Survival Of The Fittest

"So I could be a forgettable school shooter?" Quinn asked. "Diagnosed with depression or something else, then stare at walls for the next sixty years of my life and pretend it was worth slipping the leash just once." She lifted her head a little, her eyes unblinking, feral. Was there a monster in those eyes, like Carrie had said? "Nothing changed. Opportunity just came early."

Daria stared steadily back at her. Her lips were pursed. Her limbs felt weak. She swallowed against the dryness in her throat, trying to maintain her cool.

"Slip the leash," Daria repeated softly. Her eyes flicked to the gun, then back up to Quinn's face. "You didn't, you know. They took it off you. They wanted an attack dog, to do what they were too chickenshit to do."

She stared into Quinn's eyes. "Opportunity didn't come early, Quinn. They did."

Some ways behind Quinn, there was movement. Daria's eyes flickered to a human figure in the distance, fallen on their knees. But before she could say anything, she observed a different movement, stranger somehow, eerie in its familiarity and its crawling, alien connotation. Daria's head turned slowly. She stepped past Katie, over the rubbery, sodden shoes to the rubbery, sodden figure in the surf.

She bent over, placed her hands on heavy shoulders, and turned the figure face-up.

"Oh," she managed.

And for a little while, all words were lost.

Quinn ... wasn't killing people, at least. As Christina got closer she noted the other one she was with - Daria. Daria wasn't psycho yet, so she was bearable to be around for now. But Quinn "I killed three people" was giving her pause, as did some other chick who decided to nope out, as well as a guy that swam like a brick. And lay there like a log.

And that was when Christina realized that the person hadn't been swimming, just as Daria approached. Christina approached the two just as Daria flipped the guy over to reveal ... Arthur, or Artie. Something like that. The name started with "Ar."

"Hey. You think he's okay?" She knelt next to Artie, trying to see if he was breathing. She wouldn't really be able to tell, but he seemed okay. At least he wasn't actively dying.

Daria was getting boring. She had a certain self-righteousness beneath the surface that was peeling back, piece by piece, showing that behind the inquiry, all she was really doing was passing judgement. That was fine. Judge away. Quinn had been subject to that before. She was subject to it as they spoke. The interest that had held Quinn's attention to start with had faded away, replaced with irritation.

She wondered what Daria's expression would look like if she rammed her rifle butt straight through her face. Would she spit out 'attack dog' again, through broken teeth and a mouthful of blood? Would she manage to choke past the pain to condemn her again? Finding out would be much more interesting than listening to her. She wasn't armed, or if she was armed, she wasn't alert enough to the danger Quinn posed, too busy philosophising, scoring imaginary points in an imaginary game.

Even as she daydreamed, though, breaking Daria's skull, watching it splatter, the thought of her turning, shattered head and all, croaking out a 'told you so'. It rankled. She would be dead, sure, but she would get to be right.

No. Quinn wasn't going to concede that to her. They could meet again later, distant from this conversation, when it wasn't spoiled. Someone could always kill Daria in the meantime, but that was better than letting her win. Quinn could choose to walk away, and could choose to do so for any reason she wanted.

Someone had washed up against the beach, Daria walked to them. Another pang of irritation. Turn your back to her—no, she was done here. She'd already decided that she was leaving, she wouldn't be baited now.

Wordlessly, Quinn turned, saw the figure behind them, scowled, turned further, and set off at a swift walk.

She snapped her own chain, nobody else.

((Quinn continued in I am the inferno in which heroes are born))

Some guy washed up on the beach. What was this, a some tasteless teen girl’s romance-movie-fantasy? Must be, since a couple of the girls, one of which Zach hadn’t noticed before, were gathering around him. One other girl was walking off, so he didn’t need to worry about her anymore. Curious, Zach shimmied closer to the scene until he was at a reasonable distance for self defense. He held his gun tightly, pointed away from himself and the others.

“Um. Hey,” Zach said, awkwardly, “W-What’s going on? Is he dead?”

