come_sailaway | BATTLE ROYALE EVENT: SHIP

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BATTLE ROYALE EVENT: SHIP

[fortunately, not signing up for the shore excursion doesn't mean the passengers still on board don't get to have a little fun. on the contrary: they'll get to have some of the most fun of all!

about an hour after the tender leaves, at about 9AM, every screen on the ship, from the cabin TVs to the one above the pool, begins playing a live feed of the events on the island, starting with Friday's introduction video and transitioning to the passengers leaving the bunker. from then on, the camera (?) seems to always know where the action is, bringing close-up views of each fight, each death. when little action occurs, highlight reels play. there is no audio, however, outside of the droning, inane muzak of the stream and the kitschy sound effects of the reels; time to brush up on your lip-reading if you want the hot goss on scene!

in the atrium, near Friday's desk, is a large piece of construction paper, titled "PLACE YOUR BETS," showing a table with the names (some true, some not) of each competitor, with a space to write down your name next to who you think will win. the captain has already made his choice! what are you betting? don't worry about it.

the screens will play the game 24 hours a day. destroying the screens wholly will buy you only momentary respite. so, sit back, and enjoy.]

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He moves a little closer and then crouches down so that his face is closer to Ava's. The mask is creepy. Honestly, if someone wearing that was coming at him, he'd probably be scared.

But since he knows that Ava is behind it, he doesn't really have any fear.

"The whole thing was rigged. Everybody lost. You didn't do anything wrong." Malcolm bites his lip, wondering if this is what she wants to hear or not. "I don't think any less of you."

She honestly might be a bit more afraid of him, all things considered. But Ava stays put, doesn't lash out nor retreat despite her wariness.

She doesn't know what she wants to hear, really. But it does help that he's saying it, because she does actually care. What he thinks.

Ava slowly lifts her hand out to him, fingers twitching, a wordless request.

Malcolm puts his hand in hers, gripping her in the hope that she might not start to waver or disappear. He wants to anchor her to this plane of existence.

"Will you take the mask off?" he asks quietly. "I want to see you. The real you."

She tightens her hold, to stop the trembling, to make sure he's not going to suddenly up and leave. As if she isn't the one always running away every time he so much as glances her way. Because part of her knew this day would inevitably come.

She almost refuses, because she doesn't need a mirror to imagine what she looks like under it. Her cheeks still dampened with tears, eyes puffy and red. Stray bits of hair stuck to her face, and her bottom lip bitten raw with worry. But she reaches up anyway, unlatching the face plate to her mask and letting it clatter to the floor. There's a small hiss from her suit at the pressure release.

And as much as she tries to hold it back, her eyes well up again. Ava turns her face away. "How much of it did you see?"

He exhales when the mask comes off. There she is. She's a mess, but she's still pretty.

"Not a lot of it. I, um... tried to avoid watching if I could." It was too hard, watching people being forced to kill others. Funny how it would have been different if he'd been watching a tape for a crime back home. He'd had to watch many horrible things in his training as an FBI agent, but it's different when it's people you know.

"Sometimes when I heard the voice of someone I care about I would stop and pay attention for a little while."

Malcolm's hand is trembling now too, though he's holding on so tightly to Ava's that it's hard to tell.

"For the best," she supposes there's no value to really be gained from something so utterly perverse and hopeless. But if the positions had been reversed, she doubts she'd be able to look away. And she doubts he'd have broken down so easily, played right into the game as she had. Even if he claims she had no choice, she's sure Malcolm would've made a different one.

"If this is how it begins... how much worse is it going to get?" What's the point of trying to recover from all this if it just opens her up to suffering all over again?

Malcolm just shakes his head. It's a question that he's asked himself as well. "I think we've all at least learned that we can't trust anybody that works on this ship," he says. "We might not be able to trust the passengers either." Some of their fellow cruisers were a bit too gleeful about killing and it showed. In the bits and pieces that Malcolm saw, Ava wasn't one of them.

"But we need to all try to stick together."

As if she's trusted anyone a day in her life, outside of Bill Foster. "And how's that work, exactly?" Ava asks sincerely. "Stick together, don't trust anyone." It's a question she's never been able to quite figure out, in her constant need for help and it always being taken advantage of. She has no doubts that the majority of the passengers wouldn't sell each other out the moment they got an opportunity.

"I told you, I don't like people."

He realizes that he just contradicted himself and acknowledges that with a tiny smile and a tilt of his head. "I think what I meant is that those of us that we know we can trust need to try to help each other. The only way that we're going to be able to get through this is together." Separately, they'll be too easy for the captain to manipulate and pick off.

