Chapter 46: Fantom Frigate

[Lord_Shadow]

Carol

The name came to her right after the girl herself bolted.

Well that was unexpected but also understandable.

Mary seemed like she expected Leo to drop her and buddy up with a teammate.

Leo seemed unsure of what was going on. Gen knew that feeling all too well. Didn't seem like he agreed with Mary's expectations.

Genevieve wasn't sure exactly what to do or say, but she needed to say something.

"Hey it's not like that. If you guys are helping each other that's cool. I'm more than happy to just tag along." She smiled and chuckled lightly.

'Tagging along' was what she was good at after all.

"Working together could be great for us."

[KamiKaze]

Carol reminded Mary of those YouTube videos of cats. She was kind of a critter person to begin with, so she’d watch those cute animal videos sometimes? And there were ones where a cat would look in curiosity at something, like, a Roomba or a moving toy. Then, it’d make a sudden movement, and the cat would scatter.

Weird comparison? Yeah, but that’s what came to mind when Carol leaped up and ran away, as if her voice was a Roomba scaring a cat. Mary tilted her head to the side in thought. It was weird, that reaction. Maybe her bringing up teams sparked something in Carol, where she had to run off like she really needed to use the restroom?

Enough of that, though.

Mary closed her eyes. Imagined what the scene might have looked like from the audience’s perspective. Three people standing inside some pirate ship full of animatronics that looked like a Scott Cawthon reject, talking about teams. One with a broken limb, two on the same team, one alone. She opened her eyes again. She wondered what the scene with Seo-yun might have looked like.

She opted not to tell them about Jewel.

“Hm, are you sure? Like, there’s other people on my team as well, and dunno what they’re like.”

Mary adjusted her oar a bit.

“Ah, sorry. It’s just, we ran into some trouble at the cruise ship, right? So… just thinking of what might be a good idea for each of us.”

Involve Gen-person in. She still had to wonder what “more at play” Jewel was talking about. So vague, was there something she hadn’t picked up on? Maybe it was the general factor of two-to-one, maybe Carol and/or Gen were hiding something.

She knew Jewel. Not by watching the show, but through osmosis. She'd won by taking out ten people, and was a goth, and talked about strange, shocking things like how disembowelment was sexy. Would such a person lie? Mary tried to remember what she said back then, but was drawing a blank.

She thought back to Seo-yun and Mandy. Winced. It’d seemed so normal. If Seo-yun would flip so quickly, what would prevent…

"Uh, he's hurt, by the way. Do, uh, you know anything about first aid?"

[Ohm]

Leo stood frozen in place. Barely making any sound after asking his question out loud. Small snippets of breathing escaped him as he waited for her answer and his mind went wild with questions of did she want to leave? Was Leo standing in her way? Would it be better if he let her go?

But, and to Leo's shame, one of the bigger questions on his mind is did he make her want to.

Leo wasn't sure what he would do if she did. It would be her choice, and what right would he have to impose on her? But could he? It would send her into the lion's den, especially with people like Seo-yun out there.

If someone like her could be taken by the program, then so would others, guaranteed.

Leo would not let that happen.

And Genvieve either, from the sounds of it. Rather than let her leave which from a team point of view would be for the best, instead she spoke up, fine with being with both of them since they were teamed up. Mary responded by wondering if they'd met her teammates and how they would respond.

It was a good question to have, and one with not easy answer to it. Would they be fine with it? Were they playing for the cameras? Killing people? Same could be asked of him and Genevieve, was the team part important enough to ignore that they didn't know each other that well?

All that went out of his head the instant Mary mentioned his arm, Leo held it out towards Genevieve for her to see properly, through the pain that now came to mind. In the suddeness of the events around them, he had forgotten about it till Mary spoke up. He had a sheepish smile on his face.

"Uh, if you don't mind. I was hit pretty hard around here." He said, as he gestured closely towards his right arm, indicating where he was hit.

[Lord_Shadow]

And just what the fuck did he expect her to do about it? Was she wearing a lab coat, scrubs, or even a Halloween sexy nurse costume? Did he want her to kiss his boo-boo and make it all better?

She was getting too worked up about that.

"Sorry dude, no medical training here. I pretty much know how to put Band-Aids on and call it good."

She made a sort of weak chuckle and half-smile half-cringe. She was useless here and she knew it.

Still, best to stick with a teammate.

