public PTSs - 91st!

[pup]

hi all! i want to read all of your PTSs and thought i should start this up! drop them below!

k a s s i a .

"you are weak
but not foolish
you have learned
how to die."

Plugging in the USB, she looks up at her executioners and smiles.

---

The idea had hatched slowly in Kassia's mind. The day she arrived in the luxurious training center apartment she had recognized the little machine on the wall of her room. One of her first gigs had been at the AC development company which created machines just like that one. After spending weeks working on the backend for the appliance, Kassia would recognize the smiling raindrop insignia anywhere.

She had figured something that was such high quality would have been shipped to the Capitol, but it was still an unexpected surprise. Despite her terrible time working on the code for that company, it was a piece of home she could find some small comfort in.

After stumbling back from the pool party, she collapsed onto her bed, giggling from a mixture of whatever she had drunk and how different the gamemakers seemed in person. Up close, they just seemed so normal. Not normal like a regular human person--they still had that eccentric, holier-than-you Capitolite look--but they were not nearly as intimidating as she had thought they would be. For some reason, when she had pictured gamemakers, she had thought there would be more fangs involved. However, their job was still to lead her to her death.

And that's why Atticus told her that she needed to impress them. If she could impress them, then she would have a shot at making it home.

You need to be invincible, she reminds herself, small, alcohol-sourced hiccups bubbling out of her. You are here to win, and then not even the Capitol can hurt you. The victors all look stoic, powerful, and ready to fight anyone who got in their way. People capitulate to their celebrity status. If only she could be strong enough, she would have a chance to make things right, to bring her father home.

So, after the true exhaustion from the pool party set in, she took a nap to regain her energy, and she plotted.

---

The night before the private training sessions, she was thinking through the conversations of the day. Pulling the covers over her, she gets lost in a maze of thoughts. She had been told over and over again that she needed to think of something impressive for the gamemakers, but she couldn't think of anything she could do. She could barely start a fire, her time with Derecho revealed that throwing knives was out of the question, and she was sure that being openly belligerent to Saber didn't help her case.

Cordelia definitely had something planned, but Kassia knew that she really didn't need anything prepared. All the girl from one needed was to flash one of her winning smiles and wave a sword around. Alpha and Cachi definitely had something up their sleeves too. To them, she must seem like a charity case, a house cat lost in a pride of lions.

If only she could be strong like them.

Looking back up at the wall, the smiling raindrop symbol stared her down, calling out to her. Then, it clicked.

Getting out of bed, she stumbles out of her room and pokes her head out to get the attention of the avox standing by.

"Hey, um, excuse me?" Kassia wasn't used to being waited on, "Could you grab me a computer, a flash drive, and a cord?" The avox looks at her for a second, confused, before nodding his head silently.

"If they ask just tell them I want to record my last will and testament or something like that." He looks even more confused, but nods again and turns to walk away.

Biting her lip in thought, hoping he would return with what she needed, she waited. To pass the time, she took a look at the little AC controller again, inspecting it and tapping on it lightly. After moving through a set of options, she clicked on Version Settings, and, after seeing they hadn't updated their devices since when she worked on it years ago, she grins.

When the avox returns with her supplies, she sets to work. After plugging in the cord to the machine and connecting it to the computer, she's able to pull up all the settings on the monitor. After reaching a screen that asks for an admin password, she grins, she doesn't need one. When she had been working on the backend for this machine years ago, there was a glaring bug that she had decided not to fix after the manager had yelled at her one too many times.

After inputting a few commands that would normally change the temperature wildly, the memory storage in the little machine overflowed and she could do whatever she wanted. She silently thanks her younger self for being too unmotivated to fix the bug as she bypasses the admin controls. Because of her newfound admin access, she could see what other devices connected to the little machine. Like she suspected, the entire training center was interconnected, controlled by one network labelled simply as TrainingCenterLAN.

From the admin controls in the AC controller, she could easily jump from machine to machine. She looked at the titles of all the devices on the network, grouped together into folders:

Security
Cameras
WiFi Routers
Training Machines
Dining Hall Devices
Com System
and much more.

Navigating herself into the training machines, she found the one she wanted. Realistic Hologram Battle Simulator.

She had been inspecting it shortly before she had really met Saber for the first time. After inspecting the code for a bit, she began to get a feel for the machine and how it really clicked. It was simple, really, spawning the holograms as objects every time it was requested, and then the holograms had a series of commands they could take depending on the sensors.

After looking through that, she exited and checked on the security system with a grin. Yawning, she knew she needed to finish this and get to sleep soon.

The computer didn't have any IDEs downloaded already, so she set to work on the little notepad feature, writing her commands quickly and then checking each line of code. Plugging in the flash drive, she moved the code over into the small device and set it to execute upon being inserted into another machine.

