Survival Of The Fittest

Breathe in, breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out and no no no no no no no no no.

((B013: Begin))

Alvaro Vacanti sat up. Or rather sat up straight, given that he had woken up in an armchair. He looked around. Bedroom. Queen size. Shelf, table, and door. Bag at his feet with his name on it. His. He reached down, fumbling with the zipper as he pulled it open and looked inside. Food, map, book, money, first aid kit, and compass. One of those things wasn’t like the others but he didn’t really notice it. He looked up again. In the opposite corner of the room there was a door. Wooden, brown, closed. Maybe locked but he couldn’t check whether it was from here. Regardless of whether or not it was or not he at least had a little bit of time, so he stood up, looked around again to see if there was anything or anyone that he hadn’t been able to see before.

He finished checking. Nothing. No-one. He was alone. That gave him a little time to think, at the very least.

Okay, thinking. Where was he? In a bedroom, on an island somewhere. Why was he here? Because he was on Survival of the Fittest.

He was on Survival of the Fittest.

He could feel the tears beginning to go down his face. He could feel his hands shaking. It was true, he was on Survival of the Fittest. He was in a bedroom on an island and there was a collar around his neck and that teacher had actually been shot and everyone was right outside that door likely already killing each other and he was right here and his hands were shaking and he was crying. No. No. No. He was here and there was likely someone right outside that door with a gun or a sword just waiting to come in and kill him and he knew that that wasn’t true and he knew he was being paranoid but he knew that it was true and it was going further down and further down and further down and it was Lily and it was Isaac and it was Min-jae and they were placing their hand around the knob and they were coming in and he was going to-

Wait. Weapon. He forgot about something. The man on the stage said that he got a weapon, right?

He turned around and tore towards his bag again. He pulled it open, taking objects out and placing them aside so he could look through it easier. Food, map, book, first aid kit, flashlight, compass.

Money.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out.

He needed to breathe but he couldn’t because he was on a bedroom on an island and he was on Survival of the Fittest and there was probably someone right outside that door and the weapon that he was given was absolutely worthless and he was crying and his hands were shaking and why was he here and he couldn’t breathe and he was going to die and the cameras were watching him and

No. No. Think. Think. He wasn’t going to get anywhere unless he just sat down and thought about this. He was on an island and the only way to get off of it was to kill everyone else. Wait, no, that wasn’t what the man on the stage said. He said that to get off he had to be the last one left alive. He could do that. Maybe. He didn’t know. The man on the stage said that to help him he’d get a weapon. That was the money. Worthless.

He took a breath. In, out. He could live without it. He stood up. He played soccer. He was athletic. He could fight if he needed to but wait no no no no no no no why would he do that? Wait, he could run away. He was fast. He could use his legs. He could run and he could find someone who cared about him like Lily or Oskar or Barry and maybe he could talk to them and they could help him and maybe they could figure out a way off of here. They were smart. He was smart. They could do that.

They could. He could. He could breathe. In, out. Clear, reaching the bottom of his throat. He could do this. He was going to be okay.

…

He remembered back to what the man on the stage said. Take a look to the person on your right. They could try to kill you. Take a look to the person on the left, you might have to kill them to stay alive.

No. This wasn’t going to be okay for him. There were people who hated him like Isaac and Min-Jae and they were going to try and kill him and if he ran to Lily or Oskar or Barry they were just going to stab him in the back and no, he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t trust them. He could only trust himself. He could only trust himself but he didn’t know what to do and someone was going to enter the door and he was going to die here.

Wait. Think. He needed to think. He needed to get out of here. If everyone had already started killing each other then he had to move so that they couldn’t find him. He didn’t know what he was going to do after but maybe something would happen and he could think about what to do then. He could trust himself. This was a good plan. He kneeled down again, picking up the contents of his bag off the floor and putting them back in. Compass, flashlight, first aid kit, book, map, food.

He stood up again, slowly walking to the door.

Breathe in, breathe out.

