Underneath It All, We're Just Savages [Closed]

[pimpcanes]

WHO| Tom and Luke and Beth, Tom and the Psiioniic, Tom and Albert and Arya
WHAT| Tom gets injured during the patch game, kills a troll, and runs afoul of a cyborg.
WHERE| Throughout the forest near the lake.
WHEN| Week 3-4
WARNINGS| Death and violence.



I. Luke and Beth

The patch-capture seems almost quaint, the juxtaposition of the playful nature of the rules and the murderous stakes of the winnings as comical and twee as the cross between a death festival and the name "Hunger Games". Tom finds no small amount of amusement in it, and by early morning has convinced Arya to take part in it with him. The two of them sweep their way through the forest, the portrait of amiability. If it weren't for the knife that Tom carries in his palm, playing idly with, and the matching one that Arya's equipped with, they might look like a man taking his granddaughter for a stroll through a particularly wet and clammy winter.

That is, of course, until they hear others in the wood. From there they hunker down, alert, predatory, near hungry despite having been fed many times over from the generous Sponsor gifts and Molotov's hunts. At the moment there are figures moving through a snowy dell north of them, and to the east of them in the marsh.

"You manage the ones up north, will you, lass? We'll rendezvous here when the sun sets." He watches Arya go, impressed time and again with the girl's spunk and competence, before heading towards the marsh, keeping careful track of which trees he's passing so he can find his way back here when dusk comes. He could follow his footprints, but he doesn't trust the Gamemakers not to change them. They likely could change the trees too, but that seems more effort than would be useful. He's sure the Gamemakers find his rapport with Arya charming at best, harmless at worst.

He sees a blonde head of hair in the marsh, and he doesn't announce his presence. He pulls the knife out and moves near-silently through the snow-weighted bushes behind her.


II. Psiioniic and III. Albert and Arya

The end of the patch game really means very little to Tom; he plans to continue as he has with Molotov and Arya, and has put in his best effort not to let the stab wound in his shoulder slow him down. It's difficult, of course - the swelling has made it hard to sleep or to properly grip a knife with his right hand - but he only complains when Molotov's ears are sympathetic. As soon as Molotov mentions that they haven't done all that much killing this Arena, Tom shuts right up and sulks at the corner of their camp like a wet cat.

It's this insecurity, this gutting knowledge of his own uselessness, that drives him to spend longer each day looking for someone to kill and rob. It doesn't sit well with him to be both in pain and without an earned reputation to soothe it, nor does it settle peacefully in his stomach to have had such an uneventful Arena. He goes into the woods with his blade and a cudgel fashioned from a felled tree, made almost entirely unrecognizable by a ski mask and his heavy parka, hat and scarf.

He sees someone hunched over a part of the river that hasn't frozen over, collecting water, and he slips forward, looking not entirely unlike a panther moving through jungle reeds. He hopes to be silent, but the ground under him has different ideas for him.

As soon as the ice beneath his feet crackles and announces his presence, he swings the cudgel at his victim's head like a baseball bat.

Comments

[silberfuchs]

In that, at least, Arya is correct. The gunshot makes Albert pause mentally but with Tom trying to get his thumbs in the cyborg's eye sockets it takes him some serious effort to break away considering the dive into freezing water wrested the air from his lungs for an interminable moment. His arms and legs may be unfeeling, but his core is still organic and susceptible to cold.

And bullets.

He struggles away from Tom, trying to shove him down even has he breaks away, clawing for the icy bank and attempting to heave himself from the water with his hair hanging in his eyes like snow-covered moss.

[pimpcanes]

Tom's head goes under the water, and though he emerges only a moment later, the shock to his sinuses and the way it's blinded him with his hair and eyelashes gives him enough reason to not try to attack Albert as the cyborg hoists himself up out of the water.

He shoves himself backwards, towards the shore, onto the river rocks and harder ice, sopping wet and pale, looking like a half-melted candle with water running down his face. He swivels towards the gunshot.

