On days where she felt trapped by her own boredom and frustration, Marshmallow thought of season one.

If she'd just won that stupid tiebreaker in episode 13, bit her tongue, and played nice, the viewers would've carried her to the finale. She would've prevailed and gotten her hands on that coveted case, and been too busy with it to fuss with any other metal containers in the area.

Everyone would've cheered. Paintbrush might've patted her shoulder.

Then she could've taken the money and left. No sentimental speeches about how friends made crappy things better, just a "I'll remember you all in therapy." She could've pretended that none of these people meant anything to her as she confirmed that, yeah, the disturbing desert monster was right: a million dollars at Walmart was worth everything.

In this alternative timeline, maybe she would've never felt so empty and guilty. Even if that was inevitable, it would've been her insurance policy against this season two crap.

So, yeah, getting out of a competition because of someone else's dumb luck was a mistake that Marshmallow had never hoped to repeat. (She was not a big Soap fan right now.) But if she thought about anything else, maybe about the other big losses she thought of when she thought of that God-forsaken mansion, she felt like she was being crushed like a can.

In a perfect world, Marsh wouldn't let herself get attached.

⁂⁂⁂

"You're so nice, you can have this chair free of charge," the debuter had declared, shoving the chair into Marsh's arms. "We'll be the best friends ever!"

Marsh thought of the competition. She thought of the alliance the former Chickenleggers had, and the fact that she'd lost her sole remaining ally to the fist thingy in a brown-and-yellow blur not a week ago. The fact that Apple seemed to have it out for her came to mind, too.

So she accepted the chair with a smile. "Thanks, Bow! Maybe you're right."

She didn't quite understand Bow. She was carefree, full of life, and so happy just to be there. Her presence was overwhelming, best enjoyed in short bursts, yet oddly addictive - they'd probably talked six times since she got there, but her presence was such a good distraction, not from the competition itself, but from the mounting dread that she'd been there for nearly a year at this point.

Make no mistake, she wasn't going to let a partnership with a stranger distract her from taking the million.

⁂⁂⁂

Marsh regretted thinking of Bow as more of an ally than a friend, but she had to hand it to herself. Back in Season 1, she had been so good at compartmentalizing.

What the heck happened?

She found a place to think in the depths of the Perilous Woods. It was a sunny clearing with a perfectly-tended vegetable garden and a makeshift fire pit with fresh ash in it. A hammock hung suspended from some trees above; when Marsh climbed up to it, she spotted a bow and a quiver of arrows hanging from a branch.

Whoever set this place up had some survival skills. On any other day, Marsh would wonder who they were, but today poisonous thoughts coursed through her brain.

⁂⁂⁂

One day in January, Marshmallow walked out of her room at Hotel OJ only to trip over a blue box that'd been left by her doorstep. When she bent over to find a tag, she heard a most unwelcome voice: "J-just open it, please."

"Nice try! It probably has a bomb in it," Marsh sneered.

"It's too small for him to fit inside! DUH."

"Shut up, that's not what I meant. Also, why?"

"I need Santa to think I'm good this year!"

Marsh rolled her eyes at Apple's puppy-dog eyes. "So you only care about being a good person when it benefits you? Wow, no wonder you have no friends."

"N-not true!" Apple snapped. "This is why I hate you, you're all about ruining things for people, whatever that means."

"If you didn't hunt me down like I was prey, Santa might actually like you."

"Shut UP."

As Marsh brushed past Apple, she added, "Maybe if things were different, someone would've gotten you off that island before Christmas, too. Hard to say."

So, sure, she was the victim of the fires-in-the-hotel rule for that remark, but Marsh felt at the time that it was a fair enough point to make.

⁂⁂⁂

A neat trick Marsh learned between seasons? Cruelty was one hell of a drug. When you felt emptiness, getting into a fight at least helped you feel something. It might as well have been swallowing poison, because it was a bad feeling, even if you weren't seriously injured in the process. At least the pain was physical, with a defined beginning and an end, instead of emotional.

So when she heard Apple clambering through the woods, part of her didn't want to flee. She picked up her stick and waited.

Apple's face lit up as she locked eyes with Marsh. "There you are! I've been looking all over for you."

"I haven't. Hey, you ask questions all the time, can I ask you something?"

"Ooh! I don't know what a question is, but I'd love to help."

"What's the point of this act," Marsh asked, voice low and dangerous enough to give even Apple pause.

"...Huh?"

"Don't play dumb! I heard what you said. Y-you saw me! So what's the point? You already won. Why don't you gloat or something?

"Marsh, II isn't over, there's at least three episodes left-" Marsh snapped the stick in half and threw half at Apple. She dodged it. "I don't know what you're talking about- are you upset?"

Marsh felt venomous. "Is winning not enough? Do you have to humiliate me too?"

"What's that even mean?"

