eye of the storm {h/m vs f/l vs i | day 5}

[Knuckles]

"Bet you'd leave Marceline if the roles were reversed."

Time stand still as he battles with his own emotions. Marceline has been an amazing ally and friend, providing support in a place where trust is hard to come by. I know she has to die. I know it, but why? It's hard, and he finds himself torn between his desire to win and his loyalty to Marceline, but ultimately he wants to win. He wants the crown. He wants to see his family again. At least she's a friend for now. But friends don't last forever. Not here.

I know she has to die.

The line between keeping himself alive and loyalty to Marceline blurs, forcing him to face difficult decisions and harsh realities. I never wanted a friend here. Having friends, risking his life, these are all actions that could be his downfall.

I should leave her behind and let her die, but now isn't the time.

It's a reality that eventually he'll be faced with and forced to accept and keeping his mind from traveling there is far more difficult than he ever imagined.

I didn't want friends, but I found them, and they mean the world to me.

"No, I wouldn't leave her behind."

Not now.

Hal's gaze shifts to Lionel. It's tough, and maybe they would've been friends in another life, but here, they're enemies. Hal needs to stand his own ground, find his own strategy, fight for his own life, and maybe things will work out for him. He wants to be strong, but everything will eventually knock him down.

Hal allowed others to treat him as a pushover, a doormat to be stepped on and discarded after muddy shoes have been wiped on it many times. But in the game, Hal realizes that he must find his own voice and stand his ground, but it doesn't seem possible. The struggle is one he's familiar with, one where he wants to prove himself, but Hal is weak. He's unable to do anything right especially stand his own ground.

As his gaze shifts from Lionel to the others not knowing entirely sure what they're actually capable of, Hal must trust himself to make the right decision even if it seems incredibly difficult.

"I'm not afraid of your threats."

Maybe teasing isn't the exact way to go, but maybe it will illicit the response he desires, a chance to prove himself when everything else seems to fail.

"You're all bark and no bite."

Credit to Pogue <3

Hal attacks with spear
1. Felicity
2. Lionel
g8aMhrxD0D1-2


spear
4
1-2·spear

[andromache s. ⚔️ [d1b] sucy]

Blood everywhere. Everyone’s, but somehow especially her own. Marceline’s head is spinning. She leans on her sword to steady herself. Her leg… god, her legs have never served her well in the first place. This is overkill, she wants to scream. All they had to do was wait for her ankle to roll over on itself. All of this hacking and slashing is just overdoing it. Marceline, however, doesn’t have the energy to yell. The best she can muster up is a glare, bloodshot and cold eyes that waver between Five and Six. They’ve taken their turns on her, pushed her farther than anybody has in the games so far. Marceline clutches at her hip, her stomach. What else will they take from her?

They? The tributes? In a literal sense, yes. But she can’t blame them fully. Oh, she can take it out on them, that much is for sure, but none of them are truly culpable for their actions here. She thinks that maybe Hal has realised that too.

She doesn’t like the way Hal’s acting — but she doesn’t dislike it either. Not when he boldly declares he wouldn’t leave her; that surprises her, enough to draw her out of the sudden blood loss stupor. She can’t give up now, not while there’s still energy in her bones.

Six. She has something to prove to her. Marceline, grappling at herself with one hand, lunges with the other.

lightstep station on lionel’s attack 1124

rpftVclNxk1-10


marceline attacks izzy!!

sword

deep gash on right thigh 8 + 1 (blades station)

table credit to napoleon, d2m ₊⊹ 🐁 ɢʀɪғғɪɴ. !

1-10·sword

[gamemaker tallis 🧚🏽‍♂️kaitlin.]

FELICITY
CARROW.


One could not explain it well, Felicity who had never been gifted in the craft of wordplay especially couldn't, but for the third time the world slows to a held breath.

Felicity's third eye opens on her forehead, taking in the last fleeting taste of winter on the cool air; the banished smoke and the deadly cold, they settle like fed leeches until there's an impossible warmth. She can feel the eye blink, hard and cold as a stone. It does not weep when Hal tries to put an axe in her back, or when Marceline proves she does not need grace to be a monster.

"And you're a killjoy."

Snapping at Hal tastes so sweet.

Izzy dies the same way she lives, and damns the rest of them to carry her with them for the rest of their days. However numbered they might be, there's something to that truth that makes Felicity's own want out. Hal's too, if the light dying in his eyes is anything to go by.

A circlet of ice to match the one around Lionel's head crowns Marceline, and Felicity wonders about how she'll remember her when she lays down to rest at night. Will she worry about her back now, sleep on her own to make sure Hal can't rid himself of a stronger opponent? Worse, has she forged something now between the two of them, threaded iron between Hal and Marceline? Felicity still feels the source of that plague in the hollows of her chest, the threads of iron that have woven around her heart. Is she their wanderer in a dark wood, as the hags had been for her? Do they want to sit with her in the dark?

"I'd say thanks for the help, but now it's just us and a dead girl we killed together." She contemplates it for a second, then steps back a bit, getting closer to Lionel. They're all so stretched thin, on high alert even as Felicity drops her dart gun to swing loosely by her thigh. Pretending she doesn't have her pointer finger trained on the trigger, and that her heartbeat isn't thudding hard enough to break a rib, she inspects the underside of her nails a second, picking them with her thumb before looking into Marceline's vacant eyes. She tries not to balk at the ghosts she sees there. "You taking the offer to run? 'Cause I can start counting."

