Chapter Text
On the Isle, information was currency.
Carlos learned that before he learned how to ride a bike.
“Repeat it,” Jay said, tossing him a crumpled sheet of blueprints they’d stolen off a dock worker.
Carlos didn’t even look down. “Two guards at the east gate, three-minute rotation. Camera above the archway has a blind spot that lasts eight seconds every minute because the motor sticks. Combination lock is 4-9-4-2, but the four sticks so you have to pull left while you turn.”
Jay blinked. “You read that once.”
Carlos shrugged, rubbing his thumb over the seam of his jacket again and again. The fabric there was worn smooth, perfect under his skin. “You read it too.”
“Yeah, but I don’t-” Jay gestured vaguely at Carlos’s head. “You’re like a computer.”
Mal smirked. “He’s better than a computer. Computers can’t hotwire motorcycles.”
Carlos ducked his head at the praise, heat crawling up his neck. He hated when they all looked at him like that, like he’d done something strange instead of something useful. His memory just…worked.
Everything slotted into place. Guard schedules. Escape routes. The way Cruella’s heel tapped three times before she threw something.
He didn’t forget.
He couldn’t forget.
Evie leaned over his shoulder. “So what’s the plan, genius?”
He told them. Every step. Every timing. Every variable.
When they pulled it off perfectly later that night, Jay clapped him on the back hard enough to jolt his bones. “See? That brain of yours is gonna get us off this island someday.”
Carlos smiled faintly.
He didn’t tell them that sometimes his brain didn’t turn off. That every shouted insult, every slammed door, every crash of breaking glass stayed bright and sharp behind his eyes long after everyone else moved on.
On the Isle, remembering everything wasn’t a problem.
It was survival.