Chapter 18: "The First Cannons"
July 7: Day One of the Games
Capitol Plaza
The crowd was gathering for the big launch, the beginning of the Games. After all the prep work getting everything in place, it was finally time to get things rolling — and get Thanos' attention distracted so they could focus on the more important things, like setting up for the revolution in just six months' time.
It was almost a shame that this year would be the last, because Tivan was on his way out as an interviewer, and Fury would have preferred working with Trish anyway. But this one last time, Fury put on a painful smile, straightened his shoulders, and met the bright lights and cameras with a Gamemaker's poise as the deafening roar began. It was a Quarter Quell, and the excitement over the possibilities was palpable as Fury and Tivan sat down underneath the large screen following the transports carrying the tributes to the arena. The cameras showed nothing of the landscape that would give anything away, and Tivan was positively beside himself with showmanship-fueled excitement.
"So, tell us, Director," Tivan said as soon as Fury was seated, in a breathless tone that told his audience he simply couldn't wait any longer. "This year, the Quarter Quell — what will be different about this Games as compared to the last twenty-four? We know what was announced, that there will be a death every day, but just how do you intend to follow through?"
"Aside from the obvious — the tributes themselves — we have quite a few surprises in store this year, one of which I prefer to keep a secret until the time comes that we will likely have to reveal it," Fury said clearly, perfectly at ease and in control.
"We'll certainly be holding our breaths," Tivan said, shaking his head. "And I suppose, if the tributes don't keep up the kill count, we'll find out." He leaned forward, his eyes sparkling with excitement.
"That's the long and short of it, yes," Fury replied with a smirk. "The Games will bring out their most vicious tendencies — if for no other reason than to end it. There will be no extended, happy campfires this time out."
"That will certainly be different from last year," Tivan replied. He glanced toward the screen as the transports landed. The cameras didn't show the kids being unloaded, but everyone in attendance knew that was what was happening. "Now then, we're all about to see this year's arena — anything to say before the grand reveal? I was hoping for Washington myself after the little tease you put in last year…"
"Washington was a bit overrated," Fury replied, waving a hand. "Too many hiding places. The arena last year was really too busy for the group we had, and it kept the tributes apart more than we anticipated — letting those happy campfires last far longer than necessary."
"So something else entirely?" Tivan asked, sounding intrigued.
"This year, our tributes will need to be far more savvy about their supplies, for one thing," Fury said with a nod.
"With this particular crop of tributes, that will play to their strengths. As I recall from last night's interviews, there was much to be said about brain over brawn," Tivan noted with an interested sort of frown.
"All the brains in the world won't do them any good if they have no survival skills," Fury pointed out. "This arena — more so than others — will push them to make use of everything around them. And the opportunity for found weapons is next to nothing."
"So the tributes will be fighting not only each other but their surroundings," Tivan summed up with an excited sort of smile. "You're certainly making it clear just how we can expect a death at least once a day."
"More than you can believe," Fury said. "Limited resources, limited weapon choices — along with some of our classic surprises — and a special twist for the Quell. All set in one of our most inhospitable arenas."
As Fury spoke, the camera panned out slightly to show the red arches against the already blazing morning sun, the desert mountains in the distance only providing enough shade closer into the impressive peaks — though the Tesseract in the center of the desert was nowhere near any kind of shelter.
Underneath the Arena
There just hadn't been enough time to prepare in the Capitol, Scott reflected as he looked over his outfit for the Games. The whole thing was deep reds and browns, a light tee shirt and a windbreaker with lightweight tan pants and boots. Nothing incredibly heavy, so that had to mean it wouldn't be cold… unless it did get cold and the whole point was to force them into finding good shelter or building fires to give away their position….
Scott frowned down at his hands while Jubilee made her observations of the Games uniform, coming to a lot of the same conclusions he had. He suddenly wasn't sure he was ready for this. Not that he could imagine anyone ever was.
As for Logan, he hadn't really said anything yet, though that was because the people in charge of how things ran had waited to the very last minute to tell the victors and stylists what the final twist was. They were also quick to inform the victors that it was part of their final duty before the Games started in earnest to explain that last twist to their tributes.
Logan watched from a distance as Jubilee went over Scott one final time, looking a bit green at what he knew. It occurred to him that some of the victors wouldn't bother telling the kids that last little tidbit of the Games, but he couldn't even consider letting Scott go in without knowing. He glanced up at the clock — there were still at least ten minutes before they were going to launch.
He waited until Jubilee looked like she was done fussing, though the fact that Scott was absently rubbing his arm where the tracker had been placed had Logan scowling at the action. There was no way the kid knew the extent of what had been done, but it still had Logan mad. When Scott looked up and caught Logan scowling, he shook his head minutely.
