She left, leaving Gregory curled up on the ground in pain, blood streaming from his nose, staining his shirt, his chest, the carpet he was lying on, everything. He coughed once, twice. The blood was leaking down his throat, leaving an unpleasant bittery coppery aftertaste to his experience. This was not a good look, he thought to himself, but his nose, his throat and his everything, pretty much, hurt a little too much to consider getting up at the moment.
So he just lay there for a while. Ten minutes? Five minutes? An hour? But eventually, he pushed himself up with a groan, leaning a hand on the wall for balance. Everything lurched suddenly, and he nearly fell back on his ass again but hey, he didn't actually fall back on his ass! That was a success! The trickle of nosebleed had also slowed, but his shirt was ruined. Come on, he had just washed that fucking thing and then all of a sudden hey, some stupid bitch gives him another nosebleed and all his hard work had gone to fucking waste! If he saw her again he'd kill her, no doubts about it. His glass shiv was intact, albeit slightly bloodied. First blood.
He shoved it into his pocket absentmindedly. His main focus was getting this goddamn nosebleed to stop. His bee shirt was ruined now; well it wasn't ruined but he wasn't going to spend an hour trying to wash all the blood out of it again, so he just took it off. Alas, poor bee, we hardly got to know ye. Scrunching it up into a ball, he held it up to his nose, tilting his head forwards. When Sammy was younger he apparently used to get really heavy nosebleeds and he always said to like, actually tilt your head forwards because you get the blood out quicker that way and then it stops faster. And if you actually tilt it backwards it all goes down your throat and then you taste blood and then you might like, choke on it.
The mere thought of choking made him angry. God damn it, how did he fuck that one up? Leah was a beanpole. He had the advantage. He had a knife, a bolas, and the element of surprise, and even still they kind of tied. Leah was probably worse off than him but man, she should have been lying in this room dead, not ran off wherever to spread the fact that he was playing. Fuck. Fuck! He shouldn't have tried to act all theatrical, all fucking playing it up for the cameras and shit, just for him to nearly get killed by a beanpole with no weapons. He should have fucking done anything. Calmed down and stabbed her in the throat, ignored the pain and kept choking her until she was a corpse lying on the ground, stabbed her in the leg and then in the body a couple of times, anything but fucking whatever the hell he had done! This nosebleed wasn't going away so easy. Fucking hell. No more. He wasn't going to fucking act all cinematic and ham it up to the crowd. He was a beekeeper, not a goddamn actor like those guys who were doing that play. Or Kenny Yamana and his stupid egg timer. Why did he still have that? It didn't matter. No more goddamn hamming it up. If he saw Cory, Leah, anyone, he'd kill them. No more goddamn just. Whatever the fuck he had been doing.
His nosebleed was finally stopping, and Gregory lifted his head gingerly, testing to see if any drops of blood betrayed him. They didn't, and with a snort, he threw his old bee shirt on the ground, where it lay next to the door leading out to the balcony. Unzipping his bag, he pulled out the Ben's Crabs shirt, examining it. Orange wasn't really his colour, but the team logo in the middle of it was a nice touch. Maybe a little too easy for people to see what team he was on but eh, it wasn't like the bandana wasn't a giveaway anyway. And it fit him really well, too! Praise be to the SOTF executives. If only it had been yellow so he coulda like, made a bee pun or something.
Right, now time to solve his injuries. Well, the ones he could solve right now, at least. Wasn't much he could do about the bruising around his neck; it was tender to the touch and he winced whenever he poked at it, and there wasn't much he could do about the bump on his head, either; Leah smacking him against the floor hadn't like, caused him to break the skin or anything so there wasn't any blood to clean up. Maybe the kitchen would have some ice in it to like, soothe the bump? Maybe some bags of peas or something.
So hopping off the bed, he unsteadily walked into the kitchen. Man, he really hoped he didn't have a concussion or something because that would be really, really bad. As Jewel had shown a few months ago, if one of your limbs got fucked up you'd like, kind of be fine if you had a gun. A concussion screwed everything up, though. Makes it hard to like, think and do stuff. But he'd be fine! Probably.
The kitchen was small, but it was probably better-equipped than Gregory's kitchen at home. At least, before the whole, you know, SOTF team rooting through it and taking out all the knives, guns, anything that could really be used as a weapon. At least they still left the fridge's freezer full of food. It was all frozen vegetables and shit like that, though. But hey, there was the bag of frozen peas he was looking for! Another small victory. A check of the fridge part also revealed a can of beans; they were those shitty no-salt beans that tasted horrible, but it was beans! Something kinda fresher than all the dried and packaged shit that they had in the bags. Picking up his bag of peas, he went back to the bedroom part, put the bag of peas on the bed, and lied down on the bed, his head on the bag of peas. It was cold but man, it was better than like, having a concussion.