After disconnecting everything and getting rid of the evidence, she fell into sleep. It was the first time she was able to rest without nightmares her entire time here.

---

The alarm woke her up two hours later to remind her to get dressed and head down for the private training sessions. After pulling on the training suit which, to her dismay, had no pockets, she pulled on her waistband to put the small flash drive against her hip. Heading down to the basement to await her judgement, she sat in the chairs next to the other tributes in silence.

Soon, she saw some people she could consider friends go to impress their judges. Cor went first and Alpha followed shortly after. They would be a tough act to follow, but hopefully Linnaea didn't do anything too stunning to set the stage.

When they finally called her name over the loudspeaker, she took one more deep breath, knowing she already had everything prepared.

Stepping into the room, her eyes flash over the rest of the training center. It looked perfect, undisturbed, and ready for a tribute to show off a talent. Looking up at the gamemakers, she paced a little towards them and flashed the best smile she could give them and waved. "Hey, gang! Long time no see!"

She could feel her heart begin to beat in her ears.

"I know that you all like flashy things, so I hope I don't disappoint."

Walking over to the control panel where she could control the holograms, she stopped. Instead of touching the screen to activate any of the controls, she began to run her hand along the bottom of the monitor. Then, her fingers stopped as she felt the small, welcoming inlet. It was still in the same space it was in when she had filed it away for future use before talking to Saber in the training center that first time.

Grasping the flash drive and stumbling for a moment as she pulls it out of her waistband, she chuckles a little to offset the tension building in her. Searching with her hands again, she lines up the drive with the machine's port, before looking back up at the gamemakers.

Maintaining her smile, she plugs it in, and the executable commences.

The force field in front of the gamemakers flickers for a moment and shuts off, sputtering out of existence. Just as she had programmed it to do, it bypassed the security she had investigated last night. It was a handy piece of malware, to say the least. If she got out, maybe she could sell it to some anti-Capitol group to make her even wealthier than the average victor.

Then, the light show began.

The holograms flickered to life, a set of soldiers holding swords and maces set to the highest difficulty. It was her army.

Stepping away from the machine, she looked back up the gamemakers, a grin widening across her face. The malware was executing perfectly.

"See you all in a few weeks! I'm excited to win this and we can all get a bit more acquainted."

Then, her infantry charged, a battalion of automated light at her command. They jump to the gamemakers and climb the wall to where they were perched as observers. Normally, they would have been confined to one area, but Kassia had found a piece of their code showing that, if needed, they could wander throughout the entire training center. It was only the commands that limited them, so she set them free of their bounds.

Kassia knew they wouldn't really hurt them. She had seen the holograms in action, and the most they could do was bruise them a little. Still, it was nice to see the gamemakers being the ones in some danger for a change.

Her creations reach the gamemakers, pulling themselves into the observation booth, unabated by the now absent forcefield.

Turning away to let her work take its course, she strolled out of the training center, her fingers crossed that the gamemakers wouldn't use this as an excuse to drop a mutt on her from the sky before the countdown even finished.

ooc tldr: kassia goes full hacker mode, hacks the training center from her room pre-pts, then during the pts she shuts off the forcefield between the gamemakers and the tributes and sets the hologram things on the gamemakers!

elegant

S A B E R
B A N C R O F T

Every tribute has a story to tell. A use to be had in the grand scheme of everything, but Kassia Simons from Three has a scheme of her own. Ever since he's spent time around the tributes, he's learned what to expect from the teenagers who's deaths were in his hands. An avox having handed him the second bottle of beer he's asked for. A swig as Kassia Simons comes walking in with all the confidence in Panem. No one gets to find their way underneath his skin, not without consequences.

A note is handed to him quietly, reading from it while he stays on target. She's got something big planned. The smile that dares to pull from his lips as he sets the bottle down following her movements across the training center. For just a second, he notices the drive being plugged in. "Interesting." The slight shimmer of the forcefield flickers. Saber's grin continues as he taps his pen against the tablet, waiting for the finale she had planned. The note staring him right in the face.

The holograms flicker to life; weapons in hand focused on them. Lauren and Zeus probably have no idea of what's happened. His words come over quietly, "Careful now." The holograms move as her rebellion continues. The grin growing wider as he stares back unafraid of a teenage girl from Three who believes she's above them. Arms crossing over his chest as he waits for her to leave. Holograms rushing towards the walls of their observation deck. Saber waits until she's left the room before he stands up, holding the knife from the cutlery around the food. A solid hold as he tosses it downward, cutting into the hologram past the forcefield barrier.