"Don't worry. I'll be out of your hair in—" Scott checked the clock. "—eight minutes."
"I don't want you outta my hair," Logan muttered before he let out a sigh. "I'd trade places with you if I could." He gestured to Scott's arm. "Guard that thing. Please."
Scott looked surprised at the tone and glanced up to meet Logan's gaze. "What, all that talk about pressure points and you come out worried about my arm?" he asked, his head tipped to the side. It wasn't a jab or a tease; he really didn't know where Logan was going with this — and couldn't understand why Logan seemed so … he would have said 'concerned' if it was anybody but Logan.
Logan nodded. "Wasn't even a thought until they told us what they did to you guys. Nasty little surprise from the Capitol if ... there aren't enough deaths."
Scott frowned and glanced down at his arm before he had to shake his head. "Yeah, Quarter Quell. Gotta be a death every day… so they have to enforce that, right?" He sighed and straightened up at the shoulders to meet Logan's gaze again. "So. What did they do? Might as well tell me now before I find out myself the hard way."
"As I understand it — and I hope I'm wrong — if no one dies, one of you will be randomly poisoned." Logan looked beyond frustrated as he told Scott, and he couldn't just stand still.
Scott took in a deep breath on hearing it, stunned into temporary silence before he simply had to shake his head. "So we could do everything right and still die," he said as he ran both hands through his hair and looked mad. This changed everything about the way he had been approaching the Games, the way he had planned ahead. He couldn't plan for that, and he knew it.
Logan just nodded and breathed out a quiet 'yeah'. "I'll do everything I can—"
"Yeah. I'll try not to get 'randomly' poisoned," Scott muttered. "I doubt it'll really be random, but..." He sighed and got to his feet. "Guess that's one way to enforce that rule. Let's just hope they never have to use it."
"Which rule?" Jubilee asked. "The fight to the death one?" She was worrying her lip and bouncing just a bit before she tried — again — to fix his hair. "Because they are pretty sticky about that one."
Scott halfheartedly ducked out of her reach. "The fight every day rule," he said. "No rest for the wicked, I guess you could call it."
Jubilee tried to smile for him, but Logan just locked his jaw down a bit tighter on hearing it. The signal came through, and it was clear that it was time to get moving. "Watch your back," Logan muttered quietly.
"I'll be fine," Scott said with a sharp little nod.
Miles watched his mentor disappear as the little tube he was in rose up toward the arena. He'd never seen Sam look so upset before, but then again, having to tell someone there was a time bomb in their arm was probably an upsetting experience. Not that Miles would know something like that; he had very little experience in the time bomb reveal department. But it sure sounded like something that would be upsetting.
He was absently rubbing his arm as the platform rose before he reminded himself to stop doing that. He really didn't want to accidentally set that thing off. Sam had said he only had to worry about it if it was a hard hit, like bone-breaking, but Miles felt like he was completely justified in a little paranoia over this kind of thing. It was only his life that was at stake, right?
He gulped in a little air and sort of nodded to himself as the platform continued to rise until, suddenly, the first rays of blinding sun peeked over the edge and then flooded the whole thing, and Miles found himself squinting against the bright sun and trying to take in the sights as quickly as he could while a monotonous voice counted down from 60.
The first thing that registered was the fact that it was hot. Not humid hot, like back home, but hot like an oven. Miles could already feel the perspiration breaking out over his face as he put a hand up to shield his eyes. The arena seemed to go on and on for forever in either direction, and he could see for what seemed like miles all the way to the mountain range far beyond them. Not to mention the fact that there were rock formations closer — red rocks that water had pounded into shapes that probably would have been pretty if Miles hadn't been in a death game. They sorta looked threatening now, though. Like nooses or something, all curled in on themselves.
Okay, that was not a good thought to be having.
Miles took in several deep breaths that were supposed to be calming but ended up shuddering in his chest as he looked around. His district partner was right beside him looking as calm as ever, totally poised — nothing ever fazed her, did it? Opposite the big, glowing, blue Tesseract in the middle of the desert, Miles could see Kamala from the Rooftop Club, and he raised a hand to wave at her before he realized what he was doing and shook his head. He shouldn't bring any attention to himself.
The Eights were on the other side of Miles, so that was something, at least. He was close to his fellow spider, since they were arranged boy-girl-boy-girl. He waved Gwen's way a lot more subtly than he'd been about to wave at Kamala as the countdown boomed 15 in his ears and he realized, oh, hey, that was a lot quicker than he thought it had been.
