that sinking feeling | {nora/willa}
Jun 22, 2021 17:51:28 GMT -5
Post by dars on Jun 22, 2021 17:51:28 GMT -5
W I L L A
She just... needed a moment alone to compose herself. That's what she told herself as she began to paddle further and further out onto the lake, ceasing her row only after she was long outside of attack range. Everything here was quiet. The wind blew crisp along the murky waves, sent a sliver of ice up her neck and a few stray strands of hair into her head, which hung heavy with exhaustion. She forced herself to take in steady breaths, forced the wetness in her eyes to leave just as soon as it showed itself.
She hated the body she was in. She hated its weaknesses, its limits. She supposed she had even before the accident but now, being here, living like this- it was a cosmic joke of the most unforgivable sort, and she was certain everyone else in the world must have thought it was fucking hilarious. Maybe she would have too, if her fate had been dealt to someone else instead of her. Maybe she would have looked at that person, same as everyone looked at her, and thought, what a pity. It wasn't even an option for them to fear her, and she felt they should have. It was infuriating, deserving acknowledgement as a competitor and receiving pity in its place. She supposed even now, even though none of them knew the truth of her circumstances, they knew she wouldn't live.
There were probably some of them out there right now, looking at the idiot girl from Six who was sitting in plain sight, waiting on her to row ashore so that they could jump her of her items. To be fair, she wasn't being particularly risk-averse in that moment- she'd left all her allies back at the shore when she felt the oncoming panic attack building in her chest- but she was still being smart. She didn't think she'd seen a single bow in that wealth, and even then it would have taken a small miracle to land a clean shot from this distance. Well, the distance, the wind, the fact that she was rocking ever-so-slightly, just enough to make her stomach feel queasy. There were a lot of factors. There might have been some giant water horse dinosaur, or hungry poisonous alligators, or a flesh-eating bacteria floating just beneath her, but the other tributes couldn't touch her.
She sighed as a single tear fell, splashed into her lap.
Willa thought she was going to die earlier, not even thirty minutes ago. She refused to show how thankful she was, because she deserved to live just as much as everyone else, but she was thankful. And in shock. And terrified. Not of what she might have to do to continue living, of course. People seemed to think she was soft, gentle, violence-averse. And sure, maybe some of those things were true, but they weren't because she had some bleeding heart for the others to stomp on or take care of. It was because right now, she wasn't any good at violence, and people tend only to enjoy doing things they can exceed at. If the gamemakers were to host a drawing contest or a book reading contest or a fucking survive the blunt trauma to the head contest, she'd take gold all day long.
But this, here, this was an uncertainty, and for once, Willa just wanted control back.
She heard the sounds of an oar, spared only a slight glance back at Nora as the Twelve tribute came over to join her.
"Just needed a second," she said, choking down any emotional vulnerability that had been building within her before.
"It's more quiet out here, you know?"
She hated the body she was in. She hated its weaknesses, its limits. She supposed she had even before the accident but now, being here, living like this- it was a cosmic joke of the most unforgivable sort, and she was certain everyone else in the world must have thought it was fucking hilarious. Maybe she would have too, if her fate had been dealt to someone else instead of her. Maybe she would have looked at that person, same as everyone looked at her, and thought, what a pity. It wasn't even an option for them to fear her, and she felt they should have. It was infuriating, deserving acknowledgement as a competitor and receiving pity in its place. She supposed even now, even though none of them knew the truth of her circumstances, they knew she wouldn't live.
There were probably some of them out there right now, looking at the idiot girl from Six who was sitting in plain sight, waiting on her to row ashore so that they could jump her of her items. To be fair, she wasn't being particularly risk-averse in that moment- she'd left all her allies back at the shore when she felt the oncoming panic attack building in her chest- but she was still being smart. She didn't think she'd seen a single bow in that wealth, and even then it would have taken a small miracle to land a clean shot from this distance. Well, the distance, the wind, the fact that she was rocking ever-so-slightly, just enough to make her stomach feel queasy. There were a lot of factors. There might have been some giant water horse dinosaur, or hungry poisonous alligators, or a flesh-eating bacteria floating just beneath her, but the other tributes couldn't touch her.
She sighed as a single tear fell, splashed into her lap.
Willa thought she was going to die earlier, not even thirty minutes ago. She refused to show how thankful she was, because she deserved to live just as much as everyone else, but she was thankful. And in shock. And terrified. Not of what she might have to do to continue living, of course. People seemed to think she was soft, gentle, violence-averse. And sure, maybe some of those things were true, but they weren't because she had some bleeding heart for the others to stomp on or take care of. It was because right now, she wasn't any good at violence, and people tend only to enjoy doing things they can exceed at. If the gamemakers were to host a drawing contest or a book reading contest or a fucking survive the blunt trauma to the head contest, she'd take gold all day long.
But this, here, this was an uncertainty, and for once, Willa just wanted control back.
She heard the sounds of an oar, spared only a slight glance back at Nora as the Twelve tribute came over to join her.
"Just needed a second," she said, choking down any emotional vulnerability that had been building within her before.
"It's more quiet out here, you know?"
