Survival Of The Fittest

((Aaron Hughes continued from Where Do You Go From Here?))

Into the woods they went, though not the nearby woods, due to an inopportune danger zone rotation. Aaron was somewhat twitchy and uneasy. Despite his confidence in his plan, he was still saddled with questionable help. There were a lot of ways things could go very wrong. More than that, he felt constricted by the metal collar around his neck. He could get it off, if he had to. He was pretty sure of that now. The thing was, this wasn't the sort of thing that would work multiple times. He'd have a couple minutes to get his whole group free, assuming nobody was watching him as he started, and then there'd be alarm bells going off all over the terrorists' headquarters, people panicking, the whole lot. There would be forces dispatched to kill him and anyone else he managed to release.

So the removal of collars was secondary. It was a failsafe, something to bail them all out if the other tricks he had up his sleeve didn't work for some reason. The primary goal, the ultimate form of rebellion and the best step to freedom, would be to take down the cameras. This was what Aaron hoped he could do. Disabling the cameras was a death sentence, though, so his only hope was to knock them all out at once. One big bang, and the terrorists wouldn't be able to see who was flipping them off or shooting people or whatever, much less who had destroyed their precious equipment. The only tricky bit would be making sure everything went down exactly as planned. One hiccup and they'd all be dead. If Aaron couldn't be completely certain that everything would go right, if he couldn't guarantee that the cameras would all die at once, he'd get the collars off first.

He was lost in thought again, unfocused on his surroundings and his followers. It felt like it had been some time since he had slept. A day? Two? That was probably not a good thing. Were his allies even following him anymore? It was certainly possible that they had drifted off somewhere. At the moment, Aaron was feeling kind of apathetic towards this whole leader role. He liked having people listen to him. Liked doing good things. Liked getting a little respect, for once. The responsibility could be grating, though. He wondered what would have happened had he not encountered Tom on the first day. Perhaps he'd have gone off on his own, holed up somewhere, schemed and waited and enacted his plan ages ago. Maybe lives would have been saved. Then again, maybe it would have been too much. Maybe he'd have started playing to win.

The need to kill others to survive was something that, disturbingly enough, Aaron did not find that hard to understand. It was, however, something he couldn't do. It was repugnant and repulsive, but he got why people went down that path. After all, in the end, it was the only way people who lacked the smarts for escape could survive. What was morality in the face of death? Dying for ideals was stupid. The only reason to do it was when death was assured, when it made no difference.

Aaron was no idealist. He could play the hero, sure. He'd done it for years, every few weekends, with a cape and a foam sword. But all heroism was just play, just acting. Everyone left on this island had selfish reasons for everything they did. No hiding from it. People protected others because it made them feel good. They killed because it let them live longer.

They led escape groups because one person was a lot more screwed than twenty when a squad of armed terrorists showed up.

Aaron sighed. Also, being a leader meant he could get a guard set up and get some rest soon. He needed it. Needed to pull his thoughts together. He'd gotten a bit ahead again, so he scribbled more into his notebook, keeping it shielded from the cameras.

He looked around for one, shot it a smile. How funny, that the instrument of their captivity was to be so key to their liberation.

((Lillian Hayes continued from Where Do You Go from Here?))

One of Aaron's followers was definitely still following him, despite her body's protests. Lily felt an oppressive weight on her muscles, like they were turning into sacks of pudding. Her steps began to falter behind Aaron's, to the point that Aaron almost left her field of vision, vanishing into the trees. Whenever that happened, Lily frowned and forced herself into a running gait until she was right behind Aaron again, then went back to walking. Thus the process repeated for most of the third night and the fourth morning.

As Aaron turned and smiled at a camera for reasons that escaped her, Lily considered talking to him, asking him if it was possible to sleep. His gang had marched through the woods for the what felt like an entire day; she knew that she kept going from dusk to dawn with no sign of stopping. Now that she thought about it, was anyone else still following the two of them? She hadn't heard a peep from Aileen for hours, and truth be told, she was afraid to turn her head and find no trace of her behind her. As for Richard, well, she would be surprised if Richard hadn't dropped when the sun went down.

