"I killed my best friend."
This dialogue was becoming too comfortable.
"An ex-girlfriend as well, and a...mm. Not boyfriend." They made a disapproving noise in their throat. "Never. But as near as I would allow."
They shared a thin smile with Anna. "I believe I am more educated than anyone living on the difference."
Then Kelly, over their left hand fanned in her direction. Their eyes went from the stump of their pinky to her marred arm. "Though I appreciate feeling is a privilege...diminished...in some among us."
give me everything you have and more
Night 10, PM before entering.
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Latin For Dragula
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Roxanne caught her first clear look at Kelly’s wound, looking over her shoulder as the girl talked. It was somehow worse to see such mutilation attached to a still-living person, fresh blood still flowing freely. The dead were dead, wounded in the past tense. Bullet holes were just a decoration that did not change the fundamental nature of a corpse.
But Kelly was alive, and decay was now an inextricable part of her being, and would be until it was properly treated, or the rest of her fell apart. She had seen exposed bone. How could she so nonchalantly carry on, knowing what was at the end of the arm, feeling the phantom pain of her only body being fundamentally, permanently warped?
Did she regret crawling away alive from Marceline? Was this why she now sat at the edge of a cliff, insulting a mass-murderer with her back turned to them? Or was she simply secure in the knowledge that she couldn’t possibly be in more pain than she already was?
Blaise’s arrogant face was a little better to look at than a festering stump. Roxanne shifted her focus back to them.
“I - yeah, maybe there’s no difference for you, but not everyone is you,” she said, trying not to sound like a frustrated kindergarten teacher. Was she missing Blaise’s actual point, or were they simply that self-absorbed? The more time she spent around them, the less she cared about figuring out the difference between them.
But Kelly was alive, and decay was now an inextricable part of her being, and would be until it was properly treated, or the rest of her fell apart. She had seen exposed bone. How could she so nonchalantly carry on, knowing what was at the end of the arm, feeling the phantom pain of her only body being fundamentally, permanently warped?
Did she regret crawling away alive from Marceline? Was this why she now sat at the edge of a cliff, insulting a mass-murderer with her back turned to them? Or was she simply secure in the knowledge that she couldn’t possibly be in more pain than she already was?
Blaise’s arrogant face was a little better to look at than a festering stump. Roxanne shifted her focus back to them.
“I - yeah, maybe there’s no difference for you, but not everyone is you,” she said, trying not to sound like a frustrated kindergarten teacher. Was she missing Blaise’s actual point, or were they simply that self-absorbed? The more time she spent around them, the less she cared about figuring out the difference between them.
"Full sensation still, unfortunately."
The wound, ever painful, ever unhealing, was covered and just as quickly soggy. Kelly's lips peeled open into a silent hiss. What was left of her lips, to be precise.
Blaise's comment had certainly been intended for her. Kelly had sensitive ears for the direction of conversation. It was like a toilet flushing- you could hear the utter shit, triangulate it from any other room of the house. How nice of Kelly, how kind of Kelly- said Kelly, to Kelly- when Kelly was being so respectful of their faux friendly conversation that she was once again playing her role. It'd been the most familiar part of her life, for the longest time. Sitting and suffering in silence. The arrogance, the presumptions, the explanations on her behalf. She was their shoulder to cry on. Their friendly face.
their model minority, their punching bag, when they were all so keen as to steal her voice and her thoughts from herself and to be so cowardly and to hide their judgement behind their false intellectualism and their idol worship of a society that put them on top the fucking Privileged Know-Nothings Who Dared To LOOK AT HER AND PROJECT ONTO HER THEIR OWN FLAWS AND INSECURITIES THEY STOLE IT THEY BESMIRCHED HER BEAUTIFUL BLANK CANVAS THAT SHE CULTIVATED AND THAT THEY APPROPRIATED THE LOT OF THEM THE FUCKING SOUTHERN WHITE PERFORMATIVE WOKE HICKS
Kelly finally turned around, a half twist in her spine. Her eyes unfeeling above a hidden mouth as she observed the conversation with measured dispassion. She was patched up as she'd ever be.
The wound, ever painful, ever unhealing, was covered and just as quickly soggy. Kelly's lips peeled open into a silent hiss. What was left of her lips, to be precise.
Blaise's comment had certainly been intended for her. Kelly had sensitive ears for the direction of conversation. It was like a toilet flushing- you could hear the utter shit, triangulate it from any other room of the house. How nice of Kelly, how kind of Kelly- said Kelly, to Kelly- when Kelly was being so respectful of their faux friendly conversation that she was once again playing her role. It'd been the most familiar part of her life, for the longest time. Sitting and suffering in silence. The arrogance, the presumptions, the explanations on her behalf. She was their shoulder to cry on. Their friendly face.
their model minority, their punching bag, when they were all so keen as to steal her voice and her thoughts from herself and to be so cowardly and to hide their judgement behind their false intellectualism and their idol worship of a society that put them on top the fucking Privileged Know-Nothings Who Dared To LOOK AT HER AND PROJECT ONTO HER THEIR OWN FLAWS AND INSECURITIES THEY STOLE IT THEY BESMIRCHED HER BEAUTIFUL BLANK CANVAS THAT SHE CULTIVATED AND THAT THEY APPROPRIATED THE LOT OF THEM THE FUCKING SOUTHERN WHITE PERFORMATIVE WOKE HICKS
Kelly finally turned around, a half twist in her spine. Her eyes unfeeling above a hidden mouth as she observed the conversation with measured dispassion. She was patched up as she'd ever be.
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Latin For Dragula
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It should come as no surprise that Anna was not paying attention. She heard what she wanted to hear. She wanted Blaise to be a one-dimensional monster, a callous thing without nuance that did not perform out of rational motivation but because the inevitabilities that distressed her required a physical form on which to nail her grievances. The evidence to the contrary was all there. Mannerisms, citations, the like. Were the details unclear there were less loaded questions she could ask, ones with a lower risk of pulling the hair trigger of the psychopath she believed them to be, but perhaps that was her method. A sort of suicide by strawman. She did not require Blaise to be a person. Only the wave that would envelop her. Well, if she could not move past her repressed biases to read the information put in front of her more clearly then she did not deserve to have Blaise explain it to her, and you know?
Neither do y'all.
Hmm?
Nothin'.
