Z3 ROADSTER FOR SALE

[shotgunkid†]

((Wade Cartwright continued from No More Predation. (Please.)))


Once again, Wade's movements slowed as he left the asylum. But this time, with careful deliberation and intent. He was following a plan of action and paying attention to his surroundings instead of nervously jumping at shadows and moving every few hours. It was invigorating to move dynamically. The fear of death lurked behind it all, but this time it seemed to fuel his advance and sharpen his senses rather than paralyze him. After all, potential death really did lurk behind every corner he didn't check, every piece of furniture he didn't inspect, every room he didn't go into. It was terrifying, but this time... the euphoria and excitement of actually following through, being what he wanted to be, doing what he wanted to do at heart eclipsed it all. Every time he stopped, his situational awareness would kick into gear. Every noise, every shadow, every nook and cranny would fall under his scanning gaze. Then check, carefully, quietly, against cover and with the needle against a vein so he could pop it in fast in case someone tried to assail him.

Sounds and noises would come to him often. But fainter, scarcer, less frequent than before. Once he got outside and started moving there, it was apparent to his eyes and nose why. But within the grim realization that half of his classmates had fallen, there was hope. Even if a selfish hope, for himself.

This was, indeed, how he'd choose to act in those worlds of obscuring long grass next to open sidewalks and prowlers with a license to kill if he could survive long enough to get his mental act together. His shirt reminded him. If he were a carnivore, of course, he already knew that the ethical contradictions and guilt would eventually drive him to madness, despair, anger, and suicide.

Maybe murder-suicide, but not here, not now, not in the place where he only had to take one life. Yes, one. That was all the terrorists asked of him.

Would the 'prey empathy' overtake him when the moment arrived? Perhaps. But it would only be just that once, and then he never had to again -- decidedly unlike the situation of those characters.

Stop, see, move. Stop, see, move. At some point after leaving the asylum, he made up his mind to cross the bridge. That made things go smoothly; he had a clear view of everything.

His conviction to find a herd - no, group - and stay safe with them wasn't forgotten, but... all the figures he saw moving in the distance didn't seem talkative.

Stop, see, move. Stop, see, move. It might have been okay to be prey. He might eventually have come to terms with it there, where the threat was constant and faint, but not here, where it was all thrust in his face instantly in a tidal wave which would - almost certainly, his heart of hearts knew - get him killed. But stay focused.

The compound seemed a decent place to seek shelter. Darkness was equal, and he might even find some instrument to use if he actually got in a fight. As he approached, he saw the radio tower. There were bodies strewn all around it. Well, there were bodies strewn all around the island, but the especially unpleasant state of one of them made him avert his eyes.

There was a commotion inside the garages nearby, and he fled to the quiet warehouse.

Much to his disappointment, the musty and dark space contained mostly household supplies instead of tools. Maybe if he searched harder.

Eventually, the deathstink became potent. He stumbled across a somewhat rigid object.

Another corpse, noticeably bloated and decrepit. Bleaugh. At least it might deter predators from entering, he reassured himself. Might. But he figured he wanted a comfortable place to rest this time around, and none of the spots seemed to fit that bill.

Wait, there were towels all around this place, weren't there? A few dust-laden containers and many desperate attempts to avoid sneezing fits later, he had a few. It was kind of an inappropriate use, but he'd probably never get the opportunity to get wet here. He'd already lost that when he split with the group.

A few of them, carefully bunched up next to a container shelf, made a good impromptu blanket. If he closed his eyes long enough, he could even believe he was back home.

He was slightly nyctophobic himself, but with the calming noise of the waves and knowledge of all-too-real threats out there, his imagination had no potency. The enclosed, dark spaces were safety, as far as he was concerned.  

It was uneasy to think he could be murdered in his sleep, but hopefully the would-be murderers' prod to make sure he was alive would rouse him just in time to react. But these bags came with flashlights, right? They did, so no matter. Just make sure he was in a not-obvious spot, like behind this.. alcove? right here, under one of the shelves. Hold breath. Clean the dust. Hunker down for awhile. Put some extra towels over his head to prevent them from seeing him instantly. It would be safe. Relatively.

And all that only to hear noises. In the direction of the area from which he'd entered some time later. (No way to be sure.) Brace your limbs to react, he told himself. Brace them for a fight, as meager as they were.

His fists slowly balled up.

[Malloon]

(Minor GMing approved)

(Benjamin Lichter continues from Hyphaema)

Ben walked along the road. He was looking for a place to get his bearings, take stock of his preparations and get some information he needed. He passed the vehicle compound where he had been put originally, but decided against going in, instead heading to the building next to it.

