thearena | Eye see what you did there.

Entry tags:

Eye see what you did there.

WHO| Azula, Guy Crood and any other poor unfortunate souls in or around her.
WHAT| Even with one eye and barely armed, Azula is dangerous
WHEN| Week 4
WHERE| Near the labs
WARNINGS| fighting...probably gonna be violent.

The headaches had mostly subsided.

She could still feel her eyelid functioning just fine but the lights had gone out in her left eye and it was irritating.

Whoever that child was, she knew what she was doing and Azula on some level could admire that...

Especially after seeing her death announced in the night sky.

And so Azula continued as she had each day since arriving. Resting only when she had to. Hunting. Stalking. Preparing.

The short time she had spent with her tribute Diana had been...oddly relaxing. The girl had a talent for making people let their guard down and Azula found that resisting it was more frustrating then it was to accept it and deal with the paranoia that came with.

Worse still, allies of Diana's had moved into the labs and as much as Azula wanted to slit the throat of one and gouge out the eyes of his rock monster friend, she would restrain herself for now and continue her trapping attempts.

Slipping into the forest as silently as she can, the warrior woman would not let her handicap be her undoing.

It would take far more to remove this former champion from the playing field.

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Guy had traversed quite some distance around the island, trying to see everything it had to offer in terms of food and water. Flint had been something that he'd found easily, but it had taken him a while to find a piece large enough for a spearhead.

Eventually he found what he needed, though, and after knapping it into the sharpest spearhead he could manage, he'd crafted himself a spear with a great deal of care. Without any animals to make the strips of leather he needed, he'd spent a good deal of time finding the right tree park to peel off and use to secure the spearhead to the shaft, even soaking it in a little bit of his precious water and stretching it made sure that it held the spearhead to the shaft extra tight.

In short, it was a good spear, the kind of spear a nomad in a very desperate situation could be proud of. Good weight to it, nice and sharp -

- and it was very menacing-looking when Guy held it up in Azula's direction the moment they both walked into an opening in the trees. They'd both been moving so silently they hadn't heard the other coming as they'd entered the little meadow.

One eye. She had one eye.

Guy's eyes narrowed and like a good hunter, instead of springing forward recklessly, scaring off his prey, he made sure he had a good stance and waited to see how it would react now that it had noticed his presence. To Azula, it might have looked like he'd frozen in fear, but fear and patience were two very different animals.

Edited 2013-11-11 06:45 (UTC)

Her eyes narrowed as she almost stumbled into this figure who she didn't recognize.

"Another new tribute. Just my luck." She sighed looking utterly relaxed despite having a spear pointed at her. The bandages on her face were snug in place over her damaged eye but she could keep her good eye on him just fine while appearing to be at ease.

"Good for you crafting a weapon. That's sure to earn you some fans back home." She added.

"I don't care."

He really didn't. The people magically watching all this suffering and enjoying themselves? they could take all their sickness and vileness and stuff it where the sun didn't shine.

And he didn't mean a cave.

"There was a little girl. Light hair, foul mouth - her leg was mangled and she said a girl with one eye had done it."

Edited 2013-11-11 06:50 (UTC)

"One eye?" She remarked sounding curious. "Well that's such a curious description. I had two perfectly functioning eyes just recently." She teased.

"I wonder how long she held out with a wound like that." She added in a more conversational tone. "Did she give you any indication?"

Guy didn't say a word. His expression didn't change.

In fact, there was no warning at all that Guy was going to lunge at her, but lunge he did, and he thrust the spear in her direction, trying to stab her in the chest with it.

Edited 2013-11-11 07:30 (UTC)

Oh...he was good.

This was the second time Azula had been surprised by the skill of those in the Arena. The first time it cost her an eye. This time she would feel the sharp burn of the flint driving into her shoulder.

A grunt of pain and a powerful strike directly to his windpipe was his reward for the hit.

He wasn't good enough to avoid the blow but he was good enough that when it connected, he didn't let go of the spear, wrenching it out of her shoulder as he fell to the ground choking and wheezing, trying to catch his breath.

