Baffin Island: Day 6

Word Count: 39,051

Summary of Events:

Yukon woke up and found that not only were they surrounded in a fog, but he couldn't find Ulloriaq. In spite of all his efforts, Yukon couldn't summon her, and his friends refused to let him go looking for her, which incited him to great rage that caused them to knock him unconscious. When he woke up he mourned Ulloriaq for a bit before finally deciding to continue on with his friends, who waited for him. Even still as they travelled, Yukon kept looking for Ulloriaq and hoping she would find them, but to no avail. They then spied some seal coming in to shore and tried to catch one by roping it, although they roped a male seal, which required all of them to haul on the rope to bring him in . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

"It soon seemed like they were making good progress, considering that they were actually moving. Suddenly the line jerked and Yukon found himself falling backwards, with Josh doing the same ahead of him.

His back slamming into JT sent a vicious pain shooting through his ribcage, and Josh landing on him only added to that pain. If he would've been able to breathe Yukon was sure he would have screamed.

"Get off of me," Yukon swore through his teeth.

It took longer than Yukon appreciated for him to be free to get up, but when he finally got free a vicious pain shot through him as he tried to get up and he collapsed to the ground, tears of pain running down his cheeks.

Hands grabbed at his arm and hauled him up, leading to even more excruciating pain that sent him crumpling down to the ground again. He swore as tears poured out of his eyes, he couldn't hardly see anything between the agonising pain and the tears that it caused.

"His ribs," Ben said.

Josh swore.

Yukon rolled so that he was laying on his back and whimpered.

"Let me have a look," Ben said quietly.

"No," Yukon whimpered.

He felt Ben lift up his shirt anyways, and then there was the prodding, which prompted him to cry out and try writhing away, which only agonised him all the more. He had never experienced such wretched pain in his life.

"Hold still Yukon," Ben said.

As much as he wanted to, for Ben's sake, he couldn't, the pain was too much for him to keep still.

"Josh, come sit on him," Ben said.

Yukon screamed when Josh's weight settled onto his ribcage. His eyes felt like they were popping out of his head with the pain, and yet he couldn't see a thing. He shrieked and flailed.

"Get off," Ben said loudly.

The pain subsided some, but not enough. Yukon took a deep breath and sobbed. He didn't know why it seemed everything unbearable had to happen to him, first his dog disappeared, and now he was pretty sure his ribcage had been shattered into a billion pieces that were stabbing everywhere.

"Can I at least get someone to sit on his legs?" Ben asked. "And somebody else to hold his arms?"

Yukon cried out when his arms were pulled upward, but they weren't held tightly or anything, besides, that pain became insignificant when Ben started applying the salve.

The pressure on his ribcage blinded him with pain. He screamed and fought against the holds on his legs and arms viciously. He had never thought that pain this excruciating could be lived through, and he wished that it wasn't dearly. He wanted nothing more than to die at this moment."

Baffin Island: Day 5

Word Count: 30,064

Summary of Events:

Alex spotted some seals as they were walking and he, Ben, and Josh tried to kill one, but failed, and Josh got deeply bitten in the process. As a result, they went without supper and breakfast the following morning, but Ulloriaq caught a ptarmigan to stave off their hunger. Yukon was woken by the howling of wolves and thought that he'd lost Ulloriaq, only to realise that she'd been howling with the wolves, which displeased him; his calling for her woke up the others and Ben discovered that he had a broken rib. Having stopped for another day, Yukon and Alex went into the ocean to catch some fish for their meal . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

""Where do you think we want to go looking for fish?" Yukon asked.

"I don't know, maybe a little more–"

"Eagh! What is that?" Yukon exclaimed surging up out of the water.

"What is what?" Alex asked.

"Something touched me on the ribs," Yukon replied.

"What did it feel like?" Alex asked.

"It was small and– aagain!" Yukon exclaimed, flailing.

"I didn't see anything," Alex said.

