#it's a Survival Game. /Not/ a Killing Game.

[xx-obliviousfantasy-xx]

It all loops back to the fucking conversation we keep having on this goddamn website about author intent and cultural context and shit.

Killing zombies isn't the problem it's killing the zombies in the middle east

It's the virus starting in china or a foreign place in general

It's the heros all being white and more well off somehow still than the characters of color who are ultimately disposable or turned

It's the way that you don't really see disabled characters/people helping disabled characters survive because they're "just too much of a liability" or were turned/eaten first or shooting them is seem as more kind than helping???

It's the way that so many zombies ARE legless and crawling towards you on the ground and the reason they're MORE scary is because they're legless....???

It's the way that the military is always coming to save the day and they're seen as a better option (and the real ending) than the community of people who've survived all this time and are actively going out to find and provide resources of people either because the military place is "safer" (and then they recruit you to their task force) or because the leader of the group is actually evil and trying to turn people or keep people from going out to some places or testing on people or whatever (and the undertones of the leader being a poc)

It's how you're never really starting shooting the zombies in really rich affluent neighborhoods but always the poorer and more rundown looking ones (you can tell by the buildings)

It's because of the fact that any attempt to have any sympathy for them is seem as gross and wrong and naive even though they are technically still people, just suffering greatly and got infected first...

Or like... terrorist organizations...still...somehow existing...during an apocalypse...to serve as "the real enemy" and the one who caused it all.

. . .

I've never played or watched a zombie based media except like once so this isn't like...I'm not actually targeting a game and idk if these are all real things in any of those media, but I just mean these as examples in general.

I rly hate the Satanic Panic & the moral panic surrounding violence in video games in the 90s, coz it's now impossible to talk about the social implications of violent video games in a realistic sense.

No, violence in video games does not create serial killers in the way most people imagine it would.

However, it's very important to notice how after 9/11, a lot of violent video games pivoted their content from silly gratuitous cartoon gore to more realistic military shooters set in the Levant from a US American lens. It's also important to notice the connection of these games & their toxic online multi-player voice chats to Gamer Gate in 2014.

It's obviously not as black & white as it was presented in the 80s & 90s, I dont think everyone who played early Call of Duty games is a white supremacist who wants to join the military to kill people in the middle east, but I think it's dangerous to pretend like video games or any media can't have an impact on the way people think about violence.

I think what makes all the difference here is how that violence is portrayed, what the message behind it is, what the motives are behind the people who crafted that message, who the victims of that violence are, how they are portrayed & the greater cultural context that surrounds it.

[harbours-lighthouse]

BLOOD TRACKS IN THE SNOW - PART ONE

— PAIRING: Joel Miller x F!Reader

— SUMMARY: Dying in the snow seems like a pretty poetic way to go, but it seems that's not your fate when a stranger finds you. Amidst the wariness of meeting someone for the first time, you're offered something warm and new: hope.

— AN: Lol, I wrote this on my phone before proof-reading and editing it on my computer. Unconventional but it works!

cw: post-outbreak setting, description of blood, mentioning of betrayal. wc: 2.3k

THE BLOOD on your face keeps you warm. You're trembling, curled into yourself like a bunny burrowing into the ground—you want to burrow. Bury yourself deep into the snow, dig at the frozen ground underneath until your nails are ripping. But all you can do is shake with sticky blood freckled along your cheeks, dripping from your temple and down your nose until it hits the snow. It doesn’t splash or splatter. It's simply soaked into the snow where it leaves a stain, blurred around the edges.

If you weren't so numb, maybe you'd scream—call out for help. It's a risky thing to do, but people are driven to do things that could get them killed when they're faced with death, which is ironic so to say. Maybe when the survival instinct locked away in your mind is given free reign, it knows what decision—what split second choice—will be more probable of welcoming your death with a metaphorical tip of your hat.

As you lay bent inward, spine pushing against the tattered remains of your jacket, your eyes begin to droop. Snowflakes fall on your lashes, but they don't melt along the swell of your cheeks like they should. You're too cold. The chill has settled into you, permeating your pores and coating your lips with frost.

But the cold doesn't affect your hearing as much as it does everything else. Falling deeper into the snow, hands flinching with tremors that run deeply through your whole body, the crunch of snow beneath heavy boots joins the wail of the wind. Shuffling. Hot breaths puffing into the air. You can hear it all, but you can't move. Can't think.

Can't fight back.

The thought brings along miniscule movement: a jerk of your bent legs, the sharp jolt of your heart against your aching ribs. Your lashes are frozen, and it feels like stones are weighing down your eyelids as you peer upward.

Through the grey haze of snow and wind, a broad-shouldered shadow stands in front of you. A whine in the back of your throat joins the howling wind. The rush of snow.

Is it a bear? A moose? An infected? A person?

You'd be happy with either option, as long as it meant that you're not alone right now. Isn't that what this world is good at now? Turning people into unmarked graves devoid of wooden crosses or tombstones? You don’t want that for yourself, and you've been fighting against that normality for the last ten years.

Crazy how one ill-timed blizzard could knock you off your a-game.

The shadow shifts. Snow crunches. Your vision is hazy at best, crowded with tears and black dots. There's something warm in front of you, that much you know, so even with the threat of being mauled to death or killed brutally, your fingers twitch for the heat—desperate to gather it up into your hands and smear it back into your skin. You'd paint yourself with sunlight if it meant that you never felt the cold again.

Through chattering teeth, you beg.

"H-Help me. Pl-Please."

The last thing you remember is something warm and heavy settling on your shoulder, and it felt like the shape of a hand.

—

Sound begins to filter in slowly, like water dripping from a tap—except that's exactly what you're hearing. The drip-drip-drip echoes inside your ears as it breaks through the milky film cast over your thoughts.

Then you feel the heat. It burns.

With the grace of a spooked deer flailing on the ground, your neck jerks upward to look down at your body, and pain spikes through your skull. A thick and fraying wool blanket covers you, draped over your body like a veil. After staring at the stiff fibres for a second too long, you flick your gaze upward to see what’s around you.

The first thing you notice is wood. Lots of it. Wooden rafters. Wooden walls. None of it smooth and sanded, instead rough and splintering along the edges. The drip-drip-drip is coming from a singular sink that's nearly completely detached from the wall, save for the yellow-stained pipe that keeps it there. There's a plastic table, the metal legs bent so it wobbles with each shake of the house. 

Through the headache pounding inside your head, your thoughts start crashing into one another with the speed that they come to you.

Where am I? Where did this come from? How did I get here? The blizzard is gone? Why am I in pain? Where am I? What is this place? How did I get here—

The creak of wood sends them lurching to a halt, kick-starting your heart to thump against your sternum like a rabbit.

"Was startin' to think you wouldn't wake up."

The gruff, masculine voice has you flinching upright, hands pressing against the wooden floor beneath you. Pain skewers itself through your ribs and down your spine, and the headache pulses between your temples like a hammer slamming against your skull repeatedly.

A groan vibrates in your throat, which you now realise is painfully dry. Your lips aren't frozen anymore, but the parched flesh splits.

"Easy. Ain't gonna hurt you. Not yet, at least."

Your eyes snap to where the voice comes from, and hidden in a shadowed corner of the room, sits a man in a rickety chair with a rifle balanced between his legs like a cane, hands folded and resting on the stock.

Dark brown eyes meet yours. They remind you of the dark soil you'd find during the rainy season, when the rich scent of the earth hangs in the air. It would be comforting if it weren't for your vulnerable state and the fact that you don’t know this man.

You shrivel inwardly as those dark eyes bore into you, and you feel like an item being cataloged, stored away in some sort of file. What exactly is he noting? Your mangled hair? Flighty eyes? Blood stained face and fingers? Tattered clothes? The list goes on.

The man clears his throat. You watch his Adam's Apple bob.

"Couldn't find any wounds on you," he says. Silver and brown facial hair moves as he speaks, sticking to his jaw and along his upper lip like fine snow. His hair is fluffy, you notice. More like a cloud that's heavy with rain, streaked with muted brown light as a sun sets.

He lifts a finger, pointing at you. You only stare with half of your body ready to bolt to the door—which you noticed in a very quick, terrified glance to your right. The rest of your body feels numb. Shocked into stillness by the cold.

"So I wanna know why you've got blood all over you."

There's an edge to his tone, something that tells you that he's a man who will get answers regardless of what steps he has to take to get them.

You swallow, but the minimal saliva in your mouth barely does anything to soothe the aching dryness of your throat. Opening your mouth, you flounder for a moment, before making a bold move.

"D-Do you have any water?"

You don't think that's what he expected from you, because the man regards you for a moment with creased brows. Then he sighs heavily through his nose, and you watch with bated breath as he leans to the side, rifling with one hand through a backpack that's slumped on the ground beside the rickety chair. You didn't even notice it before.

"Here," he mutters as he tosses a plastic bottle your way. You catch it with a sloshy thud, fingers quivering along the ridged material. You unscrew the cap and gulp down generous sips, feeling the cool liquid soothe your throat like a cold balm.

The man's brows furrow even deeper (they must be like that permanently).

"Easy, you'll make yourself puke."

His words register—sounding more concerned than you think they should be—and you slow down before pulling the now half-empty water bottle away from your bleeding mouth. Inhaling sharply, you speak quietly.

"Thank you."

He doesn't say anything else, simply looks at you like he's gauging your character. Are you a threat? Is there something you're hiding?

"Listen," he shifts, broad shoulders hunching forward as his elbows lean against his knees. "I found you out there in the snow—nearly frozen to death. You're gonna tell me why."

Your chest shudders with a broken breath, feeling fear prick behind your eyes. Those dark eyes are piercing through you, but you wonder what they might look like if you prove that you're innocent. Harmless—to an extent.

"I..." you breathe out, fingers picking at the wool blanket. Around you, the house holds its breath. "My group turned on me."

The man straightens a touch.

"They, um—" you glance around, feeling exposed, "they thought I was sabotaging the camp. So they...tried to kill me."

"Were you?"

The question throws you off. Your eyes snap up to the stranger, and he's already watching you.

"Were you sabotaging the camp?" he elaborates, brows raising. The gravel in his voice should make you afraid, but indignation burns in your belly, and you frown at him. The same anger and betrayal you felt barely ten hours ago rears its head.

"No," you grit out, "I wasn’t. The camp was failing because no one else was doing what they were supposed to—I was the only one putting in the effort—"

The man lifts a placating hand, nodding his head.

"Okay, okay," he assures, "relax."

He pauses, eyes flitting along the blood that's caked along your face. He juts his chin up, gesturing to the dried crimson stains.

"So that's not your blood."

You shake your head slowly, swallowing.

"No. It's not."

"So you killed someone."

"...I had to."

He nods, brushing his hand against his arched nose. A question lingers on your tongue, fighting against your sealed lips before you finally give in. 

“Why’d you bring me here?” 

There’s a long pause as the man flicks his dark gaze your way, combing along your face. For a moment, you think he might brush off the question.

He shrugs his shoulders. “It would’ve been like leaving behind a dying animal.”

“I’m sure you’ve done that before.” 

���Yeah, I have.” 

Silence stretches. The drip-drip-drip seems even louder than before, and your chest feels stiff with air that you've trapped in your lungs. Trepidation settles beneath your skin alongside the pain that continues to pulse through you.

The man breaks it with a gruff sigh. You watch with your heart throbbing against your ribs as he rubs his hand along his scratchy jaw. When he looks at you again, you see wariness etched into the fine lines along his eyes and forehead.

"Alright," he sighs, and you stiffen like a deer caught in headlights as he stands. He slings the rifle over one shoulder, before bending to pick up the backpack and haul it over the other.

He studies you, leaning more on his left leg than his right.

"I ain't gonna kill you. You seem like you're tellin' the truth, so I'm taking you back to Jackson."

"Jackson?"

"Yeah, it's a town up north. Protected, warm. Probably give you something better to do than die out in the cold."

Hope begins to brew inside your chest, but your hand moves to press against your sternum as if to smother it. Hope is a dangerous thing now. Often it leads to nothing.

“How can I trust you?” you ask, and you know that it's a dangerous question because his answer might not be what you want. 

“I saved your ass.” 

Yeah, okay. That works. 

"C'mon. Get up. But listen," he points a finger at you, and the ruff edge of his voice has your skin prickling. "If you try anything, I won't hesitate to kill you myself. Understand?"

Fear trickles into your stomach, but so does determination. You know you're not going to do anything—you're not that kind of person. But there's a darkness in his eyes that only comes when you follow through on your word, and when you've put a bullet between someone's eyes before. You know that look. You've seen it in your own reflection.

Nodding your head, you shift onto your feet, holding back a whine at the ache that blooms along your ribs and behind your eyes. The room sways, but your vision doesn't go black and your stomach doesn't heave. 

The man watches you steadily, before turning his back to swing open the door. Cold wind bursts into the house, so you make sure that the wool blanket remains cloaked around your shoulders. Your jacket barely does anything against the cold as it is.

You notice that the blizzard has calmed, though, but the snow rushes all the same. You follow behind the man, the first few steps slow and strained.

"What's your name?" you ask, feeling desperate to latch onto something that seems a little more normal—not that anything has been ‘normal’ in the last ten years. 

The man turns, eyes squinting against the snow and the wind that digs into his cheeks like needles.

"Joel," he answers after a moment. “Joel Miller.”

It seems fitting, you think. A name meant for a man that seems rough around the edges, just like the wooden boards that make up the house—the one you’re leaving behind. It sends dread spinning inside your stomach. 

Joel pulls up the collar of his jacket and glances at you. "Yours?"

You blink, pulled away from your racing thoughts that are only making your headache worse. You tug the wool blanket closer around your frame, and your name falls from your split lips. Joel nods and you don’t catch the way he says it quietly to himself, as if tasting it on his tongue.

"C'mon," he grumbles, before walking ahead into the snow. The blizzard tugs and pulls at his hair, painting it white with snow. The rifle along his back stares back at you and you swallow harshly. The wind pushes against you as you follow behind Joel, shoulders hunched against the chill. His footsteps leave behind deep holes in the snow, and you let your feet fall into them.

There's relief knowing that they're not stained with blood.

Thank you for reading, God bless <3

top divider credit: @/saradika-graphics © harbours-lighthouse 2025 / i do not give permission for my work to be reposted, translated, or fed into ai. all works belong to me unless stated otherwise.

[rosy-hollow]

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ꜱɪx: The Feast

ᴀ/ɴ: so like - i forgot to kiss the brick before i bashed it into my own head... i was physically crying while writing this, ask @unch4rtedwxters they have picture proof- full series masterlist here!

ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ: cursing, DEATH, BLOOD, A N G S T, I REPEAT, A N G S T (this is me kissing the brick), the hunger games, major character death, murder, anxiety attacks, overall just bad bad bad

ᴘᴀɪʀɪɴɢ: Bakugou Katsuki x f!reader

Both of you are awoken by a loud, blaring fanfare and the booming voice of Oboro Shirakumo, the head Gamemaker of the Hunger Games, echoing throughout the arena for all to hear.

“Attention remaining tributes - the Feast will begin tonight at nightfall. All of you are in critical need of certain resources. Each of you will find what you require in a backpack, marked with your district number, at the Cornucopia. May the odds be ever in your favor.”

The silence that ensues the announcement is deafening. You try to remember who’s left.

13 died in the bloodbath, and you and Bakugou killed the boy from District four. Micah pitches in, telling you that he remembered five other canons throughout the five days you’d been in the arena.

You blink at the reminder, the sound of a cannon booming to mark the death of each tribute. You hadn’t registered the one that sounded when you killed the boy from 4, though you credit that to your crazed and panicked state.

The others… if you’d been subconsciously tuning them out, you seriously needed to step up your game.

The smallest mistake meant death in this arena.

18 dead... that meant there were six left in the arena.

You, Micah, the boy from District 1, the girl from District 2, Toga, and…

Bakugou.

You shake the thought of him from your head, focusing on your younger ally instead. 

You open your mouth to speak.

“It’s not worth going.”

“I think we should go.”

You blink in confusion. 

“You- what? No way, Micah, it’s too risky.” you frown and the boy matches your expression.

“So? You heard him, whatever is in those packs, we need! We could get you medical supplies!”

You shake your head. “No. No way. I probably couldn’t get out of this tree without bleeding out again, and I’m not risking you like that.” you nudge him gently. “I just got a new brother, I can’t lose him yet.”

Micah’s eyes widen as you quote him from before, and he grumbles under his breath. 

“You’re not allowed to use my lines.”

You chuckle, mussing up his mousy brown hair. “You win some, you lose some.”

You shift yourself more comfortably on the branch. “Hey - where did you fill up your water from? You didn’t just survive five days on just your waterskin.”

Micah shakes his head, eyes lighting up. “There’s a contraption I got in my backpack.” he says, pulling out a small mechanical lump of…something? “It might look like nothing, but it’s similar to the ones we use in 9. It extracts the water from inside leaves.”

He plucks a handful of them from a branch in arm’s reach, opening up a latch in the machine to press them into. He positions it over the mouth of his waterskin, and you watch in awe as a small stream of water is squeezed out.

“Holy…cow” you breathe out - catching yourself from cussing. Maybe the blond has rubbed off on you.

