Chapter Text
you lean towards despair
every given opportunity, you're there
but what is there to gain?
Bloodhound cannot rest.
They had stayed up too long, communicating with Talos - that is, with those in their village still willing to talk to them.
There is talk of an uprising against Hammond. An open confrontation. They had always known that machines would only bring ruin - and it is time to reject them for good, feed the tattered flesh of Talos with their flesh - after all, what is soil if not metal wrangled to life?
It scares Bloodhound to death. They are all going to die, wiped out in one fell swoop by the IMC for breaching the arena or left to suffocate on an uninhabitable planet after Hammond are done with their environmental retaliation. The Harvester is a parasite, fat on Talosi blood, mindless in its greed even as it is killing its ailing host - there is precious little Bloodhound hates as much as they hate it - but trying to destroy it this way will only mark the beginning of the end for Talos.
(But it has been dying for decades, has it not? Since before their birth, the rate accelerated drastically after their foolish, foolish decisions. Why are they trying to deny their people the chance to die with dignity, on their own terms? Does their selfishness know no bounds?)
(A whole planet, enormous in how ancient it is - reduced to a festering corpse within not even one lifetime.)
Bloodhound cannot rest, cannot even stay in bed without writhing themself into nausea. Their head is heavy and swimming, and the world does not feel real where it presses up against their cold, hollow shell.
They find themself outside their rooms, on the way to the cafeteria. There is no real reason for them to go there. No real reason to go anywhere.
Maybe it is simply about a communal area. A place for the ancient ritual of sharing food. A straw to grasp at when there is no one to turn to.
Bloodhound stumbles along, so bleary that they do not even notice the moment the voices fade in.
They are raised. Confrontational.
"...so just friends, huh. I see," someone says with a smirk obvious in their voice.
Bloodhound does not get the chance to place it before the other one interjects. "Oh fuck all the way off, don't change the topic. I don't want them to get hurt again, and--"
Oh, it's - it's them, are they - talking about..?
Bloodhound hurries to the doors, catching the jamb with their shoulder when they stumble. The bloom of pain makes them yawn in surprised misery, lost for words, but it works out in a roundabout way - they definitely make enough noise for Elliott and Boone to realize they are not alone. Eavesdropping is the last thing Bloodhound wants. They are tired of complications.
"Who's th-- Bloth? Fuck, kit, you look like death, what's wrong?"
The lights are on in the room, too many of them, and Boone's deep voice hits Bloodhound like a tide. They squeeze their eyes shut, feeling themself sway in place.
Their shoulder whines with pain, but they do not have enough presence of mind to rub it.
Heavy, quick footsteps, and Boone's voice sounds closer now. "Hey, come here, I've got you…"
He is about to touch them, Bloodhound knows, but they cannot bear it right now. Cannot bear to ruin another thing, cannot--
"Please, no." They step to the side, opening their eyes just in time to evade Boone's outstretched hand.
He freezes where he was. There is a lost look on his face, its blade lancing Bloodhound straight through their mangled heart.
"I've got this," Elliott gives Boone a pointed glare and halts in front of Bloodhound. He makes no attempt to touch them. "Can you follow me? I'll make you tea."
Bloodhound does as they are told, meek and tired, eyes drifting across the floor. An indeterminate amount of time later, Elliott hands them a warm mug, waiting for them to wrap both hands around it before letting go. It heats up some more, just this side of actually burning, and Bloodhound tethers themself to the sensation.
They find themself sitting at a table. There is a glass, a plate - Boone's or Elliott's, they know not. The lights are dimmed.
"What's…" Boone's voice, quiet, strangely hesitant.
It is no longer overwhelming. Bloodhound lets themself drift in it.
"Stress," Elliott answers curtly. "Ask Hound yourself or do your own research, I won't speak for them."
The silence tenses - stretches. The tea is scalding when Bloodhound sips it, their body defined into life through pain, fading slowly into nothing again after they swallow. They take another sip.
They were arguing, Bloodhound suddenly remembers. Elliott and Boone.
What is even the point of arguing over them. What good can it do anyone.
***
"I dunno, it just bugs out. Honestly, at this rate I just might take your advice and hit it with a wrench a few times. What's the worst that can happen?"
Bloodhound smiles into the darkness, their phone squeezed between their cheek and the musty straw mattress. "You do know I meant it in jest, right?"
"Well, you know what they say, every joke has some joke to it," Elliott sing-songs. After a moment, his voice grows serious. "You sure you don't wanna tell me what's up?"
Bloodhound instinctively curls up tighter around the phone. Their breath mists in front of them.
(There are long strings of graffiti on the Harvester. Trespassers have been dealt with. Survivors are furious.)
"I am sure," they say. Then - "Please. I would like another distraction."
They hear Elliott sigh through his teeth, but he does not press. Which is wise, because Bloodhound could just as easily call him out for insisting on carrying things alone.
Their hunting hut is cramped and cold, but it will have to do. The villagers might try to give Bloodhound the hides if they attempt to stay in their own house.
Not that it would change much, in the grand scheme of things. They are an exile in everything but ritual.
Bloodhound blinks rapidly a few times, the quickly cooling moisture making their eyes ache. It makes no sense - why on earth would they hurt over it now? None of this came as a surprise. Uncle Arthur prophesied it decades ago. They are not even sure why they came here - what they hoped to achieve.
They ended up calling Elliott just to hear someone's voice as they shivered in the hut, too tired and miserable to collect firewood. Soon enough the spreading heat will crawl all the way here from the Harvester, and the cold will not be a problem anymore.
Elliott, may the Gods bless him, was happy to launch into a tirade about a tricky bit of his decoy gear, an intricate combination or hardware and code, but there is only so much time one can spent talking technical jargon, and the churning Talosi night is closing in on Bloodhound.
"I actually--" Elliott pauses and clears his throat. "There was actually something I meant to bring up about Boone. If you feel up for it."
Bloodhound frowns, immediately wary. Immediately tired, but they would rather deal with whatever this is instead of - instead of the air slowly growing thick with sulphur.
Boone ended up, to put it mildly, wiping the floor with Elliott the one time they sparred together. Bloodhound wonders if this is what bothers him.
"What is it?"
Boone has been - odd, lately. They catch him looking at them now and then, but the simplicity of the early days is gone. He is - withdrawn, maybe. They do not understand what reflects in him.
Elliott hesitates; Bloodhound hears a thin rhythmic noise somewhere in the background - maybe he is tapping a pen.
"Last weekly - something weird happened."
Bloodhound waits in silence, blinking morosely at the bare wall. A thin layer of frost is clinging to the wood.
Last week there was an all-out deathmatch. Bloodhound had to sit that one out since they were on Talos. Elliott mentioned how he could use the extra cash and went in.
"Boone ran into me just as I finished off Wattson. She hit me pretty bad, I had - electricity burns all over my hands, just, completely fried."
Bloodhound shifts - their feet have been tingling with cold, blood growing too sluggish in them to keep them warm.
They know where Elliott is going with this. "Did he heal you?"
"Not even just that, though that was plenty weird already. No, he - showed me how to shake it out - the aftershocks. I mean, where to press, how to make them pass faster. Said he knew what it's like, all casual, like getting crisped with high voltage is no biggie."
Bloodhound sits up on their cot, putting the phone on speaker. This is it - the missing piece, they can feel it. "What do you think it could mean?"
They can hear Elliott cringe in uncertainty. "Okay, well, this is gonna sound wild, but the first thought that occured to me was like - I read this thing a few years ago, an old paper on stem cells research, horrendously outdated by now of course but I was bored and-- Anyway, you know how they would harvest stem cells and stilum-- stimululate them with metric fucktons of electricity? And then it got brought up again like ten years ago or so, right at the dawn of--"
"...respawn development," Bloodhound breathes out.
The silence is deafening. "Yeah."
