Chapter Text
Loud.
It’s so damn loud.
That was all he knew.
That was all Ren knew as the distant ringing of explosions, the clashes between iron and diamond, the thud of arrows onto wooden shields echoed all around him, accompanied by the roaring of his blood in his ears. Martyn was slinging curses at the Desert Duo, trying not to trip over Tango’s charred, dead body, nocking another arrow onto his bow. Etho had gone down earlier just before Tango did, their corpse now laying on the ground of the clearing. He, Martyn and BigB were the only ones left of the kingdom of Dogwarts, the last ones still holding strong against the Crastle and Desert Duo alliance.
He grunted as he ducked behind one of his buildings, managing to dodge an arrow that whistled past his ear. Grian’s manic, wild cackle rang out across the battlefield, above the loud sounds of fighting as another arrow buried itself into Martyn’s back.
“M’lord!” his cry beckoned to him to turn and look, to make sure if Martyn was alright, but if he leaves his hiding spot…
Martyn screeched again, followed by the sound of a myriad of arrows raining down and tearing through cloth. One of them snagged Ren’s cloak, and he flinched.
“I found him! I found him!” Scar howled, laughing and nocking yet another arrow, a great wide grin plastered across his face. He noticed me, Ren breathed. Fight back. You have to fight back. He gripped his sword tighter, clutched his shield and held it closer to him. Run! Get Martyn and go!
He needs to get out of here. He needs to run. He’s going to die, going to lose it all, all they’ve worked so hard for. Going to waste that life he has sacrificed—
He’s going to need his Hand’s attention.
“Martyn!” He screamed, instantly snatching both Martyn’s and the Desert Duo’s attention. His heart sank, and he knew his fate was sealed. “Martyn, run!”
Grian’s eyes lit up. “Get’em!” He called, kicking at Martyn’s shield to unbalance him. He yelped, stumbling and hitting the ground then rolling to the side to hold his shield up and block another rain of arrows from Scar. He scrambled to get back upright, cursing under his breath as he tried to get to his feet.
He’s too far away! He won’t get to me in time!
“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon!” Ren hissed, hefting up his shield to block an arrow that thunked against its surface. “Run!” He urged, then saw Scar aiming for him from the corner of his eye.
Martyn must’ve seen him too. “M’l—Ren!” He yelled from across the battle field, rolling right across the cobble floors to avoid a strike from Grian’s sword. “Ren, save yourself! Get out of here!” He tried kicking at Grian’s legs, an attempt to unbalance the avian but he simply lifted off the ground, wings beating to keep him airborne as he switched to his collection of ranged weapons.
“What?! No!” Ren shrieked. “Not without you!”
“I can’t go without you” goes unsaid.
Martyn spat another curse at Grian. “I’ll be fine! Go—”
Iron arrows pierced flesh, flesh on his side, and he stumbled left. His side hit the ground hard, teeth gritting in pain. It’s hit something vital, he’s sure, because his vision’s instantly swimming, that…that odd sensation you get every time you reaspawn. His limbs are starting to grow numb, heavy and dead and useless to him. He can’t run, and he’s run out of lives.
“Ren!” Martyn’s shrill scream rang out loud and clear, cutting through his now–spinning head. Cutting through the roar of blood that’s still in his head, blood that is soon going to stop flowing through his body until he respawns again in—god knows how long.
God? The word tugged at a strange…memory? in his head. There’s…another word he can relate to with that, but he can’t seem to recall what it is.
Martyn called him a few times more, Ren’s sure, until Scar’s arrows cut him down as well, striking through the back and piercing his chest—ugh, he doesn’t want to visualise that.
Where’s BigB? He found himself wondering. He can’t seem to find the man anywhere, or maybe that’s just his really blurry vision right now. Yeah, no. The blood loss’s messing with my head.
“Hey, mi’ Hand.” Ren muttered. “Martyn.”
The other man doesn’t look at him, coughing and bleeding out—bleeding out a lot faster than Ren is. He knows they’ll just respawn later, on their respective servers, all safe and found, but something about this just feels so…unsettling. Something about the excessive blood and how long it’s taking for him to die.
Also because they—they don’t belong on the same server. Ren might never see him again.
“Hey, hey, hey, Martyn.” He muttered again. “Martyn, we—we’ll respawn soon. Just hang on a lil’ more, and we’ll both be away from—from this wretched game.”
Martyn doesn’t reply.
Ren cursed under his breath. Shoot. “No, no, no. C’moooon,” he hissed. “Mar, I swear. You told me to say it before, when you to—took me to red. Told me to—swear ‘n whoever your gods are—to swear to the ██████. Whoever that is. I swear, we will see each other again, yeah? We’ll see each other ‘gain. I swear on—on your ██████.”
Darkness swallowed up his vision. He doesn’t know what he’s just said exactly, possibly just a bunch of gibberish, but he’d do it for Martyn.
A promise’s a promise, after all.