when the tide rolls {rade}

[Knuckles]

Rolf Parks Eighteen | Male | District Nine

Pale cheeks burn red while my frail hands tighten and relax around the handle of an axe. Spots dance in front of my eyes blinding me from the task at hand. I'm supposed to slaughter the dummy like it's a human being in the arena, but it isn't. My jaw clenches tightly while I bounce my gaze around the room watching. To think Chaske stood here, and now I'm standing in his place wondering what to do or even where to begin. Yet time doesn't move. No questions are answered. It's just one thing after another after another.

The axe falls from my hand clanging loudly against the floor as I depart from the station for dinner. It's a wonderful time of day, and part of me looks forward to seeing how much food is set out on the tables - if it's anything like the train, I'll definitely become fat before I die. The corners of my lips twist into a soft grin if only for a moment, but this time it doesn't stay.

Before I know it, I'm piling food on my plate not caring where it comes from. Some looks disgusting while other's look completely appetizing.

Finding a table in the corner of the room, I pull out a chair and allow myself the chance to sit down and relax. Through it all my heart races inside my chest, every hair stands on end, and it's becoming hard to breathe.

This shouldn't be happening.

I'm the good, no, perfect child.

But here I am in the Capitol being punished for something one of my siblings did.

Shaking my head, I lift my fork picking up some random piece of meat before shoveling it into my mouth. Mother and father would love it. Citadel and Pherick would devour it, yet they aren't here, and I am. So that just leaves more food for me.

ooc notes go here

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[charade]

KATELYN PERSIMMON

The dining hall was always a strange place.

Tributes shuffled back and forth, forming alliances, talking with their mentors, eating by themselves and watching the room warily. It was the same every year. It was different. It wasn’t. Imprints of memories walked the halls. She could see where she’d eaten with friends long gone. Where Orion had sat. Where she’d broken bread with Kirito, back when he had been full of nothing but unfailing optimism. The table she’s first approached Opal when she’d looked distraught. Where she’d given Mace his first present.

The dining hall was always a strange place.

Parks was eating by himself. She’d scarcely believed it, when she’d seen him in the reaping recap. Everyone she was connected to was marked for death. She’d talked to Orion on the victory tour and he’d died. Now Rolf was in the arena. Was this one her fault too? She fidgeted as she walked towards his table. She owed him something she couldn’t quite verbalize. An explanation? No, that wasn’t it. But what were you supposed to say to someone whose brother you’d killed on national television? When you were alive, but their loved one wasn’t?

“Rolf.” She said quietly. “I had hoped I wouldn’t see you again. Guess that Capitol isn’t quite that merciful.” A pang of guilt stabbed at her heart, and she couldn’t but wonder if this was their way of taunting her during the current games. They had to be. Not a single year had passed without one of the victors having to deal with a familiar name, a familiar face. Whether a relation or a connection to their games, there was always someone. Always. “I haven’t forgotten,” she continued, pointing to the name on her neck.

“I know you thought I would, but I didn’t."

"I'm a realist, and an optimist,

but I swear to you, I'm not getting over this."



table coding (c) ghosty

[Knuckles]

Rolf Parks Eighteen | Male | District Nine

The meat makes my mouth water as I tear into the delicate thing wondering what it is. My eyes roll into the back of my head. It's so amazing. Taking another bite, I find myself looking around at what's going on. Staying by myself has been my game plan because getting people together can only cause fights, and that is against the rules. Sliding under the radar may work now, but once I'm in the arena, things are different. People will want to kill me, and I will want to kill them. I'm about to take another bite, when someone decides to interrupt me.

"Rolf." Her voice is quiet, and I need nothing to tell me who's standing near me. Her voice is enough. I've heard it on the television as the stupid whore pranced through the Capitol for some stupid show. A darling in the eyes. A darling for winning a stupid game my brother didn't survive. Katelyn killed him, and now she has the audacity to stand in front of me like nothing is wrong.

But everything is wrong.

"What do you want?"

Sliding my tongue across my teeth, I set the fork down beside my plate contemplating my next move. Fighting is against the rules, but she didn't care about anything when she took my worthless brother away from me. All she cared about was surviving. And now she's here. Alive while he's dead.

But she's right. The Capitol isn't merciful. They hate every last one of us, and while Katelyn may have never wanted to see me again, I've been longing for this moment. And it's not to tell her I forgive her. Over the years the hate has built up. Every night when I'm sleeping, I see her slaughtering him. I see him crying out. I see her standing in victory. And I hate her for it.

