quiet temptations {gryphon}

knuckles
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quiet temptations {gryphon} Jun 29, 2017 10:56:07 GMT -5

Post by knuckles on Jun 29, 2017 10:56:07 GMT -5

Chester Meisenzahl

Training is for the weak, and yet I find myself moving around lifting up weapons, climbing up ropes, and creating fires. It's important to know how to survive, but right now I have a chance to put it all aside. It's time for dinner, and after training for so long, an amazing appetite has been worked up. Back in seven, I never had this much food, and it makes me jealous. People here in the Capitol eat like it's all they know while residents within the districts are starving. My family never had enough, yet I had the food I needed. The forest is plentiful if one knows exactly where to look.

My stomach rumbles, and I'm trying not to drool as I place various items of food on my plate. Some I've never seen before, but reading the name does little to help me understand. District four has fish - why would anyone eat anything that still had eyes after being cooked? And not to mention those pincers. Just look at them. They look deadly -

Do they really eat this?

Shaking my head, I move on piling more and more onto my plate. Wouldn't hurt to gain some extra weight before venturing into the hunger games. Dying of starvation isn't an option, and the more fat I have the better. Once the tiny plate is full, I look around taking in the entire room finding an empty table in one of the corners. It's best to stay alone and away from everyone before they figure out who I am. All they need to know is my name, and that I volunteered for the hunger games.

Taking my seat, I begin chowing down. Manners go out the window because I've never had this much food in one setting before. Winning the cheese wheel from the highland games gave me enough food for a while, but it's still nothing compared to what's sitting on my plate now. Part of me wonders if I'll make myself sick eating this much, and the other half of me is telling me to go for it.

The first thing I try is sweet potato pie, and man I feel like I've died and gone to heaven. It's just a dream because the angels would refuse to let me in.

[googlefont="Julee:400"]

Last Edit: Jun 29, 2017 10:56:42 GMT -5 by knuckles

lest we forget [the characters]

credit to Zoe

Gryphon
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heading to cloud nine

quiet temptations {gryphon} Jul 1, 2017 15:47:46 GMT -5

Post by Gryphon on Jul 1, 2017 15:47:46 GMT -5

McCarthy Balmain

table made by tom <333333

It isn't long before night takes over the sky above the annoyingly beautiful extravagance of the Capitol, and it's time for us to have one last meal before bed.

But all I've been really hungry for is the skin on my lips as I bite down on them in anticipation of what's to come, and concern over what I'm made of for it. They're red with irritation and small bleeding cuts can be seen as I stand and stare at various stations in confusion, hesitance, or maybe even both.

All I'm really good for is working a needle and thread, so I know I can at least patch myself up in the arena and maybe even others too if they need to be--but there's no way I can stab somebody to death with something as small as that.

There's no way I can stab somebody to death at all, but I also know that if I want to go home, it's what has to be done.

Yet Death looks much more welcoming--he could take away these red binds faster than any human being can and will in my entire life.

Or what little I have left of it, anyway.

I might as well be dying right now because with each passing day, it grows more and more difficult to tolerate these wrappings on my skin and the unfinished path tied around my pinky, but I guess that'll have to wait.

Maybe if I'm lucky enough, a Career or another tribute who was chosen to be the lucky one that gets to kill me will make it instant. Flatten the side of my face, shove a knife or sword in my eye, hell, just cut my entire head off even if you want to.

I don't see any benefit in making me the last one standing when you've got another Fray here to take home, or an Izar to keep alive this time. What about the Lowe girl? She could use the crown and a trip back to her family the most.

But not me.

I will not offer anything if I end up a victor. I may have people back home who'd like to see me be one but they're all in misery,

and one of them is even a cause of my own.

It would make no difference, and I think that's even sadder than just only one of us getting to live at all.

I trail behind all the others to the cafeteria and take small helpings of this and that, things that I don't take a good look over but believe I could try to eat regardless, just from a first glance. When I turn to face the tables however, all of them are taken.

I guess I do need to talk to at least some of these guys during our time here, don't I?

Heavy sigh and frown, I look around for the emptiest table there is and spot a boy--about my age I think--unapologetically painting his face with the bread and crumbs and paste of his food. Poor guy must not have been living too well either, but at least he found himself a huge craving for some of this stuff.

I don't know if I'll ever get myself to touch what's on my own plate.

I slowly stride over to his table and without meeting his eye at all, take a seat across from him and begin tossing and turning over what I ~~won't~~ have for dinner.

I can only hope he acts like I'm not even here.

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knuckles
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quiet temptations {gryphon} Jul 1, 2017 17:35:22 GMT -5

Post by knuckles on Jul 1, 2017 17:35:22 GMT -5

Chester Meisenzahl

It's been a challenge living in the Capitol. Seeing the fancy walls, watching as the world turns around and around. Looking at the funny dressed people wondering if they'll ever care. All the food they could ever want to eat without knowing about the starving kids back in the districts. Sometimes I can't help but wonder what life would feel like living here in the Capitol as a permanent resident, but I think now of how much I hate them. They have more money, more everything than they could ask for, and they do silly and stupid things - why dye the color of your skin to a disgusting color? It's beyond my wildest imagination.

But as I look around at the full tables, I wonder just how much of a target I'm making myself.

