mortui vivos docent [85th Finale]

That night was longer than the others. She had no idea what awaited her the next day: she had no idea how many people were left, only that the number must be small enough for the Gamemakers to force them into one on one fights. She'd long since stopped counting the canon shots, because they meant nothing in a Games where the dead came back to life. She'd lost track of time at some point during the Games, which is an issue she had never considered. It had been easy to keep track of when she was just a viewer watching other kids she didn't know fight for their lives on live television. She'd been so far removed all those years before, but now she understood a little more of what it was like. Except, she felt this Games was far more cruel than any of the others. A Games that brought the dead back to life, rather than let peace come and claim them. Then they forced to fight for their lives immediately after reviving with nothing more than a dagger.

The cruelty of the Games shouldn't surprise her. Jade had spent so many years of her life watching previous Games that none of it should shock her, but it was so much easier as a bystander rather than a participant. The Capitol had a way with weaving stories behind the scenes. They allowed the Games to appear gruesome, but also heroic and powerful. It left the Victors looking powerful, and glorious and like everything the Upper Districts desired: power, strength, money, and fame. They were made to look like they had everything, but Jade was realizing that Victors were left with nothing but scars and ghosts and a pain that would stay with them for as long as they lived. A Victor may make it out of the Games alive, but she couldn't fathom moving on with her life. She'd be forever a different person, a shade of the Jade Morin she'd once been and she didn't think it was for the better. All she had ever wanted was to be loved growing up, and now that she was a murderer she felt further and further removed from that future. Who could love the girl who'd taken Arabella Shirley's life? Certainly, the girl had always been far brighter than Jade had ever been and Jade had destroyed the light and now there was nothing left but darkness to come and claim her.

There would be no love for the girl from One even if she made it out alive. Oh, she was sure she would never stop fighting for it. She was so desperately seeking it, but she knew it wasn't deserved. No, the only thing she could deserve was a life full of scorn and ridicule. No one could love a killer like a Jade, a Career from District One, a girl the world felt had no heart and was full of cold exteriors. Jade was nothing and would remain nothing more than a shadow dressed in sparkles and beauty. She would never bring light to the world. She needed to win, of course, she'd promised Arabella and she'd promised that she wouldn't break, so she would fight with everything she had and she would deserve all of the pain that came with it. Afterwards, when she was crowned as a Victor, she could blame no one and nothing for the hate she would receive. She would take it as her burden, as her punishment for still breathing while Arabella was not. She deserved nothing more than a life full of pain and torment, and she was only too aware of this fact. She would take on the burden.

The wind whistled and tried to uproot the tent she was in, but it only managed to rock the tent and make it sway here and there. It fought with all of its might to tear down the tent, and Jade felt it was with that same determination that the Gamemakers tried to kill them and make them each suffer. At some point, she knew the anthem was close. She didn't need to hear the sounds anymore, there was simply a feeling, an inner schedule. She knew when it was going to happen, so she unzipped the tent and stepped out into the wind filled night. She held her robes together as the wind lashed at her, trying to uproot her or throw her across the arena, but she held on strong, her face tilted toward the sky to see what faces she would see. She never heard the anthem, not over the whistling of the wind, but that was nothing important. The first to appear in the sky that night was the boy from Two. She'd seen him earlier. His alliance was strong and determined. His alliance had killed Pisces Gem, she remembered. She didn't hate the boy. She understood the Games they were in, but she also found it hard to let it go. As if he deserved his death after taking away her ally. It was petty and he likely didn't deserve any of it,

The next face in the sky was one she'd added, but it still took her by surprise. The girl had been wearing white, and despite being beheaded, Jade had figured she'd be revived in the Catacombs nonetheless. Her breath caught in her throat as she realized that the girl had died, and it was completely her fault. She had killed the girl in such a way that even the Capitol had given up on the girl from Four. Jade realized that she should feel some relief at seeing this, but she couldn't. She had killed this girl who was only trying to survive in the same way Jade was. Sure, she had been cold, and even perhaps a little mean, but Jade knew the girl may very well be hiding a heart. Just like she did, because that's what Careers did. They didn't wear their hearts on their sleeves, because more often than not that had been beaten out of them. Rather, they hid those hearts behind mountains of ice, built to protect themselves and perhaps others. It was due to this that the entire world saw them as monsters, and it was only another Career that could piece the puzzle together. She had taken a girl who wanted to live just as badly as she had, who had wanted to forge her own path in life, just as she had and there was nothing she could do to ever make up for this. She could only live on, and stay strong just as she'd promised a dying Arabella Shirley.

