Trouble at Oreo's Place (Thundy, Prenten)

"Your attitude is like a box of crayons that color your world. Constantly color your picture gray, and your picture will always be bleak. Try adding some bright colors to the picture by including humor, and your picture begins to lighten up." ~Allen Klein

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Hmm, what color should I paint the sun? Oreo asked herself as she stared straight at the outside of her bedroom door, then peering down towards her vast amount of paints. A normal person would take one look at the door, look down at the paints without a second thought, and paint the sun a normal yellow color. But why did the sun have to be restricted to just yellow? It was her creation, so she was going to paint the sun something much more exciting then yellow.

Maybe a pink? Or red? I wonder what it would look like if it were blue? Meaning that her sky wasn't blue either. She had chosen for the sky to be yellow, which was also why she hadn't picked that as the color for the sun.

Blue it is, then.. She thought to herself, picking up a different paint brush and dipping it into a light blue colored paint. Just then, a noise from inside her bedroom surprised her and caused her to drop the paint-covered brush, sending splatters of light blue all over the white carpet. She shrieked involuntarily and she could hear Cryo's footsteps pounding up the stairs, coming to investigate the problem for her.

The noises got louder from inside of her room, and she could hear her precious self-painted lamp fall off of her bed-side table and crash to the ground.

When Cryo knocked on the door, Oreo realized that the paint was most likely still wet, but she forgot this when he opened the door up a sliver and looked in. "Careful!" She said. standing back nervously, too afraid to look and see what, or who, was causing all of the commotion.

She didn't have to look into the room, though, because the creature causing all of the noise jumped towards the both of them.

It was a dog. Not just any kind of dog, either. A huge, growling, "I want to hurt you!" kind of dog that had most likely climbed up the stairs to her balcony, and into her room.

Oreo gasped and stumbled back a few steps, knocking over her paint set and staining the carpet with a rainbow of colors as she fell backwards.

When the dog advanced towards her again, she faintly recognized it as the untrained, vicious dog that her closest neighbors had just bought as a guard dog.

Being her normal self, Oreo didn't do anything as it lunged towards her, not wanting to hurt it. She attempted to back away and stand up at the same time, but only ended up falling once again.

"Your attitude is like a box of crayons that color your world. Constantly color your picture gray, and your picture will always be bleak. Try adding some bright colors to the picture by including humor, and your picture begins to lighten up." ~Allen Klein

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Oreo backed away from the aggressive dog even more, pulling herself along the carpet and not daring to stand up, in case it used that opportunity to attack. It was the most vicious, hateful animal that she had ever encountered, but all she could think was, Just back away, leave me alone, I'm not a threat.. As she stumbled backwards even farther, her hand glanced over one of the many paintbrushes that had scattered all over the floor and she absentmindedly took hold of it and gripped it tightly between her fingers as the only weapon that she had. I don't want to do this.. she thought to herself, even if it was a harmless object and it wouldn't hurt the animal much.

Closing her eyes and wincing, she swung her arm towards the dog, attempting to stab it in the left eye.

A huge sigh of relief emerged from her as her weak weapon completely missed the dog's head. She opened her eyes only to see Cryo picking the dog up and flinging it back where it had come from. Without one word (He didn't seem to talk, which bugged her) he nodded to her and walked back down the stairs as if absolutely nothing had happened.

Oreo sat there for a moment, looked at the paint-stained carpet, then looked back to where Cryo disappeared down the stairs. Without bothering to clean up the paints (she hated the plain white carpet anyways) she rushed after him, her footsteps thundering against the stairs as she followed him into the kitchen.

"Why don't you ever talk?" She asked simply.

Of course, he was an Avox, but she knew that his parents had paid for him to be able to keep his tongue, so he was perfectly capable of speaking. It was why he chose not to talk that confused her the most.

Seeing as it wasn't likely that he would answer her question with speech, she walked to a kitchen drawer and pulled out a piece of blank paper and a pen and held them out to him with raised eyebrows.

Oreo Dutton wasn't ever really sure of this "Avox." If he could even be called such a thing. He could still talk, he was working for her- surely there were worse places in the Capitol to be working; with more strenuous jobs and horrible working conditions. She knew nothing about him, which struck her as ridiculous. He had been working there for several months, ever since she had moved out of her parents' home and into her own place for freedom. She could tell that he wasn't truly an Avox, so why was it that he never said anything? Confused and slightly hurt by the idea, she looked over his shoulder. Only a few words were completely legible from where she was standing, so she backed off for a moment and waited for him to finish.

When he finally did finish, however, the words on the paper made her want to turn around, run up the stairs, and hide in her room. I chose not to talk because of the atrocities committed outside of the Capitol. Here, you throw food away needlessly. In places like District 12, death is a common thing. Do you know why they die?"

For a moment, Oreo wondered what his voice actually did sound like. Was it deep or hoarse or squeaky? Would he sound angry? Or calm? She might never know, because he might never say a word to her.

She didn't let herself keep those thoughts in her mind for long, however. The next sensation that hit her was a feeling of complete pain and betrayal, to an extent. She would have thought, she had thought that they were at least decent towards each other, but it turned out that she was wrong. All the while, he was harboring negative thoughts towards her, hating her and everything that had to do with her and the Capitol.

Not that she hadn't thought about it before. Yes, she lived in the Capitol. Yes, living in the Capitol was easier then living in the Districts. But she felt that he was completely stereotyping the whole population. He was inferring that everyone in the Capitol was evil. Was she evil? Frowning, she looked away from him with an embarrassed look on her face and pondered the idea for a moment. Surely she had an easy life, but it's not as if she still didn't have sympathy for the Districts. She was just as helpless as them, when it came to wanting to do anything about the government. She couldn't very well rebel, and neither could they. The consequences were too dire, and she valued her life. Maybe it would be different if she had been born in one of the Districts, where poverty reigned over all else and terror was struck in the minds of all of the citizens. But she hadn't been, though she still felt bad.

So who was he, to go making such accusations? Just because she was born and raised inside the Capitol didn't mean that she was evil. Nor that she didn't care. No, that was not her problem. Right then, her problem was trying to get her helper to speak aloud.

She was angered by his accusations, but she did her best to keep her feelings from showing in her voice, though with complete failure. She almost started tearing up, but she was more angry than saddened by what he was implying.

"I- I do know why, yes. I'm not silly, I know what's causing it. But is there anything that you can do about it? No. Is there any way that I can help it either? No. So please speak?"

Her voice weakened at the end, faltering from confusion and hurt from being insulted as she had been. She had never quite regained his gaze, but she turned her face even farther away and it became and even darker shade of red.

If that was even possible.