[The cannon should be reason to keep running, but instead the sound startles him into looking back. He's put a good amount of distance between them, he thinks... enough that he can catch his breath, and try not to reflect too desperately on what just happened. Brigitte, her name was. She had smiled at him, asked nothing of him... had it been so many years since he last spoke to someone so seemingly kind? And he had left her in that brute's hands.

What could he have done differently, unarmed and without even his barriers? Could they have overpowered him, between them? Would that other man have gotten involved? These are things he can't dwell on, blames he has to lay elsewhere. They put him here. Him, and her, and those strangers back there - it's the gamemakers who should be made to answer for this. If he... if he somehow survives, then maybe...

Ellias turns and hurries on, not running now but keeping a rapid pace, a speed he can maintain without exhaustion. If he could only have known it wouldn't be enough. Only a few minutes pass before he hears it, the sound of footfalls behind, and by then it's already too late to avoid detection, to put distance between them. He tries anyway, breaking into a sprint once more and knocking branches aside, jumping and dancing around rocks and tangles of root, but he just isn't nimble enough and he can hear all too clearly that the pursuit is gaining rapidly.

It's a last desperate bid that sees him turn with trembling outstretched hands.]

You said to go! I won't tell anyone where you are, I won't come back this way, I swear, please, I won't do anything to you!