“Sshhh, they’re going to hear you!” The three thieves tip-toed down the halls.

 They slowly stepped through the large doors of the large modern house Abigail and her family lived in. They crept behind Abigail as she lay on her large bed with headphones over her ears. Abigail bobbed her head and hummed to the music with joy. She breathed in the salty ocean air that blew through the window. As the thieves' shadows grew bigger when they hovered over Abigail, she slowly started to roll over on the bed just in time to meet the first thieves eyes, before she was knocked over the head and everything went black. 

Abigail's eyes flickered open to see her family sitting in the dark of a large underground room inside of a boat. She could feel the subtle bump of the boat crashing against the waves, and the sour scent of the seaweed stained water drifted up her nose. 

“I think she’s waking up,” 

Abigail murmured, “Mom?”

“Mary is that you?” the Henrington’s shook Mary softly,

“Mary? Darling, please wake up”.

Carol and Berry Henrington were surrounding a small body laying on the floor. It was Mary. Abigail couldn’t believe what she was seeing, even during this frightening time they could not help focusing on Mary.

Abigail was outraged, she felt her anger bubbling inside of her stomach and burst out loudly. 

“No, It’s me! I’m the one awake, not Mary!”

“You should be paying attention to me,” Abigail hissed

Carol and Berry slowly turned towards Abigail, their faces red.

“Oh Abigail, we didn’t realize you were awake”.

Berry Henrington hopped over to Abigail. The ceiling was so low that they couldn’t stand, but had to bend their back slightly, so that their head didn’t scrape across the peeling paint above them. 

“I know you're mad but you have to help us get out of here”.

Carol sighed as she spoke, “oh , Mary would have known exactly what to do”.

A small tear drop rolled down her silky white skin. Her cheeks were washed out and faded. Cold brushed the pale cheeks with a light rose color. Berry Henrington hobbled back over to his wife. Abigail had never seen her mother cry before. She had seen her cry of happiness before, Abigail remembered that day vividly. 

On her mothers birthday, in the bright green grass of the garden. The sweet scent of the magnolia flowers drifted through her nose. A young Abigail trotted through the long blades of grass to hand her mother a special gift, but when Abigail's small foot fell to the grass a hard object blocked its way. Mary slid her foot underneath Abigail and pranced toward their mother, placing a small box in her hands as Abigail tumbled to the ground. 

This was Abigail's opportunity to prove that she was better than Mary to everyone. Abigail could finally gain her parents praise. All she had to do was save everyone. 

Abigail squinted her soft blue eyes through the glaring beam of light that shone on her blank white face. The bright turquoise colored eyes gleamed in the dark. The warm glow of the sun slowly rising beamed through the small cracks in the floor of the boat. Abigail and her family had now spent one night in this dark, weary boat. Carol and Berry lay next to each other, asleep. Abigail slowly placed her hands in front of her and hoisted her body to stand under the low ceiling of the room. She quietly crawled to the door of the small room her family lay in, and opened the wooden door with a low creak. Abigail was shocked that the door had opened so easily. As quietly as she could, Abigail leapt across the hallways to a small window lined with wood. She could view the calming sway of the blue waves in the ocean. Abigail found her eyes meet a large wooden door across the hall. Something in the door called to her when she stepped closer to it. She slowly turned the cold, brass doorknob, and walked into the dark room. There sat a small, young girl coated in dirt, and shivering in the cold. Fear glistened in the young stranger’s eyes. Her voice quivered as she spoke.

“Hello?”

“Um, hi,” Abigail spoke.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?”

“Well I’m Abigail,” she said “My family was kidnapped and put on this boat. Who are you?”

“Julia,” she squeeked. “I’ve been her for a very long time.”

Abigail shifted her wait uncomfortably in the doorway.

She sighed. “Do you want to come to the room my family is in?”

Julia’s eyes widened, glowing in the dark. She softly nodded her head.

As she stood up to follow Abigail, it became clear that she had been starved. Julia slowly walked behind Abigail into the room her parents were in. Shock spread into Carol and Berry’s eyes once they saw Julia wobbling into the room.