She stepped past Quinn.

She pretended, as she did it, that it was a casual gesture, a sign of her ease with the killer. She pretended that her heart wasn't pounding, her mouth dry. She pretended that she was exactly what she seemed to be--a badass at the end of her rope, untethered and free.

Maybe there was some truth to that. Carrie's death really had floored her, and when Quinn had first appeared she had been so apathetic and defeated as to feel as careless as she seemed. But her rage had reawakened all her feelings, including fear. So when she stepped past Quinn, most of her was just scared. Scared of dying as so many others had died. As Carrie had died. As Daria herself would die. As Daria herself desperately didn't want to die.

But when she flipped the figure in the surf onto its back, she really did forget Quinn.

She stared down at the figure in front of her. There had been, she realized now, some part of her vaguely hoping that she had stumbled on someone drifting in the ocean for a little while, free from the worries of this wretched island. That hope was gone. She knew Arjen. She'd tried to learn ventriloquism from him for a few days, only to quit in frustration. She might have pretended he was only sleeping. But his eyes were wide and staring, his body sodden and cold, and no matter how she looked at him, he didn't breathe.

"Hey." A new voice, but not an unfamiliar one. "You think he's okay?"

She looked up at Christina. They'd collaborated on one weird mutual project between their channels--Daria trying something improvisational while Christina had streamed. It had been an unmitigated disaster, but they'd had fun anyways, and been on friendly terms since.

“Um. Hey." Another voice, less familiar. An awkward, shorter figure, shambling up to them. “W-What’s going on? Is he dead?”

Daria looked between them slowly. She scanned the horizon past them, saw a human figure already a fair distance away. Quinn on her strange errand, with her illusions of friendship. Daria felt a moment's delight: the same delight that always came from meeting an alien brain, and trying to understand it. Daria felt a moment's despair: her careful thought, about eschewing murder as an island, forcing the terrorists to pull the trigger on all of them, had met an obstacle. An immovable object against an irresistible force.

Irresistible, Daria.

"He's dead," Daria said at length. "That doesn't mean he's not okay." She sat back in the sand, with the warm rain whispering down around her, and stared out at the grey horizon. "Better dead than a player. Better dead than a puppet."

He didn't seem to be breathing. And if Daria was correct, he was dead. The answer that Zack was also asking for.

"That doesn't mean he's not okay. Better dead than a player. Better dead than a puppet." Christina actually had to give that one to Daria. It made sense, in a way. At least if one were to believe that oblivion was something good compared to this.

"Yeah, well, maybe I'm just hoping that he actually made it. Maybe he'll wake up? I heard somewhere it only counts if he's warm and dead."

“Oh, okay then,” Zach said in an awkward, confused tone.

Zach was kind of disgusted with himself. There was a dead person in front of him, and yet he couldn’t muster up any real emotional reaction to it. Whether it be disgust or fear or even relief, he couldn’t be bothered to feel anything like that. Guess he’s grown accustomed to the situation after everything he’s been through. Fan-fucking-tastic.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m not sticking around to find out if he is alive,” Zach said to the other girl, “If he’s dead, he’s dead, and that’s good enough for me.”

Fuck being better off dead than a player, Zach wanted to live.

(Zachary Beck, continued elsewhere...)

"I heard somewhere it only counts if he's warm and dead."

Daria did not quite look at the girl, instead looking up into the leaden sky and the cool rain pounding down upon her, the body next to her, and the ocean in front of her. "Think it's gonna be awhile before he gets warm."

“Well, I don’t know about you," said the boy, with a shaky voice. "But I’m not sticking around to find out if he is alive. If he’s dead, he’s dead, and that’s good enough for me.”

The boy left. Daria almost bothered to look after him. Instead, she looked to the girl who'd spoken.

"Think I'm gonna go for a swim," Daria said. She hadn't known she'd been planning to say that. Now that she said it aloud, it sounded like the perfect thing. "Wanna join me?"

