Survivor: LJ Idol, Week 1, Quest for Fire

I am already gripping the bony hand to steady myself when it occurs to me to wonder how I got here. I look up to face whomever is helping me onto the boat, wobbly in the unsteadiness of wood on water. A tall shrouded figure seemingly grows taller as I sink onto a creaking plank of a bench. The robed figure looms over me, meets my gaze, but within the hood, there is only black, inky darkness, a gaze with so strong a pull that I am nearly lurched out of my seat into infinite oblivion. I somehow tear my gaze away, rest my hand on my heaving chest, panting to regain control of my breath.

The figure faces away from me now, and I know it is only by the grace of their decision to release me that I am still sitting here in one piece. My hand trembles, and I take a long deep breath, feeling the dank air in my lungs, as vague memories of an attic, or could it have been a basement?, drift to the surface, stirred up by the scent of this place.

The figure holds a long staff, and pushes it into the water. The boat gives a small heave forward and the current ushers us along, slow and steady.

Mists crawl along the water’s surface, and the lapping water sounds like whispers; secrets determined not to be uttered, yet yearning to be heard.

I dare to risk a glance beyond the shores to our left and right as we pass. I see only swaths of darkness, with the barest hints of light, a mere suggestion of the concept.

"Here," says the figure, and each of my bones rattle at the sound of this utterance.

I raise my eyes just enough to see that he has extended something to me, a stick perhaps? I take hold of the gnarled twisted thing, and notice the splintered frayed bits at one end. The waters move us and we round past a pile of boulders, through a low hanging stone arch. I pull my head down low, and feel my hair brush lightly against the low ceiling of the tunnel. Sounds of water rushing grow louder. Our skiff moves through the tunnel, and jerks forward over a small wave, picking up momentum, as we enter a more open cavern, with tall walls and high ceiling. Stalagmites and stalactites surround us, reaching out for one another like hands across a divide. Perhaps even they seek each other’s comfort in this place.

The shrouded figure still impossibly standing, turns to face me, black cloak flowing around him, like the river itself.

"Choose," he states with a voice that is at once nowhere and everywhere.

Once again, a shudder flows through the whole of my being.

Just beyond my guide, there are two tall towers of calcification, and atop each one, a fire burning bright, beacons lighting the space, illuminating two potential paths. For beyond the towers sit two cavern entrances, each entry a precipice as dark and black as the shrouded figure's faceless void.

Our craft travels straight ahead, surging toward the rock wall separating the two caverns. Now I understand. My eyes dart back and forth and I yell, “That way!" and point with my gnarled frayed stick to the cavern on the right.

My guide barely waves his hand, and the boat changes directions, flowing toward the path I'd chosen.

Then, a voice from the left cavern rings out. And I know it. I know the voice! "Stop!" I say. But the shrouded figure has turned away from me and does not look back. Our boat stays the course. I stand.

"STOP!" I scream. The boat goes on.

I stumble with the pitch and toss of the wooden craft over the current. As we pass the large stalagmite torches, I make another decision: I leap!

I land hard against the stalagmite tower, and my hands struggle to gain purchase of the calcified tower. I desperately grasp at it. My fingers and wrist find their place among the many levels of tiered rock. I cling with earnest. Granules like salt sift beneath my fingertips, tiny bits and shards fall between my fingers and disappear into the waters rushing just below my feet. Even my feet and knees now grip with everything I’ve got as the mists snake around my ankles.

What have I done?

What do I do now?

Just then, from straight ahead, from deep within the cavern I'd chosen, I hear it - music. The darkness emits the most beautiful sonorous melodies I have ever heard. Without even thinking, I reach a hand towards it as if to grab hold, so compelling is the force of its beauty. And it is then that I see that I'm still holding the twisted stick in one hand. Tears fall down my face as I listen to love and life in keys and chords. I soften my grip and lean toward the music, filled with it, yearning to be closer to it, to become it.

And then... I hear it again. That voice. I know nothing… But I know that voice.

The left cavern is fading into darkness, and with it, the voice. I lean that way to listen, to make out the words. What are they saying?

In front of the dwindling torch, the darkening entrance, fading as the torch fades, the flame dwindling down, down to an ember, and then, to nothing.

It's gone.

The tower, the cavern, disappear from view, and the voice along with it.

Something stirs within. NO! I can't, I can't just... I won't let it... be gone!

