Survival Of The Fittest

[S119 - Julia Guercio - continued from FUBAR]

Most people would run away from the sound of gunfire, but this burst in the nearby wintry forest was different. It was the catalyst for everything that happened with Matthew and the others, the tipping point of the tension that granted him his wildcard move to shoot at her and flee. It echoed through the rows of trees and bushes, embedding the terror of inevitable demise for all close enough to listen.

But this time it felt significant. This wasn’t like other gunfire that had echoed across the island over the preceding days.

There was a striking familiarity to the sound, a mysterious yet attractive allure that pulled her in like the song of a siren.

Call it an instinct or a gut feeling, the sharp, wrenching feeling in the pit of her stomach cut across her like a blade, ripping her insides out as she felt her brain be consumed by manic manifestations and panic. Her heart performed somersaults as her mind strayed to the worst case scenario. Something just didn’t feel right; her normally flushed cheeks instead fading to an uncharted paleness. A natural camouflage to the snowy sheathing that cornered her in every direction.

Julia studied her map to figure out her location, frantically pacing through the labyrinth of trees around her. The sound of the earlier gunfire acted as her only compass as she manoeuvred her way through the mirror maze of expanse. Each tree conspicuously disguised as the next.

It felt like an impossible trek until she found footprints leading away from the path. The falling snow working quickly at covering up any evidence of foul play.

Julia’s heart pounded as she followed the tracks, aware of how late she was for her reunion with Joshua.

As the blustering storm raged on, visibility seemed to only be decreasing more and more. The wind was picking up and the gusts were scathing on her skin, Julia at this point was sheltering most of her chin and face below the top collar of her coat. She kept going on the treacherous route, getting more and more wound up over how overwhelmingly badly her day had gone by the minute until she was at the point of hyperventilation. She had to stop to rest, catch her breath and come to her senses, slightly insulated by the foliage of the trees and branches around and above her. Looking at her map was meaningless at this point, the labyrinth she had found herself in continued to stretch in each direction for as far as her eye's could see.

She was worried how Joshua would react at how late she was. Had he been out here in the snow all day waiting patiently for her? And she had left him waiting because of her own incompetence. She knew she was disappointing him, just like she always disappointed people.

Scarily, perhaps her current fears and feelings were the perfect indication of the unwavering control that Joshua somehow had over her. A sense of dependence, like a gravitational pull that kept her wanting to be her best self for him, like he was all that mattered at this time. To impress him, to help him and to prove to him that he was right to trust her and help her get to this point in the game. He believed in her, which counteracted the worst moments of their time together. Enduring the mind games and the moments where he had lost control or acted indignantly towards her. She was able to see past that and forgive him; like when he scared her half to death on the bed in the dormitory room as he teased maliciously that she deserved to be punished. She knew that it wasn't acceptable behaviour and wanted to escape in that moment and throughout the hours afterwards. But waking up, his apology felt honest, that he meant what he was saying.

I will never ever do that again.

They were words that sparked her forgiveness each time. Like an abusive lover, he repeated the same tropes. The nonsense that always work in the movies and have you screaming at the characters about how stupid they are to take them back.

I'll change. I won't ever do it again. I'll do better.

And yet, a cliché as old as time worked hook line and sinker each time.

Even though his actions were sometimes questionable, his spoken words felt earnestly truthful. An honesty that felt reassuring. Even when he put her in that grave situation with Przemek it didn't feel bad forever. Even at her lowest, stooped over his bloodied corpse retching through the tears, Joshua was there to console her and make her feel like she wasn't the worst person in the world. Even though she had just done something she had never in her wildest imagination expected to have to do, he was there to pick her up. He knew the truth about her, the situation, and who she really was. If you ignore the gruesome lengths he went to force her in to that situation, deep down he only wanted the best for her. Without that happening she would be guaranteed to never leave the island, and he offered a comforting refuge that he wanted her to go home.