And once he was ready, he wrapped his hand around the knob and opened the door.

In a room just down the hall from Alvaro, someone screamed, loud and long and full of wordless rage.

((B001 Min-jae Parker Start))

Really, it was just like picking up where he'd left off when he lost consciousness. Give or take a few hiccups, like waking up in the fetal position underneath someone's bedside table and then bumping his head on said bedside table and the confusion and the realization and the choking horror that gripped him and wouldn't let go.

Jae's hands were shaking. He couldn't stop shaking, had been shaking since he'd first woken up strapped to that chair, with some smarmy fuck at the front of the room like this was some kind of seminar, all part of the trip. He'd screamed then too.

When they shot Mr. Graham, in the split second before the horrible silence that descended, he had been one of the people screaming the loudest.

His first few minutes of consciousness in whatever fresh hell this was, though, were silent. He was curled up on his side, cheek pressed to a wooden floor. It was dusty in here, hadn't been cleaned in way too long. His throat was dry, and he was stiff from laying in one position for so long on an uncomfortable, dirty floor.

So he sat up and knocked his head on the underside of the table, elegantly breaking the silence with a thump and a well-placed "Fuck!"

He crawled out from under the table, keeping his head low until he was clear of it. There was a bag nearby, with a number on it: B001.

(Haha you're number one, congratulations you dumb fuck.)

Jae sat on the floor staring at the bag for a while, almost feeling like something in it was watching him as intently as he was watching it. There was nothing there of course. No movement from the bag, no mysterious voices or anything like that. No horror movie scenarios here except for the one he'd woken up in. He felt oddly detached from everything, floaty and numb.

To distract himself from the bag, he glanced around the room he'd found himself in. It was sparse; bed frame, bookshelf, that fucking table. Smelled musty, the wood of the furniture was probably halfway rotted. Some faded photographs stuck to the walls that Jae didn't care to look too closely at. Looked like a hospital, maybe.

When he ran out of things to look at, Jae reluctantly turned back to the bag.

As it turned out, there was nothing particularly horrifying in the bag once he looked inside. Not much of interest at all besides the metal... stick thing. Telescopic baton, a piece of paper stuck to it said. It extended with a snick when he flicked his wrist, like a version of those plastic lightsaber toys at once infinitely more boring and more threatening.

Also, they'd taken his phone but left his headphones, presumably just to add insult to injury.

So that was the situation. One minute you're on a bus sitting next to your maybe-girlfriend, the next you're-

Oh God. Hazel.

It was a good thing Jae was already sitting, because the sudden wave of dizziness that overtook him would have brought him to the floor anyway. With one stray thought, the floaty, dissociative feeling dissipated and the full reality of just what was happening hit him. He was here to die. Everyone else in his class was here to die. They'd fucking shot Mr. Graham and threatened to do the same to anyone else who stepped out of line.

Jae was suddenly very, very aware of the oppressive band of metal encircling his neck.

It took a good while for the dizziness to subside. When it did, Jae pulled himself to his feet using the table leg to support himself. It definitely had the slightly-spongy texture of partially-decayed wood, and his nose wrinkled up in distaste.

He just stood there for a minute, bag and baton at his feet, not looking at anything in particular.

Survival of the Fittest, he thought, and then the last bit of numbness fell away and Jae screamed, pouring out his anger and fear and frustration at the unfairness of it all into a long, mindless animal noise of fury. Moving on autopilot, he grabbed the edge of the small end table and overturned it, saw one leg give and break off as the rotted wood impacted the floor.

The bookshelf was next, its small, musty collection flung across the room with little care, one striking the wall and causing a photograph to come loose and flutter to the floor. The bookshelf broke much more satisfyingly than the table had when tipped to the floor, and Jae gave it a kick for good measure. In all the cacophony, the soft creak of a door opening nearby was lost on him.

The first thing that Alvaro heard as he left the room was a scream.