Micah raises an eyebrow, teasingly but knowing.

“Cow?”

“It’s a thing we say. …In 11.”

“Mhm, sure…”

“Y-You’re a cow..!”

“What does that even mean?”

“...Good question.”

The day goes by like that, playful banter as you use Micah’s water contraption to fill up his waterskin as well as the empty canteen you had in your pack, while the boy went around picking berries and scavenging for food.

When night falls, you settle down for a hearty meal, finally falling asleep feeling hydrated and full for the first time since you’d entered these cursed games.

It almost made you forget about the Feast tonight.

Almost.

You knew he’d never do it, but what if Bakugou was going to the Feast right now, lurking in the darkness, grabbing the large pack with ‘2’ emblazoned on the front.

You think about his injuries, his injured arm - what if someone attacked him? The Careers coming back from revenge?

The thought plagues your mind - and as much as you try to tell yourself that you don’t care, some stupid, irrational part of your heart does.

Whether you liked it or not - he saved your life. Multiple times.

You didn’t like being in debt.

Back in 11, being in debt meant that other people could use whatever favor you owed against you. It was dangerous.

Which is why the whole ordeal made you so restless.

That’s what you told yourself at least, and you tossed and turned, but the thoughts kept you so paranoid that eventually, you just sit up, sleepy eyes looking for Micah’s sleeping form.

Only for a chill to settle deep into your bones.

He wasn’t there.

Your eyes dart around frantically, your leg screaming in protest and you can’t bring yourself to care.

Panic seizes you by the throat, choking you with such overwhelming fear that you feel like your suffocated, drowning in internal hysteria until one little detail washes over you like someone dunked you in the ice cold ocean.

“I think we should go.”

Oh no.

No no no no no no.

Shit, this can’t be happening! Micah you idiot!

Your aching limbs protest as you clamber down the tree, grabbing your dagger as you grit your teeth, your wounds searing in pain like white hot fire.

Black spots dance across your vision when your boots touch the grass, feeling dizzy from the agony but instead, you let your feet guide you, through the trees, through the bushes.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

Your heart pounds in sync with your footfalls, both deafening against the blood roaring in your eyes.

Fuck, you promised you’d protect him.

You promised.

Tears of desperation prick at the corners of your eyes, slipping down your cheeks as you run, ignoring your wounds, ignoring the danger of other Careers that may be lurking.

You had to endure.

Like always.

Your heart stops when you finally reach the clearing, the Cornucopia in the center.

But that’s not what you’re focused on.

Micah.

The girl from District 4.

His small body thrashes wildly in fear as her fingers clamp around his neck to hold him still.

No.

No no no no no.

“MICAH NO-!”

You can only watch as his eyes lock with yours, widening for a fraction before he body stills, trident piercing straight through his heart.

You feel like the breath’s been taken from your lungs.

God, there’s so much blood.

And Micah…he’s just lying there.

Sleeping.

Except he’s not.

Your feet are moving, though you’re not the one controlling them.

A scream rips from your throat, but it’s not your voice.

Your hand pulls your dagger from your pocket, except it’s not yours.

You watch as your body sinks the blade of your dagger into the girl’s neck, her screams ripping through the arena as you yank it out, before stabbing it into her flesh once more.

Again.

And again.

And again.

The monster of rage fills every corner of your mind, chest heaving and heart pumping with adrenaline until all you can see

Is red.

You keep going, stab after stab, even when you hear the cannon go off, you don’t stop; almost like you don’t know how.

A small cry is what snaps you out of your trance, reality slapping you in the face.

Micah.

Oh God. 

Micah.

You collapse onto your knees, not caring about the pain that flares up his leg as you cradle him in your arms.

He’s coughing up blood, and you have to force yourself to not to look at the gaping holes in his body.

You feel sick to your stomach.

This isn’t fair.

Micah doesn’t deserve this - no one deserves this.

“Shit - Micah…hold on kid, you’re s-safe I promise…” you choke out, near sobbing, so distraught that you don't even care about your language now.

You’d apologize later.

If- when - you and Micah go back to the tree. Together.

Micah smiles weakly, his lips stained in crimson. Streams of blood leak from his nose, as tears slip from his eyes as you brush them away with your sleeve.

“...Cow.”

“I- w-what?”

“You meant cow, r-right?” he says, and your heart snaps in two.

Here he was, dying because of you- and yet he still tried to make you smile. 

“M-Micah… p-please just stop talking, I’ll patch you up and we’ll be okay-”

He lets you continue your frenzied ramble as you try to staunch the wounds with your sleeves in a poor attempt to stop the bleeding.

A weak mumble of your name is what quiets you, the boy staring up into your wide, terrified and tear filled eyes.

After all, you were just kids.

Kids who the odds weren’t in favor of, kids with bad luck.

Just…two unlucky kids.

Brought here by the Capitol to send a message.

You had no power in the arena.

Even if you won - you were still losing.

You always would be.

“W-Win for m-me…okay?” he says, his voice cracking as you stroke his cheek, blood smearing against his skin.

You shake your head stiffly, more tears falling from your face. “No, no, no, no, no, don’t talk like that. Don’t talk like you’re going to-”

“W-when you do… tell the Capitol t-to get better bread… the kind from 9 with the golden wheat…s’good..” he mumbles his voice starting to slur.

Panic grips your heart so tightly you can’t breathe, suffocated by anything and everything, with no choice but to sit there and take it. 

“T-Tell my f-family I l-love them… o-okay? A-And tell my brothers that they can’t use m-my room when I-I’m g-gone.”

His words don’t make his face, salty tears running over dried blood that rolls down his neck, and you choke on your own tears, holding him close. His pale is ghostly pale, too pale.

“Micah p-please-”

“I love y-you… y-you were a good big s-sister. B-Best I ever had.” he says, smiling despite the tears in his eyes.

The cannon finally sounds as his eyelids flutter shut - the first one you finally register.

But the sound of the helicarrier coming to take him away is drowned out by the sound of your agonized cries.

You don’t move, even after you watch them - the Capitol - take him away from you.

You’re too lost in your sorrows to notice the pair of red eyes staring at you from the trees.

taglist: @attackonnat @ldk3347 @onlyisaa @luciapiacat @wonubby @snoopyluvrpao @kiromiix @delshmel@nijoll @babypeapoddd@mirajanestrauss1999 @kianatrg @blankk3 @witch-craft-works@midnight-drives-with-sunarin  @samxbaker@xanneeeyyyy@tom-hollands-blog @jazoewazoe @sixxe@poot2234@beabamboo@yiz5uo @ilikeyyouverymuch @hauntedodette@xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx@rosekeu@grimm3r @m4y4wasnthere@eyes4bkg @ghostsoapwhore @sunootzrose @ilovemushroomss @risu-li @kawliflo @jealousmartini

[fixationstationbaby]

Sometimes you spend nearly 4 hours making a drawing where you are the only target audience.

Yeah.

Oh boy I love games about trying to survive in an Underwater Location with the ultimate goal of reaching this specific thing that will supposedly aid in granting my freedom, all while terrifying things try to kill me every which way.

[coryndoll]

❛ we make each other alive . .

does it matter if it hurts? ❜

I’M COMING, WAIT FOR ME.

PLOT you enter the hunger games a proud weapon of your district, only to find your sharpest blade is the boy beside you, and you’re not sure which one of you the capitol wants to break first.

CONTEXT chapter five, best read in dark mode, caesars interviews, rafe and reader bonding, the last night before the games, i havent slept im so ready to start writing i havent even worked on the masterlist for this LMFAO sorry im spewing these out so much i just love thg

main masterlist | tag list | previous next

the day after the scores, you’re told it’s your rest day, but there’s no such thing as rest here.

enobaria calls it a “refining session.” brutus, on the other hand, tosses a lopsided grin and says, “boot camp.”

you literally don’t even laugh.

the two of them are already planted on the velvet couches in the living room when you step in, hair still damp, expression blank. rafe drifts in behind you and flops down beside you on the couch, one leg bent beneath him, his elbow thrown lazily over the back of the cushions. when brutus eyes him, he shrugs.

“what?” rafe says, stretching his arms with a quiet crack. “we’re all friends here.”

enobaria rolls her eyes. brutus just exhales like he doesn’t have the energy to argue.

what follows is not friendly. it’s sharp-edged and exhausting, a full-blown psychological breakdown of what you’re supposed to be tomorrow when you step on caesar flickerman’s stage. not who you are, but who they want you to become.

“you’re not just tributes,” enobaria says, pacing slow. “you’re symbols, metaphors, breathing metaphors. do you understand?”

you nod, though you’re not sure if you do.

brutus rubs a hand over his face. “we’re giving you roles to play,” he says, a little softer. “you have to sell yourselves to the capitol. they’re going to fall in love with the idea of you.”

they look at rafe first.

“you’re the knight,” enobaria says. “protector of panem. young soldier from district two. charming, powerful, noble. someone who doesn’t fight because he wants to kill, but because it’s his duty.”

“chivalrous,” brutus adds. “but intimidating when you need to be.”

“someone the audience trusts,” she finishes, “but knows better than to cross.”

rafe lifts an eyebrow. “so you want me to be terrifying and trustworthy?”

“exactly,” enobaria says, not missing a beat.

he leans back again, mouth twitching at the corner. “guess i can do that.”

you wish it were that easy. but they turn to you next. enobaria studies you for too long, like she’s trying to peel your skin back to see what’s underneath.

“you’re not fire,” she says. “don’t try to be.”

you raise your chin, something cold curls in your gut. okay.

“you’re elegance,” brutus says. “grace, a flower that blooms in the middle of a battlefield.”

enobaria steps closer. “you’re the divine feminine, not to be underestimated. you don’t fight for glory. you fight to survive. and when you do, you make it look like art.”

you don’t know whether to feel flattered or furious. how the fuck do you portray that in an interview?

instead, you just breathe in slowly, eyes fixed on the window across the room. you’re too tired to argue.

they give you sample questions, hypothetical answers. you sit there for over two hours, repeating lines until they sound rehearsed in your own head.

rafe plays along easily, his tone slipping into charm when he’s asked about his strengths, letting a grin tug at his lips. you catch glimpses of what he’ll be like on stage. it’s convincing. dangerously so.

you get a break after that, barely ten minutes. just long enough to want to be anywhere else.

you’re standing near the sliding doors to the balcony, arms crossed, head pounding. the sky’s just starting to turn a hazy kind of blue. the city below doesn’t look real. nothing here does.

behind you, you hear rafe’s voice. “you wanna go?”

you turn your head slightly. he’s holding open the door with one hand, eyebrows raised.

“spar,” he clarifies. “just you ‘n me.”

you don’t answer, just step past him. you roll your shoulders back as you turn to face him, bare feet shifting against the smooth tile.

“first hit wins?” you say.

he smirks. “you won’t land one.”

you launch at him without warning, and he catches your momentum easily, spinning to throw you off balance, but you recover fast, ducking under his arm and aiming a quick jab at his side. he dodges, just barely.

your bodies move in rhythm. it’s dance-like and clean. but he’s faster, more grounded. his strength is in his restraint. he never uses more force than necessary. you can tell he’s holding back again, testing you, watching how you move.

but you’re not weak. you’re sharp, light on your feet. your hits are quick and calculated.

there’s a moment where he catches your wrist and twists, and your breath catches, but instead of panicking, you roll with it, using your other hand to push him back, your legs sweeping under his.

he stumbles, just for a second. you both pause. then you laugh, he does too. you wipe sweat from your brow and shake your head. “you’re better at this than i thought.”

“i’m better at everything than you thought.”

you roll your eyes, but the tension in your chest has eased. the sparring is the most normal thing you’ve done in days.

he steps closer, not in a threatening way. he holds your gaze. “you’ll be good out there,” he says, voice low.

you don’t ask if he means the interview. or the arena. you just nod. “yeah,” you murmur. “you too.”

the morning of the interview, you wake before the sun.

there’s no need to, no call time that early, no knock on the door. but your body just knows, like it’s wired to the pressure now. your stomach turns the second your eyes open, heavy and hollow all at once. you lie there for a while in the dark, the sheets tangled around your legs.

you don't remember falling asleep. you barely remember yesterday. the rehearsals blurred together, your body and brain pushed past the point of tired, and now you're on the other side of it.

you keep hearing brutus’ voice in your head.

you don’t fight for glory. you fight to survive. and when you do, you make it look like art.

whatever the hell that means.

you rise slowly. everything you do feels deliberate now, like it matters. like they're watching. even now. even here.

you step into the shower and let the heat burn against your skin. it's too hot. you don’t care. the steam curls up around you, beads of water streaming down your back like they’re trying to rinse off the nerves, the fear, the truth of where you're going.

when you step out, you don’t bother looking in the mirror. you know what you’ll see. your prep team does, too.

they're waiting when you step into the room that’s been transformed into a personal studio. valis is standing to the side, arms folded in a sleek black outfit, surveying your approach like a general waiting for her soldier.

she doesn’t say anything at first. just looks you over and nods. you’re a canvas, and she’s about to make you perfect.

the prep team descends in silence, gloved hands on your shoulders, guiding you gently toward the chair. your damp hair is already being combed through, braided, twisted. there’s music playing somewhere, no real words being sung, but you barely hear it over the sound of your own thoughts.

you murmur to yourself under your breath, just words from yesterday’s rehearsal, like the phrases they drilled into you, the fake answers, the poised smiles, the things you’re supposed to say when they ask you about the games, or about your partner, or what makes you different from every other tribute.

you think about your parents, what they’ll see. you wonder if they’ll even recognize you when you step on that stage.

a warm hand lifts your chin, guiding your face as the stylists start to work. powder, shimmer, subtle contouring that sculpts your features but doesn’t hide them. they know the image valis is aiming for.

the dress appears partway through. someone wheels it in carefully, draped over a velvet mannequin, covered in clear silk. your eyes lock on it instantly.

it’s breathtaking.

it doesn’t scream district two. not really. but there’s a nod in the design. it’s less armor, more divine regalia.

you catch your reflection now.

valis steps up beside you and nods once. “you’ll have them in the palm of your hand.” but you don’t answer.

you’re standing in line.

the stage is just beyond the doors, a glowing, blinding light on the other side. the screen above will play each interview in real time, showing the faces of the tributes in front of you. it’s where you’ll laugh, charm, and lie.

the line forms by district, starting with one. you’re somewhere toward the front again, right behind topper. your heels are quiet on the smooth floor, your body still, your breath slow.

topper stands in front of you, hands loose at his sides, relaxed in a way only someone from district one can be. he plays with the button on his jacket, bouncing slightly on his heels. you can hear him humming. he’s not nervous. he’s performing.

diamonte is already on stage.

you don’t even realize you’ve been tuning her out until caesar starts clapping and thanking her. her voice was quiet, her answers clipped. gee, her mentor must be exhausted.

the moment she exits the stage, the prep team swarms her like flies. and once his name is called, topper steps forward, a grin blooming across his face like it’s second nature.

you let your attention drift as the cameras pan to him.

his laughter fills the hallway as he starts his interview, all teeth and charm and easy. caesar eats it up. so does the audience. you let your eyes flick to the screen above, only half-listening. it’s hard to focus. you’re running through every question brutus made you answer yesterday, every phrase enobaria made you repeat.

the words still live in your mouth like muscle memory.

you’re so deep in your head, you don’t realize your hand has drifted back until you feel something warm brush your fingertips.

you blink, focus sharpening. his fingers. rafes.

you glance down, startled, but don’t move. his hand is at his side too, casual like yours, but his fingers are grazing yours like they’re asking a question.

his movements are slow, hesitant, like he’s checking if you’ll pull away. but for some reason, you don’t. instead, your hand stays there.

rafes fingers finally press softly into yours, and you stare at the floor. his thumb brushes along the inside of your knuckle once, kind of grounding in a way.

it’s stupid. and still, you squeeze his hand back.

you don’t say anything. you don’t need to, you just feel the warmth and the way it anchors you for a second when the world feels like it might spin off its axis.

topper’s name is shouted overhead in that sing-song way caesar flickerman always does, a final cheer ringing out from the crowd. on the screen, topper flashes his signature smirk, presses a hand to his chest, nods once like he’s accepting a crown, and walks off into the wings where his team waits for him like he’s already won.

your hand tightens slightly around rafe’s. his thumb strokes yours once more.

then you hear your name.

his touch disappears, you’re the one pulling away. you take one breath, two, and you don’t look back. you lift your chin, and walk.

once you step out into the light, it floods you all at once. you feel the heat on your skin, the flutter in your chest. your shoes hit the stage like they belong here,

smile, you remind yourself. so you do. not too big. just enough.

your lips curve gently, like a subtle invitation. you walk like you’ve done this before. like you’ve walked on runways made of bone and silk. like you’ve never known fear.

you cross to the velvet armchair opposite caesar flickerman, who beams like he’s just seen a goddess step into his living room. his blue hair sparkles under the lights, suit more outrageous than ever. it’s something gold and high-collared tonight, glowing like it was made of static.

you sit, and the applause simmers down to a purr as caesar leans forward, hands clasped.

