tell me about despair, yours - n v. s v. s [day 4]

[august vance d7b [Bella]]

Things stop making sense after a few hours in the labyrinth. Time, space, direction, motivation. Too exhausted to talk much, the three of us fall into line with the silent ease of company we’ve developed with over the last few days. As we hurry ahead, we exchange succinct words of concern and resolve–Have you eaten? Are you okay? Just a little further, we’re almost there-- Vera and I keeping a close watch on Lucia.

When night falls, we take turns sleeping with our backs propped against the glass, one keeping watch while the other two rest. Knife clutched firmly in my fist, I close my eyes but don’t manage to sleep a wink. Behind my eyelids, the labyrinth still twists and turns in front of me, mocking me.

The only reliable way to mark the day moving into the next is when the anthem plays, showing two tributes’ faces overhead. I feel a faint glimmer of recognition in my chest when Serelis appears, a grim sense of connection, like we’re now tethered by an invisible thread, connected by the final blow I dealt. Though there really isn’t any more in common between us than two folks sitting together awkwardly in the same waiting room, watching one go in before the other.

I hope that’s all she’ll be, a strange memory to reflect on when this is all over, because my mind is too busy to worry about a one-armed ghost following me around.

In the morning, we resume the tedious task of pretending we are getting out of this goddamned labyrinth. Sleep-deprived and irritable, I rub my baggy eyes and watch Vera’s shoulder blades as she leads us around each corner. She’s getting us nowhere, I think. A more distant and sensible part of myself knows it’s not her fault, that she’s trying her best. But with each step, I feel my mind turning this same thought over and over, slowly hardening it into this calcified rock of a thought that weighs against my temples, blacking out all reason.

”OKAY,” I huff irritably in Vera’s direction, speaking to her back, ”I’m sick of this. You’ve got the directional sense of a fruit fly. New plan: let’s just–”

But I’m cut off mid-thought when the winds pick up, carrying a cloud of sand into the labyrinth. It’s so powerful and sudden that it cancels out all sight and sound as quickly as the lights going out. I reach my arms out, trying frantically to grab hold of my comrades, shouting their names, but I come up empty-handed. ”Vera! Lucia!”

I run forward–or what I think is forward–and I’m met with a glass wall to the forehead. Grains of sand gather in my ears, my hair, the edges of my eyes. I curse into the indifferent wind, blinking forcefully, shouting to no avail, ”Lucia! Vera! I’m here!”

I backtrack to where we were a minute ago–I think–but find nothing except more glass and sand. In a split second, they’re suddenly nowhere.

”Vera!” I cry out, my eyes burning with tears and sand, ”I’m sorry!”

I’m left to find my way out alone.

—

Somehow, the air becomes even more unbearably hot. The skin of my shoulders starts to form angry, fluid-filled bubbles that sting and burn against the scratchy fabric of my costume. My mouth is dry, crusted at the corners with spit and blood and dirt. The wound in my face throbs against its new stitches with every grain of sand that sticks to its edges.

I don’t know how far I’ve walked when Safina appears in front of me, her tall figure materializing from the thick cloud of sand. My shoulders tense at the sight of her, the muscle memory of the marks she left on Lucia still present. Though my limbs feel like lead, I hold up my knife defensively, its blade still tinged with the rust-colored blood of the girl standing across from me. I glance from side to side for any sign of Tide, who might be close behind.

”You following me?” I ask curtly, shouting against the wind, my voice already hoarse from yelling the names of my allies. ”Can’t a girl catch a break?”

The last thing I want to do is fight. Faced without Lucia and Vera, I feel my confidence slowly retreating. We were good back there, but we were good together. By myself, I feel less like a warrior and more like a child posing with her shiny toys. Safina is bigger than me, and probably better fed, being from Three. I feel like I’m about to get whooped.

But she doesn’t need to know that. I’m still banking on whatever margin of fear or awe I’ve earned in her eyes from killing Serelis, if any.

You got this, Nori. Do it for your girls. You’ll find them again, I reassure myself, rather deceptively.

When another girl appears from the sandy fog, the one I cracked jokes with on the first day–Sera, I think–my heart begins to pound. I exhale a long, exasperated groan into the roaring wind, rolling my eyes up to heaven. Now I’m cornered, with no allies, and tired as a three-legged quarter horse at the end of a steeplechase. Which is to say, tired as fuck.

Pull yourself together. It’s not over yet.

”I’m sorry,” I say with a regretful look at Sera. It’s not easy to strike at someone who’s already become human in your mind, even though four days ago is a long time in here. But if I get out of here alive, maybe I can find Vera and Lucia again. I turn back to Safina. ”But I promised somebody it ain’t gonna be me up in that sky tonight.”

Mustering up the last reserves of my energy, I send this cold obsidian flying.

