(Cw: injury description, death, some body horror ig, existentialism, lynx's dumb headcanons)

Gore dripped slowly down the slick, blue blade. A tear slipped down the cold cheek of the devil who lay there all wreathed in red and crowned if his broken horns. The sword had come down too hard upon his shoulder, and he hadn't been able to grab for the blade that he and scott had tossed aside in an act of virtue and honor. Their fists and claws had been all the weapon they'd needed... if the meteor hadn't struck when he had. The thick, acrid scent of burned fish swam through his nose as he cast his crimson eyes to the corpse of the merfolk who lay before him, wreathed in his own loser's crown of blazing laurels. A halo of blistering lava bubbled and popped as it seemed into the ground around the body. Scott hadn't even had a chance to grab their sword. Their legs had given out under them as the heat boiled their very will. Webbed hands were clasped around gills in a final act of desperate gasping, the smoke choking the air from lungs and gills alike.

Martyn felt the thrill filling his veins with a laugh. It was a hot, blazing pleasure that ran through his blood like lightning. It burned like pain, but it never did hurt. Others had said it hurt whenever you stole the time from another, but that wasn't true. It only hurt because they let themselves feel bad about it. He wouldn't do that. It was a death match after all.

Webbed hands twisted by the sea that gripped the blade losened their hold, and he only barely heard the sword fall to the red-stained grass beneath his feet. His boots had long since come off after his last death when he'd found they confined the large, webbed feet too tight. He clenched clawed toes into the wet grass. His arms felt heavy. Too heavy, and Martyn had to fight to stay upright as he laughed. No one was there to hear him laugh, but he threw his gold maned head back, every gasp of laughter making the pufferfish scales expand and flex under his skin, puffing up like the pauldrons of warrior. He laughed louder than he ever had before. Skizz had complimented his laugh on day one, hadn't he? Oh, how Martyn was glad Skizz had reminded him to laugh. Where was he now? With those listeners? Watchers? Taking his place among the contestants for the next match? Would Martyn join them then, too?

He sloughed the jacket from his shoulders, the banner of a long-lost land he could hardly forget flowing behind him like a scarf of blood from his waist. He flexed his claws- new additions after joining Scott- and looked down at those fishscaled hands. Were they stained red because of the blood he spilt? Or was it simply his scales matching his name? Filthy reds.

As he took a step forward, he lurched forward with an unnaturally long stride, feeling his muscles and flesh stretch with his motions like elastic stretched to its limits. His shoulder pulsed with his huffing breath. The fissures glowed purple, but he tried to ignore them. The time ticked down. The sand trickled through the neck.

That's my time.

He watched as every second passed in the pulse of his fissures and the beat of his heart. I need more time. He climbed the hill, every step more awkward than the last. It was like his legs didnt fit his hips anymore. He tasted the air, checked the tab. There had to be more time. Surely. He had drawn his blade with thirty minutes left. But now, Martyn wandered that familiar land for an hour. Maybe it was an hour? It was aimless and tired and hungry. Every second did not pass as a second, but as a beat of a time starved heart. Twenty four hours down to thirty minutes. I want my time back.

He broke into a sprint, tumbling down onto all fours. Drool (or was it blood?) Dripped down his chin as he scaled the towers, raced along the skynet, and over the hills. He scrambled around TNT craters. Had the meteor made those, too? The cake had gone stale. The bread had gone moldy. "Time... I need time. No, no, no, NO!" He snarled, his voice wet with bloodlust. After everything, he still LOST. He wasn't losing, no... no. But he watched as he lost. He stood before the hourglass, and watched red sand trickle down.

"CRUEL, YOU ARE CRUEL!" He snarled to the heavens, time-addled mind only forming words out of rage as he swiped with his claws at the sky. He couldn't hear their laughter. But he knew they laughed. They laughed and watched and listened and he had to wait. Is this how Grian felt while he buried Scar? Is this how Scott had felt before the watchers, in their infinate "mercy" slew him with a snap of their proverbial fingers? And Pearl? Did she relish the lonesome, or did she too curse the cruelty of those damn voyeuristic bastards overhead.

"Ren... Ren," he muttered, barely recalling whose name it is he called for as he held the tattered banner in his claws. "Scott... I..." He wasn't sorry. Betrayal had been in his blood since before day one.

Inthelittlewood Ran Out of Time.