Don't Break Your Neck Kid [[OPEN!!]]

[Elletnah™ The JabberJay]

Ah! Day three, it dawn just as the other, bright, sunny and way too damn early for Achlys's taste. Thankfully she had finally found something to help her sleep that did not include a chemically induced coma brought on by sleeping pills. She discovered that one wall of her room was like a giant television set and she set it so that it resembled her forest back home, it even got dark in her little imaginary world too. So she laid there and listened to the familiar sound of the forrest and got the best nights sleep she had had since leaving Nine.
Morning on the other hand was still wildly unwelcome and she greeted it with the enthusiasm of a lamb going to slaughter, considering where she would be going in a few days she realized she really shouldn't have thought of that comparison and she jumped in the shower before the gold clad escort made his usual debut at her door.
Exiting the bathroom she found her usual uniform laid across her freshly made bed. Dressing quickly she made her way down the familiar route to the dining room where the escort, mentor and possibly the other tribute sat eating breakfast.
Achlys has some more of the amusing pink fruit and apple slices dipped in caramel sauce, not necesarily a healthy breakfast but rather delicious nonetheless. She zoned out at the escort droned on about the latest fashion in the capitol brought on by there golden entrance at the opening ceremonies and how they hope that the pair will make a similar and just as amazing entrance at the interviews in two days time. Lyssy just seemed to ignore them and didn't realize they were talking to her till the room got eerily quiet. She cleared her throat and asked them to repeat the question. The mentor just wanted to know what stations she decided to try on the last day and she just shrugged and went back to picking at the pink fruit. When she finished she just headed to the elevator without the other having to prompt her and she missed the worried look exchanged between the Mentor and the Escort when she turned her back on them.
On the training room floor she managed to actually be one of the first tributes to arrive and she used this to her advantage heading strait for the obstacle course that had been interesting her for the past two days. She wanted to see just how fast she could be against an actual human trying to attack her and the Gauntlet had been interesting her as she watched other tributes try there hand at the course.
Lyssy managed to be the first in line when they finally started letting the Tributes have a go at it and her first try she didn't even make it to the top tier before being knocked off on to the padding below, landing on her elbow and sending a shooting pain through her arm.
Her second try wasn't much more successful but she was determined to atleast make one full go through the whole course before giving up. She managed to make all the way to the top but got knocked off just before jumping on to the balance beam. With renewed determination she finally made her way all the way to the top and dodged the last opponent before running across the narrow bridge and sliding across the finish line ducking beneath the last obstacle, a red projectile that she just managed to duck underneath as she slid across the finish line across the end of the platform and laughing landed on the net ten feet below. She laughed even harder when the trainers clapped for her and a gamemaker joking held up a sign that had the number ten on it, scoring her on her home run slide across the finish line a biff into the net meant to catch falling tributes from the overhead ropes course.
"Thank you!" Achlys said jokingly, "I'll be here all week!"
She bowed enthusiastically as she hoped off the net and jogged back to the end of the line to run it again, it was she would have to admit, rather fun, despite the constant threat of falling off, but she didn't mind, it actually kept her mind off her dark thoughts of the battle to come.

[Raeoki]

(Ooc: Just a warning, this post is gonna start off coded, then randomly turn all white and usual. Cause I thought I was in a coding mood...buuuuut I wasn't.)

There was no point in sportsmanship. Sportsmanship was just a myth. Especially in the Hunger Games. Quite literally, there were no rules. You could kill, murder, rape any old fool who walked you by, and no one would care, so long as both perpetrator and victim were both pieces the game of politics, and, especially, its grandstand - the creme de la creme of Panemian culture: the Hunger Hames.

Many people believed that only the tributes and, on occasion, their mentors could be considered the pieces of this homicidal annual ritual. They were wrong. This wasn't merely a game of chess, where the pieces stood in stodgy obedience, moving to wherever the hand shoved them. There were snakes in the grass, and they poisoned not just pieces, but also the fingers of their masters. And no one cared. So long as they were apart of the Game - that was the only rule.

