insidemyblood

STARTER CALL

YOU all should follow @gravityslingshot for the same content, impeccable characterization and the complex roster.

I have no armor left. You’ve stripped it from me. Whatever is left of me… Whatever I am… I’m yours.

There’s not a hug back. Not one of those familiar hands come to grace her as they had openly before. He has shut himself from her completely. She feels it, his hands too coldly and deliberately closing onto the charging pulse of her wrists, too careful not to attach. Vesper sees it as clear as day, in the iron gaze that he has never shown her before. This wasn’t just aloof. It was him slipped away like the methodical man who was good at his job. Her eyes begin to waver; she has to come to terms with it being for forever.  

Rejection stings like a bullet through her heart. Maybe he had been right; she was the only one in the world without a tell. A good spy despite her own naivety when she was simply tumbled from her frozen life and caught in the desperate moments of aloneness, betrayal, and bargaining. Brief, but deadly.

Was she selfish? Was it selfish she had chosen to take her own life in front of him than face those who were chasing her? The CIA. The MI6. And before they were near, by no shortage of faceless men sent to tie off a loose end.

No, no, Vesper... It was about how much she had hurt him.

The weight of all her lofty decisions, her crimes against her country, against everything humanly good… against him -- still haunted her in a renewed chance at life. She feels too much, and doesn’t stop herself from it.

She has lived in the trenches of guilt. Knowing that she could never find acceptance for the things she had aided. Being in the dark and looking now at the horrid scribblings on the inside of a broken man.

‘  No one.   ‘   She is sorry. But oh, he doesn’t want to hear it.    ‘  I came because I missed you.   ‘

Where they'd once shared smiles, and he'd once knew her and she him, this was different. She is so very small before him, and fearful, not of the consequences but of him. He’ll pick her apart. He’ll show her that the trust she had broken would never be offered again. He’ll tell her that he doesn’t care.

And it hits worse than anything she has ever felt before.

‘   My regret is not doing it sooner.   ‘

"No one."

The first lie.

"I came because I missed you."

The second lie. But the words don’t come without a price. A tightness forms in his chest, and a tremor shakes his hand. It’s gone almost as soon as it arrives. He had missed her too. But it doesn’t matter, his blue eyes remain cold and unwavering. He won’t let her in. Not now. Not ever again.

The lies she’s told him, the ones he’d let slide. It all feels like a distant memory, but the ache still lingers, it always has. The pain, the betrayal, the hollow space she left behind. And now, this. This woman standing before him with apologies, with regrets. He takes a step back, distancing himself, as if any physical space could somehow protect him from the wreckage she’s left in his heart. From the scars she has carved into him.

Bond forces a breath, slow, steady. But the questions won’t stop. Why now? Why come back after all this time? Had she cared, when she walked away? Or is this just another cruel twist in someone else's game? A final attempt to manipulate him, to turn him into the fool once more? Did she really think he would fall for it?

“My regret is not doing it sooner.”

It’s a lie. It’s a truth. Both. Neither.

Her words cut through him, of course they do, but they don’t land the way they should. It’s just another stone added to the pile of doubts he’s carried with him for years. She regrets it? Good. So does he. She’s not the only one who’s had to live with her choices. He’s had to live with his and with hers.

The memories come uninvited, but undeniable. The tapes with her name on them—tapes James never wanted to watch. Yusef, with that damn necklace he’d given to countless women, the same way he did with Vesper. He made her think he’d been kidnapped so she could be turned into another piece on the board. Manipulated by men who used her like they used him. But it doesn't change what she did. It doesn't change what she chose.

He doesn't trust her. Not for a second.

With a cold, unforgiving glance, he turns his eyes away from her, his voice cuts through the air, quiet but final. "You should have stayed dead." The words hang between them like a death sentence, a whisper of something that should’ve been left buried.

@insidemyblood | starter for Haymitch

The nights were always the longest. Tossing and turning in his now overly large bed in his overly large house that was so quiet a pin could be heard if it dropped. The nightmares behind his eyes never failed to stop. Katniss falling from the trees onto a blade. The mutts fangs and teeth ripping into her flesh. A bomb going off shredding her into pieces.

Peeta woke up in a cold sweat, coughing and sputtering as the nightmare tried to make its way to his lungs and release in a scream. He shook his head and walked to the bathroom, trying to clear the sleep out of his eyes. His hands ran under the sink but the water was thick and warm. He looked curiously down to see it wasn't water but rather crimson - blood. Panic started sinking in. He wanted to wash his hands clean but all he did was smear it around more until the sink overflowed with the stuff.

He startled in his bed, this time aware of the wind howling outside in the cold of the night. His hands gripped the sheets in tight fists. He took a breath, but still his heart beat hard in his chest. He wouldn't be calm until he knew for certain the home next door was still full of life.

Peeta swung his leg over the side of the bed, putting his hand on the nightstand for leverage. A debate of if he was going to head back to sleep waged in his mind shortly. He knew there was no reason to try. Instead he settled, pulling the piece of fabric on the stub of his leg for padding before mindfully setting the prosthetic in place. It itched but he ignored it, knowing if he focused too much the phantom pains would start.

He stood up shifting his weight from side to side, making sure the leg was placed comfortably and correctly. It was taking him some time to get use to but he was managing well so far. He looked out of the window seeing the small warmth of light coming from Katniss's home and his heartbeat began to steady and slow. She was okay.

Peeta sighed knowing that sleep was not in the cards but he was too tired to try and paint the nightmares that plagued him this night. He glanced the other way down the street seeing Haymitch's house cold and dark as usual. How does that man survive?

Peeta shrugged. Alcohol wasn't his favorite but maybe a drink with a mentor would help steady the nerves this night brought.

He marched out in the chill of the night and banged on Haymitch's door. There was no telling if he was awake or not.

The first knock didn’t wake him, nor did the second. The third one did, sort of. Haymitch cracked an eye open, face still pressed against the sticky wood of his kitchen table. The thudding at his door barely registered, but it was annoyingly persistent and hard to ignore now.

"Go to hell," he muttered to himself, voice hoarse. It had been a good night—or a bad one, depending on how you looked at it. The kind where he drank just enough to forget why he hated being asleep but not enough to black out completely.

The knocking came again. Louder. "Alright, alright", Haymitch groaned loudly, pushing himself upright, the knife on his hand clattering onto the floor as he stumbled backwards. "Dammit." He rubbed a hand over his face and used his free hand to steady himself holding to the chair, squinting at the sliver of moonlight creeping through the curtains. Wasn't it too late for visits? Or too early. Either way, he didn’t want the company. No one ever visited him, he had made sure of that. Which meant it could only be one person.

Haymitch dragged himself to the door, passing by piles of trash and empty bottles, and yanked it open without ceremony. And there was Peeta. The kid looked like hell, though Haymitch figured he probably didn’t look much better. Peeta’s face was pale, his eyes shadowed, and he shifted his weight slightly—adjusting the prosthetic, no doubt. The boy had been through enough, more than enough, and yet here he was, knocking on his door of all places.

"The hell you doin’ out here?" he asked, voice thick with drink. He leaned against the doorframe, eyes narrowing. "You got lost or somethin’?" He sniffed, brow twitching. "Or you've finally come to your senses and decided you wanna be miserable like the rest of us?"

Whatever it was, the older man didn't wait for it, he just sighed, and stepped back just enough to let Peeta in. "Well? You gonna stand there freezin’ all night, or you comin’ in?"