She opened her mouth, then reconsidered. Aaron was the man with the plan, and she was more than willing to follow him to the letter. Stopping to rest now would recharge them, sure, but for every hour they rested, someone else would likely die. Too many people had died already. This was just a test of Lily's endurance, and she didn't want to fail. There was too much at stake.

((Rob Jenkins continued from Fucking Compasses... How Do They Work?))

Another day, then another night, and then another day. Walk, eat, sleep, wake up, eat, walk again. Robert's life on the island entered the familiar routine of his other, normal life in St. Paul, only difference being, there was no practice or a basketball game in it (and school, but who the fuck cares about the school?).

It was weird. For a deadly game like SotF, Rob's journey was really peaceful so far. Sure, he had a fight already, but he was the aggressor in it. Sure, he witnessed person dying, but again - he was the killer. Apart from that, only some bullshit trash-talk, and lots and lots of walking alone, while according to Danya - people died left and right. Not that it really concerned him. Being away from any action had it's perks, like not risking your life, and that was a part of Rob's plan to survive after all.

What did concern him, was the fact he got lost in the FUCKING forest yet again. Rob cursed himself from going off the trail and entering the woods. Now, he just walked for another FUCKING hour, tripping on the same FUCKING root for the third time, and watching the same FUCKING trees over and over again.

Wait... The same?

Rob looked around with a feeling, he already was here before. He broke one of the thin branches on the nearby tree, leaned it on the trunk of it's previous owner, and walked forward once again.

Guess what?

About two hours later, Rob encountered the same branch leaning on the same trunk. It was confirmed. He was FUCKING lost, and he was walking in FUCKING circles.

"Fuck my life. That is all."

At least that was all, in terms of understandable speech, as Rob still angrily grumbled under his nose, as he sat down and took his map and compass from the pack again. He found the north, turned his face that direction, put the map on the ground, and the compass on the map. He still held his gun tightly with his right hand, while the left one scratched redhead's chin, making Rob aware of the fact, he was in a desperate need for a shave.

But, first things first...

How to get the fuck out of here?

Rob scanned the map carefully. Swamp to the north got dumped off quickly...

First, I could only go to the sunken ship from there, or even worse, to the all too familiar felled forests. Besides, who the fuck would want to march through a fucking swamp?

Trip to the west or south means even more trees, so they...

As Rob was completely occupied with studying the map, he failed to notice, that at least two other figures appeared nearby. For someone, who tried avoid risks and dangerous situations at all cost, Rob was way too careless about his surrounding, and that was already a second proof of that. On the plus side, the chance of the two other people sneaking behind him, and turning on the Insane Clown Posse in his ears were slim to none this time.

((Aileen Borden continued from Where Do You Go From Here?))

Oh god, ow.

Why did she think it was a good idea to go on the trip in Mary Janes? Seriously. True, she always wore those shoes, but she didn't think to bring any other ones for the trip. And now they were hurting her feet like hot irons because she didn't expect to be sent off to a deserted island where she had to kill her classmates. What's worse was, she couldn't take them off because there were probably all sorts of things that could hurt her feet much more worse, knowing the woods and the students and the insects and the possible traps and the-

Okay, she wasn't going to whine on about this like some preppy Beverly Hills girl. If she wore something that couldn't work with walking around in the woods, it was her own damn fault, seriously. At least it could be worse, like high heels? At least her shoes were mostly flat...

In any case, where the hell was Aaron? As always, he ran ahead, off doing whatever. Really, he needed to just fucking stop with his habit of running ahead of the group and then pausing, hoping that everyone would catch up with him. That's how people got lost, because they didn't stick with everyone else. And if they lost any more of the group... god, Aileen didn't know what to do. Enough people had died, she just wanted to go home. Aileen vowed that if she ever got home, the first thing she was going to do was curl up in a blanket, drink nice hot tea and go on the world's most extreme nap. No coming home parties, no tearful speeches, just sleeping, pure uninterrupted sleeping.

Really, was that so much to ask for?

Oh look, there was Aaron and Lily. They were safe again. But where was Richard? Hopefully he was having fun pretending to be Jackie Chan or something again and wasn't lost. At best, he was right behind them, yelling about getting rid of the psychos on the island with his ninja powers or something.