Marsh hopped out of the hammock, and jabbed Apple with the remaining half of her stick. It was sharp enough to draw blood; the sight of the apple juice coming out of her made Marsh's stomach drop.

"It means I need to be alone right now." She stared Apple down, trying desperately not to let the hurt she felt show.

When Apple stared blankly at her, Marsh realized that her throat was getting tight. Marsh intensified her glare before running off, leaving the stick Apple had given her in pieces at her feet.

Using her was one thing. Acting like she was so stupid she wouldn't realize what was up, though? That hurt.

⁂⁂⁂

"Merry Christmas, Marsh!" Apple thrust a gift the size of a shoebox into her hands. It'd been decorated in crayon scrawl. Before Marsh could say the thing any sane person would say ("it's July"), Apple added, "I figured I should make up for not giving you a good present the last Christmases we knew each other."

"Oh Apple! You shouldn't have," Marsh replied, grinning self-consciously. "I didn't get you anything, I'm sorry."

"It's OK! We can always celebrate this Christmas together- once I remember what celebrate means. Open it!"

It was a plush rabbit. Stuffed animals weren't her thing, but cute things were, so she still used it as her pillow for a month straight because it made Apple happy.

⁂⁂⁂

Lightbulb put her hands on her hips. "OK, Lights. It's been a while since our last meeting, but things have gotten pretty tense, and I've been wanting to fix that."

'Like you're one to talk,' Marsh thought. If there was anything Marsh had learned from previous team meetings, it was that they rarely accomplished much. Lightbulb and Paintbrush made jabs at each other while Fan treated it like a spectator sport. At best, it was unproductive and awkward. At worst, she nearly got chucked into a campfire by a deranged moon-cookie.

There was no campfire today, it was two in the afternoon, so... yay?

Right now Apple was staring at Marsh from across the circle Lightbulb had the team seated in. Marsh decided that she didn't exist.

"To that end, there's a little game I like to call 'duck-duck-goose.'" Lightbulb slung an arm around Paintbrush. "And you, my friend, are it."

Paintbrush inhaled, looking like they were thinking what Marsh was thinking: playing a game for five-year-olds wouldn't help anything. It was a demeaning waste of time.

"Do not call me 'it,'" they settled on, then began circling the team, chanting "duck."

"Goose!" they eventually exclaimed, tagging Test Tube. Test Tube made a stunned noise, but by the time she got up to chase Paintbrush, they had reclaimed their place at Lightbulb's side.

"Anas platyrhynchos, Anas platyrhynchos- Anser cygnoides!"

Test Tube wound up picking Fan, who took a moment to realize what Test Tube was saying, then similarly failed to catch her. This whole thing was so stupid that it made glaring at Apple seem desirable in comparison.

"Goose!" Fan soon exclaimed, tapping Marsh's head and bolting.

Marsh stared defiantly at Paintbrush and Lightbulb while Fan ran laps, and finally sat back down, gasping and panting from the effort even though it really shouldn't have winded him that badly.

"Uhh..." Paintbrush started.

Lightbulb grinned, "You can't have fun if you don't play, sweetstuff! We're all buddies here, and you can't go against your team captain."

"That's crap." Marsh jabbed a finger at Apple. "I won't participate until she gets her sorry butt thrown into the elimination portal!"

Fan gasped and started typing on his phone. Paintbrush sighed, "Lightbulb kinda has a point... Team-building is useless unless it's for the whole team."

"Then- then I'll just start my own team!" Marshmallow declared, and marched to a spot a little ways away. She chucked her second stick on the ground to mark the barrier between them. "There we go. This is my team's territory."

"Marsh, you can't..." Paintbrush warned.

"This isn't BFDI," Fan exclaimed, hugging his egg close. "There's patterns that need to be respected!"

"So, what, the one time Lightbulb and I agree on something, you get all rebellious?"

"Don't care. Go Team Marshmallow."

"Can I change teams, too?" Apple asked.

"I'm done." Marsh snapped her fingers, and willed gravity to carry her up and away, maybe to that cliff overlooking the perilous forest.

Instead, it flung her five hundred feet in the opposite direction until she crashed into a tree with enough velocity to knock herself out. Same difference; she'd take the reprieve where she found it.

⁂⁂⁂

"Um, i-is this safe?"

The branch wavered beneath Marsh and Apple. Apple's confidence did not waver: "Yep, it'll hold us, just watch! If you're scared, you can keep clinging to me, though."

"Yeah, I think I'll keep doing that, thanks," Marsh mumbled. She certainly didn't feel safe at the time, but holding onto Apple made her feel a little more sure than sticking it out for herself. Like Apple had said, she climbed trees all the time. She had to trust in that.

⁂⁂⁂

Like trusting ever went well.

The worst part was the fact that her heart really, truly, desperately wanted to believe that Apple was better than this.

Had ANYTHING about their friendship been real?