He froze. What was that? Or rather, who was that? He knew that it was a person, that was at the very least certain. He didn’t think any animal could make the sound he heard. Wait, what if it was an animal? What if there was something there below him? Wait, no. That wouldn’t be right. This wasn’t a dream and this wasn’t fantasy. This was real, he knew it was. He had woken up in that room and he had seen-

Oh god.

His memory went back to when he first woke up and he saw the man blow the teacher’s head off. The blood was everywhere and Alvaro couldn’t look away and his eyes were just frozen and looking at the red hole that had once been the person he had gotten to know for four years. That was real. As much as he didn’t want to believe it that was real. He was here, he was on Survival of the Fittest and if he wanted to survive the next couple of days he was likely going to have to kill more than just the teacher. Oh god. Oh god. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe-

The scream stopped, the sounds from below instead changing into a series of bangs and clatters. Alvaro moved forward. He didn’t know why. He didn’t know why he was doing this but he wasn’t stopping. He had to do this. There was something in front of him and if he stayed and cowered then whatever it was would find him and he didn’t know what would happen then. He had to be brave. Being brave was good, right? If he stood forward and stood tall then he’d be able to survive, right? Wait, no, that wouldn’t help. What he meant was that it’d help him better than cowering and being scared and being him. He had to do this. Even if he couldn’t be brave later he had to be brave now.

So, he went down the stairs, and stood in front of the door where the noise was coming from.

It was now or never.

He knocked his hand against the door. Once. Trice. Three times.

He hoped that this was a good idea.

Jae kept kicking at the overturned furniture, splinters of wood flying up with each impact of his boot, until the exertion caught up with him and he doubled over in a coughing fit, a friendly reminder from his lungs that he was both a smoker and definitely not an athlete. When his hacking subsided, all that filled the room was the sound of his ragged breathing and the blood roaring in his ears.

And in the sudden silence, three knocks sounded at the door.

Jae straightened up instantly, still breathing hard, trying to deny the way his heart leapt into his throat. It was true that he tended to attract attention whenever he opened his mouth, and he'd certainly done much more than just that now. Still. What was there to be afraid of, really?

(He knew, oh he knew. If people really were as good as they liked to pretend, this wouldn't have happened five times before.)

Still, cowering in this shitty room because of whatever might lay outside wouldn't do him any good. If whoever it was had the intent and the means to harm him, they wouldn't have waited for him to answer.

Jae bent and picked up the baton, feeling its weight in his hand. Never hurt to have a little intimidation factor when he wasn't in the mood to deal with someone. Holding it made him feel a little more in control, too. No more fear and hesitation.

He strode to the door and pulled it open in a quick motion. "What?"

This had been a bad idea.

The person inside the room stopped making noise and started walking towards the door. Alvaro’s heart quivered in anticipation. He didn’t know who was inside but he could hear the steps loudly hitting the floor and he didn’t know who it was and who the person was and whether they were a threat or not or whether they would be someone friendly. He didn’t know whether this was a bad idea or not but everything in his mind was making him lean towards the former. He had no weapon, he had no idea who was in there and why didn’t he think of this before now before he idiotically knocked on the door and now he was probably going to die because the person in there was a monster and why did he do that and why was he here and he just needed help. Someone. Anyone.

The door opened, a voice called out, and all of Alvaro’s fears were confirmed.

Min-Jae Parker stood in the doorway, holding both the same angry expression as always and a weapon in his hand (some sort of bar, or baton; Alvaro wasn’t really quite sure what it was supposed to be). Alvaro could feel his hands start to shake now. He breathed. In, out. In, out. In, out and oh god no why did it have to be him couldn’t it be basically anyone else. He knew Min-Jae. Min-Jae knew him. Min-Jae had a weapon. He didn’t. This was the worst possible situation for him and oh god why was he here and why did he have to wake up here of all places and he just hoped that Min-Jae didn’t want to do anything.

