I smell the blood of- run.

[gruesome]

Who| Some and Susannah (and Cuthbert?), and an open thread before if anyone wants to catch him tracking.
What| Some's last days in the Arena, and his death.
Where| Various.
When| Week 6
Warnings/Notes| Discussion of maneating. Graphic descriptions of injuries. Mercy-killing. Some will only track humans, but anyone can come across him doing so.

Open

A sixth week. Some rarely made it so far. There was something, after all, to the tactic of simply holing up and only venturing out and back in short excursions, or from hideout to hideout. He missed his spot on the whale model; it had been almost comfortable. It had also been almost directly below the volcano.

But he thought about shelter less and less, now. And food, more and more. Of those left in the arena, he knew more or less how many were human. He found himself, when he was near exhaustion and his will was weakest, casting around for their scents, creeping on all eight to follow them while conserving strength. It felt good to simply follow, catching scent off the floor, finding things his prey (no, not prey, he was not a predator) had touched. He would catch himself, sooner or later, and barricade himself into a corner to rest, but before then, nearly every day, there was a period when he could almost have imagined himself hunting in a pack with his siblings, as he had never done at home.


For Susannah

By the end of the week, there had been near calls. Some knew he should cut this all short. But he hadn't quite worked up the will yet. He was being still more careful tonight, with a scrap of stolen clothing from the wax-people floor tied across his face to mask distracting scents as he carefully, quietly slipped onto the darkened Fifth Floor. His claws had gotten long, and he walked carefully, silently so as not to click, making a weaving path for one of the water fountains.

Comments

[dividedgirlofmine]

Susannah and Cuthbert tend to travel together at night, Bert pushing the chair and Susannah's hands on her chakrams, so that if someone did leap out at them she could react first. They're moving now across the fifth floor, taking care to keep away from places they know friends have died in.

Their scent is clear and very, very human.

[gruesome]

Clear enough that he's derailed, cloth mask or not. Gone, suddenly, is any thirst. At least, any thirst for water. He follows their path a little way, and then diverged from it, guessing at their route, dropping to six points to pick up speed, loping silently along the side of the hall to see if he could intersect them. Just a low, long shadow sliding from cover to cover.

[tis_allgood]

Cuthbert may not be able to see in the dark the way his former companion could, but he was extremely alert nonetheless. He had been jumping at shadows ever since they set out and he jerks to a halt again when he thinks he sees something ahead. He leans down to whisper to Susannah.

"Did you see that?"

[dividedgirlofmine]

"Yeah," she whispers, "I did." Her right hand goes to her left side and withdraws a chakram from the bag. "Keep goin'. I'll throw if I need to."

And then-- then she sees it again. So she throws the chakram at it. And for once, because stealth is their best option, she doesn't yell RIZA!

[gruesome]

Stupid of him not to have anticipated a thrown weapon. He'd even heard gunfire, the last few days. But still, Some had had it in mind that the arenas were dominated by hand-to-hand fighting. He heard the thing whistling through the air, but that didn't give him enough warning to do more than jerk to the side. It struck him in a forethigh, the impact flinging him to the side. At first, he thought that that was all it had done, and he tried to scramble to his feet.


Tried.


And put his weight on the stump where his right foreleg had been.


His screams, both mouths giving full voice, were the most inhuman sound he'd ever made in Panem.

[tis_allgood]

Cuthbert immediately pulls back in shock. Whatever it is, she hit it. He had to fight his instincts to go the other way. He also had to fight the instinct to get his gun out, shooting in the dark was a waste of the few bullets he had and from the sound of it, there was no guarantee he could take it down even in broad daylight.

"Mayhap we should go..."

He moves to pull Susannah back away from whatever it was she hit.

[dividedgirlofmine]

"Please! Or--" She shudders, thinking of that thing in the tunnel that had chased after her and Roland, of how very glad she would have been to have-- "The grenade. Or-- would that set off the alarms?" They didn't need that.

[gruesome]

Three hands clasped hard over the stump, Some was glad for his grip, strong enough to be his own tourniquet. The pool of blood around himself was terrifying, smeared in great arcs by his other feet. He swallowed, head jerking as he kept down more screams. Hearing them.

"No, please!" he shouted, hoarse. Not the alarms. He'd already been through that hell rain once, paid for it in skin and fur.

[tis_allgood]

Bert took another start. Whatever it was Susannah hit, it was alive and conscious. He couldn't think properly about what it could have been, he really just wanted to escape. But then, in the back of his head, he realized they needed to finish this.

"We can't just abandon more of your plates. And 'tis far too large a risk to blow things to bits around us. Think you can finish that thing off? If... if we got closer?"

It was clear as he spoke just how little he wanted to get closer.

[dividedgirlofmine]

"Think so," Susannah whispers back. She says, a little louder, to the monster, "We can put you out of your pain if you let us get closer! Will you?"

She doesn't particularly want to get closer either, but that little thing that made the red dot of light wasn't going to illuminate whatever this was very well.

[gruesome]

He rocked in pain, groaning, his upper jaw clenched. He'd bled to death before - it was a gasping, airless, painful death.

"Oh stones, oh stones... I just need... my leg, I need a... a tourniquet!" he begged, clutching the stump harder until the pain made him shake.

[tis_allgood]

"I think that's our answer."

Cuthbert goes for his flashlight, which he had been trying not to rely on, because it gave them away as much as it helped them see prey. He turned it on and flashed it in the direction of the pained sounds.

"Gan, I know this one. Take the shot, Suze."

[dividedgirlofmine]

The monster, it turns out, is a furry centaur, with two mouths and hands for feet. Susannah thinks she might have seen it in the tribute tower before. It had spooked her a bit then, as it spooked her now. "We don't have a tourniquet," she says. "I'm sorry. We'll see you in the Capitol, God willing."

She throws the chakram again, like an oriza, and this time her aim is true.

[gruesome]

He had no further chance to protest. A gasp of blood, and he slumped softly to the floor, all the tension of pain gone in one last heartbeat.

But by the time he woke in the Capitol, almost the first thing he was aware of, he was grateful.

[tis_allgood]

When he's sure there's nothing else moving he edges closer to see if he can get the chakrams back before the Capitol takes the body.

"A clean shot and a good kill. Say thankya."