((The atmosphere of the memorial garden was as melancholic as always.))
Marceline shuffled restlessly where she sat as the latest announcements finally came to a close, pencil and paper sitting neatly in her lap, Juliette and Roxanne some feet away on either side. She wasn't sure why she had bothered scrawling more names and tally marks in the margins yet again, as it wasn't like maintaining her curated list of killers would ever lead into anything substantial. Perhaps it was merely habit keeping her going at this point, in spite of her faltering motivations.
She didn't know, and she didn't care.
Nothing she did mattered.
Their ragtag group had arrived at the memorial gardens as the sun had begun to set the day before. The trip had been mostly uninteresting, their travels having been filled with dreadfully mundane conversation, especially in light of their present circumstances. Marceline had not dared to broach the topic of her faltering desire to hunt down the killers, as she had instead remained uncharacteristically taciturn, keeping mostly to herself as they hiked, focused only on the path ahead of them.
After they had arrived, the decision to set up camp had been an easy enough one to make, with all three girls agreeing to keep watch at various different points. The night had passed just as uneventfully as the day, and now they were here, in the gardens. It wasn't the same as when she had been here previously, various items had clearly been shifted around, a perhaps ominous sign of her classmates and their activities. The worst, most ominous change had to be the body of one of her classmates, that of a very small boy, visible in the distance of where they had camped. She had her guesses as to who it was, but the disfigurement from the manner of death had rendered any inquiry into his former identity moot. Whoever he really was, his ghost had left its shell, and now all that remained was a pile of meat bearing his forgotten name.
Same as Beryl and Alex. Same as Dolly.
Marceline pressed her back up against the statue she was leaning up against, the same one that had previously shaded her as she had waited for Dolly to arrive. A faint hope echoed through her head, one that believed Dolly would magically appear in front of her in the distance just like before, her mind apparently still unwilling to accept that what was done could never be undone. Perhaps part of her thought that if she truly believed in it, then it would come true. It was too bad then, that she knew all too well that merely hoping for the world to be different would never cause it to be so.
The breeze began to pick up as she sat there, bringing with it the mercifully faint smell of corpse bile. Her unkempt, greasy hair swayed ever so slightly in the wind, as her list began to shift and blow out of her lap, as if to escape from her with the breeze, only for her to abruptly snatch it out of the air and return it to her bag with the rest of her belongings.
She stared aimlessly at the sky, pondering how the days had been blending together. In her mind's eye, everything almost felt it had been one, big, awful day. A single, continuous nightmare that she had simply not woken up from, punctuated by the crackling of speakers and the news of more death. It didn't feel real to her, at least not anymore. Perhaps it did at one time, when Dolly was still with her, but now that she was gone and Marceline's poor substitution for meaning in her absence had somewhat inevitably fallen apart, it felt like nothing but a daydream.
Forrest was dead. Kelly had killed again.
That was all that had crossed her conscious mind as she had listened to the announcements. Yet another person she had encountered was gone just like that, serving as yet another confirmation that everyone that had the misfortune of contacting her was doomed to die sooner rather than later. She felt so disconnected from the events happening around her, listening to names of people she hadn't seen since the trip silence names of people that she would never see again.
That was hardly the worst part of what she had heard, though. The news that Kelly had taken another life had almost wanted to make her bust out in laughter. She had failed yet again to save a life, her mission being proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to have been a pointless endeavor from the very beginning. She had accomplished nothing since she had woken up, and failed utterly at everything she tried to do, forced to merely to listen to tales of the aftermaths of the violence that continued to erupt around her. All this time, she had been nothing but a spectator, watching helplessly as everything fell apart. Failing to make an impact, failing to give her life any kind of meaning.
She didn't want to be a spectator anymore. She wanted to do something, anything, merely to prove that she was here and that she had existed, if nothing else. But what else was left for her to do, besides lie down and allow herself to die? She had been hoping for an answer, an end to the contradiction of her existence, but coming back here, she had only found the same emptiness that had been haunting her ever since Dolly had died.
Perhaps that was all that was left to find.
Play With Fire
Day Ten, Morning (After Announcements), PM For Entry
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VoltTurtle
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Grand Moff Hissa
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((Juliette Sargent continued from Signal Flare))
In the aftermath of the announcements, Juliette was feeling pretty good, better than she had in some time.
It had taken a little conscious effort not to burst out laughing when she heard that Kelly had killed again. In another time, another place, she wouldn't have bothered restraining herself, but those days were over for now. Pining for a lost rapport, functional or otherwise, would not resurrect it, and her current company required slightly more measured self-expression. Things were fragile here, uncertain.
Frankly, it was a bit of a miracle that her two companions were still alive. Each of the three girls had taken a turn on watch, which was stupid. The proper tactical choice would've been to let Juliette sleep all night, trading the gun back and forth, and then catch up as needed one by one during the day. It would've bought them credit with her while at the same time politely keeping her from having easy unsupervised access to their belongings and to their vulnerable, unconscious bodies. Maybe one or the other or both had stayed up during her shift, just in case, but why do that? At that point, they might as well have let her sleep. The only reason she didn't know for sure was that she hadn't even cared to keep track. She hadn't asked to hold Roxanne's gun during her guard duty (and had become oh so aware that it was specifically Roxanne's gun). When it had been her turn to sleep, Juliette had been out like a light. Unlike her companions, she had a good enough read on the situation to be confident she would pass the night unmolested.
Everything was turning out well for her, she reflected as she kept an eye on Marceline's scribbling. She'd noticed the day before, had casually brought it up in conversation, and quick as could be one thing led to another and Juliette had borrowed the writing utensil and transcribed what seemed to be a more or less comprehensive list of the killers and the dead to date. She'd done her best to hold all that stuff in her head over the past few days, but had barely any success bar the incidents that had carried some resonance or the big repeat killers. Now, though, she knew almost everything there was (provided, of course, Marceline's notes were accurate, but given the girl's studious discipline come the announcements there was little reason to suspect otherwise).
Copying someone else's homework held a certain charming novelty, as well. Juliette was glad she'd gotten to have that experience, once in her life.
The biggest downside right now was that, as campgrounds went, the memorial garden left a lot to be desired. It was full of statues and markers, but they weren't large or dense enough to provide much in the way of cover unless one specifically tried to find it. Juliette had spent most of the time sitting with her back to a large vertical stone slab the size of a folding card table that looked like maybe it should've had some sort of inscription on its face but did not. This shielded her from at least half the possible field of fire, and the rest she could keep her eyes on. But aside from sparsely-scattered objects of similar bulk, it was a big flat field with little walls and bushes but none of the dense undergrowth she'd become decently accustomed to traversing and no trees to force encounters to a closer distance. The grass here collected the early morning dew and coated her with an unpleasant damp sheen, like an artificial sweat, but she was still the cleanest person in camp so it was okay.
Also crimping their collective style was this corpse off to the side a ways, but Juliette knew precious little about that. She'd declined to investigate or even really go look at it. She knew it was there. She could kind of catch a whiff when the breeze shifted just right, but the others had figured out there was nothing worthwhile on it and it suited Juliette's purposes just fine to come off as a little prim and uptight when it came to the mortal remains of her classmates. It wasn't even like she was putting on airs; Ariana was enough, thank you very much, and she'd been pretty fresh, dismemberment aside. There would come a time when Juliette had to stare into someone's eyes as the life drained out of them, and it would be gross and unpleasant and horrible, but she was pretty sure she was ready for it, so why pile on the trauma before then? If anything, some terrible vision of a maggot-riddled skull would make her hesitate when she couldn't afford to.
She eyed Marceline as the girl sat in an almost-stupor, and tried to imagine that blond hair peeling away from pale bone and empty eye sockets. It wasn't really happening. Everything she came up with was forced and cartoony. She hadn't even seen Ariana's bones, had sort of made tracks pretty quickly after that ghoulish discovery, distracting herself with private jokes about that night so long ago when they'd all shared peach vodka and humiliating personal secrets.
Juliette's eyes flicked to Marceline again, and she made herself stop biting the inside of her cheek.
Come to think of it, everyone who'd been there in that circle was now dead, except for Juliette and Teresa. What unfortunate company to keep. The other girl was still out there somewhere, and Marceline knew how she worked just like Juliette did. If their paths happened to cross, that definitely sounded like self defense waiting to happen.
Aside from that, the news was more of the same. Forrest dead to her boyfriend, Myles and Ivy out of the picture (half of that rated half a frown), a bunch of accidents and suicides and such.
The silence stretched for a spell after the voice quieted. Juliette dug in her bag for a bottle of river water.
"They said we were halfway, what, three days ago?" she said. "Getting down to the wire."
She took a long gulp, trying to put the faintly muddy flavor out of mind.
In the aftermath of the announcements, Juliette was feeling pretty good, better than she had in some time.
It had taken a little conscious effort not to burst out laughing when she heard that Kelly had killed again. In another time, another place, she wouldn't have bothered restraining herself, but those days were over for now. Pining for a lost rapport, functional or otherwise, would not resurrect it, and her current company required slightly more measured self-expression. Things were fragile here, uncertain.
Frankly, it was a bit of a miracle that her two companions were still alive. Each of the three girls had taken a turn on watch, which was stupid. The proper tactical choice would've been to let Juliette sleep all night, trading the gun back and forth, and then catch up as needed one by one during the day. It would've bought them credit with her while at the same time politely keeping her from having easy unsupervised access to their belongings and to their vulnerable, unconscious bodies. Maybe one or the other or both had stayed up during her shift, just in case, but why do that? At that point, they might as well have let her sleep. The only reason she didn't know for sure was that she hadn't even cared to keep track. She hadn't asked to hold Roxanne's gun during her guard duty (and had become oh so aware that it was specifically Roxanne's gun). When it had been her turn to sleep, Juliette had been out like a light. Unlike her companions, she had a good enough read on the situation to be confident she would pass the night unmolested.
Everything was turning out well for her, she reflected as she kept an eye on Marceline's scribbling. She'd noticed the day before, had casually brought it up in conversation, and quick as could be one thing led to another and Juliette had borrowed the writing utensil and transcribed what seemed to be a more or less comprehensive list of the killers and the dead to date. She'd done her best to hold all that stuff in her head over the past few days, but had barely any success bar the incidents that had carried some resonance or the big repeat killers. Now, though, she knew almost everything there was (provided, of course, Marceline's notes were accurate, but given the girl's studious discipline come the announcements there was little reason to suspect otherwise).
Copying someone else's homework held a certain charming novelty, as well. Juliette was glad she'd gotten to have that experience, once in her life.
The biggest downside right now was that, as campgrounds went, the memorial garden left a lot to be desired. It was full of statues and markers, but they weren't large or dense enough to provide much in the way of cover unless one specifically tried to find it. Juliette had spent most of the time sitting with her back to a large vertical stone slab the size of a folding card table that looked like maybe it should've had some sort of inscription on its face but did not. This shielded her from at least half the possible field of fire, and the rest she could keep her eyes on. But aside from sparsely-scattered objects of similar bulk, it was a big flat field with little walls and bushes but none of the dense undergrowth she'd become decently accustomed to traversing and no trees to force encounters to a closer distance. The grass here collected the early morning dew and coated her with an unpleasant damp sheen, like an artificial sweat, but she was still the cleanest person in camp so it was okay.
Also crimping their collective style was this corpse off to the side a ways, but Juliette knew precious little about that. She'd declined to investigate or even really go look at it. She knew it was there. She could kind of catch a whiff when the breeze shifted just right, but the others had figured out there was nothing worthwhile on it and it suited Juliette's purposes just fine to come off as a little prim and uptight when it came to the mortal remains of her classmates. It wasn't even like she was putting on airs; Ariana was enough, thank you very much, and she'd been pretty fresh, dismemberment aside. There would come a time when Juliette had to stare into someone's eyes as the life drained out of them, and it would be gross and unpleasant and horrible, but she was pretty sure she was ready for it, so why pile on the trauma before then? If anything, some terrible vision of a maggot-riddled skull would make her hesitate when she couldn't afford to.
She eyed Marceline as the girl sat in an almost-stupor, and tried to imagine that blond hair peeling away from pale bone and empty eye sockets. It wasn't really happening. Everything she came up with was forced and cartoony. She hadn't even seen Ariana's bones, had sort of made tracks pretty quickly after that ghoulish discovery, distracting herself with private jokes about that night so long ago when they'd all shared peach vodka and humiliating personal secrets.
