Peter stared dumbfounded at the little girl he found standing before him as he stepped out of the jungle after better hiding another of his caches. He was at a loss to explain where she'd come from, as well as what she was doing here. His great fear, obviously, was that she'd seen him moving this particular stash of resources back into the woods a bit more, hiding it between two large fallen trees that themselves were well hidden withing large clumps of ground foliage.

Peter recognized the little girl after a moment but without being able to recall her name. He looked up and down the beach for either her parents or [i]other[/i] prying eyes. The nearest persons to the two of them were a pair of guys down the beach by the camp, standing in the surf with long wanna-be-spears; they were trying unsuccessfully to recreate the [i]four years later[/i] scene from [i]Castaway[/i] in which Tom Hanks so skillfully killed a fish with a spear from a good hundred feet away.

Looking back to the girl, Peter was surprised to see her wave and smile to him; he couldn't help but chuckle -- short and sharp -- at the big gap left by the recent loss of one of her baby's teeth. He smiled back, saying with a bit of nervousness in his tone, [color=orange]"Hi. How are you?"[/color]

Peter immediately felt stupid for asking such a question and quickly followed up with a more relevant one, [color=orange]"What are you doing here?"[/color] When she didn't answer, he asked, [color=orange]"Shouldn't you be back at the camp with your folks...? Your mother ... father ... [i]whoever?[/i]"[/color]

Still, she just stood there smiling at him politely, which began to bother Peter to no end. Nosy little brats were the last thing he needed if he was going to keep his hidden goods hidden. A thought suddenly came to him, and smiling more broadly to her, he asked, [color=orange]"Hey kid, you like candy?"[/color]

As soon as he said it, Peter realized the mistake he'd made. His heart leapt in his chest with the fear of the girl remembering her [i]stranger danger[/i] lessons from grade school and screaming out for help against the [i]bad man[/i]. But again, the little girl just smiled at him. 

Removing and unzipping a pocket of his backpack, Peter withdrew one of the candy bars that he'd found in one of the many personal packs that he'd found during the darker hours of his salvaging. (It hadn't been just Mission supplies that Peter had filched and hid away.) He took a couple of steps closer, leaned down with a friendly smile, and offered the candy bar out.

[color=orange]"You can have this,"[/color] he told her with a soft tone, still not realizing that she couldn't hear a word he was speaking. He added, [color=orange]"But [i]only[/i] if you don't tell anyone that you found me down here in the woods alone. I was, um ... I was ... [i]taking a nap[/i] ... yeah ... and I was supposed to be working ... like the others ... but I'm [i]so[/i] tired. I just needed to nap for just a few minutes. I'm sure you understand that, right...? You take naps once in a while, too, right?"[/color]