Prochoros at Patmos

[Frozen Smoke]

It had been a few days ago that everyone had been told. Her parents had cried, and hugged her tight, and some part of that felt wrong. It wasn't her who needed comforting, not really, not at all.

Survival of the Fittest, that's what it had been called, the event that had raptured away the majority of the class. Some of the team had stayed behind, not gone on the trip like her, but it wasn't like they were going to play any games anyway. Even thinking about that felt selfish, like she was thinking about herself and not them, but it kept sticking in her mind. She'd never get to train with Arizona again, never get to mess around with Cheridene again after a victory, and all of her memories with them were now tinged bittersweet with that knowledge.

They'd been let off of school too, and the newspaper had a little commemorative edition planned, but she couldn't bring herself to sign on to that. And they didn't ask.

The thing that she couldn't let go, as she sat in front of the little purple chromebook her parents had bought her for her 17th birthday, was that she didn't know what it was. Not really. She knew of it in the same way she knew of 9/11, a terrible event that was catalogued in pictures, and spoken about as little as possible. A few key images that had burnt into her mind, the thick black smoke billowing from the towers, the face of Adam Dodd as he realised it was over. She knew there was more to those tragedies, but learning about it seemed... Pointless. The kind of thing you shouldn't think about too hard, the only outcome being pain and sorrow if one did.

But as she slowly typed the words "Survival of the Fittest" into the search bar in front of her, she realised that wasn't quite right.

She clicked on the first few articles, and began to read.

They were concise, deliberately so, a list of names and short events. But something about that only seemed more awful, as she scrolled and scrolled, clicking recommended link after recommended link. There were so many names only mentioned once or twice, people who simply faded beneath the note of those writing, except to explain how they met their name. Anonymous additions to the death toll. They were professional, at least, with an almost clinical tone that nearly made her eyes glaze over as she read.

Or maybe that was the tears.

She couldn't help but imagine people she knew as those names now. Those few who she'd tried to search through for any details of, the people who had a wikipedia entry, but came with a note that it was a stub. And she could help by expanding it. Something about that tore at her, thinking of Arizona, or Cheridene falling into the pit of history forgotten of their rightful place in it.

And then, pages and pages of searching later, for those anonymous names she found something a little different. A site different from those professional ones, with their advertisements, and tight bylines and associated opinion pieces. It was messy, with a few grammatical errors here and there, and with a site design that looked far less well put together. But what those words held dug into her attention, and wouldn't let go, even as her mouth began to feel dry.

It wasn't that were less clinical, although that twisted her stomach a little, it read as though whoever had seen the events happen had enjoyed watching them just a little. No, it was the detail, and it made her only feel worse for the poor girl she was reading about. It talked about the struggles she'd faced, away from bloodshed and bodycounts, on trying to find people to help her and failing. It was her story.

There was a description of her death that she scrolled past very fast, as the events became familiar from those news articles she'd started with, until she came to the bottom of the page. There was a few links at the bottom, a donation option, but also a piece of text that read simply "contribute to the site".

She stared at it for a while.

Then her mouse moved over to it, and she clicked the link.

[Frozen Smoke]

Luca waited around as she looked at the Discord. She'd never heard of such a thing before, but she supposed the name made sense, given how chaotic it was. She'd been kept up paying attention to all it's bleeping until someone had told her how to mute things that didn't address her specifically. Still, the process itself, as it had been explained to her seemed relatively simple. Wait for the broadcast to start, which was supposedly today, and then get given a link to the camera that the person you were following. Obviously it wasn't on YouTube or whatever, but the technical people seemed to be certain it was safe, or as safe as it could be.

Routier Today at 11:31 AM
@Lukitty#5023 - tv.amesroctaf217.onion - Arizona Butler - Day 1 - Morning

Something about seeing a random person on the internet use her friends name like that felt odd. It made sense, after all, there were news reports out there already. Arizona was famous. Just not in the way any of them had thought, and in the worst way possible.

It almost felt like an exam, as the link opened up into the new browser she'd had to install, the screen flickering into life in front of her. She somehow felt like she hadn't prepared enough, like she didn't know what she was doing, as she pressed the pen in her hand against the notepad in her lap.

At least where Arizona had woken up was peaceful. Both the camera and Arizona looked over the blue expanse, taking it in.

Then, Arizona jumped in.

Luca's heart felt like it was going to leap out of her mouth, as she waited for her to resurface, only to see nothing. No bubbles, nothing, just the calm blue water stretching out as if nothing had happened. She looked away, down at her notebook, not even thinking about what she was going to write. Luca's breathing was shallow, and shaky, as she looked at the single black dot where her pen had pressed against the paper.

