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Who| R, Howard Bassem, Perry Kelvin, Julie Grigio
What| R reunites with his not-girlfriend’s not-so-dead ex he murdered way back when. It’s messy. Also him wandering around for Week 2, post-jaw
Where| Wandering away from the temple – may briefly end up close to the Compound edges but he won’t be going in.
When| End of week 1/very beginning of Week 2 for his jaw maiming. Mostly taking place in Week 2 for anything after that.
Warnings/Notes| Zombie-stuff, facial gore references.
Perry Kelvin
It’s hard to spook a zombie, but Eva Salazar’s done it. And here he’d been thinking she was a nice, middle-aged lady with a soft spot for zombies – before she began showing him exactly why she won her Game decades ago. She’s a little too good at brutal killing for his tastes. R takes off next chance he gets.
It’s the end of the week when R blunders into the very last person he expected to see in the Arena. It's a dead boy convention here.
He rounds the tree trunk and stops, stares, gets a gape in while he's at it, and he's so surprised he forgets all about groaning and rocking. His posture goes from slouching to rigor-mortis stiff. Perry Kelvin. Julie's ex. There probably wasn't anything left of him after they got through his body aside from some scraps, R imagining for a second he could feel chunks of Perry's brain hanging heavy in his pocket, fresh, those memories buzzing around waiting for someone to take a bite. The guilt staining him, cell by cell. His blood cooling on his chin.
Now Perry's there in the flesh, scavenging through a bag of supplies with this efficiency he's probably mirroring from General Grigio.
What does he do? R refuses to kill him again for old time's sake. Maybe he should say something. Apologize, if Perry remembers. Chances are he'll get a knife to the face or something but the longer he stands there swaying, the more R thinks he wants to do something stupid. If he can bring a Living girl home, he can start a conversation with someone he murdered mid-Arena. Try to set things right. Before R realizes it, he's lurching from the tree he'd been hiding behind. His best shoulder dips forward, R raising his hands in what - he hopes - is a shaky "I surrender" gesture.
"Hgggh...Perry?"
Howard Bassem
So Howard knows about Aunamee. Awkward.
R has no idea yet how he plans to catch up to him. Supposedly the human would find him because anything like a sign or a bonfire or anything obvious and interesting enough to a zombie would be even more in-your-face to the Living. After the one-sided talk with Wyatt, R’s not even sure how it’ll go.
What does he say? Would he even have the words if he had a mouth?
He’s thinking that’s a solid “no”.
He stumbles around the second week, feeling the hunger getting stronger as if the missing jaw was only an inconvenience. The thought of eating again fills him with vague nausea. So does the idea of letting himself starve. Go rest against a tree and just…stop. Wait it out. Let the jungle and those weird vines overtake him.
R keeps moving instead, shuffling forward until one day he blunders into one of Howard’s carefully placed traps from the wrong angle. The sleeping bag that’s spent the last two weeks getting dragged across the island gets stuck as R tries to keep walking, can’t, and turns to stare almost helplessly at the trap. Really? He’s supposed to be carrying this stuff for his friends and now look at it! Tugging on it again doesn’t seem to do anything. Jesus, this just isn’t his week, is it?
Julie Grigio
He can't eat very well with half his face torn off. R suspects he'll probably starve to real-death before someone figures out how to kill him. When you can’t even groan to pass the time, you spend the majority of it lost in your head, thinking. Sometimes drifting off. Mostly regretting. A lot of it seems to stem from finding out a certain dead boy isn’t as dead as he’s supposed to be.
Does Julie know about Perry? If she’s still alive, the right thing to do would be to groan about it to her, but...well. Yeah.
It's messy, like, kill-site messy. Maybe worse. The guilt comes alive in his guts again even though she knows what he did to her ex. R guesses maybe he’s scared, too. As scared as a zombie can get. He thinks back to life before Julie and realizes it’s gray and boring and – and lifeless, even for a walking corpse. Going back to it fills him with a new ache, a new horror in the back of his mind that curls unpleasantly the more he thinks about it. It’s easier to focus on the present: the wet leaves slapping in his face, the feel of rain trickling down what’s left of his face and leaving tracks in the mud caked on. The phantom jaw clenching. Teeth he doesn’t have grinding.
He keeps moving. It takes a few hours of staring to realize he’s been seeing something in the mud, these deep tracks ground in that are fresh enough they haven’t been washed away yet. Following them leads him to the edge of the trees, a circle of houses complete with spotless picket fences that look like they have a new coat of paint. R stops in surprise.
The tracks weirdly enough don’t go right at the houses – they go around, almost cautiously, as if the owner didn’t jump at the first sign of civilization. R stands there framed by the trees, his swaying posture giving him away as he considers what to do next. Bank on those tracks being anyone he knows or head toward the houses?
What| R reunites with his not-girlfriend’s not-so-dead ex he murdered way back when. It’s messy. Also him wandering around for Week 2, post-jaw
Where| Wandering away from the temple – may briefly end up close to the Compound edges but he won’t be going in.
When| End of week 1/very beginning of Week 2 for his jaw maiming. Mostly taking place in Week 2 for anything after that.
Warnings/Notes| Zombie-stuff, facial gore references.
Perry Kelvin
It’s hard to spook a zombie, but Eva Salazar’s done it. And here he’d been thinking she was a nice, middle-aged lady with a soft spot for zombies – before she began showing him exactly why she won her Game decades ago. She’s a little too good at brutal killing for his tastes. R takes off next chance he gets.
It’s the end of the week when R blunders into the very last person he expected to see in the Arena. It's a dead boy convention here.
He rounds the tree trunk and stops, stares, gets a gape in while he's at it, and he's so surprised he forgets all about groaning and rocking. His posture goes from slouching to rigor-mortis stiff. Perry Kelvin. Julie's ex. There probably wasn't anything left of him after they got through his body aside from some scraps, R imagining for a second he could feel chunks of Perry's brain hanging heavy in his pocket, fresh, those memories buzzing around waiting for someone to take a bite. The guilt staining him, cell by cell. His blood cooling on his chin.
Now Perry's there in the flesh, scavenging through a bag of supplies with this efficiency he's probably mirroring from General Grigio.
