taking this one to the grave / frigay night 2

She’d never indulged in any of the substances she knew were floating around back home, but she imagined that this was what a crash would feel like. Her head throbbed, a combination of dehydration, blood rush and general stress. The sweetness of the antidote still lingered on her tongue, synthetic syrup and saliva coagulated at the back of her throat. It bothered her, but she wasn’t convinced her body wouldn’t reject it if she tried to swallow. Vomiting twice was enough for her.

Night was slowly falling, and it was becoming less of a pain for Fleur to keep her eyes open. Every now and then an occasional shiver took hold of her, even though her clothes were damp with sweat. She ran the back of her hand across her forehead where a few strands of hair were stuck, arms heavy like paperweights.

She turned her head as much as her stiff neck muscles would allow and reached out to poke her partner’s side. "Ey. ‘Ey, Thread," she rasped, throat weak from stomach acid and hours of disuse. "Talk to me. M’bored."

Hidden beneath the request was a quieter I feel sad and alone, but he didn’t need to know that. Without waiting for a response, she forced out, "Let’s play twenty questions."

Once she had his agreement, she tried to roll up into a sitting position, only for her stomach to lurch in response. She settled for lying on the grass, vision half-obscured by picnic tables and little black dots. Thread was relatively open about his family in a way that Fleur wasn’t, for a variety of reasons not limited to my family does undeniably illegal things. No, there was also the fact that Fleur was used to withholding herself in exchange for some external goal. (Being so attuned to others made her adept at introspection, and equally adept at suppressing what she did find.) It was easy to start there.

"What was it like growing up with your brother?" she asked quietly.

"Growing up with him was… quiet," Thread answered, his voice inflecting at the end as if he were unsure. "He was the type to take on other people’s problems and not say anything about it. It was why my mother exploited him the way she did, because he never knew how to stand up for himself."

She remembered bits of Thread’s interview shortly before her own. "I’m sure he talked about how much of a monster she was." People that escaped the maws of beasts and lived to tell the tale often had their own vices, Fleur knew. Thread’s were anger and grief. Hers? No one back home was particularly monstrous (although one person regularly haunted her thoughts) and here she was, making them the villain in her fractured fairytale.

One thing about Thread’s statement puzzled her, though. "I thought you said he wasn’t levelheaded," she said.

"The only person that he was levelheaded with was my mother, if that makes sense." The subject of big brother Gabel’s rage was a threat, so he directed it toward someone that wasn’t. Typical. "She had a way quelling the storm that was brewing. I think it wasn’t until he was reaped that he showed his true colors."

Fleur thought she might relate to that, but tried not to think too hard about it. The more information she had about Thread, the more she could hurt him. (She didn’t want to.) "Do you miss him at all?"

"I visited his grave for the first time since he came home in a casket the day of the reaping." Oh. "So no."

She would be mourned if she didn’t make it, she thinks. She would always be an Adroxis, be part of a legacy that made heads turn on the street. Yet, instead of being on a throne, she’d probably be atop the mantle of a fireplace. (Reduce her to ash and she can be gunpowder in her next life, her birthright, where she belongs.) She can’t afford to think like that.

"What are you going to do if you make it home?" Fleur asked, toying with the ends of her neckerchief.

The bitter laughter in Thread’s voice is evident. "Live far away from my mother. That’s for damn sure."

Then comes the part she dreaded: "How about you?"

Fleur ran her tongue across her teeth, noting how her mouth felt more like cotton than soft tissue. What would she do? She hadn’t had much of a plan beyond volunteer, win, profit. She imagined she was sitting in front of Caesar Flickerman once more, all smiles and no substance. For the good of the collective.

"I’d go back to my family," she answered finally. "Make sure they’re all good."

Thread’s voice cuts through the air with skepticism. "What does all good mean to you?"

Victors got money, right? It wasn’t like they needed it. She could use her winnings to expand the factory, make sure operations kept running. Hell, she could buy the factory with that money, although usurping her own family for the sake of a power trip probably wouldn’t endear her in their eyes. How did one even begin to explain that they volunteered to prove that they were the rightful heir to the family enterprise, that everything belonging to Night and Eve should belong to Fleur?

She nibbled at her lip. There was no script to fall back on for this one.

"Like…" she began, faltering. "Ensuring our future is secure. We already have it pretty good, but it doesn’t hurt to add more cushions."

Fleur couldn’t see if Thread was looking at her, but she conjured up what little energy she had left in her reserves to roll onto her side, facing the legs of a picnic table. She wasn’t sure if her face was warm from the heat, the poison, or the crushing realization that she couldn’t justify what she was doing to anyone but herself.

"Sometimes talking to Stitch, that’s how he would phrase things," Thread said, and Fleur internally wrote it down as something else she (unfortunately) had in common with her ally’s dead brother. "Especially when asked why he always put so much on his shoulders. But you know what I’ve learned since coming here?”

"What’s that?" Fleur croaked. Her stomach gurgled, and she wrapped her arm around her torso.

"No one asked him to, including myself. "

The words made Fleur squeeze her eyes shut. Katydid Lomagne, the girl she had volunteered for, appeared in the dark of her escapism. You’re full of shit, Adroxis, she’d told her in the justice building.

Thread must have sensed her discomfort, or simply had enough sense to know that making broad statements without context might upset people. "Though I’m not saying your sentiment isn’t well-placed."

She wanted to defend herself, scream that she had all the right intentions and that she really was doing this for her family’s future, a future with her at the helm. Because if Fleur were in charge, there wouldn’t be so many people running around Nine aware of their dealings, flaunting their knowledge, and meeting the end of a barrel because they decided to fuck around and fight out. But those were shitty excuses, and those were hypotheticals not guaranteed to come to fruition.

"Does it have to be an ask?" she rasped. "Can’t we just do, as long as we don’t ask for…" For recognition? Liar.

"For more than what people are willing to give?" she decided on.

"I don’t think the world works like that."

There’s silence for a moment, and Fleur wondered if Thread had fallen asleep, even though she knew logically that he wouldn’t.

"People give enough of themselves," he finally said. "It’s when they don’t realize they’re being taken advantage of that’s their downfall."

Fleur gave more of a head jerk than a nod in response, neck aching. No one had asked her to do what she did. She wasn’t being taken advantage of, although she still found herself doing the thankless task of taking "be willing to die for the family" literally. Her envy was her downfall.

"What would yours be?" she asked. "Your downfall?"

"Wanting to prove to anyone that I am not my brother," Thread responded, and Fleur slowly swiveled her upper body to look at him. A weight to carry, indeed.

He tacked on something else about not wanting to be a monster, and Fleur found she was able to volunteer the whole truth this time. "For what it’s worth, I don’t think you are one."

He smiled, and her cheeks stretched into what felt like one. "Thanks. Has the antidote kicked in yet."

"Think so," Fleur breathed, allowing her body to relax back into the rescue position. "My legs still feel like jelly, but I’m not dead so I consider that a net positive."

"We both survived. That’s all that matters. Right?"

"Right. That’s all we can do."

Thread volunteered to take first watch, and Fleur viewed it as a blessing. No point in being afraid of dying in her sleep when Thread could easily overtake her while she was awake and recovering from being poisoned by a literal flower. "Maybe I can sleep off the wooziness."

What Fleur wouldn’t be able to forget about in the morning, though, was her own deep selfishness.