RYDER STONE // 8 [fin]

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Name: RYDER
Age: 17
Gender: Male
District/Area: District 8
Appearance:

will find a fc soon!

Personality:

LOVES BOOKS. WOULD RATHER STAY AT HOME. LIKES FACTS AND SCHIZZ. IS SO TERRIFIED OF STRINGS THAT HE'LL CRY. WOULD RATHER AVOID RELATIONSHIPS. USUALLY TALKS WITHOUT THINKING. ISN'T SNARKY, THOUGH. WHOLE-HEARTEDLY BELIEVES THAT HIS LEFT LEG AND HIS EYES BELONG TO HIS FRIEND WHO DIED IN AN ACCIDENT THEY WERE BOTH INVOLVED IN WHEN THEY WERE YOUNGER. BLAMES HIS SISTER FOR RUINING HIS CHILDHOOD WITH HER STUPID ILLNESSES. ONLY LIKES COLLIN AND WILL ONLY TALK TO HIM. A BIT PSYCHOTIC. CUTS HIS LEG A LOT THINKING HE CAN GIVE IT BACK TO HIS DEAD FRIEND. COMES OFF AS A BIT DIMWITTED AND IS ONLY SENSIBLE WITH COLLIN. LIKES TO PLAY PRETEND.

History:

DADDY'S A DOCTOR. THEY WERE WELL OFF. SO MUCH STRESS BECAUSE INGRID'S ILLNESSES AND STUFFS. BECAME FRIENDS WITH THIS ONE GUY WHO WAS SECRETLY INVOLVED IN A GANG AND SAID FRIEND PISSED OFF THE OTHER GANG SO THEY JUMPED HIM AND RYDER AND BUTCHERED THEM BOTH BUT SEVERED SAID FRIEND'S LEG AND GOUGED OUT HIS EYES. WHEN RYDER WOKE UP HE SUDDENLY BELIEVED THAT HE HAD GOTTEN SAID FRIEND'S LEG AND EYES. HAS ALWAYS BEEN TERRIFIED OF STRING THOUGH. IS A BIT MORE PSYCHO AND DISTANT EVER SINCE THE MUGGING. REALLY CLOSE TO HIS BRO COLLIN & ONLY OPENS UP TO HIM AND NO ONE ELSE. RUNS AROUND NEKKID WITH A KNIFE OR SAW AND TRIES TO CUT OFF HIS LEG TO GIVE IT BACK TO SAID FRIEND.

Codeword: odair
Comments/Other:

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doing
thinking
talking
extra


Full Name: Ryder Stone
Age: Seventeen
Gender: Male
Orientation: Straight

no great genius

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Collin. He’s my brother by only a few minutes. And guess what? We’re best friends! He helps me a lot, especially when I’m scared or something and believe me I get scared a lot. He always helps me, though, because he’s a good person. And he’s funny, too – when I’m terrified, he always manages to make me smile.

That’s why I love him, that’s why I trust only him. Well, I mean, I trust Graham too, but he’s too…. he’s too out there for me to relate to. Everybody loves him and he’s so athletic, it makes me jealous.[/color] How can he be like that? What is it about him that draws people to him like moths to a light? I don’t get it. Why can’t I be like that?[/color] I’ve asked Collin about it before and he just told me that I’m unique. There’s no one else in Panem like me. Why be like him when I can be myself?[/color] ”Don’t let anyone change you, Ryder. Don’t change for anyone. Not even me.”

There was one time I was running through the woods and I tripped and fell down a hill. There was a lot of brush everywhere and I felt things catching the fabric of my jeans and then the sound of it tearing.[/color] When I came to a stop I looked down, and to my horror I saw a long gash in my pants – well, not so much the tear as the little white fibers fraying out. They looked…. oddly sharp and painful.[/color] Needless to say, I screamed and jerked off my pants, throwing them as far as I could. Collin had heard me and came running. When I explained to him what had happened, he merely shook his head, picked up my jeans, and started back to the house with me trailing behind him. No one believes me when I tell them I’m scared of strings.[/color] They always laugh and think I’m joking, but I’m not. I don’t even know why – it’s just one of those unexplained terrors that get you cringing and in that fight-or-flight mode, and for me I always choose flight. I don’t like fighting mostly because I can’t. I’m not strong enough.[/color] I’m not big like Graham, I’m not smart like Collin, I’m not well-liked like Ingrid (though I don’t want to be like Ingrid because she’s a spoiled brat[/color]).