“welcome, welcome,” caesar says, beaming at you. “you look stunning, my dear. absolutely radiant. tell me—who is responsible for this masterpiece of a dress?”

you glance toward the audience, then down at the gown.

it’s a dark wine red, almost black under the lights. the fabric flows like water, high-necked with a slit up one leg, the cut hugging you like it was poured on. petals are made from delicate glassy mesh climb up the bodice, unfurling across your chest and one shoulder.

“valis and my prep team,” you say. your voice is clear, calm, just a little smoky. “they worked very hard on it, caesar.”

“they deserve a raise,” caesar says dramatically. the crowd laughs. “and is it true we have a theme going on with this look? i’m sensing something floral, something . . .”

you smile again. just slightly. “roses,” you say, letting the word linger. “a reminder that something beautiful can still be dangerous.”

a hush falls. then applause.

you see it in caesar’s eyes. you’ve got him. he adjusts in his seat. “now i have to say, there’s been a lot of talk about you. your training score was . . . well, let’s just say it had everyone leaning forward. and the quiet ones, oh, we know what they say about the quiet ones. i mean, it was the highest score received this year.”

you keep your expression unreadable. “what can i say?” you reply softly. “i prefer to let my actions speak for me.”

the crowd loves that. they cheer again. even caesar claps a little, but you feel yourself settle into the moment. you were born for this, weren’t you?

“so tell us,” caesar goes on. “what’s your strategy going into the arena? any strengths you want to share? anything we should be watching for?”

you pause for a breath.

“i’m not here to make friends,” you say simply “i’m here to survive.”

another pause.

“but i do think there’s a . . . poetry in surviving. it’s not just about killing. it’s about reading the arena, understanding people, knowing when to wait, and when to strike. and how to turn the odds.”

caesar whistles. “spoken like a true daughter of two! and is there anyone, back home maybe, who’ll be watching you closely?”

you let the question hang in the air. your eyes flick to the camera softly, and you nod. “i hope my parents are watching,” you say. “i hope . . . they know i haven’t forgotten who i am.”

that earns a quieter reaction. people are still respectful, just a little more curious. you don’t say anything else.

caesar stands with you, takes your hand, raises it to the crowd, “district two’s rose—y/n!”

the applause swells. you let them cheer, let them look at you and see exactly what you want them to see. you smile, but it never quite reaches your eyes.

you step offstage into a rush of motion. the applause is still buzzing in your ears. immediately, you're swallowed by hands. valis’ voice hits first, sharp with breathless praise.

“you were perfect,” she says, adjusting the fabric at your shoulder, like there’s something to fix even though there’s not. “the smile, the posture, the answers. perfect.”

your prep team swarms in next, touching your hair, smoothing your dress, giving you anxious, excited looks. they all talk at once. someone hands you water, someone else mutters something about a strand of hair being out of place. you don’t listen. not really.

enobaria appears behind valis, arms folded. “well done,” she says simply. “you said everything we wanted them to hear. you owned the room. didn’t overstay, didn’t overshare. you were exactly what we needed you to be.”

you nod, just once, like you’re absorbing it, but your eyes are already moving up, to the screen above the door.

caesar’s still standing on stage, soaking up the applause that followed your exit. “and now,” he announces, voice rising again, “please welcome to the stage . . . our male tribute from district two—rafe cameron!”

the camera follows him as he steps into the light. his suit is simple, dark, collar slightly open like he couldn’t be bothered to wear a tie. and a small, barely-there detail: a single rose pin at his lapel. it matches the petals from your dress.

he takes the chair opposite caesar, leans back like he’s done this a thousand times, like he’s not about to enter a deathmatch, but like he’s sitting at a bar about to tell you a story.

you don’t realize you’ve stepped forward until valis gently tugs your elbow, ushering you to sit. but you don’t sit. not yet. your eyes stay locked on the screen.

you watch as caesar leans in, grin wide. “rafe cameron. i think you’ve just broken quite a few hearts in this room.”

rafe’s laugh is low, warm. just the right amount of amused. “that’s not my intention,” he says. “but i’ll take the compliment.”

the audience swoons. you can already see the headlines. the capitol’s favorite solder, the face of two, panem’s protector.

“now, you’re quite the mystery, rafe,” caesar says, smiling. “the training scores don’t lie. and you’re not exactly the loudest tribute we’ve had, but there’s something about you . . . something commanding. tell us, where does that come from?”

rafe shrugs slightly. “i grew up around people who didn’t let words mean much,” he says. “they taught me that actions matter more. if i make it out of that arena, it won’t be because i talked my way through.”

gee, you two are looking like two peas in a pod now.

“so no fancy speeches?” caesar teases.

rafe smiles again, slower this time. “if i give a speech, it’s probably because i’m buying time to get behind you.”

the crowd loses it.

even caesar laughs, clapping his hands. “oh, i like you.”

valis murmurs something beside you, something about how his phrasing is perfect, how he’s sticking to the plan, how he’s a dream.

caesar asks about the arena next, like what he’ll do when it all starts.

“i’ll fight,” rafe says. “that’s what i’ve been trained to do.”

“and if you’re not the last one standing?” caesar asks, voice softer.

rafe pauses.

and for a second, you see it, something flickering in his expression. “then i’ll make sure the person who is . . . deserves to be.”

caesar lets the silence hang for just long enough before rising to his feet and calling out his name like a victory bell, “rafe cameron!”

the applause slams through the studio again as rafe rises, nodding once to the audience, then turning to disappear into the wings.

when rafe walks past the prep teams and camera cords, he doesn’t stop until he’s beside you.

you nudge his arm, “panem’s protector?”

he hums like you’re challenging him, “our rose of panem?”

you roll your eyes, but there’s a smile in it.

the ride back to the apartment is quiet. brutus has already mumbled something about calling it a night and disappears into his room the moment the elevator doors open. enobaria lingers in the living room, speaking in low, clipped tones into a thin communicator tucked into her wrist. a family call, maybe. her voice softens when she says the name lynna. it makes you smile, even though you don’t know who that is.

you don’t listen in anyway. it’s not your place.

instead, you let valis and your prep team start their work.

they're gentler this time, quieter, more careful, like they know tonight is different. it’s not just an end to the public show, but the last stretch of normalcy before it all crumbles into the arena tomorrow.

the dress is removed, handled like it’s priceless. and maybe it is. your skin is wiped clean, their fingers warm as they dab off every trace of shimmer, rouge, gloss. even the kohl lining your eyes. it’s all erased, like none of it ever mattered.

you're back in your loungewear again. it’s just you.

you hear the other prep team working on rafe in the room across from yours with muffled voices, maybe some quiet laughter. his team has always been a bit more relaxed than yours. you wonder if he’s smiling. if he’s pretending he’s not scared.

you don’t speak to each other yet. not with all these people still here. but when they finally start to pack up, hands gentle and final, you feel a strange kind of grief tug at your ribs, like losing something you didn’t even know you were holding.

valis kisses the top of your head before she leaves. you don’t stop her. she doesn’t say goodbye just yet. she’s probably saving it for tomorrow. but she squeezes your shoulder and goes.

rafe’s team probably does the same. you hear the soft footsteps and hushed murmurs, and then the front door hisses shut behind them, and it’s just the four of you now.

brutus is silent behind his door. snoring, probably.

enobaria’s still talking in the living room, but her voice is fading into something calmer. laughter, even.

you don’t mean to sit down on your bed. you just find yourself there. your fingers twist the edge of the blanket without thought. your gaze is trained somewhere between the floor and nothing at all.

you should rest, but your mind doesn’t want to. it’s loud now. strategies, maps, faces, weapons, alliances, weak points. it’s all there, all fighting for space in your head.

it feels like studying for an exam in school, except this time, a wrong answer doesn’t just mean a bad grade. it means a knife in your throat. a cannon fire. a name in the sky.

you hate that thought. you hate it. but it’s real. you have to be the one who survives. you can’t afford not to be. not after all this. not with how many people are counting on you. but then again . . . the games don’t care what you deserve. and luck doesn’t care either.

you’ve seen it in old games before. it doesn’t even matter if you’re strong, or fast, or smart. one misstep, one wrong branch or trap or breath, and it’s over. that’s what scares you, not the killing.

you shift and lay back, arms at your sides, eyes on the ceiling. you think about the arena, what it might be.

a sunken city, maybe. collapsing buildings, rusted steel and water pooling beneath cracked rooftops. a place where every step is a risk.

or maybe something dry and open. a desert with no real water source comes to mind. but no, they wouldn’t do that. it would end too quickly. there’d be no tension, no drawn-out battles, no long, bloody entertainment.

they need a spectacle this year. the tributes are too good. the scores too high. no one wants to see a short game.

you sigh, and roll to your side. the fabric of the blanket scratches slightly against your cheek. you’d watched the rest of the interviews once you were back in your room earlier. nothing stuck except for a girl from five. her name slips your mind, but not her face, her hands didn’t fidget when she spoke. and the guy from eleven. there was something in the way he hesitated before answering certain questions. something he didn’t want to give away.

you’ll remember that if you see them again. like, you’ll see him before the bloodbath surely, but once you’ve taken what you need tomorrow and start to survive in the arena? it’s weird to know you might never see them again.

you close your eyes for a second, but the quiet only sharpens. the light dims in your room after it’s suspected no movement from you, and you let it. maybe your room without light will make you calm down.

there’s a soft knock at your door, like three light taps.

you blink, lifting your head slightly, already assuming it’s enobaria. maybe she’s just checking in, saying goodnight before finally calling it. you half expect her voice on the other side, ‘rest up. don’t waste your nerves now.’

but instead, the door cracks open slowly, just enough to reveal a boyish, crooked smile, like he’s trying not to laugh. like he’s about to say something really stupid. your heart flickers in your chest when you realize it’s rafe.

he doesn’t say ‘wakey wakey,’ but the look on his face might as well scream it. he leans his head in a little more, eyes squinting like he’s checking if you’re already asleep. when your mouth twitches into a smirk, he smiles wider.

you sit up slowly, brushing a blanket wrinkle smooth with your hand. “you look like you’re about to break in and rob me,” you mutter, eyes squinting back at him, amused.

he gives a dramatic glance over his shoulder, like he’s being tailed, before slipping fully inside and nudging the door shut behind him with his heel.

“can i crash here for a bit?” he scratches the back of his head like it’s casual, like it’s normal for him to just be here, hovering in the half-dark with his hair still a little tousled from the prep team’s touch.

you raise an eyebrow, but he doesn’t explain. he just doesn’t have to. you figure he just wants to go over strategies, maybe revisit some of the things you two talked about earlier. one last brain meld before the big plunge. you nod and scoot back until you’re flush with your pillows, tugging the blanket over your lap and leaving plenty of space.

he takes the opportunity immediately like a damn cat. rafe shuffles across the floor in a quick motion and flops forward onto your bed, stomach first, the heels of his feet hanging off the edge. he sighs dramatically into your mattress like he’s just dropped the weight of the world behind him. which, to be fair, he kind of has.

for a little while, you just talk. nothing important. dumb things, mostly.

you make a joke about brutus’s snoring sounding like a broken hovercraft. rafe brings up how his prep stylist nearly burned off his eyebrows with some kind of capitol serum today. he mimics the voice of caesar from earlier, going all wide-eyed and grand, waving his arms in mock imitation, “the stunning, the spectacular, district two's shining girl, y/n!” and then immediately butchers your last name on purpose.

you laugh. you genuinely laugh. it feels strange in your throat. his grin is lazy, but then it gets quiet.

not awkward quiet. not heavy yet. just quiet enough that you can hear the tick of the wall clock and the hum of some ventilation system in the room. you realize you’ve been playing with your fingers for a while. twisting them in your lap, knuckles cracking faintly. your breath feels a little tighter.

he doesn’t say anything at first. but his head turns slightly toward you, like he knows it’s coming. and then you ask.

“do you think they’ll make it fast?”

he blinks, eyebrows pulling together slightly. “who?”

“any of us.” you keep your voice low. “or if they’ll . . . drag it out. for the audience.”

they always want a show when someone dies. the words feel like glass in your mouth, but you say them anyway. it’s too close to tomorrow not to. and the longer you hold them in, the more they burn.

rafe’s smile fades a little. he rolls onto his side to face you better, his elbow propped up beneath his cheek. “depends.”

“on what?”

he shrugs. “how interesting they think we are.”

you look at him, really look at him. you know that you two have to be one of the most interesting of the litter this year. no doubt about it. it’s not even being cocky, but you don’t even have to question whether you’re interesting enough.

his brows are furrowed, like he’s working through something of his own now. whatever mask he wears for everyone else, it’s off tonight. it’s just rafe. he exhales softly, like something’s sitting heavy in his chest.

“sometimes i think . . .” he starts, then stops. his fingers drum lightly against your blanket. “i think i’ve spent my whole life being trained to win a game i never actually wanted to play.”

your heart twists. none of his words are you. you can’t relate to that, at least not fully, but you shift slightly closer. “then why play?” you ask, just above a whisper.

he stares at the ceiling. “because people expect me to. and because if i don’t . . . someone else dies in my place, i guess?”

he turns his head toward you again, his eyes softer than before. you both sit in the quiet for a long moment.

at some point, you don’t know what time it is, don’t even bother to check the clock, but you know the night’s not long enough. not with tomorrow looming the way it is. the games. the arena. the countdown that won’t stop ticking.

rafe’s still lying on your bed, arms folded under his head, his legs half hanging off the edge. his shirt is rumpled, and there’s a faint line across his cheek from where he must’ve pressed his face against his arm a little too long. he’s quiet, but not asleep. you can tell. his eyes are still open.

you don’t talk at first. it’s the kind of silence that doesn’t feel awkward, just tense, like you’re both listening to the same thing.

nothing will be the same after tomorrow.

you shift, pulling your blanket higher over your lap, fingers fidgeting with the edge. rafe swallows, shifting slightly.

“i think . . .” he starts, voice low as he breaks the silence. he hesitates. you don’t think it’s the kind of hesitation that means he doesn’t know what he’s about to say, but maybe it’s the kind where he does, and it scares him.

finally, his voice breaks through the hush again, “i think my dad rigged the reaping for me.”

you blink, hard. your first reaction is confusion. your mouth parts slightly, like the words don’t compute. you stare at him, processing. “what?”

he finally shifts. he sits up slightly, resting his elbows on his knees, like he can’t say it lying down. “i think my dad rigged the reaping,” he says again, quieter now. like he’s still not sure if saying it out loud makes it more real or less.

you just stare. your brain takes a second to catch up. “okay, but how can . . . how can someone even do that?”

he huffs. “if they’ve got enough pull. i told you my dad’s a high-ranking peacekeeper. i wouldn’t put it past him.”

you just watch him.

he runs a hand through his hair. “i’m eighteen, it’s my last year. last shot. he’s been pushing for this forever since i was a kid, always said it was ‘in my blood’ or whatever as if he ever did it when he was my age. warriors, winners, glory, all that bullshit. i thought maybe i’d made it through. like maybe he gave up. but then my name got called and . . .” he shakes his head. “i knew.”

the silence between you thickens.

“so,” you say slowly, “you didn’t even want . . . to be here.”

“not like this.” he says it flatly, like he’s already accepted it. like it’s just a fact.

you nod, but your stomach turns. you think about how fast you raised your hand, how fast you moved toward the stage. how you didn’t even hesitate. you wanted it. you asked for it. and he didn’t. he was shoved in, boxed up and dropped into it like a piece on a game board.

you look away for a second, a sharp tightness in your chest. guilt? maybe. maybe something more complicated than that. you shouldn’t care. don’t get too attached. everyone should accept their fate, but for some reason, you just can’t let this shake.

“i didn’t know it could even be rigged,” you say after a moment.

“most people don’t. the blame would go immediately to the capitol for it, and they can’t afford that. already have too much to worry about.”

you glance back at him. he’s looking straight ahead now, somewhere past the door, unfocused. he looks tired. not in the way everyone looks tired, but in a way that’s deeper. oh. he’s been carrying this for too long.

“so then what was it like?” you ask. “growing up with him.”

he doesn’t answer right away. then he laughs dryly. “loud. exhausting.” he rubs at his jaw. “everything was a test. everything had a consequence. there was no playing. no room for mistakes. if i cried, i was weak. if i hesitated, i was a failure. he used to time me doing drills in the backyard. would get pissed if i didn’t beat my last record.”

you don’t say anything. you’re not sure what you could.

“i don’t think he ever really saw me,” rafe mutters. “just some idea of who he wanted me to be.”

you shift closer without thinking, just enough that your knee almost touches his. your blanket shifts with you. you don’t say anything dramatic, don’t try to fix it. you just sit there with him.

“i’m sorry,” you say hesitantly, quietly, something you’re not used to. but you’ve been thinking that maybe you should now.

he shrugs. “nothing to be sorry for. just how it is.”

you nod. it’s quiet again. but this time it feels different. there’s no performance here. no prep team, no sponsors, no cameras.

he leans back again, rests his head against the bed, eyes shut. you keep your gaze down.

he stays quiet for a while like he’s trying not to think too hard. and then, after a few more seconds pass, he speaks. “oh, but what about you?” he asks. “what were you like before all this?”

you glance over at him. “what do you mean?”