Blaise slid their left hand into their pocket with a shrug something like agreement. "True. There has only ever been and there will only ever be one of me." It was explanation enough. Kelly did not deserve recognition for her...contributions were too strong a word. She existed, and despite her efforts to the contrary that was as much could be said of her. The only reason to remember her would be in mourning of her victims. A rough hand, but they did not pity her. No, pity was reserved for Anna whose name would be forgotten no matter how much faux extravagance she layered atop it in the pile of unremarkable, unsalvageable, unlovable failures who slumped their way into a mass grave only slightly more worth remembering than the solitary lot their cubicle and kitchen sink dominated lives would have produced if they continued uninterrupted. Only slightly. It would, after all, be more irritating to bring them flowers this way. Ah, well. Best that those invested mourn Kelly and Anna now. It would be so much harder for their well wishers to find sympathy when they reached that final, still image that ended their tale, only to realize how much time the pair and everyone like them had wasted accomplishing nothing of note.
It did not occur to them that they were walking away until midway through their train of thought, and did not matter to them until Kelly and Anna were too far back in the distance to be worth the return trip.
((Blaise And Carl D'Aramitz Continued In Acquiesce))
Neither do y'all.
Hmm?
Nothin'.
Blaise slid their left hand into their pocket with a shrug something like agreement. "True. There has only ever been and there will only ever be one of me." It was explanation enough. Kelly did not deserve recognition for her...contributions were too strong a word. She existed, and despite her efforts to the contrary that was as much could be said of her. The only reason to remember her would be in mourning of her victims. A rough hand, but they did not pity her. No, pity was reserved for Anna whose name would be forgotten no matter how much faux extravagance she layered atop it in the pile of unremarkable, unsalvageable, unlovable failures who slumped their way into a mass grave only slightly more worth remembering than the solitary lot their cubicle and kitchen sink dominated lives would have produced if they continued uninterrupted. Only slightly. It would, after all, be more irritating to bring them flowers this way. Ah, well. Best that those invested mourn Kelly and Anna now. It would be so much harder for their well wishers to find sympathy when they reached that final, still image that ended their tale, only to realize how much time the pair and everyone like them had wasted accomplishing nothing of note.
It did not occur to them that they were walking away until midway through their train of thought, and did not matter to them until Kelly and Anna were too far back in the distance to be worth the return trip.
((Blaise And Carl D'Aramitz Continued In Acquiesce))
For a moment, Roxanne thought about shooting Blaise in the back. Less because she wanted to, more out of irritation for how absolutely certain they were that she wouldn’t. They were the worst sort of smug, because they were right, weren’t they? If there had been a hypothetical perfect moment for her to pull the trigger, it would have been when they asked for it, when Alexander’s name crossed their lips with an air of puzzled disinterest.
It did seem fitting, how Blaise hadn’t deigned to say anything that passed for a farewell. They said that there was only one of them, but it seemed to cut deeper than that. There was only one of Blaise - and for Blaise, they were the only one on the island. Maybe in the world. Roxanne and Kelly could flicker in front of them like a mirage for a time, but would vanish from their sight the moment they lost interest.
The whole ordeal had amounted to nothing meaningful. There had been no connection between Roxanne and Blaise, and any understanding of each other they had gleaned had been in the most negative light possible. It was hard to imagine it turning out any better, but it left a bitter taste in her mouth.
It wasn’t often that someone with a gun was willing to hear out the murderer of people she held dear. Shouldn’t the unlikeliness of the occasion have elevated it, somehow? Brought them closer to some fundamental truth of humanity? Instead, Roxanne was left unsure if her unwillingness to shoot showed strength or frailty of character.
There was nothing about Blaise that she admired, but still, she didn’t hate them. Why? Was it simply because Roxanne had never loved anyone as intently as Marceline had loved Dolores? Was that a simple matter of circumstance, or did she have a sickeningly detached heart, to compliment her detached identity?
Time was running out to figure it out, to understand herself, or the world, or anything, and for the moment, nothing was more important than Kelly. Her words had been swimming around Roxanne’s mind ever since she first strolled through the casual interrogation, but she’d barely even acknowledged her outside of her head.
“...There they go, I guess.” She sat down near Kelly, but not next to her. Not on the edge of the cliff. She wasn’t sure which she trusted less, gravity or the girl.
“So. What’s your reason to stick around? Full sensation and all?”
It did seem fitting, how Blaise hadn’t deigned to say anything that passed for a farewell. They said that there was only one of them, but it seemed to cut deeper than that. There was only one of Blaise - and for Blaise, they were the only one on the island. Maybe in the world. Roxanne and Kelly could flicker in front of them like a mirage for a time, but would vanish from their sight the moment they lost interest.
The whole ordeal had amounted to nothing meaningful. There had been no connection between Roxanne and Blaise, and any understanding of each other they had gleaned had been in the most negative light possible. It was hard to imagine it turning out any better, but it left a bitter taste in her mouth.
It wasn’t often that someone with a gun was willing to hear out the murderer of people she held dear. Shouldn’t the unlikeliness of the occasion have elevated it, somehow? Brought them closer to some fundamental truth of humanity? Instead, Roxanne was left unsure if her unwillingness to shoot showed strength or frailty of character.
There was nothing about Blaise that she admired, but still, she didn’t hate them. Why? Was it simply because Roxanne had never loved anyone as intently as Marceline had loved Dolores? Was that a simple matter of circumstance, or did she have a sickeningly detached heart, to compliment her detached identity?
Time was running out to figure it out, to understand herself, or the world, or anything, and for the moment, nothing was more important than Kelly. Her words had been swimming around Roxanne’s mind ever since she first strolled through the casual interrogation, but she’d barely even acknowledged her outside of her head.
“...There they go, I guess.” She sat down near Kelly, but not next to her. Not on the edge of the cliff. She wasn’t sure which she trusted less, gravity or the girl.
“So. What’s your reason to stick around? Full sensation and all?”
"Funny that we still respect their gender identity? No way they extend the same courtesy if they could exploit us like that."
The conversation had devolved, puttered out- most idle assemblage of words by the teenaged mouth did, it was an artifact of the untrained and underpowered mind- but it struck Kelly as charmingly crude, in a way. For once there hadn't been a single person willing to keep up with the pretense. Everyone had, Kelly was so keen, said what they meant. Cruel words, careless words: precisely the sorts of words that lurked in hearts and minds when nobody was looking and when the hapless torture victim of reasonable expectations was freed of their burden of proving that, yes, they too could play the game.