And now he was the only one who knew who she really was, knew the truth about the situation with Przemek and the necessity of her actions to comfort Przemek and end his suffering whilst also securing her own chance to live out the long life that she had always wanted. Everybody else on the island would view her simply as a murderer, somebody that had no issues with killing somebody. The sharp sound of the thuds as she drummed the rock in to Przemek's face still traumatised her but nobody would know the inevitability of what was going to happen if she didn't. His fate had already been sealed.

The more she repeated the story in her head the more she believed it.

That she had done Przemek a favour, given him one last saving grace of mercy to release him from the pain and suffering he was having to endure in this world. It had to happen, and unfortunately she had to play the role of the vessel of the delivery.

And yet through the repetition of her memories, Julia couldn't shake her present morbid feeling that was consuming her from the inside out about what would happen when she was reunited with Joshua. She was scared over how he would react. What was going through his mind right now? Was he upset with her for not showing up to meet up with him? Was he angry with her for not following through with her promise? Did he think that she was abandoning him?

Julia was fourteen at the time - old enough to understand what death meant but young enough to still carry the naivety of how death felt.

The sound of the phone ringing was the starkest part of her memory. The shrill tones that reverberated effortlessly throughout each room of the Guercio household bore no foreshadow of what was about to come. Julia had been studying with her older sister Marina when the call came in. Dad was out playing golf whilst mom was in the backyard planting new rose bulbs. She’d only just started to be allowed to answer the home phone recently so there was nothing abnormal about her enthusiastic dash for the phone.

“Hello? Guercio household!” She beamed excitedly, smile raised from one ear to the other like the cat that got the cream. Julia enjoyed the feigned importance of such formalities.

“Ciao Nonno!”

She replied to the voice down the phone, her excitement replaced by concern for the sorrow in his voice. A soft wobble as he delicately battled to keep control of his emotions, in a bid to protect his young granddaughter from suspecting the worse.

“Are you ok Nonno? Let me get mom.”

Without waiting for a response Julia spun her heels and ran from the kitchen to the patio door at the back of the house to lead her mom back to the phone. There was a nervous energy that riddled the air around them as her mom’s slow walk evolved to a gallop addressing Julia’s sense of concern and urgency.

Everything that followed haunted her for a long time. She may not have thought it did, at least not at a surface level, but the fears of death and grief often played on her mind. The impact on her troubled thoughts saturated through her brain as she confronted the expiry of life for the first time.

It was never easy watching somebody you care about be upset. Trying to console them whilst not knowing how best to do so. The silk in her mom’s voice rapidly descended into anguish, a flurry of tears replacing the grin planted on her face as she cultivated the garden. Her words, despite choked though the crying, managed to be comforting, an immediate offer of support and condolences. Marina and Julia looked at each other anxiously as they watched on, unsettled by what was unfolding before them. The calculus they were working on before no longer relevant as they feared the worst.

Before long, dad was back home and the girls were being sat down. Mom had been cryptic with them ever since getting off the phone and dodged any questions they asked with the finesse of a politician. Dad shared with them that Nonna had passed away. Perhaps they were lucky that this was the first time a member of their family had died, but it was sudden without any warning signs. In a way that didn’t help the emotional detachment that followed; without the forewarning they weren’t given the blessing of being able to prepare. Of course it would still be a shock, it never wasn’t, but not having that mental safety rail building up to the crescendo was further damaging.

As with many Italian families, the Guercio’s were very close. Life in New Jersey was good. In fact, not just good, things were fantastic. The sense of community was unparalleled and that was the thing she had struggled the most with about moving to Salem, Massachusetts. Ever since the relocation, Julia had felt herself slipping into the shadows. A long, slow fall that she couldn’t seem to grapple against. The once-confident young girl was being replaced by a socially anxious, hesitant shell of her past self with a total lack of self-belief. Being further removed from her grandparents, her cousins and her friends from elementary school cemented her apprehension in daily life – her laser pinpointed in the direction of school, swimming and a greater dependence on her immediate family. Even her sisterly bond with Marina, despite how annoying she could be, strengthened.