"Arya! Don't come close, he's dangerous!" It doesn't matter whether he means it or not. He hopes it gives Albert enough pause for him and Arya to escape.

[needlebearer]

"I don't need to come close," she calls back, steadying her feet in the snow and bringing the gun up for another shot. She doesn't shoot just yet, with them both scrabbling about there she's afraid she'll hit Tom by mistake, but she keeps the gun trained on Albert, hoping that combined with the previous shot she'd fired off would be enough of a warning.

[silberfuchs]

"You're more likely to hurt yourself with that gun than me, girl. And Tom, you're the one who kills unsuspecting children in the Arena, not me. Or have you not told her about the food court?" He growls, but he keeps what distance he's taken. True, Arya has terrible aim, but that can sometimes be more dangerous than a professional, and the last thing he needs now is a bullet wound. As it is if he doesn't get dry soon he'll catch his death.

If he's lucky, Tom actually will.

"Don't let me find you again, Cassidy. Using a child as a shield won't work a second time."

[pimpcanes]

"Arya understands the purpose of an Arena, Heinrich. Don't you, lass?" Tom drags himself from the water, shivering slightly, soaked, miserable but looking angry rather than sorrowful for it. He takes a few steps until he's at Arya's side.

"Next time I won't let you be so lucky as to use ice to your advantage." He places a waxy hand on Arya's shoulder. "Thank you for the assistance, dear. Let's be gone now."

[needlebearer]

It's not until Tom's back at her side that she lowers the gun, still gripping it tightly but taking her finger from the trigger. While she's no stranger to killing, she's always had to strike opportunistically rather than engaging in that sort of stand off, and now that she's out of the situation she feels her heart pounding and her hands shaking, and she's unsure whether she'd have got a decent shot if she'd had to shoot to kill. It annoys her more than anything else - she resolves to practice with the gun as much as she can so that the strangeness of the weapon isn't an added factor there too.

"What did he mean?"

[pimpcanes]

"In a prior Arena, I set fire to a food court - a gathering area for people to eat." He figures that much is explanatory, but it doesn't hurt to clarify things for Arya, so he can detail the picture before others get the chance to add to it. "There were some wee ones there, unbeknownst to me, and his lot has seen fit to label me a hunter of children ever since."

He lets her keep the gun, knowing she won't use it on him but that she may benefit from feeling a bit safer in the face of uncertainty, of her image of him being distorted by new information.

[needlebearer]

On the one hand Arya's fairly certain there's no smoke without fire, but on the other Albert probably would have said anything to get either Tom or Arya off guard. She knows that in the Arenas, realistically of course adults would have to go after children, but she can't help but think of the Hound murdering Mycah so brutally. She's not sure exactly how she feels - and she finds that hard in itself, liking to cling to clear cut explanations and emotions rather than anything she has to see multiple sides of.

"Killing children is wrong," she says, more to reaffirm it to herself than to lecture him. "But it's even more wrong for the Capitol to throw them into an Arena if they can't defend themselves."

[pimpcanes]

"Aye, I won't argue with either of those points." Although he's killed plenty of children here in the Arenas. "I try to think that it's better to kill them kindly than let the weak ones suffer, that for those of us in this situation we can only choose between wrongs rather than huddle in a righteous shelter. Do you understand?"

He's shivering, still sopping and cold, and he starts to trudge back towards their lair, shrugging off his jacket. "We best be getting back, dear."

[needlebearer]

Arya grits her teeth, thinking of all the weak and innocent she'd seen suffer and die. She had no qualms about killing, but only those she felt deserved it, though she nods reluctantly anyway. She supposes that if they were going to die anyway, she'd rather end their lives quickly herself. "I understand," she says reluctantly. "But I don't like it."

She begins to follow him back towards their encampment, brooding on everything. Enough people had warned her not to trust Tom by now that it's difficult for her to do so, though she also knew that not only was he her best chance of survival, but there was a great deal she could learn from him to become stronger. And if she achieved nothing else here, she was determined to become strong enough to kill everyone on her list singlehandedly when she returned to her own world.