"I haven't forgotten." My eyes turn towards her for only a moment as she points to her neck. His name is etched into her skin, and I want to slap the piss out of her.

"How can you not forget about a person you killed?" I ask louder than I meant to. Heat radiates from my cheeks, my hands ball into fists, and I slam them against the table knocking my plate of food into the floor. "You get to walk around like some stupid doll while I sit at home seeing you kill him over and over and over." My voice grows louder as each word falls past my lips, and I'm standing on my feet looking at her through narrow, beady eyes. "I once asked how I'm supposed to forgive you. How I'm supposed to be happy you're alive and he isn't. I've spent the years trying. I've tried to put the memories to rest of you slaughtering my brother. I've tried, but I can't." My voice grows quieter, and I stop for a moment.

("I'm...sorry for what I had to do.")

She said she was sorry. She said she had to do it, but sorry will never cover it. Sorry will never repay the debt that's owed. Sorry is just a hollow word when nothing else is said. His blood was spilled by her, and I won't stop until her's is saturating the ground.

"I'll never forgive you, Katelyn Persimmon, for as long as I live."

ooc notes go here

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[charade]

KATELYN PERSIMMON

Her presence didn’t inspire anything in him but anger, she had figured as much. Rolf’s voice raised almost immediately, wrathfully venting that it was impossible to forget someone you killed, though she got the feeling that he meant that it was hard to forget that she had killed someone he cared about. Rolf rambled on about how he couldn’t shake the image of her killing Chaske and how it grated on him that she got to prance around like a doll while his brother was in the ground.

Katelyn’s face hardened upon hearing that. She didn’t enjoy what she’d done. It was just something she’d had to do. She didn’t expect him to understand that, but she couldn’t stand to hear it said either. That wasn’t her. The bachelorette? That wasn’t her goddammit. She wasn’t a socialite, she wasn’t a vapid, shallow heartbreaker. She wasn’t some prize to be won and she definitely wasn’t a doll. Even if she had let the Capitol pull her strings. She seethed internally, feeling her skin grow hot. She despised him for saying what he had, and despised herself more because on some level he was right.

If looks could kill, she supposed she’d be six feet under. But they couldn’t, and she wasn’t, and Rolf had more to say, his voice dropping dangerously low. “I’ll never forgive you, Katelyn Persimmon. Not as long as I live.” Katelyn sniffed in annoyance, tossing her hair to the side and arching an eyebrow at him. “I don’t expect forgiveness. I don’t deserve it.” Drake? Desi? Would you ever forgive me if you knew I could be the reason you’re headed for early graves instead of more of Kirito and Harbinger’s loved ones?

“I’m sorry that I killed him. But I’m not sorry that I lived.” She rested her hands on the table, leaning forward and regarding him coldly. She didn’t need this right now. Lately, it seemed that every time she tried to help someone it either went horribly wrong or they didn’t appreciate it. Or it made things worse. ““I was trying to give you closure. One last mercy for a dead man. My mistake.” She said through gritted teeth.

“Given Colgate’s absolute shit job at mentoring, I don’t think you’ll have to worry about me being alive for too much longer.” She snarled acerbically. “You’ll be too busy being dead, just like all the other tributes from nine since the sixty-sixth.” Hate me, she wanted to say. You couldn’t come close to how much I hate myself right now.

"I'm a realist, and an optimist,

but I swear to you, I'm not getting over this."



table coding (c) ghosty

[Knuckles]

Rolf Parks Eighteen | Male | District Nine

A small grin twists across my face as I watch the way she's bothered by what has happened. Maybe it was my words, but it doesn't matter because I've done exactly what I came to do. Forgiving her was impossible. She did the unthinkable, and I wish he was alive in her place. Kate doesn't deserve to be alive. But what would've made my brother different? What if he would've succeeded in killing Katelyn in the hunger games? Would he have changed? Would he be like her? Winning game after game until the Capitol tosses it all away? No, he'd be better. The crown was better fitted for his head, and she took it away from him. She killed him in cold blood, and one day I will do the same to her.

"I don't expect forgiveness. I don't deserve it."

You're right, I want to say, but she's adding more words in before I can speak. She's sorry she killed him, but not sorry that she lived. I try to stifle a laugh, but I can't hold it back any longer, and I'm cackling at her false remarks. Sorry won't cover it. She can't be sorry for doing something if she wanted to live. She killed him to survive. She killed him on purpose. She wanted to do it.