What does he do? R refuses to kill him again for old time's sake. Maybe he should say something. Apologize, if Perry remembers. Chances are he'll get a knife to the face or something but the longer he stands there swaying, the more R thinks he wants to do something stupid. If he can bring a Living girl home, he can start a conversation with someone he murdered mid-Arena. Try to set things right. Before R realizes it, he's lurching from the tree he'd been hiding behind. His best shoulder dips forward, R raising his hands in what - he hopes - is a shaky "I surrender" gesture.
"Hgggh...Perry?"
Howard Bassem
So Howard knows about Aunamee. Awkward.
R has no idea yet how he plans to catch up to him. Supposedly the human would find him because anything like a sign or a bonfire or anything obvious and interesting enough to a zombie would be even more in-your-face to the Living. After the one-sided talk with Wyatt, R’s not even sure how it’ll go.
What does he say? Would he even have the words if he had a mouth?
He’s thinking that’s a solid “no”.
He stumbles around the second week, feeling the hunger getting stronger as if the missing jaw was only an inconvenience. The thought of eating again fills him with vague nausea. So does the idea of letting himself starve. Go rest against a tree and just…stop. Wait it out. Let the jungle and those weird vines overtake him.
R keeps moving instead, shuffling forward until one day he blunders into one of Howard’s carefully placed traps from the wrong angle. The sleeping bag that’s spent the last two weeks getting dragged across the island gets stuck as R tries to keep walking, can’t, and turns to stare almost helplessly at the trap. Really? He’s supposed to be carrying this stuff for his friends and now look at it! Tugging on it again doesn’t seem to do anything. Jesus, this just isn’t his week, is it?
Julie Grigio
He can't eat very well with half his face torn off. R suspects he'll probably starve to real-death before someone figures out how to kill him. When you can’t even groan to pass the time, you spend the majority of it lost in your head, thinking. Sometimes drifting off. Mostly regretting. A lot of it seems to stem from finding out a certain dead boy isn’t as dead as he’s supposed to be.
Does Julie know about Perry? If she’s still alive, the right thing to do would be to groan about it to her, but...well. Yeah.
It's messy, like, kill-site messy. Maybe worse. The guilt comes alive in his guts again even though she knows what he did to her ex. R guesses maybe he’s scared, too. As scared as a zombie can get. He thinks back to life before Julie and realizes it’s gray and boring and – and lifeless, even for a walking corpse. Going back to it fills him with a new ache, a new horror in the back of his mind that curls unpleasantly the more he thinks about it. It’s easier to focus on the present: the wet leaves slapping in his face, the feel of rain trickling down what’s left of his face and leaving tracks in the mud caked on. The phantom jaw clenching. Teeth he doesn’t have grinding.
He keeps moving. It takes a few hours of staring to realize he’s been seeing something in the mud, these deep tracks ground in that are fresh enough they haven’t been washed away yet. Following them leads him to the edge of the trees, a circle of houses complete with spotless picket fences that look like they have a new coat of paint. R stops in surprise.
The tracks weirdly enough don’t go right at the houses – they go around, almost cautiously, as if the owner didn’t jump at the first sign of civilization. R stands there framed by the trees, his swaying posture giving him away as he considers what to do next. Bank on those tracks being anyone he knows or head toward the houses?
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It's all going to get plastered over with reality now. And reality doesn't have foam claws or animatronic dinosaurs, reality has ugly predators with gritty skin and blood-caked mouths and saliva full of bacteria. Reality rips you apart little bit by little bit.
Fuckers.
He's tied himself into the tree with his belt around his waist - naturally, even the shortest belt the Capitol had for a grown man can fit around both him and the branch. He has a stash of the last of his spoiled ranch dressing in a gallon jug in the crook of the trunk and bough. His head rests against a fork in the branch. A little pool of drool collects in the corner of his mouth. Slight wheezes come out his nose as he dreams. A thin line from the netting goes from his wrist all the way down, thirty feet, to the trap.
His legs dangle, looking from a distance and filtered through the leaves like two hanged corpses in miniature.
He's able to filter out the occasional calls of wildlife, but the tug as R hits the trap would pull him out of the tree if he weren't strapped in. His arm jerks out and he snaps awake, instinctively reaching to unloop the noose around his wrist. He lets it drop, lets it get caught on a tree on the way down, surprised not to hear angry shouting below. He squirms in the belt until he's on his belly in the tree and looking down.
Most people look the same from directly up above, so it takes a moment before R moves enough for Howard to remember the strange, jerky gait. "Rob?"
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It becomes apparent why R doesn't groan a hi to his buddy: what's left of his mouth is a few splinters of yellowed bone and flesh hanging down in shreds, a maggot wiggling out of a hole where there used to be a jaw-bone and now there's only confused regret. In retrospect, stumbling up to Perry Kelvin hadn't been one of his smarter life choices. R spots Howard then, his head jerking up. The shriveled strings of meat jiggles as something in his eyes shifts, becomes slightly more attentive, more eager. Seeing Howard's face poking out of the branches jolts him back to the present. Having a friend does that apparently.
He opens the mouth he doesn't have to gasp something casual, something like your traps have it out for me like it's no big deal. Right, right. No mouth. This probably wouldn't be half as annoying if he hadn't remembered how to speak. If he was one of those zombies that could only groan and stare and wonder.
"Ggh," R says. It's probably just air from his collapsing lungs.
He raises his hand in a slow wave at Howard, trying to beckon him down and show him that look, he's still not a threat. He couldn't bite him even if he felt up to it. R turns and tugs uselessly at his sleeping bag again, rattling Howard's trap and hoping he can make his point without lips. Somehow he's not surprised to find the little human in a tree; he seems to have an affinity for high places and obviously he's probably a good climber. This Arena must be a better fit for him than the desert...
no subject
Howard's trying to forget he ever participated in that. Initiated that. Whatever.
"Gotta say, your new look is a little hard to swallow," Howard jokes. The laugh that follows is fluttery and high, a moth made of breath, awkward and mostly humorless. "Bite off more than you could chew?"
He starts to unstrap his belt - it's left little red indents in his sides to match the bark pattern imprinted on his back through his clothes - and loops it through a loop on his pants before starting to descend. He pauses a good story above the ground, watching R.
