A body

By Lucy's face you were fairly certain it was her friend, the body twisted like some godforsaken pretzel to fit into the small space. It was pale, smelled horrible, and had a note for a necklace.

You gulped, "I'm sorry...like I said, we should go."

She didn't respond right away, her expression sorrowful, just staring at it for a while. "We can't leave without the note."

"Sure we can, these people are crazy! They're playing with us here, we could get a headstart if we ran instead of looking through these crates, which are probably all tricks of one kind or another!"

She shook her head, "I've got a feeling there's more to this then we think, John. Will you help me over?"

You stared at her in disbelief for a moment before answering, "If you really want the body, I'll get it out."

"Look at your feet, look at how much you weigh. You'd smash her before you got her out!" She said in an outraged whisper.

"Is that really so bad? I wouldn't mind being smashed if I were dead,"

"Neither would I, but we aren't her and I'd rather not add a ghost to the list of things we've got to worry about."

You gave her a look. "You don't really believe-"

She interrupted you, "-I was kidding! Trying to lighten the mood a bit before we try dragging a body out of some crate in the middle of the forest. I'd just rather do it myself, alright? I want to be the one to pull her out."

You took a deep breath, "Alright, I'll help you over."

"Thanks."

You Intertwined your fingers to make a platform for her to step on. She did, and you pulled her over. She stepped into the crate and you heard a little crunch as she fell.

"Please tell me that was the body."

She gave a sigh of relief and said "Take a look!" Handing you a box of matches.

You opened it up and looked inside, a few were broken in half from her falling on them, but otherwise they were good, by the label on the package it had two hundred of them. "You were right to suggest we stay, 200 matches!"

She smiled and began lifting the body up and over the side, you helped and eventually you got it over. She looked around at the bottom and pulled out another little metallic object with a note wrapped around it. She began to read it, handing you the metal, a bullet. "We want to keep with the 'stone for two birds' theme, but we couldn't help but leave you a blank."

"Not exactly reassuring but it's something," You said, loading the blank.

She climbed back over and began reading the body's necklace note, "Apologies for the body lovebirds, but I lost a bet to my friend and he thought it funny to **** you to strip the corpse for the clothing. At any rate, hope you're enjoying the adrenaline of the game, and good luck!"

She bit her lip slightly, "When I get my hands on these people I'm gonna rip them apart..."

"I second that." You seconded.

She looked over the clothes. "These are worth it, unfortunately. John, could you...?"

"Ah! Yeah." you turned around and heard the sounds of clothes being transferred from one body to another.

"You can look now." She said, doing a solemn spin as you did so you could see the outfit. Probably more to prevent the awkward moments of staring whenever you could get the occasional glance and eventually piecing together mental pictures to get an idea of what she looked like.

She looked gorgeous, despite the messy hair that comes from sleeping on leaves and dirty face that comes from living in a jungle. She had proper boots, thick jeans, and several layers of shirts ending on a jacket.

"Utilitarian and goodlooking." You noted.

She nodded, "She had good taste, I..." She looked down at the body which now had her shredded dresses, "less so."

You couldn't help but smile, "I take it living in the jungle changed your preferences slightly?"

She smiled back, "Only slightly, relax."

"Relax?" You raised an eyebrow, relaxing meant she had plans of knowing you after you got rescued, if you got rescued.

"Yeah, I don't know. I imagine society won't be quite the same if we get rescued, and we'll probably want to stick together just because we know what one another feel like." She reasoned.

"And if only one of us makes it?" You asked, "what then?"

"Then I'm sure you'll find others to satisfy your dress-wearer watching urges." She said, almost sadly.

"What if it's you who makes it off alone?"

She shook her head sadly, "I'm not getting rescued without you. I've lost one good friend on this Island already, if I lose another then I don't care to leave alive."

You couldn't let her die alone.

You looked up at the sun, realizing there wasn't a whole lot of time left in the day.

"We could go back to camp, or we could make it a ways towards the next crate of supplies, or we could to finding a place to hide for when they come searching the day after tomorrow..." you laid out the options, and Lucy nodded, "I trust your decision more than mine here, I've never been good resisting gambling urges, even with time."