"It was like I was being kissed on the side by something with a mouth the size of a Barbie doll," Yukon said.

"You don't think . . ." Alex trailed off, as if expecting Yukon to know what he was thinking.

"I have no idea what you're laying down," Yukon said.

"The fish are attracted to the salve," Alex said.

Yukon looked at Alex sceptically. He couldn't be serious, could he? What could possibly be in the salve that the fish might think appealing? It was a ridiculous idea, but yet it didn't seem entirely out of the question either.

"Come closer to the shore so you don't have to tread water," Alex said. "Let's see if I'm right."

Yukon swam until his feet touched the sand.

"Now hold this at your armpit and hold this out," Alex said, handing Yukon a corner of the net.

"What about the bottom of the net?" Yukon asked.

"Ben!" Alex called.

Ben hurried into the water.

"How about you hold it at my armpit and I hold it underwater?" Yukon suggested. "I think that's less weird for both of us."

"Yeah," Ben agreed.

"And I'll hold it here," Alex said. "And now we'll wait and see, just try and hold still if they touch you, we want to eat them."

"This is ridiculous," Yukon muttered.

He inhaled sharply when he felt the sensation again and Alex swam in close. "Let go with your left hand!"

Yukon did so and Alex wrapped the net around his back. He could feel something writhing against him.

"Now what?" Yukon asked, squirming in discomfort at the writhing sensation.

"Come on," Alex said, pushing Yukon toward the shore.

"I told you they're attracted to the salve!" Alex exclaimed as Yukon's back cleared the water. "That was a cinch!"

"Just so long as you know the salve is not applied specifically for fishing purposes, we still have potential for further injures along the way," Ben warned.

"Can you get it off my back?" Yukon asked. "I'm not enjoying this."

Alex hurried Yukon over to their campsite and released the net. Yukon turned around to see quite the sizeable fish writhing around on the ground. Josh handed Alex a club, with which he struck the fish on the head, causing it to stop moving.

Nice as it was to have supper, the method of catching it had been more than a little awkward and unpleasant, as far as Yukon was concerned."

Baffin Island: Day 4

Word Count: 24,027

Summary of Events:

Yukon got to thinking about how the fact they were hiking home was his fault because he'd wanted to do the trip. Ben noticed and worked to convince him that nothing of the sort was true. As they were talking Ulloriaq suddenly took off at a run . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

"A sudden horrible thought struck Yukon: Ulloriaq was carrying all the firewood, and it could hinder her abilities to attack or fight, which could lead to her getting injured.

Quickly he picked up into a run after her. He felt like his backpack was slowing him down, but he wasn't sure if it was the best thing just to drop his backpack and hope someone else would pick it up.

The ground suddenly dropped out from under him and he hit the bottom harder than he'd expected. Pain shot through his ribcage, wrist, and ankle, but regardless he scrambled over the top again and pushed himself to keep running despite the pain that shot up his ankle and through his ribcage with every stride and breath.

Ulloriaq was still running, and as fast as he was going, Yukon felt like he was falling behind. He had to catch her before she got hurt. He urged himself to go faster yet, but even still he felt like that wasn't getting him anywhere.

Unfastening his backpack as he ran, Yukon pulled it off. The reduction of weight made him feel almost like he'd just dropped an elephant off his back. He felt like he could fly almost.

But even still, he felt like he was getting nowhere in relation to Ulloriaq, but he refused to let himself give up, he needed to get the firewood off of her before she got hurt or killed by it or because of it.

Yukon thrust his legs at the ground as hard as he could, trying to push himself further and further ahead, trying to gain on Ulloriaq somehow.

Suddenly Ulloriaq came to a halt. Yukon ran for all he was worth to try and gain some ground before she started off again.

When she did start off again Yukon noticed that she was coming back just as fast as she'd left, but he kept running anyways. She'd get to him faster if he worked on getting to her as fast as he could.

