liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2

ryan
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over the moon, where all the wild things are

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 20, 2020 15:14:12 GMT -5

Quote

Post by ryan on Jun 20, 2020 15:14:12 GMT -5

She’s a fickle one. A brooding color of red. Cherry wet and full of rage. She flaps her wings and squawks in the air as she finally catches a glimpse of succulent specimens. She wonders if they were aware of their presence. They always flew in a group. However, Cherry was always the fiery one. Full of furry and nothing good. She liked to cause pain, even if she wasn’t provoked. She eyes one of the tributes, to whom she perceives as the older boy. She squawks again, this time louder and fuller than ever. She was ready to draw blood.

[Cherry [Orizuru] attacks Nikolai || Talons (Knife)]
Iyuk_b3JEVknife
[2041 -- Block -- 0.0 damage
(Knife)]

Blueberry had always been the silent type. Only doing what he had been told, or even what he had seen. Sometimes he acted out of strife, but now a days, he was all about survival. He could not rival his sister, his timid demeanor usually being overpowered by her feisty one. He would always do what his sister did, and regardless of what was the outcome, he would feel vindicated. So watching Cherry swoop in on the older boy, Blueberry set his sights on the younger boy. His claws ready to draw blood. They would protect each other, and feast like royalty when they were done.

[Blueberry [Orizuru] attacks Emmett || Talons (Knife)]
knife
[2194 -- Shallow Cut on Left Calf -- 3.5 damage
(Knife)]

Kiwi had always been the one to rush into things, but this time she was late to the party. She watched as her brother and sister had already swooped down. Maybe she was thinking about how they used to be. Full of vigor and happiness. She wondered why they did not act like that anymore. Like everyone was their enemies. She was sure that they just wanted to protect their home, and she had always been the reactive one. She watched her siblings take on the boys, so she would take on the girl. She would show her a fury that she had never seen before. Green with envy and red with rage.

[Kiwi [Orizuru] attacks Perdita || Talons (Knife)]
knife
[2136 -- Shallow Cut on Back of Head -- 4.5 damage
(Knife)]

knife·knife·knife

Last Edit: Jun 20, 2020 15:16:00 GMT -5 by ryan

L△LIA
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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 21, 2020 15:33:30 GMT -5

Quote

Post by L△LIA on Jun 21, 2020 15:33:30 GMT -5

You don't say it, but you're relieved when Perdita doesn't murder Emmett. It's not until afterward that you learn his name and yet it's not knowing his name that nags at you with guilt. It's something... bright and unnamable when he talks, like light catching on his teeth even when his mouth is closed. Andorra has it too, like your littlest sister took a bite out of the sun once and tiny pieces of it are still stuck in her smile. Here in this place, looking at Emmett in the wake of giving into fear and quietly encouraging Perdita to kill him — because that seemed easier than sharing the scraps of kindness and sympathy you wanted to hoard for yourself — you... well, you feel bad about it. And you feel stupid for feeling bad about it in a way that makes you feel bad about feeling bad, because you're not supposed to feel bad here... but also you're supposed to feel bad... but also-also you're not suppos—

"My head hurts," you whine quietly to yourself while trying to help set up something resembling a camp on a beach of red sand. The water is unsettlingly still and fills you with agitation, despite being worn out from the morning's battle and hiking into and out of a bizarre storm. The three of you lay your cloaks out like blankets and study the urns you've filled with water that no one thinks is safe to drink, even though you're almost thirsty enough not to care. "But what if it is okay to drink? One of us could... try it?" You propose, each of you looking to the other in a silent game of no dibs, that inevitably ends with you putting a panicked finger on your nose ("Nose goes!"), Emmett following suit, and Perdita refusing to participate in such exasperating nonsense.

There's not much that's useful besides the urns of suspicious water and a small stash of sewing needles and thread that someone found on the long walk here. Each of you has a bag and there's not one, but two polaroid cameras after a spare falls from the sky and you immediately snatch it out of Emmett's hands to snap a photo of him making a dumb face of surprise at your sudden antics. It's followed by a small harp and a parcel containing... you have no idea what they are, but your significantly more competent allies seem to think they're some sort of filtering device. Looking at them and trying to figure out how they do something useful makes your head start to hurt again so instead you switch focus to thinking about how Perdita never gave you back your crossbow. You don't ask for it because you feel lighter without it, only picking up a cache of small knives earlier (which you discovered by tripping over them, screaming bloody murder at how close you came to slicing and dicing your own beloved face, your most precious possession) because you thought the others would judge you if you didn't.

"Your knife is cooler than mine," you can't help complaining at Perdita as you sit around a non-existent campfire together, taking stock of what everyone managed to scavenge thus far. Your new throwing knives look teeny and pathetic on the ground next to the artfully twisted dagger you surrendered to her in the bloodbath. While the throwing knives are sleek and lightweight, the dagger twists and spirals with an intricate pattern etched across the opalescent steel. "It's stars," you realize, picking it up and squinting to examine the design more closely, "like a galaxy." Like everyone who has ever seen pictures of outer space, you always loved nebulas and how gas and dust somehow turns into absolute magic out there. That could never be real, you would tell yourself, even as you reshelved the books in the Non-Fiction section, turning away to go in search of things that might be easier to wrap your head around.

When you look up, Perdita is eyeing you as if trying to figure you out the same way you've been analyzing... her knife. Trying to laugh your obvious misstep off, you turn the handle of the dagger toward her and hold it out the way you were taught to pass scissors as a child. Oh, yes! I found this. It's yours. I'm just returning it, hahaha. I don't know how it got in my hands! It's a funny story! But also it's not a story at all because obviously I have to idea how I came to be holding this. Hoo boy, life sure is strange! Her eyes flick back and forth from your face to the way the blade is poised so that a simple push of your own hands would cause you to stab yourself, the blade effortlessly gutting you. "Just keep it," she sighs, her voice commanding rather than kind as she switches her attention to polishing a smear of her own blood off the crossbow she clearly has no intention of relinquishing to anyone, much less to you.