The loss of her Nonna had only worsened the dissipation of her extroversion.

Her fond memories of Nonna and the unconditional love that she had blessed her with; the beautiful home cooking and extravagant hosting skills, the warm hugs of reassurance and lessons taught on how to be kind, and the many chest laughs over the years. These were the important remembrances that lived on despite her dampened spirit. The insurmountable warmth and happiness she once felt whenever thinking or being with her beloved grandparents had been betrayed by a sentiment of loss and emptiness. She couldn’t think of those happy times without being plagued with sorrow and afflicted with the grief left behind. Internet searches on how to successfully mourn a loss had not amounted to anything worthwhile and it wasn’t a life lesson that anybody had ever taught her. How do you manage loss and change? Both were terrifying.

What shocked the most was how life around seemed to just go on by as normal. Lives continued to be lived, clocks continued to tick each tock. She was left straddled with her uncontrolled emotions which so easily got the better of her, whilst for everybody else nothing had changed. You live your entire life thinking you are important and that you mean something, but as soon as your alarm clock goes off and your time on this planet is up, you fade away and people forget you.

Surprisingly, Julia didn’t actually cry during the funeral and the weeks leading up to it. In a way it was her way of bottling up her emotions, by distancing herself from her family and isolating herself in a bubble of wounded grief. The tears she expected to weep were instead trapped by her subverted fears and an inescapable weight bearing down on her that she should be the strong one. She felt uncomfortable throughout it all, worried that to the outside world the emptiness she felt at losing her Nonna revealed a deeper problem with her, that was she was different and not like the other girls. The reality of course was very different. Her hollowness came as a prize for caring too much and the intimidation of how to grieve acceptably.

Unfortunately, Julia’s desire to put other people first only snowballed. It was okay for her to be the invisible one, because intrinsically she did not feel she mattered. It was a burden she never relinquished, even though for her own mental well-being she probably should have.

Life went on by - the family dynamic wasn't impacted too much. Maybe for the first couple of days and weeks, but by the end of the month in some ways it felt like Nonna never even existed. The deep stench of normality they bathed in as the days continue to pass.

The memories grew further in to the past with each passing day, the boldness of her recollection fading at the same time.




Perhaps the same would happen when she didn't return home from the school trip. When she was no more.

Julia's pacing through the snow resulted in very little outside of pessimistic thoughts, each crossroad looked identical to the last. There was no way of telling whether she was just walking around in circles for all of this time, the gunfire from earlier was long gone and met only with silence. Time passing hadn't yielded any success either, she was completely oblivious as to whether it had been half an hour or several hours.

Exposure to the deteriorating weather conditions were having abstract impacts on Julia's mind, fears that she was trapped in an endless snow globe with no escape.

Then in the distance, two heaps that at first glance looked like nothing more than bags piled up on one another. It was only when she drew closer that the bloodied crime scene became more visible, scarlet blood painting the snow. It narrated a skirmish, bags, clothes and weapons spread thinly across the ground.

A chill ran down her spine as the blurred face of the first corpse was uncovered.

The two bodies Julia had stumbled upon were sprawled over on top of one another. The motionless corpse of a young man submerged into the snow, his coat removed, and the exposed undergarments soaked through with a combination of blood and the wet kiss of the snowfall. A spiteful gash had ruptured his neck and seemingly issued a fatal blow whilst a splatter of blood decorated his face for good measure. She scanned the familiar body from top to bottom, stunned by the sight of his arms wrapped around the second body, this time a girl with brown hair that shielded her face from the impending erosion of the elements. The arms wrapped around her had tensed up from the rigor mortis, trapping her in his cold grasp. One hand curled tightly around her neck and the other resting on the side of her face, an eternal grip like that of an old Roman sculpture.

