streetsmarts: (pic#8810946)
Nick ([personal profile] streetsmarts) wrote in [community profile] thearena2015-02-14 10:46 pm

Bang you're dead, alouette, here's your silhouette. [closed]

Who| Nick and Jack, Firo, Jane and Phone Guy
What| Nick gets a little stir crazy and realises this is only going to end once people start dying.
Where| All over the place.
When| Late/End of Week 3
Warnings/Notes| Cursing, lots of murdering


Ever since Nick, for reasons still beyond him, took on a Saber Tooth Tiger he's been laying low. The injuries he sustained were debilitating, but a medkit and a good friend made all the difference. Nick and Ellis had food, knives, warm clothes and blankets and most importantly of all a gun. It warranted a sense of security and afforded Nick a little time to let his back heal some after being scratched and slashed to high hell. Eventually, they're going to have to find some more food and move their asses and it gets Nick wondering just how long these things are meant to be. He's lost track of time, but the weird and suspiciously erotic Valentine's gifts he receives from Jason seems to indicate that they're breaching the third week.

Third. Three. That is longer than he had wanted to deal with this shit. He expected mayhem from the get go and a real struggle around every corner, but the stretches of silence span too long for his liking. It's abundantly clear to him that he needs to shake things up if he wants to thin the herd, because he sure as hell isn't intending on waiting around for everyone to die of frostbite or starvation.

Jack:
Dark intentions aside, Nick is happy to enjoy his sponsor gifts for the moment. He and Ellis have secured a cave and he's perched outside it with his gun concealed in his coat. He should be watching his supplies while Ellis is off fishing, but he's distractedly flicking through one of the issues of Celebrus while taking swigs out of his bottle of chocolate sauce. It seems like the ideal time to sneak up on him, but his attention isn't as hooked onto the scantily clad Capitol fashions as he would have the outside world believe. He isn't dumb enough to zone out entirely, but he's dumb enough to look dumb.

Of course, the bottle of chocolate doesn't help.

Jane:
So. Supplies. He needs some of those. Jason has been a sport so far, but Nick would like to think about where he's standing at least a week in advance. Of course, his intention isn't just to go forage for some shit like a boy scout, he's hunting people as well as their shit. If he can gun down someone with something useful, it'll be all the better for him in the long run. He's had more than enough experience with this sort of thing, even if the wilderness isn't exactly his forte.

He watches Jane fuss with her supplies for a long moment before he decides not to draw it out anymore. He could try to shoot her from the bushes, but he knows how the Capitol loves dramatics. He steps out into the open, rifle pointed (with the finesse of someone used to holding a gun) at Jane.

"Looks like you're about to have a bad day, honey."

Firo:
With a few deaths under his belt by this point, Nick is feeling a little more open to broadening his horizons. The figure he sees stirring in the distance looks to be someone young, so even his weak conscience hesitates before he tells it to shut the fuck up and approaches with very little concern for anything but his target. He hadn't checked to see if he was worth a bullet before, but in seeing the backpack he's solidified his intentions in his mind long before he opens his mouth.

"Smile, kid. You're on TV." Says the strange guy, pointing a rifle at Firo.

Phillip:
There was probably a point in the apocalypse in which Nick decided that maybe he ought to work out his life, work on his priorities and stop being such a dickbag. Being here pretty much destroyed those intentions before he really even started working on anything but trying to make friends. Whatever, right? He was neck deep in zombies, fighting for his life and now he's here in this slow crawl doing the same thing with less guns and less action. Quite frankly, he's doing everyone a favor.

He recognises Phillip when they happen upon each other, though Phillip doesn't see him lurking about at first. He takes a moment to assess the situation before he steps out into the open and points his rifle at the other guy with a friendly smile on his face.

"Hey- hey. How do you like them apples?" He chuckles, then he needs to lower the gun to raise an eyebrow at Phillip. "Get it? Because I left you up a tree. That was funny."
foundafamily: (Default)

[personal profile] foundafamily 2015-02-14 02:41 pm (UTC)(link)
He stiffens and stops in his tracks when he hears the voice. Damn it, damn it, he didn't want to waste the energy fighting if he didn't have to, but at least he's armed to take on someone. He turns to face the speaker, thinking that just so long as the guy doesn't have a long-range weapon...

Well. He's been on this end of the gun a few times before and it's never gone well for him.