Wait, he had to say something. Anything. Min-jae was there, right in front of him, expecting something from him. Considering where he was and who he was talking to Alvaro had to say something. About this. About anything that would allow him to get out of here.

“Hi, um, Jae.”

He could barely get the words out.

"Oh, it's you." Not the most tactful greeting Jae had ever given someone, but of all the people to come face-to-face with in this deranged game, Alvaro was way, way down on Jae's list of either priorities or concerns. Not someone he cared for, not someone he actively hated. Jae's feelings on Alvaro could be summed up as indifference, with a side of mild irritation and vague dislike. Their only meaningful interaction that he could recall was that disastrous group project with the two of them and... fucking Isaac Brea, who didn't even have the decency to show up for the school trip and get plonked in this hell with the rest of them.

Jae scowled at the thought of Isaac out of habit, before remembering that any and all thoughts of him were best left alone forever and shoving them to the back of his mind to focus on Alvaro again. Unless he'd seen Hazel, Henry, Asha, or Nadia and could point Jae in their direction, Alvaro was basically useless.

"Well, what do you want?"

Every part of Alvaro’s brain that allowed him to respond decided to shut off the moment Min-Jae responded to him.

He was standing there. Min-Jae was standing in front of him. Min-Jae had a weapon. Alvaro didn’t. He was just standing here in front of the kid who Alvaro hated him and who Alvaro knew was a bad person to other people and who Alvaro knew was in a game with him where the aim was to be the last person standing and who Alvaro could see had a better weapon than him and oh god oh god why was he here in the game and why did he have to awaken here of all places with Min-Jae and no weapons and no, no no, this had to be rigged, there was no way that anyone else could have been put like this and it was because they hated him, he knew that; everyone hated him and he was going to die here because someone who hated him was right in front of him and his body couldn’t move and he knew that he had to do something but he didn’t know what and oh god he needed help and he needed to get out of here and do something just do something please-

“I-”

The syllable forced itself out of his throat.

Aaaand Alvaro was exactly as helpful as predicted. Which was not at all. No help here. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Alright, Jae felt a little bit of sympathy for Alvaro here. More empathy than sympathy, even; he'd pretty much shut down too just a few moments ago, albeit in a much more destructive way. Expecting someone who could probably barely keep his shit together day to day to be good for anything right now was out of the question.

Which wasn't to say that Jae was going to stand around here and wait for Alvaro to work through his copious personal issues while who knows what was going on with his friends elsewhere in this hellhole. Sympathy or no, he had people to find and places to be, and neither of those things involved standing in this doorway waiting for Alvaro to remember how words worked.

Heaving a sigh, Jae turned away from Alvaro and took a few steps back into the wreckage of the room, kicking some of the splintered wood aside. He zipped the bag back up and slung it over his shoulder, the number printed across it catching his eye and making his frown deepen again. Congratu-fucking-lations, Number One. There was some kind of sarcastic joke somewhere in there, he was sure.

After one last look around the room to make sure he hadn't missed anything and to confirm that he most definitely never wanted to see it ever again, Jae stepped through the mess back to the door. Alvaro was still standing there with all the charisma of a mannequin... or a corpse. Jae grimaced.

"Hey." No response. Seeing that Alvaro didn't seem intent on moving, Jae poked him in the chest with the baton. "Out of my way."

Min-Jae was still there. In front of him. He had stepped back slightly but Alvaro could still see him and he was still holding the baton and both of them were still on an island with collars around their necks and in a game where the aim was to be the last person still alive. He had to do something. He didn’t know what but he knew he couldn’t just stand here but he didn’t know what and his body wasn’t moving and min-jae was right in front of him. This was a mistake. Min-Jae was going to be a bad guy. Alvaro knew that was going to happen. He acted angry to everyone and Alvaro knew that in particular he hated him. His hands were shaking. Something. Something.

He remembered back to before he woke up when the man was speaking on the podium. He had to look around him. Anyone could kill him. He could have to kill anyone to survive. He had to either be dead or do something. He knew that he didn’t want to be the former, but he knew that he didn’t want to do the latter, either, but min-Jae was right in front of him, he had to do something. Anything. Anything that would get him out of here alive.

