Survival Of The Fittest

A bullet whizzed past Marshall. He ducked, though too late for it to matter. He had no time to thank whatever lucky star had let him survive so long.

His brain tried to compartmentalize the facts, putting them into tiny, clumsy boxes. Diplomacy was out. Marshall had two working arms and June only had one. California had said ‘help me.’

Marshall shoved the revolver into June’s working hand, the matter of trust not even a blip in his mind.

“Cover me!”

The phrase sounded strange, distant, the only words he knew how to say because this was a situation he’d never thought about.

So as Matthew and Shawn started firing and pulling back, Marshall sprinted forward despite every nerve in his body screaming at the sound, and his missing fingers returning feeling in full force.

Didn’t matter.

California had said ‘help me.’ California had pulled glass out of his skull and bandaged his hand, comforted him when he didn’t deserve it, and taught him how to smoke. Kai had said ‘take care of her’ and Marshall had promised that he would.

That was all that mattered, and Marshall had never moved faster in his life.

He arrived at her side. He saw blood where Matthew had hit her, but had no time to think about the proper way to move her. Had to crush the fear, the urge to start apologizing for leaving her here. He just started to scoop her up into his arms, nerves flaring at every gunshot, with no ability to distinguish where they came from.

"KATELYN'S DEAD, ASSH-" and then two bullets were fired in her direction, one from Matthew, one from Shawn? That jerk was still alive? He was here?

Before she could think on his presence any longer, Marshall shoved cold metal into her remaining hand, and her heart leaped. Tingly fingers, edge of the cliff.

Her parents were very vehemently against weapons. MSNBC liberals, pro gun control. So, she had never even seen a gun in her life, much less touched one, much less asked to utilize one. Even on this island, even given the eleven or so days she had been surrounded by, soaked in this island's violence, she hadn't yet touched a gun. Dick and Darryl had done all the protecting for her, back when she was with them, back when they were alive. And, she hadn't wanted to touch a gun. It was destruction at the tip of your finger, a squeeze of the trigger and you could permanently, devastatingly mark all your anger onto the person in front of you.

June had wrought enough damage just with her bare hands. She didn't want this.

But, cover me, Marshall asked of her, when she didn't even know what that phrase meant. Protect me.

Her fingers fumbled, struggled to maintain its grip. Protect him, protect him.

Shawn had sought cover. Matthew, the asshole that'd knocked California out, was still in the open, trying to get distance. He would receive her anger.

Shakily, shoddily, she matched the fire the boys had thrown her way, two shots aimed at Matthew, before running off to the side.

Gunshots.

Gunshots like explosions in her ears. Rocking her already aching head with more noises it couldn't properly process. Her ears rang as the hot spring erupted around her, a combination of screams, smoke, and fire.

Someone pulled her up, roughly, and she nearly pushed them away. But her legs would have been unable to hold her body up, they'd become fallow, they managed to help the person hold her up, but only barely. As she hurriedly looked around in an attempt to figure out what was happening, she saw it was Marshall who had grabbed her.

"Where's Kai?" She managed to sputter out through the dark blotches dancing across her vision. "Is he ok?"

She pushed off his shoulder a little to look around, in an attempt to scan the area for him.

An attempt she shouldn't have made.

As she looked around she felt a burning sensation in her chest, the same feeling as the one when the girl had shot her in the shoulder.

Despite Marshall's attempts to keep her standing, she collapsed back to the floor like a crumpled piece of paper. One hand still limply gripping his arm as all the remaining strength left her body.

Her body back on the cold hard rock, she could feel something warm begin to flow onto the stone beneath her.

((Kai Rosado-Prince continued from Story Is, She Left Without A Trace))

The Danger Zones aren't working.

That was Kai's only coherent thought as he ran down the path back to the hot spring. His strides were clumsy. Luck and subconscious awareness kept him upright and away from the edge. He didn't know what it meant, but it meant something.

The Danger Zones aren't working, they aren't working, the explosion, they-

Gunshots.

Kai was still upright. He was going towards the sound, rather than it coming to him. But his stomach still dropped just as sharply as if he'd stepped off the steep ledge of the mountainside.

He had Ren's gun, the shotgun, and the grenade launcher tucked into his bag. Everything else he and Cali had taken from Kitty had been left back at the hot spring. He hadn't been gone long, but it had still been long enough for things to boil over.