"Anyone else down there?" He'll wait for the go-ahead before he hops down and helps R out. "Thumbs up for the all-clear."
He's pretty sure asking R to tell him verbally would be just a little sadistic.
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R pauses, the hesitation stretching longer than he meant it to. He glances around the jungle closing in on them, listening for footsteps or that particular life-smell to hit his nose. As far as he knows they're alone, but it's not like he was constantly looking over his shoulder the whole time. It's not a habit he's cultivated. That plus the fact Howard drops something that seems borderline impossible - a thumbs up, Jesus - and R's left with his hands full. He thinks he still remembers how to do this. Maybe, just maybe...
Staring down at his hands and biting lips he doesn't have anymore, R focuses on his fingers. They're covered in bloodless scratches. A few places the skin's been rubbed away from bumping into trees a little too hard and a little too often. He pictures the brittle bones folding, muscles pulling and flexing. Blood pulsing red instead of black.
Almost reluctantly he forms a very, very shaky thumbs up. R looks almost stunned he has the dexterity for it, jerking his head up to stare triumphantly at Howard like he's been shot. Holy shit, check it out! He practically waves the thumbs up like a trophy, feeling something that might even be pride pushing away the fog he'd fallen into over the weeks.
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He trusts R's judgment, at least. R's a bit behind the curve on many things - speech, human emotions (although he's in good company there), tying his shoes - but he's always been a good watchdog. Aside from the night vision, Howard has faith in R's ability to smell a 'zombie snack' a mile away, by which he means anything with a pulse. So Howard begins to scramble down the tree with grace earned through practice.
"Here, let me get you out of that, it's not a fatal trap-" Howard hasn't been using anything lethal ever since he accidentally killed John Watson last Arena. An expression of concern slithers over his face, briefly, as he wonders how much R remembers of the last trap of Howard's he stumbled into.
Someone eventually broke the news to Howard. He didn't watch the footage, but...you killed and ate Julie. R watched. He's pretty sure he doesn't need to add actual detailed footage to the nightmares that that shoveled into his subconscious.
He lands with the crunch of twigs beneath his feet and starts to untangle the snare around R's sleeping bag of supplies, silently judging the shape of the lumps inside and wondering how many of the cans he left R the zombie managed to keep hold of. He kicks it and it gives a muffled clank.
"I think we're getting a bit long in the tooth for this, R," he says, grinning again.
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R lets go of his fistful of sleeping bag as Howard lands a few feet away with a thump.
"Kggkk," R tries to sound as agreeable - and patient - as he can. It's not easy.
The thing is he's just not really in the mood for jokes about his state of corpse-hood (he hesitates to call it "person-hood"), not when he can't even groan back a response or croak out his excuse for a laugh. All he can do is stare. R's always hated the staring. Now he's stuck like this, even more trapped. At least before, he could say something even if it took forever and a day! He'd roll his eyes at Howard if he had the muscle control for it. In his head, he's totally doing it.
With the sleeping bag freed, R can finally carry out his end of the...uh, well, okay so it wasn't a promise or a deal. No idea what to even call it. But he's here. Mission accomplished. R backs away from the bag with his head sagging down to his chest and his arms limp at his sides, hoping it's a clear signal of "knock yourself out". Maybe it'll put any questions about his hunger to rest for now. Howard's always been good about reading him. Mostly. There's that kiss R's convinced is a major lapse of judgment.
Will Howard ever grow old and wonder what the hell he was thinking?
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He unwinds the trap from R's leg and holds his fist out for a bro-pound. He hopes R recognizes the gesture. If not, he'll explain later. As desensitized as he is to gore, he realizes he wants to put a little space between him and the yawning wound that makes up R's face.
Howard checks the contents of the sleeping bag, then loops the cords around his neck and shoulder and climbs back up the tree. It's harder laden down, but he isn't about to leave the sleeping bag on the ground. Soon he's managed to scramble back up high enough to hang the sleeping bag from a branch, where it dangles like an oversized fruit, and just as promising of sustenance.
He gets back to the ground and puts his hands in his pants pockets, meeting R's eyes. It always weirds him out how R's gaze never quite seems to focus, as if he's looking past you a bit. Howard realizes that it's partially because R's eyes don't dilate in dim light - the pinpoint pupils stay fixed and slightly off-kilter forever. "You seen Aunamee?"
The levity of his tone vanishes like steam.
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At least it looks like things are better between them. Howard seems to be in a good mood between not getting bitten and having free supplies drop into his lap, apparently, because he's bending down to check out the sleeping bag without shooting that many paranoid looks his away. R cranes his head to watch as Howard seem to approve and scuttles up the tree like a squirrel before popping back down. It takes him a moment to realize why he's stashing the sleeping bag up there. Safety, probably, maybe so he can eat in the tree. Another life skill in the Bassem grab bag. R's impressed.
The question brings him back down to Earth, R staring for a moment longer before nodding. Oh, he'd seen him, all right. Probably only within hours of the Cornucopia, but two weeks ago tends to smear around the edges even on his best days. R resists the urge to shrug. There's all kinds of flavors of shrugging that can say all the things he can't. Without a proper voice, he can't exactly explain himself. Can't connect to Howard the way he was used to.
Incidentally, he's sure this won't give Howard any funny ideas about kissing him now.
He waves back to where he thought the Cornucopia was, some vague gesture that's more floppy, boneless wrist than a point with purpose. There. Somewhere. He remembers most of the conversation that night while he'd been trapped in the pit with Aunamee's shadow looming over him, R longing to tell Howard about it. Whuffing out a wordless sound, R reaches out to touch Howard's shoulder. Try to be around for him. He can't bite or groan a warning or, really, do anything to help Howard at all.
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"Did you get him?"
Howard's voice is tight, taut with hope. It's as if his spine is without slack, as if he grows a few inches then as he rocks on his toes trying to reach the answer he wants. As if it's right there in front of his nose, and all R has to do is confirm it.
He wants to be able to sleep. He wants to hear crinkles in the night and not fill the spaces with images of his impending torture. He wants to feel, for the rest of the Arena, no matter how short, that Aunamee can only touch him as a nightmare. That he can relegate at least one danger to being all in his head.
