Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter for Bombs and Bullets, Chapter #16: Pushed to the Limits. This chapter, ladies and gents, is our final tribute introduction chapter where everyone will have finally been met. The last four tributes you shall be introduced to today are Audhild Olthono, from District 9, by 66asmvr, Cambric Vogel, from District 8, by dyloccupy, Satin Spinel, from District 1, by Mistycharming, and Ponty Carr, from District 6, by Queenofinsanity: I've got quite the colorful cast today, ladies and gents. We're focusing on Training Day 2 today, and then moving onto the latter half of the Pre-Game phase with Scores, Interviews, and final moments with some Capitol dealing plot sprinkled in. I am very excited to have the entire cast introduced now, and finally I can get into solidifying everyone. Hope you all enjoy Chapter #16: Pushed to the Limits.
And very briefly I want to say thank you to thorne98 for his cover photo he made for the story - can be viewed on Desktop Mode of the website if you read on your phone, for mobile users - as I think it was a much better improved version than before. While I am at it, once again, go and check his exceptional SYOT Death is the Rule, where I have three lucky tributes in that piece.
~ And so sayeth the Lord, do not feel angry when the wind blows in the opposite direction, for otherwise you'll be blown away in the storm
Audhild Olthono: District 9 Female (12)
He doesn't trust her. She can feel it, the way he looks at her with one of those pointed glances that balances halfway between a look of fear and anger. She doesn't mean it, she didn't mean it, but twelve-year-old Audhild Olthono has gone and done it anyways. She didn't mean to punch the kid in the gut, but there is just that smug look on his face to the point where she feels like he deserves it, so Audhild does it. It had been a good hit, given her district partner doubles over in pain and he is not faking the pained expression on his face, but Audhild doesn't mean to also run away. There is a lot she needs to think through, but she can't blame herself entirely. She wants to blame the stupid, stupid Capitol and this stupid Hunger Games idea. It has her thrown into a loop, she swears it, where she can't concentrate, and the walls vibrate in strange jutting motions, shadows creating static pictures along the edge of the room.
She tries eating her breakfast as normally as she can, slowly nibbling away at a piece of bacon. Audhild looks at Jason across a plate of pancakes, so massive to the point where she nearly cannot see over them, he looking at her briefly, but then he looks away. Neither one of their mentors are up yet, the two having woken up a bit earlier, but only Audhild admits why she wakes up before the sun is even up. A group of Avoxes had already made breakfast by the time they're up, and all the two of them have been doing for the last half hour is eat, eat, eat. The second day of training isn't for another half hour at least, starting supremely bright and early. She's surprised she even made it out of bed, frankly, as the calling to stay in bed and ignore the dues of training are very much there, highlighted yesterday after Audhild watches all the Careers do their thing.
Audhild is primarily fixated on that District 4 girl, but she doesn't know her name. They are the same body mass, look similar to one another - it takes her a good few glances to get the distinction out of her head - and watching how the little girl absolutely shreds the dummies to pieces has her gulping, and her grip on the knife she is practicing with no longer feels as strong as it did before. When the Career is finished - how can someone so small and so young be on the same level as a seventeen year-old from Two? - and there's a sea of plastic floating across the Center floor, she locks eyes with the girl for a second, and Audhild visibly moves away from the spot at the knife throwing station, allowing the Career from District 1 who had been patiently waiting - Audhild had only been there for a few moments anyways - to take her spot up to bat. The encounter startles her enough that Audhild quits for the day, even as she watches Jason get pummeled into oblivion by a trainer on the mat.
"Tuck in your elbows," she shouts at him, he looking at her with a clear look of disdain, but it is good advice and Audhild has had to deal with a fight in the same way before. It is up to him if he wants to take the advice or not, but it isn't her problem anymore.
Audhild sets her plate away from her, full at the moment. She hasn't tasted food this opulent in a long time, and sitting next to the freaking mayor's kid, he's probably eaten like this every single day of the week his entire life. She doesn't want to be jealous of him, but it has already sorta slightly kind of happened at this point. He isn't the most handsome thing in the world, she'll give him that, being four years older than she is and another seven to eight inches taller, but there's a certain demeanor in Jason that she is having a hard time washing away from looking at him. She turns her head to the side, frowning, that causing him to pause in his eating, fork halfway to his mouth covered in eggs. Jason sets his fork down, clearing his throat. "What, Audi?"
It's her name, well her nickname rather, and she prefers when people call her by that short name. She's wondered why her parents did that, naming her something so out of left field, but she's never garnered the courage to ask. Unlike the last time she garnered the courage to... if she looked bad then people should've seen the other- Audhild cuts the memory off short, biting on the inside of her cheek, something she does frequently to keep herself from going down pitfalls. "Nothing," she says, strewing one of the pieces of sausage through the puddle of syrup piled onto the plate. "You- you remind me of someone." She sees the person clearly, lanky and long like Jason, with a darker shade of brown to their hair than Jason's, and much darker than her own oak brown color that nearly glows auburn in the sunlight. The kid's face, gone pale from the blood loss, scarlet seeping out of his side, bright, bright diamond eyes gone dark with a haze of shock and pain, Audhild stumbling away from the blade, hands shaking and-
"Like who?" Jason asks, having set down his fork, placing a hand underneath his cheek.
