Excerpts From Video Card One:
"No, you go first," says a voice from behind the camera. The camera points at some dirt and rocks for a moment and then turns toward a thin girl.
"Hi, this is Breann McNaughton," says a little girl of about nine or ten with medium length strawberry blond hair.
"And I'm Brian McNaughton," says a boy of the same age who turns the camera and aims it at himself as he says this.
The camera pans to a little boy of about six or seven years old and the voices of Brian and Breann say in unison, "And this is our little brother Morgan." As the camera pans a quick glimpse of a rock wall and some desert plants are seen.
Breann comes back into view and says, "Me and Brian are the McNaughton Twins and they sometimes call me McNice."
"And they call me McNaughty," says Brian as he quickly turns the camera on himself and then back at his sister.
"Sometimes they just call us Bre and Bri for short," says Breann. Then she points toward Morgan and Brian pans over to their little brother. "But they always call Morgan Morgan since Morg would sound like morgue which is a place where you store dead people until they're buried and we don't want to call him that!" Somewhere in the middle of Breann's statement, Brian aims the camera back at his sister.
"You might be wondering what we're doing out in the middle of nowhere and actually we're not totally sure about that either," says Brian pointing the camera quickly at himself.
"All we know is that this guy who said that he was our uncle drove us out here and left us here a few days ago," says Breann. "Do you remember what he looked like?" asks Breann to Morgan.
Morgan comes into view and he says, "Nope! I hardly remember the guy at all. I think I was asleep the whole time!" Morgan walks up real close to the camera as he says this.
"I slept through most of it too," says Brian conversationally as he points the camera back at his sister.
"I think he drugged us or something because all I remember is drinking something and then waking up in the car once and then having another drink and then waking up here," says Breann holding her arms out in reference to her surroundings.
The camera stops and when it restarts Breann and Morgan are seen standing inside a tunnel. The tunnel has a door about ten feet in from its mouth. When the camera starts the door is closed.
"The guy who left us here wrote these instructions for us," says Breann holding up a packet of about two dozen printed pages that are stabled at the corner. Then she adds, "Inside this cave he left us a ton of food. He says it'll last for two years if we use it right."
Brian turns the camera on himself and says, "We didn't actually hear him say that, it was written on those pages."
"And someone else could have actually written them," says Breann as Brian points the camera back at her.
"I gotta go potty," says Morgan.
"Well then go, we don't actually need you here," says Breann.
Morgan runs toward an outhouse about thirty feet away. Brian follows Morgan with the camera. Just past the outhouse is an old shack.
"Maybe we should go spy on him with the camera," suggests Brian.
"Naw, why waste the memory?" says Breann.
Brian keeps the camera on Morgan until he disappears into the outhouse.
Breann appears on camera again and she walks toward the door and opens it. She says, "In here we have a two-year supply of food." The light is low, but the camera quickly adjusts as Brian walks forward and kneels down to allow more light into the tunnel. Inside the door are stacks of metal containers and three cots with sleeping bags and pillows.
"The instructions say to keep the door closed to keep out the rats and snakes and stuff," says Brian turning the camera on himself momentarily.
Brian turns the camera back on Breann as she drags an open metal container to the door. Each container is two feet wide, three feet long, and three feet deep. "As you can see there's lots of food in here and if you look on the side there's a label that says what's in it. Mostly it's just a bunch of protein bars and granola bars. They don't actually taste very good, but some of them are alright," says Breann.
"Show them the candles," says Brian from behind the camera.
"Oh, yeah, there are fifty candles in each one of these things and that's how many days the food in here is supposed to last us." Breann points to the stack of containers and says, "There are fourteen more of these things."
"Which means we have enough food for seven hundred and fifty days or just a little more than two years," says Brian. He turns the camera on himself as he says this and holds it with one hand so that he can show himself holding up two fingers on the other hand.
"The guy who left us here," begins Breann who then says, "Our Uncle," as she makes quotation marks with her fingers, "says that he'll come back for us in two years. He didn't actually do a very good job of explaining why he took us here and left us in this place, but that's what he says he's going to do."
"Show them the part that says why he took us out here," says Brian.
"Maybe I should read it since I don't think it would be that easy to read from the camera," says Breann with a hint of sarcasm.
"Okay, you do that sis," says Brian turning the camera on himself and making a funny wink at the camera.
Breann makes a face at the camera and then holds up the instruction pamphlet and reads from it, "I took you out here to protect you from a dangerous situation which is developing. I'm protecting you from people who want to do you harm. I'll explain it all to you in two years when I come back for you." After a brief pause she adds, "And that's all it says."
