The Past Has Passed Away

[Super Weegee]

Ok, he can breathe a little bit, this seems to be going decently well so far. Probably as well as it's going to get, anyways. Julien isn't repeating his demands, he isn't trying to show he's serious by cutting Faith, and he seemed to have calmed down a bit.

Most importantly, he kept talking and giving Matthew time to try to figure out a way to get Faith out of there. Preferably without handing over the scissors, though he'll toss it over in a millisecond if Julien decides to draw blood.

This is still so fucking dumb, what am I doing?!

Matthew kept his focus on Julien, with an occasional glance towards Faith, as he went on about how it would take only a few seconds and a little pressure to do something they'll regret. Since they are on an island where only one person will survive, that's a given. Then as if Faith wasn't there, he talked about how he loved her, how she avoided him when he confessed it, and finished it off with a question for Matthew.

Before he can open his mouth, Faith pleaded with him to run, to get out of there and leave her to die by Julien's hand.

"No," Matthew immediately responded, "I'm not leaving you."

Looking back at Julien again and doing his best to maintain a calm expression, he spoke.

"I-I agree with you on how pressure can make you do almost anything, Julien. I mean...Caroline and Regina were best friends." A tone of regret bled into his voice, "And Caroline shot her on accident when they met up again in these damned woods."

Quickly pushing the memory down in his mind, he continued.

"Anyways, th-there can be a lot of reasons why she didn't want to talk to you after you said that to her. Maybe she just wasn't ready at the time, or m-maybe she just thought of you as a friend, but she was wrong to beat around the bush like that. T-That said-" Matthew pointed towards Faith with his free hand, "-she's right there!"

He paused as he put his hand down at his side and looked at Faith.

"Why don't you ask her about it? W-Without the risk of her throat being slashed?”

[Endellion]

"Well, there's a simple reason, really."
So that was how it had happened, then... Caroline deserved better.
"Because she thinks love, at least that kind of love, is all jealousy and possession, and she isn't the sort of person who lets anyone else change her mind easy. And, well... she was never right there. Not really. I should know. So there was never any point to asking her, and there still isn't one." Just another thing he had known her long enough to be sure of. "It is nice to be out with it though, and hey, I don't even have to listen to any of the bullshit she'd try to feed me for my trouble. Being the dutiful friend who ignores what he really wants only works for so long, you know?"
Though she was hardly alone in that respect.
Julien looked down at Faith, eyes all screwed shut and trying not to cry. It came as little surprise that she genuinely believed he was going to kill her, really. "And... run, hm? Where would he run to, defenceless as he is? There are far worse things in this place than me, Faith." And like that, the knife was gone, she was pushed back towards Matthew and he turned to be on his way. The war scythe on his back bumped up against the hole punched in his thigh, and for all it hurt, for the hissed noise of pain drawn out of clenched teeth... it did give him an idea, at least. So he decided just to leave it on the floor. If he wanted for something like it, he was in the fucking woods, so finding a branch that suited him just right would be absolutely no object. It would be easier to get the drop on people with something that didn't have a blade on the end as well, should it come to that. Considering it that way, a sensible choice alright.
He did hope they used it well.
"You're going to need to do better than that if someone comes for you... but I'm sure that goes without saying. Though it seems sticking with him wouldn't be a bad start after all." He didn't look back.

[ Julien Leblanc continued elsewhere. ]

[Frozen Smoke]

Faith tried to force her focus onto the things that really mattered to her, rather than the aching in her legs and neck, or the words that were being so tersely exchanged around her. Her eyes were still clenched shut, and she tried to imagine herself at home with her family, clinging to an image of smiling faces and comfortable silence. Something better than here. It was hollow, and shallow, and even as she lingered on it, it became a horror in it's own way. She forced down thoughts of how they'd all be feeling now, that she'd never see them again, that they'd all be desperately praying for her soul.

Faith wished she believed in an afterlife.

