C o n q u e s t o f S p a c e s {Drace}

[gamemaker kelsier]

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"You could still be,
what you want to,
What you said you were,
when I met you." ;[/b][/size][/color][/font][/center]

His heart beats beside mine, a steady pulse, sped up and loud in my ears. There is fear in his eyes, and when he blinks, it's through blood and sweat. My arm is wrapped firmly around his shoulder, and his weight is against my skin, his own hot and sticky. He smells of tar, of iron, and Drace. It intoxicates me, calms me down from the previous rage I felt only moments ago when I knew I could tear him and everyone else apart with one finger and not feel tired. A shiver of fear runs down my spine, and I quell it just as quick. There is anger that rests beneath my bones, wanting to be let free, but not right now, not when he is in pain. He is, I know he is. His breath comes in ragged gasps from his short run, and he limps from the beast's attacks.

I don't know how long we have been moving, I have only been trying to get as far away as possible. From the tar, the mutt, my emotions, everything. Moving feels good and correct. It feels safe. We come into a clearing and Locust stops, so I do as well, choosing a spot clear of tar and debris to set Drace down, slowly, I rest him against a log, afraid of my own legs giving out beneath me, both calves now cut. Carefully, I tighten the bandages I hastily tied around the bleeding calf only moments ago, grunting softly from the burning pain at the movement. With that taken care of well enough for the time being, I move on to inspect Drace's wound. His leg is almost completely cut through from the mutt's tusk, and I sigh in soft exasperation at his inability to stay safe.

My movements are quick and focused, long fingers stitching him up with the needle and thread from his bag. I try to ignore the blood on my finger tips, so close, I can almost taste it. My mouth waters, and I literally have to bite my tongue to keep myself from tasting it, I want it so bad. I can remember how it tasted that day in the bathrooms, his hair between my fingers, and no space between us. Now there is a canyon, with me on one side and him on the other. I know not what to say to him, because I'm afraid if I speak he'll only bark back. He's barely said one word to me since I found him between the trees, running from a dead girl.

I don't know if he's angry at me or not. I don't remember why it matters that he isn't. I can't even remember why I wanted to be here in the first place. I feel sick, wasted away, and tired. It's getting harder to ignore all the dirt under my fingertips, all the blood that cakes my shirt, and the germs. I can't stand the bugs or the itch, or any of it. I can feel myself getting ready to blow whenever I have time to remember how dirty I am. I hate the dirt, and I lost the gift of my rubber gloves already. Sitting back on my heels, I rest my face in my palms, hiding for one moment from the world, hiding from the latest death on my hands. The mutt, if we're counting it, makes ten deaths. Nine back in one, one in the games.

It only gets easier to kill.

I never went through the moment of clarity, asking me why I was alright with it, the killing. I've been close to death since I was eight and found out someone could stab you through the chest and you'd be gone. I've been close to death ever since I started drinking people's blood in the first place. Sometimes you take to much, sometimes they die. It is a natural order, a cycle. I am the predator, they are the prey. I do not feel anything about it anymore. There is no reason to.

Parting my fingers, I stare at Drace, eyes searching his for signs of anything. I'm curious, I suppose. I'm not one hundred percent sure on why I'm here. At first, it felt vital that I protect him, but if he's going to do stupid things like not move when a charging elephant is going at him, I'm not sure if I see the point. Leaning forward, I break my eye contact with him, and begin to wrap a bandage around his leg. I take my time, making sure it is perfectly wrapped before I stand up and move beside him to rest against the dead log as well, keeping reasonable space between us. When I am comfortable, I simply ask, "Why?"

