Survival Of The Fittest

So what if he lost a few grades in one subject.

((Maxwell McCormick: Continued from No Stairway To Heaven))

Max had never agreed with sports. In fact, sports had never really agreed with him either. He'd never exactly been an athletic sort of guy, unlike his brothers, and whenever he had participated in gym or extracurricular sporting events, he'd been a benchwarmer almost every time, relegated to watching other people improve at the game whilst he just wished he was somewhere, anywhere, else. Now, of course, he was still warming the bleachers, but it was of his own volition, and more importantly, he was actually getting some work done.

Down below, they were doing some sort of basketball drill that involved dribbling and shooting, but quite frankly he had zoned out of the movement altogether less than two minutes after they had started, too busy focusing on pulling out his various folders and textbooks. Now, the shouts and the irregular rhythm of hollow balls smacking against a wooden floor provided a neutral enough background volume for him to focus on studying.

At the moment, chemistry was on the chopping block. Relative formula masses, moles and radioactive decay. He vaguely remembered the introduction he'd had to this topic a year ago, but online classes hadn't stuck in his head quite as well as in-person ones, so he kept having to flick back and forth, sticking rulers, scraps of paper and even a pencil inside his textbook to hold various places open. So engrossed was he, that it would be child’s play for someone to walk up without him noticing.

(Medea Parth continued from Ad Susceptum Perficiendum)

Gym class was by far Medea’s least favorite class in school. She wouldn’t say she hated it — in fact, she felt that the word hate was thrown around far too casually by most people for her tastes — but she really did not look forward to participating. All the movement and physical exertion was just… too much for her. She was almost always in a pool of sweat in her gym clothes and her body always ached. If there was one thing about the quarantine she would miss, it was the fact she couldn’t avoid this class anymore. Just how could anyone do this regularly, she wondered?

Laci could do this in her sleep, but Laci could do a lot of stuff in her sleep, Medea thought.

She wasn’t much for sports either. They seemed pretty boring. She would go if she was invited or if she wanted to show her support for a friend, but overall sports offered little excitement. She’d rather tinker on her machines or play some video games than ever play a game of basketball. It was probably why she wasn’t doing so well in PE. Her grades for this class were, at best, mediocre and at worst, abysmal. She had broken off from the activities, her clothes sticking to her flesh with an uncomfortable amount of sweat and breathing heavily. She felt so gross and exhausted, her limbs pulsating with pain in protest to doing these activities. She felt like she could collapse any moment and she had no comfy bed to do so on to.

Moving to the bleachers, she saw that she wasn’t the only one who opted to break away from the gym fun. Maxwell McCormick was busy working on his school work, completely absorbed in his work that he didn’t even seem to notice as Medea walked over to him.

“Hey, Max!” She greeted, steadying her breathing so she didn’t seem like she was suffocating. “What’cha doin’ over here?”

((Alex Avanesian continued from ))

Normally, his grades were, like, really good, in every subject. Maths came to him like flying came to a bird or swimming to a fish, English was like, sorta boring but all you need to do is just sorta make stuff up about how, like, the blue door means the main character is depressed or whatever, even if that didn't really make sense because you know, if Alex's wall was painted blue, maybe he just liked the color blue. Didn't mean he was actually depressed or whatever, but in the hamfisted allegorical world of English, that was how it went. History and stuff was just memorising stuff, and like, if he could memorise all the stuff that happened in SOTF it was pretty easy to memorise all the stuff in world history. And then everything else he just sorta muddled his way along.

The one exception to his grades, was gym class. He was exceptionally clumsy with his feet; Alex remembered one time, when he was playing some soccer with the kids on his street when he was younger. In an astounding feat, he managed to kick the ball in the right way that it deflected off a telephone pole, off a wall, and hit another kid in the face. He hadn't like, been happy, which was understandable, but it sort of put Alex off the idea of sport because the kid's nose was bleeding really badly and any time he tried to play sports with balls, he just sorta remembered the kid crying as blood gushed all over his shirt and then he was a little sheepish around the ball and then his team lost and people got mad at him.

At least he got to check out the guys, though. That was a plus. And because he was on the bleachers he could just sorta say that he was watching then do whatever they were playing. But right now, Alex had a very interesting book about SOTF and the like, logistics surrounding it, because abducting like, 180 to 300 high schoolers from wherever in America and making them kill each other on some random island somewhere presented a logistical challenge. It didn't go into the whole conspiracy theory part, which was sorta disappointing because like, there was a pretty good argument that to transport all those kids they'd need some kind of governmental assistance, but eh, SOTF conspiracies were sorta like, uh, 9/11 conspiracies, in that if you started talking about governmental assistance or whatever you got funny looks.

