Survival Of The Fittest

(Deanna Hull continued from Don't Stop, Tick Tock...)

Dee liked birds. Even dead ones. A month after she'd turned eighteen she'd dragged Whitney into a tattoo shop and gotten him to help her pick out a songbird from the flash catalogue. It was blue and red and cost $80 to put on her ankle. The pain hadn't been terrible. Maybe she was tougher than she thought. Maybe that was why the bird skeletons and abandoned courtyard hadn't bothered her as much as she'd feared.

Of course, that didn't mean she wanted to sleep down there amidst them.

Instead, Dee and Kyran had spent the night in the second-floor office. They'd made their way south from the shipping yard and restless docks, talking in a getting-to-know-you sort of way, and by the time they arrived she was feeling better. A bit more whole. Then, it had been morning and her clothes, draped over the backs of a couple chairs, were dry again. And elsewhere on the island, more people than just Dave Russell and the birds around here were dead.

Eight of them.

So what was she supposed to do now? Even the birds couldn't fly away anymore. Dee remembered some old scary kids book her mother had gotten from the Tacoma Goodwill when Dee was like ten. It was about a girl named Sara Byrd she thought, and the other girls made fun of her by saying 'Fly away, Byrd!', and Sara'd gotten three wishes from a gypsy woman; of course they wishes completely screwed up her life. So with the last wish Sara wished the gypsy women had met a girl Sara hated instead of her. Then the other girl had seen Sara and said 'Fly away, Byrd!' and her wish came true and Sara turned into a bird for real. The end. Apparently that was scary stuff back in the nineties.

"I wish we could fly away, like birds."

Dee wondered what other people were doing now. She guessed most of them had plans of some sort. Plans to team up and try to get out, plans to find friends and just stick together. Or plays to hide from everyone else and keep moving.

Or plans to kill.

"I don't know what to do. Seriously, what are we supposed to be doing here, Kyran?"

Because now it was several hours after that announcement said people were dead and the two of them were still holed up in the office. They'd run out of banal conversation topics about each other to reiterate, although Dee had actually gotten to, well not like him. She didn't think she wanted to like anything right now. But OK, she kinda liked him.

She got up and walked over to the window, looking down at the courtyard. Disneyland had an aviary, she remembered. It was 50 years old and had 150 singing robot birds. Frankly, she thought this was probably the better of the two. Maybe some people had plans to go to the amusement park that Kyran had seen on the map and have their own mini-Disneyland vacation. It made about as much sense to Deanna as any of the other potential plans did.

"I'm sorry, I know I've been like totally useless. Um… I'm gonna have a smoke."

She pulled out the case and cut her ration by another 20% Smoke drifted from the tip.

"You want a drag? They taste good, they're like, I dunno, evil honey."

[[Kyran Dean Continued From: Don't Stop, Tick Tock, Sun Blows Up Today .]]

"It's alright. I don't smoke."

The thought still lingered. The first morning announcement. People were doing this. People he knew and that was bullshit. In his mind he always knew it was going to happen, but he'd held some hope in his heart that they wouldn't do anything reckless. They knew each other too long, most of them anyway.

Kyran had convinced himself for a little while the night prior. He'd held the heart shaped pendant necklace in his hand, the one his mother gave him before he went on the trip in the first place and told himself again and again.

They wouldn't do that. They wouldn't. But they did. Fuck, they actually did.

The announcement said that Dave committed suicide, he jumped off the cliff, and so that part was even worse than the horrible accident he had imagined when Dee first told him about it. Kyran had to be grateful that Deanna was there to keep him grounded, somewhat. If not, he might have been the next Dave Russell. Her company, as strange as she was at first was a nice anchor for him and yeah, he was starting to get used to her presence enough to say more than just a few small words at a time.

Now Dee was giving him a sarcastic look, the kind of look that said "Are you freaking serious?" her hand still holding out the clove cig between her two fingers.

"On second thought - sure whatever."

The consequences of smoking were the least of his worries right now. Anything to keep himself occupied would be nice. Smoking? Shame on you Kyran Dean. Sorry mom and dad on the off chance you're watching.

"By the way, I think your stuff should probably be almost dry by now."

---

They were walking the courtyard now, Kyran didn't want to try the cloves inside and risk trapping the smoke smell inside. He quietly suggested taking a walk outside to burn some time with a merry little stroll along with the cigarette, because yeah just cause he was trying it now, didn't mean he was suddenly going to love the smell of burning paper and whatever else was inside.

It wasn't so bad. He gave a small cough; it wasn't like he was hacking or anything. And then he'd hand it back and then they'd talk again. That was the pattern.

