What Do I Do Now?

[jimmydalad]

((Cammy Davidson continued from Weakness In Us All

The announcements came on before Cammy even realized what time it was. Things had happened and the next thing she knew, the place where the paper said to meet up became a danger zone. Not knowing what to do, Cammy ran away to any safe zone and now, she was alone. Again. She was doing well. She had a group she could go with who were actually doing something and she had found Kyran. However, everything got turned on its head like a sick joke and she had lost said group while also probably annoying Kyran.

During the announcements, she had heard Travis's name and was not surprised to find out he had killed someone. Thinking back to when she had seen him, she wished she could've done something more to stop him. She wished she could've killed him. Killed him to prevent someone else from dying. Slow down the attrition of students that was happening and buy them time to get away.

Wishing death? It made her pause for a moment. She clutched the top of her head with her right hand, her face contorted in deep thought. Was she still her? If she was still in the first day, she would have never wished death upon a person. In fact, she probably wouldn't even want to harm anyone. Yet now she was all for just going into the game and just killing people. First it would be Travis, then what?

Angrily thrusting her hand down to her side, she clenched it hard. What the hell was happening to her?

[D/N]

(Deanna Hull continued from The Time for Talk Is Now)

"Hold on, stop."

Deanna bent over, wheezed a couple times, spat on the grass, then looked at Kyran.

"I just... need another minute to catch my breath."

They'd been jogging -- at least by Dee's definition -- for a few minutes, and that was about all she could take for now. Yeah, she knew they were trying to make decent progress. He didn't need to tell her so. And hopefully he wouldn't.

At least her ankle was feeling better. There was some bruising there and she thought it was still a bit swollen, but as long as Dee wasn't feeling the pain, she figured it was alright.

Even if... that didn't totally make sense to her? She'd tried to think back to the old first aid courses, those times she volunteered at the hospital, but no helpful information was springing to mind. That was kinda weird. Dee wasn't a brainiac, but she remembered stuff. Just not right now, she guessed.

Maybe she'd be able to think better when she wasn't so worn out. They just needed to find Cammy Davidson, and then -- then things wouldn't be OK and she'd probably be even closer to death than right now -- but hell, at least she wouldn't have to keep running around worrying about Kyran not finding the others. And maybe she'd have a chance to get more food and maybe her head would clear up a bit. If nothing else, she hopefully wouldn't have to show off how pathetically out of shape she was again.

"Uggggh. Alright. I'm okay. Let's uh, let's go."

Yeah, maybe everything would get better and maybe not. Summed it all up.

They passed by an overturned cart and were in a big grassland she surmised used to be the golf course. There were some rolling hills and trees, but outside of the elegant building off in the distance, not much. At least not until she noticed their quarry off in a patch of short grass.

Hey, how bout that?

Dee and Kyran called out for Cammy, and by the time they arrived Dee was feeling it was now her job to fade into the background for a few minutes.

"You guys wanna talk?"

That's OK. Dee was used to that. She stood off to the side and felt into her pockets, her fingers tapping against Whitney's cheap plastic case.  Well, it was the morning and she hopefully wouldn't need to run again for a while, time to destroy her lungs a bit more.

So she popped the case open, and holy shit, there was only one clove ciggie left. Which meant she'd lasted six days on this place and she was still alive.

Dee stared down inside the case.

Was it OK to be proud?

[jimmydalad]

Hearing her name being called out, Cammy quickly turned around. She didn't have time to raise her crossbow, but seeing who it was, she was almost glad she didn't raise her weapon.

"Oh, hi guys." She replied sheepishly, looking down to the floor. She really did not expect to see the two of them again so soon. The way that she had left them before left much to be considered with regards to it being good. She remembered it being a mess and she probably was right.

She stood there for a moment, trying to find the words that seemed to have escape her for the moment. What could she really say? Dropping her crossbow onto the floor, her arms crossed over her and she could feel herself physically shrinking.

"Are you here to help, or is circumstance a cruel bitch?" Cammy asked, laughing quietly at herself for a moment before falling silent again for a moment.