He looks at R's eyes, those pale blue irises, and he reads only what he wants to see in them. His eyes are wide, and the faintest smile is threatening to take over his mouth.
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R peers into Howard's face and sees that hope and trust and simmering fear wishing it could dissolve, all at once. Regretting he can't feed Howard the answer he wants, he shakes his head slowly. No, no he didn't. He let him go or Aunamee let him go (it's not clear which was which).
No, Mr. Bassem, I did not murder anyone up to and including Aunamee this Arena. Sorry.
Something he knows from experience is guilt starts to crawl up from that hole where Eva stabbed him in the stomach. R's eyes slide away from Howard's face as he drops his hand away from that bony shoulder.
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"Ah," he says, quietly, then louder, "ah." And he swallows.
He brushes R's hand away from him as if the zombie boy can't get it away from him fast enough. There's something sickly in his face, something bitter and sour that's been fermenting underneath the surface for a while. It's hurt, and it's resentment, and it's a feeling of betrayal, and it's that that pulls the next words from his lips.
"Guess there are some people you respect too much to kill. I get it. I know where your priorities are."
He regrets it immediately.
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R stares hopelessly at Howard as his face transforms, the realization sinks in, and he wonders if his inability to commit to a decision - murder, for instance, something he's had plenty of experience with - is going to kill their friendship once and for all. How long has Howard been wondering this? What kind of human's totally okay with offering up a man to not only get killed, but eaten alive for those blood-choked minutes? Confused, R backs away with his head hanging down.
No, he just...he couldn't do it. R's not a murderer. Well, okay, he is, he's eaten too many people to say that with a straight face, but he's always killed for a reason. Food. Life he can't have. Memories he swallows down for those few minutes he doesn't have to be him.
Not what Howard's asking.
R looks up to meet his eyes and shakes his head. He can't just straight-up murder even Aunamee in cold blood, he wants to say, and then he realizes it's a good thing he can't talk right now considering what happened to Howard last Arena. Maybe the silence, for once, is a blessing in disguise.
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That deep-down nagging voice says he should have expected that. Aunamee has a way with words that Howard doesn't, a certain charisma that Howard could never even aspire to. And, like he's always suspected, he's the disposable friend. R can stomach chowing down on him when it's convenient, when Karis is around or it's dark, but not on a psychopath with a two-dollar smile.
"What about other allies?" He tries to change the subject, although it's clear from his voice his mind is still lingering on it. Stuck in the mire, in that awkward space between forgiving and resenting. He runs a hand over his wrist. He can't meet R's eyes, but that's alright - it gives him more of an excuse to continue watching for movement nearby.
At this point he'd almost welcome it.
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Too bad R can't groan anything to defend himself or comfort Howard or anything at all. The most he can do is pause and give the question some serious thought. His brain chugs away through the cobwebs he's sure weren't there when he was alive, struggling against the dust and decay in the corners. Allies, allies. R's never thought of his friends as "allies" before and after seeing Eva in action, he's not sure he can count her as someone good for Howard's continued well-being.
Then again, there's Wyatt...
He gestures at his mouth, knowing he can't exactly do the man's mustache justice. Wyatt-Alive-Out There Somewhere. R then wobbles his hand down to Shion's level and shrugs. No clue where he is. Shion hasn't actually killed anyone as far as he knows, but he also sucks at surviving. It's been weeks.
As for Julie, she's still a no show. R shrugs again miserably, his shoulders drooping. Sorry, Howard. The list of people he knows who at least consider killing him for his stash of supplies is short. It's hard to concentrate when he could feel Howard doing his best not to look his way as if he's diseased. The human's looking everywhere but here.
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And suddenly he understands why it is that people leave their friends, because that impulse suckles away at his insides like a tapeworm. He could walk now. He doubts R would ever find him in this Arena if he bothered to hide, and even if he did, there's only so much damage R can do halfheartedly gumming him.
But he also remembers Orc walking on him, and he can still remember tasting the blood dripping down his face and mixing with tears as he pleaded not to be left alone.
He reaches over and weakly pats R's elbow. "Guess that just makes us, then."
OKAY THIS IS HAPPENING
But the biggest problem was the lack of weapons. He'd tried for a few, but all he got away with was the bear trap.
So, obviously, he needed to turn it into a weapon that could be used, not just as a trap, but something to hit a person with. The bendable rods for the tent were fastened to the bear claw with the ropes, also from the tent. He'd tested it out a few times now, and while you had to carefully pry it back open once it hit something, it worked out well.
He'd headed in a direction, and tried not to regret the decision. There was some kind of temple, and he'd gone in and searched it, but didn't touch anything yet. He'd spend a night or two in it, and maybe move on. He hadn't touched the water yet, either, but there was only so much beer he could take. For now, he'd taken the time to go through his dwindling supplies. Half of a box of powdered eggs, and only a few potatoes left.
No matter how busy he might be, though, he was always alert. So the shuffling is hear, as is the groan, and he's on his feet, stopping when he hears his name come from the corpse. His name was being groaned to him by a corpse.
How the hell did it know his name? "How do you know my--" Perry knows that face. He knows that face. He freezes up, mouth falling open slightly before he snapped it shut. He didn't stop holding his weapon in an attack position though, even as he says angrily:
"How do you know my name?"
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He can see the change as it morphs in Perry - he goes stiff, surprised because who knew a corpse could talk and then he looks pissed, his eyebrows knitting together. Maybe he suspects that not only zombies are cannibals, but they're also thieves of the worst kind. He...oh. Oh shit. It's not just that. Perry actually recognizes him. R had wondered if he would, in that dim fantasy he'd had in his head if they could ever re-do what happened that day in the lab: what if Julie had died, what if he could've gasped something out first thing through that door instead of snarling. What if Perry hadn't decided to sign up for that salvage mission.
This isn't one of the scenarios. R swallows nervously, an old reflex that still stayed with him somehow even though his mouth is dry and his throat ruined by whatever he's shoved down there throughout the years. He can feel Perry's eyes, so dark they look black instead of brown, fixed on him. The accuser and accused. "Murder victim" is probably more accurate.