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[umber vivuus 12b 🥀 [dars]]

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[bg=090004][atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellSpacing,0,true][atrb=cellPadding,0,true][atrb=width,500,true] I'm waking up, I feel it in my bones enough to make my systems blow welcome to the new age, to the new age welcome to the new age, to the new age whoa, whoa, I'm radioactive, radioactive Steps fell like raindrops, each one causing a bigger mess in the world around me. I was covered in blood again. Why was it I was always covered in blood? (You chose to watch as a monstrous creature charged at you full speed, dumb ass.) Without the hand that was wrapped around my shoulder and pulling me forward, I probably would have stopped running long before. Not because I felt that I was safely out of reach from the raging mutation, I still didn't. But I had lost a lot of blood, and with it, a lot of energy. Did I look as bad as I felt? Probably. Maybe worse. I kept a steady stride with each step feeling like a stab to my thigh. (Couldn't afford to look silly, I suppose?) I knew I had a limp, and I wondered if maybe it would be permanent. After what felt like an eternity of running, Locust finally came to a dead halt, and Xanthus did the same. We were on a patch of dry land, but the smell of tar still infected the air. Was it the air that made me feel nauseous, or the blood loss, I wondered. Both would have made sense, because there was no telling how many things had fallen into the black substance that plagued every bit of land that my exhausted eyes could see and sank beneath it's surface, fighting for air until the thick bubbles they created ceased to exist. What if a tribute had already been swallowed whole by the stuff? There had been a cannon in the middle of the fight we had just escaped, for all we knew it could have been the tar's first victim. (Would it be the last?) One of the things my mind, still drugged with adrenaline, kept telling me was that I was doing all of this for nothing. (You were.) Was I? A part of me wondered why I was bothering. If death had already sank it's hungry teeth into my body, and was just waiting for me to draw my last breath, why was I fighting for what life I was still being allowed? Wouldn't it have been better to die now, before my friends built up too much hope for my return, then later, when they were beginning to picture what I would look like with a crown on my head? (Yes, but that won't stop you, will it?) No. It was a sad truth, and one that I regretted choosing, but I couldn't lie there and die. I thought, if only for a second, I could, when the mutt galloped at me with the hatred of the sun that I could, but I didn't want to be remembered like that. I didn't want people to remember my sister as the girl who's brother didn't try. I didn't want Dexter to look over at my empty bed and know that I could have done more to save myself and I didn't. I wouldn't quit. I would fight everything, just as the Capitol wanted, and I wouldn't do it for myself. I would do it for the family that I was never going to see again. For the ones that loved me, and understood me. "Why?" Xanthus wanted to know, as he fixed my leg. Why what? Why had I allowed the gaping hole to be placed in my leg? "I-" A knot formed in my throat and nearly stopped me from being able to breathe, let alone talk, but I tried my best to choke it down and keep my words calm. "I don't really know." It wasn't a complete lie, part of me still wasn't even sure if the other part was sane or not. "I guess I just got caught up in the moment, or something." I had a history of doing things because I was stuck in a moment, Xanthus of all people should know. My hand instinctively went to the nearly completely healed cut on the bend on my neck. It seemed like that day in the training center happened a lot longer than less than a week ago. Months, at least. Strangely, only one question arose in my head. One that I questioned even mattering to me. "You aren't mad at me, are you?" Why did it matter? Xanthus was supposed to be like every other tribute in that arena. An enemy. I was supposed to be able to kill him, just like everyone else, and never think twice about it, but even killing the girl from two had given me enough guilt to consider letting myself die. What was I going to do if it came down to Xanthus and I in the finale? I would have never been able to kill him, or even swing a weapon at him. Some how, I liked the boy that carefully stitched my leg closed. Even though he held a secret that could have meant the end for me, one that might even speed my untimely death up on it's quick course to me. As Locust and Opal announced their departure to scout the area, I stared at the curved blade of my sword. Each sway was more beautiful than the one before, and some how the thing managed to maintain a look of symmetry in it's unusual beauty. I decided it would probably do someone else a lot better than me, and if Xanthus had it, I knew it was in capable, careful hands. Besides, I needed to know that he forgave me, even if I never knew anything else. I needed to know everything would be okay. (It wouldn't.) [Drace gives Xanthus his Flamberge]

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ooc: table/graphic made by shrimp.

