Put on Your Game Face

[blastinus]

(B041 - Reuben Walters Start)

It was five minutes after Reuben Walters had woken, and he’d barely moved. His eyes were fixated on the open bag in front of him and the KABAR knife in his right hand. His phone was gone, his laptop had been taken too, not to mention all of his game consoles. Nothing to do but stand around and wait for the end.

Reuben had known of Survival of the Fittest. How couldn’t he? Anyone who surfed Reddit and other message boards had to have heard about it at this point. Officially, no tapes had been published of the show’s production run, but people had recorded the broadcasts and clips were easy enough to find if someone was curious.

Reuben had seen them, the starvation and the violence and the slow mental degradation. Kids murdering and butchering each other, fighting over dwindling resources and the promise that one of them would go free. The last broadcast was… what, two or three years ago? His parents had turned off the television, just shut themselves off entirely from the newscasts and the speculation and the unbridled terror of it all. But fool as he was, he’d looked for clips online. He had to know what was happening.

They wouldn’t prove hard to find. SOTF was everywhere back then. Some folks trying to put their heads together and identify landmarks that could clue the authorities in. Those were okay people. But then you had what could only described as vultures. The speculators and the folks making rankings. It was hard not to get drawn into this frenzy.

Tilting the KABAR in order to get a feel for its weight, he began to wonder; were millions of people now staring at him too? A weedy dork just turning a knife around and standing motionlessly? Were they taking bets of how long it would take? Were his parents watching? They might, despite themselves. Jeez, they were probably shouting at the screen, “Move, you idiot!” or something. Well, he’d just have to write his mom and dad a mental apology, because this was a lot to unpack, and he wasn’t going to go wandering through unfamiliar territory while his head was in the clouds.

For the fun of it, a few months back he’d read some of those stupid survival guides that people were posting, as if they had any idea what it meant to be hunted by their classmates. Even so, words and snippets of advice began darting through his head. Find a shelter, get out of the open, locate sources of water… right, as if he was going to drink anything he found on this island.

It was now close to ten minutes. Still nothing. He didn’t want to face this reality. He didn’t want to turn and see the horrors awaiting him.

[Yugikun]

There were noises, from deeper within the temple. Like someone breathing. Like air getting sucked in at an uneven, stressed rate. Like some sort of emotion forcing, spluttering the air out.

It almost sounded like crying, if one listened hard enough. It almost felt as if something had happened.

And if one followed the noise, if one went down to where it was coming from, they would find someone. A girl they might recognize from class, from the parties they went to. She was short, but not scrawny, her arms showing some lean muscle if one looked close enough. Her hair was black, chin length, almost preened, looking from the back. Her skin was brown, but still somewhat light in tone. Her top was a forest green; her jeans were a denim blue. If one saw her, they would see her on her knees, body near-doubled over on the ground, facing away from them. They would see a bag on the ground — the nametag G031, if one were close enough to see it — as the girl dragged it towards her, picked it up, look at what it was labeled, look at what it called her.

And then the girl would drop it. The bag would bounce off her knees and fall straps first onto the ground. The girl would clutch her sides — something that hadn’t been noticed the first time — double over, and then the noise that sounded like crying would come from her again, until the moment she grabbed the bag and began her pattern once more.

[blastinus]

It was the sound that eventually spurred Reuben to movement. Puzzling his situation over hadn’t helped. All that he had read was confusing...conflicting, and clearly designed for someone with more survival experience and some actual muscle. He was never going to climb a tree, or hunt, or anything of that sort, and it was frankly fortunate that he had heard something to distract him, otherwise he would have collapsed in on his own self-deprecation like some kind of decaying star.

It sounded like crying, and as he came closer, he didn't recognize her, and he hardly knew what to say to make this situation any better. All he could do was try to offer some kind of help, hollow as it may be.

"Are you alright?" he asked, plainly aware that if this was going to go pear-shaped, he was not now or ever in a shape to fight. He was taking a gamble on this.

[Yugikun]

The girl turned around. Stared at Reuben, for a moment. Showed her teeth, as she smiled at him.

“...Hey.”

She hadn’t been crying.

((B041 and G031, continued elsewhere))