Another "running gag" of Aaron's that she had noticed was that whenever he did run ahead of the group as usual, they would catch up to him, only to see that he was jotting something down in his notebook. And oh look right now was no exception. He was writing in it. Smiling while writing, at that.

Now what? Aileen had no clue.

She gently placed her things on the ground, and stared at the two.

Really. On one hand, she didn't "get" any of them that well, Richard and Aaron especially. Aileen was never a people person to begin with, so she wouldn't get what made people run ahead of the group like this or pretend to be a ninja while people around them were fucking dying. On the other, she still felt that protectiveness towards them, and if they died...

"Well?" she said in a low voice.

((Milo Taylor continued from Fucking Compasses... How Do They Work?))

Milo had been running, screaming almost nonstop for roughly half a day and a night. This was nothing new for him; the island was getting to be less and less enjoyable with each passing minute, let alone day.

Eventually, however, he made his way to the woods.

Good. Thank Me. We're good. I'm away from the cockroach. Little did Milo know, as fortunate of an occurrence as it was, the tranquilizer had worn off.

"Shit, I'm hungry," he muttered to himself. He set his daypack down, unzipped it, took out a loaf of bread, and began digging into it like some kind of annoying idiot piranha.

Suddenly, he heard rustling, scribbling and human speech a short ways off. He wrapped the small amount of bread that was left up, stuffed it in his daypack, hefted it up, and took a walk over to see who it was.

Lo and fucking behold. A few people he didn't know, and that douchebag that broke his iPod speakers yesterday. Fortunately, the group and the douche were moving separately from each other, or so it appeared.

In a moment of stunning clarity of mind, he decided to mask that he knew this, walk a short ways out, and call out to them.

"Hey, anyone there?" he yelled.

This is gonna be fun, Milo thought bitterly.

It didn't take long for Lily and Aileen to catch up. Good. Aaron was not feeling super patient at the moment. Definitely not feeling like having to stand around forever while they caught up. They really should have been keeping pace. Should have been making more of an effort to keep the group together. After all, Aaron was the leader. It was his job to set the speed. If they had issues, they should have told him so. Still, he liked having his little breathers, his times to sort his plans. Liked the fact that he actually knew what he was doing.

The largest annoyance at the moment was that Richard was missing. Again. It seemed like the boy wandered off at every possible opportunity. It was very, very difficult for Aaron to keep his cool in the face of that. Coupled with Aileen's neediness and his own fatigue, it was very certainly approaching time to take a rest, before he completely lost it and kicked half the group out, told them, if they were so smart and self-reliant, to find their own damn escape plan. Still, that wouldn't be the right thing to do. He had to keep his help. Had to save them. Save everyone. The things he did to help people astounded him.

Aileen was interrogating him. Again. Probably hoping for more information. Good thing he'd had time to write. Good thing he'd taken the extra precaution of writing across non-sequential pages. No way was he going to tip the whole plan to his allies. If he did, there would be several instant problems. Someone, like Richard, would probably read everything aloud, for one. Even if he could prevent that particular disaster, they'd instantly be wanting more details, more specifics. Or, worse, they'd decide to revolt, decide they'd had enough of being led by someone sane and intelligent, and just kill him and enact the plan without his assistance. That seemed the sort of thing Aileen might pull. Lily would probably intercede on his behalf, and he did have the gun, but that wouldn't guarantee victory, and, more than that, even if he emerged triumphant he would need a new group.

Time to dole out another little tidbit, though, to keep Aileen from feeling like no progress was being made. Checking the angles of the nearby cameras, making sure they wouldn't see anything, Aaron showed her the first page of plans.

it seems pretty clear, given the lack of electricity around the island, that they don't want us to have acess to power. the question, then, is why? i think we can probly assume that its because electricity is some how dangerous to their plans. the thing is, there's electricity all around us. those cameras dont run off magic. i don't know any batteries that last for weeks, and they cant be solar because then a week of clouds would end this whole thing.

that means there has to be a generator somewhere.

There. Plenty to keep her thinking. This was the part of the plan that seemed particularly obvious to Aaron. The part he'd been hoping to check with Bounce, to make sure nobody else had tried. Still, it seemed unlikely. His classmates paid attention to how things were, but they were infuriatingly limited when it came to figuring out the whys of a situation.

