there’s a monster incoming | roommates vs. goramont

I learn pretty quick that frost eats into you. The ache is sharp but far away, chapped lips pressed into a thin line as though that could keep some semblance of warmth coiling in my lungs. They start to ache, I exhale, the whole thing starts over like an hour glass tilted on its axis. It takes too much effort just to go through the motions, Vallora and I fumbling with tent pikes far longer than it should. It occurs to me, huddled against her and our wolf while shivering against bitter winds, that I should fear this endless Winter.

I don't.

In fact I find the numbness familiar.

It's like greeting an old friend when I finally fall asleep, wrapped up in agony and her dreamless embrace.

Introspection has never been my strong suit. There's nothing to feel while looking at a reflection made of parchment paper, worn ragged by all the times I've redrawn each feature. I've always hated the thing staring back at me in silver mirrors, but it was always comforting to know that it was never truly me trapped in there. (You'd probably hate him too.) Denial is a mild flavor.

It's hard to tell just when I wake up. It's a long, drawn out process of coaxing tense muscles into remembering how to move. I'm sure I waste too much time suspended in wakeful purgatory, fighting against my own body as I drown out the way it screams to help it forget we're so broken. "Lora?" My voice is heavy with sleep after I've somehow sat up, digging my knuckles into my eyes to force them open.

Silence has never felt so heavy. "Lora?!" I'm alone.

Panic is warm, white hot, scorching. My heart thuds hollow, dropping into the bottom of my stomach and I almost fall with her at the speed I rise. Desperation doesn't cut to my core, it cuts through it. I'm tearing through the tent with reckless abandon, acting on impulse I don't trust at all.

I am always thoughtful, I am always calculated. I am laying in a puddle at Vallora Seth's feet because my knees go weak when I catch sight of her. "Oh thank god." She's framed against the winter sun, outshining it effortlessly. I keep myself upright with a hand on her shoulder, fingers digging into her skin so that I can feel her beneath my fingertips but not so tight as to hurt. I'm finding that distinction matters so fucking much to me. "Wake me next time," Weak. Pathetic. Shaking words. And I mean every one. "I thought-,"

But that's just it. I didn't think at all. I saw that she was gone and for once I did not care if that was to my benefit, didn't consider a worst case scenario or hope she'd just left so I needn't worry about the effort of having her around. I saw that she was gone and I just needed to prove all those terrible thoughts wrong.

Honesty hurts. I don't like it much.

"This mangy thing stuck around, then." I let my hand fall to my side, feeling colder than ever. The wolf... thing seems almost cute, like, in some lights. I'd half expected it to rip out our throats in our sleep so the fact that it hasn't is a good sign. I've never been one for pets but an extra body means extra warmth. Lora seems to like it, anyway, so it's worth keeping around. The way it noses my palm to request I card my fingers through it's shaggy fur is kinda endearing too.

I don't mention that we haven't had breakfast as we pack up, starting off into the unknown because it's smarter than sitting in one place and waiting for the wealth alliance to swarm like starving buzzards.

"So we don't lose each other." I lie when I grab Lora's free hand, the other wrapped tight around the hilt of my knife.

And I see it coming before I feel it's sting. A lumbering abomination, a mass of matted white fur. It dwarfs us, a tower of glistening white hurdling towards us. For once, I'm thankful for the reflexes I'd haphazardly honed all those years I wasted in a sweat soaked gym. I just manage to throw myself out of the way of it's tusks, swallowing a pained grunt as it catches my freshly-healed ankle.

It doesn't feel real. Even as I stare up at a monster, fresh blood pooling in the place that it cut me it's like I'm moving through a dream, terror shimmering like stars around me with every strained breath.

I can only pray I wake up.

ALISTAIR GALE

I curse against the wind as my blade falls loose from the creatures chest before I get the chance to draw it further along it's ribcage. It's roaring something fierce and large as the damn thing is, it's lashing with icy tusks before I've even got the chance to raise my knife for a second go.

Alistair wears a smirk that suggests he thinks this means he's won something, blade twirling deftly between his fingers. I wipe blood off my cheek with my sleeve, heart racing for all the wrong reasons as I mimic him with feigned mockery in my expression. Honestly it's difficult to hide the smile.

"Sorry," I twirl my own knife with a particularly extravagant flourish. "Got distracted by, y'know, you- bleeding everywhere."

I'm hiding my worry beneath a fiery exterior, shaking breaths and heart cinched tight as I force my feet into the same old dance I'd been forced into a thousand times. This should feel like something familiar, but all I can-

"Watch out!"