Bloodhound's mind kicks up into overdrive. They no longer feel the cold. The trail is right in front of them. "It makes so much sense - Elliott, listen, his scars…"
"Weird, right? Well, I dug up some of the more obscure content, and Hammond were really into reprinting from 'growth points' before they developed the technology that let them grow the tissues in layers like they do it now."
An image flashes before Bloodhound's eyes, pulled up from the icy depth of their memory: something deformed and painful and full of ardent desire to stop existing. They saw it on the dark web, maybe, a fired worker leaking photos out of bitterness. Never had they felt such a peculiar mix of horror and pity.
If Boone was anywhere near that…
"He was their lab rat," they say.
Oh Gods, please let them misunderstand. Please let it be literally anything else. Please, Elliott--
Elliott exhales with a whoosh. "Fuck."
How much pain would that have put him through? How many rounds had he cycled through - to the point where it would permanently etch its claim on him, tissue overlapping and curling in on itself, every nerve twisted and alight - oh Boone…
Bloodhound hears Elliott scratch through his beard. He lets out a shaky laugh. "I feel…kinda bad for giving him so much shit now, even though… He's been through a lot of it already, huh?"
"What do we do?"
"But what can we do, now? They've already fucked him up. At least he, like, got away, right?"
Bloodhound thinks of the predator brand mangling Boone's shoulder and does not think they agree at all.
***
Things get better after that, in a way. Bloodhound gets to watch Elliott, kind-hearted and compassionate, extend a hand to Boone. Gets to watch Boone tentatively accept the offered companionship. Oh, they are still at each other's throats half the time, trading jokes and jabs with effortless ease, but - they work well together. They flow well together, no matter what either of them says. The orgs recognize that and often put them on the same team, capitalizing both on the banter and the absolute confusion the two of them wreak upon other competitors when they combine their abilities.
Elliott groans loudly when Ajay sends him a meme about 'Boorage', from a thread documenting his and Boone's antics in the arena. Boone only laughs, asks for the link to the thread, and proceeds to call Elliott 'Magic Man' exclusively for a solid week.
Things get worse, too.
Bloodhound learns to dread, truly dread, news from Talos, their heart sinking every time they receive a message. Those come more and more sporadically now but, they know, not for the lack of activity.
With resignation akin to peeling back a rancid bandage, Bloodhound digs up a report from a satellite circling the Harvester, the one acting as a hub for the data collected by ground-level sampling bots.
What they read makes their stomach drop. The soil has become poison, the disturbed magma spilling acid into it, washing heavy metals out of the deeper layers and expelling them into air. Plants will die. Animals will starve. Humans…
This is it, then. The beginning of the end. Not with an explosion but with the insidious, creeping disease.
Bloodhound's entire self is locked up in the face of the cataclysm. They used to - to talk to their people, to talk to their handlers even, try and convince them of a better path, one that would not result in the destruction of an entire planet. Applied whatever leverage they thought they had. They used to try, for as long as they held hope.
They have none now.
Their performance is dropping, too. There is nothing to them but weakness and disorientation. Someone like that is unworthy of divine blessing. Unworthy to fight in the Gods' names.
Life, bizarrely, continues, pulling Bloodhound's empty shell along, incongruent and messy in its boundless happening when the one thing they still want is to make it stop . The burden of existence is impossible.
The orgs go on with their experiments too. A random EMP brings down the comms halfway through a game, but the orgs turn it from a bug into a feature and roll out a 'blackout' mode soon after.
Bloodhound ends up hiding out in a cluster of bushes, teeth chattering from the relentless rain, all tracks washed from existence. Alone and unable to find their team - not even knowing if they still live out there. Having almost no strength to even want to attempt something.
The temptation to simply let go is unbearable. But maybe this is their final curse - to bear witness. To know the exact consequences of their actions.
Elliott doubles down on his attempts to keep Bloodhound sane, and they are - selfishly, as always - grateful for it, grateful for the distraction, for the simple comfort of him seeing and acknowledging exactly how they are falling apart.
Boone, on the other hand, grows distant. He obviously does not know what to do with Bloodhound: precious little that worked in the past would work on them now. Boone is not the only one who has had time to change - Bloodhound has grown...colder. Harder. More desperate.
But that is fine - they do not know what they need either, anyway.
Distracted and adrift, stunned with the feeling of the ground dropping away beneath them, Bloodhound almost fails to notice the signs - until it is, also, almost too late.
***
(Wake up, child.
You need to wake up.)
Bloodhound jerks awake, their head humming, alarmed warmth trickling into their limbs.
Nothing looks out of place. The air is silent, no vibrating echoes left by a sudden sound. Nobody is in their room.
Their sleep has been troubled - they are lucky to catch more than two hours at a time. Their body feels heavy and stupid with exhaustion. Gods, they are so tired - why are they awake?
Something is wrong. They need…there is somewhere they need to be.
Bloodhound gets dressed with a mounting sense of urgency and slips out of their rooms. There are no clues, nothing, and they look around in confusion until a soft movement of air touches their cheek.
They follow that direction on silent feet, making their way out of the dorms and soon finding themself...at the docking station.
It looks empty - even the maintenance drones are offline for the night. There is no reason for Bloodhound to be there.
There is a beep of a sensor recognizing a personal microchip, shrill like the call of an oriole in the lifeless hangar, and Bloodhound ducks behind a stack of crates where the shadows are at their deepest.
They recognize his footsteps immediately. Boone moved the Swallowtail to the base once the raining season began, the rainwater apparently too acidic for the disposition of a space vessel.
Bloodhound looks above them in alarm. The narrow front of the ship juts out above them, and Boone's footsteps are growing closer, he is going to see them any moment now--
"Peacing out after all?"
Bloodhound starts so hard they nearly knock into the crates. They have not even noticed Elliott - was he hiding here somewhere, too? Waiting for something - for Boone?
Elliott is awful at stealth. It is a testament to how poorly Bloodhound is doing that he had flown under their radar.
They hear Boone let out a long-suffering sigh. "What do you want."
"I want to know what it is you think you are doing."
"I don't owe you any explanations."
"What about Bloodhound?"
Bloodhound's heart hammers in their chest at the sound of their name, as if they have been caught. Oh Gods - they are eavesdropping again, they should leave - or make themself known, at least…
They do neither.
"What about them," Boone grumbles.
Sounds of footsteps again - unhurried. "I bet you told them nothing. Again."
Oh - Boone is leaving. Boone is leaving.
Air freezes in Bloodhound's chest. Oh Gods, will it ever stop hurting, please, will it ever stop…
Part of them wants to run to him. To - to what? Yell at him? Beg him to stay? Something else?
But for what? If he wishes to leave - who are they to keep him? Last time they tried to cling...
"This is none of your business."
"See, I kinda think it is."
Oh, Elliott - trying, even now, to keep people. Trying for their sake, too.
He does not need to. It is not worth it. Let him go.
Bloodhound's eyes grow wet; their vision blurs. They lower themself to the ground, arms wrapping around their knees. The hangar is chilly, eager to lap up their meager body heat.
After a pause, Boone lets out a frustrated noise. "It's - it doesn't matter. I'm not good for them, not like you are. They don't need me."
"I mean, yeah, frankly? You couldn't have met them again at a shittier time. I've never seen them this low. But like - what's your alternative? You gonna just run? Go back to cage fighting?"
"No," Boone snarls. Then, drily - "I did my research, like you told me to. I will go to Talos. See what can be done."
Elliott groans in frustration. "Hell, you two sound the same-- and how do you think that's gonna help? Outside of the arena, have you even been to Talos in these past ten years? Because let me tell you, things have changed."
"What, have you been to Talos - before?"
"Yes," Elliott bites out.
"Did you know th--"
"No. We never got to meet." Elliott sighs. "We both know that it's not the real reason. We've talked about it. You're doing a shitty thing right now."
They have-- what?
