Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Neil had first bought the plane ticket, he had no one sitting next to him, and it was a relatively empty flight. Not many people flew overseas in the middle of the week at eleven at night. 

Or maybe they did, as Neil now watched as his flight was slowly overtaken by two sports teams—two rival sports teams, two rival murderous sport teams. 

The sports teams—Neil didn’t even like sports, he didn’t even know who they were, if he was supposed to be impressed—Foxes and Ravens, their jackets said, had apparently accidentally booked the same flight on the same plane to the same place they were apparently going. 

“This is bullshit!” a woman shouted, no doubt a captain based on her disposition and the way the rest of her team, the Foxes, deferred to her. “Make them change flights!”

Neil watched from his place in the back of the gate area, hood pulled up and hat pulled over his eyes, as the Raven’s captain fought back. There was a weird tension going on with the Raven and someone from the Foxes’ team—actually, Neil realized the more he stared, the Raven’s captain had a weird tension with two people from the Foxes’ team: a short, blond man with a vacant expression and black armbands, and a tall man with green eyes and scarred skin below his eye. The tall man looked anxious. The blond man looked bored. 

The Raven’s captain, the back of his jacket proudly displaying the name “Moriyama,” sneered and taunted and riled each one of the Foxes—except for the bored one, who continued to look disinterested but was standing protectively in front of the tall anxious scarred man. 

Neil watched them squabble for thirty minutes before the coaches stepped in and said there was literally nothing to be done—this was the only connecting flight for both teams from both places they came from, and each team would just have to play nice until they landed. 

“Coach! This is an eleven hour flight!” the captain shouted. 

The Foxes’ coach rubbed his eyes and sighed. 

The Ravens’ coach stared at his team, who were standing in a strange formation with serious expressions on their faces, and didn’t say a word, didn’t make a sound. 

“This is going to be a long flight,” one of the Foxes bemoaned. He was tall and standing beside another short blond man identical to the short blond bored man. 

Neil closed his eyes. This was going to be a long flight. He intended to sleep it away. 

*

Short blond bored man was sitting beside Neil on the flight. The tall anxious scarred man sat in the aisle seat. Neil was crammed in the window seat.

Neil kicked his duffel bag a little farther under the seat in front of him and made sure his hood hid his face. He did not want to engage with the sports teams. 

As soon as the flight attendant finished checking the rows, the short blond bored man flipped down the armrest between them, and Neil looked over at the movement. 

The blond man was already staring at him. Neil snuck a glance at the man’s armbands and, annoyed at the man’s staring and the inevitable toxic masculinity that would overtake the flight, said, “How did you get those past security?”

The man didn’t seem surprised that Neil had noticed the knives in his bands. He didn’t seem anything at all. 

The tall anxious scarred man said, “Are you fucking serious, Andrew?” 

Andrew, still staring at Neil, gently fingered one of the hidden blades inside his band. 

Neil turned away and flipped up the window blind, staring out at the wing and waiting for takeoff. Let Andrew stare. Let him smuggle knives onto an eleven hour flight. Let the Foxes and Ravens fight. Whatever. This would be the last time Neil would see the United States. He intended to stay where he was going or die while he was there. 

It was a strange farewell, bittersweet, seeing a beach that was across the country from where his mother was buried. Neil was tired. He didn’t want to be here anymore. He didn’t want to be anywhere anymore.

The pilot announced they were ready for take off, and Neil closed his eyes. It was time to go. 

*

Things were fine until they weren’t. 

The flight was quiet until it wasn’t. 

Everything was calm until the cabin depressurized and oxygen masks fell in front of every passenger. 

Neil heard someone from a few seats behind him scream. 

Everything was too chaotic and Neil couldn’t breathe and so many people were screaming, people were standing up, the tall anxious scarred man—Neil knew his name was Kevin because someone had called his name at some point during the flight—was securing a mask on his face. Neil could see, through the turbulence and the chaos, most of the other passengers doing so as well. 

Andrew was unbuckling his seatbelt and moving to stand up. A bump of turbulence made him fall back immediately, and Neil watched as Andrew’s hands curled tightly around the front of the armrests as he attempted to stand again. His legs looked shaky. His hands looked weak. Neil looked at his face and noticed that his skin was pale. 

“Hey,” Neil said, quietly, over the roar of the plane, the people, the storm. Andrew did not turn to him. 

“Hey,” Neil said again, a little louder. Andrew still wouldn’t look away from the people in front of him, searching, looking. Neil reached up for Andrew’s oxygen mask, and that was when Andrew finally turned to look at him, annoyed, intense, furious. Neil, without a second thought, slipped the band quickly over Andrew’s face and secured it behind his head, pulling it tight. Andrew immediately pulled out one of his smuggled knives and pushed the tip to Neil’s throat. The jostling of the plane poked the blade into his skin. Neil barely felt it. 

Neil pushed the blade away from his neck and said, “Your brother is three rows up. He’s not sitting by a Raven, and he’s in the middle seat.” The more Neil spoke, the more he realized that, oh, actually, maybe he should have his oxygen mask on, too. His vision was blurring and it was hard to breathe. He reached up for it, still staring at Andrew, still trying to get him to calm down. “You need to get Kevin out of his seat, and then you can move to the emergency exit row, which should be in front of your brother. Don’t forget that your seat is a flotation device. I’d advise taking Moriyama’s. He should be up there, too.” 

Neil finally slipped his mask on and took a deep breath. There was so much screaming he didn’t know if Andrew heard anything he said, if anyone was paying attention to anything other than the fact that they were going down and everything was dark and scary and Neil didn’t have anyone who would look for him when he was gone. 

And then the plane crashed. 

*

There was fire in the water, an engine and an emergency boat somewhere, and people were still screaming, calling out for names that Neil didn’t recognize, wouldn’t know. He was trying to keep his head above water, was hoping to find his duffel bag, but Neil didn’t have anything, just the clothes on his back and the cushion of his seat as a flotation device, cradled to his chest, and he was kicking his way somewhere, in any direction. It was dark outside, and people were still screaming, and no one was calling Neil’s name. 

*

Eventually the waves stopped overtaking him and Neil could breathe enough to focus and focus enough to open his eyes, and he saw the sun cresting behind an island not far from where he was, and he saw debris drifting, and people floating and crying, and he started toward land, and he came across someone who couldn’t keep their body afloat. 

Neil thought for a moment—but it wasn’t worth it, leaving someone out here, and he’d want someone to stop for him, even if he didn’t have anyone, so Neil, through thick and weary limbs—he was so cold—went to the drowning man and held him up. 

“You need to take off your shoes,” Neil said, trying to keep him up, he was so tall, and his bright orange jacket was soaked and sagging off his skin. “I can’t keep you up if you don’t help.” 

The man, panting, gasping, held tight to the floatation device Neil was sharing and took off his shoes and placed them atop the seat so he wouldn’t lose them to the depths of the ocean. 

“I need to find Dan,” the guy said. “I need to find her.” 

Neil didn’t know how to tell him they weren’t going to find her, but instead he said, “Okay. We’ll find her.” Anything to get them to shore. 

Neil started kicking, and soon, the guy joined in, weak and weary, looking out for Dan, looking out for anyone. Neil looked at the island up ahead and kicked. 

*

Matt must have seen Dan amongst the people who were already on shore as he abandoned Neil as soon as their feet brushed the bottom and slogged his way to her and the few others huddled together on the beach. Neil, as soon as he was able, collapsed on his knees. He was gasping, breathing in sea water, thick with salt, and immediately coughed it out. He vomited up whatever was left in his body before he crawled his way out of the ocean and curled up on the beach, breathing and breathing.

He could hear the huddled mass call for more people out on the waves. Neil wanted to look out, see who else had made it, but he couldn’t move. He listened to the people instead, face buried in the sand, eyes closed. The sun was still rising. 

*

“Did you see the emergency boat?” 

“Yeah, I fucking saw the boat. Did you see Tetsuji on it?” 

“I saw Tetsuji and the pilot pull an unconscious Coach out of the wreckage and put him on the boat.” 

“Where’s Riko?” 

“Dead, hopefully.” 

“I don’t think we can afford to hate each other in our current situation.” 

“I don’t fucking care about our current situation! Our plane just crashed! I just had to swim to shore! I'm on a goddamn island! Oh my god, I’m panicking. Fuck. Oh my god. Shit. Where are the monsters? They’re the only ones not here.” 

“What about the Ravens?” 

“I could give two shits about the Ravens. Where are the monsters?”

*

Neil needed to get up. As much as he would like to lie on the beach and wait for death, he didn’t want to be around either sports team while they were marooned on this island. Wiping at his cheeks and scrubbing more sand into his skin, Neil struggled to sit up, struggled to motivate himself, struggled to stand.

But he didn’t have anything else to do, so he sat up, motivated himself, and stood. He began limping along the shoreline, considering the trees above him, taking stock of what was around him. The Foxes in their huddle didn’t notice him leave nor try to stop him.

Neil moved on. His clothes were cold and clammy and caked in sand, but he could feel already how hot the day would be. Not a cloud in sight—ironic, considering the storm that ruined them. Neil moved on. He hadn’t gotten far before he saw another group of four sprawled on the beach, and it only took a few seconds for Neil to recognize the twins and their two tall companions. Andrew was on his back, an arm tossed over his eyes, one leg bent. His twin was beside him, hugging his knees and rocking. Kevin was pacing the beach and staring out at the horizon. The other man was on the other side of Andrew, sitting cross-legged and ticking a list off his fingers. Neil couldn’t hear what he was saying.

Once he was close enough to the group, feet crunching the sand and drawing their attention to him, they all looked at him. Kevin stopped pacing. Andrew’s twin stopped rocking. The other brunette stopped speaking. Andrew did nothing, arm still thrown over his eyes.

“They’re looking for you,” Neil told them, and that’s when Andrew finally uncovered his eyes and looked up at Neil.

“Who the fuck are you?” Andrew’s twin snapped.

“Um, bro,” the man on the other side of Andrew said. “What’s up with your eyes?”

Oh right. Neil looked down at his sandy fingers in consideration. He wiped his index finger on his wet, sandy shirt. There was now more sand on it. Thinking that nothing could hurt more than it already did, Neil sighed and fished the contact out, tears immediately pooling and pouring down his cheek. He must have lost the other one somewhere in the ocean. He blinked a few more times to clear out the sand, tears still streaming, as he dropped the contact at his feet.

The monsters, as the Foxes had called them, stared at Neil in various degrees of horror and confusion. Kevin looked disgusted. The other tall man looked horrified. The twin looked annoyed. Andrew had sat up. He was the only one staring at Neil with no expression at all.

Neil tapped two fingers to his temple in a sad salute and said, “Go Foxes,” before he continued his trek, alone, across the beach.

*

“Oh my god, Kevin! Nicky! Guys! Are you okay?”

“Not really, but we’re here. It looks like all the Foxes made it. Where’s Coach?”

“I think that Tetsuji and the pilot took him and some of the Ravens on the emergency boat and fucking left.”

“Coach wouldn’t leave us!”

“He would if he was unconscious and had no fucking choice!”

“Oh my god, so we’re really stranded?”

“Oh my god, I’m gonna puke.”

“Do it over there.”

“I’m gonna do it here.”

“Ew!”

“Bro!”

“Stop!”

“Are you okay? It’s okay; here, I’ll hold your hair.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay.”

“Look, it’s going to be okay. We are a well-known sports team and we were on our way to a well-known place. Our coach made it out. There wouldn’t have been enough room for all of us to fit, anyways. We just have to wait for help. We just have to wait.”

“But for how long?”

“Oh god.”

“I’m gonna be sick again.”

*

Matt, once everyone stopped being sick and they realized, fatalistically, that they really were going to be stuck here, stranded, for who knows how long, remembered that he hadn’t made it to the beach alone.

“Where’s that guy?” he asked, looking up and around. Guilt hit him heavy in the chest. Matt had left that guy in the ocean. He hadn’t even waited to make sure the guy could stand before he clamored to the beach, trying to get to his people, to Dan.

“What guy?” Dan asked. Matt was still looking for the guy, now out at the ocean and the scattered debris floating in from the crash. He took two steps out, like he was going to go into the waves to search, when a hand grasped his forearm and stopped him.

Matt was honest-to-god shook that it was Andrew who had stopped him. Matt shrugged out of his grasp, a little startled, and took a step back. Since when did Andrew care about something outside the monsters?

“What guy?” Andrew asked, and Matt suddenly had the attention of all the Foxes.

“Um,” Matt said. He decided that he didn’t like Andrew’s undivided attention, but he couldn’t look away as he went on, “I was really struggling out there. After the…after it all. I don’t really know what was happening, but suddenly this dude was there and he was telling me to take off my shoes and he helped me get here. He saved my life.” Guilt and shame now weighed heavy on his chest. Matt needed to find him.

“Was he a Raven?” Allison asked.

Matt shook his head. “I don’t think so. I don’t know who he is, but I didn’t even get a chance to thank him.”

“Did he have brown hair? Blue eyes? Kinda shady?” Nicky asked. Matt didn’t know how to answer. He had been too frantic to pay attention to anything. He thought the guy’s eyes had been darker than blue, but who paid attention to the eye color of people they just met, in the dark, after their plane crashed? Matt shrugged, helpless, and Nicky went on, “Because we saw him walking down the beach a little while ago. He said you were looking for us, and then he left.”

Matt looked down in the direction the monsters had come from, but he didn’t see anyone down the barren strip of beach, going and going, in front of him.

“Fuck,” Matt said.

“Whatever,” Aaron said. “Who gives a fuck about some random dude? We need to find something to eat.”

“What was the guy doing on our plane?”

“We don’t own the airlines, Allison.”

“Still seems pretty sus.”

“He saved my life,” Matt said again. He was still looking down the beach. From beside him, he could feel that Andrew was doing the same.

*

Neil had finally ventured into the thicket of jungle in the middle of the island, not wanting to be on the beach anymore. He wished he had thought to take one of Andrew’s knives, if he still had one, but Neil could make do without one for now. He wouldn’t have been able to rob him, anyways, four against one and Neil not nearly caring as much as he should.

So he was stuck on a deserted island. He’d been living on the streets just a few nights before. At least now there wasn’t the threat of his father’s men finding him. 

First, Neil needed to find somewhere to sleep. And then he could work on finding some food. The sun was a lot higher, and things were a lot hotter than they were a few hours ago. Neil would have to find a way to boil water. He’d need to search the debris washing up on shore.

This would be fine. Everything would be fine.

“I’m fine,” Neil said. He turned from the jungle and went back to the beach, hoping to find anything to help him. “I’m fine,” he said again, and again, and again.

*

Neil was just evaluating a potential tree he could use as shelter when someone hit him in the stomach with a giant tree branch. He was smacked so hard, and the tree branch wasn’t smooth, that something hard and pointy stabbed into his stomach. Neil felt his skin break, but he didn’t feel anything else break, so he could manage. Well, except for that the wind was knocked out of him and he was flat on his back.

“Well, well, well,” someone drawled from above him as Neil wheezed for breath, and then the abhorrent face of the Raven’s captain, Moriyama, was leering down at him, flanked by two other Ravens. He was smirking. “Looks like we’ve found ourselves a lost little pig. What should we do with it?”

Neil, unimpressed with Moriyama’s weird act (hadn’t they only been on the island for a few hours and already he was acting like an insane psychopath?), said, “Spill its blood?”

“An educated pig!” Moriyama said. More Ravens emerged from the trees to bear witness to Neil’s sorry state. God, Neil hated sports teams. “Remind me again what happened to the pig at the end of the book?”

Neil, hands sliding around for a rock, a stick, anything, retorted, “Remind me again what happened to the rich, entitled kids at the end of the book?” One of the Ravens stepped on Neil’s roaming wrist, pressing down. Neil hissed but stopped struggling.

Moriyama glared. “I’m not entitled.”

“And I’m not scared of you,” Neil said, and then he spat in the Raven captain’s direction.

Moriyama gestured for two of his Raven’s to grab Neil and lift him up. As soon as he was upright, Moriyama grabbed Neil by the chin and tilted him this way and that, as if sizing him up for a meal, and said, “You should be.”

Chapter Text

“Should we build a shelter?”

“I don’t know how to build a shelter.”

“It’s so hot and I’m so thirsty.”

“Don’t drink from the sea.”

“What do I look like, a fucking idiot?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my god, why is the only bag we’ve found Allison’s? All she has is clothes and some shoes.”

“We can use those heels as a weapon.”

“If you impale anything with those shoes, I will kill you myself.”

“Oh my god, this is the worst.”

“Just wait until you realize that none of us know how to hunt or forage for food.”

“Fuck, you’re right.”

“We’re so screwed.”

“Can you help me with this? At least some of us are trying to make this situation livable.”

“Whatever, dude.”

*

The Ravens dropped Neil in a deep hole and left him there without saying a word. Neil wasn’t sure what the Ravens were planning on doing with taking him prisoner. Neil assumed it was some power trip the Raven’s captain—he knew his name was Riko after one of the Ravens asked the captain a question—was living out now that he was unsupervised and clearly in a leadership position, but probably they kidnapped him so that Neil couldn’t use up more resources on the island that the Ravens could use for themselves.

Neil wondered if the Ravens were going to try to take the Foxes as well. He didn’t intend to stick around long enough to find out. Neil let the Ravens drop him in the pit somewhere in the jungle, wet with mulch and sea water, without putting up much of a fight outside a few wiggles and squirms to see how strongly the Ravens would fight to keep him.

He was punched or kicked for any movement, so Neil stopped trying. Eventually, once they had dropped him in his prison (had they dug it out themselves? was it natural? what was it doing here?), they walked off silently without a look back, and Neil waited a long time before he considered the mud around him and how he’d get out. He didn’t know how long the Ravens intended to be gone, but he wasn’t about to waste time. The top of the pit was maybe two feet above Neil's head, and his prison was as wide as Neil was tall. After taking a deep, steadying breath, Neil punched his fingers into the wet soil, dirt pushing and pressing underneath his fingernails, and tried to climb.

*

“What’s the point of taking him, Riko?”

“To lure out the Foxes.”

“Is he a Fox?”

“I saw him on the plane sitting next to Andrew and Kevin. And I saw him fish out that one from drowning. They’ll come for him.”

“Who is he? How do you know they’ll come for him?”

“I don’t know who he is, but it doesn’t matter. They’ll come for him.”

*

The sun was set and the night was cold by the time Neil finally dragged himself out of the pit, fingers ragged and bleeding, body covered in mud, mouth dry from no water, dirt on his teeth, soil in his nose. The wound on his stomach from when Riko smacked him was throbbing and burning. Neil was gasping and panting, shaking just outside the pit and so hungry, so tired, before he forced his muscles to relax, forced his body to stop convulsing, and rolled onto his feet. He could smell a fire, or perhaps one just burned out. He silently went in that direction. On his way, he found a rock, the size of his palm, with one jagged edge, and picked it up, wiping the space under his nose with the back of his fist. Something was running from his nose. He figured it was blood.