“This is Julia”.

Carol grabbed Abigail's arm, pinching her skin, and pulled her into the corner of the room as Julia swayed patiently near the door.

“What is she doing here?” Carol hissed.

“I found her. When I woke up I noticed the door was unlocked so I went outside and found Julia in another room.”

“But what are we going to do with her? We can’t afford to have her get us into even more trouble than we already are in.”

Abigail noticed Julia looking at Mary cuiriosly.

“That’s Mary, my sister,” she said.

“For some reason she didn’t wake up with the rest of us.”

Julia nodded slightly. She opened her mouth to speak.

“Is she-”

“Alive?” Abigail said. “Yes, we checked her pulse”.

Abigail turned back to her mother.

“At least let her stay with us for now.”

“Fine. But remember, we don’t know who she is, or what she’s been through”.

The two shuffled back over to Berry and Julia, and sat in the room as the day slipped away.

The next day Abigail knew that they needed a plan. They could not stay on this boat any longer.

“So how are we going to get out of here?” she spoke.

“I don’t know Abigail,” her mother sighed. “I don’t know if there is a way out.”

“There is,” Julia piped up. 

Everyone turned to look at the girl sitting in the corner of the room. 

“There is a way out, Don and the others use this boat to ship things, sometimes the boat is even at the dock, but when it is they lock all of the doors.”

“Who’s Don?” Abigail cut in. “And why don’t they lock the doors?”

“Don’s the main guy here. He’s the one who calls all the shots, and everyone listens to. There are three guys on this boat, there’s Don, and then there is Bob and Rob,” Julia giggled. “They’re not very bright, and they say that they don’t lock the doors because no one is brave enough to risk getting caught, but I think they are just too lazy.”

“So how do we get out?” Abigail prompted.

“Well, the time where you would be least likely to get caught would be late at night, and there is a door at the end of the hallway that leads to the back of the boat where I heard there are boats you can use to travel to land”.

The team took hours working before they found their final plan.

Abigail looked around herself. They could tell that it was getting late when the boat grew darker. They would all wait until two in the morning, which Julia would be keeping track of due to the amount of time she had spent tracking time on this boat, and set their plan into action. 

“It’s time,” Julia whispered.

They stood and quietly tip-toed out the door, and down the long hallway leading to the back door. 

As Carol's foot landed on the wooden floor board a loud creek sliced through the silence of the boat. The sound of footsteps beating on the floor grew louder as one of the thieves inched closer to them. They quickly ran back to their room, but when they started opening the door the three thugs jumped out from across the hall. 

“Get them!” who Abigail assumed was Don yelled.

Don was very big. His head could hit the high ceiling if he jumped, and his muscles popped out of his arms. Bob and Rob stumbled behind Don as they leapt down the corridor, through an open door, and up thousands of stairs. Finally they reached the top of the staircase and stepped onto the large balcony of the boat.

“I think we lost them!” Berry gasped while carrying Mary in his arms.

They slowly crept towards the edge of the boat when a loud shriek rang through the air.

Don landed on the balcony with a loud thud. The whole floor of the boat shook, and the group rumbled to the ground, but Carol was sent flying in the air, and splashed into the cold, dark, blue water. Everyone turned to see the waves crash against the boat, and Carol sucked under the surface. 

Fear shot through Abigails lungs as she cried out. “Mom!”

A large wooden boat dropped from the boat, and Julia plunged into the water seconds after.

“Come on!”

Berry, clutching onto Mary with one arm, wearily crawled over the edge of the boat and let himself fly into the water.

Only Abigail was left now. She fearfully glanced at the storming sea below her as she climbed onto the ledge. Abigail’s mom doggy-paddled towards the raft, and shouted while choking on water. 

“Come on Abigail, you can do it!”.

Abigail squeezed her eyes shut, stretched out to the sky, and finally she slowly leaned forward into the air and dove into the ocean.