After giving what he judged was enough time for Aileen to read his message, Aaron snapped his notebook shut and stowed it again. He was about to suggest setting up camp, waiting for Richard and taking a rest, when the voice distracted him. Someone was shouting. Seeing if anyone was there. Aaron snapped to full alertness, drawing and leveling the gun in the rough direction the voice had come from, at the same time stepping behind a tree. It blocked his line of sight of the speaker, but that would be more than worth it if this came to a firefight.

"Who is it?" he called, voice much softer than whoever had spoken first. "This is Aaron Hughes. I've got a little group here. We're armed, but we aren't looking for trouble. If you want to talk, come out with your hands in front of you. Empty."

The voice was not super familiar, but that wasn't doing Aaron's state of mind any favors. He could rule out most of the truly horrifying killers, at least: Reiko, Kris, and Clio were female, Maxwell had that accent, and Aaron knew how Nick and Ivan sounded. Still, no point taking any chances.

((Richard Han continued from Where Do You Go From Here?))

Richard brought up the group's rear. From there he could keep an eye on everyone, and protect them if need be. The rear was also the favoured spot for an ambush, attack from the rear and you have initiative your opponent doesn't, and he knew to look out for that, and he knew how to deal with it. Lastly, if someone were quiet enough, and sick in the head enough, they could pick off stragglers without alerting the rest of the group. The best defense in the world didn't help you if a queen or a rook was behind your lines.

And somehow he didn't like the idea of Aileen or Lily being picked off before him.

And that's why he chose to stay at the back. He'd already lost one of them, he couldn't lose another one.

Of course, defending the group was a lot easier when you could see them. Stopping to retie his shoelaces and almost losing them completely hadn't been part of the plan. At least he knew their general direction so he'd catch up with them soon enough. It had only been fifteen minutes and he was going at a good pace. Too good a pace, in fact.

He could hear voices not far behind him and to his left, muffled by the trees and the light breeze that shifted them ever so gently. Two deep voices could only mean his group had company, and now that he considered it, his position gave them an unusual tactical advantage. He began to creep his way towards the voices, crouching through the leafy cover some of the bushes and tree trunks afforded.

Like a ninja?

He narrowly avoided stepping on a fallen branch.

Like a ninja.

((Inactivity avoidance protocol engaged))

Looks like the only way was south. Well, the only way that won't lead to more frustration for Rob anyway. Unless he'll lose his compass along the way, or any wacko like that Milo guy will interrupt him again, it should be a peaceful jour...

"Hey, anyone there?"

No...

Rob seriously hoped his ears were making fun of him. Could it be possible, that this fuckhead followed him all the way through woods? Well, according to Rob's eyes, when he turned his head toward the shouting person, yes indeed.

God fucking damn it...

There was one thing which turn out to be useful from this situation though. As Robert looked around to spot Milo, he also spotted 3 other people. A girl completely unknown to him, a geeky-looking guy (with a pistol), and...

FUCK!

A black girl. Rob's heart started beating faster, but not from excitement, happiness or any other thing like that. It was more of an anger mixed with nervousness, like someone from the opposing team just scored a go-ahead bucket one second before the final buzzer. One annoying person was enough for his tolerance. Adding another one getting on his nerves (without even opening her mouth) could only mean disaster.

Okay Rob. Settle down. Don't look at her, and everything will be fine. Concentrate on Milo, guy with the gun, trees, or whatever. Just... Just don't look at her...

Fortunately for the redhead, the geeky guy took the initiative and pointed out the gun in Milo's direction (but not directly, if Rob's calculation were correct. It seemed like the nerd didn't exactly know the place where Milo was standing), and shouted something about being armed and not looking for trouble. That worked for Rob perfectly. If he would be hostile, and with THAT kind of company, Rob was perfectly sure at least two of the gathered people wouldn't come out alive from this 'conversation'.

But, the time for analyze was or. It was time to make an action on his own. The giant stood up, still holding his M15 handgun firmly, but not pointing it in any specific direction. Then, he decided to do some little theatrics. First, he turned toward the annoying guy, and informed the entire world, in a bit over the top voice, of his feelings about Milo's arrival...

