an awfully big adventure // Day 5 Shadow Hydra

Tell them something is coming
There's blood in the water
Give them a warning
Let it all come crashing down
Burn the castle to the ground

Whenever you were a child, there were inevitably going to be times where you were sent home crying, courtesy of your peers, in one way, shape, or form. You never got beaten up - after all, the vast majority of kids were no more physical than the neighbor's fat cat who snoozed on the porch all day - but in a place where intellect was key and children were bound to make mistakes, you would end up the victim every now and then.

Each of the adults took care of you in their own way. Your mother would hug and soothe you, bathing you in her warm presence and calming words. Your father, more awkward, would nevertheless listen and offer his advice, born from similar circumstance. Your late grandfather, ever the cheery man, would cheer you up in his own way, reminding you that there was more to life than tears and insults, usually punctuating his point with a freshly baked cookie.

But you think you liked your grandmother's method the most, in retrospect. Whenever she was the first to chance upon you after such an incident, she'd sit you down, all serious looking, and whisper, "There, there, my darling Akira. Tears are wasted on cretins such as those. You know the old saying that we live by, right?"

And you sniff but the tears would stop, for you knew what was coming next and you had always felt a kinship to the saying in question.

"Say it with me, darling. 'Fate whispered to the warrior, 'You cannot withstand the storm...'"

---

When you wake, the only memory you have of is pain.

Thigh, stomach, you're not sure what to make of the parts of your body where instead of flesh there is only burning, muted but blazing beneath the surface of fresh bandages.

And all over there is another sort of pain, the burning of muscles in exertion. Your skin is not damp with sweat but soaking with something else altogether.

For someone who fell asleep surrounded by grass and towering oaks, it is altogether an utterly mystifying experience.

Gradually the rest of your senses kick in. Touch registers jagged outcrops of stone beneath your hands and knees, a wind chill setting your wet and exposed skin alight with goosebumps and an involuntary shudder. Sight blearily clears, revealing that somehow, your possessions remain by your side, jade polearm washed clean of Cesare Crocetti's blood and bag full of its many possessions. Hearing brings to light the pounding of water on shore, a sound you've only ever heard in the recaps of certain Games, and you think you can make out the slight crunch of footwear on fragile stone as well. Smell sends salty brine through your system with a single inhale, and it's almost refreshing in a sense. Taste-

Sweetness, an unexpected scent this far out to see, wafts under your nose and into your mouth, and your stomach groans in response even as rationality takes a dim but protesting backseat. What the hell would pancakes of all fucking things be doing out here?

But you find that you don't care. In three days you hadn't consumed anything more than water from a canteen, and though you had rarely had been able to eat to your heart's content back home, you'd rarely gone hungry either. This was a new sort of challenge, one you had predicted and attempted to prepare for back in the halls of the training center, but the rich Capitol food had prevented your makeshift hunger strike from lasting much more than twenty four hours back then, and here you'd made it through four times as long-

No, three. Why on earth did you think it had been four days already?

You climb, ignoring renewed hunger pangs from your middle, ignoring the desire to just lay down and rest until nourishment renewed your body and mind alike. But other thoughts fight for dominance, too, that of stubbornness and that of sheer willpower, those of rationality, such as the other footsteps you had heard, and of a certain sense of vulnerability-

You stop as a sudden wave of adrenaline pierces your heart, snapping you back to reality. Where are Andy and Bella? comes the thought, not quite panicked but with the feeling building icy cold in your chest. Andy was on the brink of death yesterday, why did we-

Wait, that's not right either. Sure, he'd taken hits, but he'd been far from death's door nevertheless. He'd had his chestplate to thank for that, and the crazed, mostly ineffectual strikes of a dying man.

Nausea replaces hunger in the pit of your stomach, and you force thoughts of Cesare down as your looking becomes frantic, head whipping back and forth for any signs of life-

The shape of a girl registers in your vision, and you relax, for Bella is right there with you as always.

Then she steps out of the fog, and relief curdles and turns into some twisted mix of confusion and unease. She was not Bella, her hair and skin alike were too dark for that.