"I don't know where the others are though. The place we were supposed to meet up became a danger zone. So for now, I'm alone. Again." Her voice lost the confidence it once had towards the end and she looked away from them. She softly kicked the floor and her hands gripped harshly onto her arm.

She just wanted to run. Pick up her crossbow and run away from them both. However, if they did come for the reason that she thought they did, there was no way she could do that. She hoped that they did meet out of circumstance, it would make things much more easier.

[Cake]

[[Kyran Dean Continued From: The Time For Talk Is Now.]]

"We need to go do something, right? I don't know what, I mean I'm not really good for much I know that, but I can help."

Those were Dee's words.

"You're absolutely right, we should do something. I don't even know exactly where to start or what to do, but maybe we can find someone who might."

These were Kyran's own.

Back at the Aviary's gift shop, both he and Deanna had made a solid agreement. Now here was Deanna, holding on to that carpenter tool he gave her and keeping her end of the agreement. How about you Dean?

It's what he thought about as he followed Dee's lead the whole day, stopping every once in a while for Deanna to catch her breath and rest her legs, and maybe eat, drink, smoke or something and now here she was getting ready to burn another clove yet again. It's no wonder she ran out of energy way too quickly, but if it made her happy, then who was he to deny her a possible last smoke, right.

She only had one left though and a part of him wanted to suggest helping her find some more, but screw that. Besides, she didn't need any more and Kyran wasn't going to be her enabler either. Dad taught him better than that, especially if one wanted to move faster without wheezing for every small distance.

Though on a second observation, it didn't seem like it was just the poor lungs keeping her down. Perhaps he was too quick to judge, because he remembered her injured ankle again when she bent over and then rolled up her jean leg to check. There was bruising, but he also noticed something peculiar.

It was a tattoo. A tattoo of a small red and blue songbird. Now how about that?  

Looks like he wasn't the only one who felt an odd connection to the Aviary and the creatures it formerly housed. The tattoo itself reminded him of that little song bird he'd found injured years ago at the park, same color and everything. It had a broken wing.

He was about to ask Dee about it, if there was any significance by chance, for some small talk when she had spoken up and pointed out Camilla Davidson off in the distance, yes the same Cammy Davidson they had hoped to track and follow, but failed miserably for over half a day, but somehow luckily stumbled onto without running into anybody new.

Or at least anyone still alive. There were still the corpses of his classmates that he so readily steered Deanna away to avoid when he so much as caught a glimpse or silhouette of one from meters away. He didn't want to think about. Not about any of the announcements that may or may not have played sometime during their walk here. He filtered it out; background noise was all it was now.

Weird how it was just getting - Normal.

If there was anything important there was Dee here to let him know at least. That was a good working relationship they had here, whatever it was.

Now hopefully she'd talk to Cammy and handle whatever plans they had in mind while Kyran simply plays follow the crazy leaders. Sounded simple enough.

What. No Deanna, Kyran does not want to be put on the spot to talk to Cammy right now, it would work much better if it came naturally- oh okay, never-mind then, you're lighting up another cigarette again and looks like the spotlight is already on and so is this awkward chat.

Cammy started talking and yeesh, talk about mood swings compared to how she was last time.
At least this version of his friend seemed more reasonable and less psycho.

Turns out she'd lost the others and had not come in contact with them even with the note she had. He paused when she asked if they were helping, but avoided her initial question to talk about the other thing she said. He really didn't want to talk about that stuff right now. In fact, they could always talk about it later if she asks again when they were out of the open and to some place safer.

Especially when there was the corpse of a girl whom he caught a glimpse of short distance behind Cammy.

It was Venice Pennington-Johannes, but he didn't know that. All he knew was she was a brunette, brown haired to be exact, similar to Cammy and Deanna, just lying there in the grass, a twisted heap: like a dead songbird - with a broken wing.

Now what?

Cammy asked it, or maybe not, maybe it was his own voice in his head, but it sounded too feminine to be his. Maybe it was the girl, dead bird, something.

"You're not alone."

