Survival Of The Fittest

It might have been pizza. Tyrell wasn’t sure.

Sure, it definitely tasted like every cheap slice of pepperoni he’d had in his life, but something about it seemed a little surreal. Only half an hour ago he was certain he’d been bleeding out from a crossbow wound in the gut, eyes fixed on the horizon and not the tepid hellhole that he’d been left to kill and die in.

Seconds after closing his eyes, Tyrell found himself standing, staring down at a ballpit of all things. He wasn’t sure what he was waiting for exactly, but he had a strong feeling it’d be a little while longer before he really had to be there. And he did have to be there.

She’s gonna lose her shit when she wakes up here.

There was time to wander around here, figure out just what exactly this weird-ass excuse of an afterlife was.

Before long, Ty encountered an all-too familiar aroma. Pizza, something he never knew he’d miss quite so much. Like cheap, late-night garbage pizza, nothing fancy. The kind of thing you’d stumble into a 24/7 joint to scarf down after a little too much illicitly obtained alcohol.

Standing by the buffett, he stared vacantly at an empty wall as he savoured the delicious, empty calories. After over a week in that tropical fuckscape with nothing but stale crackers and water, it tasted positively divine. The only thing that held the experience back was the looming feeling like - maybe it wasn’t real? Except, here he was. How couldn’t it be?

For the first time since waking up, Ty looked down. He was dressed the way he usually was when he went out anywhere - black jeans, tanktop, hoodie. No part of him really hurt anymore, and the scars on his arms and face weren’t there anymore. The memories that accompanied them felt faint, too.

I’ll take it.

So he was here. Where was here? Ty walked out of the buffett, noting the array of familiar faces that surrounded him. If this was where they all ended up - some LOST bullshit where they made up a reality to find each other in because they all died together and it was so spiritually significant - then, there were people in this place who Ty had put here. His eyes scanned the room. Some stared at him, others were caught up in conversations with friends. Everyone here was from the island, and everyone was dead. Or at least, they had died. They didn’t look dead right now. Mostly a mixture of boredom and relief.

Their afterlife seemed to be one of those arcade-and-pizza establishments, milquetoast and strange. The word “crusty” came to mind. There were things about it he seemed to understand without really knowing where he'd gotten the information. Elliott wasn't here, neither were any other dead relatives or historical figures. This was their place, no one else's. Some part of him knew there was an exit door, and he ought to consider walking through it. There was a car waiting outside, he reckoned. He couldn't leave yet, though. Not alone.

Wolfing down the crust of his ninth slice of pizza, Ty wiped the grease off of his hands and face with a conveniently placed napkin as he eyed one of the television sets in the room. One of them displayed quite the spectacle, Diego Larrosa reducing Henry Sparks to a pile of rough hewn giblets with his grenade launcher.

“Shit, dude. Overkill much?”

Ty wasn’t sure if he was proud to see the guy was still fighting or worried he oversold the whole win at any cost thing. Especially since, at the end, he had a feeling he was going to end up somewhere.

Reaching into his pocket, Ty was happy to find a packet of cigarettes. To his shock, the moment he drew one to his lips it was already smouldering.

“Huh. Seems... legit.”

It felt like a cigarette was supposed to, as well. Ty tried not to think about whether addiction or relief really worked the same way here as they used to. It felt like what he knew it should’ve felt like, minus the associated guilt of the habit slowly killing him.

Kinda begs the question, am I really smoking it?

Given where they were, he knew there were some folks here he really wanted to see. The last things he’d been thinking of before he died were the nights he’d spent with Axel, Andy, and Lorenzo. Though, he wasn’t sure Ren would much want to talk given all that had happened. Still, it would be nice to tell them all the things he wished he had gotten the time to.

That reminds me.

Near what looked like skeeball machines, he saw one familiar face that he definitely had words for.

((Taking a steady drag of his maybe-cigarette, Ty strode over wearing what might as well have been the platonic form of a shit-eating grin.))

Drew wasn’t sure how he was supposed to react to Camilla’s panicking behaviour and he wished that he could have been better at trying to comfort her. Comfort was not really his strong suit and this was more like something that Declyn would be able to handle. He wished Declyn was with the three of them then but now it was his time as the oldest to try to be helpful and he knew deep down he had been the one who had been the burden. He had wanted to cry again and again as he had watched his friends falling apart on the island and now all he could hope was that Diego could make it back home for them and for himself. But right now he had to focus on one of his dearest friends in front of him and he had to make sure that she was going to be okay. He just felt so heartbroken at seeing Cam like this.