You fumble for your armor as the girl from Twelve steps into view, but her focus is not on you. Behind her comes a boy, but the nervous, twitchy gait of not that of Andy but the boy from Five instead. Shin guards are fastened, boots are put on, and more shapes emerge, too many to be from any one alliance.

Your armored vest is put on over bare and bandaged skin alike, mind too caught up in panic to register the fact that when you had fallen asleep, you'd had no such thing as an armored vest, and it is not until the gloves are on your hands and the helmet is going on your head that finally, familiar shapes appear.

There's Bella, not thirty feet away. And next to her is Andy, in worse shape than you can remember - When did he get that fucked up? you think, the answer on your tongue - yet still plodding along nevertheless. With a start, you recognize Dove on the other side of the clearing, the boy from Six and the little girl from Ten still at her side.

Then it hits you with the force of a speeding freight train. This is a goddamned feast.

One, two, three, you count heads all the way up to fourteen, excluding yourself. Almost everyone is here for whatever the fuck the Gamemakers have deemed your prize - and why the fuck does it smell like fucking pancakes? - and the meaning is clear.

Blood will fall, and more faces will join the two girls and one boy who lit up the sky last night, two Careers and a lower district boy -

But wait, Cesare died last night, a Career boy, while the two girls had been of lower district birth -

Your head hurts, only void taking the place of any sort of rational memory or thought. But even that too fades, as a roar sets your blood on ice.

Slowly, you turn. One, two, three, four sets of eyes stare back, each atop a different head at the end of a different neck.

Shock turns to panic, barely restrained by rational thought. So it's that kind of feast then, you manage to think. Of fucking course it is.

You know that appearances are most likely deceiving, that whatever sort of beast lurks in these shadows is most likely not as deadly nor intimidating as it looks, that it can be killed by steel and bleeds the same blood as any other muttation. No doubt this is some sort of attempt to weed out the weak, while the strong take down the beast itself.

But when the girl from Twelve moves, it's not to strike at the beast itself, it's to smack a nearby boy across the face with her war hammer. And you can't help but agree with her, either.

You are no hero of the fairy tales that all kids heard when they were young and impressionable. You are no Eye Saw, no slayer of dragons.

You're just a boy who wants to live. And tangling with something that could most likely bite you in half with a single chomp is not the best way to survival.

So instead you turn, away from the beast and towards the true enemy instead.

---

And you knew the words by heart, having heard them a hundred times before. It always was your favorite saying, even then.

"...and the warrior whispered back 'I am the storm.'" you finished, watery eyes gazing into those of your grandmother.

"Yes, my dear Akira," she said, stern yet motherly all the same. "You are the storm. And the storm does not concern himself with the lives of sheep. Don't you ever forget that."

Grandmother had always been made of sterner stuff than the rest of your family, but you had never begrudged her for that. Not then, and certainly not now.

---

For you are the storm. And you will not let yourself get stopped here, by beast, by man, by anyone or anything.

A shard of memory flashes through your eyes, of your blade cutting through a girl's leg directly at the hip. You're not sure whether it's truth or fiction, but you know that the last time you raised your blade with the intent to kill, it struck true as blood and flesh alike spilled.

So when you strike at the nameless, faceless boy from Ten that the boy from Five had just struck at himself - for two blades were always more effective in slaying an opponent than one - there is nothing but cold, grim determination setting your jaw and burning in your heart.

You are the storm, and the storm does not care about the lives of insects.

Hang the lies, no disguise
It's our time
Let it all come down,
Down, down

song: Gallows - Katie Garfield

The fog comes in like a storm, covering the world in grey light. I remember the way the thunder would roll just ahead of the clouds like a warning, telling us it was time to bring in the animals and find a roof to shelter under. Now, though, there is no shelter from this rolling wave and we are pulled under. For a moment I am claustrophobic in the clinging tendrils of vapour, fighting to breathe when all my lungs take in is water. I am drowning on land.

Then my gasps ease and air comes rushing back into my body. My head is swimming somewhat but I can think again.