"Well, maybe I'm a shitty person!"
"That's a bullshit excuse, and you know it!" Elliott explodes. "What the fuck, man! Hound needs support--"
"That's why you are here," Boone points out.
"I am not enough!" Elliott retorts, and oh, Bloodhound's heart aches. He is enough, of course he is, and so much more than they would ever be worthy of-- "They need both of us. I need you to help me help them. They perked up when you arrived, so obviously you were doing something right, and I can't fucking--" he breaks off, "I can't fucking do this alone. I thought you understood."
They cannot stand this any longer - they need to see, they just need to see their faces. They need to see, just this once. Even if Elliott never shows any of this again. Even if Boone leaves forever.
Very carefully, they peek around the crate. Both are standing a dozen metres away from their hiding spot, the voices carrying effortlessly over the wide expanse of the hangar. Elliott has his back turned to them. His hands are on his waist, his shoulders are rigid. And Boone--
Boone is looking directly at them.
They freeze in place, their eyes wide. The pained expression on his face grows wistful.
Oh, how stupid - of course he would realize they were here - Elliott might have missed the clues, but Boone is a hunter...
"I have wronged them," he says. His eyes are still on theirs. "I didn't mean to, but I've hurt them so badly, and I - I am terrified of doing it again." He finally looks back at Elliott, and Bloodhound nearly staggers from the tether breaking. "I can't do it again."
"Then stay," Elliott spreads his arms, like it is that simple. "Make up for it, fix it, whatever you wanna call it. Just do right by them for once."
Bloodhound cannot be here anymore. Cannot wait for him to make his decision. Dizzy and exhausted, they slink out of the hangar and back to their rooms, their heart impossibly heavy. Sleep, when it comes, is brittle and thin like mountain air, and they choke on it.
Something flutters out of Bloodhound's locker when they haul their carcass to the gym the next morning. Their reflexes are too slow to catch it, and they, bewildered, pick the small object off the floor.
It is a flight feather, a wide one, black with a white tip. When Bloodhound turns it, black erupts in iridescent blues and purples.
An equinoxian crane. A migratory bird - one that always comes back.
When Boone walks into the gym an hour later, dressed in sportswear and ready for his own workout, he gives Bloodhound a nod across the room. They nod back, hoping that any of their gratitude shines through.
***
Things change yet again, as they are wont to do. Boone's orbit closes in on Bloodhound again, and Elliott is not far behind, as if emboldened by their united front.
All Bloodhound wants is silence and solitude, but they get neither. Elliott ambushes them with homemade cooking and makes them taste test his ambitious pickling experiments. They draw the line at Eddan scolopendras, although something tells them that was Elliott testing how far they would be pushed anyway.
They manage to slip away from the base unnoticed for a weekend of hiking with only Arthur's sporadic appearances for company, but Boone catches up with their nearly non-existent tracks exactly by the time it becomes too late to turn around and walk back, and no amount of huffing and puffing from Bloodhound's side can deter him from following.
The three of them secure a win together (Elliott's and Boone's achievement exclusively - Bloodhound was so out of it they nearly walked off a cliff halfway through the match). Bloodhound's greyscale rage is still locked away from them, slipping like sand through their fingers. But winning means publicity, and the talk show host plagues them with questions obviously meant to provoke, but Bloodhound only grows more and more hazy under the onslaught. They have no answers for the public. They have none for themself. They do not wish to speak of it.
Elliott diverts and distracts, a whirlwind by Bloodhound's inert side. When that does not help, Boone 'accidentally' knocks over a pitcher of cucumber water and sizes up the host with a threatening grin until everything is mopped up and they can resume the show. The host takes the hint and drifts to safer grounds. Bloodhound burns with silent shame in the privacy behind their mask.
The two of them still squabble, of course. They clash the way any two people clash when working closely together, in the tight narrow space left once their private nightmares take their toll. Boone is too straightforward for Elliott's liking, and Elliott is too elusive for Boone's. Each of them, in the other's opinion, encroaches on Bloodhound's space (which is something they are inclined to agree on). Bloodhound does not blame them for squabbling, though they do not understand why either of them would have such high stakes in this. But from this up close, they can see them slowly learning each other. Can see them starting to appreciate the other's approach when - for a lack of a better word - handling Bloodhound's quiet cataclysm.
Elliott is probably the gentlest man Bloodhound has ever met, kind the way the deeply wounded are kind, considerate the way people can learn to be when the lesson is on cruelty. Elliott's kindness is of the strongest breed: tempered steel, granite foundations, scales tipping with the force of his will. That makes it stiff, perhaps, in its dedication, easy to take advantage of, but who in their right mind would fault him for it? Elliott is a good man. He knows the riverbeds of Bloodhound's boundaries and knows how to flow along them.
Boone, however, knows when to cross them. He pushes Bloodhound's buttons like no one else ever could, adept as if it has not been a decade since he last got the practice in. He is infuriating even now, moody the way Bloodhound remembers him to be, with a dormant anger that, in scorching, rivals their own. Kind, too - otherwise Bloodhound would not care to know him so closely - but in a different way, swaggering in and taking up space without permission or shame when he knows he can help.
They share many similarities too. Both dedicate themselves to their passions and hone their skills, both are crafty and inventive and effortlessly think on their feet. Both learn to find a certain cruel beauty in bloodshed, albeit perhaps for different reasons. Both are survivors. Neither shies away from a fight.
They are both scared. Elliott jumps at the sound of his phone ringing and recites strings of numbers from memory and paranoia-checks his gear at least a dozen times before every match, especially since that cloaking fiasco from last season that cost his team the win. He startles awake from his cat naps and drums his fingers and looks around as if he's just lost something until his eyes land on Bloodhound, and then a pained and strange thing seizes his features for a brief moment before a randomly selected mask takes over.
It is a rarer sight these days - his masks. Bloodhound does not begrudge him his defence mechanisms.
And Boone - well. Whatever happened to him makes it seem sometimes like Bloodhound was merciful in presuming him dead. Which is a horrendous thing to think on its own, but they are learning him anew now. He sleeps poorly - which is something they had discovered back on that first night, and then later, during the matches that spanned multiple days - and he hates people leaning over him. He wakes up gasping if he rolls over into a supine position. He keeps doors and windows in sight. He does not talk about his past. He looks at Bloodhound like they are his biggest regret.
Bloodhound does not know which way to read that.
Their grins, Elliott's and Boone's, are strikingly similar. Their warmth is the same even when filtered through different prisms that translate it into the world.
They care for Bloodhound. And Bloodhound does not understand why, cannot fathom why, until it suddenly falls into place, until they remember - the way Elliott looked at them before Boone reappeared. Like he, too, knew that something was happening, something was growing, a gentle, monumental inevitability. Was happy to watch it grow together with them, happy to exist in it, just for the two of them.
And then Boone came back and tore the axis out of Bloodhound's world, defanged the venomous serpent of their decade-old mourning so suddenly they did not get the chance to grieve for that either. Came back with his grins and quips and inserted himself right in the place by Bloodhound's side, as if he were never gone. As if what they had was still...
Oh. So they both…
Oh no.
It comes as a fresh stream of despair in the sea for Bloodhound to drift in, off-balance and lost. Asking the Gods why they do this to them is pointless - the evidence of their unworthiness only keeps mounting.
Anyone else would be excited, probably. Flattered, honoured to be...liked by two such men (they do not dare think the stronger word) - to be deemed worthy of such affection.
But Bloodhound looks at them, at either of them, and only drowns deeper in the endless trench of guilt, its mass devouring them whole, beyond any light or hope for reprieve.
Looking at Elliott is especially hard. Holding his gentle and generous heart, meeting his eyes and knowing what they see in them - but not knowing what he sees in theirs.
Elliott is so kind and steadfast and devoted, a brilliant, smart man - why cannot they just love him? Why cannot they just make something easy for once, for just one person?