"We can probably go over the first aid kits we got and see what we can work with though. Probably hunker down and try not to agitate your injury."

Injuries were bad, really bad. She stole a gun from the last injured person she came across. She looked poor Leo over.

He had nothing worth stealing, it seemed. Besides, he was a teammate and that meant sticking together anyway.

But...

If he became dead weight, or an anchor dragging her to the depths...

Would it be so wrong to cut him loose too?

She looked at Mary. Back at Leo. Smiles all around.

She needed friends, but she needed to survive more. Stick with them until it became clear they were a liability. Then she could ditch them.

Then she wouldn't feel guilty about putting herself first.

[KamiKaze]

Mary made a face. Looks like Gen wasn’t of much use, either.

It was all too much. Seo-yun and Mandy attacking them, being here period, the fact Leo had a broken arm, what Jewel had to say…

She reached up with her free hand to massage her scalp. Somewhere, she picked up on the breathing, the shaking hands.

She knew she needed to focus. Her brain felt fizzy, fuzzy, like soda that was turning to jello. She wondered what Jewel meant, what she had to be worried about here specifically. Inhale, exhale.

Then, she remembered and immediately jumped on the mention.

“First aid, uh, right! We’re probably gonna need like, pain pills, and something to keep his arm still, and maybe something to calm his nerves? Like, I could make a funny joke or something.”

Another laugh. Another look at the cameras.

Look back.

“Gimme a moment.”

She set the oar down and unzipped her bag. The first aid kit wasn’t hard to find.

[Ohm]

The response wasn't what Leo had hoped for, not even close. The pain that had reemerged in his mind was reverberating up his arm, an unconscious stiffness in it to keep any more from occurring.

"That's...alright. We'll figure something out." He mumbled out loud, more to himself than anybody else in the room.

Thankfully, at least for Leo, Mary was up for helping fix his arm. To a degree at least that they could. He knew little of medical stuff, outside of what they would teach them in school. And they tended not to cover getting one's hand broken.

One would figure they would teach that crap if they could be kidnapped for SOTF at any moment, but the less one knows, the more entertaining it is for the masses, was his guess anyway.

Anyway, they needed to figure out where to go. They couldn't stay here forever, as much as Leo would want to stay put. Too many places for people to pop up as prior events have shown him, too many unknown factors that could come into play.

Couldn't put Mary in danger over that... and Genevieve too.

He racked his brain for answers to that question, as Mary went to work with her medkit. Leo let out a small thanks to her as she did. A smile on his face despite the pain.

He was in good hands.

((Leonard Kenter continued elsewhere...))

[Lord_Shadow]

Genevieve held an empty smile on her face, she didn't know what else to do. What good was she in this kind of situation? She didn't know what to do to help, so how could she help?

Leo seemed to understand, as did Mary, but the disappointed looks did little to make up for the feelings of guilt and helplessness. She made a soft sigh and set to work looking through her own kit for anything that could help.

She thought about what exactly she was hoping for with this. Leo was hurt, and Mary wasn't on her team. Those facts were at odds with her hopes to survive. Injured people are generally a liability in SOTF. When the team stuff was introduced, groups made of non-team members seemed more at odds and prone to strife.

She wanted to live, wanted to escape, wanted to avoid a gruesome death like all those she had been too squeamish to actually look at when watching the highlights. She was just a kid, a stupid useless know-nothing kid. Why couldn't she just live a normal everyday boring old life and become bitter and depressed as she grew old instead of being bitter and depressed about to die young?

"We'll get through this." She spoke aloud, but not to them. Moreso a reassurance to herself.

"We have to."

She smiled at the other two, smiles all around. If she smiled and acted happy enough, maybe she could forget the reality of her short meaningless life.

((Genevieve Erickson continued elsewhere))

[KamiKaze]

Mary opened the first aid kit.

"Ah... painkillers... two kinds? Is Ibu or Asprin better?" she mumbled, partly to herself. "There's anti-septic, gloves... masks? Uh..."

She fumbled through the kit a bit more.

She couldn't help but wonder what Jewel was trying to say. Like, obviously she was outnumbered, right? Leo and Gen were on the same team, she wasn't. That'd make things tricky, even without the whole arm thing.

But for now? Focus on the arm thing, even if your hands are shaking, even if your brain can't focus too much. Just... try to work through this, okay?

((Mary Cheung continued in Miss Negativity))