Exiting Us: Part Two

At the island Essay made sure that the ground rules clearly included talking to John Friesen more frequently. Everyone in RIOT had been reassured of John's leadership skills (after all, anyone with perfect arching accuracy is someone worth paying attention to). Essay was also pretty on-the-ball, so their dedication and focus was given, for a time.

As with any group of ten-to-thirteen-year-olds, their attention began to wander when they realized just how small Widji Island really was. There was no running water. In fact, with the supplies dumped out in order to get more people into less canoes, there was no clean water at all. And no food. And no fire. So far luck was with them...

Helga led the chorus of whiners in several out-of-tune rounds of "It's a Hard Knock Life" from Annie and a few boys decided it was a good idea to squirt the dirty lake water at Giggie through their teeth. "What are we supposed to drink, Essay?"

She hadn't thought this through yet. Widjiitiwin Island was deceptively far away from the MBC shores and a return trip would take way to long for water. Essay grabbed the walkie-talkie from her backpack. "John?" No response. "John!" Riggs figured out that the radio was of the short-wave variety but her explanation of the electronic mechanics behind the whole system was so advanced that only Mike Fondse would have been able to understand. "Basically," she summarized, "You'll have to get closer and probably quieter to communicate. Why don't you float off shore a bit?"

So Essay took the walkie-talkie and headed out to talk to John. Before to long his voice came over the radio waves, loud and clear and calm. "I'm here, Essay. What's going on at the island?"

Chaos!" she admitted. "There is no water! What am I going to do?! I can't just come back!" But John was, as usual, way ahead of her. "I put some water purifying kits into the backpack you were carrying around on Monday. I knew they would come in handy eventually. It's a chemical thing - you just pour them into the water like Kool-Aid and it's okay to drink. Just make sure you ration them."

Essay paddled back to shore and showed the kits to her team. They decided to have a volunteer try the water first, just to make sure it was good, and Zack was the first to shoot up his hand. "It tastes a little like soap... but it's kind of sweet too." Then he poured the rest of the can he was drinking from over his face and smiled. Before long everyone was drinking the sweet and sudsy freshwater liquid from reused juice boxes, old cans found around the fire pit and anything else they could find that wouldn't leak. As the day got hotter and the sun got brighter, the people got restless and hungry. Water wasn't enough anymore. "Essay, what are we going to eat?!"

Essay, once again at the end of her rope and without any creative solutions of her own, jumped into the docked canoe and pushed off, walkie-talkie in hand. "John, they are getting hungry and grouchy and I have nothing to give them! One of my boys was talking about roasting up his flip-flop if I didn't come up with something soon - and I don't think he was kidding! Any ideas?"

John didn't miss a beat. "I've got an idea and I'll get Program on it immediately. You know the giant catapult we've been using on beach day? The water balloon one. Well, I've always wanted to try something on a bigger scale." John explained the rest of his plan and told Essay to go and get the kids ready for their meal. In a half an hour every RIOT member was wading in the water up to their belly buttons, waiting for lunch. "I feel ridiculous," Max said to Adam and Larissa. They shushed him as Essay walked out in front of the group.

Okay. I know some of you may be feeling a little ridiculous, but John has promised me that he is going to send food falling from the sky - so pay attention and keep your eyes on the horizon!" For a moment nothing happened... little did they know that there was an epic feat of brilliance going on right across the lake...

Chief, Wingspan, Gritz and Jemima were putting John's master plan into action. With the help of Ruben and his truck they had constructed a catapult (built mainly out of surgical tubing, balloons, rubber bands and extremely congealed spaghetti) that stretched back from two huge trees at the beach - one near the marina and the other by the swing set. The elastic part was pulled overtop of the docked boats, reached past the chained road block and was pulled almost all the way to Widji Road. In the basket (borrowed from housekeeping who was still out with several cases of swimmers ear), John himself placed the first care package. It was filled with chocolate bars, hot dogs, marshmallows, potato chips and rice. The rice was for the main dish - the other things were intended to mix into the rice and flavour it up a bit. When it was time to send it over, John gave the signal and Ruben let it fly.