That doesn't mean he'll give up right away, though. Maybe there's something he can cook up. His knife is in his hand, but he knows it won't be much good at this range. Fast as he is, he can't close a gap this big before the other guy can pull the trigger.

At the very least, he can settle for learning this guy's face so he can hunt him down later. He may not be very smart, but Firo doesn't forget faces easily. He scowls as his eyes scan over the man's features. "Why don't you try watchin' your goddamn mouth, pal?"

Not that being called names is the most important thing at stake here, but even if he's going to die anyway, he can't just let that slide. And it's a way to try to keep the man talking.
foundafamily: (Default)

[personal profile] foundafamily 2015-03-03 02:46 pm (UTC)(link)
As much as he knows--quietly, somewhere in the back of his mind--that he shouldn't let himself get riled up, the insults are doing the trick. Neither they nor the lack of emotion nor the barrel of the gun are unfamiliar enough to scare him, but he is very obviously pissed off.

"How 'bout you stop actin' like a fuckin' coward and put that fuckin' gun down? I'm happy to show you how a real man fights, bastard."

He knows the chance of the bait working is damn small. The Camorra's rules about guns are, admittedly, pretty damn outdated. And this guy sounds just like Dallas and all the other street thugs Firo's run into all his life. If anything, the words are just to try and make the other guy as annoyed as Firo is right now.

So right as the words leave his mouth he takes his last chance and throws his knife. Having spent so much time around them since he was a child, Firo knows this thing isn't made for that and its balance is terrible. It's a slim hope that it'll do anything at all--that's why he aims for the center of the chest and just hopes it'll do something.
voiceinthephone: http://nightingails.livejournal.com/131995.html ([HIDE])

[personal profile] voiceinthephone 2015-02-14 04:22 pm (UTC)(link)
Phillip had been foraging for supplies, testing a fire-making kit he got from his Sponsors and carrying a big bundle of roses in the bag where he used to carry his tent. When he heard Nick's voice, the guard rolled his eyes and spoke up. "Oh ha ha, you lying pile of sh-" he began before he turned around and saw the business end of a rifle. A goddamn rifle.

"Whoa..." Gray instinctively dropped the kit and raised his hands in that classic don't shoot pose. What was even scarier than the gun was the friendly way his assailant was acting. "Nick, don't do this, you have a gun and there's bigger problems than me. Save your bullets." First saber-tooths, then what? Guns were commodities in the Arena and to see someone use it like a crazed murderer (though not far from the truth at that moment), made the situation that much more dire.
Edited 2015-02-14 23:50 (UTC)
voiceinthephone: http://squaredmc.livejournal.com/34010.html#cutid1 ([Climbing])

[personal profile] voiceinthephone 2015-03-03 05:15 pm (UTC)(link)
"Kinda hard not to, you're on this world's most televised pr-program, you lying pile of shit," Phil spat out then he heard the reasoning behind his inevitable death: a shower. A goddamn shower and a prize in exchange for every life he takes. Dramatic, yes, but Gray has a horrible suspicion that Nick has done this before. That meant that whatever was going through Nick's mind, it was set in stone and all he could do now was run. He didn't care that it would look cowardly, he had to make sure the gunman wasted as many shots he could. The former guard knew he was done for, might as well make things difficult for someone as shallow as his killer.

With that, Phil turned tail and took off and headed towards the forest.
voiceinthephone: hollow-art ([GET OUT OF THERE JEREMY])

[personal profile] voiceinthephone 2015-03-04 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
The shot graze Phil's leg, exposing raw flesh to the sudden cold, causing him to yell out in pain. He didn't want to die but in the end, he wouldn't be able to hide forever from someone as determined and a good shot as Nick was. Wherever he came from, he was used to putting people down like it was dismantling a couch.

He hid behind a thick trunk of a tree as he tried to stop the bleeding, not give the man a bright red trail for him to follow. "I'll give them a show too," Gray muttered under his breath. The trees weren't great for climbing but with this, "If you're so intent on killing people off, why pick me? There's others you can choose." Though if Nick or anyone dared mention putting down children just to win, to be that cruel and selfish, Phillip would not hold back and charge right at him.
voiceinthephone: ([10-20 is my bitch])

[personal profile] voiceinthephone 2015-03-09 06:58 am (UTC)(link)
"I-I can try," Phil hissed, spotting Nick by his peripheral sight and tried to run away. "But you won't stop, will you?"