Kai yanked open the bag and pulled out the first weapon he laid his hand on, and then he burst into a sprint down the last stretch of path that wove around the mountainside to the hot spring's alcove. There was a sharp twang of pain down his calf as the stitches tore free. He was only vaguely aware by the weight of the weapon in his hand that he hadn't grabbed either of the guns.

"CALI!"

Matthew fired another bullet as Shawn dove for cover (that was probably the smarter idea, but uh, he was here now) at Marshall, who’d gone forwards to try and drag Cali outta harm’s way. It was pretty ballsy, he had to respect that, but ultimately it was a pretty fucking stupid decision. Suppose that was sorta the same thing, ballsiness and stupidity. But anyway, all he’d done is put himself right in the line of fire, and so he'd signed his death warrant. He didn't see the gun in his hand; had he just, like, dropped the idea of shooting at Matthew and Shawn to drag his buddy out of cover?

Right, he’d handed the gun off to June there. Whoops.

Bang, bang. At the first one, Matthew had already turned to run. It sorta... pinged off the rocky wall and probably sailed into the forest below. Sure would suck if you were in the wrong place. The second sent a burning shock through his side as it just about grazed the running man, who let out a hiss of pain, slowing just a little with a hand clutched to his side. Fuck, that was too close. He hadn't pegged June as the kinda girl who knew how to use a gun anyway, but c'mon, that woulda been an easy shot for him! Didn't really matter, though, and it was good she couldn't aim for shit because otherwise he would be dead. A gunfight, especially if Katelyn was around, was just gonna end in the two of them being blown up anyway.

"SHAWN! C'MON!" He couldn't really even see them, but Matthew pulled his pistol from his waistband, firing a few shots in June and Marshall's general direction to give Shawn some covering fire in case June's aim suddenly got way, way better. Which, uh, he didn't really see happening.

God, he was gonna have so many scars by the time he was home.

Shawn ducked his head as June returned fire, quickly popping out of cover to snap another burst of buckshot in her direction.

He missed, unsurprisingly. Even a skilled marksman would struggle landing a shot at this distance with a weapon as inaccurate as his. But that was fine, he was mostly providing covering fire anyway. His ally however had no such excuse.

“Goddamnit Matt, they’re right fucking THERE!” he spat, blindly firing off another shot as Marshall pulled Cali out of the fray. “Cap ‘em already before…”

Another voice added itself to the growing cacophony, barely audible above all the yelling and gunfire. He popped back out of cover, ready to line up another shot at the newcomer... Only to freeze up in horror at the sight before his eyes.

Oh, no… Not again.

“Bail! BAAAIL!” he screams, scrambling away as Kai rocked up with a fucking grenade launcher.

He tripped over as he fled down the mountain path, trying to put as much ground between himself and those grenades as he could. Scrambling away in sheer terror as panic gripped him, his earlier confidence melting the moment they lost what little advantage they had.

It wasn’t until he reached a crossroads just out of sight of the springs that he came to a stop, catching his breath as he checked to see if Matt was still following him. At his back stood an old signpost, pointing in three directions at an uneven angle. One for the hot springs back the up path they just fled down, one pointing westward towards the campground, and one pointing eastward back to town.

It wasn’t long before Matt caught up with him, Shawn's lips curling into a relieved grin.

That grin dissipated the moment he saw the patch of red in Matt's jacket.

“Oh fuck… Oh shit, dude, did they get you?!”

"I'm fine, just a flesh wound, I think." Matthew panted out as he followed behind his buddy, glancing behind them nervously. He hadn't seen what made Shawn start screaming like a girl and run faster than him (although with the little shots of pain coursing through his side goddamn Letitia was probably faster than him at the moment) but he could imagine. Katelyn. A military helicopter. Kai rolling up with all the guns of every single person they'd killed. Probably the former or latter, but in any case... Matthew hissed, leaning against that old ass signpost for some assistance.

"Cali's, uh," Matthew panted, feeling down at that little patch of red slowly creeping through his jacket, "dead. Or, at the least, she's pretty fucked up. Got her in the... chest, or the stomach, or something. I think maybe that'll distract them." Glancing back up at the mountain, he tried to control his breathing, maybe a little bit panicky right now on account of how... fuck, what was this, the third person he'd shot in 24 hours? Jesus. Just gunfight after sniping someone who maybe wasn't actually Evie oops to another gunfight. And if Katelyn was there, coming back after them with a grenade launcher... well, there wasn't really much they could do right now except move or snipe anything that came past the corner they'd rounded, and even then that might not be enough.