Often, it was stated that when a Capitolite thinks of an escort, they think of them as being of some relation, in terms of stereotype, to a dog, or some rodent pet, because they were cheery and loyal, and sometimes, even cute. All of those Capitolites were wrong. Of an escort was to be associated with an animal, a dog and, especially, a rodent was beyond mistaken, to the point of stupidity. No. What an escort was like - what an esc was - was a snake.

Hospes Compleo slithered through the training center. He looked like a snake, with the cold, calculating eyes, and a sense of challenging everyone who dared to glance at him. There were one or two other escorts in the training center that day, trying to scrounge up as much knowledge as they could before their tributes were released into the arena. These were the snakes in the chess game. These were the hit-men. These were the informants. Sometimes, they weren't always the hit-men; sometimes, they weren't always the informant. But they would always be the snake. People were often mistaken by the escort stereotype, where an escort tended to yip and yap and pep and advertise; they were wrong. What they did, every year, past, present, or future, was coerce. The rest, aside from the advertising, were only necessary one-percents.

Hospes, in particular, took great pride in juggling the two jobs with such finesse that the only reason, really, why none of his tributes (I think) had won, was because of their own lack of ability; Hospes had done his job - coercion, as well as advertising - beautifully, and he always would, no matter how many demonic victors slung punches at him.

As of late, there hadn't been too many developments from the training center to make Hospes and the other escorts hiss and rattle their tails. All that was known was that the District 9 girl had shown particular capability with the bow. The District 9 girl. The one that had literally glowed transcended beauty. She and her little male friend had made Adam and Daisa look like rugs, though, when not compared to those lesser-district rivals, the District 8 kids had been quite stunning themselves - in a humanly capable sort of way. The children from Nine, however...

Hospes wondered if he ought to search for them. Search for the girl, especially, if she was as competent with a bow as the Gamemakers had whispered - the foul little gossips. Yet, at the same time, new "heroes" were always emerging, smiling shiningly as they demanded a hammer be brought onto their heads. Let the girl wait...let the girl wait...

Hm, funny. He used to think this mafia-like aspect of an escort's duty to be shameful. All of those scandals that the pretty little news reporters would gasp over, how an escort had stomped on one tribute's hand a dozen times, how one had even snuck into another's room and banged a bottle of wine into one child's ribcage, news the districts never heard about it. Hospes had twisted his lip at such behavior, and would become so angry at the assailants that he wished he could rush over and slap their disgusting, cheating faces. He thought that way until he became an escort himself. That was when he grew attached to the kids (the ones that were beneath his tutelage) - if they were good to him. Then the other tributes simply stopped being children. They were merely obstacles. Horrid, evil obstacles, meant to destroy a sweet little child's life. And then it was suddenly easy for Hospes, to lean over to a rival tribute as he trained, whisper something into his ear, and walk away coolly as the tribute paled, blushed, squirmed - whatever the offended tribute's personality called for.

They were just pieces. What of it? If they weren't prepared for such brutality so early, then that was their fault. The Hunger Games had begun the moment their names had been drawn out - Hell, the moment their squirming, screeching bodies had been shoved from their mothers' wombs! The enemies were all around, as were the attacks. They had to be ready for them. Only carcasses don't watch their backs.

The obnoxious gong of the Gauntlet that was so piercing, so nasal that, at times, Hospes could hear from the floor of District 8 apartments, hit his ears; the signal that the tributes could have another turn on the dangerous thing. he turned, for the Gauntlet could always crop up a few interesting individuals. He had heard it on his way to the training floor via elevator, but by the time he had stepped off, none had been playing the imperious obstacle course. Promptly, though, that had changed.

He neared it, half with snake-like interest, half with parental impatience (such was his paradox). He had always believed that the Gauntlet was a far too dangerous thing for children to be playing on - at least, the twelve-year-old tributes shouldn't go near it; he supposed it was fine for the eighteen-year-olds. But couldn't they have something that more closely resembled a playground? Yes, this was the Hunger Games - but did the tributes, especially the younger ones, absolutely have to break their necks so early on?

It was the District 9 girl (Speak of the Devil!) - Achlys Triffon - who was taking a go at the Gauntlet. Apparently, her skill-set wasn't merely limited to the bow and arrow, for she moved across the platforms with great ease, her sprightly step hardly noticing the frustrated trainers as they swung their foam bats at her. Good Lord, she was at the balance beam before she was even clubbed off! Oh, yes, any old career would have snubbed her, but she was a member of the inept lesser districts - to Hospes, who had seen six whole years of scores of kids being shoved off the Gauntlet before they even reached the second platform, this was a feat.

