One of the things I love about Through this Fire, across from Peter Balkan is its subversion of the Robinsonade story. It removes one of the trope’s most crucial element: the Rescue.
The Rescue is usually the climax of the story. It’s the culmination of the protagonist’s cunning and tenacity. This is perhaps the only genre where a Deus Ex Machina is a productive narrative device. The characters can signal a passing ship, but the presence of that ship is often entirely up to chance. It’s an interesting element of the genre, and a rather constant one. Even in Lord of the Flies, which is by no means intended to be an uplifting or triumphant story, the civilized world still comes for the boys in the end.
The Mountain Goats decentralize this theme. The idea of rescue is floated, but it’s framed as fevered religious delirium. Waiting for the armies of the lord. Reintegration is an impossibility, even should anyone come. The story isn’t about staying alive until God or Fate saves them. It’s about staying alive for the sake of staying alive. It’s about grieving inevitable death. There’s always a clock ticking somewhere.