eye of the noose | [clue killer / naomi / cleo ]

[cluekiller]

TW: violence, torture, death

Predictability will be their downfall.

I remove my glove to wake them up. Nails scraping against chalkboard, screaming against weak ears and strained necks. The girls wake up in identical predicaments, nooses around their necks, wrists tied behind their backs, feet planted on top of unsteady buckets. They will sense the danger before they see they are facing each other, mirror reflections of one another. I stand by their side, waiting patiently. One will watch the other die tragically.

"Hello, my little rulebreakers."

They can't help themselves, and neither can I. Ambitiously snatching two instead of one this time, and Cleo is a repeat visitor. Who would've thought it would be so easy?

"Welcome back, Cleo. Happy to see me again? I bet you still haven't figured out why you're here," I tease, smiling behind my mask. I wonder if she will snap at me again and call me a psycho, or has she learned by now that she is powerless in my presence? "Try not to throw up this time. I had to clean that unsightly mess by myself." I pretend to think she cares about my wellbeing. I enjoy mocking her. It is her own fault she is in this situation.

Naomi is different. I strut to her side of the dimly-lit room and tilt my head at her. "And you. I bet you never thought you'd be here. Or did you?" Rage festers within me for a moment, a hot flash of something they cannot see written across my face. It lasts only for a moment before I compose my breathing and turn away.

"Anyway, this time is going to be different. We're playing a game," I walk to the chalkboard and reveal a drawing. Six blank spaces beneath a sketch of the gallows. "Have you ever heard of Hangman?"

As much as Cleo's torture brought me joy, this would be different. The tension and fear melting off of their cheeks will fill my appetite today. It is emotional torture more than anything, and it is exactly what they deserve. At the end of it, only one of them will walk away.

"The winner survives. The loser dies. Understand? You have to guess the most letters."

I wait for their responses. Whether it be tears, pleas, shouts of rage, frustrated scoffs, accusations, I do not care what they think of me or what they have to offer. I've come too far to change my mind about this. "I will give you one hint."

I turn around and write it on the board.

'A fun hobby.'

"Begin."

charade [nyte] welcome to your game. There is only one winner, and as has already been said: only one survivor. The game will work largely like you'd expect. Guess a letter, hope you got it right. For the sake of continuity, we'll do it like this: For your first posts, do not guess a letter. Your first post should be more of a reaction to waking up in your current, erm, condition. You can use this opportunity to roll for your next post. (1-10) The person with the higher roll will be given the correct letter, while the person with the lower roll will be given an incorrect letter. You may roll for the next round in your second posts, and so on. The person who wins the most out of the first three rounds will live, and the other, well... it is called hangman, isn't it?

[charade]

C L E O

It was her own fault she supposed, for working up enough courage to try to walk alone to Grady’s dorm at night, to ask if he wanted to take her out to a restaurant. Maybe, maybe she felt bad about the way she was starting to feel about Benji. Maybe. But that was the problem with trying to do something nice for anyone other than herself.

It usually backfired.

When she’d woken up in a familiar room she’d actually let out a sigh of utter exasperation before the fear started to creep in. What was going to happen this time? Was she going to be shocked until she could barely walk again? Why was that masked fucker obsessed with tying her up?

Stop it. Get some help.

With a jolt she realized she wasn’t alone either. Standing across from her was—Naomi? Hands bound, a rope around her neck, balancing precariously on a bucket. Fuck. Something was nagging at the back of her mind. Why Naomi? Why her and Naom; what did they have in common besides traveling the same circles? And why was some small part of her brain annoyed that she wasn’t the only one being kidnapped?

“Oh, come on!” she managed to say, her voice threatening to crack. But no, she couldn’t—couldn’t allow herself to show fear, not when there was someone watching. Someone like Naomi. If these were to be her last moments, she was not going to cry in front of a social try-hard who had to be everyone’s friend.