Christina looked up at the sky. Still raining. The other guy left. Whatever. Daria sat down and asked if she wanted to go swimming. On the one hand, it was quite muggy. But, it was raining so, so hard.

"Maybe." Christina leaned back as she sat on her ass. "Don't remember if I packed my swimsuit." It came to her that she had, at Jessica's insistence, although Stephanie had worn it more times than Christina had (i.e. Stephanie had actually worn the damn thing). Christina chuckled at the thought of Stephanie wearing the too-small top for Jessica, restricting the air flow to her lungs.

Daria nodded. The contrast between the muggy air and the cool rain making her skin clammy would have annoyed her--had annoyed her--before she'd heard the Announcements, and before she'd spoken to Quinn.

Quinn. All her doubts, her fears, her hopes, crystallized in one person. Callous, but not quite heartless. Egotistical, but not quite solipsistic. Dismissive, but she had listened, and stayed her hand, and walked away without killing a single soul.

A lot of things. Not forgettable.

And Daria? Daria, who had finally found her anger, her rage, her pupose? Too late to help Caroline or her friend. Too late to help the litany of the dead, killed by others, killed by chance, killed by creatures like Quinn? Daria, who with all her words hadn't been able to reach Quinn?

(she walked away maybe she heard maybe she listened maybe maybe maybe).

Her thoughts were speeding up again. Her heart was beating, hot purpose in her vain again, a contrast to her cold skin.

Daria looked at the other girl across the cool corpse. She managed a flickering grin, and felt a little more like herself. "Who says you need one?"

Hands on her shoes, unlacing them, pulling out stiff, stinking socks and tucking them pointlessly into shoes as the rain whispered down around them. "I'm not gonna play," Daria explained, standing up. "Not gonna kill. Not even trying to survive." Hands to her waist, pulling her blouse over her head. Her rumbled white bra contrasted against her dark skin, already sodden with the rain. "I'm planning to die," Daria said, as she zipped down her skirt and stepped out of it, leaving clothes in a twisted heap on the sandy shore. Her hands moved back to the clasp of her bra, unhooking. "But I'm gonna die taking them down." Hands to her waist again, bra dangling from one finger, sliding matching panties to the shore. again. "First, thought? I'm gonna swim."

Easy, in some ways (how many quick chances behind the curtain, careless of who might see while she found her new costume?). Terrifying, in other ways. Naked on an island of killers, with the cold metal of the collar against her neck, threatening to blow at any moment. Was this how she wanted to die?

Doesn't matter what I look like when I die. Matters what I'm doing.

One last show. One last stage. A chance to break the rigged game. To break the binary. To outshine the sun.

Naked as the day she was born, Daria sprinted through the rain and dove into the water. She tasted salt on her lips, and for a moment was lost in the infinite intermingling of sea and sky.

(Daria Bhatia continued in The Tower)

Christina's eyebrow rose at the of Daria's decision to strip to nothing and go swimming. She was going into power save mode or something. The no killing? Fine. But the stripping down and possibly committing suicide? No. Christina just lay back and let the rain hit her face and her body, hoping this would give her a decent shower.

Nope. Wasn't working. It still felt oppressively humid, and she couldn't stand it any longer. Christina rolled her eyes as she eyed her bag, and then the ocean, where Daria was actually semi-enjoying herself.

Fuck it. "Hey, wait up!"

Her bag was opened up. Shirt off, shoes and socks off wrapped up in aforementioned shirt, and placed in the aforementioned bag. Then, sigh, she unbuttoned and dropped her jeans and underwear, kicking them into her bag after burying her knife in the sand right under her bag. Finally, her bra was unsnapped and dropped into the subsequently zipped up bag. She looked out at the shore for a second, looking for a camera to mouth three words to.

You. Saw. Nothing.

And with that, Christina ran into the water herself in the nude, at least hoping to enjoy herself a little before this whole thing went to shit.

((Christina Rennes continued in The Tower))