Juliette's eyes flicked to Marceline again, and she made herself stop biting the inside of her cheek.
Come to think of it, everyone who'd been there in that circle was now dead, except for Juliette and Teresa. What unfortunate company to keep. The other girl was still out there somewhere, and Marceline knew how she worked just like Juliette did. If their paths happened to cross, that definitely sounded like self defense waiting to happen.
Aside from that, the news was more of the same. Forrest dead to her boyfriend, Myles and Ivy out of the picture (half of that rated half a frown), a bunch of accidents and suicides and such.
The silence stretched for a spell after the voice quieted. Juliette dug in her bag for a bottle of river water.
"They said we were halfway, what, three days ago?" she said. "Getting down to the wire."
She took a long gulp, trying to put the faintly muddy flavor out of mind.
((What was the point of a memorial if it was completely anonymous?))
Without the memories of their creators, of the members of the island community, the garden held no meaning. Sign stripped of signified.
Roxanne contemplated the potted plant in front of her, a little ways off from the other two girls. The only hint that it was more than just a plant was the necklace that had been deliberately set down in front of it.
It obviously hadn’t been moved for years, worn down by the sun and elements on the side that faced the lonely sky. She brushed away the soil on its other face. Even before its disfigurement It would’ve looked cheap, with a cliched heart locket. There was nothing inside.
This was a signifier that signified only significance - it meant something, but she would never know what. It was possible that no one alive knew what it really meant, and the things in front of her were just two shapes. A potted plant and a necklace. End of story.
Was this a symbolic grave, for a symbolic death, or just an absent body? Did the necklace belong to the ‘deceased’, or was it a gift, given too late to make a difference?
None of her guessing mattered, or would bring her any closer to knowing the truth. If it hadn’t been for the name on the map, her thoughts wouldn’t have even gotten that far. There were so many other things she would have thought of before a memorial - an art exhibition, maybe. The name on a grave might fade with time, but this marker hadn’t even been given that much of a chance to endure.
And, from the lens of an outside observer, wasn’t her life rather the same? Everyone who knew her, even her friends, thought ‘Roxanne’ was just a nickname, a strange affectation that they nevertheless accepted as part of her. If she dropped dead, right then and there, no one alive would ever know the full extent of her rebellious little identity.
Didn’t that mean they’d be right? Anna hadn’t flung herself into the fires of freedom and emerged, dripping a molten trail behind her, as Roxanne. She had just subtly shifted her mentality, tried to steal more hours from the day so she could be herself for a little longer.
She would die Anna, and who was Roxanne to say that was wrong? The name didn’t repulse her. She’d carried it for most of her life. She’d been the one who associated it so strongly with everything she hated about her life, tainted it so thoroughly she felt she needed a clean break from her old self in order to truly live.
The newspapers would say Anna. If some attention-grabbing organization built a monument to honor every victim of SOTF, she would be Anna there, too, a single name lost among hundreds. That was the memory that would outlive her.
What was she supposed to do? Walk up to a camera and rant about who she was? Who she thought she was? That’d be gauche, inauthentic. Did she accept that her attempts at running away from herself had always been doomed to failure, sink back into being Anna?
Would there be any difference if she did? Genuinely, what had ‘Roxanne’ done over the past week that ‘Anna’ never would have? What had she done, period?
Followed her only living friend around like a stray dog, acting like she was trying to herd a cat. Always the peacemaker, always trying to de-escalate, make sure nothing happened until something inevitably happened to her. They’d had to change her bandages. It stung. It was only a ghost of what would come.
Given a choice, she’d like to think of herself as Roxanne. Maybe that was all that really mattered in the end. It made her sound cooler. Simple. A little silly. In her last few days, she had the right to cling to something for such a petty reason, didn’t she?
Her thoughts circled like this until the announcement broke her free.
Forrest was dead. She didn’t feel sad. Just resigned. She could only imagine how Marcy was taking the news that Kelly had survived and killed again. The girl had already been uncharacteristically quiet after they left their Commissary-branded tomb. Not a single attempt to preach to Juliette.
The silence was a little refreshing, but worrying at the same time. If her idealism was fading, what was taking its place?
“Yeah, we’ve done an above-average job at not dying,” Roxanne said, finally turning to face her companions again. “Glad they didn’t make this place a danger zone. Not sure I’m up for another hike this early in the morning.”
Without the memories of their creators, of the members of the island community, the garden held no meaning. Sign stripped of signified.
Roxanne contemplated the potted plant in front of her, a little ways off from the other two girls. The only hint that it was more than just a plant was the necklace that had been deliberately set down in front of it.
It obviously hadn’t been moved for years, worn down by the sun and elements on the side that faced the lonely sky. She brushed away the soil on its other face. Even before its disfigurement It would’ve looked cheap, with a cliched heart locket. There was nothing inside.
This was a signifier that signified only significance - it meant something, but she would never know what. It was possible that no one alive knew what it really meant, and the things in front of her were just two shapes. A potted plant and a necklace. End of story.
Was this a symbolic grave, for a symbolic death, or just an absent body? Did the necklace belong to the ‘deceased’, or was it a gift, given too late to make a difference?
None of her guessing mattered, or would bring her any closer to knowing the truth. If it hadn’t been for the name on the map, her thoughts wouldn’t have even gotten that far. There were so many other things she would have thought of before a memorial - an art exhibition, maybe. The name on a grave might fade with time, but this marker hadn’t even been given that much of a chance to endure.
And, from the lens of an outside observer, wasn’t her life rather the same? Everyone who knew her, even her friends, thought ‘Roxanne’ was just a nickname, a strange affectation that they nevertheless accepted as part of her. If she dropped dead, right then and there, no one alive would ever know the full extent of her rebellious little identity.
Didn’t that mean they’d be right? Anna hadn’t flung herself into the fires of freedom and emerged, dripping a molten trail behind her, as Roxanne. She had just subtly shifted her mentality, tried to steal more hours from the day so she could be herself for a little longer.
She would die Anna, and who was Roxanne to say that was wrong? The name didn’t repulse her. She’d carried it for most of her life. She’d been the one who associated it so strongly with everything she hated about her life, tainted it so thoroughly she felt she needed a clean break from her old self in order to truly live.
The newspapers would say Anna. If some attention-grabbing organization built a monument to honor every victim of SOTF, she would be Anna there, too, a single name lost among hundreds. That was the memory that would outlive her.
What was she supposed to do? Walk up to a camera and rant about who she was? Who she thought she was? That’d be gauche, inauthentic. Did she accept that her attempts at running away from herself had always been doomed to failure, sink back into being Anna?
Would there be any difference if she did? Genuinely, what had ‘Roxanne’ done over the past week that ‘Anna’ never would have? What had she done, period?
Followed her only living friend around like a stray dog, acting like she was trying to herd a cat. Always the peacemaker, always trying to de-escalate, make sure nothing happened until something inevitably happened to her. They’d had to change her bandages. It stung. It was only a ghost of what would come.
Given a choice, she’d like to think of herself as Roxanne. Maybe that was all that really mattered in the end. It made her sound cooler. Simple. A little silly. In her last few days, she had the right to cling to something for such a petty reason, didn’t she?
Her thoughts circled like this until the announcement broke her free.
Forrest was dead. She didn’t feel sad. Just resigned. She could only imagine how Marcy was taking the news that Kelly had survived and killed again. The girl had already been uncharacteristically quiet after they left their Commissary-branded tomb. Not a single attempt to preach to Juliette.
The silence was a little refreshing, but worrying at the same time. If her idealism was fading, what was taking its place?
“Yeah, we’ve done an above-average job at not dying,” Roxanne said, finally turning to face her companions again. “Glad they didn’t make this place a danger zone. Not sure I’m up for another hike this early in the morning.”
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VoltTurtle
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Absentmindedly, Marceline grasped the pendant resting on her chest, before slowly bringing it up in front of her face. She twirled it between her fingers, eyes affixed upon it and almost mesmerized by it.
She didn't know what she was going to do now that she had finally woken up to how truly hopeless the path she had been walking was. She had tried so hard to search for answers to what she was supposed to be doing with what remained of her short life, but had ultimately come up lacking.
She continued to stare ahead, transfixed by the pendant and by everything it represented. Perhaps it was time for her to fall back and ask herself, if Dolly were still here with her, what would she have wanted her to do?
"They said we were halfway, what, three days ago?" Juliette said. "Getting down to the wire."
Juliette was right. Soon the winner would be crowned as the last man standing and then be allowed to leave this place alive. Perhaps, against all odds, the sole survivor would be her, after she bumbled her way through, watching everyone else die around her as she mysteriously stayed alive through it all. That was mere fantasy, however, because the winner had to be a killer. They were all told that from the beginning, that they had to kill at least one of their classmates to be allowed to go home. Whoever the winner wound up being, they would have only gotten there seizing the opportunity with their own two hands.
She wouldn't seize it, because she didn't want it. All she wanted now was to die.
"If anything happens to me, you have to live."
Her girlfriend's words echoed through her head as she sat, her eyes still vacantly staring at the little key. A demand that had been given to her by the person closest to her heart, and a promise that she had made to follow through. Dolly wanted her to keep living, to survive as best she could, but that was a ridiculous prospect. If she were to survive, it would only be by not only deciding that she deserved to live more than everyone else, but also carrying out that decision by taking another person's life. She would be choosing to be just like her classmates whom she hated most, the ones she had previously decided to hunt down for their transgressions.
Though, surely Dolly knew what she had been asking of her, right? Perhaps Dolly knew full well what surviving would entail, and wanted her to live anyway, thinking that she deserved to survive more than everyone else. Or, perhaps Dolly had been thinking more broadly. If Marceline didn't inherently deserve to live more than anyone else, that also meant that nobody else inherently deserved to live more than her, either.
Perhaps Dolly had gone through the complex moral questions raised by her request before making it in a heated moment, or perhaps Marceline was simply reading too much into it.
She lopsidedly leaned back against the statue once again, letting the pendant fall onto her chest. Despite the fact that she had possibly been overthinking it, that last train of thought did raise a good point. Being the sole survivor wasn't inherently wrong in and of itself, at least. There was the fact that murder was still morally wrong, however, and murder was required to truly survive this place. Taking another person's life was a core tenant of her relatively hazy moral philosophy, and she wouldn't allow herself to murder anyone else and violate her principles.
Or rather, it was before, and she wouldn't have before.
She had already wanted to kill, hadn't she? She had earnestly tried to murder Kelly, even if she hadn't succeeded. Didn't that mean she had already violated her principles? She might have tried to justify her murderous intent on the grounds that her would-be victims deserved it, that she was helping to buy her fellow students more time, and perhaps that was right, but would she have thought the same thing before arriving here? Of course not, she didn't think she personally had the right to decide who lived and who died back at school, so why now?
Because the circumstances changed, and because she didn't think there was another option. She had said all of that before already, and therefore she had already concluded that murder was more justifiable under the right circumstances. This place had already changed some of the rules for her, so maybe it changed other rules too.
Taking a life would still be evil, though, and if she did it, she would be evil. She couldn't seriously be trying to justify murdering innocent people, right? Even if she tried to do as Dolly asked, the blood of her victims would forever be on her hands.
Or... would it?
Didn't the blame ultimately lie on the terrorists? It wasn't like she or anyone else for that matter wanted to be in this situation. It wasn't like Erika, or Justin, or Kelly, or possibly even Blaise would have murdered anyone else had they never been put here. It was all the terrorists' fault, nobody who had died would be dead now if it weren't for them. With that in mind, did the blame truly lie on any of them for what they did?
Say there was a gun to the back of her head, not unlike the explosive collar weighing on her neck. Say she had a device in her hand that had a button on it, and she was told that if she didn't push it she would die, but if she did push it, all of her classmates would die instead. Would she push the button? She wanted to say that no, she wouldn't, because her life didn't outweigh everyone else's.
But, say there was a gun not only to the back of her head, but also all of her classmates' respective heads too. Say that they all had a device with a button on it, and they were all told that all of them were going to die, with the sole exception of whoever managed to push the button first. Would she push the button, then? And if she did push it, who would be responsible? Would she be responsible, or would the person holding the gun to the back of her head be responsible?