He got it, but like, it seemed a bit weird that they could do this seven, probably soon to be eight if his theory was correct, times and the government couldn't do anything about it. That was politics, though, Maybe Danya was just really good at what he did.

"Huh?" Max glanced up, and as he did so a ruler slid out of his textbook. Cursing under his breath, he snapped it shut before anything else could tumble out and scooped up the offending piece of stationary, looking at Medea with an awkward smile on his face. Parth was one of the few people who... Liked? Tolerated? Dealt with? Him. She was nice- she actually paid attention to him, and their friendship lacked the argumentative sting of his interactions with Juanita.

"Hey... Hey Medea." His greeting was a lot less exuberant than hers, but a greeting it was nonetheless. "Just some chemistry. Not a fan of basketball yourself?" He raised an eyebrow down and towards the court, where someone had pitched? Thrown? Tossed? A perfect hoop. Cleanly in the center of the ring, the only sign of its passing the disturbed netting. Shifting over a little, even though it was a bleacher, and there was plenty of room for Medea to sit down, Max's eye was caught by another fellow sports-slacker.

Max didn't know them in the slightest, but it wasn't them that had drawn his attention- it was the book that they were reading. The Island's Logistics: How Survival of the Fittest Fits Together. On it was displayed a photo of a tropical-looking island, a disused lighthouse and half-sunken yacht mouldering by a broken down harbour. Max knew that island- it had been all over the news after the last... Well. The last Survival of the Fittest.

What a fucking creep show that was. Like those cartel murders with the folks kidnapped off buses and made to fight to the death with clubs and shit. Real messed up stuff. Why you'd want to actually look into it more was a mystery to Max. Pulling his gaze away from the book, he turned back to Medea. "How you been doing? Oh, and, you uh... Know that guy?" He slung a finger towards the stranger.

“Really? Neato!” she said cheerfully as she took a seat next to him. “Pretty smart of you to work on your other class subjects rather than just sit and do nothing! Wish I thought ahead like that.”

She gave a sheepish laugh, as she looked down with slight embarrassment. She was honest in that she wished she thought of it since then she could work on her homework for the classes she had after PE while at PE. Usually she does a rush job on the way to school to get it all done. This whole time she could have done so at PE? That was a revolutionary idea!

She was about to reply to his question about how she was when he pointed at a newcomer to the bleachers. She turned her gaze to the person he was pointing at, a boy reading a book on Survival of the Fittest. For a brief moment her perpetual smile faded when she realized the subject matter of the book, but she shook it off. She didn’t want to think about it too much. It was a tragic affair and so many people died. Hundreds of kids like her, never leaving high school, experiencing life well into their old age… She would cry if she thought about it too much.

Of course, she recognized the person in question.

Her smile returned to her face as she looked at Max. “That is Alex Avanesian.” she said. “He’s a friend of mine too! We like to talk about techy stuff sometimes.”

He was also interested in SOTF. it was an odd hobby, but she wouldn’t judge him for it ever. Her own opinions on the subject were her own, and if he was interested in it that wasn’t her place to judge. Some people just had weird hobbies and interests.

She looked over to Alex and said “Hey! Hey, Alex! How are you?! Want to come join us?”

She shifted around in her seat, hands on her knees. She was so giddy to have two friends to talk to right now that she could hardly sit still. She hoped the two boys got along. She loved it when her friends got along. She looked back and forth between the two boys, her smile widening with every passing second.

And so, the question must be asked: how have the Arthro Taskforce been able to so successfully transport hundreds of children to these remote islands far away from the original place of abduction, all without being apprehended or leaving a trace? There are, of course, many theories about this; ranging from mundane explanations such as the ATs having access to large boats in which they could ship these children to their death, to the bizarre theories of governmental or corporate assistance; ranging from the United States to Israel to China, on certain conspiracy forums dedicated to the discussion of Survival of the Fittest, these theories and more are commonplace.

Alex jumped a little at his name being called, peering up at the two of them nervously from his book. It was really good, and he had sort of like, lost track of time and all that in his reading. The author had spent some time on their forums, and Nexion pinged everyone when it was released because a couple of the regulars had been interviewed as part of the book's delving into the conspiracy part of SOTF theorism, asking them why they thought what they did and what introduced them to the whole conspiracy thing so he had bought it as soon as he could get his hands on it. Like, it didn't mean much because some of these people, they changed theories like you changed clothes but they were still like, the sort of respected people because normally they had good arguments for their theories.

