Survival Of The Fittest

Win or lose.

That had been his philosophy, both in this game and in life. If you weren't a winner, then you were a loser, and that was that. The only thing that mattered—above anything else—was that you had the higher score and did better than somebody else. So, he put his nose to the grindstone and always played to win because he couldn't stomach the alternative.

It was a miserable way to live, in hindsight. He'd taken his whole life and turned it into a zero-sum game. So, when the rules of the game changed—when you scored points not by shots at a hoop, but shots at your peers—all it took for him to jump in was the idea that maybe, just maybe, he'd have a shot at the gold. Because, in the end, all he wanted was to win.

All that to win. All that for a trophy clasped in tight hands, a medal draped proudly around the neck, and a foot on the podium.

All for nothing.

S043: DONOVAN LAUER — CONTINUED FROM "Honor Amongst Thieves"

Donovan stumbled away from the scene of the crime. Spattered drops of blood followed behind him, mixed earth and red, a path he'd paved for himself—how long had he spent blazing this trail for himself, in hindsight? Damn. At the time, he'd never seen it coming, but now, it seemed like it'd been an inevitable result of his actions all along. He wished he'd known.

He raised his hand to his mouth and coughed into it as a terrible pain shot through his lungs, the loud echo of his wound. Then, through haze-ridden eyes, like a foggy mirror on a rainy day, he saw the crimson specks in the palm of his hand. It was blood. He understood it now, all of a sudden, exactly where this road led—not to the Hall of Fame, but to the grave.

"Jen," he said, with a turn of his head. His voice didn't sound familiar, not as commanding or strong as he'd always imagined. Maybe it never had. "Hey, Jen. Can we slow down for just a little bit?" He gritted his teeth. The adrenaline and the energy had faded. His body hurt all over. The grief of his loss weighed on his shoulders like millstones. And he felt so, so tired.

Truth be told? Donovan didn't want to slow down. But he couldn't keep up anymore.

((Jennifer Farrow continued from Honor Among Thieves))

The adrenaline still hadn’t worn off. She had been in fight-or-flight situations before, she’d been in situations where she had to win. She played competitive sports. She even took some outdoors training once, and at one point pushed herself so hard that she felt proud to have survived it all.

This was nothing compared to being in a real situation, with real people shooting her. She didn’t even notice Donovan calling out to her until she checked back occasionally.

“Fuck! Shit… Donny… I got you.” Jennifer rushed back and held him close. They’re both athletic, but Jenny thinks maybe she could carry him. It was a nice thought, and if they were out camping, on a normal school day, she’d do that to get him back safe, but it was going to be tiring doing this, and did she have enough food to keep her energy up? And where even is ‘safety’?

No, no. He’s hurt.

“C’mon, hey. Can you walk? I’ll hold you up, or hell, I can even carry you, man. Just…” she looked around, hand gripped to her spear. “...we need to stay safe. So just, stay with me, okay?”

She didn’t want to lose him. Not now.

Donovan didn't want to be a burden.

Back home, part of his philosophy was that people should pull their weight on a team. Otherwise, you were like an iron ball around everyone else's ankles, and you weighed them down, you dragged them down. You were a burden. All his life, he'd hated people like that. He came to play, came to win—not to carry the rest of the team on his two shoulders.

He wasn't enough of a hypocrite to think that same idea couldn't apply to him. He'd gotten lucky, of course—never an injury throughout his time on the team—but if he hadn't, he'd be the first to offer to ride the bench. It wouldn't be fair to hold the rest of them back for the sake of his ego. That was the same thing he'd complained about for years and years and years.

Donovan wouldn't be a burden for long.

"No, no," he said, waved Jenny's concerns aside with one hand and clutched his wound with the other. "Just need to take a breath, you know? I'll be fine, Jen." It was another falsehood, the latest in the series he'd told her throughout their time on the island. At this point, it was a bad habit. The lies trickled down and out of his mouth as the blood did.

Each flex of the wound sent another wave of sudden pain through him, aftershocks to the earthquake. The red crimson seeped through his shirt, sticky and wet. The smell was thick in the air, like rusty coins, and he felt sick to his stomach but held back the bile as best as he could. With each breath, it got harder to take the next. He had to make them count now.

Donovan sighed, and his brown eyes softened. Then, he collapsed against one of the congregation's pews, back slid against the worn-out wood. "You don't need to worry about me," he lied again. "We're safe now. You're going to be fine, Jen. You're going to be fine." For once, it was the truth. Then, he repeated it—for himself this time. "You're gonna be just fine."

"Just karma, right?" He laughed, false confidence in his voice.

Maybe it was.

After everything, all the pain and all the lies, maybe it was.

"Just karma," he murmured. He'd never expected to end his life with a confession on his deathbed. But, at this point, after it all, he felt like he owed one. If not to anyone else, then to Jenny. She deserved it. "You know, Jen," he muttered, "I've got a lot of stuff to get off my chest. And, when I'm done with all that," he frowned, "I think you're gonna hate me."

“Hey man, don’t say that okay, Don?” Jenny leans down to him. “That’s like, a common death flag thing in movies. And you’re not gonna die, okay?” Jenny smiled. She smiled because she had to. If she didn’t, she’d be crying right now. Crying at the possibility of her only friend on this island being gone.

“And you’re gonna live okay, so don’t go saying stuff like you’re about to die…”

A lump built in her throat.

“...I won’t hate you, and you’re gonna be fine too. I promise, Don. I promise.”

She held her spear, looking around, but ultimately glancing back at Donovan. “Just… rest. I’ll keep watch, okay? Here, j-just watch my bag. Take any food, not that I have a lot, from it. Okay? For energy?”

She was going through a phase of denial, and she knew it.

Donovan flashed a weak smile.

