Tri-District Tournament Day One: Juno vs. Fray

Tarver Fray's a fuckin' asshole.

Noel had screamed bloody murder when she'd been told she'd be getting onto a train to District Four without Leon. The first time they'd ever been separated since they found each-other, the furthest they'd ever been. And when the train eased away from the station and the distance between them grew larger and larger, Noel swore she felt her chest tear in two.

She hadn't cried in front of her adopted father, nor in front of Syrena, but when she'd beaten her first opponent and sauntered back to her quarters and found herself alone, she'd wept silently - thinking only of him, her twin, and if he was as broken as she was to be apart. Noel knew this was some sort of fucked-up punishment for god knows what - probably when Tarver had muttered something about co-dependency and she had told him to fuck off, and now here she was.

So when she got up the next morning and stepped into the arena with a last name that wasn't hers, not really, but everyone seemed obsessed with - she pictured Fray's asshole face and knocked her opponent out with one clean crack! to the skull.

Tried and tested, Noel took one look at Juno of District Two and watched as her face morphed into that of her adopted father.

Bastard, she thinks as she swings - nothing but rage and the distance between herself and her brother.

noel attacks juno, flail
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Noel hears something thud, but no crack - she swings her arm around in a circle, the flail following its trail in the air and picking up momentum. A little flair, a little warm-up, Noel huffs air through her nostrils in annoyance. She's just getting started, she tells herself. It's okay not to K.O. in the first attack.

She grits her teeth and sees an axe fly toward her -- not so fast, she thinks, skipping her feet once, twice, before sliding at the last second across the floor baseball-style. The axe soars over her head and clatters to the floor behind her, but she doesn't look to see where it landed. Instead her eyes are concentrated on her opponent's legs, pulling her right arm up to arc the flail as she slides. If she can get Juno on the floor, she's got this in the bag.

Come on, she thinks. Come on, fall down. The sooner this is over, the sooner she can go back to One and find Leon.

noel attacks juno, flail
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miss 0

But she's too quick, still sliding across the floor as the weapon strikes - its weight too slow for her movements. It snaps at air, the chain clinking without impact, and falls to the ground, dragging Noel's arm with it as her body tumbles against the matt.

"Damn it," she spits, scrambling upwards to regain herself.

If there’s one thing Noel has been good at, it’s avoiding consequences.

Until now, until Tarver Fray caught her and Leon red-handed in his kitchen. But for years she and her twin had dodged Keepers, flashlights, sirens. Flung fists, eyes to identify their faces, potential parents looking to split them apart. So when Noel scrambles up from the floor and heaves the flail upwards, each bout of effort feeling heavier and heavier as her stamina depleats, it’s second-nature to bend her whole body backwards and watch the second axe fly across the air above her.

On the come-up, she aims for the head.

noel attacks juno, flail
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The weight of her weapon lashes awkwardly to the side, a clean sweep through the air. And there's a split-second where Noel thinks she can grab her balance, side-step just quickly enough to pirouette with the momentum and slam her weapon back again. She feels powerful in that second. Like everything's going to be okay.

And then the moment is over, and something is digging deep into her chest and pushing her down to the ground. She lands with a thud, smacking the back of her skull on the training mat, and the crowd groans on impact. Her weapon greets her with a clang beside her, ball and chain lying as uselessly as she.

There's an axe sticking out of her protective vest, the wind knocked out of her chest. But she grabs the handle and yoinks it out, heaving in a gasp of air as she casts it aside and crawls up onto all fours, blowing loose strands of hair out of her face as she grimaces upward towards Juno of Two.

She'll be punished for this, she thinks bitterly, even if she wins. Looking like a legend one day and a fool the next -- Tarver won't stand for slackers. She can hear his voice in her head already, how without the vest she would've had a canon in the games by now. Her conscience retorts back something about how he'd know what that sounded like all too well, more kids dead in the games than she has fingers on her right hand, and as she hauls herself up she realises this is why she's in this position.

Because she's too damn smart for her own damn good. And if you can't outwit, outplay.

Heaving with exhaustion, she jumps forward with a roar and a mighty swing.

noel attacks juno, flail
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deep gash 8flail

Noel's weapon finally, finally finds its target, drawing blood and blooming a bruise under her opponent's skin. It's a satisfying feeling, especially pretending that her opponent isn't a kid from Two but her real enemy: the man that paperwork claims is her father.

There's a rush of adrenaline that comes on the impact, confidence lingering on the verge of arrogance. She's found her rhythm, keeping her eyes locked on the axes that fly from Juno's hands. She ducks to the right but feels a stinging in her cheek as she flinches, a hot slice carving into the delicate skin -- "argh!" she cries, blood dripping to the floor before them.

noel attacks juno, flail
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miss 0


13.5/25

Instinctively she lashes out with her weapon and it strikes nothing but air - Juno keeping distance with ranged weapons. It's just a scratch, she tells herself, trying not to think that if she had bent her head at another angle she might have lost her head entirely. And she's not dying here, not in Four - where the air is tangy and humid, where strangers gather to bet on her like sport based only on the surname printed next to NOEL on the billboards and books.

Not without Leon. Not this far away from him.