the odd ones out // mo + terra, 5th victory tour

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lance
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gay and chaotic? call it gayos

the odd ones out // mo + terra, 5th victory tour Aug 19, 2021 3:18:42 GMT -5

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Post by lance on Aug 19, 2021 3:18:42 GMT -5

m o h a m e d .

"you are weak
but not foolish
you have learned
how to die."

It's very surreal, being on the other side of things this time.

Even today (or, in this case, perhaps especially today) memories from winter one year past flash through your head as crystal clear as if they'd occurred yesterday.

Breaking down in front of Babe. Seeing reassurance from Sami. Those pair of moments, a perfect halfway point to participating in the carnage and finding yourself on the other side of it, once again watching but without the distance and nonchalance of ignorance, a screen, and hundreds of miles to remain desensitized to the whole process of wanton murder. It was ironic, in a sense, how halfway between each attempt to break you down, seep into his cracks and tear him apart from the inside, you'd been granted lifelines, instead.

Sure, Sami would have been there for you regardless, or so you'd hoped at the very least, something about district honor and same sides and all that. But Babe was a surprise in more way than one - the victor from Nine, older by only two years but what felt like triple that - had been witness to his first real post-games breakdown. And far from being disgusted, he'd empathized. Comforted you, even.

They were different in ways beyond the details of their homes and games, and yet you'd departed Nine with a new connection instead of an enemy. How ironic, that in the Capitol's attempt to divide, to conquer, to increase animosity amongst the districts, their attempt to ostracize by putting those that played their games and lived to tell the tale on a pedestal as a punishment to the other districts, that they'd given the victors themselves an opportunity to find common ground. To unify.

You briefly consider how Terra's meeting with Babe in Nine had gone. Had she maintained her composure better than you had? Had they found a common understanding as murderers by necessity that today you realized you would never quite understand? Would she be a friend and ally, or someone who would be more standoffish like Adder?

And then you have no more time to consider, because there she is and oh Allah it's time for pleasantries and-

"Terra?" you ask, nerves overriding the rhetorical nature of your question. Of course this is Terra, dummy. Who else would it be? "I'm Mohamed al-Amin, of District-"

It's only mid-sentence, mind racing through the rundown of Ten's victor, that you remember. Terra Montague. Seventeen. District Ten. Killer of six, if you count her own district partner. Deaf as a result of-

You can feel all of the blood leave your face. Fuck. You'd literally spent the week leading up to this moment practicing rudimentary sign language to the best of your ability in order to communicate properly - how on Earth had you forgotten?

Frantically, you move your hands, face twisting in concentration as you remember the basics. HELLO. I A-M M-O-

-fuckfuckfuck what was H again?

elegant

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[ retro gm ] angel lí ✨
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the odd ones out // mo + terra, 5th victory tour Aug 20, 2021 20:20:46 GMT -5

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Post by [ retro gm ] angel lí ✨ on Aug 20, 2021 20:20:46 GMT -5

kindness .

Only when the train has spent two hours travelling away from District Four's station do you allow yourself to breathe a sigh of relief.

The worst part is over. Children in One, Two and Four have left with more than they had when you arrived, armed with the most powerful of weapons - knowledge. It will not be your last visit to the Capitol's favourite districts, nor will it be the last time you are punished for what they are calling a rebellion. Is it rebellion when you were just following orders? Is it rebellion when you were just a child, numbed by the war they brought to your home and acting on instinct? Will the children of One, Two and Four be villainised for learning from you as they are instructed to by their parents, peers and great leaders?

You are not unlike them - and that is what keeps you sane. But the guilt gnaws at you, insatiable. Teaching Lachlan how to fight did not save him. It only cursed him further.

Can you face the other children of Panem, knowing you have damned them to an inevitable slaughter, too?

Someone hands you a card after you change your clothes into something less athletic. You don't need to read it, you've studied them for years. Samiyuq Hernández Huapaya. Four kills. Mohamed Al-Amin. The luckiest boy in the world.

Russell Grimes and Daniela Bedolla - stabbed through the eye and the stomach. The boy from Four left their ship barely alive, never stood a chance against Ramsey Robichaux.

It is strange to keep names. You're used to numbers, tallies, quotas. If you're ever given a name it's only to track them down. Now you've been given two names of survivors and two names of corpses and you've no idea at all what to do with this information, but it feels important to keep them fresh in your mind. You practice saying their names aloud, unable to hear the tempo or annunciation as you repeat them over and over and over again.

Russell Grimes. Daniela Bedolla.

You hope they sound brave.

