gold rush [the wilds, toni shalifoe]

chapter 8

Day Seven

Fatin

"You know, I really didn't expect you to say yes when I asked if you wanted to come with me," Fatin told her as she watched Hunter rip some more of the material that formed the long sleeves of the sweatshirt.

The blonde shrugged, having not said much since Fatin had suggested almost two hours prior that they should mark their path so that they wouldn't get lost in the forest. She was rather tired, having not slept at all all night due to her mind constantly comparing Toni's anger to Riley's and causing her to question everything.

"I guess I just didn't want to have to see Toni," Hunter admitted after a pause long enough that Fatin had began to think she wasn't going to get an answer from the Texan. It still amused the cellist how different her, Dot and Shelby's accents were from each other despite being from the same town - something she was quite intrigued by but not intrigued enough to ever actually ask about. "Her behaviour just kinda... freaked me out a bit."

Fatin nodded, telling from the way that Hunter trailed off that she had no intention of talking about her reasoning. She was going to make a comment teasing her about only caring about Toni but knew that Hunter wasn't in the mood to joke about or have a deep conversation.

"Do you think they'll be annoyed at us for taking the coke and leaving?" Hunter asked as Fatin ripped off a piece of her bloodied purple leggings, the Texan looking at the long gash on her friend's leg in surprise as she hadn't been around for Leah shoving Fatin in anger and cutting her. Fatin was quite glad she wasn't, cause she was tuned very well into how acts of violence seemed to cause Hunter to withdraw into herself.

"Oh, fuck yeah," Fatin laughed before turning around and seeing the guilt spread across Hunter's face. She sighed before smiling at the girl and encouraging her to walk deeper into the forest. "Besides, it doesn't really matter cause once we find water, they can't talk shit."

Hunter nodded, realising that Fatin had a point before continuing with their trek. She narrowly avoided a patch of quicksand, tugging Fatin back just before the girl stepped into it herself. The two of them might not have had the survival skills that Dot had, but they had each other and a willingness to do something good for once - and that was enough.

___

"How concerned are we that none of them are back yet?" Shelby asked as the girls all sat around the campfire that morning, all very aware that Fatin, Toni and Hunter had left the camp during the night and had not returned - or in Toni's case, just never came back to being with. "Cause personally, I'm at like a solid seven."

Martha looked at Shelby in slight annoyance as the blonde turned to look at her, wanting her to say something comforting about Toni being gone for so long since she knew her best. None of them really knew enough about Fatin to know if this was usual behaviour for her, and Shelby and Dot both knew that this was slightly out of character for the old Hunter but that she had been prone to a lot of erratic decisions in the weeks before getting on to the plane so they couldn't rule it out.

"If you're wondering if I'm worried about Toni, just don't okay? She's not my business anymore," Martha replied, trying to hide the fact that there was a tiny bit of her that was slightly concerned about Toni's whereabouts but knowing that the part of her that was more annoyed at her fucking up again was triumphing in her mind.

"Okay, well there's also Fatin," Shelby pointed out, knowing everyone was already annoyed at the girl.

"She stole two cans of our water supply, so pretty sure she doesn't deserve a place in our thoughts and prayers," Leah snarked, not in the mood to argue as to why they should be out looking for Fatin when she was annoyed at the girl still for not helping to build the shelter.