[kaitlin]

nori attacks safina, obsidian throwing knife
h1R6EVVmU8throwing knife
{miss}

nori attacks seraphina; obsidian throwing knife
throwing knife
{8.5, cheek}

(accuracy on safina attack, day 4)
throwing knife
{4.0, back}

throwing knife·throwing knife·throwing knife

[D'Arcy Mason d6b [Tyler]]

[googlefont="Cinzel Decorative"]

Safina Roy

tell me about despair, yours - I

The tears had flown fresh as her name appeared in the sky. I struggled to focus through blurred eyes on her face, pleading to hold onto it just a little longer. The ghostly outline of the girl from home still etched onto my eyes as the sky goes back to the early dawn darkness, fading with each blink until they adjusted back to the absence of her. It had made her death seem official, now. I was now the only piece of District Three left in here.

The desert felt like it had just doubled in size.

In between the glass walls, just Tide and myself. And my eyes unable to stop their crying. It was all the worse for how embarrassed I was feeling about it all. I was a raging femme fatale, hungry for the fight. Only hours later I am reduced to a child, crying out with arms curled around my knees. All that was missing was begging for mommy and I'd complete the picture of the devastated weakling. It hadn't escaped my notice that no sponsors had sent me any wares today.

Suddenly I feel a presence on my body - soft, a little moist. My eyes jerk around and my arms move to fight until I see what seem to be a bunch of the tiny plants that litter the maze making their gentle way up my body. Their presence is soft and soothing. I decide to trust them; something in my gut tells me they won't hurt me.

They reach towards my face and I feel the tear tracks tickled away, absorbed into their mossy bodies. The plants have come to console me, drawn towards my sorrow and surrounding me in what feels like a warm hug. It's almost enough to start a fresh waterfall. It feels ironic - the sponsors who have stakes in my survival have given me nothing in the wake of my grief, and yet the arena where I am meant to die is here to take its pity. It's as if it knows the great tragedy of our fates in here. The plants around me hoping to do what little they can to help ease my destined path. As the tears stop the plants disperse once more, save but the one I see crawling into my bag. Here to help me if I need it once more. I look down at it, and over at Tide. Perhaps I'm not as alone as I feel.

As the day comes we take turns trying to sleep. In my turns, however, I find myself lost in thought. Whether it was the pity or sympathy or who knows what driving the plants' actions, the act itself is enough to help replace the overwhelming grief with a drive. A fire. A will to survive. I feel as though I have broken out of a cage and found wisdom outside of the shattered bars. I know the beast lies in wait inside of me, ready to pounce at the first sign of a fight. But I also know how the beast is a reckless thing; if I let it control me I may lose focus on anything but the fight at hand. I need to be able to tame this beast, bring it out when I need to, but not let it consume me. Maybe if I had done that before, the fight could've gone different. Maybe Serelis would still be among us. But I know that I still need that beast to drive me through doing what I need to do to get out of here alive.

I will master this beast inside of me. Or I will die trying.

The dusk approaches, signalling a new chance to move, a new chance to kill. Tide and I need to plan whether we go further into the maze and finally find that sweet water, or whether we chase after our ally's killers and take some revenge. Both are risky, both are rewarding.

Before we have the chance, though, the sands around us kick up in a deadly dance. Through the golden haze the world shifts. I don't see Tide. I don’t see the glass walls. I don't even see my own hand stretched out in front of my face. All I can do is slam shut my mouth and eyes and fight off the sand searching for every crevice to sink itself into. I am aware I am moving but I cannot tell in what direction. All that is left of the world is the ever swirling sands.

Until they stop, suddenly, and after a few minutes it's as if the sandstorm had never existed. I spit sand from my mouth, wipe it from my face, empty as much as I can. "Tide?" I call out, but there is no answer. I have no idea where I am, but I know I am nowhere near where I just was. The sand here is dark and scorching hot. I feel like I am burning up with each passing second.

Perhaps I am in hell.

As I gather my bearings and belongings and resolve to start figuring out where I might be, I see her. Nori, patched up from the damage we left her with the night before. She sees me and returns my furious gaze. "You following me? Can't a girl catch a break?"

"Like the one you and your friends gave Sera?" I retort, venom spitting with each word. The beast inside begins to stir, sensing my desire for some revenge. I want the girl to feel the pain she helped cause. I can see in her eyes that we both desire to see the other one dead by dawn.

The battle begins. I feel the knife graze my back as I raise the blunt to strike. Too late do I notice the other girl, unfamiliar but with a name on the tip of my tongue, standing there in the path of my weapon. It is too late to stop, too hard to turn my weapon away.

I can't seem to stop making enemies in this arena.

[Safina attacks Nori | Spiked Blunt]
uoTGjdOn5xspiked blunt
[Result = Miss 0.0]

[Safina attacks Seraphina | Spiked Blunt]
spiked blunt
[Result = Block 0.0]

[Accuracy on Nori Attack | Day 4]
spiked blunt
[Result = Deep Gash, Left Forearm 8.0]

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·spiked blunt

[Cait]

sera keoch

“Don’t drink that.”