She went for a third time. It was breathtaking to watch. Achlys slipped past the foam clubs, barely noticing them. She slid through the finish line, the slide somehow bird-like, and found herself nestled in a comforting net. She laughed. She laughed like just another girl.

And this was all Hospes could think: The little thing's a problem, to be certain.

As of late, Hospes was relatively uninformed of Adam and Daisa's progress. He had been told by the trainers that Daisa had shown great brutality to a poor dummy in the axe station, and that was grand, but still - could she take on the Gauntlet? Could she take it on as gracefully, and with fewer tries than Achlys?

She must have been practicing, Hospes decided, as little blossoms of applause bloomed from the impressed hands of the trainers. Achlys's laughter bubbled. Hospes decided to oblige; he clapped slowly, his fingers barely tapping his palm, a second passing between clap. She probably thought that if she could beat the Gauntlet, she could beat the Games; there have been a few low-ranking losers like that.

Yet Hospes had lived long enough to know that assumptions only led to a bruised knee; sometimes, a broken one. He needed to check. He needed to know if this girl would kill his tributes. And he ever so wanted a victor this year; the two tributes he had now - well, one of them, at the least - were such a breath of fresh air from last year's crop. He wouldn't mind putting up with them for a few more years, especially if they offered a distraction from Daniels's tartuffery and fanfaronade.

He waited for the clapping to die down; for her to get to the back of the line; for the attention to turn to a tribute as he skipped and clanged flinchingly about the obstacle course. Then, the Snake struck.

He was too brisk and too silent for anyone to notice; not even Achlys, even when he stood beside her, a statue without a clear pose, his arms inhumanly bent in front of him, as he held his fingers. Hospes stared out of her out the corner of his eye for a while, examining her, trying to determine if she was sadist material. She was a rather cute little girl. Youthful, in a sense. A tad too solemn around the eyes, though, perhaps? Oh, well. It mattered not. All that mattered was that he destroyed her, in some sense of the term.

So he leaned forward. She didn't seem to notice. His mouth was close to her ear. He murmured, voice cold and soft: "Congratulations. Funny, the things you accomplish when you practice, don't you think?"

(ooc: So, I just kinda scared myself writing those last two paragraph. "Squick!" moment, to be sure. Dx I'd just like to note that Hospy did NOT mean to be that creepy...he's not a pedophile, you guys...I swear...

And I'd just like to apologize to all the people whose been waiting for me to post, and are probably looking at this and thinking, "THAT LITTLE BITCH!" I'm sorry. I go where my muse takes me. I'm...I'm sorry... (((((((((( )

[Brave]

HE’S A REAL NOWHERE MAN
SITTING IN HIS NOWHERE LAND
MAKING ALL HIS NOWHERE PLANS FOR NOBODY

Cesil's eyes opened against his will. The room he lay in was black, partly due to it's lack of windows but also due to the fact that the digital wall to his left had been turned off by his hand hours ago. At first the contraption had excited him, he had never witnessed something like it before, didn't even really understand what the world "digital" meant, but it had allowed him to go from a view of the capitol to a view of the ocean- something he had only heard about before - to a view of a wheat field to an image of a forest, a brilliant green forest and it had left him trembling as he stood, staring longingly. He thought he would be able to look at it forever, but he found the opposite to be true. There was too many private things that the forest had on him for the capitol to have too, to many moments of great loss and great gain. That was his entire life, that wooded ground, and here it stood, projected on the wall like it was nothing, just there as something pretty to look at. The forest was much more than that, to Cesil at least. It was the only home he really knew, the only constant provider of all good things. It was there that he had brought up his brothers, brought up his life, brought up his heart. Cesil could only hope that when the time came, it would be there that he would die as well. He had shut it off, after that. He had much preferred the darkness of the room to the painful reminders of everything that had been ripped away from him. He had slept much better under darkness's hand, not peacefully but at least with some sense of security.

