thearena | Arena 14: A Grimm Age

Arena 14: A Grimm Age

The morning breaks to a familiar routine for most of you. Bright and early the Tributes are roused by their escorts and stylists, escorted from their rooms and to the waiting hovercraft. The flight takes them a few hours out from the Capitol and after landing they are escorted quickly into an underground complex to be prepped. Tributes will find to their dismay that their outfits are a little less practical and a little more costume this time around, the ratio of which depends entirely on the whims of their stylist. Peacekeepers will appear almost immediately after they've finished dressing to put them in the waiting launch tubes.

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They rise up from the ground and -- phew, what's that smell? The Tribute's look around them to see a full-on medieval village, constructed entirely from wood and thatch. There are empty pens that might have once held pigs and chickens attached to the houses and a well is visible down the street. What commands attention though is what's in the centre of the village square where the Tribute's are standing; a pyre built around a tall wooden stake. Those who look amongst the piles of twigs and wood will see the gleam of weapons, as well as backpacks containing survival supplies. This is your Cornucopia, Tributes.

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Anyone who tries to look further afield, over the roofs of the houses, will see the main feature of this arena looming above them. The castle stands tall and forbidding, a monstrous sized building of stone with flags bearing the emblem of the Capitol flying from its parapets. From here, if they squint, they can see the drawbridge is down and the portcullis is open. For now.

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A triumphant sounding of trumpets is what signals this arena's beginning and with it those Tribute's with powers may feel a sudden tingling in their bones, a rush of energy as those powers are restored to them. Any with constantly active abilities will find a light illuminates immediately over their head, signalling that something about this powered arena is going to be a little different from the last. For those who try to use their powers right off the bat... well, they'll be in for a nasty shock.

[[OOC: A mod reminder that this arena is designed to punish Tribute's for using powers. If your character will attempt to use powers at any time in week 1 of the arena it needs to be reported here to be RNG'd by the mods for chances of success or injury.

There will be a thread on Death Roll posts for subsequent weeks power usage to be reported.]]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The return of his abilities is both a blessing and a curse.

On the one hand, he's been struck by lightning. Gary doesn't even realize this has happened, or how much damage he's done, but he knows that it sucks a lot.

On the other, that burst of adrenaline lingers. It keeps his heart pumping and his legs moving, driving him out of the central square with the now crackling Cornucopia and into the streets. He isn't keeping track of how long he runs. Or rather, staggers. It feels like a run to him; Gary's world moves in frames, one frozen bit of time after the other, comprehended for just a moment before it slips out of his grasp and the next takes its place. Every flash is like some new, horrific revelation, like he's woken up somewhere completely alien, deaf and covered in blood and in a confusing amount of pain. When the adrenaline finally wears off, Gary has no idea where he is.

In a dim, narrow alley somewhere near the Cornucopia, Gary's legs give out underneath him and he collapses face-first into the musty road.

Edited 2015-05-26 23:12 (UTC)

Nitou isn't sure what hit him. Something hot and loud had slammed into him, sending him flying, rolling away. The ridiculous wizard beard he'd been wearing had caught fire and was no longer long enough to drag on the ground. The end of it still smoldered just above his knees. The hems of his robes were smoldering in much the same way (some of the robes were even still burning), and who knew what had happened to his hat. Nitou could feel burns on his head; if he'd been in any shape to care, he would have assumed it had burned up or gotten blown off.

There's a loud groan as he tries to get to his feet again. What had happened? He's thinking back, trying to remember what he'd been doing..."Haruto?" That's right. They'd been just about to team up to get supplies. For once, they'd found each other before things got bad...hadn't they? "Hey, Haruto?" It's more a croak than a yell, and Nitou's not really succeeding at getting to his feet just yet.