A wave of his hand and the shimmer is back. Sitting back down, he listens to the fading holograms and yawns. "Hmmm..." Saber's focus coming back to the other two, unsure of if they had been informed of tributes hacking into the system. "Intelligent, confident, but unruly. Well versed in technology, but holograms aren't gonna save her in the arena." Looking at what Zeus and Lauren put, he smiles. "Well, let's see how you handle the arena without an army behind you." Scribbling down the final score of a 9 into his tablet.

[lance]

s t o r m .

He knows already that if he's going to stand out, get the sponsors to like him, have any chance whatsoever in surviving the experience ahead with what looks to be little more than his own two hands, he's going to have to do something big. Something unexpected. Something wholly unique, yet still very much himself.

Luckily, Storm Adroxis was, by definition, a force of nature, even by his loving siblings and long-suffering parents. Doing something big and explosive? Why, that was practically in his name.

And it was also very time sensitive, which was why when he was called into the training center for his evaluation, he wasted no time before practically sprinting over towards the plants section. Yes, not even to greet the Gamemakers or introduce himself. His mother would have no doubt chided him for such an act, but he was the same boy who had overindulged on cake to the point of vomiting on Avriel's shoes on the train and then had spontaneously jumped into the deep end of the pool during the party without an inkling of knowledge as to how to swim. Manners were kind of the last thing on his mind right now, okay?

He allows himself one stray thought as he reaches the plants center that he really should have worked on his cardio before choosing to volunteer for this, before he gets to work. He'd spent the vast majority of his time in the center at the plants station for this exact reason (well, that, and knowing the basics of surviving - like, how embarrassing would it be for him to die because he'd eating the wrong type of berry or something like that?) and within moments had practically emptied the stores of all the juniper and rosemary he could find.

Jogging (not sprinting, this time, he'd learned his lesson) to the center of the room, he dumps the several pounds' worth of plants right next to one of the ornamental trees. Well, maybe it wasn't ornamental - he had climbed it out of curiosity at one point during the training, but, well, details - but the point wasn't that so much as it met his specifications. Tall, sturdy, and with one very prominent branch pointing out to the side.

The next part would be the hardest, and was frankly impossible to get perfect in a fifteen minute time period, so the plan was to not even try. The specifics and the presentation were what mattered, and this particular detail? Well, if it marked him down a notch or two, then he could just do it again in the arena. But better.

Knowing this, Storm jogged over to the trapping stations, pulling a thin yet sturdy piece of rope out of the pile, and jogged back to his plant pile. Wrapping the rope around his neck like a shawl, he climbed the tree until the branch was within reach (a simple task due to it only being a few feet over his head), and hastily tied a knot that would keep it attached to the branch.

Jumping back down to the ground, it was a simple matter to make a noose - again, not the best choice for a snare but quick and easy to make in a pinch - and place it flat on the ground. Once that was done, he took his plant pile and spread it out in a tight circle around the tree, in what he hoped looked like natural foliage.

Well, as natural as a shining linoleum floor could look, anyway. Has he mentioned that a lot of this is based on presentation and imagination?

Luckily, that was the final part of the plan. It's surprisingly difficult for his gangly noodle arms to drag a dummy over to his contraption, but eventually he situates it so that it's practically standing in his noose. Then, with one more jogging round trip, he darts over towards the survival station, picks up a flint, a rock, and the driest stick he could find, and finishes his task by once again climbing up the tree.

His call of "Action!" is noticeably breathless, but in his defense, running laps around the training center and lugging the thiccest training dummy in the room halfway across it was tiring work, okay? And with any luck, he hoped that the presentation would make up for it.

With a pull, he yanked on his rope from his vantage point. And as he'd hoped, the hapless dummy is powerless to resist the force of motion against its solitary legs as it falls backwards, flat on its back.

And flat on the mess of rosemary and juniper. Which, by the way, did he mention that those were two particularly flammable plants?

It takes a couple of tries to light his stick on fire with the flint and rock, but once he does the stick lights up immediately like some sort of miniature torch. And, finally allowing himself a grin, he threw the torch down to the mess of plants and dummy down below.

It's not until he's jumped down from the tree - safely outside of the plant radius - and his plant circle, rope, and the dummy itself are all ablaze that he laughs. It was intricate, difficult, and even imperfect at times, to be fair. But in the Hunger Games, a clean decapitation and a messy one kill tributes all the same.

The laughter he lets out right before leaving the room is filled with maniacal glee - and why shouldn't it?

Storm Adroxis, troublemaker, prankster, and amateur arsonist, had just set the fucking Training Room on fire.

