Two brothers sit on a beach. One cooks fish. The other watches the ocean, waiting for enemies to arrive. His philosophy is rigid: “They come. They fight. They destroy. They corrupt. It always ends the same.” The fish-cooking brother smiles and responds warmly: “It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress.” This is not a scene from Survivor. It’s a scene from Lost, my other favorite show. It’s from the season five finale, called “The Incident,” and it’s the first time we lay eyes on legendary mystic Jacob and his nameless nefarious brother, the human form of the monstrous cloud of smoke that’s stalked the island since the first episode. What does any of this have to do with Vytas Baskauskas, or Survivor: Cambodia — Second Chance for that matter? A couple of things. For one, the conflicting philosophies of Jacob and the Man in Black speak to the beauty of Survivor, the idea that men and women voyage to a magical place twice a year and do horrible things to each other — but sometimes, something magnificent and revelatory can happen for the people who allow themselves to survive the darkness and emerge in the light, like a moth flying free from its cocoon. For another, fans of both shows immediately pictured the Jacob/MiB moment from “The Incident” during the ninth episode of Survivor: Blood vs Water — at least, I did. The Survivor scene sees Vytas and his brother Aras, winner of Season 12, sitting together on Redemption Island, both of them blindsided by people Aras trusted. The brothers are halfway out of the game, but not all the way there, and they don’t see eye to eye on the current situation. ARAS: “I’m still in the game. So are you.”

VYTAS: “It’s different. We’re not actually in the game. It’s purgatory.”

ARAS: “It’s not purgatory. I’m in the game. If I wasn’t in the game, I would be eating a cheeseburger right now. Since I’m not eating a cheeseburger, I’m in the game.”

VYTAS: [Rolls eyes, burps] The scene takes place on Day 23, and the Brothers Baskauskas are actually debating whether or not they’re in purgatory. You could not get a bigger Lost moment on Survivor if you tried. Now, Survivor life imitates Lost arzt once more, with Vytas’ return to the game. Just as the Smoke Monster wanted nothing more than to free himself of his brother and live on his own terms, Vytas comes back to Survivor without a plus one — but unlike Jacob’s sinister sibling, there’s a big part of Vytas that actually wishes Aras was here in Cambodia. “I’m happy that I get to play my own game,” Vytas tells me when I ask how he feels about playing without his brother, “but I’m also a little bit…” He trails off, smiles, and catches himself in a moment of vulnerability. “These are deep feelings! But it’s almost scarier to play your own game.” “When I played with Aras, he messed up,” Vytas continues. “Now I have no one to blame but me this time. Getting ready for this game, and looking at the 19 other people who are out to get you, at least before one of those people had my back no matter what — and now that I’m not with him, it makes me so much more grateful for the experience we got to share together. That was cool. It was so cool to go through this with Aras. I’ll play my own game this time, unencumbered by any complexity of the Blood vs Water business — but I’ll miss him.” When Vytas waxes poetic about missing his brother, and when he talks a few minutes later about recently becoming a father, there’s a sense that the reformed bad boy of Season 27 has reformed even further — that he’s a softer, gentler soul than he was even two years ago. But that’s the kind of thinking that gets you torn apart in the jungle. “I think I’m manipulative,” Vytas tells me, wearing a quiet grin, looking deep into the distance at sights unseen. “I’m going to manipulate the hell out of this game.” ON THE NEXT PAGE: Confidence Man



