BUCK TANNER (rides) wrote in colosseum, @ 2013-12-11 16:53:00 |
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Buck’s decision earlier to be a good person and stay had paid off literally immediately. Only a few hours after he had come back to camp, a silver parachute floated down and landed near Laurel. He’d thought it must be some kind of medicine, but this must have been something special. Capitol magic was good like that, sometimes. It had made a marked difference in her wounds. It didn’t grow back her fingers or anything. But it seemed to have helped. Now, she looked better already. That was damn good timing. Seven knew what the hell they were doing. This meant a healthy Laurel, and though he probably should’ve worried a little more that she would turn on him instead of the other way around, he wasn’t that concerned. Not yet.
To celebrate, he’d dragged Laurel out on a walk to gather more snow clean to melt. Not too far. He didn’t want to tempt fate or more baby bears. They hadn’t had very historically good luck on walks. He stuffed some particularly powdery stuff into his canteen. This was also an excuse to talk about what their next move was, now that they were both in a position to get out of here.“You’re actually feeling better?” He asked for probably the third time. He didn’t quite trust anything that came from the Capitol, he couldn’t help it.
When the medicine had first arrived Laurel had insisted that it must have been for someone else. The infection had taken hold of her and she was growing too weak for any real medicine, she expected, but after some persuasion she’d tried it out. The effect had been so quick, and while she still wasn’t at perfect health it seemed to have cleared up the worst. It was good, blood poisoning wasn’t something she’d really wanted to die of. “They ain’t forgotten me!” Laurel had told Buck happily, blowing kisses to the sky and then settling down to her first peaceful sleep in days. And it seemed to have worked even as she’d slept.
She was standing alongside Buck, feeling stronger still. “Sure am,” she told him. “Shit, I thought I was a goner. They really are looking out for me,” she smiled at him. She was still injured, still missing fingers, but her hope had returned. “Anyways, I got a question for you,” Laurel started, keen to talk now that they were away from Iaso and Mouse. “Why’d you not ditch us?” She could’ve asked why he didn’t kill her, but the question was there. She was grateful to him; it could have been easy to kill her while she was fading fast.
She lit on what he’d been thinking of before almost too quickly. A part of him startled. Had he really been that obvious? But she couldn’t have known. He shrugged. “I don’t know.” He really didn’t. He had continued to struggle with the question all morning, but the parachute seemed to be the answer. He couldn’t leave an ally in good health. “I thought about it.” He admitted, careful to look at the snow instead of her face while saying that. “I wanted to.” He smiled up at her then, a picture of cocky ease.
“But what kind of a person would I be if I left you alone with the Threes. Bored to death. Talking about computers all the time. No fucking way.” Buck shrugged. “But now, though. We should think about it.” That felt more fair, two leaving two. “They’re hurt, and I don’t want to wait around here much longer.”
“I’d have ditched them if it was just those two,” Laurel told him, quite at ease to admit that. “They’re too smart, and reckon I ain’t clever enough to be best buddies you know?” Laurel smiled, the small blonde girl having smiled a lot more now that she felt that she was on the mend. It would take more than a career, a mutt and blood sickness to get her killed, it seemed. Laurel had a slight spring in her step once again, and she knelt down onto the snow to try and help Buck. She was still clumsy with her injured arm, but unwilling to do anything but pull her weight.
“But thanks,” Laurel stole a glance at him before nudging him with her elbow and smiling at him. “I got your back too.”
“That was my plan, too.” He felt better admitting it to her now that it probably wasn’t going to happen. “If you went away, too.” He couldn’t bring himself to say If You Died because that felt like jinxing it. But it wasn’t going to happen now. They were fine. He smiled. “I’m not smart enough for them either. I feel like a damn idiot around them, actually.” And that was dangerous.
He returned the nudge with a little grin of his own. “You better. You kill me in my sleep after all this, I’m haunting your ass for as long as you’re alive.” This shouldn’t have been a real possibility, but it was, and thus the joking vibe of it was lost, and the whole thing felt a little more sinister than intended. He shrugged to cover it. “But yeah. I’ve got your back while you’ve got mine. Same as before.” Simple as that, he thought.
