The first thing Cryaotic became aware of was the calming rushes of the waves and the crushing darkness all around him. He remembered he was flying to Sweden with his two best friends Pewdiepie and Cinnamontoastken, but something was off.
It didn´t feel like he was sitting in his slight uncomfortable chair or even in a plane at all. Confused, the brunette blinked and reached up to check for his mask.
His arm felt heavy and wet…wait a minute. The gamer shifted his position and gradually he became more alert. He was completely drenched. Half of his body was draped over something hard and his legs dangled in cold water.
What happened? Cry thought, lifting his head to look around. His eyes widened and panic rushed his senses, making him feel lightheaded. He was drifting in the middle of the ocean, holding on to a big section of broken debris.
The plane crashed. Sweet heavens, the plane. Fucking. Crashed. Am I the only survivor? No…Pewds! Ken!
Cry searched the dark frantically. Even with the many stars above, it was darker than ever. The moon was just a small curve, its glow as useful as the many pricks of lights around it.
It was useless, he couldn´t see a thing. The brunette gripped his safety float with one hand and with the other he started groping around for his friends. It didn´t take him long until his fingertips brushed against something soft.
He gave it a testing pull and someone yelped.
"Ow! Jävla!"
"Pewds?"
"Cry?"
Cry heard shifting to his left and a hand brushed against his.
"Is that you bro?" The hand grabbed him and squeezed it tightly.
"Yes. Is Ken here?"
"Y-yeah. But I think he´s still unconscious. Fuck, Cry, what happened?"
"Plane crash." Cry held tight to Pewdie´s hand and after a while of moving his hand around blindly, he found Ken.
He locked their hands in a death grip as well. In their drowsy/knocked out state, he didn´t want either to slip into the ocean unnoticed and drown.
"We´re so so screwed!" Felix said.
"Hey, it´s alright." His masked friend ran his thumb over the back of his hand soothingly. "It´s okay, we´ll make it back alive."
"How!? Everyone else is probably dead! We´re cut off from all communications! No one knows where we are! It´ll take days till we-"
"We´ll make it!" Cry interrupted him firmly.
There was silence for a moment, before Felix sighed.
"Yeah, of course, bro. Sorry, I just panicked there for a second."
The brunette nodded and gripped the other´s hand more tightly. And even if I´d die, at least I´d be around the two men I care the most about…
But he didn´t say anything else and they drifted in silence, waiting for the sun to rise and their remaining crew member to wake up.
A few hours later, when sunny rays began to dance over the rippling surface, Ken started stirring from his sleep.
Pewdie was the first one to notice, as Cry had dozed off. He nudged the brunette awake.
"What´s going on? Are we in Sweden yet?" Ken muttered.
"Uhh, not exactly," Felix tried to joke as his friend blinked tiredly. "Svenska is much colder, I assure you."
"Then where – HOLY SHIT WHAT HAPPENED TO THE PLANE?!"
"It crashed." Cry commented and Pewdie shot him a look.
"NO SHIT GENUIS!" Ken looked around wide-eyed, his breathing quick and frantic.
"Ken, calm down, you´re hyperventilating!" Cry said, reaching out and grabbing the other´s hand.
"Ken, we´re alive, everything will be okay!" Felix yelled over Cry´s persuasion and Ken´s freaking out.
"Everything will be okay? We´re going to die!" Ken continued shouting. Cry pretended he did it to get him to shut up. He pretended he was only stopping his yelling so the man would calm down and not pass out from the hyperventilation. But honestly, he hated the fact that Ken was voicing what he had been losing sleep over most of the night.
The brunette slapped his friend across the face. It worked. Ken stopped yelling and looked surprised. As did Felix.
"We have to keep calm, alright?! Freaking out won´t get us anywhere. Understood?" Cry said firmly and his friends nodded.
"Good." The masked gamer took a deep breath. "So, what are our options?"
"We-we could swim?" Felix suggested.
"But we would have to take this float along or we´ll drown." Ken said.
"I don´t think that´s a good idea." Cry said. "We have no water, no food and trying to paddle around might just rob any strength we might need for later."
"We have plenty of water!" Felix exclaimed, signaling around them. "We´re in the middle of the ocean."
"Felix, you can´t drink salt wat-" Cry began.
"I know, but isn´t there a way to cleanse it?"
"How?"
Felix shrugged.
"I heard that if you drink less of 32 ounces of sea water each day, it can keep you alive." Ken said. "But it´s not healthy."
"What about rain?" Felix said.
"Can´t." Cry shook his head. "It´s going to be dirty. We could get infected with some sort of virus."