The glass is halfway to Circe’s lips by the time I catch up to her, lingering by the edge of the maze. She barely looks back at me, staring intently into the depths of the strange chalice, body swaying slightly to the soft music she’d commented on wanting to investigate only minutes before.

I look around. No parachutes. Not from Flynn or Annie. Very obviously a trap. Surely she’s not so stupid as to–

“Too late.”

What the fuck?!

“What the fuck?!”

I make a mad dash forwards towards her, ignoring the pain that shoots up the side of my body from the sudden movement, but Circe easily sidesteps me. She tips the glass upside-down to prove her point, before letting the goblet go altogether. I watch as it buries itself into the sand, ten different images of the same cursed chalice bouncing off the walls of the never-ending labyrinth.

“It tastes... awful.”

I could slap her right now. “You idiot! What if that’s poison?!” I sink to the ground, pulling my bag off my back to rifle through it, searching for the tub of antivenom from earlier.

In a way, this is all Jupiter’s fault. If he hadn’t poisoned me, I wouldn’t have had to take the antidote, and I’d still have enough to force down Circe’s throat and save her, because God help us all if she dies to a fucking booby trap–

“I think it’s just wine.”

Great. Like that’s any better.

I crawl across the ground and pick up the discarded cup, sniffing it tentatively. The stained redness around the rim confirms that Circe is once again right, even before the scent of fermented berries punches me in the face. I sigh. It better not be spiked.

“Okay. Well. I guess we’ll just wait and see what happens. Capitol-grade liquor can’t be that strong, right?”

---

It must be, in fact, just about the strongest liquor known to man.

The effects of the alcohol are almost immediate. It’s kind of amazing, in an awful, fucked up way, how such a small amount of liquid can turn Circe into a completely different person. Like, it takes me at least five drinks before I even start to feel tipsy.

Circe’s size isn’t doing her any favours, of course. And stupid me thinks that means the alcohol is going to make her into the sleepy, mellow kind of drunk I used to be before I learnt how to control my liquor.

But no. She’s the rambling, trauma-dumping kind of drunk, leant up against a side of the labyrinth going off on a tangent about how she never drinks because it tore her family apart or something like that, and oh my god. If I wanted to spend my time in here babysitting tributes, I would have allied with little Junie.

It’s all very depressing. And feels incredibly wrong and intrusive of me to sit and listen to it all, knowing she won’t remember any of this come morning. But I can’t exactly leave her, can I?

Well, I’m proven wrong again.

“I need to go for a walk.”

Damn the fact I was literally just considering what I would give for a little bit of solitude; I can’t let her out of my sight.

“Like hell you do. You’re fucking wasted. I’m coming with you.”

Even in the thick of intoxication, Circe is still thinking like a survivor, a killer. “You’re injured. You shouldn’t walk anywhere.” I choose not to point out how she’s just as incapacitated as me right now. If not more so.

“I’ll only be 15 minutes. Just... stay here.”

I look at her incredulously as she staggers to her feet, hands outstretched like a tightrope walker to try and steady herself.

“Have you even been drunk before?”

She’s slow to reply, alcohol likely making her sluggish in words and movements alike. “Sure, a few times... I’ll be fine, I promise.”

Ugh. It’s literally as bad as looking after a five-year-old. All that’s missing is the pouting lip, the hands on the hips and the crocodile tears about not getting her way.

Fine. She’s a big girl. She wants air, she can go get her air.

“I’m giving you five minutes, max.” As if my permission meant anything to her. I watch her disappear around a corner of the labyrinth, sighing deeply to myself at the entire ordeal.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t grateful for the temporary silence, though. But it’s almost too much. The missing cadence of Circe’s voice must trigger some kind of melatonin release, because I’m so suddenly overcome with fatigue that I can’t help but shut my eyes, simultaneously fighting off the floating sand particles on the wind.

Just for a minute. Then I’ll find Circe again.

---

It is, in fact not just one minute I pass out for. I can tell too much time has elapsed by the change in the colour of the sky. That, and the fact that Circe is nowhere to be seen.

God. I’m the worst fucking person alive.

I’m running first, remembering second that my body is still desperately trying to heal my battle wounds, but not caring at all about the pain each stride brings. I’m out of the labyrinth in record time, confirming what I’d already suspected earlier – that we were close enough to the edge, and that if Circe had never consumed the wine and gone off on her drunken tangent, we would have been out of the maze ages ago, far away from the place of bloodshed, and most importantly, still together.

I race across the Arena, head whipping around from side to side desperately for any trace of raven hair, already knowing deep down how futile my efforts are.

I don’t know what to do. And it’s so fucking hot. Certainly too hot to think straight. I wish Flynn hadn’t called me today already. He’d know what to do, what to say.

But he’s not here. And neither is Circe. And neither is Izzy. It’s just me and all this stupid fucking black sand.

I feel myself start to hyperventilate, chest rising and falling unevenly, too quickly. Was there a trick to surviving panic attacks? Deep breaths? Fresh air?