Dominic's face came next, and she barely contained the sob that tried so desperately to force itself out of her throat. Jade bit down on her fist, and felt the pain, gathered her courage from that pain. She needed to stay strong. She knew it was better than fighting him, but she didn't want him dead. She didn't want to live in a world where Zenia, Pisces, Arabella, and Dominic were dead. She wanted to live a life with them, if they would accept her. Move into the same District, get away from her family, and see what they were like before the Arena claimed their souls, but she couldn't. Pisces's face was next and it was another punch in the gut, and before she knew it she was doubled over in pain. She stomped the ground repeatedly with her feet, wishing there was a suitable punching bag nearby but there were only gems littered all over the ground. She wanted them to be her friends, and she'd known it was impossible. It was a dream that couldn't be, because they had all met as Tributes and only one of them could ever live. Jade had the urge to scream, but she bit down on her fist once more.

The anthem was done now. She got back into her tent and stared at the cloth. She didn't know how much time had passed as she just stared into the void, nor did she really care to keep track. Her friends were dead. She would never see them again, and she felt she owed them so much. It was them that had helped her in this Arena. They had tried to keep her whole, and each of them had fought so desperately. Her chest hurt, and she pressed her hand against her heart. Before she was aware of what she was doing, she found herself looking through her backpack, as if trying to keep her mind off of it. She found the dragon plushie, and held it close to her chest, but it was next to the cards she'd found under Perdita's feet, and suddenly she could no longer resist the curiosity. It was as if something were telling her to look. She grabbed the cards, and the first one bore Pisces's Gem's name, and now she wondered if she should look.

They were from Dominic. The end of each card bore his name in some form, and as she read each card she found that sometimes her tears would litter the surface of the cards. Morin children didn't cry, but she had cried for Arabella, and now she cried for her alliance. She read each and every one of those cards so many times. Her eyes were blurry by the end, and her throat hurt, but she kept reading them until she passed out that night, the cards in one hand, the dragon plushie in the other.

Jade's night had been restless. When she had passed out, she would eventually be woken up by the earth's rumbling, moving as if there were an earthquake. She didn't hear the blast of the catacombs destruction, she wasn't close enough to the Cornucopia to hear it. She did feel the earth, as the entire arena suffered the loss of the catacombs. Of course, Jade didn't know the catacombs collapsed. She didn't know why the earth suddenly moved, and then stopped. She couldn't know about the inner workings of the arena or even begin to comprehend why things happened in the arena. That was too outside of her own control. All she knew was that the earth was angry, and then it was still. After some time, she eventually fell asleep once more, still clinging to the post cards and the plushie.
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Jade woke up to chaos. Her tent swayed this way and that, and she heard an alarming noise. Was it the fluttering of wings? Quickly, she stumbled out of her sleeping position and stuffed both her plushie and the post cards into her messenger bag, and half hopped and half ran out of the tent. There would be no time to repack it. She was surrounded by Word Delivery mutts, all of which told her without words to move. Some dive bombed her and she'd jump out of the ways, others went for her face and she'd do her best to shield herself. At first, she made useless attempts to shove them away using her arms or shoo them, and none of it worked. As her mind slowly began to wake up, realization began to sink in. The Gamemakers wanted her to move. It was time for her next fight and she would have no say in the matter.

Knowing it was useless to fight them off, she obeyed. She abandoned the tent and ran as quickly as her legs could carry her. Whenever she needed to stop and rest, she would come to regret each lungful of air as the mutts set out to make her life miserable. They weren't going to let up until she reached her destination, wherever that was. Every so often, she'd get so annoyed at one of them that she'd try her best to swat them away with her hands, but it was always a useless gesture. It was obvious they weren't going to make it easy on the tributes. The arena was designed for suffering, and it was increasingly obvious that the Gamemakers did not think they had suffered nearly enough.

It was sudden when the mutts finally left, honking as they left. Jade was trying to catch her breath, and for once she was given peace while she did it. At first, she didn't wonder why the Delivery Words left so suddenly, and she could hardly care less until she got enough air in her lungs. Then, she heard something, and she knew why they had left:

"Who'd you kill?" A familiar voice asked, causing Jade to look for the source. Kahinta,
"Callum,"
"I got Johnwayne. you know who's left?"
"... You."

Suddenly, she watches as Oberon lunges after Kahinta, who is obviously holding something in her arms and takes off. It isn't long before they see her, though. It wasn't a welcome experience. Kahinta and Oberon had wanted to kill her, and they had helped Callum do it. Worse, the way Kahinta spoke during the whole exchange left a bad taste in her mouth. She was one of those people who obviously felt Careers were heartless, useless people and that hurt, because she had realized that she was none of that. She wasn't a machine, but a person. Jade wasn't cold hearted, she just hadn't lived a very happy life, surrounded by people who loved her.

