Martyn stays as he is, knelt at Ren's feet, forehead so low as to almost be touching the ground and leaning on the sword that he balances precariously on its edge in front of him. 

"Hand."

Ren's voice is so close, so tantalisingly near, and every inch of him craves to stand, to bask in Ren's stare and take his rightful place by his side. 

Martyn does not dare to lift his head. 

"Martyn," his king's voice cuts through the overwhelmingly tense stillness. "Look up."

Ah, a command. That he can obey, and Martyn does, slowly raising his head as his eyes stay firmly planted to the ground. 

"Oh, Hand," and a finger lovingly strokes his cheek, "what has happened to you?"

While I've been gone, goes unsaid. Finally, Martyn raises his eyes as well, meets his king's gaze, his king, his king—

And he breaks. 

Feels his face contort and shoulders start to shake as big, ugly sobs rip through his chest, soundless at first and then unbecomingly loud as he tries and fails to catch his breath. His king's image swims before him; he tries to blink past it, fails and remains gasping, shuddering, curling in on himself with the force of his love, his joy, his boundless, agonising sorrow. 

It's a shameful, pathetic display. By all rights, he should be instantly cast away; if Ren kicked at him like an unwanted puppy and bid he get out of his sight, Martyn would fall over himself and break his legs in his haste to rid the king of his despicable presence.

But Ren reaches out, instead, takes his face in his hands, wiping at the tears that stain his thumbs. He graces his skin with all the gentleness of someone who is clueless as to the things Martyn's done in his absence, what he's become—

It's presumptuous and improper, and he does not deserve to kiss the ground at his king's feet, he knows—but he stumbles and grips Ren's wrist with both his hands, holding on, begging with the drowning he does in Ren's eyes to never let go, please don't let me go. 

Ren kneels, as well, then. The hand that makes contact with his neck guides his head to rest on his shoulder; the other rubs his back. It's tender and more than anything he's ever known, more than his entire world, and Martyn is undone.

Oh, my liege, if you'd seen the things I've seen. 

Ren holds him, and in the weight of his king's hand tangled in his hair Martyn can hear only Ren's whispered words of comfort and his own choked-off sobbing. There are no voices and there is no never-ending laughter; there is only them, as they should be, as they are.

"Hey, want me to kill Scar?"

Yes.

Grian stills and, despite himself, feels the beginnings of a pang in his chest. Unbidden, his mind goes to the lone base in the middle of the server, the torn apart house, and he thinks of everything Scar has been through. 

Everything he's done to him in this game and the ones before. 

He imagines zombies and swords and stacks of TNT, imagines blood-spattered sunflowers, almost similar to poppies in their red. He thinks of the piercing heat of a desert sun. He thinks of something long gone, and the light behind Scar's eyes that never truly left. 

For just a moment, he indulges himself in the idea of refusing, saying, no, don't touch him, leave him alone—and then remembers that if Scar doesn't deserve to die, then he, Grian, doesn't deserve this. 

And if Jimmy's words are a pang, then this realisation is like a sucker punch to the gut. 

He lost that right. 

He lost the right to shield Scar when all his hands did was deal the killing blow, every single time. 

Grian says yes to Bdubs' waiting eager eyes. Later, when everyone around him gasps and starts to whisper amongst each other, he does not take out his comm and instead casts another glance towards the deepslate wall across the field. 

If he squints, he can almost make out the man at the entrance, gesturing animatedly at the air around him, and he smiles.

heading somewhere far away

"I'm going to kill you," Scar utters and he looks up into Grian's eyes, searching for some kind of reaction, some sign that Grian is as afraid of him and this thing between them as he is, that he understands—

Grian waits to be let go and continues rubbing soap suds into his hair. 

"I'd like to see you try."

update: now with art

Etho sticks around for a long time, after.

Wanders around the server, avoids every site of active battle, and eventually comes to a free spot near Joel's fairground, where the grass is marked with patches of gunpowder, but the leaves ripple and his vision remains clear of dirty dark grey smoke.

He stays there a while—until his comm pings with the news that it's over and something hooked deep in his shoulders begins to let up on its unyielding pull.

He stays after that, too. Until an all-too-familiar voice comes up on his half-baked musings, complete with the usual tint of derision—with less heart behind it now, though.

"What are you doing here, Etho?"

Etho turns around, makes a point to smile despite his mask.

"Hi, Joel."

Joel sighs, walks up to stand beside him.

"You like the fairground?"

"Liked it better when it was still whole."

Joel sighs again. Taking advantage of his gaze being lost somewhere between the ferris wheel's cabins or the railings of the slide, Etho looks him over—notes both the bags under his eyes and the green streak in his hair, bright in a way he's never seen it be this far in.

"You okay?"

Joel blinks, as though surprised by the question being asked—or the person asking the question.

"Yeah, I think I am," he says after a moment of consideration, and then scowls, "Bloomin' Scott killed me again, though."

