gamemaker artemie simons | done

[gamemaker artemie 🦉nyte]

thirty-nine ; a perfectly nice man

[gamemaker artemie 🦉nyte]

a r t e m i e 🦉

He is a perpetual witness to glory.

Artemie was thirteen when he first realized this, looking down at what remained of a playground bully. A mottling of swollen pink skin already oxidizing into something darker. As he soothed the wounds on his sister’s knuckles, he marveled in the perfection of his own. He was not strong, but he knew strength — a much cleaner way of living. Without all the ugly bruises.

The bully was expelled, Polly got a week’s worth of detention, and their mother bought Artemie chocolates on the way home from school. Which his twin was angry about until it became obvious he intended to share. ”You’re good at getting into trouble, I’ll have to be better at getting you out of it.” He said that night around hooked pinkies. Though he would grow into a man of empty words, this remains the only oath he'll ever try to keep.

They grow up, they grow apart. His sister is content with playing in Capitol bounds and Artemie has never been content with anything. He's grateful that their paths don't often cross these days, but knows she's still willing to ruin her knuckles for him.

And he's still willing to share a piece of chocolate.

His smile seems kinder than it is. Only slightly intentional on his part. Helpful, of course, in all those endless hours spent stroking egos. When company dinners would bleed into bottles of empty wine and he could whisper in important ears. Claiming to have more than he was capable of offering and — really — nobody follows up on a pretty enough lie. Those that do are easily silenced with enough money.

(His family's wealth can be traced back before the dark days, if you strike all those years they spent starving from the record. No, he's not very fond of the Capitol's charges. He feels no need to lie about that. He wouldn't have been reduced to groveling without their interreference.)

Artemie is credentialed by a silver tongue, nothing more. All he'd needed was an in. Which he found when he was hired as the personal assistant to the executive assistant to a junior gamemaker. It's hard work in it's own right. To be a cuckoo playing himself off as a part of the brood.

He has many friends, each one of them serves a purpose. Bright young minds hanging themselves on the lowest rung of the social ladder, he laughed and listened to their ideas and hoped they wouldn't realize their own potential as quickly as he had.

In his carefully kept notes is a chemist and her ideas of manipulation states, drugs that can be aerosolized and dispersed among tributes.

A mechanic who concerned herself with sustainable energy, a way to turn the arena itself into a tool to be shaped in real time by gamemaker's hands.

A lonely socialite who thought Artemie a kindered spirit, whose lavish gifts all end up at the nearest pawn shop. Cash is more useful than all those pretty jewels.

Closest, perhaps, to a real friend is the quiet architect with ideas of manipulation through hostile environments. Who thought that complete control of tribute's actions was possible if arena's were built cleverly enough.

And sure, Artemie could have put their names on the proposal he drafted to the counsellors but that would have made it all seem much less impressive. They might not have looked at it twice, had he not seemed so much of a genius. (And he is, just not in the way they are thinking.)

They should be happy their ideas were heard at all. This is the innovation they'd been so passionate about, right?

Some days he fears he is nothing but a void of endless wanting. Defined only by his tireless pursuit of absolutely everything, that consumes all he's ever held within his hands far before he has the chance to enjoy it. Artemie knows he will die with the pang of starvation in his gut, all because he was born of a legacy with an uncurable wound. Always standing beside something great, but never able to bask in the warmth of it.

But the moon looks so lovely hanging in the night sky, doesn't she? It doesn't matter that her light is not her own if she wears it well enough.

And he does.

Being named Gamemaker was just the start.

Of what?

Well, Artemie can't wait to find out.

[gamemaker artemie 🦉nyte]

Gamemaker Lauren Kinkade

i promise he is qualified for this

[Gamemaker Lauren Kinkade]

Whoops! Delighted to be GMing with him!!

ACCEPTED!