The building smelled of corpse. That made part of Ben glad; he had been looking for one here, but that didn't make the other part of him feel any less queasy. It was also totally dark inside. That meant that, if there was a camera inside, he could try to hide what he was doing. Perfect. Ben took his bag off his shoulder and fished out his flashlight. Also in the bag was his new possession, the chair leg. Ben had decided against swapping his boot out for the chair leg, since he couldn't throw the chair leg.

He switched on the flashlight and hoisted his bag back onto his shoulder. Then he walked in. He swept the flashlight around and soon found the corpse which was responsible for the smell. He didn't recognize it, but he did notice its collar was intact. Good! He then looked for a place where he could sit down.

He found one. It was beside an alcove, just outside of sight of the door. In the alcove were a few shelves, and a pile of towels lay on the floor under them.

Sitting down with a grunt, he pulled his bag in front of him and pointed his flashlight inside. He found his map, and took it out. There was some deciding to do.

The plan Ben had come up with was simple, very simple, but he had reason to believe it might work. It had been assembled piece by piece during his time in the asylum. It was made of two parts: The first part had come to him when brainstorming how to avoid the "players". The obvious solution was, of course, to hide. To hide somewhere where they wouldn't or couldn't go. And where wouldn't they go?

Well, the danger zones, of course. But he couldn't either. Unless he was dead, he had suspected, since why would the terrorists kill what's already dead? And the corpse next to him confirmed that.

But what if the terrorists only thought he was dead? Ben didn't know if the collars could check if people were alive, but if not, that meant the terrorists who watched the cameras turned them off when they thought people had died.

He hadn't gotten any further with the plan then, because he understood that doing it would only protect him as long as he was in a danger zone and the terrorists thought he was dead. When it ended, either he would have to keep still and risk "players" finding him, or the terrorists would explode his collar. Plus, it was next to impossible to predict where the next danger zone was going to be. When he had checked his map, he had remembered that most of the places except the the asylum had been danger zones. The problem had been remembering which ones hadn't been danger zones yet, since those were the ones most likely to be the next ones - at least, he suspected.

He hadn't been able to.

The second part of his plan had come in bits and pieces after the library had burned down. The terrorist's broadcast had told him a few things: For, one that there were probably terrorists on the island, which he had confirmed - probably hiding in the danger zones themselves - but the other thing the broadcast had told him was that any place that was on fire would be declared a danger zone, and would be quickly put out. Because a fire might attract attention from other places.

Now if only Ben or someone else could stop them from doing that.

It wasn't too difficult to put two and two together at that point.

He was looking at the map now, trying to decide what to burn. There were a couple of places that Ben could set alight: One of the buildings around him, the storehouse at the bottom of the island, and the asylum itself.

The problem with the first and last, though, was that he might kill one of the classmates who weren't killing. So ultimately, it wasn't much of a decision. Feeling rather pleased with himself, he put the map away and had a quick look inside the first-aid kit. There was the lighter he was going to use, and the rest of the stuff. Then he put that away too and took out his wallet.

How was it that he and no one else had thought of this plan, he wondered. Then again, he thought, it wasn't entirely his idea - somebody else had burned down the library, and without them he wouldn't have had the idea or the information he needed. And, he thought while he smiled at his wallet, he had a small ace in the hole, something he doubted most of the others would have.

He relished the thought of what he would do once the terrorists went to the storehouse.

The two things left on his list to do were 1) get a glass shard from a window somewhere, preferably from the library, since he knew there were windows left there and 2) go to the storehouse.

The problem was, of course, that the library was occupied at the moment. And it was on his way to the storehouse. So he had to wait.

He looked around for something to do in the meantime. Glancing to the side, he looked at the towels under the shelves. Remembering something about wrapping a towel around your face in a fire, he scooted over and grabbed one.

But then the pile lurched, and Ben shot back, yelling in fright and dropping his wallet.

[shotgunkid†]

The steps drew closer... closer.. closer.

Mind primed fists ready body tense. Fight or flight? Oh, it was as though he'd been born for the former. It didn't matter how meager his own body was. Adrenaline pump almost injected - only to be retracted at the last minute. His body's natural reserves would do just fine.

He knew there was no way to predict the exact moment. Predict where this other person was. Their stance could be reacted t---

ONE OF THE TOWELS WAS PULLED! ROLL, LEAP, FIST! In a few moments, Wade abruptly rolled off the towels, forced himself up and shaking away the last of them, and adopting a fighting stance. This wasn't ideal, but it would cover his vitals and head.

The shocked expression of the other boy threw him completely off, and his conscious kicked in. The adrenaline ride skidded to a halt just as he was about to launch a hit. In time to understand the other boy's potential non-hostility and soften the stance. By small fractions. The words came out clipped and aggressive. Too threatening, maybe, so he tried to drop the fists and soften it as they came out. Try and reassure this other person, even though instinct was screaming that he was letting his guard down at an absolutely critical moment.

