Salvation Island [surviving the crash]

[. s p o r e l e t t ♪]

p r e f a c e

p r o l o g u e

[/i][/ul]
t h e . p l o t

t h e . i s l a n d

r u l e s

• Be civil and follow site rules within the rp.
  
• There is no minimum or maximum post requirement.
  
• Use ingenuity and creativity to make things interesting!
  
• Filling out a form for your character is optional.

c h a r a c t e r . f o r m[b]name[/b]:
[b]age[/b]:
[b]gender[/b]:
[b]appearance[/b]:
[b]personality[/b]:
[b]history[/b]:
[b]other[/b]:

[. s p o r e l e t t ♪]

c h a r a c t e r s

[/b] (m:f 5:5)

Isabella Di Fiore, 13. (f) -- Cai
Garrett Brighton, 13. (m) -- Sporelett
Eamon O'Connell, 12. (m) -- Izzie
Rory O'Connell, 12. (f) -- Izzie
Victoria Andrews, 12. (f) -- Sydney
Kyo, 11. (m) -- Ivy
Giselbertus Gherardo, 10. (m) -- Icy
Emilie Lefevre, 10. (f) -- Sporelett
Pavel Zhenechka, 9. (m) -- Icy
Iliana Williams, 6. (f) -- Kitty[/ul]
f u l l . b i o s

SPOILER: Click to show

name: Isabella Di Fiore (Bella)
age: 13
gender: Female
appearance: Very tall and slim, Bella has a coolly collected air about her despite her youth. Her skin is very pale considering her heritage, and the milky white contrasts sharply with her long, dark brown hair. Somehow her locks are kept immaculately straight and shiny regardless of what she is doing, although even she won't be able to keep it that way for long. Bella has very large brown eyes and thick lashes, though the expression them is guarded and carefully neutral and she is caught smiling only very rarely. When she boarded the plane, she was wearing an expensive pink-and-white sleeveless top and a white skirt, along with a silk ribbon in her hair, though she has a spare pair of white shorts and a vest in her bag. Her only footwear is her white sandals, though they too are expensive and well-made.

personality: Bella does not talk a great deal, though she is sharply perceptive and has a quick mind. Her voice has an Italian lilt, though her English is perfect, and she has a good singing voice. She also speaks fluent Italian and Sicilian. She is not particularly friendly and has a rather detached demeanour, though this is more from lack of social exposure than unsociability. However, Bella is from a long line of sly and double-dealing opportunists who would exploit any advantage they possibly could, and many of these traits are most certainly present in her too. She seems feminine and classy, but she is capable of gritty perseverance and isn't afraid to get her hands dirty either.

history: Bella is the only daughter and youngest child of a wealthy and influential Sicilian "businessman", Giovanni Di Fiore, and his wife. Officially he is the boss of a large investment company, although in reality he runs a far more shady business and has significant criminal contacts. Bella has two older brothers who work with their father, but she is currently seeing out the completion of her education which is carried out by private tutors inside a family estate in north Italy. She has never been to normal school and has had little contact with children her age.

other: Bella admires quick wits in others.

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name: Garrett Brighton
age: Thirteen
gender: Male

appearance: Garrett isn't a terribly large boy for his age, just reaching five feet tall and weighing a grand total of ninety pounds. His countenance is thin and pale from extended periods of time spent languishing indoors instead of playing outside with other children. His eyes are a clear and delicate green, and are long-lidded and intense. Garrett's hair is dark and slightly long, and tends to hang limply about his face. He is dressed in formal black pants and a button-up shirt, and tends to wear a bored, supercilious expression on his angular face.

personality: Garrett's demeanour is rather silent and morose, and he's never been extremely social. He's the type of person that hangs about the edge of social gatherings, watching everyone else and making people feel uncomfortable. He tends to be spoiled and arrogant with other youths, yet he is also completely unused to conflict, and tends to give up very easily. He is quite naive and unknowledgeable about the outdoors, and dislikes nature as a rule.

history: Garrett grew up in a wealthy household in London, England. He never knew his mother, who died when he was three years old, and was raised solely by his father, who was often busy with business. His formal education was completed in various private schools, supplemented by tutors who schooled him in everything from mathematics to playing the piano, which he is reasonably skilled at. Up until he suddenly found himself stranded on a deserted island without his father or any of his house staff on hand, Garrett had very little free time, and had never left the bounds of the city. He has very few practical skills to rely on in such a setting.

other: He finds innocence to be charming.