It had simple rules, but it was a boring rule-set. It didn't speak to power the truths that Kelly had always been suspicious of, but only ever recently all too sure of. Blaise, Kelly simply concluded, was still thinking of a different sort of game-board than Kelly was. Checkers in a lowly amount of dimensions. Kelly tasted the refreshing brine of sea air through what was left of her lips, the flavor seeping in through the copper-flavored cooking oils that bled from stripped flesh and gums.
Kelly was sure she'd hear Blaise's name again, then. Flat game moves for an (ironically) binary system. Blaise had one simple thing to prove and to fight for. Kelly had a lifetime's worth of motivations.
Back to Anna then. The particular nothing of a sadsack.
An empty head could more easily be filled, perhaps. Ideas or lead, equal weight in the fist of an anointed Lady Justice. Kelly nodded to herself before turning around. Roxy at least had enough verve to avoid the most obvious and mundane of interactions- the one where someone ended up in the water below. Kelly would have welcomed the attempt. Only one of them had already made bodily love to the sea.
Kelly searched Anna's eyes, an innocent softness to the muscles of her face. Mostly obscured by the boundary of the mask.
"Well you and I have both survived this long." Kelly almost didn't blink. When she did all of a sudden she was surprised. Not necessarily annoyed, but put off. "There's still a difference." Breathing out helped her cool down. A meditative breath cleared the air, which always seemed to buzz around her, on all sides of her ears.
"Which one of us do you think has the better claim to being alive? Right now?"
The conversation had devolved, puttered out- most idle assemblage of words by the teenaged mouth did, it was an artifact of the untrained and underpowered mind- but it struck Kelly as charmingly crude, in a way. For once there hadn't been a single person willing to keep up with the pretense. Everyone had, Kelly was so keen, said what they meant. Cruel words, careless words: precisely the sorts of words that lurked in hearts and minds when nobody was looking and when the hapless torture victim of reasonable expectations was freed of their burden of proving that, yes, they too could play the game.
It had simple rules, but it was a boring rule-set. It didn't speak to power the truths that Kelly had always been suspicious of, but only ever recently all too sure of. Blaise, Kelly simply concluded, was still thinking of a different sort of game-board than Kelly was. Checkers in a lowly amount of dimensions. Kelly tasted the refreshing brine of sea air through what was left of her lips, the flavor seeping in through the copper-flavored cooking oils that bled from stripped flesh and gums.
Kelly was sure she'd hear Blaise's name again, then. Flat game moves for an (ironically) binary system. Blaise had one simple thing to prove and to fight for. Kelly had a lifetime's worth of motivations.
Back to Anna then. The particular nothing of a sadsack.
An empty head could more easily be filled, perhaps. Ideas or lead, equal weight in the fist of an anointed Lady Justice. Kelly nodded to herself before turning around. Roxy at least had enough verve to avoid the most obvious and mundane of interactions- the one where someone ended up in the water below. Kelly would have welcomed the attempt. Only one of them had already made bodily love to the sea.
Kelly searched Anna's eyes, an innocent softness to the muscles of her face. Mostly obscured by the boundary of the mask.
"Well you and I have both survived this long." Kelly almost didn't blink. When she did all of a sudden she was surprised. Not necessarily annoyed, but put off. "There's still a difference." Breathing out helped her cool down. A meditative breath cleared the air, which always seemed to buzz around her, on all sides of her ears.
"Which one of us do you think has the better claim to being alive? Right now?"
Roxanne didn’t give much thought to Kelly’s first question - despite Blaise’s myriad character flaws, misgendering them would be petty, childishly rude. If she wanted to hurt them, she’d do it because of any of the many things they’d actually done wrong; and that chance had already passed.
She already knew the answer to the second question.
“You do,” Roxanne said. No hesitation.
She could moralize about the intrinsic value of human life, but it would be an admission that simply existing was the only claim to mattering she had. She could cast judgement upon Kelly for the lives she had taken, but why, when she didn’t feel righteous indignation for the murdered she had genuinely cared about?
In the end it all came down to action versus reaction. Choosing to follow Marceline had technically been her own choice, but all that had accomplished was binding Roxanne to her friend’s hollow dream. She could have easily died without ever having tried to do something worthwhile for herself.
“You had to fight to stay alive. The closest I’ve come to dying was as collateral damage, or daring someone to pull the trigger.” She was only alive because no one had seriously tried to kill her, yet. At least if she had tried to hide in the woods for weeks, she could pretend that it had been due to a successful strategy instead of the whims of the universe.
But, of course, Roxanne wasn’t the type of person who could spend her last days cowering alone, or so she told herself. What had her continued presence in other’s lives even accomplished? Was she better off for having spent a week with Marceline, despite how it ended? Could she be proud that her friend hadn’t simply wandered out of the lighthouse and waded straight into the sea? If Marceline was somehow the last one standing, would it be of any consolation? She was maybe the only person who would never forget her.
“All I am is power without will, and even this gun was just something I was lucky enough to be given.”
She already knew the answer to the second question.
“You do,” Roxanne said. No hesitation.
She could moralize about the intrinsic value of human life, but it would be an admission that simply existing was the only claim to mattering she had. She could cast judgement upon Kelly for the lives she had taken, but why, when she didn’t feel righteous indignation for the murdered she had genuinely cared about?
In the end it all came down to action versus reaction. Choosing to follow Marceline had technically been her own choice, but all that had accomplished was binding Roxanne to her friend’s hollow dream. She could have easily died without ever having tried to do something worthwhile for herself.
“You had to fight to stay alive. The closest I’ve come to dying was as collateral damage, or daring someone to pull the trigger.” She was only alive because no one had seriously tried to kill her, yet. At least if she had tried to hide in the woods for weeks, she could pretend that it had been due to a successful strategy instead of the whims of the universe.
But, of course, Roxanne wasn’t the type of person who could spend her last days cowering alone, or so she told herself. What had her continued presence in other’s lives even accomplished? Was she better off for having spent a week with Marceline, despite how it ended? Could she be proud that her friend hadn’t simply wandered out of the lighthouse and waded straight into the sea? If Marceline was somehow the last one standing, would it be of any consolation? She was maybe the only person who would never forget her.
“All I am is power without will, and even this gun was just something I was lucky enough to be given.”