Neil ventured toward the smoke of the fire, not making a sound.

*

Neil found the Ravens piled atop each other, cuddled and close, under a makeshift shelter from leaves and sticks. They had their own pile of salvaged debris, suitcases and miscellaneous finds, in front of the Raven on lookout, drowsy but watching the tree line, alert, ready. They had a makeshift spear clutched to their chest. There were two fires: one smoldering near the pile of Ravens and another near the lookout.

Neil didn’t care about the stuff or the fires, but he did like the idea of a spear. Clutching the rock tight in his fist, Neil moved closer.

*

The fight was quick but not silent. By the time Neil had knocked out the guard and stolen the spear, the pile of Ravens was stirring. In the dark and still night, illuminated only by the red and orange glowing embers of a dying fire, the Ravens looked like a hellish beast of gangly limbs and long faces, moving sluggishly but in unison, silent but deadly. Riko looked right at Neil from the middle of the mass and smiled, the red of the fire reflecting in his black eyes.

Neil grasped the spear tight in his hands and sprinted for the trees.

*

—he ran and ran and ran and ran and ran and ran—

*

“Get off of me.”

“I’m fucking cold, bro.”

“What’s up with you and ‘bro’ lately?”

“Really? You wanna talk about my vocabulary now?”

“No, I want you to get off my fucking foot. I’m claustrophobic and you’re scaring me.”

“Well, maybe if Aaron hadn’t made the shelter so small, we wouldn’t all have to cram together so tight.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? I didn’t see anyone else doing anything.”

“I was trying to light a fire.”

“It went out.”

“I was trying to boil water.”

“Oh, on the fire that went out?”

“Give me another of Allison’s shirts. I want to be warm.”

“Bro, Allison’s shirts are, like, lace. There’s nothing warm for you here.”

“Call me bro one more goddamn time.”

“Get. Off. My. Foot.”

“Oh my god, where’s Andrew. I want one of his knives.”

“Go the fuck to sleep.”

“Everyone shut up! I think I hear something.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“Oh my god, who did it.”

“Who! Who would do this when we’re so crammed on top of each other!”

“Please, god, I want to die.”

“Seriously, if you don’t get off my foot, I’m going to chop off your leg and eat it raw.”

“Whoa, someone’s hungry.”

“I’m fucking tired, Jesus Christ.”

“Have you guys seen the stars?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Oh my god.”

*

When Neil first heard the waterfall, he thought he was dreaming. He had been running so long, tired and thirsty, that he thought his mind had finally given up on him and he was dying. He stumbled at the sound, and veered in its direction, and wondered how much longer before his feet gave up on him—the sun was rising and Neil hadn’t noticed, he thought he passed the same tree twice but maybe it was more like five, had he ever left the jungle? was he always here? how did he get here? where was he? who was he?—and then the water was louder and louder and then Neil was there, seeing the pool through the trees, a spring, an oasis, a waterfall of water so clear and bright and blue that Neil dropped his spear he’d fought so hard for and fell to his knees at the bank and drank.

*

When Neil finally returned to himself, he stepped into the pool of water and washed off all the blood and mud from his face and clothes. Then he took off his clothes and washed the rest of his body, standing with his head under the waterfall and closing his eyes to the roar of the water. Now that his body wasn’t aching with the need for water, Neil could think with a clearer head about the sting of hunger plaguing his stomach. He paced, naked save for his underwear, in front of the pool while he thought, his clothes hanging to dry in the hot sun. Neil thought he’d seen some berries before he collapsed at the spring, and looking over, he found them.

Good. Finally. Something was going right. How long had he been out here again? Man, his face hurt. He’d almost forgotten how the Ravens had punched him anytime he tried to fight back. Fuck, he was hungry. And still needed to find a place to sleep. And probably something more sustainable to eat than just a few scant berries. Wasn’t he supposed to rub them on his skin first to make sure they were edible?

Goddamn but Neil was really starting to hate it here. Fuck the Ravens. Fuck this island. Fuck everything.

Neil stuffed a fistful of berries in his mouth without testing them on his skin. Fuck me, too , he thought, and then sat down to plot his next move.

*

“I’m tired of digging for clams.”

“Well, that’s too damn bad! There’s literally nothing else for us to eat.”

“Can’t I just eat a leaf? It’s so green and beautiful and I think I could digest it.”

“You know what? I don’t care. Eat the giant fucking leaf. Whatever.”

“Andrew’s got knives and he’s not even sharing.”

“I thought he was out hunting snakes.”

“He is? Wow, that’s baller.”

“Shut the fuck up and get back to work.”

“Fine. But only because I’m tired of being around you.”

“Well, you better get used to it. We’re going to be here a while.”

“Fuck.”

*

Once his clothes were stiff and dry, Neil stepped back into them and scrubbed mud onto his face and arms and the back of his neck. He lamented the last time he’d ever feel clean before taking a deep breath and heading in the direction that, he hoped, would lead him to the ocean. He needed to forage through whatever washed up, and, hopefully, use his spear for something other than self-defense against deranged sports teams. 

*

Neil had never fished a day in his life, or tried to stab a fish with the head of a spear before in his life, and wasn’t he supposed to know something about refraction? The fish wasn’t where it appeared?

Fuck.

Okay.

He could do this. 

Neil stood ankle deep in a cubby off the coast, surrounded by rocks and seaweed, his shoes in the sand, the mud protecting him from the harsh glare of the sun, and took a deep breath. 

He could do this. 

“I can do this,” he said, and then held very still and waited for some fish. 

*

“Don’t you think it’s weird we haven’t seen the Ravens?” 

“Don’t tell Renee, but I’m still hoping they perished.” 

“I’m standing right here. I can hear you.” 

“Um.” 

“Oh.”

“Haha...um...” 

“Although I agree that it’s weird we haven’t seen them. They should have washed up on the same shore.” 

“Right? Where are they?” 

*

Neil gave up trying to spear a fish and instead took off his shirt to use as a net, which worked only marginally better, as he caught two fish. 

But he didn’t know how to gut a fish. Was that what he was supposed to do? Neil didn’t know. 

Fuck. 

“You can do this,” he told himself. “You can do this. It’s fine. We’re fine. I’m fine. C’mon, Neil, you just got to...uh…” Did he cut the belly first? Chop off its head? 

Jesus Christ, Neil had never felt like a bigger idiot in his life. He wished he could tear into the fish, scales, bones, and all. Wasn’t that a thing people did? Catch a fish and then take a bite, right out of the ocean, right there?

“It’s like sushi,” he said, though Neil had never had sushi. 

Fuck. 

He sighed, setting the fish on a slab of rock. 

“Gut, then,” he said, and then took the sharp point of the spear and dug in. 

*

Neil didn’t have a fire, or a way to make a fire, or a way to cook his fish other than leaving it out in the hot sun. 

He looked at the warm, uncooked, coagulated meat of the fish he just desecrated and said, “It’s like sushi.” Just the thought of the disease he could get from the raw fish made Neil’s stomach turn. 

Okay. Fire.

Neil looked out at the ocean, the shoreline. He wondered how far the Ravens were, where the Foxes were, how everyone seemed to be able to make fire and eat food but him. 

*

“Fuck, I’m so hungry.” 

“Goddamn but I think I’m dying of thirst.” 

“I think we need to leave the beach.” 

“I just spent five fucking hours fixing the shelter.” 

“How do you know it’s been five hours?” 

“I’ve counted every goddamn second.” 

“Wait, sh, everyone quiet! Do you hear that?” 

“Yeah, it’s the sound of Kevin’s stomach.” 

“Embarrassing, bro.” 

“Yeah, bro.” 

“Don’t you fucking start or I’ll eat you first.” 

*

Neil thought he remembered something about rubbing two sticks together. He scavenged the edge of the jungle until he found two dry sticks, and then, feeling like a fool, he pitifully rubbed them together, just to test how they felt against each other, and realized that this task was futile and stupid and he wasn’t strong enough to create enough friction to start a fire with two motherfucking sticks.

But he didn’t have anything else to do.

Neil sighed, sitting down, and started to strip the bark off the sticks.

“This is fine,” he muttered, as soon as the sticks were bare. He then began shredding the bark into smaller pieces and piling it up in the space between his legs. 

Neil positioned the sticks perpendicular to each other: one lying on its side on top of the kindling and the other braced between the palms of Neil’s hands, the end of it stabbing into a divet in the facedown stick, and started spinning.

*

“Oh my god, did Andrew really kill a snake?”

“Well, I mean, I held it down for him. He didn’t do all the work.”

“I’m so impressed. Inspired. Ravenous. How do we cook it?”

“We’ll start a fire with this lighter we found.”

“Oh my god, you found a lighter?!”

“Yeah, we found it in Andrew’s fucking pocket.”

“Oh my god!”

“Are you fucking serious?”

“Jesus Christ!”

“Andrew! Why didn’t you give that to us last night when we were trying to make a fire?”

*

Neil’s hands were blistered, oozing, bleeding, and raw. His back was drenched in sweat, the dried mud on his face and arms caked and cracking from the relentless sun. His arms were shaking from the energy he exerted, his body only fueled by a few handfuls of berries and the intense and violent desire to make a fire for himself.

But he’d done it. Smoke had sparked around the time Neil’s blisters started tearing and secreting, and Neil hadn’t stopped spinning until there were embers he could lean down and blow on, and soon, there was enough to catch, and Neil had made a small, baby, tiny fire.

Neil was too tired to rejoice, and he hadn’t gotten more kindling before he started his fire so he had nothing to keep it going, and, too afraid of losing it, Neil cradled the pile of smoldering kindle in his hand as he went in search of more things to burn.

*

He had a roaring fire and a useless fish he had gutted since he didn’t know how he was supposed to cook it over a fire with nothing to hold it in. But Neil hadn’t gut the other fish, so he stabbed it on another stick he found and held it over the open flame and watched it catch and cooked it until it was burnt.

The charred scales were hot and disgusting, but the meat was good, and Neil picked the bones clean.

*

Neil’s fire was nestled in the shade of trees at the edge of the jungle, and Neil, stomach sated for the moment, stared out at the rolling waves of the ocean, taking in the sounds of the island: the screech of birds, the crash of waves on the shore, the crackling of his fire. It wasn’t hard, in that moment, to ignore the ache in his hands, cramped now and still bleeding, or the throbbing sting of the wound on his stomach, or the dire situation of keeping his fire burning while he tried to build a shelter and get himself fresh water.

But for now, at this moment, Neil had escaped the Ravens, started a fire, and eaten a fish. For now, he was okay.

*

Neil had draped a giant leaf over his face and lied down after realizing he didn’t know how to build a shelter. He knew he could hogtie something together, stack some sticks, drape some leaves, but he was so hot and tired and frustrated.

So instead he fell asleep, and when he woke up, a Raven was kicking out his fire while another punched him in the face, hard enough to break his nose but not enough to knock him out. Disoriented and furious, Neil scrambled to his feet and fought back like he hadn’t before when the Ravens first captured him.

His assailants cursed at Neil’s frantic energy, his jabs and veers, blood streaming from his nose, his eyes watering, his cheeks puffy. At one point he slid his bloody, infected hand across a Raven’s mouth, and they were so repulsed by the motion that they shoved Neil away, and Neil took that opportunity to run.

It was hard, running in the soft sand, so he moved closer to the dense sand near the tide and sprinted, but the lag he experienced in the dry sand was enough for a Raven to tackle him into the ocean.

The Raven sat atop the back of Neil and held his face under water, and Neil was so taken aback by this violent attack from people who didn’t even know him—what did they want from him? what had he done to deserve this?—that he stopped struggling, and the Raven pulled him up. As soon as he could breathe again, Neil dug his fingers in the sand under the water and grabbed the first thing he touched, which was a slimy and slick starfish that Neil immediately twisted and shoved in the Raven’s mouth.

The Raven yelped and retched, and Neil wriggled out from under them and began running again, his soaked clothes weighing him down, but adrenaline pumping fast in his veins. He realized, though, the farther he ran along the beach, that they’d catch up to him eventually, with nowhere to hide but the ocean or the jungle, so, resigned, Neil veered toward the jungle, no spear, no fire, the chill of the ocean soaking into his bones, and kept running.

*

“So, what’s the plan?”

“I think we should stay here.”

“I think we should explore the island.”

“Famous first words of every horror movie, ever.”

“Do you not see how much work we’ve put into this place? I’m not leaving. Who’s to say whatever’s in the jungle is better than what’s on the beach?”

“There’s nothing on the beach. Andrew found food for us in the jungle .”

“He can keep doing that. I’m not leaving.”

“I’m so hot and I don’t want to be covered in sand anymore.”

“Oh, you think the sand will just go away as soon as you can’t see it?”

“We can’t stay here forever.”

“What about when help comes?”

“I’m bored.”

“Oh my god.”

“Fine. Half of us will explore the island and the other half will stay on the beach.”

“Fine.”

“Great.”

“Good.”

“Yeah, I love separating from the group. Famous second words of every horror movie ever.”

“Let’s just go.”

“Don’t forget to come back.”

*

Matt went with the people exploring the jungle: Kevin, Andrew, Nicky, and Allison. He didn’t say it, because hadn’t brought him again since they’d dropped the subject yesterday, but Matt still wanted to find the guy who saved his life. The thought of him out there, alone, or with the Ravens, or perhaps joining the Ravens? or dead, even, caused panic and a soft sort of grief to swell in Matt’s chest.

Matt intended to find the guy before they were rescued.

But as they traipsed the trees, salvaging things that looked cool or usable, stepping over wildlife and avoiding things that looked deadly, until Kevin ordered them to turn back, Matt didn’t see even a speck of life outside of the Foxes—not a footprint, not a sound.

*

Neil climbed a tree before the sun went down, praying that he was safe from snakes and bugs and jungle cats? were there jungle cats? he didn’t know and didn’t care. The wet denim of his jeans had chafed his thighs as he sprinted, so now Neil had an uncomfortable rash to add to his wrecked hands and growing infection.

He could feel himself becoming feverish, and the wound on his stomach was definitely oozing a color it shouldn’t be, and by the time the sun set, Neil was shaking with fever and sick with cold. But there were no Ravens below him, or snakes slithering up his legs, or bugs crawling in his ears, or jungle cats tearing out his heart, so Neil leaned his back against the trunk of the tree, steadied his weight on the precarious strength of the branch he called his bed, and closed his eyes.

He didn’t sleep, but he hadn’t really expected to.

*

The next morning, Neil rolled out of the tree he had been sleeping in. Turns out he could fall asleep after all, and with no way to hold his body still and secure in the tree branch, he plummeted to the ground, landing on spare twigs and loamy moss and soil, and had the wind knocked out of him.

He wheezed breath back into his lungs, trying to calm down, frightened, his mind projecting back to the plane crash, and falling, and falling, with no water to catch him and nothing to hold on to and still so inevitably alone.

*

By the time he could breathe again, Neil was more awake and had different priorities other than a sad little pity party and no one to love him.

First, he needed to clean the wound on his stomach, perhaps find a way to cut it so it would stop leaking. Then, he needed to find some more food.

Then, he needed to do something about the fucking Ravens.

Chapter Text

“I. Am. So. Hungry.”

“Did you figure out how to hunt yet?”

“What the fuck do you expect me to hunt?”

“I been hearing some buzz about a lot of birds in trees.”

“Oh, great, wonderful, let me just fashion a goddamn bow and arrow and kill some birds in trees, you stupid piece of shit.”

“Whoa, okay, chill out, bro? I was just saying—aaah!”

“Oh my god, stop!”

“Guys! Stop!”

“Get off him!”

“Let go of me! It was just a joke, bro, just a joke!”

“If you say bro one more time—”

“You’ll what, bro? Oh, fuck—”

“Seriously?!”

“Oh my god!”

“We don’t have time to chase each other on the beach, guys! Knock it off!”

“Aaaaand they’re gone. Fuck.”

*

Neil was skirting the edge of the jungle and the sand of the beach when he heard it. He had been clutching his stomach, trying to alleviate the ache, stumbling, hoping he wasn’t becoming delirious, when something from up ahead huffed and snorted and Neil looked up and saw a pair of tusks gleaming through a gap in the foliage.

Neil immediately fell into a crouch, but he didn’t actually know what he was supposed to do to defend himself against an animal with tusks.

Survive, I guess, he thought, and then the boar stepped out of the trees, and Neil looked around for a weapon.

*

“Kevin, oh my god, Kevin, stop. Look. Look.”

“What?”

“Sh. Look .”

“What is that?”

“Um. A pig?”

“Boar.”

“Pumba?”

“What?”

“If you are about to tell me you don’t know who that is, I want you to just kill me.”

“Shut up. Fuck. Get down.”

“I am down.”

“Sh.”

“ Sh !”

“ Fuck !”  

*

Neil had just prepared for the beast to charge him when its attention diverted to something else and suddenly it was running in a different direction. And Neil had just been about to run away when he heard a very human, very scared, and very loud yelp of another person stuck in a jungle with a charging boar.

Neil looked in the direction of the scream and, assuming it to be a Raven getting their just desserts, instead saw a flash of bright orange. A Fox. Shit.

“God-fucking-dammit,” Neil said, and then he stood up and grabbed a decaying branch off a tree and yanked it until it snapped off, all jagged ends and sharp enough.

*

Nicky watched death approach with boxed feet and ivory tusks when Kevin’s hands grasped under his armpits and pulled him out of the way. Nicky felt the brush of air against his face, a snort and a roar from the beast, and then, as it readied to charge again, another figure, swift and silent, grunted and slammed into the side of the animal.

“Oh, Jesus!” Nicky exclaimed as he scrambled into Kevin’s body, which was still behind him and gripping under his arms. Kevin tried weakly to bat Nicky’s reaching hands away, but Nicky was desperate, and as soon as he had a hold of Kevin’s biceps, he did not let go. He watched, terrified, as some small man stood over the boar he knocked over, heaving with adrenaline.

“Um,” Nicky said. His hands were shaking even through his tight grip on Kevin, and Kevin brought up his own arms to curve around Nicky’s shoulders.

“Uh,” Kevin said, just as lost.

*

Neil just wanted the beast to go away, and then everything would be fine. If the beast went away, he could leave the two Foxes to go back to their camp or whatever the fuck they were doing in the jungle, just two of them, alone, and then Neil could go back to searching for food.

It would be nice, if Neil could kill the pig, but without a knife or an easy way to make fire or anywhere to store the meat to keep it from rotting in the sun and sand, and with absolutely no energy to spare, Neil couldn’t find any justification to kill the boar. So, he was going to have to run.

He looked to the two Foxes as the beast struggled to rise from Neil’s jarring tackle. They were huddled together, pale, and staring, wide-eyed, at Neil.

Neil nodded at them, and then pointed at the beach with his branch in a clear indication that they needed to get the fuck out of the jungle, and then, as soon as the boar rose and huffed at him, Neil turned tail and ran.

Hopefully he’d find the waterfall place again. He was really thirsty.

*

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, oh my god—”

“Stop. Stop it.”