She had to move fast. The pain in her shoulder sent a surge of adrenaline into her blood. She felt the heat pulsing off it and hoped it wouldn't impede her arm too much.

Just as well she was faster with her feet. Which she demonstrated as she swung her boot hard to try and crush his nose.

The kick connected, causing his blood to spatter in the dirt. He still didn't lose his grip on the spear but his body was thrown back by the blow, so that he landed on his side. He scrabbled to get to his feet and for a moment he looked like he was going to try to thrust the spear up at her, despite the fact that there wasn't enough distance between them to bring it up to bear.

That only lasted a moment, because what he was really doing was picking up some of the sandy dirt of the forest floor to throw right in the direction of her good eye while he tried to spring back up to his feet.

Edited 2013-11-11 07:42 (UTC)

A combination of speed and luck saved her this time as she blocked her eye with her arm and threw it aside.

Suddenly...A scream pierced the air around them. A girl...she couldn't have been more then 14 with a tangle of bushy brown hair. She had a sword run through her chest.

Azula jumped back and her eyes were wide as they could be, pupils tiny specks as she quivered and gazed upon the dying woman with a look of familiarity.

The first tribute she'd ever killed in the arena. Looking as real as either one of them standing right there in the bushes as the sword slid out of her and blood sprayed from the wound making her skin pale.

Guy was properly distracted by it, letting out a terrified little yelp. This was the first time that he'd seen one of the projections in the arena - or anything like them, given he had nothing like television or movies where he came from.

To him, it might as well have been a ghost and he didn't have the faintest clue how he should react to it. Other than screaming. Screaming was a given.

Edited 2013-11-11 07:51 (UTC)

His voice...and the girls, was joined by two others.

These two were boys. One tall one short, both screaming on the ground clutching at their legs...or at the stumps where their legs had been. The same sword could be seen in the ground just in front of their stumps.

More people she had killed! Azula was backing up to a tree now. Suddenly...her eyes slid to the boy who had attacked her.

"You! You can see these as well?" She demanded of him, though she wasn't sure if he would hear her over the screaming.

But the wheels in her head were turning. If he could see them, this wasn't another hallucination brought on by her withdrawal. This was a trick of some sort!

Eyes wide, Guy nodded.

Then, just like before he attacked without even the tiniest bit of warning, and he threw the spear in her direction as hard as he could. It was the kind of spear throw that could kill a girelephant.

The strange visions weren't attacking. They were just dying around them. As terrifying as they were, that was all the more reason to kill her quickly so he could run.

Her wide eyes saw the spear leave his hands all too late. This time it too her in the meat of her arm. The pain that blossomed from it earned him a gasp. Sweat budding on her face.

Out of the forest more screaming. Bodies on fire. Boys and girls, no older then 18, some much younger.

And then the most horrible thing. Azula began to laugh. She laughed softly at first. Then louder, till her laughter boomed over the screaming of the dieing tributes who's flesh was being melting to their bones. Some were simply coughing and gaging on smoke no one could see.

"Good...look at them all." She panted and curled her fingers around the spear wrenching it free with another grunt. Splinters burst from the tree he had pinned her to and blood began to stain the ground as it ran down her arm.

"Look at all these people dieing around you. Do you know who killed them all?" She asked steadying herself with the spear as a twisted smile cracked her face open.

"ME!"

She shifted the spear to her damaged arm, she could barely grip it right now let alone throw it.

"And my time here is temporary. If you hoped to avenge the death of that girl you met? You have failed. And you will fail again. And again." She explained to him slowly stepping through the still sobbing, crying bodies.

"Because this is our world. So you may kill once or twice. You may have small rewards such as wounding me. But eventually? You will die. And you will die horribly. And you will never. Ever. See the world you came from or anyone you loved ever again."

Her teeth gleamed brilliant and white and perfectly straight in the light of these flaming screaming ghosts. In her eye there was a darkness. She could not truly be human could she?

Guy's breath caught in his throat. She was human. That was the scariest part of all this. Animals were merciless but they didn't enjoy killing, they just enjoyed eating. Only when a mother was training their young did they cripple prey instead of making a clean kill and even then it wasn't for the fun of it.