"Someone," Audhild's face burns crimson, flushed at the top of her forehead. "It doesn't matter."
It doesn't matter. Someone else has said this to her before, but she cannot remember exactly. All she remembers is that dark, dark room and the lashing of the whip, her dainty screams bouncing and breaking along the rivets of the wall, and the warmness of blood seeping down her back. It might've been the parents of the boy, or her parents, or the Peacekeeper holding that dastardly torture device, it doesn't matter. It may have been four months since then, but all Audhild can feel even now, especially when standing underneath the shower spring, some rusty little faucet that only works half the time, is the way the individual droplets feel like the clash of leather onto flesh, to the point where Audhild jumps out of the shower after turning off the water, as if it is going to strike out with a tiger's bite.
Having five siblings, they all being brothers, and she being the only girl, as well as the youngest out of all of them, Audhild knows it is wrong of her to feel jealous, just like how she feels about Jason, but it's there regardless, no matter how hard she tries to fight it. Perhaps that is why she finds Jason so untrustworthy. He doesn't seem to be, but she has been wrong about every single one of her decisions in her life up to this point, so another one won't hurt. Her parents have never full out said it, but she sees it in the way they do not stick up for her after the excruciating lashings, they seeming to go on for hours on end, that her parents are not putting the fight in for their little sweet baby girl, the daughter they've always wanted, the daughter that saves the Olthono family from total collapse... Audhild cries herself to sleep for two weeks straight. It is that her parents do not even consider why she stabs the kid in the first place. Ironically, they don't even ask how she manages to steal the knife away from the cutlery, of which there's only eight knives in their house altogether. Her father skips over the question as if it doesn't even concern him.
What matters is her end result, her brutal end result which has the boy she stabs writhing in pain on the floor, blood pouring out of his mouth, and Audhild shrieking apologies of all kinds in languages and tongues she did not know existed. The Peacekeeper who grabs her by the shoulders does not need to be that rough in throwing her about, as the stupid asshole bully is alive after all, for she only gets a few inches in before freaking out and letting go of the blade, it hanging limply in the boy's side, he crying in so much agony that it sounds like a tribute being killed on the screens while the Games are going on. It is not her fault she's born short, nor that her brothers are all more talented than her at all the athletic stuff... it does not excuse anyone to go and start picking on her at lunch, knocking away her tray, a single slap across the face at times... desperate times call for desperate measures, do they not?
She still isn't sure what crosses over her when she spots him from across the courtyard, bullying some other kid, a boy that looks like her if the gender had bene reversed, and all Audhild sees is a ledger drowning in red, and she lunges, whipping the knife out of her backpack pocket, and stabbing him straight in the side, but the scream from the kid she has just struck wipes away the ledger, she freaking out, blood splattering onto her hands, onto the handle of the blade, and some spraying into the kid's face that she had just rescued.
Audhild feels sorry, she thinks. She's not quite sure, truthfully, but it does mean she no longer has to go to school there. The Peacekeepers have labeled her a danger to her scholastic learning in a public environment - always the eloquent writers, those Capitol plastic scumbags - and it means Audhild is home-schooled now. It does mean that her brothers are now known as the Olthono gang, a group of kids who could snap in seconds if they like. Her very first reaping, shortly after her first run-in with the law on some sort of attempted murder attack - Audhild does not mean to wish to murder him, nor did she even want to stab him, things just kinda sorta happened - and she's reaped. She stands there like a gawking chicken, and that is before reality actually hits her like a sledgehammer to the gut, and the sobs wrench forth, and she's crying just like that bully she brings to his knees, and the Peacekeepers are hauling her to the stage, she shaking her head back and forth, shouting obscenely, "Not the whip! Please, not the whip! I can't bear it again!"
The poor girl gets something better, doesn't she? A brutal death in the Hunger Games, as she's seen plenty of District 9 kids go in, and none of them come out of the belly of the beast walking upright on both legs, but always in wooden crates fragranced with some sort of Capitolistic stench to hide the musk of rotting flesh and rigor mortis, never smiling, eyes closed, hands folder over one another, and the body bleached, naked... Audhild has never seen a crate up close, as she can only guess what her strongly visceral reaction would even be, but it will not be her embracing the Grim Reaper with wide freaking arms.
She shakes her head, closing her eyes briefly, pushing her plate away from her. Audhild isn't hungry anymore. "I'm sorry, Jason," she says suddenly, without much hesitation, or any hesitation, she looking directly at him after she opens her eyes.
Jason has another bite of eggs half up to his mouth at this point, he setting the fork down once more. "For what, Audi?"
"I shouldn't have punched you on the train ride," Audhild grimaces at the memory. She didn't mean to cause him any pain... but damn if it wasn't a great freaking punch. "I was just-" she sighs to herself. "I was very high strung, I think."
Her district partner nods rather shallowly, almost as if it never happens. "I understand, Audi," and then, sliding some of the eggs across his plate, "It was a damn good punch," she smirks to herself, as the mayor's kid takes his full bite after being interrupted so many times. She watches him chew rather absentmindedly, he swallowing, a certain look of refreshing quality on his face. "Fresh start?"