“Um, oh my god? Oh my god? Oh my god—”

“Seriously. Stop. We’re going back. I’m sorry I chased you.”

“I’m sorry I called you bro.”

“Thank you.”

“Sure. Do you think he’ll be okay?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think the boar will come back for us?”

“I don’t know.”

“That was really scary.”

“Yeah.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“C’mon, Nicky. It’s okay. Let’s go back.”

“Okay.”

*

“There they are!” Dan said when Kevin and Nicky eventually returned. They’d only been gone maybe twenty minutes—a bit long for a frivolous chase, but not long enough to cause for any sort of worry. Matt had thought they simply decided to explore the jungle after their spat.

But as the pair crept closer to the group, Matt noticed the shaky hands and pale faces, and Nicky collapsed right to his knees in the middle of the shelter and Kevin kept walking until he reached the ocean, waist deep, and then he started splashing water on his face.

“Um, what’s up?” Dan asked, frowning at their weird behavior. “Did you see a dead body or something?”

Nicky shook his head and took deep breaths. Andrew, who had been sitting under the shade of a tree at the jungle’s edge, stared out at Kevin for two seconds before he turned to Nicky and waited. Nicky did not look up at anyone as he calmed down from whatever had happened out there.

“Ravens?” Allison asked as soon as Nicky was calm enough to shift off his knees and into a cross-legged sit.

“No,” Nicky said. “It was a boar.”

“Oh shit!”

“Damn.”

“Scary!”

Kevin finally ventured back from the sea. He had apparently decided that the face was not enough and had instead dunked his entire body in the water. He shed out of his shirt and pants, resting them to dry on top of the shelter, and slicked his hair away from his face.

“There was this guy,” Kevin said.

“And, what, did the boar kill him or something?” Allison asked, annoyed, hands on her hips. The effect was a bit ruined by her inability to stop staring at Kevin’s chest, but no one commented. Kevin and Nicky were a bit too somber that no one wanted to make any jokes.

Nicky shook his head. “No, but he…”

When neither Kevin nor Nicky would finish the sentence, Aaron snapped, “But he what? Attacked the boar? Lured it away? Saved your life? What?”

Kevin and Nicky looked to Aaron. “Well,” Nicky said. “Yes.”

“Fuck,” Matt said. Aaron stopped scowling. Allison dropped her arms back to her side. No one said anything for a minute.

Andrew was standing now. He hadn’t stepped foot inside the shelter this whole time, not to sleep, not to laze, but now he was pushing his way past Dan and Renee, stopping in front of Nicky and Kevin. “Who was it?” he demanded.

Kevin shook his head. Nicky said, “I dunno. It kind of looked like that guy? Who took out his contact that first day? Except it looked like his nose was broken and he was covered in blood. And mud. And I think he had a black eye. Er, eyes.”

“Jesus.”

“Fuck.”

Andrew turned to face the jungle, not saying anything more. Matt stared at Andrew for two seconds before he also looked out at the trees, heart in his throat full of hope and trepidation.

“What’s up with this guy?” Allison was saying. “He saves Matt and leaves, and now he saves you guys and just leaves? What the fuck?”

“Should we go find him?” Dan asked.

“Sure fucking sounds like this guy wants to be alone,” Aaron said. “I’d say let’s just leave him alone.”

“But…” Dan started, but there wasn’t really a follow up. No one wanted to go into the jungle right now, not with the scare of a wild animal that almost killed two of them, and not with as little information as “he saved our lives, once.”

But Andrew wouldn’t stop staring at the trees, all day, all night, and Matt couldn’t stop glancing, either, and everyone was so unbearably
and
unbelievably

hungry.

*

The boar was relentless, but even it tired of chasing Neil after a while, abandoning him at a random juncture: a path leading deeper into the jungle or a path leading back to the sea, but Neil was so tired. As soon as the boar left him and didn’t come back, Neil sprawled on his back in the middle of the jungle, in the middle of it all, and gasped deep breaths, trying to remember the last time he drank clean water, ate cooked food. He’d been trying to make a shelter for days—days? hours?—and still all he’d done was run and run. 

Neil swallowed that sobering thought with a hint of hope. His life on the island wasn’t much different than how it had been before the plane crash, so he knew he could survive—it just sucked to realize that being stranded on a desert island wasn’t anything new. 

*

Neil was trying to wrangle together sticks and leaves into some semblance of a shelter when he heard the first click. He thought maybe it was a weird island sound, something from a tropical island that only made sense to other things on tropical islands, but then there was another click, followed by a pointed whistle, and Neil realized it was a code, and that the code meant he was found. 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he asked, incredulous, and then he fisted two oranges—because Neil had finally caught a break and found an orange tree as he ventured through the jungle—and turned to flee. 

Neil could not fathom why the Ravens were so relentless, but he was starting to understand why the Foxes had wanted the Ravens on a different flight so bad. And it’s not like this island was massive. Sure, Neil didn’t know the true size, but there hadn’t been a time when Neil couldn’t immediately locate which direction the sea was in, even when he ventured too deep, too fast. How were the Ravens not finding the Foxes and going after them? 

Maybe the Foxes had something the Ravens were scared of. Maybe Neil needed to find out what that was. Maybe it was time for Neil to stop running. 

Neil, followed by low clicks and quick whistles, sprinted through the trees as the sun set for a third night, and he hoped that he was running in the right direction.

Chapter Text

“Please, god, I’m perishing.” 

“I’m wasting away.” 

“I’m mellltiiing. ” 

“I’m bored.” 

“I’m hungry.” 

“I’m tired.” 

“Hi, Tired, I’m Dad.” 

“God, I want to kill you.” 

“Don’t worry; if you don’t, the starvation and thirst will soon.” 

*

Neil had eaten one of his oranges and found another bushel of berries by the time he found the Foxes. It was the next day, hot and humid, and Neil was covered in sweat and parched.

The Foxes hadn’t moved from where they were marooned, and it looked like the monsters had joined the rest of the fray. They had a semblance of a shelter, and some suitcases and other miscellaneous debris piled by a scant fire, burning low. They seemed unconcerned with the status of the dwindling flames, so Neil hoped that meant they had a way to keep a fire going.

Neil did not immediately go out to them. He wasn’t sure how he would be received: perhaps they would see his bloody, beaten face; his scabbed fingers, bleeding hands, dirty face and neck, and think that he was insane. They might try to hurt him. He certainly did not think they would take pity on him.

Shoving the last of his berries in his mouth and palming his last orange, Neil crouched low in the thicket of the trees at the edge of the jungle and waited, and watched.

*

“I’m just wondering when it’s okay to start eating the sand.”

“Don’t eat sand. Don’t. Don’t eat sand.”

“Why don’t you try fishing?”

“I don’t know how to fish.”

“Do you want to die? Because this is how you die.”

“How about we all go out in the water and fish together?”

“And scare all the fucking fish away? Jesus Christ.”

“We need to go back in the jungle.”

“With the wild animals?”

“I’m hungry enough to say yes.”

“Look, all I’m saying is, if one tiny scrawny little man is enough to tackle a charging boar, the eight of us should be enough to kill one animal.”

“What about coconuts? Aren’t those a thing?”

“I swear on me mum I will eat a bug right now. Right fucking now. Get me a bug. I will go full Lion King on its ass and eat it alive.”

“Ew.”

“Gross.”

“Bro.”

*

Neil wasn’t sure how long he had been found out, listening to the Foxes squabble while hangry, but he noticed early on that Andrew usually stayed away from them, on the outskirts of their shelter, staring out into the trees aimlessly. Andrew stared at seemingly nothing for a long time, until Neil realized that his gaze hadn’t moved from Neil for a while, and Neil had been staring back, not breathing.

When he realized that Andrew had well and truly seen him, Neil stayed crouched but said softly, “Hey.”

“What are you doing,” Andrew asked. He did not stand up. He did not alert the others.

“I need to talk to you,” Neil said.

“From the trees?”

“I can come out.”

“I can’t just let you walk up to them.”

Neil, ruefully, said, “I know,” and then he stood up and watched as Andrew pulled out a knife.

*

Andrew held a knife to Neil’s back as he walked him into the Foxes’ camp. Neil held his hands up in a defensive gesture, his orange still fisted in the palm of his hand, but he wasn’t afraid that Andrew would stab him. The tip of the knife was barely grazing his shirt, and Neil wondered at the formality of it all, wondered why Andrew felt the need to hold him prisoner this way, but Neil wasn’t afraid.

The rest of the Foxes, who had been arguing on the beach as they dug around the tide, searching for food, looked up and exclaimed at the sight of Neil and Andrew. Half of the Foxes sprinted to them while the others approached more cautiously, and still Neil stood straight and calm with a knife to his back and waited.

*

“Um.”

“What the fuck?”

“Hello.”

“Hi.”

“Andrew?”

“Um?”

“Hello?”

“Hi?”

“Oh my god.”

*

“Um,” Matt said again, staring at the man who had saved three of the Foxes’ lives so far. Andrew had a knife to his back and a hand on his shoulder to keep him from running, but it didn’t look like the guy wanted to leave. He didn’t even look like he minded the knife. Matt didn’t know where to start. Um… “What happened to your face?” he asked.

“Ravens,” the guy said.

“What’s your name?” Allison asked.

“Neil,” the guy answered.

“Why are the Ravens hitting you in the face?” Andrew asked.

“I don’t know,” Neil replied.

“What were you doing on our plane?” Aaron asked.

“We don’t own the airlines,” Renee reminded him softly. Aaron looked only moderately chastised.

Neil shrugged, and Andrew tightened his grip on Neil’s shoulder. Exasperated, Neil said, “Vacation,” in a deadpan tone.  

Andrew did something behind Neil’s back, perhaps pressed the knife in a little harder, which made Neil even more exasperated. “Really? I owe you my life’s story now?”

“You owe us your life right now,” Andrew said.

Neil turned to look at Andrew, and half of the Foxes made aborted gestures for him to stop antagonizing the monster, but all of Neil’s attention was on Andrew so he didn’t see. “Do I?” he said. “Look, the Ravens are fucking nuts. They won’t leave me alone. I haven’t slept in days. I’m looking to make a deal.”

“A deal?” Allison asked, dubious. “What the fuck do you think you can offer us, small little man with a broken nose?”

Matt had thought it was weird, the way Neil was holding his hand above his head, and now Matt saw why. Neil, unconcerned with the knife and the monster staring him down, turned back to the Foxes and rolled the thing in his hand—an orange—in their direction. They all stared at it in silence. Nicky swallowed noisily.

“I’ll help you get food and water until help comes for you. I just need you to keep the Ravens away from me.”

“What did you do to make them come after you?” Dan asked.

“Exist, apparently,” Neil said. His hands were at his sides now after rolling the orange. Andrew still had a hand on his shoulder and the knife returned to his back. “So will you help me until help comes for you?”

Matt frowned. Why did he keep saying it like that? Until help comes for you . It looked like Andrew was frowning, too. Before either of them could ask, Nicky was diving for the orange.

“Of course you can stay with us! What the fuck, are we monsters?”

“Yes, you are.”

“Obviously.”

Nicky batted the comments from the other Foxes away as he straightened. “We’re all stuck here together, after all.” He beamed at Neil. “Welcome to the Foxes!”  

*

“Um, no offense,” Allison said, as soon as Andrew dropped his hands away from Neil and slipped his knife back in his armband. “But I think your nose is broken.”

“Oh, right,” Neil said, and then before he could bring his own hands up to prod at his nose, Andrew reached out and yanked Neil’s nose back into position with a loud pop .

“Fuck!”

“Jesus!”

“Andrew, hello?”

Neil did not exclaim or make a sound. He prodded at the bruised skin around his nose and sniffed, scrunching his nose up and down as he got used to his nose being in the right spot again. “Thank you,” he said to Andrew, and then he turned back to the rest of the Foxes.

“Okay,” he said. “Show me what you’ve got.”

*

“Is he asking to throw down?”

“Why are you whispering?”

“I’m scared.”

“I think he’s asking to see our stuff.”

“Oh, that makes sense.”

“Why are you scared?”

“Um? I mean? Look at him?”

*

Neil was sorting through Allison’s clothes for something to use as a fishing net when one of the Foxes, who introduced himself as Nicky, said, “Um, bro, are you bleeding?”

“Probably,” Neil said, holding up a pair of underwear from the suitcase that was mostly lace held together by two strings, before tossing it aside as useless. He heard Allison protest indignantly from somewhere behind him.

“No, really, like, were you stabbed?” Nicky went on.

“Not recently,” Neil told him. He found a relatively lacy top that he could use as a net, but if Allison protested about the underwear, she’d probably definitely have something to say about this. Ignoring Nicky’s ringing hands, Neil stood up. “Is it okay if I rip this?” he asked her.

“You’re asking permission?” Allison sniffed, inspecting her nails.

“Uh, yeah? It’s your shirt?”

Allison studied Neil with narrowed eyes for a moment before she flapped her hand dismissively and walked away. As soon as she left, Neil ripped the shirt in half, and then looked around for two branches he could tie it to.  

“Seriously, Neil, you have a giant hole in your shirt and I can see blood.” Nicky tugged at the bottom of Neil’s shirt to stop him, and Neil held it up just high enough to inspect his wound. It wasn’t stinging or throbbing as much as it had been the night Neil dragged himself out of a hole, but it was still inflamed and secreting pus underneath the scabs. Neil would probably need to let that leak out. Maybe he could borrow one of Andrew’s knives to open the infection.

“Okay, Nicky,” Neil said. “Thanks. Hey, would you mind starting a fire? It might take me a while to catch enough fish for everyone, but I’ll bring something in.” And then Neil left Nicky by the pile of clothes and headed toward the ocean. There were a few pieces of driftwood he picked up on his way down that he could tie the shirt to, and then he stepped out of his jeans at the edge of the tide and took small steps into the waves, searching for fish.

*

“What’s up with this dude?”

“What?”

“Huh?”

“Well, I mean, just like, what the fuck did the Ravens do to him? We’ve only been here four days, but his nose was broken and I think he’s missing two fingernails and he looks like he got stabbed.”

“So, what? It’s not like we’ve been living the fairy princess life, either.”

“True, but also, like, we haven’t been stabbed?”

“Ugh, whatever. At least we get food. And hey, where’s Andrew?”

“What?”

“He’s gone?”

*

After minutes or hours of standing and waiting, finally a small school of fish swam up and unsuspecting into Neil’s makeshift net. He immediately hefted the two sticks up and out of the water, cradling the squirming fish to his chest so they wouldn’t escape, and turned around to evaluate how to get them to shore so he could keep fishing. He debated for a minute just throwing the fish on shore so that he wouldn’t have to leave the water and walk back and forth, but as soon as he held a hand to a slick and wiggly fish to throw, someone splashed in the water beside him and stood at his side.

Neil looked over to find Andrew staring at him, unimpressed.

“Oh, hey,” Neil said, surprised. He squeezed his hand around one of the fish and readied to throw it, ignoring Andrew’s growing condescension.

“You’re so stupid,” Andrew said, reaching out to hold Neil’s wrist and stop him.

“I didn’t know how else to get them to shore.”

Andrew, sighing, picked up the bottom of his shirt and held it out like a plate, and Neil, inspired, dropped the wriggling fish into Andrew’s shirt. Andrew immediately held closed his shirt so they couldn’t escape, and then he seemed to settle in beside Neil. Andrew hadn’t removed his pants, instead rolling them to his knees, and Neil looked down at his own bare legs and wondered if he was supposed to be more modest.

Oh well.

“Fishing is boring,” Neil told him, setting his net back into the water and staring down. For some reason, he found himself holding back a smile.

“Everything is boring.”

Neil snorted. “I can see why you guys were starving.”

“I can see why the Ravens were trying to kill you.”

“Sh, you’ll scare the fish.”

“I’ll drop the fish.”

Neil’s smile broke, but he didn’t turn to Andrew. “You’ll get the last word at any cost, won’t you?”

“No price is too steep when you’re stranded on an island.”

“Fair enough.”

After a charged beat where Neil thought he’d get the last word, Andrew said, “You’re an idiot.”

Neil, still grinning, still not looking at Andrew, said nothing more.

*

“Oh my god, food!”

“Food!”

“Fooooood!”

“FOOOOOD!”

“ FOOOOOOOOOOOOOD! ”

“ AAAAAAAA .”

“ AAAAAAAAAAAAA .”

*

The Foxes didn’t have anything to boil water in, either, so Neil was going to have to find the hidden oasis again. Or maybe some more oranges. Possibly a coconut (those were a thing, right?). He hoped that the Ravens hadn’t found the waterfall, or at least that they wouldn’t be there when he found it again. The Foxes had been lucky enough to wash ashore with a few of their water bottles they had purchased on the flight, crunched and wrinkled with no lids, but capable of storing water. Neil could fill those up with the spring water and bring them back, or he could squeeze an orange with his bare hands and meagerly fill up the container and eat the rest of the orange (or, actually, it’d probably be easier to just eat the orange and get the liquid that way). Or he could take all the Foxes to the spring and let them clean up and enjoy themselves.

Yeah, that made more sense than bringing back filled up water bottles of dirty spring water. How was he even going to carry them all back, anyways?

God, Neil was so tired.

He stood up. The Foxes and Neil had been surrounding the fire, eating the fish that Neil had caught and cooked for them, and now most of them were catnapping and dozing. Renee and Dan were doing some complicated patty cake game. Nicky was resting his head on Kevin’s shoulder. Aaron and Allison were asleep, backs to the fire. Andrew was beside Neil, lighting the end of his stick on fire and poking it in the sand to let it out, over and over.

When Neil stood up, Matt, who had been lazing on his back with his eyes closed, said, “Where are you going?”

“Water.”

“Ocean,” Andrew said immediately. He didn’t look up from his stick.

Neil glared down at him. “To drink.”

“Pee.”

“Do not tell me you’ve been drinking that.”

Andrew didn’t say anything, and Neil, repulsed, took a step back.

Matt laughed. “Okay, as funny as that was, he’s fucking with you. We’ve been wasting away, Neil.”

“Then let’s get some water. I know a place.” He didn’t know where it was , exactly, but he knew a place. He could find it again. Probably.

“Tomorrow,” Andrew said.

“But we’re thirsty now ,” Allison chimed in, no longer sleeping.

“Coconuts,” Andrew said.

“Are those even a real thing?” Aaron was also sitting up now.

“We’re not leaving.”

“But the thirst. It looms.”

Neil looked around at the Foxes, not understanding why Andrew was stopping them from going. Maybe because the sun was going down?

“I can fill up some water bottles and then we can all go back tomorrow.”

Andrew, also standing, poked Neil, not very hard, with the end of his burning stick. He poked him in the stomach, near his infected wound, and Neil, caught off guard, stumbled—and stumbled, and stumbled, and fell.

“Oh,” he heard one of the Foxes say.

“Right,” he heard another.

“Looks like it’s naptime for Neil.” A shadow loomed over his face, and Neil looked up at Andrew staring down at him. Neil picked up a pitiful handful of sand and tossed it at Andrew’s legs, but he didn’t get up. Now that he was down, he didn’t think he could get up again.