Right. That was... three outta five fired for the rifle, and god knows how many out of fifteen for the pistol. Could probably be doing with a fresh mag, but...

Two shots would be enough. Unless everyone was coming, in which case they were fucked anyway. Leaning against the signpost more for support, placing a hand on it to steady himself, Matthew glanced back the way they'd come. No signs of people approaching, no tiny fucking catgirl with a grenade launcher poking her head over the rocks before delivering a grenade right at their feet, no sounds of June and Marshall and whatever fucking shitshow thing they had going on rounding the corner to shout like this was a hockey or lacrosse game (what the fuck was the difference anyway?) so... maybe Cali was distracting them, or maybe they were just gathering all their weapons up. If she was definitely dead from that hit, maybe they wouldn't bother with first aid, just revenge.

"Uh, should we head back to your camp? Dunno if anyone else knows about that." Matthew asked, his eyes still locked on the road, rifle clenched by its midsection with one hand, the other hand leaning on the sign to keep himself steady..

He felt a little woozy, admittedly. The blood and... fuck. How many people had he killed on this island?

"You think?" asked Shawn, with a raised brow.

A grim realisation slowly dawned on him, as he watched that patch of red grow with every desperate breath. Matt was shot. His one and only ally, the man who was carving his path home, had gone and gotten himself hurt. Just like what happened with Bethany.

Shawn grit his teeth, a seething look in his eyes as he glared daggers at the back of Matt's head.

It was bad enough that Matt had pulled them into conflict after conflict, potentially jeopardizing their chances of getting rescued. It was bad enough that he had the audacity to try and torture Cali, when they could've just shot her and be done with it. But now he was injured. Shawn's greatest asset was now a burden.

Fuck. Fuck.

Shawn's eyes glanced back up the path towards the springs. Kai and the others were probably gonna arrive at any moment, likely with a perfect view of them. Matt's arrogance was going to get them both killed at this rate, the bastard too stubborn to admit he was already dead. By all rights, he should offer to hold the line, fend off their pursuers to give his only friend a chance to escape. But Shawn knew better than to expect Matt to do something as selfless as that...

At least, not voluntarily.

"I've got a better idea..." said Shawn, right before snapping one of the cuffs onto Matt's wrist, linking him to the signpost that he'd similarly cuffed mere seconds ago.

After which, he quickly fled before Matt had a chance to register what happened.

((Shawn Bellamy continued in Scholar's Mate))

Clink. Something cold, metal wrapped around his wrist with a little click, and Matthew glanced down at it

"Wh- Hey what, uh..." Handcuffs. One around his wrist, another linking him to the sign he'd been leaning against. What? What? What the fuck? Had- Matthew glanced up at Shawn, or where Shawn should have been. Oh.

Oh. Ah. Oh, son of a bitch. Son of a fucking bitch!

"Shawn, you mothERFUCKER!" Matthew screamed, his free hand dropping the rifle and reaching for the pistol, hoping that Shawn would be somewhere. Oh, that motherfucker. That absolute fucking son of a bitch. He'd, what, abandoned Matthew here and left him for Katelyn and Kai to pick apart, while he got away scot-free just like that? No! Fuck him! He fully intended to put a bullet in the middle of that little scrawny fuck's back, but he was nowhere to be seen, having beaten a steady retreat down the path. And here he was, easy pickings for the stupid little fuckers who'd just gotten into a gunfight with him and were probably making their way down the mountain to come fucking torture him to death. Fuck. Fuck! Fucking FUCK!

"I AM GOING TO RIP YOUR GODDAMN GLASSES OFF YOUR FACE, YOU FUCKING FOUR-EYED FUCK! YOU FUCKING TRAITOR!" What the fuck had he done? What the fuck had made Shawn think 'Right, time to send my only buddy to his certain death so I can go jerk off in my little shitty camp that wouldn't last a little bit of rain about how cool and smart and awesome I was for leaving my buddy to die when there was literally no reason to fucking do that! What a clever little piece of untrampled dogshit I am!' There was literally no fucking reason to do that! He didn't even like, take anything, he just fucking tied him up and ran! What, was Shawn into fucking BDSM or some shit? Little fucking rat.