Not that she had much time to think about it as the bird mask approached. They mocked her, and the fact that she’d vomited from the shocks.

Bitch.

“Why—are you so obsessed with me?” she ground out, raising an eyebrow as she looked down, desperately trying to keep her balance. “People are going to start—talking.”

Of all the days to wear heels…

At least the masked motherfucker hadn’t taken them this time.

“I did what you wanted!”she wailed, but they ignored her and went to bother Naomi instead. Before explaining that they wanted to play a game. And the loser would kick the bucket. Well, would have the bucket kicked. It wasn't fair. She'd alerted the authorities, told everyone at school, warned them about this psycho. She'd done everything right and the bastard had taken her again.

Hangman.

What a bitch.

Cleo gulped nervously and wondered if the rope had just tightened or if it was her imagination getting away from her. A fun hobby? Oh what a great clue, like that narrowed it down. Shopping? Knitting? Baking? Volleyball? Oh, no, no, she had to think like the weirdo, didn’t she?

A fun hobby was creeping. Stalking. Kidnapping.

Murder?

“Do you think anyone knows where we are?” she said to Naomi instead, her voice wavering slightly. Ah, she could just picture Benji and Maverick riding in to rescue them. Grady—

Well, maybe he’d be driving the car.

It was a nice thought.

z|jh1CKSKm1-10

reroll for the tie breaker
1-10

and again

1-10

B U R N S

kaitlin

1-10·1-10·1-10

[[nyte]]

Her dreams were warm. A blur of rosy lips and pale skin, of laughter smothered in her palm and stowed away for a rainy day. Fingers gentle as they trap a formless face, biting the tip of her tongue as she draws gentle circles on their skin with a makeup brush. She remembers what it's like to smile, the kind that creeps upon your lips when you're least expecting it. Sloppier than those she learned to force, ones you can't bite back no matter how hard you try.

It had been a very long time since Naomi Valero could recall her sleep being filled with anything but paralyzing fear.

But today, her dreams were warm.

Wake up. Sharp an tinny, a screech that suffocates. Wake up! She's fighting through ice, so fucking numb that she can't feel her fingertips. She's out of control and it terrifies her, letting her bindings dig into her wrists just to prove her hands are still there. WAKE UP. Her eyes snap open, grounded by pain and halfway to a panic attack.

There's warmth dripping off her fingertips and something chafing against her throat. Settled upon a perch that teeters uncertainly beneath her and for one terrifying second, she thinks she recognizes the person across from her.

Blinded to all but her own panic, Naomi strains against her bonds realizing quickly just how close she's coming to death and past the point of asking why. If that's Clara, if they have Clara too -

the person bound across from her lets out an exaggerated sigh and Naomi instantly recognizes her companion. "Cleo?" And oh, she sounds pathetic. Voice high pitched, trembling as she chokes on the words. Even now she's nothing, hyperventilating as Cleo trades banter with their attacker.

And then the... thing draws close to her. "D-don't!" She chokes out, recoiling from them like she'd been struck. "Please." She squeezes her eyes shut, tasting tears and trying not to gag. She almost asks why, an instinctual question clinging to the tip of her tongue and kept in place by her last shred of pride.

This is senseless. Something twisted lingers beneath that mask, contorted by it's toxic thoughts. Reveling in fear, in cruelty. Quite literally playing with it's food. It doesn't matter what it thinks of her, or if Cleo is cruel and she is a coward. She won't give it a chance to try and justify this fucking game, not even to sate her own curiosity. If Naomi dies here, she doesn't want to know why.

When Cleo speaks to her, it's almost calming. She tears her gaze away from the gallows, toward the girl that looks so much like her dear friend. They're little more than acquaintances, but at least she's not a psychopath in a bird costume. "I don't know." She's still struggling to speak, sucking in breaths like she's trying to memorize the sensation.

"But maybe we can-" The words are torn in two by a sob, dragged involuntarily from her throat, "maybe we can talk. There must be something we can offer it, right? What does it want?"