She felt, more than heard Julien's last words to her, ringing close in her ear as he pointed his face towards her. Every pain was spent to block it out, to not give him the satisfaction of a reaction, a grimace or look of surprise or hope or whatever he wanted - Just to keep her face level. But she felt something else, too, the feeling of movement by her throat that she'd been dreading as his hand twitched. Her whole body tensed, only for the hand to pull away from her before sliding across, disappearing back into whatever crevice Julien had been hiding it in.

Faith said nothing as he spoke again, addressing the two of them, as her hand almost instinctively grasped at her throat. Making sure she just hadn't felt the cut, and reassuring herself that this was actually happening, even as her own wide eyes confirmed it. Those same eyes tracked him every step of the way, as he was swallowed up by the same woods that had unleashed him on them, before crossing over to meet Matthew's.

She turned to look over her shoulder at the log which Julien had been sitting on, just a few moments ago, and reached out towards it. Her hand and arm were trembling, and her legs felt like they were about to give out, so she ended up half-sitting half-falling onto it. The absurdity of it all was begining to creep into it all, as she looked back at Matthew's face, the surprise now mixed with a hint of concern.

She was alive!

Faith didn't even try and stop it, as the laughter welled up from deep inside her, coming out of her mouth in long uncontrollable fits punctuated with desperate gasping for breath. As she continued to laugh, the heaves of her breathing became heavier and deeper, the absurdity of it all becoming desperately clear.

She was alive.

And with that, she finally began to cry, only interrupted by soft fits of laughter as she hung her head down. Her arms rested on her thighs, holding her back up somewhat straight, as she watched the rivulets of tears run down her legs. She had let go of the blanket dress at some point. She wasn't sure when, and it didn't matter, nothing mattered.

She was alive

[Super Weegee]

Matthew listened as Julien essentially says that there was no point in asking Faith in the first place and that she would try to lie even if he did. More assumptions on his part. How would he know that if he never confronted her about it? At least then, he could say he made an effort.

The next thing Matthew knew, Faith was shoved towards him and Julien gave some advice to her before turning around and walking away. Just like that, it was over.

They were safe. For now, anyways.

Matthew let out a sigh of relief, but before he can say much of anything, Faith collapsed onto the log she was sitting on earlier and laughed her lungs out. Her laughter turned into tears as he just stood there awkwardly, not really knowing how to comfort her besides giving her some space. What was he supposed to do, give her a hug? Yeah, totally a good idea after being face-to-face with a psycho.

His pounding heart began to slow down as he crossed his arms and focused his breathing. God, that was close. It would've been safer to run, to get out of range and pray that Julien's leg injury was bad enough to stop him giving chase. It was dumb to have stayed and even dumber to have risked his wrath by not handing the scissors over, but Matthew stayed anyways.

And they both survived.

Looking towards Faith, he spoke.

"Thank god. We're lucky he didn't decide to just slice your throat. If he did, I..."

Shaking his head, he changed the subject.

"...Well, that doesn't matter. Let's get out of here before someone else decides to add us to their kill count."

[Frozen Smoke]

"Sorry." she murmured, almost compulsively, as suddenly a tinge of embarrassment ebbed into the whirlpool of emotions she was feeling. Everything he said seemed like it wasn't a bad idea, but the situation felt too dreamlike now to really concentrate on deeply, as her arms crossed her chest. The feeling of her hands rubbing up and down on her shoulders as she looked away from him, that felt real, comforting to focus on for just a few more moments.

The effort that Faith had spent trying to block out what Julien had said, to think about anything but what he was saying, it all felt fruitless now. The little snippets and threads she'd had to steer away from, those were all far easier to recall than anything else. Accusations, lacking the elaboration, only stung more. Hurtful observations that she wanted to scream a refutation of into the woods, if only doing so wouldn't probably scare off the one ally she had right now.

If she was Wyatt, she'd have been able to shrug it off, to sit high on the confidence of knowing what you thought was right was right. To have that true, unflinching belief in herself, to not even want to explain why he was wrong but to be confident in the knowledge that he was and everyone knew he was.

But she wasn't Wyatt.

She was worried Julien was right.

Her grip on her shoulders tightened a little, and she looked back up from the dirt and back at Matthew, who was still waiting for a response.