Right. Right. Despite the rage and maybe a little bit of hurt clouding his senses, getting mad and pissy about it wouldn't do anything. He still had an untreated wound, as the little bit of warmth leaking into the top of his pants was happy to tell him. Oh Jesus Christ, if this was just because he'd gotten a little tiny fucking scrape from a bullet or something... Oh, Matthew was going to make anything Katelyn could have done to Shawn look like a little fucking joke, the shitty kind you get from one of those jokebooks that wasn't even fucking funny. Right. Right.

He gave a few experimental tugs on the chain, but the thing wouldn't budge. It looked like, uh... actual BDSM ones, so maybe if he kept tugging the shitty chains would break, but he had a feeling Danya wouldn't have skimped on his collection of handcuffs to impress the ladies with. Shit, at least he wasn't gonna have metal chafing all up and down his goddamn arm.

Second line of attempt was the sign itself. Matthew was a quarterback, how was a shitty little wooden sign that'd been out in this goddamn weather for years gonna hold up to him? A few good kicks, and, uh, all the sign did was kinda shake a bit and slightly move in the other direction a little. Next, he, uh, tried his shoulder.

"STUPID! FUCKING! PIECE OF SHIT!" No such luck, though. What the fuck did they make the sign out of? Maybe he could fucking shoot it in half. That idea put another one in his head, a lot easier and better and just... something he could actually do.

Yanking the chain taut, Matthew pressed the pistol's barrel against it and pulled the trigger.

He was free soon after, yanking his hand away with a sigh of relief, although the handcuff around his wrist was... well, might be there for a bit. Too close to his hand to shoot off, but maybe if he had a knife or something he could try and file away at it? Or maybe Shawn had the key, and... oh, what the hell was his problem? Matthew had saved his ass! Letitia would have opened his chest cavity like a surgeon and if not for Matthew, he would have died there! Or what about the goddamn ambush when they first met? Shawn woulda been dead there too! Every goddamn time, Matthew had pulled his ass out of the fire, and this is the thanks he got?

No. He'd been wondering what happened to Shawn if he decided to go for keeps, and, well... this made that easier. After that, he couldn't just let that son of a bitch walk off this island smiling and waving at all the army guys who came to save their ass. If it was the last goddamn thing he'd do, he was gonna murder that fucking freeloader. Only thing he'd ever done was lose in a fight to fucking Letitia.

"I'm coming for you, you son of a bitch." Matthew growled out, picking up his rifle and glancing down the path one more time to ensure Katelyn wasn't coming after him before he ran off. There were only a few places Shawn could be. Matthew knew most of them.

Little fucker.

((Matthew Bell continued in Scholar's Mate))

Marshall felt the tug on his arm when California got shot. He tried to keep her moving, but he hadn’t been ready and she slid out of his grip and to the floor.

“No… no, no, no—it’s fine, I’ll… we’ll--”

Another burst of gunshots, could have been Matthew, Shawn, June, who knew. Marshall ducked his head, trying to cover Cali with his arms despite the fact that it was too late for it, before he heard Shawn shrieking that they had to bail. Screaming and footsteps thundering away

There was yelling and gunshots, and he could hear Shawn screaming that they had to bail, clearly terrified. Marshall raised his head to see Kai, grenade launcher in hand. Terrifying, but also the most beautiful sight Marshall had ever seen in the moment, bringing a surge of relief that cut through the fear and dread and the urge to hunt Matthew down and put a stop to him by whatever means necessary.

But for now, California needed help.

He didn’t move from where they are, instead bellowing for the others.

“FIRST AID! HURRY!”

He tried to find where she’d been shot, and inhaled sharply. She’d been shot in the torso. A limb would have been bad, but the torso… how were they going to work around the organs, how were they going to fix this, why was this happening when things were meant to be getting better, how—

“It’s going to be okay.”

Marshall pressed down on the wound, not knowing what else to do except to try and stop blood from coming out, but blood kept leaking, staining the bandages on his hand, the bandages California had done for him—

“They’re gone. They’re gone, I'm here, Kai's here, he's coming, it’s going to be okay--”

She got Matthew. She got him.

What scared June most, more than the rain of bullets and words and the unending cacophony of it all, was that, for a second, it excited her.

That second ended when California slipped out of Marshall's grasp. She collapsed in on herself, the stone and snow beneath her turning red, and June knew instantly what had happened, all other emotion chilling instantly to a deep, sinking dread.

There were long, dragging seconds that June was stuck in place, unable to help, unable to do anything but watch Marshall put his hands over California as if that'd do anything, prevented from doing anything by the constant fire rained upon her by Shawn and Matthew. The fire stopped once Kai returned, one-man cavalry, and Matthew and Shawn scrambled, finally a relief from the mayhem.