I gasp as he pulls me aside, a yelp letting loose as the creature only just misses me with a wide, forceful swing of it's head. My feet fall where his arm guides me, stepping lightly as my heart thumps heavily against my ribs. I choke on the curse I was going to spit, an airy and shuddering breath coming out instead. I can feel his heartbeat; I count a few too many before I move to pull away.

My mind is elsewhere. Somewhere far away. Not here in the arena, far from District 1, and far from home—except, not. It feels like home, but- I've never been. But Ali is there and we're- not dead. Where-

Shit.

This isn't the fucking time, Lora.  Focus.

"Let's fucking kill this thing."

And I let the cold caress of the moon upon my chest guide my blade.

"and you feared a lonely death, like a lake leaves you alone in her depths."

Scarlet snow still feels like a victory, through clenched teeth and - "And they say chivalry is dead." A part of me has always wanted to hurt, though I didn't know how sweet hurting for another could feel. It's a sharp pain, shallow enough that the stinging sensation lingers long past the time the tusk met my skin. I'm not scared, I'm grateful, eyes traveling the length of my only friend to make sure she remains pristine. Never really considered the whole knight in shining armor gig but I'm not against giving it a go.

Except I can't really shake off the way this hurts. The numbness brought on by cold weather and cold hearts sets my breath at a frantic pace, its beat pounding in my ears as I try to keep steady on fragile foundation. I sway against the wind and she begs me to fall with her, promising the path of least resistance. "It's not that much blood." I retort and I don't look down because I can't stand to prove myself wrong.

There's only so much pretending I can do.

I wouldn't say I'm scared yet. The Bloodbath marked my breaking point, a rock bottom which I never expected to survive. I shattered. In front of everyone watching at home. In front of all the other tributes. In front of the person who's come to mean the most to me.

"I'm sure I'll be fine." My voice doesn't waver, no matter how much it might want to. Nails dig into this cliff face, forming my own foothold and with bloody hands and broken nails I try to climb.

There's no telling if I'll make it out of this, but I'm trying.

I hope that means something.

ALISTAIR GALE

Seeing my own blood in droplets at my feet makes me curse through clenched teeth, biting cold and stinging snowflakes melting upon contact with the cut I've already managed to fill with grit. I slap my free hand to the cut, grimacing through the pain.

I've had worse, I tell myself, whistling another curse through my teeth.

"Oh, what?" I snap. "Think I can't handle a little cut?"

The fear and the pain set my veins aflame, white-hot embers searing in my cheeks and fueling the anger that seeps into my voice and burns bright within my eyes. I know it sounds like anger, looks like rage. And maybe there is some there. Maybe I can't stand the way he stands tall and unwavering for- for me.

The thought sets me on edge; his shoulder against mine keeps me from falling.

So why do lean into him then? Why am I clinging to his arm, steadying him and letting him steady me? Why is it that all my life I've never been able to fit where I was meant to and now suddenly- here. Next to him. Of all the places, of all the people—and it just so happens my jagged edges fit perfectly here. With his.

"Lucky I find you persuasive," I breathe, only letting go of him so that we can both swing.

"and you feared a lonely death, like a lake leaves you alone in her depths."

I'm always a fraction of a second too late, caught mid-breath and poised on the balls of my feet to leap away from the attack. I don't feel pain so much as I anticipate it, somehow it aches all the worse. My eyes widen as I watch the beast tear across my chest, lips parted softly as though expecting to scream. Lucky the wind has stolen my breath.

I stagger back a couple of steps, finding I've forgotten how to breathe as I press my hand to the wound. Blood seeps from in between my fingers, a sharp stinging eminating from where my cold fingers meet the split skin. It's not agony and for that I'm grateful.

This isn't unbearable. I can keep going.

Lora is somewhere beside me, a shadow hanging on my heels. I cannot bring myself to try to meet her gaze, in spite of the warmth and comfort I know it offers. Spite is keeping me standing, a curdled frustration somehow pushes the pain to the back of my mind and strengthens my grip on my knife.

If I look at her, I'll melt.

"Oh, fuck you." Through grit teeth, shaking from adrenaline and rage. I cannot wait to see this thing fall, its blood drying on my blade. And I will get to say that I am the one who survived, a bloodstained victory woven from ice and thorn.

I have no faith in strength, but vengeance is far more potent.

ALISTAIR GALE