Survival Of The Fittest

On the third day, K. Emerson did not exist.

[K. Emerson continued from Wurlitzer Jukebox]

On the fourth day, K. Emerson awoke in a bed with no memory of how there he arrived. It was not the only unremembered thing since he first arose from the high place, but this one hurt more, like a beetle rolling up his brain. There was blood everywhere, and K. was almost hungry enough. Sooner or later he would have to kill, because he was thirsty enough, of that he could be sure. Since leaving his bag behind, and not going back, only wandering deeper into the static—since then he had felt himself disappearing, falling into the sooty void of his stomach, curdled into a wad of bile, rotten milk smell.

Recent neurological research suggests that there is a spike in brain activity not during the moment of decision-making, but just before; that the appearance of choice to the conscious mind is simply an illusion, and the hard work is already done before we have a chance to say anything. To say nothing of cosmic determinism, the predictability of all action based on previous interactions between gravitationally significant bodies of matter, on a personal trapped within one's own head level this kills free will dead. It makes no difference, of course, whether your body chooses or you do, or where one finds the line rending twain, or if one is at all. Not unless one was able to return to the reptilian mind, the pre-conscious bio-machine, would a pre-emption of this precedential brainwork be possible—and to what end? The carrying out of a non human impulse? What can a reptile mind do? It cannot speak, cannot love; it cannot know that it is dying. It finds the hot places and avoids the cold. It notices food and consumes before thought. Its entire body is a muscle that contracts and expands, a snapping jaw wrapped around an intestine, and sex organs.

K. is not yet that monster, though he has begun to shed his skin. He rises groggy, groaning, unperceiving of the rising and falling vocal tones of the God Voice from an unseen font of noise. He picks up his mace from the floor and almost drops it, not ready for the weight. His head, unadorned by hat or helm, is coated in a sheen of skin oils and sweat, his hair a greasy plume of faded brown. Clothes smelling of bodily fluid—any and all will do. Take your pick.

With both hands now K. picked up the mace and began to patrol the quarters, in search of another head to smash—to reach inside, eat the brains, and become human again.

It didn't strike Cassie as fair that Dawn's name was brought up that morning in the same breadth as killers such as Katelyn, Jessica and... Fitz.

((Cassie Chao continued from The Disappearance of an Internet Angel))

She tried not to think too much about it, burying her head under the makeshift blanket of t-shirts and jumpers she'd thrown together. Though with yesterday's tragedy still fresh in her mind, it was all but impossible to ignore those two names, and the horrific memories that came with them.

It pained her to think that it was less than a week ago that hearing Dawn's name reminded her of all the good times they had shared. The quiet conversations, Cassie sharing her newest character designs, Dawn returning the favour by giving her knitting tips and reassuring her about her overblown health scares. Those memories were all tainted now, replaced by the sound of Tenshi screaming, the stench of burnt flesh, the image of those cold eyes gazing out into nothingness...

Cassie tightened that bottle lid a little more, rolling onto her side to gaze at the concrete wall beside her. She never thought she'd find herself missing that stupid Hello Kitty alarm clock.

The rest of the day had been relatively uneventful, mostly spent trying to explore the research station without drawing undue attention. Which, given the signs and sounds of carnage that surrounded them, meant it was mostly spent darting from one building to another trying to not get spotted. They briefly considered heading elsewhere, but by that point it started getting too dark to return to town before nightfall, so instead they opted to spend the night at the sleeping quarters.

And now, with the announcement come and gone, she didn't want to do anything else but curl up in her bed and sleep until she had finally awoken from this nightmare. She could even pretend that she was back home, close her eyes and fool herself into thinking she was in her bedroom, despite the terrible draft. Or the biting cold. Or the strange stains in her mattress that she desperately tried to ignore. Or the odd smell that emanated from some of the other rooms. Or the various concerning noises they had heard throughout the night, remaining quiet and keeping those doors shut tightly, hoping against all hope that if there was a killer on the prowl that they wouldn't think to explore their rooms...

