Survival Of The Fittest

The technician known as Sparky sat at her workstation and simply stared at the screen of her computer. She wasn't entirely sure that she believed what she was seeing. A couple of the others had picked up on one of the kids - the weird little goth that had smeared herself with gore and had been responsible for part of the swamp being set ablaze - had been gathering pieces of scrap. Tin cans, mostly. Lourvey had brought it up with Achyls, but the senior tech had dimissed it; nobody was going to break through a collar using a soda can. It wasn't worth monitoring.

Except, apparently, he'd been wrong.

Her eyes had to be playing tricks on her. There was no way that anybody had the balls to put themself through that much pain. Sparky blinked, hard, rubbed her eyes, but no, the sight remained. A girl screaming in pain, the hot aluminium she'd melted scalding her skin even as it did unknowable damage to the inner workings of the collar. Sparky was stunned, she was amazed, in a couple of small ways, she was even a little impressed.

For a good thirty seconds, the young woman watched Liz Polanski's agony, transfixed by the pain of a girl that she was barely a year older than. A few moments more, then there was a sharp intake of breath from behind her. Sparky turned.

All the colour had drained from Dennis Lourvey's face. "Is that...? Oh shit. Oh shit."

Achyls, working nearby, heard the other technician speak up and seeing his face, all but leapt out of his seat, knocking it over in the process. He'd been jumpy ever since he'd realised that the destruction of a camera in the Ranger's Station had effectively left them with a room-sized blind spot. Achyls had blown the perpetrator's collar personally, but Sparky had worked with him long enough to tell that the concern was eating away at him.

Achyls rushed over and the second he saw Sparky's display, he swore. "Blow the collar!" he barked at the woman, who snapped out of her daze for a few moments to enter the associated command. Nothing happened. "I said BLOW THE FUCKING COLLAR!" Achyls bellowed.

Sparky flinched back. "It-it... it won't work, Sir!"

The lead technician whirled around and grabbed Lourvey by the lapels before screaming into his face. "Get Danya! NOW!" his subordinate was out of the door in the blink of the eye.

Sparky looked back to the girl on her screen, others now on hand to help her. The young tech's eyes narrowed in thought.

~*~

The door almost burst from its hinges as the man himself, Mr. Danya, swept into the hub room. Behind him came Richards and Baines, both carrying assault rifles and wearing their best poker faces. Lourvey stumbled along after them, still deathly pale, although seemingly now with the makings of a black eye. Almost unnoticed, Jim Greynolds slipped in last, expression unreadable.

Unlike that of his boss.

Danya wasn't angry. His emotional state transcended mere anger. He was furious, so enraged that one could practically see the steam emerging from his ears. When he spoke, his voice trembled. It was obvious that Danya was having to put considerable effort into not breaking something.

The question was simple. "Who. The hell. Missed it?"

Silence. Danya made fists, took a deep breath. A red smudge was visible on his knuckles.

"Who saw the kid getting materials together, and didn't. Tell. Me?"

More quiet.

"There are five of you, and you're trying to say that not one of you saw what was going on? Don't insult my intelligence."

And then a voice. "It was Achyls."

Every person in the room turned as one... to Cecily Lacoste, twirling a blond ringlet of hair around her finger. She had the look of somebody that was very much trying to hide a smile.

"Explain," growled Danya.

"Lourvey saw what the girl was doing. Achyls told him not to bother with it."

The senior technician gaped, mouth opening and closing mutely, like some kind of fish. Danya let out a long, heartfelt sigh.

"Oh Achyls. All this time, all that experience, and now you spring this on me?" Danya looked up to the ceiling for a couple of moments, as if thinking. "I'm afraid that you're no longer inexpendable, Achyls. Such a shame. We had some times, didn't we?"

Achyls swallowed, his adam's apple bobbing noticeably. "So that's it? 5 years and that's all I'm worth to you? You're just going to kill me!?"

Danya chuckled, conveying absolutely no humour. "Oh no no, Achyls. I'm not going to kill you," Danya swivelled, gestured to Sparky. "She is."

There was a momentary silence, then Achyls, with a roared 'Fuck you!', launched himself at his boss, desperation granting him enough speed to... get cold cocked in the jaw by the butt of Richards' gun. He went down hard with a cry, clutching his face as he sprawled on the floor. Danya looked down on the technician for a moment, tipping Richards and nod, then returned his gaze to Sparky, who seemed stunned.

"I meant that, by the way," he favoured her with a grin. "You're the new girl, it's traditional," Danya considered a moment. "Not to kill one of us. Getting your hands dirty. Baines," he gestured and the blond man stepped forward, drawing a pistol and holding it out to Sparky. She took it gingerly.

Danya nodded. "Kill him."

Sparky looked down at Achyls. Her former superior looked up at her, still holding his broken jaw. There was little more then resignation in his eyes. Sparky hesitated for a couple of seconds, the gun an unfamiliar weight in her hands. A little longer, and Achyls spoke.