"You wanted me dead," she stated, staring at Kahinta. "Unfortunately, I'm back and I won't die again."

Just as she raises her sword, she sees another figure. A blonde girl she immediately recognizes: Arabella's ally. That made four of them, and Jade began to wonder if this meant it was the end. That's how the Gamemakers liked to send off some of the Games, and she figured they loved the torture of a four way fight the most on a Quell. Maybe it was almost time to get out of here. She glanced at Lysander, and frowned. She had no love for the girl. After all, she'd been the one to begin the fight that caused the rift between Arabella and her. She knew that Arabella cared, though, so couldn't attack her. Not until there was no one else left. Her eyes left the girl and she stared back at Kahinta. The girl set something down and it ran off from the battlefield. Then she lifted her sword and swung. It was time to end this: the sooner, the better.

(Jade attacks Kahinta with sword)
GiLVEelbWZsword
(1089 -- Shallow Cut on Right Bicep -- 3.5 damage)

(pts reroll)

(Jade attacks Kahinta with sword)
sword
(1175 -- Severed Left Ear -- 8.0(+1) damage)

There's surprisingly little blood.

The boy's helmet bends and shatters as Oberon plunges the knife into his ear, a shard of plastic grazing his cheek as it flies past him; the next moment his body simply... falls, cleanly and wordlessly, and Oberon watches the boy's limbs give a few reflexive twitches before falling still. He'd died as cleanly and neatly as he apparently had lived.

[possibly more to be filled in here depending on Pisces' death post]

Oberon squats there for a moment next to the dead body as he tries to catch his breath, alternating between gazing out into the distance for more enemies and being unable to keep his eyes off the boy's form, slumped in a dip in the grass between two blank gravestones. The pain is catching up to him now. He unrolls the rest of the bandages and slides down to sit at the base of one of the gravestones, wrapping up his mangled arm as best as he can one-handed. He doesn't expect the crude dressings to hold up for long in a real fight - but then again, how many people were left? Wasn't today supposed to be the grand finale?

He turns to look at the grave he'd sat down on. The chisel he'd left scattered next to it before their fight that morning still lay there, and he'd carved "Kestrel" right across the middle of the stone where the name was supposed to go. He glances toward the dead body, turns back to the gravestone, crosses out Kestrel's name. Then he strips the boy's bag from his body, swaps out his own battered bag for the boy's, and sits down next to it, mindlessly riffling through the contents - there were quite a lot of supplies in the bag, which was unsurprisingly much more neatly organized than Kahinta's had been - while he waits for the anthem.

Johnwayne and both District Fours are the other faces in the sky that night.

Oberon lets out a sigh of relief at the faces. As much as he wished he could've been the one to strike down Dom, he had to admit it would be much easier to not run across him, and instead pick off the battered body of whoever'd been the one to kill him.

He gets up, walks to Dom's gravestone, and crosses him out. Then he does the same for all the other faces he'd seen in the anthem, correcting "Kestrel"'s name to Pisces Gem as he went, leaving only two whose names were still intact: Jade's and Zenia's. He still didn't have a name for the Five girl, and there was probably someone else he'd forgotten - the other Eleven? - but one or both of them were probably dead by now. Finally, he came to a stop in front of the dug-out grave, and on the blank stone marking it he carves out Kahinta Jones.On a whim, he lays flowers across hers and Pisces' graves as well.

Jade, Zenia, maybe Five and Eleven, and Kahinta. It looked to be another year where the Careers pulled ahead in the first half of the Games, only to fall apart at the final eight - and today had to have been the final eight, for how much longer could they make them stay in here, fighting each other and dying only to come back to life and have to do it all over again?

Forever, the answer whispers in his mind. They could do it forever if they wanted to. This was his second life, and judging from the faces of Pisces and Callum and Wolfram that had shone down from the anthems, it was going to be the last chance he'd get. But he can't help but wonder how it'd feel like to be on his fourteenth or sixteenth shot, an endless parade of tributes in layer after layer of catacombs until they'd all won and they'd all lost and they'd all wrapped themselves in the Arena like a second home.

Oberon curls up inside Kahinta's grave, huddling against one corner with the boy's cape in a feeble attempt to keep out the wind and cold, and sleeps fitfully. His nightmares are filled with endless dimly-lit stone corridors; even after he realizes he's dreaming, he can't seem to find a way out.

---

He wakes to shaking.