"Good lord, not you again!"

...Then he turned toward the geek, and before he could point the gun at the redhead out of sheer surprise, Rob spoke to him with a friendly (at least he hoped so), joking tone...

"Dude... Please do me a favor and pull that trigger, before he'll blow our minds with his stupidity..."

...All of this while desperately trying to avoid the eye contact with the black girl. Better safe than sorry.

((LIVE AILEEN LIIIIIIIIVE))

Aaron immediately thrust the book right in her face, expressing his thoughts.

He had made the observation that there was no electricity on the island, even though the cameras were working just fine. So, there was a way the cameras were working, and not everything else here. So he wanted to figure out how they got the cameras working right now? A conundrum, indeed. Aileen had never really considered that, to be honest. She did know that it was being broadcasted all over the world, that various people were watching all of this. Whenever she thought about how it was being broadcasted, she would curl her lip in disgust at the thought of people laughing at everyone dying like it was no big deal, or worry about her mother, who was most likely watching her right now and freaking out.

So... no electricity. That actually was a good point. So that meant that they had to look into the power source of the cameras for now? Aileen pressed her mind for any potential power sources that could be used on the island, but to no avail. Seriously... no electricity elsewhere, couldn't be solar, obviously not battery run... damn, what could it be?

As the book disappeared from her view, her thoughts were interrupted when she heard... shouting? Was that it? Someone was yelling if anyone was here.

Oh great, another person they had to deal with. Another potential psycho, another person who might just wander in with no problems and bug everyone, only to leave when someone- most likely a certain bespectacled redheaded female- would yell at them. Aileen clenched her fist. God fucking damn it to hell! Were they some sort of magnet for random people to run up and say hi, only to leave when someone said "Fuck off"? Sure, Aileen was trying her best to cut that out, but sometimes she had to wonder.

Luckily, once more someone spoke up before she could say something inappropriate. Namely, Aaron. He was telling the person that they were armed but not planning on attacking anyone.

She could vaguely see the speaker from where she was standing. The guy in question didn't look like he had been planning to go on a school camping trip when he packed his clothes, much less running around on a deserted island filled with psychopaths. It looked more like he was planning to go to a fancy dinner party or something just before he got abducted or something. Seriously, this scene was more than a little absurd, even just for that little element.

Oh, and to make things more absurd?

Another guy stepped in, acting like the individual in the fancypants had followed him. This guy, though was different. Tall and athletic looking. And on closer inspection, he had a gun. Oh shit. Tall, athletic guy with a gun. They were fucked if he decided that they looked like things good for target practice or excellent punching bags. He didn't seem to like the other guy, even asking for Aaron to shoot him. Presumably, that was a joke. At least, that was what she hoped. Or rather, prayed to god that it was a silly joke.

And, Aileen spoke once more without thinking.

"And who... who are you two?" she asked, an odd, confused look on her face.

Really. Really. What was going on here, and what was about to happen? She didn't even know anymore.

((Man I'm slow. Sorry.))

Lily saw Aileen bringing up the rear just after she came to a stop. Good to know. But she didn't look quite as patient as Lily did at the moment. Aileen peered curiously at Aaron's notebook, wondering what the heck he was writing in there. "Well?" she asked, causing Lily to look over at Aaron, too.

Aaron seemed annoyed by Lily's question, but decided to call her over and share his notebook with her. Lily blinked. Aaron was actually going to share his plan? Suddenly her curiosity was piqued, and she deliberated looking over their shoulders without permission. She almost took a step, then leaned back, switching between positions a couple times before deciding to go through with it anyway. She'd be able to follow Aaron's plan better if she knew what it was, after all.

What she saw was actually rather inspiring. Aaron's thinking was perfectly sound, but after reading his notes, Lily started to get a niggling doubt in the back of her mind. The island was a big place, big enough to give space to over two hundred people, and the terrorists would have picked the best hiding spot they could think of. For all Lily knew, the generator was buried underground, surrounded on all sides by a foot of reinforced concrete.