“before the games, or the training center, or before your name was even in the pool. what’d you care about? what’d you want?”

you don’t answer right away. the question sits in your chest like a stone.

he isn’t asking in that surface-level way people do, the way interviewers or capitol hosts might. he isn’t fishing for a soundbite. he’s just asking because he wants to know. maybe because it makes everything feel a little less isolating if he knows someone else used to be a real person too.

you press your tongue to the inside of your cheek. sigh. “i don’t know. i think i was bored.”

it’s a poor way of starting this, but thankfully he doesn’t say anything. he just watches you, listening.

you shrug a little. “my mom works in records for the district. basically just moves files around and makes sure everyone else is on time. it’s as dull as it sounds. she's been doing the same thing since before i was born. every day. same path to work, same lunches. she gets home, sits in the same chair, turns on the same channel, and that’s her night.”

you pick at the blanket in your lap. “my dad’s a peacekeeper too. nothing like yours, i think, but he plays the game. he keeps his head down, follows orders. they’re both good people. i know it. i think they’re just . . . resigned. like they don’t expect anything more. i was probably gonna end up doing what my mom does, to take over her job eventually. get slotted into the same chair, the same shifts. get used to silence.”

your voice drops. “and yeah, i didn’t want that.” you glance at rafe again, “i didn’t want to be invisible.”

you laugh once. “i thought volunteering would make me matter. thought it’d give me some kind of identity, some pride. like maybe people would look at me and see me for once, i guess.”

he doesn’t answer right away, and for a second you wonder if it sounds ridiculous out loud. like a kid trying to win gold stars in a system designed to kill them.

but rafe just nods, slowly. “makes sense.”

you exhale, finally letting your back rest against the wall too. you turn your head slightly. “what about you?” you ask, softer now. “if you didn’t get reaped. if your dad didn’t, whatever the hell he did to get you here, what would you be doing right now?”

his jaw clenches a little. you can tell he’s thinking, but you can also tell the answer’s not easy.

“i’d be home,” he says finally. you glance at him, but you don’t push. “probably walking sarah to school,” he adds. “she hates waking up early. always complains the whole way there.”

a faint smile tugs at the corner of his mouth, but it doesn’t last long. “wheezie would already be up, probably trying to get out of eating whatever our stepmom cooked for breakfast. she used to slip it into her jacket pocket and then flush it when no one was looking.”

you smile, just a little. it’s the first time you’ve heard him talk about them. “you have siblings?”

he huffs a breath, a little like a laugh but not really. “yeah. two sisters. sarah’s sixteen. we used to fight all the time, over nothing. she’s stubborn as hell but she’s smart. too smart, sometimes. wheezie’s thirteen. she’s got this habit of pretending she’s not listening, but she remembers everything. like . . . everything. it’s creepy.”

you smile, surprised. not because he has sisters, though that’s new, but because of the way he’s talking. you’ve never heard him like this. not in the training center. not in the interviews. not even on the rooftop.

“they sound like a handful,” you say.

“they are.” he pauses, then adds, quieter, “they’re good, though. better than me. wheezie would slack off during training more than me, but sarah’s good for it. all the camerons are.”

“you think they’re watching?” you ask.

he shakes his head. “i hope not. not if they’re smart.” he exhales slowly through his nose like he’s trying not to let something show. “they probably think i volunteered, talked my dad into saying my name,” he mutters. “i wonder if that’s worse.”

you don’t say anything. you don’t know what the right thing would even be.

he runs a hand down his face and lets it drop, then turns to glance at you. “any siblings?”

you shake your head. “just me.”

he nods like he figured. “that explain the volunteering?”

you almost laugh. “no. i mean . . . maybe a little.”

he waits. doesn’t push. but he’s looking at you now, and it feels like you owe him something, but you’ve already said it. “i just didn’t want to end up like my mom, you know,” you say like he already understands, and he does.

he looks at you for a beat longer, then nods like he gets it.

you both fall quiet again. you’re tired, and not just physically. it’s in your bones now, all of it. but sitting here, next to him, it’s a little easier to breathe.

and neither of you says it out loud, but you both know this might be the last night you ever get to talk like this. maybe that’s why it matters so much. maybe that’s why you don’t want to move.

but then there’s another knock. you and rafe both glance up at the same time, barely a beat after it lands, and the door creaks open. enobaria stands in the doorway, shoulder leaned into the frame. she lifts an eyebrow, clearly amused.

“are you two having a sleepover?” she drawls.

you deadpan right back, “why, you wanna join?” you toss her a look over your shoulder, one part playful, one part exhausted. it’s not a real invite, but it’s not not one either. you’ve never seen her act normal.

she huffs, something that’s almost a laugh, and crosses the room to pull the desk chair out. it gives a small squeak as she turns it around and drops into it backwards.

“cute,” she mutters. “but let’s talk strategy again.”

you groan immediately, flopping backwards like she’s just sentenced you to death early. rafe doesn’t miss a beat either, dropping his head until his forehead nearly hits the mattress, arms sprawled out beside him.

“what is this, homework?” you mutter into your pillow.

enobaria doesn’t smile this time. she’s watching both of you now, eyes sharp, tone steady. “listen,” she says. “you can complain all you want, but in the next week, one of you might die. or both of you. i’m not gonna sugarcoat it. i’m not good at that. but i know what works.”

you sit up again, slowly. rafe’s already half-propped on his elbows, listening now, even if his head’s still turned to the side.

“you two watch each other’s backs,” she says. “no matter what. no splitting up unless you have to, and even then, you circle back. don’t assume anyone’s dead unless you see it with your own eyes. and if it happens, if one of you goes, you make it mean something. don’t let it be for nothing.”

you can feel your throat tighten and your stomach turns. you glance at rafe. he doesn’t even look at you.

enobaria leans forward. “you don’t have to kill each other,” she says. “but one of you needs to come back. one of you has to. you understand me?”

you nod. it’s faint. rafe gives a slow blink. another nod.

“use everything you’ve learned,” she continues. “everything. don’t wait to be clever. if it’s brutal, be brutal. if it’s manipulative, fine. lean into it. alliances are fine for the first few days, but they always burn out. you two are a unit. don’t forget that.”

you shift in place, something in you itching. “you’ve seen this a lot, huh?” you ask.

enobaria gives a quiet nod. “more than i’d like.” she leans back again, resting her head briefly on the top of the chair.

“last year’s kid from four, ria, remember her? she got cocky in the final five. thought she had enough food stockpiled to wait the others out. didn’t account for an acid rain trigger that melted her stash. by the time she had to come out, she was half-starved and stumbled right into the final three’s ambush.”

you wince.

enobaria’s voice drops lower, thoughtful. “always account for change. for traps. for things that feel unfair. because they are. it’s a game, but it’s also a show. that means it’s rigged for drama. that means they want surprises. don’t fall into them.”

you nod again, slower this time. “okay.”

she exhales, like she’s getting tired of the weight of her own words. then she adds, almost offhandedly, “also . . . i don’t know. if it gets desperate, you could always start a fake romance or something. no one’s done a believable one in a while.”

you groan like she’s your older sister telling you something you don’t wanna hear, but rafe huffs out a soft laugh into the mattress.

she grins. “i’m just saying. the capitol eats that stuff up. doesn’t have to be real.”

“goodnight,” you say, waving her out.

“just keep it in your pocket,” she smirks, standing. you scowl at her through narrowed eyes. rafe’s still half-buried in the bed, clearly choosing not to comment. enobaria starts for the door. “get some rest. you’ll be up late enough tomorrow.”

you turn your head on your pillow as she leaves, watching her go. she stops in the doorway just once more.

“noon,” she reminds the two of you. “we’ll say our goodbyes then.” and then she’s gone.

the door clicks shut, leaving the room. you exhale hard into your pillow, bury your head deeper into it.

rafe hasn’t moved much. he’s still stretched out across your bed, holding himself up on his elbows, staring at the far wall like it might offer answers.

you stare at the pillow beside you. you don’t know why, but neither of you say anything. you just sit there, processing.

@nicholaschavezslut69 @iissza @snowtargaryen @yootvi @ariiwritess @spideysimpossiblegirl @skyslowalking @adribarbie @obsessionsarenotfortheweak @0-tatiana-0 @beebeerockknot @rafestar @drewstarkeyzwhore @drewsephrry @annaconscience @writtenbyhollywood @yourtypicalteenagegirl @daisydark @v4mpscrms @issahruiz @ilovefictionallmenn @derpjungkook @vanessa-rafesgirl @sunny1616 @alphabetically-deranged @nrmlgirl @supercxnt @xoxosblogsblog @rafegetinmybed @siyahmoonlight @livie4lifestarkeyblyth @d-daxx @tsumudoll @ogcrashout @jjasmiineee @loverliner @ailimedae @belle101200 @hiimbrina @nomup @ayy1234567 @girxwrp @k4yr14

[derangedchameleon]

So I‘ve been hearing everybody talk about how similar young Haymitch is to both Katniss and Peeta. With Katniss‘ „things will never change so don‘t think about it“ attitude, family relations, and tendency towards reckless behaviour, and Peeta‘s „I don‘t want them to change me“ and and belief in humanity, and ability to sway a crowd.

What I have not been hearing is his similarities with Gale (please don‘t stone me I don‘t like the guy much either) but seriously! As soon as Haymitch went running straight at Snow with Louella in his arms all I could think was „Had Gale been reaped, this would have been him.“

Haymitch is way more openly rebellious than either Katniss or Peeta on day 1. Gale would have never been able to be subtle about his rage. I hear people say constantly that Gale would have played the game perfectly and ruthlessly (probably because of his „killing people isn‘t different from killing animals“ comment (which I honestly think he only said to make it easier on Katniss, since in order to survive she‘d have to kill anyway)), but I think they‘re really selling the absolute ball of rage that this boy is short. He has been the primary caretaker for a family of 5 since age 13. He is cursed to end up in the mines where his father died, while all he wants is to be out in nature. I think his rage is very comparable to Maysilee‘s. Stuck. With no hope for a way out. So he often misdirects his rage (example: his snide comment at Madge‘s pin), just like she does with her meanness in the beginning.

Yes Gale‘s rage would have ended up much more targeted towards the careers (that chocolate scene would never have happened) but he would have 100% been hyped at the idea of blowing up the arena and would have been all in. And hey. Maybe his rage would have become more directed at the capitol after his reaping, just like Maysilee‘s did.

Even in family relations Gale and Haymitch are quite similar. Yes Gale had 3 siblings to take care of instead of 1, but their mothers are very much alike. Being present and working in a laundry business even after the tragic deaths of their husbands in the mines. And Haymitch‘s little brother is way further to him in age than Prim was to Katniss. The only year in which Haymitch could have possibly volunteered for Sid would have been in his own final reaping year. The same for Gale and Rory. And then there‘s also the fact that, had Haymitch‘s twin sisters not been born early… he would have also had 3 siblings to take care of instead of the one.

Anyway I think if Gale had been reaped, he would have ended up acting a LOT like Haymitch in the games. People forget that his sadistic streak and true loss of perspective on who the true enemy is happened after the bombing of 12. (also it‘s not like he gave the order to use those bombs on the rebels, or even had the idea to use them against the rebels, and Beetee designed the things but somehow he gets a free pass)

I think Gale would have 100% ended up a failed Mockingjay. The biggest difference between Gale and Haymitch, I think, is that after Snow comes and burns his family (and probably also Katniss) to the ground for his rebellion, he wouldn‘t collapse. He‘d just get more angry, maybe try and stage his own private assassination attempt on Snow idk.

Anyway. My point is. There are also similarities between Haymitch and Gale (and also cut Gale some slack guys. He‘s an incredibly complex character and I think a big part of the hate he receives is blown out of proportion)

[reclusiarch-orm]

I would very much recommend "Valdor: Birth Of The Imperium" as early reading in the Heresy. Even though its not technically in the Heresy, it picks out some of its themes beautifully. The narrative echo of treason. The omens of events that will replay. That will ALWAYS replay, as long as human beings are refashioned into weapons. Deprived of their potential for all else.

A key theme of the story is that "warriors can't exist without a war". And how, in creating an immortal warrior caste, you lock humanity into that war. This early, fate was already sealed. Warriors will fight to fight. To avoid obsolescence. Elevated to near godhood, mortals cannot tear them down again.

Ushotan vs Valdor gets the core of "treason" much better than what's actually written for Horus. Valdor is nothing. He is no one. Not on the inside: he is fully, completely hollowed out. And he is the perfect tool. He is the true realisation of the Emperor's vision. He's a murdered man. That's the price of loyalty. He has nothing. He has no self. He is dead.

Ushotan is made imperfect, destined to die not just for his "fate" as a traitor. But for the very biology of what he is. His body would soon collapse and kill him, even if he was to survive this story. He knows it. And still, he is so searing hot and ALIVE. He has none of what Valdor has, and yet has everything he doesn't.

The emperor is shown as the traitor that HE is, as well. How he turns on those who swore loyalty to him; HE shows them what treason is. He massacres the Thunder Warriors. He creates them, asks for their lives and loyalty, then turns on them. He is the arch traitor. He wanted to make a peaceful, prosperous humanity, yet he made warriors, and warrior gods to lead them. He made war. He made immortal oppressors.

Then a lot of lore in general about the creation of the primarchs, the games played with chaos, the lies and lies and lies. It's a good book. You should read it, if you are interested in the themes of treason and the philosophies behind this world. It's one of my favorite books in the setting, easily.

[akdw]

When thinking about rebellious acts in Sunrise in the Reaping, Maysilee and Haymitch's more obvious, blatant ones is the instant thing you think about. But the other tributes defy the Capitol in more indirect ways or symbolize it.

Wyatt disproved Snow's worldview and the main point of the Hunger Games-He knew all the odds, he had it all calculated, he was older than quite a lot of the tributes and did have a chance at fighting. He knew this, he could've slipped from making any dumb mistakes and have been laser-focused on survival, but instead, he jumped in front of Lou Lou at first sight of danger. He didn't have to; Lou Lou's odds were almost nonexistent. He knew he shouldn't. But he did because he cared about Lou Lou, he was her caretaker. That's humanity and goodness at its core.

Louella represents just how incompetent and foolish the Capitol is; Messing things up, scrambling to kill and cover every wrong thing up, making a mess of things. Louella's death shows what big screw-ups they were, how when they finally tightened things up with the districts, they got taken down eventually anyways.(The original boy tribute, Woodbine Chance, can also represent this)

Lou Lou, of course, is blatant. Always yelled at the Capitol people for murdering them. Accused them of the murderers they were, freaked Caesar out, made the Gamemakers scramble to cover up her screams at the interview. She might've not been in the right mind, but she howled at the Capitol people, calling them as are; Not people saving humanity from an all-out war, not people saving others from the worst of themselves, but just plain-out murderers.

[socksual-innuendos]

What are ghouls?

we just don't know....

Some ghoul biology headcanons and some review of the two different ghoulification methods (as supported and not by canon)

If you have listened to any of my ramblings about the show, you know I hate the implication of all ghouls being obligate addicts to prevent going feral. However, given what we know of the themes of Fallout and some confirmations in both Fo:Prime and FO4, I've decided there might be some interesting implications here, along with further looks into what makes ghoul go ghoul.

So what are ghouls?

Well, a short description from what we see from the wiki/games/canon is that ghouls are those exposed to radiation that don't die of radiation poisoning and instead mutate, with exposure means varying from accidental exposure from the bombs/irradiated areas, to outright deliberate exposures via experimentation, hopes for immortality, or simply listed as.....serum.

The games have shown us that the process of ghouling isn't just novel to humans, nor is it just novel to humanoid shapes (see; Harold).

There isn't a set reason on what exactly predisposes someone to ghouling vs dying of radiation sickness, nor is there parameters on what makes them go feral. This leaves room for the fun, and where I got the hair up my ass to make a long form post.

So lets start with the obvious;

There are two subsets of ghouls,

One is directly radiation induced. These are the ones we are most familiar with.

The other is drug induced. These we have a few examples of, with little to no explanation of....why is there a ghoul drug. At least not a direct reason is given for "Drug that turns you ghoul". I however have some headcanons on how this came about.

In this post I will cover a few topics relating to ghoul qualities and how they vary between the two subtypes. These will be;

I. Modes of Creation: How We Go Ghoul and What This Implies II. Biological Quirks III. Ferals. What Are They, What Causes Them, And Why Aren't They Attacking Each Other IV. The Rotting vs Chem-Heads: Interpersonal Politics Within Non-Feral Ghoul Populations

I. Modes of Creation: How We Go Ghoul and What This Implies

Ghouls Created by Radiation Exposure

So you've just survived the nuclear holocaust. What's next? Well, if the onset of radiation sickness is anything to go by, then not much....

Unless you're one of the lucky few who ghoulify.

But what causes one to ghoulify and another to succumb to the radiation? What exactly in the genes make one turn while another simply dies. The exact question does not seem to have an answer in canon, however we are shown in several cases that Pre-War was not afraid to experiment with radiation.

While in some instances these experimentation involved medications or chemicals (see: next section), there is mention of controlled exposures to radiation being something studied.

This experimentation can be seen through Vault Tec Vaults (Vault 12) and implied in a few pre-war medical buildings/holotapes (Robco Buildings, the accounts of Control Subject Peters) and with outright accounts, such as Eddie Winters and Desmond Lockhart.