Haruto, too, is still trying to figure out exactly what was going on. He had charged into the fray of the Cornucopia, just about made it to a bag of supplies, one eye on Gary and the other looking out for Nitou, when everything flashed white. When sense comes back to him he's face down on the ground, someone has just stepped on his hand, and he can smell burning. So, so much burning. Not much sense had managed to come to him, and so he spends a few moments more laying there, feeling wretched and confused enough to not want to deal with the situation at all, but then a voice echoes in his head.

Haruto Soma. Is that ALL you have to give?

Dragon. It's Dragon. Who's just itching to get out, and would like it if he just kept lying in the dirt waiting for it all to stop. He's still not sure what's happening, but it's enough motivation to get him to plant his arms and push himself to his knees, and crawl away from all the heat and smoke, even though it hurts like hell. Soon enough he's found a fence and has used it to haul himself upright, and that's when he realizes that the burning is not just something that was behind him. He was burning. Or had been burning. His right pantleg is still smoldering and partially absent, and his side is hardly better. He's about to curse, but over the chaos behind him, he's sure that he hears something.

"....Nitou?" It's not a yell, either. He needs all his energy to stand upright and keep going. Yelling will use up too much.

"Haruto?" Nitou croaks. He's just ignoring Chimera growling away about being hungry, because getting eaten seems like the least of his worries right now. He's sort of managed to roll himself into a seated position, and he's twitching a little. "Haruto!" He can see the figure by that fence, and he's pretty sure he knows who that is.

Only pretty sure, because his head's still spinning. He's getting to his feet now, and...nope, down he goes again. Too much, too soon, no support.

There, that's Nitou! And he looks about as bad as he himself feels. He lets in a sharp gasp and goes with his first reflex, which is to try and vault that fence but... no, nope, not happening. His effort to use his bad leg to boost himself is a no-go. His second try while springing from the other leg does get him the height, but his mobility isn't what it should be and so he just awkwardly flops half over it. Then grunts, rolls, and falls over onto the other side.

"...ngggh! I'm coming!" Gradually. Eventually. He needs a few moments more to get back on his feet, and then he is limp-staggering on over. Riders have to stick together.

Nitou's sort of flopping around trying to get back to his feet, looking not unlike a boneless fish, if Chimera's groaning in his head is to be believed. "I'm coming, too!" Even if he's what's being come to.

Eventually, he somehow manages to get a bead on where the ground is and that he should be trying to get off of it, and he triumphantly sits up. Hah. He's got this. He's got this, man.

"No, no! Stay there!" Damn, this is way too familiar. Wasn't he yelling that sort of thing at a useless, confused Nitou last arena? He picks up the pace of his stagger, which causes him to stumble a little and slightly alter course.

...Hey. Hey, is that Gary collapsed between those two houses? "Gary? Hey!" Never mind what he said about Nitou staying there. He's going with that course change, and motioning for Nitou to come along with it.

That must be where they're coming. Going. To Gary! Yes! Gotta save this guy over here. Nitou finally manages to get to his feet, though he's shuffling over that way with all the grace and care of a zombie with an inner ear disorder. "Hey!" He yells both after Gary and Haruto, because yelling is good. Yelling is something he's getting his voice back for.

That is indeed Gary collapsed between those two houses and he's a little worse for wear. What's probably the most immediately alarming thing about him is the thin trail of blood dragged behind him, apparently from his foot. The sole of the opposite flat has been blown off; the former is mostly intact, but that's because it's melted to what's left of his toes. The comically dainty maid outfit is, predictably, ruined. Gary will have time to mourn over this later.

Meanwhile, while he's certainly not going anywhere, he doesn't have the luxury of being unconscious. Gary's chest heaves with erratic, hyperventilating wheezes, so his head is turned to the side to apparently make the whole breathing process slightly easier--and the upturned eye, alarmingly, doesn't seem to be quite intact. His singed lids are covered in blood and swollen mostly shut. It's probably better for everyone's sanity if no one tries to force them open.

Conscious or otherwise, Gary hasn't registered that anyone's joined him. His ears are still ringing too much to pick out Haruto and Nitou's calls, and his working eye is buried in the dirt. They'll have to come a little closer to get his attention.