Perry Kelvin deserves the truth.
"Ate," R feels the word withering on his tongue. He reaches up and taps his forehead, the humidity plastering his hair to his skull as he slurs. "Hhhg...here."
Should he come closer? R debates it, feeling the hunger tugging him toward Perry as if once wasn't enough. He can feel the urge to drool trying to fight its way past whatever shreds of self-control he's learned in the Capitol. R can't look away from Perry's face; too old, too young, and he's seen it before in the scuffed mirrors frowning back.
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And he was his killer. But he was his killer because he wanted him to be. It wouldn't do any good to say that it was all an accident, or that he should be upset because he died, and this was the corpse to do it. Perry hadn't picked out exactly where he was going to die, or who was going to do it. He knew what he wanted, and that lab?
It was just the place that was where the mission was, on the day that he wanted. "That makes no sense, you know that, right?" As soon as he said it, he knew how dumb it was. How could he really expect a corpse to make sense?
"Come any closer and I'll take your head off." Perry might be confused on this whole thing, but every kid in the stadium knew what a corpse looked like when he was hungry. And he wouldn't be leaving the dying thing to this one again.
"When did you show up here?"
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"Think...months," R says.
Each word, each syllable is more of a struggle than usual. He can feel Perry's black eyes on him, unreadable. Flat. With a stare like that burning into him, R has to struggle even more than usual to force words between his stiff lips. When he looks at Perry, he feels all the eloquency he usually has in his head vanish and in its place is a void.
R can practically feel the other boy studying him, working out the best plan of attack to take him out with the lowest risk of being bitten. If he was more of a man, he'd let Perry take his head off anyway. Shuffle those few feet closer and let him do it.
It's almost like Perry's whispering all those secret thoughts he'd had long before that lab.
R opens his mouth. Maybe if he changes tactics, mentions the girl they both love. "...J...Julie...?"
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If they can talk, why haven't we tried, and would this. Would all of this? Would a man, dying in a construction accident, be a waste of life because we were too blind and stupid to do anything?
But this corpse, he'd been here for months. Months. Humorously, Perry has to think, that now he's stepping onto corpse turf now. And isn't that funny, all things con--
"What did you say?" Perry stood completely still, his body almost shaking from his nerves being wound so tight. "Julie. How do you know Julie?" It's a terrible realization, to know exactly what happens next.
"Did you eat her, you fucking corpse! Did you hurt my girl!? Did you eat her like you did with me!?"
Do your worst to R's face :)
R gapes at Perry, stunned. All his apologies and explanations fly out the window and in its place is that blank fog that he's spent most of his new un-life hating. Eat her? He - he couldn't, he...
But then he remembers that cave; turning Howard, Howard this little pathetic excuse for a zombie eating Julie alive while he had to listen. Every squish and crunch of bone. The deafening silence from Julie herself.
This is the part where he should defend himself. Maybe groan he's kept her (mostly) safe and if he could take back murdering Perry, he would. The only thing he gives him is a guilty silence that hangs pregnant in the humidity.
I will never hear that said to me in regards to anything again YOU'VE GOT IT.
The guilt he feels is immeasurable. If he hadn't been so set on his death, she would be alive. If he hadn't been so selfish, she would be alive. If he hadn't been the worst excuse of a human being, she would be alive.
It's not just the corpse's fault that she's dead. It was Perry's, too.
Back at the stadium, you learned how to use a gun. How to shoot for the head. And, if you did not have a gun, how to disable a dead person so they couldn't come after you. Forget about just using the claw weapon he had (he'd use it in a moment), he screamed, rushing at R; before he reached him, he dropped low, tackling him, and knocking him down. It was hard to get back up for them, right?
He wanted to rip him to shreds, like he did to his girl.
fufufufu >:3
R knows it should. It does, because his freshest memories are his apathy, the sinking, looking at the trees and the sky and shrugging as he stares for the hundred time at the How to Run a Salvage pamphlet. For the second he has before the human's on him, he sees that Dead look in Perry's eyes flicker and vanish.
The tackle catches him right in the solar plexus. R might have the height advantage, but Perry's got more muscle and a superior sense of balance.
He hits the ground with Perry on top, the urge to grab onto his shirt and jerk him close enough to bite rising up in his jaws. Mud squelches under his back. He bears his teeth without realizing he's doing it, his face frozen in that rigor-mortis death mask that Perry's seen over and over right before an attack. He wants to grimace, groan at him that she's fine! and I'd never eat her! The words get tangled up in the urges as the trees overhead spin. His hands paw at the other Tribute's shirt, his arms, flopping out in an instinct to grab and hold on because it feels natural when everything else is a blur.
(Probably not helping things here).
>3 Will be in the next tag that it happens!
The second also began with why he was doing this, but the difference wasn't just how he could get it to hurt, but why he was doing it. Guilt about Julie? Anger at what this corpse did to her? Guilt about letting him kill him? Anger that he didn't get the job done like he was expected to?
He was not getting turned into a zombie. This guy was strong, and he wanted to eat him, and Perry needed to find a way to incapacitate him. It's when Perry smashes his elbow into R's chest that he sees the bear trap weapon he'd created. Now he has an idea, and with a swiftness that surprises even him, he rolls away in the direction of it.
jawsome
He'll be ashamed to admit it later, but his grimace starts to transform to a snarl.
He should bite Perry. Take a chunk out of his leg this time.
R's still trying to fight to do the right thing for a change. It's the reason his hands don't sink their nails into Perry's exposed skin as he nails him with the elbow, why he falls back with a wheeze of air from his dead lungs instead of lunging forward.
For a change, Perry gets that lucky break life's denied him.
That is TERRIBLE
The claw was already open, and he just went for it without preamble. Digging the top metal part into the corpse's mouth, he pushed it in.
"I messed up." Perry whispered, digging it in deeper. "You got me. No hard feelings there. You got me, and I wanted you to get me. But you ate my baby girl, and I'll never forgive you for that. But the least I can do is make you suffer for it."
He sat back a little, to give the trap the space it needed to snap down, the loudest crunch he'd ever heard before stunning him for a moment.
:D Figure we can leave it around here.