And after all this time, she still just wants to run away.

w6PYmnnAfA1-10

(tie breaker bc apparently naomi and cleo guessed the same fuckin letter, like bottoms)

1-10

1-10

1-10·1-10·1-10

[cluekiller]

I expect nothing less from Cleo. She flatters herself in my presence, ever the swan in the spotlight. Attention adores her. This time, the encore is not in her favor. If she is lucky, she walks out of here a second time. I wonder if she will learn anything from this experience. She failed last time. Perhaps I am the drill to her selfish mind, yet I am written off as a psycho, a mindless reaper, the embodiment of chaos. Unfortunately, I cannot carve self-reflection into their bones. Sure, I could tell them why, but what is the fun in that?

This calculated chaos is for my own satisfaction.

Where there is an opportunity for pity, I see irony in Naomi's tears. There is no piece of me remaining that can feel a semblance of sympathy for her. A sweet face, pathetic cries. I should silence her for the audacity, but I have a feeling punishing tears will only breed more. I have no time to train her like a mutt. The game must carry on.

I anticipated their chatty behavior. They will inevitably conjure ways to attempt escape. I raise my eyebrow at Cleo, a gesture she cannot see, and wonder how she plans to play the game. Will she tell Naomi that begging is fruitless? That she has nothing of interest to me? Maybe this time she will gamble something new, something that the oh so innocent Naomi will bring to the table.

My answer is the same. I want what I want, and it is nothing they possess.

At this moment, they don't even possess their own lives. I do. Regardless whether they choose the right or wrong letters, at the end of the night, I can kick the buckets beneath their shoes and watch them swing.

They are mine.

"Tsk tsk," I shake my head at Cleo. "Wrong answer. Looks like Naomi has the one-up already."

I turn and write the letter "i".

_ _ _ i _ _

"Vowels are a safe choice," I muse, and I wonder how Cleo will react to the reaper breathing down her neck. He inches ever so close. How prepared is she to die? How prepared is Naomi to watch? I suppose I expect too much. I am sure Naomi will close her eyes like the coward she is.

"Time to step it up, ladies. Your necks are on the line." I turn to Cleo, nodding in her direction to indicate my smugness. "It wouldn't be so bad, would it? The world would finally know what it takes to shut you up."

[charade]

C L E O

What to offer the person that chopped Cass up and put him in a cooler?

Oh gee, well she’d already tried money and sex so the killer was clearly blind and stupid. They wanted something but obviously, they didn’t know what that was. Imagine not knowing what you wanted out of life. Pitiful.

Cleo moved one foot shakily, trying not to slip off her perch.

“They want death, Naomi, that’s why they turned Cassius into dog food.”

God, get with program, Naomi, she wanted to say. There was no time for this. If rescue wasn’t coming they needed to figure something out fast. Shame, the way that Naomi clung to people like a parasite, Cleo had thought she'd have been near someone when she was taken.

Ah well, instead of playing the game, Cleo thought, y’know, maybe they could establish a little rapport, a little quid quo pro. Figure out a way to choke the killer on their beak, not be murdered, slam birdbrain into the chalkboard until their head was a bloody smear.

Just girl things.

And then Naomi said the letter I.

That conniving little bitch.

What a time to grow a backbone.

“A!” Cleo sputtered indignantly. Her head snapping to the killer.

“Tsk, tsk.” they said, shaking their head. “Wrong answer, looks like Naomi has the one-up already.”

They drew an I on the board and Cleo felt like screaming bloody murder. If the noose didn’t strangle her, she was going to strangle Naomi with her bare hands. Screw it, why pretend to tolerate her anymore? Naomi always took too long to get to the damn point anyway. Always looking to get something, never enough spine to say it outright.

Why Clara willingly chose to hang around that little weasel, Cleo couldn’t begin to fathom.

