breathe out {anise; end}
May 29, 2017 4:10:09 GMT -5
Post by shrimp on May 29, 2017 4:10:09 GMT -5
She knows it's over. Her leg (or rather, what's left of it) burns like iron and it's taking all of her strength to lean against a tree for support. Her chest heaves, her inhales sharp and audible. An internal rhythm is fucked up and scrambling. Vision's beginning to blur into technicolor, like yesterday but worse - yesterday, at least Anise knew the symptoms would fade, with time. But it seems that she has no time left. Once more in this arena, nothing is as she expected.
What did she expect when she stepped forwards without a word?
To protect. To kill. To represent. To die.
And now here we are.
Anise's next attack is a miss as Cassiopeia counters with tears leaking from her eyes and spreading downwards. The two girls are soaked in crimson, dripping and staining the ground beneath. Anise understands the finality of the blade, its inertia too much to bear as she falters for just a moment. A moment is more than enough. Gravity caresses her in its rough-around-the-edges grasp as her leg buckles and she collapses, wax shattering with a crackle and the splint around her remaining leg snapping in two.
Pain wraps around her ribs and stays there, nestled in between her heart and her soul. It scratches in the nooks and crannies, curdles her blood and dashes up her spine. But she won't give, her teeth are cemented together by will and she forces her breathing back into a rhythm, as if this will prolong the inevitable. District Two will not have the pleasure of seeing her last breath filled with tears, despite the taunts that float through her brain. Not good enough. There's been three cannons today, she will be the fourth.
Her eyes, bloodshot sclera and almond irises, gaze at her left arm that floats in bitter wine and wax pebbles. The drawing's still there, a mosaic of two worlds intertwined, the mountain and the sea. Her right arm's smudged and faded, blood mixing in with the crayon petals, changing roses to rubies to stains that'll wash off in the next rainfall. But her left is forever, brilliant shades of silver and blue; one last gift from Gabby Bellamonte. (And you // kept us awake with wolves' teeth // sharing different heartbeats in one night)
The seconds that rush to claim her life last for millenium. Still she fights with Pain, its bloodlust that digs its spear into her side, presses into her bones. Death waits in front of her with palms raised to the sky. Molly Malachite flies upwards without a glance at the ground. Raven Barker steps behind a tree, never to be seen again. Eva Hope glitches twice, fingertips turning magenta before Death envelopes her back in its cloak. Cassiopeia's sobs turn into rivers. Whales lick at her skin and nuzzle against her wounds, dotted with garnets and softly peeping.
When her mother left that night, peonies turning towards the moon and hands clasped together so tightly that their knuckles were like snow, she told Anise that her fate was to was walk with demons. Anise wonders if she was right.
But at the end of the day, it was her decision to step forward, to slice at skin and to sit in silence as the trees whistled and the sands of time trickled out of the hourglass. It was her decision to keep her household from falling apart, to take two steps and not three in a marble hallway, to spend a night in mourning with a boy from eleven, to spend a week with a girl too rough too kind too much of everything under the sun. There was never any use in looking back, and she's not about to start now. Instead, she takes another step forward.
Her eardrums must be popping - is that the sound of a train? She must have acquired that ticket by now. The tide rolls, coating her leg in a warmth she had forgotten existed, sea foam lapping at her cheeks. Death sits beside her, a hymn echoing from its lips. Cassiopeia's face fades from view, obscured by a blur of blues, aqua and turquoise and periwinkle, a dash of goldenrod and hazel. She hears a smile in the air, a laugh in the wind. A weight lifted from her shoulders.
A shudder, a small gasp. Gabby holds her and she feels like the air. Death lends her a hand and she takes it, a numbness seeping into her veins and anchoring itself into her cerebrum. For a moment she feels sand in between her toes, a smell of salt from years ago that nudges its way into memory. The hurricane subsides, the eye of the storm dissaparates and there's one last strand that holds on - fear of the unknown, the uncertain, the unexpected.
But she's lived through gravity rotating and redirecting and re-righting itself. She's seen a land that crinkles under her touch, floating doors and a storm of roses. She's lived through screams and bloodshed, quiet sobs in a swimming pool and vigils that tore through her facade. She's climbed a staircase of teeth, created a symphony with 88 steps, flew through the air as her stomach dropped and her eyes widened. She's seen the unknown, survived the uncertain, fallen through space and time and into the unexpected. What lies ahead is just another journey.