There's a bear-trap attached to his face. It happens in a blink; one second it's there, the next he can feel the steel teeth cutting into his skin and punching down to the bone. He should be screaming in pain. Writhing away. Not...lying there almost as if he wants to let Perry do what he wants. Make it right somehow.
Their eyes meet. The bear-trap does its magic.
R hears more than feels it tear away half his face. It's a beast of a bear trap and his bones are brittle, no thanks to his state of decay - he can hear them crunch into fragments, what he calls his blood oozing out as his lower jaw is severed. It plops onto his chest.
Maybe it's realizing he can't talk or that he's just that much of a coward, that he's too wussy to deal with this right now. Either way, he's had enough. R surges to his feet with a strangled grunt, more of that black oil dripping from his face and reeking. The bear trap clatters to the jungle floor as he shoots Perry a look, sees that flat black-eyed stare of his, and staggers off, wet leaves slapping against his face as he dives into the tree-line.
Aaaaaaand finish!
His shirt is covered in zombie blood, and he's taken off the jaw of the corpse, the man, the corpse, that killed him and his girlfriend. And Perry doesn't feel that much better about it. He thought there'd be a satisfaction about how he got some revenge.
He feels sick. It's only because of the lack of food that he doesn't toss anything up, before he pulls his knees up to his chest and buries his head.
Perry cries silently, hiding away from the cameras.
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There's still a third of the peanut butter left. It's going slowly. When her hunger gets really bad, she grabs a fingerful of it to suck on, easing the pain in her stomach a bit.
She stays moving because it's something to do, and it's moderately safe. She uses her fake arm to carry her bag so she doesn't feel the strain of the food. It's dwindling. It's getting really depressingly small, her cache. It was stupid to think it'd last the whole time.
Maybe some sponsor will take pity on her.
Moving means she finally comes across the houses after two weeks getting blocked by the water surrounding the arena. She's had enough water, thanks. Not that it's much better inland.
The houses, though. She doesn't trust them. There's gotta be something wrong there. A trap of some kind. It's too damn enticing otherwise.
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R plods along at a zombie's pace, which is a little bit above a snail's and definitely below Old Lady with a Cane. It's the closest thing to a corpse ambling along, curious but not in a particular hurry because food isn't involved and he still isn't sure if it's Julie or someone else. He rattles through big wet leaves slapping him in the face and chest, winding through tree trunks spotted with these bright blue bugs he's never seen before.
His nose works, at least. R sniffs, tilting what's left his head as if that'll make a difference, and takes a nice big breath through his nose. The smell of mud and someone Living. Seems familiar. It tugs even more than it normally does, R deciding he might as well check it out because it's not like he has a busy schedule wandering around lost in some jungle. It's either this or he lets the vines try to eat him again.
R blunders through a gap in the trees like a herd of rotting buffalo, his heard jerking up sharply as he spots a flash of blond hair. Sure, it's matted down with leaves and mud, and her face is hollowed out by dehydration and a lack of food, but it's definitely Her. He forgets about his mangled face, feeling a phantom smile breaking across it as he zeroes in on her. R's attempt to say "you're alive!" comes out as a wordless grunt.
Relief cuts through that daze he'd been wandering around in. Everything stands in sharp contrast to the blue of her eyes to the way one arm doesn't look quite right...
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She turns, on the defensive, with the crash of trees and twigs snapping. The bow's drawn, an arrow notched. Only reason she's on the defensive is those... those things. She'd only seen a flash, a deep-throated chirp, then she was gone. There was no way any of the wildlife around here was peaceful. AFter the evil bunny rabbits last Arena? No fucking way.
Julie scans the jungle behind her, towards the noise, the arrow's point dripping water, the metal already glistening from the muggy air.
It's no surprise to her when the noise proves itself to be a hopeless zombie and not a giant lizard. She's all ready to breathe his name with a happy shout, R!, except the gore that is half of his face is too red, too bright, moist and --
She crashes over to him, dropping her arrow back in her bag on the way. "Fucking hell, R, what happened?" Disgust mixes with real concern, her hands falling on his shoulders. She needs the touch this time. She swears she can see his tongue hanging like a greying dead slug, but it's him. (Look at his eyes, Jules, way easier.) He's still -- moving. And after the hallucinations last time, their special ending.
Jesus, she's glad to see him. She'd hug him if it wasn't for all the blood. "Hey. God. You can't get around this arena without someone tearing you up, huh?"
And now she can't even hear his voice. Selfish to think that sucks. "What was it? Someone in the Arena?"
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Instead he reaches out to touch him with her hands on his stiff shoulders, easily within biting distance that he figures General Grigio would've tried drilling out of her since she was a kid.
"Gklk..." R shrugs, trying to downplay the fact he's missing a good chunk of his face and not quite succeeding. His eyes drop down as she grills him about...that. This would've been impossible even if he had a working mouth. For a second he stops. Freezes, guilty as the day he killed his first man. Stares wide-eyed at her.
Your ex did this. He's back.
He's startled to realize that a part of him doesn't even want to tell Julie about Perry being alive and well and still with that closed-off look in his face that used to scare her. There's this weird temptation to keep it close to his still heart. Is this jealousy? Is it something else? For all he knows, it's a shade of his past self. Maybe he hadn't been a very nice person to hang around with, pre-death. Staring down at Julie, the way she's looking at him in concern (and trying her hardest to hide that disgust), he decides he needs to be the better corpse. She deserves to know. Perry was - is - a part of her life. He can feel the heat of her hands seeping into him where she's still touching his shoulders.
Silently, R reaches up to point at where his mouth was, then his brain, and then presses his hand to her chest, right over her heart. He flops How can you pantomime that "the boy you used to love (you know, the one I ate) is in the Arena" and "knowing him, he's probably still alive". R pictures Julie flaring with understanding and crashing through the jungle looking Perry. Something weird and not entirely pleasant clenches inside his chest like a fist.
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It would've been something else if it was Howard. God, she can't even. Think about Howard. She doesn't. If she thinks about him, it becomes her fault somehow. Letting R go, letting him bite someone because he was starving, just like she was. Is. Close to again.