He had gone to breakfast, as expected, and had sat quietly alone, the area empty with the exception of the escort, who always seemed to be where he was. They didn't eat with him, however, just lurked quietly in the background, staring at him which at first unsettled him but he eventually tuned it out. He sat quietly, picking through some oddly colored fruit and this bread with a blue spread on it, which he uncertainly tasted before deciding it was okay, tasting a bit like lemon and maybe carrots and something else he couldn't really place. He picked at his clothes a bit as well, a bit uncomfortable with just how well they fit him. He was use to living at large, his clothes generally hanging off of him as they almost always came from his older brother, Onyx, who was somehow even bigger than Cesil. Now, faced with tight, form fitting clothes, he was a bit uncertain. Sure, they were nice, a soft blue color that Cesil could agree with, but they weren't familiar and they weren't his. They made him feel foreign, like a thief, and Cesil once again found himself longing for District Nine. He finished his breakfast with the thought, wiping his face with a napkin, for no particular reason except that he felt it customary, and attempted to stand when he turned and flinched at the sudden closeness of the escort. They just watched him closely in a manner that made Cesil's fists clench, their eyes sizing him up before returning to his face. They gave him a nod them, just a slight inclination of their head before they disappeared, and Cesil was quick to follow their lead and leave, unwilling to linger on the awkwardness of the moment any longer than necessary.

He arrived at the training center late, that he knew and understood. It was already bustling with life by the time he arrived, a bit weary from the previous days swimming sessions, and he shifted about, eyes scanning for familiar faces. He found  one at the gauntlet. Achlys Triffon stood in all her redheaded familiarity, poised gracefully on a platform at the gauntlet, moving with such confidence that Cesil felt drawn to watch. He was familiar with such actions, he knew them well, actually. He had observed them in another red haired girl in another time, a happier one. Try as he might, the thought still brought pangs to his chest. He would keep a wary distance from his fellow tribute. If one thing that encounter had taught him so very long ago, it was that attachment was dangerous, especially to this particular girl. He often placed her and Amira in the same box, and had only recently started to remind himself that despite their similarities, she was no Amira, she never would be. Still, she tangled his thoughts and feelings when he got too close, she would make him do something stupid, and if he wanted to get back to his brothers, doing stupid things would not be an option. He moved his eyes instead from her to the gauntlet. In complete honesty, it had fascinated him from the first moment he saw it. It was just so...physical? It was an entire test based on ability and skill and instinct, something that just screamed out to the hunter in Cesil and well, if Achlys could do it, then certainly so could he.

He approached the course only when a trainer nodded him forward, and he took his first step onto the range cautiously, slowly. That in itself was a mistake, there was no waiting, no planning ahead, just thinking and feeling your way forward. A large foam sword swung towards him, intent on knocking him flat off before he had even begun. He leaped forward without thought, the sword glancing hard off the side of his leg and resulting in an awkward landing, punishment for his mistake.

It took him three seconds to throw all intellectual thought out the window and act on his reflexes, as he would during a hunt. In the end, it had been his body, not his mind that had put food on the table every night. Thinking slowed him down, movement made him go much faster.

He dodged another hit easily this time, pivoting to the side and raising his leg, and then slipped above another hit from the opposite side by repeating the motion in the other direction. He could leap forwards easily from there, onto the next platform in seconds, alert and alive. It was a game of cat and mouse, this course, only this time Cesil was the prey. The feeling was not foreign, however. He knew what it felt like to be hunted. To run for one's life, to evade and avoid and slip and slide up and down hills and through the creek all the way back to the fence. This was no different.

Whack. The sword aimed higher this time, but he was ready for it, he leaned back, ducked and used his hand for leverage, pushing against the platform to move forward quickly, this time taking two platforms before turning fast as the next hit came, this one more accurate as it glanced by his ear, knocking him off center, causing a stumble that he quickly corrected and then moved on from.