That comes as a surprise. Audhild is confused... is there anything such as a fresh start? It seems that Jason doesn't require much to be convinced, huh?
She reaches across the table to shake his hand, something that her parents have indeed taught her despite all the absentee parenting. "Fresh start, Jason," she agrees, shaking on it.
However, as she reaches back to sit up straight again, the pit in her stomach that only gets deeper and deeper when her name is plucked out of the reaping bowl, or as she slams her fist into Jason's stomach, it gnaws at the growing crater once more. If things are mended and the burnt bridge has been extinguished, then why does her heart still hammer in her chest?
Why does it seem like things are not going to be starting off on the same foot with a clean slate?
Cambric Vogel: District 8 Male P.O.V (18)
"I saw that coming from a mile away," he shakes his head at his district partner, trying to hide the disdain in his voice, failing the way Magdalena looks up at him with a scowl, she clutching at her hurt knee, it cut open down the middle, a thick gash starting to leak out of the liquid all men share. This must be procedural at this point, but Cambric spots the way his district partner is going to take a tumble the moment she steps forward with a locked leg towards the next trainer. The billy club hits Magdalena in the chest, she making a faint cry in pain, but her collapse onto the floor is less than graceful as she bangs her exposed knee up against the chaffed side of the build. "I thought you knew not to run forward with a locked leg? Or does common sense not come to you easily?"
It is a rather harsh question, especially as she's glaring daggers at him now, but it has been like this between the two of them, this sharp banter, full of his sarcasm and insults he only partially means, he swears it, medical honor and all. There's been a lot of times in his life where the injured party has not endured the simple task of following common sense, and he asks the same question to everyone after that, kind of nervous tick of his, he supposes. There are a few tributes off in the distance snickering, Cambric looking at them and tossing them a glare, one of them being the male from District 2, who locks eyes with Cambric, but he doesn't cease the amused look in his eyes. The Capitol medic, or at least one of them, rushes over to them. "Can you stand?" he asks his district partner.
Magdalena's look at him suggests insanity, as if why wouldn't she be able to walk? A hit to the chest is no easy force to blunt off without feeling some slight stinging or obstruction of breathing. "I'm fine, Cambric," she says, but then hisses once more, clutching at her knee. The scarlet leaking from it is a bit more copious, and he can already hear the groans some official must be giving at having to clean it up. But it wouldn't be them cleaning it, would it? It'd be some Avox being shouted at by four different higher-ups, and Cambric would want to knock all of them into oblivion for speaking to someone in that manner. The other random tributes have stopped their snickering, but he is not going to forget that guy from Two's stare, partly due to his handsome nature, but the way there is a lack of shine in those pupils, the darkness floods away the other remaining aspects.
The medic has reached them at this point, crouching down, but doesn't say anything. The training regiment continues as it had been, as after Magdalena is the girl from District 1, Satin, if Cambric recalls her name right. He takes his eyes off of Magdalena for a moment, just to be transfixed as Satin seems to do quick work of the fighters, the obstacle course being completed in under a minute, but it his district partner gripping onto the sleeves of his training uniform that rounds his attention back to her. "What hurts?" Cambric asks, and he has to quick himself mentally, for his tone is way too damn worried, throwing him off of his game. He shouldn't care about her, he really shouldn't, not when he has to get home over her dead body, but in this moment in time, all he sees is another child from up above suffering, and he needs to be able to heal that suffering.
"My chest," Magdalena says weakly, placing a hand there, and he notices that she's trembling. "Did I break a rib or crush a lung? It- it hurts to breathe and-" she starts to hiccup, Magdalena's eyes widening, and her grip tightens, she starting to run out of breath. Luckily the Capitol medic is immediate, her leg being patched up with a thick strip of gauze wrapped several times over the wound, a shimmering ointment seeping out around the edges. Cambric looks around at the other tributes, all of them being together for the joint exercise on the obstacle course, the wiry and timid looking boy from Three going and being felled on the second trainer which a sweeping undercut to the leg, causing the kid to fall out over himself. No one else is paying them any attention, but if it gets any worse...
He thanks the official, who once again does not say anything, grabbing Magdalena by the hand and hoisting her up to her feet. "Can you walk?" he asks. It's an evolved question, as he's moving past the simple orderlies, and Magdalena nods her head, perhaps a bit more frantic than he'd like, but it is better he does this now than rather having a district partner getting ridiculed for having a panic attack. Inhibitions are not weaknesses, a distinction he's learned throughout his life, and if anyone wants to get in her face about it can meet their face with his fist if they're not careful. Cambric knows he does not look like the most intimidating person in the world, what with his rather lanky appearance, a darker brown shade, and luscious amber eyes where he seems to fit in the Career pack more than anything, but that is a different story for another day. Looks can be deceiving, and not to judge a book by its cover... Cambric's fists can do enough talking if need be.