And yeah, I don’t like getting into physical brawls. I can’t properly defend myself or anything so I’m a sitting duck. People like to pick on me too because I’m so different from them. I don’t like being picked on and made fun of.[/color] Because of that, I tend to stay at home or close to it, keeping my nose buried in any book I can find, completely oblivious to the world. I love these old adventure stories that Mom has – she has an entire collection of them in the back room, and that’s where I lose myself. I pluck any book off the shelf that has a neat looking cover (”don’t judge a book by its cover,” they say; oh well, I do[/color]) and either plant myself on the couch or go into the forest or even climb up into a tree. Hide myself from the world – leave it and enter another one, full of fantasies and heroes and mythical creatures and places. I love the older books especially; you know, the ones that you’re scared will fall to pieces if you turn the page too quick. Those are the ones that really capture my attention. The smelly yellow pages hold faded black words that are usually hard to read, but it’s always worth the time. I’ve been involved in so many journeys, so many battles, so many love triangles, so many betrayals that I feel it when the characters are hurting. I feel their pain, I worry for them, I cry when they cry and I get mad when they’re mad.[/color] Everything seems so real in the written world that I feel like I’m living it.[/color] Like if I close my eyes for just a second and open them, I’ll see the character in front of me. Or if I glance at the shadows, there’s the villain, all coiled up and ready to pounce to tear you apart and taunt you with something you care about. All I have to do is turn the page. The good guys always win.[/color]

One thing I absolutely love to do is take those stories I read and go out in the woods to pretend like I’m actually in them.[/color] I run around with sticks and slay bush dragons, practice my swordsmanship on trees, gallop my stick horse to far off countries, create potions with mud and crushed leaves – the world is my playhouse.[/color] No one likes to play with me, though… Usually I’m out in the forest by myself, but that’s okay. It just means that I[/color] get to be the hero. I[/color] get to create life-saving concoctions. I[/color] get to be loved and have fame, even if it’s all a pretend world. No one can hurt me there because the hero never dies.[/color]

Collin may have once said I was unique but he really never knew how completely true his words were. You see, my left leg and both my eyes belong to my old friend Jake. I’ll tell you more about him later. But anyway, yeah, certain body parts of mine belong to him. Many times I’ve tried to cut it off so I could give it back to him (even though he’s dead but I figured that he’d rest more peacefully if he had all his appendages[/color]) but Collin or Graham or someone stops me. I also tried gouging out one of my eyes to give to Jake but again I was stopped. They don’t believe me when I tell them, either. “Are you crazy?” they say. “Ryder you’ve been reading too many books. Get your head out of the clouds, you idiot. Stop taking whatever drug you’re on.” I don’t get how they don’t understand. I mean, isn’t it obvious? That isn’t my leg, these aren’t my eyes. Why is it so hard for them to see that?

Oh, and that brings me to another point. Ingrid, my wretched sister that might as well be a witch in disguise. She ruined my childhood – ruined all of ours,[/color] actually. With her stupid illnesses which I’m pretty sure she just faked in order to get attention. It got her spoiled rotten, it really did. She was pampered like some diva princess and ugh, it drives me mad. She’s[/color] the reason my parents are on pins and needles with each other too – I figure we’re just one snap away from this entire family tearing apart. But not me and Collin, oh no; we’re tight like two peas in a pod. If worse comes to worse, though, we can all just throw Ingrid out of the house. Throw her to the wolves like they do to the villain. Leave her to fend for herself. Lock her in the stockades.[/color] Treat her like the rest of rotten scum that crawl across the earth. If it weren’t for her we could have had such a lovely childhood; you know, like all the kids at school. Sure, they’re poorer than us, but their families are close-knit and they love each other. All I have is Collin.[/color]
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has ever existed

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I guess…. I guess I kind of look like Graham. Kind of. My hair is rather dark, black with a few light brown patches if it gets exposed long enough to the sunlight. That usually happens in the summer, though, when the weather is nice and I go outside a lot and drag Collin with me. My hair is also unruly a lot because I don’t like to take the time to comb it or anything. It takes away my time for playing and reading, that’s why.

