The Road Ahead // Arrows
Dec 21, 2015 23:23:36 GMT -5
Post by charade on Dec 21, 2015 23:23:36 GMT -5
KATELYN PERSIMMON
There hadn’t been a four way finale since the year Cricket Antoinette won. Given that she had been eleven when that had taken place, Katelyn wasn’t sure what to expect from the finale, and the knot in her stomach tightened with each passing second. The remaining tributes found each other far too soon for her liking. The careers; Someith and Septys, Heather from seven and Harbinger. There was an intake of breath, the steeling before the hammer dropped, and with a strike from the boy from four, the battle was joined. It didn’t take long to see a pattern In the attacks. Someith appeared to believe that the other career was the biggest threat to him and carved away at him mercilessly, Heather following suit.
Septys, for his part, did his best to defend himself from the onslaught of poleswords and did so bravely. Harbinger, harbinger chose to help the boy from one fight back against Someith, though his initial strikes were weak, no doubt in part to the loss in balance. The tributes traded words with their blows, but Katelyn scarcely heard what they were talking about. She and Kirito were sitting next to each other in the district eleven quarters, watching the screen like it was the only thing in the world that existed. The fight raged on until the first cannon fired, Caesar Flickerman exclaiming something about revenge and eliminations. The knot tightened further. Harbinger had killed Someith, unknowingly avenging his district partner, though he had no way of knowing that.
A minute or an eternity later Septys fell to Heather, and Katelyn felt a stab of sympathy for Opal, resolving to find her when she had the time. But until then…
“It was like this last year, when it came down to it. Watching you and Wyatt. Wondering what I would tell your family if you made it this far just to, to…”
Katelyn trailed off, watching Heather scream at Harbinger. Then she was back in the cold, in the snow. Margaret standing across from her, stoic and unfeeling, holding a spear coated in her blood. “I killed them you know.” She knew. Just like she knew that district eleven usually died early. Like she knew that seven had no victors, the same as her own. Like she knew that they were dead, they were both dead and Margaret had killed them. The ice castle was supposed to be a thing of beauty, but it was just the headstone on a frozen tomb for twenty-three. There was a shriek and Katelyn’s focus snapped back to the screen. Heather was missing an ear. Both tributes were bloody, the ground soaked with their efforts, a pair of bodies unmoving beneath them.
Harbinger took a breather while Heather dealt with her missing ear to pull something out of his pack and mutter something over it. She caught the words Chloe and thank you, but most of it was drowned out by the commentators. Heather destroyed his single piece of armor while he was reflecting and Katelyn’s heart leapt up in her throat. “I’m sorry you have to bury another son, Mr.Rhodes.” She’d practiced it a dozen times, alongside what she’d say to Annora’s sister. She closed her eyes, trying to prepare herself for the worst, finding and squeezing Kirito’s hand like the roots of an ancient oak tree holding onto the earth below it; heart pounding in her chest like the dull thrum of the threshing machines that cut the wheat. She couldn’t look. Not again, fate couldn’t be that kind again could it? A cannon fired and she felt the familiar twitch take hold of her shoulders.
It passed and Flickerman’s voice rose to a shout, yelling that this was an unbelievable end to the games. Then he started spouting something about games history firsts and the genius of Katelyn Persimmon’s mentoring style.
Her breath caught. She opened eyes that been screwed shut to see Harbinger standing alone on the column, and then she gasped in shock. Harbinger had done the impossible. Not surviving in spite of missing a leg, a few victors had done that, but while several districts had churned out multiple victors within the span of a couple years, this was unheard of. Three years in a row? That had never been done in games history. Not by any career district and sure as hell not by any lower district. For a moment, Katelyn was stock still, every muscle in her body tensed, much as it had when Kirito had been on the screen with Wyatt.
The Rhodes would not bury another son.
She had succeeded. They had succeeded.
It felt like there was an electric current running through her body, starting in her knees and working its way up to her lips, a tremor, not unlike the shivering the cold had caused her in her games. But warm. She shivered and grabbed Kirito by the shoulders, spinning him around. Without thinking, she planted a kiss full on his lips before wrapping him a tight bear hug, all her pent up frustrations escaping via her tear ducts. “We did it!” she cried. “Harbinger’s alive! He’s coming home, just like you did!” she sobbed.
Her boys were alive.
Katelyn's eyes were misty, but with tears of joy, damp with the flood of relief. “He’s coming home Kiri.” She chuckled exhaustedly and cleared her throat, before wiping the back of her hand across her face and breaking the hug, feeling suddenly awkward for her unbridled outburst of emotion. “I have a tattoo appointment to cancel.” she finished lamely but happily.
Harbinger was alive.
Odds be damned.
"When you’ve lost your way, when you have no words,
we are your strength, when you don’t have anymore. "
table coding (c) ghosty