It was a simple response accompanied with a short head-shake.

Kyran looked at Dee again; whenever she was ready they'd look for the others, if that's what both girls really wanted to do. The sooner the better, because he didn't want to be near that body any longer.

"Time to move."

Garrett, Matt, and whoever else, couldn't have gone too far from wherever destination they'd noted for their Rendezvous Point. He told them that much.

[[Kyran Dean Continued To: You're Driftwood.]]

[D/N]

"Alright."

She replaced the last cig and slipped the case back into her jeans.

They'd move on. And as long as she didn't smoke number six, she'd be OK.

That was some silly superstition you've started there, Dee's mind was trying to say, and Dee's mind was right, of course. It was silly. And stupid. And there was absolutely nothing to indicate that smoking would lead to her immediate death, at least.

Except that there was.

Because Deanna hadn't told anyone, but around the time she smoked number two she'd realized that hey, what were her chances of surviving out here, realistically?

So maybe if, somehow, she lasted the six days, that'd be enough. And her smoking the last cig would be some kind of symbol that she'd done OK and that was really all the Deanna Hulls of SOTF could ever aspire to.

And maybe that meant she'd do something like head back to the cliffs or the cove where she'd started this game. And it'd be time to end it there.  

But maybe things had changed.

And now here was Kyran, and he was wavering between the old white-knighting and assuring Dee that no, she wasn't slowing them down, and this new hey Dee, why don't you take the lead for a bit and talk, I'll hang back and follow what you think and maybe I'll be consumed with some self-doubt of my own. That was kind of scary. Because like what had she been doing, earning his respect or something? Kind of annoying too, because it gave her less reason to keep that little bit of hate she still nursed down in her gut ever since the docks. Here was Kyran getting angry and talking about his mother and not just assuming that he was captain of the Doing the Right Thing S.S., and he'd never been all like that in the first place, had he?

Worst or maybe best of all, it was chipping away at the excuse she'd given herself a couple days ago for why that maybe-plan of hers wasn't gonna work: the excuse that duh, she couldn't up or die -- with or without a goodbye -- because then oh Kyran would just blame himself and it'd all be her fault. But even failing that excuse, her maybe-plan was looking to be smoking ash now, and the reasons behind that were remained obscured by shadowy curtains that she was still afraid to peek behind.

And here was Cammy too, and Dee couldn't forget Cammy was there, because Cammy led to more people -- maybe Garrett Wilde and Matt Vartoogian and who knew who else -- and a whole new series of events that weren't merely holing up with the birds or the mall; it was opening the door to some house party full of people you'd never met and it wasn't fucking easy especially since you still weren't sure of the girl taking you there in the first place. And Dee was probably never going to see Cammy as even close to whatever she saw Kyran as, but going with her would still force Dee to see Cammy a hell of a lot closer than anyone else on this island.

And she was still hungry and thirsty and there was that weird feeling of lightness floating in her head, not quite a headache, more like a tiny pinprick that sucked out just enough knowledge and memory to make her question what she knew. But she could put those aside a bit longer.

She could keep the cigarette in her pocket and pretend the time simply hadn't come time to smoke it yet. A silly superstition.

(Deanna Hull continued in You're Driftwood)

[jimmydalad]

She waited for a response, with the moments feeling like lifetimes passing by. Her legs were rooted to the floor. All she could really do was watch, and wait for a response. Would it be something scathing? Or was it something good? She hoped it was the latter. She didn't want to have to deal with anymore bullshit while she was still on the island.

Kyran's reply was short and sweet. Like it was before. But the words lifted a heavy weight off her. Kyran didn't hate her guts and he was willing to travel with her. Dee would be coming along as well. The isolation she felt in that moment had disappeared. She wasn't alone. She didn't have to face this alone.

Nodding her head, Cammy followed Kyran. Maybe she was a bit lost right now. Maybe talking could come later. At this point, Cammy was just running on auto-pilot. She could feel her will to continue slowly draining. That thought alone terrified her.

((Cammy Davidson continued in You're Driftwood))