“Fine,” Neil said. “Fine. I’ll sleep for a little, and then we’ll go. But can you do me a favor first?”

“No,” Andrew said, and then he lightly kicked sand at Neil’s face and returned to the fire. Neil, out in the open, annoyed, exhausted, closed his eyes. Just for a little while.

*

“Look at him sleepin’.”

“He’s not a dog.”

“Woof, though, amirite? He’s so cute.”

“Um, sorry, where are you seeing cute? Is it between the black eyes or the chapped lips? Dude’s got one foot in the grave, my guy.”

“Please, call me Bro. My Guy is my father.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“ You shut the fuck up.”

“Make me.”

“I will.”

“No, really, guys. Sh. He’s trying to sleep.”

“Aw, look at him. He just rolled over.”

“Oh my god, are you serious?”

“ Sh! ”

*

When Neil woke up, the sun had set and he was curled on his side in the same place he had fallen asleep. The fire was softly smoldering in-between Neil and the pile of Foxes crammed together under their shelter. Neil sat up, scrubbing sand off his face, and random articles of clothing sluffed off his torso: a shirt, another shirt, a pair of socks, and booty shorts that said, “after school snack.” Neil was baffled at the clothes until he realized that they were probably supposed to serve as a blanket. Uncomfortable at the notion and the foreign emotion swelling in his chest, Neil stood up, and then he saw Andrew, sitting beside the shelter, staring out at the sea, staring right at him.

Neil went to sit next to him. He was too anxious to sleep anymore and resented that he had slept so long and deep that he hadn’t even noticed when the Foxes went to bed, when they draped clothes over him, when the sun went down.

As soon as Neil was settled, Andrew returned to staring out at the ocean. Neil joined him, the waves so loud and ominous with only the moon to pull them. He listened hard for any other sound, wondering if maybe he could hear a whale, or if there was some monster out there, or if there was anything at all besides sand and sea. He couldn’t even hear Andrew beside him, though he could feel the warmth of his body.

In front of the swirling majesty of the sea and stars, Neil felt so small and insignificant and barely alive, so far outside of himself that he hadn’t noticed Andrew was staring at him until he said his name. 

Neil snapped back into himself, turning to Andrew. It didn’t look like he had anything to say; maybe he just wanted Neil’s attention. That was fine. Neil was bored, too. 

“Do you know any scary stories?” Neil asked. 

Andrew didn’t say anything for a long minute until he finally replied, “No.”  

“That’s too bad. I might know some. I wanna say there’s one with bugs.” 

"Bugs."

"Yeah."

“There’s a bug in your hair right now.” 

Neil tried to run his fingers through his hair, but it was so tangled and sandy that he didn’t get very far. Smiling, but not looking at Andrew, Neil said, “Ah, so you did know one after all.”

“Shut up.”

“Won’t you get it for me?”

“No.”

Neil clicked his tongue. There was a beat of companionable silence, and then—

“Boring,” Andrew said.

“Boring? You’re the one with no good stories.”

“Have you heard the one about the witch in the well?”

“No.”

“Hm.” Andrew did not continue. 

Neil frowned. “What, that's it?”

“I haven’t heard it, either.”

Neil was startled into a laugh. When Neil turned to face Andrew, grinning, Andrew was already looking at him. 

Chapter Text

“So we’re going to get water today?” 

“Yeah. I found a spring a while ago, with a waterfall and everything.” 

“And food?” 

“Yes, food will be provided.” 

“Awesome.” 

“Sick.” 

“Totally.” 

“No, actually, I’m about to be sick, if you’ll excuse me.” 

“Jesus Christ.” 

“Oh my god.” 

“Are you okay?” 

“Yeah, I’m fine. The fish just didn’t sit with me well. So we’re all going? We’re all just leaving camp?” 

“I want to be clean.” 

“We can go in shifts.” 

“Who wants to go first?” 

“...” 

“...” 

“...” 

“Okay, I’m going to need at least four of us to put our hands down.” 

“Don’t look at me. I can hold my hand up all day. I have amazing strength in my right arm.” 

“Permission to make a masturbation joke at Nicky’s expense?” 

“Denied. We literally play sports for a living. Of course he has amazing strength in his right arm.” 

“Oh right.” 

*

They dumped whatever was left in Allison’s bag out on the beach and wheeled the empty luggage with them through the jungle so they could carry the water bottles and whatever else they found along the way. Neil was hoping to find oranges again, and some berries, and maybe something big to eat? Now that he had access to Andrew’s knives—Andrew was included in the first trip to the waterfall, along with Kevin, Matt, and Renee—he had some hope of getting real, live, big-boy food. Maybe they’d come across the boar again. 

“How far in is the spring?” Matt asked as they began their trek. 

“I don’t know,” Neil said. 

“What?” Kevin asked, incredulous. “You don’t know?” 

Neil stepped out in front so he could lead the way and avoid any pointless conversations. “Yeah. I know it’s here, but I don’t know where. It also might be close to the Ravens, and possibly even overtaken by them. How good are you at hand-to-hand combat?” Neil asked, stepping over a mossy tree root. Remembering suddenly that coconuts (right? coconuts? the more Neil thought about them, the more he was convinced they weren’t real) grew on trees, Neil looked up in search of the mythical fruit (vegetable? berry?) but found nothing. Typical.  

“I can handle myself,” Kevin sniffed. 

“Sure,” Matt teased. “You just keep Andrew within a five inch radius of you at all times because you can handle yourself in a fight.” 

“Well, I don’t keep him around for his excellent teamwork or conversation skills.” 

“I think Andrew is a great conversationalist,” Renee said. 

“And he’s an excellent team player,” Matt said, grinning at Andrew, but Andrew was staring straight ahead and following Neil into the thicket of trees, not paying attention to their conversation at his expense at all. 

Or so Matt thought, until Neil turned around with a raised, dubious brow, and Andrew tapped two fingers to his temple and saluted him, saying, deadpan, “Go Foxes.” 

*

“Hey, Neil, where are you from?” 

“Arizona.” 

“Really?” 

“Sure.” 

“What do you do?” 

“Read.” 

“Haha. No. I mean, like for a job?” 

“A job? At my age?” 

“Haha. That’s true. Do you go to school?” 

“With all the money I make at my job?” 

“Haha. Wow. What’s more depressing: being on this island or being a millennial?—ow! Kevin, what the fuck?” 

“What did I say about making bad millennial jokes?” 

“Okay, sorry, boomer, I’ll watch my language from now on—ow! Stop throwing rocks at me!” 

“Stop saying stupid things.” 

“Kevin.” 

“What.” 

“I was just saying a stupid thing—fuck! Throw something at me one more goddamn time.” 

“Do something. I dare you. Apparently I need to prove I can handle myself.” 

“Neil, are we almost there?” 

“God, I hope so.” 

*

Neil had been running the last time he went to this spring, sprinting through the dark and afraid and delirious, and he was about to say there was no hope of finding it again when he heard the same thing he heard the first time: the cascading sound of crystal clear, clean, no-salt-added mother-fucking water. 

Matt whooped. Kevin stopped scowling. Renee smiled. Andrew kept following Neil, silent and steady. 

*

Kevin, Matt, Renee, and Andrew stripped down to their underwear (well, Andrew kept his armbands on). Neil stepped out of his jeans, and then they all sprinted into the oasis and scrubbed off their sweat and blood and tears (well, maybe just the sweat and blood), and drank and drank and drank. Kevin and Matt started wrestling in the water, and Neil and Renee started filling the water bottles and arranging them in the suitcase. Andrew was walking around the perimeter off the secluded spring, caressing the leaves of bushes and popping berries in his mouth. None of them had put their clothes back on. 

“It’s lucky you found this place,” Renee said to Neil as they filled another water bottle. 

Neil nodded. Renee, despite her sweet smiles and soft voice, made Neil kind of uncomfortable. 

“Why didn’t you just stay here?” she asked. 

“Food. Fire. Ravens.” 

Renee nodded. “No way for rescue to see you if you’re hidden in the jungle, either.” 

“Right,” Neil said. “Rescue.” He wanted to be done talking to her now. He stood up, and a sharp pain on his abdomen reminded him of something he needed to do. “Hey, Andrew,” Neil said, calling out to the man currently scrubbing water on the back of his neck. He looked up at Neil’s voice, and then he walked over when Neil gestured. Neil watched as water from the spring slid down the cracks and creases of Andrew’s pecs and abs. 

As soon as Andrew was close enough, Neil held out a hand, and Andrew immediately put his own in it before Neil could say anything. Neil blinked in surprise. “Um,” Neil said. “I need a knife.” He tried to pull his hand out of Andrew’s grip. 

Andrew didn’t let go. “Why,” he asked. 

“I have a cut on my stomach and I need to clean it. It’s oozing.” 

“Let me see,” Renee said. Neil grimaced, but Andrew let go of his hand so Neil could hold up the bottom of his shirt for Renee. Andrew and Renee bent to inspect the wound. They both had the good grace to not mention the other gnarly scars littering what they could see of Neil’s abdomen, but he did not like having to bare even that much of himself. Hopefully they would continue to not fucking say anything about it. 

After a moment of silent consideration of the red and puffy wound, Renee softly asked, “Who did this?” 

Who else? Neil thought, but didn’t say that. Instead, he answered, “Ravens. The captain. Riko? Whatever. He hit me in the stomach with a branch and then dropped me in a hole.” 

“A hole?” Kevin asked from the water. 

“What the fuck?” Matt asked.

“How did you get out?” Andrew asked. He poked at the wound with the pad of his index finger, and Neil hissed and glared. He dropped his shirt, and Andrew and Renee looked up at him again, waiting for an answer, so he held up his hands between them, the scabs and cuts, the two missing fingernails. 

“Anyways,” Neil said. Why would they care how he got out? They didn’t even know him. “Can you cut where it’s infected? I just want the puss out.” 

“Gross,” Matt said, emerging from the water. 

“Is this safe? Sanitary?” Kevin asked, emerging from behind Matt. 

“I don’t care,” Neil said. “Just do it.” 

“Isn’t there a thing? Cauterization?” Matt asked. 

Neil paled. “Um, I’d rather not. That’s for when you’re bleeding out in an emergency.” 

“Really?” Matt looked speculative. Renee was holding her hand out for a knife. Neil was lifting his shirt again. 

Andrew was looking at Neil. He said, “Have you done that before?” 

“What, bled out in an emergency?” Neil asked, uncomfortable. “Who could say?” 

“You could.” 

Neil did not say. “Just cut me open, doc,” he said, and then Renee asked if he was ready and he said yes. 

*

They washed Neil’s wound and patted it dry with Renee’s shirt, and then they started their walk back. Now that they knew where they were going, Neil started ripping leaves off trees and tying them into a knot, only to hang them back on the same tree he just pulled them off. 

“What are you doing?” Kevin asked. 

“So we don’t get lost,” Neil explained. Andrew immediately took them down. Neil frowned at him.

“I’ll remember,” Andrew told him.

“Will you?” Neil asked, unconvinced. 

“Yes.” 

Whatever. Neil let him take down the knots. Who knew how much longer they’d be here, anyways, and, really, they didn’t want to give away where they were to the Ravens. Though it was definitely suspicious that Neil hadn’t seen them for a few days. Normally they were right up his ass. 

“You really haven’t seen the Ravens this entire time?” he asked his Fox companions on their walk back. They all shook their heads. “Weird,” he said. 

*

“Wow, is that my boyfriend’s face, fresh and clean?” 

“Sure is, babe!” 

“Look at you! So handsome! So clean!” 

“Okay, stop bringing up the clean thing.” 

“Okay, well, it was really bad.” 

“And now it’s your turn.” 

“What was that?” 

“Nothing, babe. The water’s great.” 

*

Neil fished while Andrew took the second group of people to the waterfall. After a few hours, he left a pile for the Foxes beside their filled water bottles and salvaged debris. 

Once he had done all he could for them for today, he told Renee he was going to explore the jungle and he’d be back by the time the sun went down. 

“By yourself?” she asked. “Didn’t you come to us so you wouldn’t have to be alone anymore?” 

Neil shook his head. It’s true he wanted their protection from the Ravens, but he mostly just wanted somewhere he could flee to when the Ravens chased him. He didn’t need the Foxes to follow him everywhere he went. He wasn’t a child. 

“I’ll be fine. If there’s trouble, I’ll come back.” 

“Why are you going in the jungle, dude?” Matt asked. 

“Bored.” 

“Are you serious?” Kevin looked at Neil disapprovingly. “After all you’ve been through, you’ll go back in there just because you’re bored?” 

Neil shrugged. “What else is there to do?” 

Kevin and Matt looked at each other imploringly, and then at a bit of a loss. 

“Uh.” 

“Um.” 

“I’ll be back later,” Neil said, and then he went in. 

*

“Where’s Neil?” 

“Oh, hey, guys! You’re back!” 

“He went into the jungle. Did you see him?” 

“No. Why did he leave?” 

“He was bored.” 

“Are you serious?” 

“Wow, that guy is a fucking idiot.” 

“Oh my god, food! Yay!” 

“Is he coming back?” 

“He said he would.” 

*

When Neil came back, the sun had set a while ago, Andrew was sitting next to the shelter again, and most of the Foxes were asleep, except for Matt, who was sitting in front of the fire and beamed sleepily when Neil came back, and Dan, who was drowsing with her head on Matt’s shoulder. Matt roused Dan as soon as Neil returned, and the two lone Foxes joined the pile under the shelter. 

Neil dropped the handful of sticks, tall and thick, he had in his hands on the ground and then plopped down beside Andrew with a soft groan.

“What’s that,” Andrew asked, pointing at dried blood on the side of Neil’s hand. Neil held it up so they both could inspect the shorn skin. 

“Snake.” 

“Venomous?” Andrew asked. 

“Well, I’m not dead.” 

Andrew’s expression didn’t change, but Neil could feel the sheer exasperation pouring out of every orifice of Andrew’s body that he couldn’t help but smile. “Don’t worry,” Neil reassured him. “It was a little baby, plain and boring. It bit me a while ago, and all I’m feeling is annoyed that I can’t use my hand as well as I should.” 

“Little boys shouldn’t go off in the woods alone.” 

“I’m fine.” 

Andrew sighed. “What’s with that?” He gestured with his head to the sticks Neil had brought back. 

“I’ve got an idea so the Foxes will leave me alone and not be so bored.” 

“Beat them with sticks?”  

Neil snorted. “No. You guys like sports, right?” 

“No.” 

“He says, wearing a letterman jacket.” 

“Not by choice.” 

“I don’t know what you’re trying to say. Anyways, don’t worry about it. I’ll show you tomorrow.” 

Neil slowly lowered himself onto his back in the soft sand and closed his eyes. 

“Don’t you want to sleep with the others?” Andrew asked, a soft mocking tone in his voice. 

“No,” Neil said. 

“It’s warmer with them.” To prove his point, a gust of wind blew over the island, almost letting the fire out, but as quick as it appeared it blew by, and the night was still and chill again. 

“It’s warm enough here,” Neil said, soft, and then he fell asleep. 

*

“Neil! Yay!” 

“Hey.” 

“What’s with the sticks?” 

“Allison, can I rip more of your clothes?” 

“What are you going to rip?” 

“The lingerie.” 

“Dude, I spent, like, a hundred bucks on that.” 

“Why the fuck were you bringing it to an away game, bro?” 

“Mind your business, bitch.” 

“I can use something else.” 

“No, it’s fine. Just buy me a replacement when we get back.” 

“Um, right.” 

*

Neil recalled when they first boarded the plane the lacrosse sticks being loaded onto baggage claim. He wasn’t sure why absolutely none of the sticks made it to shore, but Neil had gotten the idea after the snake had bitten him and he used a branch in the shape of a giant wishbone to corner it and kill it. 

He thought maybe he could tie a shirt to the diverging tip and the Foxes could use it as a racket. How lucky that he had found enough wishbone sticks in the jungle for each Fox. 

As soon as Kevin realized what Neil was trying to do, he joined in immediately, ecstatic, coaxing the others to join and make their own rackets, but everyone declined. 

“Literally, can’t we take a break from lacrosse? Can’t we literally do anything else with our lives?” 

“No,” Kevin said. Neil continued to rip and tear and tie. 

“What can we use as a ball?” Matt asked. He was down to play. 

“I was thinking of balling up and tying some seaweed and seeing how long that lasted. If it doesn’t work, I’ll go get an orange from the jungle.” 

“By yourself again?” Dan asked, dubious. She had not been pleased when she saw the bite on Neil’s hand. She had made him wrap it with a shorn piece of fabric. Neil had allowed it, but only because he didn’t care enough either way. 

“No,” Andrew said. He was not with the fray, but he wasn’t sitting in the shade like he usually was, either. He watched with bored eyes as Neil and Kevin made sad and rudimentary rackets. 

Neil rolled his eyes. “Whatever. If the seaweed ball doesn’t work, Andrew and I will go looking for an orange.” 

“That’s a waste of food!” Aaron sniped from somewhere by the shelter. 

“ You’re a waste of food!” someone chimed back. 

Neil rolled his eyes again. 

*

“Literally, I am not going to play lacrosse. I think my body has forgotten how.” 

“You better not be saying that when we get back.” 

“What are you talking about? When we get back I’m taking a hot shower for fifty years.” 

“Are you ready to play or not?” 

“Literally no! Did you not hear me? I’m not playing lacrosse.” 

“Okay, what do you want to play, then?” 

“I don’t know. Let’s make something up.” 

“Like what?” 

“Okay, listen, now hear me out: six people on a team. A goalie, two people to score, two people to block, and someone to play middleman. Tackling is okay.” 

“Wow.” 

“Seriously?” 

“Jesus.” 

“Well, that sounds really stupid, and we only have nine people, so we can’t even split our teams up that way. Also, what the fuck? That seemed like a pretty quick response considering we just now said to make something up on the spot.” 

“Whatever. Leave me alone. I’m thinking of calling it...Sexy.” 

“Oh my god.” 

“What?” 

“Jesus Christ.” 

“LAME.” 

“Disgusting.” 

“Ew.” 

“Leave forever.” 

“Um...wow. Okay. Um. Exy?” 

“Oh my god.” 

“Bro.” 

“Ew.” 

“Whatever. Let’s just try it. Who’s gonna be on whose team?” 

*

Neil had spent his whole life running, so he’d never seen the appeal of wanting to do more of it recreationally. His mother never let Neil venture far enough away to enjoy anything that wasn’t sitting quietly and reading, so the only hobby Neil had outside of surviving was, well, reading. But there weren’t any books on the island, and Neil really didn’t have anything else to do, so he decided to play the weird sport Kevin seemingly made up in two seconds flat. Neil tried to keep up with all his rules and regulations, and despite his aversion to sports and teamwork and other people in general, by the end of the first game, Neil had somehow earned Kevin’s grudging respect. 

“You’re fast,” Kevin complimented him, and Neil immediately grimaced at the nice words coming out of Kevin’s mouth. 