He glanced one more time around the group of tributes, around the arena, as the final ten seconds ticked down, and he felt his feet already moving to the edge of his platform. "Just say one; just say one," he started to mutter under his breath. He was ready to move. He needed to be gone. This was not a place he should be. At all.
He was pointed entirely away from the Tesseract, his gaze on a backpack close by, and as soon as he heard the klaxon bell, that was it — he bolted.
Miles ran with everything he had, totally focused on getting the bag and getting out, and he wasn't the only one who had that idea.
"AUGH!" Miles shouted when he saw someone in the corner of his vision coming closer than he was comfortable with, and he had just turned with both fists raised when he saw that it was Gwen, with a bag already slung over her shoulder. She shooed him ahead of her with a muttered "go, go, go, go, go," as already, the first cannon had sounded — though Miles was too petrified to look back and see who it was for. He didn't need any further prompting before he picked up the bag — it felt way too light, but he wasn't exactly picky about supplies right now because he didn't want to die — and the two spiders ran as fast as they could toward the relative safety of the rocks and mountains, the only hiding spots available in the whole arena.
If anyone thought that those kids in Ten needed any weapons to get their first murder under their belt, they were dead wrong. Arkady Gregorovitch barely even looked further than a few steps ahead of his platform when he grabbed a hold of Monet and simply broke her neck bare-handed. She had barely even gotten off the platform. And Arkady hardly paused at all before he barrelled right for the Tesseract looking for a weapon — already looking for his next kill.
He wasn't the only one to go for the Tesseract, though even the Careers gave the Tens a wide berth, clearly not wanting to engage the two psychopaths and instead content to let the tributes from Ten pick their weapons and then run off to go kill tributes, thin the herd — so the Careers wouldn't have to.
Most of the other tributes had the same idea, skirting away from the Tens, though that just prompted a small race when both tributes from Ten took off after anyone foolish enough to get within their line of sight — and the more skittish tributes scattered.
It was a good thing the younger tributes that year were so fast, and while both of the spiders at the outskirts of the fight squeaked out screams of terror when they saw Arkady look their way — they outpaced the older Tens and managed to get away, though neither of them stopped running for a good long time, just for good measure.
Not everyone was so lucky, though.
Jessica Jones was sure it was just the icing on top of the horrible cake of everything else that had happened that she'd been stationed next to District One's tribute when the platforms came up.
She knew her best chance was to run; she wasn't going to delude herself into thinking that she was strong enough or fast enough to make it into the closer Tesseract supplies — and the way Kilgrave was eyeing her just cemented it for her that this was a bad place to be.
As soon as the bell rang, she took off at a run, but one second, she was watching Bucky knock over the guy from Three on the way to a heavy broadsword, and the next, something had hit her, and she went down in a tumble.
It took a moment for her body to register that she was in pain, but when it came flooding in, all white hot and burning, she realized that there was a dagger in her back, and as she tried to push herself to her feet, she only got another few steps before she realized that simply wasn't going to cut it. Drawing breath hurt.
She felt something hit her back, and she went sprawling once more, her eyes closed against the pain of a second dagger in the back as she heard the guy from One shout out a "nice shot," moments before she felt a hand close around her ankle.
She might be down, but she wasn't out, and she kicked at the hand with everything she had, satisfied when she heard a cry of surprise and pain, and Kilgrave drew back.
"Ha," she muttered to herself, triumphantly, before Kilgrave came back and grabbed her by both feet, dragging her backwards along the ground.
She scrambled, her hands dragging along the dirt and rocks and trying to find purchase. It was sandy and hot and dry, and there was just nothing to slow her travel, and when Kilgrave finally stopped pulling her, she tried to turn over and only succeeded in pushing one of the daggers deeper in her own back when she did so — but at least she could see him. She wasn't going to die not being able to see him.
"Come on, Jessica," Kilgrave sneered at her. "Why don't you show us what you can do?" Over his shoulder, Nefaria was cackling with glee, tossing a knife over and over in her hand. Jessica quickly realized that she had been the one to hit her. Not Kilgrave.
"Always getting someone else to do your dirty work, huh?" she spit out Kilgrave's way, and his eyes flashed with anger for a moment before he snatched one of the knives from the collection Nefaria had already somehow managed to accumulate and simply drove it into her side.
Jessica shouted when the dagger hit, but it didn't kill her immediately. Instead, she suddenly felt like she was growing weaker and weaker as the blood started to pool around her, until she was too tired to push off the hand that Kilgrave laid on her cheek as he crowed to her about something or other — she didn't care to spend the energy to find out what he was on about.