Etho has nothing to say to that. Another minute of silence passes, as the temperature around them starts to mellow out.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spots Joel glancing his way, looking almost unsure. "Are you...?" he asks and, as expected, doesn't finish the phrase.

Etho looks over at him again. Staring directly into his eyes, he nods.

"Okay," Joel says. "Okay."

Almost as though by force, his brows pitch downwards.

"Good for you," he spits then, with more venom in his voice than anyone would imagine for such a simple remark.

Suddenly, Etho understands what he's getting at—what he's been getting at the entire season.

"You still care."

"Wh—no, I don't," Joel immediately bites back—a wolf, ready to bare his hackles, even now.

"You do," Etho repeats, but it's not the accusation it could have been.

"I have the Mounders now," Joel says in response, and it's not the uncompromising rejection it once was.

Etho nods. "Yeah." He knows that's not the end of it, knows that Joel has something more to say, will always have more to say—in contrast to where his own words feel like they could never be enough.

For a moment, silence reigns and neither of them speaks. Etho shifts his weight from foot to foot, digs his hands into his pockets and flexes his thumbs. Somewhere in the unnatural stillness, the first bird chirps in the remnants of warm-blooded destruction.

"The ship burns, everything burns," Joel recites softly.

Etho nods again.

Joel looks up at him, something vulnerable in his expression never seen before.

"I'm not—I can't—" he begins, and then breaks off, pressing his palms into his forehead with a frustrated sound. He squeezes his eyes shut, and Etho waits for him—but strangely, he finds himself fine with that being the state of things for the rest of both their foreseeable futures.

"I don't—I won't burn again," Joel eventually forces out. "I'm not going to—do that. You know. It's—I'm tired of everything burning, okay? I'm just—I'm tired," he repeats, and looks over at the remains of the helter-skelter behind him. "I want to keep this. I want something I can call my own."

"You don't want to run around the server lighting things on fire with me?" Etho asks in a somewhat-joking tone, but he gets it. He does.

And he thinks Joel gets that, too.

Still, when his old soulmate grabs his hands into his own, hot and dry skin just like he remembers, when he looks up at him, a question in his eyes, a desperate plea for something that stays, something real—

Etho thinks of Cleo and Grian.

"Yeah, I don't want to burn, either, I think."

Joel relaxes, steps away, but does not release his hands. Etho takes that as his invitation to come closer, drop his head down until it leans against Joel's, and their shared warmth envelops them, not like flames licking at their ankles, but like a comforting embrace, like home.

He thinks of the Relation—charred sails and splintered wood scattered around the air like the tiny scars on his fingers.

headfirst for halos

When he looks at Jimmy, dancing flares in his eyes, and wants so desperately to grab his hand that he digs his nails into his own palm instead. He knows, in all the jokes they make, that everything is numbered, each laugh counted and added up in the cracks of bones that never reach their chests. 

He knows at night, too, when he forgoes sleep next to Jimmy on their single bed and listens to the sounds of the doomed world outside. Even in the silence, he can hear it when he cannot hear anything at all. 

Time, time is precious, too much and not enough, this will end.

It does, of course it does, and nothing surprises him less. After all the deaths that his preceded by a hair's breadth, he thought, hoped that maybe—but no, these worlds always take their own, Jimmy is proof of that, Lizzie in a twisted way now, too, he supposes. They all are, really, and nothing has ever made sense more and less all at once. 

He still has to catch his breath in BigB's Backrooms, and then again when he's on the surface and the wither has just been killed and everyone is laughing, they're laughing, and before he knows it it's been a week, two, and he's still catching his breath, looking over at the lonely dog on a lonely mountain and wishing for something—anything. 

He needs, he needs—and so he goes around the server, doing things purposefully with no real aim, as though if he makes his presence large enough, it will cover up the two gaping holes at his sides. He takes and he takes and he takes and does not stop until—

He does not stop. 

He slows down eventually, when the sky is dark and he's barked his lungs out, it seems like, and the very air itself can tell that they're not long, now, none of them are. Baxter is empty, as his hands, his head, his heart, but for a faint barking outside that disappears as soon as he strains his ears to hear it. 

He sits down. Looks at the chests and lets out a long sigh that tapers off into something aching, broken. 

warning: because i'm me, it ends the way it does in limited life. as a result, much pain and suffering and jimmy is dead in this one

Joel gets in trouble with the law again, and again, and again. Minor offences at first, drinking in public and one instance of attempting to shoplift a cheap pack of gum that makes Grian about implode upon himself with incredulity—Joel has money, what in the world!—before he recognises it as Jimmy's favourite flavour.

They deal with that, too. He dutifully bails his friend out every time and does his best not to ask too many questions. The situation is far from ideal, but on some level he understands—everyone deals with grief in their own way. With luck, this should pass.

Then, Joel pulls a knife on Scott and has to pay a ridiculous amount of money to keep him from pressing charges.

That's when Grian loses it.

"What the fuck, Joel," he rants in the car on their way back from the police station. "What the actual fuck were you thinking."

From his far-too-relaxed position in the passenger seat, Joel snorts.