Their surroundings were painted with disturbed snow, clearly showing the sign of a struggle, erratic tracks in the snow sketching a scrambled brawl as the two classmates succumbed to the collision of their fates. Weapons discarded to the ground – a gun her fingertips recognised thrown down on one side of the pair whilst a blade half buried lay on the other. The bodies fused together beautifully contrasted the deflowering of their humanity, the horrors that likely occurred during the vicious encounter nulled by the frozen embrace they had found themselves in.

The girl’s coat was riddled with bullet holes, dried blood around each hole the only remnants of the fury the gun had unleashed. People often make references to finding peace when people die. Anecdotes of the corpses looking peaceful, serene, composed. Yet just like with Przemek this wasn't really the case with this girl either, instead her final appearance represented shock, terror and distress, fossilised in time. She didn’t want to disturb the two but the sinking feeling at the very pit of her stomach scratched at her to investigate further and get a closer look to identify them, and so she moved closer towards the bodies.

Part of her already knew what she was going to uncover but she fought against her better instincts, refusing to believe it could end this way.

No.

No way.

It can’t end this way.

The scraps of crimson-tinted golden hair blew in the wind, revealing itself fully from beneath the girl’s long hair, gave her the answer she already felt inside. As soon as she had heard the gunfire earlier, Julia feared she knew what it meant but this glimpse into the reality of it still stung. The cognizance she discerned from the noise of the erupting bullets had left the writing on the wall and perhaps she had just been delusional for the minutes and hours that followed on from that. She didn't want to believe it, not until she had proof. Perhaps it all just being another cruel joke he played on her, like in the dormitory room, like in the church. But from the trauma depicted on the bed of snow, his fate was absolute.

Julia collapsed to her knees under the weight of what felt like her world caving in.

Her stomach ached with the pressure of a tornado ripping her gut to shreds, she clambered for breath as she choked on a rancid mixture of vomit and air. After a moment everything started to feel empty, like she was completely alone once more. In her mind, the wind around her steadied and the freezing cold that had blighted her trek vanished, overcome by a burst of feverish temperatures of isolation that cut through her veins. The quiet, sensible voice still in the back of her head whispered for her to look away. To leave the scene and never come back. It’s probably the advice she would give somebody else in the same situation as her – retire and never return. No good would come from the lingering resonance. But, like always, Julia didn’t follow her own advice. She owed it to Joshua, and the girl who from closer examination appeared to be another swimmer, Madeleine, to endure this. Even with his death obvious, she still felt under his control.

It's what Joshua would've made her do, just like before she forced herself to look. Like the final glares that burned through her skin from Przemek, it felt necessary. It felt important. She clenched her teeth and looked down at the pair. She couldn't be sure who the antagonist was from the scene as Joshua delicately cradled Madeleine, but from the damage down by the sword she, and a disbelief that Joshua would do anything untoward, Julia made the assumption that Madeleine caused this all to happen.

Julia leaned forward and brushed the girl’s thick long hair from his face, revealing an empty gaze in the whites of his eyes as his once-rosy skin had already started to fade to a lighter shade of pale, likely helped along by the cold. The plumpness of his lips, the same lips he had kissed her with reassuringly only the day before, were replaced by a chilling tint of blue. His eyes had been left slightly open, the frost of the cold weather had garnished his eyelashes. Through her visible shaking, she closed his eyes as a mark of respect.

“W-why?”

Julia punched the snow beside his body, a cascade of temporal frustration washing over her.

“I wouldn’t have left… I wanted to stay…

You made me go…

You wouldn’t take no for answer...

Why did you force me to leave you?”

Her questions were left unanswered, his final parting gift.

