As soon as they landed in Thirteen, Cerise put on her greenest face and turned to Violet. "Do you know if I can go up to the surface and get some fresh air? I'm feeling a little queasy."
"Yeah, you don't look great," acknowledged Violet. "I'll get someone to lead you outside."
Violet left and quickly returned with a massive man dressed in black with an earpiece in, who gave Cerise a thick jacket before turning and leading her out of the hovercraft, through the labyrinth-like tunnels of Thirteen and finally out into the sunlight. Cerise was hit simultaneously by the blinding white snow and the blistering cold. If it wasn't for the phone call she was about to make, she would absolutely have turned around and gone straight for any fire she could possibly find. But she needed to make sure that nobody else heard what she was about to say, and so she would have no choice but to brave the weather.
Cerise looked around and found a mostly empty bench. "Would you mind standing behind the bench, but at a distance?" she asked the burly man. "I need some space." The man gave a grunt, then turned around and walked away, leaving Cerise alone on the bench.
Once Cerise felt that the man was far enough away, she took out her phone and dialed the number of her boss and closest compatriot. After speaking all of the various entry-codes to the phone line out loud, she finally made it through.
"How'd it go?" asked Alexios.
"Not nearly as well as we might have liked," replied Cerise. "The extra items were found and pulled."
"Why?"
"The inventory numbers didn't add up."
"And you couldn't go and tamper the inventory?"
"I mean, I could have. In theory. But Violet and Soorim made the inventory, and I had other things assigned to me to deal with before the transport so I couldn't be there to inventory supplies."
"Cerise, come on. This was a perfect plan."
"I can't step too far out of line, Alexios, or I could be in even bigger trouble. Ruby puts protocols on top of protocols on top of protocols to make sure that everything is perfectly in line all the time. If we want to have a shot of me being able to chip away at things in the long term, I need to make sure that I stay on her good side – and really, on the entire Events staff's for now."
"Well, we've gotta do something, Cerise!" exclaimed Alexios, who had done nothing in this particular endeavor. "Our time is running out."
"Give me a moment to think. I'll call you back." Without waiting for Alexios's response, she put him on hold.
Boy, did she have a lot of thoughts about Alexios.
Cerise had somewhat fallen into the rebel group that Alexios ran. Her end goal was to restart the Games and restore the country to the glorious state that it was in under her great-grandfather, but she couldn't quite figure out how to go about it, and so in a classic Cerise move, jumped at the chance to join any group that might help break up her mother's control over the country. And all things considered, she'd done a pretty good job of fitting in, even after blowing her overall goal the minute she joined the organization. That was because she had Alexios wrapped around her thumb with her good looks and her political influence. It was clear that he preferred Cerise to that ticking time bomb, Pacifica. So why didn't he just let Cerise move forward with her plans?
Alexios certainly did not have his own plan of attack for what to do once he had control of the government regarding the Games and the Events (or, really, regarding anything). If he trusted Cerise, which he did, he should just let her come up with a plan and run with it. All he was doing was trying to create small disruptions in society without actually doing anything that would actually cause the governmental takeover he was aiming for. Cerise actually had a concrete plan of attack for how to move forward and the means to carry out that plan. If he just let her take control and run with it, she would do much better than he was doing at actually disrupting the status quo of Panem.
Suddenly, Cerise realized something. There was a way for her to finally get things moving, and to undoubtedly move things in the direction she wanted to go. And as far as she could tell, there wouldn't even be all that much of a risk. In fact, the steps she would need to take would probably help her standing in the government and with her mother. Admittedly, it would put Alexios, and possibly also herself, in a lot of danger. But with great risk came great reward, and now was definitely the time to take risks.
Cerise took a deep breath, then took Alexios off of hold.
"Well?" he asked.
"I have an idea. It's a bit risky, but it just might work."
"I'm honestly down to try anything. It's your move."
A Snow-like smile spread onto Cerise's face. "All right, then. Here's what we're going to do."
Garnet Emerald could hear the ticking of the clock on the wall of the small green room that he and Violet were using. He was trying his best to review the speech he'd be delivering at the Opening Ceremonies that would be starting any minute, but his brain couldn't help but focusing on literally everything besides that speech.
"Where is Cerise?" Garnet asked.
"I'm not sure. She went outside to get some air after the hovercraft ride and I haven't seen her back since," Violet answered, putting the finishing touches on her makeup.
"Well, she'd better hurry up or we're gonna start late. And we can't afford to do that, not here in Thirteen of all places."
"Garnet, she'll be here. It's all going to be fine. Don't get so worried about everything. You're turning into your mother."
"Don't play the mother card with me," Garnet replied, with a little twinkle in his eye.
"Hey, as the older cousin, it's my right to tease you."
"Yeah, yeah."