Dee was actually pretty interesting it turned out. They'd shared hobbies, and a few life-stories to pass some time. She had a few of the same interests as he did. Like she loved to sing and play the guitar. Kyran also mentioned he knew a thing or two about playing the guitar, but he downplayed his ability a little and didn't mention anything about singing, despite the concurrence there. That stuff he always kept to himself for the most part. She also liked birds, which cool too. Kyran gazed over at the bright feather corpses around him as he leaned over the railing of one of the courtyard walkways. He sighed.

When he was kid, Kyran had seen an injured bird, he'd wanted to help it fly again, but it was sick and had a broken wing and he couldn't do anything about it. In fact that partially got him interested in helping animals in the first place. He wanted to be a veterinarian like his mom or do some work in helping animals in some form or another.

It hurt that he possibly wouldn't be doing that anymore. In all likelihood, he'd be dead in a few days, Dee would be dead, they'd all be dead. Just like Mr. D and all the dead birds scattered around this aviary.

Then Dee was suddenly mentioning stuff about plans again, asking what they were supposed to do now. It made sense to ask, since they could only avoid the obvious questions for so long.

I don't know what to do, she said once again. What are we supposed to do here? I don't know either.

"Survive," he found himself mouthing quietly under his breath before speaking directly back to Deanna.

"We should probably stay here, at least for one more day. It's better than moving around too much and getting gassed from unnecessary running."

OK. Stick around here a bit. That was a plan.

"Yeah. Maybe if we hold out a couple days, who knows? There was that rescue the last time this happened."

That was probably a lie. She knew that. Dee remembered the rescue thing from three or four years ago. It fascinated her, briefly, at the time. And thinking back now, she realized something. Special people survived. Lovebird couples and fan favourites with promises to keep. Kids who took part in daring escape plans or risked their lives to recover a killer's humanity. They'd written articles and become cage fighters and been on Dancing with the Stars. And the winners, they were the badass snarkers and avenging heroes and the love-to-hate villain who won once just to switch things up.

The Deanna Hulls of SOTF weren't special. They didn't become motivational speakers or C-list starlets. Deanna Hulls became flight attendants or hostesses on cruise ships. They went to large state colleges for a year and worked administrative or data-entry jobs, maybe they'd have their own desk some day. They stood behind the Estee Lauder counter at Macy's for a couple bucks above minimum wage, and late at night when the commercial said they could be their own boss by entering the lucrative field of massage therapy they gave it serious thought. They wanted to get into nursing because it was an important job, but they were dental assistants or orderlies at rehab clinics.

The Deanna Hulls were the ones who sang and played guitar, but weren't singers or guitar players.

But until that inevitable truth decided to crash down in front of her like an unwelcome meteor, sticking around and hoping for the best wasn't too bad an idea. Indecision had always been her forte.

"I mean, I don't think there's anything else we really should be doing, you know? Well, they want us to… but just staying low has to be the best way to stay safe as long as possible"

And see, there was even some intelligent rationale behind that indecision.

---

There wasn't much point in trying to fortify a glass house, so in the end they decided to keep alert and, when night fell, to at least try to keep a watch going. Kyran and Dee wandered the area; they poked their heads into the zen garden for a bit, and made their way back to the courtyard when the sun began to dip.

Dee caught sight of her reflection in the aviary's glass panels once or twice. It wasn't as bad as she thought. She'd thrown away her compact mirror with the rest of her makeup a day a go, but she'd have to at least keep tabs on how she looked over the next couple days. There was kind of a nasty scrape across the bridge of her nose, but it didn't look like it would leave a big scab or anything. And the scratches on her hands scraped when she made a fist, the broken edges of skin rubbing together. She could handle it. No complaining -- especially not to Kyran -- about her scratches, or her ankle, or that gnawing appetite that wouldn't be appeased by a couple more nibbles on one of Kyran's bars--

"Hey!" she said. "I found birdseed!"

Kyran, over in the next room, looked up. He didn't seem too enthused about her discovery.

"I think it's mostly sunflower seeds. Hey, if you don't want any, that's fine."

It turned out to be mostly edible. If not that tasty.

---

Dee had promised to take first watch. Honestly, she didn't want to take the second because she was positive she'd conk out before morning. And once she made sure Kyran was asleep, she crept outside the courtyard with the first aid kit and examined her ankle. It still hurt to walk too far. But there was only a small amount of bruising. That was good, right? If she'd torn ligaments or something, she was sure it'd be a lot worse. So if it was just a mild twist or a sprain or a rollover, all she needed to do was…

That was funny. Dee would've thought that maybe during her year as a weekend candy-striper she'd have picked up some useful skills or knowledge. But nope. In the end she just wrapped it in bandage and hoped it would heal naturally.