Oberon climbs out, stolen morningstar in hand, and looks around, the wind howling so loud in his ears that he can barely hear the rumble of cracking stone. The mausoleum seems to sink in on itself in slow-motion, like a collapsing egg-cake; right before his eyes the once-majestic building becomes no more than a pile of rubble, the rock dust billowing out quickly carried away by the wind.

It's then he spots the red-clad figure striding towards him from the entrance - no, not red-clad; there's enough of the original color showing that he can tell she's meant to be wearing white, but Kahinta's entire body, from her face down to her legs, is nearly completely drenched in blood.

What the fuck?

"Who'd you kill?" Kahinta calls out. Her eyes are darting between him and the gravestones. He keeps his eyes on her.

Wolfram, Pisces - "Callum." The only name Kahinta was likely to remember or care about anyways.

"I got Johnwayne."

Hmm. That was interesting. Oberon lets out a low whistle, thinking of how Johnwayne had trounced them in the bloodbath, proudly declaring they were no match... and now he was dead. In the Catacombs, judging from the bloodstained white fabric. By Kahinta's hand. Hell, he's almost proud of her. He starts wondering who put the two of them down there in the first place, but he brushes the thought aside. It didn't matter, and he'd probably have to win first to find out anyways.

"You know who's left?"

Oberon glances back and forth between the remaining names of the gravestone and Kahinta. Maybe some random girls, or the one Career they'd killed, and...

"... you."

He lunges at Kahinta. What did she even think she was doing, walking up to him in the finale with a kitten in her arms instead of a weapon? And why the fuck was it even here, when the Eight boy had died days ago?

It was always going to come down to the two of them, he thought, ever since Kahinta had destroyed all his efforts at district unity by going off about rebellion and then stomping away into the fog. He'd been waiting to teach her a lesson or two, to make her regret her little tantrum, to best her once and for all and take -

Kahinta steps back, and as his boots kick into gear to chase after her he notices that two other figures are coming towards them: Jade, and the Five girl whose alliance had set all those traps for them back in the cloud spire. Well, that answered the question of who was left. Kahinta turns toward Jade, finally having the sense to drop the stupid kitten, but the wasted seconds are enough for Jade to approach from behind and take a swing at her, her sword carving Kahinta's ear from the side of her head.

Part of him wants to scoff at Kahinta for her misjudgment, but mostly he's just angry at Jade; what right did she have to interrupt the moment he'd been wanting to have for days?

Kahinta dives at him and he shifts to one side, leveling his morningstar at the intruder.

"Back off," he snarls at her. "She's mine to kill!"

Jade froze as she watched the girl's ear fall from her head. For a moment, she no longer saw Kahinta standing in front of her. She was back in the Catacombs, holding onto a dagger and trying to hold herself together. She swiped, and her sword tore into the flesh of Arabella's forearm. Her breath caught in her throat, and she shook her head, trying to rid herself of the image, but it wouldn't go away.

"Don't you dare give up now. Don't you dare go easy on me. I deserve better than that." She whispers, her fingers curling tightly around the hilt of the knife. "You break here and I won't ever forgive you."

Arabella's hand gripped her dagger and attacked, and Jade had felt the sharp pain as the girl's dagger had sliced her own ear off. She hissed in pain, and then the image was gone. She blinked in surprise, her hand holding healing wound on her face, as if it had just happened. Jade wasn't sure if she was relieved, or disappointed when the image was gone. She wanted to see Arabella more than she wanted anything else in the world, but now wasn't the time. Jade had promised that she wouldn't break, and that she'd remain strong and having visions of a dead girl wasn't exactly something a totally sane person would have. She needed to hold herself together, or Arabella would never forgive her.

"Back off," he snarls at her. "She's mine to kill!"

Jade hissed in pain as the boy's weapon tore into her cheek, causing her to temporarily lose her balance and stumble backwards. It served as another reminder that she couldn't lose her focus. Jade was so close to the finish line that she could feel it. While she no longer wanted to be a Victor for the glory like she once had, Jade had made a promise and meant to keep it. When she was going to die, she would meet Arabella, but she knew that would only happen if she kept her promise first. If she died here in the arena, it would be due to her own negligence. It would be due to her own weakness and inability, and she was positive Arabella would never want to see her again. Even in death. That wasn't acceptable. She needed to remain strong, even if that was the last thing she wanted, because she would meet Arabella again. Even if it was years later, she was determined.

