Gregory did not have to wait for what was to come. He knew what Mr. Bill was going to do; he saw it in his eyes. He also noticed that around Mr. Bill a black shadow was growing and flowing out of him. Gregory, not hesitating, runs at Jasmine and wraps her in his arms shielding her from the danger to come. Not a split second later the gun fires as both Jasmine and Gregory fall to the soft black sand of this new emerging world.
Mr. Bill fires the second shot as the door of the vehicle closes suddenly, surprising Mr. Bill. He quickly lunges back into the vehicle, and in doing so loses the grip on his gun and it falls onto the black sand. The vehicle flies up into the air slowly, turns and moves away from the island and towards its programmed destination.
Jasmine did not know what happened but had heard the familiar sound of the gun firing. She felt Gregory’s body on her and then it moved to the side and lay motionless. She manages to get to her feet and catch the last glimpse of the vehicle as it disappears into the blue sea and sky.
“What happened?” She asks Gregory, who was still lying on the sand. After a few seconds of no answer she looks towards him. He was not moving, and Jasmine realizes just at that moment that he was shot. Gregory had shielded her from the two shots that Mr. Bill fired. She quickly moves to his side and starts to examine him. She finds to her dismay that both projectiles had hit him, one on the side of the head and one hitting the middle of his back, missing his spine by an inch. The wounds looked deep and serious.
“Oh my Lord!” Jasmine begins to pray since she did not know what else to do, and tears start to flow from her eyes. After a few moments she turns Gregory fully over on to his back and puts her head on his chest. She hears his heartbeat, although faint, which meant he was still alive, barely. Quickly she remembers her backpack and opens it, pulling out the med gun and the last tube, the red one. She really did not know if it would do any good, because she did not know if it would help at all.
She inserts the tube into the med gun and then injects Gregory in the neck with the red fluid. She did notice that he was not bleeding as much as she thought and that was a good sign. She then looked about her to see what to do next. She and Gregory were going to investigate the island and see if they can build shelter together. She had uploaded her device with all the information Philomena had gathered as well as some survival information in case of emergencies. Now she had to try and do it on her own.
She hated to leave Gregory laying there but she had no choice. She looked about her again surveying the landscape. About twenty five yards from her there were a few medium size trees next to each other and then ten yards from there many trees formed the beginning of a jungle or forest. The information that was on her device about survival was old from a time long past. She became overwhelmed with the task now, before talking it over with Gregory they seemed to be filled with hope and promise but now all she felt was loneliness and dread. She stays on her knees and tears did not stop flowing, she could not move to do anything although her mind raced to push her to do something.
“Lord I need your help, I am scared and I do not know what to do.” She cups her face with her hands and sobs heavily. A wispy hand emerges out of the air and slowly touches her gently on the shoulder. As that hand touches her the slow materialization starts to extend upwards, slowly forming an arm, shoulder, neck, head, the other shoulder, upper body, lower body, and finally legs. “Do not be afraid,” the soft voice assures her.
Jasmine lifts her head as a deep peace overcomes her. She then turns around to meet the person speaking to her. To her amazement she meets the most beautiful being she had ever seen. She could not tell if it was man or woman but could see the flowing white garment about it and behind it a set of two colorful wings spanning six feet each. She falls back before the being and sits there in awe, but then bows her head in reverence.
The being grabs her and lifts her up, “do not bow to me, only God is one worthy of that praise, but I am like you my sister.”
She stands up with the help of the being and now fully in its presence. “who…” she begins to say slowly, “… are you?”
“You have just started to notice the reality of everything. I am your guardian ordained to you by the almighty one.”
“Fr. Ed… He told us about our guardian angels.”
“He is praying for you as well in the throne of heaven.”
“My Gregory is dying and I am alone here.”
“That is only for God to know, all he asks is our trust. Don’t you trust him after what you have come to know?”
Jasmine pauses thinking over all that has happened, “I know that it is hard, but despite that I choose to trust.”
“Good, now I will help you for a little while, but you must be strong and cast away your fear.”
“Thank you.” Jasmine’s heart is elated by this encounter as the guardian angel grasps her hand and guides her to the closest tree.
“Built a home here, it will be shown to you on your device. A gift from Philomena, through the Lord” The guardian angel reaches out and touches Jasmine’s device.
“Voice command active… device responding to alias Philomena…”
Jasmine looks from the device to the Guardian angel, “how is that possible?”