It didn't take her long to bleed out, and that was a relief, as it meant she didn't have to listen to him bragging to the other Careers about having the first kill of the group — or listen to the other comments about how pretty his kill was, either.
Apart from Nefaria and Kilgrave, another Career was looking to post a kill on the scoreboard before the initial bloodbath was out, and Amora had set her sights on the little girl from Six.
Kamala had already talked with Scott and Clara the night before, and she knew what the plan was. The plan was for her to run, and then the other two would meet up with her after she found a good spot to hide. Clara had assured her that they could find her and that she didn't have to worry about it — they'd get weapons and supplies.
It was a very good plan, and Kamala was in full support of this plan. It was just that her brain was in full support of the plan, while her body had decided to just … stay ... put.
It was just like the Reapings all over again; she was too scared to move when the klaxon bell rang out to signal the end of the countdown, and she only got moving again when she saw that the blonde from Four had a sword — and that her district partner had a mace, of all things — and that both of them were looking her way. She took off running at last, but she ran almost right into the big wall of muscle that was Skurge. He all but batted Kamala back toward Amora, who smiled down at Kamala when she skidded to a stop.
But thankfully, the Sevens had been close by when the bell rang, and when Clara saw Amora making a move on Kamala, she let out a frustrated sort of growl. She thought the plan was that the little girl from Six would run. But with Amora right on her, it was about all the little girl could do to simply avoid getting hit — even if it was obvious Amora was toying with her.
Clara didn't even really look at what she was grabbing as she picked up a pair of staves on her way to Kamala's defense, and when Amora's sword came swinging down, Clara managed to block her with the staves and drove forward as she barked for Kamala to run.
Kamala didn't get the chance to act on it, though, as the decision was made for her, and Scott arrived to simply pick her up and throw her over his shoulder, a couple backpacks in the other hand as he handed Kamala a sheathed knife. "Anyone tries to follow us, don't miss," he told her before he took off running with her, intent on getting Kamala out of danger while Clara dealt with Amora.
The sword came down on Clara, and she bared her teeth as she deflected the blow with one hand and brought the other around to crack Amora in the arm with the other stave. The sword went clattering to the ground, and the blonde Career backed up a few steps — in clear shock that Clara had disarmed her so quickly.
Panting, Clara shoved one of the staves into her back pocket before she picked up the short sword that Amora had dropped and headed toward her, ready to slash and end the little witch.
Before Clara could put an end to Amora, the Four girl's giant district partner bashed into her, sending the little blonde sprawling. The sword was knocked loose from her hands, and before she could get to her feet, Skurge had picked her up from behind, his arms crushing the breath out of her as he pulled her back closer to Amora.
Clara squirmed and struggled as Skurge laughed over her shoulder, but that just seemed to tick the little Creed off more. She quickly shifted her thoughts from fighting to breaking free — and causing whatever damage she could to him — as Amora gathered up her sword.
When Clara saw that Amora had her weapon back, she realized how short of a time she had to work with — and with her teeth clenched together, she threw her head back and cracked Skurge in the face, stunning him enough that he loosened his grip so she could shift a bit in his grasp. When her hand went part way behind her, she just grabbed everything she could, squeezed hard, and twisted until Skurge had let go of her with a cry of pure pain.
But Clara didn't let go of him — not until she'd pulled the stave out of her back pocket and backhanded him with it across his temple. The crack that echoed the desert sands was one that rang with finality, and she'd barely drawn back for another hit when the canon for Skurge went off — and the little Creed turned back to Amora with Skurge's blood splattered across her pale features.
As Clara got to her feet, Amora got to her senses and turned tail. She knew that if Skurge hadn't been able to stand up to Clara, she didn't have a chance. Her best bet was to find the rest of her Career pack — and hope that they wouldn't turn on her with her muscle gone.
When the Four girl took off, Clara looked around her to pick up the other stave and grabbed a pack on the way out, a bit further out of breath than she had intended to be as she headed in the direction she'd thought Scott and Kamala had gone.
In the meantime, on the other side of the Tesseract, Brock Rumlow had cornered Alex Summers, and the lanky young man was trying desperately to simply avoid him as the much broader boy stalked toward him and cut off his avenues of escape.
Alex tried to grab a weapon at the Tesseract — which he was starting to realize was his first mistake — but before he could close his hand around the sword he had been eyeing, this creep had bashed into him hard in the side with a mace. And now? Now, Brock was simply playing with him — taking pot shots when he could as Alex scrambled back on his hands and knees and then harder pot shots when Alex managed to get to his feet. The Six boy was trying to break him down little by little instead of just getting it over with — and there was nothing Alex could do about it.