“Thanks,” he said, awkward, and then he handed Kevin his racket. “I think I’ll sit out the next game.” 

Kevin frowned but didn’t try to fight to keep him, as Aaron was also sitting out, so the teams were still even. Andrew hadn’t played at all, instead watching from the sidelines, silent and bored, and when Neil walked away, he went to sit next to Andrew to watch the remaining Foxes switch positions and start a second game. Aaron took off his shirt and walked into the ocean for a casual swim. 

“Don’t you want to play?” Neil asked Andrew after the “dealer,” as Kevin called them, started the game by throwing the ball of seaweed across the pitch. 

“No.” 

“I’m sure they’d have more fun if you were out there.” Neil didn’t really know if they would or not, but he had to imagine the Foxes liked playing with Andrew, since he was such a respected member of their group—and, also, he was on their actual lacrosse team. 

“No,” Andrew said again. 

“I know I would have had more fun.” 

“You don’t even know me.” 

“I don’t even know any of you,” Neil said. “And I know I’m not supposed to play favorites with strangers I bargained with to protect me, but if I could, I’d say you were mine.” 

Andrew started digging his fingers into the sand, still watching the game. “Why,” he asked, and Neil stared straight ahead so Andrew wouldn’t see his smile.  

Neil shrugged. “The knives, probably.” Andrew flicked sand in Neil’s direction. Neil rubbed at his mouth to hide his grin. “Okay, okay. Your dislike of literally everyone and everything?” 

“Like looking in a mirror?” 

“Well, I imagine you have that experience already,” Neil said, pointing out at Aaron. Andrew flicked more sand. Neil said, “Okay, fine, I get it. Um...your dedication to your friends and family?” 

Andrew stopped fiddling with the sand, looking up at Neil. He didn’t appear any more or less engaged than he normally did, but his focus was sudden and intense, and Neil, looking back, stopped smiling. 

“You don’t even know me,” Andrew said again. 

Neil, after a soundless beat where all he knew about the world was the hazel of Andrew’s eyes, looked down at his hand resting between them and flicked his own sand in Andrew’s direction. 

“I know enough,” he said, and then they both went back to watching the game.

*

“Neil, please, I can’t eat any more fish. Please. Please.” 

“Stop saying please.” 

“Why?” 

“You know Andrew doesn’t like it.” 

“He doesn’t?” 

“Whatever. Just don’t say please.”

“Okay, fine. Neil, blease, I can’t eat any more fish. Don’t make me eat any more fish.” 

“Wow, spoiled much?” 

“No, it’s fine. I was actually thinking of hunting.” 

“Hunting? Hunting what? How? Where? When?” 

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll be back. I just need one of Andrew’s knives.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh, no, I’m worried about it. I’m going, too.”

“Me, too.” 

“Yeah, and me!”

“Great. Family outing with Neil. Let’s all go.”

“Um.” 

“I said, let’s all go, Neil.” 

“Uh.” 

“Neil.” 

“Fine. Great. Let’s all go.” 

*

From somewhere not far into the jungle, Neil, crouched, silent, poked his head up over a bush. From beside him, eight other heads also poked up to peer over a bush.  

“Bird,” someone whispered. 

“Sh,” someone shushed. 

“ Bordt, ” someone whispered. 

“ Sh ,” someone shushed. 

Neil closed his eyes, exasperated, before he took a steeling breath and opened them again, zeroing in on the bird and every miniscule movement it made. From beside him, the Foxes held their breath, and, surprisingly, very still. 

They all nine watched the bird in tense, anticipatory silence for fifteen seconds until Neil, with absolutely no warning nor any sound at all, flicked his wrist, once, twice, back, forward, and the knife whizzed through the air and lodged, perfectly, in the breast of the large bird, making it promptly fall. 

Immediately, three of the eight Foxes stood and whooped while the others rejoiced but less violently. 

“Fuck yeah!” 

“Woooo!” 

“That’s what I’m talking about!” 

“How many more times are you going to do that, Neil?” 

“Um, how many more birds do you think we need?” 

“What’s a good number, guys? Ten? I’m thinking ten.” 

“Sorry, no, I want to see that at least twenty more times.” 

“I want him to hit an orange off the top of my head.” 

“Oh, shit, great idea. Me, too.” 

Neil sighed. He’d gone to the bird while they rejoiced, Andrew following. He cleaned the knife on his shirt and handed the bird to Andrew while they celebrated his lucky kill. Neil didn’t tell them that all their merrymaking just scared away probably nine out of the ten birds they wanted him to fell, but it was still midday and they still had time. 

“How about five more? Or maybe three?” he offered, and the Foxes nodded. Neil, also nodding, fell back into his crouch. 

From beside him, eight other bodies also fell into a crouch, and then they all nine ventured farther into the jungle, on the hunt for food. 

Chapter Text

“Nicky, you need to be faster.” 

“How the fuck am I supposed to be faster when I’m running in sand?” 

“Neil can be fast in the sand.” 

“Neil isn’t human.” 

“Neil weighs ninety pounds.” 

“Neil eats babies like you for breakfast.” 

“Did you know Neil once wrestled a boar?”

“I heard he hit an orange off the top of Andrew’s head with a throwing knife.” 

“I heard he turned the Allison Reynolds down when she asked him out.” 

“I heard he’s gay.” 

“Neil isn’t gay.” 

“Well, he isn’t straight!” 

“What does it matter what I am?” 

“Neil, sweety, we’re all in love with you, so we’d like to know who has an actual chance.” 

“What?” 

“What?” 

*

Andrew started joining Neil when he ventured into the jungle on days that he was bored and wanted to take a break from the Foxes. 

The first time Andrew joined Neil, the walk was quiet and peaceful, interrupted only once by Neil spotting a beetle the size of his hand and silently pointing it out to Andrew. They both watched as the beetle crept its way up the trunk of a tree, and once it disappeared, too high to comfortably watch, they continued on. 

The next time they went in, Neil got distracted trying to decipher if what he was seeing through the treeline was a wild animal or just a weird shaped tree when he tripped on a root and Andrew had to catch him so he wouldn’t fall flat on his face. His hand was curled tight around Neil’s bicep, and he didn’t let go until Neil turned to him and nodded in thanks. They continued on. 

The next time after that, they found a berry bush and settled on the ground beside it, picking off the fruit one berry at a time and popping them in their mouths. After a few silent handfuls, Andrew, lips stained red, threw a berry at Neil’s mouth, juice exploding on his closed lips as the berry fell pitifully to the ground. 

Neil, glaring, gestured for Andrew to wait, and then he opened his mouth. Andrew threw one in. Neil ate it. 

He held one up for Andrew, but Andrew refused to open his mouth. Neil, shrugging, tipped his head back and threw the berry into his own mouth. He felt another one bounce off his upturned chin. 

Neil could feel juice dripping off his lips and down his face. It must have been a lot, because Andrew wouldn’t stop staring at his mouth. 

“Gross,” Andrew said. 

Neil, grinning, shoved the rest of his handful of berries in his mouth before moving to stand up. He held a hand out for Andrew to take. Andrew took it. 

They continued on. 

*

“OMG, Neil, guess what!” 

“What?” 

“We found another suitcase while you were gone!” 

“Really? That’s great, guys. Thanks.” 

“Did you hear that? Neil’s proud of me.”

“He's proud of all of us. We all found it.”

“Okay, well, he said it to me personally. So.”

“So, what?”

“So there.”

“So, fuck off.”

*

Matt hadn’t had a chance to be alone with Neil since that first day, so when he saw Neil walking along the edge of the jungle and looking up in confusion, no Andrew, no Kevin, Matt waved Dan away from following him and jogged to join Neil with…er…

“What are you doing?” Matt asked. Neil was still frowning up at the trees.

“Do those look like coconuts?” Neil asked, pointing, and Matt followed his finger to the tops of trees.

Matt also frowned at the weird shapes. “I don’t know. I thought coconuts grew on palm trees.”

“I don’t think they’re real.”

“Palm trees?”

“Coconuts.”

Matt laughed, and then he was a bit startled when Neil took off his shoes and prepared to climb.

“What are you doing?” he asked, more out of shock than any confusion on what Neil was clearly about to do.

“I’m gonna find out what those are.”

“Well. Okay. But before you go…” Matt reached out and put a light hand on Neil’s shoulder. Neil flinched but didn’t try to step out of his touch, so Matt left his hand there. “I just want to say thank you. For what you did.”

“With the jellyfish sting? Stopping Nicky from peeing on Aaron doesn’t really—”

“No!” Matt stopped him, shaking his head and chuckling. “No, I mean when we first crashed.” Matt’s smile dropped. “You saved my life.”

Neil subtly stepped out of Matt’s touch, but he nodded in acknowledgement, somber. “It was scary out there.”

Matt snorted at the understatement. “Yeah, but at least you were going to make it.”

Neil shrugged. “You made it, too.”

“Yeah,” Matt insisted. “Thanks to you.”

Neil shrugged him off again, and Matt decided that he would have to try other, less obvious ways to show his appreciation for the actual life that Neil had saved. For all the lives he was saving.

“You want to race?” Matt offered instead, pointing to another tree just next to the one Neil was about to climb, with the weird substance at the top that might or might not be coconuts.

Neil finally relaxed. “Sure,” he said, offering a small smile.

Matt smiled back. 

*

“Neil, sweety, aren’t you tired of wearing the same things over and over again?” 

“What else am I supposed to wear?” 

“Well, I would offer my lingerie, but it’s currently being used for exy gear.” 

“Why would I wear lingerie?” 

“Oh my god, did someone just say Neil’s going to wear lingerie?” 

“What? No—”

“Where? Where is he?” 

“I’m not—” 

“Oh my god, we need to find another suitcase, right now. Do you think the Ravens packed any negligée?”  

“No, wait—” 

“We’ll find some, don’t worry. In the meantime, Neil, at least take the jeans off. No one will care if you’re not wearing pants.” 

“Yeah, Neil, take off your pants.” 

*

It went like this: Neil and Andrew, in the jungle. A snake falling from a tree. Neil, stumbling away from the creature, Andrew too slow to grab him, Neil’s shirt catching on a branch, ripping, shredding, he was falling, he fell. 

Andrew was staring impassively down at him, and Neil was glaring up at him, annoyed that he’d fallen at all, and then he felt a draft on his nipple and looked down and saw that his shirt was torn, shredded, unwearable. Useless. 

Andrew wasn’t just staring at Neil’s sorry state on the ground. Neil, startled, brought a hand up to cover his scars, but he was too late. What could he hide now that Andrew had seen? 

“Fuck,” he whispered, and then he stood up. Andrew did not help him. Neil stared at Andrew, waiting to see what he’d do, what he’d say, when Andrew, staring at the exposed torso, used two fingers to brush the fabric aside. When it just fell back in his way, Andrew tugged, once, looking up at Neil’s eyes, and waited. 

Neil, uncomfortable, angry, hopeless, sighed and ripped the rest of the shirt off. Andrew returned to staring at the scars, light fingers tracing up and down and around, lining up with burn marks and fiddling with bullet holes. 

It wasn’t cold out, but Neil still shivered. 

“They won’t like this,” Andrew said, a palm slowly sliding up and down the road rash curling from Neil’s shoulder to his waist. Andrew’s hand was warm, and large, and claiming the space on Neil’s ribs. 

“You could offer your shirt,” Neil said lightly. He was waiting for Andrew to look up, but Andrew was still staring at the scars. 

“I could not,” Andrew said, unsympathetic.  

Neil sighed. Andrew’s other hand was feeling across the thick ropes criss-crossing on Neil’s stomach. Neil hadn’t realized, but he was leaning into Andrew’s touch. He took a step back, and Andrew’s palms slowly slid off his skin. Neil felt cold, bereft. 

“Let’s go,” he said, refusing to meet Andrew’s eyes now that Neil had Andrew’s attention on his face again, and then he turned around so he could walk back the way they’d came. He knew Andrew was following because he could hear his light footsteps, and then he felt light fingers once again tracing the thick scars on Neil’s back. 

*

Someone wolf-whistled when Neil and Andrew stepped out of the edge of the jungle, but they quickly sobered once they got a good look at Neil’s torso. 

“Um, Neil?” 

“Neil?” 

“Bro?” 

“What the fuck?” 

Neil, self-conscious, incensed, hugged his stomach. He did not look at Andrew. He did not look at anyone. He was standing in the middle of the Foxes’ camp, half-naked and uncomfortable, and the Foxes were surrounding him, every single one, and staring, and somber. 

“I need a shirt,” Neil said, stiff, awkward. 

A heavy silence, and then someone disappeared to the pile of Allison’s clothes and then came back with a bright yellow swatch of fabric—and the pair of “after school snack” booty shorts. 

“Seriously?” Aaron asked. 

“What? He might as well change if he’s changing.” 

“Christ.” 

Neil, expression pained, reached out for the clothes, but Nicky, the one who had grabbed them, took a step just out of reach. 

“Neil,” he said, slowly, like trying to coax a small animal. 

“No.” 

“Neil, I’m not going to give these to you until we talk about this.” 

“There is no ‘this,’” Neil said, making another grab for the clothes, but suddenly Andrew’s arms were curling under Neil’s arms and holding Neil back by his armpits, and Neil wiggled, futile, furious. 

“Is this really what you want to do?” Neil asked them all, the Foxes, staring at him being held captive by Andrew, staring at his scars. “You want to fight me about this?” 

“There is no ‘this,’” Andrew reminded him.

“Fuck you,” Neil spat. 

“Neil,” Renee said, in her soft voice that Neil hated so much. He hated her. He hated all of them. “We just want to know who did that to you.” 

“Because it fucking matters?” Neil asked, still trying to fight out of Andrew’s hold, but there wasn’t even an ounce of give. Andrew was holding him flush against his chest, and Neil was two seconds away from kicking his feet like a petulant child. Allison was staring at the iron mark on his shoulder. Kevin was looking at the bullet wound. Matt was studying the slashes on his stomach.

“These look like old scars,” Dan mused. “Neil, how old are you?” 

“None of your fucking business,” he said. Neil had almost broken free of Andrew’s hold, so Andrew had to shift his grip, his arms now wrapped tight around Neil's torso, hugging him. He was squeezing Neil so tight, Neil had a hard time breathing. He wanted Andrew to let go. He wanted to run away. 

“What happened to you, Neil?” Renee asked, her voice even softer, and Neil was so mad, he threw his head back and headbutted Andrew. Andrew gave a small grunt, but his hold didn’t diminish at all, and Aaron had stepped forward, furious, but whatever look that was on Andrew’s face made him stop. 

“Dude,” Aaron snapped. “No one fucking cares.”

“Clearly,” Neil snarled back. 

“No, Neil,” Dan explained, “he means that we get it. Whatever you tell us, how you got these scars, whatever. We’ll understand. We’re not the Foxes for nothing.”

“Oh, what, so just because you all have some sob story, I’m supposed to tell you how many times I’ve been stabbed?” 

“How many times?” Andrew asked, and Neil fought harder to get out. 

“I don’t care. I don’t care about any of this. Just give me the clothes so I can go.” 

“Will you come back?” Andrew asked. 

“Yes,” Neil lied. 

Andrew, quick, unbidden, kneed the back of Neil’s knees, causing him to lose his stance and fall. Andrew fell with him, settling Neil in his lap, still grasping his torso but now also barricading Neil with his legs. 

“You’re a terrible liar,” Andrew told him. 

Neil felt frantic, cornered.

“Let me go,” he said, and his voice cracked. 

The rest of the Foxes lost their nerve. “Andrew…” Kevin said, after a pause, but Andrew said, “No.” 

Neil stopped fighting, but he didn’t stop being angry. “Kevin has scars,” he pointed out. “Why doesn’t he have to say anything? Why is it just me?” 

“I did this to myself,” Kevin said immediately. None of the Foxes reacted to his admission, meaning they must have already known. “I used to be on Riko’s lacrosse team. We used to be brothers. I used to have a tattoo on my face with the number two, and when I got out, I couldn’t stand the sight of it anymore, so I cut it out.” 

Neil was panting in Andrew’s hold, trying to decide if he was supposed to care that Kevin mutilated his face. 

Unfortunately, he did care. He did care what happened to them, what they did to themselves, what they saw in him. 

Exhausted, defeated, Neil slumped back into Andrew’s chest and closed his eyes. Andrew’s hold slackened but didn’t let go. 

Neil couldn’t tell them everything, wouldn’t tell them everything, but he could tell them this: 

“I’m fine,” he said, and at least three Foxes made sounds of protest. He opened his eyes again. “It’s fine. The people who did this—” 

“ People ?” 

“—they’re not around anymore.” Well, most of them weren’t around anymore. 

“But why did they do it to you?” Allison asked. 

Neil, trying for brevity, to lighten the mood, to avoid the question, said, “Do people really need a reason to hurt me? I’m kind of a piece of shit.” 

“No, Neil.” 

“Stop it.” 

“Neil, bro.” 

“Anyways,” Neil said. He pinched at Andrew’s wrist until he let go, and then Neil stood up. “I’m fine.” He turned back to Andrew. Andrew’s nose was bleeding. Neil didn’t feel bad. “I’m not going to run,” he told him, meaning it this time, and then he turned to Nicky. “Give me the clothes.” He held out a hand. 

The Foxes stared at Neil for a long time. They didn’t say anything, or do anything, and eventually, Nicky held out the clothes, and Neil took them. He walked toward the ocean, his only escape that none of the Foxes would follow him to, not when they could see he wasn’t running, and tried to still his shaking hands. 

*

“So are we really not going to talk about this?” 

“Talk about what, his scars?” 

“No, the fact that Nicky gave Neil a crop top and booty shorts to wear and Neil is just wearing them.” 

“Oh my god, really?” 

“He’s so cute .” 

“I wish I could take a picture. I want to remember this forever.” 

“But really, I do want to talk about his scars. Namely, who shot him?” 

“Neil doesn’t look much younger than us. Who the fuck is shooting at children?” 

“And hitting them with irons.” 

“Or trying to gut them.”

“God, I’m so mad.” 

“Where’s Neil? I miss Neil.” 

“He’s literally by the ocean and he’s literally only been gone for five minutes. You can literally see him.” 

“So? Whenever he’s gone, I feel a bit lost.” 

“Co-dependant, much?” 

“I’m just saying.” 

“Whatever.” 

*

Neil fingered the ruffled hems of the shirt Nicky gave him for the fifth time since he’d put it on and sighed. Why had they given him this shirt? It was pale yellow and form-fitting, a ribbed and stretchy fabric with frilly hems and the patch of a bright red heart sewn onto the left breast of the shirt. His abdomen was exposed, and the black booty shorts left absolutely nothing to the imagination. He thought about putting his jeans back on, but he did like the feel of air on his red and rashy skin. He really couldn’t get by much longer wearing the denim. 

Neil sighed again. 