While the others sleep, you lay with the dagger held out above your face in the moonlight. Against the night sky like that, more than ever, it looks like a tiny galaxy that you mysteriously hold within your hands. Until now there hasn't been anything within this arena that made you feel like you were in control, but there's something about the illusion of holding a complex system of stars and stellar remnants in your hands that's reassuring. "It's a... spiral galaxy," you joke quietly to yourself as you rotate the twisted blade over and over itself, feeling very smart about remembering the term, despite not remembering much else about it other than how pretty the pictures were.

You don't recall falling asleep any more than you do waking up, everything feeling like a dream regardless. "Your lion would not defeat my cat," you argue with Emmett, the two of you getting much too serious about a hypothetical of whose stuffed animal would win in a fight. "This," you hold the scrappy looking black kitten plush up as if it's an irrefutable fact that a domestic cat could take a lion in a fight, "is an alley cat. Do you know how vicious those are? I almost died to one once," you say while gasping in shock at your own harrowing tale.

"Oh, we can all believe that," he snickers in reply, the lion plush in his hand swooping in to take a swipe at your cheek. Rawr!

Your hand immediately moves to cup your face: scandalized. "Not the face!" You wail, trying to play it off as if you're joking despite how obvious it is that you're definitely not joking in the slightest. "I have boundaries, you kno—" A piece of paper whizzes past your cheek, narrowly missing, following the path where the fluffy lion's paw grazed you gently. Had you not jerked back from Emmett's teasing, it's obvious that blood would have been drawn. Or, if it wasn't obvious from the near-miss, it's certainly obvious after a second miniature paper crane slashes into the other boy's calf, blood welling up where it managed to cut through his pants.

Ducking for cover, you scramble to make a grab for your dagger, your eyes wide as you attempt to wrap your head around the strangeness of being attacked by what looks like the kinds of tiny paper birds you would fold with your sisters on rainy days, the three of you filling bell jars with them, each one a tiny wish. Another in the flock dives at Perdita's head as you swing your knife at the ones circling around you and Emmet. Compared to the miniature birds, your small knife feels like a ridiculously giant sword; a ridiculously giant sword made of stars. For a moment you think of the irony of attempting to attack a bird with a piece of sky, uncertain of how your handheld galaxy could possibly do any damage in this situation. As lovely of an excuse as that is, you know that a lack of damage certainly wouldn't be the knife's fault.

( C H O O S E Y O U R O W N A D V E N T U R E )

(You hit...)

You don't know what you expected to happen when you stabbed at the little crane. Somehow it wasn't blood. Paper doesn't bleed and so you pull your weapon back, heart racing as you examine the red on your hand and try to find the wound that must have been inflicted upon you. This moment is too surreal for you to reconcile the blood on the bird with the bird itself... with paper.

Watching the games, you've seen plenty of things that didn't feel real, reinforcing your ideas of science as a wild kind of magic or maybe just special effects and lies. Living the experience doesn't make it any easier to process. If anything, more than ever, you feel as if you are being tricked. "This just isn't possible!" You yell, gaping at origami come to life. Instead of understanding, the only thing you can do is make a wish, the same way that you and your sisters would wish on the paper cranes you made together at home.

Instead of merely wishing to survive, you wish that you've gone as insane as you feel right now and that all of this is only happening harmlessly within your useless head. In that way, you're able to wish that none of it is happening at all.

(You miss...)

It's not surprising when your hand flails through the air without connecting with your target, or at least it's probably not surprising to other people. You can't process what's happening right now well enough to feel anything except the racing of your own pulse. "Take that!" You yell, stabbing at the air again and hitting nothing as the cranes easily out-maneuver you. "And that! And that! And that!" A miss! And a miss! And yet another shocking miss! Whipping around in a circle you slash and jab haphazardly while forgetting to take the time to aim, as if you're once again reenacting one of your favorite action scenes without care for whether or not the moves have any useful applications for the current situation.

[ niko attacks blueberry, knife ]

NYcjoQVa7lknife

[ 2084 — shallow cut on back of head — 4.5 damage ]

knife

Last Edit: Jun 21, 2020 15:34:42 GMT -5 by L△LIA

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tick 12a / calla
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just a litle creacher

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 21, 2020 23:35:18 GMT -5

Quote

Post by tick 12a / calla on Jun 21, 2020 23:35:18 GMT -5

All threats aside - Perdita really isn't that bad. Because after she had put her crossbow down and after I had fixed her wound dressing, she didn't even decide to go back on her decision and kill me. It's the cynical part of me that thought she would, I guess. But she didn't. And that's all that matters here. I survive one day and get ready for another, trekking across the arena with two sort-of-not-really-yet-allies.

It's complicated.

But it's when we're walking out of the storm that I see it, - a little lion sitting at the base of one of the trees, in a pile of red and green and purple, and I stare at it for a minute. It has to be some kind of joke. Perdita and Niko keep walking but I hesitate in front of it, tensing in the face of a potential trap. Except after a moment of silence I touch the fleece of its mane and think of Ridley.

Little lion, Caesar had said in my interview. Little cub, Mom had called me before I left.

I stuff the plush into my bag and jog to catch up to the other two.

The sponsorship comes first, once we've found somewhere tucked away from the wind to rest for the night. I can't help but feel a little smug when the parachutes start falling into our laps, because I told them I'd be worth keeping alive. The gold around the Le Roux name isn't just for show anymore, not since Ridley won at least, and now it's starting to pay off.

I've barely even opened the first package when there's a sudden flash and I almost panic, blinking the spots out of my vision as fast as I can and reaching for my weapon. When I can see again, I catch Niko is scampering away with the camera I'd just unwrapped. "Hey!" I shout after him indignantly, letting him go after Perdita swings her glare around on me when I get up to follow.

Niko's annoying, I've decided, in the way that I've always wanted my brothers to be annoying.