Something flashed in the corner of her eye. She stared at it, trying to recall why the item seemed so familiar to her. It was a messenger bag. It had patches of green and pink all over it. The bag definitely stood out, but that wasn't what made her pause. It looked like something she should know. Jade had seen it somewhere, hadn't she? The realization was slow at first, but then she was glaring at Oberon. The bag belonged to Pisces. She had seen Pisces's face in the sky that night. Her grip tightened on her sword with barely contained anger. Had he been his killer? Had he been the one to take her ally away? How had he died? Had it been painful? Had he suffered?

Just as she was about to speak, Lysander acted. Jade watched as she took her weapon and smashed it into the boy she had just wanted to attack. She heard the now familiar sound of bones breaking. It sounded so satisfying. While Jade had discovered she had no love for killing people, she decided that killing him wouldn't be so bad. He had murdered Pisces. Her ally had been a good kid, and he had on more than one occasion helped her. She owed the boy who chose to help her, to care about her. She'd ruffled his hair and then she'd never seen him again, and the pain pierced her heart, threatening to take her breath away. Oberon killed Pisces, and that meant that he needed to pay.

"That belonged to Pisces," she growled, pointing at the bag with her hand. "You killed him."

It was an accusation, not a question. She wasn't thinking straight. Her vision blurred, and she grit her teeth. She wanted nothing more than to sink her blade into the boy's flesh. She wanted to hurt him like he'd hurt Pisces. If she lived through this, Jade knew she would end up regretting her reaction. She understood all about the arena. They were forced to kill each other, and with so few people left the Gamemakers were forcing one on ones. Deep down she understood, but right now all she felt was anger and something worse. Pain. Hurt. Loss. Grief. She wanted to hurt, and she wanted to cause him pain too, because she wanted the pain to go away. She gripped her sword so tightly her knuckles had turned white.

It had only been a couple of days ago. She had just found her way out of the Catacombs, and he'd been there. The moment he had known it was her, he had hugged her and immediately tried cheering her up. She was a girl who had never been loved. Not really. Even her closest sibling was kept at bay, because of the way the house worked. She knew little care, little affection, little companion and so the alliance that cared for her had found a place deep within her heart. She would never forget them. Her heart ached. She felt her eyes sting with unshed tears. They hadn't deserved to die. Dominic. Pisces. Zenia. Arabella. They should all be alive and happy.

"I'll be taking that bag back," she hissed.

None of it would bring them back. None of it would take away her pain, but at the moment she didn't care. Right now someone needed to pay for his death, so why shouldn't the boy who killed him be the one to pay? She gripped her sword and swung out at the boy who murdered Pisces.

(Jade attacks Oberon with sword)
2A09vO86eAsword
(1161 -- Shallow Cut on Back -- 4.0 damage)

Oberon pitches forward face-first toward the edge of the grave as his leg buckles under the Five girl's blow. He reaches his free hand forward, fingers desperately scrambling to find purchase against the edge of the stone; the motion sends a jolt of pain all the way through his injured arm, and it's all he can do to twist his body away from Jade's retaliating blow.

The three of them had him surrounded. As they circle around him, weaving between the rows of stone and uneven mounds of dirt, he can't help but be reminded of the packs of coyotes that sometimes snuck into the district where Wanderers and other miscreants had made the outer fence weak, circling a deer or cow until they found their opening to take the much larger animal down.

"You killed him." There's a certainty in Jade's words, and it takes him a moment to realize she's glaring at the bag he'd taken off the dead boy last night. How she could even recognize the bag had been Pisces' was beyond him - they'd all looked much the same, some random mishmash of sparkly colors like all the other items they'd gotten in the arena. "I'll be taking that bag back."

All they'd ever wanted from him was to take, and take. Jade wanted the bag, Kahinta was definitely eyeing up his weapon, and who knew what the Five girl was going on about. He had the half-cracked facemask he'd pulled off the boy's body, and a sack bulging with useful things, and the other three must've been spiteful of him for having so much while their own bags lay flat and empty.

He deserved the spoils he'd gotten from that fight. He'd beaten Pisces in a long and exhausting battle for every bit of armor and supplies he'd been able to take. Hell, the boy had even been something of a worthy opponent, the way he'd parried Oberon's words just as deftly as he'd parried his weapon. Not that people tended to listen to reason, when they were caught up in their own jealousy.

"Yeah, I killed him. So what about it?" he snaps back at Jade, shuffling backward from her outstretched sword. "What do you care, which of the four faces from yesterday I claimed? They're all dead anyway."

Heroes don't exist in here. Just kids, playing the game.

Then Kahinta lunges forward, having finally managed to pull out an actual weapon, and everything explodes.

He's all too aware of his own heartbeat now, the waves of blood pounding in his ears and flickering spots of color creeping in on the edges of his vision. The front of his shirt is soaked in seconds after Kahinta yanks the knife from between his ribs. He coughs. Everything is red.