Wicked.

elegant

---

S A B E R
B A N C R O F T

Okay. Call him soft all you want, but he's found a lot of enjoyment in the time he's spent bonding with Zeus and Lauren. Both of them have made him laugh enough that he's going to have alcohol come out his nose at some point, except he can't focus on that. Instead, he watches their youngest tribute from nine come in. Storm Adroxis is exciting, but also worrisome. A few more years could do with having a real contender for victor, but he's seen the boys file. There are big expectations that come with a name like his. Tapping his fingers softly in a rhythm on the chair beneath him, he can see Lauren growing more and more tired.

The boy from nine goes collecting plants, setting up a scheme for them. Saber's keeping track of how much has been taken, his voice coming in gently as he speaks to the other two. "Think the kid knows what that is?" Instead, the kid begins to move around to grab some rope, putting it around the neck as Saber watches the kid climb up and up. Curious of what the plan was, he continues to glance from the others to Storm. As the kid jumps, part of him is surprised to see it all planned out. "Just a simple noose snare?" Except, the boy drags a dummy over and the disappointment starts to pull at him as he sighs.

A voice calls out as if he's on a movie set, there's a certain childlike amusement to it. Memories of being in the mutt zoos when he was younger flooding his memories. Storm Adroxis then pulls off a surprising pull of a trap as the dummy goes up. The torch takes a moment, but it's not enough to be dull as Saber watches the boy toss it into the plants burning absolutely everything. The dummy's head rolling in the flames for a moment before Saber lets out a small snort in amusement. Definitely unexpected from a kid his age in the games, but he's enjoyed watching Storm laugh all the way out of the room.

"So clearly, Adroxis kids are just all wild." A laugh on his lips as he writes in a 10. "For his age, he's going to be someone who's underestimated and I don't think anyone will see him coming. It's gonna be a grand story to tell." Looking to the other two, he watches them cross it out for a 9 instead. Fair enough. A 9 for a Nine. Maybe he is growing softer, after all.

[alex 🐺]

Lux had used the last week in the Training Center to dry out following Alpha’s cheap and stupid trick. She had also maintained her distance, a line of demarcation drawn between them without words. It only made sense—they were nothing to each other before the Games and they would be nothing to each other during the Games. The in-between didn’t even matter.

Sleep draws away from her like a tide moving away from the shore, only a trace of fatigue as it ebbed, her arms wrapped around something warm and solid. Someone warm and solid.

It’s only after they’ve showered together using up all of the hot water, pulling on their training outfits, the embroidered One shining like gold next to the diamond Two on Lux’s chest that she feels something like tightness enter into her throat, stifling her words.

They didn’t need to talk about anything. Odds were, neither of them was coming home. As it was, Cordelia had helped her craft her PTS idea late the night before, passing a mug of tea between them as they swapped strategies.

Lux’s sketchbook was littered with notes about all of the tributes that they were up against. Cordelia had crossed some thoughts out, adding her own, and Lux’s sketches bled over the words, stretching across pages and over margins. Willem and she had discussed his sketches the night that she had hid out in his room and she wondered fleetingly if he would ever want to take a look at the things that she drew that needed to be exorcised from her head like demons. She’d have to ask him soon.

The walk to the Training Center is silent and Lux feels her hand bump against Cordelia’s more than once. She nearly grabs on, but she doesn’t allow herself the vulnerability. Love had paraded the lionhearted boy around the Games like a trophy fucking kill and while she would always want to take a page out of his book, it was never her style.

“Good luck, not that you’ll need it,” she whispers to Cordelia as the girl from One heads in before her, and Lux stands behind the other tribute from One, Alice. Tributes around them turn at the sound of her voice and Lux nearly growls, biting back words like venom.

Love had charisma coming out of him like smoke from a fire made from damp wood and she was exactly the same, but that last thing she needed was the diamonds that littered her body, her armor, to shatter and break for a girl who was probably just using her.

At any rate, she only has a little more than a few hours to wait for her turn.

It goes by in the blink of an eye.

She takes graceful steps into the room, calm and assured, her chest and head held high because at the end of the day, at the end of her life (if it came to that and she hoped against all hope that it wouldn’t), she was a Bellisario through and through. She wasn’t Love and she wasn’t Vanya and she had to use any and all weapons at her disposal.

Including her body.

The training top is the first to go, tossed over her head behind her. Her shoes and socks are next, and then her sports bra and leggings, her black underwear flung off into the dark.

"Lux Bellisario, District Two," she tells the assembled crowd, twenty feet above her, her voice carrying melodically. Never a roar because she wasn’t a fucking Le Roux idiot.

She was a diamond.

And they would see all sides of her.

Love had shown in the Games that every action generated and equal and opposite reaction and he watched and waited and reacted the way he needed to in order to better his situation.

But that had all gone to shit when Emerson Le Roux had died and when he actually started to care about the other tributes. Aspen had given him a very ignominious end and the boy that sparkled like a diamond had finally sputtered out.