"Fuck." Gregory uttered the first words in like, an hour. This had went terribly, but at least he had a knife on him now, one that would beat Cory's diving knife easy. Glancing down at the collar strapped to his neck, he had an idea.
"Hey, uh, Ben? Any uh, advice? For like, playing and not getting my ass beat by filler?"
Land of Milk and Honey
Open, around 10 am
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Applesintime
- Posts: 836
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Rattlesnake
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- Joined: Wed Aug 08, 2018 10:23 pm
"Well, you got the first step figured out, which is not doing... fuckin' that again."
A soft sigh emanates from Gregory's collar.
"If it starts bleeding again, pinch it right at the top of the cartilage, by the way. Should stop things a bit faster.
"But let's break it down a bit. Like, I'm in her shoes: Some useless piece of cannon fodder, sitting around waiting to die. That actually sounds kinda familiar. And along comes some guy who thinks it's all fun and games until it's not. But for me it never was, right? I'm gonna be on my guard. I'm gonna start thinkin', boy, seventeen, eighteen years is a long fuckin' time to just end when some guy grabs my neck. You might think you really want it, but for me, peeling your fingers off is the most important thing I've ever done in my life.
"I can't tell you exactly what to do instead. This shit's too hard to succeed playing copycat. But I can say you got a couple options on how. Like, you don't wanna find out what happens if you have another fight like that, right? Maybe next time is the most important thing in your life, too. Or you can play cold and calculated. Seems to work for the big killers. Hit hard and fast. Have a plan that stops everyone else's plan cold. Make sense?
A soft sigh emanates from Gregory's collar.
"If it starts bleeding again, pinch it right at the top of the cartilage, by the way. Should stop things a bit faster.
"But let's break it down a bit. Like, I'm in her shoes: Some useless piece of cannon fodder, sitting around waiting to die. That actually sounds kinda familiar. And along comes some guy who thinks it's all fun and games until it's not. But for me it never was, right? I'm gonna be on my guard. I'm gonna start thinkin', boy, seventeen, eighteen years is a long fuckin' time to just end when some guy grabs my neck. You might think you really want it, but for me, peeling your fingers off is the most important thing I've ever done in my life.
"I can't tell you exactly what to do instead. This shit's too hard to succeed playing copycat. But I can say you got a couple options on how. Like, you don't wanna find out what happens if you have another fight like that, right? Maybe next time is the most important thing in your life, too. Or you can play cold and calculated. Seems to work for the big killers. Hit hard and fast. Have a plan that stops everyone else's plan cold. Make sense?
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Applesintime
- Posts: 836
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"I shoulda just stabbed her." Gregory lamented, looking at the little glass shiv he made. He felt like an idiot, to be honest. He had the chance to get a kill, his name on the leaderboards, and then all of a sudden bam! His nose was bleeding again, he was hurting all over and worst of all, yet another person was out there with the knowledge that he was playing. Another name to cross off his metaphorical list. Cory and now Leah, which sucked because she was nice but at the end of the day?
She was just filler.
"Like, man, I tried to be all flashy and theatrical and shit because that's what the audience wants, right? I wanna like, be popular and cool and l-like, instead I get my ass beat and all that happens is that my nose starts bleeding and I slice her a couple of times. That ain't gonna kill her. If I had just stabbed her in the neck or like, the chest or the arm or anywhere, I woulda walked outta here with a kill." Sighing, he put the knife back in his pocket and pushed himself off the bed, still holding the peas to his head with a hand
Woah. Sudden wave of unsteadiness, and he fell back onto the bed, hissing. God, he hoped he didn't have a concussion. He shouldn't, right? Maybe this is all just like, getting your head bashed against the floor aftermath. Yeah, that would probably mean that he had a concussion but hey, a man can hope, right? He wasn't even a man. He was 16. Nearly 17, but still. Ten days to go, and he'd be damned if he didn't make it to his goddamn 17th.
"So, your suggestion is gonna be like, stop trying to be theatrical and cool, and instead just stab them or smack them with my weapons? I suppose that works but, like, man, I wanna be good TV. Sure, going around like a robot all not caring about the camera and getting kills is good, but hey, I'm sure I've gotta bunch of fans, right?"
"Right?"
She was just filler.
"Like, man, I tried to be all flashy and theatrical and shit because that's what the audience wants, right? I wanna like, be popular and cool and l-like, instead I get my ass beat and all that happens is that my nose starts bleeding and I slice her a couple of times. That ain't gonna kill her. If I had just stabbed her in the neck or like, the chest or the arm or anywhere, I woulda walked outta here with a kill." Sighing, he put the knife back in his pocket and pushed himself off the bed, still holding the peas to his head with a hand
Woah. Sudden wave of unsteadiness, and he fell back onto the bed, hissing. God, he hoped he didn't have a concussion. He shouldn't, right? Maybe this is all just like, getting your head bashed against the floor aftermath. Yeah, that would probably mean that he had a concussion but hey, a man can hope, right? He wasn't even a man. He was 16. Nearly 17, but still. Ten days to go, and he'd be damned if he didn't make it to his goddamn 17th.