Kelly was quick to reply, having only heard so much of what Anna had said. Just the words themselves, really, the vocal quality behind those words had a vanishing smallness. Empty space in the form of a mouth. Kelly's tongue prodded the jagged scar flesh starting to sew over her cheeks.
"Cost of mine was the hand."
The shotgun rigidly clacked as Kelly clumsily picked it up, pinned it against the bit of dusty space between them. Opposite side from her remaining hand- she'd needed to twist, to feel the aether swallowing her dangling legs surge a bit closer to claiming the rest of her.
"Standing in front of a gun willingly sounds like a statement, at least. Some kinda intent, I guess. You deserve a little credit for that." Kelly wondered what was going on behind Anna's eyes. Judgement, probably. That particular unwelcome, quarrelsome voice never quieted until gunpowder overpowered it. But there was enough emptiness in the tone, in the blankness glazing over the iris like cold soup skin...
"Carlson was the one who didn't pull the trigger? Can't imagine there's anyone left who wouldn't have. Maybe me,"
No need to rush to kill something already this dead, right?
"- but obviously I wasn't there. Anyways. I've been thinking about it, recently. I know why I'm going to live, of course, but I don't necessarily know what it means beyond that." Kelly adjusted the mask. Pulled it up a bit higher, the hem now sealing over her nostrils. Oddly sweet smell.
"We're always being watched, right? There's eyes behind every camera and every remaining gun. Everything we do from here on out echoes larger than ourselves. Your last words might not be spoken ones." The pained grunt sounded like it came through a smile, as Kelly's peeled nerve endings reminded her they lived right against the leaky breaks in her skin. "If you're gonna come any closer to dying, it's like I said. Have an actual reason to, right? If your... let's call her probably not a friend anymore. If she wants to finish the job then it'd be pretty sad if it came down to 'because she was still in the way'. My take on it."
"Heck, you could try to kill me right now and I'd at least respect you a bit more. It'd be some kind of evolution. Think about it, right?" This long monologue, the maybe attentive ear on the other side. Kelly couldn't help but think that somehow she was still the Kelly who'd stalked lunchrooms looking for the society's discarded scraps- the stragglers, the leftovers starved for banal conversation. "We were always gonna struggle to grow up when we graduated. You and me, we weren't exactly winners, however we tried to front. Something kinda like what we're doing now was, uh, inevitable?" Even the question marks sounded boringly cheerful, except for how much they sounded like they needed a watering can's worth of hydration.
"This island lifestyle we've been forced to live really isn't so far from how fucked up society was in the first place... I'm really hoping that the you in another life wouldn't have been this aimless in college, is all what I'm saying."
"Cost of mine was the hand."
The shotgun rigidly clacked as Kelly clumsily picked it up, pinned it against the bit of dusty space between them. Opposite side from her remaining hand- she'd needed to twist, to feel the aether swallowing her dangling legs surge a bit closer to claiming the rest of her.
"Standing in front of a gun willingly sounds like a statement, at least. Some kinda intent, I guess. You deserve a little credit for that." Kelly wondered what was going on behind Anna's eyes. Judgement, probably. That particular unwelcome, quarrelsome voice never quieted until gunpowder overpowered it. But there was enough emptiness in the tone, in the blankness glazing over the iris like cold soup skin...
"Carlson was the one who didn't pull the trigger? Can't imagine there's anyone left who wouldn't have. Maybe me,"
No need to rush to kill something already this dead, right?
"- but obviously I wasn't there. Anyways. I've been thinking about it, recently. I know why I'm going to live, of course, but I don't necessarily know what it means beyond that." Kelly adjusted the mask. Pulled it up a bit higher, the hem now sealing over her nostrils. Oddly sweet smell.
"We're always being watched, right? There's eyes behind every camera and every remaining gun. Everything we do from here on out echoes larger than ourselves. Your last words might not be spoken ones." The pained grunt sounded like it came through a smile, as Kelly's peeled nerve endings reminded her they lived right against the leaky breaks in her skin. "If you're gonna come any closer to dying, it's like I said. Have an actual reason to, right? If your... let's call her probably not a friend anymore. If she wants to finish the job then it'd be pretty sad if it came down to 'because she was still in the way'. My take on it."
"Heck, you could try to kill me right now and I'd at least respect you a bit more. It'd be some kind of evolution. Think about it, right?" This long monologue, the maybe attentive ear on the other side. Kelly couldn't help but think that somehow she was still the Kelly who'd stalked lunchrooms looking for the society's discarded scraps- the stragglers, the leftovers starved for banal conversation. "We were always gonna struggle to grow up when we graduated. You and me, we weren't exactly winners, however we tried to front. Something kinda like what we're doing now was, uh, inevitable?" Even the question marks sounded boringly cheerful, except for how much they sounded like they needed a watering can's worth of hydration.
"This island lifestyle we've been forced to live really isn't so far from how fucked up society was in the first place... I'm really hoping that the you in another life wouldn't have been this aimless in college, is all what I'm saying."
“I wouldn’t have been,” Roxanne said, able to muster more conviction for the defense of her stolen future than her own self. She ignored Kelly’s attempt at social commentary - In the broadest of terms it was true, in the sense that a galaxy could appear the same size as a planet, if viewed from far enough away. Society was obviously deeply flawed, and every living thing had to consume others to survive, but Survival of the Fittest was so jarringly artificial. How could her actions there translate to the real world in any way?
“I probably would’ve felt miserable, and trapped, but there still would have been things worth doing. I would’ve been driven, winner or not. There’d be a future I could work for.”
This was barely even a conversation - she and Kelly were just exchanging monologues. It was still preferable to whatever they had been doing with Blaise, though - she was willing to assume at least a speck of good faith on Kelly’s end. They genuinely wanted each other to listen.
She couldn’t be sure that she was understanding the whole of Kelly’s point - it felt like she was talking about herself almost as much as she was Roxanne. But still, there was truth in what she could grasp.
Roxanne was an afterthought, even with how late in the game she had lived. Just another face to cross out in a yearbook that had almost completed its metamorphosis into holding only obituaries. Her standoff with Marceline had been a statement, but without any blood to punctuate it, would it just slip into obscurity without being acknowledged beyond the pity credit Kelly had given? In the end, there was only one way to ensure that your name wasn’t forgotten.
