Like A Glove

[ViolentMedic]

((Russell 'Fitz' Fitzroy continued from The Sound of Bugles.))

It was night. No more news had come yet. He hadn’t heard gunshots in a while, either. The nights had generally been quiet.

Kaede was asleep. Fitz was keeping watch through the window. He alternated between peering through the sniper rifle at the distance, and looking past the scope to look down into the street.

They’d switched houses – the stench of Alex’s now-headless corpse was too much. The head sat in the bag next to him, and didn’t smell much better. Fitz had moved to a different room from Kaede, largely to keep the smell away from her.

Occasionally he whispered to himself.

“You see anything?”

He waited a moment, then pitched his voice up. “No, sirree. I don’t see anything. I’m not as tall as you, though, I can’t be looking through the windowsill.”

Formerly Armand, then Mister Fluffernutter, then currently Armand again, sat in Fitz’s pocket, his little head sticking out. Fitz glanced down, then retrieved him and placed him on the windowsill.

“Is that better?”

“Much, much.”

“Now do you see anything?”

“Nope. I’m a puppet. I see what you see.”

Fitz tilted his head and grimaced a little before he said, “Got a point there—ah, shit.”

He’d accidentally nudged Armand as he spoke, and Armand had toppled off the windowsill and outside. Fitz lowered the rifle, then got to his feet and crept downstairs, before heading out the front door to retrieve him.

Nothing was visible immediately, though it was dark. Fitz looked upwards at the nearby higher windows, where he’d sit if he wanted to keep an eye on the street, before he slid out and shifted over to where Armand had flopped onto the snow. He crouched, keeping his rifle (unloaded, for now, more a scope than a weapon) in one hand and scooping Armand up with the other. He remained crouched, looking down at him.

“Hey, you can’t be doing that,” he whispered.

He’d thought to check the higher windows, but it was really too dark to be able to see everything. And he was much more obvious, now that he was on the snow.

[Laurels]

((Ellis Wheaton continued from If I have to explain it to you, it's not funny.))

Ellis had continued walking after leaving the bar. He didn't really have anywhere to go, nor did he really want to go anywhere in particular. He mostly kept to the town, feeling the chill as he walked around. He wasn't sure if he'd find anyone else or if he'd run into danger. He mostly walked until he was starting to feel exhausted and his throat burned from the cold.

Ellis knew he should go inside eventually, so he had taken to the housing area and was prowling around looking for what looked to be the safest, most likely to be abandoned home. He needed to drink some water and try to warm up before going to sleep.

As he looked around the houses, he heard the sounds of snow crunching. He turned to the sound and tried to look over to where it was.

"Hello?" he asked the sound.

[ViolentMedic]

“Fuihagggh—Jesus!”

Fitz straightened up and fumbled with the rifle, but didn’t raise it at the source. He turned around, squinting in the dark at the silhouette that had approached as he tried to arrange himself into a more in-control stance, Armand tucked in the crook of his arm as he mucked about with his gun.

“Sorry, just… Jesus. I’m cool! Are you cool?”

He continued to squint. He couldn’t recognise the boy based on their shape alone. Everything he had was upstairs, aside from the rifle, a clip in his pocket, and a squirrel puppet. His flashlight was among the items upstairs.

“I guess you wouldn’t have said hello if you were gunning. You got a light? Can’t see nothin’.”

[Laurels]

Ellis heard someone moving. He could sort of make out a shape in the dark, and it definitely looked like some guy was holding a gun. Ellis raised his hands in case it was held towards him.

The figure asked Ellis if he was cool.

"Yeah, I'm definitely cool," Ellis said. "For once in my life haha."

He wasn't sure why he was joking now with a gun leveled at him. Maybe he was still gunning from his last exchange with Armand.

"And yeah, I've got my flashlight still. Permit me to reach for it."

Ellis began to rifle through his bag for his flashlight.

"Ok, found it!"

Ellis pulled a flashlight out and turned it on. He held it under his chin, something that would no doubt be terrifying for the boy to see, but it was less rude then shining it in the boy's eyes.

"See? It's just me. Ellis Wheaton. May I shine the light towards you?"

