Like I Got the Devil at My Feet [Closed]

[pimpcanes]

WHO| Black Tom, Clint and Sam; Black Tom, Alain and Arya
WHAT| Tom and Arya start thinning the competition.
WHEN| Week 5 and 6.
WHERE| The forest.
WARNINGS| Death.

Were Tom even slightly more self-aware, he might be embarrassed to spend so much time as a weeping willow, moping around wishing he had Molotov to talk to with his long trailing branches and vines drooping onto the ground. He's been doing his best to coddle Arya without stunting that independent streak of hers, to provide her with food and shelter in his lair of the forest, but for the most part he's lonely. Most of the Tributes have been heading towards the castle or the sea, and as such he can't even fritter away his time killing. His powers have made surviving in the Arena easy, but they've also made it boring.

Today he pulls together a new body for himself like twisting a piece of a wet towel upwards out of the mulchy floor of the forest, trailing still those willow vines, wreathed in ivy and even less humanoid than when he first appeared. The hair of moss has become more of a mane, traveling all down his body, giving him a mangy, furry appearance, almost. His eyes glow yellow within deep, dark sockets that seem gouged into the bark-like substance that makes up his skin, and sap drips from his mouth and nose in long, sticky ropes, leaving a sort of snail trail through the forest as he shambles around. The beacon above his head is bright enough to cast a horrorshow light on his already terrifying features, making his brow seem heavy and nose aquiline.

He slouches his way through the woods, muttering out of boredom to himself. He collects his morning star, although the time it'll take to get his body back to something human and that can leave the forest is going to be onerous. It'll take at least a few days to start approximating a person again instead of a beast made of trees with elongated arms and claws. Then again, he has nothing better to do.

Comments

Hope this is okay - let me know if you want anything changed

[atouchofka]

It would be unfair to say Alain is lost without his dinh. Though he's never dealt with a Roland-less life before now, he's led enough sorties and carried enough messages alone to know how to take care of himself without a tet. He doesn't lack for courage, or for skill, and he hasn't yet let himself sink into despair. He cut up the wolf that took Roland, dried its meat and packed it up, took Roland's knife and the remains of his shirt, and has been settled since, caring for the blisters on his hands and sleeping on the highest ground he can find.

No, he doesn't lack for skill. What he does lack, more than he cares to admit, is purpose. He still can't bring himself to intentionally kill innocents, not in the service of a power like the one watching them. He has no wish to win, beyond that he promised to try. His first priority in the Arena was to protect Roland, and he has failed in that. For the most part, since Roland's death, he has simply stayed out of sight, relying on his instinct and his Touch to warn him of anyone's approach. He has enough meat to last him two weeks or more - the wolf was big, if tough - and enough weapons and training to protect him from most of the Arena's horrors. If he can outlast it, he has decided by now, so much the better.

He is walking through the woods now, leaning heavily on his crutch, his other hand resting thoughtfully on the book in his vest pocket. Water, that's the important thing. Find a place with good, clean water, and he can last a week or more.

At first, the presence doesn't register to him. His Touch is weaker here, and Tom's mind has an odd, inhuman shape to it. It's only when the first sound reaches his keen ears (shuffling, muttering, too close...) that he turns his attention to it and reaches out, cautious of sparking the Arena's defences against powers, to focus on that oddly half-human mind. Alain's hand slides slowly towards the kitchen knife shoved in his belt, longing for his gun. Otherwise he stands stock-still, his head slightly cocked, like an animal that hears a twig crack.

"Show yourself," he says at last, his voice low but carrying. "Whatever you are."

[cognitived]

The last time Clint ran amok in the forest, things hadn't really gone well for him. But the longer the Arena drags on, the harder it gets. Water's hard to come by, and food's dwindled down too in these past weeks. Sponsorship can only go so far. They've still got to try to survive though, even if only one of the people here will come through this game alive. So despite his injury, Clint's out and about, Sam at his side, as they check on some traps they'd set. It's not the first time, and given the lack of trouble, they've seen fit to go further and further, chasing any trail of potential food. Maybe it's not the best idea, but they're sort of armed, and hopefully working together they're enough to take on an attacker.

And if not, hopefully they've proved interesting enough to be brought back.

Whatever the case is, they're picking their way through the forest, careful and quick. There's something unnerving about the forest, and maybe that's just the ache in his missing limb speaking, but Clint's on edge, scanning the surroundings with a gaze as sharp as his namesake. He shifts, signs quickly, if clumsily, having lost half a measure of his meaning with his hand.

"Up ahead?"