Any bit of relief she might've had seeing him slowly drips away. He just kind of stares at her, making her shift and back up a step. Not that she feels particularly in danger, but. Yeah. She's getting vibes. Not real good ones. His hand still stays on her chest, and really, it's way close to her breast for her to feel comfortable.
She's assuming he did that on accident. The expression on his face is something more important. "You could just nod, you know." Or shake his head. She's not a real thrilling player in Charades, and she's not getting any better at reading zombie expressions. Problem is, she's around Living people too much now. "Or like, motion a dinosaur. 'Cause I think I saw one. Was it a dinosaur?"
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Oh yeah. Yeah, he guesses he could've just nodded. But nods and shrugs and staring don't convey that feeling twisting from his guts on out when he thinks about Perry being back, being rightfully pissed because for once death-by-zombie wasn't a given. That look on Julie's face once she realized Perry wasn't answering her in the lab. How quiet she'd gotten in the 747. The same look that's on her face right now as she peers at him as a bead of sweat trickles down the side of her cheek.
He jerks his head at the idea of dinosaurs. R has a vague idea of the word "t-rex", movies, popcorn. Lots of long teeth that could put a horde of zombies to shame. Other than that, no.
R regretfully shakes his head. Honestly, he probably would've taken dinosaurs over Perry Kelvin.
He points again, more emphatically, at Julie in something that looks more like a stabbing motion, substituting in for all the exclamation points he can't express. Human. Living. He holds his hand to Perry's height, tries to make his eyes look as Dead and flat, so dark they're black instead of the warm brown they used to be. Points at the face that ate him.
This would've been easier if he knew how to squat down and spell it out in the mud. He could even groan it, if he had the mouth.
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The videos of past Arenas -- she can't do those. She remembers the boat, the yacht, and the way her first Arena kept playing through it, off of screens and sheets of ice. Seeing that lance go through her gut at twenty different angles.
Not dinosaurs, though. Which, in her opinion, is kind of a miracle. R's smell is. Uh. Pungent. Walking carrion, there. Anything that was a scavenger should've been bee-lining for that sickly-sweet scent of decaying flesh and coagulated gore.
Oh, god, don't shake your head she thinks, backing up to give herself a little room. Little globs of red and brown sling off his face and rain on the leaves around them. Bile rises into her mouth.
Right. Charades. Ye high? Human? "How did someone do that?"
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He watches, mortified, as a wave of disgust flits around Julie's dirt-streaked face. It's a testament to her zombie tolerance these days that she doesn't march back into her section of the jungle.
He catches himself jerking his head a nod before remembering all sharp movements could end up with Julie getting rotting flesh flying into her eye. At least they're finally onto something. Someone, not something. It's progress. Just a name short, only two syllables he used to feel like rot on his tongue, the guilt from over the years so much more fresh again because somehow Perry had been different from all the others.
The problem was saying all that without so many words.
Eyes. Try the eyes. There'd always been that Dead look in Perry's eyes as he withdrew, when something went wrong with his smiles and Julie stopped catching him writing. Try to emphasize that.
R stares at Julie, tries to do his best flat, lifeless impression, and points at his eyes. Look, Julie. You've seen this look before and it scared you more than the hungry mouths waiting outside the walls.
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The problem is it's too soon. She hasn't seen Howard -- the small, scared kid her age -- since that first Arena. What she saw of him last Arena wasn't Howard at all. But the Dead eyes. She remembers those.
In a moment of weakness and horrible memory, she flinches back from him, adding a little distance between them. There's only so many times you can get stared at like that by the Dead and not want to bash a head in. Usually, actually, the stare is followed by bashing. Or shooting. She much prefers shooting and she's yet to ever find a gun.
"Stop that." She snaps it, a chill going through her. All that tearing. She hadn't died fast enough. She has the peel of skin by teeth at the back of her neck; jagged and broken fingernails claw at her arms. If only that fucking bear trap had been the thing to kill her. "Forget it. I'm shit at this game." Forget it. Yeah, she wishes. But that stare unnerves her and being unnerved makes her frustrated, on top of, you know, starving and sweating every extra pound of fat she's ever gained. "We should get moving. I've been looking for something to kill. To eat."
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R drops his eyes to the ground. Forget it, yeah. He can do that. His eyes lift back toward her as she points to the other, more pressing issue at hand. She's probably already figured out that the plant life here is no good - no salads - but he points at the nearest bush and shakes his head. Just in case.
Then he pauses. No rabbits, wolves, wild dogs. Definitely no supermarkets filled with soggy newspapers and dented cans. The food here is...unconventional. He thought he saw a flash of pebbly hide a few times but when he shambled closer to check it out, the animals were long gone.
R flops his hand toward the Compound. It's not visible from where they are but it's close enough that he suspects she probably know it's there too. Maybe they could risk it if he comes along. Distract any Tribute who might think she's an easy target.
He's been staring at her arm for awhile now, all without realizing it. Now he's figured out why - she's holding it weird. Something about it doesn't look right. Trust him: he's gnawed through enough arms to know. His eyebrows go up.
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She hefts the bow onto her shoulder, the bag at her back. Right. Moving. She's been moving for a while; long enough to know there's probably not a damn thing edible in this entire arena. She hasn't seen a rat, let alone something mouth-watering like a fish or a turkey.
Julie nods towards the Compound. Yeah, it's definitely a trap. But where else is there to go? She shoves some particularly dew-laden leaves out of her way, starting to go towards that direction. The stare stops her, of course. It's not the too-dead stare anymore.
She drops it a little defensively, rubbing it with her real hand. "It's fake." She holds it out, touching his chest with those eerily realistic fingers. "Lost it before the Arena."
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The fingers look real, but that's where the resemblance ends - he knows when she touches him he should feel her body heat seeping into him, smell that electric scent wafting off the skin. There's nothing. He looks down at it, then back up at Julie. Somehow he should've known.
His imagination dusts itself of cobwebs and kicks into gear. The how isn't as important as imagining Julie in pain, her face that lights up with those crooked smiles of hers clenched. Did she cry? Does it still hurt? She's not toughing it out, is she? The questions don't flash behind R's eyes but they're still there with nowhere to go, no outlet. He runs his grey fingers across Julie's false arm, feels the give of the skin that still doesn't feel quite right because he's torn his way through enough flesh to tell the difference.