But they do, they do - of course they love him, how could they not?
But Boone - fiery, hurting, infuriating - why does he make them feel like…
Oh...of course.
***
Bloodhound loves, but it brings them no relief.
Bloodhound loves, and this realization feels like a death sentence. Their love is heavy, awkward, ill-fitting. It is malnourished and sickly, grown on poor soil, harvested with careless hands; the burden of burdens weighing on their shoulders like an iron cloak. People sing about walking on air and being filled with light, but Bloodhound only feels heavy and numb.
How full of themself do they have to be, to love both of them? To dare think they have a right to either of them, let alone both? How utterly selfish are they, to cling to them like this? To answer their kindness and goodwill with something out of their rotting chest?
Because this is the best Bloodhound can do, this is all they can do, but it can never be enough. To offer it to them would be an insult.
It does not stop them from - wanting. By the Gods, it does not stop their feeble heart from trying to sing every time Bloodhound looks at them, thinks of them, is in the same room as them. It stutters and crumbles and comes alive with every speck of attention, giddy and mindless with starvation.
But even if Bloodhound were horrendous enough to choose - a low they have yet to reach, small mercies - how would they even be able to do that? This awful longing rending their chest - how can they do this to either of them? How can they hurt them like this?
The answer is simple: they cannot.
And so they will not.
If being alone is what saves Boone and Elliott this heartbreak, then so be it. In the grand scheme of things it is a miniscule price to pay, and one Bloodhound owes them anyway.
Though simple, the decision does not come easy. Heartbreak has never come easy to them. Grief is an old friend, but the familiarity does not lessen the pain when it lands on silent wings to feed on what is left.
But there is one breathless spot of sunlight in this unending winter storm.
"How long is it gonna take you?" Boone drawls from where he is sprawling on Elliott's couch.
He is dressed in a three piece suit, which looks odd on him but only because Bloodhound is used to his more rugged getups; the suit itself is immaculate, a flattering charcoal with a dark blue pocket square to match his eyes. His hair is tossed over the armrest.
The suit is definitely going to get wrinkled like this. But Bloodhound, their cheeks hot, only finds that it adds to the charm.
Bloodhound themself is wearing burgundy, something Marzia had picked out for them. It had to be refitted at the last moment: they have lost weight.
They are waiting for Elliott to come out of the bathroom where he is putting on finishing touches. There is an event with the sponsors, and everyone is expected to at least make an appearance. Boone turned up at Bloodhound's door and bullied them into getting dressed - they may have lost track of time - but then it turned out that they need not have worried as Elliott got held up deciding on his makeup.
"Almost-- fuck, I was almost done, but now you've distracted me and I have to redo-- hang on one sec…"
Elliott sounds frazzled. Oh, this is going to be a long evening.
"Sure thing, duckie," Boone chuckles. "Being fashionably late was still, well, fashionable last time I checked."
Bloodhound raises their eyebrows but Elliott pokes his head out of the bathroom before they can say anything.
"Did you just call me..?"
"Am I wrong?" Boone tips his head over the armrest so that he can look at Elliott upside down. "You're yellow. And preen-y."
"I do not preen! And I am not yellow!" Elliott steps out fully and oh, his suit is a blinding white, diamond buttons glinting in the light. He had scored a sponsorship with a tailoring company, and it has done him good. He gestures at the flawlessly tailored suit as he speaks - and he is right, this makes him look like a graceful swan rather than a duckling.
"Not right now, perhaps," Bloodhound remarks quietly anyway from their armchair, and Elliott redirects his accusing look at them.
Oh, his eyeliner is perfect.
"I get no respect from either of you," Elliott complains, but Bloodhound, even as they are now, can only grin in response, unseen behind their mask. "Nothing wrong with looking good in the ring, definitely nothing wrong with looking good when they bring out the hors-d'oeuvres."
Boone gets up from the couch and squeezes past Elliott, coming chest to chest with him for a moment. There is no reason for him not to walk around the other side of the couch.
"Nothing wrong with looking like a snack either, duckie," he murmurs just on the edge of Bloodhound's hearing, dipping his head before he steps away.
Elliott flushes and turns away, reaching up to rub the back of his neck, but that makes him realize that Bloodhound is looking.
"Can you believe this guy? What a shit. Anyway, you ready?"
Bloodhound falls a little behind as they make their way to Elliott's car to get to the venue. It gives them a chance to watch Boone rib Elliott, to watch Elliott grow flustered and try to give as good as he is getting in turn. He seems to grow genuinely frustrated for a moment when Boone points something out about his hair that Bloodhound misses, but then Boone backs off, lifting a placating hand and actually stepping away to leave Elliott more space as they walk side by side.
There is...a familiarity to Boone's conduct around Elliott, Bloodhound sees it clearly now. Boone easily throws his considerable bulk around, to impress as well as intimidate - but it is when he gets genuine that he starts trying to make himself appear smaller, less obtrusive. He ducks his head and hunches his shoulders, perhaps even without realizing that he is doing it. It is strangely endearing, like a bear tucking in its razor sharp claws.
...He started hunching his shoulders just before he left Talos.
But maybe he will not leave now. Maybe Elliott convinced him to stay, one way or another… The nickname alone is a dead giveaway.
There is a bitterness in Bloodhound's throat as they watch them banter and joke, as they watch Elliott punch Boone in the shoulder and let his hand linger, but they squash it with as much resolution as they can muster. Staying out of their way is the literal least Bloodhound can do. Falling behind as they move on.
Maybe the two of them could grow into something together. Maybe they would not need Bloodhound to be happy.
***
They hold a game at the Talos arena.
They have not been there in a while, and Bloodhound has a good idea why, but evidently it has been decided to capitalize on the destruction while there is still a planet to house the arena at all.
They promise a grueling match, a full twenty-four hours. The weather mode remains offline this time: the shifting Talosi landscape is enough of a challenge of its own, and besides, the cinematic shots of it dying in real time would only be ruined by fog or rain. To keep things interesting, the orgs lower the resource spawn rate: fewer recovery items, less ammunition. Teams will be lucky to have guns. Luckier to have syringes. Every bullet is going to have to count.
The participants are allowed to select their teammates. Before Bloodhound can even think about it, Elliott and Boone inform them that they have already submitted the form for the three of them.
Bloodhound cannot find it in themself to feel anything anymore. They go there to pay their final dues. One last sacrifice to the soil of Talos. One last goodbye to what used to be their home. Bloodhound decided against bringing Artur this time - maybe they can at least spare him this horror.
The ground is hot beneath their feet, the Epicenter is nothing but steaming mud as the ice melts from the heat, turning the grave of their parents into a swamp, old tragedies morphing into new. What was already dry is now cracking under their footsteps.
The match is difficult. Each of them manages to secure a gun and a handful of ammo (and a small bundle of arrows for Bloodhound's bow), and they are dubiously lucky to come across a now-empty battlefield and loot a syringe that had rolled into a ditch and out of sight of whoever had won the skirmish. They breathe a collective sigh of relief when Elliott only nearly twists his ankle after falling into a webbing trap - the one syringe they had before was used up on Boone when he tried to play tank and soaked up a round from Octane's SMG. They have basic shields; Boone's is cracked.
Their rations were not impacted by the sparse resources mode, at least: the teams might be forced into mode brutal fights, more visceral ways of eliminating each other since the removed anonymity of bullets is no longer an option, but nobody is going to starve. Small mercies.
Bloodhound, Elliott, and Boone largely avoid everyone, hardly even by design. Sparse ammo and the resulting need to get closer for a fight has turned everyone into stealthy stalkers. And yet the game continues: barely half the time has passed when the robotic voice echoes across the arena, announcing only one other team remaining.
They come into the train yard area from the north on the early morning of day two, the uncomfortable feeling of being watched burning the backs of their necks, and Elliott sends out a decoy to hopefully redirect their attention. Their position is abysmal: they should fix that before trying to engage.