Other than all that, it was just like home really.

((Madeleine Molliqaj continued from The Disappearance of an Internet Angel))

The Hilton, this place was not. In fact, Madeleine imagined that one of the hostels that dotted Salem for the tourists who wanted to visit on a budget was much more comfortable than this place. She could imagine how the bedroom she was currently in was comfortable and homely once upon a time. She could imagine what she would do with it: add some paint to make it cheerfull, put some personal effects on the desks, pictures or scented candles to add some warmth and life to the room. Maybe a laptop so she could listen to music or watch shows. Then she started wondering about how the person who lived here once upon a time could have been anyone, and while she was waiting for Cassie to wake up, Madeleine fantasised about who they could have been.

It was preferable thinking about someone else's life compared to hers right now.

Tenshi hadn't invaded her dreams, thankfully. In time, Madeleine expected that she'd make an appearance to torment her. She would have died no matter what, and... it was better that she died with friends around her rather than from a painful and slow infection caused by a man who didn't care for anything other than himself.

Really, did that describe the man who shot her or the man who abandoned her?

Fitz's name had appeared in the announcement. Mildred, a girl who Madeleine had seen once or twice, heard about, was dead at his hands. Shot with his rifle. It was silly, but Madeleine felt guilty. Maybe if she hadn't been so harsh on him, hadn't yelled at him, he wouldn't have stormed off and found himself in that situation. Even still...

Unable to bear the silence that left her inside her own head and playing with dangerous thoughts, Madeleine slowly got up, exited her room and knocked on Cassie's door gently. They'd heard noises through the night, and whether it was the building creaking and settling or killers slinking around, she didn't want to imagine.

"Cassie? It's me. Are you awake?" She whispered urgently, eyes darting around the corridor. Two ways an attacker could come from, and that wasn't even counting the doors. Someone could be holed up in there, waiting for someone to pass by to ambush them.

In a way, she preferred the wilderness. Madeleine knew the woods and the wilds of Salem, and while the snowy abyss outside the building wasn't the same, she could close her eyes and imagine it was if not for the freezing presence that was the terrorists and the other people here.

K. avoided looking in the mirror a second time as he moved to the door of his room. His first thought was that he was likely not alone. It was still early enough in the proceedings that if one were to be lost, for a moment, in a whirlwind of illogic, that they might pick this place for comfort, ignorant of the blood red target painted upon their sleeping selves. It was horribly uncomfortable, but indoors. It was claustrophobic, but there were beds. If he could remember yesterday, he figured he might remember being so distraught that he allowed himself this, out of self-pity told as self-care. Maybe he'd hoped to wake up dead. To be a nice snack for an early bird.

But he did not remember that mood, and considered it a miracle that he was still alive. Alive and chosen to do the pecking. Slowly, he turned the knob on the side of his door, and pushed it open a hair. He could see that the door across the hall from his own was closed. The doorway diagonally across on the other side was doorless; nobody would choose that, as a hiding place. Blocked from looking down behind the doorframe without sticking his neck out further and revealing himself, K. could only see that, down the hallway, someone was trying to get into somebody else's room.

It was the knock that drew his attention, first. He could see that she was talking, but didn't know the words. What he knew was, she had a club, and he didn't know her name. That kept him from making any sudden movements. For now, he was staying in the room, until he saw what whoever she was with had.

Unfortunately his stomach had other ideas, and suddenly groaned like the hull of the Titanic, forcing him to retreat momentarily from the door until it was done.

Madeleine's question was met with a disgruntled groan, followed by several footsteps before the door opened ajar to reveal a groggy looking Cassie.

"Morning Maddie..." she yawned, wiping the sleep from her eyes. "S-sorry, just... Haven't slept in an actual bed for a while now."