Mohamed al-Amin should not be standing on the platform and you both know it. The whole of Panem does. Difference between you and the rest of the country is that you don't care. Survivors are survivors. Growing up on the streets with a war raging around you everyone recognised everyone, and you all looked out for each-other. Shrapnel children, born from chaos. That's a bond. A familiarity you find in someone else's eyes. Home, it says. And, I'm sorry. Me too.

Mohamed Al-Amin did not fight to be where he is, but he survived. To you, that's far more commendable. He's unsure how to be a victor and truth be told so are you, but you're doing your best not to show weakness.

His mouth moves around his name with confidence and stops, capillaries a hue of pink. A wave of his hand, he speaks a language you can barely understand. You look through blurred glasses trying to read his gestures. An A, an O, you hold up your hand and stop him in his tracks.

'Sorry,' you say aloud - it feels abrupt, so you try a smile on for size. It barely fits. But he's trying, which is far more than anyone else has done for you these past four weeks. Kindness is foreign. Kindness is loss. Lachlan blooms in your mind and you will yourself not to burst into tears. He is everywhere. In your dreams, in Mohamed's kindness. In a language that transcends sound.

In the ringing of your ears, forever forever forever forever forever-

'I haven't learned yet.'

You hope that explains enough, for you are so utterly exhausted trying to communicate.

'I'm Terra,' you try again, twisting your hand from a halt to a hand-shake. 'Did-?'

Do your words feel kind? Gentle? Intuitive? Your throat says they are, but your balmy skin distracts your mind.

'Did you learn that for me?'

Kindness. Ringing, ringing, ringing, no sound. No fear. Your instincts tell you to run, knowing what kindness has cost you onboard The Abyssal. Instead you smile, ever so slightly, and blink back a sheen of tears in your eyes.

'That was very kind of you, Mohamed al-Amin.'

His name feels as wonderful as you hope it sounds.

table by elegant.

Last Edit: Aug 20, 2021 20:33:42 GMT -5 by [ retro gm ] angel lí ✨

“and men said that the blood of the stars flowed in her veins.”

lance
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gay and chaotic? call it gayos

the odd ones out // mo + terra, 5th victory tour Sept 2, 2021 0:19:33 GMT -5

Quote

Post by lance on Sept 2, 2021 0:19:33 GMT -5

m o h a m e d .

"you are weak
but not foolish
you have learned
how to die."

For the second time in seemingly as many seconds, you're stopped in your tracks by your own realization. Terra Montague's voice, though slightly cracked from disuse, rings clearly in the winter air, her hand gentle but firm.

If at all possible at this point, you flush even deeper. Because duh, she'd only lost her hearing months ago, after seventeen years of learning to communicate the same way you had, and if the past month was anything to go by, it was much, much easier to fall back on an old language than attempt to pick up a new one.

You shake her hand mutely, relieved that she didn't take offense. There's an air around her behest of her reputation, that of one who has killed before and lived to tell the table, that same air of hauntedness that surrounds Sami and Babe. But like Sami and Babe, there's a confidence laced beneath it as well, one reinforced by a steel in their veins you could only dream of emulating. Half of you is relieved that you only had to kill mindless beasts to earn your passage out of the arena and back to the real world, yet half of you cannot escape the notion that in doing so, you miss a critical part as to what makes the victors, victors.

Five kids had entered the arena and left it, but only four had left it with the blood of another person on their hands. She's more like the rest of them than like you, more of a warrior than you ever were or will be.

But there's more than one way to contribute to the war effort. And while you might not have the same tally of murder locking you in a chokehold for the rest of eternity, you nevertheless have been there and done that. Terra Montague from District Ten killed in defense of her district partner, similar to how you'd thrown your own life on the line for Sage Sun.

Killer or not, there's more that binds you together than what splits you apart.

Plans A and B may have fallen through, but you're a little quicker on your feet than you were last year, a little more sure of yourself. Plan C might not be efficient, but you're patient, and the familiar feeling of being newly introduced into the first day of the rest of your Capitol-dictated life is one that still shines hauntingly familiar even now.

Hell, you'd broken down into a sobbing mess within five minutes of meeting Babe. Terra's already doing loads better by comparison.

"Yeah," you respond with a slightly exaggerated nod as the blush recedes to the tips of your ears, enunciating the word slowly and as clearly as possible on your lips and tongue. "It can get lonely, after the Games." And you're speaking from a position of privilege, Sami having been by your side from the very beginning, so to think about what Babe has felt, what Terra must be feeling, is beyond your scope. "The least I can do is ease that burden as much as I can."

This is new, unfamiliar ground, and socializing has never been your strong suit. But you've faced down rampaging mutts and partook in a grand revolt against the powerful elite in the Capitol and still live to tell the tale today.

Making a new friend is a piece of cake by comparison.