You met Vytas once before Blood vs Water, albeit briefly, flashing before your eyes at the Survivor: Panama — Exile Island finale, glowing with light as he embraced his brother, the newly named Sole Survivor. Many years later, Vytas hit the island on his own quest for the million dollar prize. Over the course of his 27 days in Season 27, Vytas recruited others to his cause by telling stories about his troubled past as a heroin addict who spent several months in prison, and stories about who he is today, reformed and healthy, totally going to yoga, lending hundreds of dollars to strangers off the street. At one point, Season Two winner Tina Wesson asked Vytas to identify the hardest part about Survivor. He smiled and delivered the answer without pause, blinking with purpose: “Oh, that’s easy. The dishonesty.” This is the spectacular brand of smoke that Vytas sold all day long during his season, wooing men and women alike with an electromagnetic energy that even Desmond David Hume would have trouble resisting. At least, that’s my experience while speaking with Vytas at Ponderosa. He talks slow, his words flowing with a booming-bass rhythm. He plans his lies, confident in his abilities to con his competitors, but respectful of their powers as well. “There are some smart players here,” he tells me. “Everyone here is astute. Everyone will be able to feel whether you’re with them or against them.” Alright, so Vytas doesn’t think everyone here is astute, or even ascoot. “There are some pawns,” he says, nodding along as he names them. “Woo is a pawn. Keith is a pawn. I don’t know about the Kellies. I think they both could be pawns. I don’t know much about either of them. I know Wentworth is a super-fan. I remember listening to Wiglesworth’s interview and it seemed like she wants to have some old school player fun. I like that. She seems trustworthy.” Earlier in the day, Jeff Varner identified both Wiglesworth and Vytas as members of his pre-game alliance; if it’s true, Vytas keeps that information close to the vest. He’s not too worried about particular people right now — people on the beach, at least. His mind dwells on people at home, such as Aras, but mostly his new son Asa. “That’s the hardest part for me being out here,” he sighs. “I’m just missing my kid. My kid’s one years old. You know, Father’s Day is coming up, and I’m going to miss that. He’s just started speaking some words. He’s such a bundle of joy. That’s the one thing that will be tough for me.” I look into the eye of the man as he speaks about his son, and there’s a faraway quality about him, not unlike what I saw in Kimmi Kappenberg when she told me about her children. But unlike Kimmi, Vytas immediately pivots from talking about the joys of fatherhood to talking about how becoming a parent adds a new weapon to his arsenal. “My first time around, I used my story of recovering from addiction,” he says. “I had this comeuppance, and I was able to turn it around. But that story has been used. I can’t engender goodwill on that story anymore. It’s been done. But I have a new story: I’m a new dad. ‘I miss my kid! I love my kid so much!’ And people will say, ‘What a sweet guy!’ And the great thing about that story is that it’s true, you know? I’m not fabricating something.” He’s not fabricating his love for his child, but Vytas is absolutely fabricating ideas for his rivals, as he goes on to tell me that his son has already played a pivotal role in his Second Chance strategy. In the weeks leading up to the season — during the two-week voting period — Vytas dedicated his social media accounts almost exclusively to pictures and discussion centered on his son, very much deliberately. “That wasn’t for anybody other than the 19 people here with me,” he says. “That’s who that was for. I hope it just planted a seed, to change people’s perspective a little bit — that I’m not just the guy who beat up on his little brother.” Vytas knows he can’t crush his reputation from Blood vs Water. “First impressions are the strongest impressions, so people will always remember that,” he says. But he hopes he can show a gentler side through talking about parenthood, creating an image the other players will be drawn toward — especially the ones who are afraid of the 39-day adventure ahead. “People out here are scared,” he says, smiling, looking dead ahead. “Even though people are talking up a big game — ‘I’m going to win this time, you’ll see! Watch how I play a second time around!’ — people are scared that they won’t do as well. They’re going to want to feel safe. I’m good at that. I’m good at nurturing. I’m good at parenting. I’m good at making people feel safe. I think people are going to want that, and I think that’s going to help me do well in this game.” With that, Vytas tells me exactly how he plans to do well in this game — and it involves converting as many people as possible to his cause, one phase of Survivor at a time. ON THE NEXT PAGE: The Shape of Things to Come