Truth be told, she was thankful to finally have an excuse to get up. She probably would've just spent the entire day laying there if left uninterrupted, ignoring any hunger pangs or back aches, more than happy to just cocoon up and occupy herself with her own idle musings. Anything to get her mind off the reality of her situation, or the unpleasant memories of the previous morning.

"Everything okay?" she asks, completely oblivious to the pair of eyes staring at them further down the corridor.

In that time between Madeleine's knock and Cassie's answer, many ideas flashed through her mind, each more horrifying than the last. Cassie had left her for some reason in the night and left Madeleine alone, she'd gently open the door and find that Cassie had been brutally murdered overnight by one of the many people whose names accompanied the announcements or worse, that she'd find nothing but the scene of a long-ended fight with no sign of Cassie. So, to see the door open and find Cassie sleepily rubbing her eyes on the other side was very welcome.

"Yeah, it's OK. Just, uhm, I wanted to make sure everything was fine. I, I mean uhm, I just wanted to make sure you were OK!" As the last of Madeleine's worry and paranoia left her mouth in a stupid tangled gabble, she gently giggled afterwards. "Sorry. Just, uhm, didn't want to stay in that room by myself any longer. Just, uhm, couldn't stop thinking about, anyway nevermind. How did you sleep?" She felt relaxed now, not bothering to look up and down the corridor.

She was with her friend. Everything was fine.

Everything was not fine, meanwhile, in K.'s room.

Cowering in the corner, waiting for the other shoe to drop, K. shook like a leaf. If they had heard him, and were armed, they'd be right after him. It was over. He could try and get one good swing in, but only just so his arms would fly careening off when he caught the shotgun blast to the face that awaited him. So, no. Here in the corner he'd stay. All by himself, if he could help it. Any second now, he'd go, and with dignity.



Any second now.





Aaaaaaany second now.




It wasn't happening. Not the way he'd anticipated. At the door, and he was there in a blink, he leaned out and spied the girl down the hall, talking to yet another, standing in the open doorway. So there was a numbers advantage. No word yet on whether they were better armed too. Maybe it was time for a different tactic. Play the pathetic. But he couldn't just use the mace as a cane. Hold it from the top, and poked. Flip it over, and the ball doesn't make for something you can exactly put on the floor to steady yourself.

At this point, why don't I just get it over with and charge them?

He could not; he was afraid to die.

Maybe I'll just walk over, non-threateningly, but not pretending to be injured? Maybe they've killed and have food to spare. Get rid of excess bag-weight.

Yeah, sure. Just be a good neighbor and ask if they have any baking soda. That might work. Fuck it, why not? Anything goes at this point.

K. opened the door, walked into the hall, looked down the way at them, and couldn't bear the shame. He walked across the way into the other, unoccupied room, and hoped they hadn't seen him as he went and sat in the far corner of the room, scratching his patchy four day neckbeard stubble.

"Um..." Cassied replied, pausing as she considered Madeleine's question.

She found herself thinking back to the previous evening, spent curled up under those loose covers trying to drown out the strange noises throughout the night. She couldn't remember much about her dreams, though the snippets she recalled were vivid enough to stick in her mind.

A lone ice skater making figure eights on a vast frozen lake. A house that she had never seen before, yet felt intimately familiar with. A strange sensation in her arm, that upon closer inspection revealed itself to be a festering wound. A sharp, piercing scream that cut through her like a knife. A figure in bloody rags, staring blankly with dead frozen eyes.

"...I slept okay, I guess."

She rubbed her arm, pondering their next move. Though a small part of her was curious as to what secrets this building held, the rest of her wanted to leave as soon as possible. There was a wretched smell in the air, one that reminded her all too well of the house they stayed in during their first night. No doubt about it, this building had its fair share of ghosts. Ghosts Cassie saw no reason to disturb any further.

"I think we should..." she began, only to stop, the sound of a creaking door catching her attention. She turned her head a second too late, just barely missing a glimpse of the ghoul prowling in their midst, her heartbeat steadily increasing as she felt a chill in the air.

"D-d-did... Did you hear something?"

