(Untitled)

[with_diamonds]

Simply put, things were a fucking mess. The past two weeks had been spent worrying about Chase, a feeling not lessened by the fact that his recovery was imminent, and Lucy had begun to think she was nearing the end of her rope, though that wasn't anything new for her. Over and over, it seemed, just when she thought things couldn't get any worse,

Comments

[defected]

By most standards, Bryce Larkin could be considered lucky. Eight months, now, he had been on the island, and before this week he hadn't lost a single soul. The fault in that reasoning, of course, was the simple fact that he didn't have anyone or anything to lose; he never had. It was the way that he lived his life, out of necessity of the island and out of habit on it

[with_diamonds]

Eyebrows raising, Lucy took a few steps nearer at the returned greeting, knowing now that at least there was no chance of startling him. It was a stupid thing and she'd never liked to think of herself as a clingy girl, but distance was the last thing she needed, like as if by keeping people close, she could prevent them from going, though she had disproved that reasoning long ago, waking up in an empty bed in the hut that had been her and Ryan's. Now, any tactile instincts were repressed, but something in her head still thought a clearing's worth of space was too much.

"God, you've been really going at that thing, haven't you?" she asked, though the answer was apparent enough in the sweat and his breathlessness. It wasn't absent observations she ought to have been focusing on, but she had no desire to be seen as always full of self-pity, always being left behind, as if she had any control over the island's taking people away. "I almost forgot this was even here. What's up?"

[defected]

He had never been what most consider 'open' and, for a long time, Bryce had never truly minded it. But too much time on this island - too much time in one place, period - and everything he had once believed to be true about himself was being quickly redefined. Once a person who never allowed himself to get too close; now a man who mourned the loss of those he held dear through violence directed at an inanimate object

[with_diamonds]

Something about that struck a chord, made her stomach twist as she realized what must have been going on. What he was describing was a feeling that Lucy knew all too well, and had acted on once before, though far less sensibly; it left her with only one question, no longer having to wonder what might have prompted something like this. Her own recent losses still fresh in her mind, she frowned, and no longer giving a damn, stepped close enough to rest a hand lightly on his shoulder. She had been through this enough times to know how much it hurt.

"Better than taking it out on a concrete wall, at least," she offered, though there was no levity in the statement, despite the self-deprecating edge to her words. At her side, her fingers flexed; she'd been lucky, she supposed, that there was no serious damage done when she had gone and punched the side of the Compound. Hardly her proudest moment, though it had felt good, too, in its way. She exhaled heavily before he could respond, voice lowering as she asked, "Who was it?"