Brock swung the mace at Alex's head, and the younger Summers managed to dodge it — but he didn't even consider the leg sweep that followed. Just like that, Alex found himself flat on his back with Brock Rumlow looming over him with a sickening smirk on his face.
"Tough luck, kid," Brock sneered, drawing back the mace.
Alex was gasping for air as he braced himself for the hit, unable to call out for help or do much of anything, really — when a ferocious-sounding shout echoed over him. He was suddenly very aware of the person standing over him — very, very closely over him, in fact. With one foot outside either of his hips, Kitty took a defensive stance — a sword in hand very much like the one Kurt had wielded the year before.
When Brock took a swing at Kitty, she ducked and lunged forward, sending the sharp tip of the sword into Rumlow's shoulder and forcing him into dropping the mace. She didn't look ready to stop, either. She darted forward again and kicked the mace away from him then drew back to strike again when Alex finally got his wind back and called out for her to get the heck out of there.
Kitty paused only long enough to glance over her shoulder to see that Alex was really hurting — pale and bleeding and incredibly vulnerable while she had her attention on the creep in front of her. With a sigh, she abandoned what would have been the end of Brock to instead run back to half drag the younger Summers to his feet, slipping her arm under his shoulders as she kept her sword out, practically daring anyone to get in between her and getting her district partner to safety.
As for America, the young woman from Twelve had drilled it into her district partner's head that she would go to the Tesseract for supplies. His only job was to keep back and make sure that he kept an eye on her so that he could flag her down once she had what she needed. She was hoping to get at least a backpack or two as well as something useful, like a knife or rope. If she was feeling particularly good, she'd also like something to add a little oomph to her hits, like staves, but she would just have to see what she could find.
America had just found a particularly heavy backpack — which she hoped meant it was filled with something she could work with — when she saw a movement to her left and looked up just in time to see that rather than listening to a word she'd said, Billy had gone with her to the Tesseract to try and help.
It wasn't like she could exactly fault him, either, because he had somehow managed to get his hands on a set of brass knuckles that looked like America could have some fun with, but he wasn't paying attention, and he had drifted far too close to the Twos.
Billy cried out in surprise when he realized how close he was to Brian, who was pulling a long sword out of the Tesseract. It didn't look like Brian had even zeroed in on Billy; they were simply too close to each other, and when Billy shouted his surprise all over the place, it had caught the older boy's attention.
As America rushed over to help, she almost had to pause midway and grin with pride, though — because to Billy's credit, as soon as he saw that Brian was that close, he'd lashed out for one of the pressure points that Logan had shown him in training. All that time on the rooftop had paid off after all, and it was enough that Billy had pinched the nerves on Brian's arm to get him to drop the sword so that America had plenty of room to work with when she got there.
She tackled Brian to the ground, pausing only to catch the brass knuckles Billy tossed her before she hissed out at him to get out of there — and this time, he actually listened. Though whether he was running from the carnage as the first cannons were echoing and America was just laying into Brian or if he was actually listening to her, it wasn't entirely clear.
Billy didn't get too far, though, before he ran almost right into the other tribute from Two, and it was lucky for him that the purple-haired girl was more intent on getting to her brother than on killing any smaller tributes.
"Run!" she shouted at Billy, before she headed toward America with her sword drawn.
He blinked at her in surprise, totally not expecting that from a Career, but he wasn't stupid enough to ignore two people yelling at him to run, so he kept going, glancing constantly over his shoulder to see if America would listen to her own advice and get out of there as the Tesseract cleared of everyone but the Careers at this point.
"Get out of there!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, surprised when the force of his shout left him a little dizzy, though he realized belatedly that Brian had managed to get a shot in, and he was bleeding from the temple.
But America was intent on teaching the Career in her grasp a lesson. She absolutely would have kept going, but on hearing Billy's shout — and how desperate he sounded — she turned just in time to see the flash of a sword and ducked out of the way so that she only got a bit of a haircut instead of letting Betsy take her head off.
Betsy was ready to continue to press her attack, too — until Brian moved and sounded positively pained. She shifted her attention to Brian for a moment instead of America — realizing what Kitty had realized in another nearby fight, that she couldn't kill one tribute and save another. "You need to get the hell out of here before I find the time to run you through," she said America's way at last.
America narrowed her eyes for a moment before she readjusted the bag on her shoulders and nodded sharply. "Don't let me run into you again, Two," she warned — and then took off at a run to find Billy.
Betsy watched her go for a moment before she knelt down next to Brian to see how bad it was … and by the look of him, it was pretty awful. "I'll be right back. Don't die on me, big brother," she muttered quietly before she headed out to look for supplies.
