consider this the slip :: w + m blitz

[pogue]

It's hardly ten minutes after the train has started when Whiskey slams back the third shot of vodka from the bottle he'd plucked from the alcohol cart in the corner, ignoring the absent stares of the avox in the corner and slamming the shot glass down onto the table in front of him. Lips twist, eyes squeeze shut and he feels fire snake its way down his throat and deep into his gut.

"Fucking hell..." He mutters, shaking away the demons and the damned that wrap their claws around his shoulders and peel away hardened flesh. He shuffles over to the couch, hardly managing to collapse back into the cushions before he hears the door slide open and watches Mackenzie Pryce make his grand entrance.

Local legend, victor extraordinaire, a man made of gold or whatever. Whiskey doesn't give a shit.

A man that wouldn't think twice of him once he's gone gives his usual spiel, all empty promises and i'll do my best to get you home  and all you have to do is trust me  and Wiz bites back the second glob of spit that could get him killed that day, shifts his gaze to his district partner before narrowing it back onto the victor in front of him as the latter fades into silence.

One heartbeat, two, Whiskey bites back the words that he wants to say and replaces them with ones that are just as vile and soaked in gold.

"Well!" Wiz pronounces, clasping his hands together and fighting back the urge to wince at the way the noise rebounds inside of his skull. "Don't worry, Kenz. You don't have to lose sleep over me." He assures, rubbing his thumb against the lip of the shot glass absent-mindedly. "When that timer starts, I'm gonna step off and you can watch me go-" 

He clasps his hands together once more, bang, then pulls them apart as if he'd holding an explosion between his two palms. In some ways, it feels like he is. "Kaboom!" 

He pulls himself up from the couch with as much grace as he can muster, thumping in his head only growing as he makes his way towards the private quarters. "All you have to do is market it and then forget about me. It's like I'm doing you a favor." He punctuates the sentence with the slamming of a door and stumbled footsteps as he makes his way back to his room.

[umber vivuus 12b 🥀 [dars]]

He'd forgotten that his own suffering is allowed, too. Spent so long trying to convince himself he was a good person, focusing on the fixing, that he somehow convinced himself his own problems weren't allowed anymore, or that they were less important, or that it didn't matter either way, because he didn't have time to stop and fix them. Because it was life or death: someone's life was always on the line, and even though it was still his own a lot of the time, it was often someone else's as well. And they're always so close to making it back alive and yet- and fucking yet. Three separate finale appearances, nine top eight placements, not one beating heart.

He hadn't been sleeping. And so when the time came for him to have some patience with Whiskey Finch, he didn't have any left to spare.

"When that timer starts, I'm gonna step off and you can watch me go-" The loud clap of his hands ricocheted against the hollow walls- "Kaboom!"

He was drunk. Mackenzie smelled the liquor now, sour as the look on his face. He was growing more and more annoyed with Whiskey Finch by the second.

"All you have to do is market it and then forget about me. It's like I'm doing you a favor."

He was surprised by his reaction: a laugh. Quick, small, but genuine. Market it?

"Oh, got it all sorted, then?"

He took the seat next to yet another drunk teenager, wondering why he'd even bothered to try and win ten years ago.

"Because I've got other shit I could be doing if you're already giving up."

Hypocrite.

He closed his eyes, guilt immediately weighing in his chest like water, filling every corner of his lungs. He'd drown if he didn't fix this, he knew he was.

"Look, you wanna know the truth? No one cares about the idiot who gets himself killed in the bloodbath to prove a point. My tributes are smarter than that. You aren't some mindless career, or some sickly little twelve year old who hasn't got a chance in hell at winning this. You do have a chance, if you stop with the pity party right now, accept that your life has already been as good as it will ever be, accept that it will only get worse from here, and then fucking fight for it anyway."

He stood, gritted teeth and angry adrenaline.

"You got something worth saving? Then do it your fucking self."