{Shooting Blanks} [Kousei, Aya, Open]

[Deleted]

I a g o
I z a r – M c C l a i n e

•••

{I feel numb most of the time}
{The lower I get the higher I'll climb}
{And I will wonder why}
{I get dark only to shine}

•••

Sleep should not be hard to come by here. My body aches from training and the days move like along at the pace of a jackrabbit. I blame the living quarters. Daunting rooms flush with windows that stretch up the ceiling make me long for my little room back in eleven. So much so I’ve taken to pacing during the evenings, up and down our suite (until Tasmain scolded me that I was interrupting her beauty sweep), and then hallways until I’d found a refuge to take me in atop the training center. A few days ago after staring for several minutes at the button above 12 marked R, I’d pressed the gold lettering and let the doors open to a rooftop garden. Trees sprung up like a wall along the sides (and I imagined a forcefield lay behind them as well), while several wooden gazebos dotted the artificial grass landscape.

I whistle as I walk along the false stone path toward the center gazebo. Whisper a song, Iago

[/color]. I think of the times my mother would hum in the kitchen, glasses softly clinking in the soapy water as she scrubbed away the last flecks of dirt. Little hymns for laundry on the line, short prayers for mopping the floor, and quiet psalms for the morning coffee. I stare out at the pines blocking the sides of the roof. The outlines of the city blink in yellow and white, reflecting stars and shining light back toward me. Would that my mother could see me now.[/color] I think of her often. I still believe she had meant to come see me off at the justice building—surely something had prevented her from walking through the door? I hang off over the wooden railing of the gazebo and tilt my chin against my chest.

Doubt seemed unhelpful here; I shrugged it off like a bad dream. It must have been so much easier to worry about not being strong enough or big enough for the arena. That I could care enough about such things, but Benat comes to mind and I realize the futility. There are plenty whose blood will fall that think they’ll be the last to fall. Pride was a drug, and I was far and away keeping it out of my life. I’d shaken the reserve of others, for certain, but I wasn’t stupid enough to think they couldn’t[/color] just as easily stab me through the neck. It was more about the satisfaction of putting them down that made me smile. I bring my hand to my chin and listen to the opening of the elevator doors. “Oh goody,” I call out, “You found me.” [/blockquote][/size][/justify]

[aya]

I'm already born
I'm already wise
I'm already worn
I'm already wonderin' what am I

Cerise Mephistopheles—

[/color]
[/i]

Back in District Three, most of Cerise's nights had been occupied by some sort of illicit activity. Often she was up past two or three in the morning either perfecting documents for her clients or delivering them. Daylight did not lend itself to discretion. With the third floor of the training center already asleep and silent as the grave, she had found it difficult to focus on her thoughts. There was something oppressive about the stillness, as though she did not have the freedom to tinker or mutter or curse or think out loud. The quiet made her too cautious, and she did not thrive under such circumstances.

As a result, she found herself wandering the training center, seeking a better thinking environment. Her expedition took her to the annals of the basement, through a cobweb-filled service tunnel that she expected was strictly for avoxes, into the boiler room, through the kitchen, and directly in front of the training center before she was stopped. As Cerise had discovered years ago, if you looked as if you knew where you were going and carried yourself with purpose, nobody seemed to suspect that you were doing something you ought not to be, regardless of age. She was escorted back to the third floor by a hook-nosed peacekeeper who scolded her for wandering around, but she didn't acknowledge his admonishment with more than an exaggerated eye roll and a handful of exasperated huffs. What did she care if she was somewhere she wasn't supposed to be? What were they going to do, kill her?

The second the elevator doors shut to take the peacekeeper back to wherever he was positioned, Cerise hit the call button. Between eye rolls, she'd glimpsed a button for an area that she had not yet explored — the building's roof. She stepped onto the elevator, which shot to the top of the building — past four, six, eight, nine, ten, twelve, and all the prime-numbered districts in between — and deposited her in the middle of a substantial rooftop garden. She'd hardly stepped off the elevator and into the path when she was met with the voice of one of her opponents. "Oh goody. You found me." The girl from three was not caught off-guard by the quasi-greeting, but by the fact that she could identify the owner by cadence and pitch. The volunteer from Eleven.

"A blind kid could find you. Always breathe like your nose is busted, McClaine?"

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[kousei ♚]

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[/color] Scoff[/size][/font][/center]

No sleep comes to me tonight despite me wanting it to, but sometimes you just get that feeling that stops you from doing so. It's weird because in these warm, comfortable Capitol beds sleep should come easy, compared to what we have in District ten but no. I guess it's just why I'm here that makes sleep elude me; deep down I know that all this stuff will only last a little bit before I'm thrown into conditions worse than District ten, the arena. I guess that's what keeps me awake, just the very thought of it keeps be awake and I hate the fact that I'm letting it get to me this easily.

That is what makes me go to the rooftop, I quickly change out of my pajamas's (yes I still wear those!) and into more casual clothes. I slowly creep out of my room, making sure not to disturb anyone because I'm sure they'll be annoyed for disturbing their sleep and for not getting enough rest myself. I go up to the roof, I've never been up there before but I heard just looking at the sky can relax you and if there's one thing I haven't felt since I got here it's relaxed. I press the call button in the golden elevator and step in, wanting it to go to the highest floor. I wonder if other past tributes felt this way, feeling as if there's no way out. The feeling that nothing is in your control. I know I sure feel that way.