It didn't take her long to find a rather big medical kit — and though she wasn't the best at patching people up, she wasn't going to leave it to anyone else as the rest of the Careers finished gathering their supplies and clearing out the Tesseract.
Brian's entire face looked as if it had been shattered, and his blue eyes were no longer visible from the swelling that had already started up. She just kept muttering to him to hang in there, though he really wasn't responsive — even when the stinging antiseptic hit an open cut, he didn't react. But as long as he was breathing, she was going to do what she could to make him comfortable, though she kept her sword close at hand — she didn't trust her so-called allies not to try to make a move while her attention was distracted..
By that time, it was just the Careers left at the Tesseract, and while most of them were looking over the weapons and supplies that they had at their disposal, Nefaria had seen the two of them and made her way over, a sneer curling her lips when she saw the state Brian was in. "Tough luck," she said dismissively as she sat down nearby, flipping her knife in one hand as she surveyed the damage. "You're wasting good supplies on him, you know."
"You're wasting good oxygen," Betsy countered. "Mind your own business."
Nefaria sneered again, still watching Brian with an expression somewhere between disinterest and boredom. "You can't move him."
"What difference does it make to you?" Betsy nearly shouted. "I'm not asking for your help."
"If you kill him now, it would be easier. I've seen long deaths, and you're going to mope about it for ages if he clings on," Nefaria said with a bored sort of wave.
"Just get away from us," Betsy hissed.
Nefaria tipped her head to the side before she simply let out a breath and shrugged, pulling herself to her feet — before she took one of her throwing knives in her hand and tossed it directly into the center of Brian's chest to finish the job America had started.
Betsy gasped, and without thinking about it, she picked up her sword in one hand and spun — only making contact with Nefaria's wrist but severing the tendons she needed to close her fingers. The girl from Three held her hand to her chest, clearly not expecting that swift of a retaliation from Betsy — or that ruthless.
"If he dies, so do you," Betsy said at a low whisper, holding her sword up as she glared at Nefaria.
"My way was faster," Nefaria tried to explain, still clutching her hand and obviously taken off-guard by the threat.
"Mine won't be," Betsy replied as she started to circle around her, unblinking.
Nefaria glanced around at the other Careers, but if she had expected any backup from them, she was sorely mistaken. If anything, some of them looked excited at the prospect of a showdown between the two girls, and Trevor was grinning outright and had his feet propped up to watch. Both Jean and Amora were simply settled in, wearing smirks that only grew the wider Nefaria's eyes got. Kilgrave even let out a little, low chuckle when the cannon sounded for Brian, as they all knew what it meant.
Betsy didn't hesitate to attack, driving forward with her blade flashing. As she spun past Nefaria, the girl found herself without the use of one leg — and the opposite arm. Betsy turned and threw an elbow back into Nefaria's face, then drew her sword as Nefaria stumbled backward — cutting a wide gash across her face as she fell.
Nefaria crashed to the ground, unable to stand, her chest heaving, and stared up at Betsy, taken aback both by the severity of her attack and how quickly it had come. "You can't…" she breathed out. "He was on his way out anyway. Go play with that frizzy-headed little whelp!"
"Again — trying to order people around," Betsy said with a scowl before she kicked out and hit Nefaria in the center of her chest. She looked up at the other Careers. "None of you care one bit about her, do you?"
"No, no — go on," Trevor said almost lazily, grinning wide. "This is a good show. And she totally had it coming, right?" There was just a trace of the manic personality he'd shown off to the Capitol as he laughed, but when he turned his gaze to the trembling Nefaria, it was with the kind of look he'd worn on the rooftop meeting of the Careers.
Betsy looked toward Kilgrave and Jean with a challenging glare. "And you? Mind you, I'm not asking permission."
"What use is she at this point anyway?" Kilgrave pointed out. "You've already injured her, and I'm certainly not going to play nursemaid."
"Then I'm almost sorry that I'll be killing the only girl here you ever had any control over," Betsy said before she took one of Nefaria's knives and flipped it in her hand. She drove it down into Nefaria's chest with all of her strength and weight.
Nefaria was still clutching for a breath when Betsy stood, but she didn't wait around as she gathered her sword and her medical kit. "I'm leaving. If you follow me, you will die."
"So soon?" Trevor sounded almost disappointed.
She gave him a look of barely-veiled contempt. "I know why you want me here, and I'm not sticking around to have a knife in my heart from one of you."
"You know if we run into you again, we won't just let you leave," Amora said over the sound of the gasping Nefaria.
"I'm not worried," Betsy replied. "You don't have much anymore in the line of fighters. And what you have does not concern me. It might be wiser for you to try to avoid me."