Violet looked over to her cousin. "Garnet, what's up?"
"I'm just… I'm a bit worried about this whole thing. These Events really just have to go well."
"They will. We have everything planned out so nicely thanks to the team from Thirteen. They're being careful and deliberate, and everything is set down to the minute and the ounce of material. Everything is going to go perfectly. You can trust me on that."
At that moment, the door to the green room opened, and Cerise came in, wearing her dress uniform and with her red hair pulled up in a sleek ponytail. "Sorry this took me so long," Cerise said. "I guess the long ride really didn't sit well with me."
"It's fine," Garnet replied. "Hovercrafts can be rough, especially going this far."
"Yeah."
The two siblings fell silent, allowing a pregnant pause to fall over the room. The thirteen-year age gap between Garnet and Cerise had always made their relationship a little strained, but their mother's shift from favoring Cerise, who was basically the poster Panemian citizen, to favoring Garnet, who was a more difficult and less obedient child, was really the straw that broke the camel's back. Neither sibling could really remember the last time they'd had an actual conversation that was more than just pleasantries, which made Garnet sad the more he thought about it. Then again, Cerise had never seemed to want to have a sibling, as she'd never made any attempt to really befriend her brother, even when they were children. So as sad as Garnet was that he never really had a sister, he recognized that it was probably not him; rather, the fact that they really had no relationship could be chalked up to a combination of many external factors over which Garnet had little to no control.
"Ready to go?" Violet asked, breaking the tension between the two of them. The siblings nodded. "Awesome. Let's get this show on the road!"
The Opening Ceremony went off largely without a hitch. Garnet noticed that the officials from Thirteen seemed rather frustrated by the universal inability of the tributes to march in time, but what did they expect from a bunch of literal children, nine of whom were fourteen and under? At least the competitors were able to be quiet enough that Garnet and (general? Someone) could make their speeches. Then, Garnet got a chance to greet each child individually and pin the medallion representing their district value onto their chest. He found it very enjoyable to talk to each child for a moment as he shook their hand and pinned their medallion to their chest; there was something special about seeing the eyes of the kids light up when they were complemented. And as cacophonous as the wide variety of uniform color-trim color combinations looked, a casualty of letting all the competitors choose their own colors to accompany their district color, there was something endearing and powerful about seeing the competitors dressed in uniform all lined up in a row. It was the most palpable symbol of district unity Garnet had seen in his whole life.
After the ceremony was over and the dignitaries and tributes had exited the formal space, Violet orchestrated the process of getting everyone back onto their hovercrafts to transport the tributes to the Arena and the rest of the Games team back to the Capitol. As Garnet made his way to the hovercraft, however, he was pulled off to the side by Violet. "What's up?" he asked.
"I just got some news from Ruby's guard," she replied. "We've got Alexios Nox."
"What?"
"Yeah. Apparently we got a tip as to his location, and when we got there, he just turned himself in without a fight."
"You're kidding."
"That's what I was told just now."
"No way. No way! There is no fucking way that that's the whole story. You're telling me that the rebel leader who poses the biggest threat to our country's existence, the only rebel leader who is capable of actually causing problems and who knows that, just gave himself up when confronted? There's something else going on here."
"You make a good point," Violet contemplated.
"Come on, let's get on the craft and get back to the Capitol. I don't know what's about to happen, but I have a bad feeling."
*sigh*
Well, this took longer than anticipated.
How has everyone been? I know it's been like a hot hour sine I've updated, and there's not a lot of excuses for that, apart from my mental health absolutely tanking this year. (Also honestly I didn't want to write the whole Opening Ceremonies but couldn't quite figure out how to pull it off for the longest time lol.)
Anyway, hi! I'm back and back with motivation because I have some really fun ideas for where the subplot and the verse is going to go, and I'm genuinely excited for all of you to see where we're headed!
Considering that I basically haven't touched this story for five months, it should not come as a surprise that I'm reevaluating some of my plans for the story. One of those plans is audience participation. I'm definitely still interested in having you all involved because that's kind of the hallmark of my stories, and I enjoy getting to involve my readers in the actual Events. However, I've realized that one of the key disadvantages of audience participation is that it takes a little bit of control over the story away from me, and with what I want to do with this story, I need to make sure that the story goes the direction that I want it to. So I still need to work out exactly what the best route is to take, but I'll keep you all posted.
In the meantime, if you haven't filled out the check-in from last chapter, please do so! Hopefully I'll be back in less than five months with the actual beginning of the Events! I do have a lot in store so I'm very excited to show you all. And by the way, if you still want to sub to OTWT, I have a few slots still open! Feel free to DM me or check out my profile for more info!
Thanks for sticking with me through all of this; I really appreciate it.
Yours truly,
Goldie031