I shouldn't trust either of them. But I think I do, just a little.

Maybe it's because sometimes I catch Perdita with the same look in her eyes that Silk always had. Or that Niko seems to carry himself with the same easy confidence as Harper. I think that should make me hate them. Or it should at least make me run from them or kill them or do something because they're so similar to my own siblings, so cruelly similar. But there's a part of me that whispers this is how it was supposed to be.

This is how the three of us should've been growing up - moving with a camaraderie that came naturally. I don't know exactly what that says about me; being more comfortable with the people who might kill me after a single day than I was with my own family after sixteen years.

Another beeping sound comes, quieter this time, and when a third parachute comes floating down to me I watch Niko and Perdita out of the corner of my eye to see if they react. But they're too busy comparing their weapons, turned towards each other, so I don't say anything.

I don't know why.

Maybe it's just a leftover survival mechanism, an all for one mentality that I never grew out of. There's no pride of the pack here, but when I crack the package open I almost blow my cover anyway. Because there's a blunt inside, a little tiny piece of home that I didn't think I'd see again. Tatton and Aurora must be kicking themselves right about now. I toss the parachute into the bush and tuck the dart down into my boot just like they taught me. If I survive tomorrow, I tell myself, if I can prove that I belong here, then I'll pull it back out and find a way to light it.

I bunch my cloak up under my head and turn over about two dozens times, waiting for an anthem that never comes. Except I remember hearing the cannon, I do, but I also remember being panicked and confused and hazy.

So maybe I just imagined it.

And I don't want to ask Niko and Perdita and risk sounding stupid. So I don't. The numbers will be thinning out soon enough anyways.

I count my breaths and try to fall asleep, looking out at the stillness of the dark water and wishing more than anything that I could hear the waves. If I try really hard, I think I can, but that might just be a memory, something I tucked deep into the hold of my mind for nights like these. Because in one moment it's there, and then in the next it's just wind from the storm, moving through the trees and the brush and my hair.

Waking up feels just like falling asleep, seamless, in a way. Like what I imagine slipping into and out of the ocean would feel like. But my head feels different in the morning, and so does my body, less waterlogged and more focused. I watch Niko go through my bag, upturned by how much I had moved around last night, and it only takes a record time of three seconds for my mind to catch up.

In one hand he's got the lion I had picked up on the way here, the one I had shoved to the bottom of my bag so I could avoid something like this, and in the other hand he's got some sad mangy thing. "Your lion would not defeat my cat," he's saying and I snatch the plush back and scowl at him.

"This is an alley cat," he crows as he keeps going, "I almost died to one once." And now I think that I've decided that he's both annoying and stupid. Because in a fight between a lion and an alley cat - the winner is obvious. But I try not to think of the parallels here. I try not to think about how I was that alley cat for along time. (And how maybe I still am.)

"Oh, we can all believe that." I say, only half joking, and maybe it's because Perdita isn't looking, but I push the lion towards him and let the paw swipe across his face. Or maybe I throw it at him, just a little.

He started it.

But I swear I just barely graze him before something flies between us and we both jerk back. The world narrows down a little and I scramble to my feet, reaching for the knife under my cloak. It's only fair that we run into this now, after letting our guards down a touch too far. I try to track whatever's flying above us when they swoop and collide with us.

"Shit." And I grimace at the sudden burn of red seeping from my leg, "Watch the talons!"

[ emmett attacks blueberry ; knife ]

SCivd_nvobknife

deep gash on right forearm -- 8.0 damage

knife

Last Edit: Jun 21, 2020 23:36:28 GMT -5 by tick 12a / calla

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eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris
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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 1:17:28 GMT -5

Quote

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 22, 2020 1:17:28 GMT -5

She's grateful that she cannot see herself from the outside.

This is the kindest of her cages — this body of hers. She can only imagine how feral she must appear to them, how broken. She is a ruined, terrible thing, with her finger on a trigger and petals wilting in an open wound.

They will not take root in her heart, and she knows this. Just like she knows that she cannot fire the arrow, even with Niko hovering behind her and whispering in her ear. She blinks, and it's Artemus standing across from her.

It's Calypso, and Brentley, and Roland.

And she acts like she hasn't shot each of them down before, like she has ever hesitated in hurting anyone. But this is more than a metaphor, and the weapon she is holding is tangible and sharp. She's tired, and afraid, but she lowers the bow and gives away nothing.

"Then make yourself useful." Because he promises to help them, and that is what she needs right now, but she refuses to beg for it. There's a meadow when she falls to her knees, lilacs brushing against her thighs and fireflies shining in the waves of her hair.

And maybe it would be easier to stay down there, gentle and warm and restrained, but she does not know how to fold herself. She cannot bend. So she stands there, with the wind moving across her cuts and ripping through the knots of her hair. She wonders what they must think of her.

But she learns to keep her gaze averted from them; when Emmett is taking off the strips of her shirt and wiping away the clot of flowers and blood on her chest. There's a tear running down her cheek, but there is no sound of crying. She doesn't give her pain a life.

It bleeds out of her, and dies on the ground. He applies a thicker balm of herbs, with hands that don't shake, and wraps it in place with bandages made for healing. She turns to look at him, and the sun is setting behind him, and they've just made it out of the storm.

He's golden, and he's good, so she rises to her feet and walks away without saying thank you. They set up camp by spreading out their cloaks, dropping their bags in a pile but holding tight to their weapons. And none of it feels quite real, or safe, but they still lie there together.

Until she can't shut off her thoughts, and she forces herself to sit up and clean the bolts of her crossbow to distract herself. Except it's only one, and she's scrubbing at her own dried blood. She doesn't know how to interact with the boys, and she can't sleep, so she builds walls around herself.

With every glare, and sharp reply, she tries to push them away. Niko speaks with a smile that reaches his eyes and words that go a mile a minute, but all she registers is that he's attached to the knife she stole from him and too nervous to ask for his bow back.