Abigail fluttered her eyes open to view the calming white clouds floating in the sky. Abigail was parched. Her lips grew dry and cracked, and she could taste the salty sea water sucking the moisture out of her mouth. Abigail’s back ached from the hard wood seat underneath her. She sat up and saw a small island getting closer and closer towards them

“Land!” she shouted.

Each person grabbed an oar, sliced it through the water's surface, and heaved the oars backwards shooting the boat forwards. After ten minutes the wooden oars hit the sand, and everyone jumped out of the boat. They fell to the hot sandy beach with relief. 

Abigail couldn’t care less about the hot sand that burned against the torn skin on her hands from rowing, she could lay on the beach forever.

Each person slowly stood up from the soothing, sandy beach. Abigail examined the endless blue water that swayed in front of them.

“Now how are we going to get home?”

Without the slightest bit of effort to be optimistic, they all simply sighed at Abigail, and walked through the Jungle ahead of them with the intention of finding their way through this island.

Seconds, minutes, hours passed as they have been tumbling through the jungle. A loud sound echoed through the trees and branches. Two people crashed through the giant, green leaves and onto the dirt. A girl and boy, they looked similar, probably siblings, maybe twins. They both looked around Abigail's age, but were much taller. Everyone jumped away from the barbarian - like kids. The pair inched towards them examining whether or not they were a threat.

“Hands in the air!” The boy grumbled. His voice was deep and gravely.

“Liz,” The boy pointed at their hands, and the girl rapped a long scratchy cord around each of their wrists

They gestured for them to follow the pair with a grim expression . They trailed behind the two kids scraping the dirt with their toes. The lines made a long trail.

They finally reached a small campsite with a fire and tents. Liz pushed them forward, and they stumbled onto a bamboo shelter. 

“What are we going to do with them Rico?” Liz asked. The girl's voice was high pitched but still grumbled.

“I don’t know, what do….”

Their voices faded as they came to a whisper. A rustling sound came from behind them. Mary rolled over on the bamboo bed. They all jumped.

“Who’s that?” Liz walked over to the shelter.

Mary’s eyes twitched but did not open. 

“She can’t wake up,” Abigail thought. “If she wakes up she’ll save the day, and leave me in the dust, and everyone will love her. I can’t let her wake up.”

Abigail leaned over Mary carefully observing her. Mary’s eyes kept twitching, then her head suddenly jerked to the left .

“I don’t think that’s supposed to happen,” Julia stepped backwards cautiously.

“Someone better tell me what is happening now!” Liz shouted trying to get their attention.

The clouds grew dark in the sky. Now Rico had joined the circle surrounding Mary. Mary’s eyes continued twitching and now her head was twitching too. Her body was hard and stiff as her eyes, head, hands and feet twitched. Finally Mary’s body relaxed, and she stopped twitching. Abigail sighed and rested her hand on Mary's arm. Her body stiffened again, and suddenly her whole body shook rapidly. The dark clouds filled the sky blocking all light.

“What is happening to her!” Rico pointed at Mary.

“What did you do?” Abigail's mother screamed.

“I didn’t do anything!” Abigail yelled back. 

Carol pushed Abigail away as she stumbled towards the front of the crowd of people, and Abigail stood in terror.

Thunder boomed, and rain poured down on all of them.

“It looks like she’s going into cardiac arrest!” Julia shouted over the thunder.

“Does anyone here have medical experience!” Berry cried, drenched in rain.

“We have two jungle kids, a rich girl and her parents, and a girl who was stuck in the dark of a gory boat for years. Who here is supposed to have medical experience?” Abigail snapped. 

Lightning struck in the distance. Carol glared at Abigail. 

“I think you need one of those paddle things to shock the person back to life or something!” Julia pushed her sopping wet hair out of her face.

“How are we going to get paddles here?” Rain poured down Abigail’s face.

The lightning struck again, this time a little closer to them.

“The Lightning!” Liz shouted, craning her neck to view the path that the lightning made. “Can’t the Lightning shock her back to life?”

“Wouldn’t that also kill her?” Abigail squinted her face to stop the rain from dripping in her eyes.