"He deserved it."

Grian sputters.

"He deserv—what, no, Joel, this is serious. You can't just go around pulling knives on people, that's not—what the hell is wrong with you?!" he bursts out, and surprises himself with the vehemence behind his exclamation.

And then Joel does something incredibly, infuriatingly Joel.

He rolls his eyes and asks, "Why do you care?"

In that moment, Grian wants nothing more than to punch him.

Steeling himself, he schools his expression into one of indifference. Two can play this game.

"I don't."

"Sure you don't."

"No, I'm being serious, Joel. By all means, continue self-destructing—but I'm not sticking around to watch. So far you've crossed every line humanly possible, and I just—"

His resolve breaks. For a moment, he takes his eyes off the road to stare earnestly at Joel, who looks away the moment he meets his gaze.

"The way you're heading, I'm about to become a singular Bad Boy," Grian confesses to the back of Joel's head. "And I don't want to see that happen. I've lost Jimmy, I don't want to lose you, too."

A pause.

Eventually, Joel forces out through gritted teeth, "Stop the car."

"What?"

"Stop the car. Stop the fucking car right now."

Grian slams on the brakes, and the car's barely had time to skid to a halt before Joel is wrenching the door open and setting off, walking briskly along the edge of the road.

Scrambling to get out of his own seat, Grian follows.

"Wait, no," he calls out. "Joel, what are you doing?"

"Leaving," Joel spits, barely turning around, his words carrying across the wind. "You're sick of having to deal with me? Congratulations, today's your lucky day. You'll never have to see my face ever again."

"No, Joel, that's not what I meant—"

"Oh yeah?" Joel swivels around. "Well, then I pray you, tell me what you really meant. Go on, Grian. Tell me why I shouldn't have killed Scott right there on the spot."

Advancing, he pushes at Grian's chest.

"Tell me, Grian," he repeats, and his voice gains a note of something resembling hysteria. "Tell me what's oh-so-wrong with me. Tell me why I'm the one who's wrong and everything isn't fucked, tell me, Grian—"

Grian gently catches Joel's wrists before his knuckles can come into contact with his face. Carefully, he says, "Scott didn't kill Jimmy. Jimmy's death was—"

"An accident, I know," Joel snaps. "It's always the accidents with him, isn't it? Missing steps, tripping over his own feet, falling off fucking bridges—"

Unable to do much more, Grian nods. Because Joel is right. It is always the accidents—it was, and they always joked about Jimmy being cursed, but now that he's gone, Grian can't help but wonder if the curse was really on them all along.

Feeling the tension slowly seep away from Joel's wrists, Grian loosens his grip and brings their hands down, interlocking their fingers. Joel lets him, and a temporary calm settles over the shore, but Grian knows him too well to believe that this means that the storm is over.

Sure enough, a moment later, Joel laughs, quietly and without any humour.

"You're full of shit, Grian."

Grian blinks, taken aback, and says nothing.

Joel continues, "You're actually, genuinely full of shit. Jimmy's gone, and you're expecting me to, what, not be at all messed up?"

Grian still doesn't answer. He doesn't know what to say, what he could possibly say to prove to his friend that he does care, he does, cares so much that it feels like he's going to rip apart from the inside if he lets himself dwell on it for any longer than he already is—every minute of every waking day.

Joel gives him a long, searching look, and whatever he finds makes his tone turn downright venomous when he carries on, "Oh, but it's easy for you, isn't it? You haven't cried or—or anything, you don't fucking—you don't give a shit, do you?"

He rips his hands away, stumbles backwards.

"Ever the reasonable one, always telling me to calm down, right? WELL I CAN'T CALM DOWN, MY FRIEND IS FUCKING DEAD!"

Grian levels a look at Joel, meets his enraged, devastated expression head-on.

"Joel, I'm just saying, this isn't the way to grieve. This is—you're destroying yourself, Timmy wouldn't have wanted you to—"

"Shut the fuck up!"

Silence.

The rapidly descending dark obscures Joel's face, but his sobs ring out loudly in the night.

"Oh, Joel."

With only a moment's hesitation, Grian steps forward and brings his arms around his friend, who instantly goes pliant in his hold. "I hate you, Grian," he cries into his neck, and his shoulders jump. "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you—"

Grian sighs, "I know."

I hate myself, too, he doesn't say. Joel weeps with sobs that sound more like wails, and Grian does his best to swallow down the ugly and inhuman thing that rears its head at the base of his throat. He knows that, come tomorrow, none of this will matter, and the only thing that will still hold meaning will be the large gaping hole at their side.

in which john loses the laurens-lee duel

the last thing i see

This wasn't supposed to happen. John was supposed to shoot first. John was supposed to win.

Alexander leans forward, balancing his entire weight on the hands pressing down on John's abdomen. Blood seeps in between his fingers, sticky, warm and moist; he shifts, pressing harder, trying his best to ignore John's whimpers, trying to ignore the fact that he can't remember the last time John let on that he was in pain.