"Just keep it."

It doesn't need to be more than that. He speaks of stars, and galaxies, and she keeps her eyes locked forward. Waves crash in the distance, moving out of sync with the slow drum of her heart. When she passes out, she prays that they will have abandoned her.

But they are still there when she wakes, still bickering and laughing and spreading out empty palms against the sand. She pulls tight against the strap of her crossbow, and starts preparing for the day. There's no time to eat, or drink. This isn't a safe haven.

She has been to this beach before, in some way. She knows this ocean, and she has felt this sand, and she only has to look down at herself the recognize this shade of red. She bites at her lip as the morning fades, listening to Niko and Emmett feud.

With soft animals, and no blades.

Then the birds swoop in, or at least what look like birds. Tiny, and pale, and sharp as a dagger. A wing slices across the back of her head before she can lunge away, quickly grabbing the crossbow she has claimed and lifting it with a trembling arm.

The pain is alive in her hand, a beast that has woken up as she slept, but she closes her throat with a gasp and tells herself to push through it. She squints a bloodshot eye, and looks through the hurt and the rage to find her target.

"Stand back. Both of you."

And she fires the arrow into something that will not bleed.

perdita attacks kiwi ; crossbow bolt #1
urGBx2yMbzbow
Arrow in Cheek -- 7.0 damage | +1 target practice (8)

bow

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 1:19:34 GMT -5 by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris

all my girls got their lace and their crimes.

ryan
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over the moon, where all the wild things are

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 1:32:24 GMT -5

Quote

Post by ryan on Jun 22, 2020 1:32:24 GMT -5

She is red in the face as she felt her talon grace the boys blade. How dare he be quick enough to block her talons. She squawked louder, a visceral one if someone else had to quantify it. She circled around as she watched these creatures stab and shoot at her family, and she felt nothing but red. Carnage and blood amongst the ocean breeze. She would have more of it.

[Cherry [Orizuru] attacks Nikolai || Talons (Knife)]
aPiXzks83eknife
[2130 -- Deep Gash on Left Calf -- 8.0 damage
(Knife)]

Blueberry felt blue as these creatures had stuck sharp objects into his body. The paper tearing sound was on that Blue hadnt heard in ages. Maybe he had been flying too close to the sun, or maybe he never experienced pain like this before. They speak to them in tongues that he had never heard, and he thinks about trying to rip them all out with his talons. However, he would have to survive first. Like Cherry, he had always been a fighter.

[Blueberry [Orizuru] attacks Emmett || Talons (Knife)]
knife
[2166 -- Severed Left Ear -- 8.0 damage
(Knife)]

She could feel her wings slice through skin. She was doing it. She was protecting her family. She loved them, and she would die from them. These creatures reacted in weird ways to them. They shouted things that of course Kiwi would never understand. All she could do was squawk as she circled around them with vicious eyes. She didnt even see something flying as her as she felt it lodge into her face. These creatures were vile in Kiwi's eyes, but the girl most exclusively. She would make them all pay.

[Kiwi [Orizuru] attacks Perdita || Talons (Knife)]
knife
[2134 -- Deep Gash on Neck -- 10.0 damage
(Knife)]

knife·knife·knife

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 1:34:10 GMT -5 by ryan

L△LIA
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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 13:50:19 GMT -5

Quote

Post by L△LIA on Jun 22, 2020 13:50:19 GMT -5

You don't know what you expected to happen when you stabbed at the little crane. Somehow it wasn't blood. Paper doesn't bleed and so you pull your weapon back, heart racing as you examine the red on your hand and try to find the wound that must have been inflicted upon you. This moment is too surreal for you to reconcile the blood on the bird with the bird itself... with paper.

Watching the games, you've seen plenty of things that didn't feel real, reinforcing your ideas of science as a wild kind of magic or maybe just special effects and lies. Living the experience doesn't make it any easier to process. If anything, more than ever, you feel as if you are being tricked. "This just isn't possible!" You yell, gaping at origami come to life. Instead of understanding, the only thing you can do is make a wish, the same that you and your sisters would wish on the paper cranes you made together at home.

Instead of merely wishing to survive, you wish that you've gone as insane as you feel right now and that all of this is happening harmlessly within your useless head.

The problem is there's clearly nothing harmless about it. "Shit," Emmett curses at his injury, "watch out for the talons!" There's twice as much blood after he lashes out at the bird you wounded, hitting it significantly harder and with greater focus. Suddenly the tiny crane begins to look something like a strange storm cloud, its body becoming mangled as it rains red upon them. Pitter-patter, goes the blood. Pitter-patter, echos the rushing of your own.

"Stand back." Crossbow in hand Perdita is statuesque as she takes aim, defiant of her own body and yesterday's wounds. "Both of you," she commands with a stern ferocity you'd be stupid not to heed. While you certainly are stupid, you're not that kind of an idiot. Instead you're the kind of idiot who does as he's told and takes a couple steps backward — until your heels as wet and sinking into the damp sand of the shore — something going soft in your chest as the breeze tugs at her knotted hair and her finger pulls the trigger. She is decisive. She is unforgiving in a way that expects people to do better without bothering to elaborate on any guidelines. There is nothing accidental about her, unlike the way you've always managed to luck your way through life.

There is wind and there is rain, red as it may be —

Red as her head, red as my heart —

A voice in the back of your head can't help waxing poetic, too used to the way you would waste away your laziest days laying around watching old games being replayed, trying to find the words to describe the ferocious survival on screen. There were plenty of things you wanted to learn from them, if only any of those things were easy. But there was never anything easy about any of it and so you never learned anything that might have helped you cope with your sister's illness and the toll it took on your family or the way her struggle made you want to give up, despite having the fewest problems of anyone. There were times when you even wished for bigger problems, for the attention that came with the unexpected fainting, the surgeries, the terrifyingly experimental treatments. You didn't want the struggle, you just wanted your scraped knees and childish devastation over being called a doo-doohead by someone you thought was your best friend to matter sometimes. You wanted to not be scolded for the insignificance of your problems for once.