People didn't play finales like this. Never in living memory had he seen tributes who'd unite so completely against a common enemy, not when there were so few remaining. And it wasn't like the Five girl had any revenge to take against him, or some sort of grudge to settle -

He turns toward her, eyes narrowing.

Perhaps he'd underestimated her, after all - it had evidently been a smart move for her to go at him, banking on Jade and Kahinta to follow suit. He'd spent the entire games thinking of her as some drunk girl, a weak-willed tagalong clinging to Meredith and Cyro's heels for protection. Even her words to him just seconds ago had been nothing more than a fearful plea. But even so, she'd managed to survive for this long, and so he ought to have been warier. He wonders if her demeanor had been all an act after all. If the real mastermind telling Cyro to set all those traps for them might've been the girl looming over him all along.

A coward's play, to be sure - he would never stoop so low as to feign such helplessness - but one he should've known better than to fall for nonetheless.

"He'll come for you whether you hide from him or not," Oberon scoffs, swinging at the girl. "You're not special."

Jade was tired of the arena. Her life had been focused on this moment. She'd been trained to wield weapons, to run, to fight since the moment she could walk or pick up a stick. Her father always watching, ensuring his children would learn to be killers in order to bring glory to his family and District, and she'd tried so hard to please him. Always a little more effort. More laps around the field, give more bruises to the opponent, never fall, and she'd always look in his face hoping for the approval that rarely came. What she'd really been seeking was warmth and that's something she could never obtain from the man she called her father. She hadn't realized any of that before the arena, and her heart ached any time she thought about it. That she'd put herself into this situation to win over a cold hearted man who would forget her the moment she lay bleeding on the arena floor. Maybe he'd already stopped watching after she'd died the very first time, so disappointed that he could care less if she made it out. She wished that she could take it all back, step down so that another girl from One would gladly take her place.

No, that's not right, either. Jade realizes that with she doesn't want anyone here. None of the kids from One deserved this mess she was in. They were all trained. Any who would have volunteered to take her place were just as broken as she was. They likely came from families with similar values, and perhaps they'd never known warmth, either. They'd be looked upon by both allies and enemies alike as monsters, as that's all Careers were to the lower Districts. Pisces had been different and readily accepted the boy from Four, but then again Dominic had never been like her. Jade had acted like a Career, while Dominic had always been different from the same mold. He'd been more accepted, but the others had seen her as nothing but a monster. Perhaps the only people who would have understood her in the arena were long dead. Meredith, she'd found a certain kinship with, an understanding due to their backgrounds. Jade may not have known where the girl came from, but she'd been a Career in much the same way Jade had been. Will from the same District, the times she'd run into him he'd echoed what she was: a Career through and through. The girl from Four, the one she'd murdered to get where she was today. Her District partner that died so early on. Maybe he was the lucky one.

Now she was alone, surrounded by people who would look at her and think monster. How many of the onlookers in the Capitol thought the very same? The Victor from Eleven who probably cared for Arabella, she likely did. All of the lower District Victors probably did. All anyone would ever see when they looked at Jade Morin was a monster Career from One, but she'd learned that she was so much more while in this arena. She'd felt her blood turn cold, her breathing halt when she realized the girl from Eleven had thought she had been no more than a monster. She'd held the blade that ended that same girl's life, and clung to her with a desperation she'd never before felt as the girl fought to live and breath even after her dagger had found its way into the girl's heart. Jade learned that they were all wrong: she had a heart and sometimes she found herself wishing that everyone else were right. It would be easier to make it back home if she didn't have one. It wouldn't have hurt her at all when she'd taken Arabella's life if she had no heart. She wouldn't feel guilt when her sword beheaded the girl from the Four, and she wouldn't feel guilt when she grabbed her sword and prepared to kill more in order to walk out of this place alive.

Jade wasn't paying enough attention to the fight. The amount of people attacking the single boy of the group combined with her lack of attention caused her blade to barely scratch the boy. A part of her felt minor relief at that: she didn't want to see so much blood again. She was sick and tired of seeing blood. However, if she was going to live these kids were standing between her and Victory and she needed to spill their blood to make it out alive. There was only a little left to go and she'd make it back to the Capitol. She had promised Arabella that she would be strong from then on, and she intended to do just that, even if surviving felt more like a punishment than real victory. She had never realized the burden that Victors must carry with them at all times, but perhaps her situation was different from the others. Like the other three here, she'd died. She would be the only Victor that she knew of that died before being a Victor. She knew what death felt like, and how it changed her. She knew it gave different perspectives and gave more clear understanding, so maybe the other Victors would be very different from the monster girl from District One.