He started kicking around in the waves. He had calmed down a while ago, almost as soon as he was away from the Foxes; he had pushed down his rage and shame and fear into a well deep inside himself where he always pushed his rage and shame and fear. It didn’t really matter what the Foxes thought of him or his scars or his life. They may care about him now, here, while he saved their lives and spent time with them, but the Foxes weren’t real here: they were scared and anxious vessels, just trying to survive until they didn’t have to try anymore. They knew someone was coming for them, so they didn’t need to do anything or be anyone else but a person who waited for help to arrive. They were not really here. They did not really care. 

They didn’t need to know that Neil knew better—that Neil was always trying to survive, was always someone else, so he wasn’t just an empty being, lost and on island, waiting to go home. 

*

Eventually, Kevin came out to join him. He kicked water at Neil in greeting and Neil kicked back, and then they began walking the shoreline, not saying anything for a while until Kevin brought up possible exy footwork and Neil, intrigued, responded. They walked up and down the beach for a while, and Neil knew the other Foxes were watching because what else would they be doing? when Neil eventually asked, “Why were you number two?” 

“Because Riko’s number one,” Kevin answered, grim. 

“Is he?” Neil would rather follow Kevin around than Riko. Despite carving out his own face, Kevin still had a decent head on his shoulders—and he knew how to play a game. Why would anyone call Riko number one? 

Kevin opened his mouth to answer, but someone beat him to it: “Talking about me behind my back, Kevin?” Neil and Kevin whipped in the direction of the voice and found Riko Moriyama and three Ravens emerging from the jungle, dirty, sunburnt, chapped and peeling, but still the most unsettling thing Neil had seen on this island. 

Neil moved to stand in front of Kevin. 

Riko tutted. “Tsk, tsk, brother. What would the master say?” 

Neil, glaring, turned to look at Kevin and saw that his face was pale. 

Fuck , Neil thought. The Ravens finally came out to play.

Chapter Text

“Hey, do those look like storm clouds?”

“Oh my god, finally. I’m so tired of being hot during the day.”

“And free water!”

“You’re right! Let’s get the water bottles.”

“OMG, Neil is gonna be so proud of us.”

“I’m hoping for a hug, but I’ll settle for a high five.”

“I have never seen Neil willingly touch anyone or anything, except for maybe Andrew.”

“Hm.”

“Weird.”

“Huh.”

“Well, I’m still hoping for a hug.”

“Damn, me too.”

“Hold up. What’s happening over there?”

*

One minute, Kevin and Neil were alone in the water, watching as Riko descended from the edge of the jungle to the tip of the tide. The next, Andrew was standing in front of Neil, facing down Riko and his Ravens. Neil remembered more than three Ravens—at least seven, maybe more—and he wondered if they had stayed at their camp or if they were lurking in the jungle, waiting to pounce. 

Neil pushed Andrew out of the way so Neil wasn’t standing behind him. They stood side-by-side and watched as Riko came to a stop five paces away. 

“Riko,” Andrew said. “To what do we owe this pleasure?” 

Riko, still grinning strangely at Kevin, said, “We’ve come to greet our neighbors. After all this time, and we haven’t even said hello.” 

“A pity it couldn’t have lasted longer.” Andrew was pulling out a knife from his armband, and he wasn’t being subtle about it. He wiped the sand on his shirt. Neil thought it was a silly display, but Riko did stop smiling, and Neil realized he had been right. The Ravens were afraid of the Foxes—well, at least one Fox. 

“And I see the lost little pig found his way home,” Riko said, turning his attention to Neil. Neil didn’t bother replying. 

“Another thing I find interesting,” Andrew said. “Why him?” 

Riko looked to Andrew. “Why not?” he said, and then he took a step forward and Andrew tapped the tip of his knife to Riko’s chest. 

*

“Andrew!” 

“Bro!” 

“Oh my god, Riko is really here, isn’t he? Fuck.” 

“We’ve got to stop him before he hurts someone.” 

“You really think Andrew is going to gut Riko?” 

“Honestly, yeah.” 

“Let’s go.” 

*

The Foxes approached the tense circle: Andrew holding a knife to Riko’s chest, Riko’s hands up but unpreterbred, uncaring. The other Ravens didn’t try to intercept. Neil stayed in front of Kevin, and he gestured to the Foxes to stop when they had gotten close enough. 

“What are you doing here, Moriyama?” Neil asked. 

Riko smirked. “You let little boys fight your battles for you now, Kevin?” 

There was a soft splash as Kevin shifted in the water, but he said nothing. Riko sneered. 

“Typical, but not surprising.” 

“Why are you here, Riko?” Dan asked. 

“Why are any of us here?” Riko asked, mocking. “For food and for water.” 

“We’ve been here for days and you still don’t have food and water?” 

“No, we did,” one of the Ravens answered. “And now it’s all gone.”

Riko was grinning, first at Andrew, and then at Kevin, and finally at Neil, where he lingered. His eyes were bloodshot and his lips were chapped and cracking from dehydration and heat, but Neil still felt unnerved. When Riko didn’t turn away from Neil, Andrew took a step closer, his knife poking into Riko’s collarbones through his shirt, and Riko finally looked annoyed at the knife. 

“We’d like to make a trade, Foxes,” Riko said, stepping back from Andrew’s blade. “The pig for your lives.” 

“What?” Allison asked. 

“ Lives ?” Nicky asked, aghast. 

Riko gave a complicated whistle, and suddenly six Ravens emerged from the jungle, covered in mud and sweat and brandishing makeshift weapons of various makes and models: spears, clubs, maces. 

*

“Dude, are you fucking serious? Just pick some goddamn berries in the jungle! There are literally oranges and fruit in there!” 

“Not enough.” 

“So you’re going to kill us because you can't live off fruit?” 

“Perhaps killing is a bit dramatic. Definitely maim, though. Possibly cripple.” 

“What the fuck?” 

“You’re fucking sick.” 

“No. We’re fucking hungry.” 

*

“Why me?” Neil asked before the Foxes could start fighting. He wasn’t sure what was going on, why Riko had gone so insane—perhaps he really was that hungry, but Neil couldn’t fathom why the Ravens, who seemed to be so good at fashioning weapons, didn’t just use them to hunt for food. It was almost embarrassing. 

“We know who the breadwinner is,” one of the Ravens answered. 

“Have you been spying on us?” Allison hissed, and Riko laughed. 

“Like you’ve made it so hard to do. We’ll take the boy and leave you all alone.” 

“That’s it?” Neil asked. “You just want me to get you some food?” 

Riko’s face went impossibly innocent. He held up a palm, straight and high. “Scout’s honor,” he said. 

“Don’t do it, Neil,” Kevin said suddenly. “Don’t go.” 

Neil pursed his lips, debating. He was calculating the odds on how well the Foxes would do—they didn’t have any weapons, but they weren’t deranged and sick from hunger and thirst. It might be possible—

Before Neil had reached a decision, Andrew made it for him: done with the play for dominance, Andrew swiped at Riko’s face with his knife. Riko stumbled back, a nick on his nose, and then he was snarling, and then he was furious. He whistled again, and the Ravens came down from the jungle.

*

Neil pulled Kevin out of the water so they wouldn’t be hindered by the waves as they fought and defended themselves. Every able-bodied person on the beach converged on themselves, fighting and yelling, and it wasn’t long before Neil saw blood staining the sand. It was too chaotic to tell who was winning at first, and Neil was trying to keep Kevin outside of the fray but also keep an eye on the other Foxes—he pushed a hand out of the way before it punched Allison in the face, he ripped a spear out of a Raven’s hand and snapped it in half over his knee, someone punched him in the ribs but he turned toward them and backhanded them with the spear he just broke before shoving them away from him, causing multiple people to lose their footing and fall.

Neil thought they would make it until he noticed that the Ravens stepped back from the other Foxes and started focusing all their attention on just one.

“Andrew!” he heard Aaron yell, and then Neil was running.

*

“So even monsters can fall, huh?”

“Get away from him!”

“Riko, what the fuck!”

“Oh my god, Andrew!”

“Stop!”

*

Neil pushed his way through the riot until he found Riko and four other Ravens holding Andrew to the ground, his own knife in Riko’s bloody and slashed hand, pressed to his throat. His arms and legs were pinned, spreadeagle, all of him on full display. Andrew was staring up at Riko, impassive, blank, but Neil could see the strain of his muscles, the blood and sweat on his face and neck, and knew he hadn’t meant to fall.

“Stop,” Neil said again, and Riko, turning to Neil, pressed the knife into Andrew’s neck until blood welled, and then he kept the knife there, digging into Andrew’s skin. Neil watched a trail of blood slide down the side of Andrew’s neck and splash in the sand.

The Foxes were screaming, but they didn't want any resistance to cause Riko to snap and hurt Andrew.

“Oh my god!”

“Riko!”

“Andrew!”

“ Stop ,” Neil said again. “I’ll go. I’ll go with you.”

Andrew turned to look at Neil, and finally something broke through his mask: anger, intense, and focused entirely on Neil.

“It’s fine,” Neil said to him, to all the Foxes. “I’ll go.”

“We made a deal, Neil,” one of them said. Neil didn’t want to look and see who was disappointed in him. He didn’t want to know. He wanted Riko’s knife away from Andrew’s neck.  

“I’m ending the deal,” he said. “I don’t need your protection anymore.”

“Neil—”

“You can’t—”

“Bro—”

“It’s fine,” Neil said again, louder, overtop of their protests. He was still looking at Andrew. Andrew still had a knife on his throat. “There’s a storm coming in, so you should be good on water if you fill the water bottles. Fix the shelter. Andrew knows how to fish. You guys will be fine without me. I promise.”

“Neil—”

“Seriously—”

“Don’t—”

“Touching,” Riko said, and then he pulled the knife away from Andrew’s throat and straightened. “And I had hoped to use my last bargaining chip.”

“What more can you possibly have?” Allison asked. “We’re on a deserted fucking island!”

Riko was grinning at Neil. The four Ravens were still holding Andrew down to the ground. Andrew was still glaring at Neil. Neil finally turned away from him, from them all. There was nothing left to say.

“I have enough,” Riko said. “Let’s go.”

*

Riko ordered the four Ravens to keep Andrew down until night fall, when the rest of them would be too far away for the Foxes to come after. Riko held the knife at Neil’s back and said if any of them tried to follow, he’d make surviving a lot harder for Neil, and he’d do it right in front of them.

Neil had his back to the Foxes, so he couldn’t see the looks on their faces, but he could hear their resounding silence. He didn’t even hear Andrew fight back, now that there wasn’t a knife to his throat.

Riko pushed Neil, and then they were walking, and walking, and then they were gone.

*

Eventually, Riko grew bored of holding a knife to Neil’s back, so he handed it off to another Raven, a tall, imposing Raven with dark hair and the number three tattooed under his eye that had probably always been there and Neil just hadn’t noticed until now.

“Another one?” Neil asked.

“Another what?” the man asked, his voice rich with a French accent.

Neil, surprised, answered in French, “Another bitch who lets Riko put him in a place he doesn’t deserve.”

The man also seemed surprised at the language. He was quick to respond in it though. “You think I don’t deserve to be third?”

“I think Riko doesn’t deserve to be first.”

The man’s expression turned sour, and then he shot a nervous glance in Riko’s direction. Riko was glaring at them, clearly unable to understand the language but knowing when he was being talked about.

The man faced forward once again, poking the tip of the knife into Neil’s back in reprimand. He said, in English, “You call Kevin a bitch? I thought you were friends.”

Neil said, still in French, “We are friends. And I’ve called Kevin worse.”

“Neil,” Riko said, his tone light.

“Riko,” Neil acknowledged.

“Maybe you’ve been with the Foxes too long so you forget, but when you’re with the Ravens, I am king.”

“Okay.”

“And you’ll learn to do as I say.”

“Sure, Jan.”

Riko stopped. The rest of the Ravens stopped. The French man looked pained. As soon as Riko gestured for the Ravens to circle Neil, the French man handed the knife back to Riko and took a step back. Riko prowled the space in front of Neil, speculative, before he said, “Maybe it’s time to be humbled.”

“I’m not the one on a high horse.” Neil’s heart was racing, but his voice was steady, and he wasn’t turning away from Riko, away from any of them.

“No,” Riko agreed. “But you can still fall.” Two Ravens kicked at Neil’s knees, and he collapsed to the ground. Neil tried to fight back, but his arms were immediately restrained and Riko was already swinging.

*

The Ravens left Neil in a bloody heap as soon as they made it back to their camp. Neil didn’t have enough energy or blood in his body to study what had changed from their camp since the last time he was here, but he could tell there was more debris, and the shelter had expanded. The sun was going down, and two of the Ravens were starting to light a fire under the protection of their shelter, as if it'd be safe from the storm rolling in.

“Do get up quickly, Neil,” Riko called, as Neil held very still, a hand to his exposed stomach, staunching the blood from superficial wounds. He knew the cuts would stop bleeding eventually, but there was so much of it, and he couldn’t feel anything but the pain, couldn’t think, he just wanted it to stop. Riko went on, “We are so dreadfully hungry.”

*

The Foxes had waited only until Neil was out of sight before they attempted to fight the remaining Ravens holding them prisoner, but the Ravens had a mission and they weren’t going to shirk on it: they wrestled, fought, and corralled the Foxes, just long enough, that by the time they stopped getting in the Foxes’ way, it was too late. When the Ravens fled into the jungle, Matt and Dan followed, but the Ravens had their plans there, too, to separate and deceive, so the Foxes would have nothing to follow, no leads, no trails.

Matt and Dan returned to the other Foxes, who were standing in a tense circle around a sad little fire, their pile of food untouched and hidden from the growing storm under their shelter. No one was very hungry.

“What do we do now?”

“Go after him.”

“Why? He left us.”

“To protect us!”

“Are you sure?”

“I don’t know what mosh pit you were just in, but it was obvious Neil was agreeing so they wouldn’t kill Andrew.”

“Oh, because Andrew has never handled himself out of a mess before. If Neil had just waited two seconds, Andrew probably would have gotten out.”

“True, but Neil didn’t know that.”

“What the fuck do you mean, he didn’t know that? He’s spent the most time with Andrew than with any of us. Of course he knew. He went for something else.”

The Foxes fell into an uncomfortable silence. Perhaps it was because Neil didn’t know Andrew that well that he thought he wouldn’t break free, or maybe they didn’t know Neil that well that he had gone with the Ravens so quickly. Riko had mentioned another bargaining chip.

“I just don’t buy it,” Matt said eventually. “I don’t think he’s a Raven.”

“You’re just clouded by your love and your id.”

“Okay, psych major, I’m not clouded by anything. Neil saved my life.”

“Yes, we know.”

“We’ve heard.”

“We are aware.”

“No,” Matt said, angry. “I don’t think you do know.”

“What are you trying to say, Matt? That just because a random citizen didn’t want to watch you die, he’s suddenly good and bright? We all saw his scars. Maybe he really is involved in something shady—and maybe he’s not the good guy.”

“Why are you suspicious of him now that he’s gone? You were fine to let him handle our food and get us water, but as soon as the Ravens threaten one of our lives and Neil stops that from happening, you suddenly think he’s been a Raven this whole time?”

“Look, maybe we're just scared because we think Neil is going to die, and it will be because of us. Whatever reason he was on that plane, he landed here with us, and we knew, we know , that the Ravens are insane. And I think, because Neil saved Matt’s life, and Kevin’s, and mine, that the Ravens think he’s with us. And now he’s going to die because we couldn’t keep our promise and protect him.”

It was dark out now, the storm swirling in and crashing. It was easy to understand, here, now, how easily the plane had fallen prey to a storm like this. There was nothing at all and then there was the cold and the rain and the shriek of the wind, constant and loud, relentless and suffocating.  

“We’ve got to go get him,” Renee said, shouting over the storm.

“What, right now?” Aaron demanded, holding his arms up. They were all drenched and shivering, squinting through the pelting sheet of rain and trying to see through the dark.

“Yes,” they heard Andrew say. He had been standing on the outskirts of the group, near the edge of the jungle. At his voice, the Foxes turned to him, just as a flash of lightning, violent and bright, illuminated the island. In that second, they saw Andrew’s pale and furious face, the bruise he’d gotten near his eye during the fight, and the trail of blood leading down his throat. He had a knife in his hand. “Right now,” he said, just as the rumble of thunder shook the island, and everything was dark and misty.

Andrew turned back to the jungle.

And the rest of the Foxes followed.

*

When Neil still wouldn’t get up, one of the Ravens—the Frenchman—hauled Neil to his feet and pushed him to the water. Neil’s current shirt wasn’t enough to use as a net, so he asked the Raven, who introduced himself as Jean, if he could use his shirt.

Jean scowled, and Neil said, “It’s either that or you give me a weapon to hunt with.” Neil swayed in the waves, which were growing stronger with the brewing storm, and his violent blood loss made standing and concentrating hard. Jean held a steadying hand on Neil’s shoulder.

“You must stop,” Jean said in French, harsh. “If you do not act strong, Riko will punish you again, and we will still have no food.”

Neil, drowsy, smirked. “A pity. Looks like I die either way.”

“I will help you, but you must stand tall. Lean on my arm.”

Neil’s morbid humor faded. For whatever reason, Jean was helping him at the risk of punishment. Neil glanced at Jean’s arms and noticed the fading bruises and cuts. He thought about the two on Kevin’s face, carved out, and wondered what it must be like to be third.

Neil took a deep breath, and then he leaned on Jean’s arm, just barely, just enough. “Okay,” he said, steadying his stance, and gestured for Jean’s shirt. “Before the storm rolls in.”

*

The excursion was unsuccessful. The waves were rolling too fast, and the fish had fled at the sign of the storm, and as soon as Jean and Neil couldn’t feel their feet anymore, they limped back to shore. The sun was almost completely set, and the rumble of thunder in the distance grew closer.

Riko was not pleased when Neil approached the shelter, blue, black, and red, with no food.

“We just asked for one thing,” Riko tutted, and then motioned for two Ravens to grab hold of Neil’s arms. Their hold was slick and weak due to the chill and rain, but Neil didn’t have anything left to fight with.

“There’s nothing to catch, Riko,” Neil said. Neil’s gaze slid to Jean, standing just behind Riko, and the last light of day illuminated his face, stark and gray. He looked as tired as Neil felt.

“Nothing?” Riko asked. “I’ll show you nothing.” The last thing Neil saw from the flash of lightning before the night went dark was the glint of Andrew’s knife, approaching the skin under his right eye.

*

“God, and I thought it was muddy before the storm.”

“I feel so wet and slimy.”

“Ew, it's so gross.”

“And dark.”

“And scary.” 

“And dark.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“Wait.”

“Oh my god.”

“Oh my god! Oh my god, we lost them!”

“Are we literally separated right now? On tonight of all nights?”

“Andrew!”

“Kevin!”

"Guys!"

“Hello? Can you hear us?”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“Fuck.”

“Shit.”

“Dammit.”

“Okay. Okay. All right. This is fine. Maybe this will work out better. Spread out and search for clues.”

“Ruh Roh, Raggy.”

“Shut the fuck up. I hate you forever.”

“God, today is the worst.”

“Right?”