The ring will be closing to their south. There is a tunnel going through the rock monolith in that direction: if they go through it, they will stay out of sight.
Bloodhound glances to the side as they bring up the rear. The train yard has already seen its fair share of bloody action, it seems. A body catches their attention, a young person in bright purple half-draped over an empty supply bin. They do not recognize them - might be a moth, an unfortunate casualty of someone more experienced and more accustomed to killing without flinching.
There are arrows sticking out of the dead person's back in an odd, spine-like array. An incredible luxury, leaving them there: Bloodhound themself only has three in their quiver.
They are so busy musing about collecting the arrows that they nearly fail to notice Boone stop dead in his tracks the moment they step into the tunnel.
"This is a-- this is a bad idea," Boone says, and Bloodhound is instantly alert. The tunnel looks empty - and as stable as can be - but might he be seeing something they are missing?
"Why?" they prompt when nothing comes forth, but Boone only shakes his head.
"Listen - I don't like the idea of getting bottle--boh--bottlenecked as much as the next guy, but this is our surest way to reach the ring and stay out of the open." Elliott gestures at his Wingman, at the Mastiff in Boone's white-knuckled hands. "If they still have a sniper, we're toast." He nods to Bloodhound - "No offence."
"None taken - we should go deeper," Bloodhound agrees. Lobbying for a four-ex yielded no results.
"No," Boone chokes out. "I can't - no."
He is still staring at the dark abyss of the tunnel. There is a tremour to his shoulders.
Is he afraid? He was not afraid that one time in the caves - but they were open on the cliffside. The tunnel, Bloodhound knows, will start feeling like a tomb long before the light from the other side comes in.
"Boone…" Elliott begins, placing a careful hand on Boone's forearm - he flinches - but Bloodhound already has a plan.
"I shall do recon," they say, and that finally makes Boone snap out as he turns to look at them, eyes haunted. "The decoy has, hopefully, sent them northwest, but it will be prudent to make sure."
"Hound - splitting up is not a good idea - again, if they have snipers…"
"We need all the intel we can get," they point out. "Besides, I saw a few arrows I could harvest. It might not fully even out the playing field against a long range sniper, but I can still land my shots."
Elliott still looks unconvinced, and Boone - oh, Boone is so pale - but it is obvious that they see Bloodhound's point.
"Stay by the mouth of the tunnel, you will still be out of sight here," they suggest. "Drink water, rest until I come back. Maybe there will be no need for us to go through."
They slink by the corpse they saw earlier and pull out the arrows. One breaks, caught on a bone - they frown at the sound - but the other two could still be serviceable if dirty.
It does not take them long to find the tracks: heavy footprints of a human and two trails left by metallic feet. Headed northwest, just like they intended. A full squad. Octane is already dead, they know, so it cannot be him. Which means…
They do not even feel anything at first. What tips them off is the sudden, deafening silence, dead even against the landscape scorched clean of wildlife. The world holding its breath.
Then comes the tremour, a buzz so subtle it almost fails to register through the soles of Bloodhound's boots. With it, comes a deep, horrifying sense of wrongness. The giants awaken beneath the ground, and they bring forth their fury.
The earthquake hits like a heavy blow, almost knocking Bloodhound off their feet before they turn it into a roll and tumble to the ground, splaying themself over the dessicated skeletons of grass. The ground shakes beneath them like a convulsing beast, dust rising to blind the sun, and there is only the angered, betrayed roar of earth rebelling against the wrongdoings of man.
"Hound! Hound, can you hear us-- come in…"
"Elliot," Bloodhound fumbles for the comm button. They can barely see through the dust. The soil feels hot through their clothes, calling cold sweat to the surface of their skin. "Elliott! Are you safe?"
"The tunnel--" he cuts out, the connection staticky, "couldn't-- Boone is fine, but…"
But what?!
"Repeat what you said!"
Static.
"Elliott?"
The static cuts out too. The line goes completely dead.
Bloodhound curses. Now, of all times, to cut off communication - unless something went horribly wrong, unless they are buried…
Bloodhound rises to their feet - the shaking has passed, though their bones are still humming at the same pitch as the ground singing its lament - and looks in the direction of the train yard, trying to glimpse anything over the slowly settling dust.
It is carnage. A twisted mass of sand and soil and rock - cars jumbled and bent around boulders, torn lines swaying in the wind. The train yard has collapsed, the very place they had treaded not half an hour ago scrubbed from existence.
Fuck. Fuck. But okay - their beacon pings were still coming through. Elliott was alive enough to comm them, and Boone - well, Boone was obviously unhappy about the tunnel, but Elliott said he was fine - if the southern side of the tunnel is open, they might be able to get out that way. If it is sealed… It is an awful way to die. But at least the prospect of being respawned takes some of the horror out of it.
A part of Bloodhound wants nothing more than to run to them, die with them if need be - but that will not help anyone.
But maybe, if they act fast and smart instead, Bloodhound might be able to end the game and call in the dropship before too long. Spare them some of the suffering.
They need to find the last team.
It takes Bloodhound a moment to find the tracks again, the landscape shaken by the earthquake. They must have gotten run around by the changed pattern because they catch up to the last team so suddenly they nearly run into them, hiding behind a boulder at the last possible moment.
"This shit is pissing me off. Making me all zappy." A deep voice, a screeching sound of metal - Revenant. The simulacrum sounds fed up.
"I know what you mean!" Pathfinder's chipper cadence. "My circuits feel all fuzzy too. But I know a great way to--"
"Didn't ask you. Don't care. Shut up."
"Isn't it a shame that I still have to listen to you two even with the comms down," Caustic groans. So this means that they went down for everyone after all.
Bloodhound feels some of the tension leave their chest. Their lungs feel just a little bit less constricted.
They could take them on, maybe. The velafolk reflexes are swift, but Caustic is slow, encumbered: they could throw the axe at him after shooting an arrow at one of them. But which one? Revenant is more dangerous at close range - but his sadistic tendencies will likely prompt him to forego weapons and go in for the kill with his bare hands. Pathfinder is more likely to shoot first, ask questions second.
Shoot Pathfinder, axe Caustic...deal with Revenant later.
Not their best plan, but the ground is settling into its new cradle, flowing into the tunnel - and time might be running out.
Bloodhound reaches back for their bow - and their hand closes around nothing. The bow is gone.
Oh no - they must have dropped it when the earthquake happened. Horribly foolish - the arrows are useless now - what are they going to do? Taking on both of them, even if they take out Caustic immediately, is a risky fight.
But Elliott and Boone...
"I am starting to think you don't want to win." Revenant's voice is a tear in the fabric of being, a violent slash on the canvas.
"I will not justify my reasoning to you," Caustis speaks with derision.
"Please, friends, there is no need to argue over a silly little bin! Say, why don't we just go check it out? I could set up a zipline that would take us half the way to the train yard!"
"Because it's a pointless fucking thing to do," Revenant snarls. Bloodhound hears a series of snipping metallic sounds as he extends his fingers. "We saw them go this way, and I bet the fart bin went off because of the damn landslide or whatever."
"Like I told you, my…'fart bin' went off on a delay. If it were due to the earthquake, the trigger would have happened instantaneously."
Bloodhound swallows. If Caustic had left a trap near the tunnel - or multiple traps, even - and at last one of them went off - could they have triggered it? Neither has protection the way Bloodhound does, and with just one syringe between them…
Something in Bloodhound's periphery catches their attention, a tiny light winking out, and they glance down at their wrist, at the harness holding the metadata cartridge.
It appears to be offline.
Bloodhound frowns and quickly frees the wrist, checking the hairthin scar left over from the microchip implantation. The skin around it is red. Whatever has hit the arena, it managed to impact it too. There is no way of knowing if the damage has been enough to slash the data transfer, but it does not look good.