But with Lux, everyone had already seen her as an object of desire, a dumb girl who flaunted her looks and her wit, her body as a commodity to be consumed.

But....what if she could take back that power? Take back her body and use it as a weapon?

She definitely wasn’t here to be consumed—mind, body, or soul.

She was a knife, a razor’s edge, a weapon—even when she was butt-ass naked, the line of black diamonds along her ribcage to her hip, one pink near her thigh. No one needed to know that she hadn’t triumphed last year.

None of that mattered now.

The constructs approach her out of the shadows as she moves to grab the falchions. She had asked for them specifically and the weight felt like an extension of her own arm. They circle her, easily towering over her. One carries a spear, another a greatsword and the third has weapons that match her own. She steps back, bouncing on the balls of her feet, waiting and waiting, naked as the day she was born and ready to bathe in blood.

Uncertainty is a pit of darkness that threatens to take over, pulling her under, because what had Love done? Would this even be memorable?

The answer flies out of her brain the moment the construct with the greatsword swings at her and she meets his strike, both swords flying up in front of her face to block most of the blow.

He—because it had to be a man that was as close to flesh and blood that the Capitol could get without actually letting them kill someone before the Games—bears down his weight on her and she kicks out as best as she can, swinging her leg to catch him out.

“Don’t forget about the bottom when you’re dealing with the top,” Love had always said. There had to be some joke about sex in there.

She catches the back of one of his ankles and swinging her leg back forward, he trips and steps right into her waiting sword tip.

The crunch feels real—the blood feels and tastes real as it sprays across her face, his chin tearing through his upper lip. The tip of the sword comes through the crown of his head and she pulls the blade out, relishing in the squelch. 

Who needed clothes when she looked so fucking good in red? 

The other two constructs watch and wait in silence before the second one—the one with the spear—launches himself forward.

She deflects him, only just, but he takes a swipe at her side and catches her thigh, scratching across the bare flesh. A whoosh goes out of Lux’s lungs and she feels her leg start to give under her weight as the construct with the twin falchions steps up behind her. Rolling on her bad leg, Lux moves away from them, her leg screaming in warm, hot pain and she launches one of her swords at the construct with the spear, catching him in the shoulder.

It’s just enough towards his heart that she thinks she found her mark. He drops unceremoniously, but she’s miscalculated like a fucking idiot because the construct that’s left has two swords to her one.

He doesn’t have a face—it’s just a blank mask—but the fucker would be grinning from ear to ear if the Gamemakers had gifted him with a smile.

It doesn’t take a genius to know that Lux is on the back foot, standing with her assets on display, blood dripping down her body. Maybe she could drop to the second construct, pulling the sword from his body to even things up. 

He moves quickly, faster than the other two, and Lux has to dodge, stepping backward as quickly as she can.

But for all his bluster and fast movements, he leaves openings in his defenses and Lux keeps backstepping, deflected blow after blow from the swords. Waiting, like Love had taught her, waiting to strike. She feels herself starting to tire, because this isn't like sparring back at home with blunted swords and weapons that would only leave bruises. 

This wasn't a game any longer. It had stopped being a game the moment her name came out of that stupid glass bowl. 

She parries one of his attacks and sees the moment, knowing she was losing time and interest from the crowd above her. She pulls his arm towards her with her free hand, her sword crossed with his, and brings her knee up to the soft part between his legs. She’s rewarded with a punch to the face when he gets back up, dropping one of the swords.

It’s not enough to make Lux see stars—she’s a diamond after all and sparkles on her own, but she spits in his nonexistent face, pulling him again by the arm onto her sword, almost like an embrace. 

He falls like the others and Lux flings her bangs out of her face, not even bothering to wipe the blood and the sweat from her eyes even though they sting like a fucking bitch.

She doesn’t even bother with her clothing as the door slams shut behind her. 

He's known all his life that beauty can be weaponized. If he had to thank his elder half-brother for anything, it was that. Even as a toddler he could remember watching Glamour prepare himself for the public, from meticulous skin care to his fashionable outfits. Lauren watched, mostly from a corner of the closet, and learned.

So when Lux Bellisario, District Two, slinks silently into the room and sheds the absolutely atrocious garments they've provided for her, Lauren understands. It's not an act of rebellion. It's an explanation.

What weapon is more deadly than the body itself?

Lauren's leg begins to bounce as Lux blocks and parries. He starts to wonder: what if a tribute dies in the training center? Would they reap someone else from District Two? Or would the High Council instead see fit to send an expendable Gamemaker into the arena?

He'd truly rather that, than to be stripped bare in front of strangers.