He hit the balance beam with a finality. He was going to make it across, no questions asked. The beam might as well have been a branch on a tree, and if there was one thing Cesil was very familiar with, it was trees. He sank into a crouch, bent at the knees, one foot in front to lead, the other in back to support, arms up and low and bent and ready, and from there he moved, catlike and alert and with absolute speed. He was a third of the way across before the first projectile neared him. It's aim was true, going right for his head. He leaned back onto his supporting foot immediately and flattened himself, waiting until it was upon him before striking it upwards, over his head and behind him. He moved on, gaining another few feet before again red flashed, this time at his feet. He slid his footing to the side, stepped around it, over it and then kept going, the end nearing. He was going to make it, there was no way he wasn't-

Smack. Something knocked his feet out from under him. He hit the beam hard, his balance gone, and rolled over, headed down into the net. But the net was not just a net, it was failure, it was the end, it was eleven years ago when the wild dogs has chased him up the tree with his father and he had slipped, and his father had reached out and tugged his hand back up onto the branch, pressed it their firmly, reprimanded him. "You don't let the dogs get you, Cesil," He had told him, so serious in that moment, "You never let the dogs get you," And it was as if again, his father had reached out and pulled his hand, this time up and onto the beam, and that was all that he had needed. He clung to it with that hand, holding tight with all he had, dangling painfully over the edge. He was slipping, he could feel it, the beam wasn't bark, there was no grip. He lunged upwards, finding purchase on the beam with his other hand for few precious seconds before he was forced to remove it, to knock another projectile out of his way. Then he pulled again, pulled hard with two hands and managed, just by an inch, to find purchase with his leg. He flattened himself there as another object flew by him, this time the aim wide, and then pushed himself over and back onto the beam. He stayed down too for a moment, completely still until again another flying object hit him, but he brushed it off and stood again, finally back on his feet. From there it was an easy leap to the finish line, which he crossed just so, panting heavily as he came to a rest, his arm tired from the exertion of holding himself up.

He stretched a bit after the movement, proud but definitely ready to move onto something else- he hadn't shot some arrows in a while, and it would be good rest for his hand. He was about to move over to the station when something stopped him.

At first it was just the red of Achlys hair that called to his attention, the girl stood focused and alert in line to try the gauntlet once more, for whatever reason Cesil couldn't fathom. Once through had been enough for him and had left him almost injured, and he was pretty adamant about entering the games as fresh as he could be. However that wasn't what bothered him, no, it was the Capitolite beside her,  a man, if they still even where people, watching her in a way he knew, in the way a wolf cornered the lamb and the shark circled the fish and the hunter pulled back the string of his bow and waited for the moment he could let it fly.  And had it been anyone else, Cesil would have turned his back on the scene and let it happen, walked away and allowed the strike to take place. After all, of everyone in the room, Cesil felt more than certain that Achlys Triffon did not need nor desire his help. But he wouldn't go, wouldn't let it happen. Not to the girl with red hair. Such an action in itself would be a betrayal to everything Cesil had ever felt and known about himself. So instead he stood tall, squared his shoulders and took the critical steps that would put himself at her side, facing this unknown man. And while he approached them and spoke to Achlys, his eyes never left that of the man that had somehow ended up in the training center. "You had a great run there, Lyssy," He stated, the nickname he had learned from the train coming to his tongue in a surprising manner. He didn't correct it, however, instead just let the phrase linger. The closer this man thought he was to the girl, the better.

tagging Elle and Rae
words 2045
lyrics nowhere man by THE BEATLES
notes hunger games
credits this was made by PARTY POISON

[Elletnah™ The JabberJay]