"I'm not hostile. You?" Deep breath between that first sentence and the word. Very loud and audible. It would be a good cue for the other to cool it. That was what Wade attempted to practice. Release of energy. Cessation of visual, audible, and perhaps subliminal hostility signals. Well, it was all very sudden and he wasn't doing such a good job of it. It would just have to be enough to make this other male stay and say something.

[Malloon]

Ben had been caught by surprise. Again.

It just wasn't his day.

The boy had emerged from the pile of towels with speed and agression that had completely caught Ben off guard. In the few moments that had taken him to throw his arms up in shock and back away the boy had rolled out from under the shelves, jumped to his feet and balled his fists, obviously preparing to punch him. Ben could only watch in horror as the boy threatened him, him wanting to run, but unable to, seeing as how his most precious possession - his wallet - lay between the boy's feet.

But the threatened punch never came.

The boy had stopped moving. He was still tense, but wasn't trying to attack him. If there was a moment to get the upper hand, this was it, and Ben knew it. His shock was dissolving and his mind was racing, thinking how to get to his boot before the boy could react, seeing as how it was on the floor beside the boy. He was just about to lower his arms and make a dive for it when the boy started to speak. The tone was harsh, and the words unintelligible, but they made Ben pause. Had he not been reminded that there were good people left earlier, he wouldn't have given this boy the benefit of the doubt, especially seeing how wound up he was, but now...

Clearly, the boy noticed his words had been too harsh as well, for when he spoke next the tone was loud and measured and the words were clear: "I'm not hostile."

There was a pause while the boy took a deep breath. "You?"

Ben didn't know what to say to that, so instead he just shook his head. The boy seemed sincere, but Ben didn't want to set him off accidentally.

[shotgunkid†]

A fearful-looking noncommittal head shake was all Wade got. In itself, that implied a number of things: the boy could be throwing Wade's guard off in a number of ways to prepare for an assault of his own, he genuinely couldn't find anything to say, was mute, was..

Well, it all looked sincere enough, anyways. Relaxing his stance into a more casual posture, he thought fast: the best way to defuse the tension and get the ball rolling would be to start a conversation and what, at this late stage, would someone be interested in talking about? Something of value, preferably. Unlike many of the previous breaths they'd both had to waste.

Wade quietly lifted his own bag and gripped it cautiously.

"Are you short on supplies or anything?" Not curt, but fast.

[Malloon]

This situation was calming down rapidly. First, the other boy had stopped looking so tense. And then he'd offered Ben some of his supplies.

If this was a trap, he'd walk into it head first, because he did need supplies. Badly. He lowered his arms and grinned in relief, relaxing somewhat.

"I, um, yeah. I am actually. Not that I'm starving, but I haven't got that much left." he replied, wanting to be honest, since he'd just been offered food and water out of the blue. And he wasn't starving, or in that bad a shape, if he was honest with himself. He'd had three meals a day - granted, not the most filling of meals, but they'd been enough - and all the walking he'd done the past week had tightened up his leg and back muscles, not much, but enough that he'd noticed it.

Point was, he felt he was justified in lying to whomever attacked or threatened him, but he couldn't do it when they were being nice to him. And being sincere in it.

And since the boy seemed nice enough...

"But, uh, first, could you pass me my wallet, please?" he asked. "It's on the floor, there." He pointed at the boy's feet.

[shotgunkid†]

Quickly, Wade obliged him. In a subtle manner, of course, he kept his eyes out because of the potential for a surprise attack (that never came, of course). It took just under a few moments to see where the wallet was, snatch it up, and then turn to hand it to Ben.

The opposite hand went in to hover over his bag's zipper.

"And?"

[Malloon]

Ben accepted his wallet back with a nod and a small "Thanks." He checked it, then breathed a sigh of relief - it had fallen open, but nothing had fallen out.

"Whatever you can spare, I guess," he said in response to the boy's question. "I've got a piece of bread left, one tin of crackers and two of these food bar... things." He gestured to his bag, which lay against the wall. "I counted, and as much as I've been eating, I've only got food for about two days left. So today and... tomorrow."

He grimaced at that. Two days of food and water, three days more until the deadline. Deadline. Ha ha.

"So, how much've you got?"

[shotgunkid†]

Checking his own supply, Wade was surprised to find much more than he expected at first glance. Thinking more deeply, however, it made sense that he hadn't been eating a whole lot. This stuff was largely tasteless, and over the course of the past week or so there had been nothing to stir up his appetite. Quite the opposite, in fact.