SPOILER: Click to show

name: Eamon O'Connell
gender: male

name: Rory O'Connell
gender: female

age: 12

appearance: Despite being fraternal twins, and despite, of course, the gender difference, Eamon and Rory look quite similar to each other. Both of them are tall for their age, Rory more so than Eamon (to his slight embarrassment), and thin-framed. The two have the same fair skin and red-gold hair, but keep it different lengths -- Eamon's is cropped a couple inches shorter, falling into his eyes often and curling around his ears and chin, while Rory sports a shoulder-length hairdo. They also have different eye colors, Rory's a bright blue and Eamon's a more muted green-gray.

personality: Eamon is, well, a bit of a know-it-all: smart, resourceful, and ingenious. Rory is also very bright, but in a less academic way. She specializes in reading other people and dealing with them. They don't have the classy air of a lot of the other children, but a down-to-earth kind of attitude. Their personalities complement each other -- Rory is energetic, outgoing, and a bit of a spitfire, while Eamon is more reserved, collected, and somewhat passive-aggressive. Be warned that their true loyalties lie only with themselves, no matter how friendly they might seem to outsiders.

history: Eamon and Rory O'Connell were born in a suburb of Limerick, Ireland, to a shopkeeper and his wife who weren't exactly the richest people in the country, but neither were they the poorest. The twins' childhood wasn't charmed nor excessively terrible, and from the beginning, they were very close. Wherever one of them went, the other followed; Rory, a tomboy through and through, got along just fine with the neighborhood boys Eamon was friends with, cheerfully joining in their games, fights, and assorted explorations. It remains to be seen how well this childhood fun has really prepared them for surviving on the island.

other: They're adorable, and they will stab you in the back. 8'D

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name: Victoria “Vicky” Andrews
age: Twelve
gender: Female

appearance: Vicky's appearance, by all standards, is one that screams “prim and proper”. She's a regular little lady, one who is used to the finer things in life. Her hair, which is rich and brown, is always kept at its best form. It's always brushed and curled into cute little ringlets, and, its rare to see a hair out of place on her head. Her eyes are the same rich, brown color as her hair, and while pretty to look at, are usual scrunched up in disapproval. Vicky is lanky girl, one with a thin frame and long limbs. As of the day of the crash, she was wearing a lovely green dress and black tights but, who knows how they fared as of now.

personality: [Spoiled. Selfish. Vain. Vile.] Vicky, despite her innocent looks and pretty smile, is a rather selfish, bratty girl. She's the one you tend to always find surrounded by others, always charming other to her beck and call. She's not used to losing, or not getting her way, or even being told no. She's thrown to violent hissy fits, and will steal what she wants, when it pleases her. She's not also against blaming others for her faults, or to hurt others to get her way. Whatever it takes to maker her happy, really.

history: The only child of a rich, American family, Victoria, Vicky Andrews, was spoiled from day one. She spent many of her early days being coddled by her mother, receiving gifts from her father, and just all around being treated wonderfully. She went to a private school, when younger, and just recently was accepted into a fancy boarding school. She, obviously, was pleased.

other: Not above to stabbing people with pencils, there's your warning.

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name: Kyo (meaning manly apricot)
age: Eleven
gender: Male

appearance:

[/i] is in fact a he, he lacks any sort of curve (although not many Asians have a body like Beyonce) and speaks in a soft voice that is decidedly too low for the female sex. He stands at about 5'0 and is always eating something, long nimble fingers able to pick any pocket around. During the crash his clothing consisted of a dark jade green t-shirt, form fitting black jeans, and thick boots.[/ul]personality:

[/center]
Although Kyo doesn't talk all that often, when he does his words are well thought out and used carefully. He takes in as much as he can before he voices his opinion on it and often surprises those who think him dumb or mute because of his thoughtful nature. Sneakiness comes with his silence, though, and he is quite capable of setting something up right under everybody's noses and causing mayhem without leaving a clue. But Kyo would never do such a thing, right? He plans his actions and activities so meticulously he borders on being obsessive compulsive, and becomes distressed when people decided to simply improvise. He's quite the pick pocket and will snatch food, items, and even coins and bills from strangers if he's in need. His past has taught him all the best techniques for taking things that aren't yours.[/ul]history:

other: He suffers from mild PTSD, and has nightmares about his biological family's abduction every night.[/spoiler]

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]

N a m e ;; Giselbertus Gherardo

A g e ;; Ten

G e n d e r ;; Male

A p p e a r a n c e ;; He looks totally awesome, what else would he look like! Wait, you actually want specific features? Alright then. Closely weighing at about ninty-five pounds, he actually seems thin, compared to his four foot eight height from heel to the top of his head. Due to an accident a bit earlier on in his youth, he bleached his hair white, though he thinks it makes his eyes stand out more with his clothing. To him, casual clothing is always navy blue and white, and he normally strives to wear it every single day.

P e r s o n a l i t y ;; Arrogant isn't honestly the only word that can summarize Giselbertus, the one who believes he's perfect and 'awesome'. Stuck-up like a rich child, which he is not, he believes that he can get away with anything that comes his way. Heck, he hates hard labor, so if you really want him to work, good luck with whatever plan you have. Along with that, he uses the word 'awesome' just a bit too much, even when things are so totally not awesome.

H i s t o r y ;; Rich class people? Stuck-up entirely. Lower class? He felt fairly sorry for them. Without either the high or low class to reside in, he currently sits in a middle-position family, though he acts like he's the god child, always getting what he wants. That is, until his parents had lost their jobs in East Germany (Prussia, in his mind), and they had to move to America for the lower-paying jobs. He took no heed to this, however, and continued acting as though he was the God around there.

O t h e r ;; He likes saying things are awesome!~ What else is there? ;;

[/size][/spoiler]

SPOILER: Click to show

name: Emilie Lefevre
age: Ten
gender: Female

appearance: Emilie is a slender, willowy little slip of a girl. Though young and small, she is a good height for her age, standing at 4'8 currently, and shows every sign of being in the midst of a rather pronounced growth spurt. As a result, her limbs look a bit gangly, and she's almost always on a quest for food. Emilie is fair-haired and fair-skinned, and wears her wheat-coloured locks in twin braids. Her large, inquisitive eyes are a light shade of olive-gold. Currently she is wearing a cream-coloured shawl and grey plaid sleeveless dress over a brown, long-sleeved shirt, but she has a change of clothes in her bag. On her feet are little white socks and a pair of Mary Janes, and she also wears a dark-coloured beret on her head.

personality: Emilie's English is not the greatest. She speaks with a very strong French accent, and frequently needs to grope around for the word that she wants, switching her phrasing when she can't manage to say something the way she intended. Though young and sheltered, she is a very practical girl, with a strong stubborn streak. She seems very sweet and friendly, but this girl has the tenacity of a bulldog. Her values are rooted strongly in good morals and tradition, but sometimes she ends up pushing them on other people as well. She also happens to have an impressive temper, which it is best not to inflame.

history: Emilie grew up in a large house in rural France, along with her mother and father and six siblings. She had two sisters and four brothers, and was the fourth child, which meant she was stuck exactly in the middle. Because travelling to a school every day would be more trouble than it was worth, and her parents could not afford to send their children to a boarding school, Emilie was home taught until she was nine years old. After this point, her oldest brother got a job in the nearby town, and began driving her and some of her other siblings to a public school on his way to work.

other: Emilie's dream is to be an architect.

SPOILER: Click to show

N a m e ;; Pavel Zhenechka

A g e ;; Nine

G e n d e r ;; Male

A p p e a r a n c e ;; He isn't exactly what one would call scrawny or overweight. Being technical, Pavel is actually decent sized for his age, being at a hundred pounds, though it seems decently distributed, for he is fairly tall in his height, five feet, one inch. Very noticeable features are most likely his light, hay-like hair and his misty cerulean eye color. To be honest, his eyesight is failing, miserably at that. He never seems to be without his beige sweat-shirt, no matter how the temperature may vary.

