Arena 1: An injured ally

[knifewithnoname]

Who| Pruna, Sandy, Howard and potentially Mickey if he wants to join in the brat brigade
What| Sandy is horribly injured, Pruna and Howard are just horrible
Where| Arena 1
When| A few hours after start
Warnings/Notes| Blood, bear traps, potential amputation, small children being awful, small child being used as dokidoki bait by other small children, with this lot there will probably be more warnings edited in

Pruna continued to drag Sandy along, she had given the girl some rocks to throw at any of the stupid eyed creatures that tried to get near. She had her knife in one hand, the sword wedged between her and Sandy and the bag slung over Sandy's shoulder.

She wished she was bigger so she could carry her properly though she kept telling herself she could just leave her. It was Sandy's own stupid fault for being injured, on the first day as well. Pruna had known she was weak but not this bad.

She spotted some houses, or things that were probably meant to be houses and made her way towards them, shoving open the door of one, knife out in case anyone had gotten here first.

Comments

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy felt numb.

Honestly she was amazed she was alive. She kept fading in and out but every time sleep threatened to take her a sharp pain from the metal teeth sunk through her muscle and bone would snap her back into horrible painful alertness.

She wasn't a very smart girl compared to many, but she was by no accounts stupid. She knew that the fact that the pain had dulled and that losing feeling in that foot wasn't a good thing. But what she couldn't understand was why Pruna was going to such lengths to save her.

Maybe they really were friends?

"I'm sorry." She mumbled grateful that from her current position she couldn't look Pruna in the eyes for this apology. "I screwed up again."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard sees them from afar and follows them. At first glance he expects he'll have to fight to keep up, but he soon realizes that that's inaccurate. Even moving in that dizzy weave he's developed from the concussion, stumbling with only one eye and a patch over the other, they're easy to follow. One of them's injured, and after a bit of observing he notices that it's Sandy. Dumb kid.

Pruna, on the other hand, might prove useful. Howard waits until they're in the house and then approaches and knocks the door. He steps back back back, far enough that Pruna can't reach out and attack him if she's in a bad mood and hoping the fact that he gave them warning will earn him some good karma.

He holds a pink blade in his hand.

[knifewithnoname]

"Yes you did be doing. But we will be fixing it." She slid Sandy off her back looking at the leg, she was starting to think it wasn't even worth saving anymore and began running through things she would need to cut it off. The knock startled her, she doubted the monsters would knock but another tribute might. She handed Sandy the sword if she could even hold it and took her unicorn horn dagger to the door with her.

She opened it and was surprised to see Howard. "Howard," She looked at the knife in his hand, and the eyepatch. He had been stupid too then. "I can be beating you you do be knowing that so do no even be trying to be attacking me. What do you be knowing about metal teeth leg eaters?"

[justoutrunyou]

"Bear Trap." Sandy groaned from back in the shadows of the room bracing a sword against herself. Howard wasn't her favorite person in the world but she'd let anyone in right now if they could help get the stupid thing off her leg.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Metal teeth leg..." He pauses as Sandy clarifies and leans with his hand against the side of the house. Balance still isn't his strong suit. "I'm not about to try and shank you, Moody. I wanted to see if you had anything worth trading."

He looks at Sandy, at the blood on her leg. "Like bait, for example."

[knifewithnoname]

"Bait." She wrinkled her nose following his gaze and then looking behind him to the stupid eyed creatures. "Do they be being good to be eating?"

She beckoned Howard into the house and closed the door. "I did be getting loads of vool stuff we can be trading. " She liled the idea of bait, but first they had to make sure Sandy lived long enough.

She went back over to the other girl and wrinkled her nose at the state of her leg.

[justoutrunyou]

"Bait?" Sandy echoed and her grimace turned into confusion, and then the realization dawned on her slowly.

"You can't be serious." But she had the feeling Howard was as serious as her injury.

"It's all we can do to keep me from bleeding out here!" She protested and just that outburst was enough to make her feel a little dizzy.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"The anthropomorphic Bratz dolls? Yeah, they're great eating. Better than just surviving off the sugar rush out here." He walks into the house, keeping one hand on the wall for balance, just in case. He's more tightly-wound in a tight space with a skilled killer.

He crouches down to take a look at Sandy's leg. "I didn't say the bait had to be alive," he says coolly.

[knifewithnoname]

In an instant Pruna was behind him, her leg hooked behind one of his feet, not knocking him off balance but warning. Her unicorn knife was at his throat, she mourned the loss ofher proper assassin dagger but she brought her empty hand to where his kidney was, digging her nail in.

"If the bait do no be needing to be being alive then I do be hearing you volunteering Howard." Her voice was as calm as ever though her etes glinted, visible only to Sandy.

"First we will be dealing with the leg eater. Then we will be talking of bait."

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy had been about to yell at Howard defensively when Pruna stepped up to the plate...and frankly blew Sandy's mind. Sure Pruna had already saved her life once today but being willing to kill for her?

She couldn't honestly say she'd ever met anyone like that. And even if Pruna had said she would do as much there was always that part of Sandy that wasn't sure. Especially with her leg in it's current state.

"Things are gonna get messy no matter what we do." Sandy grunted through clenched teeth trying to sound strong despite the pain that she hadn't yet acclimated to. "It's up to you what kind of mess it is."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Jesus!" Howard drops down, using the wall and one hand to the floor to keep Pruna from knocking him down entirely. "Look, you obviously can't figure out the bear trap on your own or you wouldn't have called me in, so how about you put the knife away before I walk?"