Time passed by as she kept hunched beside the intertwined bodies, more snow fell as cradled herself. The silently falling snow had a soothing breath that felt ominously relaxing, like the calm before the storm. It felt reminiscent to the winters as a child living in New Jersey, the visits over to New York City with her family or friends and playing in Central Park. This time the illustrious magic of the snow was disfigured by a sinister edge, unlike in those memories she didn't have any desire for a snowball fight, or to build a snowman. Instead Julia lay down in to the sheet of snow and rested in to a subdued snow angel, or at least half of one. It all felt very melancholic in a depressive way, a blighted trip down memory lane as she wished she would melt away with the snow.

"W-what am I supposed to do now?" she whimpered to herself.

Prior to this she had always had a purpose, a reason or a friend to keep her head above water but now she was all alone and was drowning. It was an isolating tenderness.

Julia always wanted to help people. To make them feel better, to heal them or stop them from hurting, anything she could do to make things better. She was always the strong one, the voice of reason, the one who would put others before herself and now she was simply confused as to what to do next. Joshua had taught her to look out for herself, whilst also sneakily blighting her with a sense of dependence on him throughout their time together. He was a rare comfort on an island of death and despair, and she treasured that warmth. For the 48 hours they were together, it was clear that she needed him to survive as they got down to the business end of the death-sport. He was the one who offered up his rations whilst her own supply grew thin, he was the one who taught her to be strong even when afraid and now her strength had been depleted as much as the blood had drained from his body. He was the one that made sure wherever they travelled to was safe and that his weapon was always primed ready to defend the both of them so that she didn't have to hurt anybody. Perhaps the worst part of the bereavement was that he had convinced her that she could actually do this - she could survive and go home. He even gave her a free ticket for the return journey and for a little over a day that was the glimmer of hope that kept Julia going. She had begrudged him for it at the time, but it was his way of being helpful in the traditional misguided approach that he was familiar with and she was going to miss that. It was the mental stimulation she needed to keep driving onwards, to hold her own against Matthew and the others even in the face of imminent danger. Yet now her shield had been torn to pieces.

Her foolish hope had died along with Joshua.

For once, it was Julia that was hurting and she didn't know how to treat her own sickness. The feeling of emotional emptiness left her feeling numb and apathetic. The fire that once burned inside of her had been snuffed out and all she wanted to do was keep laying there until she succumbed to the exposure of the accelerating winds. She thought about the cameras watching on as she lamented in her feeble cowardice, she didn't want to give up like the terrorists would want, but she didn't have the emotional or physical strength to pull herself together.

Just like when she lost her Nonna, she had plunged into a pool of disinterest. She didn't want to spend time with anybody, she didn't want to speak or move, or do anything.

Her foot tugged against the blade in the snow as her intrusive thoughts willed her on to oblivion.

I can't do this.

Julia had always been somewhat of a control freak. Not overwhelmingly so to the point that it detracted from her generally relaxed personality, but internally she would often find herself screaming at the half-baked actions of others. Disguised under her humble exterior, a splash of arrogance that occasionally let itself out to roam. It wasn’t that she took directly took umbrage with what other people did or how they moved, it was that she believed things should be done in the right type of way; considerately, and to a high standard. Most importantly she knew that she was able to do things to a golden standard, she knew that what she did would be good enough so it irritated her when she was stuck with a sub-optimal performance or was under the control of somebody who cared less than she did. Between her introversion and this, it was safe to say that group projects were not her favourite thing.

Perhaps that was why she loved swimming so much. It was so easy to use those fleeting moments in the pool to block everything else out whilst completely alone with nothing but her thoughts. All other noises were reduced to distorted warbles being sanctified by the ripples that flooded around her. She took every opportunity she could to bathe in what felt like nothing short of a black hole. It was just her, the gentle ocean she was submerged in and the whistle of their coach. There was a danger hidden behind the control; the morbid curiousity that tickled the borders of her control. A natural thrill that came with the risk of losing that totality. In the water she was strong, fully in control; able to control how long she held her breath, how hard she wanted to push or how elegantly she wanted to swim. The tease of the uncertainty, how easy it is for even the strongest of swimmers to be swallowed up and spat out by the plunge, brought an unprecedented calmness like nothing describable.