If Guy had to kill, he planned for it to be cleaner than the death Azula had tried to inflict on Mindy. He planned to try to make them all more like the death he'd given Mindy instead. But this woman standing before him, eyes reflecting the fire, wasn't an animal, she was human. She was human and crueler than any animal ever could be.

For a moment, he looked as if he might believe her words, because they were tugging at fears he was already feeling but then the fire only reminded him of another fire, one that had once loomed up behind him and then loomed before him.

She was trying to tell him going home alive was impossible but lots of things were impossible, weren't they? Being a lonely child lost in the wilderness and surviving. Escaping the end of the world.

The fire around him scared him at first. Then it didn't. For all firebenders had the ability to master fire, it was in the hands of people like Guy that fire had been borne of human hands in the first place. He owned it just as much as she did.

When he spoke next, after spitting out blood from his bleeding nose, his voice deepened, rumbling with something that was ancient. It wasn't that he himself was old but in him was instinct older than civilizations, one that was, for many, long since forgotten. There were few that remembered deep down in their bones what it was like to look out on a primordial world of growling nightmares and decide that all they needed to make order, all they needed to live and feel joy in it, was their own two hands.

"I surbibed the end of the world once," he said quietly, his words only partly muffled by his bleeding nose. "I'll surbibe long enough to end this one."

Not all of it, of course, but this, this little world that had been created around suffering and death. That needed to die.

He pulled his flint knife free from his belt and launched himself forward, slashing in the direction of her face, grabbing at the spear with his other hand. He wasn't really aiming to hurt her, mostly just trying to throw her off her guard so the spear could be wrenched out of her hands. With her injured arm and shoulder, he had a fair chance of pulling it off.

He planned to run. His ability to fight through his fear made her no less terrifying - it never made things less terrifying - and now he knew he didn't stand a chance. She was too used to fighting other people and he was too used to fighting beasts that were too beastly to be cruel.

But he'd put a lot of work into that spear.

Edited 2013-11-11 09:01 (UTC)

There were one of three options on how he would have responded to her speech in her mind.

The first and most preferable. Give in to despair and allow death to take him. Unlikely but one must remain hopeful.

The second and more likely was he would run. But she had his weapon and he was clearly a solid built man. Most men no matter the skill she displayed liked to believe they could take her.

And so when he took option three and lunged for her. She was ready.

Step one: gently drop the spear so it fell in front of her and with a calculated kick send it at his legs to trip him.

Step two. Her own knife that she had slid from her pocket while speaking. It flipped open easily and if he tripped or if he dodged. Would would be ready to go for his legs. Ever aware of his own knife.

The only undetermined factor was the mobility of her wounded arm. The fingers were stiff and she hadn't tried to move it much but if he didn't trip she would need both her arms to defend herself.

Her beartrap hung off her hip. Always an option.

Her rope was around her waist like a belt. She could easily pull it free but if her arm refused to co-operate it would be difficult to use it to strangle him.

She'd have to hope to hit an artery. Or sever enough muscle in his leg that he couldn't continue for long.

The blood dripping from her fingertips reminded her that they were on a tight schedule now. If there were predators in the area the constant screaming of the holograms she was trying to tune out would draw them, and the scent of blood would draw them faster.

He was feet away from her now. He'd been in striking distance in seconds. She let the spear fall, drew back her foot, and struck!

He did trip, but his reflexes were very fast and even as he tripped he was watching her movements as he went down rather than looking at his feet, ever vigilant of the situation around him.

He tucked forward into a roll -

- and then as soon as he was able to kick off, he kicked backward into a roll, going right back in the direction he came, not even trying to stand near her or stay still long enough for her to attack.

As he rolled, he grabbed the spear with one hand, rolled backward yet again, and only then did he try to take to his feet, rolling up onto them.

He said nothing as he did it, merely giving her a look that seemed to say, "Well, you're pretty scary, buh-bye now" before turning and carrying the momentum from the rolls into a solid sprint for the treeline, which was, mercifully, not that far away since the meadow was so small.

It was a very very fast sprint, one borne of having to run from things much faster than Azula.