Up and over the water the care package flew. In less than three minutes from it's launch at Widji Road the giant bag filled with supplies shot into view growing (it seemed) larger every second. With a HUGE splash their gifts landed just two feet in front of Essay. With lake water so far up her nose that she was a little worried about brain damage, Essay proudly hauled the bag back to shore. "See," she smiled in spite of her obviously pained, squinty expression, "John's got out back. It's even in a waterproof bag!"

For the next few hours everyone drank their water and ate their provisions with a song in their heart and a skip in their step. they played a few games and wrote a few cheers for John Friesen (to be recited when they finally returned to MBC mainland). After dinnertime, however, with nothing left to eat except flavourless rice and with every last purifying package used, RIOT got a little grumbly and sent Giggie to talk with Essay. "Ess, we need a better solution than water cleansers if we are going to stay here for long."

Essay climbed into her boat and went out to talk with John once more. "What am I supposed to do with these kids?" Once again John had been thinking ahead. "I've been working on figuring out that problem since I first heard you wanted to go. Tetnus has done some research and now I can tell you exactly what to do. Listen carefully..."

After she said her thank-yous and good-byes to John Essay headed back to the camp. The RIOT kids were planning a midnight canoe back to mainland, but Essay convinced them to stay and watch what would happen next. She took her paddle, marched over to a tree on the far side of the island and before anyone could protest or try and stop her she slashed the tree - HARD - with the thin wooden blade of her weapon. The tree shook and the paddle stuck deep into the bark as though it had been an axe, not an oar. RIOT gasped. Never before had they seen Essay do something so brash. Before she even had time to explain herself the sap began to flow. This rare, off-season maple tree was pouring out fresh, sweet sappy water at a quick and steady rate. "Don't doubt John and his resources, people," Essay said as she filled their vessels. "He knows what's up."

That night everyone slept as soundly as possible, considering that they had no blankets or pillows or toothbrushes or... well, anything, really. In the morning, Essay found another food package bobbing up and down in the water just off shore. They rejoiced over a fresh round of food, this one containing cinnamon buns and boxes of cereal along with more rice and hot dogs. All went well, until ten o'clock when they heard a strange sound... from the water, or rather from out on top of the water, came what sounded like shouts of war! Mini-Yo-We was attacking!!

"Battle of the camps, MBC!" Asterix and his crew shouted. "We're going to pirate this island for MYW so we can host a Survivor Day all our own! Into your ships and back to your beaches, RIOT!"

Essay pulled her thoughts together quickly. "Sensé!" She tossed him her paddle and grabbed the emergency kit tied to her canoe. "Take two boats of our strongest, fastest and most annoying kids. If we're going to keep this island you'll have to tip them!"

Sensé grabbed James, Ethan, Matt Bykiv and Denver along with a few others and headed out to meet Mini-Yo-We's navy. Meanwhile, Essay got some of the girls to gather up the small mirrors from each emergency kit. She then taped then to her canoe's other paddle and held in above her head, facing the oncoming canoers. The glass reflected the sunlight perfectly, right into their attackers eyes! Between the light they couldn't avoid and the distracting trumpet blasts from Matt's toy horn, the other camp didn't stand a chance. Billy-Diana held up Essays arms when she got tired and before long two of Mini-Yo-We's boats were tipped. They managed to rescue their watercrafts just before they sank into the depths of Mary Lake, but the remaining boats were in no shape to continue a fight. Astrix and his would-be pirates paddled back to their home shores, embarrassed, defeated and sopping wet. As they were leaving Essay called John and told him their story. "That's great!" he said, almost too proudly. "You should write that down and use it as a story or something one day - it is definitely an encounter worth remembering!"