"Yeah, I killed him. So what about it?" he snaps back at Jade, shuffling backward from her outstretched sword. "What do you care, which of the four faces from yesterday I claimed? They're all dead anyway."

That got her attention. She glared at Oberon, and for a moment she wanted nothing more than to paint the arena red with his blood, but that feeling melted away. She needed to avenge Pisces, but she felt no gains from murdering. Fighting, sure. She loved to fight, to grant opponents bruises and broken bones and scars they would wear forever. She enjoyed the adrenaline of a good fight, but she did not enjoy killing an opponent. She no longer wanted to see a sea of blood. She wanted it all to end, even as she felt the anger course through her. He killed Pisces and he deserved to die by her blade or another's, but she was hesitant about it nonetheless.

"Yes, they are dead, and you killed him. You don't even seem sorry," she growled. "We may have to kill to live, but the dead still matter."

Her reactions were a little slow. She just barely made it out of the way as Lysander's Morning Star made way to hit her, rather than the boy from Ten. She blinked in surprise, wondering why the girl from Five had so suddenly switched targets. Had she realized it was her who had killed Arabella? Was someone finally going to try and punish her for killing the bright girl from Eleven? Jade knew that she deserved it, even if she hadn't wanted to kill her, because Arabella Shirley should have been the Victor, not Jade Morin. Arabella had been beautiful, bright, and strong. She would have made a fine Victor, one that would strengthen all of District Eleven in much the same way Katelyn had. Jade had taken that away from her, and she knew that winning now would only be punishment. She deserved a lifetime of pain. That was her destiny, and she would accept it. Maybe then, at the end of her life, she could die and be welcomed by Arabella. Maybe then she could earn forgiveness in death. That's the only thing that mattered right now and in order to earn that, she would survive this arena.

"Looks like I'm just as clumsy sober as I was drunk."

Maybe it hadn't been on purpose. She couldn't tell for sure, but she gazed over at the girl from Five and nodded in understanding, even if she didn't fully understand. It didn't matter anyway. She brought her attention back to the fight at hand. She needed to end this quickly. She needed to get out of this arena, and the first thing that needed to happen was getting rid of the boy from Ten who killed Pisces. Another soul that didn't deserve to die in this arena. She only hoped it had been quick and painless. She hoped that he found Dominic again after they had both died. She hoped that they found the peace that she would know in life. Peace, warmth and acceptance. She gripped her sword and lashed out at the boy from Ten. She knew it may not have been his fault, but he had killed Pisces all the same and she would kill him for it.

(Jade attacks Oberon with sword)
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In the moment Jade turns her attention to the drunk girl, he almost dares to hope that Five's fumble would shift the balance of the fight. After all, alliances had been made and broken for far less in the arena, and it wouldn't take much to justify a retaliatory blow when all four of them, not matter what they claimed to feel, were all just as set as killing each other as he was on killing them.

Jade doesn't take the opening. "You don't even seem sorry." Her eyes are accusing, and the way she's looking at him makes him feel like she's trying to reach into his mind and yank out a reason to feel good about killing him.

Wasn't that all they were looking for? Justification? For every slice of their knives and smash of their maces to have some sort of higher meaning to it? Oberon had never given himself space for the thought. All that they had left was a raw, primal struggle for survival of predator against prey, a energy that still refused to run out coursing through every ragged, gasping breath.

He ducks away from Jade's swing, teetering on one good leg and hissing in pain as his broken shoulder collides with the edge of the stone and nearly sends him toppling into the open pit, empty but for Jade's words seeping into its dirt walls.

"We may have to kill to live, but the dead still matter."

But they didn't. The dead did not matter, because by being dead they could no longer influence the world. Inevitably, folks would move on, and the three who fell here would be remembered as no more than failures, footnotes, another set of names scrawled in the digital ledgers of that ostentatious museum display they'd put up in the Justice Building a couple years back. Nobody cared about the tributes of, say, the fifty-third, and there was little use in lying about it.

He's not ready to sink into that oblivion yet.

Kahinta's bloody knife comes for him again, and he barely gets his morning star up to block the blade before she can stab it straight into his throat. The force of her blow sends a sharp jolt through his wrist, the weapon slipping from his hand, and he can only watch in horror as it plummets down into the grave and lands with a thunk at the bottom. When he peers into the darkness, the handle sticks straight up towards him like some sort of iridescent, inanimate middle finger.