“Look, look.” she said, pleading with her eyes, cold and angery and worried all at once. “You—you need me. You need me okay? They listened to me. No one’s going to listen to Naomi, she never speaks up, okay?”

Cleo could feel the sweat beading on her forehead. They didn’t actually want to kill her, did they? They let her go the first time. Who wouldn’t?

She was Cleo fucking Burns.

Even a sociopath had to respect that. Birds of a feather or however the saying went.


ueeyeOdu901-10

B U R N S

kaitlin

1-10

[[nyte]]

Her heart is a jackhammer, voice somewhere between a whisper and a scream. There's blood rushing in her ears, a scratching at the back of her skull. A whistle-tone nearing a scream. You have to think your way out of this.

Naomi is tactical, she had to learn to be.

She lost Maverick and Grady and, a few hours ago, she would have told you that felt a lot like dying. Familiarity fading to a colorless grey, the way their eyes would find anywhere but her when she was the one searching desperately for their gaze.

And that was fucking agony, leaving scars she could still feel if she brushed her hand across her throat. Naomi swore she'd never let it happen again - she wasn't going to survive another heartbreak.

She bites down a hint of a bitter smile - don't worry the irony isn't lost on her.

It takes two, maybe three minutes for Cleo to descend into desperation. Past denial and into bargaining, is she? "How much of a villain can you fucking be!?" She barks, coughing at the force of which she spits the words. Even here, even elevated on the same shitty buckets Cleo still treats her like she's nothing.

There's no reason to cling to composure in hell. "You really think this will stop because you think you're better than me? Than everyone?!"

Anger flows, warm and tasting of rotten pennies. Hopeless and bitter, like all these words she's swallowed in an attempt to be pleasant. To be meek, to make herself into less of a burden because then maybe someone could stand to fucking look at her in a way that didn't hurt.

Naomi has always been nothing, she's going to die as nothing. One letter out of six and Cleo decides Naomi is an easier enemy. It only stings because she didn't expect it. It only stings because it comes from lips that look so much like Clara's.

She's on the precipice of a revelation, chest empty having purged so many demons.

She wants to win.

Knowing everything that would mean.

She wants to win more than she's wanted anything in the world.

"It wants us to play, let's play." She clenches her fists behind her back, "May the best woman win, Cleo."

tJWzrGAIuR1-10

1-10

[cluekiller]

Panic manifests, and I can taste desperation in the air. It filters through my mask, potent and delicious. I offer her my full attention. She attempts to bargain faster than I expected. Her head fills with air, and her ego lifts her from the earth. Naturally, I must anchor her back down to reality. She can not presume to know what I need. I do agree with her statement about Naomi, how the caged songbird chokes when she should not, but that won't convince me.

"You already served your purpose," I reply slowly, tone wrapped in the silks of solemnity. I want her to know I mean business. Rules are rules, and I don't want to change them this time. Her death is far overdue.

Naomi speaks up from across the room, drawing my attention like a magnet. The songbird defends herself only when her own death is on the line, of course. And yet I find myself smiling at the stage show. Only one round in and they start to crumble. This is so much easier than I anticipated.

"As much as I enjoy your bickering, it's time to move on. The game decides who lives tonight." I turn toward the board again, chalk resting between my gloved fingertips.

Naomi guesses correctly a second time, and then a third. I assume she has spotted the pattern.

s _ _ i n g

Secretly, I think this is meant to be.

I pivot slowly to face Cleo. "Naomi wins," I report, carefully. I watch her for a moment, allowing the weight to sink. The reaper breathes down her neck a second time and wraps his ivory bones around her neck.

"Any last words?"

As I set the chalk down, I slide quickly to her side. If she speaks, I do not plan to listen. I hope, as I kick the bucket with the full force of my foot, that she chokes on her final pleas.

The noose constricts her delicate throat like a hungry snake. I wonder how it feels to gasp for breath and find nothing. Reaching for something she cannot grasp. A new experience for her, I presume, and her last.

