❄ twelfth reminder

[echidna]

[ highway ; early morning ; open ]

[ As far as awakenings go, this one is definitely ranks up there for most unpleasant. If the sound of trucks rumbling by weren't enough, the dull pain from the previous day has turned intense. She's quiet, temporarily uninterested by investigation by looking for somewhere to hind, finding a little hole in some nearby rubble to crawl into. The crawling is far more literal than she would like, and when she pulls up the legs of her pants she can see quite clearly why that is.

The swelling has increased significantly, her legs looking some horrible mess of black and purple. She pokes at them, like the two dead things they are, and barely feels it. ]

Oh no...

[ streets ; evening ; closed ]

[ She's not even sure how she's made it this long, or this far. Her legs barely work, and it takes everything she has to keep moving, to get from hiding place to hiding place. She's breathing heavily, and it seems like she won't be making it to her next one. All she can do is hold her breath and hope those things don't notice her. Maybe she'll get lucky. Maybe. ]

Comments

[miraculls.livejournal.com]

[Maybe this would be easier if he was less optimistic, less hopeful, put less faith in his miracles and his messiahs and his own immortality. As it is, he still thinks they have a chance, even as the cannibals surround them. He murmurs back a love you too, but it's meant as a reassurance, not a good-bye. Then, louder:]

Don't let go.

[He clutches Jade to him tighter, lowering his head and attempting to charge out of the throng. It's a stupid move, a hopeless one, but since when have any of his ideas been anything but?]

[echidna]

[ It's no more stupid than standing still and waiting to be devoured, and to her, it's incredibly brave. She has no intention of letting go, but as he throws them into the group of monsters, that becomes nearly impossible. She screams as she's ripped from him by the horde, kicks and struggles and does everything in her power to get away from them. ]

Gamzee, Gamzee!

[ She shouts his name in near delirium, screaming again when she feels several sets of teeth ripping into her. ]

[miraculls.livejournal.com]

No, no -- motherfucker!

[He turns back instantly when he hears her scream, diving into the onslaught and reaching out desperately for her hand. He ignores the descending cannibals, the agony of his flesh being torn away, snarling and trying to shove the ones separating them away, only one thing on his mind.]

Jade!

[echidna]

[ She's not even sure if she's still shouting, or screaming, but it feels like she is. She's being pulled at from all angles, and the pain is blinding, overwhelming.

Her fingers are slick with her own blood when they strike his, but they grasp his hand and tangle up in it, refusing to let go. Her ears flood with the beating of her heart and the wet, sickening sound of flesh being slurped and sucked up- hers, his. The struggling has stopped, though the pain hasn't, and the world swims in a way that makes her nauseous, but that might just be from having to hear herself being devoured.

End, please just let this end. ]

[miraculls.livejournal.com]

[He grips her hand hard, still fighting and struggling to get them out of there. The situaion's turned him into little more than a bundle of survival instincts, sheer rage and terror driving him into a frenzy of bloodlust. With his free hand, he brings his claws into play, raking them down anything he can reach; he gores a cannibal's eye with his horn and sinks his own fangs into another's jugular, trying to do anything, anything, that'll help them make it out alive.

It's not enough. Without the speed and strength his blood gives him, his rage is nothing more than a dying boy's last resistance against the inevitable - for the few he's managed to take out, another two or three replace, bearing him down to the ground as his howls of fury turn into screams of pain.]

[echidna]

[ His screams barely even reach her at all, dull behind the pounding of blood in her ears. Something fills her mouth, blood and vomit, and all she can do is choke on it as she tries to cry out.

Everything is starting to go dark, and she's died enough times already to know what this is, to know what's coming. Right now, it can't come soon enough. It's a little sad for a child, for any of them really, to be so well acquainted with death, but at the moment it only means that she knows that the pain is almost over.

Something snaps, a bone maybe, she doesn't know where, but all at once the lights turn out-- it's finished. Her body goes limp as its devoured, and only then do her fingers slip from his. ]

[miraculls.livejournal.com]

[He doesn't go out quietly, still fighting, still hoping until the very end. The pain, at this point, is beyond excruciating, overwhelming even the rage until his entire world is white-hot agony and he can't remember anything before it. His struggling has turned into little more than weak, pathetic pushes, helpless attempts to try to somehow dislodge the cannibals pinning him down. He can see slivers of white poke through on his arms where they've torn the flesh off straight down to the bone, and he wonders hysterically as much as he can wonder anything in this state how it is he's still alive, if it counts as a miracle if he doesn't want it, and maybe the fact that he is is a sign that they'll somehow get out of this after all--

The only thing worse than the pain is having to watch Jade endure the same and being powerless to stop it. Maybe he would have accepted his death more easily if she hadn't been there, would have just closed his eyes and prayed for it to be over soon - but he said they'd be fine, he can't let her down now, and it isn't fair that she has to go through this, that she has to die again while he can't do a goddamn motherfucking thing to stop it, and it's not until she lets go that he realizes that there isn't going to be a last-second miracle this time around.

He's still screaming her name when one of them finally rips out his throat.]