P e r s o n a l i t y ;; Being called a shy, insolent little child is pretty much an insult in his eyes, for he is so much more than that! It is true, to his dismay, that he is quite scared of strangers, though he normally hides that feeling, due to being fairly introverted, keeping all of his emotions to himself. He rarely gets mad at others, for his calm look on life, though he does get angry once in a while. He can be pretty dangerous that way, but he could never harm a fly, or could he?

H i s t o r y ;; Starting out in an extremely low-class family in Russia, Pavel grew up with his annoying half-brother, one that constantly placed him in the shadow, as he never got what he wanted. His father always spoiled the somewhat older son of his with whatever he had, though whenever the more pale boy had asked for something, he was always rejected. At the age he would have been starting school, he had asked his father and mother if he could go to America, though they had agreed to it, which shocked him greatly. So, after that, there really wasn't anything else.

O t h e r ;; He is slowly going blind... Such a sad little puppy...

SPOILER: Click to show

name: Iliana Williams
age: 6
gender: Female

appearance: Iliana isn’t exactly what one would call “big”. Quite the contrary, as she is really small, with thin arms and legs and an overall slender build. She doesn’t appear to have much muscle, but before crash-landing on this island she was quite the active little thing, running and wrestling and tree climbing and playing with her older brother, Lucas. All that time spent outside with her brother wasn’t for nothing, and her complexion is now tanned, and doesn’t burn easily as an added bonus. Her brown hair is long, hanging down farther than her waist, with the exception of her bangs which range in length from just past her eyes to her jaw. Her eyes are only a shade or two darker than her hair, and are large and lively.

personality: Quite bold and brave, Iliana is the adventurous type. This is partially due to the fact that her brother brings her along on all his little trumps through forests, climbing trees, anything outdoors. Having an older brother who also picks on you has made her tough and resilient, and a bit rude as well. She calls people names and all that, but she doesn’t usually mean it. She’s not quick to apologize for offending someone, though. She is outspoken and outgoing, and has quite a loud voice. Along with all this, she is also quite stubborn, determined to think what she wants and do what she wants. She can become easily angered and irritated with people that try to make her do things she doesn’t want to. But really, she’s a good little girl, and loves nothing more than Lucas and having fun with him.

history: Born as the third child to a pair of working-class Americans living in the mountains of Virginia, Iliana was their first girl, and her personality was heavily influenced by her two older brothers, especially Lucas, who was seven at the time of her birth. Her other brother was 17, and she never saw much of him due to the fact that he’d moved out soon after. As you can imagine, her parents are both getting up there in their years. They turned their kids loose on the wilderness, let them do whatever for the most part, but still believed heavily in discipline and taught them how to behave. Lucas gave her little trinkets and gifts, taught her to climb trees, find some foods in the wilderness swim, wrestle, all that stuff. Though she was never extremely close to the rest of her family, she grew close to him, and vice versa. They adored each other, and it was no surprise that one wouldn’t go on the flight without the other. That’s what brought Illy (that’s Lucas’s nickname for her) to this island.

other: She always carries around a backpack (given to her by Lucas), equipped with a survival knife, a canteen of water, food (granola bars, pretzels, etc.), a first aid kit, and a tiny hand-sized flashlight. Little Illy is prepared for everything.

[. s p o r e l e t t ♪]

Garrett was feeling uncomfortably warm. His skin burned, his hair felt like it was on fire, and his eyes saw only bright, orangey-red. He blinked them open and immediately shut them tightly once more, realizing his mistake as the raging sun seared his eyes. He passed a hand over his pale, angular face, touching it gingerly as he realized that the whole thing was burned from the sun. And very likely a nice beet red by now. Sighing inwardly, the boy sat up slowly, resting his hands on the heated sand to fight off the dizziness that threatened to claim him.

Squinting his eyes open once more, Garrett realized that he was on a beach somewhere, a few bare meters from the water. He remembered exactly how he had gotten there, of course. Now that he was awake it all came flooding back, the plane flight, the crash, the swim to shore. It was more of a wallow, really. Garrett had never swam a day in his life before this, and didn't intend to do it ever again. Getting slowly to his feet, the slender boy turned his back to the sun, mentally thanking himself for choosing to wear full-length sleeves. Only his hands and face were burned, then.