Edited 2013-11-11 09:20 (UTC)

She growled, denied her prey once again!

"Oh shut up!" She spat at the screaming holograms as she threw her knife to the ground and drew her parting shot from her pocket.

Three long sharpened wooden darts. Each one soaked in the juices of the local plantlife.

Poison.

With only one eye her aim was focused. Her hand a blur as the stakes raced through the air at his retreating back.

He may yet live. But he would never forget her.

He cried out as the dart hit his shoulder but didn't stop running, tucking his knife into his belt, and quickly reaching up and pulling the dart out of his shoulder.

The end was stained with something dark green along with his blood.

"Ah, nuts."

Poison, most likely. None of the planets were safe. Very smart. He had to hope he'd gotten it out before too much got into his blood or that she hadn't known enough about the local plant-life to make it truly deadly.

He had to hope even more that he could get somewhere safe quickly because even if he didn't die from it, if he got sick somewhere in the open, there were plenty of other things he could die from.

"I hate this place. So much."

She finally let out a shuddering breath she'd been holding as she watched him react to the strike.

Lowering herself to her knees she gathered her knife from the ground. And a pair of boots appeared in her vision.

"Why did you kill me so early Azula?"

She didn't need to look up to see it was the face of Jin. The male tribute from her district. He'd saved her life. She took his.

"You know why. Don't bother me." She rose and turned her back towards him.

"They'll never forgive you Azula." His voice drifted after her as all the dead tributes rose up to watch her leave.

"I never asked for their forgiveness." She spat clutching her bleeding arm as she retreated to the lab for bandages.

Azula was not the only one hunting.

Don was also on the prowl now, rich with supplies and in the best condition a Tribute could be. But one could only imagine his amusement ~~or, well, decided lack thereof~~ at seeing the figure skulking around, setting a new trap.

Maybe a zombie. Or just darned lucky.

Let's see how much her luck would last he mused. Maybe he'd kill her, maybe she'd find a way to get away. But Don would do his best to make sure she was dead. Why not? He'd vaguely heard about her, how frightening she was and so on and so forth, how inhuman she was.

He'd have to see about that. She didn't have what he had in her, after all.

A loud snap came abruptly from one of Azula's traps, several moments later. It sounded painful. But it all that was there was a rock, if she bothered to come and look.

Edited 2013-11-11 22:26 (UTC)

Azula's wicked smile turned into a frown when she did in fact come to inspect her trap. Instantly she was alert. Someone was taunting her. Teasing her! She'd had enough nonsense today with holograms of her previous kills tormenting her every few hours.

Swooping to collect her trap she turned a slow circle, listening more then looking. With so much plantlife it would be near impossible to attack without making a sound. Of course she was sure to cast her eyes upward in case she was being stalked from above.

There was trees swaying gently, bushes rustling. Any of those sounds could be just like any normal sound. One of the advantages to being a ninja was to use the sounds and shadows to an advantage to blend in. That his color was quite similar to the greenery helped as well.

Was it teasing? Probably. But he had her attention now, and right now, he was in control. He decided what would happen and how. He was fully armed and ready. And he wanted to see how much further Azula would go, what she would do. How she would lash out at the obvious taunts.

Another trap snaps, but in a different direction and distance.

Edited 2013-11-12 01:12 (UTC)

Her eye twitched in irritation. She was being played now. And she didn't care for it.

Deep breath, in through the mouth, out slowly through the nose. Feel her heartbeat slowing. Focus on your senses. Clear your mind.

Looking more relaxed she set off in the direction of the noise cautiously. She would play this game. But she would not be an easy kill. Each step was calculated to avoid the vines as best she could. Every moment she was focused on a new noise or motion around her.

The knife in her belt was a small comfort. The spikes stored just up her sleeve was even less. But having those spikes soaked in poison at least made her feel if she at least got a hit in they would suffer for daring to interfere.

The next thing Azula might have heard and felt, was an inhale of breath, followed by a fwp. And that was all the warning she would get of the blow dart bolt coming towards her. Don didn't plan on wasting his darts on her. But he planned on slowing her down for his attack, if he could.

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Eye see what you did there.

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