Surely the one holding her hostage would bear the responsibility, right? It wasn't her fault that she was being threatened with death, but would she still be reasonably implicated in the deaths of her classmates? Say she didn't push it, and someone else pushed it instead of her. Could she blame them for her own death, would she say that they were responsible? No, because it wouldn't be their fault that they were being threatened with death. So if neither of them are responsible, and neither of them deserve to live more than the other, why wouldn't she try to be the one to push the button first?
Dolly would have wanted her to push the button first.
Marceline sat up straight, almost as if a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. This scenario she constructed might sound ridiculous to an outsider, but that hypothetical was one she was already living. The only differences were that the guns were bomb collars, and that the buttons were surviving all the way to the end.
With all that in mind, perhaps she had been wrong to judge her fellow classmates for killing in the name of their own survival. Surely she could still hate some of them, though, for any unnecessary hurt they caused with their actions. Hurt like leaving someone to bleed out slowly rather than finishing them off, or like killing a classmate who posed no threat to them, like how Blaise treated Dolly and Alex. Those of her peers who were killing just in the name of their own survival, though? The blame didn't lie on them, and it wouldn't lie on her, either.
Just like that, as Marceline silently contemplated what to do, it all began to click into place.
She didn't know what she was going to do now that she had finally woken up to how truly hopeless the path she had been walking was. She had tried so hard to search for answers to what she was supposed to be doing with what remained of her short life, but had ultimately come up lacking.
She continued to stare ahead, transfixed by the pendant and by everything it represented. Perhaps it was time for her to fall back and ask herself, if Dolly were still here with her, what would she have wanted her to do?
"They said we were halfway, what, three days ago?" Juliette said. "Getting down to the wire."
Juliette was right. Soon the winner would be crowned as the last man standing and then be allowed to leave this place alive. Perhaps, against all odds, the sole survivor would be her, after she bumbled her way through, watching everyone else die around her as she mysteriously stayed alive through it all. That was mere fantasy, however, because the winner had to be a killer. They were all told that from the beginning, that they had to kill at least one of their classmates to be allowed to go home. Whoever the winner wound up being, they would have only gotten there seizing the opportunity with their own two hands.
She wouldn't seize it, because she didn't want it. All she wanted now was to die.
"If anything happens to me, you have to live."
Her girlfriend's words echoed through her head as she sat, her eyes still vacantly staring at the little key. A demand that had been given to her by the person closest to her heart, and a promise that she had made to follow through. Dolly wanted her to keep living, to survive as best she could, but that was a ridiculous prospect. If she were to survive, it would only be by not only deciding that she deserved to live more than everyone else, but also carrying out that decision by taking another person's life. She would be choosing to be just like her classmates whom she hated most, the ones she had previously decided to hunt down for their transgressions.
Though, surely Dolly knew what she had been asking of her, right? Perhaps Dolly knew full well what surviving would entail, and wanted her to live anyway, thinking that she deserved to survive more than everyone else. Or, perhaps Dolly had been thinking more broadly. If Marceline didn't inherently deserve to live more than anyone else, that also meant that nobody else inherently deserved to live more than her, either.
Perhaps Dolly had gone through the complex moral questions raised by her request before making it in a heated moment, or perhaps Marceline was simply reading too much into it.
She lopsidedly leaned back against the statue once again, letting the pendant fall onto her chest. Despite the fact that she had possibly been overthinking it, that last train of thought did raise a good point. Being the sole survivor wasn't inherently wrong in and of itself, at least. There was the fact that murder was still morally wrong, however, and murder was required to truly survive this place. Taking another person's life was a core tenant of her relatively hazy moral philosophy, and she wouldn't allow herself to murder anyone else and violate her principles.
Or rather, it was before, and she wouldn't have before.
She had already wanted to kill, hadn't she? She had earnestly tried to murder Kelly, even if she hadn't succeeded. Didn't that mean she had already violated her principles? She might have tried to justify her murderous intent on the grounds that her would-be victims deserved it, that she was helping to buy her fellow students more time, and perhaps that was right, but would she have thought the same thing before arriving here? Of course not, she didn't think she personally had the right to decide who lived and who died back at school, so why now?
Because the circumstances changed, and because she didn't think there was another option. She had said all of that before already, and therefore she had already concluded that murder was more justifiable under the right circumstances. This place had already changed some of the rules for her, so maybe it changed other rules too.
Taking a life would still be evil, though, and if she did it, she would be evil. She couldn't seriously be trying to justify murdering innocent people, right? Even if she tried to do as Dolly asked, the blood of her victims would forever be on her hands.
Or... would it?
Didn't the blame ultimately lie on the terrorists? It wasn't like she or anyone else for that matter wanted to be in this situation. It wasn't like Erika, or Justin, or Kelly, or possibly even Blaise would have murdered anyone else had they never been put here. It was all the terrorists' fault, nobody who had died would be dead now if it weren't for them. With that in mind, did the blame truly lie on any of them for what they did?
Say there was a gun to the back of her head, not unlike the explosive collar weighing on her neck. Say she had a device in her hand that had a button on it, and she was told that if she didn't push it she would die, but if she did push it, all of her classmates would die instead. Would she push the button? She wanted to say that no, she wouldn't, because her life didn't outweigh everyone else's.
But, say there was a gun not only to the back of her head, but also all of her classmates' respective heads too. Say that they all had a device with a button on it, and they were all told that all of them were going to die, with the sole exception of whoever managed to push the button first. Would she push the button, then? And if she did push it, who would be responsible? Would she be responsible, or would the person holding the gun to the back of her head be responsible?
Surely the one holding her hostage would bear the responsibility, right? It wasn't her fault that she was being threatened with death, but would she still be reasonably implicated in the deaths of her classmates? Say she didn't push it, and someone else pushed it instead of her. Could she blame them for her own death, would she say that they were responsible? No, because it wouldn't be their fault that they were being threatened with death. So if neither of them are responsible, and neither of them deserve to live more than the other, why wouldn't she try to be the one to push the button first?
Dolly would have wanted her to push the button first.
Marceline sat up straight, almost as if a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. This scenario she constructed might sound ridiculous to an outsider, but that hypothetical was one she was already living. The only differences were that the guns were bomb collars, and that the buttons were surviving all the way to the end.
With all that in mind, perhaps she had been wrong to judge her fellow classmates for killing in the name of their own survival. Surely she could still hate some of them, though, for any unnecessary hurt they caused with their actions. Hurt like leaving someone to bleed out slowly rather than finishing them off, or like killing a classmate who posed no threat to them, like how Blaise treated Dolly and Alex. Those of her peers who were killing just in the name of their own survival, though? The blame didn't lie on them, and it wouldn't lie on her, either.
Just like that, as Marceline silently contemplated what to do, it all began to click into place.
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Grand Moff Hissa
- Posts: 2754
- Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2018 1:37 am
"I'm not sure what they're playing at with the Danger Zones," Juliette said.
This was an example of tailoring the tone of delivery to a specific audience. What Juliette meant—what she would have said had she just been speaking to Roxanne and Marceline—was "I don't know what they're thinking." As had just been established, the class had been annihilated by any sort of statistical metric. There were well under half of the ill-fated students left. And yet, an examination of the map revealed that the actual area carved out as inaccessible was a tiny chunk, maybe a quarter with really generous interpretations of the boundaries. Moreover, they curved around the village, like a mouth getting ready to swallow the most densely-packed shelter in play.
That part on its own wasn't terrible, of course. It built an impromptu arena, forcing anyone who entered or exited the town to do so through a comparatively narrow choke point, the better to engender conflict. What made far less sense, however, was that the vast forested wilderness towards the north of the island remained totally open. For almost the entire duration of her stay, Juliette had lurked there, invisible in the great emptiness. There had been some harrowing encounters, of course. She was still proud of being part of an apparently very exclusive club comprised of those who had encountered Quinn and parted on vaguely decent terms. But still, it was a tremendous chunk of real estate that encouraged strategies prone to stalling out the game, all the while protecting the most cautious, methodical, and self-sufficient among their number.
In short, it incentivized actual smart play to the point it threatened overall momentum. Or maybe, turned on its head: it made the smart play the passive. This was a silly choice when a measure of speed was key to continuing to duck the combined investigative and military might of half the western world.
But nobody liked a know-it-all, and while Juliette had her thoughts on the setup (that it was inefficient and arbitrary), she didn't have all the information. If she ragged on it now and in so doing either displayed ignorance of some core strategy invisible to her, or even if she just bruised the ego of whoever the ranking mastermind behind the scheme was, it had the potential to cause trouble when she was moving on to the audition phase of her plan. Better to play it safe, frame her critique as if she was giving credit, and wait until she was well-ensconced and properly educated to break out the red pen.
"There's a good chance we're tomorrow, though," she said, as she turned over her map, studying it carefully. "At this point, I think they hit two or three areas, maybe. And they can't touch the 'inner circle' without cutting this place off, so it has to go first or at the same time."
Eventually, she expected the island to be reduced to either a strip down the middle or else to its western hemisphere. As far as grounds for the final showdown went, it was hard to stay for sure, but if she had to guess she'd pick somewhere in the town or one of the mansions. They'd want an area with some density and cover, one where it wouldn't all be decided by whoever showed up first to set up shop. That was a problem for a few days from now, but it wouldn't hurt to work a little reconnaissance into their plan for the day.
It was a lot easier to get into this strategic mindset around the others. Probably that was because Juliette didn't have to worry about keeping so much of her mental focus reserved for keen and constant attention to her surroundings. There were three pairs of eyes on watch, now, and she was generally convinced that the two with her didn't have anything nefarious in mind. They trusted her, to a frankly foolish degree. She still hadn't even mentioned her weapon. At this point she'd probably even tell the truth whenever it came up; by letting it go this long they'd made it pretty clear they weren't concerned about whatever she was packing.
As Juliette's monologue/reverie trailed off, a little breeze swept through and tugged at her hair and the edges of her clothes. She looked around, letting her gaze linger longer on Marceline, who seemed to have fallen into a stasis of sorts after finishing her task.
Maybe she'd been hasty in discarding her ideas about putting the girl down. It would be easy in a day or two, when Juliette was on guard again. A quick, sharp, deep drag of the razor across that pale smooth throat, and then she'd be out of their lives and deaths without a word of goodbye. Or, or maybe she owed just a little more than that. Maybe a goodbye kiss, for comfort?
Juliette was contemplating Marceline still, chewing her cheeks. Maybe a kiss and then the razor? Maybe she was getting ahead of herself, and this was just a funk on Marceline's part, so the razor wouldn't be necessary at all. But she was still mourning Dolly. That was what it all came down to, so anything looking too far ahead was a little preemptive.
This was an example of tailoring the tone of delivery to a specific audience. What Juliette meant—what she would have said had she just been speaking to Roxanne and Marceline—was "I don't know what they're thinking." As had just been established, the class had been annihilated by any sort of statistical metric. There were well under half of the ill-fated students left. And yet, an examination of the map revealed that the actual area carved out as inaccessible was a tiny chunk, maybe a quarter with really generous interpretations of the boundaries. Moreover, they curved around the village, like a mouth getting ready to swallow the most densely-packed shelter in play.
That part on its own wasn't terrible, of course. It built an impromptu arena, forcing anyone who entered or exited the town to do so through a comparatively narrow choke point, the better to engender conflict. What made far less sense, however, was that the vast forested wilderness towards the north of the island remained totally open. For almost the entire duration of her stay, Juliette had lurked there, invisible in the great emptiness. There had been some harrowing encounters, of course. She was still proud of being part of an apparently very exclusive club comprised of those who had encountered Quinn and parted on vaguely decent terms. But still, it was a tremendous chunk of real estate that encouraged strategies prone to stalling out the game, all the while protecting the most cautious, methodical, and self-sufficient among their number.
In short, it incentivized actual smart play to the point it threatened overall momentum. Or maybe, turned on its head: it made the smart play the passive. This was a silly choice when a measure of speed was key to continuing to duck the combined investigative and military might of half the western world.