Looking idly about, the boy undid the buttons on his shirt and let the breeze cool his skin. Wearing full-length clothing on a sun-drenched beach may have protected his skin, but it didn't do anything to keep him cool. He shrugged the shirt off, wincing as the smooth material slid over his chapped hands, and walked over to the ocean to soak it before putting the garment back on.

Garrett spotted what looked like a tropical forest growing at the edge of the beach and walked slowly towards it, still reeling from dehydration and exhaustion. At least there's some shade on this bloody island, then, he thought sourly, sliding under the cool shade of the trees and looking grimly about. He thought about finding some fresh water, but just couldn't manage it at the moment. Stepping over to a leafy tree nearby, Garrett sat down and leaned against it, falling asleep in mere seconds.

ooc: Ahaha, recycled post from DoW. ;; Note to late-comers; feel free to make new characters and have them join whenever. I just thought I'd officially start the rp.

[{ i z z i e }]

The red-headed girl had swum to shore with her twin brother, Eamon, riding on her back, their airplane having gone down in a wreck in the middle of the ocean. Given the weight she was carrying and the couple of burns she'd sustained in the crash, most people might expect the skinny twelve year old girl to be unconscious from shock and exhaustion by now.

Those people did not know Rory O'Connell.

She'd taken a short nap when she reached the shore, yes, but less than an hour later, she was back up and alert, examining her brother's injuries. Both of the twins were covered in bruises, but Eamon had taken the worst of the blast trying to shield his sister; his right leg looked like it might be broken, and the hair on the right side of his head was matted with blood underneath his hat.

When Eamon awoke, he at least seemed coherent, which was a relief. The first thing he said was "Agh, my leg!" followed by "Where the bloody hell are we?"

"Island," Rory said. Both of them were bizarrely matter-of-fact about the whole crash landing situation. "How's your leg?"

Eamon shrugged. "Well, it's sore, but I don't think it's broken," he answered. With that, he tried to get to his feet and try to walk, but he stumbled and had to grab onto Rory's shoulder for support. "It's not broken," he repeated.

"Ah, just impossible to walk on," Rory replied, raising an eyebrow.

And that was how Eamon ended up sitting in the shade of a large tree on the shoreline while Rory stomped across the beach, completely ignoring the heat of the sand against her feet and the sun that was beating down on her from above. They couldn't be the only ones to survive the crash -- if they were, then she had just lost faith in the human race's ability to withstand hardship -- and maybe there was someone with a first aid kit.

As it happened, the girl did indeed come upon another person. He seemed to be sleeping, but bollocks to that, this was a crisis! There was no time to sleep now. "Oi!" Rory shouted, standing over the boy. "You 'ave a first aid kit somewhere in those fancy clothes?" Ordinarily, she'd be a bit more polite, but when Eamon needed help, her sense of decorum flew right out the window.

[/justify]

ooc| Feel free to reply to either Rory or Eamon, y'all. xD

[. s p o r e l e t t ♪]

Garrett's relatively peaceful sleep was interrupted by the intrusion of a voice upon his consciousness. It wasn't any manner of calm, decorous voice, either; someone was shouting at him, and quite loudly at that. As he struggled towards consciousness, the boy recognized that the voice was female. He also noticed that whoever was shouting at him had the most atrocious accent he had ever heard. It wasn't proper English at all!

Flicking open clear, long-lidded green eyes, Garrett focused his gaze on the face that was looming over him. She was pretty enough, he supposed. Clear skin, bright blue eyes, pretty red hair. Of course, the girl's hair was a bit messy and damp due to their situation, and her face was rather angry-looking right now. Not to mention the fact that she was being extremely loud, at a time when Garrett really did not want to deal with people being loud near him. (Of course he felt the same all the time, but that's beside the point.)

"Of course I don't have a bloody first aid kit," he said once the girl appeared to have quieted down. "What do you take me for? The national coast guard? And besides, there certainly isn't anywhere I could keep one without a bag." Being woken up from a nap did have a tendency to make Garrett more ornery than usual, not to mention he was sore and uncomfortable from his burns and the sand in his clothes. None of which helped his decorum when dealing with other youths.