She went back inside and sat near Kyran, knees pulled up to her chest. She looked at him. Kyran played guitar, too. He also played baseball and rode a moped. He was quiet and friendly and they got along well. He managed good graded at school (that wasn't something he'd talked about, but she remembered from a class or two).

What did the Kyran Deans do in SOTF? Dee wasn't sure. She didn't know Kyran well enough. But he had a chance to be special; she knew that. He wasn't a killer, but maybe he was one of those badass avengers, or brooding silent heroes. Maybe she was the girl who'd die early on and he'd manfully keep her in mind. He wouldn't dedicate himself to her or anything, though; she wouldn't be that kind of dead girl.

Maybe that was why she still kinda hated him. A bit. The Kyran Deans were the guys the Deanna Hulls might get married to if they were lucky, and stay married to if they were luckier still. Kyran Deans became veterinarians or moderately successful lawyers. They went to large state universities and graduated and got the titles of of junior vice-presidents, maybe they'd score the corner office one day with their own Deanna Hull as a personal executive assistant. They sold cars or insurance and got decent commissions when they met their quotas, which was most of the time.

They might die in SOTF, and they'd all die eventually, but the Kyran Deans had people remembering them and their obituaries read how they'd died 'after a long full life, surrounded by friends and family'. They died in more special ways. Deanna Hulls slipped away, caught in a danger zone or victim #3 of a mid-level killer, or in second-rate nursing homes because their grandkids all lived halfway across the country, because they weren't enough in all sorts of things, and all they had to offer was a decent voice and some teenage shoplifting skills.

At that thought, Dee looked away from Kyran, towards his bags. He had two. She had one. He had his food and a hatchet. She had a crappy horror movie prop.

Maybe she could be special.

Deanna Hulls slipped away unnoticed, and they all knew that, and they all expected that. Maybe that was what made her special. She could slip away right now; she could take what she wanted from anyone she met.

Dee looked at Kyran's bag a few minutes longer, and then she woke him up so he could take watch. They alternated shifts a couple times before morning. Dee thought that Kyran let her sleep more than she should have, but she didn't say anything. And before the announcements started, she gave him back the shirt he'd given her.

Clap-clap. Tap-tap-tap. Clap-lift-tap.

Clap-lift. Tap-tap. Lift-clap-tap.

Kyran sat crossed legged on the gift shop floor, the plastic cup he found among many in the shop, with a tropical cartoon bird on it being used as an instrument. His hands mimicked the girls in that reddit video as he hummed the pleasant folksy tune softly to himself.

...gonna miss me by my walk... miss me by my talk...

"You're gonna miss me when I'm gone."

---

One final tap and Kyran stopped, took a deep breath and turned to see Dee (who he secretly liked to refer to as Bird-Dee, because she liked eating birdseed) show up, holding the shirt she borrowed. Then not too far later, the loud speakers sounded off heeding the call of the second morning announcements.

The whole process went through again and when it finally ended it felt like a little more of him died in the inside. It was even worse than yesterday.

Kyran grabbed the cup and pitched it half way across the room, into some bird related clothing rack.

He stood up and immediately began pacing, gaze downcast onto the bird print carpet below. He lifted his head briefly, eyes met with Dee for a second and he felt a little twinge of awkwardness, so he turned away, slammed his fist into the gift shop counter, with his bag and carpenter's tool on it. He pulled out a bottle of water, unscrewed the cap and downed the bottle half-way, before placing it back onto the table with an audible thud.

Then he was back on the floor, cross legged, his pack opened in front of him and a new Aviary-Gift-Shop-Cup next to him.

"Hungry?" Kyran said with absolutely no mirth in his voice, as he set aside half of his own rations for her. "I'm sure you want more than just the bird seed, right."

Oh god and here he goes.

Don't cry don't cry don't cry.

Sitting down, Dee visibly shrank as Kyran paced. She scooted backwards on her heels until she bumped against the gift shop wall, and repeated the maxim a few more times in her head. Outwardly, she thought she looked fine. No hitching of the shoulders, no snuffling or blinking back tears. That was good. One good thing, at least.

She wanted to always find at least one good thing.

Because yeah, Kyran was finally realizing what had been obvious to Deanna for some time -- that while he'd been caring for her like a wounded puppy other classmates, friends of theirs, were dying left and right. Every hour she plaintively made him babysit her fragile butt was one in which Kyran -- stoic or fiery, whatever kind of special guy he'd be -- was being held back. And now he was frustrated, and it was her fault. She knew it.

She should have left during the night. Not with his stuff, she didn't have the guts for that yet. But she should have left, maybe she could just leave now… and then Kyran would take it even worse because Dee knew he considered protecting her to be be his responsibility now. Fucks.