"I truly am sorry for your loss," Amora said softly as she watched Betsy leave. "Know that if I see the Twelve girl, I will repay her for you if you have not already done so."
Betsy only glanced over her shoulder in acknowledgement but didn't wait any further before she headed for the rocks at a quick pace, leaving the Careers already down half their members as the cannon finally sounded for Nefaria.
Inside the Arena Transports
The victors hadn't even reached the transports to go back to the Capitol when the first cannon rang out from this year's Games. All of them froze on hearing it and turned back toward the arena, though unlike the rest of the country — they had no way of knowing yet who it was. At least, not until they got to the transport and the feed started for them.
Hank leaned over to the newest victor with a kind smile as he explained, "They delay the footage in these transports by ten minutes so that we can see the Games from their inception — and know for ourselves what happened. It will be real-time by the time we land." He paused as he listened for a moment, and another cannon could be heard, muffled in the distance. "If we wish to satisfy our morbid curiosity and ease the fear of what we don't yet know — haste is in order," he said when the sound had died off.
"Right," Logan muttered Hank's way with a little frown. "You could just say 'move your ass.'"
"He could, but then we wouldn't need Hank subtitles," Quill said as he caught up to the two of them, looking a little green still from having seen his own tributes off.
"Please don't tell me that's my job this year too," Logan said to Quill, just trying to get that look off of his face.
Quill couldn't help but smirk the slightest bit. "It's every greenie's job."
"That's a lie, and you know it," Logan replied, and Hank had to look a bit downtrodden as he watched the two of them, simply to play along with their little game. "Some of 'em aren't smart enough to understand it."
"But that's the best part — watching them try to make up the translation," Quill countered.
"That'd be me then."
"Nah, give yourself some credit," Quill said, shaking his head. "You're not nearly as dense as your predecessor in Seven. Or Schmidt… or Masters…"
"You got a pretty big list there," Logan said as the two of them climbed into the transport. "Why aren't you on it?"
"Oh, I am. I thought that went without saying," Quill shrugged easily as he paused to help Hank get Charles into the transport as well — and the older victor was watching both young men with a quiet sort of smirk at their antics.
Logan took a seat that at the time was pretty far-removed from the group at large, but that didn't last long at all when Creed dropped into the seat next to him, though neither spoke as the last of the victors and stylists boarded the transport, and, as the transport took off, a few screens flickered to life around them, showing the tail end of Fury's conversation with Tivan before the camera focused on the tributes and the 60-second countdown.
You could have heard a pin drop in the silence as the victors watched their tributes, though some were quiet for different reasons than others. Some of the younger victors, like Rhodey, still looked a little green over having to tell their kids about the final twist, while others, like Sarkissian, looked like they were hardly able to stand the anticipation of seeing at last the full extent of what their kids could do.
The stylists that had come were all lumped together and nervously watching as well, half holding their breaths as the Games started in earnest.
Sam was the most visibly nervous of the group, with a twelve- and thirteen-year-old as his tributes, and when Arkady snapped Monet's neck, he visibly wilted around his shoulders but didn't fully relax until Miles had made it out of the bloodbath, at least — running from both Tens. As soon as he'd seen that at least Miles was safe, Sam hung his head for a second. He was under no delusions that either of his tributes would win, considering their age, but he couldn't help but hope.
And Quill's earlier good mood had all but evaporated the moment One's boy got hold of his girl. The boy from Five had long ago gotten out of the bloodbath, so the only thing Quill could do was simply watch, almost as pale as Jessica as she bled out and he realized that the second cannon they'd heard while they were still boarding the transport had been for her.
When Clara started to fight with the two tributes from Four — both of the Seven victors were almost cringing until she managed to twist the fight around on the boy — and Creed let out a little chuckle when she backhanded the boy with enough force to kill him outright with the staves.
"Who authorized those two to team up with that girl?" Schmidt demanded suddenly, looking completely furious as the cameras showed Clara taking off to catch up with Scott — who still had Kamala slung over his shoulder and was clearly intent on carrying her all the way to the mountains if he had to.
It took a moment for the Seven victors to even acknowledge that he was standing up and glaring at both of them, but when Creed tapped Logan with the back of his hand, and the two of them looked over at Schmidt — and smirked — it was clear that whatever the arrangement was, if it ticked off Schmidt, even Creed was on board.
"What difference does it make?" Victor asked. "Not like you had any effort in 'er."
Schmidt looked even more furious when he realized Creed was fine with the alliance, though it was Sarkissian who laughed out a little, "That's hard to believe from you, Creed. A little girl like that with your girl?"
"Didn't say I put any effort in her either — but why not?"