"Then we´ll just boil it? Cry, you have your glasses and we could use the sun to help us."
"That could be a thing…what about food?"
"Dude, we´re in a storage of food!" Pewdie laughed. "I´ve been fishing with my relatives ever since I was five!"
"Great." The sarcasm in his masked friend´s response surprised the blonde.
"What?"
"And how may we, dear Pewds, catch the fish? If you haven´t noticed, we´re floating in the middle of the ocean. There´s no fishing material, we don´t even have bait!"
"…right…" The Swede´s expression dropped. Cry felt a knot of guilt twist up in his stomach for being a bit harsh towards his friend, but honestly, he was frustrated because that little voice in his mind kept telling him, it´s useless. They´re not going to survive. If they won´t drown sooner or later, they´ll die of starvation or dehydration.
"Let´s drop this conversation for now…" Ken suggested.
No one argued. They floated in silence for about an hour before Felix spoke up again.
"You know the worst thing about this situation?" He asked.
"What?" Cry said, sounding disinterested about the answer.
"We never got to play Wyv and Keep together, Cry."
The brunette stared at him for a second before bursting into laughter.
"What´s Wyv and Keep?" Ken asked, amused.
"It´s a game we´ve been trying to play for two years now, but it never worked. Last time we tried all kinds of things, even having the same name and pressing ´continue´ at the same time, but it still wouldn´t work so we ended up playing Foul Play instead."
"Damn it, Felix." Cry said, chuckling. "That was on my bucket list. I guess I´m never going to get to it."
"What else is on your bucket list, Cry?" Pewdie smirked, giving him the Loading Screen look. "Am I on your bucket list? Does it involve cheese and wine?"
Cry laughed again.
"The real question is, why do you even have a bucket list? You´re twenty five, man! You´re too young to-" Ken stopped.
Pewdie quickly saved the mood before it could turn sour again. "Come on, man! You have to at least have something gay on your list! What kind of life are you living if you don´t have a bit of fab in it?"
"I have to put up with your antics everytime you call, Felix. I think I´ve had enough fab to last me for a lifetime and beyond."
"You can never have too much fab!" The Swede protested.
"I think it´s obvious what Cry´s trying to say here." Ken said, reaching out and placing his hand over the brunette´s. "He likes me better than you."
Pewdie gasped dramatically and faked a hurt sob.
"Oh, guys…" Cry shook his head, a wide smile on his lips. "I think you´ve read too many fanfics."
"Of course, Cry~" Pewdie said.
"Every day, every night." Ken said, adding a seductive wink.
They all laughed at each other.
"But seriously," Felix said after a while. "If we don´t make it…I- I´ll miss you guys. I couldn´t have asked for better friends. I really enjoyed our time together."
"Me too, friend."
"Yeah…"
A strong wind blew against them and Cry looked up, wondering how it had gotten dark so quickly. His eyes widened and he paled.
"Uh, g-guys?"
"What?" Felix looked up.
"Oh no…please, no…"
The clouds had taken up an angry, black color. The cold wind picked up again and the raft swept against waves that had noticeably gotten larger.
"This-this can´t be happening!" Ken cried.
The others stayed silent. They were doomed, there was no doubt about it. What kind of comfort could they offer?
Instead, they huddled closer and gripped each other tightly. If they were going to go down, at least they were going to go down together.
Felix suddenly cursed loudly, his voice stricken with tears.
"I CAN´T! Guys! I can´t die without letting you know that you were the most important people in my life! I love you, I don´t want to be without you!"
"We love you too, Pewdie." Cry said, squeezing his hand tighter.
"No, you don´t understand!" The Swede continued yelling. He gasped and looked up at the sky, terrified. "I love you two, not like brothers, not like friends, like two special parts of my heart I can´t possible live without!"
The wind had gotten stronger and a small drop landed on Pewdie´s hand. Then another fell onto his forehead. Rain was coming.
"I do understand." Cry said. He moved his arm to grip Pewdie´s and pulled him closer. Ken put his arm around the Swede, wrapping him in a secure embrace.
"Me too," He mumbled against the blonde´s shoulder.
Pewdie began to cry. He moved his arms to wrap them around Cry´s waist and rested his forehead onto the brunette´s chest while Ken held him from behind.
The waves tossed them around, almost managing to loosen their grip on the float a couple of times. The men held on strong, determined to clutch to life as long as possible.
"We´ll see each other on the other side, okay?" Ken said, having to shout over the roar of the upcoming storm.