Hark! The birds may swoop, but her aim does not —

Steady as the water, steady as... steady as... steady as my guarder? Is guarder a word? Or is that just garter? What's a garter for anyhow? I don't think that's the same thing —

The problems tributes in the games encountered — whether large or small — were framed with such importance as to be mandatory viewing for an entire nation. That always fascinated you, even if your mind was too simple to do the basic emotional math that explained it. Now certainly isn't the time for that, one of the birds swooping up from down low to carve a gash across your left calf. It's unexpected enough that your leg buckles and you topple backwards into the water with a dramatic splash, sputtering and flailing as you sit up in the shallows and begin sifting your fingers through the sands in search of the weapon you dropped.

( C H O O S E Y O U R O W N A D V E N T U R E )

( You hit... )

Scrambling back to your feet, dagger reclaimed, you panic-kick at the air when one of the birds flies past again, your foot making contact with absolutely nothing. Water droplets soar up and all around. At least it looks like quite the show as you spin and splash, attempting to slash at top speed in hopes that quantity of attacks might somehow compensate for quality. "Yah!" You give a guttural yell, as if this might disorient the small creatures, chopping at the air with your empty hand as you wave your knife around chaotically with the other. "Yah! Yah!" It's a tumultuous mess and while it's anything except good strategy, you feel the twisted blade make contact against the unbelievable odds you've created for yourself. "I got it! I got it! Did you guys see that?!"

( You miss... )

Turns out that metal gets slippery when wet and although you manage to find your knife in the water, it takes a few more tries to actually be able to hold onto it. Recognizing an easy target when they see one, the birds dive at you without mercy and you have to repeatedly throw yourself back beneath the water to avoid being attacked before you even manage to arm yourself once more. Again and again the water splashes up as you hold your panicked breath and drop down, patting around in the sand for your dagger and managing to swing it around for a mere moment before it slips free from your grasp all over again.

[ niko attacks blueberry, knife ]

K7XuZj6mcpknife

[ 2124 — deep gash on right bicep — 8 damage + 1 blades ]

knife

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 13:51:46 GMT -5 by L△LIA

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tick 12a / calla
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just a litle creacher

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 18:32:36 GMT -5

Quote

Post by tick 12a / calla on Jun 22, 2020 18:32:36 GMT -5

My blade tears through the delicate skin of the thing's wing and I'm almost surprised when it keeps going. There's that tenacity again - the little sliver of earth that keeps crumbling under my feet. It's a constant now, after so many years of falling and rising and falling again. I can't take a step without being beaten down again.

"Stand back." I can hear Perdita say, and Niko moves but I don't. Maybe there's still some defiant part of me that hid away, hissing in the face of authority and orders and battle-glory. Maybe I just don't move fast enough.

Because there's a sudden whistling sound, a moment where the sun is blocked out and one of the birds flies by my head so quickly that it takes a minute for me to even realize it went by. It takes another minute for the pain to set in.

Everything goes white, like someone pressing cotton to my eyes before the colour bleeds back through and everything shifts, turning so fucking red. I hear a guttural sound, something feral, and barely register it coming from myself. Because suddenly everything is coming back tenfold. A burning starts in the side of my head, expanding and shrinking in time to my heartbeat but it just keeps getting faster and faster and hotter until my blood feels molten and I raise my hand up to where the pain is uncomprehendingly.

I don't really know what I expected. But it wasn't an absence.

I can feel some distant part of me start to panic, control seeping from me in a river of red because my hand touches nothing but wet because my ear is gone. All I can focus on is the pain of it, the scorch, and the screeching of the birds sounds a little more hollow, a little more far away. I pull my hand back but I don't recognize it under all that blood.

I'm finally stepping back then, tripping over my own feet and trying not to hyperventilate. I think I knew this would happen, or, I knew something would happen. I'd seen the Games reruns and I'd cut into dummies, watched blood flow on a tv screen and hacked away at plastic limbs. I went through all the Career training and have the status to show for it.

But there's something so different about the real thing. There's a shake to my body now, a rattling that shudders its way through my ribcage and I try to wrench my bones back into place long enough to grab a hold of myself.

Because when my vision clears, the birds are still here, and Niko and Perdita are still here. My family is still watching and my ear is still in the sand and I realize that my knife is still tightly clenched in my fist.

All I can hear is a shrill ringing sound, like something driving a stake through my skull and when there's another flash of white I bring my knife up blindly, swinging and stumbling and swinging again.

Something rises in me like the tide when it stays just out of reach, everything shrinking down to only it and me. If there's one thing I remember learning from my parents, it's that you don't let anyone, or anything, slight you. I'll grab that fucking bird out of the sky and make it into a hat or something, wear it like a trophy so the other ones know not to fuck with me or my head. That's what Mom would do, and maybe I am more of my mother's son than I thought, because before I know it my hand is slipping against the blood on the blade handle but I still jab it into the air towards the mutt.

I know that once the adrenaline fades that I'm going to crash, that the pain will sink in completely and I won't be able to do anything about it. But I know I can do something about this piece of shit, right here right now, getting closer and closer and screaming "Come here you son of a BITCH!"

[ emmett attacks blueberry ; knife ]

GiJ0YSG7rjknife

deep gash on left bicep -- 8.0 damage

knife

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 18:33:42 GMT -5 by tick 12a / calla

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eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris
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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 19:46:52 GMT -5

Quote

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 22, 2020 19:46:52 GMT -5

It doesn't make sense, but blood still flows.

She watches her arrow rip through paper, hears the crunch of it. There's a gush of something red, a flapping of something torn, but the thing keeps moving. "This just isn't possible!" Niko's voice echoes in her mind. She closes her eyes to find her center.