So when she straightens her hair and walks in confidence out of the room, Lauren shakes his head. "I could never," he starts, and Zeus and Saber continue far more eloquently. Upon final review, Lauren carefully removes his glasses and folds them in his lap. "I think I speak for all of us when I say: I hope we see much, much more from Lux Bellisario. She's already a queen of her own making. It's a pleasure to award her an 11 for that stunning performance!"

[napoleon, d2m ₊⊹ 🐁 ɢʀɪғғɪɴ.]

"burning hair    flesh, & bones
within the south wind blowing
 over flowers & mossy stones."

Meat is meat.

Carcass, bone, gristle. Stunner, slaughter, cut in half. These words appear in his head and strike him. Destroy him. However, they are just not words. They are the blood, the dense smell, the automation, the absence of thought. They burst on in the night, wake up upright with the tang of iron on his tongue. Skin, fat, tissue. He takes a hot shower and feels only the hotness, not the ablution.

He is never clean, not from the blood.

(minor tw: slaughter) 

They buzz him in. He walks along the sterile hall with the nerves of a whole morning, jittery and crackling like a lightning bolt about to strike, and seeing the gamemakers does none to calm him. Charlie knows rich folk, has sold than more a thousand rib-eyes and special cutlets to them, but these are a kind of rich that perplexes and bewilders. They could buy out a field with no dent in their fortunes. They could heal a sick brother at a whim. Things he would deem as miracles are only daily tidings for folks such as them.

And so he would show them the truth, the truth of the world that wealth offers a veil from.

His request is humble: one deer.

They see them sometimes in dusky evenings, as their far-off hazy shapes, trellised by mist and fog, would stand quiet vigil near the woodlands. This one also is quiet, watching with round delicate eyes from behind the fence as Charlie approaches it. Its hide is spotted, its antlers only growing in. The ears flutter as Charlie takes another step forth, both out of alarm and curiosity.

“Shhhh,” he croons, soothes, placing his hand behind a flapping ear to touch its warm flesh and then tracing it all the way down towards its cheek in a soft brushing gesture. Palm opens up, strokes the deer’s chin. The animal stills. He leans forward, breathes in the thick musk of the creature, and starts muttering the lead notes of a tune.

It’s a song they sing to a bucking animal: a hum, a hymn, a eulogy. A lullaby of death of sorts, a final verse before the final rest. His fingers explore. They find veins, muscles, places for the incision. It’s important that this is seamless. Anything else is a failure on his part, and he has been haunted by their consequences. The sound a half-skinned pig makes is one that never leaves you for the rest of your days.

And, his father’s chiding drawl, don’t panic the hog, it’ll ruin yer’ meat.

There is a tenderness in shepherding an animal to slaughter. It’s soft and gentle, an extensive ritual of celebrating the creature before it is culled, and Charlie performs it through muscle memory. His hands know where it soothes, where it calms. The shaggy neck, the gentle pulse. There is an intimacy to slaughter, a special bond between the hunter and its prey as their hearts begin thud, thud, thudding as one. In this moment they are a whole entity, one and together. They breathe together, feel together, and Charlie swears it hurts him too when the hidden blade embeds itself within the animal’s neck.

But he knows there is no pain. The blade digs deep, and then moves to incise the carotid artery in a quick movement. Always go for the jugular vein—now that’s a saying upheld and well-preserved. The blood is impatient to gush out, as red as precious metals under the halogens.

He works posthaste. The once-deer, now-carcass, rises three feet up from the ground as Charlie’s arms yank on a rope he’s brought and wrapped around a beam to make his own conveyer belt. He takes a hold of his blade again then, accesses the animal. The blood is the first thing to tackle. It takes to rot with ferocity. That’s why it’s necessary for his dagger to glide across the deer’s throat and slit it cleanly with finesse. More blood trickles out, the floor now slick with it. The carcass bleeds beautifully.

Most delight in only the before and after of meat. A precious white lamb in a field, then a softly lit steak adorned by fresh herbs. Meat can only appear as gentle or appetizing, and it seems many has forgotten of what lies between. The blood, the fur, the flesh. Inside a hide, fully intact and attached to bone. He cuts a coring ring around the skin of the anus, and then comes for the membranes. Blade facing upwards, he makes an inch-deep slit, then deeper, higher, all before it’s a full gut hook to open the belly.

His breath snags. The smell always takes a moment to get used to, to have himself grow absent around it. But, steeling himself, he quickly claws at what has to be taken out, empties the innards.

The skin is next. It gets loosened by the same blade, the flesh undressed, a special kind of nakedness there as it slowly gets revealed layer by layer.