“When I was dying and all I considered trying to smother you with my backpack,” Laurel told him, her smile to signify that she was only joking. “Reckoned by doing that I’d get enough interest for them to send me medicine, but I figured it weren’t worth the risk.” She giggled, in remarkably good spirits considering their situation. “Could’a sat on your legs and tried to do it, but I like having a friend out here too much.”
Laurel looked up quickly, scanning the horizon. After her run-in with the bears she didn’t like to be anything but alert when she was outside of their little hideout.
Though for all Buck knew she was serious, he laughed anyway. “I would’ve liked to see that.” He mused, because it was a very funny image. “You trying to smother anyone one-handed.” He took the opportunity to look into the distance when she did. Two pairs of eyes were better than one. Wasn’t that the whole point of this alliance stuff?
Finding nothing dangerous, he looked to Laurel again. “But yeah. It’s nice for now. We’ll probably have to split eventually, but not yet. I think.” How many were dead now? Eight? Nine? He’d lost track. Still less than half. Once a few more were gone, they could talk about it. Loyalty only went so far in the Arena. He wasn’t stupid enough to think otherwise.
“Sure,” Laurel agreed. But then, this was a thought to discuss while they were away from the others. She glanced up once again, still nervous in case something else appeared. “What d’you think about the others though?” Laurel asked him, cautiously testing to see if he was ready to ditch them or not.
It was a decision he didn’t want to make, but it had to be done. They couldn’t stay with three forever. He said it as diplomatically as he could. “I don’t think they’re really helping us right now. They’re both hurt, you’re not so bad anymore. You don’t need the care they do. I’m not hurt at all, really. Staying here would mean a lot more sitting in one place and taking care of people who might turn around and kill us.” It was harsh, maybe, but this was the truth of things. “I don’t think it’s helping us to stay here and share our stuff with two people who can’t even do anything.”
Laurel’s nod was curt. It felt awful, but she was starting to try and put herself into a harsher mindset. “D’you think we should grab our stuff and ditch?” Laurel pressed him for a firmer answer. “We ain’t seen so much more of this arena yet, wouldn’t mind seeing what other fucked-up bears are out to eat me,” Laurel’s usual sense of humour, once again, turned the horrors that she had experienced into a joke. She stood slowly, hoisting her backpack back onto her shoulders a little awkwardly. “And now Career kids have started dying,” she shrugged her shoulders, “I fancy my chances a little more.”
Buck felt awful too, honestly. Mouse and Iaso had been nothing but nice. But you couldn’t really be nice in the Arena. He was probably too kind as it was. He tried to bring back the steely, heartless attitude that had allowed him to laugh at the two boy and wish him death. It wasn’t very difficult. Survival was the most important thing. He had to make sure he did that. “Yeah.” He responded, just as curtly. “I don’t much like the idea of sitting in one place. If someone’s gonna kill us, I’d rather see it coming or try to hunt it down first.” He wanted to face death straight on, if he faced it at all. “Do we tell them or just go?” Telling them would give them a chance to follow, but it would be the more decent method. He couldn’t decide which was better.
Laurel shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe just go. She’s been real helpful, and he’s smart but-” Laurel hesitated for a moment before ploughing ahead with her decision. “No. It ain’t gonna last, so I want to be able to end it on my terms.” Laurel smiled at him. “What d’you say, back to just us? Since I reckon you’ve stopped being my bad luck charm, Buck Tanner.” Her tone was joking even through the accusation, and she looked around her once again. “Back to us?”
Her thinking was his, and so Buck nodded. “Yeah.” He answered, tossing out all the associated risks of this. It might not be as safe, but then it might be safer. Right now they were risking becoming boring and thus disposable. He was sure Laurel’s district had spent a shitload on that cream. They couldn’t afford to lose more sponsors than they were bringing in. This course of action at least showed they were willing to roll the dice in the Arena. It was better this way. “Back to just us. We’ll go.” He decided, laying a hand on her shoulder in a sign of solidarity. He turned around, somewhat reluctantly. He wished they’d brought more of their stuff with them so they could just go from here, but it couldn’t be helped now. He just hoped Iaso and Mouse didn’t ask too many questions.