Things haven't had much chance to get better or get worse by the time Haruto makes his way on over, and he needs to stop and lean against the house to catch his breath and just work through the pain of it all. "...Shit. Gary." He got hit by whatever it was, too, didn't he? And got it way worse than him, at least. How could things be getting off to such a terrible start?

He looks back to see Nitou closing in, and forces himself to push off from the wall and bend, giving Gary the most careful assessment that he can with a head this fuzzy and limited first aid knowledge. "He's breathing. Okay, he's alive, just..." Well, it doesn't need to be said that it seems like he's blinded. Let's worry about that later. Magic's a thing in this arena. Something can be figured out. "...I can carry one side and you can carry the other? You... you feel like you can, Nitou?"

The adrenaline of all the "oh, crap" running through Nitou's head kicks him into a bit more awareness, and he nods. "Yeah, yeah, we got you, man, we'll get you out of here..." He's quickly moving--at least, he's making as quick a movement as he is able--to pick up Gary's other side.

What makes this worse is that Chimera has now stopped complaining about the idiocy of everyone involved and is now pointing out that Nitou could finish off Gary, and then Chimera could attempt to feed on whatever it was that powered Gary. Easy as pie...Chimera likes pie. Cue momentary glaring at his stomach. "Dude, no! We're not gonna do it!" He's still picking up Gary, even if it seems as though he'll fall over himself from the effort.

Ah, there are the people. Gary can make out their voices now, even though he doesn't exactly recognize them. Then again, he doesn't recognize much of anything right now. The frames are starting to come together, but it's all still devoid of comprehension, happening too fast for Gary to adequately process. But he can focus a little bit--just enough to start feeling around with his hand when he hears someone next to him. The arm close to Haruto gives an awkward flop, feeling around in the dirt for a bit before his hand hits a shoe and starts crawling its way up the toe.

That's a person! "Hello?" Gary croaks, because that is the first thing that pops into his head. This seems like a fine and appropriate thing to say when meeting someone. There's a bit of odd shuffling as he realizes that he'd also like to see this person, too, so he's trying to crane his neck and uncover the eye that isn't a horrible black pit of agony in his face. And after a bit more shuffling and dragging his chin, he succeeds! Gary peers around and slowly takes in his surroundings. There's two people. What a surprise! He feels one of them grab his side. Gary turns his baffled stare on that one and searches for another question to ask.

"...Where are we?"

"...is Chimera being a pain again?" There's a thread of sympathy as he says it, though he's really mostly annoyed. It is never a good time to have the monsters residing in your soul getting chatty, but this is a particularly bad one. They can grumble all they want, though, as long as neither one plans on bursting out anytime soon. He grabs Gary from the other side and with a nod to Nitou, starts to lift.

"The arena. Between some houses." And that, really, is about all he knows about where they are. It's not important, is it? No, it's probably not that important. What's important is getting some more distance between them and the burning Cornucopia. It is also pretty important that Gary seems to have one functional eye. "We've... we've got you. Yeah." Easier said than done, but he refuses to complain aloud or give in to the desire to fall over. They can all fall over when they're somewhere else.

"He doesn't hurt, he's just cranky," Nitou groans, a little too out of it to really think of any other application of the word pain. Such a mooching freeloader of a soul monster thing he has.

Nitou is trying his very best to support Gary, even if it's slow going and even if it seems like they're all going to go crashing down like a Jenga tower in a bounce house at any moment. "We have so got you." Surely they can manage to shuffle off to a safer area of some sort. Surely. "You think we could get into one of those houses?" The question's directed more to Haruto than Gary; Nitou isn't sure that Gary really gets to decide where they can and can't go on account of Gary's moving even worse than he and Haruto are right now.