"Okay." she offered, meekly, as she forced herself to get up and walk with shaky legs towards where her clothes were laid out. A grimace spread across her face as she picked them up, the hem of her shirt still feeling damp to the touch, despite the time spent near the heat. She imagined they smelt worse than they felt, but the urge to pull it close to her face and sniff it was relatively easy to suppress, allowing her to live in momentary blissful ignorance as she pushed herself through the discomfort and slid the dirty piece of clothing back on.

Her jeans were in an even worse state, having barely dried at all, and feeling inordinately heavy as she dragged them up to chest height by each corner - Wondering if she could shake them any drier before putting them on. Her eyes flicked over the top of them towards Matthew, and a question came to mind, a flash of memory and contention from earlier. A worry that she had chosen a bad plan. That she was on the wrong side.

"Do you really think it's stupid?" she asked, before twisting the fabric of her jeans in her hands, wringing out a small dribble of stale rainwater that dripped onto the floor.

"Trying to escape, that is."

[Super Weegee]

As Faith was getting dressed, Matthew turned to the side to give her some semblence of privacy. Not that any of them have it, since there were cameras practically everywhere. Looking down, he spotted the scythe that Julien dropped earlier.

"That lunatic's scythe is over there if you want it." he said, pointing over towards the weapon in question. It was only fair, after all. He has a weapon and she gets a weapon. If she refused, that won't be a problem. He'll have something designed to be a weapon instead of something that's not. Though a gun would be better.

Looking over to the other side, his umbrella was still lying on its side on the ground. Was it really a good idea to keep hauling it around now? Not really, considering how somewhat bulky it is. Considering everything else, the rain is the least of their problems. Hell, the top of it isn't even sharp to serve as a makeshift spear. After considering a few other points, he decided to ditch the worthless excuse of a 'weapon'.

Before Matthew can think about the other stuff that popped up in his mind, Faith suddenly asked him a question about whether or not trying to escape was stupid.

"Yes," he said, "it is."

Immediately, he turned to face her and raised his hands to try to interrupt any immediate arguments.

"Don't get me wrong, if there was a definitive way to get the hell off this death island, I'll gladly jump onboard." His hands returned to his side. "But with the way things are right now, we can't even begin to plan it out. How would we even get our collars off? Which part of the ocean are we on? If we make a raft, should we sail away and pray that we find a random boat?"

Crossed his arms again, he continued.

"That last part is just another way to get ourselves killed. A big enough fire to signal someone is our best bet like I said before, but that isn't happening unless we get these damned collars off our necks. Otherwise, we're stuck here."

[Frozen Smoke]

Faith said nothing as she reluctantly pulled the denim of her pants up her legs inch by inch, the wet fabric clinging to her skin and feeling like it was draining every bit of heat out of her, before being dragged slightly higher up. She was glad for the privacy, at least, as Matthew spoke to her with his back turned. It wasn't real privacy, of course, nothing like that existed on the island - But it was a nice gesture. As was offering her the use of the weapon Julien had left them with, in some petty act of... She wasn't even sure what it was an act of. Was it generosity? Was he just mocking them?

She didn't know. Part of her didn't want to know. What mattered was that it gave her something to attempt to protect herself with again. A tiny fragment of agency. She took a few steps forwards, breaking back into Matthew's sight line, and crouched down in front of it. Both of her hands slipped underneath it, wrapping around the pole and lifting it up, twisting it in her hands as she tried to figure out how she was supposed to hold it. The blade at the top of it was curved away from the centre point of the handle, coming down to a wicked point, which meant you couldn't really thrust with it. But there wasn't a handle like on a regular scythe, so swinging it was going to be near impossible...

Faith decided she'd figure it out later.

She stood up, planting the base of the pole in the ground by her side, the tip of the blade reaching above her head. At the very least, it'd let her keep people at a bit more than arms length in the future. It made a great walking aid too, pressing down into the mostly dried mud of the woods beside her feet, before being leaned against the same log she'd been sitting on before. One hand grabbed her socks off of a rack by the fire, which had managed to dry out almost completely, in what was a small miracle.

