In Total Control

[randomness]

((Stephanie Wright continued from Exposure))

Stephanie had found herself slowly drifting into an irritable mood.

It wasn't just the rain, which had been little more than a drizzle and lasted all of fifteen minutes. Her jacket had kept her mostly dry through that, and the clouds had long cleared, leaving a muted blue in their wake.

It wasn't just her being tired and hungry and thirsty and probably well on her way to dehydration.

It was that and a million other tiny discomforts wrapped up in the fact that they were on an island where people were killing other people in a crazy situation that she couldn't even pretend to comprehend.

But none of that was quite conscious to her and she could only feel it as an intense feeling of irritation as she crossed yet another body. A wound could be seen clearly on the dead girl's chest, the familliar sight of blood making it clear what had happened here.

"Fuck. Another corpse, " she verbalised to Chris.

It was great to have someone else around, but Chris was yet another one of those million tiny discomforts.

Not to say he was a bad person. Far from it on fact. But Stephanie was still wary. After all, she hadn't exactly been on good terms with him back in middle school. Even, if he had changed since then, surely he remembered that she'd gotten into fights with her.

Not that she was about to remind him of that fact any time soon. There was no point in losing the friendliest person she'd met since Mallory.

"Why the hell do people keep killing?"

[Deamon]

Chris was damp and was uneasy. Then again he'd been uneasy for as long as he could remember.

((Christopher Harlin continued from Exposure))

He took a sip from one of his bottles of water and put it back into one his bags. He didn't really care which one. They were both his now anyway and Stephanie had never asked him about the fact he had two. He appreciated that, whether she was deliberately not asking him or not didn't matter. He still preferred that it was his choice whether he wanted to talk about it or not because as things were, he didn't want to.

The rain had passed long ago but Chris could still feel his hair was wet in some places. It wasn't a warm day by any stretch but it was better without the rain. Chris looked up as he heard Stephanie's voice. She'd found another corpse. He wandered over and stood by her as he took a look at the body. It was recognisable as a girl but as for who it was Chris couldn't say. The body was missing its head. Chris had seen far too many corpses already so he looked at it briefly before turning to move off. He didn't want to have to dwell on yet another loss of life, especially one that had ended so violently.

He stopped when Stephanie asked him why people kept killing. Scratching behind his ear as he thought Chris found the answer came to him too fast.

"They see no other way out I guess. No other way to escape this." He waved a hand out in the direction of the body to help make his point. "Or if they're like Mara revenge, an eye for an eye. I don't know really. There are too many reasons."

If anything that thought was worse, the fact they had been trapped on the island for so long that the list of reasons to kill some was increasing. There were other reasons he could think of, the need for supplies, fear of being attacked. So many reasons they were presented with for ending one of their classmates lives. He was sure that soon being a killer was going to become the norm and the kids that hadn't killed were going to be the exceptions.

It was a scary thought.

[randomness]

"I know. And that's what makes this all the more screwed up. Some part of me says that its perfectly fine to rationalise it like that but there's no way that I'm just gonna sit down and accept that."

The last words were almost a shout. She was far too emotional. Maybe it was the corpse. Someone was dead for who knew how long and their dead body was sitting right there, unattended, unrespected and the same was likely to happen to her. She'd left Mallory's body behind after all, how could she have expected any better for herself.

She had to calm down. This island was messed up, but she could show she was better. Better than everyone who ended up dead. Better than everyone who ended up killing. And then she would survive. That's was all she needed.

[Deamon]

"Yeah it is screwed up." Chris agreed. Stephanie seemed to be getting agitated. "But while you don't accept it, other people already have. They're the dangerous ones, the ones that are killing." Chris knew because he had seen it first hand with Theo. He was just another body now; according to one of the announcements Hansel Williams had killed him. A killer killing a killer. That was the fate that awaited either Mara or Stacey as well. He wondered if the same situation had happened between Theo and Hansel. Had Theo killed one of Hansel's friends and Hansel had gone for revenge or vice versa?

Unless Chris met Hansel, he'd never know. Even then if he met Hansel he would have most likely run from him. There wasn't much that was predictable or reliable anymore but if there was one thing it was Hansel Williams showing up in an announcement. Chris shivered if Mara had freaked him out he'd be downright terrified of Hansel. He had a substantially bigger body count.

He looked at the body again and then at Stephanie.

"We should probably keep moving. Don't want to stand around out here in case someone dangerous is around."

[randomness]

Stress was usually a good motivator but Stephanie never took to it well.

Of course she knew what was going on. She'd already seen Hansel kill. Kam at the hospital. Mallory, Alex, and so many others that were killed simply because.

She just couldn't let that go.

"Fuck! It's not like I don't know anything."

"We're in a goddamn middle of a bunch of dead people and you're acting as if I don't know that sone people are screwed up? Of course I do. The thing is, I can't even pretend to understand why they do what they do. How the hell are you so calm?"

She was ranting. The pent up frustration, fueling itself, her shoutkng only serving to drive herself further into anger. She was just throwing all her anger at Chris. There was no deep reason
he was there.

She needed to hit something. She wasn't supposed to. But she needed to hit something. She was scared now. She was already guilty about it. But the urge wouldn't go away.

Chris said something. She didn't even hear it. Without thinking she hit him in the chest.