I was heading through the forest, this forest that never ends. The home underground had been quaint and pleasant in a way I had not expected and part of me wished to return there. I knew I had to keep going, however. Keep moving and maybe I would stay ahead of the doom that chased me. We were all destined to die here, only one would break that fate. I didn't think it would be me, but you never knew with these things.

As I step through some trees I come upon a clearing. Taking a couple steps into the open space I can hear some buzzing. Another step forward and I walk face first into a tree. Shaking my head and pressing a hand to my face where it now stung I looked again. No clearing, but there was a break in the trees ahead. I must be tired, or dehydrated. I drank water not that long ago, though, how was I so far out of it?

I swear I hear yelling, but I can't hear it after a moment. Am I going insane?

The walk to the edge of the forest is uneventful, but something is nagging at me. How could I have been this close to the exit? I could have sworn I was much deeper in the woods.

My questions flew from my mind as the fog peels back once more and I am now standing on a rock in the middle of the water. The lapping of waves on the stone behind me signalling I was now no longer on the mainland.

I feel like my mind is melting out of my ears.

Screaming, roaring, and the smell of breakfast assault me and I can barely keep my head on straight. Then pain lances across my front, light at first and then in a broad blinding stroke that smotes me in the chest. I stagger, taken by surprise as not one but two tributes immediately launch themselves at me.

I can not avoid other tributes any longer, it seems, the Gamemakers have decided it is my time to fight.

Readying my axe takes time, too long. I am clumsy and slow compared to the individuals who sliced into me. I can't hesitate if I am to survive, not here. I know how these things work, I know how they will take advantage if I let them. I promised myself I would not let anyone take advantage of me again.

I throw myself forward, axe raised, and slash at the last person to have swung at me. They will not draw my blood and get away with it. I will not let someone do that to me again.

Charlie attacks Akira with his axe
zUVnkOSxaxe
Miss -- 0.0 damage

Accuracy
axe
Severed Right Hand at Wrist -- 9.0 damage

{ lost on your own
in the night }

"Thank you

Friend"

The words haunted his sleep; repeating over and over and over, incessant. Louder, then quiet, overlapping words clawing at him, setting his teeth on edge and making his left hand twitch. He could feel the words being written onto his palm every few seconds, more harsh and biting every single time.

Thank you, Friend.

He was so exhausted from carrying her still, his body in ruins. He thought he could remember her sleeping next to him at some point in the night still, a moment of awareness when he'd blinked against the darkness and found Wynter directly next to him. He remembered looking at her chest to make sure it was moving, then passing back out—

Thank you Friend, Thank you Friend, Thank you friend thank you friend thankyoufr—

Something was wrong. The sounds of insect wings fluttered within the confines of his skull; had that happened? Had... what happened? Why was he remembering insects if...?

His eyes opened for good and he was not where he had fallen asleep. He looked to where he remembered Wynter being, and she was replaced by Faline. Only a few feet away, one of the boys he'd fought the day before slept soundly, as if he had fallen into the den of a sleeping bear without realizing it. He thought, for a moment, about grabbing his spear and planting it as hard as he could into the boy's throat.

"Where is Wynter?" he shouted, stirring Faline from her sleep as well. He stood between where she was and where the boy was. Why was he—

"What did you do to her, huh?" He grabbed the boy by his shirt collar, yanking him up to his feet so that they were eye to eye. So many questions ran themselves through his head, disorientation plaguing him like any proper sickness, clouding his thoughts and giving him a headache.

This didn't make sense. They were not in the forest in which they had fallen asleep, but instead a giant rock. And if this boy's alliance, or what was left of it, had anything to do with any of this, why had he stayed behind? Mackenzie hadn't ever thought the boy was particularly bright, but caging a sleeping animal and then staying in the cage until it woke up? Even that seemed like a bit of a stretch.

"How did—"

Thank you

Friend

His palm itched, recognition. There was a flash of Wynter's face, obscured by what looked like autumn leaves, which fell all around her. A moment's eye contact, and then it was gone. Had that been a dream? He didn't remember it happening, but she was nowhere to be found. Perhaps whatever had dragged him and Faline here had left Wynter behind.