Something moved under his foot as he went to push off another stride, and instead of continuing to go forward, Yukon went down face-first, the wrist that he'd hurt before making contact with the ground again and sending a shot of near-blinding pain up through his arm before it buckled and he collapsed to the ground.

His sides heaved in spite of the pain that shot through his left side. He wanted to get up, but he couldn't make himself do anything other than breathe.

He heard the rapid four beats of Ulloriaq's gallop as she got closer. It slowed down, though, until finally she was right beside him, nosing at him and whimpering sadly.

Yukon still hadn't pulled enough air into his lungs to do anything else, so he just kept breathing, even though he wanted to say something to Ulloriaq, much less pull the harness off of her and let her go get whatever she'd run off to bring."

Baffin Island: Day 3

Word Count: 21,079

Summary of Events:

Despite his tiredness from the kayaking tournament the day before, Yukon got up and prepared to leave. After packing what they couldn't carry into the helicopter they all set out toward Iqaluit . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

"After a bit Kyle jogged past so as to come around and be in front of the group, walking backwards, one of his three cameras he hadn't left behind out in front of him; his phone and one of his GoPros were the other two he'd brought along to shoot with.

"Here we are heading out from our campsite," Kyle narrated. "Our hope that our forgotten food would be noticed and brought to us, unfortunately, was not realised, and so we undertake the trek home. Eight hundred and fifty kilometres or so on foot."

"Or more, not or so," Yukon said. "Guaranteed it'll be nothing less than eight hundred and fifty K."

"Based on the estimations of our esteemed guide, this will take us no less than three weeks," Kyle continued. "In other words, we will be walking for awhile."

"My speculation is that a trip on foot of this length hasn't been undertaken in a good century," Yukon said. "With the advent of vehicular traffic, and the greater availability of horses even, in North America have eliminated the long foot treks of old."

"What about Terry Fox?" JT asked. "Didn't he get from BC to Ontario on foot?"

"I thought he started in the Maritimes," Alex said.

"I don't know," Yukon replied. "Besides, there was a vehicle always keeping an eye on him, and, above all, it was not out of necessity. He didn't need to do it. He wanted to do it."

"So you're saying a trek of necessity of this length hasn't been undertaken in a good century," Ryan said.

"Exactly," Yukon replied. "For sure not in the last fifty years. Planes and cars, much less trains, have eliminated the need for treks like this."

"And horses too," JT added.

"Yeah, them too," Yukon said. "None of which we have."

"And we wouldn't want to break poor Ulloriaq," Ben said.

"I feel bad enough making her carry the firewood," Yukon said.

"All this to say that this is probably the most unique video to be posted in the existence of YouTube," Kyle said. "Never has such a thing been documented; and, honestly, I hadn't expected to document something like this. I was thinking fun in the far north, not survival in the far north."

"It's like an unscripted DIY Survivor or something," Ryan said.

"And a little more vicious than Survivor," JT said. "One, because nobody can get voted off the island because there's nowhere to go, and two, because if the group's numbers reduce that means somebody died."

"And we won't think about that, if you don't mind," Josh said. "It's bad enough I'm leaving a hundred thousand dollar plus helicopter full of more valuables yet behind, I don't want to think about dying.""

Baffin Island: Day 2

Word Count: 18,027

Summary of Events:

Yukon woke up before everyone else and found that his dog was missing; he successfully called her and discovered that she'd found a whale that had recently died, from which he harvested some meat for a meal. He and his friends then decided to have a kayak racing tournament to spend some of the time while they waited to see if their food would be brought to them, which didn't seem to be happening.

Excerpt of the Day:

"Yukon looked over at Alex and raised his eyebrows.

"Readysetgo!" Alex shouted before taking off.

"Not even fair!" Yukon shouted, starting of after him.

Alex only laughed.

Yukon flung his paddles as fast as he could go and quickly not only caught up to Alex, but passed him.

"Like you needed a fair start!" Alex complained.