But nobody liked a know-it-all, and while Juliette had her thoughts on the setup (that it was inefficient and arbitrary), she didn't have all the information. If she ragged on it now and in so doing either displayed ignorance of some core strategy invisible to her, or even if she just bruised the ego of whoever the ranking mastermind behind the scheme was, it had the potential to cause trouble when she was moving on to the audition phase of her plan. Better to play it safe, frame her critique as if she was giving credit, and wait until she was well-ensconced and properly educated to break out the red pen.
"There's a good chance we're tomorrow, though," she said, as she turned over her map, studying it carefully. "At this point, I think they hit two or three areas, maybe. And they can't touch the 'inner circle' without cutting this place off, so it has to go first or at the same time."
Eventually, she expected the island to be reduced to either a strip down the middle or else to its western hemisphere. As far as grounds for the final showdown went, it was hard to stay for sure, but if she had to guess she'd pick somewhere in the town or one of the mansions. They'd want an area with some density and cover, one where it wouldn't all be decided by whoever showed up first to set up shop. That was a problem for a few days from now, but it wouldn't hurt to work a little reconnaissance into their plan for the day.
It was a lot easier to get into this strategic mindset around the others. Probably that was because Juliette didn't have to worry about keeping so much of her mental focus reserved for keen and constant attention to her surroundings. There were three pairs of eyes on watch, now, and she was generally convinced that the two with her didn't have anything nefarious in mind. They trusted her, to a frankly foolish degree. She still hadn't even mentioned her weapon. At this point she'd probably even tell the truth whenever it came up; by letting it go this long they'd made it pretty clear they weren't concerned about whatever she was packing.
As Juliette's monologue/reverie trailed off, a little breeze swept through and tugged at her hair and the edges of her clothes. She looked around, letting her gaze linger longer on Marceline, who seemed to have fallen into a stasis of sorts after finishing her task.
Maybe she'd been hasty in discarding her ideas about putting the girl down. It would be easy in a day or two, when Juliette was on guard again. A quick, sharp, deep drag of the razor across that pale smooth throat, and then she'd be out of their lives and deaths without a word of goodbye. Or, or maybe she owed just a little more than that. Maybe a goodbye kiss, for comfort?
Juliette was contemplating Marceline still, chewing her cheeks. Maybe a kiss and then the razor? Maybe she was getting ahead of herself, and this was just a funk on Marceline's part, so the razor wouldn't be necessary at all. But she was still mourning Dolly. That was what it all came down to, so anything looking too far ahead was a little preemptive.
Roxanne nodded. Juliette’s danger zone theorizing was brief and relatively simple, but it showed more strategic thought than she or Marcy had concerned themselves with for the entirety of their time together. Their only real plan had been their stakeout in the Commissary, though admittedly it was too early to say if it had worked or not.
Did the benefits of Juliette’s company outweigh the myriad traumas of their encounter with Kelly? She supposed you could flip that - were the risks of trusting Juliette more deadly than the lessons they’d learned from their only real fight? Lessons scraped from her skin.
Well, Juliette had already passed the biggest trial regarding her trust, hadn’t she? She’d kept watch without running away with their supplies or murdering them in their sleep. Roxanne hadn’t been ignorant of the dangers, but there hadn’t been a proper moment to privately share her concerns with Marcy. Or, rather; with the strange mood she was in it seemed almost dangerous to try and convince her that her old friend (?) from school could be dangerous.
She’d slept in a corner, back to the wall. Fingers wrapped around her shotgun. Even stayed awake for a while longer than she had to, as a last resort. Not that it would’ve mattered. She fell asleep eventually, and if Juliette had malicious intentions, she was more than patient enough to outlast such a single trap.
What was someone like her doing with two people doing such a half-assed job trying to stay alive? Roxanne doubted it was because of their magnetic charisma. What were they to her? Lookouts? Meat shields? Or simply company that seemed unlikely to turn around and shoot her in the back?
While she was considering this, it was silent around her. Marcy hadn’t said a word, had barely even moved; and it seemed like Juliette had something on her mind, too. Just three girls, stuck a thousand miles inside their own heads, quietly brooding. She was hating it more with each passing day. At least when Marcy was monologuing, something was happening. It didn’t feel so much like she was wasting what little time she had.
“Speaking of we. And tomorrow, I guess. What do you want, Juliette?” They’d been together for an entire day but Roxanne barely knew anything about Juliette, the girl, as opposed to Juliette, the strategist. They could be one and the same, but that would be boring, wouldn’t it?
She set her shotgun down at her side while she dug through her bag, fishing out the half of a ration bar that almost passed for breakfast. She always felt uneasy whenever her gun was out of her hands, but it wasn’t as if Juliette was going to dive for it then of all times.
“Here, on the island. What do you want? Anything more than surviving long enough to pray for a win?”
Did the benefits of Juliette’s company outweigh the myriad traumas of their encounter with Kelly? She supposed you could flip that - were the risks of trusting Juliette more deadly than the lessons they’d learned from their only real fight? Lessons scraped from her skin.
Well, Juliette had already passed the biggest trial regarding her trust, hadn’t she? She’d kept watch without running away with their supplies or murdering them in their sleep. Roxanne hadn’t been ignorant of the dangers, but there hadn’t been a proper moment to privately share her concerns with Marcy. Or, rather; with the strange mood she was in it seemed almost dangerous to try and convince her that her old friend (?) from school could be dangerous.
She’d slept in a corner, back to the wall. Fingers wrapped around her shotgun. Even stayed awake for a while longer than she had to, as a last resort. Not that it would’ve mattered. She fell asleep eventually, and if Juliette had malicious intentions, she was more than patient enough to outlast such a single trap.
What was someone like her doing with two people doing such a half-assed job trying to stay alive? Roxanne doubted it was because of their magnetic charisma. What were they to her? Lookouts? Meat shields? Or simply company that seemed unlikely to turn around and shoot her in the back?
While she was considering this, it was silent around her. Marcy hadn’t said a word, had barely even moved; and it seemed like Juliette had something on her mind, too. Just three girls, stuck a thousand miles inside their own heads, quietly brooding. She was hating it more with each passing day. At least when Marcy was monologuing, something was happening. It didn’t feel so much like she was wasting what little time she had.
“Speaking of we. And tomorrow, I guess. What do you want, Juliette?” They’d been together for an entire day but Roxanne barely knew anything about Juliette, the girl, as opposed to Juliette, the strategist. They could be one and the same, but that would be boring, wouldn’t it?
She set her shotgun down at her side while she dug through her bag, fishing out the half of a ration bar that almost passed for breakfast. She always felt uneasy whenever her gun was out of her hands, but it wasn’t as if Juliette was going to dive for it then of all times.
“Here, on the island. What do you want? Anything more than surviving long enough to pray for a win?”
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VoltTurtle
- Posts: 1539
- Joined: Fri Aug 10, 2018 4:10 pm
- Location: Dreamland
Marceline's companions continued conversing as she remained only half-aware of it all, caught up in her own head.
Her disparate, rambling thoughts began to coalesce, falling into their proper places like pieces of a puzzle, forming a grander, more cohesive picture of what she needed to do. From the ashes of her previous objective, a newer, stronger one arose. Born of a promise and tempered by the fires of her repeated failures to live up to what she wanted to do. Now more than ever, she was beginning to see this island and her place in it clearly. Dolly had wanted her to survive this impossible situation and overcome insurmountable odds, so that was what she would do, whatever it would take.
She knew full well what that would entail, and how unlikely it was that her venture would succeed. Death would be inflicted by her own hands, continued suffering would be imposed both on herself and those around her, but she wasn't going to blame herself for that. Whatever she would end up doing in the future, the responsibility for her actions wouldn't lie on her, it would lie only on the backs of the terrorists, and no-one else.
This impossible task was her new burden to bear, but not out of anger or despair like before, but instead out of love. Love for someone whom she had cherished, whom she had believed in and trusted more than anyone else. Someone who, in turn, believed in her, and wanted to see her keep going to the bitter end.
She took a deep breath, in and out, newfound resolve filling her chest and bringing her new clarity of mind. Their impromptu visit to the gardens had served its purpose after all. Now, if she was serious about this, and she was, she would need a plan of attack. Wandering around blindly like she had been for the last few days would only get her killed; the fact that it hadn't already was a miracle in and of itself. Right now she needed to paint in broad strokes, the specifics would have to come later.
So...
Survival...
Surviving would mean that she would have to make it all the way to the end, obviously. To do that, she would need to make sure her basic needs were met, and she would need to avoid being injured. It all sounded simple in theory, but circumstances and previous iterations of this scenario showed without a doubt that achieving those ends would be fraught with peril.
With regards to the necessities, water was relatively easy to come by at least, but food was another, more difficult matter entirely. The goat meat that she and Roxanne had eaten had been invigorating, but her remaining rations were almost entirely out, and were nutritionally lacking anyway. Hunting another goat was an option, but perhaps appropriating someone else's supplies would be enough to sustain her all the way to the end, especially if she managed to take down one of the higher profile killers, as they likely had far more rations than they needed.
However, as she had learned, going after them specifically would be an enormously difficult task, especially given her lacking arsenal. Without proper tools of self-defense, injuries would be difficult to avoid should she find herself caught up in a confrontation. Allies could assist her by acting as extra eyes on watch and extra firepower if the need arose, but both of her current allies were unreliable.
Roxanne had stuck with her so far, but that was liable to change at any time. Roxanne had made it clear from the beginning that she had only intended to remain long enough help Marceline find her way, and afterwards only intended to stay long enough to help Marceline find more allies for her cause. The fact that she had stuck around this long already came as a surprise, so how long would it be before she either got fed up or learned of Marceline's newfound desires?
Juliette meanwhile was new, and while Marceline had decent reason to trust her given their correspondence back at George Hunter, she continued to be enigmatic with both her motivations and her loyalty. Even if there was no sinister bent to her actions, she was likely looking out for her own interests first and foremost, and thus It was doubtful that Marceline could count on her in the long term.
In the end, if Marceline wanted to be the last man standing, she would have to be able to rely upon herself to the exclusion of everyone else. Were she on her lonesome and she needed to defend herself, the best case scenario for her would be getting the drop on someone in close quarters, and as Kelly had so keenly demonstrated, that can easily become an uncontrollable situation very quickly. If she wanted a real chance at the win, she would need a firearm, sooner rather than later. Obtaining one would be a task, but there were a few avenues that she could pursue-
Wait.
Roxanne had just relinquished her shotgun, placing it down nearby, only a few feet away from where Marceline was sitting.
There was a gun right in front of her now, all she had to do was reach out and take it.
But, no, she couldn't...
But, maybe...
But no, Roxanne was her friend, one of her best friends, in fact. Someone she had sobbed over at the mere thought of her getting hurt. Was discarding her in pursuit of a possibly hopeless venture really worth it?
But, Roxanne would have to die anyway if Marceline were to succeed, and besides, didn't she already establish that she wasn't to blame for what she had to do to survive? Didn't that mean that it was okay for her to do this, too?
Marceline stared ahead, her eyes half-open, transfixed on the shotgun, not speaking a single, solitary word.
Her disparate, rambling thoughts began to coalesce, falling into their proper places like pieces of a puzzle, forming a grander, more cohesive picture of what she needed to do. From the ashes of her previous objective, a newer, stronger one arose. Born of a promise and tempered by the fires of her repeated failures to live up to what she wanted to do. Now more than ever, she was beginning to see this island and her place in it clearly. Dolly had wanted her to survive this impossible situation and overcome insurmountable odds, so that was what she would do, whatever it would take.
She knew full well what that would entail, and how unlikely it was that her venture would succeed. Death would be inflicted by her own hands, continued suffering would be imposed both on herself and those around her, but she wasn't going to blame herself for that. Whatever she would end up doing in the future, the responsibility for her actions wouldn't lie on her, it would lie only on the backs of the terrorists, and no-one else.
This impossible task was her new burden to bear, but not out of anger or despair like before, but instead out of love. Love for someone whom she had cherished, whom she had believed in and trusted more than anyone else. Someone who, in turn, believed in her, and wanted to see her keep going to the bitter end.
She took a deep breath, in and out, newfound resolve filling her chest and bringing her new clarity of mind. Their impromptu visit to the gardens had served its purpose after all. Now, if she was serious about this, and she was, she would need a plan of attack. Wandering around blindly like she had been for the last few days would only get her killed; the fact that it hadn't already was a miracle in and of itself. Right now she needed to paint in broad strokes, the specifics would have to come later.