“...The only thing worth doing on this island is winning. Is it really that simple? I’ve spent so long trying to find an answer, but is that really the only thing left for me?” The wind was slowly starting to pick up around them. On the cliffside, unprotected by the forest, they’d get the worst of it.
“And evolution or respect or whatever, I still don’t want to kill you. Even though I don’t want to die, even though it’d give me a better chance of making it to the end. I’m not a pacifist. I don’t have any reason to love or even like you, but I don’t think there’s anything that could convince me to push you off that cliff.” The waves crashed unseen against the shore below.
“I don’t know if that makes me a coward, or a hypocrite, but it’s one of the few things I’m sure of. Still, that isn’t really an answer, is it?”
Roxanne was sure there were countless others who had felt the same as her. The only thing that made her different from them was that she hadn’t died yet - and if she killed, she couldn’t even say that she’d ever had ideals to betray. There wouldn’t even be an honest fall from grace for her.
“I probably would’ve felt miserable, and trapped, but there still would have been things worth doing. I would’ve been driven, winner or not. There’d be a future I could work for.”
This was barely even a conversation - she and Kelly were just exchanging monologues. It was still preferable to whatever they had been doing with Blaise, though - she was willing to assume at least a speck of good faith on Kelly’s end. They genuinely wanted each other to listen.
She couldn’t be sure that she was understanding the whole of Kelly’s point - it felt like she was talking about herself almost as much as she was Roxanne. But still, there was truth in what she could grasp.
Roxanne was an afterthought, even with how late in the game she had lived. Just another face to cross out in a yearbook that had almost completed its metamorphosis into holding only obituaries. Her standoff with Marceline had been a statement, but without any blood to punctuate it, would it just slip into obscurity without being acknowledged beyond the pity credit Kelly had given? In the end, there was only one way to ensure that your name wasn’t forgotten.
“...The only thing worth doing on this island is winning. Is it really that simple? I’ve spent so long trying to find an answer, but is that really the only thing left for me?” The wind was slowly starting to pick up around them. On the cliffside, unprotected by the forest, they’d get the worst of it.
“And evolution or respect or whatever, I still don’t want to kill you. Even though I don’t want to die, even though it’d give me a better chance of making it to the end. I’m not a pacifist. I don’t have any reason to love or even like you, but I don’t think there’s anything that could convince me to push you off that cliff.” The waves crashed unseen against the shore below.
“I don’t know if that makes me a coward, or a hypocrite, but it’s one of the few things I’m sure of. Still, that isn’t really an answer, is it?”
Roxanne was sure there were countless others who had felt the same as her. The only thing that made her different from them was that she hadn’t died yet - and if she killed, she couldn’t even say that she’d ever had ideals to betray. There wouldn’t even be an honest fall from grace for her.
Kelly listened. Something she was too used to doing, once upon a time. Sharpness of the wind's howl in her ear didn't matter much when the human voice was more more grating still.
Her own thoughts bubbled under the surface, agonizingly unspoken.
She let the rebuttals sink back into the marrow of her brain. Anna had already at least attempted to listen earnestly, which made her more remotely tolerable than all the rest of them. Kelly knew how the tea was spilled, and how the leaves left over divined the fate of all mankind. Rumors and lectures in classrooms- those evaporated like spent gunpowder. It never really mattered, what was actually said. People heard the words that were to their benefit, or didn't hear at all. Poor Kelly, the one girl who had soldiered on in spite of that basic truth.
Roxy was still at that phase. And seemingly intended to stay there, which was disappointing to be sure, but at least refreshingly so.
"Yeah. I knew what it was like- Roxy. To feel like the answers aren't there."
She'd once thought she'd been working towards a future too. The difference was in the phrasing- working for something just left scraps. Taking something, that was the building of something new. Renewal, from the broken pieces.
---
---
They continued to converse, by some definition of the word. Neither of them had much to say, but that was actually fairly pleasant going. Kelly had discarded old ambitions and old dreams, calling them kindling for inner fire, but rehashing more naive sentiment was at least simple. Earnestly, endearingly awkward. They were probably still hiding truths from each other, but Kelly at least had the sense she knew enough about Roxy to be able to pretend they could ever have been friends in another life. 'Friends'. The sorts of things Kelly had instinctively kept as close as enemies.
Kelly didn't bother to drift off to sleep that night. Head rested on her bag as if it were a pillow, one weeping arm over her chest as if it had a hand, she contemplated the stars even though they only reflected the terrestrial self. She saw less of the night sky and more of her own twisted body, splayed under the heavens and slowly adopting new, more wickedly powerful shapes. She changed her bandages only once, even when the gauze started to sluggishly run onto her shirt. Meditation demanded her attention in full. Every question she asked herself deserved her own best answer.
She had all of them at some point, confident in how they warmed her before the sun rose. She'd felt more at home before, even, when the moon hadn't been so apparent in the night sky and her face had mixed with the trees astride when she'd laid perfectly still, barely breathing.
Still, the day did eventually come. As it did Kelly finally had her fresh bandaging. She had food to nibble at, contemplating Lucas' face with a soft sneer hidden under a mask which she carefully piped crumbs of crackers behind by a single finger. Her defensive hunching onto herself, as if her ritual were sacred, was interrupted by their classes' VIP wake-up call.
Well, VIP for those who were willing to be.
"Looks like your friend found someone else. I wonder if it was actually violent as it sounds." Kelly was unperturbed, as she abandoned a still mostly uneaten cracker and raised an eyebrow at her mirror vampire of a companion. Genuinely no anger- she was quite used to the idea of white girls failing upwards, getting accolades and credit they didn't deserve.
"Juliette's is a bit anticlimactic. I figured she'd do better."
Her own thoughts bubbled under the surface, agonizingly unspoken.
She let the rebuttals sink back into the marrow of her brain. Anna had already at least attempted to listen earnestly, which made her more remotely tolerable than all the rest of them. Kelly knew how the tea was spilled, and how the leaves left over divined the fate of all mankind. Rumors and lectures in classrooms- those evaporated like spent gunpowder. It never really mattered, what was actually said. People heard the words that were to their benefit, or didn't hear at all. Poor Kelly, the one girl who had soldiered on in spite of that basic truth.
Roxy was still at that phase. And seemingly intended to stay there, which was disappointing to be sure, but at least refreshingly so.
"Yeah. I knew what it was like- Roxy. To feel like the answers aren't there."