However it looks when I get up is how I’ll wear it for the rest of the day. Occasionally I’ll fix it up, but that’s only when Collin forces me to. Even then all I do is just use my fingers to scrape it all in one direction; nothing fancy, ever. I try to go for that “wild, sexy” look. Ha ha![/color]

My nose sticks out. That’s one thing I don’t like. It makes me feel “nosy,” just always poking my large nose into someone else’s business. ”What are you doing, Big Nose?” Yeah, I’ve heard that one before. I’ve even tried to grow out my hair so that it’d sort of shade my face and at least try to make it appear smaller. It didn’t really work so eventually I gave up on it and I never did cut my hair. That’s why it’s pretty long now. Anyway, my eyebrows are thick and dark, just like my hair. They sit right above my friend’s[/color] grey eyes. My eyes used to be light brown. They’re darker now because, like my left leg, they’re my friend Jake’s. I see everything through his eyes now.[/color] The world doesn’t look very different, though. I’m still seeing it through my perspective, but just through different…. seeing optics, I guess you could say. No one believe me about this one either![/color] How do people not remember my eyes being lighter? Is it not obvious to them that they’re a different color now? Why is it so hard to believe?

Anyway, my arms aren’t scrawny. I’m pretty muscular, if I do say so myself. When I flex, my biceps and all those muscles show up underneath my skin. I guess it’s because my family was never poor, so I never had to struggle for food or anything. I’ve been pretty well-fed throughout my whole life, which is very lucky in my case. Some of the people I knew were so bad off that they were so tiny and I felt like if I just looked at them I would break them. Unfortunate for them![/color] My arms – along with other parts of my body – tend to have a find layer of dirt or mud on them because I’m out in the woods so often. I’ve got scars dotting my skin everywhere from mishaps and hurting myself with sticks and thorns and things, and even bigger ones from when I was beaten to a pulp that one time. They're all over my body and face. The ones on my leg are worse, that’s for sure.[/color] My torso isn’t as toned as, say, Graham’s, but I’m not fat! Okay, so maybe I have just a little layer of fat – enough so that you know I don’t have abs that show through – but it’s not awful looking! I’m still very strong even if you don’t think I am. Just because I’m not all Muscle Bob like Graham doesn’t mean I’m not strong or anything because you better bet I am!

Then there’s my legs. They’re much like my arms, muscular and proof that I’m not starving. My calves are pretty tone, though – I bet you they’re the most toned thing on my body. When they flex while I run, you can see the muscles tightening and shifting under my dirty, pale skin. However! My left leg isn’t mine.[/color] It’s Jake’s. They took off mine and replaced it with his after he died. Many times I’ve stripped down naked and have actually taken a saw to my leg, trying to hack it off so I could give it back to him, but someone has always caught me and taken the saw away. It hurts like hell but Jake needs it back.[/color] There’s a bunch of long, puffy pink, grotesque-looking scars all over my leg from where I’ve tried to cut parts of it off. I almost managed to cut off my foot once, but Collin stopped me just before I could get all the way through the bone. I guess it’s a good thing he caught me, though, because I passed out soon after. It took a very long time to recover from that one and in the winter, when it’s really cold, all my old wounds start to ache and it keeps me from playing out in the snow which I hate because I love playing in the snow – making snow angels and having snowball fights, it’s the best![/color] But the pain hurts, so I often just curl up by the fire or on my bed and snarl back retorts to anyone who pulls the ”I told you so!”
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without some touch

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My dad’s a doctor. Because of him, we were always pretty well off. We never had to struggle for food or anything, so you can bet we had a very good start. I remember people looking at us weird, though, since we were quadruplets. They were like, ”How did all of you survive? How is your mother even still alive after that? It’s not like our district is high tech or anything.” They were right: out district isn’t high tech, but since Dad’s a doctor, I guess that’s why she survived. He knew how to deal with this and how to help her, but I don’t know how he did it when there seemed to certainly be more than one baby inside of her! Or Mom, especially. I admire her for putting up with us like that. It must have been super painful and hard. I’m so glad I’m not a girl.

