Moth Delivers a Message [Closed]

[pimpcanes]

WHO| Black Tom and Lord Zed; Black Tom, Gary and Kurt; Black Tom, Dorian, Maxwell and a cameo from Bayard
WHAT| Superpowers showdown, then Gary and Kurt die!
WHEN| Week 3
WHERE| The forest
WARNINGS| Death! And gore!

For a while, Tom lies dormant, like a volcano awaiting the proper tessellation of tectonic plates to erupt. He coils into himself in the trees, inward-focused, self-absorbed on his own grief for Molotov, even as he suspects he'll see her again. With the exception of Arya, he interacts with no one, waiting out the weaklings of the Arena and preparing to assault the survivors of the final week. He outlasts the voices calling people into the woods. He's immune to the bats, which have no interest in his bloodless form.

But he becomes bored, and eventually he pulls himself out of one of the trees he's occupying. It cracks as if all the sap inside has frozen, and he emerges from it neither man nor plant, but some foul combination of the two: barky skin, black sockets for eyes, moss and algae and leaves forming a ruff of hair that extends from his crown down his back. And he tends to his cache of supplies, folded into the knot of another tree, looking over the note that Molotov sent him and wondering when the next time Arya will retrieve the goods will be.

The air is warm again, and he cricks his neck back to look at the sky, appearing more mutt than Tribute. His nostrils flare, pulling oxygen into lungs that have all but collapsed from disuse. With a splintering sound, he opens his mouth and frees his teeth.

Comments

[pimpcanes]

Perhaps it's an idea that would have worked if Tom were merely that one form, instead of wended to the entire forest itself. He walks his way slowly towards them, face turned towards them, but he takes in their presence through more than his dark-socketed eyes and the ear-like knots at the side of his head. He feels them in the grass below their feet, senses their vibrations in every fluttering leaf on the wind.

He leaves this body to collapse, and so it does, stopping dead and then dropping with a clatter and wet thud into a bundle of boughs and half-rotted leaves. He travels through the roots under the earth, appearing again as another doppelganger wrenches itself free from the tree trunk nearest Kurt and Gary. The beacon travels to his new body.

"My my, what do I have here?" A vine whips out to try and catch Gary's ankles. "An X-Man and his friend? What a treat."

[a_minute_younger]

Gary responds with a pointed, mature retort of mimicking Kurt talking with his hand and rolling his eyes. Stick in the mud. Sure, he doesn't really want to push himself either, not after that disaster at the Cornucopia, and there is perhaps an argument to be had (or shouted as Kurt walks into the clearing) about situational conveniences and spontaneity, but there's no way they're going to have that talk now. Not because of sticking to the job or anything, no--because suddenly Tom is gone, then back again, right between them.

If Gary had the foresight to consider his own constant beacon showing him off like Tom's is, maybe he would have planned a little better. But Gary has never been too strong of a planner. Instead he works with instinct and his naturally heightened reflexes, both of which cooperate nicely in these sorts of situations. The moment Tom reappears, Gary is springing away in the opposite direction, rolling further into the woods. Just going to have to take the scenic route, then.

[middleversed]

Suddenly their foe is behind them with the sickening sound of a hollow body hitting the ground and then the cracking sound of splintering wood. Kurt whirls as the tree-man begins speaking and Gary tries to dodge the vine, falling into a crouch of his own that will allow him to easily jump from any attack aimed at him. Or at least any he sees.

'An X-Man.' he says, so this man knows of him and his team. Perhaps he's even a mutant himself. It might be worth trying to talk. He's terrifying to look at, it's true, but some of his classmates can be as well and they all are good people. He has to find out, before this escalates.

"Yes. Please, we're just hungry. We didn't intend to steal... well we did, but not- I mean-" Kurt makes an impatiently frustrated noise, angry at himself that he can't say what he needs to, angry at the damn sword for not coming out of the rock, angry at Gary for this stupid idea in the first place, angry at the Arena for existing. He's just angry.

"Let us go and I won't have to hurt you."

[pimpcanes]

"You could have asked politely, couldn't you have, lads?" Tom's new face crumples with crinkles like the corner of a bough as he lashes out with roots to try and grab Gary as he runs. The ivy and roots attack Gary from each tree, making getting away from the trees, at least, a better option. "Leaving so soon?"

He catches how young Kurt is, younger even than his version of Nightcrawler and he were the first time they met. He grins and those strangely human teeth seem to glitter even as sap drips down from them.

"What are you going to do, Wagner? Teleport at me? Am I supposed to be allergic to purple smoke?" He flings a root up like a trap toward Kurt's feet, trying to bring him to the ground. "You don't know me, 'tis a shame. You ought to be well aware of Black Tom Cassidy."

[a_minute_younger]

It's times like these where even an ounce of common sense would do Gary wonders--enough to recognize that trying to run away from the trees by hiding into a forest is just about the silliest thing he could have done--but alas, instinct leads him the wrong way. It's mere seconds before the vegetation rears up and snags his bloodied foot, instantly tripping him. He gasps, thinks to yell some kind of warning, but the breath comes only after he faceplants in the dirt.

Tom's victory speech goes unheard over the blood pounding in his ears, unfortunately. Not that Gary would be listening anyways; he's far too busy trying to struggle away from the encroaching roots, tugging and tearing with significantly more strength than someone his size should have. The delicate edge of his abilities that enticed him at the Cornucopia is starting too look more tantalizing. If he can't get out of this trap, he might be forced to take it.

