walk through fire to save my life [ jules vs croc ; day 3 ]

My blade sinks deep into its arm. I feel steel connect with bone, the vibration travelling through my own, and blink surprisingly at my own brute strength. With a yoink of my arm my blade is free, pulling my body backwards with its force - stumbling is my grace, because my face misses the thing's snapping jaw by inches.

"Woah!" I cry, steadying my feet on the ground. "Not so fa-"

It snaps at me again and I jump backwards, shoving the hammer forward to protect myself. We both find air but its temper rises, long tail low like a scorned dog. Whatever this thing is, I know it's pissed. I would be too, were I not terrified.

"I don't think so!" I retort, trying to make my words as loud as I possibly can. We never had pets. Our house was too full as-is. But if I know anything about creatures and animals, hoping a mutt is near enough to one, it's that they need established dominance. It needs an alpha.

Maybe that's why it found me.

"Back off!" I glare, swinging the blade as menacingly as my stitched-up wounds will let me. "I'm warning you!"

It doesn't heed my words, let alone understand them, so I try a different approach. 

"I said BACK OFF!"

Pain has taught me something in this arena. Perhaps it shall teach this thing not to mess with me.

It bats away my attack with ease but I'm not finished. A grit of my teeth and some fast thinking I stagger back, swing my weapon behind my arm and turn on my heel, throwing everything I have into a back-hand attack.

It lands with a crunch and the thing yelps in pain. Good, a rush of ego to my head. Again, again. I grin - and then scream - as my hand catches fire in a split-second snap of its jaw.

The scream turns into a howl, violent and bloody, as I stagger back and collide with the trunk of the tree. Something lands heavy on my head and on impact I curl into myself, scared of the world around me, dropping the weapon as I desperately clutch at my right hand. It stings, throbs, and then I feel nothing. Broken, perhaps worse - I can't look. I can't bare to. My eyes spill hot tears, furious at myself and my carelessness. The wound weeps scarlet, thick and warm down my wrists - too much, there's too much blood, I can't hold anything like this. Panic takes a hold of my chest - I doubt I have a hand fit to hold anything, let alone a weapon.

I cry out again, eyeing the monster with a violent glare. It can take my thumb, but I won't let it take my life. Not now. Not here, alone, when I'm so close to salvation. Palms sticky with blood and sweat reach out to grasp at my weapon in the sand. My left hand will have to do. It has to.

Damning me and my arrogance, I swing with rage and desperation.

"I SAID BACK OFF!"

At the precise moment my weapon finds air instead of skin I decide outrunning thing thing might be a better strategy.

I turn and bolt for the forest I had emerged from days ago, missing waking up to a body without pain. Perhaps it was instinctual, desperate longing for an easier time in this place, but it feels right. These sandy horizons have done nothing but taunt me and wound me. I miss the green. It reminds me of something comforting. Not home, not quite. But it calls to me, promising safety.

I make all of ten frantic steps before the monster catches at my leg. I scream, a high-pitched alarm surely to alert more of them, and crash to the ground with a shuddering thud. The hammer falls out of my reach as I crawl and convulse on the floor, kicking at the things violent mouth with my right foot in an effort to free my other leg. My mangled hand roars with pain as sand fills my wound and my arm aches with a familiarity - this is how they almost got me yesterday. Clearly I have learned nothing from turning my back on the enemy.

Grit and grain seeping into my bloodstream, I snatch up one of the spears strewn out around me from my fall and lash out with it - aiming to put as much distance between myself and the scaly thing as possible.

"I'm not dying here," I swear through panted breaths. It sounds like I'm begging - maybe I am. Begging with myself, with the creature, with the ones that put me here.

"I'm not dying like this!"

The jab at its face buys me a free moment, snatching back my punctured leg in fright. Blood weeps from the teeth-shaped gash in my skin and as I hastily clamber up to a standing position the torn muscles and ripped nerves scream. I take a deep breath and rest on my better leg, hobbling backwards as I jab out at the thing with a spear - it strikes, but this time the wound is merely skin-deep.

As terrible as it sounds, I think I'm getting used to handling pain.

Shifting my weight to the right, I steady myself and grip my weapon in what's left of my hands. My thumb throbs a dull aching beat in my right palm, each tiny little movement sending shocks up my wrist. But it's manageable - at least for the moment. I can still beat this thing.

I can kill it. I can.

I must.

Exhale, I narrow my eyes and bare my teeth toward it. "Yeah, you heard me," I mutter, taking slow steps backwards into the desert-like forest of pineapple trees.

"You're not getting another piece of me. Not on my watch!"

Snarling, I heave forwards and strike.

Another strike to my back and I buckle forwards, crying out in pain. Tears flow freely now, no strength left in me to keep them at bay. Damn if I’m seen weak. Damn if they think I can’t handle myself. I’m a girl from Twelve - they don’t expect much of us to begin with. I’m a Monaghan - but that doesn’t mean shit here.

It’s getting to me now, the reality of what I’ve done and where I am. Better me than Noah - but what about me? Why do I have to be the martyr, the one to sacrifice it all for my family? Resentment builds in me as I strike blindly, limbs flailing into the wind as I cry. I don’t want to die here. I’ll do it, because I must. But it doesn’t mean that I want to go.

Every time I think of her my stomach curls up, my throat tightens, and what's left of my hands shake. I want to scream and cry and rage against the universe for putting me here. For calling out her name. For making me speak because she could not. I want to fight those who put me here until I can't fight any more. I want them to know what it's like to hurt. I want them to know how excruciating it feels to grapple with your own selfishness, to fight against it with nothing but love.

I want them to feel a fraction of what I've felt and then ask them to expect a little more of a girl who kept her family's heads above water while she sank.

It hurts now. To move. To breathe. To think. To cry. Everything hurts - but my heart hurts the most. I stumble to my knees and raise my weapon sluggishly, shaking as the muscles in my hands and arms scream. I scream back, viscous and furious and angry.

A canon fires in the distance. I strike quickly, fighting off thoughts of my own.