So...
Survival...
Surviving would mean that she would have to make it all the way to the end, obviously. To do that, she would need to make sure her basic needs were met, and she would need to avoid being injured. It all sounded simple in theory, but circumstances and previous iterations of this scenario showed without a doubt that achieving those ends would be fraught with peril.
With regards to the necessities, water was relatively easy to come by at least, but food was another, more difficult matter entirely. The goat meat that she and Roxanne had eaten had been invigorating, but her remaining rations were almost entirely out, and were nutritionally lacking anyway. Hunting another goat was an option, but perhaps appropriating someone else's supplies would be enough to sustain her all the way to the end, especially if she managed to take down one of the higher profile killers, as they likely had far more rations than they needed.
However, as she had learned, going after them specifically would be an enormously difficult task, especially given her lacking arsenal. Without proper tools of self-defense, injuries would be difficult to avoid should she find herself caught up in a confrontation. Allies could assist her by acting as extra eyes on watch and extra firepower if the need arose, but both of her current allies were unreliable.
Roxanne had stuck with her so far, but that was liable to change at any time. Roxanne had made it clear from the beginning that she had only intended to remain long enough help Marceline find her way, and afterwards only intended to stay long enough to help Marceline find more allies for her cause. The fact that she had stuck around this long already came as a surprise, so how long would it be before she either got fed up or learned of Marceline's newfound desires?
Juliette meanwhile was new, and while Marceline had decent reason to trust her given their correspondence back at George Hunter, she continued to be enigmatic with both her motivations and her loyalty. Even if there was no sinister bent to her actions, she was likely looking out for her own interests first and foremost, and thus It was doubtful that Marceline could count on her in the long term.
In the end, if Marceline wanted to be the last man standing, she would have to be able to rely upon herself to the exclusion of everyone else. Were she on her lonesome and she needed to defend herself, the best case scenario for her would be getting the drop on someone in close quarters, and as Kelly had so keenly demonstrated, that can easily become an uncontrollable situation very quickly. If she wanted a real chance at the win, she would need a firearm, sooner rather than later. Obtaining one would be a task, but there were a few avenues that she could pursue-
Wait.
Roxanne had just relinquished her shotgun, placing it down nearby, only a few feet away from where Marceline was sitting.
There was a gun right in front of her now, all she had to do was reach out and take it.
But, no, she couldn't...
But, maybe...
But no, Roxanne was her friend, one of her best friends, in fact. Someone she had sobbed over at the mere thought of her getting hurt. Was discarding her in pursuit of a possibly hopeless venture really worth it?
But, Roxanne would have to die anyway if Marceline were to succeed, and besides, didn't she already establish that she wasn't to blame for what she had to do to survive? Didn't that mean that it was okay for her to do this, too?
Marceline stared ahead, her eyes half-open, transfixed on the shotgun, not speaking a single, solitary word.
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Grand Moff Hissa
- Posts: 2754
- Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2018 1:37 am
Juliette watched Marceline watch Roxanne for a few seconds, took in the blonde girl's features, let the fingers in her mind trace over them again, forehead to cheek to lips, but when she was torn from these musings it was not a surprise. Juliette was never allowed to pull into herself for too long when others were around, and certainly not in these moments. It had always been like that, and truth be told she was permitting herself vastly more leeway than she ever would have at home, even as it made her insides roil with guilt.
But Roxanne's question actually fell in line with her pattern of thoughts in its own way. Juliette tilted her head to the right a little as she turned back and looked at the girl, seeing her almost for the first time.
She could've been pretty if she cleaned up a little more and hadn't been mildly maimed by whatever had happened. But more than the surface, what intrigued Juliette was the moment of recognition. Perhaps it was a tactical query. Roxanne certainly appeared to have her act together on that front to a greater degree than Marceline, and she had less even than her companion's paltry rationale to trust Juliette. But was that all? Maybe it was self importance, but if only for a moment Juliette allowed herself to fantasize that it was a spark of connection, that she had been recognized as a real person by another real person, that the pretense and suspicion might fall away and allow for them each to learn and communicate something that mattered.
But no, it would be tactical. Roxanne was trying to suss out how Juliette was using them. Very well. She could play around that, could answer without answering, could offer something valuable that the other girl would never know how to accept... unless of course, Juliette was wrong.
"I'm already getting it, more or less," Juliette explained.
She lifted the water bottle to her lips and took two slow gulps, using her tongue to limit the intake. The faint sediment was gritty against her teeth, the flavor like tea steeped from grass clippings. Buying time with a drink was a classic, and she surely needed the hydration, but she preferred not to be quite so present in these moments. As she lowered it back to the ground, three little droplets spilled from the rim, dribbling in a line across the front of her blouse.
"At school," she continued, "I was always... a prisoner of myself, I suppose you could say. I was so worried about how I came off, being liked, having every little thing just so."
She was watching Roxanne directly, all smiles and good eye contact, but from the corner of her vision she was on the lookout for any sort of shift in Marceline. The girl was much more familiar with Juliette, probably much more equipped to understand what exactly she was saying, and that was risky. Was being understood actually a good thing? But even as Juliette told herself this was a diversion, something with scant meaning, her lips kept moving.
"There were a lot of things I never let myself do, or even think. I always told myself, later, later. We have the rest of our lives.
"But, well, here we are."
Her tone was breezy, but no longer cheerful, a sort of sad levity behind it. She gestured to herself with a flourish, and then opened both her arms wide, encompassing their immediate surroundings and, implicitly, the entire island.
How would this play to their captors? That was another thing to think about, but not to obsess over. Juliette knew how people worked, was well aware of how easy it was to get caught up in the fine details and miss the bigger picture. It was vital that she not get herself killed trying to put on a show to better her fortunes after the end of the game. Imperfect impressions could be repaired, but only if she was around to do so.
"Of course I want to survive as long as I can. Of course I'm hoping for something to change, someone to save us."
Oops, that was a lie. And unfortunate piece of hypocrisy in an otherwise-candid speech about being true to oneself, but she'd forgive it. It was in her nature.
"But here, now, aside from survival? I guess I'm just trying to live."
She stressed that last word, and as she did locked gazes fully with Roxanne. Her smile was smaller, no teeth, possibly unfamiliar.
"I'm here because I want to be, and being here is what I want."
But Roxanne's question actually fell in line with her pattern of thoughts in its own way. Juliette tilted her head to the right a little as she turned back and looked at the girl, seeing her almost for the first time.
She could've been pretty if she cleaned up a little more and hadn't been mildly maimed by whatever had happened. But more than the surface, what intrigued Juliette was the moment of recognition. Perhaps it was a tactical query. Roxanne certainly appeared to have her act together on that front to a greater degree than Marceline, and she had less even than her companion's paltry rationale to trust Juliette. But was that all? Maybe it was self importance, but if only for a moment Juliette allowed herself to fantasize that it was a spark of connection, that she had been recognized as a real person by another real person, that the pretense and suspicion might fall away and allow for them each to learn and communicate something that mattered.
But no, it would be tactical. Roxanne was trying to suss out how Juliette was using them. Very well. She could play around that, could answer without answering, could offer something valuable that the other girl would never know how to accept... unless of course, Juliette was wrong.
"I'm already getting it, more or less," Juliette explained.
She lifted the water bottle to her lips and took two slow gulps, using her tongue to limit the intake. The faint sediment was gritty against her teeth, the flavor like tea steeped from grass clippings. Buying time with a drink was a classic, and she surely needed the hydration, but she preferred not to be quite so present in these moments. As she lowered it back to the ground, three little droplets spilled from the rim, dribbling in a line across the front of her blouse.
"At school," she continued, "I was always... a prisoner of myself, I suppose you could say. I was so worried about how I came off, being liked, having every little thing just so."
She was watching Roxanne directly, all smiles and good eye contact, but from the corner of her vision she was on the lookout for any sort of shift in Marceline. The girl was much more familiar with Juliette, probably much more equipped to understand what exactly she was saying, and that was risky. Was being understood actually a good thing? But even as Juliette told herself this was a diversion, something with scant meaning, her lips kept moving.
"There were a lot of things I never let myself do, or even think. I always told myself, later, later. We have the rest of our lives.
"But, well, here we are."
Her tone was breezy, but no longer cheerful, a sort of sad levity behind it. She gestured to herself with a flourish, and then opened both her arms wide, encompassing their immediate surroundings and, implicitly, the entire island.
How would this play to their captors? That was another thing to think about, but not to obsess over. Juliette knew how people worked, was well aware of how easy it was to get caught up in the fine details and miss the bigger picture. It was vital that she not get herself killed trying to put on a show to better her fortunes after the end of the game. Imperfect impressions could be repaired, but only if she was around to do so.
"Of course I want to survive as long as I can. Of course I'm hoping for something to change, someone to save us."
Oops, that was a lie. And unfortunate piece of hypocrisy in an otherwise-candid speech about being true to oneself, but she'd forgive it. It was in her nature.
"But here, now, aside from survival? I guess I'm just trying to live."
She stressed that last word, and as she did locked gazes fully with Roxanne. Her smile was smaller, no teeth, possibly unfamiliar.
"I'm here because I want to be, and being here is what I want."
Roxanne was paradoxically so hungry that she felt nauseous, and it was a struggle to summon the willpower to take even a single bite from the bar. Besides, she didn’t want to listen to Juliette’s response with crumbs at the corner of her mouth. She set the ration down on her bag, where it’d still be there to disappoint her later, and gave her full focus to the other girl.
It was strange, how easily smiling still came to Juliette, how effortlessly pleasant she was. Not unwelcome, but strange. As she went on, Roxanne began to understand how much practice she’d had. She of all people should know how much work went on behind the scenes.
Now, she realized that everything had been worth it.
The scars, the stasis, the languid hours where it felt like everything had lost its meaning; all justified by this single shining moment. This was the connection she’d wanted from Forrest, the answer she’d unconsciously prayed Marcy would find.
She’d forgotten what it felt like to be pleasantly surprised. Roxanne didn’t smile often, but she couldn’t help herself. She was excited to see herself reflected in another person, to dare to hope that they might both feel the same way.
Juliette finished, and they locked eyes. Roxanne nodded, once. She understood.
“I felt the same way a lot of the time, back home. I only got to work on what actually mattered to me after I was done with the million things my parents wanted me to excel at. I thought I’d have more time as myself when I moved out, but. Like you said.” It was darkly funny, the solidarity they found in recognizing that everyone’s future had been stolen from them.
“You know, way back on the first day, I climbed the temple,” she said, gesturing to the nearby building. “Just because I could. It was beautiful, and I think it was the best thing I’ve done here. Before I got tired. Hungry. Lonely. But I don’t want that to be the peak, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life wishing I could feel that free again.”
It felt a little embarrassing, to think of such a small thing as a great triumph, but what use did shame have for them? Wasn’t speaking from the heart (as sickenly saccharine as the phrase rang) supposed to make you feel vulnerable? Wasn’t that how you knew you were saying something real?
“You think there’s anything on your bucket list we could go after? Together?” If she’d had Marcy’s complete ignorance of boundaries this was where she’d step forward, take hold of Juliette’s hands; but the distance between them remained. This was an invitation, nothing more.
In her fervor, Roxanne had completely forgotten that Marceline was still behind her, silent.
It was strange, how easily smiling still came to Juliette, how effortlessly pleasant she was. Not unwelcome, but strange. As she went on, Roxanne began to understand how much practice she’d had. She of all people should know how much work went on behind the scenes.
Now, she realized that everything had been worth it.
The scars, the stasis, the languid hours where it felt like everything had lost its meaning; all justified by this single shining moment. This was the connection she’d wanted from Forrest, the answer she’d unconsciously prayed Marcy would find.
She’d forgotten what it felt like to be pleasantly surprised. Roxanne didn’t smile often, but she couldn’t help herself. She was excited to see herself reflected in another person, to dare to hope that they might both feel the same way.
Juliette finished, and they locked eyes. Roxanne nodded, once. She understood.
“I felt the same way a lot of the time, back home. I only got to work on what actually mattered to me after I was done with the million things my parents wanted me to excel at. I thought I’d have more time as myself when I moved out, but. Like you said.” It was darkly funny, the solidarity they found in recognizing that everyone’s future had been stolen from them.
