Author Games Compilation [Cycle 1]

Final Note on Reed Quillearoy

AN ENDING BEFOREHAND
-THE MIDDLE OF A TALE-

Who am I?

Pain, stretching clear from his ear over to the very corner of his lip.

What have I done?

The nocking back of arrows, launch - blood, everywhere, sprinkling, spattering, staining. When the screams are here, skin is pierced.

Do I regret it?

Five needles the size of his fingers penetrate the tender flesh of a girl's throat, a girl he once called his sister. Her mouth gapes, black blood gurgling from the back of her throat; sometimes drops would flick out and dot the stage floor. There'd been shrieks of vermillion terrors from the audience.

I don't. Does that make me a bad person?

Flashes of electric lights. Blues, greens, all vibrant, all lethal, for the eels shone brightest when satiated by the blood of another. Complete animalization.

Steve said I was good at heart, but my morals were twisted.

Kings and peasants, peasants and kings, a long-running joke the two shared even before they considered it a joke. Water rushes in and wipes away the distrust, leaving only two scared boys awash on the shore. Sand sticks to their cheeks, and they laugh at each other for it.

He protected me, didn't he? Why did I act so spoiled? Why couldn't I say thank you?

Hunger separates the two, like it separates anyone with empty stomachs. What makes them different is that they know they'll come back together again. The young, the old, doesn't matter. They care.

I brought it on myself.

He taunts, he laughs, he looks for a fight. He wants to be remembered not as a boy that cracked under pressure, but as a boy that used the pressure to crack his way home. But he just couldn't. He fails to learn he's invincible. A kind worth killing comes after him, and it's the peasant that rescues the king.

I hate what I did.

The needles, the arrows, they all have the same effect - they pain, they numb, and they still. He lost himself then. No one could bring him back to reality.

Did he care? Like, honestly, truly care? Spider-monkey, you there?

A shoulder to cry on. Steve said it was okay to cry. So he did it. The boy nestled his face on that shoulder and cried for the years he lost and wouldn't get back. He never wanted to cry again. It made him feel pathetic, and weak, and used.

I miss him. Should I?

Dreams, led on by sweet nectar, infested the night, but they couldn't be considered dreams, as the thought of ruling over others pained him so much he thought the crown upon his head was trying to cut into his skull to take over. He didn't want that. He never really wanted that at all.

I don't miss him. Not at all. I can't.

The smoke billowed around, smudging faces, making the screams of agony almost ominous, for he couldn't put face to voice. He didn't care. He only cared for the bleeding man before him.

He didn't know what to do, so he held his hand.

He almost felt like a father that cared.

Cannons meant more than battle. Cannons meant the end of things. Whatever dream he'd been living, whatever life he hoped to accomplish in the arena, it ended, and when he awoke, he came face to face with the tyrant.

I miss him. I miss Spider-Monkey.

Pain, stretching clear from his ear over to the very corner of his lip. It hurt. It hurt so bad. But he didn't scream, didn't plead. It was merely the end of another fairytale he'd conjured up - his own. The poison dart frog ran off looking for trouble, and he got it. He became a king, he became a peasant, he fought side by side, equal, with a man he thought below him.

He said even soldiers cry sometimes.

It wasn't the adventure of his dreams, no. But it was something. He wouldn't die all old and shriveled up like an ugly prune. He wouldn't die with rotting bones and flaking skin. He wouldn't die immobile or paralyzed.

He'd die satisfied with the words "The End" stamped in the middle of his story.

Then he-

The End

~ ~ ~

REED QUILLEAROY OVERALL

6th Place - Semifinalist

That's right, he died the same round as Corradhin. And even though I gave close to no cares for Reed, I still felt on the verge of tears completely bullshitting my way through this final note. Speaking of this final note, it's way past overdue. Still proud of getting him to the semis, though.

I didn't go by the death, just because 1) I didn't think Amani wouldn't end up doing that and 2) it's so much easier to say James killed him.

I don't feel like going back to check and copy down the death. My coffee high is over, I'm writing this at two in the morning, and I feel guilty for not caring about Reed.

I did love his name though.

All the dead tributes have the best names.

Moving on.

TASK IMPRESSIONS

TASK 1 - The only entry I felt I wrote of him that was good because it surprised even me.

TASK 2 - I was going to betray Jack from the start. It's okay, he was going to do it to me too. It happened for the best.

TASK 3 - Did better than Corr. 'Nuff said.

TASK 4 - I really loved working with Tess for this task! I loved Steve, and the two worked together so perfectly. It was here that the whole "hey Steve is basically like a father to me and he's really good at it" thing began.

TASK 5 - Every. Single. Backstory. Regret. Ever. It was executed horribly. What I learned: try to be subtle.

TASK 6 - I meant to do so much more with this task. There was supposed to be an epic sword battle 'n stuff, and then feels galore over the death of Steve - but I just was not feeling it. At all.

TASK 7 - This was like half a day late. Loved James, loved the creepiness, hated how I wrote it.

~~~

This is about it. I don't have much else to say. Again, it's two in the morning, I felt guilty out of the blue for this, so yeah.

Let the last name Quillearoy be the coolest last name ever, and I'll be satisfied.

That's...it?

Reed Quillearoy - Tribute #6