grool (great + cool) ;; plastics day 2.

[✨ zozo.]

You know I thought I'd be tired, but I'm mostly just angry.

Not a shaking in your hands, fire in your chest kind of angry. More like a really fucking pissed off, lack of sleep kind of angry. An angry that makes you growl, makes you snap your teeth, makes you shitty to your allies as you bark "I'll do it myself!" and snatch the needle & thread from one of their hands as they try to stitch up your arm.

Part of me wants to say sorry, and the other part just wants this shit to be over and done with. Let Chichi slit my throat in my sleep for all I care. Break the damn blood pack, I down another bottle of water and everything still burns. I try a bundle of plants, shove them down and wince as my gums protest at chewing - I nearly gag, the taste foul. Maybe they were poisonous, no, scrunched up face (I'm going to be sick), I'm better than that.

Blink, angry, blink, tired, blink, hungry. Raise my arm, pick away at dried, crusted blood with my fingernails. "Why the fuck's my blood purple?"

I know why - at least, I think I do. I just need some distracting conversation to take the edge off.

[gamemaker sloane ♕ kaяi ♕]

<sup>It hurt.

It burned.

It made me want to scream, to cry, to just run away.

The wounds, the exhaustion, the mental toll. It is only day two and I am already falling apart. My body is failing me and I am not sure how much longer I can keep myself glued together. Piece by piece I am losing some of myself.

And sooner or later there will be nothing left to pick up.

The last arrow that flew from my bow finally bested the mutts, but there was nothing to smile about. We were all wounded, maybe even worse than the Bloodbath. This time was different though. The moment I tried to patch Kiko up, she snapped, ripping the needle from my hand. I am only a little more than useless, so snatching the one thing that I'm good at broke me a little.

But I kept it all hidden.

Just like I have done my whole life.

"Why the fuck is my blood purple?!"

"That's...that's not normal."

But nothing is normal anymore.

Nothing is normal when you know you're going to die.



( does things in maint! )</sup>

[eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris]

<sup>"What's normal?" she says it like it's the easiest thing, tightening the gauze around her bruised shin and feeling the fractured bone shift beneath her skin. Earthquake in the flesh, a tiny tragedy to ignore. Her brow furrows, but only for a moment. "What you bleed is what you bleed. Why care about the color?" Her gaze settles on Kiko, then on Mer. "Someone's going to try and gut you, either way. At the very least, three of us in this room are going to die."

She shrugs casually, leaving out the obvious and predictable; but it's not going to be me. Pulling her first aid kit from her bag, she lowers herself to the floor and meets the gaze of her allies. "Are you guys the ghost story type? There's this tale about a witch from the woods outside of One, it was my favorite as a kid. We could try to scare each other." She goes about mending herself, needle into thread into herbal remedy / but inevitably, the scar will remain.

In the long, quiet night, Elvena makes no move to share her hurt.

"Or do you have any ideas, Chichi? All this melancholy is boring me."</sup>