Ha. That’s a good one.

Ultimately, I can’t remember what you’re supposed to do when you suddenly can’t breathe anymore, and so I do the only thing I feel I can manage in the moment: I collapse to the ground and bring my knees to my chest, hugging them tightly and squeezing my eyes shut. The heat of the sand is surely leaving first degree burns on my barely clothed skin, but the sizzling pain gives me some distraction from the lack of oxygen in the air.

I’ll close my eyes until I can breathe again; I’ll open my eyes and Circe will be here.

And when I finally do open my eyes, I’m pretty impressed with myself for actually having summoned Circe back to me with just the power of my own dehydrated thoughts, if the voices coming towards me are anything to go by.

But then I blink again, and the presence in front of me is very clearly not Circe.

And there’s two silhouettes, not just one.

And they do not sound or look happy.

“You following me? Can't a girl catch a break?”

“Like the one you and your friends gave Sera?”

Hey. That’s me!

Except... obviously not. I don’t even know the second girl. And you know what? I’d very much like to keep it that way.

“Um. Hey, sorry, haha. Don’t know how I got here. Umm. I’m clearly interrupting something you guys are tryna figure out. So I’m just gonna... go...”

“I’m sorry.”

What for? It’s so chill with me! Really, no stress at all.

That’s what I’m about to say, up until the moment Nori sends a very sharp, very shiny dagger flying in my direction.

Yeah, go figure. Attack the girl on the verge of a panic attack, covered head to toe in bandages as if she’s just escaped from a fucking mental asylum. Honestly, I’m probably not far off it.

The other girl swings at Nori, and I narrowly avoid the arc of her weapon as it slices through the air. And sure, she hadn’t hit me yet, but it’s only a matter of time before she realises I’m as much of an enemy to her as Nori is and comes after me, too.

So. I’m trapped in the middle of a bitch fight. And it’s clear now that there’s only one way I’m getting out of it.

seraphina attacks safina; spiked blunt

X8|PZ_oKIsspiked blunt

broken tailbone – 7

seraphina attacks nori; spiked blunt

spiked blunt

broken left femur – 8.5

self-defense roll on nori's attack

3-8

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·3-8

[august vance d7b [Bella]]

”Like the one you and your friends gave Sera?”

Safina’s look cuts daggers into me, her voice thick with pain. My heart folds inside my chest for a moment, retreating. I say nothing. Back home, I could never keep from crying when saying sorry--the shame of being caught doing something bad, the fear they wouldn’t want me anymore, the real desire to shine up my image in someone else’s eyes. But since I’ve grown, I’ve figured it out.

Just don’t apologize in front of people you don’t want to see you cry. Simple as that.

Sorry would fall on deaf ears here, anyway.

When Safina charges forward with her ball and chain, I try to back away, but the sand and heat have made everything fuzzy and slow. The metal spikes rip open the flesh of my arm, painting my left side red. I shout with no friends around to hear or care that I’m hurt. My eyes flicker helplessly towards Sera, the living one, but I’ve already made a mistake by throwing that knife at her; by the time she spoke it was already flying. I might as well have dug my own grave.

Sera’s weapon comes hurling towards me too, pulling my left leg out from under me. It bends backwards at an angle no leg should even bend, makes a cracking sound that can only have come from my bone. My scream cuts through the sound of the wind. The ground comes up to meet me, the scorching sand pressing into my cheek. Fuck.

Breathing shakily, I push myself up to a seated position, groaning, and grasp frantically at my belt to pull my sword from its sheath. Clutching the hilt, I point the weapon up at the two of them, back and forth.

”I was protecting my friends, just like she was protecting hers! Ain’t no hate between us,” I protest to Safina, beginning to scramble backwards in the sand, trying to give myself space. But my blood is oozing out, making little cakes in the sand. Sand grinds into my wounds, the pain nearly blinding me.

I give Sera a pleading look from below my sand-encrusted eyebrows. Though I know there’s no going back now that the blows have been dealt. We all know the rules. Still, to feel a decent person start to hate you right before your eyes will hurt no matter where you’re standing. Or in my case, sitting on the ground with your leg broken.

”Guess it’s hard to hold onto your friends in here,” I grumble aloud. ”They’re turning us all into monsters. At least we have that much in common.”

It’s not looking great for me, sitting here all bloody and pitiful on the ground. But I made a promise, and I’ll fight until the end.

[kaitlin]

nori attacks safina, gladiator sword
K5g2QwTLUksword
{3.5}

nori attacks seraphina; gladiator sword
sword
{0.0}

sword·sword

[D'Arcy Mason d6b [Tyler]]

[googlefont="Cinzel Decorative"]

Safina Roy

tell me about despair, yours - II

My weapon cuts through the air and meets its target, hitting Nori hard in the arm with a satisfying thud. I pull the blunt back in and take in the red that pools from its mark. For Serelis, I think to myself. Providing some logical ration to the reason I'm letting the beast move so freely, not that I need to work very hard to convince myself that it's necessary. As long as I stay in the driver's seat and not let it take hold of the reins.

