When Luck Runs Out

Can't Say She Didn't Deserve It

I heard someone go into the other tent, but John didn't come in ours. I was asleep for a little while, trying my best to block out the muffled voices from outside the tent, trying to jam my eyes shut the best I could and cover my ears. I was really worried about what tomorrow held, Jeanette was right, they could be waiting, and at any moment they could spring out of the shadows and decapitate us. We were helpless, were we not? I mean, we had our defensive, our weapons, we weren't malnourished and we weren't dehydrated, but I'm sure Moran could chop my spine in half with his eyes shut. I was honestly the weakest link in our group, and the chain is only as strong as its weakest link and in the face of danger, I was going to snap. I wanted us to survive, of course I did. Neither Moran nor Moriarty deserved that crown of victory, and I knew that John was the one that should wear it in triumph. I didn't want it for myself; I didn't want to leave this arena because that meant I had to watch John get buried. Even Greg and Jeanette, who I thought I would never actually like. Before the games I was convinced I would be able to chop them down in triumph, and now I realize they had become friends, even after such a scare. I knew that when the end was near we'd have to betray each other, one way or another, but I also knew that it would hurt all of us when one got harmed by the other's blade. I sighed, these deep questions swirling in my head, the lantern light shining through the tent, and the voices all kept me up, and I decided that if I was going to lie awake I might as well join in on the conversation. I unzipped the tent a little bit, poking my head out to try to see if this conversation was worth my time and energy. After all, I was all snuggled up and warm in my blankets. Jeanette and John were the only ones up, John was out of his chair, getting a drink of water, and Jeanette was still sitting, saying something I couldn't understand. I sighed; it didn't look all that entertaining to be honest. I knew Greg was in his tent, probably asleep by now, and it might be better for me just to wait until John came back. John put down the water and said something, looking a little bit uncomfortable, and I saw Jeanette get out of her chair. At first I thought she was going to get the water, which sat right next to John, but instead she walked towards him, saying something I couldn't hear and standing so close. My jealous boyfriend instincts tingled with rage, but I waited it out, this could be some stupid thing right? I shouldn't go exploding on her again, twice in two days, if she was doing no more than telling him he had a little bit of blood on his jacket or something. John tried to take a step back, I could see the uncomfortableness in his face, but before I could do anything to break it up, Jeanette did something worthy of death. She kissed him. I screamed with rage, tearing open the zipper of the tent, not caring about the evident sound of ripping fabric as I ran like a murderous psychopath, ripping her away from John and throwing her into the air conditioning unit with a clang.
"Sherlock!" John called in horror, but I didn't have time for that, I was too busy dealing with this traitorous scum.
"WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING AT?!?" I screamed, smacking her in the head so hard she was thrown to the side. Jeanette screamed, not looking like the fierce female warrior I had made her out to be, instead she looked weak.
"Sherlock calm down, it's alright!" John screamed.
"It's not alright!" I insisted. Jeanette got to her feet again, bouncing on her toes and charging once more at me. But with all of this adrenalin, all of this pure rage that I had been saving up since we had got here, I met her half way, grabbing her wrists and pushing her to the ground. We tumbled together, she was still clawing at my face, but I had her in a choke hold, pressing down on her wind pipe. I could see her eyes bulging, her hands flailing, pulling my hair, clawing at my ears, any part of my face that she could reach in an attempt to get me to release her. But I was through, I was protecting my territory, defending my love, and as I saw her in pain, the one that was trying to take John away from me, something more than anger filled my body. It wasn't horror, it wasn't the cruel terror that flooded my dreams as I imagined killing again, it was joy. It was satisfaction; it was the beautiful sight of watching the people that betrayed me suffer. My fingernails cut into her skin, feeling her try to gasp for a breath, for a gulp of air to keep herself alive. And as her lips struggled to form her last word, I watched the light die from her popping eyes, and her flailing arms fell still to her side.
"Sherlock stop, stop it!" John insisted, running to my side and pulling me from Jeanette's limp body. I couldn't even help smiling a little bit as I fell into his embrace, but it wasn't a hug, it was more like a choke hold, to make sure I wasn't going to kill again, it was the type of embrace that was associated with arrests.
"Sherlock what have you done...." John breathed, holding both of my hands together as handcuffs.
"She kissed you john, she deserved it." I muttered, letting him hold me up, letting him hold me to him.
"What is all this noise?" Greg asked, finally up from his beauty sleep I suppose, his hair in some weird sleep wave.
"Sherlock..." Joh tried to say. "Sherlock he..." his voice wouldn't seem to work, and his horrified sentence ended in no more than a weak croak. Greg's confused, exasperated expression dropped to fear as he looked around.
"Where's Jeanette?" he asked. John and I were silent, and upon looking at Greg's expression, the happiness of making a kill was starting to wear off.
"John, where is she?" he asked, his voice low and demanding. John took a deep breath, and looked to where Jeanette's broken body lay, next to the air conditioner. Greg walked over silently, seeing the body in the shadows and holding a hand to his mouth in horror, dropping next to Jeanette and sitting there for a moment. I didn't think I'd ever see Greg cry, but this just might be my time.
