WAR GAMES

[shinsengumi]

10...

9...

This year, you will be participating in teams. Your teams, as sponsored, are as follows:

Aeva and Ystelle; Ashleigh and Larsen; Aubrey and Kieran; Brigitte and Ellias; Cabel and Joss; Cyrel and Hollingworth; D'Ivann and Helene; Drael and Kristopher; Griffith and Xian; Fila and Lisette; Indra and Zacharius; Ivy and Reece; Kol and Laurence; Leonel and Solus; Lucinde and Visvaldis; Malis and Vox; Oberin and Odette; Shryke and Siegfried; Talbot and Thane.

Should both members of a team survive, you will both be permitted to leave the arena alive. May the odds be ever in your favour...

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Comments

[fideles]

[It's so careless, the way he finds her. Hah! Finds? The way he stumbles on her. One moment he's alone and tallying his successes, the next he swears he can hear footfalls. Then he can damn well see her, and he doesn't have time to hide or respond before she notices him in turn.

His first instinct is a defensive assault, he even does it, but the air stays calm around them and Laurence touches his lips in a moment of fleeting confirmation. Somehow it doesn't surprise him as much as it should - he'd suspected this, he realises, from the moment he'd found that blowpipe concealed within the undergrowth. Well fine. She doesn't have to know he just tried to kill her.

Laurence converts his hand gesture into a motion of shock - pretty damn convincingly, he thinks - and then holds both palms out in her direction. There's still quite a distance between them, and it damn better stay that way.]

You hold right there, don't move! I don't want to fight if you don't, so you stay right there!

[cougar]

[She's stunned, to find someone else. She isn't sure of why—the chances of finding someone else are certainly high enough, isn't that the point of this damn game?

He raises his hands and she falls back a step, but when he speaks she finds her own tongue and raises her voice enough to reply. The rasp of it doesn't quite betray her nerves.]

I have no reason to fight you! Please, I'm only looking for someone.

[Her voice feels so small... But if he doesn't want to fight, then maybe she can get some help from him. She'll hardly be so lucky more than once, will she?]

[fideles]

[Another one? Don't these people know how foolish they're being in hoping for one another, seeking each other out? Never mind that he's doing the very same thing. Guess they must all be fools together.

The woodlands seem quiet around them, suspicious all by itself.]

Where's your teammate?

[cougar]

He went the other way. We didn't speak. [She looks back over her shoulder, as though expecting the angel to appear and prove her wrong. She shivers unbidden at memory of the cold look he gave her, but sets herself stubbornly upright once again a moment later. His suspicion reminds her to voice her own.] And where is yours?

[fideles]

[Figuring out who he can and can't trust is going to be impossible, isn't it? But he can't see any danger in giving this information. Laurence jerks his head back in the direction he just came, never once taking his eyes from the woman.]

Back there. I didn't hurt him any, he just didn't want to come. He said his brother would find him.

[cougar]

His brother... ? Was he... [She lifts her hands to her mouth, shock spreading across her face. Oh, if it is Kol of course he'd send the child away, he wouldn't want this boy stuck with... And she can't deny, either, that her heart jumps at the idea of finding Kol, for that makes it easier for the two of them to find—to be found.

If she has to die, she'll do it by the side of one of the two brothers she loves so dearly. She gives Laurence a serious look, questioning firmly now.] Was he quite ill?

[fideles]

[Laurence's surprise at her words is very plain to see.]

Yeah. Yeah, that's right. [And maybe he hasn't quite shaken that guilty conscience yet, because he blurts the next words in a flustered rush.] He told me to go. I would have stayed if he wanted, I did tell him so!

[cougar]

[With confirmation that it's Kol, her mouth goes wide again and if there wasn't the looming threat on her life, she would have shaken Laurence for his foolishness. Of course Kol wouldn't have said so, that's why she remembers.] Oh, he can't be left, he has a son out there! He'll never live through this alone, oh Kol, why would you...

[She hardly realises that she's started moving in the direction Laurence indicated, her gaze entirely overlooking him in her desperation to get moving again.]

[fideles]

[And away she goes, so very simple as that. Laurence shifts a few steps aside as she passes, making sure they stay wide of one another and then watching until she's long out of sight.

A son, huh...? Laurence sighs, turns, and walks on, rather more vigilant and trying not to think about what his teammate had had to say. He wants his brother to kill him, lady. You wanna explain that to his kid, be my guest.

He has to stop thinking. These people, these games, are going to ruin him.]