The two of them wander off to one of the more secluded areas of the training center, away from all the tributes, as now the girl from Seven is running through the course, and he watches as she hits one of the trainer's in the chest with a kick, and immediately a whistle is blown, she forced to cancel the exercise, as the tributes are not allowed to fight off or ward off the trainers, it is purely a dodging exercise. Cambric doesn't do amazingly hot, getting less than half way through the course before giving up, as two trainers were about to rush him, and it is either two direct hits to the face, or a possible broken knee, so he cries out uncle. If anyone wants to call him a wimp or a weakling, he'll gladly welcome it and then shove a spear into their sides. Magdalena isn't walking as briskly as he'd want, but it is better than limping or being entirely incapable of movement, for she seems more than capable.
Magdalena presses the small of her back up against the wall, Cambric crouching in front of her, but not so as to block all of her vision off with just him, for he's not sure how that would go, and he does not need to make her anxiety worse, if that is what she's having, after all. "Can I?" he asks, motioning forward with his hands. She nods at him rather feebly, a demure look replacing the typical brashness he's seen in her the last three days. He places the fingers on his right hand to her pulse, the left hand going just underneath her breasts - this is why he asks, primarily, as he has never, ever touched a woman here before - to feel at where the lungs would be, before shifting his fingers over to check her ribs, on both sides. The upper right side, as he gently applies pressure, telling her the entire time, elicits a short intake of breath from Magdalena, but it is only that spot that seems to do so.
He removes his hands from her body, Magdalena's lower lip quivering slightly. "W- well?"
Cambric hopes that his smile is warm enough to do her some good. He's dealt with way worse before, surely, but maybe not in a high-stress environment as this one where death is the key component for all the occupants in the building. "Your pulse is fine, Magdalena. I can't feel any broken or cracked ribs, but maybe some minor bruising, and your lungs are fine..." relief washes over him at the way Magdalena's body, which has been tense the entire time, softens and folds as if she's sinking into the wall some. "How's the leg?"
She swishes her foot to the side some so it causes her knee to bend. "Some stinging, but nothing too bad..." and she stops, looking at him, he raising an eyebrow. "You're a District 8 field medic, aren't you?" Magdalena asks. He nods, and then pauses for a moment, staring at her face, she bristling some. "What?"
He shakes his head, quipping a small smile. "Just- just a memory of something, it's nothing."
It isn't nothing, and he has never been a nothing sort of guy, not in the slightest. It had just been another normal day in the hospital, but Cambric is stationed in one of the makeshift ones down in the lower end of District 8 near the factories, where the sky is a tainted, brackish black as the fumes rise into the clouds. One minute he's fine, stocking away bandages, and then an explosion rocks the tent, causing the flaps to fly open, and the ground to shake. Rushing outside, he cannot believe his eyes as a large fireball, perhaps the biggest explosion he's ever seen in his life rips into the air, fouling the already darkening canvas with another pile of soot. Shortly after, as a few other officials who have had more training than he has rush forward, pulling out stragglers and injured workmen, when there's one that is much worse than the other, a boy about his age entirely writhing in pain, his uniform on fire, soot following him in a diverted wake, and Cambric leaps into action.
It is when he meets him... the love of his life, looking at the boy's liquid crystal eyes, a sharp influx of aquamarine through a peal of dirt, dust, and ash, the boy's hair the same color as his eyes, the deftly cut jaw and strong muscles... how lucky Cambric is that he's the medic to nurse this guy back to health. Days after recovery, the kid returns, allowed for a small, extremely meager leave in working as the hole in the factory wall is rebuilt, and the faulty machine that explodes replaced, and he gets a full look at his patient in all of his glorious light, and he is breathtaking. It doesn't take too much longer after that when Cambric's lips are on his, tasting of taffy and leather and rubber and textiles, but it is a heavenly kiss swimming in a sea of sugar, Cambric's head swimming in a haze, and the love he has for the medical field shoots straight up... until Reaping Day.
He doesn't dwell on that thought any longer, Cambric shaking his head. Magdalena quips a small smile, as unbeknownst to him, there's an entertaining grin likewise on his face. "Thinking about someone special?" she asks.
Cambric shrugs his shoulders, deciding to sit likewise as her up against the wall. "My boyfriend," he says. "I met him after he was injured in a factory explosion, and I nursed him back to health and-"
"That's cliché as hell," Magdalena laughs, and he smiles likewise.
In his time in the Capitol, Cambric has not felt the warmth that he should, feeling his boyfriend's arms wrapped tight around his chest, or how supple hands dig into his hips, fingers curling into his already curly hair, or the sowing motions with a needle, or the bright looks of hope in any kind of patient's eyes... all of it has been replaced the moment the escort, without wearing any kind of wig in some ridiculously tall high heels calls his name, his boyfriend who is not even of reaping age wanting to break forward out of the crowd, and Cambric's eyes tearing up as he makes his way to the stage, never taking eyes off of his boyfriend while he makes his way to the stage, joining Magdalena there, shaking her hand, smiling for the cameras...
This is the first stroke of happiness, all over an injury.
"Do you mind getting injured more often?" he jokes with her.
The two laugh, and Cambric's heart settles some more.