She clears her throat, wiping her nails on her flannel before shirking the heavy jacket altogether.

"Sixty... Fifty nine..." and a lazy, learned grin to match. "Fifty eight..."

[k!ah]

 
lionel estrada

I could see it, visualise the way my blade kiss the vulnerable flesh of her hip until it buried itself so deep into her flesh that it would rip through muscle, tendons, bone and sinew. I could almost taste the tang of blood that would fill the ice kissed air between us. Eight, seeing the wild, untamed look in my eyes darted away from the touch of my blade, and right into the tip of Isodel's. A cruel delighted smile hooks up the corner of my lips as blood begins to spread across the front of her uniform, as dark as the blood that soaked my own.

Isodel, ripping her axe fro eight stomach looks at me, blood staining her teeth. "I want you so bad, so get over here, don't make Felicity do all the work." My smile turns somewhat delighted as my eyes flick from Isodel to Felicity. There was a coldness in her eyes, and an almost murderous intent on her lips. Any other person might have looked at her and backed the fuck up, but I only step closer.

"And why would I do that when she looks so damned good kicking your ass?" And she was, because Isodels body was failing her as her blood drained from her body making her skin sickly pale. There was a tremble in her hand as she held the pickaxe, and the blood dribbling from the corner of her lips was so dark that I knew there was no coming back from deaths edge, not for her.

Suddenly Eight is infant of Isodel, her blade digging so deep that it claimed the soul within. The light dies from Isodels eyes as her body crumples to the ground, lifeless. Seven snaps something at me, at Felicity, drawing my attention as he strikes, his blade bouncing off Felcity's chest and I feel my body tense, my vision turning red as Mouse growls loudly behind me, his eyes pinned to the boy from 7.

Felicity closes some of the distance between us, and I meet her halfway, my chest brushing her back as she studies the two tributes before us. Mouse flanks her closely on her other side, a soft snarl rumbling up his chest. "I'd say thanks for the help, but now it's just us and a dead girl we killed together." There is no regret in her voice, in fact, she kind of looks bored, her arms resting casually by her side, her finger resting against the dart guns trigger. After another moment she tells them they should take her up on her offer to run before a slow lazy grin spread across her lips as the count down beings.

Matching her grin I rest my sword on my shoulder, looking between the two tributes. "If I were you, I would take her offer," my grin as I casually pick as some of the dried blood on my vest. "Cause I might not be so generous. And you owe me a death, one that I will come to collect."

[doesnt flee, stares down mareline and hal]

[Knuckles]

"Yeah, it's time to go."

Hal takes Marceline's hand towards their escape. His heart is racing, and the urgency of the entire situation fuels his resolve to keep going. Even though many doubts and fears creep in, he tries to push the, away. He knows he needs to stay focused if he wants any chance to succeed.

As they run together, he feels the adrenaline coursing through him, keeping him going. Their footsteps echo, the snow and ice beneath them, it's hard to do anything other than focus on what's ahead and what's lingering behind them.

"We need to keep moving." Hal urges Marceline, his voice low but firm. "We can't let them catch us."

Despite being threatened, he remains steadfast and strong, but fear and anxiety control him making it near impossible to stand up to the any danger, and it keeps him moving forward. With Marceline by his side, Hal knows they can face whatever challenges come their way.

The duo left behind can continue their threats and countdown, but Hal believes if they really wanted to kill him, they wouldn't have given them a chance to run away.

Maybe everyone is a little human today, but as time ticks away, he knows humanity will become less and less until only one remains.

Credit to Pogue <3

Hal flees with Marceline

[andromache s. ⚔️ [d1b] sucy]

They’re not finished. Marceline remembers a story her cousin once told her about a criminal couple from before the Dark Days — or even before Panem? They traveled around robbing banks with guns, stuff like that. Three and Five could’ve been like that.

But seriously? They’re still bloodthirsty? Marceline’s chest is heaving; Six is lying on the ground, a cacophony of weapons and various trinkets strewn about her. Marceline’s doing. It’s nothing like Azure this time. Marceline’s hands don’t shake. She doesn’t cry the way she did for Azure. She definitely doesn’t cry the way she did for Váli. Yesterday tears had come unbidden, today the heat of them doesn’t even prick at her eyes.

Her legs are still unsteady from Five’s slashes. Not as unsteady as she’d made Six’s at the end, but definitely not in any serviceable condition. Hal grabs her hand and Marceline accepts it happily. It’s nothing important, especially here, but some small voice inside of her still manages to remind her that this is her first time holding a boy’s hand.

She hates this. She hates who she’s become, but that’s something she can deal with if she makes it out of here. For now, she holds Hal’s hand a little tighter, with nothing but the intent to say she agrees — “Let’s go.”

Marceline sends one last look the way of the pair of rabid dogs they’re escaping from. She wants them to know this is something she’s doing out of necessity. That death he’s owed is his own. The new Marceline might just be a debt collector.

“We’ll see you around.”

marceline flees with hal!

table credit to napoleon, d2m ₊⊹ 🐁 ɢʀɪғғɪɴ. !