He meets Julie's eyes. R's mouth might be gone but the rest of him still works. His hand squeezes where he's touching her fake arm, aiming for supportive, hoping it feels intentional enough.
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And here she's wishing it was the real thing, because the way he runs his fingers up the prosthetic is weirdly intimate, and coming from a corpse, pretty soft. She swears goosebumps would've popped up where he touched; funny, because they're popping up at her real shoulder, down her very real back.
When those soulful baby blues (they would've been blue, she thinks, if they weren't so Dead-grey) look up at her, she knows it's intentional. Maybe she's spent enough time with him to read his eyes sometimes. "Don't tear up on me. I can't feel anything anymore." She takes his hand with numb fingers, dropping it between them. "Gotta hope I wake up alive with a shiny new real thing, right?"
Think we should start wrapping it up?
His hand flops to his side as he jerks his head in a nod, realizing when it's too late that he shouldn't do that because he'll risk flinging what's left of his face at her if he's not careful. Some of it's only hanging on by bloody threads, like his tongue. He wants to keep his tongue for some reason. Maybe it's sentimentality.
She still hasn't told him how she lost her arm, only gave him a time frame and the hope that they'll bolt her together good as new after all this. Without his voice, he can't ask if she's worried he'll be worried or she's prioritized (as Perry remembers her dad saying) or it's just a relief at all to even have a replacement. That wouldn't have happened before. Amputations usually meant death, either by zombies slipping in through the defenses or infection or you simply being a less productive mouth to feed.
R looks again toward the Compound, then back toward Julie. It's hard to force a steely look into eyes that wander and unfocus, but he tries.
yeah! another round or two, maybe get separated by a raptor or something?
She drops her hand out of his and rearranges everything. The bow goes right against her shoulder, the backpack after to keep it close, even if the string cuts against her hip sometimes. Only good thing about this arm was it didn't get tired; she could've held this bag forever and the only thing that would hurt was her shoulder.
No point in telling him. She thinks he'd freak a little. Almost getting eaten by a giant fucking movie alien: who wouldn't? Julie tips her head and starts, slowing her normally quick gait to account for his stumbling. "Come on. We'll look for a new face for you. Little bit of eyeshadow and no one'll notice a thing."
okay I'll start having the raptors sniffing in
Perry's missing out, he suddenly thinks and feels guilty all over again.
He'll just have to pretend he's smiling at Julie in his head, hope there's a twinkle in his eyes and she can read past the vacant zombie-stare he's cursed with. Wheezing unintelligibly, he pats her gently on the shoulder, resists the urge to drop his hand down and take hers in his, and turns to lead the way back to the Compound. As he pushes his way through the leaves, listening to the chirps and hums of the jungle around them, he can feel Julie's presence like this solid thing behind him. She doesn't move like the other Dead or like Howard or anyone else he knows. It's hard to explain.
They break through the tree line, R about to step out into the open when something rustles in the tall grass between them and the Compound. He doesn't notice it at first, plodding ahead. Something to the left shifts the grass again. There's a flash of pebbly hide. A tail, coming closer and closer...
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Seriously, if they run into who did it, she might kill them just to get some points. Seems cruel to take R's speech away when it's really the only vestigial human thing he has left.
Julie's bag swings and hits her hips with every walk. R's not really the best teammate in the Games, especially in this jungle: he doesn't hold leaves out behind him so they end up slapping her in the face more than once, and god knows the guy has no idea how to be the least bit stealthy. It's too bad her careful steps can't make up for it.
Still, she can't ever seem to leave him behind. The fact he lasts long in these Games at all is still a goddamn miracle to her.
Julie stops for a second, squinting through the leaves. It's not dark yet, but it's hard to see much with how thick the plants are. Her gaze doesn't go far and sunlight only shatters through the leaves in intermittent slices.
For being predators, zombies have shit reflexes at hunting. Julie reaches out and grabs the back of his shirt, jerking him backwards. "R--"
That's all she gets out. There's more than a flash this time as a shrieking, sleek body streams right past them, so fucking fast that she barely has time to shove her bag off her shoulder to reach for her bow. No good, she's already thinking. It won't help because these are fast and bows aren't guns and she's not that good a shot.
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Now there’s Julie. And she’s worth worrying about.
R stumbles back as Julie jerks at his shirt. His hand comes up and grazes against that pebbly, warm hide from before before it vanishes into the grass again. The Things out there! He has time to let out a surprised wheeze out of the giblets that used to be his mouth before he catches his footing and stands up, his head lolling automatically toward Julie. Still there, good. She has the bow out, R wishing he had his mouth back because it's his main - make that only - weapon. Without it, he'd just gum the Thing to death. The shriek fades off as the rustling stops. Them and the leaves and the afternoon sun.
They're being watched. R'd had the feeling from zombies, from other humans when they got close enough to shoot. He's never felt it like this. It's alien, other. If he was alive, the fine hairs on the back of his neck would be going up, another sign of fight-or-flight. Whatever's out there, he bets they'd prefer Julie over him. There's nothing like delicious red meat on two legs. He should know.
R reaches out, touches her sleeve, points at the Compound. Run for it? Then he points at himself with one blackened finger, stabs it back the way he'd come. Maybe he could lead the Things away?
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Julie knows before he ever makes his gesture what R's big plan will be. She looks at him, watches, and isn't satisfied that she's right. Something always interrupts. A moan of a zombie or a scream of another tribute or some asshole with a lance. R's never been her responsibility -- and didn't Dad teach her to drop anyone who was a liability? -- but she can't help feeling she still owes him a hell of a lot.
Dead boyfriend aside.
In the end, human instinct wins over guilt. Her heart's drumming so fast her ribs are vibrating and the point of the arrow is shaking up and down. Even if she has one robotic arm, the other's real and whining with the strain of keeping the arrow back. She wasn't made for this. Wasn't trained as hard for it.
It's all the space of a moment. She nods. "You find me after this Arena." She doesn't have time for anything else. With one movement she hefts the bow and the bag back onto her shoulder and jets. Both slam against her hip and leave a nice swelling bruise behind.