"People fascinate me..." Malcolm muses. "But I'm not sure if I really like most of them either."

"Together," she sighs. Because she tried. Tried to stick together with her small group, and watched them picked off one by one instead. Being alone is a far less painful experience. "I lose everyone that I care about," Ava tells him. "Eventually we all do. But for me, it's never a matter of eventually. It's always right away. My parents when I was five. Bill as soon as he tried to adopt me. The one scientist that tried to treat me as a person, got reassigned. Finally I had people willing to help me, for a whole two weeks. Gone. I've never been meant for... together. Just losing and losing and losing until there's nothing left."

It feels unfair to complain about. They've all been separated from their lives and loved ones.

He's kind of screwing this up, isn't he? Well, he's a profiler, not a therapist. He's trying. All of them are trying.

"Just because that's how it's always been doesn't mean that's how it has to continue to be. I can't give up and let them win."

Malcolm has to fight. If there's injustice, he can't just sit here and let it happen.

If Ava has no one, at least she has him.

She's just so tired of fighting, and she's certain that they've already won. Ava closes her eyes.

She doesn't like being a hostage, but she does know how to play one.

"I didn't think I'd see you again. And it made me realize how much of a coward I've been. Avoiding you."

"Yeah..." he says, his brow furrowing. "Why? Have you been avoiding me, I mean."

Malcolm noticed because of course he did. And because it's her. Ava draws his attention every time she's near. The fact that she would keep disappearing in the middle of their conversations bothered him. He was wondering what he was doing wrong.

Why indeed.

She could just blame it on the fear of getting attached.

"I know how to handle being miserable, angry, bitter. But you... make me feel things that I do not know what to do with. So," she stares down at their hands, still clasped.

At first Malcolm is confused, but then a few puzzle pieces slide into place. "Oh," he says quietly. She... likes him? His first instinct is to ask why, but Ava might take that the wrong way. The problem is with him, not her.

"I-I mean... how do you feel when you're around me?"

This is a moment she would rather disappear. She doesn't want to answer this question or put any of it into words. "Okay." Which might sound like an empty sort of platitude on the surface, but... it's far more than that.

Okay. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement, but for Ava, it means something. Malcolm could be wrong, but she might be saying that he makes her feel normal.

"You make me feel okay too," he replies. "Better than okay, usually."

He likes her too. She's pretty and funny and just weird enough to maybe understand that his life isn't easy and he isn't perfect.

She wants it so badly, to feel normal. Thought she was finally at a place in her life that she could simply put back all the pieces and figure out who she was meant to be. But normalcy now feels like a concept she can't dare afford.

Yet there Malcolm is, amidst all the chaos and upheaval and making it look so simple. To just be okay.

Ava breathes out, a small laugh at the end. "Okay," and this time it's in agreement, that whatever there is between them is okay.

And then finally, quietly, "Thanks."

He wants that too. The more he thinks about it, the more he thinks that's why he was trying to make it work with Eve. He wanted to be normal and have a normal relationship. Malcolm should have realized that even if Eve had lived, nothing would ever have been normal between them. Her sister was one of his father's victims.

"You're welcome," he replies quietly, gazing into her green eyes. Malcolm's not usually a touchy-feely person, but he feels compelled - he wraps his arms around Ava, pulling her close to him.

It's never made sense why somebody like Malcolm was here amongst the rest of them. They're all sorts of strange and unnatural types, with a wide range of baffling abilities and lives. And he's just a guy from what sounds like such a regular world. One with a clearly haunted past, one that's a bit weird in his own ways. And she envies that.

The embrace takes Ava by surprise, she stiffens at first, then absolutely collapses into Malcolm's arms. She breathes out, slow and shaky, and then buries her face against his neck.

It's probably time for Malcolm to come clean with Ava about his past and his father. Not at this very second, mind you, but soon. He's definitely not a perfect person, and he can't let her go on thinking that.

It's a relief to feel her relax in his arms and he holds her for a long moment. "It's over now," he says. He can't tell her that things are okay, because he knows they aren't.

She wants to make him promise, but she knows it's unfair. It's over, for now. But it's not over. This is just the beginning and worse is yet to come, and she has to get herself together or she'll only make worse decisions. Recalculate, like a GPS after a wrong turn.

But for right now, she'll take comfort and let herself believe she's safe.

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BATTLE ROYALE EVENT: SHIP

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