This is…worrying. The data is constantly copied from the chip to the cartridge for easy field respawns in mobile printing pods, as well as to the backup servers; if the cartridge is damaged, its owner can still be respawned back in the regular chambers after updating the files from the chip.
But the chip losing the connection to the satellite means a gap in continuity. Such incomplete consciousness will be rejected by a new body even if everything else matches. It will latch onto a gap like a wound to worry and tear the mind to shreds, and there is no patching it up.
If the connection is restored, the chip will transfer the backlog and update the files. But if death occurs before that can happen…
If any humans from the last two teams dies here, they will do so for good.
This cannot be on purpose. The comms might have been, but not this.
Cold sweat erupts along Bloodhound's spine, over their shoulders. An answering chill crystallizes in their lungs. If Elliott and Boone ended up trapped and cannot be respawned…
Does the other team know?
"I don't care," Revenant grits out. "I have a good hunch about who's on the last squad, and I'm hunting them down. Oh, to bring Loba the bitch's head…"
Bloodhound suppresses a shudder. Revenant is brutal in his killing, violent in a way that cannot be justified by the thrill of the hunt. If he catches them, this will be a painful death. Going up against him in a regular match is no longer nerve wracking the way it used to be before the novelty wore off, but knowing that the respawn protocol is interrupted will only encourage his brutality. Gifting him their last death would be awful.
There is no time to run to the train yard to find out for themself if Elliott and Boone are safe and then get back here. But if Bloodhound leads the team away from them... Or, better yet, ensures their win and so, their survival...
Maybe they can do something right. Maybe they can do this one last thing right.
Maybe Talos will be happy with their final offering. Complete the circle. Return to earth.
Yes. They feel the thrum of it in their veins now, echoes of the fiery blood writhing underground. Yes, it must be so.
One final hunt, then. And they are happy to play prey this time.
Bloodhound pretends to sneak - it will not do to tip them off that they were not trying to hide.
"There you are!"
They tear off downslope, the sand-dry soil flying beneath their feet, wind whistling as it is sliced in two by the wings of their helmet. They hear the sound of metal hitting ground, disturbingly close - that must be Revenant - and the whizz of a zipline stand digging into the earth like a talon.
Bloodhound runs. They have no time to stop or even turn around, and so they flee, their lungs already beginning to strain for air in the hot, bitter steam.
(Watch out, child.)
Bloodhound swerves wildly to the side just as a bullet whistles past them, tearing into the ground ahead. Sniper.
They lose their footing and tumble downhill. An orb of fire blooms next to them with a primordial hum, but Bloodhound avoids it too, rolling back to their feet and throwing a quick look over their shoulder.
They can just make out Caustic's shape, far away and above them, peering down through the scope. Watching the insects run, but they have no intention of giving him a show.
Bloodhound arches their way east, letting the momentum carry them. This will keep them out of Caustic's line of sight, if he still has bullets. Nobody else has tried to shoot them so far - so maybe they will be able to gain advantage if they lead their pursuers to--
They turn, and the tilted behemoth of the Harvester appears above them, ugly and looming. Crows are circling the choleric juts of flames from its top.
Of course.
The most fitting place to end it. Someone will find death here, in the cradle where it has found its home.
I curse you, Bloodhound thinks, feverish, mad. I curse you the way you have cursed me. I curse you for what you have done to my home.
I curse you. I curse you!!!
With a jolt threaded right through their bones, the world goes grey and sharp. Blood turns to magma in their veins, the pressure hurling them onwards faster than wind.
They no longer feel tired. They have no fear.
The Harvester towers directly over them now, a groaning mass of steel, and Bloodhound has never hated anything in their life as much as they hate it.
A pause in the fabric of space - a held breath - and then it all comes crashing down.
The Harvester releases a whooshing sigh, a great untangling of pressure, and gives one massive lurch, sinking into the minced earth - right into the lava sloshing around its corroded support beams.
A wall of fire rises before Bloodhound, and for a long unforgivable moment they are still, blinded to everything but the devouring flames hitting their frame with a blow of scorching heat. The world is tilting around them, metal moaning and snapping, ground cracking as it splits into a hungry grave.
Bloodhound regains their footing and flies on, jumping and twisting mid-air to avoid falling into the cracks, the ground bucking underneath them. They duck just before a beam swings by, spare half a glance to see it break off and topple into the lava.
The fissures are slowly widening and Bloodhound jumps across them in their flight, echoed by Revenant's screeching and clanking footsteps. Maybe he will lose his balance and fall down. Maybe the wound of Harvester will devour him the way it devours everything else--
Bloodhound skids to a halt at the edge of a fissure, the flaming maw growing wider right before their eyes. They have the high ground, splotches of heat just barely reaching them from here - and the other side is almost level with the flaming river.
The gap is too big. If they hesitate a second longer, they will not make it.
Bloodhound leaps--
The rock crumbles under their feet just as they push off.
They fall short, their feet landing right in the viscous, ravenous heat. It flows into their boots as they sink, claws its way in through the boots as it burns the useless fabric away.
The momentum carries Bloodhound forwards and they catch themself on their hands, screaming - they could not scream the moment before, all air punched out of them by the sudden pain, but now they are screaming, now they can do nothing but scream, and their hands are sinking too, dissolving into nothing but this burning, shredding agony. The fire digs in: leather is nothing to it. Skin is nothing to it.
They rear back on instinct, but the trap is too tight and yanks them down instead, and suddenly the fire is too close, and there is a brief, odd moment of something pillowing their right shoulder and chest before it burns through and tears into them as well.
Bloodhound chokes on it, too agonized to scream now, and then choking still - the hose of their respirator must have gotten burned through, they are breathing in the fumes of burning rubber and molten mineral, their lungs are on fire.
Bloodhound hauls themself to solid ground, toppling over the moment they try to put pressure on their hands, and claw the mask off. They cannot feel anything but pain, they do not know what they are doing, they just need it off.
They cough, but the razor-sharp feeling in their chest will not lessen. They are gagging from the stench of scorched flesh. Their limbs are on fire. Their head is growing foggy.
They cannot stay here. It will suffocate them. Another fissure may open and consume them. They need to get up and go.
They cannot move.
They fade away.
***
("There they are, I see them…")
("...not moving…")
("Don't fucking touch them!"
"That sure is one empty Mastiff! Why are you pointing it at me, friend?..")
Voices - faint and faraway, then fading in at once.
Are the comms back online? No, there are footsteps - someone is here, someone found them, an enemy…
"...is bad, this is very bad…"
"Shit - look at the burns…"
"Let me - I have the syr…"
Bloodhound barely even feels the jab. A seizure rolls through them. They try to fight but their body will not listen. Revenant - it must be him - he is here to…
"Roll them over - I don't think that helped at all…"
Bloodhound is struggling so very hard to catch up. It cannot be Revenant - did somebody try to heal them? Wasting syringes…
There are hands on Bloodhound, turning them onto their unburned side. Someone cups the side of their head.
"Shit-- fuck-- Hound, can you hear me? I'm gonna have to unscrew the lenses, I'm sorry, I need to see you…"
A stab of light in one eye, then the other. "There you are, honey-- can you hear me? Can you open your eyes for me?"
They cannot, it is too much - everything hurts - but this is Elliott, and he is asking them, and so they must. Bloodhound opens their eyes, blurry with acidic tears. The onslaught of light is impossible. They cannot even see Elliott past its blinding glory.
"There you are." His voice is tight with something unnameable. "Blink if you can hear me, okay? Please."
Bloodhound blinks - maybe. The light dims somewhat for a second, so they probably succeed.
"The dropship is coming!" A deeper voice - Boone's - oh thank the Allfather, he is alive, they both are. It worked. "Up there, on the bridge!"
"What the hell, how are we supposed to get there in time? They need to come closer--"
"Ell, the lava!"