"I'm not hungry, Jen," he murmured. A hand shot out to push the bag away. "If I was, I've got enough already." He muttered something else that she couldn't quite hear. Then, he took a long, shallow gasp, and a wheeze escaped his lips. His body pulsed with the pain from the center outwards, ripple effects across a body made of half-water.

"Ill-gotten gains," a toothy grin, insincere, "for all the good that did me, anyway." His right hand clutched the bag's strap around his shoulder like a lifeline, left holding the wound tight. "I'm a killer now. And before that, I was a liar and a thief." He couldn't quite feel bad about everything he'd done wrong—only that it hadn't worked out right in the end.

"Figured you should know," he whispered to her weakly. "You deserve that much."

Jenny had suspected, at least a little bit. She thought she would hate him for it, since she had been attacked by a killer, liar, and thief just as well. It was the whole reason they even went on this stupid plan. But whether because Donovan was hurt, or because Jenny didn’t want to push people away, she gritted her teeth and looked him straight in the eye.

“That doesn’t matter right now, Don,” she told him. She didn’t believe that. It did matter. She was hurt, especially because she really did trust him. Why didn’t he just explain to her when they first met up? She wouldn’t have thrown him out. What Crystal did to her was different, what those other people did, killing people, hurting them… they were different… right? She had to believe Donovan was different too, even if he did lie to her and killed someone.

But at the same time, she didn’t hate him. She felt hurt, but didn’t hate him. She didn’t know if it was because she spent the last two days with him or because he was probably the only one on this island that had been friendly with her.

The pause was enough to make that hesitation, that feeling of pain, visible on her face, before she wiped it out a split-second later, more concerned with saving Donovan’s life. “What matters is we need to get you somewhere safe, patch you up, and—”

She noticed the bleeding just now. She knew that he had to have been hurt, with how he had slowed down as they ran off, but she wasn’t expecting it to be this bad.

“Shit. Shit, Don, you’re bleeding. Hang on, there’s a first aid kit in the bag, right?” Jenny went to work quick, rustling through her pack to find the basic medical supplies they came with. But she was still in denial. She knew that with the amount of blood seeping through his clothes, it might be too late.

But she didn’t want to think that. She didn’t want to think that at all.

Donovan saw the pain in her face, the sorrow in the lines and creases of her skin, in the way she frowned at him, a picture of disappointment he'd seen plenty already. The smile on his own washed away like a sandcastle in a tsunami. The relief faded into distant memory and turned to a hollow pang of regret, the worst of all the magic tricks inside his mind's arsenal.

"I didn't want to take that to the grave," he murmured, an incisive honesty on the tip of his tongue. "Better late than never, right?" The quip was empty-hearted. Right now, he could feel his soul sink into his boots. Acceptance had a bitter taste, but it healed like medicine. At this point, it was the only thing that could save him. Maybe not in life, but afterward.

Donovan's eyes were warm, but his body felt so cold now. Hers still carried all their hurt in them, and he could tell. He didn't have any more comforting words for her, not honest ones, anyway—and he had lied to her too many times. He couldn't do it again. But he had his reasons, and he could still give those, for whatever they were even worth to her now.

He craned his neck up. It was so heavy now, a crown he couldn't bear, the weight crushing. Then, he felt something caught in his throat. What it was, he didn't know. Words or blood? Then, he coughed again and had his answer, crimson specks across his tongue and lips. Blood, then. Then, he gasped for air and sucked it in greedily, one last theft for parting ways.

"I just wanted to be a winner," Donovan croaked weakly. "That's all I ever wanted—to win something for once, just once, in my life. I was tired of losing. I was tired of being a loser." Then, he laughed weakly from shock and the situation. "I know," he said, "not a good reason. But it's the only one I've got to give." And if that wasn't the truth, there was no such thing.

"Jen," he murmured. "Keep on going, Jen; don't just go and give up and die, alright?" The game wasn't over until it was over. So much left to go. "I want you to win it all, Jen—to win where I couldn't." He pulled the gun out from his pocket and pressed it tight into her hands, a final pass of the ball. "I want you to win," he whispered, "so win. Go for gold," his last words.

And then the world went dark. Donovan took one last breath of air, and he knew, knew, knew, that was what it was. Because no matter how fast he went, how hard he fought, or how far he got, it wouldn't have changed a thing. And, when the reaper came, clad in darkness, scythe in hand, there was no resistance—he only flashed a weak smile. The time came at last.

He was ready.

No more running.

S043: DONOVAN LAUER — DECEASED
80 STUDENTS REMAIN

Go for gold. Win.

These were the same kinds of words her parents gave to her, and now Donovan, someone who actually cared about her, who was the only kind person in this island, where people showed their true colors. The people she was with just now tried to kill them, and yes, Donovan did plan to kill them first, but they were just as ruthless.

Were there any good people left?

"Don... I..."

She closed his eyes, aware that he's probably long gone by now.

"...You can rest now. You've won..."

Jenny felt a tear run through her face. She didn't even feel sick, or any other kind of emotion, just loss. She's experienced grief before. Her grandparents have died, a family friend, one of her neighbor's kids that she played basketball with once passed away from an illness. Those made her sad, but this... this death was different, somehow.

It made her feel hollow. It felt pointless. She wished she knew how to properly bury a body, instead of just... leaving him here for the animals to take him. At least someone would still care for him. Would anyone do the same for her? He would. She was sure of it.

So she would have to make it mean something. She was holding onto hope, and this was being crushed every moment. She realized now that she really did have to win. She'd have to play smart, she'd have to find a way to survive.

But Donovan already won.

He didn't have to make the choices Jennifer may have to make in the future. He's earned a peaceful rest.

((Jennifer Farrow continued elsewhere))