Then again, maybe the wires would prove to be a better target. If they were as fragile as she thought they were in the cameras themselves, maybe they'd be just as fragile as they came out of the generator. Better yet, maybe the gang could follow them from a camera to find the generator.

Oh, but what if the island had multiple generators just in case one of them failed or was sabotaged? Lily's head swam with all of these thoughts that Aaron's plan had germinated; she found herself opening her mouth to ask to write in the notebook herself when Aaron snatched it away. Then someone else got the trio's attention.

Her first thought was that more people were along, and that they could be helpful to Aaron's plan. Aaron was already taking initiative and asking them to come out unarmed. She looked up at them and felt a wave of apprehension sweeping over her, for reasons she couldn't put her finger on. She didn't know either of the two people in the distance, but neither of them really gave her a good feeling. There was also the fact that the tall, muscular guy did not drop his weapon as Aaron had suggested, and instead joked about shooting the one in the business suit!

"That's... that's not funny," Lily stammered, unsure as to the wisdom of contradicting the athlete with a loaded weapon. "Don't even kid about stuff like that."

((Narrowly avoiding inactivity.))

Milo walked out of his hiding spot a bit and looked at the man who'd broken his iPod speakers.

"Yeah, fuck you too," he said.

He then looked over at the girl who'd just wondered who he and the man were.

"I'm Milo Taylor, and that guy's an asshole," he informed her. "Any way I can make myself useful? I've been wandering around on my lonesome for a while, it's refreshing to see people that aren't either trying to kill me or violently attempting to make me leave."

What on earth was so difficult to understand about the phrase "hands empty"? It was such a simple request. Basic stuff, show you weren't hostile, that sort of thing. And yet, no, here was this guy, this guy Aaron didn't even know, waltzing around with his gun out. Either joking or inciting an incident. Turning everything way more messy than it had to be. For extra excitement, there was that other guy, dressed all nice. Two new people, people who knew each other. People who had issues with each other.

Instantly, Aaron came up with a large number of possible explanations for the situation. The easiest, of course, was that it was a trap. These guys were tag-teaming them, preparing some of ambush to separate and disarm them. The seeming stupidity of both people involved played into that, made them seem harmless. Of course, he wasn't quite happy with that explanation, because the hostility between the two seemed fairly genuine. This led him to believe that something else was going on. The suspicious one, of course, was the guy with the gun. He'd chosen not to disarm himself. This meant that he was stupid, arrogant, or had a trick up his sleeve. His words were at odds with his actions; while he presented an affected aura of cheerful jest, he also took a physically threatening position.

Aileen asked who they were, and Lily called the guy out on his tasteless joke. Aaron could work that. His first instinct, of course, was to push a little bit, see if he could provoke a more heated emotional response from one or both. The best option for that would be to simply invite the gun-wielder to shoot the other guy unopposed. Unfortunately, doing so wouldn't really be a wise move in terms of group cohesion, whether or not Aaron had any pans to let him carry it out. No, Lily had to be humored. She was Aaron's best supporter. That meant taking her side here.

The guy without the gun introduced himself as Milo Taylor. Aaron recognized the name, but couldn't quite place why. Wasn't the guy retarded or something? Just what he needed right now. Then again, if he wasn't dangerous, there was a chance he'd actually be useful, easy to get to help out. None of that pesky contradictory nature so many of Aaron's compatriots seemed to have (and speaking of such, where was Richard?). It took him a second, but Aaron had a plan.

"Yeah, Lily's right," he said, shifting the pistol to cover the guy with the gun. "That's not a very good first impression to make. So, how I see it now, you've got two choices. You can piss off, and we'll pretend this never happened and go our seperate ways, or you can prove yourself trustworthy. If you want to stick around here, you either put that gun down, or you take the clip out and put it a little ways away. Chambered round, too." Aaron was very, very glad he'd taken the time to read the manual for his gun. It'd have just been a lovely surprise for someone to have a single shot when Aaron thought they were dry.

Without shifting his gaze, he said, "And Milo, if he sticks around, you could be a great help by frisking him for surprises."

Oh yes. If there was something absolutely certain to upset this guy, Aaron was fairly sure it'd be having Milo's hands all over him. Three ways things could go, now. The guy could turn out to be smart, walk away from what was clearly a bad deal. He could be trusting, follow the instructions, and probably end up better off in the long run.