“Cam, Cam. It’s going to be okay. We’re here for you if you just want to talk about, well, anything that you don’t understand.” Drew said with a gentle smile present on his face and he felt himself squeeze Theo’s hand a little as a way of trying to comfort himself. Being able to just touch a friend again… Drew felt like he was going to be the one to go into a babbling mess at any second. “This place… I think it’s supposed to be like an inbetween. Like we’re in limbo or something.”

He felt himself laugh a bit unsurely as he knew that he had never believed in a heaven or a hell before and now it seemed like there was really proof of an afterlife. It really did feel all so surreal to him personally but it didn’t take him long to accept it as fact and that he had just been waiting to see someone that he was close to again.

“I’m not sure if limbo is the right word but I’m not very good with this stuff in general. But yeah, Theo’s right.” Drew nodded in agreement with the boy beside him and he slowly and gently held out his free hand towards Camilla. “I’m sorry if this is scary and confusing to you, Cam. I wasn’t sure what to do at first when I got here myself so I understand in a way. I’m sorry…”

I’m sorry for leaving you all to be torn apart as a family. I always thought of you guys as a close family even if you aren’t related to me. Why can’t I just tell you both this? Maybe I still do have a bit of cowardice inside of me. I’m sorry, guys.

Camilla blinked, and felt her breathing settle just a bit more. Nobody was here to hurt her, as deserved as it would be. Without really thinking, she reached her shaking hand out, and clumsily grasped Drew's arm. She held on a little more tightly than she meant to and placed her other hand on the booth's seat, using both those things to support herself as she pulled herself up.

Standing now, gazing down at her shoes, she was conscious of how tightly she held onto Drew's arm, but only loosened her grip a bit. That was the point of all this, wasn't it? So she'd never have to let her friends go ever again.

Briefly, she thought about pulling Drew into a hug. The last time, it was as his corpse was rapidly cooling. He wasn't in pain, but he wasn't alive to enjoy that. Maybe now, he'd be warm, like a ray of sunshine, once again.

It was her conscience that stopped her from doing that.

"I..."

The words I'm sorry toyed at her lips, but they meant nothing. They were all dead and it meant nothing.

"I..."

There was no reason for Theo to accept her apology. He was dead and she killed him and sorry meant nothing. So who was she apologizing to, Drew? He was dead too. It'd mean nothing.

She gulped. The sensation of her throat being whole still bothered her.

Her free hand came up to her neck, and traced a line across it. Where the shovel cut in. At least, it felt like it.

It felt wrong to say Diego killed her. At least, not of his own volition. It only happened because she allowed it to. She allowed it to because...

...

Her voice was hoarse, and barely over a whisper. "...Why do you still care about me?"

Violet found herself getting more and more lost in the crowd of so many of her other classmates and she found herself wondering aimlessly. She really didn't have that much of a connection left in this place. This.... This afterlife.... She wondered if she should take the first step out of the door with the bright light as she found herself staring at it with a brief look of wonder and she then took a small step forward towards-

She stopped moving suddenly.

She heard someone saying the name that she thought she would never hear again.

She felt her breathing get a bit heavy for a few seconds.

Someone really did say....

Princess....

Who? Who was it...?

She took a step back from the light beaming from the door.

She then turned away to head towards the voice who said her girlfriend's name.

((Violet Quinn continued in much clout converges))

Theo wished she hadn’t asked that question. It was the right question to ask, yes, but even so it hurt to be reminded of that morning. Not just because he died, surprisingly. But also because it hurt to look back at just what had happened, to be reminded of just what he had said to Camilla. Seeing her like this was a reminder of who she really was, before those announcements cracked the brittle contentment that had settled between them. And replaying those events, with that in mind, he realised with a sudden nausea who, in fact, was at fault for the events of their final moments. He tried to focus on answering the question as kindly as possible.

It was hard. He wanted to say so much, to tell them how much they all meant to him. He wanted to tell them that being with them let him be free from his fears, of judgment, of that sense of unworthiness. He wanted to tell them he didn’t need love, just acceptance; that simply being with them was all he needed for the world to shine more brightly for him. It was pathetic, really, to turn a single extracurricular activity into the center piece of his life. He wished that he could tell them why he had joined up, everything they could possibly want to know about his life, and so much more. The relief of emotional openness was tempting. How freeing it would be, to be able to smile at them and have them know just why.