In short, while we don't precisely know if Pre-War knew that ghouls from radiation exposure were truly and properly immortal, or even considered them as a "successful" rabbit hole to pursue for immortality, we know that experiments to study the effects of radiation sickness were performed. In some cases, the exposure was to test for serums and medications that would hopefully prevent/reverse radiation sickness (And likely how we got Rad-X/RadAway. See: FO4s Control Patient Peter's Logs).

We do however see that this mode is likely the most common mode for many of the ghouls of the wastelands. Pre-War ghouls that were not part of radiation exposure experiments were often times implied to be those not from areas directly in blast range and rather came into radiation exposure after they crawled out through the falled-out, baby (kill me). However, those directly in the blast that weren't vaporized are often implied to immediately be turned feral (Camp Searchlight, and other similarly directly hit areas), though sections such as Lonesome Road and certain in-game ghouls prove that some do not immediately turn feral.

These ghouls are described as experiencing radiation sickness that never got around to killing them. They experience the GI upset, hemorrhaging, "illness" (fever), confusion, sloughing of necrotic tissues, and so on, before stabilizing into what we call ghouls. It is assumed that they eventually hit the "regenerative" stage of ghoulification after their bodies succumb to these symptoms. This may be evident due to radiation exposed ghouls having the intense healing potentials as ghouls, but never "gaining back" normal, non rotting appearance.

Ghouls Created by Biochemical Means

We know through Hancock that there is an "experimental radiation drug" that can ghoulify people. We see something similar in FO:Prime, with Thaddeus taking a "healing serum" from the Chicken Fucker and how it looks (both in color and method of using) similar to that of the chem that The Ghoul uses/depends on. We are given both The Ghoul and one of his acquaintances (Ass Jerky) as direct examples of being dependent on this chem to prevent going feral.

According to the wiki, there are implications of two different types of chems that can cause a person to ghoul, directly quoted with "This does depend on the type of the drug"

While I am not too certain that these drugs differ all that much, I have a headcanon about why the wiki needed to state multiple types of chems that ghoulify an individual.

Firstly that there is mention of experiments for immortality. I believe that this may be an "all roads", a converging of methods to one end, type scenario. One or more of the major corporations was trying to unlock the secrets to immortality, however in this world that usually comes to the end of "ghoulifying" in some manner. I believe this is the drug-type that those like Hancock had found and used.

Secondly, I believe there are other handful of instances where some tried to create failed (or even prototype) Rad-X like medications (or even some kind of advanced form of Stimpakbi) prior to the war as a "Keep this in your prep-kit" first-aid. This would be the direct medication (and in long post-war scenarios "Copy Cat" medication) that those like The Ghoul and ghouls in Fallout: Prime are dependent on. This would easily explain how some people, pre-war (such as Cooper Howard, before his persona switch into The Ghoul) who may seem resistant to the idea of experimental or even promised immortality, would accidentally become a ghoul who is obligatorily stuck taking this medication. This being an assumed Rad-X/Immediate big wound healing-like drug would also allow for easy accidental (or deliberate) manufacturing post-war selling of it. Home brewed variations of a radiation resistant/Stimpak medication can sometimes have opposite effects, and this may be how some people "accidentally" become biochemically created ghouls.

We can however see that there is a market created for biochemical ghouls and their stabilizing medications as both F76 and FO:Prime show that these drugs are manufactured post-war and specifically for ghouls.

The wiki mentions that biochemically created ghouls retain their appearances longer than radiation created ghouls, however ultimately they begin their own process of becoming what we know more traditionally as ghouls.

Now let's move on to how they differ as ghouls;

II. Biological Quirks

Ghouls are defined by a few qualities;

Extended lifespan (functionally immortal), enhanced healing factors, immunity to disease, radiation perks, nourishment requirements, and sterility/reproduction.

We will dive into each of these topics and discuss that while both ghouls may share these qualities, there may be some variance into the extent or modes of how these qualities present.

Extended Lifespan:

We have come to understand and observe that ghouls will live, functionally, forever, unless killed. This point is fairly straight forward, however going feral is an ever present fear amongst both irradiated ghouls and biochemical ghouls. While we will explore ferals later on in this post, we will note that this can be seen as its own form of "death" within certain ghoul communities.

Enhanced Healing Factors:

We are both shown and told that ghouls have incredible healing abilities. While they cannot regrow limbs, it is shown that they can reattach missing body parts so long as one is available to graft.

We will get into nourishment needs in its own section, however I believe that the healing factors also extend here. Ghouls can sustain themselves longer without food or water due to some work of their healing factors, however this creates a strain on the body that makes injury recuperation dampen slightly.

However, while ghouls tend to be able to regenerate from bodily injury with ease, we can see some examples of preexisting conditions not being healed (a directly given example is Hugo Stolz, who remains blind even after ghoulification). This may be explained with the same reason as to why ghoul skin is necrotic and does not seem to heal itself. My personal justification is that anything that happens prior to a ghoul "stabilizing" is almost always permanent.

Another thing to note is how this regeneration may be an imperfect process. This may be best illustrated with how biochemical ghouls have a slower "ghouling" of their appearance. It is mentioned that "accumulating damage will change the ghoul's appearance over time". This implies that sometimes healing from an injury is not done perfectly. This may also explain why some ghouls have different disfigurements or gain degenerative conditions such as arthritis, loss of vision, or hearing.

Immunity To Disease:

We know that ghouls have an amazing ability to regenerate, however it is not gone into detail about how they are "unaffected by most common diseases". I personally believe there is some nuance to this between irradiated ghouls and biochemical ghouls.

Irradiated ghouls no longer have an immune system. This was something destroyed and not gotten back (much like how areas of skin will slough off and not regen). However, due to their body's base radiation retention there are very few ailments that can actually infect an irradiated ghoul to being symptomatic. Their bodies are generally inhospitable to outside invading organisms.

Biochemical ghouls on the other hand retain some of their immune system and have a lesser resistance to disease than an irradiated ghoul. However they have a better resistance than an unmutated human to diseases.

Both ghoul types rely on their bolstered resistance to disease and their healing factors to protect against diseases as most medications do not work on them, or at least have a lessened overall efficacy. Again this goes off the logic from the wikia that a ghoul's healing factors provide some dampening effects to chems. Also through this logic, poisons tend to also need to be administered in much higher doses for a ghoul to even feel the effects of it.

While most medications do not tend to effect ghouls or only work at higher dosages, there is a special interaction they have with Rad-X and RadAway.

Radiation; Resistance To And Effects Of:

Ghouls are especially known for their resistance to radiation. This is a quality that is as associated with them as the potential of going feral is. However, I headcanon some key differences between the ghoul types and their interactions with radiation.

Irradiated ghouls stand to gain the most from radiation, for obvious reasons. While traveling through the warm glowing fields of areas still emitting high levels of radiation is a perk in and of itself, they also stand to gain some physical benefits from this as well.

With the example of the Marked Men, it is shown that ghouls can subsist off radiation alone. I also believe this bolsters their base healing factors. Toss a bag of meat pulped ghoul into a nuclear waste spill and he'll join you for dinner in a few hours.

Irradiated ghouls are canonically mentioned to also hold onto their radiation exposure, where some even become glowing ones. I do think that a ghoul must have moments of "recharge" to remain glowing ones, as over time radiation decays off the body. While the short term doesn't seem to be effected by this, for beings who can live hundreds of years, some can see fluctuations of internal radiation retention.

Almost comically, while ghouls have no direct use for RadAway, they can use it to drop this retained radiation. This however is dangerous for Irradiated ghouls...

There is however mentions that radiation exposure can be a risk factor of feralization. We will go into further detail later on, however I will touch on this now.

Concentrated blasts of radiation can be dangerous for both ghoul types, however high radiation exposure over time is more a risk factor for biochemical ghouls going feral than irradiated ghouls. On the other hand, irradiated ghouls using RadAway would put them at a higher risk for going feral. Thankfully this later issue is not something most irradiated ghouls need to consider. Most documented RadAway use in ghouls is for retined radiation regulation for those choosing to stay within human colonies.

Nourishment Requirements:

The wiki seems to be pretty inconsistent with this, so I take this as an invite to shoehorn my headcanons in. The wiki says that ghouls do need to feed and water themselves to stay alive, however we are given a few instances where this is heavily not the case.

Outright, we are given exceptions to the rule with Coffin Willy, Woody, Billy Peabody (fridge kid), and The Ghoul, all of whom had scenarios of being deprived of food and water and survived for extended periods (and more egregiously so is Billy, who was trapped in a fridge starving and thirsty for over 200 years).

This is justified however by them being in "a hibernation like state", however other examples are also the Marked Men, who are said to be sustained off radiation alone. These ghouls are shown to be in an active and alert state. Raul himself mentions baking in the sun for several days, and while unmoving, had to trek three days back to civilization afterwards. We may see other examples of this through dialogue implications where ghouls may be deprived of food and water needs for durations that would kill a regular human.

I believe however that this can be dangerous for ghouls, especially given our next discussion of feralization.

It is worth noting that the wikia says ghouls have lost their sense of taste. While this may be a common phenomenon, we see it may not necessarily hold true due to comments from ghoul companions regarding flavor preferences. (See: Raul's sweet tooth)

Sterility/Reproduction:

While it is broadly understood that ghouls cannot reproduce, the wiki does not dive into much more detail here. I, however, propose that while radiation as a whole is detrimental to the reproductive system, coupled with the regenerative effects of ghouls, there are some...unfortunate outliers within this topic.

In regards to spermatogenesis, sperm count is at a constant low. Assuming there is anything produced, it is almost always malformed in someway.

In regards to ovum, almost all remaining eggs within the ovaries are considered mutated and non-viable. While menstruation is not unheard of in ghouls, it is more likely to occur in biochemical ghouls. However, all cycles are highly abnormal with next to no regularity. Ghouls will eventually hit a 'menopause', however this is not conventional in timeline as with humans.

While viability of either gamete is near non-existent, this doesn't not confirm absence of fertilization. Most common cases of fertilization is that between human egg cells and ghoul sperm cells. While this often ends with miscarriage in the blastocyst stage, implantation has happened in even rarer cases. Intervention is usually needed as this often is ectopic or produces continual hemorrhage. In even rarer cases, these can produce teratoma type "pregnancies".

Very rarely does a ghoul egg cell get fertilized. It is almost undocumented and it is believed this is due to every instance of fertilization is miscarried before or soon after implantation.

Within the realm of sexual disease, there is few directly infectious agents to worry about between ghouls. However, for ghouls with human partners it is encouraged to use barrier-type protection or other means to limit radiation exposure. Necrotic tissue is also a concern, especially when exposed to mucosa membranes. Exposure of irradiated semen to these membranes is also another large concern for human partners. Condoms are highly encouraged, with rad-checks and use of RadAway being another measure to facilitate healthy measures for these relations.

III. Ferals. What Are They, What Causes Them, And Why Aren't They Attacking Each Other

So let's talk ferals. Aside from the rotting flesh smell and appearance, the threat of going feral is among one of the biggest factors that non mutants use for ostracizing ghouls, and one of the biggest threats that ghouls face.

While we understand what causes feralization and know risk factors, what precisely makes one turn feral while another doesn't is about as well understood as what makes some go ghoul in the first place.

Feralization is described as a degenerative process of the mind and, in late stages, the body.

In this section we will cover a few things;

1.) Risk factors and how they fluctuate between ghoul sub-types. 2.) Behaviors of ferals 3.) Inter-community treatment of ferals

Risk Factors: What Are They And How They Differ Between Ghoul Subtypes:

We are of the understanding that ghouls can turn feral when experiencing certain physical or mental stressors. These stressors are reported as follows;

Social Isolation Poor Mental State/Intense Emotional Stressors Exposure to Intense Radiation Genetic Factors

While the above are wiki provided risk factors, I have included some of my own accepted risk factors below;

Intense Physical Stressors Extended Periods of Fasting/Dehydration Sudden Decrease in Retained Radiation Substance Withdrawal

First we will address the risk factors that effect both sub-types and discuss how these can pose higher or lower threats based upon the specific biology of said ghouls.

Social isolation, poor mental state/intense emotional stressors, genetic factors, substance withdrawal, intense physical stressors, and extended periods of dehydration/starvation are all things that can trigger feralization in ghouls, however the threshold for such will vary among the individuals.

For irradiated ghouls, exposure to intense radiation is unlikely to be a trigger for feralization unless it is a direct, concentrated blast of radiation. However if there is a sudden decrease in their retained radiation, such as if RadAway is used in high enough doses, then feralization is a much higher concern.

Irradiated ghouls have somewhat of an advantage against starvation/dehydration, as being in areas with a higher ambient radiation can mitigate the ill effects of not eating/drinking.

Biochemical ghouls, however, struggle more with going longer periods of time without sustenance. They are also more vulnerable to continued exposure to high doses of radiation. While it is unfair to include their serum under substance withdrawal, it is also their main means to prevent feralization. However both ghoul types are vulnerable to withdrawal causing them to turn.

Behaviors of Ferals:

It is well known that feral ghouls are a dangerous type, however it is also well known that they do not seem to attack each other nor other ghouls.

If feralization is a degradation of higher cognitive function, how is it then that most feral ghouls know when they are in like company? This is not so well understood, however it has been observed that appearance does seem to have some sway in this but is not a sure fire way to pass through a horde of feral ghouls. One theory I have is that ferals are drawn to radiation and by extension can feel it off other ghoulified beings. This keeps them in a calmer, more contented state. Surprisingly, super mutants seem to also bypass the ire of feral ghouls. The precise reason for this is less understood, however FEV may have some play here. It is known that ferals have heightened senses, perhaps even FEV created mutants have a specific smell that does not trigger a hunt response in feral populations.

In regards to their dangerous behaviors, ferals seem to be driven by hyper aggression and hunger. I will take liberties and a page from the lobotomite handbook, as well as reference how some extensive cognitive degeneration causes hyper sexuality/aggression in some.

However, the less observed side to ferals is one more human. While they never truly seem to know what they are doing, some ghoul colonies that tend their feral population note domestic-like behaviors such as; attempting to clean, cook, perform yard work, tend dolls, or perform duties and adhere to schedules relating to those they had prior to turning feral. Some have even reported that certain ferals "remember" the action of smoking and will perform this action in rudimentary fashion.

Inter-Community Treatment of Ferals:

So now that we know more about feral ghouls, how do they fit into the world? While most of us know them as residing in city ruins, content to stay hidden away from the harshness of the burning sun and light, some have found home amongst ghoul societies.

While non-feral ghouls within mixed colonies may hold less compassionate views of their feral brethren, certain ghoul societies dedicate care and inclusion of ferals into their society. Their exclusion may even be seen as betrayal, and they are as valued and protected as much as any non-feral member.

IV. The Rotting vs Chem-Heads: Interpersonal Politics Within Non-Feral Ghoul Populations

While most people view ghouls as ghouls, and acceptance of them can vary from being seen as equals, to indifference, to outright hostility, the nuance between irradiated ghouls and biochemical ghouls is almost entirely understood exclusively within ghoul populations (or with those that study them).

Unsurprisingly, this has caused some conflicts. While feralization is something that is an assumed inevitable end for all ghouls, the more immediate threat of turning plagues biochemical ghouls near constantly. This has given some irradiated ghouls a complex that biochemical ghouls are the poster child for why most non-mutant societies fear unprompted feralization.

On the other end, biochemical ghouls will often criticize their irradiated brethren for their appearance and smell being a determining factor for why most people do not welcome ghouls into certain spaces.

There is also the discussion of who has suffered more, with irradiated ghouls often citing their endurance of radiation sickness and often continued effects while biochemical ghouls often quote their substance dependency as a constant struggle.

V. In Conclusion:

So surely with all that we have learned so far we understand that there is much more complexity to ghouls than initially thought. I hope you enjoyed my compilation of headcanons and stuff I got off the wiki/from gameplay as much as I enjoyed writing it.

If you have any ideas or compilations for ghoul headcanons, feel free to drop them in the replies! I look forward to reading them.

[highly-flammable]

What do you think Peeta is trying to say with the if I can grows wings I could fly after Katniss says it is good if he can start to identity the shiny memories as then he can figure out what is true? He then says mockingjays need wings to survive when she says real people don’t

This scene is a very subtle and tentative display of compassion between the characters.

Peeta at this point is starting to sort out some of his memories, but bear in mind that all he can do is separate the shiny ones from the ones that are not shiny. He cannot actually recover the memories which have been already tampered with, at least not by himself, and even if he is shown footage of those moments and told that the truth is different from what it feels like to him, the emotional consequences of his hijacking are still not wholly removed. All of this is to say that his mental state is extremely confused.

Katniss is trying to comfort him by offering him a simple solution, but his situation is actually not simple, and that is why he uses quiet sarcasm here. It’s like this, “Yeah, I can just sort out of the memories and learn what is true, the same way I can just grow wings and fly.” He is not being unkind towards her, but rather bleakly pointing out how unlikely it is that he will ever be able to fully understand and internalize what was true and what was not.