He could also be dumb and start something. Aaron was near a big, solid tree, just in case. No point getting gunned down over something stupid.

((Sorry for breaking the post order slightly. Check the Away thread for details))

As several other people spoke, Rob was actually amazed, he managed to stay shut this whole time. He felt a desperate urge to go right back at Milo, or simply shout 'SHUT THE FUCK UP' at the black girl. Seriously, who even allowed her to open her mouth? Fucking negro bitch...

But the last straw came, when the nerd with the gun started acting smartass AND all-mighty at once. Not only he didn't realize he was fucking with the wrong guy, but he also started contradicting himself with a demand to disarm, while still waving his gun happily.

No, that simply won't do. Rob Jenkins was not going to play with that kind of ruleset. That nerdy guy needed a reality check FAST.

Rob gathered all his strength to smirk a little, and responded.

"First: I may be joking, but let that idiot follow you for at least ten minutes, and you'll see what was I talking about. Second: The name's Rob Jenkins... And that's all there is to that. And finally..." Rob turned toward the nerd. "Consider this, oh Great Leader: I was right here all the time, and you failed to spot me. If I had any hostile intentions toward you, I could easily aim and kill you, before anyone else would notice what happened. But I didn't. Enough of a proof? If not, then sorry, I'm not going to give you anything more, because I'm not stupid enough to disarm myself before another armed guy."

Rob tightened the grip on his pistol, but instead of making any movement with it, he continued talking in a full sarcasm mode. If someone looked in redhead's eyes though, he could see the anger just waiting to be unleashed.

"You know, for a guy who 'isn't looking for troubles', you are waving this gun way too much. Even though he didn't say ANYTHING which sounds like a hostility, you pointed your weapon at Milo and told him to come with his hands up like a captured hostage. Now, you demand a complete surrender, when you have absolutely no FUCKING control over me. I'm not going to listen to any of your suggestion, but feel free to listen to mine and piss off yourself."

At this point, Rob looked at the 'Not-Lily' girl, as she was currently the only person around who wasn't pissing him off.

"I'm not going to join your team, too many fuckheads around here for my taste. But I'll give you a word of advise. If you want to be a friendly, not hostile group, you should consider changing the leader, because this guy is doing some seriously crappy job at it. Tell him to stay in the back and play some Dungeons and fucking Dragons, because apparently that's the only thing he's good at."

((Jacquard Broughten continued from Shore Leave))

She had thought fleeing to the woods would be a good idea. She had thought that by fleeing every single true landmark, she could find a place where she could be alone and decide what to do about this little problem... Her little life problem.

Roland didn't have to say it. She could tell. As if the voices in her mind were that of a celestial body, peering into his thoughts before whispering them into her ear.

She was an Animal. A monster. Just as she first had decreed herself.

Whatever adrenaline had been keeping her injury back just released the flood gates, and slowed any progress to a crawl.

She could hear the crickets chirping. She could see the sun lowering beyond the canopy. With not an ounce of fight left in her, not a drop of fuel left in the tank, her body went limp. And as her pupils dilated, and her lungs released their warm breath, she collapsed to the ground in hunger, and exhaustion.


They didn't know how long their host had laid unconscious. Her mind may have shut down, but she was not the only resident of that mind anymore. And as such, her senses were very much still alive, feeding their records to five beings. Three of which were listening.

"...Voices!"

It was high pitched. It was young. It was such a naive, innocent voice. Care free, and completely oblivious to the world in which it was born.

Not understanding why everyone was yelling at her to stop, or why it was so difficult, the broken and battered form of Jackie began to crawl, hand over hand towards the sound of the voices, underbrush and leaves parting their ways for her as her presence was obviously known. Coming in and out of consciousness as another controlled her form, her thoughts, although muddy and addled with sleep and pain, revolved around the mystery that was felt of not being in control of one's body.

Slowly, through use of the bushes and the trees around her, her arms grasped and pulled her full weight to attention. Her hair was in her eyes, so the blurred vision that Jackie could comprehend as this other controlled every stumbling step she took did little to offer her information. All she could tell was that she was in the woods.