I thrust my hand upwards and jam my stick into the fire overhead. I reach as high as I can and within moments, a flash. The frayed ends ignite.

Before I can change my mind, I release the rock beneath my grip and slide into the misty waters, hand held high. The icy current pushes me, stronger than I even expected, and I stretch my hand upward to protect the flame. My head bobs under the water, and my lungs burn as I try not to gasp against the cold. I hear a rush of voices, so many sounds, an onslaught of hopeful tendrils of longing. They reach for me. I kick hard and get my head above water and take a deep gasp of air. I kick as hard as I can, and sweep my arm through the water, with willing my one armed swim to be enough, to get me where I need to be.

I feel for it in the darkness and my hand grabs at anything, grabs at hope itself, but slips off of smooth wet stone.

This is it, though, it must be it. The dark tower.

I search desperately with my fingertips as my head goes under again, the cold water stinging my face. I hold one hand and torch still above the water, but only just. My other hand wildly attempts to swim upwards, to rise above the river’s surface.

I open my eyes wide against the darkness, and kick against the current. I do it! I breach the surface again, another gasp, and grab tight with fingertips and fingernails. I pull as hard as I ever have for anything.

There! I have it! I grab hold of the base of the rocky tower.

I latch myself onto the tower, still gripping the torch. I work my way up, inches at a time. With one hand I grip my other wrist, so that I can keep hold of the torch, still lit. I raise my feet, grab a new toehold, and push my whole body higher up, then readjust my arms. Higher, a little higher, until, with my raised torch, I see in the glow the blackened top of the extinguished torch. And I thrust my hand towards it. My torch touches the end, and slivers of black smoke unfurl from it, and roll away. Then, a spark. A flame. The torch is lit. And there is the entrance to the left hand cavern once more.

"HELLO?" I call into the void.

"Lacey!" I hear the voice say.

I look around for the boat. "Come back! I want to go this way!" I shout. But my captain is long gone.

"Laceyyy..." the voice says, quieter this time. The music, the indescribably lovely music calls out to me too, from the opposite side, though I hear that quieting as well.

I look at each cavern, the music, the voice, both fading. The two towerlights fading, the torch in my hand, dying out.

There is no more time to waste. One last look at the direction of the impossibly beautiful melodies, and tears fall as I turn away from it, release my grip, and dive into the frigid water, toward the cavern on the left, and swim as hard and fast as I can, even as the waters push me that way. There are a thousand voices in my head as I swim these waters, an abundance of memory and hope and hopelessness coursing around me, but only one voice I ache to reach...

and then...

Am I swimming in cotton? Am I even moving?

"Lacey? Oh, Lacey! There you are! My god!"

"Mom?" I say. I think I say..?

There are other noises, beeps, muffled things, none as important as the voice I'd heard, now right next to me. Mom's.

"Lacey, no, no, lie still..." Mom says.

“Lacey, can you hear us?” an unknown voice asks.

I watch my mother's eyes, so tired, so happy, as they fill with hope and tears that overflow down her cheeks.

She's holding my hand, the way she always has done when I've had a rotten cold, or any time I just felt sad. She holds my hand now, tight, and kisses the back of it, never loosening her grip, even as the other voice continues to speak.

Then a bright light shines into my eyes, first one, then the other. Ouch.

"Pupils responsive," the voice said. Then continued, "Lacey, can you blink for me, please?I'm Dr. Vanessa Easton. Please don't try to speak. There's a tube in your throat helping you breathe. You've been in an accident.”

I blink.

“It's good to have you back with us,” the doctor says with a smile. Then, to my mom, she adds, “She is strong. This is a very good sign that she pulled through that. We’ll keep monitoring, of course. I think she's really turned a corner. You’ve got a fighter, there.”

My mom nods, and tries to speak. She smiles, tears fall, and she manages, “Thank you..”

I think I like Dr. Easton.

My mother kisses my hand again. “Lacey... you came back to us... Oh, I love you so much. Thank you, thank you.....” she says and sniffles.

It's ok, Mom. I'm here, I say. In my head, anyway. I'm right here.

I give her hand a soft squeeze.

"Oh!" she says and squeezes back so hard it hurts. But I don't mind.

A suggestion of a memory of a melody floats faintly in the back of my mind. What is it?
I'm not quite sure. It just feels like... like some day, I’ll hear it again. Perhaps a long, long time from now. But not yet.

Not yet.