But it was also selfish. This wasn’t about him. It was about them. What had he suffered, really? Had he been so injured he had to be put out of his misery? Had he been killed in a random act of violence, far away from anyone who might have cared? Had he been so driven to despair by loss he could only find solace in murder? They deserved so much more than to have to listen to him whine about his petty problems.

And anyways, he might have liked them, but when push came to shove he was never there for them. He didn’t stay awake for Drew, or try to help him see the chances he still had. He didn’t pay attention to Declyn when they found Diego, or even cry for him until Cam actually asked why, either. He had the nerve to lecture her on proper responses to grief even as he immersed himself in indifference. And he let Diego face a friend alone rather than actually bother to empathize with someone at her breaking point. It felt so greedy to ask for their sympathies, when his pains were so much more deserved.

So he didn’t say, because you liked me. Nor did he say, because you care, and not just because you wanted something or to show-off, but because you just wanted to. He certainly didn’t say, because I might have been the victim, but I was never innocent. Theo found himself staring at them. He shook his head. He owed it to them to at least pay attention to what they were saying.

So instead he smiled uncertainly at her. “Because if I was in this situation, wouldn’t you do the same? You’ve always cared so much, about everyone, and I don’t want to just abandon you just because you got angry in a difficult situation.”

He waved a finger at the buffet tables in the distance. “Do you want to get something to eat, first?”

Why did Drew care about her? It was honestly very simple why he did and he knew that Camilla and Theo wouldn't want him to blame himself for being the cause of the gardening club crashing and burning. It had hurt to watch them all just becoming wilting flowers that didn't survive to live another day. Theo was saying it so well for him and he needed to say something too.

"How could I not care about someone who had looked after us for so long? You made me feel like I was not a outsider when I came to the gardening club with Declyn and I was painfully shy around you and the others. You all are my family even if you all made mistakes. I made mistakes too. I love you all like family. I love you, Cam. I love Theo. I love Declyn. I love Diego. I can't just stop caring as that's not me. I might not understand why you did what you did, Cam. But I know you tried so hard for everyone and I'm sorry that I could never do anything in return."

Drew glanced over at the buffet tables when Theo spoke up about it and he nodded in agreement. "Yeah, yeah. I could go for some pizza right now." He said with a smile and he glanced back at Camilla. "Come on, Cam. Let's eat and talk things over."

((Drew Woods, Theo Walterson and Camilla Bell continued elsewhere))

Spiraling out from infinity, a mind crawls out from the void, clawing its way towards new awareness, though such awareness brings with it a new torment. The mind became reacquainted with its external form, the feeling of breath, electricity driving signals out through limbs, wiggling fingers and toes. The mind knows its form to be soft, fragile, and crude, for it has known the void on non-existence, however briefly, and returning to illusory reality had not robbed it of that understanding.

It had lived a life before this limbo, and even before the void, but it struggles now to approximate that existence, that persona. That person had existed where the mind now exists, every moment present in a way that it could not be before the mind was burdened with such perspective.

The mind centers the matter tied to its form, curling up its limbs, and bending the cranium inward, as it tries to regain itself.

"I am Sapphire Waters." It whispers without moving its lips. But Sapphire Waters could never feel the precise amount of blood that flowed through her body, how some of it did not belong there because it had flowed forth from split veins and skin. Sapphire Waters had never felt so wrong.

A gurgle emanates from within its throat, a rattling sound that intensifies as balance shifts and the body collapses on its side. As the mind further connects to its body, the number of sensations it can process accumulate into a growing sickness, a sense of wrongness. It can feel its mind drowning as a reflex is activated and bile is driven up from the stomach, burning the tissue lining her throat and mouth.

Eyeballs feel heavy, slow, and they remain unfocused. Still, they track forms moving around the space before them, blissfully unaware of their own bodies, of the wrongness of their existence. The mind finds that it hates them.

A rasping sound passes as muscles in the face attempt to move again, attempt to form words.

"I am Sapphire Waters. I am Sapphire Waters."

And Sapphire Waters would be free.

A little aways in the crowd of lost souls surrounding it was a black haired young man 'round the same age, taking occasional swigs out of the water bottle clutched in his bear paw of a hand as he kept glancing at it to see what it was doing for the last several minutes. He was shorter than most of the rest, but he was rather stout and bulging with what could be muscle.

He heard it finally say something, something faint, but something. He stared at it again in an ambiguous expression that could be easily interpreted as either a concerning look or a scowl and took another sip, contemplating if he should say somethin' or not since the other trickle of people ebbed and flowed like this was business as usual.

Not like it mattered, as he came to learn soon as he woke up here.