...absolutely no FUCKING control ov... A voice. Little more than a moment ago, gained such power and anger that it clearly cut through the fog. She couldn't be bothered to care who it was though.

A figure in front of her. No... A group of figures.

"Jackie! It's uncle Aaron!"

"..Unh... Wha?"

The figure at the forefront of her vision snapped back into clarity. Aaron Hughes. The voices were extinguished as her mind began to race, yet again shutting out all the things that by all means should force her unconsciousness. Those piercing green eyes were staring straight at a man she had never seen before, wielding a gun. And he was barking orders, so calmly at him. Always the man with the plan, huh...

Against the tree she stood, unable to make her legs move in the opposite direction. The last thing she wanted right now was conflict. The last thing she wanted right now was to deal with this. The childlike presence that had been there not a moment before had vanished just as quickly as it had appeared, now relished to a faint whisper in the back of her head, with all the others. However, the more familiar voice that was ringing through loud and clear sent a chill up her spine.

"This fuckwit, huh? Let's see what he's really up to..."

Oh... No...

Not a word was spoken from her mouth, but she really was a pitiful sight to behold for those standing before her. Her hair tangled and draped over her face, leaning heavily on a tree, arms clinging to the trunk for support. Her breath was labored, her mouth just cracked as air painfully whistled between her lips. Her eyes were wide and pleading, and her expression perfectly blank. And she just sat, staring at them as they made their exchange.

((Aileen needs to live again. T_T)

Lily flat-out called the tall guy out on making jokes about killing people, saying that it wasn't funny at all. See? She was capable of expressing her exact thoughts without descending into sarcasm or outright insults.

The boy in the overly fancy outfit introduced himself as Milo Taylor, and the athletic guy as "an asshole". Aileen felt the need to make a comment here, about how they both looked like assholes to her, but stopped herself before any words could come dribbling out of her mouth. Okay, they could turn out not to be assholes after all, and actually be a good part of the group in the future. Heck, the guy in the business suit even asked if he could be of help. It was best to stay on the safe side, however, with both of them.

Aaron happened to agree with Lily, saying that it wasn't exactly a good first impression to make jokes about shooting people while being stuck on a deserted island where there are plenty of murderers. And therefore, pretty much gave the guy with the gun an ultimatum; leave or put your gun down. Simple really. Really harsh wording, but hopefully he would agree with one or the other. Although, Aaron was standing behind a tree this entire time, while she, Lily, and the two guys were out in the open, and Richard was god knows where. Which meant that if this guy with the gun attacked, Lily and Aileen were the first targets.

However, nope, gun guy was not cooperative.

He went on a tirade, about how having Milo around for ten minutes would annoy them all, about how he could have just simply shot them all while they weren't looking, and about how he wasn't going to put his gun down. This "Rob" guy was going on and on about how Aaron was the one looking for trouble and was a horrible leader.

It was as if he was expecting everyone to be happy and merry, and invite him to a magical tea party with My Little Ponies and Carebears the minute he cracked a joke about shooting people! Of course they weren't happy, they were stuck on a deserted island for Christs' sake! Of course they would be a little suspicious of him and that other guy. Of course, it wasn't a good idea for Aaron to ask one guy to grope at another on hindsight, but he could at least just follow the instructions and not make this hard.

Aileen's face looked like a speckled beet when the guy turned to address her directly. Rob was telling her that they needed a new leader if they wanted people to be nice to them, even saying that Aaron could just run off and play Dungeons and Dragons.

Her lips pursed as she resisted the urge to flare up at him right back. Oh man, was she pissed. Who gave this Rob kid the right to walk to their group, make a joke about people getting shot, and then insult people who make a simple request at him? At least just make it simple and easy for everyone!

But, her next words she managed to get out without yelling. "Hey... we've been through a lot. One of our group has already been killed, and we've been separated from others. Of course we'd be a little suspicious."

Although her voice was far from shouting, one could notice a bit of venom dripping off the tone. She was trying her best not to yell at people again, but it was pretty clear that she was upset.

She looked back and forth between the two newcomers and the tree Aaron was hiding behind.

"Everyone needs to put their weapons down and talk about this like civilized human beings. Okay?"