She'd once thought she'd been working towards a future too. The difference was in the phrasing- working for something just left scraps. Taking something, that was the building of something new. Renewal, from the broken pieces.
---
---
They continued to converse, by some definition of the word. Neither of them had much to say, but that was actually fairly pleasant going. Kelly had discarded old ambitions and old dreams, calling them kindling for inner fire, but rehashing more naive sentiment was at least simple. Earnestly, endearingly awkward. They were probably still hiding truths from each other, but Kelly at least had the sense she knew enough about Roxy to be able to pretend they could ever have been friends in another life. 'Friends'. The sorts of things Kelly had instinctively kept as close as enemies.
Kelly didn't bother to drift off to sleep that night. Head rested on her bag as if it were a pillow, one weeping arm over her chest as if it had a hand, she contemplated the stars even though they only reflected the terrestrial self. She saw less of the night sky and more of her own twisted body, splayed under the heavens and slowly adopting new, more wickedly powerful shapes. She changed her bandages only once, even when the gauze started to sluggishly run onto her shirt. Meditation demanded her attention in full. Every question she asked herself deserved her own best answer.
She had all of them at some point, confident in how they warmed her before the sun rose. She'd felt more at home before, even, when the moon hadn't been so apparent in the night sky and her face had mixed with the trees astride when she'd laid perfectly still, barely breathing.
Still, the day did eventually come. As it did Kelly finally had her fresh bandaging. She had food to nibble at, contemplating Lucas' face with a soft sneer hidden under a mask which she carefully piped crumbs of crackers behind by a single finger. Her defensive hunching onto herself, as if her ritual were sacred, was interrupted by their classes' VIP wake-up call.
Well, VIP for those who were willing to be.
"Looks like your friend found someone else. I wonder if it was actually violent as it sounds." Kelly was unperturbed, as she abandoned a still mostly uneaten cracker and raised an eyebrow at her mirror vampire of a companion. Genuinely no anger- she was quite used to the idea of white girls failing upwards, getting accolades and credit they didn't deserve.
"Juliette's is a bit anticlimactic. I figured she'd do better."
Roxanne could only return a solemn nod to Kelly. She appreciated the commiseration, but was too overwhelmed by a sudden desperate wish to somehow be her, to speak with half as much clarity, because even with the mask, the serenity in Kelly’s eyes was all she needed to see.
She had known what it was like, to not have the answers, but that knowledge had belonged to an unrecognizable past self. How long ago had she metamorphosed? When she lost her hand? When she fought off Marceline? When she killed for the first time? Her life on the island was a mystery Roxanne had been graciously allowed to catch a few glimpses of.
It couldn’t have been as simple as a single shining burst of understanding, but Roxanne couldn’t help but envy the ideal transformation she imagined. To feel like you were ascending as your flesh was torn from you, to trade a limb for a purpose, agony and ecstasy in equal measure. If she’d been given a cleaver and a promise of enlightenment in that moment, she wouldn’t have hesitated.
If only Roxanne had been hurt worse by the explosion, rendered unrecognizable (how much of a fuss she had made, barely maimed), if only Marceline had stood her ground with a knife instead of breaking down, slicing her to the core of her bullshit.
Was that what it would have taken for her to return at last to Anna? Head wrapped so tightly in bandages that she may as well have no face at all, hanging to life by a thread, freed of all pretense, finally at peace?
Was that what it would have taken for her to truly become Roxanne? To have such a clear, mortal break in her life that she had no choice but to fully throw herself into the fire and actually commit to her freedom?
Maybe. Or maybe she would have just died, pitifully, and that ending was unnervingly close enough without her rushing towards pain, purifying or not.
Still, she realized now that she had been interchangeably longing for ‘truth’ or ‘an answer’, but there was a difference, wasn’t there? A truth was something that already existed in the world, waiting to be found but an answer depended on the question that was asked. If you couldn’t find an answer to a question you asked yourself, about yourself, within yourself, didn’t that mean there was some fundamental failure deep within her sense of self? At what point couldn’t she blame the island for her own hollowness, anymore?
Eventually, she recovered from this stunningly self-pitying display of lachesism, though it would linger in the back of her mind as the two retreated back into conversation.
-
Falling asleep near Kelly was probably one of the stupidest things Roxanne had done on the island, but objectively speaking, she had already inflated that list to a ridiculous length over the past few days, so what was one more tactical misstep? She had just wanted to look at the stars, for a while, when the conversation had finally stalled out, and she had closed her eyes, next to a murderer, a poisoner, but she had woken up in the morning, clutching her shotgun like a safety blanket as usual, so what did it matter?
Roxanne stirred upright, and the announcements broke the silence first. There were two surprises. One hurt more than she had expected, the other less.
“Guess Marceline found a friend she liked less than me.” It felt like the sort of statement she should have followed up with a cackle, or at least an ugly snort, but the flatness in her voice spoke for itself, didn’t it? Maybe it was admirable that she hadn’t given up. “Maybe she actually has a shot at Blaise.”
A thought came, unbidden and disconcerting. If Marceline had shot her, or if she hadn’t challenged her theft of the shotgun in the first place, would Amelia still be alive? Marceline had laid out her plans in the open, painfully clear. She wanted to win, but she hadn’t exactly gone insane with bloodlust. Would she have killed her friend if there hadn’t been anything in it for her, like a better weapon?
In the end, it didn’t really matter. Roxanne didn’t care about Amelia, barely knew her in the first place - Marceline’s social circle was as hard to keep a track of as Beryl’s. Just another reminder of actions and consequences.
“...And agreed about Juliette. I was with her for a while. We had a nice moment. Then she told Marceline to shoot me, and, I’ve told you the rest.” She shrugged.
“Wish I could’ve known what was going through her head, if she was so ready to give up, after all that.”
It had felt like a betrayal, at the time, perhaps even more than Marceline’s. But now she only felt a pang of longing for the connection they could have built together.
She had known what it was like, to not have the answers, but that knowledge had belonged to an unrecognizable past self. How long ago had she metamorphosed? When she lost her hand? When she fought off Marceline? When she killed for the first time? Her life on the island was a mystery Roxanne had been graciously allowed to catch a few glimpses of.