Yukon laughed. "You're right! It probably would've only made you look worse!"

Alex swore. "I'm going to need to start going to the gym and trying to become the next Arnold Schwarzenegger!"

"I don't think that'll do anything for you!" Yukon called, turning around tight and starting back. "It has to work, not just look good!"

"Fine then!" Alex replied. "I'll kayak home and kayak all the rest of the summer and all winter!"

Yukon turned sharply to parallel the shore when his paddle struck sand and let himself just gently float.

After a few moments Alex joined him.

"There's a problem with your plan," Yukon said.

"And what's that?" Alex asked.

"Our route takes us overland, otherwise it would take us months to get back to Iqaluit," Yukon replied.

"We're not going to find much food overland," Alex said.

"There'll be rabbits," Yukon replied.

"Yeah, but what are we going to catch them with?" Alex asked. "The ground's too solid for pit traps, I didn't bring any of my live or clamp traps, and we can't really effectively build a snare either."

"Maybe Ulloriaq can catch them for us," Yukon replied. "She's faster than we are, and she's been intent on practising her hunting skills as it is."

"Will she catch them without eating them or infusing them with dog germs?" Alex asked.

"She got the bird when we arrived," Yukon replied.

"Yeah, but birds have longer necks than rabbits do," Alex replied.

"Good point," Yukon said. "I don't know. We may have to try for a seal or two the night before and see if we can carry some meat along with us for a couple of days."

"How long will the overland part take?" Alex asked.

"A good half the trip," Yukon replied.

"So we'll have a week and a half to two weeks on the coast and then the same overland?" Alex asked.

"About, yeah," Yukon replied. "If I recall correctly."

"Being as there's that whale, though, couldn't we just stay here and live off the whale for two weeks?" Alex asked.

"It isn't going to dip below freezing in the next two weeks," Yukon replied. "Do you really want to eat two week old whale meat? It's going to have rotted something terrible by then, and it'd probably be more likely to kill us than help us survive."

"I guess that's true," Alex said. "Especially being as we can't smoke any of it or anything like that."

"It's better to keep moving and keep finding fresh meat than to try and stay in one place and make use of the whale," Yukon said.

Alex sighed and swore. "It really seems like we're being forced to have to go home whether we want to or not.""

Pronunciation:

Ulloriaq: youlohreeack

Baffin Island: Day 1

Word Count: 9,024

Summary of Events:

Yukon and his friends loaded everything into the helicopter and set out for Baird Peninsula. Upon arriving they unpacked their things and settled down to have supper . . . only to realise that the coolers containing their food were nowhere to be found. His friend who piloted the helicopter went to go back to Iqaluit to get the food, only to have the helicopter fail. After some work his friend determined that the failure was something he couldn't fix without parts from Iqaluit, leaving the group to decide whether they wanted to wait to be found or head back on foot . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

""I though we came here to have fun, though," Ryan said. "Walking for three weeks doesn't sound like fun to me."

"I don't know about you," JT said. "But all things considered, I don't feel like I could have all that much fun either way: hoping that someone will bring us our food or come find us when we're done, or having to go for a three week walk after we spend two weeks here."

"We wouldn't want to wait two weeks before setting out for home," Yukon said.

"But if we tried to stay here and have fun for two weeks, considering the situation, I wouldn't want to have to be looking forward to a wait of unknown length or a three week walk," JT said. "I don't think any of us are in the mood to just have fun anymore."

Everyone around the fire shook their head.

"So then we're presented with the options: do we just want to wait here, spending our days hunting for our meals, waiting for someone to show up either with our food or to convey us home; or do we want to start heading home?" Yukon asked.

"I don't think we should head home straight away," Josh said. "I mean, there is the possibility someone's seen our food."

"Yeah, but still," Yukon said.