Satin Spinel: District 1 Female P.O.V (18)
"You wanted to see me?" asks Cyril, the uniform restrictively tight on his body, he standing over with his district partner, Satin Spinel by the knife throwing station. The sword he is holding in his hands swing lackadaisically back and forth, the sharp end occasionally scraping on the tile, causing Satin's lips to twitch into a frown at the harsh disturbance. She nods at his question though, for wasting her efforts and breath on a simple agreement is not worth the time, for she can apply that breathing to elsewhere. She stands in the center of the knife throwing station, this being the fifth time over the last two days she's found herself wandering over to the station. It is what she is the most comfortable with, sure, but there are other weapons calling her name that do not seem as enticing all as the rest.
"I sure did," she smiles at him sweetly, curly blonde hair lightly batting against her shoulder, but all Cyril does is raise his eyebrows, looking unamused. Satin sniffs to herself in disdain; she's always found Cyril to be a rather bore, and definitely not the most interesting person back home at the Academy, certainly not someone that would look good standing next to her on stage, as the 'District 1' team. Her tricks don't work on him, but truthfully they never did, but to everyone else who has yet to know her, she'll undo them like unwrapping a gift, revealing the precious cargo inside. She can hear her mother's voice in her head, applauding her for how good she looks in the outfit, unlike their previous victor who does not look flattering in any of her costumes or outfits. Satin feels definitely exposed in the chariot ride however, as although she is not against using her body in a way to disarm anyone else, being paraded out in the open like that with only some sort of strange strip of covering for her private areas is a bit more than she's willing to bargain.
Sacrifices must be made.
Doesn't she know that? Satin has yet to truly experience it the same way her mother has, but a long time ago, the Spinel family had been the richest in the district. The families of the District 1 victors are not the richest, which is a surprise, but she knows it wouldn't be the case given Cyril's father being victor and her poor partner looking the way he does, like a rocky planet covered in craters. That is neither here or there, but it is the truth, until one day, her grandfather looses the Spinel riches in a bet, and as she's heard the tale a thousand times over, the money disappears down the drain, her mother's father kills himself from the shame, and then poor Saffron Spinel - Satin's mother - is left all alone in District 1 after her grandmother succumbs to tuberculosis. Satin is not going to call herself poor, she has too much self-respect for that, and she's seen the poor, and her family is not like that. She isn't like that, in the very least, but her mother is a different story.
Sacrifices are something she has learned to live with, especially in terms of being a Career in an Academy where the prices do not come cheap, but nor does therapy, and she's sitting at the crossroads wondering back and forth on which dues need to be paid first if her mother hasn't taken them all for her powdery inhalants. Satin bites down on her tongue, the memory halting immediately, she looking back at Cyril, he having his arms crossed over each other, his sword resting against the station. She narrows her gaze at him, trying to not make her look seem intimidating or analytical, for she does not need him at her throat just yet; that can wait, she doesn't even see that event on the horizon right now. She turns away from her partner, standing in the center, picking up one of the knives resting on the table. The blade shines a moonlit silver underneath the golden lights above, the handle a solid black, similar to the color on the training uniform.
"I heard rumors that Aris was thinking of being the Career pack leader," she says, rather short, a hint of distaste hiding in her face.
"Yeah?" Cyril shrugs. "So?"
Satin laughs to herself, which carries just a bit across the room, but Aris is sword fighting with another trainer halfway across the center; he's not going to hear her. Cyril had been practicing on dummies, Anahita not her care or concern since she isn't in the pack, Jules doing some sort of climbing exercise, and Maren taking to task with a spear-like object, but Satin has remained at the knife throwing station. "Aris? You really think you want him leading us?"
"It won't bother me, Satin," but his voice says something entirely different, just by the way he says it, as she sees Cyril shuffle some in his corner.
"You don't have to lie to me, Cyril. If you don't want Aris self-volunteering himself without everyone else's say-so, you tell it to his face."
"Why don't you tell it to his face?" her district partner asks, his voice rising a bit on edge.
She turns back to Cyril, tilting her head to the side some, flattening her lips. It is an expression of feigned surprise, one she has employed before on Cyril and countless others, meant to make the receiving end of the stare feel stupid, but it doesn't take much to make Cyril Barther feel stupid as she's discovered in the ten years of knowing him. "I won't have to say anything to his face, because I am going to be the leader of the Career pack." She's only ever seen it be the male from Two or the girl from One, and she knows right now without ever needing to combat the kid that Aris Lindel is one lightbulb short of brightness, and victory is written all over her face. She thinks about the Career pack last year and all of its faults: romances between rival districts, Valencia never holding her ground in her decisions, allowing outsiders into the mix as that never, ever spells anything else but disaster - and other stupid decisions that cause the alliance to crumble before the other outlier districts are eliminated. If she is the leader, which she will be, then there is going to be no stupid mistakes made, no decisions costing each other their lives, and the pack will stay together until they are the final remaining tributes in the arena, and if that is now what happens, she's failed.
