Survival Of The Fittest

"Gaah, fuck... Shit... SHIT!" Shawn gasped as he stumbled down the stairwell, flinging his back against the wall opposite to catch his breath.

((Shawn Bellamy continued from Little Lost Bunny))

He found himself back in one of the side rooms, with one door leading into the dining hall, a fire exit on the opposite end of the room that was already ajar, and another stairwell nearby that lead down into the basement.

Jesus Christ, where to even begin? He still couldn't believe Mr Pinkerton thought it'd be a smart idea to press his foot down on the girl's throat to check if she was alive, though to the guy's credit it actually... Worked? Just not in the way he probably intended it to, with the girl revealed to be both alive and a helluva lot stabbier than any of them had anticipated.

Well, look on the bright side, at least it was Pinksy getting shanked up instead of him. Not quite the result he intended, but a welcome development nevertheless. It did mean that the barracks was a bust, and frankly he was quickly starting to suspect the entire outpost was turning out to be a total clusterfuck.

That assessment would only get confirmed by the sound of gunshots coming from the dining hall, Shawn jolting out of his skin before covering his mouth to stifle a yelp. Yeah, that settled it, fuck this place and everyone in it.

Shawn briefly considered calling out for help, scream about there being a bunch of psychopaths upstairs... But in the end he decided against drawing attention to himself, last thing he wanted was a bullet in the back of his head, instead opting to rush over towards the fire exit and bail whilst he still had the chance.

It didn't even occur to him to check if there was anyone in the hall he might have recognised as a friend.

((Shawn Bellamy continued in Al Gore, Al Gorier, Al Goriest))

It only just now registered to Eve how much her face singed like it was on fire. Or how moist the creases of her eyes were as she glared at her knights in shining armor.

She didn't say anything. She didn't know what to say. She knew she wanted to give a big "fuck you", but she wasn't gonna say it. But she didn't know what to say, other than not say "thanks". So she wasn't gonna say anything.

Now, what she did do was circle back and grabbed her stuff including her new bear friend folded under one of her arms. And then, still wordlessly at this point, she stomped towards the shorter and less muscular boy with the axe thing. She got right up in his face.

She changed her mind.

"Call me a fucking princess again."

Ingrid was no longer paying attention to any of the three. If none of them were gonna attack her, then she was free to search the kitchen like she'd actually fucking wanted to. There was no need to get into some pointless shouting match with the wannabe SWAT team over how goddamn stupid they'd been. The damage had been done, had been surprisingly minimal, and now they could all move on. Or she could, anyway; it seemed like the girl with the bear rug had other ideas.

While the others were bickering, she busied herself digging through every drawer and cabinet in the place, searching for anything left behind that might be vaguely of use. The sooner she got to it, the better.

"Hey, hey, back the fuck off!"

Matthew took a step forwards towards the girl who'd just got all up in his friend's face (yeah, fuck it, Jack was a friend now. He was kind of an annoying dude, but at least he wasn't totally fucking braindead like these two bitches here) gun still in his hand. He didn't want to use it on her, he'd rather shoot the incel kid, but if she wasn't gonna back off or worse, start fucking throwing fists, he wasn't gonna just sit and shove the gun up his ass.

(Wendy Kennedy, continued from Little Lost Bunny)

Wendy thought she had seen Shawn come down the stairs. She ended up near the door of the dining hall, with an emergency exit on the opposite end, and another stairwell that went downward.

She could hear what sounded like an argument coming from the inside of the dining hall. She was already trying to get away from the girl she found hiding under the bed she woke up on, she didn’t want to get involved with another hostile situation.

Wendy took a moment to weigh her options. She could go further down into the building, or she could get out while she still could. If this place was becoming too dangerous, maybe she was better off trying to find a new shelter.

Wendy ran towards the emergency exit.

(Wendy Kennedy, continued elsewhere…)

"Wooooaah, woooah okay girl, okay." He waved a hand in front of him and leaned back, having lost any attention he had previously paid to Ingrid at this point.

Not like he felt like he was too threatened. Okay well not in a "I'm going to get fucking murdered" way, but more like "I'm going to get the shit slapped out of me" kind of way. Difference is one took up more space in his mind and the other didn't stop him from saying whatever the hell he wanted.