[Deamon]

Stephanie was starting to get angry. She was yelling at him for no reason. He'd been trying to deal with his anger issues. He was stressed as well. He was just trying hard not to show it. The last thing he needed was for some to get angry at him for being "too calm". He was only trying to keep his wits about him in a dangerous situation. He'd seen what the game they were in did to people first hand. He'd seen Theo before Hansel killed him, he'd seen Brianna before she killed herself and he'd been with Jesse when he had died.

Three different people. Three deaths under different circumstances. Three lives that all had the same end point on the island both him and Stephanie were currently standing on. He knew as well as anyone what SOTF did to people. So the last thing he needed was for a girl he'd only recently met to start yelling at him for something as trivial as being calm.

Then she'd hit him. In all honesty it had hurt a little, if only because it had caught him off guard. He stepped back and his anger flared up. There was a line and she was crossing it.

"What the fuck?" He asked his voice quiet.

[randomness]

No.

She'd done something wrong. Bad. She wasn't supposed to hit- She wasn't supposed to. She couldn't, she shouldn't, she didn't mean it. She didn't mean any of it. She needed to backtrack. She needed her space. She needed something and she had no idea what.

She was supposed to count to ten. She had already hit twenty two but the thoughts continued unabated, the numbers serving as a simple background for her thoughts.

"Stop it, stop it, stop it," she was frantic. She hit someone. She didn't mean it. She hit someone.

"I don't-" She was gesticulating wildly, trying to convey some sense of what she was feeling. Her breathing was too shallow. She couldn't think straight at all.

Of course she couldn't. She crossed that line again. She said she would never do it again and now it was back and she was doing it again and it would end up just like middle school all over again.

Not again. Never again.

[Deamon]

Stephanie was losing it. She was still up in his face. Chris didn't know where it had come from or if he had triggered it, but he'd stopped caring about those details.

She'd lashed out and hit him. He was trying hard not to lash out back, to get her away from him. She was saying something but he didn't care what.

He just needed to get her out his face and get some room to breathe and think about what was going on. He dropped both his bags to the floor. His muscles were tensing up and the adrenaline was starting to flow. He didn't know what was going to happen but it looked like it had a chance of being violent.

Stephanie's arms flew up again and Chris' moved on instinct. He stepped forward and put all his weight behind a two-handed shove to her chest.

He'd had the choice between fight or flight and as he used to do back at Aurora he'd chosen fight.

[randomness]

Disorientation, then panic.

He had shoved her, knocking her off balance. She landed badly, her right arm burning in pain from the impact.

She was going crazy. Her arm hurt. Had she broken it again, or was it just paranoia? She couldn't tell. She couldn't tell anything.

It was sheer instinct that led her to try and pick herself up. She couldn't stop herself. She was angry. At herself, at him, at the island, at every damned thing on this island. She would rip this island apart if she could.

But she couldn't and the ones who had left her in this state were far far away, untouchable, anonymous and probably contented.

She lashed out at Chris again. She didn't even think about it. All dhe knew was that he had pushed her. By the time she realised what she was doing, it was too late.

[Deamon]

Chris thought it was done; he was going to say something to her. Then her fist connected with his jaw. If Chris hadn't been seeing red before then, he was after the punch. He stumbled back a little bit. Then he lashed out properly for the first time since he'd been on the island. His fist crashed into Stephanie's face. It wasn't a practiced punch, it was wild and swinging.

The dam of all of Chris' emotions broke and everything just came rushing out, his inability to save Brianna, Jesse's death. If he wanted to delude himself into using that as an excuse for what he was doing the option was there. Another excuse he could have had was self-defence since Stephanie had completely lost it. She had attacked him and he'd given her a chance. She'd wasted it by attacking her again.

If Chris had been thinking straight he would have stopped after the two follow-up punches he'd thrown to knock Stephanie down. But he was lost in anger he couldn't see properly through the red. If he had been thinking straight he would have realised he had left the realm of self-defence.

He quickly lost track of how many punches he'd thrown. The throbbing in his knuckles was what woke him up. He stood there, frozen above Stephanie. The adrenaline starting to die down. The realisation rising. He had been trying to work on his anger.

He had done so well throughout the rest of his time on the island, he'd kept is cool through most of the situations he had been in. Now it had all fallen down. The whole illusion was shattered.

Brianna's words came back to him. "You're not who you were in high school, Chris. You're a good person."

Chris was shaking, an after-effect of the adrenaline. He didn't remember when he'd started crying.

"Fuck..." Chris breathed out the word. He was still the same person. The same bully he had always been. He'd just gotten better at hiding it. He stumbled back.

Then after the shock wore off, things started to repeat themselves. He broke and ran like he had following Jesse's death. He ran to his bags and picked them up avoiding looking at the body in the doorway. Then without even glancing back at what he'd done to Stephanie he sprinted away up the street. He nearly fell over when his foot hit a crack but he was able to keep his balance and keep going.

He didn't know where he was running to, but he ran all the same.

((Christopher Harlin continued elsewhere...))

[randomness]

Stephanie regretted everything.

She always did, but only after the fact. It was always the same.She let her emotions control her.

Had high school been a farce? Was it just that she had the luck of having nice people in her classes? Or had she honestly gotten better and thrown it all away in an instant?

She was bleeding. That wasn't new. And this time, she deserved it. She shouldn't have done that.

It hurt to move. But somehow, she managed to pick herself up, despite the intense throbbing in her head. Chris was gone.

She only made it a few steps before her legs gave way. She fell to the ground in a heap. She didn't rise again. She didn't regret that.

Stephanie Wright - DECEASED