The Signless (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
69problems) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thearena2014-05-19 08:08 pm
69problems) wrote in thearena2014-05-19 08:08 pm
Entry tags:
[ota]
WHO| Karkat, the Signless and YOU!
WHAT| Mutant camping, and food sharing if anyone's hungry
WHEN| All through week one
WHERE| Various less-shitty houses around the residential area
WARNINGS| Nothing as of yet; will be updated or marked in-thread
For the first week, Karkat and the Signless wander the rows of houses. Many of them are empty of anything useful, but occasionally they find a can or two to add to their small stock of rations. In a few of them they find bugs hiding somewhere dark like they found in the first one, and on those nights they have to worry at least a little less about running out of food. Once they even manage to trap and take down one of the dogs -- it isn't exactly appetizing, but cooking it as thoroughly as Signless insists on to make sure it's safe to eat masks at least some of the taste.
Mostly, they use the (less dilapidated) houses with fireplaces as overnight camps. The faint glow of their fire can be seen through the grimy windows, especially when it gets dark.
[As a note, the mods have said humans probably shouldn't eat bugs as they'll suffer pretty bad side-effects. If your non-troll character shows up and wants some of their food, it's probably best to have it happen on dog night.]
WHAT| Mutant camping, and food sharing if anyone's hungry
WHEN| All through week one
WHERE| Various less-shitty houses around the residential area
WARNINGS| Nothing as of yet; will be updated or marked in-thread
For the first week, Karkat and the Signless wander the rows of houses. Many of them are empty of anything useful, but occasionally they find a can or two to add to their small stock of rations. In a few of them they find bugs hiding somewhere dark like they found in the first one, and on those nights they have to worry at least a little less about running out of food. Once they even manage to trap and take down one of the dogs -- it isn't exactly appetizing, but cooking it as thoroughly as Signless insists on to make sure it's safe to eat masks at least some of the taste.
Mostly, they use the (less dilapidated) houses with fireplaces as overnight camps. The faint glow of their fire can be seen through the grimy windows, especially when it gets dark.
[As a note, the mods have said humans probably shouldn't eat bugs as they'll suffer pretty bad side-effects. If your non-troll character shows up and wants some of their food, it's probably best to have it happen on dog night.]
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"So, uh, one thing I was thinking about seeing if you were interested in is, well, Signless doesn't like to kill people and gets in trouble sometimes, right? Maybe if someone ever attacks him, if we're both around we can try to bond over stabbing that person a whole lot."
He mimed stabbing someone. "Just. All the stabbing. Together. We could at least try it. That's something we could maybe have in common, right?"
His expression was so very earnest.
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"I don't know if I should be touched at the sentiment or despair over the both of you," he said, but really, it was at least a little flattering to know Guy would stab someone for him (Karkat, he'd already known, would stab just about anyone).
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"What about intentionally poisoning people?" Karkat asks instead.
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He shrugged.
He was friends with Venus, among others who were pretty homicidal. He knew it was all part of playing the game for them. It was something he wouldn't allow to happen in front of him, naturally, but he didn't go out of his way to hunt them down. They weren't like Azula.
"Why, you thinking of tricking people into doing what happened with that Jolly guy? 'Cause that'd probably work - not everyone is as careful about food as me."
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His tone and expression clearly say that he's not really thrilled about the idea. He just doesn't like the idea of being complicit in murder, no matter the methods or circumstance.
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"I wouldn't be able to do it, but then that doesn't...fit. Aside from not wanting to see it, if I want to kill someone, I make it quick and I like it to be by my own hand. It fits the whole 'noble' and honest thing they have going for me, anyway."
Azula had been the exception but she'd been too skilled for him to fight her without the poison. She'd nearly killed him the first time and had poisoned him first.
"But if someone is dumb enough to eat something just handed to them by a stranger, and they don't even know if their type of people can stomach it - when we've even had poisoned food in arenas before?" Anyone could access the old footage. "Eeeeh, I hate to say it but you might be doing them a favor because they're not gonna last long if they're that reckless. I'd at least wait a week, though, let 'em at least have their time so they're not considered 'boring' this arena."
That was a true death sentence.
"At least give them some time to be 'entertaining' so they have a chance of coming back. But if you do it and they're the types that'd take you up on it - they're not going to last long, anyway. Those are the people I usually just outlast."
He stared them both down. "You'd have to both be ready to be seen as cold, though. Untrustworthy. They'll make it look worse than it is. Just keep in mind how they might twist it - it's different than just stabbing someone in the back."
That could affect them adversely the next arena. If it was something like the mini-arena that depended more on cooperation with strangers...
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"They don't know what to do with me anyway, right now. If they latch onto this and start trying to build me up as having gone cracked in the pan from the stress -- as having been broken into showing some cruelty that was always there..."
He shrugged helplessly. It would be a perfect narrative, he knew: the kind pacifist, driven to giving up all his ideals by the mental and emotional stress of the arena, first killing for mercy and then killing for convenience until he was just like the rest of his violent race. He'd just never be able to live with it. It would ring too close to true for him to write it off as pandering to the Capitol fans, no matter how much he knew he needed to separate his public and private selves for his own sanity.
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It's too bad, because it really was a great plan, but for some stupid reason or another, having Signless be just like everyone else--or even people treating him as just like everyone else--makes him feel weird and gross.
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He shrugged. "There's a price you pay when you choose certain ways to survive that might make it harder to survive later. As much as being nice to most people that I can be nice to is just something I want to do, it definitely doesn't hurt that it makes people want to help me - or at least not stab me. You always have to be careful about choosing what paths to block. Maybe blocking one will keep a koaleopard from chasing you, but it could also block you off from a river where you can get a drink."
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"It's a good idea, Karkat. Really. I'm just not made for culling, and even if we can frame it as a mercy, that hasn't worked out well for me before. You can do it, but I won't want to be around for it. I'll just... stay in another block, maybe."
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Fighting to live was, apparently, an everybody thing, and that said something didn't it? That so many of them fought so hard, hoping for something better when it might never come.
"Have you considered using poison on your weapons?"
It was good for the people that were hard to kill. Just a tiny nick and they were either gone or wound up weak as a Macawnivore kitten.
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Maybe that was a good compromise. Then Karkat could fight as he liked, still using his admittedly very good idea, and the Signless wouldn't have to feel quite so gross about it.
"At the very least you could try it?"
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