Something warm is running down the back of her neck, a hot pain pulses up her arm and spreads across her chest. There is no balance to find here, only a world turning on its axis and terrible things flying overhead. There is nothing she can think to say to comfort the boy.

So she keeps her mouth shut, and her gaze on the sky. It would be easier to run and hide, to let herself keep believing that there are certain things that just cannot happen. But here she is, staying when she wants to leave, watching a lifeless thing die.

The terrors return when she tries to prepare another bolt, a whoosh of air and a blur of white. She looks over her shoulder to see a fresh cut across Niko's leg, scolding herself for not loading her weapon fast enough. She looks for Emmett, and realizes he did not listen to her.

"Get behind—"

But there's a terrible sound, and then another. And it takes everything in her not to drop her bow and start to retch. There's an ear lying in the sand, and there's a river of blood running down the side of Emmett's face, and she hates herself for looking so afraid.

She doesn't know why she takes a step closer to him, like she is capable of healing where she is made to destroy. But it's that misstep that leaves her exposed, that puts her straight in the line of fire as one of the creatures flies right in front of her.

And she stops in her tracks, and chokes on a gasp. A streak of fire moves across her throat, and then there's only heat, and a strange kind of numbness that still aches. She reaches for the wound, trying to hold back the bleeding. She opens her mouth, but there is no sound.

So she forces herself to turn away from the stranger she wanted to save, only looking more ashamed when that puts her in Niko's line of view. She doesn't want to suffer in front of them, she refuses to be the girl that dies in anyone's arms. This is her blood.

She'll smear herself with it before they touch her.

It's lonely, and it's wicked, but she takes hold of that cold determination and forces herself to lift the crossbow back up. She tells herself that she's doing this to keep herself alive, that all illusions of bravery were slashed alongside her throat.

But she could have ran. She knows she could have escaped.

She makes her choice, and it is not her.

perdita attacks kiwi ; crossbow bolt #2
|nNs06Ywexbow
~~miss~~

accuracy | day two

bow
Arrow in Chest -- 7.0 damage | +1 target practice (8)

bow·bow

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 19:49:57 GMT -5 by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris

all my girls got their lace and their crimes.

ryan
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over the moon, where all the wild things are

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 22, 2020 23:28:28 GMT -5

Quote

Post by ryan on Jun 22, 2020 23:28:28 GMT -5

They could not see her mouth, but she did wonder how his blood tasted. If she hadnt been so focused on trying to protect, she would have stopped. Savored it. Bathed in it for just a moment. She was a feral creature after all, named cherry because she always had a proclivity to blood. It blended in with her red coat so well, and while she watches Blueberry massacred in front of her eyes, she knows that his death would not be in vein. She would take one of them with her. She would, she would, she would.

[Cherry [Orizuru] attacks Nikolai || Talons (Knife)]
MRddG7fjHxknife
[2086 -- Shallow Cut on Back -- 4.0 damage
(Knife)]

The feel of her talons ripping into the girls skin elated Kiwi. She wondered if this had been the first time that she had been close to death. Kiwi knew she was not like Cherry, she did not enjoy people suffering, but if it meant that she could go on and live a peaceful life? So be it. The blood stained her green coat, and it felt warm on her talons, an ocean breeze wafting through the air to drown out the smell of hot copper. She flew up for a moment before feeling herself being ripped into again, no doubt, another weird thing penetrating her body. She was a fighter through and through, and she would not let some girl prove that she could not protect.

But watching Blueberry fall had hit Kiwi a different type of way. They screamed things are them, and Kiwi understood none of it, but she could see. See that Blueberry had died for the sake of protecting them. The young boy had to be taught a lesson. She is weak, but she is also strong..

[Kiwi [Orizuru] attacks Emmett || Talons (Knife)]
knife
[2102 -- Slit Throat -- 40 damage
(Knife) (fuck me)]

knife·knife

Last Edit: Jun 22, 2020 23:34:37 GMT -5 by ryan

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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 24, 2020 13:37:04 GMT -5

Quote

Post by L△LIA on Jun 24, 2020 13:37:04 GMT -5

Scrambling back to your feet, you panic-kick at the air when one of the birds flies past again, your foot making contact with absolutely nothing. Water droplets soar up and all around. At least it looks like quite the show as you spin and splash, attempting to slash at top speed in hopes that quantity of attacks might somehow compensate for quality. "Yah!" You give a guttural yell, as if this might disorient the small creatures, chopping at the air with your empty hand as you wave your knife around chaotically with the other. "Yah! Yah!" It's a tumultuous mess and while it's anything except good strategy, you feel your knife make contact against the unbelievable odds you created for yourself. "I got it! I got it! Did you guys see that?!"

It's a surprisingly good feeling to have done something competent. Instead of merely grazing the small crane, you made a significant hit that actually contributed to protecting yourself, Perdita, and Emm—

"Haha!" You yell triumphantly at the birds, taking another wide swipe with your knife as you trade in a piece of your fear for a little hope of victory. "Take that, weird bird-thing!"

It's not until after you've made an idiot of yourself that you see Emmett's body floating in the shallow water beside you, blood pouring from a gash across his throat. He doesn't cough or twitch with pain. There is a horrifying, undeniable stillness. It's infectious, your body freezing as the truth of the situation overwhelms you. It's different, seeing a dead body in real life rather than seeing dead bodies on a television screen. You didn't think it would feel so different. You didn't think that what you felt before was as insignificant and heartless as it is in comparison to the truth of looking at the corpse of a boy you don't know much better than the strangers you watched die throughout the years before coming here and realizing that: You? Are an asshole.

Seeing your distraction over looking down at Emmett, the birds continue to swoop at you, taking full advantage of the situation to land an attack on the back of your neck. You cry out from the sudden and unexpected pain, but it's minor — especially in comparison to the wounds of your tentative allies. Sucking a few panicked breaths in through your teeth, you flush with embarrassment at your petty outburst, as if it's at all comparable to...

Emmett's body floats, as if it is completely weightless without his soul.