Achlys watched with fascination as Cescil ran the gauntlet, he seemed to do with ease, minus the nearly getting knocked off several times, but atleast he stayed on. It took her three tries to make it to the very end without getting knocked off and after a few near misses he made it rather far. Then was nearly knocked clean off the balance beam by what had caught her off guard and caused her to slide into the waiting net. With the fervor the trainers went after him with it made Achlys wonder if they had gone easy on her, actually after watching Cescils run she was almost certain they had gone easy on her, it made her more determined to run the course again, and give them a reason not to go easy on her, the other tributes in the arena certainly wouldn't.
She was still contemplating the course when she sensed rather than heard someone approach her from behind. She was about to turn to see when an unnaturally high pitched and disturbing voice spoke almost directly in her ear.
Achlys nearly jumped out of her skin and jerked around to face the man that had spoke and his appearance made her shrink back in horror. He was an escort, one of her fellow lower districts escorts, his tone and demeanor towards her reminded her of how her father talked to her, speaking to her as if she was beneath them. The look she gave spoke of revulsion and disgust. Yes of course she had time to practice thats all she had to do with her life right, practice to be the perfect form of entertainment for the disgusting residents who never have to face the fear of dying for their entertainment.
Her surprise was almost doubled when she heard the familiar voice of her district partner on the other side of her, calling her Lyssy. She had even wondered if he had heard her the day she introduced herself. Was he here to frighten her as well. But he was saying she did well, she didn't particularly think so, not compared to his run, she fell off twice and nearly didn't make it across the finish line, while he nearly fell a few times, atleast he managed on the first try.
She tried to stutter out a reply but felt some small between the two men. Taking a moment to compose herself she addressed the capiotlite first. "Actually unlike your favorite career tributes the only reason I know how to shoot is so that I could survive. And contrary to popular belief, that was the first time I stepped foot on that thing." She attempted to say as sternly as possible. But considering it came from such a tiny frame and her voice almost squeeked out at the end, she failed miserably in that pursuit.
After turning away from the strange looking man she addressed her district Partner, "Thank you, it wasn't the greatest, my arm is still sore from the first fall and I kind of panicked as I slid across the final platform and across the finish line into the net... I thought I was a goner for sure. You on the other hand did amazing, I was holding my breath as you dangled off the beam, I thought for sure you were going to fall. So congratulations on that!" She said, attempting to sound cheerful, but she had never really been a good actress.

[Raeoki]

(Ooc: I'd like to apologize for the shantyness of my last post, and warn y'all that this next one moves a little too briskly than I wanted it to. Oh well.)


She was like some redheaded lamb; so vulnerable, so petite, so soft that only a wolf would take any interest in a plushy thing like her. Hospes almost felt a nip of sorrow frown in his heart as she flinched and looked up at him, with eyes so wide, so...frightened. Almost penetrable, Hospes mused, though why the word "penetrable" had come to his mind, he didn't know why. And then his conscience added: She has such sad little eyes...

His heart wavered; little tremors of mercy erupted in his breast, but somehow did not reflect in his cold, statue-still eyes, for he never permitted such emasculate emotions to surface. And, especially now, any sign of a heart, or even owning one at all, would be detrimental to the Cause. Dammit! He had to remember that! His tributes - he had to remember his tributes. Would they survive, if pitted against this girl? No! he declared within himself - not because Hospes believed it was true, but to keep him going on with his attack. For before him stood a member of, presently, the more elite members of the lower district (her district partner being the only other one), and he had to keep pressing her, no matter how sad her eyes were, to ensure that she was destroyed before she got to his tributes.

The softness suddenly grew a shell. The coldness of the face matched the coldness of the heart, and the ice touched his spine. Now, he was rigid again; cruel again. And, once more, he was proud of the vileness that his rank permitted him.

As one redhead's emotions changed, as did the other: Hospes from merciful to vile, Achlys from lamb-like to indignant. The escort could see the sad little eyes become revolted coals - yet the pain still seemed to be there, hidden behind the newly kindled fires. (He found he liked looking into her eyes, even when his heart was iced over, and the fond impromptu habit proved to reveal many normative analyses.) She simply couldn't shake the lamb off. Hospes's twisted, frozen grin cracked a little wider on his staring face.

Motion attracted his eyes, swift and lion-like. Hospes only brought his eyes up for a moment, just enough to process the approach of Cesil Taprose, the male sacrificial offering of District Nine. Their eyes met; neither's gaze flinched away; Hospes noticed that the boy made a bee-line for him, his steps bold and true. Hospes, being of a more primal sort than the Capitolite stereotype demanded him, automatically knew what this meant: a battle for territory. Hospes deliberately swept his eyes down to the face of Achlys Triffon, making the ocular motion slow and gradual, to show that the lowering of the eyes was an act of his own free will, not intimidation from some stupid boy who wanted to attempt alpha-hood.

"You had a great run there, Lyssy," Cesil remarked as he stepped up to the strawberry lamb. The weird, silly mark of familiarity - "Lyssy" - had a pointed stress that the boy clearly intended to shove into Hospes's will. For "Lyssy" was code for, "This is mine. You can't have it. You can't touch it. Stay back."

