Surviving the Island(Ark: Survival Evolved fanfiction)
Chapter One: Day One
I awaken to find myself face down in the sand with the sounds of waves gently caressing the beach. Confused, I strain to remember how I got here but to no avail. I strain to remember my name but to no avail. I see a dense forest before me, an endless ocean behind, and an ever-stretching beach to either side. My arm itches; as I scratch it, I notice a diamond-shaped gem in which it is embedded.
A warm, sunny breeze blows, and I feel myself without clothes. The sounds of animals, with which I am unfamiliar, echo through the trees. I am lost on an exotic coast with no shelter from the elements, food or drink, weapons to defend myself, or tools to make such items. I do not know if I may find familiarity within minutes, days, months, or years. I must assume I am entirely alone indefinitely and must survive.
I notice a creature standing just inside the tree line of the forest. I see this thing looks lizard-like but cannot be; it is much too large. The creature stares at me as if it is just as confused about me as I am. It begins cautiously walking toward me, and I do the same in return. As we get closer, I recognize the animal.
“Impossible…” I say to myself. “It looks so much like a juvenile dilophosaurus but couldn’t possibly be. They had gone extinct millions of years ago. Surely, I am delirious from dehydration.”
The animal stops about thirty feet away from me and stares longer. I reach my hand out the same way you would befriend a dog, and I walk closer. Once I was within arm’s length of this bipedal theropod, I could no longer deny it precisely looks as paleontologists have described dilophosaurs. It has an elongated snout with a boney crest on top and a vibrant frill around its neck. Sometimes depicted with feathers, this one has none. The adults stand up to six feet tall, twenty-one feet long, and weigh nine hundred pounds even with their slender build. Still being a juvenile, this one is probably half the size it could be.
They are carnivorous, but this one seems friendly. The no-longer-extinct dinosaur stretches out its head to sniff my hand. Then, the dilophosaurus licks my hand, looks at me, and cocks its head. It was thinking about something, something I would not like. It let out a high-pitched screech, and I immediately jump back several feet. It wrenches its head back, then lunges forward, hawking black mucus at me. I throw my hands over my face in time to block the mucus from blinding me. The dinosaur charges me and knocks me to the ground. It stands on top of me, pinning me down. I reach for something, anything, and find a rock. I smash that rock into its jaw just as it strikes.
My rock hit my target, and I hear a cracking sound. The vicious animal gives out a yelp and backs off of me. I quickly rise to my feet and begin backing away with my rock at the ready. The dilophosaurus stalks me, not prepared to give up. Without realizing it, I back against a large log with branches jutting out on either side of me, and now I’m trapped. The bird-like creature charges at me again, screeching its terrible sound as it gains more ground. I use my rock to help break off a branch out of desperation. It jumps at me, and I stab it in the chest with the sharper end, piercing its thick skin. Blood gushes from the entry wound as I drive it into the ground, digging it deeper into an animal I once loved as a kid. I step on its snout, grab my trusty rock once more and begin smashing it against the reptile’s head until its brain is exposed; then, I replace its brain with my stone.
The animal stops screaming, stops fighting, and stops moving altogether. I collapse to a seated position, in shock and confused, even more so now than ever. “Where am I, and how is an extinct dinosaur still living?!” I ask aloud, but no one answers. After several minutes of being lost in thought, I remember survival comes first, answers later. I look at the dead dino, then the log. “If I can figure out how to harvest this meat…” I think. “I won’t go hungry for tonight, at least.” I look at my trusty rock deeply embedded in my lizard friend’s skull, at the tree branches. “I can use these,” I say as I collect the materials.
Once gathered, I sharpen the rock on another rock and use the sharp rock to split the top of a four-inch-thick, one-foot-long branch. I shove the stone into the split, with the pointed end protruding about six inches on one side and the blunt end about four inches on the other. It is as far as it will go, and I tie it all together with the sinews from the dilophosaurus. Then, I use the sharp end to carefully butcher the animal to preserve as much meat, bone, hide, organs, tendons, and other sinews as possible. Afterward, I used my new hatchet to cut the remaining branches off the log into smaller sticks. I set them up tipi-style and then collect additional rocks to border the sticks.
During my search, I find a black rock that seems harder and denser than the others. I strike it with my hatchet and create a spark. It must be flint. I strike the flint next to my collection of nice sticks, and sparks fly onto them, but no fire is made. “I need an accelerant,” I remember. I walk to the forest’s tree line and begin collecting fibers from the shrubbery. In doing so, I discover an abundance of berries. Red, blue, yellow, white, and black. I collect them all and head back to my sticks.
I place my berry haul off to the side to save for later. Then, I stuff the fibers I collected under the tipi of sticks inside the stone circle. I try striking the flint again. Sparks hit the threads, and a tiny ember emerges. I get low to the ground and gently blow the embers to feed it the oxygen it needs to flourish. After several huffs, the fibers ignite into a complete fire and spread to the sticks. I now own a campfire. I sharpen the bottom end of my hatchet handle, stick a dilo steak on it and lean it against the fire. My need for food will be fulfilled, but my need for water will only intensify after this. I have an ocean behind me, but saltwater will kill me. I must figure out a solution to this problem.
For the time being, the sun is setting, and I decide to try the berries. Maybe they will provide enough water to hydrate me for now. But there is also a chance they could poison me. I ingest one berry at a time. First, the white one. It is very tart, it makes my thirst even worse, but I feel more energized suddenly. I will have to remember that. I wait about ten minutes and don’t feel sick, so I move on.
Over the next thirty minutes, I try the yellow, red, and blueberries. Each one is sweet and juicy. These will keep me from dying of thirst, and I have yet to experience any discomfort from them. Finally, I try the blackberry. It, too, was sweet and juicy. I waited another ten minutes. I could feel the energizing effects of the white berry wearing off, but no sickness came about. I set the white ones aside and began eating all of the rest. I picked about fifty of each type, eating them in the order I taste-tested. Once I was done finishing off the blackberries…darkness.