She brushed the dirt and sticks and bark that had clung to the bottom of one of her feet away with a few dismissive strokes of her free hand, before looking up at Matthew as he finally answered her question about escaping. The hand which clung to her socks sat there, motionless, as she listened.

There was a temptation to argue, to fight against what he was saying, and point out the same things she had to Julien. That giving up just because something was hard wasn't an excuse. That valour was about not turning from battle even in the absence of hope for victory. But what was the point.

She looked down, at the ground that stretched between her and Matthew, staring at it as if doing so would give her the answers she needed.

Even if she didn't give up, everyone else had. The second they woke up, they'd just accepted that this was how it was going to be, that one person was going to stand tall atop a pile of corpses and that was that. Most of them probably imagined it would be them, too.

And she couldn't do this on her own.

She looked up, nodding slightly as she caught his eyes, a grimacing smile gracing her lips for a few moments before cementing into a thin line. Faith wanted to ask him what his alternative was, if his plan was just to keep going, keep trying to stay alive and stay good people until the island swallowed them up, one way or another. But the second she thought about saying it out loud, she realised that that was exactly the plan, and the grim certainty of it was one best left unspoken.

She let out a few peals of laughter, bitter and self effacing as she dropped her head to stare at her lap again.

"I guess you're right."

Faith put her first sock on, the pause motion resuming, her other leg now resting off the floor as she brushed it clean. It felt mechanical, as she looked around for a moment, noting where her bag and shoes were. She'd need to get them shortly, and leaving them behind would be disastrous. There was a brief moment of panic as she couldn't find them, her recollection of exactly where everything had been shaken loose by the last few minutes, but as the black fabric poked out from around another log and the mud stained black of her shoes caught her eyes nestled close to the fire, it subsided.

"So..." she started, as she raised her hands to the side of herself in a half shrug, indicating her lack of opinion on the question she was about to ask "Where to now?"

[Super Weegee]

Whatever problems Faith had for his answer, she clearly isn't eager to get into arguing. It was written all over her body. Really, how could she be after that whole mess? Matthew was honestly a bit relieved at that, since getting heated about it right where they're standing is not going to end well for the both of them.

Now she's interested in the various places they should visit for the rest of today. As if it's going to be anything different.

"My water's starting to run a little low." He said, grabbing his bag and unzipping it to double check, "We'll go to the lake to refill and after that..." he paused for a second to try to think of where to go, "...we'll head to the village, and..."

He let out a deep sigh and rubbed his eyes.

"...We'll figure it out when we get there. Just anywhere except here in the fucking woods. I swear, we've been having more bad luck here than the rest of the island."

With the plan more or less laid out, if it can even be called that, he walked over to one of the trees and leaned on it.

"Ready to leave whenever you are."

((Matthew Hunt continued in You Never Said Goodbye))

[Frozen Smoke]

Faith looked down at her trainers with weary resignation, bringing her right knee up so she could rest her foot on the log, her hand reaching over the laces she was supposed to be tying and towards the front of the shoe - Where the rubber of the sole was visibly peeling away from the rest of it. She rolled her thumb over that loose spot, pulling it back and trying to figure out exactly how far gone they were, and quickly feeling the cool air of the woods rush in through the new gap.

It wasn't even like they were bad trainers. Sure, they were cheap, and off-brand - But they were made for running and walking, practical things, not to be a fashion statement. They just weren't built to handle this. It felt like she'd walked a hundred miles in the past few days, and ran a few dozen more, fighting through rain and mud and slick gravel.

She used her thumb to flick the flap of loose rubber once again.

None of them were built to handle this.

Faith tied the laces as tight as she could. Hopefully they'd hold it together long enough.

"Lake's a bad idea" she mumbled in response to Matthew, as she reached down towards her other shoe, tying it up in much the same fashion.

"Still water isn't good to drink." she clarified, as she finally looked up.

"But, yeah... Let's get the fuck out of here."

((Faith Clementine Marshal-Mackenzie continued in You Never Said Goodbye))