Episode 5: Buried Alive!

Dear Tony

It's been a strange three days since last I penned a missive your way, hinting as I did at the complicated ties that bind Sanele to a possible alliance with the Triumvirate of Evil over at Rana.

This week Sanele was "forcibly" removed from the island by Mark, with health concerns being cited as the reason. His arm, you understand.

To say I was surprised would be doing me a grave injustice - although I knew not what form it would take I did know that somehow Sanele was about to leave the game.

"Forsooth!", exclaims you. "Are you gone mad, sir?"

No, friend - it's percentages. Not a trick of wizardry nor anything else unearthly.

Let me put it to you this way: every person who establishes themselves as someone who may possibly be involved in a more sinister scheme than playing a game for a million doubloons seems to end up leaving the island, be they voted off or carried off.

Last week I saw Happy Ncumisa writing in the sand and when I investigated I saw the names of The Chairperson, The Good Doctor and Sanele scrawled in the sand.

A few hours later Happy was gone, voted off her tribe. It got me thinking and that night I realised that Sanele's supposedly injured arm was yet another smokescreen for something far more diabolical.

Jude, The Good Doctor, Happy, The Chairperson and Sanele - all somehow inextricably linked to one another through forces that are not yet immediately apparent.

Seeing how quickly Happy had her torch snuffed made me wonder about my own safety in this game, and I realised that I had better lie low for a few days, blend in and do nothing but keep my eyes and ears open.

Which is exactly what I have been doing since last I wrote.

A few days ago we had a reward challenge which involved playing a numbers game for food supposedly sent by someone called Nando.

The only Nando I know is Nando Oliveira de Guzman - that sadistic half-Mexican, half-Portuguese torturer from Asuncion in Paraguay who you may remember was anything but humane to your brother back in those dark days of revolution and song, during the Uruguay Uprising.

So needless to say I sat out, and refused to partake of the food. Call me paranoid, but the more shapes I see in the jungle and the more twigs I hear breaking at unnatural hours the more I fear that there are those who know who I am and why I am here.

Trust nobody, they say. It's a dictum I hold dear to my heart.

Shortly after that Mark arrived and told us he was "insisting on" taking Sanele, leaving no room for doubt over the matter.

I pondered that briefly, wondering whether it was possible for Mark to be involved in shady dealings, but came to the conclusion that anyone with a haircut as preppy as that is probably on the straight and narrow.

Not the sort of feller to suddenly start nailing goat heads to the church door, if you know what I mean. Not necessarily one who might eat the child of an enemy, or drink jugs of pig blood by the light of the full moon.

So I figured it was all part of Sanele's plan, which I knew was somehow linked to the strange goings-on involving the Good Doctor and Jude.

Since I couldn't exactly follow Sanele I decided to let it be. I couldn't escape the feeling that somehow it would not be the last time I ever saw Sanele...

Once Sanele was gone we hooked up with Straight Mark for an immunity challenge, and you're never going to believe this one, me hearty - a challenge to free people from a grave who were buried alive!

Sure, sure - not as dangerous as the real thing, but it sure stirred up some fond memories for me.

You and I are no strangers to dungeons and graves and being buried alive, are we?

Freeing our "prisoners" who were "buried alive" in that challenge reminded me vividly of that grey September dawn 17 years ago when to a pair of fools like us anything seemed possible.

In case time (that cruel mistress!) has fogged your memory, allow me to sharpen your remembrance with this breath of bracing sea air:

Manny "Two-Picks" Baraza had infiltrated the den of vice run by our self-same Nando Oliveira de Guzman, passing himself off as a general hanger-on and roustabout despite his gentler proclivities.

Perhaps foolishly he stumbled upon a late-night deal he wasn't supposed to witness and after two months of fiendish torture - during which time he never cracked, despite the indescribable horrors afflicted upon his person - he was buried alive beneath Black Marlin Rock, that dark and devilish outcrop on the craggy shores that fringe Nando's stronghold.

With information about his whereabouts supplied to us by sweet Fanny de Figuero (who to this day I have never seen again) you and I embarked on one of our great adventures to free our friend from his premature grave.

What warriors we were! Covered in the blood of the dozens we slew that night in our mad frenzy to rescue Two-Picks, we fought side by side until the last yellow dogs had slunk back to de Guzman, tails between their legs.

We freed Two-Picks as he was gasping his last, and in a daring dash across sand and soil we carried him to freedom with the ravening wolves no more than a few steps behind us all the way.

How we drank that night! A more rambunctious tavern there ne'er was, as we swapped our stories and slapped each other heartily on the back.

There was a similar feeling in our tribe when we won that immunity challenge. The Smoker, for example, was as happy as a man who knows he has just had a serious reprieve.

I decided not to go spy on the Rana tribe at their Tribal Council that night, preferring to stick to my new plan of flying under the radar.

We were drifting off to sleep, wondering what the next day would bring, when we all heard the sound of someone approaching our camp.

With all the strange goings-on over the past couple of weeks I was taking no chances, and picked up the wooden knife I have been crafting from the abundance of wood on the island.

I didn't need to use it, however, as we heard her before we saw her - none other than The Hippy Girl, Danielle!

She explained that she had been instructed to come to our camp as an exchange for Sanele, which everyone happily accepted before inviting her to sit by the fire and chat awhile.

Everyone, that is, except me. A swap for Sanele? Coincidence? Hah!

While chatting around the fire I could have sworn I caught The Hippy looking at me strangely in one particular moment. Maybe I imagined it, but I could have sworn when she realised I had caught her staring at me that she gave me the tiniest of subtle winks.

That night I slept with my wooden knife clutched firmly to my breast.