There was still an entire loaf of that integral bread stuff left, and he'd only eaten through about half of one of his tins.

Five and a half ration bars left. He distinctly remembered feeling so drained after hearing of the deaths yesterday that he'd stopped midway through chewing. Just exhausted, mentally.

It was a little dismaying, actually. He hadn't had as many opportunities to build up muscle as he could've. Then again, though... what was the rate of gain for a teenager under severe stress?

"I've got quite a bit more than that. What do you go for?"

[Malloon]

Ben waited while the boy checked his bag. He seemed surprised, though Ben couldn't tell if it was because he had more or less than what he'd expected.

At least his answer proved he still had more than Ben had.

"I, uh.." he said. What did he want? Food was the answer. None of the choices stood out, though. Except, perhaps...

"I'd go for some of those food bars, if that's fine with you, I guess, " he said. Their label had said they were highly nutritious, so Ben guessed they were perhaps the best choice. Still tasted like cardboard, though. At least they wouldn't go stale, like the bread was.

"So, uh, what's your name?" he asked.

[shotgunkid†]

An easy answer. An easy opportunity. And at last, it finally started to feel as though he was getting into that 'groove' of life that more normal people seemed to adopt naturally.

"I'm Wade." Nice to meet you didn't seem appropriate.

In plain truth, there weren't many worse situations to say it. So he just left it like that.



More than an hour later...



Sitting down together on the cold floor, at a location that put them both somewhat at ease, they started talking and talking freely. It gave more of that pleasant feeling. They spoke of the lives they'd had. What they lost, desired, kept. Depressing stuff, but not nearly as hard-hitting as who they'd lost. There were so many regrets and little bunches of self-hatred there. Why didn't we? Should've... if only. It all stung, but not quite to the point that it drove Wade to tears or anything, just a deep pit of melancholy and self-flagellation.

It was best to leave that all behind. There was no point flogging themselves repeatedly for things that were out of their hands or couldn't see coming. Be practical, be real. The only people in the entire world they could help, at that moment, was themselves.

Deep sigh. Head low. "Anyway, I don't feel like heading anywhere right now. Wanna stay or something? I could take a peek later or tomorrow if you really want." Downcast expression softening. And beside, it would give him a useful task that might actually increase their survival odds in total. Fewer than half left, remember. Fewer than half... that gave hope.

A grim strain of it, to be certain, but still hope.



((Wade Cartwright continues elsewhere...))

[Malloon]

Ben was... dare he say... happy? It seemed so long since he'd felt like this, and even then it was undercut with the sad reality of their situation. Wade had had a tough time on the island too. And what's more, he had seen Irene before she died. They had talked at length about Irene.

Talking had done him good. All the strain of the past few days had come tumbling out, how scared he'd been, how he hadn't been able to find Maxim, how he missed being home, with a future that was uncertain, but still there, you know? He'd even touched on the thing that was most dear to him, how much he missed his family.

The strangest thing was, he didn't cry. He had drawn a few ragged breaths, but with all the crying he'd done over the past few days he had expected the floodgates to open as soon as he opened up. But they didn't. All he got was an ache in his chest, and a sense of warmth in his gut. The last part was because of Wade, he felt. He hadn't know him long, but through all the talking he felt he sort of knew him now.

...alright, an hour was a bit short a time to say that, maybe, but Wade did feel like someone he could trust.

He had done things diffferently than Ben. Apparently he'd joined a couple of groups, left them, and had heard that some of the members had died later on the announcements. Ben couldn't imagine how that must feel. He wasn't sure he wanted to, either. But for that, he was all the more thankful of the support Wade had given him.

Then Wade suggested staying there for the for the rest of the day, and maybe the night.

Ben didn't know if he wanted to do that. He had a plan, he should stick to it. And yet...If he was honest, the idea of him doing the plan now, it scared him. He knew that if there was something he had overlooked, if something went wrong, he was dead.

That which had convinced him to do it had been the small chance of it working, of him seeing his family again. That, and the idea of getting back at the terrorists for what they had done. To stop the madness, the senseless killing.

So why was he hesitating now? He had the chance to do the right thing, the smart thing.

And he wasn't taking it. Hating himself for it, he knew that as long as he had something to lose, he wouldn't be able to do it. Friendship, he couldn't just give it up. Talking with Wade had reminded him of that. Of what he still might have with Maxim, if he found him again.

He was weak, like he had predicted. And he knew he couldn't convince himself to act otherwise. He knew he was wrong, but it didn't feel wrong, somehow.

Dying with friends seemed preferable to dying alone.

So, after thinking on it, he answered Wade with: "Yeah, sure. That sounds great."

(Benjamin Lichter continues in Prey Empathy)