"Uh, h-hey." Medea was nice. They sometimes talked about techy stuff. He didn't know the other guy, but like, he had only one eye and like, Alex wasn't going to stare or anything he was too socially awkward for that but it was just sort of... weird. It was sort of like, something he didn't really think about because he had never talked to the guy but, uh, that wasn't the point. Right, uh, conversation. Yeah.

"Y-yeah, sure." Really, he just sort of wanted to keep reading his book. But it would be rude if he didn't, and, uh, yeah. Social norms and that sorta stuff. Yeah. Pulling his bookstop out of his hoodie pocket, he inserted it into the page, closed the book, and then sort of scooted forwards a little to sit next to Medea, because she was like, the closest to him and also like, he knew her and he didn't know the eyeless guy. He was probably just overthinking it and all that but like, would not sitting next to Max would maybe be seen as rude or something and he wasn't great at social norms so this is probably why he doesn't like, talk to other people that he doesn't know much unless he has to.

"So, uh, what-whatcha guys uh, what are you guys talking about?" Trying his best to seem like, friendly and not some sort of goblin that despised human contact, he brought up a sort of bad smile and smiled at the two of them. Oh god, he probably looked like a total weirdo.

"Uuuuuuh..." Max wasn't quite sure how to react to that. Sure, he got not liking sports, but if there was one thing that he would dislike more than doing sports, it was sitting around doing literally nothing. It also... Just... It was obvious? Maybe he was just being an ass here, but studying in this circumstance was like, the first thing that came to his mind. The second thing would have been doing what the other guy was up to- reading a book (or maybe just listening to some music. If he flipped his hoodie up it'd be hard to see the earbuds.)

"Alex," Max echoed, brushing hair away from his good eye. "Is there anyone you're not friends with?" He raised his eyebrow again, then watched as Medea summoned 'Alex' over with a friendly shout. Part of Max envied that. The ability to just... Say hi to someone you knew because you were just generally friendly with them, and actually expect them to come over without it being all tangled up in expectations and drama.

Alex sat down next to Medea, on Max's right hand side, which was good, because that way he could actually keep his eye on the pair. "Chem," he replied, matter-of-factly, holding up his textbook and squeezing it shut to stop any of his placeholders from spilling out. "What you uh... What you reading there?"

“I try my best to get to know everyone!” she said to Max, flashing him a winning smile. “I’m not exactly friends with everyone, but that doesn’t mean I can’t try!”

Medea clapped her hands together, satisfied at a job well done as Alex moved to join them. Though both he and Max seemed unsure of the interaction, Medea couldn’t be happier at the turn of events of getting these two to meet. Even if there was a little bit of awkwardness she felt she could make up with it by using her mutual bonds with them to balance things out and make this a nice comfortable time for the two of them.

“Yeah, Alex!” Medea chimed in, her tone bubbly and excited. “What’cha reading? I bet it is interesting!”

Medea practically shook in her seat, trying to calm down but obviously too excited to do so as her gaze rapidly transitioned from Alex to Max, then Alex again. She just hoped she wasn’t being too overwhelming with her enthusiasm for her friends talking.

“This is exciting!” she said. She motioned to Max then to Alex. “Max McKormick meets Alex Avanesian! I love it! I love bringing people together!”

Oh God. Look, if Alex was reading any other book; he had the one about the history of electrical engineering in planes - avionics, or whatever it was called, and he told himself that he'd bring that in today but then the book he ordered came today and so he figured that he'd get started on that and then he's been roped into having to talk to people and they're asking about his book and like, reading about SOTF was still seen as sorta weird, because it was still something that happened from time to time. And like, there might even be one this year, but the coronavirus had probably sorta knocked them out and so they'd probably just take some kids next year, because they sort of had like, a three year gap between events, right? 2015 and Texas, 2018 and Tennessee, but there probably weren't gonna be many senior trips this year anyway and-

Right. Get your head together. Zoning out during a conversation with a friend and her friend was like, sorta weird and not cool.