"Fuck - okay - fuck," Elliott sounds nearer again, he must have turned back to them. "We'll get you out of here but we have to move - I'm gonna have to pick you up, I'm so sorry. I'll try-- I'll-- I'll try to be as gentle as I can, okay? Okay…"
There is movement around them, hands rolling them onto their back now, sliding under their shoulders and knees - and then the world lurches and explodes in red-hot agony, lancing through them with bright needlepoints of pain.
Bloodhound cries out, pitiful, mindless with it. The hands holding them up are shaking.
"I'm sorry, baby, I know it hurts, I'm so sorry."
Elliott keeps talking to them but Bloodhound cannot register any of it, sick and dizzy and drowning in pain as he starts walking and the world teeters on the edge of collapse again. Keeps collapsing with every step.
They are going to die here. The thought comes to them with startling clarity against the burning backdrop. They are going to die. It is a strange miracle that they have not already died.
I love you, Elliott, they think, rolling their sluggish, guilty head to rest against his shoulder. I'm sorry I did not get to tell you.
At least they got to have this.
"There's no way we can get up there - I thought I saw a way but - wait - Pathfinder!" Boone's voice rolls over Bloodhound, breaking against the shores somewhere beyond. "Can you zip us up to the bridge?"
"I can try, although I will have to stay behind to hold this end! The ground is very unstable."
Elliott's hands tighten on Bloodhound. They whimper.
"Path - are you sure there's no other way--"
"Don't worry, friend! There are always backups! Perks that fleshies will never have."
A whooshing sound of reinforced rope slices through the air. Elliott turns together with Bloodhound, making them queasy. Fire sloshes in their lungs.
"Boone - you take them. For the zipline."
"What are you talking about? The weight--"
"We all have to go up at the same time anyway, just take them, I won't - I can't drop them. Please take them."
There are arms around Bloodhound again, cradling their tortured weight, and then the world is flipped once more and they land over the plane of Boone's shoulder, flesh screaming as the burns are forced to accept the pressure.
They cannot even cry out anymore. The burnt air is squeezed out of their lungs, and there is nothing left to breathe in.
Boone is hurting them, but it is not his fault. They do not blame him for anything anymore.
A wave of movement, the sound of the zipline burning through the clip. They are coming up.
Bloodhound will not hold on for much longer. There is no air. There is almost no pain anymore.
Boone...forgive me for what I am about to do to you. I will wait for you.
Their eyes feel so heavy, but they manage to crack them open. The fabric of Boone's gear is rubbing their stinging cheek, they see the empty strap for his gun beyond it. The fiery landscape flows down below, devouring every speck of life.
Their final failure. Their final mistake.
There are invisible hands pulling at Bloodhound, stronger and more insistent than even Boone's iron grip. They follow.
***
("Bloth? Bloth!!!")
***
For the longest time, there is nothing.
***
Are they dead? Is this what the final death feels like?
Nobody came for them, but they did not expect that to happen anyway. Not after everything.
***
Lights, echoes, beeping machinery. Consciousness feels like a disproportionate amount of trouble.
They are probably not dead. This will have to be enough for now.
***
They heard Boone's voice when everything ended… Did he die too? Did Elliott?
Did they fail?
Was it all, once again, for nothing?
***
They are definitely not dead. This would be too much pain for someone who no longer had a body.
Their lungs are still on fire. Their burns hurt so much they almost transcend pain. Their chest feels like somebody dropped a boulder on it and left them trapped underneath.
Their blood flows so slowly, scratching lazily at the scorch marks. Poisoned, like the rest of them.
***
Bloodhound wakes up in a private, bot-operated ward. This is not the first time they are awake but it is the first time they are at all lucid.
A bot looks them over; Bloodhound lies supine, letting the machinery roll them over when needed, blurry eyes fixed on nothing. They feel the bot prod at their bandages. There appears to be a great amount of them.
There is almost no pain right now - they must be on anaesthetics. It feels like they are supposed to be hurting, but instead they are...detached. The body is a burden. There is an invisible layer between it and them.
Whatever gas mixture they are being intubated with tastes like cold iron. Breathing seems like too much trouble, but something keeps doing it for them when they try to stop.
***
Bloodhound is conscious again, cranky from the pain and the itching. Their wounds are healing, as far as they can tell, but they are too tired to summon any interest in it.
A bot checks them over again - routinely by now, no emergency kits on standby - and slots a connector into a port on a tablet on Bloodhound's bedside table, uploading the results. After it turns away, they hear the beep as a piece of privacy software deletes its visual memory.
Bloodhound collects their strength for about an hour after the bot folds into the wall. They pick up the tablet and blearily call up the list of visitors - there is nothing urgent they wish to know about their state anyway. Their bandaged fingers struggle to land where they want them to. The blurry screen keeps doubling.
Loba, Marzia, Mitchell Sé - their lawyer. A name they do not recognize; maybe a reporter attempted to sneak in, something not exactly unheard of. Elliott and Boone came together. Hm - why would they..?
All requests for visitation were denied by default - on account of Bloodhound having been unconscious, they presume. Otherwise Elliott and Boone would have been let in even though Bloodhound does not have their mask yet.
They manage to put in a request for their headgear and tap a few sliders before passing out again.
***
Marzia pays Bloodhound a visit next time they are awake. They are strong enough to be sitting up, masked, keeping their bandaged hands folded in their lap.
"As your agent, I suggest you tough it out," Marzia gestures. "Skin grafts have already been made, other tissues regrown directly in vivo - you're well on the mend by now, and the recovery story will go over well with the public even if nobody will see the actual scars." She pauses, letting out a contemplative hum. "As your friend, however...just get respawned? It's more expensive, yeah, and you're halfway through already, but you can afford it, especially after the win."
The win… Bloodhound has not even thought about that.
But this pain is only fitting. To erase it into unbeing would be to spit in the Gods' faces.
And anyway, they and Marzia are not friends.
"I will take recovery," they whisper. Their throat is too ruined to speak normally.
Marzia nods, her lips pressed together. "Sure. Another thing - they know by now that it was foul play. Talosi rebels are the main suspects."
There is a question in her expression even though her tone is neutral.
"The Harvester would collapse on its own anyway," Bloodhound says, measured and slow. "It was already collapsing."
There are talks about building cooling stations. Draining the lava. Stringing the corpse upside down to exsanguinate it from its slit throat.
When will they leave it alone? Any 'help' comes with a larger price tag than Talos can ever hope to pay. Bloodhound would know. By now, they would know.
"But it was helped along."
"I know nothing."
"Are you sure?" she frowns. "Talk to Mitchell before you give out any statements. They will come asking--"
"And find no answers here."
Irritation begins to simmer, only stoked by the burning pain in their limbs and chest and throat. Bloodhound always has so frighteningly little patience when they are injured.
Marzia moves to say something else when the doors to the ward slide open. The sound isolation is of high enough quality that Bloodhound had not heard any voices, but now they recognize the two people before they even appear in the doorway.
"I would like you to leave now. Thank you," they tell Marzia quietly.
She frowns at them again but rethinks arguing soon enough. After one last weighted look, she steps out of the ward.
Bloodhound waits for the door to close behind her before replacing their mask with a pair of glasses. It takes a frustrating amount of effort and concentration to wrestle everything in place when they still cannot feel their fingers.
"Hey, Houndie," Elliott greets them. His voice is swallowed by the empty walls. "We got - pinged that you were accepting visitors."
Bloodhound nods, exhausted. Their head is swimming.
"How are you?" Boone asks.
They both hover uncertainly, out of place in their downtime clothes. They look - uninjured, or healed at the very least. Both are slightly more scruffy and ragged than Bloodhound remembers them to be. Elliott's tan skin is of a greyish undertone; Boone has stark rings under his eyes.
How long exactly has Bloodhound been out for?
"I feel like shit," Bloodhound admits with a half-hearted scowl.