The camera stops and when it starts again Brian is seen in full view for the first time. Morgan is standing behind Brian. Brian says, "Okay, now we're up at the spring. It's about three hundred yards from the shack and it's where we get all our water."
Breann turns the camera to show a small pool of water and a pipe coming out of the ground with water continuously flowing out of it. There are trees all around the pool.
"And down here we have a little tub," adds Brian.
The camera pans down to a trough. Another pipe flows continuously into the trough and water flows out of the top of the bottom end of the trough through a little square cut out.
"You can see a stream, but it disappears in just a little ways," says Brian.
The camera follows Morgan as he walks from the end of the trough to the end of the streamlet.
"It soaks into the ground," says Breann, off camera.
"The instructions said not to come up here by ourselves since there are mountain lions which might eat us," says Brian.
"And so we're supposed to only come up here together," says Breann.
"They'll especially like to eat Morgan," says Brian.
Excerpts From Video Card Two:
"Today is the first day of the second week that we've been out here and it's so boring that we decided that we'd make our own news show," says Breann. She is standing on the porch of the little shack with Morgan by her.
"We call it 'News From The Middle Of Nowhere'," says Brian as he turns the camera back on himself for a moment.
"Actually we decided to call it 'Desert News'," says Breann. Then she adds, "And Morgan's going to start off with a weather report."
Brian points the camera at Morgan who says, "Today it's hot and sunny just like every day so far."
"Tell them what the temperature is," whispers Breann. There's a large thermometer on the porch of the shack.
"Oh, yeah, and it's one hundred and eight degrees," says Morgan.
"In the shade!" says Brian turning the camera back on himself.
"Why do you keep doing that?" asks Breann.
"Because people want to see who's talking," says Brian turning the camera on himself again.
"It's silly," says Breann.
"No it's not," says Brian, again turning the camera on himself.
"Anyways," adds Breann impatiently, "back to the news. We haven't seen any TV or movies or got to use the phone or anything fun like that since we've been here."
"And the only thing we have that uses electricity is this camera," says Brian pointing the camera on himself.
"And we have a hand cranked recharger to keep the battery charged," says Breann.
"And we don't have any toilet paper and we have to use rocks," says Morgan.
"You didn't have to say that," whispers Breann looking at the camera like she's worried that Morgan may have said something which the viewers might disapprove of.
Morgan says, "It's true, we have to..." The camera stops, cutting Morgan off in the middle of his sentence.
"Actually these protein bars are pretty good," says Brian to the camera. He adds, "They taste sort of like candy bars and they have lots of protein and some fiber too." Brian is sitting in the shack by himself talking to the camera. He has his shirt off. It's draped over the back of the chair he is sitting in. "In case you're wondering, it's really early in the morning and Morgan and Breann are still sleeping. I decided to get up and have breakfast by myself. Last night we heard a bunch of donkeys walk up towards the spring. So far we haven't been able to get any of them on the camera, but we will."
Brian reaches out toward the camera and it stops.
The camera comes back on and the operator is running with the camera toward something. Rocks, shrubs, and feet are all that are shown as the camera bobs around for the first several seconds, then Brian says, "I just saw three donkeys across the wash. They ran as soon as they saw me." Brian trips over something, but the camera keeps running and is not damaged. Brian runs forward for about fifteen seconds during which time the camera continues to bounce around and all that is shown are rocks, shrubs, and occassional glimpses of Brian's shadow. Finally, the donkeys are shown. They are about fifty feet away looking back at Brian. The camera zooms in on them and Brian says, "These are probably the ones that were making all the noise last night. Let's see how close we can get to them." Brian does his best to keep the donkeys in frame as he takes several steps towards them. Suddenly the donkeys turn and run away. They stir up some dust as they climb up the far bank of the wash. They disappear over the bank after a few moments. After they disappear, Brian turns the camera on himself and says, "Now you have seen the donkeys too. They weren't easy to track down, but I caught them for you on 'Brian's Live Animal Adventure Show'!" Brian does his best to sound like an announcer for some television show. The camera stops.
"We are supposed to have a trash fire once a week," says Brian kneeling in front of the fire ring which is in front of the shack. The fire ring is full of protein and granola bar wrappers, a few other pieces of trash, and a whole lot of dry brush.
Morgan appears and sits near Brian and says, "Yeah, we can't throw stuff away in the outhouse or else it will get filled up too fast and we won't have a place to go to the bathroom anymore."
"That's gross, Morgan," says Breann from behind the camera.
"Well, it's true," says Morgan.
"Forget about it, we're supposed to be doing a documentary on our trash fire, remember?" says Breann.
"Oh, yeah, sorry," says Morgan smiling at the camera.