"You?" Cyril raises an eyebrow, voice hinting in disbelief. "Not to be mean, Satin, but-"
"But what?" she looks back at him, eyes flashing a thunderstorm gray. Perhaps, on second though, maybe she could turn on him right now and no one would blink an eye. It is not like the Peacekeepers could just kill her, as that would be unprecedented in the history of the Games. Cyril pauses in mid-sentence as she looks at him, but there is no way in hell she is letting him off the hook that easy. "No, no, Cyril, finish your sentence. Why won't I be the leader of the pack?" He doesn't say anything, picking up his sword to go back the way he came. She slams the handle of the knife down on the table, shocking the girl from Eleven who is standing next to them at one of the archery stations. "Cyril!"
"How do you know you're the best?" he asks suddenly, through gritted teeth, standing straight up in her face.
Satin tilts her head to the side, eyes averting over to the side, as she cannot maintain eye contact with him lest she look at his hideousness. She simply knows she's the best, as that is what the stars have told her up above. A long time ago, which really means it hadn't been forever ago, she's a nice gal with plenty of friends practicing in the training Academy with her friends, until one day she sees the comparisons in how she holds herself and how they hold themselves, all purely on a classist distinction since they have money and poor, dredged out little Satin Spinel picks up the scraps at the table. She wants to scream and shout that she doesn't, as there's her family, and then there's poverty, and she dangles above the line, but her voice is drowned out in the wave of petty rich bitchiness. The little nice act washes away like an already crumbling sandcastle into the ocean, and she throws herself into her training.
Of course, the Academy had not been her primary goal in life, but when her mother begins slipping and falling and Satin doesn't recognize the men she brings over into the house anymore, holding copious bags of that white inhalant her mother seems to love more than her own daughter, that this is what it must be. She's heard her mother say a thousand and one times that misses the 'good life', whatever the good life must be, Satin thinking it has to be about money, and there's only one way to truly make money in District 1. It wouldn't be back before when her grandfather had not lost the fortune in a bet, but enough where it could save her, as Satin had no other family she could count on, it being just her and her mother, and whatever occasional suitor would stop by in the meantime.
There... well, there's also Obsidian, a rich kid in the Academy, but she grimaces now, feeling a bitterness wash on her tongue as his name crosses her thoughts.
It's not the right time or place to think of him now, as she's saying goodbye to her mother, who is pleading and begging her little sunshine star wins so they can return to the good life, when he walks in, not Obsidian, but a Jasper Onyx, and her life completely collapses as her mouth only forms one word over and over again, something she cannot stop repeating, as it is why she retires so early when coming on the train to head to the Capitol, surprising Lance, Kevia, and most of all Cyril, but she cannot stop mouthing that one word Jasper tells her, a sentence that brought down the very barriers of heaven.
Father...
Satin shakes her head again, as Cyril is waiting with bated breath right about now for her to actually do something, but she's never been that sort of girl with the whole idea of all talk, no performance, for Satin Spinel knows how to perform. She picks the knife up that is resting on the counter, where she had last set it down, also picking up the other remaining knife resting on the shelf to her right. Cyril takes a step back so she doesn't club him in the face - perhaps breaking his nose would help his appearance, the red would all mix together, wouldn't it? - and Satin throws the first knife, spiraling her wrist forward to add some spin on the toss. The blade soars down the path, directly into the head of the dummy, slicing the cranium directly in half, through the center, cerulean plastic and manufactured brain matter spilling onto the floor.
The next knife, the other one she hasn't thrown embeds directly into the chest of the dummy with so much force, at bulls-eye, that the dummy tilts over onto the floor with a resounding crash.
She turns back to Cyril, an impressed look on his face.
"That's why, Cyril," Satin says smugly, tapping her fingers on the desk. "That's why I'm the best, and why I am going to lead the Career pack."
If anyone wants to disagree with her, sure, that's fine.
She'll have a knife for them too.
Ponty Carr: District 6 Male P.O.V (17)
He's normally, and very much so slow to anger, but something about that Amaris O'Hara, his district partner... she makes his blood boil in a way he does not know is possible. He already knew he is not going to be a huge fan of her anyways, from the moment she's reaped and he watches her face turn a thousand shades of vermillion and crimson up and down her body, she shouting at the escort, having to be held in place by another Peacekeeper, and now knowing her occupancy, it is almost a rare taste of justice, given that she is being held back by one of her own, someone she probably likes and trusts... it is too good of an opportunity to pass up, as he sees the look in her eyes, the way she looks at others with a one-two of her head, the same way she looks at him. Ponty knows he's not like the other guys from District 6 that are generally reaped; he definitely is no volunteer. He can't recall ever seeing a male volunteer for District 6. He can't recall anyone volunteering in District 6, no one in the district is designed for it.
Well, maybe Amaris and the hatred that burns in her eyes, but it isn't his concern. He knows right away, just from seeing the darkness that builds on her hands that she's one of those white thugs who hide their faces behind masks, all cowards who cannot show who they truly are because they know if they did, there'd be hell to pay. He's stayed out of it, of the troubles that plague Six, although Six is one of the more tame districts, like a Career district, or Twelve - Twelve's notoriety after Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark dies down quickly in just a few years after Romulus Thread is killed in mysterious circumstances, as they're back to their generally sidelined, courteous, demure selves, or at least that is what some of the other Peacekeepers have said before when stopping by his family shop.