Min-Jae touched him with the stick. Alvaro’s body jolted.

The foot went up.

((GMing in this post approved by Yugikun))

There was a certain way that things were supposed to go in any given situation. The fact that circumstances so often didn't have to courtesy to go the way they were supposed to was one of Jae's longest-standing pet peeves. Obviously, this whole SOTF mess was the biggest example of the right order of things going right out the window, but even here, there should be a kind of logic.

Jae wanted out of the room. Alvaro was in his way. Jae told him to move and gave him a nudge with the baton. Logically, Alvaro should have moved out of the way and let him be.

Instead, Alvaro went fucking berserk.

Pain exploded in Jae's knee and he staggered to the side as his right leg buckled under the force of Alvaro's kick. "The fuck-" was all he managed to get out before Alvaro moved towards him, face terrifyingly blank, like he was in a trance. Instinctively, Jae lashed out at him with the baton, striking a glancing blow across Alvaro's temple. It didn't do much to stop his momentum and in the next moment Jae found himself thrown to the floor among the wreckage of the furniture as Alvaro tackled him head-on.

Stars exploded in Jae's vision as his head cracked against the floor and the breath was driven out of his lungs and holy fuck holy shit what the fuck was happening-

Alvaro was hitting him, relatively weak blows but he couldn't breathe and he tried to raise the baton again but it had flown out of his hand and was spinning on the floor out of reach and Alvaro saw and dove for it at the same time. The weight lifting from his body allowed Jae a moment to draw air back in but he couldn't move fast enough, his head hurt and everything hurt and what the fuck Alvaro-

Jae saw the blow coming and just barely had time to raise his arm to shield his face and just barely enough breath to scream as his fingers broke and the blows wouldn't stop and Alvaro was trying to fucking kill him oh god oh god oh god-

Jae tried to scramble away or to curl up to further shield himself but his leg felt numb and wasn't responding the right way and he might have been crying and Alvaro was-

Alvaro was-

There was a split second where their eyes met and everything stopped and he almost thought he saw realization spark in Alvaro's gaze.

He didn't wait to see if it would take.

Jae pulled his working leg back and kicked out as hard as he could, catching Alvaro in the stomach as he loomed over him and sending him sprawling.

The kick connected. Min-jae fell back.

Wait, did he just do that? Oh god oh god he-

Moved forward. Too late for him now. He had just attacked someone and he knew that he couldn’t back out at this point.

A whump.

Another hit.

A feeling of heaviness as both of them crashed against the ground. A moment of disclarity as the world swirled around Alvaro. Sudden clarity as they both stopped. Min-Jae in front of him. Below him. Wait, did he do that? Oh god oh god he- watched as both Isaac and Jae left the library and stared, dumbfounded at the scene that had just occurred. It had only been a couple of seconds ago when they were planning what they were going to do for the report and now Alvaro was the only one still in the library after both had left. He didn’t know how that had happened. All he knew that they had both left and they couldn’t work on it and they were going to fail because they couldn’t work as a team. No, that wasn’t why they were going to fail, they were going to fail because Alvaro didn’t speak up and try to stop them from arguing or at least try to stop Isaac from leaving. It was his fault. It always was. Nobody liked him and he just made everything worse just by being there. That’s how it always was. That was how it always was since the move. He was always the outcast. Different from the rest of them. He didn’t want to be here. Nobody wanted him to be here. If he vanished right now nobody would even notice him because he was him and he couldn’t change anything about himself and it was his fault and nobody liked him and he was here in this game and the people in charge were laughing at him and he just wanted to be home and he just wanted to not be here and

The first punch went down.

The second.

The third and the fourth and the fifth and the sixth and he wasn’t thinking at all; every area of his brain had shut off and now he had the weapon in his hands and the seventh and-

“Kkka.”