We grew up going to school, helping Mom and Dad out around the house, doing what we could to pitch in. We were pretty close as a family, but then Ingrid started having her “illnesses.” I never believed her for one second! She just wanted attention![/color] I don’t even know what she became sick with; all I remember is that she stayed up in her room, most likely in bed, and made everyone do her bidding. She’d ask us to get her things and help her places and it really, really made me mad.[/color] I think it was just because she was the only girl child – she was pampered like crazy and I hated it. I’m pretty sure she just took advantage of it too, trying to pull those puppy dog eyes and sweet talking us into doing things. It really got annoying after a while and I had to always bite my tongue whenever she asked me to do something. I didn’t want to but I always did.

All of Ingrid’s “illnesses” took a toll on Mom and Dad’s marriage. Sometimes when I’d sneak downstairs at night for a snack, I could hear them talking quietly in the dining room. They were using harsh tones and it made me worry. What’s going on?[/color] I’m pretty sure they fought, too; over what, I don’t know, but I could sometimes hear their elevated voices through the door of my room as I tried to sleep. Sometimes it scared me, really scared me. I’d been so sheltered from any sort of violence and other than sibling rivalries that I wasn’t used to fighting and serious arguing. I didn’t like it and it made me scared. What’s going to happen?[/color] My parents never showed the effects of it, though; when they were around us, they were still the happy, chirpy people we knew. But there was a difference in the air between them. They didn’t talk to each other as much, and when they did it was in a quiet, neutral voice. Not that tone that held tenderness for the other person.

Right around then was when I met my friend Jake. He lived on a sheep farm and wasn’t very well off, so he often came over to my house and we would play and eat. He liked the eating part the most.[/color] We would then go off into the woods and have sword fights with each other using sticks, throw leaves and pine cones at each other, and just cause some havoc. He never replaced Collin, though. No one can replace my brother.[/color] Sometimes I would go over to Jake’s house and we’d run around with the sheep, pet them and play with them. His parents were always so happy and I envied that.[/color] He only had an older brother (who was 18 at the time) and they got along fabulously, and all-in-all their family was very well functioning. I’m sure they never gave their parents the same crap that Ingrid gives mine. I bet that’s why they were always so close.

What Jake and I didn’t know was that his older brother was all caught up in a gang. Apparently they were the “top dogs” of Eight, and when another gang tried stepping up, they were quick to put the hammer down on them. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.[/color] The newer gang pushed back and soon brawls were taking place. Dad knew something was up because more young people were coming to him with stab wounds and massive bruising. I saw some pretty grotesque stuff back then.[/color] But Jake and I didn’t have a clue; no, we continued on playing games with each other and chasing the sheep.

One day we were off in the sheep pasture, petting the little young ones and chasing the older ones, comparing wool coats, when we saw some figures standing off in the distance. At first we thought it was Jake’s brother and his friends, so we just brushed it off and continued to pet the small animals. But they came closer, and closer, and soon we realized that they weren’t Jake’s friends. Neither of us knew who they were.

They approached us and asked us what we were doing, so we told them we were playing with the sheep. The people even played a little with us, sneaking in a few questions here and there. ”So what are your names? How old are you guys? Do you both live here?” I remember them tensing up as Jake told them who he was – their faces seemed to change expressions quickly and they suddenly had predatory eyes. But we both didn’t know, so we continued to giggle and play until one of them pulled out a metal bar. They struck Jake down and I screamed. Strike after strike they tore at him, and I tried to stop them – truly I did[/color] – but one of them jerked me back and hit me really hard in the side with something sharp. I only remember seeing Jake’s little body all beaten down and a black blur swinging at my head, then everything gets really fuzzy. I don’t know exactly what happened next. For a brief moment, though, I distinctly remember seeing Jake lying sprawled out, one leg hacked off and black holes where his eyes were.