Madeleine didn't reply at first, busy gazing down the hall where she'd heard the door creaking.

"Yeah. I did." Bringing the sword up to bear so she could firmly grasp it in two hands, busy repressing the memories that the sword now carried like a bad stench, Madeleine nodded, her voice carrying a nervously authoritarian lilt to it. She didn't want to use this on anybody anymore, but she'd seen, she'd heard what people could do. Fitz murdering people with his rifle. Tenshi dying because someone shot her with the same gun. Madeleine wasn't going to let that happen to Cassie or her.

It was too early for this, a little dark part of her mind joked, and Madeleine found one half of her mouth cracking up in a weary smile, the kind reserved for when you're in a situation where nothing is actually funny but you're going to go insane if you don't take a little humour in something.

"What do we do? Think it came from up there," Madeleine pointed with her sword up the hallway, "so we should be free to run the other way,"

It could be a friend, Chloe or Corbin or someone friendly.

But it might not be, and that was enough to make her think twice.

Cassie took a deep breath, eyes fixated on the end of that corridor as she waited.

The fact they neither of them had a clue what made that noise just made things infinitely worse, her imagination running wild. After all, maybe it really was a friendly face, like Dawn or Kelsey or one of Madeleine's friends. Or maybe it was Katelyn Graves, covered head to toe in blood, prowling and waiting for them to turn their back...

There was a cold gust of wind, Cassie initially mistaking it for a distant death whistle.

"...I think we should leave now."

Quietly slipping back into her room, she quickly bundled her things back into her bag, making sure not to leave anything important before returning to the hallway. Nodding to Madeleine, she silently made her way back towards the exit, not wishing to linger a second longer than necessary.

((Cassie Chao continued elsewhere...))

One day, Madeleine thought, she'd like to stand up for herself and Cassie and not run from a scary noise or threatening people. She'd like to stand up and go check out that noise to see if it was a friend or someone dangerous. She'd like to ask the strange and threatening people who lied about people being dead what the hell their problem was and what the hell they were trying to achieve by spreading fear and misinformation.

But, today was not that day. Madeleine waited patiently outside Cassie's room, her nerve ready to break at another creepy noise or movement in the corner of her eye. Cassie led the way out once she had all her stuff, and Madeleine followed behind.

((Madeleine Molliqaj continued in Take Me Somewhere Nice))

Aaaaaaaany second now.

---

It did not come. Not until the announcement that woke K. up early the next morning. Thirstier. Hungrier.

K. went outside, with his mace. It was colder, and some snow was still loosely clinging to the ground. When he was close enough he dropped to the ground and began to shovel it into his mouth. Handful after handful disappeared down his throat. Cold. Wet. Tangled with dirt and grass. It was the first thing to pass between his lips since the forgotten day.

A great mass of clouds had gathered in the sky. Even in his deprived state, the starving mongrel dog in him sensed what those meant; a storm, a blizzard, a torrent—a flood.

Would this be his ark?

He tried to remember how it was that he had come to stand here. Before this, there was yesterday, and before that, a day he had forgotten. But in between yesterday and two days before, he had come a long distance; it had been a road day. That must be why he could not remember; he was lost somewhere on the side of the road from the mine. It hadn't been quite a distance the preceding day from then to the town, the bar. And he had come there from...










From...

It was no use. There was a hole in his brain where his beginning should be.

If only he had his map, he would know the shape he had walked, and where he likely came from. But now it was all a jumble, only territory.

So he could keep going, keep following the road, find what he may, or he could stay put, explore the labyrinth, shelter from the storm, him and surely soon everyone else.

And what would they look for? A place to stay. And what better place to stay, than the place for staying?

So he needed away. But not like, gone away. Shelter was still needed.

K. shoved another fistful of snow in his mouth.

"Rotate," he said, through bites.

He took a few more handfuls of snow, shoved them into his pockets, and then he was gone.

[K. Emerson continued elsewhere.]