hard soul to save :: cecily vs whiskey

When daybreak spills over her shoulder, Cecily turns to face the sun.

The rain is little more than a memory now — falling so gently over the dunes, erasing all of the terrors it had sung to sleep only hours ago. Maddox's blood is washed away from the sand, kicked up like stardust into the morning air. Tragedy begets beauty. When the Capitol came to retrieve their body, Cecily watched from a distance.

Safe in the shadows.


She remembers the way Maddox hung there like a constellation in the making, like a shooting star on a silver string. Like a plaything. Like something temporary. The downpour was loudest, then. When she started to cry, the sound was robbed from her lips. Part of her was grateful, and another part felt all the more troubled by it. Not even her grief was safe.

If given the chance, the Capitol would steal everything from her.


Maddox is gone, even when they said they would not yield — and now Cecily wipes away tears. The kind that are stubborn enough to fall only minutes after waking up. She grabs her spear, shrugging the strap of her backpack over her undamaged shoulder. Gazing out at the horizon, the thin veil of fog shielding her from the raging heat, but only barely, she spots a stretch of green to the north.

Hope is cruel, and she knows this more than anyone, but she's already made it this far up the road she chose. She glances down at her weapon, cold and clean in her grasp, and the drying spots of blood peeking through her still damp clothes. There are bandages wrapped around her chest and left shoulder, tightly binding the bone shattered beneath the surface of her bruised skin. A nebula of dead stars.

Within her right boot, her foot is equally dressed for the occasion — each stubborn footfall forward another fracture line through the marrow. Call it repentance. In the back of her mind, she tells herself that they're problems to be saved for later. Survive this, and then heal. She tricks herself into believing it's still a possibility.


The only way out now is to play by their rules, but she's already cheated. She's not allowed to win, and yet. She keeps marching — keeps her eyes on the greenery as it expands around her, as she limps into a seemingly kinder landscape. She winces, forced to come to a stop as she steadies her breathing, trying to ignore the throb of pain shooting up her leg.

It's like crawling up the side of a mountain, even knowing that there's only a jagged cliff waiting for her. She's not sure what she'll do when she reaches it, but she likes to think she won't be as afraid. If she just keeps going, kills two more innocent people, then no one else has to die because of her. She'll stop running. Desperately, she'll try with everything in her to stop running.

And she'll fail, like she always does.


Her hand runs through her hair anxiously, thinking of her family and Beau — all the lives she hasn't yet managed to ruin. Leverage. That's what it comes down to. Standing on the cliffside, peering down at all her loved ones, gazing up at her where they lie surrounded by red flowers. This is what she's fighting for. So selfishly that she doesn't realize it's a terrible prize.

Cecily is a war criminal — and the battle is still raging.

Another pained step into the unknown, and it's all she can do not to scream as hand and blade emerge from the earth. For a moment, she's convinced the arena itself is trying to attack her again, jumping quickly to the side and taking the edge of a blade to her thigh. Deep enough to cut, but not enough to shake her footing. She drops her bag to the ground, spear in both hands. "You're a tribute, right?" She asks it before she can think it through. "Are you real?"

The answer doesn't change anything.

Even as a voice speaks gently, "I don't know you," and all she can think is that he should have counted himself lucky. "And trust me," she lurches back as he points out with his weapon, not taking any chances. "I wish we could go our separate ways." It's strange to look at him this close. She watches a boy fall apart under soil, and moss, and it feels terribly real. Human. "But we can't."

To break her, the Capitol guides her to reflections.

"Don't have to tell me twice."

Her spear draws a thin line of red across his skin — and for a moment, she battles with the realization that to survive, she will need to see and do much worse. Terrible things have been caused by her hands. Still wrapped around her weapon. She can't let go of it. Ghosts smile over her shoulder, the sunlight blurs through the fog and rain continues to fall around them.

Some endings, even cruel ones, are beautiful.


"You stupid or something?" His words are harsh, but his expression betrays his true intent. Even beneath the earthy disguise, she doesn't see anything that suggests he might be secretly enjoying this. If anything, it's just like it's always been. Scared kids fighting each other — wooden swords at their throats. It's not a game made for winning.

He glances down at the blood running down his arm, stumbling back a step. "Just as-" he loses himself to the pain, just briefly, and she understands. Even as she works to secure her footing, she can feel the echo of a breaking bone move underneath her skin, and it's enough to make her swallow hard. "Just as real as you are."