It couldn’t have been as simple as a single shining burst of understanding, but Roxanne couldn’t help but envy the ideal transformation she imagined. To feel like you were ascending as your flesh was torn from you, to trade a limb for a purpose, agony and ecstasy in equal measure. If she’d been given a cleaver and a promise of enlightenment in that moment, she wouldn’t have hesitated.
If only Roxanne had been hurt worse by the explosion, rendered unrecognizable (how much of a fuss she had made, barely maimed), if only Marceline had stood her ground with a knife instead of breaking down, slicing her to the core of her bullshit.
Was that what it would have taken for her to return at last to Anna? Head wrapped so tightly in bandages that she may as well have no face at all, hanging to life by a thread, freed of all pretense, finally at peace?
Was that what it would have taken for her to truly become Roxanne? To have such a clear, mortal break in her life that she had no choice but to fully throw herself into the fire and actually commit to her freedom?
Maybe. Or maybe she would have just died, pitifully, and that ending was unnervingly close enough without her rushing towards pain, purifying or not.
Still, she realized now that she had been interchangeably longing for ‘truth’ or ‘an answer’, but there was a difference, wasn’t there? A truth was something that already existed in the world, waiting to be found but an answer depended on the question that was asked. If you couldn’t find an answer to a question you asked yourself, about yourself, within yourself, didn’t that mean there was some fundamental failure deep within her sense of self? At what point couldn’t she blame the island for her own hollowness, anymore?
Eventually, she recovered from this stunningly self-pitying display of lachesism, though it would linger in the back of her mind as the two retreated back into conversation.
-
Falling asleep near Kelly was probably one of the stupidest things Roxanne had done on the island, but objectively speaking, she had already inflated that list to a ridiculous length over the past few days, so what was one more tactical misstep? She had just wanted to look at the stars, for a while, when the conversation had finally stalled out, and she had closed her eyes, next to a murderer, a poisoner, but she had woken up in the morning, clutching her shotgun like a safety blanket as usual, so what did it matter?
Roxanne stirred upright, and the announcements broke the silence first. There were two surprises. One hurt more than she had expected, the other less.
“Guess Marceline found a friend she liked less than me.” It felt like the sort of statement she should have followed up with a cackle, or at least an ugly snort, but the flatness in her voice spoke for itself, didn’t it? Maybe it was admirable that she hadn’t given up. “Maybe she actually has a shot at Blaise.”
A thought came, unbidden and disconcerting. If Marceline had shot her, or if she hadn’t challenged her theft of the shotgun in the first place, would Amelia still be alive? Marceline had laid out her plans in the open, painfully clear. She wanted to win, but she hadn’t exactly gone insane with bloodlust. Would she have killed her friend if there hadn’t been anything in it for her, like a better weapon?
In the end, it didn’t really matter. Roxanne didn’t care about Amelia, barely knew her in the first place - Marceline’s social circle was as hard to keep a track of as Beryl’s. Just another reminder of actions and consequences.
“...And agreed about Juliette. I was with her for a while. We had a nice moment. Then she told Marceline to shoot me, and, I’ve told you the rest.” She shrugged.
“Wish I could’ve known what was going through her head, if she was so ready to give up, after all that.”
It had felt like a betrayal, at the time, perhaps even more than Marceline’s. But now she only felt a pang of longing for the connection they could have built together.
"Power without the will to use it is nothing," Kelly echoed softly.
"Big screen moment... Over the top, honestly."
Roxanne's words had evoked the scene quite well. Kelly very much had wanted to slap the ghostly simulacrum of Marceline's pathetically tear-soaked rag of a face through the holograms of her vision. Kelly was surprisingly easily lulled into assuming a certain sort of her former... doormat shape, as it were. Kelly had infinity plus one experience with the timbre of how lips with an agenda flapped. Sinister misrepresentation from unreliable narrators dripped from all syllables. Kelly couldn't say she quite knew why she afforded herself a moment of her own most detestable mood- why she took Roxy's words at face value. BS was BS, even and especially if it was tangentially related to the truth.
Roxy herself, after all, was in many ways Kelly's equal. They'd both worn masks, they'd both expected great things of themselves. Kelly had hidden behind facelessness, Roxy had hidden behind different faces. The cartoon five cent mustache of character building- taking on a name change. Something of a bad fanfiction quality to it, rather...
All those little musings about things that didn't matter ultimately and in the blink of an eye seemed a good deal less than the sum of what she'd allowed herself to become. She hadn't expected that she could think such things so plainly and simply without feeling revulsion for the scars that marked where she'd stripped and peeled and re-appropriated herself. She hadn't expected the thoughts to itch, to bother her a good deal deeper into her flesh than her actual wounds. Burrowing, crawling things.
For a brief moment, she was reminded of how small she actually was, much as she no longer felt that to be the truth. The itch was brief, she willed it away, much like she'd learned her own heartbeat didn't have to obey anything except herself if she stood her ground.
"Marceline trying for Blaise's head. Hm. I think... If her creed is really just survival for the sake of her lost Lenore, like you said, it'd be a bad move. Wouldn't it? Blaise's sort of dubious self-righteousness could only be matched by someone equally as discipline-dly selfish."
"What I mean is, Marceline might not have the clarity of vision to survive an encounter with a... wraith, I'd call it." Kelly nodded, jabbing a finger through the air like a dagger intended for Roxy's throat. A soft gesture for the one hand left to make it. "I don't think she would risk it? Or at least not yet."
"And I think that means we will be meeting her again."
The unasked follow-up question was the only one that mattered. Quite typical for girl talk.
"Big screen moment... Over the top, honestly."
Roxanne's words had evoked the scene quite well. Kelly very much had wanted to slap the ghostly simulacrum of Marceline's pathetically tear-soaked rag of a face through the holograms of her vision. Kelly was surprisingly easily lulled into assuming a certain sort of her former... doormat shape, as it were. Kelly had infinity plus one experience with the timbre of how lips with an agenda flapped. Sinister misrepresentation from unreliable narrators dripped from all syllables. Kelly couldn't say she quite knew why she afforded herself a moment of her own most detestable mood- why she took Roxy's words at face value. BS was BS, even and especially if it was tangentially related to the truth.
Roxy herself, after all, was in many ways Kelly's equal. They'd both worn masks, they'd both expected great things of themselves. Kelly had hidden behind facelessness, Roxy had hidden behind different faces. The cartoon five cent mustache of character building- taking on a name change. Something of a bad fanfiction quality to it, rather...