His leg was already starting to fail him, the cold crystallized his blood, inflicting even more pain than he anticipated. He wanted to swing his bag at him, he was already thinking about what his friends could scavenge off his dead body. When Gray finally realized that nothing he had was worth losing, he came to a choice all of his own.

Phillip Gray chose to die by trying one more lounge at Nick, to shove him into a tree and make him lose that damn gun. It was useless but he went down taking a stand.
voiceinthephone: hollow-art ([Hurt: oh dammit Freddy])

[personal profile] voiceinthephone 2015-03-15 05:03 am (UTC)(link)
The bullet strikes square in Gray's chest, ripping through at least his lung and parts of other organs. The force of it all is enough to knock him onto the tree trunk. He isn't getting up and would die in a few minutes as blood began to fill up and drown. What's more, he wasn't fighting or getting up anymore. Phil was almost thankful for Nick's shooting him, smiling as he hung his head down. At least now, he would die as a man and not a pile of organs.
drinkupmehearties: (Totally not hiding)

[personal profile] drinkupmehearties 2015-02-18 12:00 am (UTC)(link)
A few minutes earlier, the pirate had spotted Nick and promptly flattened himself against the side of a tree, out of view. Normally, this would've been where Jack would slip away unnoticed and mentally mark this cave down as occupied. But desperation had finally started to settle in deep. Beyond the chance fish here and there, or friendly Tribute willing to share a meal, Jack hadn't eaten all that much. The uneasiness, headaches, and lucidity that being sober brought about -- which the vodka helped to quell until it was summarily gone -- only compounded the problem.

Glancing around the tree trunk a couple times, Jack confirms that the man is alone and distracted. He lifts his chin and carefully slips the hunting knife from his parka, eyes fixed on Nick, then edges out from cover. His approach is slow and steady, within the man's blind spot, and as silent as Jack can make it.

Killing Nick isn't his intention -- not unless his hand is forced and escape proves impossible. If Jack had been in a clearer state of mind, too, he would've knocked Nick out first as a safeguard. But instead, with thoughts locked only on the prospect of getting some actual food, the pirate circles around to the man's back and inches into the cave.

Light from the sun illuminates enough of the place for him to spot the supplies, and so Jack moves over and gets to work rummaging.
drinkupmehearties: (Eheh)

[personal profile] drinkupmehearties 2015-03-07 10:44 pm (UTC)(link)
The noise does immediately snap his attention upwards and over to Nick, and the pirate freezes when his eyes land on the rifle.

Well. Shit.

His hands jerk away from the supplies, releasing the bottle of booze that he'd been trying to take. He lifts both hands up, the serrated hunting knife still clasped in one, and gives Nick a placating smile. "Never had the stomach for it, really." He's trying to calculate the distance between them, to figure out whether or not he could cover it in the amount of time it would take for the man to pull the trigger on him.

Or if throwing the knife would be a better bet.

In the meanwhile, Jack is trying to slowly lift himself from his kneeling position, all fingers curling on his free hand except his index. "Hang on, hang on. Let's take a think on this and not be short-sighted and rash, mate. You look to be a reasonably intelligent man, I'd ... wager, and, as I'm sure you've realized it, there's many a more danger out there to be had than just me." He's lightly gesturing outside the cave, in a slow way that doesn't spook Nick into shooting. "So I say -- and again, I can't stress enough that you think on this -- why waste a bullet like that?" He lifts both eyebrows. "Rather, how about, instead, I can go on me merry way, quietly, and we can forget this foolishness ever happened." A short pause, almost hopeful. "Savvy?"
drinkupmehearties: (Well shi)

[personal profile] drinkupmehearties 2015-03-10 03:59 am (UTC)(link)
His spiel was meant to either talk Nick out of it, unlikely as it looked, or distract the man long enough for Jack to take action. Either way, honestly, would've worked for him. But the tilt of Nick's head is the pirate's first indication that time had run out, and he's only one swift step forward -- the knife clutched in his hand -- when the rifle fires off and the bullet hits.

The impact slams into his chest like a hammer, causing his eyes to grow wide, and it knocks the breath from him with a half-choked grunt tangled in his throat. He drops hard to his knees, but the sharp pain from that barely registers above the sudden flare of white-hot pain that explodes out from his chest and races through his body. One hand weakly snaps out to keep himself from fully face-planting onto the floor, while the knife in his other hand clatters to the side, useless.