"So, your suggestion is gonna be like, stop trying to be theatrical and cool, and instead just stab them or smack them with my weapons? I suppose that works but, like, man, I wanna be good TV. Sure, going around like a robot all not caring about the camera and getting kills is good, but hey, I'm sure I've gotta bunch of fans, right?"
"Right?"
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Rattlesnake
- Posts: 190
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"You could say there's been some buzz.
"But like I said, you gotta do your own thing. Like my thing was, I'm the under dog, and I got my, my, my idiosyncrasy right? And wouldn't it be fuckin' awesome if I got three kills and then got three more. From a strategical standpoint that's probably not the #1 best idea. But you know how it ended up. The key is, like, I remember talking with a buddy who's actually good at SotF Champions and he was clowning on some randos with some stupid build and his teammates are flaming him but he's still stomping. 'Hey,' he says, 'you know the rule for messing with people like this is, you gotta do everything else exactly right.' Perfect pathing, vision control, whatever.
"So doin' stuff your own way is fine. I'll tell you for sure it's an investment in your postgame future. But when you try something, you gotta commit all the fuckin' way, alright?"
"But like I said, you gotta do your own thing. Like my thing was, I'm the under dog, and I got my, my, my idiosyncrasy right? And wouldn't it be fuckin' awesome if I got three kills and then got three more. From a strategical standpoint that's probably not the #1 best idea. But you know how it ended up. The key is, like, I remember talking with a buddy who's actually good at SotF Champions and he was clowning on some randos with some stupid build and his teammates are flaming him but he's still stomping. 'Hey,' he says, 'you know the rule for messing with people like this is, you gotta do everything else exactly right.' Perfect pathing, vision control, whatever.
"So doin' stuff your own way is fine. I'll tell you for sure it's an investment in your postgame future. But when you try something, you gotta commit all the fuckin' way, alright?"
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Applesintime
- Posts: 836
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Gregory chuckled. Heh, nice pun. What the pun also did was say hey, he actually had some fans! Probably. Hopefully. So he had to live up to them, right? And he couldn't do that if he was dead. So yeah, maybe being a little theatrical wasn't the worst idea in the world, but when it came down to it, he had to be like, willing to cut the theatrical crap out and just go for the jugular. If he had went for Leah's jugular, she would be dead. If he had went for Cory's jugular, well, honestly he still probably woulda skid on that little piece of glass or whatever the heck it was, but maybe if he had a knife he coulda quickly stabbed him. And then he would have had a kill under his belt day one, and then hey, he coulda maybe stabbed Nate too. Two kills. Day one. He coulda leveraged that into getting more, maybe even got the ten if he was lucky.
But there wasn't any point in thinking about ifs. What he had to do, was think about what was next.
"So... stick with the whole theatrical thing, but try and kinda, like, turn it down a notch for when I get the chance to get a kill? Like, stabbing someone to death is plenty theatrical, I shoulda done that. But yeah, I decided to strangle her and that's what I got. I'll like, try and keep your information in mind."
He chuckled, pointing to his nose. It had definitely stopped bleeding.
But there wasn't any point in thinking about ifs. What he had to do, was think about what was next.
"So... stick with the whole theatrical thing, but try and kinda, like, turn it down a notch for when I get the chance to get a kill? Like, stabbing someone to death is plenty theatrical, I shoulda done that. But yeah, I decided to strangle her and that's what I got. I'll like, try and keep your information in mind."
He chuckled, pointing to his nose. It had definitely stopped bleeding.
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Rattlesnake
- Posts: 190
- Joined: Wed Aug 08, 2018 10:23 pm
"Yeah, you got it. You gotta, gotta, gotta keep your own flavor. But being practical is showy in its own way, you know? Like, the frozen peas. Not super sexy, but shows you've got a cool head. I think a lot of kids woulda missed that opportunity.
"We're out of time for now, but you're still in a good spot if you look for those advantages and keep everyone else's potential plans in mind. Whatever happens, a lot of kids have come back from being in a lot worse shape than you. Go out and kill 'em.
"We're out of time for now, but you're still in a good spot if you look for those advantages and keep everyone else's potential plans in mind. Whatever happens, a lot of kids have come back from being in a lot worse shape than you. Go out and kill 'em.
