Aries "Goat" Styche [avox :: done]

[rook]

{ a r i e s s t y c h e}
avox

i'll taste the devil's tears
drink from his soul
but i'll never give up you
i'll taste the devil's tears

My throat is dry, despite having necked half a bottle of whiskey before I scurried out of our wooden shack of a house, and into the midnight moon's soft light. The grass plains strech for mile after wicked mile, each blade is gently stroked with dew. The trees are few and far between. In the open landscape of District Ten, fields are stripped down, left simple for the animals to graze. So, there's no cover as I scramble over a crumbled stone wall and out into the fields. I am open and exposed, a dancing silhouette in front of the great moon. Mother would be proud to see me now, in my element. The whisper in the wind.

I am the devil, they say. Demon in the dark. Walking down the street, withered old ladies would point at me with long, bony fingers and shriek. My appearance is unorthodox. A thick, bushy beard clouds my face, contrasting from my high, protruding cheekbones and sunken eyes. I'm a skinny man, because we don't eat well these days. Thin arms, thin legs. My hair has been uncut for nearly a year. I run through the fields under the cover of darkness, those hags screams still fresh in my mind. The devil in human form. For folklore says that the devil takes the form of a goat, and my face very much resembles that.

Don't go out at night, not into the fields. The talk of townsfolk, panicked whispers on street corners. Mothers telling their children to come home before the sun sets on District Ten. Their little shoes pattering on cobblestone pathways, in fear of what hides on the other side of the hill. I ignore such warnings. The talk of the chupacabra. Some said they have seen the creature - a great beast, the size of a bear, with fangs like a bat, and horns like a bull. It's claws are like scythes, each one. And when it rears back on both legs, taking an entire sheep in it's jaw, it is the most horrifying creature on the planet. It's an escaped Muttation, that's what the townsfolk say. It must be.

It's not.

No one has seen the chupacabra. It's rumors and gossip, stories to stop children misbehaving. A fairytale, nothing more. Farmers have been reporting their sheep missing for months now, putting it down to the creature. Fools and idiots. In the absence of a logical explanation, they resort to blaming myth and folklore. Nothing can go unexplained, to them. They have to have an excuse, so that they don't need to worry. But they do. They do need to worry, because the chupacabra is so very, very real indeed.

I am the chupacabra.

Sickness plagues our farmland, with many of our flock dying of disease. Profits drop as quickly as the bodies, and I can no longer afford mother's medical care. She is dying, and so I must make blood sacrifice to make her better. Steal away the sheep from other farms, cut the throats of those that remain, make it look like a beast attacked. Yes, that's the way. Slaughter them like the animals they are, and make it seem to the world that a beast from the great abyss is responsible. The perfect crime.

And now, as I slip between the barbed wire on the outskirts of Daleland, I am ready. Knife in hand, crouched low. Like a wolf, stalking a flock. Because that's what I am. Nothing more than a common wolf killing for sport. The less sheep in District Ten, the higher the price of wool. Demand. I need to outgrow the competition, get the cash flowing back in the right direction, and pay for mother's medicinal care. This is all for her. She would be so proud of me.

Every slash at the throat of a sheep brings a dozen terrified bleets. The sticky, red mess is on my hands and down my shirt, all over my legs and boots. I keep killing, trying to keep the flock quiet. Trying not to draw attention to mys-

Click.

And there it is, pressing against the back of my head. The barrel of a gun, cold and solid and pressing.
"Drop the knife." The voice is dark, unmistakably Derrick Dale. I can almost picture his fat face chewing tobacco, whilst his chubby fingers fidget on the trigger of his long barrel rifle. I drop the knife, defeated.

---

And now look where we are, where we have come, and where we are goooiiiinnngggg. In the pit, the great pit. Belly of the beast, I was swallowed whole. Now I dance for their amusement, jester in the court, jester without a mind. Happy with giddy little cries and yelps, hopping about and around like a mad cat. Not a cat, no no no, we hate cats. Cats are vile vermin, like rats. Eat a cat, tastes chewy, like duck, but a darker meat. No, nothing tastes the same now. It's all just solid, or liquid, or putrid goo. No taste. Not now they cut out my tongue and threw me into the abyss. Down into a hole, into the core of the earth, like the worm that I am.

Oh, but I love it. Not a skinny little runt any more, no. Celebrated, better on, glorified for what I am. Goat. The name the townsfolk would shout at me from across the street, it's now my stage name. The wide-eyed, protruding-eared, long-bearded Goat from District Ten. What's left of that man's mind is tucked away. It has to be, if you want to survive here. In the pits. In the shit. I am bigger, stronger. Bulky, defined. A gladiator, taking on muttations three times my size. I may not measure up, but this Goat has horns.

And treasures. Crawling and crawling as my friends get slaughtered by illegal Muttations for the enjoyment of Capitolites. This is all against the law, that's half the irony of it. Cut out my tongue for a crime, but then they do something illegal with me. Irony so heavy that it presses against my chest and makes me scream for every second of every day. Arms and legs and decapitated heads, all rolling around on the Arena floor as some great beast devours my fellow Avoxes one by one. And I collect their entrails, precious and delicious and valuable. Bones and guts and organs, all for my collection.

I scramble away, ever the rat in the corner. Waiting, waiting, waiting.

he said "i am the devil, boy,
come with me and we'll break many laws"
he offered me eternal life
but inside my heart there's a picture of a girl

word count: 1083, graphics: rook
theme: the devil's tears by angus and julia stone

[maverick hale 🌧️ d5 [nyte]]