bitch bites dog [Safina x Jupiter, Day 6]
Jul 28, 2024 9:27:27 GMT -5
Post by D'Arcy Mason d6b [Tyler] on Jul 28, 2024 9:27:27 GMT -5
[googlefont="Cinzel Decorative"]
Safina Roy
Safina Roy
bitch bites dog - I
The first light of dawn seeps into the navy sky above, and I look up with expectation. It's a routine to me now; dawn comes, I stop, anthem plays, the dead shine their last light over their sandy grave. Tonight I plan to stare up at the face I know I will see. Get one last look at the girl I had once put on a pedestal, who knocked herself off of it, who I then buried in a pit of hate. Once it is up there it will be official, it will be known. Tide, wherever he is, should see that from his spot in this arena. I wonder if he'll know it was my hand that dealt the blow and satisfied the revenge I had chased.
A few minutes more pass by, and then the familiar sound of the anthem rises to live and bounces off the dunes of sand. The sky illuminates and the first face appears, larger than life and staring down at us all with eyes that no longer see. A glare down over the entire desert, accusatory to their killer. The face of the person on my mind. Only, not the person I wanted to see.
Tide Evros, District 4.
Dead.
The sight of his face makes my head reel as the blood drains itself from my head. The beast and the trapped voice, too, seem to have paused the war raging inside me as the shock consumes my whole being. I can still picture the days watching over him, the nights of travel together, turning to him when there was nobody else I could turn to. I knew it was a risk. I knew that it needed to happen eventually. I knew that even the beast's hunger for spilled blood hadn't been enough to stop me from dreading having to be the person to do it. Someone else has spared me that burden. A weight has lifted itself, only to be replaced anew with the heaviness of grief.
I turn my attention back to the sky as Tide's face replaces itself with what I had been waiting to see. Vera Jeon stares down at me in her final farewell. I don't know if it's my imagination or not, but I could swear I see a defiance in her eyes. It's as if she's taunting me from the world of the dead. You got me, but he comes with me. Her and Tide. Victory paired with loss. The fire doused by the shock starts to rekindle, burn fresh.
The anthem fades, and I spend the day in and out of sleep under the shreds of canvas haunting the dark sands like corpses. In the moments I'm awake my mind is abuzz, planning, thinking. There are only four of us left, now. Four damaged souls, surely each of us now tasting how close we are to victory. Three more to die, one to win back their life. One of whom has just killed Tide in their battle for survival.
I think about who might have been the one to do it. Jupiter surely has shown himself capable. I let him live because of it. So that there was a better chance that I wouldn't be the one to kill my own ally. I think of him back there with a battered leg. Could he really have been the one to do it? Could he have really had the time to make it to wherever Tide had been, to battle his fellow career and live to tell the tale? It seemed too unlikely, too foolhardy. He seemed more calculated than that. He was a boy in sync with his beast, not absorbed by it. Not like me.
I think of Sera, the other Sera, who had been caught in the crosshairs of a war she didn't ask for. She had slunk away from the furnace of sand as Nori had fallen, battered and bruised. Had she been able to heal herself up in the short time since? Could she have held a vendetta of her own for our own fight, taken it out on a boy she knew to be my ally? It seemed possible. Anything was possible.
Then there was Artemis, the wild card. I lie only a few hundred paces from the spot where her tent had been that day, a few hundred more from the spot where I slinked away from my sleeping allies, to share a moment of humanity with the girl from District 2. I was impressed that she was still alive now, having made her way through this hellscape on her own. Then again, I had no idea what she was capable of. Maybe she had a beast of her own, felled Tide when he got in her way? The irritating voice of the girl who had once had control of this body had nagged at me before, nags at me still. This time, though, it is quieter. Less sure of the weight of the act of peace.
After all, there was only one winner of the Hunger Games.
As the sun sets I see the colours. The sand springs to life with vibrant hues, the shifting sands a psychedelic haze. I keep walking, walking, walking ever forward. I try ignoring it, focusing my beastly instinct for the hunt. And yet it's all so disorienting! I try working my way towards the twisted metals and neon lights of the art display I had seen that first day. I'm sure I'm heading in the right direction, but I feel as though I'm not moving. Despite the beauty of the colours, I'm more on edge than ever.
That's when I hear a terrifying sound. A foot, sliding a bit in the sand, but not the sound of my own. The beast turns and gets ready to strike whoever this adversary may be, to be faced with the beast I freed from my trap the night before. Despite my mercy he was here, close to me once again. I don't trust any reason there could be as to why.
It's a reminder that there's no room for mercy in the arena.
[Safina Roy uses Poison Plants to coat Spiked Blunt]
[Safina Roy attacks Jupiter Graves | Spiked Blunt]
VC8OBOZZSaspiked blunt
[Result = Miss 0.0]
[Accuracy Reroll]
spiked blunt
[Result = Deep Gash on Cheek, 8.5 + 1 Poison (1/3)]
spiked blunt·spiked blunt[Safina Roy attacks Jupiter Graves | Spiked Blunt]
VC8OBOZZSaspiked blunt
[Result = Miss 0.0]
[Accuracy Reroll]
spiked blunt
[Result = Deep Gash on Cheek, 8.5 + 1 Poison (1/3)]