give it time and you will outlive me [mutts v. UGG]

Cannons, and another night with no bright lights looking down on them from the sky. He should be there, eyes alight, a number emblazoned at his back as a mark to the world that he had existed and then not. Kenji never shows. It sets her on edge, skin crawling and the hair at the back of her neck prickling despite her attempts at calming herself down, fingers skittering over her cloak and pants and boots to assure her that she's all in one piece. Oberon has his theories, but Kahinta's not sure she buys them.

"It's too simple... if it was just about keeping us guessing, why keep the cannons at all?" she asks, but she doesn't expect or really receive an answer. She's not sure there is one. Verena and Nilima have their reasons. It's simply not for her to know them. It wouldn't matter anyway.

Hours staring into the dark, barely able to hear the sounds of Oberon's and Daemon's breathing above the winds, and she finds nothing beyond the faded echoes that have followed them throughout the day. She digs her fingers in between the crystal ribs that line her bones, fisting the shirt underneath and trying to draw herself closer underneath the gem painting she's been lined in, but it's no use. Kahinta Jones cannot keep being small in the dark, no matter how much she wishes for the comforts of her ignorance.

---

"- but One is probably still alive. Jade and... Emery? Em- something. And the girl I hit during the Bloodbath seemed like she was in with the... the boy from Two... Johnwayne. Helle?"

Kahinta mumbles to herself half the morning as they move, tries to remember their faces, but they're already fading. Remembering them had never been important to her, but as they continue to walk through the cascade of flowers, she tries to distract herself from the crawling discomfort of feeling like she's being watched, and not by the eyes of the people of Panem so far away. Her cloak billows around her as they go, Oberon and Daemon and then Kahinta round the back, eyes alert. There's nothing for as far as she can see beyond the swirling colors, save the continued presence of the figures in the middle distance.

They don't mirror them, not exactly. Three, varying heights, all walking in their own way. She squints, and petals dash her vision, but she swears she sees her own face in the haze for a moment. It never clarifies, and she turns her eyes away instead of staring at something that's made to drive her to paranoia, made to distract her from everything else.

Everything else, like Daemon bruised and bleeding on the ground and scared of the stuffed animal of a bird she'd pulled from out of a bush and tossed away. Everything else, like the assured way that Oberon spoke his opinions that was starting to grate against her nerves every time he deemed himself correct.

Everything else, like a boy whose name she was never supposed to remember locked on her, words sinking in as Kenji realized he was staring at someone who was watching him die and choosing to do nothing about it.

She knows what she'll have to do to get home. In the days to come, Kahinta will have to do whatever she has to to get back to Temple. Knowing and doing are different things, however, and watching a boy bleed out on her boots is different than watching a girl kill her sister on a projection on her living room wall. It burns the same, but this she can touch, can taste, can breathe in and choke on with the colors that paint the landscape every shade alongside the red that sticks under her nails.

Her eyes are still fixed on the distance, hand wrapped loosely around the handle of her weapon and attention drifting back to the shades that are haunting them, when Oberon's scream breaks her concentration.

"Ambush! Kahinta! Behind you!"

Twisting her foot against the ground, Kahinta is only half turned when a sharp blow against the back of her head shatters the stars her stylist had so meticulously woven about her like a crown. She feels some of the beads bounce against her shoulders, hair tumbling along with them and spilling black onto the ground alongside blossoming red. Her neck is wet within a second, hot and sticking to the hood of her cloak as she continues turning, stumbling and trying to blink the spots from her eyes.

A mutt, red and glittering in the storm, and nothing to feel sorry about making bleed on her boots.

"What the fuck are these things? Kahinta, Oberon, are you alright?"

"It got my head- fuck- got my head pretty bad!" she calls out in turn, raising a quick hand to press at the wound and gasping at the burn that shoots through her scalp. "We need to move, fast! We can't take too many hits like that!"

Her stumbling has tossed her to the side, and Oberon moves in front of her to slash at the creature that had raked across the back of her head. Tightening her hold on her morning star, she whips her arm behind her as she turns, arcing up and around to strike down hard against the one before Daemon.

Her head is screaming as she whips her face to the side, vision locking on the second lizard that circles back into view. It's crystal eyes stare right back, and Kahinta feels a frission of terror shoot down her spine at the near singular focus it fixes her with as she tries to move to the side. With a yank, she pulls the geode from the writhing, hissing creature she'd swung at, stepping slow and winding around as Oberon and Daemon reposition, and the creatures strike again.

This time she's a little more prepared.

It's not much, but Kahinta is able to smack her boots together as she leaps backward, letting the momentum carry her a little farther with the help of whatever tech is in the shoes. What should have been a deep rake across her torso instead skims her hip, cutting through the black to graze against her skin. Her feet have barely toed the ground behind her before she's pressing forward again.

"I'll keep this one busy," she shouts, arm wheeling back from behind her to try and land an equal blow on the second lizard, and hoping that Oberon and Daemon can act quick enough to level their playing field.

Her strike swings wide, slamming against the dirt beside it, and Kahinta gasps at the shock of the blow up her arm, pulling back as quickly as she can to avoid a retaliatory strike. Something, anything, she thinks, sucking in another quick breath and throwing her arm back forward, the accompanying sound of shattered gem and bone a triumph above the wind.