The sensation is familiar. He's been shot, before. Stabbed.

But this was the first time -- as warm blood gushes freely over the hand that's pressed futilely against his wound -- that it'd been this fatal. "... Bugger." The word fades on his lips, and a couple seconds later the pirate collapses fully onto the floor of the cave.
cowcatcher: (won't back down)

[personal profile] cowcatcher 2015-03-04 07:12 am (UTC)(link)
She's crouched over in the snow, scouring her hands with some of the sleet on the ground despite how the cold bites right down into her bones. Granule by granule it melts against her skin, sloughing away the dried blood coating her arms to each elbow.

Beside her, the earless carcass of a rabbit lies stripped crudely to the muscle, its pelt tied in a bundle beside it with a strip of fabric. It sinks slightly into the snow as it loses heat, already beginning to freeze. She wants to bury it away from the blood to better disguise what she and the others are storing for later. Her deposits are scattered throughout the clearing, a couple kills to each hole, and from what she saw earlier, they're keeping just fine.

Compared to the last arena, they're living like kings. Nick fishes, she traps with the snares she improved on in the training center, and Luke has been hunting. They had struck out at the Cornucopia, each one of them making off with something that had proved invaluable several times already. The knife she had used to skin the rabbit is strapped to her thigh, a familiar weight. Other tributes seem to be laying low, but this is what they know. Minus the walkers, this arena is a homecoming.

It's been nearly three weeks, and they're all still alive, even Clem and her old friend. She feels prepared. She feels safe. She feels like one of them really has a shot this time.

She hears him too late. Snapping upright, her feet crunch in the snow when she rounds to face Nick, knife already unsheathed and in her hand.

That's when she sees the rifle, and the murderous look on her face becomes one of pure shock.
cowcatcher: (i shouldn't have come back.)

[personal profile] cowcatcher 2015-03-05 06:48 am (UTC)(link)
Were she aware of his motives, Jane might have understood. Survival has moved her to do some things that look pretty shitty in the light of day. But the rules are different here, and she won't play by them, won't murder without a cause. She has no illusions about what this means; part of her is already resigned to this, but it doesn't stop the resentment burning in her eyes.

There are things she could offer him, would have tried to offer him if there were anything stopping him from taking it all for nothing but a bullet in exchange. Bartering won't save her life, and she isn't the type to beg. She thinks of Clem and the others, of Luke and Nick and Daryl, who don't know that guns have made it into the arena. She hopes at least one of them will hear the shot, and that they'll know better than to come running with her missing from the cave.

In the end, Jane says nothing, because her knife in his gut would say it so much better. Instead she straightens to look him right in the eye as she raises a foot and brings it down on the skinned rabbit, grinding it through the snow and into the mud and frozen dirt beneath. There's no getting out of this, but she won't be forgetting his face anytime soon. Whether he cares or not, he's made an enemy of her, and they both know he won't have that rifle forever.
Edited (banning myself from editing now okok) 2015-03-05 07:06 (UTC)
cowcatcher: (losing)

[personal profile] cowcatcher 2015-03-09 08:09 am (UTC)(link)
She tells herself she's ready, tells herself she's already been stabbed in the heart and beaten to death, that this'll be quick, but beneath her searing anger bubbles a traitorous fear. She's died before, yes, but in the end it makes little difference.

The first shot fires right through the top of her stomach to come out just shy of her spine, while the second one hits dead center and is stopped from exiting by a pair of vertebrae. Her knife slips from her hand, landing a split second before she does. Jane herself collapses with a gasp that's disproportionately quiet to the rifle's report, breath escaping in a fog between her teeth while her blood begins to melt a patch of the snow beneath her. Bone-white hands are slow to try and stop the bleeding, and almost uselessly shaky. It feels like all the heat in her body is flooding out of her through the holes he made. She can't see it, but her wounds are steaming slightly in the winter air.

Maybe he'll stick around, the way Dandy had, and she'll get even when she reanimates. The others come to mind too, and how they're even less safe than they were before. She can't even warn them, can't hand off the obsolete equipment that in the end only got her this far. The bitter rage she feels is only matched by the pain lancing through her where the bullets tore a path.

"Fucking.... asshole..."
Edited (editing for the knife, which is Nick's for the taking.) 2015-03-09 08:17 (UTC)