"Uh, it's, uh, it's about Survival of the Fittest. It's like, looking at all the logistics and stuff you know? Because, because, uh, they have to transport a hundred and fifty or so kids on like, average to these weird remote islands in like, Africa or Asia or wherever they are from wherever in America they pick them up from and it just sorta, like, takes a look at how they might logistically do that or something, you know? I-It's really interesting, it's a good read, yeah." Alex just sort of rambled about what came to mind with the book, and he hoped that like, they didn't think it was weird, but like, people were interested in true crime and stuff and this wasn't all that different from reading about serial killers or whatever, but there was a sorta stigma because it was kids killing other kids and nobody really wanted to talk about that part. The awkwardness was probably dripping off him.

Medea was chattering excitedly, and honestly, Alex couldn't get how someone could be so energetic without some kind of drug. At least he like, sorta had a kindred spirit in Max who didn't seem entirely enthusiastic about this conversation either. He probably just wanted to go back to doing his work, and Alex just sorta wanted to go back to reading. Like, if uh, if talking to everyone you see and being more bubbly than a bubble bath was your thing then good for you, but sometimes people just wanna read in peace. No offense to Medea, though, she was nice and probably meant well, it was just sorta like... Alex liked picking his conversations, right? Like, that was the reason he liked the Student Disaster Preparedness Association or whatever way those words were ordered. Everyone there, he knew them and what they liked, and so if he wanted to talk to Gale about SOTF or just play games with a couple of his friends then he could do that.

Come to think of it, that was probably why he hated working the till.

Max paused. Medea was buzzing all around the pair, smiling and exclaiming and... Christ. He squeezed his eye shut and tried to filter out the noise from her for just a moment, thankful when Alex started talking. He was quieter. Less... brain-killing. Medea was a friend, he could call her that at least, but she was a little too much at times.

"Yeah, but like..." Max snapped his fingers tigether, as if trying to find the right words. "Why?" He finally settled on. "I dunno, just seems... Kinda morbid." He looked at the book. At the mouldering harbour on the front cover. That wasn't an artist making some ego-riddled point about civilisation's decay, or something stupid like that. It was a crime scene. A crime scene where kids like him had been made to kill each other.

Uncomfortably like him. His age group. His country. A twinge of paranoia ran up his spine, but he surpressed it. Stop freaking out. He instructed himself. It's not going to happen. He didn't need a new idle thought to keep him up at night. Best to quash that down now.

Medea listened intently to Alex’s explanation of the book, her smile still planted on her face despite the less than… pleasant nature of the subject matter. Survival of the Fittest was a depressing subject for Medea since she never wanted to think about all those deaths, but she could understand why someone might be interested in particular aspects of the whole thing. It was a curious thing for how this one organization managed the logistics of the operation, let alone pull it off multiple times.

“Well…” Medea chimed in, looking at Max sheepishly. “I mean, it is interesting? Learning about something even if it is pretty dark. It isn’t for me, personally, but everyone has their interests! Some people really like those videos of surgeries and stuff. I like those videos of the doggies and kitties that use buttons to talk.”

Mede giggled, looking back and forth between her two friends. From her perspective things were going well. She hoped that by the end of this Alex and Max would be friends, but she wouldn’t pressure them to be. Friendship can take time, after all.

“So, are there any interesting facts or theories in there?” she asked, tilting her head. “I imagine the author has some ideas.”

Why? That was a pretty big question, and it was like, one that was sorta hard to answer, because there were a lot of like, ways to answer that question. Like, it was sorta weird that like, he was interested in it, but like, what's the difference between being interested in SOTF and like, being interested in true crime? They're both the same sorta thing really, and, like, nobody would look at you funny if you said that you had a theory about whatever true crime case was the latest thing, but you say you have a theory about Survival of the Fittest, and everyone sort of looks at you weird. He was all too familiar with that.

"Well, well, uh, it's just, yeah, yeah it is sorta morbid but like, it's sorta interesting to read about, if you uh, get what I mean? L-like, it's weird to think about, to like, to find out why these people wanna like, uh, t-take all these kids and make them kill each other you know? And like, the reasonings behind the weapons and who supplies them and stuff, and like, how they actually get the guys over to wherever because, because like, they don't just have the feeds live you know? It's all sorta like, it's two or three weeks late so by the time you learn who the winner is they're already won and everyone's been dead for a while." He shut himself up there, because he'd probably mention that like, he watched the feeds and then, like, nobody really wanted to talk to people who watched the feeds because that's sort of like, people who view terrorist propaganda.