She couldn't have been dead— the cannon would've woken him up.

He cleared his throat, pulse pounding against his temple, blinding him as he tried to remember things that were not there. Things that must not have happened.

He let go of the boy's collar, brushing his hands off on his pants. His left palm had gone from itching to burning now, and he finally glanced down at it. Dried blood caked it, scratches that parts of which had already begun to scab over. After noticing the dried blood under his fingernails on the other hand, he deduced that he must have scratched himself in his sleep. But the scratches were not what disoriented him so much that he stumbled back. It was the fact that they were in the shape of a phrase:

Thank you

Friend

What the fuck is happening? He thought, white noise screeching inside his skull. His hand burned; why had he carved those words into himself? Mackenzie braced himself on Faline to keep from toppling over, pulling his spear out for a fight that must have been coming. He felt defenseless, weak. He'd worked too hard to save her; no way in hell was she going to die while he wasn't there to protect her.

"We have to find her Faline. We have to g—"

He looked down at the ground, up at the sky. The sun was shining just as it usually was, bright and warm and unfairly cheerful, but when he looked back down at the ground, he was certain.

His shadow was gone.

"My... shadow." Helpless eyes looked over at Faline, hoping she would have an answer, before he gulped: "Am I... Am I going crazy?"

Would it have been so hard to believe? Countless people had lost their minds to an arena. Harsh conditions, starvation, murder. Maybe that iodine tablet hadn't been enough to purify his water; maybe he was delirious from lack of sleep. But he felt well rested, and the disorientation seemed universal. It wasn't just him.

A flash of darkness caught his eyes and he followed it. Like a snake, shadows slithered along the ground up, up, and up toward the top of the large rock they were on. It very well could have been his own, for all he knew.

"There!" he shouted, bolting toward it. Maybe following it was dangerous; maybe it would give him answers. He couldn't leave Faline behind, not with someone who'd lready tried to kill her once, but in the fog of his mind, he knew there was something more going on. Attacking this boy would've been a waste of time, and Mackenzie doubted he could even do any real damage in his current state.

He stumbled and fell, ripped the knee of his pants on a rock, but he was determined to catch it. As he clamored on, he saw more of them, shadow-like creatures swiveling around on the ground, all headed for one place. Where could they have been going that was so important? With every step, worry grew stronger.

Thank you

Friend.

He crashed forward, sound of a cannon so loud in his head that he wanted to scream. He felt himself carrying her again, running but not toward something. He was running away with her.

"Down!" her voice echoed, and then he snapped back to reality.

He had to find her, had to save her.

Up ahead, the shadows all congregated, building themselves up into a ball, floating like a child's nightmare come true. At its center, a blue light began to pulse, and it began to take shape, slowly building itself up. Mackenzie stood in awe, unsure what to do. Fight it? Run away? He caught sight of another tribute, Cassia, and he instinctively grabbed for Faline and pulled her down. A quick glance to his right and he saw the boy, who had followed them up the rock. Part of him felt bad; at least Mackenzie still had Faline. This boy had woken up in enemy territory.

"Stop following us," he said anyway, returning his focus on the shadow creature. It had morphed into a giant dragon, like in the storybooks children read. Four heads, each with jagged, razor sharp teeth, looked around for victims to satiate their hunger. More and more tributes came, so many that he first had a hopeful thought that one of them would be Wynter, clutching the wound on her throat and pissed off as always. But that hope turned to doubt and then to worry when more of them came still and none of them were her.

Where was she? Why were they here and why wasn't she?

Mackenzie saw the banquet of food easily enough to recognize that this was a feast, but had Wynter's health been too poor for her to take part? Maybe she was right where he remembered her, still sleeping, still oblivious to this hell.

There were no answers except one: he would have to fight if he wanted to survive, same as always.

{ don't be afraid, no
don't be afraid to lose }

song: afraid

Five days
Underwater
Near your island
Off the coast
I know

The waves hit the rocks, barking like dogs.