Ponty has been approached already by one of the Careers, the D4M if Ponty is right, someone a lot shorter than him, somewhat stocky, asking about joining the alliance since they're down a member - he figures it is the thirteen year old that had been throwing a fit in the melee dummy corner - but he refuses. He may have strength and he may have some skill with a welding hammer, but there's no welding hammer anywhere around the training center for him to even make a difference in people's opinions of him. Since Ponty has muscular arms, it apparently makes him look automatically strong, and not that he'll disagree with the sentiment, but the less other tributes know about him, the better. The Carr family owns a blowing glass company in the artisan sector of District 6, a family owned business for four generations, maybe a bit longer, as Ponty remembers seeing collective pieces made before the Dark Days began, when productions had to cease.
He and his family have provided windows, dials, gauges, and other sorts of glass necessary for the train and car constructions going on in District 3 and 6, those collective works from the districts all colliding together to send the finished product off to the Capitol. Ponty isn't sure, but his family might be the richest in the entire district. There has been a time or twenty someone has stopped by just to see him because his shirt is off, his face covered in ash, brow furrowed in concentration, only for him to heed no mind. Not many Peacekeepers stop by to ever buy anything, usually a one-off Capitol visitor for some sort of important business meeting or evaluation that will select something he himself has personally made, but he's heard the rounds of gossip as there is always someone stationed in front of their shop just in case some scoundrel decides to steal one of their expensive pieces, given one piece sold could probably feed a family of four or five for three months without having to work another day on the train tracks or in the truck ports.
Ponty currently is standing on one of the mats in the training center, off to the side, for he isn't practicing or holding onto a spear or a sword or a trident, but a staff. The wood is firm in his hand, unbending, it won't break no matter how hard he smashes it against a post. A mechanical dummy stands in front of him, armed with its own sort of weapon, some sort of billy club padded in layers and layers of leather. Ponty imagines that the face is Amaris, she trying the ranged weapons, practicing with a sword, and then sparring with a trainer, she breaking the guy's nose, and that has her thrown out yesterday, but yet he finds her prattling about on the floor this morning, having left earlier than he did. Apparently, as she's bragged about it at dinnertime where he's being forced to sit in, the Careers have approached her, the sleazy Aris from Two, but she refuses, which only ticks the kid off even more, but Amaris isn't allowed to touch him.
"Unlike the way she threw me into a wall, huh?" He won't lie, he likes it a bit rough, but if Amaris wants to sleep with him, all she has to do is ask. He won't take her up on the offer, for he'd rather have sex with a corpse or Madam President Rodney before that, but it'd flatter him just slightly. Ponty laughs to himself still after kissing her, from when he punches her in the gut and her elbow in his neck. It is something he decides the moment she yells at him, something about cowardice and strength, and he wants to make the distinction very clear that he has the strength, and if Amaris wants to believe otherwise, she can, but he'll gladly shatter this staff across her face before that ever happens. People like her disgust him. He has money, he has status; his family wouldn't need to work another day in their lives for a few generations at least, but they do, the Carr family puts in the work. He loves what he does, but he's also learned that he isn't better than anyone simply by how much money he has or what his status might be, regardless if it is the upper echelon of Panemian district society, as the label feels restrictive, like someone placing a tight rubber band over his shoulders and expecting him to lift his arms.
He turns the machine on, it whirring to life. The boy from Six turns around, holding the staff in his hands, feeling the way it bobbles along the mat and into the grooves, as if he's feeling the Earth churn underneath his feet. There's the sound of someone's footsteps next to him, just a bit away, but he pays them no mind as they're probably walking towards the fire-starter station, which is directly there. After the District 3 kid takes the hit to the chest and falls off of the obstacle course - Ponty makes it 80% of the way there, as the blows do not knock him off before a good gut punch like what he hits Amaris with has him wheezing for an hour - he and his partner, Ciphra, stay there the rest of the session until lunch. It is just him, Amaris, the Careers, the girls from Seven and Ten, and the boy from Twelve remaining in the center for the second session. Ponty opens his eyes, thrusting the stick forward and up into his hand, as if he's pointing it at an approaching foe.
The machine makes its first roaring noise, the club swinging forward, Ponty turning around and- CLANG! A cry breaks in his throat, one of shock and surprise as his staff does not hit the mechanical arm from the machine, and instead of leather like he expects, the wooden staff is braced up against the end piece of one of the spears, and holding onto that end of the spear... Ponty narrows his eyes. "Amaris," he croaks out, and he swallows the bile that threatens to appear. Rather, on second thought, he shouldn't swallow whatever nastiness wishes to come forth when she's around. If she seems as terrible as she comes across, why would it matter what else she'd be covered in? His district partner smirks at him, her hair tied back into a quick bob, eyes cold and unflinching, and Ponty realizes he's just made himself look like a wimp with saying her name like some dormouse.
She pushes the whirring machine back, it shutting off after being moved from its designated spot, Amaris filling the void. She flips the spear upside down, now resting her arms on the blunt end. "Ponty," she regards, but there is no lost love between them. The two of them, standing in their chariots, do not say a word to one another, and she hardly even waves at the crowds while Ponty drowns up the attention, soaking it in, and even though he says good morning to her simply out of courtesy, she has given him the cold shoulder... until now.