"The...?" Gary's eye flickers away, wide and blank like he's just had a baffling, terrifying revelation. He hasn't, of course. He's just very confused. These faces and words are all familiar, Gary just has no idea what to do with any of them, and it's all culminating in some really peculiarly unsettling feeling that he doesn't especially enjoy.

Things only get worse from there. Gary doesn't put together that Nitou and Haruto are going to pick him up until they actually do, at which point oh god the pain is horrible jesus shit this is literally the worst. He wails something incoherent in protest and thinks to run. Not surprisingly, lacking that adrenaline boost, his legs are much less willing to cooperate. The base instinct at least keeps his feet moving so the others aren't dragging him, and within a few steps he's forgotten why he wanted to run away in the first place, having instead narrowed in on Nitou and Haruto's reassuring voices and the horrific amount of pain he's in.

Blearily, Gary registers the words 'get into' followed by 'house.' "...Are we going home?" he asks. His voice wavers slightly with a combination of earnestness and terror. "I wanna go home."

Edited 2015-05-28 01:18 (UTC)

It's less of a run and more of a thrash, from Haruto's current perspective, and he almost loses his grip on Gary in the process. The metaphorical Jenga tower is wobbling on the donut wizard side. He's determined to stay upright, to keep going, to fix this all somehow... and well, he can manage upright, even if he has no idea how the rest will happen. There's a stumble back before he manages to get moving forward again, making quick eye contact with Nitou and nodding towards one of the houses. Just straight out the alley and around, and maybe there's a door there.

"Yeah. Yeah, I bet we could." And then Gary is latching on to that bit of the conversation, and then Haruto feels his mouth go dry. "...somewhere safe. We're going somewhere safe." It's not as much of a lie as what first leapt to mind to say. 'Yes, Gary. We're going home.' Because if he's dying, if this is going to be it for his go-around this time, then what's a little lie in the name of giving someone a moment of hope? But he doesn't know for sure that the guy's going to kick the bucket. So no lies like that yet. "...if we've got to kick a door in, how're your legs doing, Mayo?" Because he's got one leg that is not up for the task of any Rider Kicks at the moment, sorry.

Nitou winces. It's partially because of the pitiful way Gary wants to go home--he wouldn't mind going home, either--and partially because he hurts all over. Holding Gary like this is making him realize he's done something to one of his shoulders, but he's sort of able to use their forward momentum to supplement his own. "Yeah. Safe at home..." Oh, man, he feels horrible helping Haruto lie like this, but it's that or to tell Chimera to shut up, they can't eat Gary.

"My legs? My legs are fine! Just fine!" He thinks. Maybe. Burned, but fine. "I can so kick any doors in."

There's no harm in either lie, it seems; as soon as Nitou chips in, Gary has already settled back into a state of distant, amazed but also mortified staring. He hasn't understood what their answers were and he won't remember this later. Nothing gained, nothing lost. Everything's fine.

This state of delirium lasts a bit longer than the others. Gary calms, at least, eager to follow the mechanical motions of walking and looking around. His naturally heightened adrenaline levels are helping in the recovery, steadying his legs. There are enough toes on his bloodied foot to support his weight, so that's a plus. Gary isn't thinking straight enough to appreciate this, but he's getting there.

Instead, as they approach the house, he starts to put together other things--little, random things, like how they all smell like smoke. Why do they smell like smoke? Gary's head slumps and he realizes that the maid dress he coerced his Stylist into designing is patchily burnt and falling off in places. He whines in disappointment. "They're gonna be pissed..." Gary murmurs to himself, apparently without realizing that he's said it.

"Great. You're on door-kicking duty." It's nice to have Nitou to count on, when things are bad. And more and more of a rarity as of late, given their mutual bad luck, but it's an easy thing to slip back into. There's no time to angst and panic and be afraid and avoid him, now that they're in here and it's life or death.

"You've got it, you're doing good, Gary, good job..." Haruto is damn impressed at how much of an effort the guy is managing to make. That's his power, isn't it? His ignorance as to when he's beaten or in over his head transcends into the physical, it seems. Good for him. That's just what they need right now, no sarcasm. "No one's pissed. It's fine! It's... it's fine."