( C H O O S E Y O U R O W N A D V E N T U R E )

( You hit... )

Grunting as you take an infuriated swing at the creatures attacking you, the sound is garbled nonsense. There's a hint of a whine, evidence of how unfair everything feels in this moment — for you, for Emmett, for everyone. Hidden inside the whine is a note of keening as you try to hold back from crying, your chest twitching silently between held breaths. Much louder than that is the sound of anger, both justified and half-crazed in a way where it feels like fire is licking at the backs of your knees and your ears. Your scalp, your shoulders, your armpits, the soles of your feet; everything burns. Nowhere is the sound is bravery. Nowhere is the sound of trying to pretend you're not completely overwhelmed.

( You miss... )

The shaking is too much, try as you might to retaliate against the swarm of paper cranes that just killed a boy whose death you were supportive of only yesterday. You should feel relieved, probably, to have a competitor done away with so easily. You don't. Instead you can't keep your aim focused, your hand trembling as you take swipe after missed swipe in a fight the three of you obviously weren't prepared for, losing your footing when you very nearly fumble and step on Emmett's body, as if what he needs right now is for you to add insult to fatal misery.

[ niko attacks kiwi, knife ]

zrdEh|Wydqknife

[ 2041 — block ]

[ accuracy re-roll ]

knife

[ 2109 — deep gash on left bicep — 8 damage ]

knife·knife

Last Edit: Jun 24, 2020 13:39:37 GMT -5 by L△LIA

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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 24, 2020 16:51:04 GMT -5

Quote

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 24, 2020 16:51:04 GMT -5

It's a quick disaster.

A fire without a spark, the quiet embers of dying flames. It's a horrible thing, the kind of tragedy that you cannot relive when you close your eyes; but it's still a memory that belongs to her now. It still sounds like paper shredding, still feels like a hot knife against her throat. And she's in pain, and she's afraid.

And he's dying. They are mirrors of each other — two bodies standing in the middle of the wreckage, blood rushing down their chests. But his cut is deeper, and there is no time to take his hand and try to stop the inevitable. She is watching him die.

Her fingers are trembling, slipping down the wetness of her neck. The birds had flown past her, but it feels as if there's a fresh cut. It's a tangible agony, but she can't take it in her hands. This is an internal trauma. This is what she hoped for.

Because he's floating in the water, and his eyes are staring up at the sky, but he sees nothing. He feels nothing. And he is no longer in her way, no longer a threat and no longer something she needs to save. Her gaze finds Niko, and she swallows hard.

It's like swallowing flames. He's only just noticed, still shouting and swinging his knife, covered in blood but not drowning in it. "Niko," she starts to say, but the sound is impossibly dry and harsh. She doesn't mean for it to be.

She is crying, and she is trying not to be ashamed. She is selfish, and fleeting, and willing to be cruel. But that doesn't mean she is. A true killer doesn't pray that killing a thing will not destroy them; but she does. Because Niko has to die.

Like Emmett had.

Like everyone will.

And like the birds, she wants to fly away.

"Niko. Look at me."

She pulls the trigger, and she doesn't hide.

But her hand cramps,

and her arm shakes,

and he watches her break.

perdita misfires (kiwi) ; crossbow bolt #3
aFgAtR749wbow
miss / attack invalid

bow

Last Edit: Jun 24, 2020 17:37:27 GMT -5 by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris

all my girls got their lace and their crimes.

ryan
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over the moon, where all the wild things are

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 24, 2020 19:56:24 GMT -5

Quote

Post by ryan on Jun 24, 2020 19:56:24 GMT -5

She was proud of her sister for doing what was needed to protect their home. She watched as the young boy fell moments as she attacked the older one. She wished she could have tasted his blood. She could smell the fear that it gave off, and it drove her into pure bliss. She rose into the sky again, just to watch as the boy she had her eyes on had slashed through Kiwi. Kiwi would fly no more, and all she saw was red. She squawked through the air, this time a decibel louder than before. She would protect her home, she would avenge her siblings, and she will make them pay. She would make their heads roll.

[Cherry [Orizuru] attacks Nikolai || Talons (Knife)]
trDnW3Y4A5knife
[2141 -- Miss -- 0.0 damage
(Knife)]

knife

Last Edit: Jun 24, 2020 19:57:14 GMT -5 by ryan

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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 25, 2020 16:36:52 GMT -5

Quote

Post by L△LIA on Jun 25, 2020 16:36:52 GMT -5

Grunting as you take an infuriated swing at the creatures attacking you, the sound is garbled nonsense. There's a hint of a whine, evidence of how unfair everything feels in this moment — for you, for Emmett, for everyone. Hidden inside the whine is a note of keening as you try to hold back from crying, your chest twitching silently between held breaths. Much louder than that is the sound of anger, both justified and half-crazed in a way where it feels like fire is licking at the backs of your knees and your ears. Your scalp, your shoulders, your armpits, the soles of your feet; everything burns. Nowhere in the sound is bravery. Nowhere is the sound of trying to pretend you're not completely overwhelmed.

"Niko," Perdita's voice is faint, but it's difficult to say if that's because her voice is distant or because you are. It feels as if you are trapped in a bell jar. Suffocating. On display. Unable to escape walls you cannot see. "Niko," she tries again, "Look at me."

A bolt fired from her crossbow whizzes past you, close enough to jolt your attention in her direction, even as the the nearest bird pulls itself up and up and out of the projectile's path of danger. "I'm looking!" You scream, more panicked than before, but somehow more focused. Instead of an existential crisis, you fixate on her crossbow and swollen hand. You look from wound to wound to wound to her face and you can't decode any of it, not after having seen Emmett standing one moment and still on his back the next. Still, you look her in the eyes, swallow, and manage to catch your breath.