[ViolentMedic]

“I wish that were me, but I’ve never been, like, cool-cool,” Fitz said, his tone remaining casually serious, like the joke had entirely flown over his head.

He shifted back slightly at Ellis pointing the flashlight upwards.

“Euagh. Yeah, alright, I believe you. Ellis… huh.”

Fitz paused briefly, eyes flickering down to the puppet tucked in his arm.

“Oh, yeah, that’s fine. Uh, heads up… it’s Fitz—uh, Russell Fitzroy, but Fitz is better. I did... kind of kill two people, but it was a week ago.”

As he spoke, he edged Armand out of the crook of his arm and into his free hand again, holding the rifle with one hand again. Just before Ellis could point the torch, he popped it on his hand.

“I think, uh… I think I got something of yours, actually.”

He attempted to make it wave, though it ended up more like a flop.

[Laurels]

Ok, it was someone named Fitz. Ellis sorta recognized the name, but it was really hard to figure if that was because of the announcements or memories from school at this point. He did admit he killed people, which wasn't the best thing to hear now. Ellis hadn't killed anyone, and that had to be super rare at this point.

Fitz then said that he had something of Ellis'.

"What? What do-"

Ellis shined the light on Fitz, and that's when he saw it. The gray felt with the black, wire glasses and the red waistcoat. Fitz had sorta moved him in the air, but Ellis' mouth dropped open.

"...Armand? W-h-wha-how? How did you find him?"

[ViolentMedic]

Fitz had to squint through the light to be able to see Ellis’ look of shock.

“I found him in Mildred’s bag, and saw his name on this laminated list of what everyone got assigned that Adam was carrying. I guess… I guess the terrorists thought it’d be funny to assign him as a ‘weapon.’ Fucked up, huh?”

He took a step forward, still holding Armand out.

“I guess you want him back?” There was a tinge of regret in Fitz’s voice. “He kind of knows way too much about me now, and he’s good company… but I don’t like the idea of holding a puppet hostage, that’s kind of… I dunno, just mean?”

He wiggled the puppet again, shifting the gun even further back in his other hand so it wouldn’t be misconstrued as a threat.

[Laurels]

Ellis couldn't believe it. Armand was taken out of his bag because the terrorists had decided to make him someone else's weapon? He shouldn't have been surprised by their sick sense of humor, but amazingly he was.

To Ellis' even greater surprise, Fitz was offering Armand back to Ellis.

Ellis should have been scared. He should have been distrustful. Even with the gun moved out of the way, Fitz still could easily turn it on him after faking out his generosity.

But Ellis didn't care. He stepped forward, reached out, and took the puppet out of Fitz's hand.

[ViolentMedic]

Fitz allowed it with little struggle, though there was perhaps a hint of reluctance in how he didn’t really move his hand to make it easier for Ellis to take it, but he didn’t try to hold Armand back, either. Once Armand had been retrieved, Fitz lowered his arm. He shifted the rifle back into his arms, but still kept it firmly pointed away from Ellis.

“Sorry if he smells, he’s been in my pocket all week and… well, I don’t think any of us smell great, but there’s been a lot of corpse-stink and blood-stink and not-had-a-shower-stink… ah, you know what I mean. You’ve been here.”

Fitz shifted on his feet and looked down.

“Oh, and I called him Mister Fluffernutter for like five days. Didn’t know he was an Armand. And gave him like three or four different voices. He was British for twelve hours. Sorry.”

[Laurels]

Ellis looked over Armand. He did look a bit dirtier than normal, especially inside his mouth for some reason. Fitz was talking about what he had been doing with Armand, having apparently called him "Mr. Fluffernutter." Ellis didn't mind so much. His original name for Armand was something uncreative like Stevie Squirrel, not that he could exactly remember his ten year old self trying to come up with Armand's name.

"That's fine," Ellis said, barely looking up from Armand. "I just...I'm glad to see something from home..."

Ellis' smile vanished. He didn't have a home anymore. The rest of his puppets and his possessions were probably being burned in the yard following his rant to the cameras.

Ellis looked over to Fitz.