“Yeah.”

“For real.”

“I miss Neil.”

“Shut up.”

*

Riko dropped Neil once he was done working on his face. He said something to Neil, probably demanding more food, and then he laughed and went to the shelter, the rest of the Ravens following. Neil couldn’t hear anything over the roar of the storm and the ringing in his ears. He lay flat on his back, wet sand molding to his skin, cold rain washing it away. He wasn’t sure what on his face was blood and what was rain.

He didn’t care anymore.

When the storm didn’t slow down, when the Ravens settled under the shelter, when Jean sat between Neil and the rest of the Ravens, serving as lookout, watching him perish, Neil slowly sat up. They stared at each other, vacant, lost, before Neil stood up. Jean mirrored his every movement, his focus intent. Once Neil was standing, Jean took one small step in the Ravens’ direction. 

“He knows who you are,” Jean said, his voice drowned out by the rain.

“What?”

“We found you washed up on shore.”

Neil frowned. Neil has gotten himself to shore.

Jean, annoyed at his idiocy, snapped, “No,” and then pointed to the pile of debris near the Ravens' shelter. 

Neil didn't know what he was supposed to find there other than clothes and shoes, but he kept looking until he saw a familiar red and black duffel bag.

“Oh,” Neil said. 

“I don't know why you have a strange shrine to your vile father in that binder, but Riko knows now. We all do.”

“Ah,” Neil said.

“Whatever you do now, wherever you go. It doesn't matter. You do not have much time left.” 

Neil felt so cold, so tired. “I know,” he said, soft, and then looked to Jean one last time. A flash of lightning burned the sight of the black three on his face into Neil’s retinas. Neil nodded at him, in thanks, in goodbye, and Jean waited until Neil was at the tree line before he called Riko’s name.

*

“Andrew, we’ve got to stop.”

“We lost the others.”

“Aaron can’t stop falling.”

“Okay, jackass, like you’re doing any better.”

“We need to evaluate the situation. We’re not going to find him blundering about in the middle of the jungle. We don’t even know how far they are.”

“Andrew, are you listening?”

“Andrew, stop!”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“Well, shit. Now what?”

“Try to find the others, I guess?”

*

Neil’s desire to flee from the Ravens was so strong, nothing else mattered: he wasn’t cold, wasn’t shaking, wasn’t bleeding out from cuts on his stomach and arms. He didn’t know what Riko carved into his face and it didn’t matter. He wanted out, he wanted gone, he wanted nothing. He didn’t know when or if the Ravens would even try to look for him in this weather, but as soon as he was far enough away from their camp, Neil started sprinting through the trees, slipping on sticks and mud but uncaring, unfeeling. He’d just stand up and go again. He wanted out.

He wanted gone.

*

“God, we’ve been out here for hours and I think we’re lost.”

“This is the dumbest thing we’ve ever done.”

“I think we should stop and wait the storm out.”

“Okay.”

*

When there was a flash of lightning and Neil saw a Raven’s face staring at him through the trees, Neil no longer felt numb and anxious to leave. He felt furious and ready to fight.

Without stopping, Neil leant down and picked up the first thing his hand could grab and lobbed it in the Raven’s direction. There was a thunk and a rustle but no other sound—until, through the rumble of thunder, Neil heard a pointed whistle.

“Mother of Jesus fucking Christ,” Neil gasped, and ran.

*

“Wow, when will the storm end?”

“Never.”

“Do you remember what it was like to be dry and warm?”

“No.”

“I do. It was just this morning.”

“Oh, yeah.”

*

Hunted through the jungle in the middle of a tropical storm in the dead of night, pelted by rain and wind and stalked by clicks and whistles, running in circles, slipping in mud, falling into holes, freezing, furious, lost, confused, Neil was just about to stop in the middle of it all and scream and scream when something tackled him to the ground.

His mind shuffled through the possibilities as he fought to get away: a Raven, another Raven, possibly a Raven, a jungle cat, his boar nemesis come for revenge, his father—but when he felt a light blade on his neck and a hand covering his mouth, Neil tasted the salt and the sea through the person’s hand and looked up and saw the silhouette of the only person who mattered on this godforsaken island. Neil stopped struggling.

“Andrew,” he sighed, relieved.

*

“Did you hear that?”

“I can’t fucking hear anything, bro.”

“No, seriously, listen.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“Kinda sounds like…a whistle?”

*

Andrew didn’t move the knife from Neil’s neck, and he didn’t get up from his straddle on Neil’s hips, but Neil didn’t mind. He was so relieved to see Andrew again that he couldn’t help but to slide slow hands up Andrew’s arms, stopping to cup his elbows.

“Don’t touch me,” Andrew said, and Neil dropped his arms.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Neil said, his voice muffled from behind Andrew’s hand.

Andrew ignored him. “What happened to your face?” he demanded.

“I don’t know. What does it look like?”

“It looks like Riko carved the number zero under your eye.”

“Oh.”

Andrew still hadn’t moved his hands. Neil was still staring up at Andrew, trying to make out his features. “Well,” Neil said eventually. “I guess I always have been and always will be nothing now.”

“Shut up.”

“Can we get up? I’m cold.”

“Don’t ever fucking do that again.”

“Well, it’s not my fault. It was your cousin that gave me these skimpy clothes—”

Andrew pressed the blade a little closer to Neil’s skin. Neil shut up.

Andrew leaned down and moved his hand from Neil’s mouth so he could be closer to Neil’s face. Their noses bumped by the time Andrew stopped. He said, deadly soft, “Do not presume I need anything from you.”

Andrew’s breath was warm across Neil’s lips. Neil, his tone just as soft and deadly, replied, “I wasn’t going to let him hurt you.”

“I don’t need your help. I would have gotten out.”

“I wasn’t willing to take that chance,” Neil said. “Not with you.”

For a moment, Neil thought Andrew was really going to slit his throat and leave him to die in the jungle. Instead, Andrew lifted the knife from Neil’s neck and moved to rise, bracing heavy hands on Neil’s chest and pushing himself up from there. Neil wheezed at the pressure, but Andrew didn’t care. As soon as he was up, Andrew held a hand out to Neil. Neil took it.

“I hate you,” Andrew told him as soon as they were both standing. He sounded bored by the prospect, and he wasn’t looking at Neil when he said it.

Neil, his smile hidden in the dark, said, “I’m sure I’ll survive.”

“Not for long,” Andrew said. “Not from me.”

Chapter Text

“Where are the others?”

“Around.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“They’re here somewhere.”

“Yeah, well, so are the Ravens.”

“They followed you?”

“Apparently everyone follows me wherever I go.”

“Stop running, then.”

“No. Leave me alone.”

“No.”

“Whatever. I’ll stop running when I’m dead. Let’s find the other Foxes.” 

*

Matt wasn’t built to keep running like this. Or maybe he was, being on a lacrosse team, but he certainly wasn’t built for it here, in the middle of a jungle in the middle of the night, being chased by rabid Ravens. 

“At least the storm is letting up,” he panted to the others, presumably behind him (he couldn’t see). 

“No, it isn’t,” Allison said, also out of breath. 

Matt would have replied, except he heard someone fall. Slipping in the mud and trying to turn around, Matt stopped just in time for a lightning flash to illuminate Dan, sprawled on her back, with a Raven above her, holding a pike in two hands above their head, as if they were going to plunge it down. 

Matt didn’t even have a breath to scream. 

*

“‘Let’s go in the jungle, guys, let’s go save Neil, guys, Neil has never done anything wrong in his life, ever, guys, let’s go get him back from the Ravens, guys.’” 

“Okay, but, like, are you done?” 

“Never. I could complain about Neil all day.” 

“Complain about the weather, instead.” 

“You know, I would, except I think that I want to complain about Neil. I bet he caused the storm.” 

“Grow up, bro.” 

“‘Grow up, bro.’”

“Ass.” 

“‘Ass.’”

*

Neil threw a rock at the Raven just as they were about to, what, fucking impale Dan? Neil felt just as shocked by this as that first day the Ravens chased him and held his head underwater. The Raven yelped and fell, slipping in the mud and losing grip of their pike. Renee rushed to pick it up as Neil ran to Dan to help her up. When the Raven didn’t immediately get up, Neil hoped that meant he had knocked them out. 

“What the fuck is wrong with these Ravens?” he asked, grunting when Dan wrapped him in a tight hug immediately. 

“Neil! My son! My boy!” Dan was saying, petting his wet hair with her wet hand, and Neil delicately extricated himself from her grasp. 

“We’ve got to go,” Neil said. He couldn’t see Andrew behind him, but he could suddenly feel his fingers in his hair, smoothing down whatever Dan had done to it. 

“Where are the others?” Renee asked. 

“Not with you?” Neil asked. 

“No,” Matt answered. 

“Goddammit, Andrew,” Neil said, and then, after making sure he could see the vague outlines of Andrew, Matt, Dan, Renee, and Allison, he turned them in a random direction, with no idea how he was going to find the rest of the monsters but hoping that it would be soon. 

*

“Let’s go back.” 

“We can’t.” 

“Why?” 

“If the others think we’re in the jungle, they won’t leave until they find us.” 

“So, what, we just stay in here until they find us? Sounds dumb.” 

“You’re dumb.” 

*

The storm became so unbearable that Neil told them they had to stop or else they’d probably die. They sheltered under the cover of thick trees, Allison clutching Renee close, Dan with Matt, Neil with Andrew. They were huddled with each other as much as they could tolerate, meaning Andrew was on the end and had his arms wrapped around Neil’s torso, pinning Neil’s arms to his side. Neil’s back was to Allison’s back, and so on down the line, ending with Matt holding Dan. 

“Just until it stops,” Neil shouted. There wasn’t enough room in the air to speak to each other, to hear what anyone was saying, to see, not even with Andrew holding Neil so close. Everything was dark and night and cold, and Neil closed his eyes to the rain. He was about to settle in for a long night of suffering when Andrew leaned into his space, lips by his ear, and said, “Do you know any scary stories?” 

Neil laughed and, exhausted, dropped his head until it rested on the space between Andrew’s neck and shoulder, and when Andrew didn’t push him away, he kept it there until the storm stopped. 

*

“I’m so bored.”

“At least the sun is up.”

“Do you think Neil is okay?”

“Don’t worry about Neil. Worry about us. Like the fact that Andrew just abandoned all of us in the middle of the storm.”

“I thought you knew it was because Andrew is in love with Neil.”

“Fucking what ?”

“Huh?”

“Who?”

“Oh my god.”

“Hey, do you hear that?”

*

Allison was singing. The sun was up, and Neil and the Foxes had begun walking through the jungle, and there wasn’t a Raven or storm cloud in sight, and Renee had been lightly humming, so Allison started loudly singing. Neil, who was still a bit woozy and drowsy from blood loss and the complete and utter exhaustion that came from surviving for so long for absolutely no reason at all, kept stumbling and tripping, and a Fox would help right him: a hand on his elbow, a touch at his back, a shoulder to catch him, all under the backdrop of Allison poorly singing made-up sea shanties and working songs.

When Allison’s voice cracked for the third beat in a row, Dan cleared her throat, presumably to make her stop, when they heard something through the trees.

Neil immediately fell to a crouch, but he fumbled to his knees and Andrew had to pull him back up. When Neil nodded in thanks, he found Andrew frowning at him. The rest of the Foxes crouched beside him, behind him, in front of him.

They waited.

*

“I swear to god I just heard someone say, ‘To give us sugar and tea and bum.’”

“That’s not how the song goes.”

“Oh, and you would know?”

“Fucking everyone knows.”

“Prove it.”

“What?”

“Sing the song. Right fucking now.”

“No. Fuck off.”

“You!”

“You!”

*

Dan and Matt rose from their crouch to find Aaron and Nicky having a pitiful slap fight while Kevin rubbed at his temples behind them.

“Hey, guys,” Matt said, and Nicky yelped. Aaron jumped. Kevin dropped his hands, looking hopeful.

“Oh my god!” Nicky exclaimed, and then the final three Foxes ran to meet up with the rest of the group. Neil had meant to rise with the rest of them, but it took him a minute, and Andrew had to lift him up by the forearm when he still couldn’t get up.

“We need to go,” Andrew said, still frowning at Neil, while the rest of the Foxes finished their hugs.

“That’s kind of the idea,” Matt said, pointing in a vague direction that maybe lead to the ocean. “We don’t want any more run-ins with Ravens.”

“No,” Andrew said, and finally the Foxes took notice of Neil’s slumped and haggard state.

“Oh my god!” Nicky exclaimed again, getting a good look at Neil’s stomach, arms, and face.

“Neil,” Kevin said, looking pale. Aaron said nothing, but even he appeared a bit sick at the sight of the wounds.

“We need to get off this island,” Andrew said, and then he tugged lightly at Neil’s arm to get him to follow and led the Foxes through the jungle.

*

“So are we going to keep waiting for help? Or nah?”

“I don’t know. I mean, we can probably get some food for Neil to help with his strength, but the dude’s really got to get out.”

“A raft?”

“How are we supposed to build a raft that will hold nine of us?”

“Maybe just two of us?”

“I don’t want any of us to leave each other.”

“That might be our only option. I’m kind of worried that we might die if we don’t get off soon.”

“Yeah.”

“True.”

“Okay.”

“Fuck.”

*

When they finally found the beach, Neil was dead on his feet, shuffling along and urged forward by anyone who was close enough. Neil had stopped acknowledging people hours ago, and now Matt was worried every time he looked over and it didn’t look like Neil was breathing, even though he was standing and walking. Neil’s blinks were too long and he couldn’t coordinate his feet, and Matt was scared.

“We’ve got to get him some food,” Matt said.

“He just needs to sleep,” Kevin said.

“We need to get to the shelter.”

“Should someone carry him?”

“None of us are really at our best here.”

“I could do it.”

“Neil, can you crawl onto Matt’s back?”

“I’m fine.”

“Jesus Christ, Neil.”

“Where are we?”

“I don’t know.”

*

They walked along the beach in the hot sun, Neil refusing to climb onto anyone’s back and adamantly claiming that he was fine. And when Andrew found an orange and peeled it for him, feeding him a wedge one at a time, it looked like it might be true.

The Foxes relaxed, and they could walk in peaceful joviality until they saw their shelter in the distance and found Riko and the Ravens rifling through their things.

*

“Permission to eat the Ravens?”

“Granted.”

*

“Did you think it would be so easy, Foxes?” Riko asked as soon as they were close enough.

The Foxes said nothing. Neil could see they were struggling with how to present their power dynamic. Neil would have pushed forward, but as soon as the Ravens were in sight, Andrew let go of Neil and pushed him behind him, and then the rest of the Foxes kept pushing him down the line until Neil was all the way in the back, unable to see anything but the sight of Kevin’s tall head standing out front.

“Riko, what the fuck,” Kevin said.

“We’re just hungry,” Riko said. “No hard feelings.”

“Bro, what the fuck?”

“No hard feelings? You took off half his face!”

“He looks fine to me,” Riko said, and then he laughed.

“You can’t stay here,” Kevin told him.

“Oh yeah? And you think you can stop me?”

“Yes,” Kevin said, and then, once more, chaos erupted on the beach, Kevin tackling Riko to the ground, the rest of the Foxes creating a tight formation and standing tall against the remaining Ravens, watching as the two former brothers wrestled, until Kevin grabbed a rock and swung and Riko screamed and they heard, from off in the distance, the unmistakable thwop thwop thwop of a helicopter.

*

Immediately, everyone on the island—Foxes, Ravens—started waving frantically for the helicopter to see them, to come over, to save them. They were jumping and screaming, Riko on the ground cradling his hand, Kevin standing above him, Andrew beside Kevin.

Neil was staring up at the helicopter that was definitely here for the sports teams and knew it was time to wake up.

*

“Coach!”

“Oh my god, Coach!”

“Oh my god, I want to go home.”

“We’re gonna go home.”

“I’m gonna be sick.”

“Again?”

“It’s happening.”

“Oh my god.”

“Okay. Okay. It’s okay. We get to go home. We’re okay.”

*

The Foxes swarmed Wymack as soon as he stepped out of the helicopter and ran toward them. The Ravens were around their own coach having their own reunion.

Wymack was checking faces and bodies, and when he was satisfied with the general state of their being, he said, “Are we ready to go?”

And then they all looked at the helicopter and realized they’d have to get back in the air.

“Um.”

“I…”

“Uh.”

“Right now?”

“You wanna stay here forever?”

“Well, no, but—”

“We need to get Neil home.”

“Right, he needs, like, a blood transfusion, and a bed.”

“Who the fuck is Neil?”

“Our new dad.”

“My best friend.”

“The love of my life?”

“He’s my after school snack.”

“He’s your fucking what?”

“Oh my god, Coach, they’re my shorts and they're great. Quick, Neil, show Coach your ass.”

But when the Foxes turned around, Neil wasn’t there. And neither was Andrew.

*

Neil didn’t want to go back in the jungle, but he couldn’t stay on the beach, either, so he skirted the edge of both, wanting to run but unable to flee.

“What are you doing,” Andrew asked, and Neil stopped walking, turning to Andrew. Andrew’s arms were folded, forcing down the hems of his armbands and revealing the horrendous tan lines he had, that they all had. Neil hadn’t been paying attention because they were all haggard and gross, but Andrew’s hair was ratty and dirty, his lips were cracked and bleeding, his forehead peeling, his skin red. Andrew needed to get off this island.

All of the Foxes did.

“I don’t know,” Neil answered him. His chest seized suddenly, and he had a hard time getting air into his lungs. Andrew watched him struggle impassively, his arms still crossed. His apathy toward Neil’s panic helped Neil get over himself, but he still felt anxious and lost, even when he could breathe again. “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

“So you’ll stay on this island by yourself? You’ll die here.”

“I’ll die if I go back.”

“Why?”

Neil hesitated. He had never told anyone about his life before, had never had the chance, no one to believe him, no one who cared—but the Ravens already knew about his life, after finding his binder—oh right, his binder, Neil would be returning with no money or contacts—and suddenly he couldn’t breathe again. Andrew gave no indication he noticed Neil’s growing panic. After a moment, Neil said, “My father.”

“What about him.”

“He works for the mob.”

“And?”

“And he wants me dead. He’s been chasing me for ten years.”

“By yourself?”

“My mom died a year ago.”

Andrew stared at Neil in consideration, and he wouldn’t say anything, or do anything, and Neil could hear the Foxes calling their names, but still Neil said, in a quiet whisper, “There’s nothing for me if I go back. There’s nothing for me anywhere.”

Andrew said, “There’s nothing for anyone anywhere,” and then pulled Neil in for a kiss.

For a second, Neil was so shocked he didn’t kiss back right away, but when Andrew started to pull away, a quiet fear rose in Neil’s chest, so Neil pressed forward, keeping his hands to himself, the echo of Andrew’s fierce don’t touch me from last night in the jungle loud in his ears, and he kissed Andrew like Andrew was going to leave him on a deserted island and they’d never see each other again—and Andrew kissed him back, rough, biting, until he pushed Neil away from him, his lips puffy, his hands jittery, and said, “Let’s go,”
so Neil stood up
and went. 