In response, Katniss gently tells him that people don’t need wings to survive. With this line she acknowledges that he is right and the task she spoke of like it was so simple might be impossible for Peeta, and he doesn’t have to do anything impossible to survive. It is okay that his perception of reality is a mess, it is okay that he is damaged, he can still live. (By the way, this is a big piece of development in their relationship, because as far as I remember this is the first time Katniss has been able to voice her acceptance for hijacked Peeta. This is her letting go of the near-perfect image of the old, resilient, strong Peeta, and acknowledging that Peeta is not gone, only changed, and whoever he is now, that is okay with her.)

But this kind of grace is hardly ever extended to Katniss herself. She had been turned into a symbol of revolution before she even knew it, and then she was paraded around, made to look like an inspiration and source of strength, pressured into compliance, even when she was traumatized and afraid and grieving. It is a deadly game for Katniss, with no out. She can either be the Mockingjay, or she will be destroyed.

Haunted, broken Peeta, even though he had been programmed to hate and fear her, has come to understand some of this as he tries to work out who Katniss truly is. This is perhaps especially because Coin has sent him to join Katniss’ squad. Confused as Peeta is, he is smart and likely has worked it out (especially after the psychotic break when he tried to kill Katniss roughly a day ago) that Coin actually wants her dead. He and the rest of the squad have also figured out that Katniss is lying about the mission for Snow’s assassination being sanctioned by Coin, that it is actually her personal mission. They understand, or at the very least Peeta understands, that this means Katniss knows her situation is dangerous enough that she cannot go back to anyone who can then hand her over to Coin. She feels like she herself has to end this and buy her freedom and safety through that Herculean feat. All in all, Katniss is immensely burdened. She cannot afford to be her authentic, flawed self, to be afraid or weak. She has to be a symbol of strength and hope, even now. To choose otherwise is to choose death or some other form of annihilation.

This understanding is why Peeta says, “Mockingjays do (need wings to survive)”. He cannot offer her the comfort that just being who she truly is, is going to be enough for her survival. But he can acknowledge what a difficult situation she is in.

By the way, after this exchange is the first time Katniss voluntarily touches Peeta to soothe him since his hijacking. And Peeta feels safe enough with her that he lets her.

[cosmic-giraffe]

Okay so it seems like my initial assumption of Tetro's structure was wrongggg

I assumed that Pink would follow the same structural framework as canon DR: prologue, Chapters 1-5 featuring one murder per case (with Chapter 3 being the obvious exception), then Chapter 6 focuses on the students unmasking the mastermind(s) behind the killing game, executing them, and an epilogue to give them all a happy send off.

Given how Tetro ends in just two weeks, it's basically confirmed that we won't be getting a Chapter 6 or a fully fleshed out epilogue. We'll instead get the murder and investigation this Friday, followed by the trial next week, and that will be the end of it.

The surviving students will...what? Be set free? Expected to go back to their ordinary lives with the knowledge that 11 of their friends are dead and they all came pretty close to dying too? Or kept in containment so the scientists can do whatever the Hell else they want with them?

Tetro Blue will likely have the same scientists and Monomoko running the second killing game, wherever that may be (Fujioka Memorial is in ruins, the labs aren't conductive for a prolonged killing game environment), so my initial expectation of Dr Yonekura and Dr Kan being held to answer for their crimes in Tetro Pink likely won't be happening any time soon.

GOD I'M JUST SO ON EDGE REGARDING THIS SERIES

We'll probably have to wait a few months/a year or two before we start getting Tetro Blue, but for now, I just wanna focus on Tetro Pink. As soon as this part of the story has wrapped up, I'm gonna write a lot more thinkpieces on it lololol

[a-man-in-the-crowd]

finally got around to drawing some hunger games au shit here ya go

[yapping below]

i had a good time trying to draw annabel's hair. she doesn't have rag curls, but she still has curls! still tryna figure out exactly how i want her dresses to look but yk i'm working on it.

i was thinking of what characters would have as their district token, and i settled on a pearl necklace for annabel. me personally wouldn't wear a necklace to an arena where everyone's trying to kill you (i say like i wasn't the one who made her make this decision) but. to each their own. 🤷‍♂️

speaking of the arena, i went with something pretty plain. the arena in my head so far is kinda supposed to be a mish-mash of past arenas in-universe, and it's basically referencing the hedge maze, so i wanted the arena wear to be decently versatile.

eula's reaping outfit is pretty similar to her death outfit in the comic minus the jacket, and will's? uh. idk i was just like 'patched up t-shirt' and rolled with it.

oh yeah and the little look will is giving eulaaa. i don't wanna say exactly what's going on in his little head just but AGH i love the angst of them being the only people who ever tolerated or noticed the other and being put into a killing game, forced to spend the next few weeks knowing at least one of them is going to die. eula genuinely sees will as a friend, even in the arena she clings onto the idea that he'll join their little group. no one really believes in either of their chances of survival. eula might not realize (or is choosing to ignore it), but will? he knows very well. at some point in the first book peeta mentions his mom genuinely didn't believe he was going to win — i don't doubt something similar happened to will.

on a lighter note, imagine thirteen siblings and two parents squeezing themselves in a room trying to say their final goodbyes to will in the span of like five minutes. more probably, they took turns but... just imagine

[rosakuma]

FINALE PREDICTIONS FOR CH.5 TRAPPER, VICTIM, KILLER, SURVIVORS AND OTHER STUFF!

Hey sooo…..Tetro Pink ending soon with this and next Friday. Apologies for not making any post about the previous batch of episodes but they were…..a lot. Anyways! I am of course very sad and scared we’re close to the end of this fun tragic ride of Tetro Pink, but before we get to the finale BDA and trial next week. I want to crack a shot at who I think is dying, who’s responsible for the traps, who’s surviving, and what will happen after the trial. Now some of my predictions are just going to be a mixture of theory crafting with some evidence and just “I have a gut feeling about it”. None of what I’m going to say obviously going to be true(I mean look at my ch.4 prediction ), but I just want to give out my reasoning for each for fun!

Spoilers for ch.5 up to this point and kinda everything before ch.5

Okay getting started, let’s go over who I think did the traps, notes, stole wada’s stash, getting Ken and Ojima high and drunk, and who planted the drugs. Then we’ll get into who I think has the most victim and killer vibes. And finally the survivors and what might happen.

The traps, notes, and the reason behind it

With how frequent they keep getting from going from a gasoline bucket to a chloride, a bomb and then hatchet!? Yeah this is getting intense, but time to figure out who I think it is. Yeah its Ken Hasegawa.

Looking at all of the current suspects, it really boils down to Ken.

For starters we can easily eliminate Mai due to her at first accidentally triggering the traps intended for someone else and how the later ones are intended for her to find.

Hiroaki and Tamba were supposed to be the victims of the first two traps, so it would be weird for either to set the rest clearly for Mai. You could make the argument that the gasoline one was for Hiroaki by Tamba and the locker one was for Tamba by Hiroaki. But it's strange why Tamba would resort to violence towards him because during that point of the story, she clarified that she’s only going to stalk him to see if he’s suspicious and if he is, she’ll just hold him hostage until another murder happens. While for Hiroaki its strange because he clearly doesn't want to hurt or have anything to do with her and just want her to leave him alone. Also he doesn't know her schedule well to know when she would hit that trap.

Wada and Yanagi are a double package in terms of their own body betrays them. Specifically that Wada starving himself made him too weak for him to commit any of the traps with how he has to carry buckets full of gasoline and caltrops and even a ladder or chair to reach high enough for both the art room and locker room doorframe. Wada is 5’1, so he would have to get a ladder/chair to reach up there, but risk of being caught is too much for him. This kinda applies to Tamba too since she’s short(5’2 to be exact), although she is technically strong enough to lift a ladder/chair, but the risk of being caught too much. While for Yanagi, sure he’s tall enough to reach the doorframe of both rooms, so that’s not a problem. But there’s the fact Yanagi has both a concussion he’s recovering from and his hand being messed up still from Decision Game(Von even confirm that his hand in a permanent relaxed fist position). So he runs the risk of either collapsing from his symptoms of his concussion coming back or trying to lift up a heavy bucket filled with gasoline/caltrops one handed. There’s also the emotional factors with these two as the target neither of them would want to hurt on purpose even if the traps doesn't kill the person.

And then there’s Ojima who while tall enough with being 6’3, he runs into the emotional attachment factor(him caring for Hiroaki) and the fact he dissociates often to where he would be unable to set any of these traps. Especially with running the risk of easily being caught.

So all that leaves is Ken who has a good explaination for each of these concerns we might have. Reaching the door frame? Ken is 6’2 he’s tall enough to reach it without needing a ladder. Ken while nice to the others, isn’t that emotionally close/attach to them(due to him only staying by Kamimura’s side and never developing any further friendships with those alive) to struggle doing something to them that can possibly kill them. No physical barriers that prevent him from setting these up(yes he lose his eye, but that doesn't mean he can’t do anything still). And he’s not really accounted for where he was at for most of these events. Not to mention another thing that possible supports this theory is the fact he told Hiroaki that he was going to the storage room to find sealant for the cold lockers. And what happened soon afterwards? Oh nothing except a bomb blew up in a book that the note Mai received told her to. Which btw Hasegawa frequent the library most of the time too, where he would know where that specific book would be. And if Ken the trap setter, then he also has to be the note writer for Tamba’s death threat with how these new notes connect to the first one in trying to get Mai to trigger these traps and get to them. Especially since she’s the only one stubborn and stupid enough to continue doing them(sorry Mai Mai ily still). This also works with him being with Tamba before she found the note, so honestly he could’ve found out she’s going to the locker room after a certain amount of time and decided to plant it before she got there.

But why would he do all of this? My current running theory is that Ken has figured out something to help them escape somehow, but cannot directly speak it out loud. So to cause distraction from the doctors and Monomoko not catching onto him. He’s doing all of this to both distract everyone else with new worries popping up, distract the overseers into thinking he’s planning a murder, and to get Mai to specifically help him without telling her directly the plan. Hence, why the latest note mentions if she continues to follow the notes to help them all escape, Tamba will live and how this trapper needs her strength. Not to mention Mai is right that despite the traps hurting her, they’re not deadly to where they’re going to straight up kill her(I mean we can argue the bomb and hatchet, but she’s still kicking soooo…yeah). This can still fit with Hasegawa’s character in not wanting to really hurt or kill anyone despite not really bonding with anyone on a deeper level like he did with Toshi.

Now let’s get to next on the list of:

Wada’s Stash

There are two main suspects I have for who has possible done this. Those being Hasegawa and Tamba. Going over how they could’ve done it first, both these two have investigated the dorms before and have found his stash. Its possible either could remember the location of it to take it. Along with the fact a lot of people here keep forgetting to lock their doors too. But then there’s the factor that anyone still could’ve done it with most alive have seeing Wada’s room(Ojima when fixing his computer, Mai and Shigeki when investigating in ch.3). Another problem is what if he just moved his stash in his room somewhere else? How would they remember to find it then while being quick as possible to sneak in? Though I’ll still suspect these two based off of the motivation for each.

For Ken, it could connect with his plan if we go with my theory on him setting the traps. Somehow stealing Wada’s stash was important in terms of his plan. Perhaps as just another distraction for Wada and Mai to deal with. Or maybe Wada was hiding something else in his stash that Ken noticed before he would need. Plus it is possible even if Wada moved it, Ken was in his room before again during [Quick Check] since he agreed to help Wada with his selective mutism. Maybe he was searching Wada’s room to know where it is while Wada was chatting with Hiroaki.

Now what about Tamba that makes her a suspicious candidate? Well this mostly goes down to two things. 1. Tamba has always been the one who keeps going on about Wada’s stash since she doesn't like how he’s hoarding all this food from everyone. Not to mention getting on Wada about how much he eats. And 2. Her current paranoia could’ve caused her to maybe camp out somewhere(probably her dorm room before moving out due to the punishment).

So you might be wondering “Well why would she risk stealing from Wada’s room and not just…stock up in the kitchen or any remaining food left in the storage room?”. Well for the storage room, we don’t know if Wada actually did take all the food there plus its never restocked, so its hard to keep on inventory to be sure if something was there before or not. While for the kitchen….y’all remember what happened to Isono right? Staying in the kitchen to get something to eat, only to get her head bashed in by the only other person there. Yeah Tamba not taking a chance I bet if it was her.

Highsegawa and Drunkjima

Ok so this one is kinda hard since we don't know what exactly got Ken high and Ojima drunk. We’ll get Ken out of the way first.

So somehow Ken got himself high after the defence game. I’ve seen some say maybe he did this to himself to ease the pain. To which searching it up, it does say “THC or CBD binds to specific receptors on the brain and nerve cells, which slows pain impulses and eases discomfort.” So honestly it's possible. But Ken’s reaction may discourage this a bit. But okay let’s say regardless if Ken did this to himself or someone else, who got the THC and where from?

My only guesses are that its either from the medbay OR it was someone’s reward. And the only two people we know now that got an reward from Defence game is Tamba and Wada. But I have no clue why they would want to make Hasegawa high unless they were trying to help him I guess in a way to ease the pain? Knowing now that Wada was the one that picked the bodily sacrifice punishment for everyone, which caused Ken to lose his eye, maybe if its an reward that Wada received, he gave it to Ken due to feeling bad about what happened. They were both in the dining hall before Hiroaki and Ojima came in on the day Ken ended up high.

Okay so moving onto Takeshi. I think he got himself drunk. Let me explain. So the two times it seems he got himself drunk was after a love confession. The first one being himself slipping that he loves Hiroaki to him. While the second is Hiroaki saying he loves him back when Ojima waking up from his hangover. Each time, Ojima went to or remained in the art room where him and Hiroaki is sleeping. But then there’s the question “Where did Ojima get alcohol to drink in the paint room?” Well well well, who said it had to be alcohol? Apparently according to the web, you can actually get drunk off paint fumes. “In general, the effects appear similar to the effects of alcohol intoxication. Depending on the time spent inhaling, one may begin to feel a slight stimulant effect and a loss of inhibitions. As the chemicals take effect, the person will often feel as if they are intoxicated by alcohol.” So its likely that Ojima might’ve been huffing paint to forget about the love confession incidents. Though if not the love confession for why he’s getting himself drunk, then maybe it's his new way of coping with his trauma coming back to him to try not to space out. Or alternatively he’s doing this to cope with recent events of hurting others. Either way I am very concerned about this and I hope he stops(especially if he survives after all of this).

The Drugs

This one also still has me stumped. Sure I could just say it was leftovers from when Okazaki took them or that Ken planted them since I think he’s the trap setter. But I’m pretty sure that she used up all of Hiroaki’s drugs, these seem to be new, and Idk if Ken was planning yet to do anything that drastic to get Hiroaki to relapse. My only guess really if it’s not Ken or leftovers Hiroaki forgot about is that Tamba planted them.

I know that’s might be a reach since Tamba and Hiroaki didn’t start fully beefing with each other until she got the note. But let’s think about their relationship before hand. With this chapter revealing a lot about Tamba’s feelings on Hiroaki, with the spotlight as an added bonus that gives more insight, it’s clear she never hold a high opinion of him. Tamba did like Hiroaki a bit, but in a way she felt like she didn’t have to behave well since well Hiroaki way worse than her in comparison, so no one will really focus on her than him. And before all of this with the death threat and Watari’s trial, there was the stairwell incident(well the first one that is). Tamba almost hurt or potentially killed Hiroaki down the stairs because she was very paranoid. She didn’t mean to of course, but this was kinda brush off by her and some of the others despite Hiroaki being really upset about it. But that didn’t matter since during this time after the trial, Ojima and him were discussing a plan for him to apologize to everyone.

Hiroaki discovered the drugs before he apologized to Tamba and the others. So I could see with it being the finale trial where they have to just go through one more murder to get this done and over with that maybeeeeee….Tamba decided to make Hiroaki overdose so it counts as a suicide and they all get out scot free. To which staff side confirm if Hiroaki overdose from those drugs, it would count as a suicide. I know Tamba doesn’t have a way to know that’s completely true, but she doesn’t really think through anyways with things sometimes. Plus it would be a perfect plan as no one would probably guess it was her who planted them and just assumed that Hiroaki found them himself and did it because he’s an addict. So even if it does count as a murder, Tamba would win it and we know she’s not willing to die even to save Mai or Shigeki from her student spotlight.

Okay now it’s time to go through who’s potentially on the chopping block this chapter!

Before we do, let’s go over where everyone’s currently at the moment.

Hiroaki & Ojima- Balcony

Wada- Was in the hallway with Ojima presumably on the first or second floor, now should be back in the hallway by the stairwell with Mai and Tamba.

Ken & Yanagi- Both are trapped in the medbay/morgue, presumedly overnight.

Tamba & Mai- Both still at the bottom of the stairwell around the basement level near the hallways.

Going through this, I think really the most vulnerable at the moment of who could be killed is Yanagi and Ken right now. Sure Wada is at a vulnerable moment too of being caught, but the only person right now that could kill him is Mai. To which I doubt she would and plus, Tamba would know because Mai was with her while she was crying in pain from her fracture.

So unless Ken and Shigeki are let out by sometime tomorrow, I don’t think they’re going to be safe. There’s also the fact someone lock them in there and….yeah I think one of them did it and I think it was Ken. I don’t know why exactly, but when you rewatch the episode they get trapped in, Ken is the one to go to the door. He messes with it before saying it’s locked and Yanagi coming over to try opening it.