I do not check on Naomi until Cleo's face tints blue. Whether she chooses to watch is on her own conscience, but she cannot escape it. Even if she closes her eyes, she will hear the retches in Cleo's throat and the tightening of the rope.

"Congratulations, Naomi. You live."

As she said, may the best woman win.

"For now."

Naomi is a better person than Cleo, but she has sins of her own. She is imperfect. My hatred does not fall any shorter in comparison.

I grab something she cannot see, and jam it into her arm. A syringe. "This is a paralytic," I say, tossing it aside in favor of a knife. I scrape it across her rope until she is safe from the noose's clutches. "In a moment, your arms and legs will feel like jelly. Don't worry though, your organs won't shut down." That would defeat the purpose.

From the shadows, I gather my equipment and slink toward her ragdoll body. My movements are slow and agonizingly meticulous as I kneel by her side, a needle and thread in hand. "It's funny, what I'm about to do. Silencing the songbird." I position my needle below her lip. "It won't make a difference though. Cleo is dead, but you will still be the same. You don't sing when it matters."

I jam the needle through her flesh. Blood oozes, staining porcelain skin. I feel nothing.

I return to my board and use my chalk to finish the word.

s e w i n g

"It was so easy! Why didn't either of you think of this?" I taunt.

Once I am finished, her mouth is sewn completely shut. Gently, I wrap a blindfold around her eyes. Now I will send her back into the world the way she has always been.

Useless.

ooc: both of you are allowed to post reactions as you see fit, but this post will be the killer's last!

[charade]

C L E O

It was worth a shot, she thought irritably, pushing away the wave of depression that hit her. Why did no one understand her importance? She was the glue that held the goddamn group together. The one they rallied around. The true alpha bitch, despite Stella’s spider web catching the unwary. When Cleo talked people listened, they had to. That was the kind of presence she had, that was who she was, and fuck anyone who thought otherwise.

Like Naomi. Like the killer. Oh, she knew she should be afraid, worried about her impending doom, especially when she failed to guess the letter again. But it was just so hard to be scared when she was so enraged by her helplessness. The birdbrain was a fucking fuck that didn’t play by any set of rules that Cleo understood other than being in control of the situation was the most important thing.

“Oh, shut up!” Cleo snapped at her sister’s simp. “Villain? Trying to sound smart or something? Call me a bitch. Everyone else does.” She clenched her teeth and glared at Naomi. It wasn’t like when she’d been electrocuted. She didn’t have the time to be afraid. This was a competition now, and Cleo hated losing.

But Naomi had more to say.

“Oh for—“ Cleo ground out, rolling her eyes. “Newsflash, Naomi, I am better than you. For fuck’s sake you’re almost as pathetic as Elaina.”

It was a mistake to get carried away though, because Naomi guessed another letter in the meantime, but Cleo’s rage was blinding her to anything else. They said when a person was faced with death, they showed their true face. And so she did, tearing the mask away and showing exactly who she was. No games, just fire and brimstone.

And yet Naomi, the meek little mouse , still had more to say.

"I’m the only woman here," Cleo retorted. "You’re just a stupid little girl.”

The killer then announced that Naomi had won the game, something Cleo found idiotic as there were still several letters to go, but she didn’t expect the bird to play by her rules. Not anymore.

“Any last words?”

Many, very many and not enough time to say them all. But she’d accepted her fate. She’d been outplayed and outmaneuvered at every turn. Had her control ripped away from her. It had reduced her to tears the first time.

A second time? All it did was piss her off.

So that was it. That was how she was going to go out, hung from the gallows like a rebel spy. Not the way she'd have wanted to go out, even if she had told Maverick to choke her that one time. At least she was dressed to kill, she thought with a sniff. If anyone could make a good looking corpse, it would be her.

“I’ll see you in hell.” she hissed as the bucket was kicked out from under her.

If she was lucky, maybe she’d see Benji there too.

FIN.

B U R N S

kaitlin