In some ways it was absolutely terrifying, yet there was a small part of her that still found battling with that risk exhilarating. And now she found herself in a position where everything around was risk. The whole week leading up to this moment had felt like drowning to her. An uncomfortable burning sensation locked in her chest like a final gasp for air that would never appease the pain. An immersive grief that choked her from the moment she had woken up to this point, somehow the oxygen betrothed her lungs regardless of how cataclysmic everything around her felt. The seduction of hope had sometimes gotten the better of her, but since finding Joshua and Madeleine sprawled out in the snow, the insufferable familiarity of pessimism had returned.

There would probably be a sick satisfaction from Joshua if he could see her like this. The destruction of what little dignity she still had left after the Przemek incident and the embarrassing number of tears she had cried in to his welcoming shoulders. She felt beaten down and bruised. Ashlee, Timothy, Przemek, Joshua... the magnitude of her grief was only multiplying and the burden it carried only seemed to worsen over time. Julia remembered Joshua's words of solitude, about feeling unloved or like he didn't matter. It frustrated her that she never had the chance to actually tell him that he was wrong. That people did value him, even if he didn't think so. She was so wrapped up in her own problems that she never really extended that care or attention to him either. She didn't need her to diagnose him, but she was pretty sure she could've offered a helping hand. But now there was no more time left, her selfishness had taken up all the chances she had to raise his spirit.

A heavy sigh. An act of confession that she knew she would need to stop moping around at some point, the thoughts sprinted through her mind of what words of reassurance Joshua would be saying to her right now if he was able to speak to her. He would want her to go on, to succeed. He had already sacrificed so much for her chance at survival, for her chance to make it back home and see the people who meant the world to her. The family she would so often put ahead of herself. But this time she needed to do this for herself. To do it for Joshua. Giving up now would only be throwing that back in his face. Not even to mention her family. Of course she doubted that they'd actually be watching any of this footage, but the longing to see her parents once more, to give her sisters a hug.... those were the emotions and drivers that she needed to lean in to.

It was painfully cold which stung at all of her senses, her runny nose reddened from it's bitter taste. Julia stood up and dusted herself off, the snow falling back to the ground leaving the engravings of a shadowy disturbance.

She collected Joshua's coat and lay it over his body like a blanket, a gulp of remorse as she covered his head. One final chance to provide him with the dignity he deserved. His scarf had blown further out but she saw it wrapped round the trunk of a nearby tree. His scent was still decorating the scarf as she wrapped it round her neck - a symbolic emblem of the protection he had offered her over the past two days. She felt bad to take his belongings like this, but having it round her neck offered some comfort as she made her way from his final resting place. She considered collecting up the weapons that had been scattered around the bodies but she decided against it. She already had a gun that she could use to protect herself if needed so maybe leaving it with the two would offer some support and company for the afterlife. Furthermore, Julia wanted to try to move the bodies out from the elements and move them in to a more shaded spot to keep the bodies a little more preserved and out of the dynamic weather conditions, but the bodies were locked together and with the rigor mortis it was impossible for her to move either. Dusk was rolling in and the darkness of the evening meant she needed to seek shelter and abandon her efforts, it wouldn't be safe outside at night in this unpredictable climate.

As she walked in to the distance, she turned for one final glance. In contradiction with her final moments that morning with him alive, Joshua's golden hair was no longer glowing in the morning sun and his innocent smile was sadly no longer her final memory of him. They would not meet again.

Part of her wished she had never found him.

Maybe that would've been easier to stomach.

Then his virtuous face and cosy hug would be the last memory she could carry.

Instead of the bloodied scars of his gaping wounds and blue lips.

[S119 - Julia Guercio - continued in Houston, We Have A Problem]