“But what if we set something up so that it limits the amount of force of the lightning,” Rico stepped next to Liz. “But it has just enough power to shock her back to life? Would that work?” 

“Maybe, It’s worth a try,” Julia yelled.

Carol sat next to Mary as the rest devised their plan. Berry asked what they would use to transfer the energy from the lightning to Mary.

“Lightning would be most likely to hit trees because they are the highest up, so we would need to connect something to the top of a tree, and connect that to something that is a similar shape of paddles, outlined with something that would block some of the power of the lightning.” Julia announced.

“How are we going to get a giant metal rod to connect to the top of a tree?”

Liz’s eyes widened. She ran into the bushes, and dug through the wet, sharp, bright green leaves, cutting her hands in the process.

Rico turned back to the group. “I don’t know, but maybe we can work on the paddles part first. We might be able to just get a metal pot and wrap it in cloth.”

Abigail was shocked.

“You guys have pots and pans here? Why? How did you guys even get here anyways?” Abigail pried.

Rico jumped as lightning struck again. It was very close to where they were set up this time.

“We don’t talk about it!” Rico blurted out scrambling away from the group.

“Found It!” Liz shouted in the bushes.

She held up an extremely long metal wire in her bloodied hand. 

“We can attach that to a tree!” Julia jumped in the pouring rain.

Liz nodded her head walking over to the group, and placing the metal wire in the middle of the circle. She then walked over to a small hut and wrapped a long piece of cloth around her cut and bloody hands. Rico ran over to Liz, grabbing the rest of the rest of the cloth, and clattered through a pile of silver pots.

Abigail climbed to the top of a tall tree that Julia calculated the lightning might hit next. She held the long wire that was connected to the pots that would shock Mary back to life. The wind, and rain pushed against Abigail’s arm as she was about to connect the wire to the tree.

“If I connect the wire then Mary will wake up,” Abigail thought. “And if she wakes up she will save everyone,” She looked under the storming branches to Mary laying on the bamboo surface. “I can’t let her save everyone. That’s what I’m supposed to do.”

“Abigail come on, your sister is dying!” Carol’s voice came from below.

“Dying” The word rang in Abigail’s head. She pushed against the wind and connected the wire to the top of the tree. 

Thunder crashed, and the raining clouds exploded with an enormous strike of lightning. Abigail's hand lay on the wire as the lightning struck the tree. Her hair flew, and the powerful bolt of lightning surged through her arm, and burst in her chest. The island grew dark, and the sky grew farther and farther away as the ground came up to meet her.

“I think she’s waking up,” a voice whispered.

Abigail opened her eyes to a bright, shining light. Her body ached and her chest burned. Her parents sat in the silky blue chairs from the nurse’s room in their house.

“I’m home,” Abigail thought.

Carol and Berry quickly stood up, and shuffled over to Abigail. 

“You’re awake!” Carol exclaimed.

Abigail sat up slightly, “Did it work?” she winced when she spoke.

“Did what work?” Carol held up a mirror, and adjusted her makeup.

“The lightning, and the paddles with the tree,” Abigail's head was foggy.

“Oh, that thing!” Carol put the mirror back into her purse. She chuckled. “Oh no, that did not work at all! The only thing it really did was shock you, but then I came up with this brilliant plan and….”

“So I was electrocuted for no reason?” Abigail thought as she lay her head back on the hard table. “What happened to Julia? And the two kids from the jungle?”

“....and then Mary saved everyone!” Carol exclaimed.

“Mary?” Abigail huffed under her breath.

Her face burned red in fury.

“Yes, Mary,” Abigail's mother said. “Anyways, the doctor said that you’re fine, and you might be sore for a while,” Carol pranced away from the table doing her makeup again.

Abigail clenched her fists. Pain pierced her fists as her nails dug into her hands, and her face burst with fiery anger. 

“I’m alive,” Abigail whispered.

She squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m home, and I’m alive.”

Mary, and Abigail’s mother drifted away from her brain, and Abigail let herself melt into the hard, wood table that ached her back. Much like the wood from the boat.