His gaze lowers to the cut running across her thigh, nodding at it. As much as she wants to make it out of this encounter alive, he wants the same. Every cut is a reflection. She reminds herself that if she doesn't do whatever is necessary, those things will only be done to her in turn. "We both bleed like we're real, huh?" That doesn't make any of it easier.

Weighing her options, she holds off on lashing out again — leveling him with a gentle, cautious stare. If this is where it ends, the least they can do for each other is be respectful. Call it friendly fire.

"Are you the type who likes to know the names of the people you killed?" There's a pause after she speaks — a clap of thunder. "Or can we agree to stay strangers?" It's insensitive of her to ask, she knows, but it feels more right than anything. She thinks of Aneesa, Sasha, Gavin, and Maddox, and how the sound of their names will always be like a dagger plunging into her heart. Quick, and merciless.

Tears shine in her eyes, but she lifts a hand to wipe them away. He takes a moment to collect his thoughts, clearly considering the same questions she's asking herself as they edge closer and closer to the inevitable. Maybe they're not that different. She tried to run, and he tried to hide. Here they stand. Losers reaching for a crown.

"Everything in my gut is tellin' me to keep you as a stranger-" his voice trails off, and she wants to grab him by the shoulders. Shake him hard, and convince him to listen to his instincts. Knowing him means mourning him. She already feels gutted enough as it is, so why willingly take another blade to the stomach? "-but I think if I'd been listenin' to my gut I wouldn't have made it this far.'

Lightning cracks across the sky.


"No sense in dying as strangers, no sense in givin' them what they want." His muscles relax like he's not about to try ending her life with his weapon. His eyes take her in, and she forces herself to hold his gaze. It's not a clear picture, but in fairness, it's not like he's seeing her on her best day, either. "Whiskey Finch, Seven." He sounds almost kind.

"Who do I have the pleasure of trying to kill?"

She hesitates with her response, staring pointedly at his spear. When he lunges, she moves to the side, nearly dodging the blow save for her arm. Her breath hitches in her throat, a quiet hiss of pain. It stings, and then bleeds into the other terrible feelings she's already dealing with. This is how the story goes for her. It's all hurting. It's all wanting to run when things get scary. Like knowing that this boy is Whiskey Finch, and she wants him dead.

Her name is a death sentence. She speaks it.

They trade tragedies — a cut for a cut.

He's bleeding out, and so is she. All's fair in war. Her heart beats against her chest, echoing inside of her ears. Ringing. It feels like she's standing in front of the forcefield again — in front of the district fence, in front of Gavin as he lies there dying — like the wind is trying to pull her to freedom by the hair. Fingers moving gently through the strands, comforting her in the absence of them. She looks over her shoulder, always gazing at what she chooses to leave behind, and all she sees is emptiness.

There is no fairness in love.


There's nowhere left to flee that is safe for her — and there's no longer any reason to dream that she might save her friends. They're dead, and will always be dead, and it feels like her insides are twisting and turning whenever she thinks of it. "You could do anything," Gavin had insisted, and only hours later, she had to shoot him in the head. Days after losing him, she can still remember the way his hand felt when it closed around hers.

Forgetting the trauma means forgetting them.


She comes to a stop before him, hands tight around her spear. Always, she wills herself to have the strength to tear down all of the obstacles standing in her way. They regard each other, and their respective scars. Her name seems to trigger a realization for him. "Oh," rolls off of his tongue quietly, fading behind the pattering of rain. "You're the runner, right?" When he smirks at her, she frowns. Not that she can deny his comment.

That's her.


There's blood on his teeth, a cruel undertone to his words. "It was kinda ripe that you thought you could run away." Her brow furrows, grip tightening around her weapon to the point of bleaching her knuckles white, staring so stubbornly at a boy who wants to hear the sound of her cannon. Knowing that she will do everything in her power to rob him of that. Her eyes close, remembering all the explosions that have broken her down. She stands here in spite of them all.

His smirk drops, and really, who is she to judge a person's character in what might be their final moments? She's not the hero in this story, so she has no right to ask for it to be him. Maybe they're both just side characters, meeting in a chapter that no one will bother to read. The moment feels pivotal enough. The storm continues on, the sunlight pushes through the fog, and she meets his gaze as an equal. As a terrible person willing to do terrible things.

"But hey, I tried to fight 'em too."