I manage to avoid hitting the other girl in the nick of time, reassuring myself that this is proof that I haven't given myself over completely to that bloodthirsty creature. Nameless had yet to give me any reason to attack, after all. I glance over at her and recognize that she's one of the girls from Six. The face of Carmen, lit up in the sky, comes back to memory. I wonder whether she's now my mirror in this game; was she there to watch her district partner fall? An orphaned tribute now left with nothing from home to hold onto? There was no hiding the bandages covering her wounded body. Did she have a list of names on a hit list of her own? The feeling of familiarity without a reason why lingers in my mind like a mosquito's incessant hum around my ears.

Why can't I remember her name?

Ideally I would hope to possibly find an ally in this unknown girl; perhaps if I had noticed her there, had a chance to talk to her about the murderous girl from Eleven, I could've convinced her to help me take my revenge. If only she hadn't stumbled her way into the path of my weapon!! It was clear now that any chance of that was completely negated as I watched the girl take her defensive position and draw out a blunt of her own. I couldn't blame her for deciding a girl she didn't know throwing a weapon her way would be anything but an enemy. Thankfully I see her eyes dart back and forth between Nori and I. I may be an enemy in this girl's eyes now, but so is my own enemy. The three of us stand there, ready to fight off the other two to try and get away with our lives intact.

Nameless' weapon strikes out at us both, I try my best to move out of its way as it makes its way towards my rear. I'm not sure whether I was successful in my dodge or if adrenaline is working its magic to try and keep the pain at bay as long as possible. What I am sure of is that the girl managed to hit Nori hard in the leg, twisting its shape in an unnatural way and felling the girl down like a mighty tree. I see her back away and address me. "I was protecting my friends, just like she was protecting hers! Ain’t no hate between us!" I scoff at her words, the roaring of the beast within drowning out the small voice of reason telling me how right she is. Any semblance of sympathy for the words of the girl vanishing as her sword cuts into my hip.

"It's too late for no hate between us," I call back, "Not now. Not where we are." Nori mutters something under her breath. The other girl doesn't speak, just braces for the next strike.

How can any of us do anything other than hate the other, for standing in the way of our own survival? I will hate Nori for what she did to Sera. Her friends would hate me if I end her life in this stifling inferno we're in. Nameless would have her own friends and family who would hate me for robbing their daughter of a chance to come home.

Hate will breed like rabbits in here until none of us are alive to hate anymore.

[Safina attacks Nori | Spiked Blunt]
ANX_VSLZopspiked blunt
[Result = Deep Gash, Back of Head 9.0]

[Safina attacks Seraphina | Spiked Blunt]
spiked blunt
[Result = Block 0.0]

[Safina attempts to light-step Seraphina's attack]
1-10
[Result = Success! Damage Negated]

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·1-10

[Cait]

sera keoch

Apart from the first flung dagger in my direction, the other girls seem to want to leave me alone. Can’t figure out if the weapons they’re swinging at each other are aimed at me or not as well, but they don’t touch me. It’s as good a cue as any to leave – only there’s too much open space across the desert to trust myself enough to make a clean exit. Even if their weapons are pointed at each other for the moment, all it takes is a turned back presented as an opportunity for the tides to turn against me.

I’m piecing it together, slowly. Nori’s girls killed Sera. Sera’s friend is angry. Nori’s bleeding out on the floor. Both girls are looking at me uncertainly, expectantly, wondering who’s side I’ll take.

Honestly, it’s a nightmare. And this is exactly why friendship groups should never come in odd numbers!!

It’s not my place to interject myself into their war of words and weapons. My own spiked bat hangs loosely in my grasp; I’m terrified to realise how featherlight familiar its weight has become. I don’t want to use it.

Think I have to use it.

“Guess it’s hard to hold onto your friends in here.”

Nori’s looking straight at me when she says it. Huh. I think she’s trying to tell me something. Accuse me of a betrayal I didn’t know I committed.

But like... we’re not friends. We’re just people that existed in each other’s lives for a brief moment, a wrinkle in time, for no reason other than bad luck. We came together and drifted apart only to find each other again here, but there’s only so many times a rubber band can be stretched before it snaps completely.

“I don’t make friends.” Not anymore. “And if you guys did… well, that’s on you.”

They’re only going to rip your heart out.

They’re only going to leave you.

They’re only going to let you down.

Every woman for herself.

seraphina attacks safina; spiked blunt

f_JBISpoAispiked blunt

broken tailbone – 7

seraphina attacks nori; spiked blunt

spiked blunt

block – 0

accuracy on attack on nori

spiked blunt

miss – 0

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·spiked blunt

[august vance d7b [Bella]]

”It’s too late for no hate between us. Not now. Not where we are,” Safina answers.

Then everything around me goes black.

