@j-thegiant
The sun was already starting to dip. The desert sand was giving off a heat that tangled with the heat radiating off her own body. She reached her left hand up, touched gingerly at her right bicep, and cringed. She kept walking. She wanted to run. She wanted to tear her bones out from her body and find her old self, where the cruelest thing ever done to her was treated promptly. She wanted to hear two more cannons before she reached the edge of the arena again.
The canteen over her shoulder bounced against her hip, sloshing and splashing around. Her footsteps seemed to fall in rhythm with it. Squish, swish, squish, swish. Until she saw the fence on the horizon again. Until she saw another figure, that blended in the haze, just like Carol had. Her heart leapt into her throat when she got close enough to see more. The hair, the height - he looked like her brother. Her baby brother, who wasn’t really a baby anymore. Who was far smarter than his big sister. Who was watching his big sister drag her feet through a desert, after leaving someone to die once again.
If she ran, the only place she would run back to was the city. If she ran now, she would just keep running until she died or she won. She didn’t know which one she was more ready for. So she kept walking, and waited to be seen.