The crane dives at you once more, but you manage to duck and swipe at it with your dagger. That's when you notice the corpse of the other bird skewered on the twisted blade, pale and terrible. Up close it looks even more like paper, the folds of its body impossible yet undeniable all at once. A web-like map of thin capillaries shadow its crisp skin and you wonder what its heart must look like, if there's anything left of it or if it burst as your knife stabbed through.

You blink. Disoriented.

( C H O O S E Y O U R O W N A D V E N T U R E )

( You hit... )

Holding the skewered body of the creature up for Perdita to see, you don't know what to do with it. Hey... hey, look, your silence says, joyless. Did you see that? I got it. Yeah. I got it. You're not ready to feel the inevitable crunch of its fragile bones if you attempted to pull it off, but the way its tiny head lolls with the dagger's movement is horrible. No, you're not ready for that. Instead you switch your focus back to the face of the girl who keeps telling you to follow her, to look to her. You don't pay attention to the miniature corpse and you certainly don't turn toward the much bigger one. Like this, you don't see the bird's head smack lifelessly into its own limp wing as you take another swing at its last remaining companion.

( You miss... )

"Did you..." You trail off, no longer loud and yelling but withdrawing the same way you always would on rainy days, secretly letting the weather get you down as if trying to figure out what mild sadness felt like instead of the dramatic, earth-shattering despair that so frequently threatened your family. You weren't allowed such petty emotions. A little rain? A paper cut? A cute girl rejecting your hopes of laughing away an afternoon together? It would be insulting for a Konstantine to let such frivolous things bother them. You were taught to save your sadness for things that mattered. You were taught to save your sadness for your terminally ill sister, as if nothing existed between Charlie's good days and her bad ones.

You don't finish asking Perdita if she just tried to kill you with that last shot, because you're not allowed to ask about such petty Almosts or Maybes when you know that all of your shock and all of your sadness is supposed to belong to Emmett's death.

Don't worry about you. You're fine.

[ niko attacks cherry, knife ]

Ql4NVEpD|yknife

[ 2099 — deep gash on back of head — 9 damage ]

knife

Last Edit: Jun 25, 2020 16:38:56 GMT -5 by L△LIA

( C H A R A C T E R S )

eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris
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liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 26, 2020 0:09:57 GMT -5

Quote

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 26, 2020 0:09:57 GMT -5

"I'm looking!"

And what a tragedy he must see.

Her hand seizes up, the crossbow slipping from her grasp as the arrow whirs dangerously close to him. It hits nothing, and she saves nothing. And she's still bleeding, and there's still tears in her eyes, and there's still a dead boy floating in the water.

The sun is setting with him,

and the world is darker for it.

She watched them play with toy animals not even an hour ago. Just a matter of days, and she had been sitting with Emmett in the dining hall and helping him through his hangover. This is what her choices lead to. The girl who always runs, standing in place.

Part of her wants to resent Niko for it, to curse the memory of the fallen Le Roux heir. But she could have shot to kill, she could have stolen the knife and given it back straight through his throat. She could have ran. Disappearing had always been easy for her.

But now she's pulling a knife from her bag, ignoring the fire licking at her legs and the voice screaming in her mind. 'Leave him. You have to go.' She owes him nothing, and she knows this, but there is something inside of her that cannot give up.

At least not now, not where her actions finally have consequences. This is not a thing that she can abandon — this is not a thing to love, and ruin, and leave. His name is Niko, and his was Emmett, and they are hers to hold. She will carry them.

She says this with a broken hand,

and fingers that won't stop shaking.

"One more. We're okay."

The knife soars, and she is jealous of it.

perdita attacks cherry ; throwing knife #1
IEroUYS|n1throwing knife
Shallow Cut on Forearm -- 3.0 damage

throwing knife

Last Edit: Jun 26, 2020 0:11:05 GMT -5 by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris

all my girls got their lace and their crimes.

ryan
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Pronouns: he/him
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over the moon, where all the wild things are

liability [sunborn v orizuru] Day 2 Jun 26, 2020 3:53:50 GMT -5

Quote

Post by ryan on Jun 26, 2020 3:53:50 GMT -5

Blueberry and Kiwi have been ripped to smithereens, and now they turn on her. The carnage and carnal hunger intensfies in her, blossoming and blooming into nothing but pain as she has now realized that she is alone. She will not be able to fly with her family again. They fought valiantly.

However, it wasnt good enough.

The older boy does not falter, but Cherry does, as she is ripped into by his knife. She feels nothing but pain but it is still nothing. Nothing hurts more than a broken heart right? She flaps her wings and squawks into the ether, the ocean breeze now feeling hot on the wounds she has sustained. None of them would hurt as much as the wounds that she would cause.

She would send their world into oblivion.

[Cherry [Orizuru] attacks Nikolai || Talons (Knife)]
7zcL0Sfe5_knife
[2198 -- Shallow Cut on Back -- 4.0 damage
(Knife)]

knife

Last Edit: Jun 26, 2020 3:55:05 GMT -5 by ryan

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Post by ryan on Jun 20, 2020 15:14:12 GMT -5

Post by L△LIA on Jun 21, 2020 15:33:30 GMT -5

Post by tick 12a / calla on Jun 21, 2020 23:35:18 GMT -5

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 22, 2020 1:17:28 GMT -5

Post by ryan on Jun 22, 2020 1:32:24 GMT -5

Post by L△LIA on Jun 22, 2020 13:50:19 GMT -5

Post by tick 12a / calla on Jun 22, 2020 18:32:36 GMT -5

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 22, 2020 19:46:52 GMT -5

Post by ryan on Jun 22, 2020 23:28:28 GMT -5

Post by L△LIA on Jun 24, 2020 13:37:04 GMT -5

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 24, 2020 16:51:04 GMT -5

Post by ryan on Jun 24, 2020 19:56:24 GMT -5

Post by L△LIA on Jun 25, 2020 16:36:52 GMT -5

Post by eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris on Jun 26, 2020 0:09:57 GMT -5

Post by ryan on Jun 26, 2020 3:53:50 GMT -5