[middleversed]

He can't teleport, he's trained himself out of it by now in the Arena, and so his reaction to the root is a dive sideways instead of a bamf behind their barky foe. The name doesn't ring a bell but the sapient tree knows his name and that is enough to give him pause, to keep talking.

"If you know me, you know I have more tricks than just teleportation." Like trying to pull whoever this Black Tom is' attention on him entirely instead of terrorizing Gary yards away. He's starting already to understand that the supplies are forfeit. The only goal now is escape.

Scrabbling on the ground for a moment, Kurt finds a solid branch and wrenches it up from the forest floor, brandishing it like a saber at Tom with his stance mimicking those late-night swashbuckling movies he loves so much. "If it's a fight you want, then fight!"

[pimpcanes]

It's clear that Tom isn't immune to pain, as he flinches and thrashes when Gary starts ripping at the roots with surprising force. He redoubles his efforts to tie Gary down, this time swinging an entire bough at Gary's head.

"What are you going to do, hit me with a branch? Night vision and sticking to walls won't do you well here." There's an angry tone his voice now, not the sugary taunt from earlier but something furious and sadistic, and he lunges for Kurt with his humanoid body, foot long claws on each hand extended and strange knot of a mouth filled with spittle and mulch.

[a_minute_younger]

As we've already seen, Gary is far from immune to distraction even with his improved reflexes. His focus is on those roots; he finds some satisfaction in feeling them rip under his hands and watching them flinch away like a bunch of frightened animals, not necessarily in their pain, but in that he feels he's making some progress, some kind of impression. It's a powerful compulsion.

It is not nearly as powerful as the bough that hits him upside the head.

The branch connects with a dull whump, hard enough to throw Gary several inches off the ground before he comes rolling to a stop a few feet down the path. Stars dance in his vision and the headache he's been ignoring since the Cornucopia claws with renewed vigor at the back of his eyes. He is thoroughly dazed and will need a minute of recovery. Hopefully Kurt can hold is own until then.

[middleversed]

Kurt barely has time to acknowledge Gary being hit before he's trying to avoid similar, the chilling wooden form of Black Tom calling his bluff and springing with surprising speed. Surprising enough to catch Kurt cleanly, piercing his shoulder and sending blood spraying. He gives a strangled cry and awkwardly tries to bludgeon his assailant with the branch in his arms, but strength seeps out of him with every drop of blood.

But he'll use every last bit of strength to struggle, at least, trying to keep Tom's attention on him.

Three-fingered hands scrabble at Tom's back, the young mutant staying near instead of bolting like he wants. He won't leave Gary, even if any fear of teleportation is long gone. It's the Danger Room training - the X-Men training - that kicks in instead. Protect the team. Protect each other.

[pimpcanes]

It works; Tom's attention is thoroughly on Kurt, and while he tries to wallop on Gary's stunned body with the branch, he's really just thrashing it against the ground, unable to aim while he's got his focus on the more interesting, more satisfying, and more nimble target.

"The longer you make this, the more it'll hurt, boyo," Tom says, trying to slash at Kurt as Kurt scrambles over him. Tom's nowhere near as quick as Kurt, but when Kurt snaps a branch off red, blood-streaked sap spills down Tom's back, sticky as glue, and Tom hopes it'll slow Kurt down some.

[a_minute_younger]

The distraction is plenty of time for Gary to recover. He comes to his senses slowly, but reacts much faster, rolling sluggishly away from the thrashing branch and staggering to his feet. One hand makes a blind grab for the awful pain in his head and finds his hair matted with blood. He isn't sure how to react to this. Fear? Remorse? Neither of those seem like options that will end well, given the situation.

Oh, right--the situation. Gary blinks away his blurred vision and focuses in on the scuffle in the clearing. He has no real plan of attack, here, but he knows that he doesn't want Kurt to get hurt more than he already is. He'll figure out how to get to that end when he gets there. Meanwhile, he gets there--at a sprint, with a yell and a flying tackle at Tom's side, aiming to wrap his arms around his neck.

[middleversed]

Kurt gets stuck in the sap and if it weren't for the clear and immediate danger, he might have contemplated the ridiculousness of being stuck via sticky sap to the back of a super villain. Blood leaks down his arm, staining his dark fur even darker as he struggles to gain a better purchase on Tom, to at least do some damage before--

Before Gary does something monumentally stupid like throw himself at Black Tom instead of running the other direction as fast as he can.

"You idiot!" Kurt's so angry at Gary's move that he barely feels his wound for a moment, clenching his teeth in frustrated irritation before trying to adapt to the situation, trying to see any way out of this now.

The only thing he can think to do is grab Gray and teleport away. He doesn't want to, doesn't care for the idea of a beacon over his head for the next several hours, but if it's that or die...

[pimpcanes]

Tom hisses and tries to knock Gary away with a backhand that is too slow and too late - but he's literally got his roots down in the ground, and so he leans from the impact but doesn't topple. For a moment he, Gary and Kurt, piled atop each other, stand at an insane angle before Tom straightens up, from nearly parallel to the ground. And then there's a bamfing sound and the stink of sulfur and they're gone.

"Run away, little X-Man..." Tom taunts, looking around for the beacon - but his eyesight in this form is pretty poor, full of more shadows than colors, and so he can't seem to find where they went. He starts to spread his senses out, instead, feeling his way through every leaf and blade of grass.