Boone laughs, the punched-out sound almost startling Elliott. "You look like it too."
Bloodhound nods at them to sit - why are they here otherwise? - and each drags a chair over, sitting down on either side of them, exchanging looks across their covered feet. Bloodhound cannot decipher them. They feel as far away as their numb limbs.
"How are you?" they whisper, unsure if the words will even cross the distance.
It's Elliott's turn to laugh - cutoff and sharp. "It's - hah, it's, don't worry about us at all, we weren't the ones who…"
Bloodhound frowns. "Who…?"
What did they miss? There was so much happening...
"You stopped breathing." Boone's voice is a dark, hollow thing. Oh - so that is what they meant. "We had to…"
Whatever he means to say dies in his throat. Bloodhound can see it working the knotted words, but nothing comes forth.
"Boone and I had to resuss-rescus-- to give you CPR," Elliott comes to his rescue, and ah, that will explain why their ribcage feels so trampled. He reaches out to place a hand on Boone's forearm - the same way they would do it for him. Bloodhound aches for them, shackled and numb. "Path gave us another syringe before we zipped, that carried you just enough until we got to the emergency kit on the dropship."
So Bloodhound did die there. They did, actually, die there.
"Velafolk…" they start.
"Path's fine," Elliott waves a hand; Bloodhound watches Boone track the movement as it leaves his forearm. "He clocked that respawns were down but just kinda…rolled with it. They restored him from the latest backup, which was just before the game, so he won't remember the game itself, but…he's gonna be fine." Elliott seems to remember something and shrugs. "Revenant's conked it but I think they're shipping in a new unit for him already."
There was someone else… Was there not? Two full teams…
Boone must have noticed their look of confusion. "Caustic's fine, for what it's worth," he says, "he kept out of danger. Held back to 'observe' or whatever. They called it a draw and left it at that."
There is no hiding the derision in his voice. Bloodhound agrees with it wholeheartedly.
So everyone lived - more or less. Although that does not take into account the civilian casualties that happened on the day or since or are going to happen as the necrosis spreads, nd it will not be avoided or bargained with. There is no time - again, there is no time…
"Hound," Elliott interrupts the jumbled flow of their thoughts. Fidgets with his cuff as he waits for them to drag their gaze to him. "We uh - we," he throws a look at Boone, "we know that you know that… I mean, that you knew… Boone, help."
Boone's eyes are hard. "We know that you knew that respawns were down." He laughs at Bloodhound's instantly guarded look. Its sound is a hurting thing. "Come on. I knew it, which means you definitely did."
Bloodhound swallows - their throat protests - and looks away. They know it is just as good as admission but - what else are they to do?
"Why did you do it?" Boone's voice is lower now. Trying not to pose as a threat. Or maybe just mimicking Bloodhound's quiet tone.
But there is nothing they can tell him, threat or no. "You were not supposed to come for me," they murmur.
"That's not an answer."
"I wanted to lead them away. To end the game if I could." All other reasons are curdling beneath the surface, shadows that need not to be spoken of.
Their limbs are hurting. Their head is hurting, poisoned, useless. Smoke is making their eyes sting.
"You know it was too risky!" Boone presses, unheeding. Elliott is silent and anxious next to him.
"I couldn't let them find you, I couldn't…" There is not enough air. "I had to end the game before something happened to you."
They do not even know how Boone and Elliott got out of the tunnel. If they were, even, in it in the first place or if they avoided the landslide. If they thought they were going to die. If they were afraid.
"Bloth, you could've died." Boone's brows are pinched. "We could've actually lost you."
Of course he would be afraid for them instead, the selfless idiot, but why does he not see it - how does he not understand? How does he not--
"I would rather it be me!" Bloodhound croaks out. Their voice is all wrong, scratchy, hoarse, but maybe if they are loud enough Boone and Elliott will hear. "If anyone had to pay, I would rather it be me because I...I…"
I am a failure. I am a disgrace. I love you, Gods, I am so sorry that I do.
Fokk, their throat hurts so badly. Every word is a nail ploughing the soft tissue, dragging upwards, skewering their tongue.
It feels so tight, too. No matter how hard they swallow through the pain, it will not open.
There is something poised and weightless to Elliott before their carnage, a pause between heartbeats, an inhaled breath held before it is expelled.
"Hound…" he calls, hesitant. "Do you…"
He knows. Oh, he knows.
They have no words left. They nod miserably.
Bloodhound watches their hands, curled uselessly in their lap. They wish so desperately to be alone.
On the greying edge of their field of vision, they see Elliott and Boone exchange a look. Elliott lifts his eyebrows and dips his chin. Boone narrows his eyes.
They both know, then. There is no use hiding it anymore.
"I love you both," Bloodhound chokes out. Meeting their eyes is an impossible task. "Please forgive me."
Their throat will close for good here, they know. They still, drifting in their aching husk.
There is nothing else they can say.
"Houndie - hey..." Elliott's voice, well, of course he wishes to talk, he always does, but some gaps cannot be bridged even with thousands of words. "Hey. I promise, it's not, uh-- it's not a problem? It really isn't."
Bloodhound lifts their face, uncomprehending, their face pinched.
Elliott's expression is urgent, strangely - energized. Boone is biting his lip.
"Elliott and I had a chance to talk after the - the initial earthquake."
"You mean, after I decoy'd us some light and you stopped freaking out," Elliott grins at him across Bloodhound's bed, his smile a bit too sharp.
"Hush." Boone looks at Elliott until he ducks his head, his cheeks growing pink. "We agreed that if we lived - if all three of us got out of it alive…"
Elliott swallows and nods. "Cards on the table."
Bloodhound stares at them. They stare back, obviously waiting for them to say something, to react, but they do not… "I do not understand."
"Well, we...there's…" Elliott flounders, making aborted motions with his hands.
"It's okay, Bloth," Boone comes to the rescue again, although Bloodhound is not sure, whose. "The thing you are despairing over - it's all okay. We have time to figure it all out."
He and Elliott share a look; something swift passes between them.
They will still not touch Bloodhound, not even through the covers, nothing. Afraid, maybe, to hurt them, but to be apart after this, in this, is unbearable.
Their eyes are burning. They feel their face crumple.
"Hound - oh fuck, Hound, did we say something wrong?"
Bloodhound shakes their head, lost. If only they could at least cover their face, preserve the last shreds of their dignity - but their hands feel so heavy. Their chest is caving in, and something is bursting out of it, and they just need to...
"No, I am--" they manage, "I wish to hold you both so dearly, but - everything hurts." They let out a laugh, grimacing at how wet it sounds.
Boone's face is so frighteningly soft when they chance a look at him, but his body is already leaning forwards as if on its own.
Elliott chews on his lip, raises his eyebrows. "Would you like us to try?"
Bloodhound nods in a wordless plea, the cursed helplessness encasing their core into stillness, their eyes undeniably wet. Yes, they would like to be held, please, please.
And then both of them are moving closer, and there is some shuffling and shifting involved because, while wide, the bed is still meant for one person only, but they end up - not embracing, exactly, but pressed together as much as Bloodhound's bandages and pillows and respirator will allow.
Elliott plasters himself against their uninjured side and lets out a deep, long-held sigh, sliding a hand under Bloodhound's bandaged one; Boone curls over them on the other side, a huge man trying so carefully not to hurt - they lean into him anyway - and whispers something Bloodhound does not catch as he kisses the top of their head. Cedar and ozone envelop Bloodhound, a forest storm, warm air blanketing the ground. Something wound so tightly that it felt like an endless spasm finally relaxes, the pain from it clear and impermanent.
The three of them stay like that for a very long time. Bloodhound's exhausted tears dry up. Their body goes slack, the fight finally going out, but it is held upright anyway, encased in warmth. They drift eventually, lulled by Boone's and Elliott's hushed voices as they murmur to each other over their head.