Then it’s harvesting the meat. He looks at it now and sees a map on the flesh, its lines already drawn-in, the planes already dissects into fields of symmetry. The fattier, more sinewy parts are gold pots—they become sausages, steaks, stew meat and delicious pot roast. That’s the money cut, the rich man’s dinner. He takes an intense care in scoring it gently off the bone. Next comes the scrapes, the other parts. It’s bones, organs, and lipids that protest against the sharp of his fillet but yields regardless under his butcher strength. Those’ll make nice late night meals or enchant a broth to new flavor levels.

Bloody, efficient, and moving to a rhythm born out of repeated work, he has the poise of a chef and the hands of a slaughter as he assembles all the cuts neatly in their belonging piles.

He steals a glance at the clock out of the corner of his eye, is bolstered by the time he has remaining.

I can do this.

With a full gait, Charlie’s attention swings towards the stove they had set out for him. And in a basket close by, there are all matters of herbs and aromatics, thick bulbs of garlic and fragrant sprigs of coriander almost a painting from how vivid they appear. Fresh, he has insisted, right from Ten’s gardens, enriched by death and manure. He slices off a block of butter, lets it glide across the cast iron with a fervent hiss. And as it crackles and caramelizes, he grabs a handful of herbs, smashes the aromatics with the blunt of the knife, all in a flowing symphony of movement that crescendos when they fall in the pan with a second hiss, this one followed by a burst of smell. Cooking onions and garlics. It hides the scent of iron, envelopes the whole room that, if even for a moment, Charlie feels as though he’s home again.

The memory swells outwards, guides his hands as they toss the pan and then nestle the fresh venison under a bed of browned onions, the meat sizzling as it grills. Iron and heat—they don’t take long to cook the flesh through, having it ready by the time Charlie adds another dollop of butter and a sprig of thyme for the basting. His spoon scrapes against iron, splashes the golden juices over the golden crust of the meat, repeat, repeat, repeat.

He wipes away the sweat on his forehead. He plates it all quickly, less for appeal and more for haste, he isn’t a chef. But there’s a point Charlie’s trying to make here by slaughtering a deer and serving it in minutes. Slaughtered and dressed to consume for the gamemakers’ ravening pleasure.

The threes plate of venison glisten.

He has them sent up to the gamemakers after they have been thoroughly taste-tested by a few avoxes, and he meets their eyes as the plates are laid out in front of them.

“I-I- heard you guys, you know, enjoy a feast,” Charlie says, half-stutters even. “Well, this is a feast from ten, made by yours truly. Eat it with some sauce and don’t, well, don’t look at the pile of guts on the floor when you eat it.”

Or look at it. Stare at it and face it upfront.

Charlie, with bloodied hands, turns to leave.

Meat is meat, and dinner is served.

It was late in the day and Lauren Kinkade was tired.

He'd drunk a truly epic number of espressos but still. The fatigue of watching twenty-some children attempt to impress him was wearing. Between sessions he stood up, stretched, sat down next to Saber. In the span of a movement he leaned over and fell soundly asleep on Saber's shoulder.

The buzz admitting the butcher from District Ten woke him.

Groggy, Lauren straighted his glasses. One deer. The request is relayed to them, in their hermetic Gamemaker perch. Lauren's brow furrows. Who could be so dear to Charlie Gallows, District 10? There's some conferring with Saber, which saves him from making awkward excuses, and then a deer - oh! - is led into the room and Charlie gets to work.

Because it is work. He makes that very clear, though he is quiet and gentle. Lauren does his best to swallow the bile -- he knows it will be much worse than this -- to be present. In the span of mere seconds and somehow also endless hours, Charlie divides the carcass into pieces, which are soon forgotten.

Instead, all he can think about is the incredible aroma. It permeates even their perch, onion and rosemary seeping through. It's far more intoxicating somehow, having witnessed the entire event. It's the difference between listening to a song and being in the recording studio when it's stitched together. Charlie Gallow has made a tidy mess in his exploration of the deer carcass but he's also made a meal.

A real, bona fide venison stew.

Lauren waits for the go-ahead from the avoxes but not a second longer than that. He knows Charlie Gallows must leave. But first, he brandishes his spoon, dibs it low in the soup, and draws in a mouthful of venison.

It needs perhaps a bit longer to be truly tender. But it fresh. Delicious.

He uses the spoon to wave bloodied-handed Charlie out the door. Then, he curls his hands around the bowl, hugs it to his chest, and leans back into his chair. He sips from the edge of the bowl while the other Gamemakers discuss.

By the time they've settled, Lauren is nearly done with the soup. "He fed us," he whines, and then hears an echo of his brother in the plantive tones. He screws up his face, sighs, and tries again. "Obviously he knows how to kill but also how to survive. That's really valuable? Especially in our arena?" His gaze flits between Saber and Zeus. "A 10 for Ten. I have a feeling Charlie will like that."