"She'll slow them both down," Schmidt all but snarled.
"No she won't," Logan argued. "So why don't you just keep your big nose in your own business."
"My tribute is my business."
"You didn't do a damn thing but try to scare that girl senseless," Logan shot back. "So just back off before you get hurt." To make it more interesting, Creed was glaring Schmidt's way right along with Logan — and none of the occupants of the plane quite knew how to react to that particular united front.
"Hey, Schmidt," Sam called to get the man's attention away from the Sevens. "Isn't that your tribute that Nine's girl's wiping all over the floor?"
Schmidt turned and followed Sam's gaze to the screen, and his lip curled into a sneer of disbelief when he saw that Kitty was, in fact, well on her way to killing Brock Rumlow, if it hadn't been for the fact that her district partner was so badly injured. Though it was hard to tell if Schmidt was pleased that Brock had survived or not, considering it had been luck and not skill that let him live another day.
Logan was just nodding to himself with a little smirk on seeing Kitty's progress. If nothing else, the kids that had spent time on the rooftop had gained some confidence. Or he hoped they had. The proof of that was just highlighted as the cameras moved on to the emerging fight between the Twelve boy and the boy from Two. It was short and sweet — and interrupted by America — but even before his district partner had arrived to help, Logan saw that Billy was making use of what he'd learned, going right for pressure points to disarm Brian before America arrived.
"Where did a kid from Twelve learn something like that?" Viper asked Black Bolt, though when the response was just a bewildered shrug, her gaze swept the transport, accusation in her expression almost as sharp as the sound of brass on bone from the screen.
"Probably the same place his partner learned how to make a guy hurt," Johnny noted with an obvious wince over the sound of Brian's cheekbone shattering.
"I'm pretty sure she showed up like that," Quill said. "Kid had a record of throw downs when she got here."
"Of course. I should have known. Delinquents," Viper breathed out.
In their little corner across the way, Creed leaned forward to mutter something quietly to Logan, who just nodded in response. Victor let out a little breath and leaned back with a smirk. "I think your kid's screwed, Viper."
"He's Bobbi's anyway," Viper said with a dismissive wave, and Bobbi just sighed and nodded. "I got the more competent sibling."
"Startin' to wonder if Ten makes the crazies or if ol' Charlie stacks 'em that way," Creed muttered with a grin, just trying to stir up trouble now that there was a little tension in the transport — even if the Capitol feed was on the Careers as Betsy tried to save her brother. "Wind 'em up and set 'em loose…"
"I'm afraid they come to us naturally that way," Hank said,shaking his head.
"Yeah? Here I was convinced that you were givin' em the beastie treatment before they hit the transport. Put all that psycho mumbo jumbo to use. Make 'em crazy."
"You see Ten get the first kill? Not Charles' style anyway," Quill muttered, waving a hand at Creed almost haphazardly as the cameras followed the dissolution of the Careers — and the victors followed the steadily growing smile on Viper's face on seeing that her tribute could be cruel when she wanted to be.
"That Two girl ain't followin' Viper's lead," Creed said with a shake of his head. "Too much heart."
"Won't be a problem when she returns," Viper said, unconcerned. "Bobbi was the same way, weren't you, darling?" she added toward her fellow Two victor, who matched her unconcerned look with a little nod and a shrug.
"If she gets out," Creed argued. "She's gotta get past my sister."
"The one with two dead weights?" Viper replied.
"Neither one of 'em are dead weights," Logan said. "They'll make it further than yours."
"Everyone's overconfident their first year," Bobbi said, stepping in when Viper's eyes flashed.
"Doesn't mean I'm wrong," Logan replied, and the unified smug look from the two Sevens was just too much for Bobbi to watch — so she turned her attention to placating her partner's ego.
**Note: In the original story on FFN that we were part of, "In the End, You Always Kneel," each Games chapter had a running tally of deaths at the bottom. We found it incredibly helpful as readers to be able to keep track of who was still in the game and who to look out for, so we're doing that again here, putting the names in death order, with 24 being the first death and obviously, the number 1 spot going to our victor. We probably won't have this at the bottom of every chapter, just the ones with significant Games events (including deaths). Chapters focusing on the behind the scenes, obviously, don't need it. :)
24. Monet St. Croix, District Eleven Female, Killed by Arkady Gregorovitch
23. Jessica Jones, District Five Female - Killed by Zebediah Kilgrave
22. Skurge, District Four Male - Killed by Clara Creed
21. Brian Braddock, District Two Male - Killed by Giuletta Nefaria
20. Giuletta Nefaria, District Three Female - Killed by Elizabeth Braddock
