breathe in | {jequirity/dustyn} | blitz

gamemaker 💀 hades lochlan
Administrator

7,692 POSTS
last seen Apr 23, 2024 18:13:19 GMT -5

— 🥀 —

breathe in | {jequirity/dustyn} | blitz Sept 28, 2015 19:14:39 GMT -5

Quote

Post by gamemaker 💀 hades lochlan on Sept 28, 2015 19:14:39 GMT -5

DUSTYN CHASE

The nature stations were all a joke. Not a funny joke, ether. All the trees were too perfect, grown under the care of false lighting and temperature control. None of the trunks twisted for the sun and the leaves were all an unnatural shade of green and it was nothing like back home. He had left Bette's flowers in his room to soak, but he still felt them against his wrist. He still heard the birds and saw the sunlight in Bette's hair and that was real.

This was just sad.

"District Two does it better," he said to the girl who struggled to build a fire next to him. "Way better." She had one of those faces that probably seemed familiar to everyone. Dark hair, eyes like cold coffee, and skin like cream, with a round, pretty face and thin lips. He thought, perhaps, he recalled watching her reaping on the train with Beretta. District Six, something-Eckhart, if he remembered correctly.

"I'm Dustyn. And you look cute when you concentrate."

{table: zoe}

AND MY HOPES, THEY ARE HIGH
I MUST KEEP THEM SMALL
I TRY TO RESIST
BUT I STILL WANT IT ALL

^{I AM A GARDEN OF BLACK AND RED AGONIES}

arx
Retired Staff

2,426 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Apr 23, 2024 12:58:45 GMT -5

literally so gay, doing so many crimes

breathe in | {jequirity/dustyn} | blitz Sept 28, 2015 19:54:21 GMT -5

Quote

Post by arx on Sept 28, 2015 19:54:21 GMT -5

Jequirity Eckhart

♫

in this white wave

I have got to be the worst tribute in the history of tributes.

It's bad enough getting Reaped, but being horribly incapable of learning how to do anything right is what's really going to get me - dead. Ripred, I'm so dead. I'm no good at any of things they are trying to teach me. Sword slashing? I can barely life one. Knives only make me cringe, reminding me of a past I'd really rather forget. I can't hit targets or build a trap. I can't even build a damn fire! I growl and toss the useless wood aside.

Ask me to play a piano, a violin, viola, cello, harp--- That dream is dead. I'll never play another instrument ever again. If only lighting a fire was as easy as playing Ernst’s Variations on “The Last Rose of Summer” ...

"District Two does it better."

I tried to hide my fear but I jumped all the same, picking up the firewood again and trying to start something. Maybe if he thought I was busy he would leave me alone? (Ripred, I can't talk, he can't make me, I will not do it --- shit, I'm panicking, no, no panicking just building a fire, just ignore him, he'll go away that's how boys work right?) I stop my hands from shaking by shoving them into my lap.

"I'm Dustyn. And you look cute when you concentrate."

Great, one of these boys.

I roll my eyes at him so he can see it, give an exasperated huff to top it all off. But on the inside my stomach is churning and my heart is racing. I can only pray he doesn't ask any questions. Because I can't answer them. Not in any language he speaks.

in this silence, i believe

"I run on the road, long before I dance under the lights."

gamemaker 💀 hades lochlan
Administrator

7,692 POSTS
last seen Apr 23, 2024 18:13:19 GMT -5

— 🥀 —

breathe in | {jequirity/dustyn} | blitz Sept 29, 2015 20:35:04 GMT -5

Quote

Post by gamemaker 💀 hades lochlan on Sept 29, 2015 20:35:04 GMT -5

DUSTYN CHASE

He waited moment after moment and then came no reply, pardon a simple roll of her eyes and a cold shoulder. He guessed that was fair. In less than a week they would be in the same arena, and only one could come out. Would it be this girl?

Not if the arena was frozen, he realized.

But he decided he would make sure that wasn't an option. "Move your hands down when you twist it." he instructed, picking up his own stick. "No, like... Like that." After a few spins, smoke billowed from a small pile of brush. He watched as the embers became flames and the flames danced as they grew, then fell sickly as they began to die out. They had nothing left to consume after their brief, beautiful, terrible reign and, oh, how relevant that was to Dustyn Chase: the boy who was destined to die just as quickly as everyone learned his name.

"What's your name?" he asked, keeping his eyes on the remnants of the fire, not daring to look at her, not daring to let her know how terrified he was, beautiful or not.

Besides, beauty didn't mean all that much in a place like that. If it did, people like Tiger would have won hands down. Luck, that was what mattered. And for people like Dustyn, the mere fact of them being there was the beginning of their bad fortune. That was why careers were feared so much typically: coming here was not a death sentence to them, but a dream come true. Luck worked in their favor, they thought. Usually.

Because Dustyn was a career, wasn't he?

And as he stared at the flames he had to blink away the tears so no one would see.

So maybe he wan't a career after all.

{table: zoe}

AND MY HOPES, THEY ARE HIGH
I MUST KEEP THEM SMALL
I TRY TO RESIST
BUT I STILL WANT IT ALL

^{I AM A GARDEN OF BLACK AND RED AGONIES}

arx
Retired Staff

2,426 POSTS

Pronouns: she/her
last seen Apr 23, 2024 12:58:45 GMT -5

literally so gay, doing so many crimes

breathe in | {jequirity/dustyn} | blitz Sept 30, 2015 12:33:29 GMT -5

Quote

Post by arx on Sept 30, 2015 12:33:29 GMT -5

Jequirity Eckhart

♫

in this white wave

Go away. Walk away, strut, whatever it is Career boys do --- leave.

But he doesn't.

"Move your hands down when you twist it."

I glance at him as he stoops to pick up his own stick. I watch, trying to replicate the motion, figuring he must know what he is doing being from District 2 and all. But I'm really a lost cause --- he really should just leave... I spin the stick a few times, the result being me looking like an idiot and him masterfully getting smoke to rise from the wood. "Like that."

Dustyn Chase, District 2. I'd make sure to recall his name when I didn't die of hypothermia in a few days.

"What's your name?"

The stick I had been spinning slips from my grasp, clanking a bit on the ground as it rolls away from me. Pounding heart, sweaty palms --- (No, not now. A panic attack is certainly not how I want to be remembered. Shit, shit, shit.) I keep my hands from shaking by folding them in my lap.

I touch my hand to my throat, then press my index finger to my lips. It was good an explanation as I could give without --- I swallow the lump in my throat and reach for the stick --- speaking.

I smile at him despite the churning of my stomach; he deserved an apology.

in this silence, i believe

"I run on the road, long before I dance under the lights."