He crouched a bit to see eye level with Eve.

"Princess."

Like a terrible stop-motion animation, a taunting smile was immediately plastered onto his face. Jack had to hold himself back from chuckling or anything as any thoughts about this being a shitty idea flew over his head like any funny joke to an audience taking things too seriously.

Eve glared at that self-satisfied shit eating grin. Her left hand balled harder and harder until her fingernails jabbed into her palm, precariously close to puncturing her own skin.

But she couldn't. She hated that she couldn't. She hated that she had to be subservient. It wasn't fucking fair.

She turned on a dime and stormed out the room wordlessly other than her grunts and clicks as she held back her tears as hard as she can. Her stomps on the floor that echoed through the dining hall and down the hallway outside said enough for her, anyway.

((continued later on in the woods))

Her search had proven both more and less fruitful than she'd expected. She'd found an old frying pan, in just-good-enough shape to serve as an okay weapon, which her uninjured left hand held tight. To her pack went a bottle of hand soap and a small butter knife. Truthfully, she wasn't certain what she intended to use either for yet; they just seemed the only things in the kitchen that could potentially serve a use.

She finished her task just in time for the girl with the bear skin to storm out of the kitchen and out of the dining area altogether, clearly fuming.

"Huh."

She turned to the two boys, who'd clearly done something to piss her off.

"What's her problem?"

"No fuckin' clue." Matthew shrugged. Honestly, his opinion of Jack had improved if anything. Dude was cut from the same shit-talking cloth as he was, even if he was also kind of a fucking idiot. Intentionally trying to piss off someone who was already pissed off with a very familiar shit-eating grin? A fuckin' classic! It was like being back with Shawn. "Just stormed off. I dunno, maybe she has something better to do."

"Anyway," flipping the safety back on on his pistol and tucking it back into his waistband, "wanna get going, Jack? Not much else here to do."

"Listen, listen listen..."

He started snapping his fingers, realizing only now he didn't actually know this girls name at all.

"Rapunzel, I didn't really say shit. Got like, two words out and that was it. Bam, she gone." He raised his hands up in an exaggerated shrug and shook his head. "Your guess is as good as mine."

He exhaled and slung the axe over his shoulder. "Alrighty then. Mark one person off that we know for a fact that's trying to fuckin' murk people. Well well, dust has settled, and I don't see any good fucking shit here." He turned towards the door. "Yeah, I'm bouncing."

Ingrid rolled her eyes. She didn't buy that they hadn't stuck their feet firmly in their mouths with that girl. Frankly, they seemed too stupid to have a normal conversation with anyone but each other.

"Whatever you say, man."

She turned away, heading towards one of the exits, frying pan gripped firmly in hand.

"Don't follow me."

If she was gonna pull this off, the last thing she needed was two loudmouthed morons on her tail.

((Ingrid Wilde continued in all animals can scream))

Matthew watched Ingrid go as Jack shoved both feet so damn far down his throat that they were sticking out of his ass. LIke, there was being a dick to people who were being a dick to you - fine, cool, gucci - and then there was being a dick to people for no reason - not fine, not cool, certainly not gucci. Like, if this dude couldn't handle a relatively chill conversation without immediately giving some shitty kinda insulting nickname Matthew wasn't too sure how much longer he'd be sticking with him.

"Alright, uh, I guess we go. She's probably ransacked everything of use in there, so no point sticking around." Matthew shuffled his feet, glancing towards the door. "The gun dude's probably far gone. No point in going after him." Without waiting to see if Jack was following, Matthew shrugged his shoulders, hiking the bag up, and left.

((Matthew Bell continued in Dissension))

Jack stayed a moment too long probably as yeah, this other girl probably took the only good shit in here. Nevertheless, Jack learned a thing or two playing open world games.

Namely to be so damn meticulous when searching through shit that it gets rather annoying for anyone watching. Leave no stone unturned or whatever the fuck they say. It wasn't like Jack was gonna stay too long at this, just go for a minute or two extra before leaving or anything.

Did he find anything? Nothing he would consider good at all, but it's fine. It wasn't like he wouldn't be able to catch up or anything.

(Jack Kilgore continued at A Headless Blunder Operating Under the Illusion of a Master Plan)