The muffled sound of Sera’s voice paints the back of my eyelids with color, tricks me into thinking I’m still watching their movements above my place on the ground. But my eyes are still closed, trapped shut by the blinding pain. I don’t know if she’s talking to me. I don’t catch what she says. The sand is soft and warm, like a hot bath; the wind washes over me like the screen door swinging open in summer. Maybe this is what the beach would be like, though I never got close to it. Not in this lifetime.

Everything in my body aches with a heavy, distant moaning. I don’t want to move. I wonder how long I can lay here on the soft sand before death takes me where he wants me to go. Though I don’t want to die. No, no, no. If only they would go away, I’d lay here until Lucia and Vera find me. To sew me back up again. ”Don’t you dare thank me,” Vera had said, handing the needle back.

The recollection of this small gesture of kindness overwhelms me, and suddenly I feel my throat tightening around a sob. I never did say thank you. Vera and Lucia are gone, and I’ll never be able to repay their kindness. I’ll die with the weight of that debt on my back. Who knew til the very end would happen so soon, without warning? I would have died just fine and content if I’d had one more day with them, in our halo of temporary safety, the armor we built with our laughter.

My heart aches with this last glimmer of love towards them. Even here, that’s what we had given each other. Making the effort to smile and care for a near-stranger when you’re scared deep in your bones, that’s the closest thing to love I could have asked for before this inevitable point where someone killed me.

When my eyes open they’re blurry behind a dam of tears breaking, and the world is spinning, the colors of Safina and Sera and sand all misty and dull and harsh at the same time. I don’t know how long I’ve been down. Sera doesn’t hit me again, though I see the fuzzy shape of her weapon float over me cautiously. Maybe they’re ignoring me now. Maybe they thought I was dead already. Maybe I already am.

I try to hoist myself up to a kneeling position, but my legs are unsteady, the bones in my left grinding together, and I fall back on my behind in a cloud of dust. Again. I press into the sand with my palms, putting all my weight onto my good femur. I don’t want to die lying on the ground.

”Hey Sera,” I wheeze through a dream-like fog of thought, in delirium, stream-of-consciousness being all I can manage. ”How do I look? I don’t wanna die ugly.”

And I swipe weakly for their legs with my sword, hoping to at least die fighting if I’m gonna die looking like a sack of busted potatoes.

[kaitlin]

nori attacks safina, gladiator sword
hkXWI2Gp0tsword
{9.5}

nori attacks seraphina; gladiator sword
sword
{9.5}

sword·sword

[D'Arcy Mason d6b [Tyler]]

[googlefont="Cinzel Decorative"]

Safina Roy

tell me about despair, yours - III

Nameless' words ring out in my ears. "I don't make friends, and if you guys did.. Well, that's on you." Fair enough, I suppose. We all knew what the Games entailed, the heavy price tag that would come with the saving of our own lives. The thought had plagued my mind in all of those days with Sera and Tide. I wonder quickly what happened to Tide now; whether in the chaos of the sandstorm he had managed to stay alive. Whether we would find our way to each other once more. Whether the numbers that remained would allow us to want to see each other again.

Only one person makes it out alive. And yet I got myself close to people that would need to die if I were to survive. How foolish of me. How refreshingly human of me. Something in my nature that the killer beast could not touch.

As smart as this girl was, I also felt for her in this moment. To survive the games with people you cared about was hard enough. If she had faced this all alone then that was infinitely worse. I wonder again whether she had a role in the death of her district partner, as an unwilling witness… or an enemy of circumstance.

At this point I watch Nori, battered and bruised, struggle to get up off the ground. Fighting for some dignity, I suppose. As much as I despise her in this moment I can't help but admire that the girl hasn't given up. I watch her open her mouth, start speaking to Nameless.

"Hey, Sera…"

The world around me starts to spin as the words register, bring back a mixture of emotions and recognition. Nameless suddenly has a name. The other Sera in here. I remember seeing the name on the list I had tried memorizing in my Training Center quarters, connecting the dots to the Sera I was coming to know well. Always stumbling over the girl from 6 with the similar name. It was as if I never got the hang of untangling the two from one another.

Even now I feel dazed as the emotions of the girl's death come back fresh. Grief at her loss, rage at her assailants, sorrow for Tide and I, guilt for knowing deep down that it needed to happen for me to get out of here. It had been a lot to process each of these the first time around, one at a time. All at once it was unbearable.

I’m vaguely aware that I'm staring into the face of the other Sera with all of this emotion mixed into a mosaic on my face. Seeing only the ways it differs from the young girl from District Three. I'm so lost in the features of her face that I don't notice the swing of her weapon taking aim once more. This time I know it makes contact, I feel the crack at the base of my spine and the pain radiates from it, snapping me right back to my senses in time to see Nori, too, with a sword coming towards my chest. My hand makes it to the blade just in time to divert it away from my heart, but the metal still plunges into my flesh.

Funny how a moment's hesitation is enough to change this so drastically.