“With God nothing is impossible,” the angel smiles at her, “our saint on this earth had a gift with these devices and the stream.” Jasmine looks back at the device and starts looking at the programming, “this is incredible!”
“Yes it is…” The angel smiles, “follow the advice to help you survive and I will be by your side, maybe not visible all the time but always by your side.”
“Thank you,”
“You are welcome.” “Now ask her how to build a shelter and I will bring your husband her so you can build the shelter around him.” The guardian angel moves gracefully, almost floating and carries Gregory, like he was a feather, and brings him to the spot where Jasmine is standing.
Jasmine stands there looking at the device for a moment as her guardian angels moves away, “Philomena, provide information on building a shelter on an island?”
“More information needed… what type of island?”
“Can you do a geo scan and come to a conclusion.”
“Affirmative… scanning… Tropical island 60%, jungle 15%, forest 25%… Tropical closest proximity…”
Jasmine is astonished that she did not have to say the name of the device to ask it to do the scan after the affirmative. Then she looks back at the device’s programming and notices that it was very complicated, even for her to full understand it. It has to do with the tone of the person speaking and the sensitive touch response.
While Jasmine was in thought Philomena continues, “Scan shows two tools present to accomplish task of building simple shelter… Tools required… Opening instruction on how to build primitive tools…”
As Jasmine scans the information on the device her guardian angels places Gregory softly on the ground before her, “be at peace.”
Jasmine looks up at the angel, “thank you.”
“Remember I am here with you always,” and slowly the angel fades out of the material world.
Jasmine stands there staring at the empty air in awe.
“When ready step by step instructions can be provided to accomplish task…”
Jasmine moves her gaze back to the device, “I am ready.” Jasmine starts to follow the devices instructions on first building the tools, even if crude, they still will accomplish the job. Fallen branches, veins and rocks of different shapes and sizes made up the materials to use for building.
After a whole day of work, the makeshift shelter is built and she stretches and lifting her gaze to the heavens. She notices that the sun, which filled the sky all day, now was setting. She goes to Gregory and checks on him, he seemed to be doing better. The wounds were now dry, which told her the medicine was working, but it would be a while before she knows for sure. At least now they had a shelter and she can try and concentrate on other things.
She opens the backpack and grabs the Syntech bottle and takes a few of the food palettes and forces one down Gregory’s throat. “This should help a little.” She had built the makeshift hut with a small opening in the middle of the roof and a pit in the center. She did not know what it was for but that is what Philomena instructed.
“Temperature dropping… fire required to survive…”
Jasmine did feel a cold chill in the undercurrent of the wind. Then Philomena starts to instruct Jasmine on how to build a fire. That took a while to get done, but Jasmine is a quick learner and she finally gets the fire roaring. Now she realized what the hole in the roof was for since she seen the smoke rise to the top and escape out of the shelter.
Jasmine was amazed at the amount of things she was able to accomplish with the help of Philomena. Her hands were rough now from hard work and her body was tired. She looks towards her husband and sits next to him. She gives him a kiss on the forehead then lies next to him and falls into a deep sleep.
She wakes up at mid-day while the sun was up high in the sky. She stands and stretches out and notices her body is sore from all the work she had done the previous day. She yawns, “good morning my husband,” Glancing to the ground where her husband lay, she leans down and kisses his forehead. She then walks out of the shelter and meets the bright sun and the clear blue sky. She looks inland and above the trees at the mountain which had clouds on top of it. She then looks towards the beach and starts to walk down to it forgetting to put her shoes on.
She feels her feet touch the black soft sand and notices she had no shoes on. The sand felt good on her feet and between her toes, so she continued walking to the shoreline. She lets her feet touch the cool water as she looks out into the endless sea. She could not see anything else on the horizon so she turns and starts to walk the beach. After a few paces she sees the gun, Mr. Bill’s gun on the ground. “hmmm he must have dropped it before the vehicle took off.” She picks the gun up and carries it with her back to the shelter. She puts it next to Gregory and looks at his face, she grabs a food pellet out of the bottle and puts it in his mouth, which was getting absorbed into his body, and she was hoping that it will help his healing as it did for Mr. Bill.
She was not a medical expert so she could not tell how long or what that red liquid is doing to him or how. She closes her eyes and says a prayer, “Lord I thank you and trust you, if it is your will let him be okay. I would give my life for him, as he has done for me. I love him.” Then she begins to say formal prayers while kneeling before her husband.
