Put That Kid Down

Chapter Seventeen

"What... the hell are you-"

The hilt smacked into David's temple.

.

"Where the hell is David?" Max muttered from his spot high up a pine tree as the brainwashed campers set about putting paper plates on the picnic tables dragged out of the dining hall. Worrying at the edge of his shirt with his free hand, he almost missed the shadow emerging from the woods.

"Good afternoon, campers!" Daniel grinned cheerily at the crowd, getting a chorused response to his greeting before he plastered a pout on his face, hauling the body he was dragging up against his side, "Dear David here had a bit of an accident!"

Nails digging into the tree to the point the resistance hurt, Max felt his stomach drop out and his hands go cold. There was blood all down David's side and the rip in his shirt, the wound he could see from here, proved it was his. He wasn't moving.

Max hadn't even considered the idea of David losing.

Maybe getting hurt, but never...

How could this happen? ...Was this his fault?

"We should take him to the sauna so he can be cleansed before he ascends! We don't want Xeemuug upset with us, do we?"

Max almost missed Daniel's words, still trapped in the moment, thoughts circling frantically like an upset beehive, buzzing out he's dead he's dead he's dead in a dull roar.

No. Before he ascends.

That's what Daniel had said.

David wasn't dead yet.

Yet being the operative term. Max had to get down there without being noticed.

"Hey, Max," a creepily dreamy voice addressed him, and Max nearly lost his grip on the pine, scraping his hands against the branch and pressing sap into the wounds before he regained his balance, heart thumping in his throat.

"Space Kid, I know you're fucked up right now, but do not say a word-"

"Oh, darn, that's some bad language, Max; what are you doing up here?" Sitting on the branch below him, Space Kid sounded... like his usual spacey self. How? How was it possible? Sure, the kid was weird on his own, but not enough that the brainwashing would just meld like that... Okay, Max didn't really know how brainwashing worked.

"Didn't they put you in the sauna?" Max demanded, keeping his volume low to avoid garnering attention from the others.

"Well, yeah, we all went in the sauna," Space Kid waved this off, "but we're getting ready for some kind of party, now. It sounds like loads of fun, but then I saw you up this tree and that looked like fun, too."

Max grabbed the sides of Space Kid's helmet, inspecting his eyes carefully, before he realized aloud, "Oh my god, you can't be brainwashed because there's nothing in there. It's like a million fucking miles off in space. Have you just been going along with this bullshit?"

"Of course," Space Kid blinked, "We're playing make believe. Daniel's really good at making up stories about space, but that doesn't mean they're real, Max, jeez."

"Space Kid," Max turned the boy's head forcibly towards the preparations, "They are not playing make believe. That is real poison."

"Oh, wow." There was a moment of silence while Space Kid processed this with his usual lack of skepticism, "Jeez, we gotta save them, then, right?"

"Yes," Max hissed, on the verge of frustrated tears- uh, on the verge of pushing Space Kid off one final high place. Instead he took a deep breath and didn't murder his only remaining ally.