He used to be easier to intimidate. Three prior arenas have hardened him.

"How about you get your fingernails out of my liver and I'll take a look at your girlfriend."

[knifewithnoname]

Pruna hissed, annoyed because Howard was right. She didn't know how to deal with the leg eater herself and needed his help. Her dagfer disappeared as quickly as it had appeared and she stepped back.

"So do you be knowing how to be getting it off or do we be needing to be remving the leg." Messy as Sandy said, but it couldn't be helped.

[justoutrunyou]

"Whatever works." Sandy growled teeth clenched in anticipation of Howard messing with her leg. "Just don't let me die."

Even if death meant she would be sent back to the Capitol, she didn't want to return until enough others had died that she wouldn't be alone.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"If you remove her leg, she's going to bleed out. Don't be stupid." He settles himself in front of the bloody, mauled leg and pokes at it, not seeming to care if that causes Sandy pain but not doing so intentionally. Then he pulls his knife from his pocket and starts unscrewing part of the bear trap.

Thankfully it's not a Phillip's head.

"Okay, hold her up, because if this has gone into her artery she's going to bleed out anyway and I'll need to tie it off before she does."

He pulls the spring from the bear trap and it releases Sandy's leg.

[knifewithnoname]

"I do no be being stupid." She stuck her tongue out. Only babies didn't know how to remove limbs without killing their victims patients.

She gripped Sandy's shoulders hard holding her up as Howard worked, watching him closely, taking in all his movements.

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy let out a startled cry of pain and choked on a lack of air in her lungs. She had not been prepared for the pain that suddenly exploded in her as soon as the teeth moved out of her flesh and bone and the coagulated blood started flowing again. Fresh tears burned from her eyes and she gripped desperately at Pruna.

She was going to die, she was sure of it.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Shit, she's bleeding again." Howard uses his belt and sinches her thigh as tightly as he can. "Okay, you got her, you got her. The trap's off."

He raises an eyebrow. "Where'd you run into a bear trap, anyway?"

And can they recycle it?

[knifewithnoname]

Pruna kept an iron grip on Sandy as the bear trap came off, not letting her move at all and not caring about the grip back. She was impressed by Howard, not that she showed it, but she was glad he knew how to deal with this.

Once it was off she let go of Sandy and moved round to stand next to Howard, she had no idea how Sandy had managed to stumble into the device so she left her to answer that if she could.

She pulled off the leggings that she wore under her dress and began slicing them with the knife.

"Have you been seeing water anywhere?"

[justoutrunyou]

Unfortunately Sandy was too overwhelmed with the pain to give him an answer right away. She was choked up with sobbing, her face bright red and expression twisted up and ugly. She was trembling and silently hoped and begged for it to end one way or another.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard flinches, expecting Sandy to scream, and is visible relieved when that doesn't come. "You're doing good." He pats Sandy awkwardly on the shoulder. Bedside manner isn't his forte. He helps her sit in a more comfortable position and sits back, fiddling with the broken bear trap.

"No water. The milkshake stuff seems to keep the animals away, though." He holds the trap up. "You realize how many other people could just wander into these?"

Howard has always been ruthless. This Arena might have just made him a killer.

[knifewithnoname]

Pruna leaves the comforting to Howard as she just wants to scream at the girl, tell her to stop crying and grow up.

But she didn't think Sandy would react well to that so she focussed on bandaging her leg, it was making the best out of a bad situation and Pruna would just have to keep checking that it didn't get infected.

She did grin at Howard's next words, "Do you be thinking you could be collecting them without getting trapped in them?"

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy's head flopped back as she sucked air into her lungs through her teeth. It was a sharp slap of reality that Pruna could so easily ignore her horrible pain. That was just how Pruna was.

"It was at the Cornucopia. Right between me and it." Her eyes snapped open as the words she was hissing sank in. Her vision was blurry from tears and the inside of the Gingerbread house seemed to wobble and waver.

Right in front of her? Could they have targeted her? Was this because of the cuff? Then why didn't Pruna get targeted? Was it because Pruna was better at the arena then Sandy was? More entertaining?

Thankfully it was enough to get her mind busy and off the pain...for now.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Sure. I'm good at this sort of thing. So you should, um..." He loses his train of thought and rubs one hand over his temple, wincing. "You shouldn't get too set on killing me. Might pay off in the long run for you not to."

He pats Sandy again on the shoulder and gets up, then looks at Pruna with a smirk. "How would you like to play with fire?"

[knifewithnoname]

She blinked at him, distracted by his eye for a moment, wondering how he had lost it. She didn't have any intention of killing him, yet, whilst he was being useful.

She saw his gesture and copied it, patting Sandy awkwardly, not sure how that was supposed to help anything but not wanting her to be upset, then went back to bandaging.

She grinned at the suggestion, "I would be liking that."

[justoutrunyou]

Despite the "Comforting" shoulder pats and the bandaging that still hurt because of the deep wounds and crushed bones...Sandy couldn't help but feel uncomfortable with how things were turning out. And worse still she was starting to feel light headed.

"Is this one of those injuries where I shouldn't let myself pass out?" She mumbled barely able to hear whatever the two of them were talking about over the blood rushing in her ears. She fumbled for her water bottle and with a trembling hand brought it up to her face to splash some water on it and try to clear her head.