"You're probably better off mugging some poor first-grader whose mum stuffed their bag for them," he scoffed, somewhat usefully, though not at all intentionally. "Tell me if you find one, though! There might be something inside to put on sunburns..." Apparently content to go back to sleep, he closed his eyes again, obviously expecting his companion to leave without further comment.

Too bad Garrett had no idea how the laws of the jungle actually worked.

*****

Unlike some of the other children who had boarded the ill-fated plane that had brought them to this deserted island, Emilie was a very strong swimmer, and had no trouble escaping the plane and traversing the short distance from the exit to the beach. She even managed to bring her bag with her, probably because it wasn't very large, and she hadn't very much to fill it with in the first place. In any case, the young blonde girl clambered onto the baking, sun-drenched beach easily enough, and looked to be pretty well off...

Until she noticed the long gash that was running down the back of her forearm.

Numbed by shock and ignored in her rush to escape the wreckage of the plane, the girl had failed to notice her wound until she finally stopped to take stock of herself and her surroundings. What she found then was a little shocking, and more than a bit scary. "Mon dieu!" she gasped, unsure of what to do. "Non non non... Que dois-je faire?" The wound was bleeding alarmingly, and, never having been injured like this before, she did not know whether it was life threatening or not, and what to do about it to make it stop.

"Aidez-moi! Aide-" Emilie stopped in the middle of her cry, pausing midstep as she wandered down the beach in search of assistance. One hand was clamped around the cut despite the pain it caused her in an attempt to stem the flow of blood, and her hazel eyes were casting about worriedly. "N-no... English," she muttered, switching to thickly-accented English. "They speak English. Help me, please! I need help!"

[Kitty]

When Iliana came to, she was laying on a beach, waves lapping up around her small body. Slowly, she uncurled from the ball that she found herself in. Simultaneously she realized several things. One, their plane had crashed. Two, the salt water around her was stained with a faint red color. Three, she was alone.

Alone...wait, where was Lucas? He was on the plane too! Illy grumped into a sitting position; where had that boy gone! He'd promised Mother and Father he would look after her. But here she was, all alone on a beach. Do you know the meaning of alone? There's no one but here

After recovering from this irritated realization, Iliana automatically checked around for her backpack, the one that Lucas had given her only a few months ago. She'd stocked it with a first aid kit, food that wouldn't spoil, water, a pocket knife, a flashlight...yup, she came prepared. A crash landing on the plane she was on was the last thing she expected to happen, though; it was a good thing she always carried around her explorer's pack, wasn't it? "Aha!" she exclaimed when she spotted it a mere five steps from where she was laying. The sand between them was scored with scrape marks; it was as if she'd pushed it up when she'd swam to shore.

Ah...it was a good thing Lucas had taught her to swim... Speaking of which, where was that boy?

She muttered to herself in annoyance as she began crawling to her pack, and it was then that she realized why the water around her was tinted red. The skin up her right leg, from her ankle to her knee, was scored with several deep scratches. What- ow! Owowowowww it hurt! Iliana cried out and automatically clutched her leg to her body. Where was Lucas? He'd know how to take care of her! She could fix minor little scratches, but this was so big! And it hurt! All those little cuts and scrapes from thorns or tripping in the forest or falling out of trees, those all hurt too! But this really hurt! Get to your pack, find Lucas she instructed herself. Slowly she crawled/hobbled to her pack and dug out the first aid kit. She didn't think it had enough band-aids for a boo-boo this big...but wait! There was the wrappy stuff! Lucas had called it...a bandage? Gauze? Whatever, he'd shown her how to work it!

Her pack was soaked, but the first-aid kit was watertight, so when she got the 'bandage' out, it was dry. Now...wrap it tight, right? She stared at her leg uncertainly...wouldn't that hurt? But Lucas had said that that was what she was supposed to do...Lucas always knew what to do! If only he were here, then she wouldn't have to do this all on her own. Hesitantly she began wrapping it around her leg, starting at the ankle. "Owww!" she cried out, flopping backwards and releasing the bandage. Why did it hurt so much to do what Lucas told her? What had he said? "Its probably really gonna hurt, Illy, but you gotta wrap the bandage around your boo-boo if its too big for band-aids." Well, dang it. She'd have to grit her teeth and bear it, then, she supposed.