Now he was going through the motions of breakfast, being sure to mention that she was eating his food. She should refuse it, just to spite him.

Instead, Dee reached out and took some water from Kyran, then half a bar. "Yeah, thanks," she said.

They ate, mostly in silence, and Dee was about to use up her third cigarette to avoid bringing up what they needed to discuss. They could smoke and talk about more stuff that had nothing to do with anything, stuff they'd already talked about twice. But her fingers grazed the case, tapped against it a few times, and then she turned back to Kyran.

"We, like… I guess we can't stay here. We need to do something, right? I don't know what, I mean I'm not really good for much I know that, but I can help.

Don't cry don't cry don't cry ah fuck there were just a couple tears. She wiped them away and that was all.

"I can. Seriously. So I think we need to try."

That was fine, she was allowed to cry.

Kyran took in a breath and glanced up from his high energy survival bar, which he nearly choked on and coughed up when Deanna first broke the silence of their breakfast in time to see her eyes water before she quickly brushed them away. But Kyran didn't cry, because he wasn't allowed to.

"No tears, that's what girls do," his dad would always keep reminding him ever since he could remember and Kyran learned from a young age that guys had to be strong and weren't supposed to cry. Kyran was strong wasn't he? He could be strong.

"Yeah," he said with a nod. He wanted to say more to her right there, but all he did was repeat "yeah" again, this time with comparatively more strength there than the first.

Everything went back to that first day on the pier. Right before he first saw Dee near drown in that ocean current then pull her out, he was working on it, psyching his mind and body up for this, for their potential... well, anything at all. Whatever it was they were supposed to do, he needed to be ready for it instead of sitting there and waiting to die like they've been.

It was already their third day here on this god-forsaken island and so far he had accomplished absolutely nothing except maybe extend his life-span a day or two based on some luck, while everyone they knew, like his friends, or her classmates were still killing or being killed, people he knew for some screwed up reason he couldn't even begin to understand or fathom why.

Sure, lying low and out of sight at the aviary was the smart thing to do, in fact that was his idea in the first place. It just felt like there was no progress made if they stayed there, only buying some time doing nothing.

"You're absolutely right, we should do something. I don't even know exactly where to start or what to do, but maybe we can find someone who might."

So Kyran rolled his shoulders to shake out the nerves. His stuff was quickly organized and stored into the pack now placed over his shoulder. He chugged a good amount of what was left over from the water bottle he opened earlier, and then did a few quick stretches to warm up the body, his active frame nearly hopping with energy.

He looked back at Deanna, placed his snapback in reverse on his head and gave her a quick look that said "You ready? I'm ready" who by then had at least managed to get packed.

Yeah, now he was ready for this bogus game. His carpenter's tool was in one hand, while his other hand browsed around the aviary gift shop for a few of those plastic tropical bird-print cups and some spare Avian print t-shirts. This would have been pleasant if it wasn't a horrible death game. He liked animals and he appreciated Dee's company and the weird thing was they'd probably have never gotten to know each other like they had before this, even after four years of high school.

Maybe he was wrong, maybe he did manage to accomplish something on that first day.

If they made it out here, at least he would have a few neat souvenirs.

[[Kyran Dean Continued To: The Dead Nineties.]]

Kyran was warming up all jock-like, doing stretches and stuff, and Deanna smiled and bit her tongue when he wasn't looking so she wouldn't laugh. Should she do something to get ready? Maybe she could tie her hair back. They could stride out together looking like they were in a movie trailer or something, ready go kick some ass.

She'd already tossed her few remaining things back into her daypack, adding a baggie full of birdseed and some random junk she'd scrounged up that'd probably be useless: a bird-themed hand towel, a pencil, an old-school alarm clock. Dee wondered if she should leave behind any money for the stuff they were taking. Her juvenile delinquent days were supposed to be done, after all. That almost got her laughing again, and then she remembered the night before and it didn't seem all that funny.

But then there was Kyran, who had decided to help himself to some worthless crap of his own before they set off. Maybe it was funny.

"I used to shoplift a lot," she blurted out as they left. He turned his head, and she shrugged.

"I got caught in Sephora and they banned me for like a decade. They called the cops and everything. Sorry, I just thought it was funny that we were taking all this stuff. Maybe we could steal weapons from people or something."

That was the worst idea ever. But at least she was thinking, right? Thinking of something other than last night, sitting and staring and dreaming of taking. Dee was always a taker; she knew that. She didn't want to die a taker. She'd already discovered that she didn't want to die a fish, either, no matter how much she'd liked to swim.

She liked birds. She wanted to die a bird.

(Deanna Hull continued in The Dead Nineties)