"We have to be careful not to use too many matches or else we'll run out," says Brian. "So, we build the dry brush and stuff up carefully before we try to light it," adds Brian.
Breann pans down onto Brian's hands as he lights a match and holds it under some dry brush. It catches quickly.
"There it goes," says Brian.
"I wish we had some marshmellows," says Morgan.
"You say that every time we start a fire," says Breann.
"That's because I like marshmellows," says Morgan.
"Well, we don't have any. You'll have to get used to it!" says Breann.
"Can I start the fire next time?" asks Morgan.
"You're too young to use matches," says Brian.
The camera stops.
"Tell them about the thunder and lightening," says Breann as she gently pushes Morgan toward the camera.
"There's a lot of thunder and a lot of lightening and it's really loud," says Morgan.
It is dusk and the sky is cloudy. As the children talk there are a few loud bangs and lightening flashes.
"I'm glad we have a nice safe cave to sleep in," says Breann.
"Yeah, the lightening can't get us in there," says Morgan.
"One lightening strike and the shack could catch fire and burn to the ground," says Breann.
Brian pans to the shack which is about thirty feet away and barely visible in the dim light of dusk. Morgan walks over in front of the camera and continues talking about the lightening. "It sounds like explosions and it's not really all that scary, but one time Breann jumped when she first heard it."
"I wasn't scared, I was just surprised," says Breann.
"No she was scared," says Morgan.
"No I wasn't," says Breann.
The camera stops and when it starts back up it is light and it is raining. All the children are standing behind the camera in the tunnel looking out at the shack. "It's been raining all day," says Breann.
"I went into the shack, but the roof was leaking," says Brian.
"What about the porch? Maybe we could get a picture of the water in the wash from the porch," says Breann.
The camera is lowered so that all that is seen is the ground and then Morgan says, "What's that rumbling sound?"
"I don't know, but it's coming from up that way," says Brian.
Suddenly the top of a wall of water is seen moving down the wash and overflowing the bank slightly. The water is dirty and frothy and moving at a tremendous speed down the wash. There is some debri in the water and Breann says, "I think that was a tree just now."
"Or at least a large bush," says Brian. Then he adds, "I hope the donkeys aren't hanging out in the wash."
"Don't animals have a sense that tells them to get to safe places when the weather is bad?" asks Breann.
"Maybe," says Brian.
The camera remains fixed in the direction of the wash. The wave of water has passed by, but the sound of water rushing remains. Suddenly part of the bank collapses.
"Wow, did you see that?" asks Morgan.
"That was like a huge chunk of dirt," says Brian.
Another section of the bank collapses.
"I hope it stops raining pretty soon," says Breann.
"It doesn't look like it will," says Brian.
More of the bank falls into the wash.
"That's getting real close to the shack," says Brian.
"Yeah, kind of," agrees Breann.
Suddenly the section of the ground in front of the shack that had a fire ring on it disappears and the edge of the bank is now less than ten feet from the shack.
"No way! How can this be happening?" asks Brian.
The camera remains focused on the shack and the bank of the wash just beyond it. The children say very little for several minutes and then the camera stops.
The camera comes on and the shack is shown from the wash. A wet, sandy slope leads up to the shack where the fire ring used to be. Breann walks out the door of the shack and the camera zooms in on her. Breann says, "As you can see the shack survived the storm and the flashflood, but the fire ring is gone and the question remains, 'Will the shack make it through the next flash flood or will it be washed away and disappear into the barren desert?' It may remain for the next hundred years or it may be gone by next week. Only time will tell. Nature took a devastating toll this time. It washed away our fire ring. Now we'll have to build another one. It may take hours to recover from nature's fury, but the inhabitants of this place will find a way to make it!"
Brian starts to laugh.
"How was that?" asks Breann.
"That was pretty good sis!" says Brian.
"That sounded pretty stupid if you ask me," says Morgan.
"No one's asking you," says Brian.
The camera stops and when it starts up again, Brian and Morgan are working with their shirts off. They are stacking rocks into a ring to make a new fire ring. They work as if the camera is off for about forty seconds and then Brian looks up at the camera and says, "Building fire rings is hard work and to keep my energy up I have to drink a lot and eat these." He picks up a protein bar and holds it up for the camera. He says the brand name of the protein bar and then he adds, "These give me lots of energy so I can work hard without getting tired and they also help to give me huge muscles."
"Yeah, how do you think I got such huge muscles?" says Morgan flexing for the camera.
Both Morgan and Brian start posing for the camera. They flex their muscles and imitate various poses that they've seen body-builders do for the camera. Both boys are very thin and they know that their poses are more funny than impressive. In fact, they go for the comedic aspect of their performance as both put on their best silly muscle man show for the camera.