Breathe in, breathe out. Feel the air enter your lungs, run through your bloodstream, spiral up your back and comfort your synapses.
With one last exhale, she cuts her string.
What did she expect when she stepped forwards without a word?
To protect. To kill. To represent. To die.
And now here we are.
Anise's next attack is a miss as Cassiopeia counters with tears leaking from her eyes and spreading downwards. The two girls are soaked in crimson, dripping and staining the ground beneath. Anise understands the finality of the blade, its inertia too much to bear as she falters for just a moment. A moment is more than enough. Gravity caresses her in its rough-around-the-edges grasp as her leg buckles and she collapses, wax shattering with a crackle and the splint around her remaining leg snapping in two.
Pain wraps around her ribs and stays there, nestled in between her heart and her soul. It scratches in the nooks and crannies, curdles her blood and dashes up her spine. But she won't give, her teeth are cemented together by will and she forces her breathing back into a rhythm, as if this will prolong the inevitable. District Two will not have the pleasure of seeing her last breath filled with tears, despite the taunts that float through her brain. Not good enough. There's been three cannons today, she will be the fourth.
Her eyes, bloodshot sclera and almond irises, gaze at her left arm that floats in bitter wine and wax pebbles. The drawing's still there, a mosaic of two worlds intertwined, the mountain and the sea. Her right arm's smudged and faded, blood mixing in with the crayon petals, changing roses to rubies to stains that'll wash off in the next rainfall. But her left is forever, brilliant shades of silver and blue; one last gift from Gabby Bellamonte. (And you // kept us awake with wolves' teeth // sharing different heartbeats in one night)
The seconds that rush to claim her life last for millenium. Still she fights with Pain, its bloodlust that digs its spear into her side, presses into her bones. Death waits in front of her with palms raised to the sky. Molly Malachite flies upwards without a glance at the ground. Raven Barker steps behind a tree, never to be seen again. Eva Hope glitches twice, fingertips turning magenta before Death envelopes her back in its cloak. Cassiopeia's sobs turn into rivers. Whales lick at her skin and nuzzle against her wounds, dotted with garnets and softly peeping.
When her mother left that night, peonies turning towards the moon and hands clasped together so tightly that their knuckles were like snow, she told Anise that her fate was to was walk with demons. Anise wonders if she was right.
But at the end of the day, it was her decision to step forward, to slice at skin and to sit in silence as the trees whistled and the sands of time trickled out of the hourglass. It was her decision to keep her household from falling apart, to take two steps and not three in a marble hallway, to spend a night in mourning with a boy from eleven, to spend a week with a girl too rough too kind too much of everything under the sun. There was never any use in looking back, and she's not about to start now. Instead, she takes another step forward.
Her eardrums must be popping - is that the sound of a train? She must have acquired that ticket by now. The tide rolls, coating her leg in a warmth she had forgotten existed, sea foam lapping at her cheeks. Death sits beside her, a hymn echoing from its lips. Cassiopeia's face fades from view, obscured by a blur of blues, aqua and turquoise and periwinkle, a dash of goldenrod and hazel. She hears a smile in the air, a laugh in the wind. A weight lifted from her shoulders.
A shudder, a small gasp. Gabby holds her and she feels like the air. Death lends her a hand and she takes it, a numbness seeping into her veins and anchoring itself into her cerebrum. For a moment she feels sand in between her toes, a smell of salt from years ago that nudges its way into memory. The hurricane subsides, the eye of the storm dissaparates and there's one last strand that holds on - fear of the unknown, the uncertain, the unexpected.
But she's lived through gravity rotating and redirecting and re-righting itself. She's seen a land that crinkles under her touch, floating doors and a storm of roses. She's lived through screams and bloodshed, quiet sobs in a swimming pool and vigils that tore through her facade. She's climbed a staircase of teeth, created a symphony with 88 steps, flew through the air as her stomach dropped and her eyes widened. She's seen the unknown, survived the uncertain, fallen through space and time and into the unexpected. What lies ahead is just another journey.
Breathe in, breathe out. Feel the air enter your lungs, run through your bloodstream, spiral up your back and comfort your synapses.
With one last exhale, she cuts her string.
