose side these guys are even on.

Funny we forgot to ask the pilot that.

The End