Hospes glanced up at Cesil, but kept his face tilted as if he still examined Achlys, so that he peered up at the boy over his thin eyebrows. His still grin twitched into a toothy challenge.

The prize suddenly piped up: "Actually," (Hospes realized that she was speaking to him, and his eyes flicked down to her face) "unlike your favorite career tributes" (What the Hell makes her think I'd even look at those narcissistic dickbags? Hospes wondered, but shrugged the question away) "the only reason I know how to shoot is so that I could survive. And contrary to popular belief, that was the first time I stepped foot on that thing."

Two halves of Hospes suddenly and violently split: one that cried out, Ah-hah! So she IS dangerous! Another that gasped: "Who'd make a cute little girl like her survive with nothing but a bow and arrow - assuming that's what she's "shooting"...Where were her parents? Certainly District 9 hasn't fallen into such economic corruption that little girls have to go around and shoot things just so they can put food on the table...Really, where's society coming to these days? A cute little kid just can't be a cute little kid anymore...God...that's...that's just horrible...

Despite the latter half's long-windedness, the first half managed to absorb the rest of Hospes, as Achlys turned to commute with her district partner, the winning half's want for violence making it the stronger of the two. He only marginally paid attention to her talk; the rest of him kept his attention on Cesil. The boy still had his eyes trained on Hospes, as attentively as a hawk when a fox creeps into its domain. He really doesn't like me, does he? Hospes thought with a creeping smile. And he hasn't even let me say a word to him...rude little thing...

Hospes considered Cesil for a moment, beyond the realms of Achlys. The boy in his own right deserved to be a prize; Hospes had not failed to notice his dynamic feats during his spin on the Gauntlet. The boy was more adept than his female companion. She had needed three tries; he, though he had almost crashed himself, completed the course in only one go. Now, Hospes did not know if Cesil had been as out of practice as Achlys, but still: one go was almost godlike, especially when put in the context of the lesser districts. Cesil had been as triumphant on the obstacle course as a career. To slit his throat, emotionally or physically, just a little, would be an almost obligated effort for any escort who cared a damn about his job, or his tributes. But how? But how...

He looked down at Achlys. His twisted grin became dagger-like.

In an attempt to defend his territory, Cesil had laid the first brick of his destruction.

Achlys had just finished her gratitude and congratulations to Cesil; Hospes decided to spring now, before Cesil could try to drag her away from him. In a direct violation of Achlys's comfort and Cesil's ownership, he stepped forward, then leaned; the sleeve of his crimson suit dragged onto Achlys's bare arm, and remained there, as invited as a virus and just as imperious. Again, his hateful, demonic grin seared next to Achlys's face, his chin just a fly's hover over her shoulder. His voice was merely an intelligible hiss, so low that only Achlys could hear his words with true accuracy. "Second best once again, hm? And you accept it so willingly..." As he hissed, he drew the arm that had brushed against Achlys back, and curled it around her shoulders like a python, caging her in his wintery embrace, sticking the little claws of his hand into the exposed flesh of her shoulder, so he could imprint into her his dominion. "But I suppose that when you're so used to losing," he spat with abhorrent relish, his mouth flinching closer to her face, "you take what you can get, hm?" He chuckled, a strange, thumping chuckle. "But, you know, you can't go for second-best in the Games. You want to know what happens when you get second-best in the Games, my dear?

"Nothing. Short. Of rape," was the hissed, dripping admission. "But you know this already, I'm sure..." Another thump of a chuckle. He pitched his voice higher, and spat: "'Oh, look at me, I can use a bow. I can surviiiiiive!'" he snorted. "Have you not seen how emaciated you are?" He jabbed his finger into her side. "Please. Even after all the spectacular three-course meals my fair town" (he alluded to the Capitol with more than a hint of sarcasm) "has offered you, you can't fill out well enough to even look remotely healthy, nonetheless worthy of a sponsor's time. I do feel bad for your escort; must be hard to advertise a sack of bones like you. I was actually speaking with him the other day." His smirk twisted like a snapped neck. "He feels bad, too."