Aah, and there they are, at the back door to a rickety house. His gaze darts to Nitou and he makes a wordless, questioning sound. Care to do the honors?

"It is totally fine," Nitou chimes in with easy reassurance. He doesn't care what the Stylists think; this is a deathmatch arena. Clothes should be the least of their worries, even if he's glad they're not in this naked. He wouldn't put it past the Capitol to decide to chuck them in there naked, and he does not want to see some of these dudes without any pants on.

But hey, door duty, he's got this. He's so got this. "Alright, stand back!" Not that he's moving particularly quickly, but he's moving better than Haruto and Gary are. Still, it takes several kicking attempts before the door finally caves, and Nitou's breathing like he's just run a marathon. "See? Piece of cake..."

Finally, these reassurances seem to stick. Gary even goes one step past registering that they've been said and responds. He looks up between Haruto and Nitou, then zeroes in on Haruto with a wide, mournful eye.

"But...but my..." The word escapes him and he trails off. What else can he think of? His surroundings are all too complex and muddy to describe, that's out of the picture. Eventually he settles on the pain. The pain is very easy to focus on, and is even starting to resolve itself into manageable portions, rather than the global, unidentifiable ache of several minutes ago. "...my head," Gary groans instead. "Head hurts..."

Any further insights will have to wait, because now he's thoroughly distracted by the loud whump of Nitou's foot striking the door they're standing in front of. Gary didn't even notice they'd stopped walking until just now. He winces away.

"Ahh--loud," Gary whines. "Why're you so loud?..." And so on and so forth. It's all gibberish, he's clearly not directing this at anyone.

That is an uncomfortable look to be getting. It might be good that Gary's able to focus somewhat better, but it's not doing anything for Haruto's own morale. "We'll rest up, and it'll feel better. Alright? It'll be alright."

More lies. Or what he's pretty damn sure, in the moment, is not a very good version of the truth. They will all probably hurt less once they've had some time to rest, but pain of this sort takes a while to go away. At least it seems that the shack of a house that they have broken into seems... safe is a bit strong of a word to use, but maybe not hazardous is the way to put it. He gives a thankful nod to Nitou, and starts forward again, hauling Gary on inside.

Everything is broken and overturned, and there's probably nothing worth salvaging, but maybe they can stay out of sight of any windows and hunker down and wait for the chaos of the Cornucopia to blow over.

"It's so gonna be alright." Nitou doesn't really know what to do except to back Haruto up here, because he has no idea what else to do for poor Gary. "Come on, we'll just...rest! Yeah, we'll rest. And I'll stop being loud."

This is all working out much better than it probably should. Unsurprisingly, Gary doesn't think about that--but he is starting to think about more grand, abstract concepts. Memories are coming together again. He has a vague idea of where he is now. It's the Arena, right? It only just started. They dressed him up, put him on the platform, there was a lot of running, some fire, more running and shoving then...a fuzzy gap of movement and pain and confusion, leading up to this. Gary is conscious enough now to be concerned about the lack of details. Whether or not he'll remember filling in any of the blanks is anyone's guess.

He stumbles in as directed, a bit more stubbornly now that he's focusing on something other than moving his legs, and decides that now he has a good place to restart. For like, the fifth time. He's working on it. "...Fuck," Gary growls, knitting his teeth and squeezing his eye shut. "What happened?"

Since resting seems to be the plan that two out of three of them have settled on, Haruto is finding a bare spot on the floor up next to one of the walls and attempting to set Gary down on it. With the way his one foot looks, sitting is going to have to be better than standing. "Lightning? Lightning. We all got hit by lightning." It all happened so quickly and unexpectedly that he has no way of knowing that this was Gary's 'fault'. These sorts of things just happen in arenas, right?

closed to Haruto and Nitou

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