“You know, way back on the first day, I climbed the temple,” she said, gesturing to the nearby building. “Just because I could. It was beautiful, and I think it was the best thing I’ve done here. Before I got tired. Hungry. Lonely. But I don’t want that to be the peak, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life wishing I could feel that free again.”
It felt a little embarrassing, to think of such a small thing as a great triumph, but what use did shame have for them? Wasn’t speaking from the heart (as sickenly saccharine as the phrase rang) supposed to make you feel vulnerable? Wasn’t that how you knew you were saying something real?
“You think there’s anything on your bucket list we could go after? Together?” If she’d had Marcy’s complete ignorance of boundaries this was where she’d step forward, take hold of Juliette’s hands; but the distance between them remained. This was an invitation, nothing more.
In her fervor, Roxanne had completely forgotten that Marceline was still behind her, silent.
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VoltTurtle
- Posts: 1539
- Joined: Fri Aug 10, 2018 4:10 pm
- Location: Dreamland
It was rare to see Roxanne have a moment of mutual connection with someone. Marceline herself had only witnessed something like it a handful of times through all the years she had known her. Both Juliette and Roxanne had lived their whole lives never truly allowed to be themselves, only to have their lives tragically cut short. Roxanne finally found someone she could relate to in the way that she never could have with Marceline, because Marceline had always lived freely, following her own path and never allowing anyone else to dictate what she could or could not do.
Even now, as she stood there a few feet behind Roxanne, shotgun clutched tightly in her hands, muzzle pointed away and to the ground, she had been the one to decide that following Dolly's wishes was the best course of action. Dolly may have provided her a target to hit, but she was not truly obligated to take aim and fire. Due to the dead or not, Marceline was ultimately the one making the final decision.
A decision that she immediately began to regret.
Juliette raised an eyebrow in response to Marceline's display, looking straight at her and pulling back just enough to be noticeable. Roxanne recognized the change in body language, and turned her head to look straight at Marceline. Staring into Roxanne's eyes and the emotions behind them immediately flushed Marceline with guilt. Unable to maintain eye contact with the girl who's trust she had just betrayed, Marceline averted her gaze, staring instead at the ground directly in front of Roxanne.
She had made an impulsive decision to betray the trust of her only remaining close friend, and now she had to live with it. There was no backing out now, she had already gone too far. Nothing between them would return to the way it was before, even if she sheepishly tried to go back on her choice. Besides, even if she did back out, and everything did somehow go back to the way it was before, was that really what she wanted? Did she want to go back to being a directionless girl that couldn't seem to do anything right? Did she want to let herself die, despite Dolly's wishes? The answer was obvious, of course not. She was doing what she thought she had to do.
Marceline felt the need to explain herself, because Roxanne deserved to know why. She owed her that much, if nothing else, for all the time they had spent together.
Marceline did her best to meet her friend's gaze, Juliette's presence washed from her mind as she focused her attention entirely on Roxanne. She needed to tell Roxanne everything, and her concerns of how Juliette would take all of it didn't matter compared to that.
"Roxy... I..."
Awkward pauses and stumbling speech betrayed her uncertainty. How could she possibly explain all of this to her without coming off as if she had gone mad? Perhaps there was no way for her to adequately explain, perhaps all she could do was persist anyway, and try her best to elucidate it all.
"I'm... taking this," she declared, briefly jostling the shotgun in her grip. "Because..."
Part of her wanted to come up with some kind of lie, say that she decided she needed the weapon to continue her forgotten crusade, and spare Roxanne the truth of her betrayal. She knew that doing so would only make this worse, however, not only because she was a bad liar, but because Roxanne deserved the truth.
"I've decided that I'm going to try to live to the end."
She let those words briefly hang in the air as she gathered her thoughts, trying desperately to paint a clear picture of what led her to this moment, so that hopefully Roxanne would understand and maybe not judge her so harshly for what she had already done, let alone what she was going to do.
"I've decided that because Dolly said..." She trembled slightly as she spoke her girlfriend's name, her throat beginning to close up as she experienced the grief and panic all over again. "Y-You know what Dolly said to me, before I fucked it all up and she died."
"A-And," she continued, her vision blurring as she began to cry from the stress of this self-inflicted situation. "I've realized, even after she died, everything I was doing was because of my love for her. It was all always for her, because she was the only thing that has managed to give my life any meaning."
Uncontrollably, like a dam beginning to burst, Marceline finally began unleashing the thoughts that had been brewing over the last few days.
"I wanted to go after the players because I was angry at the world after she died, and I wanted to die in a way that she couldn't blame me for. You were right all along, and I was lying to myself about it the whole time. I realized all of that after the fight with Kelly. I guess failing again when I had the chance to actually do something that I set out to do made me rethink everything all over again."
She choked up, her face turning red with shame. Knowing how she was hurting Roxanne with all of this, ripping away her moment of connection and destroying their relationship was almost too much for her to bear. More than anything, she wanted to abscond from this situation with what few shells the shotgun already had loaded and avoid the consequences of her actions. She had to do this, though. She had to see all of it through to the end, because what else did she have left?
"I still don't know what I want, really," she muttered, just audible enough for Roxanne to hear her. "But I know she saw something in me that was worth protecting. She thought I deserved to live more than she did, and she made me promise to keep going. So that's what I'm going to do."
In light of all of this, Marceline didn't understand what it was that Dolly saw in her. Perhaps it wasn't for her to understand, perhaps all she could do was trust her girlfriend's belief in her.
"A-And," she said, forcing herself to be loud and clear despite her throat's attempts to squeeze shut. "I don't stand a chance without this. I need it, so I'm taking it. Give me the rest of the ammunition, and then you can go."
Even now, as she stood there a few feet behind Roxanne, shotgun clutched tightly in her hands, muzzle pointed away and to the ground, she had been the one to decide that following Dolly's wishes was the best course of action. Dolly may have provided her a target to hit, but she was not truly obligated to take aim and fire. Due to the dead or not, Marceline was ultimately the one making the final decision.
A decision that she immediately began to regret.
Juliette raised an eyebrow in response to Marceline's display, looking straight at her and pulling back just enough to be noticeable. Roxanne recognized the change in body language, and turned her head to look straight at Marceline. Staring into Roxanne's eyes and the emotions behind them immediately flushed Marceline with guilt. Unable to maintain eye contact with the girl who's trust she had just betrayed, Marceline averted her gaze, staring instead at the ground directly in front of Roxanne.
She had made an impulsive decision to betray the trust of her only remaining close friend, and now she had to live with it. There was no backing out now, she had already gone too far. Nothing between them would return to the way it was before, even if she sheepishly tried to go back on her choice. Besides, even if she did back out, and everything did somehow go back to the way it was before, was that really what she wanted? Did she want to go back to being a directionless girl that couldn't seem to do anything right? Did she want to let herself die, despite Dolly's wishes? The answer was obvious, of course not. She was doing what she thought she had to do.
Marceline felt the need to explain herself, because Roxanne deserved to know why. She owed her that much, if nothing else, for all the time they had spent together.
Marceline did her best to meet her friend's gaze, Juliette's presence washed from her mind as she focused her attention entirely on Roxanne. She needed to tell Roxanne everything, and her concerns of how Juliette would take all of it didn't matter compared to that.
"Roxy... I..."
Awkward pauses and stumbling speech betrayed her uncertainty. How could she possibly explain all of this to her without coming off as if she had gone mad? Perhaps there was no way for her to adequately explain, perhaps all she could do was persist anyway, and try her best to elucidate it all.
"I'm... taking this," she declared, briefly jostling the shotgun in her grip. "Because..."
Part of her wanted to come up with some kind of lie, say that she decided she needed the weapon to continue her forgotten crusade, and spare Roxanne the truth of her betrayal. She knew that doing so would only make this worse, however, not only because she was a bad liar, but because Roxanne deserved the truth.
"I've decided that I'm going to try to live to the end."
She let those words briefly hang in the air as she gathered her thoughts, trying desperately to paint a clear picture of what led her to this moment, so that hopefully Roxanne would understand and maybe not judge her so harshly for what she had already done, let alone what she was going to do.
"I've decided that because Dolly said..." She trembled slightly as she spoke her girlfriend's name, her throat beginning to close up as she experienced the grief and panic all over again. "Y-You know what Dolly said to me, before I fucked it all up and she died."
"A-And," she continued, her vision blurring as she began to cry from the stress of this self-inflicted situation. "I've realized, even after she died, everything I was doing was because of my love for her. It was all always for her, because she was the only thing that has managed to give my life any meaning."
Uncontrollably, like a dam beginning to burst, Marceline finally began unleashing the thoughts that had been brewing over the last few days.
"I wanted to go after the players because I was angry at the world after she died, and I wanted to die in a way that she couldn't blame me for. You were right all along, and I was lying to myself about it the whole time. I realized all of that after the fight with Kelly. I guess failing again when I had the chance to actually do something that I set out to do made me rethink everything all over again."
She choked up, her face turning red with shame. Knowing how she was hurting Roxanne with all of this, ripping away her moment of connection and destroying their relationship was almost too much for her to bear. More than anything, she wanted to abscond from this situation with what few shells the shotgun already had loaded and avoid the consequences of her actions. She had to do this, though. She had to see all of it through to the end, because what else did she have left?
"I still don't know what I want, really," she muttered, just audible enough for Roxanne to hear her. "But I know she saw something in me that was worth protecting. She thought I deserved to live more than she did, and she made me promise to keep going. So that's what I'm going to do."
In light of all of this, Marceline didn't understand what it was that Dolly saw in her. Perhaps it wasn't for her to understand, perhaps all she could do was trust her girlfriend's belief in her.
"A-And," she said, forcing herself to be loud and clear despite her throat's attempts to squeeze shut. "I don't stand a chance without this. I need it, so I'm taking it. Give me the rest of the ammunition, and then you can go."
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Grand Moff Hissa
- Posts: 2754
- Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2018 1:37 am
Once again, without moving much at all, Juliette receded into the background in the face of a confrontation. Unlike with Valerija and Julien, however, her feelings this time were less nervously offended anger and more an uncomfortable mixture of disappointment and pride and doubt.
The disappointment was because, against all odds, Roxanne actually had somewhat gotten it. Juliette had taken a stab in the dark, fully expecting to be tilting her hand as nothing more than a moment of pleasant pointlessness that was discarded as fluff or misinterpreted. But Roxanne felt it too, the freedom from old habits and rules, and with more time Juliette would've loved to speak with her at greater length on the matter. She would've loved to share her bucket list, perhaps, though of the pair she was travelling with Roxanne was unfortunately notably less qualified to help with the checking off of items. But it was more than she'd thought she'd get from anyone, but the moment was so fleeting. She hadn't even had time to reject the invitation.
The object of her pride was Marceline. That was some real opportunism shining through, a tactical play that Roxanne had only figured out too late. It had even caught Juliette off-guard; she'd noticed Marceline's movement, of course, but had figured its purpose more innocuous. Seeking comfort, perhaps, in the face of ever more death and tragedy. But no, the girl had stolen the gun, and announced her course, and now Juliette and Roxanne were staring down the most recently-minted prospective player, without a scrap of effective defense between them.
Maybe that should've been more scary, but Juliette didn't think for a second that she was about to get shot. If Marceline was planning to gun them down, the lead would already be flying. No, she had set herself on a course, but only in theory. She didn't have the will to seal it just now. Juliette could understand that so very well.
From where she sat leaning against the slab, Roxanne might as well be tumbling over the side of a boat, screaming and flailing before hitting the water with a tremendous splash.
What was that fight with Kelly Marceline had alluded to, anyways?
Juliette picked up her water bottle again and took another long sip, tilting it up towards the sky. She let herself slurp it a little, something she normally never would've done, but here and now it was a piece of dramatic commentary on the situation, as well as a sign of her state of ease. When finally the bottle was empty, she screwed the top back on, the plastic crackling as her fingers worked it. She unzipped her bag slowly but not silently, and put the empty bottle inside.