The girls pull back. I direct my attention to Sera. "So you're Sera too, huh?" I huff out. I nod over in the direction of Nori. "Careful. She's got experience killing girls with that name."

"Me, I'm just learning as I go."

[Safina attacks Nori | Spiked Blunt]
s51SXLYyopspiked blunt
[Result = Broken Right Foot 6.5]

[Safina attacks Seraphina | Spiked Blunt]
spiked blunt
[Result = Broken Left Arm 6.5]

[Safina uses self-defense against Nori attack]
3-8
[Result = 6 damage negated]

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·3-8

[Cait]

sera keoch

filler; I'm so incredibly sick my head is so swollen I cannot write anything rn I'm so very sorry :( but here's a little bit of dialogue though sorry if it makes no sense

---

“So you’re Sera too, huh?”

“Ya, that’s me. Doesn’t seem to be a very lucky name in here, apparently.” I think on the irony of forcing this girl to fight someone with a name shared with her ally. Guess it was bound to happen sooner or later. Still. I almost feel bad for her. Heaven knows how damn confusing it must all be right now.

And then her weapon slams into my arm and, surprisingly, I suddenly don’t feel as empathetic or understanding. “Hm. For someone who’s ‘just learning’, you sure are fast at it.”

---

“Hey Sera.” I turn around, clutching my arm, reeling at the slickness that comes away, before realising the voice is coming up at me from the ground. Nori splits a grin at me, blood-stained teeth on display, exuding the same false confidence that intimidated me so on the first day in the Arena. “How do I look? I don’t wanna die ugly.”

I’d tell her it’s not over. That she isn’t dead yet, that nothing is promised in this world. But she’s writhing and rolling around on the floor looking desperate and ghostly, blood spewing from open wounds in a way that makes my skin crawl. I’ve never liked blood. Day-old cadavers are so much cleaner for dealing with.

“I think you’re asking the wrong girl for fashion advice. But... I think you look great, babe. Really. Pulling off the whole ‘brink of death’ thing better than Xov Thao ever did.”

Is it a mercy swing to bring my weapon down on her? Will it make me a different person if I kill her now? Would it make me a coward or someone respected to let Safina exact her revenge and finish the job off herself?

And most of all: is it a sin to take this life when I don’t even know if I want it for myself?

I wish I had answers; I wish I had more time. But there’s none of it to be found in a place like this.

So I close my eyes and let my weapon make the decision for me.

seraphina attacks safina; spiked blunt

rWta66dpVUspiked blunt

seraphina attacks nori; spiked blunt

spiked blunt

lightstep attempt on nori's attack #317

1-10

spiked blunt·spiked blunt·1-10

[august vance d7b [Bella]]

"Careful. She's got experience killing girls with that name."

Her words are confusing, unfair. My eyebrows furrow into a knot. Experience? Is that what you call killing one person to defend my friends?

”Oh, oh!” I call up, coughing, to the ceiling of the dome, the cameras. ”Look out Panem! I’m coming for your Seras!” I gaze back at Safina through the glassy fog of my eyes, which struggle to fix on any particular thing. ”Though I woulda been a Safina killer if I could have picked.”

I pucker my lips and blow her a kiss with one blood-sticky hand.

In my concussed stupor, Safina might be the personification of evil. I can see it now, a red aura of anger that emanates from her skin, so hot the air shimmers away from her. I wonder for a second who it’s burning worse–her or me. The image of her standing over me seems to multiply every time I blink. There’s one of her, then two, then four, then all of the Safinas are spinning around me in some murderous ritualistic dance, a hundred metal flails swinging in my direction, crashing into my foot again. The pain is distant, like it’s someone else’s foot. It gathers slowly, swells up and washes over me like a wave. I wince hard when I feel it, my face responding more slowly than the pain creeping up my leg.

”AAAIEEE!” I howl, the shout morphing into a prolonged moan of pain. Sucking up the last bit of moisture in my mouth, I hawk a gob of spit in Safina’s direction. I grumble at her, though it’s not clear if I’m speaking out loud, ”Self-righteous bitch! Acting like I’m your worst enemy. I put that poor girl out of her misery. I didn’t bludgeon her to death.”

Sera hasn’t hit me again, I know. The world is spinning but I can still tell who’s hurting me and not. Blessings upon her. She stares back at me like she’s been thinking about my question while Safina hit me, and has just now thought of the answer. She tells me I look great, better than that girl from Twelve last year. I hack up a laugh from deep in my sand-swollen lungs. Who could forget the end of last year’s Games. Lionel Estrada asking that poor girl to beg for mercy, and Xov refusing, stubborn, even as her severed left hand stared back at her from the floor.

I chuckle again through the pain, managing a weak, toothy smile. I certainly have a concussion. There are three Seras in front of me; I try to focus my eyes on the middle one. ”Yeah, thanks. I guess you’re right. I still have both hands.” I raise my hands in front of my face, and form two thumbs up. Only then do I realize I’m no longer holding my sword; that in my last swing it slipped out of my grip and hurled itself across the sand, out of reach. I think that’s it over there, behind Safina. Damn. I look back up at Sera, palms open.