That was the sound that came out of his throat as the kick connected against his stomach and he reeled and he fell, back thumping against the cold ground. This had been a bad idea. He made a mistake. He had come here and now he was going to die because Min-Jae was in front of him and climbing on top and no no no he had to do something and he saw the baton a little bit away from him and he just

needed

to

Adrenaline drove Jae forward even though his body felt weak and numb. He rolled onto his side and scrambled over Alvaro for the dropped baton, didn't care if his elbows and knees drove in painfully, felt something like victorious when his hand closed around the baton once again.

Alvaro made another move for it, but this time Jae was ready. He kicked out again, felt a satisfying crunch under his boot that might have been Alvaro's glasses or his nose, turned and raised the baton-

"You little-"

His cheeks were wet and his makeup smeared and he was still crying but he was furious and there was a vicious satisfaction as he turned the assault back on Alvaro-

"-fucking-"

If Jae had been thinking more clearly, he might have been surprised at how much difference a weapon made even when he was down one leg and half a hand-

"-shit!"

The first kick connected. Alvaro closed his eyes. Something crunched over them.

He opened them again. Min-Jae was moving. Blood was dripping down his eyes.

Oh god, blood.

He froze up.

Then the baton came down.

Again.

And again.

He was going to die here.

Because people hated him but he knew that but he couldn’t do something about it and because he was that kid from the other country who couldn’t speak but always tried so hard during it that nobody could help but laugh at him when he did it and who everyone kept around because they felt sorry and he had a cafe that they could use off of him and because he was here in the death game where he didn’t have a weapon and everyone else did and it was his fault for this and for everything because he was him and every time it happened he didn’t have the courage to do something about it and he needed to do something to get out of here and survive but his body couldn’t do anything but he needed to do something, something, something

Do something.

He looked out. There was a splinter lying on the ground.

Good enough.

He clutched it around his hand, and he swung it towards Min-Jae, as hard as he could.

There was something to be said for those clutch survival instincts that kicked in when everything was in overdrive. Everything was automatic, unthinking, and it was a good thing. If he'd had the time or the capacity to think, Jae would have no doubt been lost in the pain, the shock, the revulsion at what he was doing. Later, when he did have time to think, he'd reflect on how those few minutes of mindless movement were probably what saved him from losing an eye.

He jerked backward when Alvaro lashed out at him with the chunk of wood. Fast, but not quite fast enough to dodge, sharp edges digging into his skin and dragged across, a startled, pained cry, blood on his face. He didn't scream again, didn't have the breath, and the sudden backwards movement sent him toppling to the side as he tried to put weight on his injured knee.

In the moment of reprieve, Alvaro wriggled out of Jae's reach across the floor, struggling to get to his feet. Jae grabbed at the bedframe to lever himself up and yelped when the movement sent pain lancing through his broken fingers. It dimly occurred to him just how badly Alvaro might have fucked him up. The thought put a little more fuel back into the fires of Jae's rage and adrenaline, and he staggered to his feet after Alvaro, wincing as his leg protested but didn't collapse again.

"Motherfucker..."

He hit. He heard a scream of pain.

That was because of him. That was the first thing he realised as Min-Jae fell back off of him onto the ground.

Something kicked in. He could move. He needed to move. He tried to get up, something that he wanted to do slowly because of the pain in his legs and his chest and his face but couldn’t because he needed to move and he didn’t know what had happened and he didn’t know where Min-Jae was and he had a weapon and Alvaro didn’t and he was going to die here and he needed to do something and move.

So he did. He got up. His chest hurt, his hands hurt, his face hurt, there was something in his throat, but he was up.

He looked around, and

He saw Min-Jae. Leaning on the bed, gash on his face. That was because of him.

He looked angrier than ever, and was beginning to stand up again.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Run.

Run.

Run.

So he did, picking his bag up off the floor along the way.

He didn’t dare to look back.

((Alvaro Vacanti, continued elsewhere))