"What do you want?" He cannot help the scowl that crosses over his face. His parents would be disappointed with how he's treating a lady, but that is where he raises a hand and wants to tear his hair out, for Amaris O'Hara is no lady. "I'm busy."
"Fighting a machine," she says, voice rich and thick with mockery. "All you've done is fight dummies and machines. Why not spar with an actual human being?"
Ponty shrugs his shoulders. "Unlike you, Amaris, I follow the rules," and then he smirks likewise, his skin glowing a darker luster underneath the golden lights. "Besides, no need for me to train with people. If I already kicked your ass, I'm sure I can beat the others." He does not believe that in the slightest, but the way Amaris's eyes light up in a ferocious fury, explosions going off in her corneas, he has her beat; the tiniest little insult is enough to send her in a ricochet flight along the wall. "And all I worry about is kicking your butt."
"Says the kid who couldn't get across the obstacle course today," she gets a bit closer to him, Ponty finding this absolutely amusing, as this must be such a repeat of last time that it nearly gives him deja vu, because she is so much smaller than him and yet his enough liquid arrogance seeping out of her body that she could fill up a Capitol bathtub. "I finished it. I was also approached by the Careers," Amaris lets that bit hang, Ponty rolling his eyes, as if that is supposed to mean something. There have been plenty, plenty of tributes in the history of the Games approached to join the Careers. However, if that is the game she wants to play...
"So was I," Ponty brandishes the staff, holding it a bit tighter in his hand. "The guy from Four asked me."
"The girl from One asked me."
"You wouldn't fit anyways," Ponty smirks to himself, Amaris raising an eyebrow. He's sure they're about to throttle each other in the face any second now. "You're too ugly for them."
Amaris throws the spear on the ground, eyes widening, turning to the color of the darkest night, but Ponty is not about to have another repeat of the train ride, and he is not going to kiss her again, there's no damned way in all of the nine hells. Ponty strikes Amaris across the face with his staff the moment she lunges for him, he backing up the moment he lashes out, for it has Amaris reeling out of shock. When she rights herself, no one seems to have noticed, but Ponty walks forward to her, as this is his domain and she is not about to overstep it and try to take over. He presses the staff into her hand, a welt appearing on her right cheek, swollen and speckled, a tinge of pink on her pale skin.
"I swear to God, I'll-" Amaris starts, but he does not let her finish that sentence.
He steps closer to her, almost as if they would be kissing, Ponty pressing a hand on her shoulder. "I've said it once, O'Hara, and I'll say it again," he's hissing now, through clenched teeth, a vein starting to pop in his neck. "You try to hit me one more time? It'll be the last time you raise your hand," and, before he pushes her off of him as his skin is starting to crawl, "I'm not someone to fuck with, Amaris. I'll kill you,"
Ponty does not care to see what her reaction would be, surely something with a lot of lip sputtering and cries of indignation, but he is no longer her concern, and she should've have been his concern in the first place. He doesn't like her, and he never will.
Alright, ladies and gentlemen, that was Chapter #16: Pushed to the Limits. We've met every single tribute now, woohoo! I would love ya'll, if you review and if you do your typical charts and stuff, to have them updated for I like to keep track of them myself. With us meeting Audhild Olthono of District 9, Cambric Vogel of District 8, Satin Spinel of District 1, and Ponty Carr of District 6, that's all 24 tributes, our full cast shown. As I did with Slaughter, this is the point where I show everyone the break down by ages,
18: 8 ~ (Satin Spinel, D1F), (Cyril Barther, D1M), (Ciphra Longsdale, D3F), (Amaris O'Hara, D6F), (Magdalena Bertha, D8F), (Cambric Vogel, D8M), (Bloom Estrada, D12F), (Mirek Bosco, D12M)
17: 8 ~ (Aris Lindel, D2M), (Jules Harper, D4M), (Seth Cables, D5M), (Ponty Carr, D6M), (Sage Dagoba, D7F), (Rodric Oxford, D10M), (Zola Taonga, D11F), (Vanya Vasiliev, D11M)
16: 5 ~ (Maren Johnson, D2F), (Tach Andon, D3M), (Sophiana Delarosa, D5F), (Jason Lacey, D9M), (Vivian Whiplash, D10F)
15: 0
14: 0
13: 2 ~ (Anahita Cascade, D4F), (Roanoke Arkus, D7M)
12: 1 ~ (Audhild Olthono, D9F)
Look at the skew, ladies and gentlemen, haha, 16 of the cast are seventeen or eighteen years-old, and we've got three young ones. Next chapter, #17: Locked Out of Paradise, is going to be our Private Sessions. This will be shown from a Capitol character POV as I did in Slaughter, and likewise for Slaughter, I show every tribute's session as otherwise I wouldn't find a way to be fair - no, not every tribute gets an interview, that would be too much, it's why I didn't ask it on the submission form - so it will probably take me a bit longer to get through the bulk of the chapter than usual, as my last Private Sessions chapter was 10k, and I will most likely reach that same number if not higher.
Thank you all so much for reading. I hope you review and let me know about this last batch of tributes. I love you all so much! Have a great day! Bye!
~ Paradigm