She rushed over to the two, Kai right behind her, and followed Marshall's command, she went to his side, dropped the gun he'd given her, and zipped open her bag, handed him her first-aid kit, whatever Marshall thought he needed. But it was just a gesture. Marshall saying it would be okay was just a gesture. The blood looked like it would never stop pouring because it wouldn't, this was all just palliative care.

California was dying.

The terrorists were blowing up, this game was supposed to be coming to an end, and yet California was still dying, because people were still playing the game.

June's whole torso trembled. Tears flowed from her eyes, her teeth ground into one another.

More people surrounded her than she expected. It was a nice feeling, that they cared about her, despite her not knowing them. She didn't really know that many people from the class at all. Only her brother and her friends and of that group only her brother and Kai were left. So it warmed her emotionally that Marshall and June cared so much when they didn't have to, but as her blood continued to spill out into the snow she could feel her extremities begin to feel cold. Her mouth began to taste like iron as well. She swallowed and held off her bodies desire to cough.

Marshall continued to press his hands against her chest, but it was the equivalent of putting a plaster on a severed artery. The blood continued to pour free in gouts, covering the bandages she'd applied to him. Their original connection, before they had gone to find Kai. Back when he had been the first person on the island who had cared about her as a person. That had been days prior, and while she didn't know much, if anything about him, she felt close to him. They'd been through a lot together in a short amount of time, and he was trying to save her life. June was too, even though they'd never truly met, and their only interaction had been minutes earlier, because they were both good people, like Kai was.

A life that'd had its thread of fate cut. There was no stopping the inevitable result, like the gods and heroes she'd spent so long reading and writing about and drawing her preordained time had come. Charon was dutifully waiting and she had no way of skipping the appointment for her crossing. She did wonder who she would see, Charon was after all only one underworld deity, from a Western pantheon, there was Wepwawet, Mictecacihuatl, Batara Kala, Hine-nui-te-pō. Maybe she'd meet all of them, or none of them. Maybe none of it existed at all. California didn't know and she didn't dwell on it.

She was running out of time and there was something she needed to do.

"Where's Kai?" She breathed, voice weak from the blood loss.

Even without his glasses, Kai recognized one of the retreating figures. He'd have recognized the voice if not the shape of the person. Matthew.

He'd already taken aim with the grenade launcher before he fully processed that it was the weapon he'd grabbed. A few moments later, he'd realize how bad of an idea that was. How disastrous for everyone it could have been. In the immediate present, Marshall's shout was the only thing that kept him from pulling the trigger.

But then reality rushed back in. Then Cali's voice, weak in a way that made his heart clench, reached him.

Kai practically threw himself down at her side and grabbed her hand while June and Marshall did what they could. "I'm here. I'm here, Cali, it's- the Danger Zones aren't working." He let the grenade launcher drop from his other hand and instead sandwiched her hand between both of his.

"The Danger Zones aren't working," he repeated. Like that meant anything when she was bleeding out on the ground. Like those were the magic words that could save her. "I was there and they're not working, we can get to the shore, we can go-" His voice cracked. He was just babbling nonsense.

"Cali, please." She had no power to do anything either, but all Kai could do after coming back to this was beg.

California smiled.

Kai had been right.

His defiance hadn't been in vain.

He gripped her hand tight and she wished she could feel it.

"You can go." She whispered, grimacing as pain flared across her chest and shoulder.

With an uncomfortable amount of effort, she reached up with her free hand and gripped the back of his neck to pull him down closer to her.

Then she raised her head and chest and kissed him. It was weak, more of a light brush than anything else, but the meaning and importance remained the same.

She forced the smile back onto her face, even as Kai's face became blurry and washed out through a combination of her tears and fading consciousness.

"You can go." She repeated because she wanted to make sure his last memory of her was a hopeful one.

Kai didn't resist when Cali pulled him closer. Didn't know what to do with himself when she kissed him. He'd never been kissed before. This made him never want to be kissed again.

"I don't want to go." Stupid, childish retort. It sounded like he was contradicting himself, but he wasn't really. It wasn't I don't want to go at all, it was I don't want to go alone.

"Cali," he choked out her name again. She was smiling when she sank back, but her eyes had gone vacant. "Cali!"

Kai squeezed her hand so tightly that he felt every ridge of bone between his palms. It would have hurt her if she was still able to feel anything at all.

"Don't leave me here-!"