The elevator door opens and I step out, walking out and going onto the roof but when I get there I notice there are already two people out there! Maybe they are there for the same reason as me. I stop as I realize I haven't seen these two tributes yet, actually wait, I've seen them in their reaping tapes but that's it. McClaine, isn't he the volunteer from eleven? You see that is someone with guts I admire. He volunteered for that little kid no problem, I could never do that, I mean look at me, I threw up on everyone out of fear of the very prospect of the games. Another guy who's better than me, braver than me.

I don't recognize the other girl even though I probably saw her reaping tape. I speak out, not sure if they actually saw me. I clear my throat loudly to get both of their attention. "A-am I intruding on anything?" Just keep cool Mantel, just stay clam and keep cool.

WC:426

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Narrative
"Speech"
Thought
Other

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[Deleted]

I a g o
I z a r – M c C l a i n e

•••

{I feel numb most of the time}
{The lower I get the higher I'll climb}
{And I will wonder why}
{I get dark only to shine}

•••

There are a few tributes that I haven’t come face to face with, one of them being the girl from three. I try to give everyone the same approximation (after all, there was no use in overestimating anyone’s abilities

[/color]) though whispers had pegged her as one of the ones that wouldn’t fall apart into a million pieces. I had to have an ounce of respect for anyone that could hold it together this week, moreso that she was comfortable enough to hurl an insult to my face. While my neck burned hot, I wasn’t about to be undone by any common put down. Any of us Izars had a nose that was too squished for our faces, it’s not as though that was highly original. It had been long enough since anyone actually challenged me here. Fighting was so much more fun when on equal footing.

“Mephistopheles,” I begin, not wanting to mispronounce her dreadful name but I go for it anyway. I’d spent an afternoon watching the reapings, though they filled me with embarrassment more than anything else. If tears were tesserae the whole of Panem would have more than enough to go around. “It’s a shame when both wit and beauty are lacking,” I say with a grin. I angle up on my elbow and hold my chin in my palm. She’s small but her walk strikes me the same as a panther’s—at least, as I imagine it would be. [/color]“But we can’t all be so lucky. I hope that they at least taught you how to make pleasant conversation in Three.”

She’s not alone. The urchin from Ten ambles in and it’s all I can do to laugh. A-am I intruding on anything?[/color] He asked as though we’re about to skin him alive then and there. What a pathetic excuse for a human being. I give a grin and turn. I plant both hands flat on the gazebo railing and clear my throat. “Well now Upchuck,” I say, “We were actually just about to discuss what would be better for you: if we hung you by your neck until your head fell off…” I grin at the thought of his face turning blue. “…or if I’d rather chop you up, limb by limb. Isn’t that right?”[/blockquote][/size][/justify]

[aya]

I'm already born
I'm already wise
I'm already worn
I'm already wonderin' what am I

Cerise Mephistopheles—

[/color]
[/i]

Under most circumstances that had presented themselves over the recent week, Cerise would have been entirely ready to fly off the handle at the District Eleven boy for calling into question her intelligence. She couldn't care less about beauty — bah. Being beautiful had always been her older sister's thing, which was never something Cerise had envied — the girl didn't have two braincells to rub together, and would be massacred within a day in Cerise's playing field — even with the tributes being years younger. Rather, Cerise took the jab in stride, returning Iago's smirk with a saccharine smile of her own.

"Oh, I know," she agreed in earnest. "You're so lucky to have been born smart and handsome, unlike me — I was born to be a huge liar." He was clever, of course, that much she'd gathered — the way he toyed with the other tributes had certainly caught her attention since arrival. Cerise, of course, was cleverer, but she got a certain amount of enjoyment out of the game that the older boy was playing.

A pathetic voice stuttered its way into the snark fest, causing an involuntary cackle to escape Cerise's throat. A little welt from one of the lower districts toddled into view. She couldn't put a name to the face, nor to the height — which was a solid half-foot below hers — but Iago was kind enough to supply a moniker. "Well now, Upchuck, we were actually about to discuss what would be better for you: if we hung you by your neck until your head fall off, or if I'd rather chop you up, limb by limb." This was the sort of remark she'd expected from the Eleven boy, based on the reputation he'd garnered over the past week. Cerise's features contorted from a smirk to something much more menacing, particularly when asked for verification on the matter: "Isn't that right?"

Her lips spread wide with malice before she opened her mouth to respond. "You forgot the one where we slice open that pudgy stomach of his and tug out his entrails foot-by-foot until he's got nowhere left to upchuck from." — Oh, she did enjoy that nickname and all its implications.

She plucked a thin branch from the tree on her left, twirling it in her fingers menacingly, as though contemplating the best place to jab it into the stammering boy. "Of course, we could always snap his twiggy little legs — " she broke the branch in two "— and his twiggy little arms — " again, she punctuated it with the crack of breaking wood "— and break them again — " snap! "— and again — " snap! "— until there's nothing left but dust." She dropped the small bits of twig at her feet, then ground them with the toe of her boot, as if she was squishing a cockroach. She smiled at the boy, eyeing him expectantly for a response: "So which will it be, Upchuck?"

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