No pelicans

"The pelicans, sir, had nothing to do with it!" The frightened sailor exclaimed to the captain.

The captain furiously kicked a tree limb on the shore.After a stream of foul words spewed from her lips, she turned to the roughed up sailor, "Then what happened?”

The sunburnt sailor licked his chap cracked lips, “Well, sir, it started early this morning when we came ashore...”


..... Earlier this morning.

The sailor with a mild sunburn began his morning routine with the other sailors. The day was already hot and humid which only further added to the foul mood of the sailors. They had been at sea for months now and were running low on food and water. Seeing this island had given them hope a few days ago but now it was a curse. No water could be found so far on the island. And the scouting party still had not returned from yesterday.

Rumors began late in the night about how the scouts were killed by monsters or that they found water and were hogging it for themselves. This sailor was skeptical, he only believed things if he saw it.

In the mist of mopping the deck the captain came out glaring at the deck crew through the bright sun. “Any word?”

Answered with silence the captain said,” I want everyone off the ship and in teams of two to gather food and wood. Return here in two hours.”

Things were desperate indeed if the captain was sending everyone off in search of food. Perhaps someone would get lucky and find water too. With that this sailor grouped up with one of the kitchen helpers.

“Let's go to the cliff” the kitchen helper said.

The sailor shrugged the cliff was as good as any direction. So through the thick jungle the hacked their way up the cliff. It was hard to find dry wood and one would think that with all the humidity there would be a water source nearby but no.

So they gathered up the driest wood they could find. As they made their way up the cliff side they could see the signs of the scout group having passed this way before. At the top of the cliff the trees cleared out and at that moment the sailor glanced in the direction of the ship. There he saw the captain laying on the sand in an odd position while the scouting party scrambled on to the ship.

“What...” The sailor stammered. The kitchen helper attacked the sailor knocking him towards the side of the cliff.After grappling,kicking, and biting for a few moments in an evenly matched fight the sailor knocked the helper off of him sending the poor guy tumbling down the cliff.

The sailor looked of the edge and could see nothing through the dense jungle below. At the sandy shore in the distance he saw the captain looking at him and by the time he returned to the captain, the scouting crew came up with a story. A story where they returned with water and food to find that the captain had been attacked by a flock giant pelicans. Fearing for their lives they ran under the pelicans to prep the ship for sailing.

....

“So,sir, you see there is no native giant pelicans, the scouts were just trying to take off with what water and food they could.”

The captain paused in her pacing and glanced at the food helper as he limped up,”What's your story?”

“Same as the sailors, but I thought the scouts didn't find any food and there was no way I was going to share the food I gathered with this pig.”

“Hey, at least I am not a cow.” The pig sailor said to the cow food helper.

The gorilla captain glared at the two as if they were idiots but she was even more mad at the group of animals she sent to find resources.