The laughing doesn't stop as she leans forward. Her arms resting on the table. Silence surrounds me, and my jaw locks in place, and my teeth are grinding together. All she wanted was to give me closure, but that isn't found anymore. The only closure I'll ever receive is her head on a silver platter. For her family to feel the pain that I've felt. And oh how I'd love to hand deliver the head myself.

And then to top it off, it's like she's telling me I'm as good as dead. Only a foolish man wouldn't realize that. Only a foolish man wouldn't know when death was coming, but I hope to defeat it. No, I don't hope to defeat it. I will come out of the arena alive. My hands ball tightly into fists, and I find myself staring at her wishing she would go away. Red spots flash before my eyes. Heat flows from my bright red cheeks. My eyes narrow, and within a moment, I'm lunging forward swinging as hard as I possibly can aiming towards her ribs. The final blow was a broken rib, and I'll give her the same feeling.

"Colgate doesn't matter to me!" I'm shouting at the top of my lungs not caring if anyone is around to hear me. People can stare if they want, but they should know it's rude to stare, and one day the favor will return upon them ten times as worse as it is now. "You wanted to give me closure for someone you murdered, well let me tell you the only way to get it." My words flow steadily as the flame growing inside of me grows larger. "I'm going to kill your tributes, and it won't be a fast death. No, it's going to be slow. I'll make sure they know that you are the reason that I'm destroying them. It'll be worse than the death that one tiny girl received in the seventy-second hunger games"

My heart leaps inside my chest as a dark grin twists across my face.

"And it'll be all. your. fault."

ooc notes go here

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[charade]

KATELYN PERSIMMON

That got a rise out of him. She’d known it would, but found it hard to care. He started yelling about how he didn’t care about Colgate and she could take her closure and shove it. She was teetering on the brink herself, almost as angry as she had been when Weaver’s name had been called the previous year. He threatened them then. Threatened Drake and Desi with slow painful deaths, laughed and said it was all her fault. Katelyn stood stock-still for a moment, her head telling her to walk away now before she did something stupid, but her heart raging against her chest like it was a separate living creature.

It was too much for one person to deal with. Her shoulders started to quake and she wondered if she was going to start crying. Tinselton. The show. That she hadn’t called Bay or Ben in months. Desi. Drake. That their lives might have been the price of keeping the Rhodes and the Miristiomas safe for a year, on top of the emotional hell she’d put herself through for their sake. “It’s already my fault.” She said curtly, “All of it.” She said as her voice started to rise. “It’s already my FAULT. IT”S ALREADY MY FAULT!" She howled as she tackled him over the table, knocking him to the ground and slamming his head against the tile.

“DO YOU THINK THIS IS LIVING?” she cried as grabbed the front of his shirt and slammed his torso into the ground as he tried to get back up. ”DO YOU THINK I’M HAPPY? WINNING THE GAMES WAS THE WORST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED TO ME, I HOPE YOU-“ she was cut off when something hard hit her back and she sprawled forward before getting yanked off of him. The Peacekeeper standing behind her, holding onto the back of her shirt looked less than pleased. She spit at his visor and turned to look at Rolf, who was being held by another peacekeeper.

“I HOPE YOU WIN.” She roared. “THEN MAYBE YOU”LL UNDERSTAND THIS HELL. THEY DON’T END, THEY NEVER-" The peacekeeper holding her cuffed her across the face none too gently.“Ms.Persimmon,I’m going to have to ask you to calm down and to stop threatening tributes with physical violence.” He wiped her spittle off with his other hand and looked at it in disgust. “Or do I have to have you confined to your quarters until the games start?" Katelyn stared daggers at him and struggled in his grasp. “Get off me,” she grumbled, her voice losing most of its volume, though it kept its edge. “Are you going to stop?” Katelyn turned to Rolf and glared at him.

“You’ve got no idea what you’re in for,”she seethed, struggling with the peacekeeper as he tried to move her.“What they show on screen could never prepare anyone for the reality of it all!”she yelled, her voice starting to rise in pitch again. “I could have taken the supplies off of his body while he was still bleeding out and kicked snow in his stupid face. But I stayed. I stayed because he asked me to; cause I thought nobody should die alone.” She was breathing heavily by that point, her chest heaving and eyes large and wild.

“And when you lay there dying, your blood seeping out onto the ground, surrounded by images of the broken bodies of your allies and the people you killed for nothing, I hope you remember that I tried to offer whatever comfort I could and then I hope YOU CHOKE ON IT!” she screamed as the Peacekeeper forced her out of the room.

"I'm a realist, and an optimist,

but I swear to you, I'm not getting over this."



table coding (c) ghosty