Completely confused as to how he had managed to squeeze in all those smack-downs without a single interruption, Hospes glanced up at Cesil - the new, true prize - and raised his face from Achlys's cheek. Hospes examined the boy's face, stickily curious to see how the kid would react to the obliterating assault he had made on Cesil's territory. His mouth twisted again, and he added, loud enough so Cesil could understand him completely: "Ah, but at least she has a friendly little knight in shining armor to come and rescue the fair damsel! Pity she won't be able to do much for him..." He patted the frail shoulder he had squeezed his claws into, with such a force that the pseudo-friendly touch was more like a slap. His mouth wrinkled; he stretched a hammy, incredulous brow upward. "Or will he be the death of her? Or will she be the death of him? That's the thing when you become friends with any of the other tributes - the friendship never lasts long, does it? Hah hah! Oh, yes, there's always the question of who will be the first to fall, who will be the weakest link in the chain...But I think I can guess who, out of the two of you..." His gaze swept pointedly to Achlys; his mouth shrank, and became a condescendingly sassy sneer, his eyelids drooping a little with brazen cynicism, to make the portrait complete.

His mind suddenly flashed back to one of his early days as an escort, the first year he had acquiesced to this primal form of escorting. A large, clunky, brassy boy had been a member of the sacrificial crop, and his physique and confidence had proved quite promising. His mind, however, had been beyond inadequacy. Though refused to bow to any insults or pranks the other escorts slugged at him, he seemed quite partial when Hospes whispered in his ear that that year, no land mines would be set in the Cornucopia. The countdown was just a hoax; if he wanted the best weapons and the most delicious food, he'd better rush off as the clock was ticking, when all of his ignorant competitors had least expected it. Hospes's little lie was easily believed. His little scheme had worked. He wondered if the two tributes in front of him would be dumb enough to listen, if he played his cards right...Still, cards right or not, he doubted himself. Really, it felt as if the horrid soliloquy he had just maced into them had been enough, but with the appearance of Cesil, he simply felt that a verbal punishing simply wasn't...enough, to say the least. Hospes had been challenged; he would take the dare to its fullest possible extent, even if that was beyond physical means.

Thus, the ruse was attempted. His arm still slunk across Achlys's shoulders like a lazy serpent, he turned his eyes to the Gauntlet. He decided to change his facial expression to a more relaxed one, the cynicism and sass oozing out of his pores, his face becoming its usual still, lifeless, chilly smile that held no emotion, simply unnecessary existence. "I do pity tributes like yourselves," he chuckled softly. "You go on the Gauntlet, go all the way to the top and beat it, and you can't help but wonder, just for a moment, if you're athletic enough to survive the Games. And then - you're the first to go down in the Bloodbath." He turned his painted smile back to the young ones. "There's one every year. Even then, when they're out of that godawful mess on the first day, they still falter. The terrain strangles them; the climate rots them away. And it's all because they don't know. Spent too much time on this stupid thing." He cast his arm in the direction of the Gauntlet. "It's almost...pathetic," his head head suddenly snapped around so he could stare at Achlys, "don't you think?"

Slowly, his head revolved around so he could peer into Cesil's soul. "You see, you two don't know what they" (he turned his head slowly, and his eyes dug into the Gamemakers, as they ambled around in their perch) "know...Which is surprising; those saintly men" (he referred to the Gamemakers with a touch of satire in his flat, icy voice) "are such chatty old fools. They're willing to spill anything - to anybody except, hm, to tributes, apparently." The corners of his mouth twisted a little higher. "How unfortunate. And the Games is coming up so fast for you two..."

Was that forced? he asked himself. That felt a little forced to me...A touch too rambly, also. He decided it was of no matter. At least he had managed to blacken and bruise the little girl's ego, which could prove critical in the arena. Ego is everything. Especially in warfare.

(Ooc: Eeeeh, the last part is...sorta...flubber. See if we can lead the conversation in another direction, not just a whole, "Leave her alone!" sorta thing. The Lyssy intimidation will keep going, they'll just have other stuff to discuss while keeping on with the main idea of the thread. We don't have to follow in on it, if y'all don't want to. We can just file it under another one of Hospy's impromptu performances, if necessary. (He's quite spontaneous when he wants to be.) )