"Go ahead," he forced out, wincing as the action aggravated his injury. "Shoot. I'm just one in a long line that's outlived his usefulness," Achyls hauled himself to his knees. "Just remember that sooner or later, it'll be you th-"

The gunshot cut him off.

~*~

"I was under the impression, Lourvey, that you redesigned those things to be foolproof."

"With respect, sir, I didn't take into account that somebody might be willing to pour molten metal onto their own neck. I'm amazed the kid still has a throat. If that group hadn't been on hand to help her..."

"We don't trade in ifs and buts, Lourvey, it's vital that we prevent her from..." a smile crossed the face of Mr. Danya. A sick, sick little smile. "Lourvey, check the girl's dossier. ... I think we might have a friend of hers around the place."

~*~

Kwong Lei stirred and for the first time in four days, became aware of his surroundings. He'd been kept in a drug induced stupor for much of his time there, eating and drinking what he'd been given on autopilot, incapable of wading through his thickness of mind to formulate any thought.

Until now.

He was in a well-lit room, and he was sitting on - no, tied to a chair. He'd been positioned in front of a desk, upon which was a computer with a display he didn't understand, and a large microphone. Kwong tried to turn around, to see what was behind him, but found his movement too restricted by the ropes binding him to manage it.

There was a grunt. "Stop with the moving, or I'll start with the shooting."

"Don't be a moron, Baines," Kwong heard the eyeroll. "The big man will fucking murderise us if we hurt him."

"Murderise? Really Richards? Really?"

For a moment, Kwong was back in the classroom again. He had a strange urge to threaten detention. However, before his (still admittedly a little drugged up) mind could come up with anything foolish, the spell was broken.

"Children... children. I suffer from enough bickering at home, and the two of you don't strike me as eight year olds," muttered apologies, then somebody walked around to stand in front of Kwong. He stiffened.

It was the man who had introduced himself as Danya.

"Mr. Kwong," Danya said, seeming to savour the name. "So pleased to finally meet you in person. I'm afraid I'm going to be very rude here, but ...I'd like you to do something for me.

Something very important."

~*~

The PA system crackled into life across the entire island, sparking confusion amongst the students. This only intensified when the voice that began to speak wasn't that of Danya... it was that of Kwong Lei, their math teacher over years of education. Mr. Kwong's voice was uncharacteristically but surprisingly tremulous.

"Good afternoon, students. I've been instructed to read out a prewritten statement from Mr. Danya regarding an incident that has taken place on the island," he cleared his throat.

"And I quote.

It's come to our attention that one of your number has been interfering with their collar. This is clearly unacceptable," Kwong's voice grew a little stronger at this, beginning to drip with sarcasm. "After all, we wouldn't want anybody refusing to play ball, would we? The student in question is Liz Polanski, some of you might know here. I'm speaking to you in order to bring an offer from Danya.

Should anybody successfully kill Liz Polanski, they will immediately be awarded a weapon from our very own stash of best kill prizes as a bounty.

Miss Polanski. If you instruct anybody, verbally or by any other method, in your techniques, we will immediately detonate their collar. If we see you persisting in trying to break our rules, we will detonate collars at random. If you remain at large, we will send in a team to hunt you and anybody found to be allied with you down. We may also-" Kwong faltered. "We may also see fit to eliminate your beloved teacher."

There was a long moment's silence.

"It has also come to our attention that Miss Polanski has recklessly destroyed one of our cameras, as a punishment, we will now detonate a collar," there was an indistinct murmur across the PA. When Kwong spoke again, he sounded horrified. "What!? No! I - you can't make me-"

A heavy impact, followed by a gasp and a whimper. Somebody had struck Kwong.

"I... I will be commencing this punishment now," a second of silence and... "B148, Daisuke Nagazawa, eliminated.

This is your teacher, Kwong Lei, signing off. Kids I believe in-!"

We now return you to your regularly scheduled SOTF action.


~*~

#1 Carol Burke - Kami
#2 Madison Stone - Xylophonefairy
#3 Celeste Beaumont - Moth - Haruka Watanabe (Shake&Bake, Hero Card used)
#4 Lucy Ashmore - Zecuma
#5 Phillip Ward - Fanatic
#6 Daisuke Nagazawa - Lawther (inactive)
#7 David Morrison - Dom - Alison Walworth (Dom, Swap Card used)
#8 Marty Lovett -Fiori - Rizzo Vitoria (Acelister, Hero Card used)

-

As per usual, you have three days to play cards. As not per usual, you have seven days after this to get the deaths done. We'll be testing how this goes for a little bit to see if it works. We'll then see if any of the other suggested changes are viable.

Link the death post here when you're finished, don't mob people for death rights on PM unless they ask for it, and try and get the ball rolling as early as possible.

Have fun!


- Also, as of this announcement we will no longer be allowing the adoption of characters. Those currently on te list will remain there until their periods are up, but from here on in, inactive characters will be killed off rather than put up for adoption. It's midway through day four, past time what we consider to be fair for the adoption process. Thanks to all who picked up characters to help the game continue.