Over the next hour she slowly (and painfully) wrapped her leg, then secured it with the clippy thingy she found in the kit. She recalled Mother wrapping Lucas's ankle when he sprained it that one time. He didn't like it, either; it hurt him too.

Where was he? Find him, he could fix her. Her leg still hurt, and she'd found various burns on her body while she was wrapping her leg. Lucas would know what to do...just find Lucas. She pulled on her pack and made her slow way down the beach, not really walking...nah, she was pretty much crawling with one leg elevated from the ground. She had one task in mind: find Lucas. Even if there were other survivors, and she hadn't seen any yet, Lucas was the one she needed. She needed her big brother.

[:c a i:]

Bella was a born survivor. It was really something of a family inheritance, since all the Di Fiores were willing to fight dirty and play rough if it meant they could get something out of it. Or indeed, such as in this case, if it meant they could survive. So when the plane had gone up in smoke and started to sink in the ocean, Bella had reacted with only thoughts of self-preservation on her mind. She'd grabbed her hand luggage and snaked her way out of the nearest exit, thinking nothing of jumping straight into the water and swimming as rapidly as possible to the nearest land mass.

Once she'd reached the sands of some strange island, Bella had sat down in the shade of a tree and checked herself for injuries. There was a large bruise on her right shoulder and a various nicks and scrapes, but nothing that she deemed to be life-threatening. Slightly irritable at the state of her clothing, she removed her shoes and put them in the sun to dry, then tried to wring as much water as she could from her long, dark hair. Magnifico, she thought, a desert island. The only times I want to be on one of those are when my father has bought one for me!

A very irritable expression on her elegant features, Bella snatched up her bag and opened it, inspecting its contents. Everything was soaked, naturally, and she swore under her breath to see the sight of her valuables. Her money was practically disintegrating, her passport a soggy mess. Her spare clothes were dripping, so she hung them over a branch in an attempt to get them dry. What was she going to do now? She idly sifted a handful of sand and drew a vague pattern, trying to imagine what her father would tell her to do. He had already briefed her on the correct course of action if she found herself amongst either a) a gang of drug dealers who wanted to hold her hostage, b) the police who had "a few questions" and c) a group of men with crowbars. He had not, however, told her what to do in the event of a plane crash. Which meant she would have to use her Di Fiore instinct and sort herself out.

Bella got up and brushed herself off as best as she could, though the sand stuck to her wet clothing and skin. She surveyed the beach and tried to see where exactly she had found herself. Definitely a desert island... but was it a deserted desert island? Where were the other passengers? And the captain? Where was he? She had a nasty feeling, given that she could see the plane's smoking wreckage and destroyed front-end, that the plane's crew had met a cruel fate trying to land. But there had to be other passengers who had made it off, didn't there? So where were they? Bella squinted and stared up along the beach and realised that there were in fact several small figures crawling along or laying out on the sand that she had not initially noticed. She almost grimaced, realising that she might have to deal with a bunch of idiots.

"Always be friendly with people until they've given you everything, daughter.Then you leave them in the dust." she remembered her father's words and sighed. Don't make enemies until they can't harm you she told herself, and she picked up her shoes which had already dried in the scorching sun. She slung her clothes back in her bag, though they were still wet, and pulled on her sandals. She walked down the beach and was intent on going to inspect the plane, but on the way she spotted a girl making a great commotion. She was babbling in a mixture of French and English, apparently panicking about some wound she'd got on her arm, and Bella paused, eyeing her calculatingly. It probably wouldn't go down too well if she just ignored her now, would it? Oh dear. That would mean she would have to help.

"For God's sake, stop yelling." Bella said with a sigh. "It's not like you have lost an arm, is it? Just put pressure on it. Tear a strip off your shawl if you have no bandage." There was no way she was going to use her own garments to patch a stranger up. She glanced up. There was another little figure moving slowly towards them. From the size of it it seemed to be a very small child or some sort of animal. As she got closer, she realised it was actually a girl who was half-crawling along the sand. And she was very small.

"What is this, an infirmary?" she muttered. "Hey, you! You with the bandage! Have you got more?" Bella looked down at the child imposingly, judging her to be perhaps six or seven. She tapped her foot impatiently. The sooner she could stop being nurse the better.