"Thank you. I...really don't know how to explain how good this is for me. It might seem strange but..uh...I'm really grateful."

"Can I pay you back somehow?"

[ViolentMedic]

“Eh, like I’ve got any room to talk about strange.”

Fitz considered the offer, then shifted and leaned against the house, fingers drumming idly on the gun.

“Hmm... I mighta taken you up on that. Asked for supplies or something, maybe even tried the whole hostage thing. I’ve kind of done a lot of… not good things during this game, and made a lot of stupid mistakes. I mean, I haven’t been balls-to-the-wall crazy… but I shot Tully. Might not have been who I was aiming for… but fuck, I can’t even remember any more. Let my gun be stolen… that killed Tenshi. Missed Alex, and that killed Cedar. I killed Mildred rather than let her kill me, even when she had all the reason in the world to want me dead.

“I keep ditching people, and almost all of them end up turning up dead not long after. Cassie, Madeleine, Victor, Adam, Dawn. Didn’t bother to try finding anyone I might still care about, because I was too focused on myself. I left Evie and she’s murdered like four people. I sold out Matthew and Shawn to Katelyn. And I spent this morning chopping off a corpse’s head.”

Fitz let out a quick, bitter giggle.

“All to hear that, maybe, so much of what I did might never have been necessary. So, you know what? It’s small. It might not even matter in a day or two.”

Fitz’s smile was faint, and still bitter, but it was present as he stared off into the night.

“But fuck… I wanted to do something nice for once. So I’m just glad that it means something.”

[Laurels]

Ellis stared at Fitz as he began to ramble. Fitz basically outlined the entirety of his time on this island to Ellis, talking about the people he killed and the things he did. Ellis was a bit surprised and unnerved, but he tried to not let it show. Everyone was completely fucked up by this point, and since Fitz wasn't immediately trying to take off Ellis' head as well, he had to at least thank his fortunes that he was likely to be a small part of Fitz's story here.

Ellis nodded.

"Everyone I've met here has either disappeared or died on me. Armand's the only one who came back."

He then fell back into silence as Fitz talked about how good it felt to do something nice for someone else. He had to think about that. He hadn't done much nice for anyone here. Sure, he was friendly to folks and tried to help where he could, but Ellis hadn't really done anything of great value or appreciation. Doxxing his family wasn't nice, and his friendship didn't save anyone's life or keep them from disappearing. He was nearing the end, and he hadn't done anything of real significance to anyone.

But looking at Fitz, who had clearly had a worse experience here than Ellis had, Ellis saw the opportunity to do something nice.

"You know...I think I know how to repay you..."

Ellis quickly shoved Armand in one jacket pocket and put the flashlight in the other, feeling the weight of it hit the knife in his pocket. He then reached into his bag and pulled out a bottle of water, tucking it under his armpit. He then zipped up the bag, removed it from his shoulder, and placed it on the ground in front of Fitz.

"Here. It's all yours. I've got everything I need now."

Ellis switched the water bottle for the flashlight, shining the flashlight back under his face. He gave Fitz a smile.

"Take care, and good luck."

He turned off the light and walked away from Fitz. All Ellis had on him now was one bottle of water, one flashlight, one puppet, and one knife.

It was all Ellis would need for the rest of his time here.

((Ellis Wheaton continued in Ba Dum Tish))

[ViolentMedic]

“No, it’s cool, you need—“

Before Fitz could finish the sentence, Ellis had already turned the flashlight off and left.

“Hey... HEY—”

Fitz cut himself off, clamping his mouth tight as Ellis vanished into the darkness. He took a couple of steps afterwards. But it was dark. Kaede would be left alone. His supplies were upstairs. There was no telling what was out there.

Fitz stood there, silently deliberating for a few moments, opening his mouth like he was going to shout a few times, but ultimately staying silent.

“...Dammit, not again,” he muttered after a while.

He stared down at the supplies, then sighed and muttered, “Fuck.” He grabbed the bag by the strap, and started to haul them back.

He went back inside, though not without one more glance in the direction Ellis had gone.

((Russell ‘Fitz’ Fitzroy continued in It's Quiet...))