Oberon shifts his gaze frantically between the three girls, all still surrounding him. "Clearly it's not over," he growls back at Kahinta before lunging forward, making a desperate grab at Jade's sword in hopes of wrestling it from her grasp.

Jade found it was more difficult to attack with so many people grouped around a single target. Her sword completely went past the intended target and felt the vibration as the blade hit something else instead. Momentarily, the vibration numbed her arm and she grunted, pulling her sword back and glancing at the boy she was determined to kill, and his would be ally turned wanna be murder. Jade couldn't help but wonder what happened between them to cause the girl to attack her District partner so eagerly, but perhaps she shouldn't be the one to judge. After all, her own ally had been the one to kill his District Partner, and besides hadn't this boy been the first to attack? She glanced between the two one more time, deciding to take the time to study the entire situation. Maybe next time that would make her accuracy better.

"It's over, Oberon. Get in the fucking grave!"

Stepping back, Jade wondered if it would be a better idea to allow the two fight themselves. The girl almost seemed to want the boy dead even more than Jade had, and she found it difficult to imagine what he'd done to her, because Jade had every reason to want to kill him. After all, he had been the person to murder Pisces and that meant that he had to pay, didn't it? Deep down she knew that she shouldn't hold it against her fellow tributes: they were all shoved into the Games and expected to fight to the death. Why wouldn't Oberon want to murder Pisces? She'd had to kill tributes in this arena too, and none of them had filled with her joy. She'd even been forced to kill the girl she'd cared about, so she shouldn't be one to judge. Even so, she felt it wrong not to avenge his death. He'd been a good person. She remembered meeting him in the dining hall, before the Games had been given the chance to change him.

Pisces had also helped her. Up until she made that promise to Arabella, Jade had been next to useless. Sure, she'd cut off a hand, and landed a few good hits on opponents, but she'd also been in the process of losing her mind. How many times had her allies been forced to hold her up, and support her when it should have been her protecting them? She was the Career from One, and while Dominic may have been a Career too, Jade had known he was different from some of the rest. It had been her job, her duty to protect her allies and she'd failed them. When she'd finally made that promise and got her sanity back, it had been too late to be of any use. The Game Makers had already begun separating them, and from that point on they'd been alone. She'd been useless when they were together and for that she owed them all. That's why she would make the boy from Ten pay with his life. That's why she fully intended to be the one to strike him down, because Pisces had deserved so much more in life. And she should have been protecting him.

"Clearly it's not over,"

Kahinta's attack had missed and the boy refused to back down. Of course he would. Anyone who happened to make it this far had guts, and enough rough edges from all the lives they'd taken. The Game Makers made sure that everyone at this point in the Game's were killers. They wouldn't allow a non violent tribute to win. Why else did they ensure when the numbers dwindled, tributes would run into each other and be forced to fight? They wanted to break them down, or they wanted to crown a blood thirsty killer. Either would apparently be fine with the Capitol, but not someone who refused to kill others. They would be struck down earlier. None of the four standing here would be innocent. Worse, they'd all come from the Catacombs. Each had died once and taken more lives in order to make it out. Just as she'd taken Arabella's life. They were all murderers. So, she shouldn't expect the boy to cower in fear or run away. He was a killer, not a scared little boy.

Just as she was about to attack, the boy jumped towards her. At first, she figured he wanted to attack her, but she soon realized his real target was her weapon. He wanted it, and she wasn't willing to let him have it. She attempted to shove him away, and his fist grazed her skin and left behind a small bruise. A tiny price to pay to ensure her weapon remained in her own hands, and not his. It was her sword, and she planned on keeping it. She didn't envy Kahinta who only owned knives. After murdering Arabella with one, she was even less inclined to like them than before, and she had never been a fan of such a tiny weapon. Knives were not a proper Warrior's weapon.

"Is this just a game to you," she called out. "Do neither of you have a heart?"

Her eyes found the girl, just in time to barely dodge an attack. She grunted as the weapon grazed her skin, leaving behind another small bruise. She hissed in frustration, glaring at the girl for a moment. The first time, she could sum that up to a mistake: they were huddled trying to attack a single person, and he wasn't exactly an immobile target. The second time, however, she didn't believe it was a mistake at all. Why couldn't she accidentally hit Kahinta, or Oberon? For a moment, she considered hitting her, but then she remembered Arabella and refocused her attention on the boy who killed Pisces. Even if Lysander wanted to attack her, what could she do? She wouldn't hurt the girl who Arabella trusted enough to ally with and protect. Not until she had to. Not until it was only the two of them left.

"You're not doing much better," she growled.

Jade grabbed her weapon and lunged at Oberon.

(Jade attacks Oberon with sword)
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