"B-but yeah, there's a lot of conspiracy stuff, stuff like, uh... If it's a government it's been accused of being behind SOTF, and then you get the nutcases who like, tell you it never happened and they're all CGI or actors or something, right? Like those guys who say that like, that elementary school that got shot up was fake and never existed or something and all the parents and stuff were just crisis actors. It's totally not true, but yeah, there's a lotta consipiracies about like, the whole thing because of what happens. It's, uh, a b-big thing."

He flipped the book back around, staring at the front cover. The last version's island. The government was probably there right now, doing like, evidence shit. Because when you abducted something like 160 kids, a bunch of evidence was gonna be there.

"B-but yeah, uh, there's a bunch of things- theories about like, how they get them there. Government aid with like, the Air Force and stuff, and then like, fishing boats and shit, and then..." Alex squinted, flipping the book to the word side.

"Teleportation. Huh."

Max paused for a long moment as both Medea and Alex made their points. And sure, Max could sort of get that... Learning about dark stuff, but the conversation reminded him of his chat with that girl the other day. What was her name? Graves? Ah yeah, Ashlyn Graves. 'Grunge died fast, so you think I'd relate.' Reaching up to swipe away at his hair, his natural frown deepened slightly.

"I guess some people must like it." He said slowly. "It's definitely not for me though." Admiring Kobain's suicide, researching up on blood games... Was it boomer of him to think that folks focused way too much on violence and death? That was kinda boomer of him, huh.

"They do it because they want the world by the balls." He made a vague grabbing motion with a hand. "Think- every time a busload of kids goes missing, the only thing that's on everyone's mind is that freak who runs it... Uh..." His knowledge failed him. "Dan? Danza? You know the one." He gestured off with his hand to nobody in particular. "And they do it from the US, so no playing it off like a third-world tragedy." He let out a long sigh.

"But yeah, I guess figuring out how they get all those kids to an island is cool?" He shrugged. This was definitely the kind of shit he wanted on his mind instead of his chemistry homework.

“Well... regardless of the how and the why, it is still a pretty horrible thing to happen,” Medea smiled sadly, shifting just a little uncomfortably in her spot on the bleachers. “I don’t understand how someone could do something so horrible. Regardless of where it happens, there is no justifiable or moral reason for why it needed to happen in the first place.”

Medea sniffled, suddenly realizing she started crying at some point. She sheepishly wiped her eyes, still trying to maintain her smile. This was one of the reasons why she never liked to talk about subjects like this, she always ended up crying. It was a little embarrassing that it took so little to get her to cry. But to her, her empathy was a strength and not a weakness.

Still, she didn’t want to bring down the mood on the conversation with her friends by weeping.

“Ah… sorry, I started to get a little emotional there.” she gave a forced chuckle, then returned her attention to Alex once again. “But, um, teleportation? Is that really something someone thinks is possible? I mean, conspiracy theories can get pretty wild at times, if rather nonsensical. You’d think they would use such a technology for a more beneficial purpose than… that. But, nothing about the whole thing is logical."

"Danya." Alex absent-mindedly corrected Max, staring at the book for a few seconds more before flipping it shut and adjusting the bookmark. It was a good book, but like, it was sorta weird to have to try to explain it, specifically when like, the subject manner was so morbid and like, still fresh. Like, the last one was only three years ago, and they still had the little memorial speeches every July 19th. But, uh, yeah, it was fine. Max and Medea didn't seem to be all too bothered about his interests. Things were sorta going well.

Max had actually brought up a pretty interesting point as well, which was Danya's whole sorta 'everyone look at me' thing. Whenever some class of kids got taken for SOTF, it was the only thing the news networks could talk about for a few weeks, at least until the footage started rolling out and the more inquisitive people started watching it. Especially with like, them being taken from the literal capital last time. It was a pretty risky move. but, like, it had worked, and people wouldn't stop talking about it and how much of a security failure and humiliation it was for the government. But now most places didn't really do senior trips anymore, and COVID had probably still sorta messed stuff up, so they were probably gonna take like, a year off, break from that three year rhythm. Either that, or look overseas.

Zoning out as he thought, Alex only managed to catch the tail end of Medea's question. "Teleportation? Uh, yeah, some people like, think that the government has teleportation and secretly uses it and doesn't give it to the public for any number of reasons. It's stupid, but- you OK?" She had like, the sort of red eyes that you get when you cry, and like, her eyes were sorta teary and all that and Alex started to feel sorta weird because like, she hadn't really liked talking about it and, uh, had he done something bad?

"We can, uh, we can talk about something else if that, uh, i-if that makes you feel better."