"Who did this." He demanded. It wasn't a question; it was almost a promise for revenge, a low growl that would surely lead to more violence. There was silence, and Greg got up, his usually buoyant, happy face twisted in uncomprehend able rage.
"Who killed her?" he asked. But that was obvious by the situations, and John's mutterings, Greg could figure out who killed her, loud and clear.
"Sherlock Holmes, you killed my partner?" he asked.
"She kissed John." I growled, fighting against John's strength to try to get at him. I would kill him too, I was ready, I was wiling.
"I'll kill you Sherlock, I'll kill you." He insisted.
"No you won't." I growled.
"And why not?" he asked.
"Because I'll kill you first." I insisted with a twisted, dark smile.
"NO!" John screamed, grasping me around my chest and pulling me back. But I was ready, my hands were balled into fists, my teeth were ground, I was ready to get rid of the last District Five scum that was sharing our roof.
"No more fighting!" John yelled, and his voice was wavering, as if he was crying or close to it at least.
"He killed Jeanette, he needs to go!" Greg insisted, but he was still bouncing on his toes, but he didn't charge, he didn't want to betray John.
"I know, but she was no saint either, we can't have any more violence, we can't afford it. We need our numbers against Moran and Moriarty, and that's not possible if we're killing our own." John insisted, still keeping a firm grasp around me, preventing me from getting my well-deserved vengeance. Greg dropped his arms, and I couldn't help but feel disappointed.
"You're right, as usual, but he is not going unpunished." Greg insisted.
"We'll make him, I don't know, get us more water." John shrugged. Greg laughed, as if that were some sort of joke.
"No, no, he needs to suffer like she suffered. No food or water, for a day." he insisted.
"What!?" I exclaimed.
"That's not at all fair." John decided.
"Chained up too, so that he can't throttle me in my sleep." Greg decided.
"I'm still human Gregory, perhaps you've forgotten?" I snapped.
"I never knew." He insisted.
"We'll tie him up with the rope from the store, we'll figure out his punishment in the morning." John decided.
"Tie me up? Come on?" I groaned, but let myself be hauled towards some piping on the roof.
"Hold out your hands." John demanded. I sighed, but held both of my hands out, still having drops of blood and flesh over them from clawing at Jeanette's skin. Greg watched suspiciously, as if he didn't think John would tie me properly, or at least so loose that I could slip out.
"How could you do something so horrible?" Greg asked, looking at Jeanette's body, half concealed in shadows, but it was evident she wasn't right. Her neck was swollen and bent the wrong way; obviously someone had killed her cruelly.
"You don't know the full story." John insisted.
"I had just woken up, and was going to go out there, when I saw Jeanette kiss John. My John." I insisted, wincing a little bit as a bit of rough rope rubbed up against my skin. John tied the rope extremely tight around my hands, binding my wrists together and tying a knot around the pipe, so that I couldn't go anywhere. Maybe, if I had been trying to escape, I could've, but I wasn't going to embarrass John like that, besides, he was the reason I had blood on my hands.
"That's still not a reason to kill her, I'm sure it wasn't anything serious, Jeanette wouldn't do that." Greg insisted, still looking at me with the most hateful of looks.
"Evidently she would." John insisted.
"You're a monster you know that Sherlock. You're a cold blooded murderer; I don't know how you can even look at yourself in the mirror and think that you deserve him." Greg decided, and with that he disappeared back into his tent, without a goodnight to John or an effort to arrange Jeanette's body nicer. John stepped back, admiring his work, and I slid down the pipe, suddenly realizing what I had just done in full force.
"John, what have I done?" I muttered.
"I don't know, honestly Sherlock, I don't know." John insisted. "Why would you kill her, she made one mistake, she didn't deserve to..." he stopped his own sentence, obviously not able to come to grips with what I had actually done.
"She deserved every minute of pain she got. She kissed you John, and she knew full well that we were together, that we were happy." I insisted.
"We're not." John muttered. "Not anymore." My heart dropped and I looked up at him with big, watery eyes.
"What do you mean?" I asked in a small sort of croak.
"I mean that we're not happy right now. I'm not happy; you're a murderer Sherlock, that wasn't self-defense, that was the first kill you've made voluntarily." John muttered.
"John, I wanted to kill her. I might not have wanted to in the beginning, but I saw her pain, and I knew that I had to. I liked it." I whispered, so quietly I barely heard myself.
"It's like I don't know you anymore. You are not the innocent, world hating boy I fell in love with, you're a killer, you're a savage, you don't even look like you anymore." John insisted, covering his mouth so that he couldn't say anything else. If anything broke me, that did, my own John, flat out telling me that he no longer loved me. That he had never loved me after we got Reaped.
"Just hold me John, just hold my hand, and please, tell me that I'm going to wake up soon." I pleaded.
"I don't want to." John said flatly, and with that he walked back over to his tent, leaving me there, tied to the pipe, to let the first of many tears fall down my cheeks.