This is the losers bracket.


"It's like I told O'Malley... we've all got our vices." He echoes words meant for a dying boy, and her jaw clenches. When he looks at her, she wants him to see that she is still alive. That she is still a force to be reckoned with. She doesn't want this to be over. Not for her. Even as his spear enters her stomach before she can expect it, driving so deeply that she can taste iron dripping out of the side of her mouth, landing on her fingers and warming the skin there, she catches herself down on her knees. She tries not to collapse.

"Where'd the running get you, Deerling?"

It's terrifying. Like staring down the barrel of a gun, and trying to find the right words to beg for her life. The feeling as it leaves her body is indescribable, like a piece of her soul has been ripped from her, gushing in the blood running from her torso. Her hands start to tremble, shoulders shaking from fatigue and terror, the ache of shattered bones moving through her. Shallow breaths, dizzy thoughts. This is where it lead her. Backed into a corner.

Staring up at an executioner, but the blade is in her hands. She refuses to let go.

"It got-" and she sputters, voice breaking at the edges, a gasp that fades into a whimper. She's off her feet, dying, staring face to face with the repercussions of her actions. This is what she was running to. This is the undoing she chose, over and over again, like a cannon on repeat. Time doesn't feel linear. Not anymore. "It got me to the same place as you." She swallows, and hates the taste.

And she thrusts upward with her blade.

She drives a mirror shard into his stomach — and when he coughs up blood, so does she. Killing him is killing her. Her arms shake from the weight of her spear, jerking it out of the wound he shares with her, hoping that the momentum will gut him for good. She stays on her knees, body trembling against the cold earth, staring into the eyes of a boy who intends to be the last person she ever sees.

Funnily, she wishes him the same fate.


A spray of red hits her cheek, but she's already so in shock that she can hardly register it. It's just another bad dream that will greet her in the night, a feeling that she will never be able to erase from herself, no matter how far she runs from it. Even the thought of standing now seems like an impossible battle, like every nerve in her body is begging her to fall to the side, and just accept the end.

Her vision blurs, and for a moment, she wonders if this is purgatory. It's odd, sharing your dying moments with someone else. She can feel tears running down her cheeks, but she is numb to the grief. Her pain is hollow now, a drumming ache in her bones, and a white hot pulsing across her stomach. Her head lulls, a tremble moving through her, the ringing has never been louder. The fear has never felt more distant.

In her worst moments, Cecily Deerling is a reckless girl. A girl who never learns, and never thinks, and who loves so deeply — to the point that she ruins everything on behalf of it. Her best intentions are her most terrible mistakes. She has to own that, has to come to terms with the reality that she is foolish, and impulsive, with a tendency to lead people astray.

Forever the problem child — the bad influence.

She remembers when her father told her that he hoped Maddy never turned out the way she did — because she was stubborn, and defiant, and always so quick to give him the cold shoulder. For a long time, she pretended like it didn't bother her, but now here she is. Minutes away from unconsciousness, a darkness that she might never wake from, replaying it in her mind. The tears keep falling, but her face is almost calm.

At peace.


Horribly, she agrees with him now. It's easier to accept than it should be. But if she could guarantee anything for her little sister in her last moments, it would be the hope that she turns out nothing like her. Maddy deserves to stay kind, and good, and when Cecily looks at herself she doesn't know how to see past being a murderer — a fucking idiot who went and killed all of her friends. Who had the audacity to run, and fight, and fail both times.

All of her choices have to mean something. In the sunlight, she imagines her family, the one she found in this prison, and it makes it easier. Her muscles relax, slacking to one side when his spear fumbles forward, scraping her shoulder. It feels like nothing. It falls like falling asleep, like her cheek's pressed into the mud, and she doesn't know if she has it in her to get up. She gasps, and shivers, and thinks how sad it is. That this is what they sacrificed their lives for. To watch her fall apart like a coward, and finally run out of plans.

"I don't think-" his voice is a powerful whisper, just loud enough to rise over the ringing still playing over everything like a melody. "I don't think running is going to get either of us home." Forcing her hands to press against the ground, she starts to pull herself up slowly, staring into his eyes for a long, pensive moment. "I know, Whiskey." One last surge of adrenaline rips through her, a muted scream wheezing out of her throat as she forces herself to her feet, gazing at him with the last of her fury.


"That's why I'm not running anymore."

This is the last stand. This is her phoenix rising.