”I’m not like her,” some part of me adds, still picturing that gruesome scene and this one. ”I won’t suffer for pride like that. I know it’s over.” I kick my broken leg to demonstrate, wincing at the pain that flares up in response. ”They don’t really need me back home.” My look turns pleading, teary eyes shining up at her. ”Don’t play around with me like Lionel did with that poor girl. Just end it, good and fair.” I hold Sera’s gaze, despite the spins, nodding like I’m trying to convince myself too.

The pain is constant, overwhelming. It overshadows all thought with just one thing: I want it to be over. I know there’s no coming back from the way Safina has crushed my body like this. I don’t wanna be a martyr. I already went and lived a life of toil and suffering, everyone I loved being taken from me. Enough is enough.

”Do it, Sera. Don’t let it be her,” I groan, shooting Safina the wary side-eye. ”She hates me.”

I want it now, I’m desperate for it. The cold, merciful strike of death. I growl, furious, grappling for Sera’s legs, kicking out at Safina. Inhaling all the air that will fit in my battered ribcage, I scream at both of them, ”Just DO IT!”

[kaitlin]

nori attacks safina, unarmed
VwZB_3ZGW0unarmed
{3.0}

nori attacks seraphina; unarmed
unarmed
{2.0}

unarmed·unarmed

[D'Arcy Mason d6b [Tyler]]

[googlefont="Cinzel Decorative"]

Safina Roy

tell me about despair, yours - IV

The heat is so intense.

All of this time it has been bearing down on us, engulfing the three of us in its suffocating grasp with a force that seems to be intent on sucking every last bit of air from the breaths we take. Only now, paired with the throbbing of the wounds that litter my body, am I aware of the fogginess of my brain, the slowness in the thoughts, the holes in the logic it can produce. How much I've been letting the beast roam free today. How much effort it now takes to try and reel it back in.

"For someone who's just learning, you sure are fast at it," Seraphina calls out. My brain sluggishly acknowledges the wit in the remark. Why was I trying to kill her again? It was hard to remember. If only it would cool down a little so I could think more clearly. It had all gotten so tangled up in the bloodlust of my inner beast, who looked for excuses instead of reasons. I manage to land on something witty in the fog. "Thanks, I'm a quick learner." Heh.

Nori's on the other side of me and I can tell the heat and exhaustion has taken a toll on her just as much as the wounds she's been dealt. Her hands bare, the giant sword dropped now out of reach. She's mocking my words now, and it's doing absolutely nothing to help clear my head and everything to stoke the fire to a new level of inferno.

Movement draws my attention back to Seraphina and I see her swing her mighty weapon, eyes closed shut as it hammers through the air. She doesn't know where she swings and the weapon whooshes by my head, barely missing me as it whistles away once again. Then Nori's suddenly screaming, spitting towards me in a way that would piss me off more if I wasn't already so angry. What a fine image the three of us must be right now, stumbling and screaming through the scorching sands.

Nori's cursing me out. "I put that girl out of her misery. I didn't bludgeon her to death." And through the anger and the foggy warmth of the mushy remnants of my mind, some semblance of truth resonates in the words she says. I struggle to remind myself of the exact events of the other Sera - my Sera, in a sense - and her death. Nori didn't cut off her arm, it's true. Nori hit the girl, but it wasn't her cross to bear alone. I couldn't remember now whether she had dealt the final blow. I wasn't sure if it even mattered; if Sera had just been on a painful countdown to a slower death. If Nori had truly been doing her a favour.

It was this beast inside of me that really just didn't care. I was angry, and that was all it needed to do. Let my anger fuel me and then use that fuel to take me over again. Persuade me with roaring promises of vengeance. Maybe Nori shouldn't have been the target of that vengeance, the fly under my swatter. But in the end she was, a place to channel the built-up anger that had been stoked with gasoline by the desire deep within for someone to pay with blood. She was a way to get to the real object of my anger. The girl with the guitar that chopped through a girl's arm in the first place.

Vera.

Nori has turned now to Sera, pleading for death to be at her hands. The girl knows her wounds are severe, her weapon too far to defend her life for much longer. "Do it, Sera. Don't let it be her. She hates me." For a moment I can see myself as if I'm looking onto the scene from the sidelines. I can see the rage burning in my eyes, the anger scrawled on my face. Uncontrollable, unforgiving. I can see the pleas of the girl on death's door. The beast before me doesn't care. Nori raises a fist against the beast but the weapon is already hurtling towards the pair of girls.

In the infernal heats that have engulfed us all, I finally land on a name for the beast.

Demon.

[Safina attacks Nori | Spiked Blunt]
5F|DPUPR8jspiked blunt
[Result = Stabbed in Forearm 8.5]

[Safina attacks Seraphina | Spiked Blunt]
spiked blunt
[Result = Miss 0.0]

spiked blunt·spiked blunt