You could say maybe it was Hiroaki who lock the door to prevent Tamba from getting help. But that doesn’t make sense. There was a short time frame from when Ken and Shige went to the medbay and Ojima and Wada heading upstairs to find Hiroaki. The balcony not on the same level as the medbay is. So basically Hiroaki would’ve have to been camping out near the medbay to them, lock them in, and then rush upstairs without anyone noticing? Very unlikely and I do think he ran up stairs to hide near the balcony. Wada and Ojima were already upstairs. So Mai would have to be the only one who could’ve lock them in if it was a third party. But she obviously wouldn’t because why the hell would she lock the people in who’s trying to help Tamba? This entire chapter has her trying to find out who’s doing all of this and targeting Tamba for her sake of safety!

So yeah I think Ken lock him and Shigeki in the medbay. But I’m not 100% sure why. My guess is it might have to do with something with his plan, but I’m still not sure.

As for how this murder might go….all I can think of is somebody going to die via a trap.

Okay murder aside since I don’t have much to say, let’s just go down the list of who I think is dying as a victim or killer.

Victim(s)

Yanagi Shigeki- Yeah Yanagi high on my list for becoming the victim of this chapter. With how much importance it’s put on Yanagi protecting Mai. I have a feeling that knight’s oath will be the end of him as perhaps Mai might trigger another trap and he will try to save her by knocking her out of the way of it. Even if not through a trap, whoever trap him in that medbay whether it’s Ken or not surely doesn’t have have good plans for him. Also he confessed his feelings to Mai and this is Danganronpa, so of course he’s going to die before Mai can tell him her feelings about him too.

Hayashi Mai- Now I’m not fully sure if Mai dying or not as the victim as much as I was before we found out her reward is her vote being the only one voted as a solo vote. But there’s still a good chance she can be on the chopping block due to maybe the killer wanting to get rid of her pronto as she holds a lot of power right now. Plus if the trap setter is actually planning for a murder to happen, it could be hers.

Ojima Takeshi- So Ojima I was for sure thinking was going to die last chapter….he did not. But this chapter I am really afraid that might finally happen. I think most likely with how he’s a risk with falling into any deadly traps with his daydreaming or the fact he’s getting himself drunk can lead to this outcome. Plus the fact he also did a love confession this chapter as well isn’t a good sign for him and Hiroaki. Not to mention how tragic his death would be with last chapter focusing on how he’s afraid of dying young or that he’ll never be able to have a future with how much his lift been ruined by his parents and uncle.

As for the others, I didn’t put any for Hiroaki, Tamba, and Wada as I think they’re all red herrings in terms of dying. As for Ken, I don’t think he’s dying either as I think he’s going to play a big importance in this case.

Killer(s)

Wait why is it the exact same people + Ken? Lol yeah I also think the 3 picks I chose for the victims can alternatively be the killers in my eyes. This is kinda mixture on fitting any potential tragedy themes we could have for them while Ken is something I was thinking logically could happen.

Yanagi Shigeki- So if Yanagi’s not on the chopping block as the victim, then I feel like killer most likely would happen too. Now keep this in mind, him including my other picks minus the last one I’m thinking are going to get the Hama treatment in terms of accidental killing someone without realizing their actions did. So it would be tragic for Yanagi to actually be the finale killer compared to ch.1 where he was accused/framed as the killer of Isono. Especially with how the one who will be executing him is Mai…the woman he loves. And the worse part is, he would accept it as he rather save her and everyone else than his own life. After fall, his knight’s oath swears to protect her.

Hayashi Mai- Now if Mai instead ends up on the tragic accidental killer route, it would fit with how her falling into the mastermind’s trap of following all these notes and traps lead to her being turn into the killer. She would basically have to vote for herself to be killed just to save everyone….and you know she will. She swore to protect everyone and get them out alive right? So if she must, she will. Also how depressing if all of this happens and Yanagi the victim too? The man she might love who ended up confessing to her died because of her hands. Some Romeo and Juliet stuff right there man.

Ojima Takeshi- I feel so evil for this one, but this is kinda something I both don’t and want. It would fit soooo well in the tragedy of development this chapter has for Ojima with having him be afraid of hurting people to end up killing someone(albeit accidentally through a stupid trap). Which it’s possible even more now not because of him dissociating, but because he keeps ending up drunk. Just imagine a drunk Takeshi ends up triggering a trap that ends up killing someone else and he just stares at them. Dissociating from the whole event because he thinks he did it. To then have Hiroaki defend him the whole trial, seeming to save him only to be proven wrong and it’s true that Takeshi is counted as the killer of this case. Also while it would suck in a way if Ojima dies for Hiroaki’s development, it makes sense for it to happen. Up to this point, Hiroaki didn’t lose anyone close to him. Sure, he did lose Chiba and Tsuno, but he didn’t get to develop those bonds further than he would like to and sadly didn’t treat them right when they were alive as well. Ojima been the only one he’s been close to since day one he cares about from beginning to end. To lose him allows him to show the vulnerability he’s been hiding from the whole group this entire time and cement how he’s just like the rest of them. A scared teenager who loss someone they care and even loved thanks to this horrible game.

Hasegawa Ken- Okay so Ken really not that high on my list as while I do think he set up all of these traps, I don’t think he’s going to be counted as a killer seeing how Watari’s trial works and the fact staffside confirm that if Okazaki only killed Tsuno via trap, it counts as a suicide due to Tsuno opening the trap door. But in the scenario he does, yeah he might be on the chopping block as the killer. Though I will say it would be cool if he does end up as the killer, he somehow escapes his execution with how most likely he has a plan for him and everyone to escape.

So that leaves the remainder as who I think will be the survivors are:

Hiroaki Nakamigawa

Wada Masanari

Tamba Ruiko

Hasegawa Ken

and whoever out of my 3 picks escapes both the victim and killer allegations. To which if you want me to bet who, then I’m betting Mai.

After all of that, how do I think Pink is going to end? Well for starters we know it’s next week as it’s confirm we only have 2 Tetro Fridays left. So definitely no chapter six and the epilogue is most likely going to be just be on the same day as the trial.

I have 3 scenarios that I believe in. Spoiler alert, I don’t believe in the solo survivor theory via killer wining or battle royale or memory erase theory. So no mentions of those for these.

Scenario 1: Escape from the School!

So this theory is that after the trial during the execution, the students are going to escape with a plan thanks to Ken. This might involve them raiding the arsenal for weapons or a reward one of them won on one of the previous games. This can also maybe save the killer of this chapter and result in us having 6 survivors instead of 5! Alternatively if not themselves allowing their escape, imagine if Monomoko helps them escape since there’s still a good conscience in them. Eventually everyone gets out, steals a car, and boom! They all escape free and swear revenge on these people for doing this to them.

Scenario 2: So can I go home now?

It just simply happens. After the trial, everyone gets to go home as promised. Of course they’re taken outside probably in bags and transported to a secluded area away from the lab so they themselves can figure out the way back to their homes together. Too much of a risk to just simply drive them all home obviously. This allows the students to if they desire give each other their contacts and travel home first, then swear revenge on their captors later.

Scenario 3: *Vanishes out of Thin Air*

This is relatively the same as the previous scenario, except Monomoko just teleport them all back to their homes. Just poof! They’re gone. At most we might get a hint of one of the students deciding to try to seek out the others so they can figure out what happen to them all and who done this to them. Especially since they need to figure out what to tell the public for some of them.

To which after any of these scenarios it just cuts to Yonekura like usual, as they prepare the next set of students….

We’ll see if I got anything right from these! See y’all tomorrow, I’m so scared rn!

[sirsealery]

mentioned this a bit at the bottom of some comment thread in one of my hunger games fics and figured i might expand on it a bit here? to see what other people have to say, i think. sotr spoilers !!

fyi im wearing a homemade lorax costume right now as im typing this. happy world book day!

so, anyways, i wanna talk about the careers. i wouldnt call myself a career fan or lover, and frankly i dont have much love for any of the careers in the series, especially in the first book and sotr. the only exceptions are finnick and annie (and i suppose mags? is she a career?) because theyre written as actual people. which leads me to my first point, which is that so often, theyre just so cartoonishly evil. they remind me so much of those disney channel bullies but take it up a notch. they kill people instead of shoving them into lockers or flushing their face in the toilet. but like with the same energy and the annoying jock voice you know what i mean?? lmao

and i mean i get it. in the first book theyre like the main antagonists and we're not spending more than a couple of pages with them, so they dont need to be all that fleshed out. which is totally fine, i dont care, but in some of the other books? in sunrise, where silka is actively trying to be humanized? to me, it fell very, very flat. i felt absolutely nothing reading about her eat chocolate and cry at the foot of the tree. and panache being a cato 2.0 kind of annoyed me. i get it! dumb brutes exist, but how are there so many of them? i dont think ive ever met a single person like this. ever. i dont know though, maybe my experience isnt universal. maybe in other parts of the world there are plenty of laughably stupid hunks. basically all of the careers are complete idiots, just running around and stabbing babies.

okay now what i really wanted to talk about after ranting a bit. sorry gang. i wanna talk about how sad the career existence is. i mean, theyre needlessly brutal and mean. but they were also raised this way? id love for someone more articulate than me to talk about this too. i had a thought a while ago kinda comparing the careers to like .. the people who peaked in high school? id love to have an exploration of the career experience, either an essay or fanfiction (lmk if theres any youve found !!) cuz like .. of course youre bringing honor and glory not only to yourself but also your whole district, patriotism and all that. but i wonder if its still the same once you start killing kids? i mean its basically a given that theyre pretty desensitized to violence, gore and death at the point where they volunteer for the games, but i dont think its quite the same when youre actually like .. doing it??

and when you go home, youre celebrated and praised, but only like until someone new wins, which is next year. and theres gonna be the trauma of the games and potentially life altering injuries and while in the other districts theres some kind of sympathy for victors, but since in the career districts they idolize it, theres not really any/as much i think?? i imagine itd be really weird to work your whole life, achieve your goals, and then come to the realization that you basically have no purpose now but to watch kids under your care die and hope that at least one of them will survive. i wonder if thats why some of the careers in catching fire were so eager to rejoin the games? since its all theyre known for and theyve had nothing for the last like 10-20 years and they want a shot to do what theyre best at again? relive their glory days or whatever? im honestly not sure, but i think its worth thinking about. thanks gang 🙏

[beanwaterontherocks]

Honeymoon

(An x reader version of a fic on my ao3)

Fandom: Killer Chat! Pairing: Ronin Beaufort x gn!reader Summary: You didn't know why you had been been brought into this death game situation, but all you knew was that you needed to survive. If that included teaming up with a serial killer, then so be it. Warnings: Death Game AU, Blood and gore, Murder, Self-mutilation, slightly suggestive language, Reader smokes cigarettes Word count: 5015

“Contestant 89 has been eliminated. Cause of death: Contestant 66”.

An automated, robotic voice rang through the forest. You heard the slight gasp from your companion on the other side of the campfire as you wrote the announcement down. Some people had gotten a gift from the mysterious “Game Master”, lying neatly next to them as they woke up. Yours had been a sleek, leather-bound notebook and a pen. Whoever had put this thing together must have known your profession but you didn’t know anyone who would have the funds and the insanity to do this. 

“Hey, number 66 has killed a lot of people, haven't they?” Jack asked, hugging his knees to his chest. You had found him crying by the riverside 5 days into the game, he was starving and disheveled. He probably wasn’t more than a few years younger than her, but you still had this itch to help him. He had looked so hopeless, just sitting down and letting himself sob, uncaring of the dangers.

“Yeah, this is their 15th one and it’s only been 12 days, whoever they are, they really want to get out”, you answered, flipping through your diary entries. “There’s 35 dead so far and I haven’t heard of a number over 100, so we can assume there’s around 65 people left”, you said, throwing another stick into the dwindling fire. You had luckily found a small cave to hide out in for the night. 

“Don’t you wanna get out?” Jack asked, grabbing a berry from your ration bag. You sighed and looked to the entrance of the cave. The forest was vast but you could catch a glimpse of the towering wall that kept all the contestants in. How far were you from Uptown? Could this be a private island? 

“I do, but the rules said you just have to be the ‘last ones standing’ to win and that plural means that you can team up”, you said, shooting him a soft smile. Jack smiled back and stared into the flames. 

“I overheard someone talking in the forest once, he said he saw someone being killed with a crowbar, who would be stupid enough to pick a crowbar?” Jack laughed, though his voice was shaky as he was likely pictureing how brutal that death was. Something rose up from the back of your mind, murders committed with a heavy weapon to the skull, murders you had written articles about. 

It couldn’t be. 

“Maybe they’re confident, not stupid”, you mused, looking over at the axe that you had chosen. Most contestants had stumbled upon a depot filled to the brim with weapons and tools. The one in your area was mostly empty, but you had been lucky enough to find an axe. It was heavy to log around, but it was useful. The tool gave you a weird comfort at night, holding it like you were a kid clinging to your teddy bear, scared of monsters in the night. 

“I’ll keep a lookout tonight, you’ve done it the most, so please get some rest”, Jack said, gesturing towards the deer skin you had set up as a bed. 

You looked into the flickering fire as you laid down, the axe propped up right behind you. You closed your eyes, your head thumping with the stress of your situation. No good would come of panicking, but you were by no means relaxed. The game weighed on your chest and every step you took was taken with extreme caution. You wished it hadn’t delved into chaos so quickly, then you might have found a group to rebel with. You sighed as the crackling of the fire lulled you to sleep. 

“Contestant 12 has been eliminated. Cause of death: Contestant 66”.

The announcement stirred you awake, the fire hadn’t gone out so you could clearly see Jack, cutting up a small brown root with his knife. Sitting next to him was your water bottle and he had opened it. 

“Jack, what are you doing?” You asked, sitting up and reaching your hand behind your back, you felt the wooden handle of your axe. Jack jumped a bit at your words, he clearly hadn’t expected you to be awake. You hadn’t slept in 2 days, so that made sense. 

“Oh, I’m just…cutting up some ginger for your water, it really helps with uh…dental health, I read it in my book”, he said, though his voice had a noticeable nervous strain. You were armed with an axe, but his eyes were darting all around the cave, looking anywhere but you as he spoke. Jack’s “Game Master gift” had been a little book on plants, you had flipped through it once while he was asleep. Whatever he was holding was too light and uniform in shape to be ginger. Your mind sparked with a memory of small, white flowers outside of the cave. Your mouth went dry at your realization. 

“Water hemlock…what the fuck. You’re trying to poison me!”, you exclaimed as you stood up, taking the axe with you. 

Jack stood up too, holding the knife out and pointing it at you. You could see sweat start to form at his brow as his legs shook. He looked like a frightened baby deer, like he had done the day you had found him.

“You’re too calm! I started thinking…” he exhaled shakily, "what if you’re the Game Master, you seem to know everything!” you gritted your teeth as anger bubbled inside of you. You had gathered food for this guy when he was too weak to even move and you had spent days awake keeping a lookout. But he had tried to kill you, maybe you had put too much faith in him. 

After all, people were being killed left and right not 2 weeks into the game and he wasn’t any different, even if you had been kind to him. 

“Why would I be the Game Master, why would they play their own game?! It’s clear that they’re probably sitting in a fancy room somewhere, sipping expensive booze and getting off to us killing each other!” You yelled and Jack shrunk in on himself at your tone. “And I don’t know anything, I’m just drawing conclusions”. 

“I just don’t get how you’re so calm…if we’re drawing conclusions, then you probably don’t have anyone to go back to, you don’t need to get out”, he said, suddenly leaping forward with the knife raised above his head in shaking hands. you took a step back, your heart pounding as you flipped the axe, holding by the head and using your whole weight to swing the wooden handle.

It collided with the side of Jack’s head with a thud, sending him barreling to the cave’s floor. He hit the dirt and you saw the mauve bruise blooming on his head, you crouched down and looked at his face. Luckily, he was still breathing. You hadn’t been aiming to kill him, you would like to get out of here without having to kill anyone. You felt a pang in your chest as you packed up your things. You had spent nearly a week surviving with this guy, had he really been suspicious of you the whole time? Your chest stung, guilt creeping up on you and sending your heart to your stomach.

“I’m sorry”, you spoke quietly, slinging your bag over your shoulder and grabbing the knife from his hand. 

__

“Contestant 28 has been eliminated. Cause of death: Contestant 70”.

You had frozen up when you heard that announcement, Jack had been contestant 28. Had he still been unconscious? It had been 3 days since you left the cave, had he been completely defenseless against number 70? He had betrayed you and let paranoia get the best of him but your heart still ached for him. He was scared and terrified when you weren't, he had done it all in fear and desperation to get home.

To blame him completely would be taking blame off of the twisted bastard who was watching them. 

You peered out from the bushes, watching as a man left the cave. 70’s clothes were spotted with blood as he carried Jack’s supplies, leaving his body. Your grip on your axe tightened as your knuckles turned white. You couldn’t take that guy on, especially not since he had a gun sitting in his belt. The splatters of blood didn’t look like he had shot Jack though, the gun was probably for emergencies. 

He never got the chance to draw it as a figure stepped out from the trees, raising a crowbar and swinging it right into 70’s skull. The sharp hook buried into his head, blood pouring down and coating the side of his face.