Smoke billows above us, blooming up like a flower, soft and alive for a split second before the wind takes it, carrying it away.

Sometimes we do this, just lie in the sand. Even if it's cloudy, we just lie here, not speaking. Words sit between us, a silence laden with the burden of all the wishes we have that we won't speak because they'll never come true.

And it's here, as the sun slowly falls behind the clouds that I slip my free hand into his, intertangling our fingers as if to lock myself to him, as I stub my cigarette out in the sand beside me, as I roll over to kiss him, that I know I love him.

That I know he'll never love me back.

I wake up, tears spilling down my cheeks.

I can feel Violet's hands on my waist, almost painful, digging into my hips as he held me. I miss him a lot, more than I've ever wanted anything- I want him.

I try to move, pain holding too tightly. My vision wavers, spilling back and forth like a ship in heavy storm. It's strange here, foggy and I can't quite remember how I got here. I shut my eyes for a moment, tilting my head back against rock. My brain feels detached inside of my skull, swimming on its own.

I open my eyes again, vision trying to focus on the beach in front of me but unable to.

Fog.

It's not my eyes, it's fog.

Nothing new, it was foggy all the time in Four.

The pain is fresh though, piercing. That's new.

I try to remember what I was doing last night but I can't. Was it a party?

I look down at myself, pajamas stained with blood. Not a party.

Where's Violet?

I stare at the water, at the way it moves too unnaturally. There are fish in it. Jumping? I've never seen that before, not so close to shore. My feet are in the water still and as one swims close, I scramble backwards just quick enough for it's gaping mouth to miss my feet.

This isn't Four.

The blood, the pajamas, the fish.

This isn't Four.

A dream.

I pull myself up shakily, pain shooting through my body in small bursts, only just manageable. Volkner died yesterday but I don't remember getting this beat up, which means something happened between now and then. I stumble, a ringing in my head. God it hurts. It fucking hurts.

But when I stumble, something slips away behind me.

I turn quickly, eyes trying to catch the enemy, and failing first but then I see something moving, lunging, sprinting across the beach. Me. It's me. No. My shadow.

I think I must be going fucking insane but it's undeniably my shadow, running sideways along the rocks.

"Oi, you stupid slut," I whine, "Get back here!"

I don't know whether to follow my stupid shadow or just lay down and die. I must be going mad.

"Makes sense," I mutter softly," "I've betrayed myself a thousand times. What's one more time?"

I move forward though, eyes searching the shoreline for Bella or Akira. I can't see Akira but I do see Bella a little ways ahead, walking towards where my shadow went.

"Bella!"

She doesn't seem to hear me and I wonder if it's the sound of the surf or something. I catch up to her, reaching for her wrist. Then I see it somehow, as if it's just appeared there. Maybe I didn't see it because it was so out of place here, in this strange hell.

A table, laden with food and fifteen seats.

I'm not going to live through this.

I can't handle a feast, I know that.

I look back towards the ocean, eyes on the surf. I'd rather be eaten alive by the creatures in the water than this. I'd rather die in the ocean, salt replacing the blood in my veins. I want to turn and run lke the coward that I am. I almost do, when I see him.

My shadow, climbing ino a pile of darkness and rising up.

This is a fairytale, a goddamned dream.

A nightmare.

I pull my spear out despite everything and a calmness settles itself in my stomach.

"Look after yourself today Bella," I say, "Don't worry about me."

I walk forward slowly, eyes trained on the beast.

My spear will do nothing to stop it, I know that.

Children scream around me, yelling hings that make little sense, that barely matter. All of us are dying anyway, I still haven't seen the point in getting angry about killing each other. I guess whatever drives us forward.

We all need something to keep us going.

I think about Violet, waiting at home for me.

Hopefully, if he hasn't gotten himself beat to death yet. If it weren't for him, if it weren't for knowing he's watching me, I'd be dead by now.

I hope he's happy.

[Andy attacks the Hydra with spear]
f3B_oS_Sspear
[Shallow Cut on Back of Head -- 4.5 damage]

Five ways
You were my lover
Incantation
Off the tide
In rhyme

song: Islands