All those little musings about things that didn't matter ultimately and in the blink of an eye seemed a good deal less than the sum of what she'd allowed herself to become. She hadn't expected that she could think such things so plainly and simply without feeling revulsion for the scars that marked where she'd stripped and peeled and re-appropriated herself. She hadn't expected the thoughts to itch, to bother her a good deal deeper into her flesh than her actual wounds. Burrowing, crawling things.
For a brief moment, she was reminded of how small she actually was, much as she no longer felt that to be the truth. The itch was brief, she willed it away, much like she'd learned her own heartbeat didn't have to obey anything except herself if she stood her ground.
"Marceline trying for Blaise's head. Hm. I think... If her creed is really just survival for the sake of her lost Lenore, like you said, it'd be a bad move. Wouldn't it? Blaise's sort of dubious self-righteousness could only be matched by someone equally as discipline-dly selfish."
"What I mean is, Marceline might not have the clarity of vision to survive an encounter with a... wraith, I'd call it." Kelly nodded, jabbing a finger through the air like a dagger intended for Roxy's throat. A soft gesture for the one hand left to make it. "I don't think she would risk it? Or at least not yet."
"And I think that means we will be meeting her again."
The unasked follow-up question was the only one that mattered. Quite typical for girl talk.
“I don’t know. She has a plan, and she’s stronger than I thought she was, but most plans don’t survive first contact with the devil themself.” Especially when the devil wouldn’t even need to open their mouth to tempt their victim to doomed violence.
Roxanne wanted to believe that Marceline wouldn’t lecture Blaise before she tried to kill them. She imagined that she’d lost her self-righteous streak after the friends she’d stabbed in the back, literally or not, but Blaise was a special case, weren’t they? They’d been what inspired Marceline to set off on her crusade in the first place.
“If Blaise is a wraith, what does that make Marceline? A banshee, wailing ever since Dolores died?” Ludicrously, Roxanne could picture her now, standing and weeping by the cliffside. “It’d probably turn out badly for her, yeah. But I don’t think she could stop herself.”
Despite the bleak subject Roxanne smiled, a little, at the sheer improbability of her staying with Kelly for an entire night, at finding a connection. Not much, not friendship, barely even an understanding - but something more real than she’d gotten from everyone else she’d met.
“Either way, I think if she sees that I’m with you, she’ll drop dead from sheer outrage.” A stupid joke despite how true it felt. Dodging the real question, probably much to Kelly’s disgust. Roxanne couldn’t even commit to saying she wasn’t sure what she’d do, the next time they met - and Kelly was right. It felt like an inevitability, not a question.
After a while longer, the two masked girls wandered elsewhere. No sense in just sitting around, waiting for inexorable fate to find its way to you.
((Roxanne had more decisions to fail to make, after all.))
Roxanne wanted to believe that Marceline wouldn’t lecture Blaise before she tried to kill them. She imagined that she’d lost her self-righteous streak after the friends she’d stabbed in the back, literally or not, but Blaise was a special case, weren’t they? They’d been what inspired Marceline to set off on her crusade in the first place.
“If Blaise is a wraith, what does that make Marceline? A banshee, wailing ever since Dolores died?” Ludicrously, Roxanne could picture her now, standing and weeping by the cliffside. “It’d probably turn out badly for her, yeah. But I don’t think she could stop herself.”
Despite the bleak subject Roxanne smiled, a little, at the sheer improbability of her staying with Kelly for an entire night, at finding a connection. Not much, not friendship, barely even an understanding - but something more real than she’d gotten from everyone else she’d met.
“Either way, I think if she sees that I’m with you, she’ll drop dead from sheer outrage.” A stupid joke despite how true it felt. Dodging the real question, probably much to Kelly’s disgust. Roxanne couldn’t even commit to saying she wasn’t sure what she’d do, the next time they met - and Kelly was right. It felt like an inevitability, not a question.
After a while longer, the two masked girls wandered elsewhere. No sense in just sitting around, waiting for inexorable fate to find its way to you.
((Roxanne had more decisions to fail to make, after all.))
"We've both heard her screaming and neither of us have died yet," Kelly shrugged in rebuttal, her body language having idled when she'd ceded the conversation to Roxy. Attentive, a bit distantly so, but certainly and in theory there for her peer. Classic Kelly. Playing all the old George Hunter High greatest hits, like 'stand there aimlessly' and 'simper passively for attention'.
Kelly smiled as well. Not that it was particularly relevant.
"Sounds like a good enough plan. Fingers crossed it ends like that."
Fingers on her one good hand, anyway.
It was up to Roxy. Kelly wasn't any further disappointed in the formless mass of failed ambitions standing in front of her, cute as anything pitiable was worth a teenage girl's affection. Marceline would die, it was a simple truth hardly worth a second thought. It didn't matter by whose hand, and it didn't matter if Kelly was around to see it. Kelly's blood had thinned enough when she'd bled some of it out and lived to tell the tale, after all- whatever was left wasn't enough to feel the outrage. None of Kelly's blood could be spared to boil on Carlson's behalf.
Rage simmered when it was trimmed. Slow-cooked, became delicious and hearty. There simple was no Marceline, in Kelly's vision of the future world. Kelly, she so fancied, had evolved beyond the need for her. If fate had other plans, then Kelly also had no need for fate. She was coming to understand that she never had.
((Kelly Nguyen continued elsewhere))
Kelly smiled as well. Not that it was particularly relevant.
"Sounds like a good enough plan. Fingers crossed it ends like that."
Fingers on her one good hand, anyway.
It was up to Roxy. Kelly wasn't any further disappointed in the formless mass of failed ambitions standing in front of her, cute as anything pitiable was worth a teenage girl's affection. Marceline would die, it was a simple truth hardly worth a second thought. It didn't matter by whose hand, and it didn't matter if Kelly was around to see it. Kelly's blood had thinned enough when she'd bled some of it out and lived to tell the tale, after all- whatever was left wasn't enough to feel the outrage. None of Kelly's blood could be spared to boil on Carlson's behalf.
Rage simmered when it was trimmed. Slow-cooked, became delicious and hearty. There simple was no Marceline, in Kelly's vision of the future world. Kelly, she so fancied, had evolved beyond the need for her. If fate had other plans, then Kelly also had no need for fate. She was coming to understand that she never had.
((Kelly Nguyen continued elsewhere))