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Applesintime
- Posts: 836
- Joined: Sat Jul 04, 2020 11:57 am
- Team Affiliation: Ben's Crabs
"Well yeah, my head is cool because these peas are pretty cold. Heh heh. But yeah, I'll like, try and do that, yeah. Lil' less showmanship, a little more practicality. And I'll go out and kill a buncha them, don'tcha worry Ben!" Gregory gave a mock salute with his free hand. Ben's argument made a certain kinda sense. Being practical was well, practical, but hey, look at Jewel and Karen and Mason and Corin. All they did was just hey, be practical. Karen shot everyone she saw, including her own teammates. Well, that wasn't really practical, but it worked. And then, well, shooting people was- it could be kinda showy, right? He didn't know where he was going with this train of thought. Maybe it didn't matter. Maybe what he was trying to get at was that being 100% showy wasn't the best tactic for survival. AnArchy was showy. Admittedly, she was also probably having some kind of mental breakdown. She died. DeVasher died, the showy people died and at the end of the day, the people who were more practical survived.
He still didn't know where he was going exactly, but now he had a better idea of what he could do. What he would do. There was obviously still a place for being showy, but when it came down to life or death, he had to be practical. Lifting his bag of peas from his bump, he tossed it onto the bed.
First, he grabbed his bee shirt from the corner he had thrown it in. Damnit, he liked that bee shirt, and he was gonna try and get the blood out of it. So he brought it into the bathroom, turned the cold water taps of the bath onto full blast, and tossed the shirt into the bath, arranging it so that the water would be landing on the big bloodstain. Running to the kitchen, he retrieved a slightly worn sponge and started scrubbing at the shirt best as he could, with the help of some shampoo. It wasn't exactly a laundromat - wait, there should be a laundromat somewhere on this ship, right? They had to launder all the crewmate's clothing somehow. Maybe he should try and find that later.
The water in the bath grew gradually more and more pink, and the shirt was gradually going back to the original yellow. It was a kinda yellowy-pink colour, but hey, it was kinda cleaner! He kept scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing until the water wasn't really turning any pinker and most of the fresher blood was gone. Then, turning the cold water off, Gregory wrung out the shirt as best as he could. It was still damp so he couldn't wear it right now, but that was alright, because he could wear it soon. It wasn't dripping wet so he rolled it up into a ball and shoved it into his backpack, making sure the bolas handle was still kinda poking out.
Then, he pulled off his bandana-
BEEP BEEP BEEP
"Alright, jeez! Gimme a minute!" Gregory yelled, putting the bag of peas against his head and using the bandana to kinda secure it in place against his bump. That annoying beeping stopped, and Gregory breathed a sigh of relief.
"Well, that kinda went badly! But hey, keep watching me, and I'll get you some blood soon enough!" Gregory addressed the camera, giving it finger guns, before moving out.
((Gregory Miller continued in TOTES COOL AND ALL THOSE JAMS! WITH BEAU AND HANNAH!))
He still didn't know where he was going exactly, but now he had a better idea of what he could do. What he would do. There was obviously still a place for being showy, but when it came down to life or death, he had to be practical. Lifting his bag of peas from his bump, he tossed it onto the bed.
First, he grabbed his bee shirt from the corner he had thrown it in. Damnit, he liked that bee shirt, and he was gonna try and get the blood out of it. So he brought it into the bathroom, turned the cold water taps of the bath onto full blast, and tossed the shirt into the bath, arranging it so that the water would be landing on the big bloodstain. Running to the kitchen, he retrieved a slightly worn sponge and started scrubbing at the shirt best as he could, with the help of some shampoo. It wasn't exactly a laundromat - wait, there should be a laundromat somewhere on this ship, right? They had to launder all the crewmate's clothing somehow. Maybe he should try and find that later.
The water in the bath grew gradually more and more pink, and the shirt was gradually going back to the original yellow. It was a kinda yellowy-pink colour, but hey, it was kinda cleaner! He kept scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing until the water wasn't really turning any pinker and most of the fresher blood was gone. Then, turning the cold water off, Gregory wrung out the shirt as best as he could. It was still damp so he couldn't wear it right now, but that was alright, because he could wear it soon. It wasn't dripping wet so he rolled it up into a ball and shoved it into his backpack, making sure the bolas handle was still kinda poking out.
Then, he pulled off his bandana-
BEEP BEEP BEEP
"Alright, jeez! Gimme a minute!" Gregory yelled, putting the bag of peas against his head and using the bandana to kinda secure it in place against his bump. That annoying beeping stopped, and Gregory breathed a sigh of relief.
"Well, that kinda went badly! But hey, keep watching me, and I'll get you some blood soon enough!" Gregory addressed the camera, giving it finger guns, before moving out.
((Gregory Miller continued in TOTES COOL AND ALL THOSE JAMS! WITH BEAU AND HANNAH!))