Chapter Text

“Coach, meet Neil.”

“Uh, hi.”

“Neil, huh?”

“Yes.”

“What the fuck happened to you, kid?”

“Uh. A lot.”

“Right. Save that for when we get back. Let’s load up. I’m tired of looking at all your dirty faces.”

“Thanks, Coach.”

*

There were actually two helicopters, so thankfully the Foxes didn’t have to ride with the Ravens. As soon as the pilot caught sight of Neil, he ushered over the other member of the flight team and Neil was sat down and immediately caught up in emergency first aid. There was such a flurry of activity, and the whirl of the chopper, and the Foxes trying to fill their coach in on everything that had happened, Neil sort of fell on the wayside of attention. The only one still watching as he was patched and cleaned, questioned and curtly answered, was Andrew, sitting across from him and beside his brother. 

Neil could see, through the person flashing a light in his eyes and checking for cognizance, Andrew tense at the first sign of take off. All the Foxes tensed, and their coach was trying to convince them that it was okay, they were just flying back to the states, and then they could drive back for all he cared, all eight of them in one bus he would rent, however much it cost. They were all tight hands and fierce holds, though Andrew wouldn’t let anyone touch him. 

He stared at Neil, fists clenched at his sides, and Neil stared back, the whole time through take off, the entire flight, all the way home. 

*

Once the helicopter landed, the Foxes clamoured off, sobbing and laughing and happy to be free. Coach said they would have to go to the hospital to be checked out and approved for travel, but while they were waiting for the paramedics, he would let them borrow his cellphone and call whoever they needed to call. 

“I’ll call Abby right now. The rest of you figure out who’s getting the phone first.” 

The Foxes started fighting immediately, eventually deciding that they would select who went first with rock-paper-scissors. Neil watched, mildly amused, and briefly wondered if the Ravens would be landing at the same airstrip. He hoped not. He never wanted to see the Ravens again. 

Neil wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do now. He could wait for the paramedics, but he would rather die than go to a hospital, and he didn’t have any way to pay for whatever treatment they were about to force on him. Neil would have to revisit some of his and his mother’s old hideouts and safehouses. He thought he remembered his mother leaving caches for these types of emergencies, and he might be able to recall his uncle’s phone number if he thought about the sheet of numbers for a while. Maybe he could rewrite it from memory. 

Neil also knew that if he stayed here much longer, police would come for him. The Foxes’ coach seemed like an okay person—the Foxes clearly trusted him implicitly, even Andrew—but Neil couldn’t fathom that the man would take Neil just because his Foxes loved Neil so much. 

And did the Foxes still love him? Neil always knew they would not care as much about him as soon as they were off the island, and so far, that was proving true. Neil didn’t mind—he was nothing, so he didn’t expect people to care about him—but he was sad that he would be losing people who had meant so much to him during a traumatic part of his life. They came for him, that night he gave himself up. Neil had never had anyone come for him before. It would be hard, almost impossible, to say goodbye. 

But what else was he supposed to do? 

God, why did Neil leave that island. Maybe he would have had a story like Hatchet or Island of Blue Dolphins. Maybe he would have befriended the boar. Maybe he would have finally found a coconut. He would have named it Wilson. He wouldn’t have had to worry about anything until there wasn’t anything left on the island for him to take, and then he would have died there, alone, no one chasing him, no one caring. 

Fuck, Neil’s head hurt. Someone was holding his arm, saying his name. People were swarming him, and Neil couldn’t see. 

He fell. 

Someone caught him. 

*

“We need to get him inside.” 

“Why is he passing out now? Dude didn’t sleep the first four days we were there and he was fine.” 

“Okay, bro, maybe that’s why he’s passing out now.” 

“His nose is bleeding.” 

“Is that bad? That sounds like it’s bad.” 

“I’m freakin’ out, man.” 

“Where are the doctor people? Aaron, you’re a doctor person.” 

“Yeah, but I hate Neil. And what the fuck do you expect me to do, anyway? Cradle his head and tell him nice words until he wakes up?” 

“Well, can’t you tell us if he’ll be okay?” 

“How about the rest of us, huh? Look, Neil will be fine. Unless the Ravens caused any sort of internal damage that we don’t know about, the guy is just tired and probably in shock from his wounds. Also he’s lost a lot of blood. And he was tortured for, like, half of the days that we were there. His body is probably just shutting down.” 

“Okay, that still doesn’t sound good? Andrew, check his pulse.” 

“Is he breathing?” 

“Where’s Coach? Someone go get Coach.” 

*

When Neil woke up, he was in a hospital bed and a clean and washed Andrew was staring down at him. Neil could feel the sand and sun still caked into his face and skin, though the doctors must have done something about his body while he had been unconscious, but Andrew looked bathed and groomed, his skin still peeling and flushed, but fresh clothes, combed hair. Neil wondered how long he'd been passed out.

“What are you doing here?” Neil asked. 

“Making sure you don’t run,” Andrew said.

“I can run if I want to.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Fuck you.”

They glared at each other until Neil’s eyes wandered over Andrew’s fresh, clean, face, and lingered on his lips. Andrew tolerated the look for two beats before he turned Neil’s face away.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Andrew said.

“Why not,” Neil countered. “We’ve kissed now. I can do whatever I want.”

“No.” Andrew sounded angry.

Neil forced his head back to Andrew, frowning. Neil didn’t understand the intensity, or the furious pout on Andrew’s face, so he thought back to all the times they’d spent together on the island—alone, in the jungle, gentle touches, careful avoidances, constant control—and their first kiss, Andrew’s retreat, his adamant demand that Neil not touch him unless he wanted it—

“Oh,” Neil said.

Andrew put a hand over Neil’s mouth to stop whatever he was about to say, but Neil was undeterred. From behind Andrew’s hand, Neil said, “Andrew. It’s okay. I won't touch you unless you want me to. And I wanted you to kiss me on that beach, and I want you to kiss me now. Or whenever. Or never. It doesn’t matter. You can always kiss me. I’ll always want it.”

Andrew pressed his hand harder onto Neil’s mouth. “Don’t ‘always’ me,” he said.

Instead of answering, Neil pressed a soft kiss to Andrew’s palm before he tore his own face away and let Andrew take a step back without protesting.

“Where are the Ravens?” Neil asked.

“At a different hospital. Pigs have been called.”

“Why?”

“Because of your face.”

“Great. When do they get here?”

“Soon.”

*

When the police eventually did show up, two of them and very unimpressed with the state of Neil, they tried to urge Andrew to leave the room so they could speak to Neil alone.

Andrew propped a hip against the side of Neil’s bed and stared at them, not saying a word.

“Look, kid,” one of them said after a minute of watching Andrew inspect his fingernails. “We can do this the easy way, or we can start the line of questioning with the fake ID your friend here used to get on the plane.”

“Why can’t he be here?” Neil asked, annoyed, though he was also confused on why Andrew refused to leave.

“Just in case he’s the one who did that to you.”

“Why do you think he did this?”

“We hear it was a bit chaotic on the island.”

“By who ?”

“The tip we received from the others, the Ravens—”

Suddenly, outside Neil’s room’s door, multiple aggrieved voices could be heard moaning and groaning.

“Oh my god.”

“Seriously?”

“How could you look at Riko’s face and think, ‘Yep, he’s the trustworthy one’?”

“Who brought the clowns in to do the questioning?”

“My mother could do a better job at this and she’s fucking dead.”

“Out!” one of the officers called. “Everyone out! We just want to ask Neil why he was tortured on the island and who the fuck he is. We do not need input from the peanut gallery.”

A shocked silence, and then, from outside, one of the Foxes stage-whispered, “Well someone woke up on the wrong side of the donut shop.”

Neil pinched the bridge of his nose. Andrew was still inspecting his fingernails. The unflustered police officer was threatening arrest while the flustered police officer postured and sputtered. The Foxes would not shut up.

For some reason, Neil wanted to smile.

*

Eventually, the Foxes outside the door were ushered away, and Andrew’s clear refusal to leave was eventually put up with.

“So, Neil,” the flustered officer finally began. “Let’s start with your name.”

“No,” Neil said.

“Excuse me?”

Neil said nothing.

The incensed tone was back. “Kid. This is serious. You are facing some very serious charges here, and you will be charged as an adult.”

“Stop calling me kid.”

“Then stop acting like one.”

Neil crossed his arms and glared at the two officers from behind Andrew’s shoulders. Andrew was still propped against his bed, a shield between Neil and the police. “Look, gentlemen,” Neil said, his voice loud and carrying. “You probably should have picked the easy way.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means the Foxes would have answered your questions,” Neil told them, and then he closed his mouth and turned away and settled in for a very long…well, a very long rest of his life, probably.

*

“Coach? What’s the situation?”

“Neil is being treated as a hostile patient. He’s now handcuffed to his bed and being restrained from breaking his thumbs to get out, which apparently he has now tried to do twice.”

“Jesus Christ, Neil.”

“Oh my god.”

“Was he always such a fucking idiot?”

“Where’s Andrew?”

“I dragged Andrew out ten minutes ago and locked him in the rental car. Someone better go make sure he hasn’t eaten his arm off.”

“Har har. But really, what’s happening?”

“I don’t fucking know. I pulled Andrew out before he stabbed an officer. I left Neil on the bed. I don’t even know who Neil is. Why do you expect me to know what’s going on with him?”

“Um, because you’re our coach?”

“Obviously?”

“Duh?”

“So? Aren’t you going to do something, then, Coach?”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“God fucking dammit.”

*

When his door opened again, Neil expected Andrew but saw tribal tattoos and a wife beater instead. The police, hoping to coerce Neil into confession with heated staring and taunts, had been standing at his bedside for the past hour. Neil had not uttered a word.

“Officers,” the Foxes’ coach greeted. “Give me a minute with him.”

Neil directed his glare to the coach as the two officers weighed their options and eventually ceded. Maybe they thought Neil knew the man and would be more willing to speak. Maybe the coach thought Neil would talk. Maybe they were all fucking idiots.

“Where’s Andrew?” Neil asked as soon as the police closed the door behind them.

“Taking a walk,” the big man answered, pulling up the guest chair so he could be closer to Neil’s bed. As soon as the coach sat down, he stared at Neil, unblinking, unflinching, and Neil glared back, unafraid, uncaring.

After a minute, without a break in his stature, the coach asked, “Why won’t you tell them what happened to you?”

“Because fuck them,” Neil said.  

“Will you tell me?”

“No.”

“What if they start to suspect the Foxes were the ones who hurt you?”

“Then they’re not very good cops.”

“Why did the Ravens do this to you?”

“Because they’re fucking insane.”

“Don’t you want them to get what’s theirs?”

“I don’t give a fuck about the Ravens.”  

The coach sighed, leaning back and rubbing at his eyes. “Christ, kid.”

“I’m not a kid,” Neil snapped, tired of having that word thrown in his face. As if everything he had ever done—his survival, his time on the island, his entire life—simply meant it was all a part of childhood, just another proof that Neil was nothing—not even grown up.

The coach sighed again. “Okay. Look. Neil. Let me ask you this, then: why did you stay with the Foxes?”

“What?”

“On that island.” The coach was looking at Neil, and Neil didn’t know how to look away. “Why did you decide to stay with the Foxes?”

“Because the Ravens were trying to kill me.”

“The Foxes are just as prone to violence and murder. Or did you not interact with Andrew at all?”

“What makes you think Andrew would hurt me?”

“What makes you think he wouldn’t?”

Neil felt like he was being tested, so he stopped engaging with the Foxes’ coach. He turned away again, his arms still crossed, but he could feel his hands shaking.

“I’m not afraid of Andrew,” Neil said. “I’m not afraid of any of them.”

“But you’re afraid of the cops?”

“No.”

“Would it help if your parents were here? Have they been contacted?”

God, why had Neil left that island. “I don’t have any parents,” he said.

The coach muffled another sigh, leaning back in his chair. The cheap upholstery squeaked when he moved. For a few moments, all Neil did was stare at the wall and all the coach did was stare at Neil.

Eventually, the coach asked, “Why were you wearing Allison’s clothes when we found you?”

“Because my shirt ripped.”

“And you couldn’t walk around without a shirt on a tropical fucking island?”

“No,” Neil said, turning to meet the coach’s eye for a beat. “I could not.”

Another tense stretch of silence, and then the coach continued. “Matt says you saved his life.”

“He’s telling everyone that.”

“Did you?”

Neil shrugged.

“What about Kevin and Nicky?”

“What about them?”

“I heard there was a pig.”

“I guess.”

“And Andrew?”

“What about Andrew?” Speaking of, Neil wished Andrew would come back now. He was tired of speaking to the coach, to anyone. He was so tired. “What do you want from me?” Neil asked, turning to the coach.

The coach studied Neil’s face, the bandage on his cheek, the red of his roots, the truth of his eyes, and said, soft but gruff, “Neil. I know. I know what it takes.”

“And what does it take?” Neil snapped, but the heat he felt in his bones didn’t quite make it to his voice. He just sounded tired, defeated.  

“Listen,” the coach said, ignoring Neil’s question and standing up. He stooped over one of Neil’s handcuffed wrists and procured a paperclip to pick the lock. Neil was so startled by the unlocking that he didn’t think to flinch away from the coach’s looming form. The coach dropped the lock pick on Neil’s stomach as soon as the wrist was free, and they both watched it bounce once before settling on the thin hospital blankets. Neil looked up at the coach, baffled.

The big man continued, “I’m going to call them back in, and you have a choice to make. You can either tell them what they want to know and come back with the Foxes once it’s all over, or you can pick that other lock and go wherever it is you think you can go now that they’ve found you.” The coach waited until Neil grabbed the pick before he went to the door.

“But…” Neil said, at a loss, suddenly hopeful, suddenly sick. “Why?”

The coach opened the door and nodded to the cops to come back in. He turned around once to look at Neil, and then he rapped twice on the wall with his knuckles in parting before saying, “I guess we’ll find out, won’t we, kid?”

Chapter Text

One minute, Neil was running through the jungle, struck by lightning and falling, drenched from the rain, Riko straddling his hips and holding a knife over his face, and then Riko was Andrew, and then Andrew was Neil’s father, and the knife was a cleaver—and the next minute, Neil was jolting awake on David Wymack’s couch, covered in sweat and suffering through quick, short breaths. 

Neil reached up and traced the shape of the jagged scar on his face: a crooked diamond, meant to be a zero, carved from the top of his cheekbone and swooping down almost his entire cheek. 

The scent of coffee was thick in the air. Neil fiddled with the scar tissue until he heard the kick of a chair from the kitchen. He sat up and saw over the back of the couch Coach Wymack sitting at the kitchen table reading a newspaper and sipping from a steaming mug. It was four in the morning.

“Eggs are getting cold,” Wymack said, not looking up from his paper.

Neil went to get some eggs.

*

“Are we still on for tonight?”

“Yeah, as long as everyone can finish their homework by seven.”

“I think the real struggle will be to get Neil to stop reading by seven.”

“Neil will stop reading for this.”

“Neil doesn’t even stop reading for Andrew.”

“Okay, well, Neil’s sacrificed his life for Andrew so we’re not counting anything that they do together as relevant.”

“Anyways, see you guys tonight.”

“See you tonight.”

*

Neil was browsing in the YA section of the campus’s library and Andrew was trailing behind him, picking at random spines of books and letting a few of them fall to the floor. Neil stopped to look at the back of a book with an interesting title, and he felt Andrew’s fingers lightly probe the fingers of Neil’s free hand.

Neil smiled, still looking at the words of the blurb but not taking in any information, and he laughed when Andrew smacked the book out of his hand. Neil wrapped gentle fingers around Andrew’s grip and tugged, continuing down the row.

*

“I hear Jean is doing well with the Trojans.”

“I can’t believe he left the Ravens.”

“I can’t believe Neil wanted to be his friend after all the Ravens did to him.”

“That’s our dad!”

“Shut up. Neil hasn’t been our dad for almost a year now.”

“I think I’m going to make him custom booty shorts that say ‘cannibalism is okay if you eat Riko Moriyama.’”

“That’s a mouthful.”

“That’s what she said.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

*

Neil and Andrew had time to kill after their classes but before seven, so they settled onto Wymack’s couch and made out until they heard the snick of the lock turning.

“Do you have any idea how much I hate coming home to you in my apartment?” Wymack grumbled, tossing his keys on the counter and walking to his bedroom.

Andrew didn’t reply, instead picking up Neil’s book and aimlessly turning the pages until Neil took it from him. Andrew turned on the TV and Neil settled his back against Andrew’s side, and they sat in relative silence until the alarm on Neil’s phone went off at six forty-five.

“You guys playing that game again?” Wymack asked from the kitchen.

Neil nodded as he followed Andrew out the door.

“Don’t forget your key!” Wymack called, and Neil patted the familiar object in his back pocket. It never really left, anyways.

*

“I think Andrew’s custom racket is here.”

“I don’t know why you guys won’t let me take this sport to the public.”

“Because it’s fucking stupid, Kevin.”

“ You’re fucking stupid.”

“Give me my gear. I want to be backliner this time.”

“I thought Neil was doing backliner today?”

“Neil is playing striker.”

“Wow, can we bet if he scores on Andrew today?”

“I’m in.”

“Me, too.”

*

Neil was buckling Andrew’s knee pads for him when the other Foxes came into the locker room.

Matt whistled at Neil wearing Fox orange, like he did every time. “Damn, Neil. Are you sure you don’t wanna be on the lacrosse team with us? It’s like the uniform was made for you.”

Neil straightened, shaking his head. “I’m fine.”

The assorted Foxes rolled their eyes. “Whatever. Are you ready?”

“For exy?” Neil asked. He grinned. “Always.”

*

They split up their rudimentary teams, using a few of the lacrosse freshman to fill in the gaps. Andrew was on the away team colors. Neil was wearing the home team colors.

“Hey, Neil,” Robin, one of the freshmen, greeted as they stretched and prepared. “I hear your dad got shanked.”

Neil touched the tips of his toes, using the bend of his body to hide his father’s smile. “Yep,” he said. “I hear Riko is only getting marginally better at playing with his non-dominant hand.”

“Yep,” Robin said. When Neil looked up, they shared a grin.

*

“I just don’t understand why Andrew cares about this sport but not the actual sport he plays.”

“Andrew doesn’t care about anything.”

“Andrew cares about Neil.”

“Neil doesn’t count. Are you ready? Who’s the dealer?”

*

Dan was playing dealer for Neil’s team. Neil got the same rush as he always did when the game was about to start and he was playing striker. Though he was fast and better suited for the backliner position, Neil loved the aggression and adrenaline he got from playing striker. If only exy were real. Maybe he could like sports then.

Kevin announced the start of the game, and before Dan threw the ball, Neil looked to Andrew in the away goal. Andrew gave him a two finger salute before swinging his large custom racket behind his head to rest on his shoulders, relaxed and ready.

Neil returned the salute as Dan threw the ball across the court—and Neil ran.