"I say we should wait at least two days before setting out, just in case someone has seen our food," Josh said. "And if someone arrives with our food then we're set and we stay here for the rest of the time — because we'd tell them about what happened and they can bring us the part and then we'll be able to go home — and if not, then we go home."

Yukon shifted his jaw.

"That sounds reasonable," Alex said.

Ben nodded.

"I mean, we should give it a chance," Ryan said. "After all, I don't really want to go for a big long hike if we don't have to."

"Exactly," Kyle said.

"Why should we wait two days?" Yukon asked.

"Well, because there's the possibility that someone's seen the food today and will bring it to us tomorrow," Josh replied. "However, there is also the possibility that Dad will only notice it tomorrow morning, and because he'll have the trip with the researchers he probably won't be able to bring it to us until the day after."

"If it's not noticed in two days then it's not worth waiting around for," JT said.

Yukon shifted his jaw again.

"Exactly," Josh said. "We'll probably end up eating more hunting than the food we prepared for the trip than we prepared for the trip by that point."

"Are we sure it will only take three weeks?" Ben asked.

"Yes," Yukon replied. "I looked at my topographic map, and the terrain isn't all that rough along the route we'd take. I mean, there are some difficult bits, but they shouldn't really slow us down all that much. At most it'll take us a month.""

September Novel Essential Information

Novel Title: Baffin Island

Time Setting: 2017

Genre: Thriller

Minimum Word Goal: 120,000

Timespan: July 1-21

Location: Baird Peninsula, Baffin Island, Nunavut

Main Character: Yukon Sarka

Background Information:

Conceived from a brief encounter between his parents, he lived a generally unstable life with his mother, mainly due to her alcoholism and resultant need for money to feed her addiction.

He was born in British Columbia, and lived there until he was three years old. His mother then learned that her father lived in Iqaluit in Nunavut, and moved them there, where the instability only increased.

His grandfather was a man of many women, and many of them, and many of his children by them, all lived in the same house. This was a significant stressor for him, but it was thankfully met with some relief.

His grandfather's sister and her husband lived just down the street, and offered a much more stable environment — much less one that had some peace and quiet — which led to him quickly spending a lot more time with them than with anyone else.

In fact, he spent so much time with his great aunt and uncle that they added a special bedroom for him onto the plans for the house they built when he was seven, and dedicated a lot of their time to caring for him and teaching him about his Inuit heritage.

When he was on the cusp of thirteen, however, things changed. After having spent the night with his great aunt and uncle, he went to school like any other day, only to be shortly summoned to the principal's office, where a police officer informed him that his mother had been killed.

His great aunt and uncle sought to have him put under their care, but probing by the government revealed that his mother had placed a name down for his father on is birth certificate. The man lived in Ontario and was contacted. He asked for a paternity test to be sure and the results came back that they were indeed father and son.

With the encouragement of his great aunt and uncle, he was sent to Ontario to meet his father, stepmother, and half siblings, and found that, despite his fears, his father was a nice man who was more than pleased not only to meet him, but to care about him.

His stepmother was overbearing in his mind, and his half siblings didn't really appreciate him all that much, most especially his older brother, but the loving care of his father has made up for the shortcomings of the rest of his family.

Having, still, a deep love and care for his great aunt and uncle, he has spent his summers with them, also appreciating the more rural atmosphere in Nunavut, and the ability to get out into nature much more than he has in Ontario.

After graduating high school he went into university for a wilderness-related degree; not that he's entirely sure what he's going to use it to do, but he has a deep love for nature and wishes to do something that allows him to be in the great, wild, untamed outdoors far more than indoors or in an urban environment.

In the last month he finally graduated from university, and to celebrate he has decided to go on a trip with his three closest friends from Ontario and his three closest friends from Nunavut, with the destination being the uninhabited Baird Peninsula on Baffin Island for two weeks of near-complete isolation from the outside world, which might possibly allow him to put his new education to use.

Pronunciations:

Nunavut: noonahvoot

Iqaluit: ihkahlooeet