If Marceline turned on her, Juliette would talk her down. That wasn't even the seductive embrace of arrogance. Juliette had dealt with significantly more steady and sure and psychotic peers in her time here. More than that, she had dealt with Marceline on prior occasions, and had a pretty good idea of how the girl worked and how to get through to her. Back at the pool, Juliette had refused to rise to the bait, refused to let herself become flustered or perturbed. Rather than harassment, that had bought her conversation, and an insight she had never sought out but did not regret acquiring.
She hadn't even let herself think about how it felt that day, starting to talk as they undressed. She'd acted normal, natural. No other choice, right? Couldn't be the pervert who stared, couldn't be the prude who was afraid to catch a glance. Just act like everyone else, act normal like how it somehow was normal for all of them. That was the big real reason Juliette hated swim class more than any other part of school. How was it even allowed for students to be naked around each other on campus? It wasn't the 1950s anymore. She knew what Marceline looked like changing into a swimsuit. How could that be real?
That was part of the doubt. Right now, dirty and desperate and on the edge of a breakdown, Marceline looked every part the castaway, and yet Juliette was thinking about the locker rooms. She could almost smell the chlorine, could all but feel the contrast between smooth tile and rough grout between her toes, all damp no matter the time of day. Juliette had always tried to be first in and the last out not because she was a teacher's pet, but because it let her be alone in those moments, let her not be surrounded by the torture of dozens of her classmates all undressed, but Marceline had been there and the connection had been forged unwillingly, and she'd said what all Dolly meant to her but Dolly was what, a week dead? Dolly was probably looking pretty rough right about now, her eyes maybe melting out of her head or whatever was going on with that corpse over there that Juliette still wouldn't look at. Dolly's name was on Marceline's lips, another empty pledge of eternal love or whatever, but that didn't make the girl any more alive.
But still, Juliette wasn't quite sure she should be thinking like this.
And of course, the other part of the doubt had more to do with what came after.
Go find a girl to kiss. She could still hear Quinn's voice, like the girl was just as present in her mind as Dolly was in Marceline's, whispering those words into her ear again and again in a creepy spectral rasp.
Go find a girl to kiss. Or kill.
Maybe both.
Either way.
The disappointment was because, against all odds, Roxanne actually had somewhat gotten it. Juliette had taken a stab in the dark, fully expecting to be tilting her hand as nothing more than a moment of pleasant pointlessness that was discarded as fluff or misinterpreted. But Roxanne felt it too, the freedom from old habits and rules, and with more time Juliette would've loved to speak with her at greater length on the matter. She would've loved to share her bucket list, perhaps, though of the pair she was travelling with Roxanne was unfortunately notably less qualified to help with the checking off of items. But it was more than she'd thought she'd get from anyone, but the moment was so fleeting. She hadn't even had time to reject the invitation.
The object of her pride was Marceline. That was some real opportunism shining through, a tactical play that Roxanne had only figured out too late. It had even caught Juliette off-guard; she'd noticed Marceline's movement, of course, but had figured its purpose more innocuous. Seeking comfort, perhaps, in the face of ever more death and tragedy. But no, the girl had stolen the gun, and announced her course, and now Juliette and Roxanne were staring down the most recently-minted prospective player, without a scrap of effective defense between them.
Maybe that should've been more scary, but Juliette didn't think for a second that she was about to get shot. If Marceline was planning to gun them down, the lead would already be flying. No, she had set herself on a course, but only in theory. She didn't have the will to seal it just now. Juliette could understand that so very well.
From where she sat leaning against the slab, Roxanne might as well be tumbling over the side of a boat, screaming and flailing before hitting the water with a tremendous splash.
What was that fight with Kelly Marceline had alluded to, anyways?
Juliette picked up her water bottle again and took another long sip, tilting it up towards the sky. She let herself slurp it a little, something she normally never would've done, but here and now it was a piece of dramatic commentary on the situation, as well as a sign of her state of ease. When finally the bottle was empty, she screwed the top back on, the plastic crackling as her fingers worked it. She unzipped her bag slowly but not silently, and put the empty bottle inside.
If Marceline turned on her, Juliette would talk her down. That wasn't even the seductive embrace of arrogance. Juliette had dealt with significantly more steady and sure and psychotic peers in her time here. More than that, she had dealt with Marceline on prior occasions, and had a pretty good idea of how the girl worked and how to get through to her. Back at the pool, Juliette had refused to rise to the bait, refused to let herself become flustered or perturbed. Rather than harassment, that had bought her conversation, and an insight she had never sought out but did not regret acquiring.
She hadn't even let herself think about how it felt that day, starting to talk as they undressed. She'd acted normal, natural. No other choice, right? Couldn't be the pervert who stared, couldn't be the prude who was afraid to catch a glance. Just act like everyone else, act normal like how it somehow was normal for all of them. That was the big real reason Juliette hated swim class more than any other part of school. How was it even allowed for students to be naked around each other on campus? It wasn't the 1950s anymore. She knew what Marceline looked like changing into a swimsuit. How could that be real?
That was part of the doubt. Right now, dirty and desperate and on the edge of a breakdown, Marceline looked every part the castaway, and yet Juliette was thinking about the locker rooms. She could almost smell the chlorine, could all but feel the contrast between smooth tile and rough grout between her toes, all damp no matter the time of day. Juliette had always tried to be first in and the last out not because she was a teacher's pet, but because it let her be alone in those moments, let her not be surrounded by the torture of dozens of her classmates all undressed, but Marceline had been there and the connection had been forged unwillingly, and she'd said what all Dolly meant to her but Dolly was what, a week dead? Dolly was probably looking pretty rough right about now, her eyes maybe melting out of her head or whatever was going on with that corpse over there that Juliette still wouldn't look at. Dolly's name was on Marceline's lips, another empty pledge of eternal love or whatever, but that didn't make the girl any more alive.
But still, Juliette wasn't quite sure she should be thinking like this.
And of course, the other part of the doubt had more to do with what came after.
Go find a girl to kiss. She could still hear Quinn's voice, like the girl was just as present in her mind as Dolly was in Marceline's, whispering those words into her ear again and again in a creepy spectral rasp.
Go find a girl to kiss. Or kill.
Maybe both.
Either way.
When Roxanne realized what was happening, her euphoria didn’t fade. It was instantly warped to something darker, but no less intense - she had just come the closest to happiness she’d ever felt on the island, a peak higher than seeing the horizon from the top of the temple. She had seen a glimmer in Juliette’s eyes, but it would never be anything more than a flash of the future they could have found.
She had faithfully trailed behind Marceline for a full week, and it was only now that she decided to betray her? Maybe if this happened at another time, Roxanne would have found it fascinating, been proud that she had found any sort of resolve. She wouldn’t even have cared that she had wasted so much time preaching a cause she’d never truly believed in.
But she could never forgive her for ruining that perfect moment.
Marceline ranted about how her girlfriend loved her, so murder was okay. Roxanne said nothing, but barely listened, drinking in the despair that was apparent on her face. She was red-faced, crying. Pathetic. It wasn’t enough. It didn’t make her any less furious that Marcy felt bad about her declaration of war. At least if she had the honesty to look her in the eyes, she could respect that.
“Marceline.” Roxanne’s smile was frozen on her face. She wasn’t sure if she felt more anger or disgust. Julliete’s apparent complete lack of concern was irritating, but still, she was unconsciously glad to have an audience beyond the anonymous cameras.
“That’s a lot of words when all you needed to say was how much you want me to die.”
Roxanne didn’t want to die, but if someone was going to kill her, she wanted it to be the winner, so she could haunt them for the rest of their hopefully lengthy life. She would live on in nightmares, in prayers for forgiveness, in deathbed confessions. This was not the legacy she would have chosen, but anything was better than oblivion.
She deliberately stepped forward. Close enough to wrap her hands around Marceline’s neck if she wanted to.
“So pull the trigger or give me my gun back. Those are your only choices.”
If Marceline blinked, well, that would be that. Roxanne would take her shotgun back and take comfort in the fact that she’d never need to hear another one of her speeches. If she died, it would be quick, at least, and maybe that would finally inspire Marceline to make something of herself.
No matter what happened, no one who saw this would ever forget it.
She had faithfully trailed behind Marceline for a full week, and it was only now that she decided to betray her? Maybe if this happened at another time, Roxanne would have found it fascinating, been proud that she had found any sort of resolve. She wouldn’t even have cared that she had wasted so much time preaching a cause she’d never truly believed in.
But she could never forgive her for ruining that perfect moment.
Marceline ranted about how her girlfriend loved her, so murder was okay. Roxanne said nothing, but barely listened, drinking in the despair that was apparent on her face. She was red-faced, crying. Pathetic. It wasn’t enough. It didn’t make her any less furious that Marcy felt bad about her declaration of war. At least if she had the honesty to look her in the eyes, she could respect that.
“Marceline.” Roxanne’s smile was frozen on her face. She wasn’t sure if she felt more anger or disgust. Julliete’s apparent complete lack of concern was irritating, but still, she was unconsciously glad to have an audience beyond the anonymous cameras.
“That’s a lot of words when all you needed to say was how much you want me to die.”
Roxanne didn’t want to die, but if someone was going to kill her, she wanted it to be the winner, so she could haunt them for the rest of their hopefully lengthy life. She would live on in nightmares, in prayers for forgiveness, in deathbed confessions. This was not the legacy she would have chosen, but anything was better than oblivion.
She deliberately stepped forward. Close enough to wrap her hands around Marceline’s neck if she wanted to.
“So pull the trigger or give me my gun back. Those are your only choices.”
If Marceline blinked, well, that would be that. Roxanne would take her shotgun back and take comfort in the fact that she’d never need to hear another one of her speeches. If she died, it would be quick, at least, and maybe that would finally inspire Marceline to make something of herself.
No matter what happened, no one who saw this would ever forget it.
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VoltTurtle
- Posts: 1539
- Joined: Fri Aug 10, 2018 4:10 pm
- Location: Dreamland
Roxanne's aggressive advance wasn't to go unnoticed by Marceline, who leveled the shotgun in her former friend's direction.
"Stay back," she ordered, her voice coming out weakly as she took her own steps backward to maintain a healthy distance between them. She didn't understand what Roxanne's strategy was, even if she did manage to close the gap without being shot, Marceline still had her knife tucked away and ready to be used. Was Roxanne really so confident that she wouldn't be harmed? Perhaps she wasn't really, and that was the point. Her slow advance continued even after Marceline told her to stop, unabated by the words.
Her hands trembled as she stared daggers at Roxanne, the situation she had put herself in escalating in a way she had not predicted. She had expected her friend to do as she was told and leave for the sake of self-preservation. Roxanne had defied all expectations, instead almost taking Marceline's declaration as a challenge, issuing an ultimatum that cut her to her core.
Marceline didn't want to hurt Roxanne, the very idea was intolerable to her. This was a girl she had cried over merely getting injured just a few days prior. A girl that she had spent so much time with over the years, shared laughs with, shared stories with, shared almost everything with. A girl who had brought her back from the brink of oblivion after the death of her girlfriend without asking anything of her in return. Just a few weeks ago, before all of this, had she been asked if she would die for Roxanne's sake, she would have said yes—the same answer she would have given for Dolly, and Alex, and Beryl.
Yet despite all that, she couldn't help but admit that Roxanne was right. Marceline did want her to die, because Roxanne had to die if she were to live and keep her promise. She just wanted her to die out of her sight, in a way that she wouldn't have to feel as bad about in the aftermath. Roxanne was testing her resolve, forcing her to confront the reality of what she wanted, and what it would take to achieve it.
Roxanne was right.
That was why Marceline squeezed the trigger.
Except no great kaboom came, not even a slight click. The only noises heard were the same as those before; her rapid, stressed breathing, her heart thumping in her ears, and her periodic footfalls as she tried to keep her distance. The gun's safety was still on, she realized. In her haste to get her hands on Roxanne's weapon, she had completely forgotten to flick it off.
And she just tried to kill one of her best friends.
Immediately, she reconsidered. How far had she fallen already? Was this what it was like, trying to shoot for the win? If this was what it took, then she couldn't do it. No matter how much she might want to, no matter if Roxanne needed to die for her to live, she couldn't bring herself to do the deed. She simply didn't have the strength of mind.
Yet, still, her newfound surety of purpose pleaded with her. She couldn't just abandon everything yet again. What else did she have left, after all of this? She'd be lost again, wandering purposelessly until she inevitably died, only this time without anyone there to comfort her. She couldn't do that, either. Not again, not after building herself back up from nothing.