After she is done praying, she gives him another kiss on the forehead and takes a food pellet for herself. She then grabs her device and walks out of the shelter. She begins to feel the bangs of hunger, but she did not know what they were, she had not felt hunger at all in her adult life.
Living on food pellets you were given what you needed and that is all. They only calculated what your life style required, and most everyone had almost the same doses. It was rare to have a higher does.
Usually the pellets suppressed hunger and gave enough nutrition for a full six hours. She begins working on the shelter some more, because there was more to build on and to strengthen it according to the plans and directions on her device.
She got to work to occupy her time and avoid thinking to much about Gregory. Time passes quickly this day since she awoke later in the afternoon, the sun was about one hour away from setting, when Philomena speaks, “scan shows fresh water supply low… maximum duration before depletion eight hours.”
“Philomena, we have all the water we need in front of us there.” Jasmine turns and looks at the sea.
Jasmine has not thought about water at all, she had in her backpack about half a gallon of refined water, and she had not tasted the sea water so she thought it would be drinkable. It looked clear and clean to her eyes.
“Proper equipment to desalinize sea water not found…”
“So we cannot drink it?”
“Affirmative, in its current form it is not drinkable…”
“Explain.”
“Drinking sodium chloride saturated water will cause dehydration instead of hydration.”
“hmmm… suggestion?”
“Area in scan range not detecting drinkable water… Range fifty yards…”
“We did see water inland beyond those trees, I guess I would have to go there and see.”
“Physical displacement is required for further analysis of any new resource…”
“Okay, you are so pushy.” Jasmine smiles as she heads back to the shelter to check on her husband and start the fire before night falls.
Jasmine gives her husband another food pellet and takes one as well. She was still feeling that grumbling in her stomach. “hmm I don’t think I feel good.”
“Scanning bio reading of subject Jasmine…”
Jasmine with a surprised look glances at the device next to her and waits.
“Nutrition intake too low… Physical activity increased intake by one hundred percent…”
“I guess I better take another palette,” Jasmine stops as she begins to open the bottle, “Philomena scan Gregory’s bio’s”
“Scanning…”
After a few minutes, “Life signs are good, two wounds detected… healing slowly… head trauma causing possible comatose state… Chance of recovery 57.34%…”
“Any estimate on when he will awake?”
“Unknown… Daily examination needed to provide possible estimate…”
Jasmine looks at the bottle she has, opens it and counts the pellets. Then she goes into her backpack and finds the other bottle, opens it and counts those pellets.
“Forty Seven pellets left.”
“With current needs… only 4.7 days left of pellet nutrition.”
Jasmine pauses for a minute as she thinks, “is there any other nutrition?”
“Yes… scan shows close proximity of food items in containers.”
“In containers? What type of containers?”
“Metal containers.”
All of a sudden she remembers the cans in her backpack. She had forgotten that they were food. She opens her backpack and takes the cans out, she only had five. Peaches, pears and ham, “I guess these will do.”
“Food items sufficient for two days at current calorie expenditure.” Philomena responds
“Any suggestions after that?”
“fifty yards scan shows many sources of nutrition…”
“That is good news for us.”
“Other sources of nutrition require a person to be conscious, Syntech pellets are made to dissolve and minimal digestion is needed.”
“I guess he will have the pellets and I can get the source of nutrition, so that will leave him with almost twenty three days, and God willing he will be awake and healed by then.
“I will prepare to go out tomorrow and find this other source of nutrition, for now my stomach is aching with hunger I guess. I will eat peaches and ham for tonight and tomorrow is another day.”
Jasmine opens the ham can easily with the ring top, eats it and then opens the peach can, drinks the juice and eats the peaches.
“I feel better, and now it is time to sleep, good night husband,” she kisses Gregory on the forehead, “good night Philomena.”
“Good night, Jasmine.”
The device to Jasmine seems more like a guide or a friend with its own personality and talking to it seemed more natural. Jasmine lies down next to her husband on the soft grasses she collected, next to the warmth of the fire and slowly begins to drift off to sleep.
“Detecting presence of unknown subject… fifty yards away from current position…”
Jasmine opens her eyes on hearing the sound, and begins to close her eyes again.
“…Unknown Subject forty five yards… proceeding closer to shelter…”
Jasmine opens her eyes again, and her mind suddenly realizes what Philomena was saying. “Unknown?” the question comes to her lips as she sits up.
“Scanning for more information… Unknown subject forty yards…”
A slight fear of the unknown rises in Jasmines heart.
“Bio scan results… 78.23% match found… wolf….”