[gamemaker kelsier]

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[/color]

"You could still be,
what you want to,
What you said you were,
when I met you." ;[/b][/size][/color][/font][/center]

When I asked why, I was searching for answers, wondering why, like when you see a natural disaster and cannot fathom it. Naturally, Drace is a disaster to me, exactly what I don't need. He is something to pine after, to relate to back home. But he isn't from home, he is exotic to me, that tanned skin and those callused hands. When he speaks, his words are never full of anything but what they mean. He doesn't aim to lie or confuse. When he speaks, he means exactly what he says, and it's more than refreshing. I've never met someone like that, but for Nero, blunt to the bitter end of our relationship. Yet, when I asked why, I did want to know about why he didn't dodge the animal. Mostly though, I wanted to know why he kept dodging me. Why he acted like nothing had happened between us at all.

Maybe it was only me, but in those heated moments in the bathroom, I was happy for once. Yes, maybe I had lured him in there, but there had been a simplicity to us, we had connected on a different level. He knew my movements before I even made them. Drace had not been my first, not at all. There had been countless others, some of them even dead from the amount I took from them, yet none of them had tasted as sweet as him. I hadn't ever really had to do much chasing either, I was Xanthus Grimm. I was wealthy, mysterious, beautiful even. Yet somehow, I feel like I've been chasing Drace for a very, very long time, through centuries and disguises. He feels right, and tastes like home.

He doesn't see me though, and I'm sitting right here. I feel tiny, insignificant. I have spent these past two days watching him, reaching out to help him up when he stumbles, guarding him. He either does not care, or he does not notice. I've never struggled to be noticed before. Still, I tell myself that all I want him for is his blood. Only his blood, and that jawline. Or those eyes, and that voice. Quite possibly the beautiful way he moves, even when wounded. Might even be the lovely way his voice sound in my ear, when raw from kissing.

You aren't mad at me, are you?"

I stare at him, his expression, trying to figure out if he is serious. Maintaining a carefully blank one, I cock my head to the side as if to hear better. I am at a loss for words, trying to figure out why he might think that. I have never really felt hatred to most people. No, all my hatred is used up on those that took what was most precious to me. There is none left for anyone else, only quiet acceptance of their existence and me choosing to ignore that. There is a slight anger for the way he moves subtly away from me whenever I reach out for him, a slight sorrow for when I remember the taste of his lips on mine. Yet, there is no hatred for this boy with the morals that are far higher than my own. I open my mouth to attempt to voice these things, but before I can say anything, he hands me the beauty that is his sword.

Mesmerized, I stand up, legs slightly aching from cuts that slowly ooze blood. Ignoring the pain, I raise the sword, and go through the movements that I've been learning since I was a young boy being taught by my father. I sweep it in an arc through the air, body bending with it's movements as if it is simply an extension of myself. I can feel where the air bends around it's curves, hear the sting of it when it slices the air. I feel peaceful, going through the exercises, feeling the blade whirl around me as if I'm dancing. It is a sort of dance I suppose, my feet move fast enough, the sword could be a partner. The music is the wind I create. Finally slowing, I give Drace a slight bow, and then point to the pitchfork that rests beside him, still glittering red.

His eyes go to it, and selfish, horrible me, I lean down while he is otherwise entertained, and press my lips to his. He tastes still the same, and I find I'm desperate for him. I meant to just give him a quick peck, and leave off, but my tongue has other plans. Sharpened canines scratch against his lip and draw blood. Carefully, I kiss it away, the taste of the pure iron in my mouth almost intoxicating. I want more, oh so badly, but I know he can't give it. Tearing myself away, I stumble backwards, decidedly clumsy for me. I turn on my heel then and find a shadow to slip into, the flamberge clenched in one tapered hand.

[Xanthus receives Drace's sword]
[Xanthus gives Drace his pitch fork]

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