Beatrix Cottontail [D10 tribute] (bunnyearsliar) wrote in colosseum, @ 2014-04-16 18:51:00 |
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'-- and that's the story of our last family reunion, with my second cousin Fawn and great-great-gran Pippa and ... and ... and my great-uncle Bolt, I think he's like, once removed too, and the ... the alpaca rodeo. Yeah, that's always --' Beatrix was in a bizarrely blissful mood as she stumbled around in the rain with the stew container on her head, drunk as a cowboy on moonshine during the local stampede in Ten thanks to the fermented grapes she had found and eaten earlier after wandering through the vineyard on the sky island west of the Cornucopia. If she was usually loud enough while sober, then her lowered inhibitions allowed her to achieve the impossible of somehow breaking her own personal loudness record. She could even be heard above the din and rumble of the storm that was raging all around the arena. Unfortunately for her, the last four people in the arena she'd want overhearing her happened to be right there. Sure, she could tear apart all four Careers and rip out their spines with her bare hands -- she was a weapon, after all, forged in the fires of pain and indignity at the hands of frogs and murderous clouds, and she was even more of a weapon without weapons -- but that wouldn't be fair, you know? Which was why she ... turned to face them, put one hand on her hips, and thrust the other one out in front of herself with as much drama as she could, palm facing out. 'STOP,' she shouted (and slurred), even though giving away her exact location was the stupidest thing she could have done; her judgment was awful at the best of times, but it was atrocious now. 'I've got a lot of skills I can offer y'all -- if y'all will just be smart and let me live first.' For a second, Pompeia did stop. Why would someone shout? And why would they shout that? The Cornucopia left little for the Careers, and so they started hunting altogether. Any potentially useful items they couldn't carry or didn't want to carry were dropped off the side of their mountain island home before they crossed the bridge back towards where they last found food. The pack had been following a voice they could barely make out, muffled by rain. It was human. The spot on the mountain made it difficult to pinpoint exactly where it was coming from, and it was hard to navigate through the vines and their support. So when Pompeia heard the shout, she was shocked. She stared in Beatrix's direction with a look of disbelief, and then looked at Aeneas, as if to say, Seriously?. And then she kept talking!! Pompeia continued moving forward as the girl went on and on and on. There were no indications of traps. And when Beatrix offered her proposal, Pompeia emerged from the fog to roll her eyes and draw her sword. Even in her drunken stupor, Beatrix knew that the giant Girl Two pulling out a sword was a very bad thing, and she screamed -- not out of fear, but as a war cry, obviously -- as she stumbled around in a circle on the spot before turning to run. 'Didn't realise y'all were that pissed 'bout me carvin' my initials in the dummies!' she shrieked in a squeaky voice, remembering when Pompeia had shouted about it back during training. 'Uh, I can set traps! Electric ones, even! Or out of nothing! And I can make ... wine?' Of course she couldn't, but it was the first thing that sluggishly came to mind as she ran through the vineyard, boots squelching in the mud. 'And I know all there is to know 'bout seduction! I can be the Lysander to your Walnut!' Was Girl One even there? She couldn't help sneaking a look over her shoulder, and screamed again when she thought she could see and hear the Careers giving chase through the mist and rain as she ran. Beatrix's little speech made Aeneas let out a bark of laughter. It was more a laugh of confusion than amusement -- the Lysander to their Walnut, what the hell was she even talking about? And seduction? Who the hell did she think she was going to seduce? He considered telling her that they would take her help and then just shoving his spear through her, but it seemed cruel, and she was running. Trying not to keep laughing, he followed. Shad's eyebrows had disappeared into his hairline after Beatrix rattled off potential contributions to the pack. He was laughing, too, face lighting up against the grim arena. Without a ranged weapon, he couldn't do anything to stop her from running, so he ran after her with the others, trailing behind. He was beginning to suspect his stomach was not happy with the rich fish stew he'd been sent the day before. "Be careful not to fall in a puddle," he warned them. "She can do that, too. Drown all of us. At once!" “Without the go-kart, even,” Shimmer replied brightly to Shad, though her eyes stayed in front of her. It was hard not to laugh at little at the absurdity of the situation. The girl - whom she vaguely recognized as being Snare Girl - had a small lead on them, but one which would be easily overcome in a few moments time. Once they’d all gained on her, for what was about to be an easy kill, she called out after Beatrix, “You forgot your disguise today. That must be how we found you.” Shimmer followed it up with a little laugh, remembering the ridiculous way she used to spy on them at training. If there was anything Beatrix wished she had done more of in training weeks ago, it was running. She didn't even glance over her shoulder now to take a look at how close the Careers must be -- though with all the mist and rain, she probably wouldn't have been able to see much anyway -- but they definitely sounded close. Her boots had stopped squishing in the mud of the vineyard and had begun pounding against slick, but solid rocky terrain again. She could feel a stitch in her side and her lungs were burning with a dry sort of pain as she kept sprinting forward in a wobbly line thanks with her drunkenness, with no idea where she was headed. 'Uh, I meant to be found!' she shouted back without looking to see who had just been taunting her. 'And I'm a master go-kart racer!' There was nothing but more mist and stony ground ahead of her as she ran and ran and ran. 'You don't wanna fuck around with me, I swear! I'm warnin' you right now.' As much as she tried to sound threatening, her voice came out as an absurd cross between shrieking and wheezing instead. 'Y'all better back off! I can't feel pain, so if you kill me, I'm gonna come back to life and fuck up your sh--' -- and just like that, Beatrix suddenly disappeared completely out of the Career pack's view as she ran right over a cliff on the edge of the sky island. In fact, she seemed to have fallen out of the arena entirely. There was a long silence where nothing could be heard but falling rain and the occasional low rumble of thunder. Perhaps someone in the audience would swear they heard a faint, 'I meant to do that!' when it was really just the wind blowing as it always did. And then the boom of the cannon finally sounded. Shad had skidded to a stop, stomach gurgling, when Beatrix disappeared over the edge. He exchanged a look with the others, hoping to confirm that he'd actually seen what he thought he'd seen. The cannon fire authenticated it before they could, though, and he reacted with an expression that was both delighted and surprised. "Damn." Pompeia was struggling not to laugh either, and her mouth was open to tell Beatrix that she should stop when the blonde disappeared. In her effort to stop herself from tumbling after Beatrix, Pompeia's feet slipped on the rock, and she fell backwards. For a moment, she just sat there, stunned. Like the others, Aeneas had lurched to a stop, far too close to the edge of the cliff for comfort. He let out a single 'ha!' that sounded more hysterical than amused. The sheer absurdity of Beatrix Cottontail's death was almost too much to bear. He looked down at Pompeia, debating whether or not he should offer to help her up. He decided against it. Instead, he looked down at the thick blanket fog, wondering what her corpse looked like after hitting the ground, god knows how many feet away. He cleared his throat. "That's weird," he said. "I could've sworn she said she could fly." If she could have peered over the cliff without putting herself at risk of following, she would have. Instead, Shimmer had to settle for staring into the misty abyss as she tried to process what had just happened. “Maybe she did,” Shimmer said. “Clearly she knows how to fake her own death.” She couldn’t help the giggle that followed. |