Twenty-four hours from now, Vytas Baskauskas will cruise up to the marooning, sitting with perfect posture in one of the two Ta Keo boats, speaking openly and warmly about what his second chance means to him, now that he’s free to play Survivor without a loved one. Of course, Vytas has already been playing Survivor without a loved one (social media presence notwithstanding) over the past several weeks of campaigning and preparation. The game is afoot here at Ponderosa as well, with first impressions already forming. “A lot of people are sizing each other up,” says Vytas, “but they don’t know how they’re going to play. ‘I’m going to make big moves!’ Yeah, but what’s your strategy? I don’t think a lot of these people can nail down what their strategy is.” I ask Vytas if he can nail down his strategy, and he smiles again, nodding slow. “Yeah,” he says. “I think I can.” He goes on to tell me about his multi-tiered approach to sneaking his way through Second Chance, beginning right here at Ponderosa. “Just observe, right now,” he tells me. “I think some people are getting really stressed out by the wait. I’m watching that. Who’s strong minded? Mental stamina is a big part of Survivor. How long can you sit with an idea? How long can you stay on course?” Vytas sees his future competitors, and in many cases, he believes they’re already giving up secrets of their game through “big smiles” and “nice body language,” and also how people are sitting with one another at Ponderosa. “This morning, all the San Juan del Sur people sat together,” he says as a for instance. “All these old school people sat together. If you’re smart, the game’s happening right now.” For his part, Vytas is trying to carefully shift his own shape: “What books am I reading? What’s my body language? When I talk to the handlers, how am I speaking? Am I saying kind things? Every piece of language that you use, whether it’s verbal or nonverbal, analyzing other players — I want people to see me as the kind, sweet Vytas. ‘I want to work with him!’ You want the game to start and for people to come work with you. That’s the whole point of pre-game.” After the pre-game, he says, comes the early game, the first few days of the season that can make or break everything that comes next. “Early in the game, the strategy is about engendering good will and trust,” he says. “You can’t win the game in the first five Tribal Councils, but you can lose it. You can lose it by making enemies, by making yourself a leader, by making yourself too big of a threat. It’s important to keep as many options open as possible early on in the game, without being obvious about it. If people know you have a lot of options, they’ll want you out, because you know there’s going to be a tribe swap, and whatever alliance you have will be mixed up.” Vytas further defines the early game as an exercise in “creating relationships,” and making sure the people he works with feel good about who they’re working against. “I won’t tell anyone who I want to vote out,” he says. “It’s all about, ‘Who do you want to vote out? What do you want to do?'” Not that Vytas doesn’t have an opinion on who goes out when, of course, but if he disagrees with the names being mentioned, he feels he “can manipulate that if it’s what I really don’t want.” “I would never name somebody unless I heard my name getting thrown out,” he continues. “Unless you hear your name getting thrown out, it’s not good to name people, unless it’s someone really close to you. As soon as you throw someone’s name out there, they’re going to get wind of it. They’re going to try to throw it back at you.” At least, that’s how Vytas views the early game. The next phase — “the middle game,” he calls it — requires a more proactive approach in defining targets. “The middle game is the vote or two before the merge, and once the merge comes,” he explains. “Once the merge hits, that’s where you set yourself up. The vote before the merge is where you say, ‘Who is around that’s going to keep the target off my back? Who can I trust — or, really, who can I have a mutually beneficial agreement with?’ Because there’s no such thing as trust on Survivor. But are we in a mutually beneficial situation?” That’s Vytas’ plan for the middle game and beyond: Surrounding himself with people who come equipped with similar threat levels, and turning them into targets before the bullseye lands on his back. “I’ll try to set the game up around the merge,” he says, “and I know for me, because I’m an athletic dude, we’re seen as threats, even though the game is so obviously not geared toward us anymore, and I don’t know why we’re still considered threats at this point. But you have to keep enough threats around.” Case in point: Vytas’ own brother Aras, who won Season 12 largely due to the fact that he was kept around to squash an even bigger threat in the game: Terry Deitz, the record-making challenge beast who now wanders the same Cambodian beach as Vytas. “If Terry hadn’t won all those immunities and they got him voted out, who was the next target? Aras,” says Vytas. “So, keep Terry around — keep Jeremy around — keep some of those guys around.” Vytas isn’t just using Terry as a historical example, either. He wants to work with his brother’s rival battering ram, for a wide range of reasons. “I like Terry, and not because of Aras,” he says. “I love the fact that he beat Aras [in challenges], and I want to get in on that winning team, but man, Terry is a trustworthy guy. If he shakes your hand and says he’s good, you’re good. That’s not something I can say about a lot of people out here. Some of the old school players I hear that more from, or get that feeling from.” Vytas knows a thing or two about playing with old school Survivors, based on his own experience in Blood vs Water partnering up with second-ever Survivor winner Tina, and his own brother Aras, champion of a simpler time. Even his season’s winner, Tyson Apostol, came out victorious by partnering with one of the first Survivors ever, Gervase Peterson. “I look at Tyson, and he played one of the best games in Survivor history,” says Vytas. “He’s one of the top ten winners. He got a core group that he stuck with. He got Gervase and Monica, and he rode them to the end.” That’s why Vytas wants to work with someone like Terry. “Old school players stick to their alliances more, and new school players are ready to jump ship.” But Vytas, interested in the classic mindset, comes from the modern era — so where does that leave him and the ship? ON THE FINAL PAGE: The Man Behind The Curtain