Then, there was sound again, echoing with the tinny compression. A familliar voice. Luca's eyes snapped up, and saw Arizona again. She let out a long breath of relief, as the familiar sounds of rapid fire swearing came through the internet, a sound she never thought she'd be happy to hear.

More people began to come into frame. 'Zona seemed confused, but at least no-one there was bad news, and she knew most of them. All of them, actually, as the names of others began to filter through her shocked brain. Not close enough to really know them, but she'd never heard much bad about them, and she knew who they were. Her hand scribbled them down on the paper.

"Saffron, Yuki, Caroline"

There was yelling that the camera picked up too. Faint, but close enough that she could make out the distinct sounds of frustrated swearing. They heard it too, as they began to talk about it. Brave as always, Arizona took the lead, and tried to investigate. Luca noted that down too. Caroline wandered away from them. Yuki wanted to find her sister, and god, they all sounded so scared. But they had a destination at least, and Arizona lead them away from the camera and...

That was it.

No fancy editing, no panning to follow them on their trip, that was it. The camera just sat there, broadcasting an empty view of the lake out. There was something so hollow in that. They'd talk on the walk, do something, surely. But this was all she got. A snippet, and a small one, and that was what she had to write about.

She looked down at her pad, and the three sentences she'd written down, hoping they'd magically grow in front of her. Unsurprisingly, they didn't, and she clicked the x in the corner of the screen she'd had open. Other people would probably be there, eventually, and she didn't want to see that. That just left her with an empty google document, titled "Arizona Butler, Day 1", with a cursor blinking at her.

[Frozen Smoke]

Luca couldn't help but stare at the tuna steak in front of her. It was nice, obviously, Dad was a great cook. She kept flaking off little chunks of it to eat as she sat there, just so he wouldn't think that was the problem if he looked in. She just wanted to stay here, just for a little bit, now that she had the excuse. He'd knocked on her door and asked if she wanted dinner, and let her choose what she wanted, and they'd talked a little as she helped prepare it. It had been nice, and full of promises that they'd go on a holiday soon, somewhere away from America. The Carribean maybe, or Iceland, or Japan. All of them sounded good, as he'd told stories of the things they could do together there. But, he'd had to head back to his office, so now Luca was alone again. Free to stare blankly at the light brown grill-marks seared into the side of the fish.

The tuna couldn't blink impatiently at her like the cursor on her screen seemed to.

She'd asked if there was any more footage from the first day, after getting that first video, but they'd said they couldn't find any. So she had to try and find a way to sum up what had happened there before midnight. It hadn't been hard to think of some key points, that Arizona had tried to kill herself, formed a little group, and then they'd moved away. But that wasn't a paragraph. It was a sentence, and she had to stretch it out into being more than that, like she was the black hooded torturer in some medieval dungeon cranking a rack until it told her more. It felt more like her brain was the thing on the rack, as she prodded at the wilted asparagus that sat on her plate, spearing it on her fork and twirling it around in front of her.

The worst part of all of this was that it felt so desperately important. This was, well, it was how people would hear about Arizona. Both now, and in the future, when they looked through the archives. She hadn't asked how many people looked at the site, but she felt like it had to be a lot. How her friend would be thought of, for years to come, was up to her. It was her responsibility. Normally writing was so easy, it felt just like dribbling a ball, you started and then you kept going until you snapped off a conclusion. This time, it felt like the ball was just sitting there, refusing to bounce up to meet her hand again like it was supposed to.

She pushed the plate forwards, and slumped her head down on the table for a moment, scrunching her eyes tight enough that stars started to form in them.

Everything was impossible.

[Frozen Smoke]

Lukitty Today at 10:43 PM

Arizona began Day 1 by diving into the lake, seemingly attempting to drown herself, before coming to her senses and resurfacing. She met Saffron, Caroline and Yuki shortly after this. The four of them worked out where they were, then moved to investigate shouting from nearby, and during this Caroline became seperated from the group. The remaining three of them were unable to find the source of the shouting, and instead decided on a location to head towards, the Inner Circle.

Chair Queen Today at 11:06 PM

Some passive/indecisive voice in this, e.g. "seemingly attempting", please try and stick to definitive statements where you can!
Also I know it's hard, but please try and keep emotional judgements or commentary like "coming to her senses" to a minimum, we try and keep a clinical tone here for obvious reasons.
Still, great first attempt Lukitty! Thank you for your hard work, look forwards to seeing your next post