"Yes!" Cry yelled back. "And if we all make it there, we´ll definitely be boyfriends, okay?"
"Okay!" Ken said.
"Okay, Pewdie?" The brunette asked, nudging the Swede at his chest. Felix nodded.
"Okay."
Cry let his head rest on the blonde´s shoulder, feeling Ken grip his forearms tightly. They´re going to be okay. The only thing he regretted was not making a goodbye video to his fans when he said he was going to Sweden. The only thing he left them was a tweet. One single tweet. It´ll be the last that they would ever get from Cryaotic.
At least I´ll die in the company of friends- lovers? Cry thought. I hope Russ and the rest of the crew are going to be alright…wow…the storm is loud.
Felix lifted his head from his chest and looked up, searching the sky. Cry froze. Ken shot him a wide eyed look.
There was definitely a steady sound coming from somewhere. With the waves roaring and the wind howling, they couldn´t be sure at first.
"HELICOPTER!" Felix cried, pointing towards a dark object in the sky.
"Are you sure?!" Cry asked.
"YES! WE´RE HERE! WE´RE DOWN HERE!" Felix yelled. He let go of Cry and pulled off his shirt. Before any could question what he was doing, the Swede waved it in the air, still shouting. Cry followed his lead, as did Ken.
The three shook their shirts, just their luck they were multicolored, and gestured wildly with their arms.
There was no possible way that the rescuers could hear them yell, but they did it anyway. All of the terror, the depressions, even the anger at their fate was swept away the instant they spotted the helicopter and they shouted their relief into the storm.
It started pouring now, the rain fogging up their clear vision of their rescue vessel. It was hovering over them and all of the sudden they were bathed in a blinding light.
"Don´t worry!" Came a distorted voice from the chopper. "We´ve got you!"
Something splashed down next to them and they could make out a rope ladder. Not wasting any time, the gamers swam towards it.
Felix was the first one up, then Ken and lastly Cry. A few paramedics greeted them with warm blankets and hot drinks, sending them to the back of the helicopter. There were some beds and chairs, including more paramedics who searched them over.
Not too long after being checked and helped into dry clothes and blankets, the three friends collapsed in the back together on a small bed in the corner.
Felix immediately laid down, resting his head on Ken´s lap and placing his feet in Cry´s.
"Hey." The brunette jokingly protested.
"Shut up…" The Swede mumbled.
"It´s okay, friend." Cry grabbed one of the blankets and spread it over Pewdie´s body. The blonde responded with snuggling into his friends. He dozed off several minutes later.
Ken and Cry sat in comfortable silence for a while before Ken finally spoke up.
"I…uh…" He stopped, searching for words. "I really meant why I said back there."
"I think we all did."
"The funny thing is, I had certain thoughts before. I just thought that either fanfictions were really rubbing off on me or it was just a crush. Or two. Two crushes, I mean. But when Pewdie broke down and said he loved us…I, err…I knew I felt the same way."
Ken watched the Swede, waiting for Cry´s response nervously as he played with Felix´s hair absentmindedly.
"I had these feelings for quite some time, but it´s not exactly something you´d casually bring up over a Skype conversation." Cry said.
"Heh, guess not."
"So in some twisted way…it was a good thing that this all happened. I mean, some people may have lost their lives, I don´t know how many they found, and we lost a lot of our stuff, but on the other hand, we created a bond and had a chance to look into our deepest, darkest thoughts."
"Yeah, cause when you´re about to die, your thoughts don´t seem as wrong as they did before."
"I wouldn´t call them wrong, friend. Just…strange."
"Unique."
"We´ve always been weird, so it´s okay." Cry said.
They laughed quietly.
"So…" Ken said after a pause. "Are we officially together now?"
"Pretty much, yeah."
"Good." Ken nodded.
"Good." Came the echo from Pewds. "Can you guys stop talking now? I´m trying to sleep here."
Ken flicked Felix´s forehead.
"Don´t talk to us like that, boy!" He demanded playfully.
"Hey! Ow, that hurt Ken! I don´t want to be in a relationship if it´s going to be abusive!"
Cry laughed darkly. "Too bad. We´ve got you in our clutches, little uke."
"Hey!" The Swede struggled to sit up, but the other two held him down. "I´m not the uke!"
"Sure you are." Cry said, patting his cheek.
Pewdie began to pout. "You guys suck."
"Not here, darling." Ken said with a wink and Cry laughed again while Felix buried his face into his hands.
"Can we please just go to sleep?"
Finally relenting in their teasing, the others agreed and they settled back, sharing a blanket as they drifted off in each other´s arms.