[heather - d2 [mylee]]

K  I  P

Kiptyn Nott, District Six.

I’d tried counting steps of the previous tributes as they made their way in and out, but I’d gotten bored and lost track by the time the girl from Four came out. Were those tears? I’d thought, but couldn’t discern. By the time I’m in motion, it’s not fear or anxiety mounting in my stomach but something more sinister, and still all the more eager. With each step, I can feel the weight of metal in one pocket, a piece of fabric tucked into my waistband. When the door in front of me is open enough to let me in, I shove my hand down and pull out the sunglasses, lift each arm, and slide the frames down over my face. The room, with its fluorescent and artificial lighting, skews mean and distorted by polarization.


I.

They’d caught my eye when I’d been lurking around the edge of the pool, the tan frames abandoned on a side table fully secluded from the sun. I’d watched Kinkade, how his lips wrapped around the straw in his drink, excitement plastered across his face as bodies splashed in the water and limbs flailed, sending sprays of water into the air. When my feet had felt sufficiently shriveled, I’d slipped around to the side of the structure and nudged at the bottom with my ankle, the curtain shaking free in the breeze. From the back corner, they’d only been an arm’s length away, and I’d snagged them without causing much of a fuss, pocketing them before taking a drink from a tray passing by with considerable speed.

Now, they sit tight on my face, tension mounting behind my ears when I come to a stop in the center of the room. I can see the three of them, or who I assume must be the three of them, among the silhouetted figures milling about. It’s as if the lenses are distorting time, lagging everything so that the present always feels just a fingertip's touch away and unattainable. When I slide the frames off from the bridge of my nose, I take a lens in each hand and twist, the frame giving quickly. I drop the pieces to the linoleum and grind each piece down, the plastic and glass imaginably sharp, despite the thick sole of my shoe.


II.

I’d watched the boy from Twelve slip into the Training Center, silent and uninteresting. A little less cautious, I’d followed him for the sake of seeing what he did—he couldn’t be boring all the time. But suited up and tense, he’d slid into the sparring room and the door had shut quickly behind him, a disappointing and anticlimactic end to what could have been a weekday morning’s load of fun. So I’d loitered in the hallway, trying to figure out how I might kill more time, when Bancroft slithered out to join me. We’d locked eyes briefly, and I’d nodded respectfully as he’d passed me and hooked a quick left into the bathroom.

I could piss, I’d thought.

The bathrooms, even down here, were sterile and bright, every nook and cranny in the grout overexposed. I’d sidled up to the urinal beside Bancroft and dropped my boxers and trousers, dropped them all the way to ground. In the brief moments of his shock and disbelief, I’d squatted down to pick them up, twisting the ring dangling off his right hand on my way back up.

Now, the gold glints blindingly in the light as I hold it up, one eye squinted against the glare. When I drop it into my open mouth, the taste of metal explodes across my tongue, the whole of it seeming to knock against each tooth on its way to the back of my throat, and then down.


III.

A bit more sober and a little less cautious, I’d had two more drinks poolside before spotting Hollistero, his body tall and reflected in the water. Standing at the edge of the terrace, all I could think was, we’re so high, how there was nothing underneath us that wasn’t made by fallible, human hands. The water broke, and then broke again, never still enough. When the thought became overwhelming, I’d sat on the edge of the nearest chair and buried my head in my hands, stripped a nearby shirt from the top of the chair and wiped my eyes on it, only to register then whose it was and, moments later, that I could fold it up small enough to fit into the pocket of my trunks.

Now it’s wrinkled, just this morning unfolded then folded again, a rhythm I’d repeated through the morning in my room as I waited for the light to split even. When it did, I’d shoved the fabric deep into my pocket, then tucked it into my waistband once through the door.

My gut feels heavy and uneven, and I can almost see the ring, golden and corroding, settling at the bottom of my stomach. With each step I take toward the fire making station, it seems to move and jostle. At the table, I grab a couple pieces of flint, some tar. I spread the shirt out, pulling the sleeves of the t-shirt taught before unscrewing the lid of the jar and dipping my hands into the tar, scooping out a palmful of the thick, viscous substance. Keeping the fabric stretched with my knees, I paint with my hands, childlike and carefree. The rough image that emerges is crude and phallic, misshapen and unpleasurable to the eye and anything else. I want to think it's visible from where they’re standing, want to make some stupid joke about being drawn to scale, but instead I kneel back down beside it, strike the two pieces of flint against each other and watch the whole thing catch fire, the tar first and then the fabric, but the time between each flame catching is so miniscule we might as well call it instantaneous, and everything consumed by flame regardless.

[ table: pogue ]