When I woke up, I thought I was dead. The room had soft colors and I saw shelves lined with books, a few sticks propped up in the corner, and drawings pinned up on the wall. It was my room, but how did I get there? I tried to move but as soon as I did I regretted it. Pain was suddenly everywhere.[/color] It hurt so bad that I screamed, tears instantly flooding my eyes. Collin was the first one to come barreling in – he took my hand in his and I clung to it as tightly as I could without my arm hurting. ”It hurts, Collin. Make it go away. Make it stop.” I sobbed and begged him, but there was nothing he could do. I was stuck in this pain so I just cried, eventually asking where Jake was. ”He’s dead, Ryder. I’m sorry.” Collin looked mournful, I guess, and so I just wept.

Recovering from that attack took a very, very, very long time. In fact, I’m still not recovered from it.[/color] I had broken bones and stab wounds, not to mention dark bruises everywhere. Needless to say, I was in constant pain. Mom, Dad, and Collin all helped me, but they couldn’t do anything for my depression. I was incredibly sad that Jake had been killed, and that mixed with the pain was just torture for me. I often just laid in my bed, curled up as best I could, and moped. I didn’t want to do anything and I refused to eat most days, but eventually that turned around. Gradually I got over it.

I had nightmares about it, too. Often I’d wake up screaming, thinking I was being attacked, but the image that lingered in my head the longest was the one of Jake’s mutilated body, leg cut off and eyes gouged out.

That image got me thinking and suddenly I didn’t see me as myself anymore.[/color] I didn’t believe that my left leg was mine and I suddenly realized that my eyes were a different color. It struck me as odd, and when I told Collin about it, he didn’t believe me. I kept telling him that Dad must have taken Jake’s leg and eyes and given them to me, but he still insisted no. He said that all Dad did to me was stitch up my wounds and brace up my broken bones, but what does Collin know? He wasn’t there, he wasn’t the one being beaten.[/color] He doesn’t know and he doesn’t understand.

Once I’d recovered enough, I started venturing out more but my thoughts made me do some things that I’m sure Collin didn’t want to see. When I was strong enough, I went into the shed behind our house and stripped down naked, took a hacksaw that Dad used on trees and I began to saw at my leg. It hurt like hell, but I was severely determined to give Jake’s things back to him. Collin found me, though, and he was completely shocked. There was blood everywhere and my flesh was showing, so I can only imagine what it was he saw. Either that or he was startled because I was naked![/color] He asked what I was doing and I told him that I was giving Jake’s leg back, but he slowly talked me out of it. He helped me put my boxers back on and used my shirt to tie around my leg, then called Dad over. Dad gave me a good scolding for it but he was more overwhelmed with concern, so my punishment was short lived.

I didn’t stop there. Ever since then I’ve been trying to hack off my leg to give it back, but someone always manages to catch me or I passed out. I’ve even tried gouging my eyes out, but I’ve never been able to get very far with that one. It’s just odd seeing something sharp coming at my eye and my instinct is to flinch away, so I do. The eyes are a lot harder to return than my leg, which has collected a massive scar collection over the years. If you add up the scars I got from the initial attack and the ones I’ve given myself, both on my leg and around my eyes, you’d think I was thrown into a blender or something.

People notice the scars, I know that for sure. I can hide the ones on my leg for the most part, but everything else shows. My arms are peppered with them in all shapes and sizes, my face has the odd ones around my eyes, I’m pretty sure my nose is a little crooked too, but there’s the underlying things too. I’m not as completely sane as everyone else.[/color] I believe that’s because I might have been hit in the head with that steel bar one too many times. People find it weird that I still enjoy playing pretend and running around the woods thinking I’m in some other world. I don’t know why. I don’t understand.[/color] What’s wrong with that? Why is that considered “immature?” I enjoy[/color] doing that and Collin even plays with me too, so how weird can it be? Everyone in this district is just too uptight. They need to loosen up.[/color] I just turn my crooked nose up at all of them. They can live in their dry, dull world of plain fact and I’ll be content to stay in my “imaginary” world of fiction where anything can happen.
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of madness

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– Aristotle

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rushed finishededeedelskwiolr

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[garnet beauford d8 [earthling]]

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ACCEPTED!