The man yelled, disoriented as his attacker pulled out the hook and swung again. That impact brought him to the ground. The assailant brought their crowbar down on 70’s head one last time, blood and bits of brain splattering onto their red pants. You could make out burgundy hair, dark eyes, a striped beanie with devil horns and a tall stature. The stench of blood filled your nostrils, making you retch slightly. 

“Contestant 70 has been eliminated. Cause of death: Contestant 66”.

So 66 and the crowbar user were the same person. The way the head was violently smashed in was all too familiar. You had stared at pictures like that late at night, guzzling coffee and chasing a deadline. Your growing suspicions were confirmed as 66 began to contort the corpse’s limbs with loud, sickening cracks and drawing on the ground with his blood.

A scarlet pentagram began to take shape in the dirt. A serial killer in a death game, like a kid in a candy store. 66 stood up from his crouch and looked right at the bush you were hiding in. 

“You enjoying the show, darlin’?” He asked, an amused smile stretched across his face. You cursed under your breath, he had known you were there the whole time. You stepped out, your axe slung over your shoulder. 

“So you’re 66 or should I say the Devil’s Butcher”, you said, looking down at the corpse. He would have killed you straight away if he wanted to, maybe you could get out of this alive. “Not your best work, but I guess you don’t have all your tools”. He laughed as he poked the body with the tip of his boot. 

“Are you a fan? I’d be happy to give you my autograph, if that’s your last wish”, he spoke, blood dripping from his crowbar. It was probably heavier than your axe, but he sure did know how to use it. 

“Not a fan, I’ve just written a lot of articles about your murders, so thanks for paying my rent”, you said sarcastically, you were eerily calm in the face of this danger, more than you had been at any point of this game. Maybe this whole thing was chipping away at your sanity too but that probably would work in your favor. 

“How did they manage to kidnap you? I mean you’ve eluded the police for years”, you commented. There were a few tears in his jacket and his pants were stained with both old and fresh blood. His expression turned sour, his brows furrowing.

“Dunno, I was just finishin’ up a kill and someone came at me with a syringe”, he kicked some dirt on the ground as his eyes filled with a simmering rage “I got that fucker, but there were more of them, last thing I remember is passin’ out and I’m kinda pissed”. 

You nodded at his words, either the Game Master had figured out he was the Devil’s Butcher or they thought he was a random killer. Anyway, they likely wanted to spice up their game. 

“Are you aiming to get out? I’d think someone like you would have fun here”, you said and immediately realized how suspicious you sounded. No wonder Jack had thought you were the Game Master. “Well, I guess the options are pretty limited here, must be constricting”, you added.

“You’re right about that, but I’m not not havin’ fun, you’re pretty relaxed though, think I’m not gonna have fun right now?” He asked teasingly, a dangerous glint in his ink-colored eyes. 

“I think you would have done that already if you wanted to, I’ve got a proposition for you”, you said, lowering your axe. Your heart was beating wildly in your ears, your life was on the line every second you spent not running from him. But it thrilled you, in an odd way. There was no time to unpack that.

“Aren’t you polite, what can you offer me?” He asked, tilting his head in an exaggerated manner. you shuffled around in your bag and pulled out your notebook. 

“I’ve been writing down where the people who dispose of the bodies are coming from, I might be able to find an opening in the wall”, you flipped through the pages and showed him your notes.

“I’m pissed as whoever made this whole game too, so let’s team up and find the guy”, you said., watching his face. He raised an eyebrow and ran a finger over the metal of his crowbar. 

“So all you have is some notes, that’s really temptin’, I’m almost convinced”, he said, his words dripping with sarcasm. you scoffed and tucked the book away, of course he wouldn’t team up with you that easily. You were crazy to do this, but maybe you had to be a bit crazy to survive.

“I also noticed that there’s a bump under the skin on my arm, they have to be using chips to track us”, you explained as you put down your bag you pulled Jack’s knife from it as you felt around for the spot on your bicep.

“I like that they’re keepin’ score, as far as I can tell I’m top of the leaderboard”, he said, watching you curiously. “What the hell are you up to?” 

“I think you know already”, you said, putting the leather strap of your bag in between your teeth as you raised the knife to your skin. “Enjoy the show, 66”, you spoke, your words muffled slightly. A searing pain shot through your arm and warm blood ran down like a creek. You bit hard on the leather as you used the tip of the knife to dig around in the wound. It was the worst pain you had ever felt, your entire arm went numb as your flaming nerves yelled at you to stop. 

Suddenly you felt a hand on your shoulder, you turned your head to look into those dark eyes. Maybe the pain was getting to you, but you could have sworn his eyes had a glint of…some twisted form of respect.

Finally, through the horrible agony, you found something small and hard, you scooped it up and pulled out the knife. Scarlet coated your arm, the wound wasn’t big but it was deep. You panted as the wound stung even without the blade in your flesh.

“Well, would you look at that, there was a chip in there”, 66 took the knife from you, inspecting the small metal square, it had a blinking green light. “My name’s Ronin, by the way”, he said, like now was the optimal time for introductions. 

“Ronin…put the…oh fuck” you hissed as you held your arm, your head was starting buzz from the loss of blood “put the chip in that corpse”. It was the last thing that left your mouth before your consciousness slipped from you, leaving you to hit the ground. 

___

When you came to, you were propped up against a tree, your sore arm was banaged and you could feel some stitching under the gauze. Ronin sat next to you, a hand on his cheek as he grinned, there was an open medical kit in his lap. 

“So you’re contestant 88, they announced your death when I put the chip in, they said it was a heart attack”, he explained, closing up the box. your head was reeling, as you turned to face him, your forearm was dirty with dried streaks of blood. You told him your actual name.

“I take it you wanna team up now, seeing as you didn’t leave me to bleed out”, you said, glancing at your arm. Ronin hummed in an exaggerated way. 

“I think I’ll give it a shot, you seem like a little daredevil, so maybe we’ll get along”, he said, smiling and you caught a glimpse of a black tongue piercing. Looking at him up close while you were fully conscious, he was good-looking. That was a dangerous thought to have, you realized and quickly averted your gaze. 

“I had a plan with all of that, it’ll be easier for me to sneak around if they think I’m dead…wait, we need to-”, you didn’t get to finish your sentence before Ronin held up your chip, it had stopped blinking after your “death”. 

“Right here, don’t think I didn���t see what you were doin’, darlin’”, he spoke and you exhaled in relief. You leaned against the tree. 

“That means you’ll know if I ever decide to betray you”, you stated, the blood loss clearly making you less wary of sounding suspicious. “You think I can kill you?” You asked, a slight smile on your lips. Ronin chuckled in response, a dark joy lacing his voice at your words. 

“You’re a character, let’s make that deal but I have one condition” he leaned in, forcing to look at him as he whispered in your ear: “You can stand by for all of my kills here, but once we find the big boss, you’re helpin’ me kill him”. 

You sat there stunned for a minute, your mind racing at 100 miles an hour. You wanted to get out without any blood on your hands…but maybe that was already too late. You had unarmed Jake, left him vulnerable and stood idly by as Ronin had killed a contestant. You were mad at the sick fuck who had orchestrated all of this, the one who had put people in a death for entertainment. You gritted your teeth as you thought about it, maybe it was doing the world a service. 

“Fine, it’s a deal”, you said firmly, raising your hand for a handshake. Ronin took your hand, his fingers were cold and he held your hand tight. 

___

You stared at yourself in the bathroom mirror, the guard uniform was a little big on you, but nothing too noticeable. Ronin sat by the sink, cleaning the blood from his crowbar. He handed you the security pass he had grabbed from the guard’s corpse. 

“We need to be quick before they find the body”, you said, tucking back your hair and revealing a dark purple spot on your neck. Ronin’s lips turned up into a smile and you felt your face flush and heart speed up as you recalled that night. Those lips on yours and an unusual softness to the way the killer’s hands held you. His voice speaking lowly in your ear and his lips leaving the skin on your neck tingling warmly.

You shook your head as you snapped out of it, that had just been a way to relieve stress and nothing more. Even if it had been nice…comforting in a way you hadn’t felt in a long time, even before this death game. 

“Aye aye captain but don’t you forget your deal with the devil”, Ronin said, walking up behind you and placing a hand on your shoulder. A memory bloomed in your mind, the look in his eyes the last time he had done that. You humored him, put your hand over his and intertwined their fingers. 

“It’s not like you remind me every day with that annoying look on your face”, you said, rolling your eyes as you grabbed the helmet from the side of the sink. With the visor pulled down, you looked enough like the guard to calm your nervousness a bit. 

“Get out there and make me proud”, he said teasingly, giving your shoulder one last squeeze. 

You flipped him off before exiting the bathroom, you spotted another guard holding a tray with a crystal carafe filled with amber liquid, a cigar box and a glass. 

“Can you believe this? Bringing him his afternoon scotch isn’t in our job description”, the guard sighed. you really wondered what the description for this job looked like. You stiffened up at the casual tone though, had you gotten unlucky and ran into a friend of the guard you were impersonating?

You glanced behind you, the door to the bathroom was ajar and you spotted a peek of burgundy hair. Your nerves stilled, he was right behind you if things went south. 

“How about I do it?” You asked, ready to signal to Ronin if your voice gave you away. The other guard happily handed over the tray and pointed at a door down the hall. 

you took a deep breath before opening the door. The sight that greeted you was straight out of a movie, so cliché it almost made you laugh. A suit-clad man sat in a plush velvet chair, his eyes glued to a screen displaying camera footage from the forest. The TV showed a contestant brutally attacking another with a hunting knife. 

“Contestant 47 has been eliminated. Cause of death: Contestant 92”.

The automated voice poured out from a speaker and the man leaned back in his seat, his hands folding behind his head. You fought back the fuming urge to break the carafe over his skull right then and there. 

“You’re late, you’re lucky I drink it neat, or else the ice would have melted by now”, he spat, turning around to face you. He patted the table in front of him impatiently with a frown. Your eyes widened as you recognized the face scowling at you. Now you knew how he knew of your profession, what a petty asshole. You shoved down the anger boiling inside as you placed the tray on the table. The man crossed his arms, gesturing to the bottle as he tapped his foot. You really had to pour it for him too? 

You uncapped the carafe and poured the likely expensive scotch into the glass. He grabbed it as soon as you finished, looking back at the screen and sipping the booze. you stepped towards the door, stopping at the back of his chair. Your blood rushed in your ears and your heart started beating so hard it was almost painful against your ribs.

You felt the cool blade of the knife hidden up your sleeve as you stepped closer, you had to honor your promise, you liked to think you were a person of your word. 

“Would you get out already? I don’t pay you to stand around-”, his words were cut off by you grabbing his thinning hair and pulling harshly to tilt his head back. He had no time to shout for help as you brought out the knife, biting your lip in disgust as you ran the blade over his neck.

The blood poured out like a running stream, staining his crisp white shirt with deep crimson, he let out a choked sob as he dropped his glass. Crystal splintered against the floor and, as if on cue, Ronin entered the room with his crowbar slung over his shoulder. 

“Simple, but a throat slit’s a classic for a reason”, he said, his smiling showing that he was all too pleased with himself. The man held his hands to his bleeding throat, choking out pleas and cries as his body convulsed. You stepped away as Ronin took his sweet time sauntering over, eyes gazing at the wound. He looked overjoyed, like you had gotten him a present that he had always wanted. 

“The knife is short, stabbing him would have taken too long”, you rationalized, pocketing the damp knife. Ronin crouched down to the man, reaching out and grabbing his chin, the motion made the wound gape like a red maw. 

“Did I put on a good show, sir?” Ronin asked mockingly, the man’s eyes welled up with tears as he nodded, hoping it would please the Devil’s Butcher. “Aw thanks, how about you get a live performance this time?” He asked before  letting go and swinging his crowbar to the man’s head.

He did it again.

And again.

And again. 

you could only watch the wall as the white was splattered with blood and dark bits of brain matter. You heard the disgusting cracks and squishing as Ronin beat his accumulated anger into the man’s skull. 

“Ronin, I said we had to hurry, I think he died on the second strike”, you said, listening as the sounds stopped, Ronin walked up behind you, his shoes splashing in the blood. He rubbed his chin like an art critic as he looked at the wall. Ronin reached out and dipped his fingers into the blood, drawing lines on the plaster until there was a dripping crimson pentagram on the wall. 

“As my biggest fan, what do you think of this?” He asked teasingly as he glanced at you. You shoved him and turned around to hide the smile you couldn’t believe was on your face 

“I think we need to get out of here”. 

Ronin walked over to the corpse and reached into his pocket. He pulled a pair of car keys with a shining Mercedes logo on them and jingled them with a wide grin. 

___

“I knew the guy, he was CEO, I wrote an article about claims of OSHA violations in one of his factories”, you spat as the two of you sat in the 6-figure car, getting blood all over the cream seats. Ronin tapped his finger against the steering wheel, in tune with the song on the radio. 

“Hey cheer up, you’re like a martyr now”, he laughed, looking over the empty, dark highway. 

“Since I have to spend 12 hours in a car with you? Fuck yeah I am”, you said, glancing out of the window. 

You had opened the door to the control building and announced over the intercom that the contestants were free. Maybe some were pissed at their ruined chances for the cash prize. You hoped they all found their way home though, but right now you were exhausted. For the first time in weeks, you truly felt like you could relax. The only thing that was missing was a…

You looked to Ronin, who was holding a cigar out towards you, like he had read your mind. “Ronin! Stealing cigars, I’m so disappointed in you”, you said, chuckling as you took it. Just your luck, there was a lighter in the glove compartment. You took a drag of the expensive tobacco, the smoke filling lungs, burning in the way you loved.

But you definitely preferred your cheap cigarettes. You handed him the cigar, he hadn’t said anything about being a smoker, but he took a drag nonetheless. “How does the fruit of your labor taste?” You asked as he handed it back to you. You rolled down the window to let the smoke pour out. 

“It sucks, let’s get some food, I’m so sick of fucking berries”, He said, glancing at a sign advertising a chain diner a few miles ahead. You just now noticed how hungry you were. You hadn’t had a proper meal in a while. All that was available in the forest were fruits and the occasional wild game.

“I was thinking blueberry pancakes actually”, you said, pulling out a wallet filled with cash from the glove box. 

“I’m gonna get apple pie”, Ronin stated, the red lights of the diner shining in the distance on the highway exit. 

“That’s not a breakfast food, but I guess you deserve it”, you said, looking at the clock that read 4AM. 

“Shit, a compliment from you, darlin’?  You’re makin’ me blush!” He said as they pulled into the parking lot. You rolled your eyes and opened the car door. 

“That’s just blood, wipe that off before we go inside”.

The two of you sat in the virtually empty restaurant in a comfortable silence as you scarfed down your food like starving hyenas. You felt cold fingertips against your hand under the table, you looked to Ronin, who only answered with a smile. You sighed and held his hand, but your heart warmed as he squeezed it softly. 

You would make it back to Uptown and ditch the car on the way. You reached into your back pocket and placed your notebook and pen on the table. 

“You finally want that autograph?” Ronin asked as he grabbed the book. 

“Write whatever you want, I just wanted a keepsake from this”, you spoke as you took another bite of your pancakes. 

Once he was done scribbling, he slid the book back to you. You read the words with a raised brow. “What’s ‘killrch8t_b00t.mango?” You asked, you had expected his phone number or at least a signature. 

“You’ll find out when we get home, I’m sure you’ll fit right in”. 

___

SLAUGHTERHOUSE_LOSERS

@ goreboy:

rejoice losers, your resident Devil has crawled his way outta hell 

@ Angelic:

Ronin! What happened? You haven’t been active for weeks and when I went to your place you weren’t there! I looked everywhere for you. God, I’m so relieved. 

@ K9:

Your absence has been most puzzling, attempting to track you became entirely impossible. I am however pleased that you did not die before being brought to justice.

@ hitmeuppp:

holy shit i thought you were dead or something 

glad to have u back tho

@ goreboy:

Aw thanks for The warm Welcome 

i hope you’ll show my new Friend the same Hospitality 

@ Angelic: 

What do you mean? 

@ goreboy: 

welcome the Newly Christened @MC

@ MC:

Ronin? What is this? 

@ goreboy: 

Go Introduce yourself And Let’s tell Them all about our Little Honeymoon darlin  

[712virginia]

I like to believe that Will and Hannibal survived the fall, and after that, for a short time, they lived a life closer to the way Will lived his life before; isolated. I feel like that would be Hannibal given up the luxury and exhibition for a while just to have Will, to admire him in his habitat. He would be allowing himself to have something that's not a spectacle or a game. It's just intimate and private.

I think they find a house/cabin in the middle of nowhere, kill whoever lived there and didn't waste anything (like Garret Jagob Hobbs). They hunt, they fish, and they cook. Listen to the silence, talk to each other.

Hannibal would look so peculiar and out of place, and I think Will would find that quite fascinating.

I don't think that could last forever. They've eventually got bored and start to plan something scandalous, dramatic, just for the sake of it. It's not in their nature to be ordinary.

However, I think they they would try ordinary life for a while, just to have those memories ( and since FBI would probably be looking for them in fency places).