With great hesitation, Marceline flicked the safety off, keeping her eyes affixed squarely on Roxanne all the while. Maybe the false shot and the removal of the safety net would cause her friend to reconsider. Maybe Roxanne would realize how close she had come to death and cut her losses before it was too late.
"Roxy," Marceline pleaded, as she continued to backpedal. "I don't want to hurt you. Just give it up and you can leave."
"Stay back," she ordered, her voice coming out weakly as she took her own steps backward to maintain a healthy distance between them. She didn't understand what Roxanne's strategy was, even if she did manage to close the gap without being shot, Marceline still had her knife tucked away and ready to be used. Was Roxanne really so confident that she wouldn't be harmed? Perhaps she wasn't really, and that was the point. Her slow advance continued even after Marceline told her to stop, unabated by the words.
Her hands trembled as she stared daggers at Roxanne, the situation she had put herself in escalating in a way she had not predicted. She had expected her friend to do as she was told and leave for the sake of self-preservation. Roxanne had defied all expectations, instead almost taking Marceline's declaration as a challenge, issuing an ultimatum that cut her to her core.
Marceline didn't want to hurt Roxanne, the very idea was intolerable to her. This was a girl she had cried over merely getting injured just a few days prior. A girl that she had spent so much time with over the years, shared laughs with, shared stories with, shared almost everything with. A girl who had brought her back from the brink of oblivion after the death of her girlfriend without asking anything of her in return. Just a few weeks ago, before all of this, had she been asked if she would die for Roxanne's sake, she would have said yes—the same answer she would have given for Dolly, and Alex, and Beryl.
Yet despite all that, she couldn't help but admit that Roxanne was right. Marceline did want her to die, because Roxanne had to die if she were to live and keep her promise. She just wanted her to die out of her sight, in a way that she wouldn't have to feel as bad about in the aftermath. Roxanne was testing her resolve, forcing her to confront the reality of what she wanted, and what it would take to achieve it.
Roxanne was right.
That was why Marceline squeezed the trigger.
Except no great kaboom came, not even a slight click. The only noises heard were the same as those before; her rapid, stressed breathing, her heart thumping in her ears, and her periodic footfalls as she tried to keep her distance. The gun's safety was still on, she realized. In her haste to get her hands on Roxanne's weapon, she had completely forgotten to flick it off.
And she just tried to kill one of her best friends.
Immediately, she reconsidered. How far had she fallen already? Was this what it was like, trying to shoot for the win? If this was what it took, then she couldn't do it. No matter how much she might want to, no matter if Roxanne needed to die for her to live, she couldn't bring herself to do the deed. She simply didn't have the strength of mind.
Yet, still, her newfound surety of purpose pleaded with her. She couldn't just abandon everything yet again. What else did she have left, after all of this? She'd be lost again, wandering purposelessly until she inevitably died, only this time without anyone there to comfort her. She couldn't do that, either. Not again, not after building herself back up from nothing.
With great hesitation, Marceline flicked the safety off, keeping her eyes affixed squarely on Roxanne all the while. Maybe the false shot and the removal of the safety net would cause her friend to reconsider. Maybe Roxanne would realize how close she had come to death and cut her losses before it was too late.
"Roxy," Marceline pleaded, as she continued to backpedal. "I don't want to hurt you. Just give it up and you can leave."
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Grand Moff Hissa
- Posts: 2754
- Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2018 1:37 am
"Just do it."
Juliette had moved a few feet over to the side by now, such that she wouldn't catch any of the spillover if and when Marceline pulled the trigger and gunfire tore through Roxanne's body. As she did, her hand came back out of her bag with the razor clutched casually in it, and from there it slipped to the back of her skirt, depositing its prize. She pulled herself up to her feet and kept her gaze on the confrontation unfurling in front of her. Her bag came along for the ride. That was a little habit Juliette had been trying to consciously cultivate and reinforce ever since the event with Julien and the river: keeping at least her most vital things in her grasp at literally all times.
It was kind of a shame that their group was going to end like this, right here and now. They'd had something pretty nice for a bit there, Juliette thought. She could easily imagine coasting through another few days and keeping this until nearer the end, and especially could tell herself that it'd be cleaner to strike while on guard or something. The hurt and betrayal here was kind of hard to take, especially knowing that at most one of the two in front of her would walk away from this place alive.
If, as she expected, Marceline pulled the trigger and blew Roxanne away, then things could probably continue more or less the same, absent one set of hands and eyes. This was why Juliette was positioning herself in Marceline's camp. She'd already done her part to secure her spot as the replacement ally, and while she wouldn't have chosen such a terminal exit for Roxanne given her way, it was out of her hands now.
If, on the other hand, Marceline handed the gun back, then Juliette would be particularly disappointed, but her actions were appropriate all the same. She did not think Marceline would allow Roxanne to turn around and shoot her, and if the girl killed Marceline first that would be Juliette's cue to make herself scarce. But if Roxanne just left, as she seemed most apt to do based on the impression she'd given so far, then Juliette would be right there to comfort Marceline. She'd give her a hug, and maybe just a little more, and she'd say it was okay, it had been the right choice, it would all be alright, and then she'd drag her razor straight across the girl's neck.
Because it would be a mercy, wouldn't it? If Marceline couldn't kill a friend, if she couldn't take this step in these circumstances served to her on a silver platter, then she was spewing nothing but hot air. She was already effectively dead. And Juliette had singled her out days before they met as likely broken and ruined and dead enough already, so this would just be following through on that. It was simple. It was right.
Only, as she looked at Marceline's face, traced that throat with her eyes once again, she didn't want it to go that way. It was because, she told herself, this edge, this purpose, this betrayal, it was all far more interesting. Marceline seemed so full of life. There'd be ample time to pick someone off later.
Juliette had taken two or three steps closer, for no good reason. Marceline wasn't shooting. Why wasn't she shooting?
"Power without the will to use it is nothing," Juliette said. Her voice was meant to be firm and commanding, so she hated the faint edge of pleading. "Shoot her already."
Juliette had moved a few feet over to the side by now, such that she wouldn't catch any of the spillover if and when Marceline pulled the trigger and gunfire tore through Roxanne's body. As she did, her hand came back out of her bag with the razor clutched casually in it, and from there it slipped to the back of her skirt, depositing its prize. She pulled herself up to her feet and kept her gaze on the confrontation unfurling in front of her. Her bag came along for the ride. That was a little habit Juliette had been trying to consciously cultivate and reinforce ever since the event with Julien and the river: keeping at least her most vital things in her grasp at literally all times.
It was kind of a shame that their group was going to end like this, right here and now. They'd had something pretty nice for a bit there, Juliette thought. She could easily imagine coasting through another few days and keeping this until nearer the end, and especially could tell herself that it'd be cleaner to strike while on guard or something. The hurt and betrayal here was kind of hard to take, especially knowing that at most one of the two in front of her would walk away from this place alive.
If, as she expected, Marceline pulled the trigger and blew Roxanne away, then things could probably continue more or less the same, absent one set of hands and eyes. This was why Juliette was positioning herself in Marceline's camp. She'd already done her part to secure her spot as the replacement ally, and while she wouldn't have chosen such a terminal exit for Roxanne given her way, it was out of her hands now.
If, on the other hand, Marceline handed the gun back, then Juliette would be particularly disappointed, but her actions were appropriate all the same. She did not think Marceline would allow Roxanne to turn around and shoot her, and if the girl killed Marceline first that would be Juliette's cue to make herself scarce. But if Roxanne just left, as she seemed most apt to do based on the impression she'd given so far, then Juliette would be right there to comfort Marceline. She'd give her a hug, and maybe just a little more, and she'd say it was okay, it had been the right choice, it would all be alright, and then she'd drag her razor straight across the girl's neck.
Because it would be a mercy, wouldn't it? If Marceline couldn't kill a friend, if she couldn't take this step in these circumstances served to her on a silver platter, then she was spewing nothing but hot air. She was already effectively dead. And Juliette had singled her out days before they met as likely broken and ruined and dead enough already, so this would just be following through on that. It was simple. It was right.
Only, as she looked at Marceline's face, traced that throat with her eyes once again, she didn't want it to go that way. It was because, she told herself, this edge, this purpose, this betrayal, it was all far more interesting. Marceline seemed so full of life. There'd be ample time to pick someone off later.
Juliette had taken two or three steps closer, for no good reason. Marceline wasn't shooting. Why wasn't she shooting?
"Power without the will to use it is nothing," Juliette said. Her voice was meant to be firm and commanding, so she hated the faint edge of pleading. "Shoot her already."
Juliette’s betrayal hurt almost as much as Marceline’s, but maybe it was generous to call it a betrayal. Maybe everything had just been in Roxanne’s head, so desperate to feel that she latched on to the first sign of anything real, anything that could elevate them beyond killing or being killed.
Maybe this was all for the best, after all. There was nothing left for her in the garden. If she lived through this, the others had proven they weren’t worth having hope in.
Juliette’s poisonous encouragement rang true, though. Roxanne had carried power in her hands for ten entire days, only ever using it to imply, never to force, to take. That just wasn’t who she was, and she hoped who she wouldn’t ever be.
Still, she needed power to persevere. This was a trial. If Roxanne reclaimed her shotgun, that would be proof enough that she deserved it. If Marceline fired, well, she’d earned it, hadn’t she?
Roxanne was watching Marceline’s face, not her hands, but the click of the safety was a quiet reminder of the knife’s edge she was walking on. She continued forward, regardless; unaware that the trigger had already been pulled once.
“I know you don’t want to hurt me. But without that gun, someone else will kill me. I bet it’d be a lot more agonizing than if you blew my head off my shoulders right now, wouldn’t it?”
The wound on her cheek was itching again, the wound that Marceline had cleaned and bandaged just days before. How had things fallen this far, this fast? With each step forward she became more and more aware of the physicality of her existence. Her beating heart, her parched throat, the starved nausea that she’d never gotten a chance to sate. It could all end in an instant.
“Don’t take this the wrong way. I don’t want to die here. But I want to die completely helpless even less.”
Up until this point she’d been riding the adrenaline from her single beautiful, delusional moment with Juliette. She’d approached Marceline, completely fearless, a paragon of willpower with a steady voice. She couldn’t keep this up forever. She wouldn’t need to, either, and that thought scared her even more.
“So give me the gun or shoot me, you fucking hypocrite.”
It was only here, at the end, that her voice cracked a little. In desperation, in fury. It was only now that she realized how much she didn’t want those to be her last words.
Maybe this was all for the best, after all. There was nothing left for her in the garden. If she lived through this, the others had proven they weren’t worth having hope in.
Juliette’s poisonous encouragement rang true, though. Roxanne had carried power in her hands for ten entire days, only ever using it to imply, never to force, to take. That just wasn’t who she was, and she hoped who she wouldn’t ever be.
Still, she needed power to persevere. This was a trial. If Roxanne reclaimed her shotgun, that would be proof enough that she deserved it. If Marceline fired, well, she’d earned it, hadn’t she?
Roxanne was watching Marceline’s face, not her hands, but the click of the safety was a quiet reminder of the knife’s edge she was walking on. She continued forward, regardless; unaware that the trigger had already been pulled once.
“I know you don’t want to hurt me. But without that gun, someone else will kill me. I bet it’d be a lot more agonizing than if you blew my head off my shoulders right now, wouldn’t it?”
The wound on her cheek was itching again, the wound that Marceline had cleaned and bandaged just days before. How had things fallen this far, this fast? With each step forward she became more and more aware of the physicality of her existence. Her beating heart, her parched throat, the starved nausea that she’d never gotten a chance to sate. It could all end in an instant.
“Don’t take this the wrong way. I don’t want to die here. But I want to die completely helpless even less.”
Up until this point she’d been riding the adrenaline from her single beautiful, delusional moment with Juliette. She’d approached Marceline, completely fearless, a paragon of willpower with a steady voice. She couldn’t keep this up forever. She wouldn’t need to, either, and that thought scared her even more.
“So give me the gun or shoot me, you fucking hypocrite.”
It was only here, at the end, that her voice cracked a little. In desperation, in fury. It was only now that she realized how much she didn’t want those to be her last words.