Making friends isn't what I came here for, and eating all this food isn't going to help me in anyway except maybe put a few pounds on before dying in the hunger games. Hunger is such a strange thing, and I'm trying all this food, shoveling it down my face as fast as I possibly can - I want more. It's absolutely delicious, and it makes me feel like I'm never going to have enough. The day it's all taken away is the day I'm going to fall. Having enough only means so much, but once I'm inside the arena, the lack of food will surely make people loopy. I've gone hungry. I've nearly died of starvation while growing up, and yet I'm still alive. I've proven time and time again that I am a survivor, and maybe I can survive this.

But I'm all alone until a tribute sits down at the table I took for myself.

My first instinct is to stand up and move away - I was here first, and yet as I look around I realize every other table is full. A silent sigh leaves my chest, and this boy doesn't even look at me, he doesn't talk or anything. He just sits there looking at his food. I have a chance to offer a friendship, or to put him down further than he appears to be right now. But in all reality all I care about is devouring my food that's sitting on my plate and getting more.

I finish chewing the food that's in my mouth, and I follow up with a drink of water that fills the cup swishing it between my teeth trying to make sure there's nothing stuck between them. Silence is awkward, and maybe he could use a friendly hello, a pick me up, anything to help him out, but if I remember correctly, he volunteered for this too.

Why look like a lost kid when this was a decision he made?

Some of us here didn't have a choice while a few of us did.

The fork slides out of my hand landing on the table with a clang. My tongue slides along my lips, and I try to continue eating, but doesn't he know it's rude to sit in front of someone and not even say a word? Teens don't have respect these days, and I want to prove a point. But making enemies in front of everyone here isn't what I need to do.

I almost feel bad for him, and I would if he wasn't at the Capitol for the same reason I am.

I sigh;

"It's okay to talk. It's okay to not be alone."

[googlefont="Julee:400"]

lest we forget [the characters]

credit to Zoe

Gryphon
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quiet temptations {gryphon} Jul 1, 2017 18:10:54 GMT -5

Post by Gryphon on Jul 1, 2017 18:10:54 GMT -5

McCarthy Balmain

table made by tom <333333

For awhile we stay like that, him feasting upon his selections and me struggling to even so much as lift mine to my rosy lips and my eyes to his. I can hear loud chewing and the sound of liquid being tossed around in his mouth before his glass clinks back onto the table, and that is the most he "says" for me to hear.

I almost feel like I've gotten away with having to bother him for a seat when the others are occupied by other groups, smiling and laughing and making light conversation as if we weren't going to kill each other in less than a week.

It's strange, how they can all be like that. Not dreading the day we rise into whatever the hell they're going to throw us into this time, when we won't have the cool air conditioning of the gym anymore or the privilege of eating food like this; our own rooms to sleep in, our own avoxes that I don't even need, the glittering wealth of the Capitol to be flaunted at us by anyone, any chance they get.

Not thinking about how we're going to fight for survival and the supplies needed for it.

How we're going to cut each other open and leave ourselves bleeding out onto the environmental floor, red upon red upon red and it's all you see, hear, think, taste, feel, breathe--

"It's okay to talk. It's okay to not be alone."

Almost.

He sighs at me before speaking these words, but they're so sudden yet so needed that I forget how to hold my damn fork and it clumsily falls out of my hand onto the plate, metal loudly meeting the edge of it before falling onto the floor.

Fuck.

The hand shakes and I slowly look up at him, brows furrowed, eyes locked on mine and I feel like every inch of me is now being scrutinized all the way down to my soul, I'd much rather suffocate into Death's arms from this red thread tangled all around me instead of have him watching my every move because he's doing it so intently, not to mention what he just said really hit me because I might as well be alone.

Mom, Dad, brother, sister and I--we might as well be when nobody wanted to hear the truth. When nobody in our neighborhood tried to help us. When none of our friends reached out because they wanted to help us, not because they were asked to--even if there was Holli.

When Holli--

Fuck that coffee cake.

I want to forget how it tasted.

"S-Sorry." I quickly return to my plate despite not having a clean fork now for it, which an avox comes to collect as I pick it up and hand it to her, becoming frozen to the bench. "...I just thought you wanted to be left to your food."

I want to forget how I'm sitting here with a needed explanation to give for my silence.

"Didn't mean to be rude, I thought it was better to mind my own business."

I want to forget how everything feels right now.

Last Edit: Jul 1, 2017 18:17:27 GMT -5 by Gryphon

Made by the lovely moon(stone) <3

knuckles
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probably flailing over something

quiet temptations {gryphon} Jul 3, 2017 18:26:23 GMT -5

Post by knuckles on Jul 3, 2017 18:26:23 GMT -5

Chester Meisenzahl

For a moment my words hang loosely in the air, and yet I still find myself glaring at the guy sitting here. Sitting silently may have been the best option, just leave him alone and perhaps an unspoken friendship would've formed, but right now all that matters is the silence has been broken with an axe from seven. He looks terrified, and part of me wonders what his life is like at home. Something strange is happening, and I keep shoveling more food down my throat. Manners only go so far, and I have learned what it's like living in a world where my every movement is caught on tape.

"S-sorry."

His words are quick, and he's stuttering. It's almost like he's lost, and yet I'm the one who's in control. My life has been built for this moment, a chance to rebuild myself while the rest of the world pushed me down. Mother and father said they cared, but I quickly learned it was all a lie.

Part of me wants to laugh, but the slightly nicer side of myself keeps a straight face.

An avox collects the fork he dropped, and he freezes for a moment. Watching his every movement becomes something to pass time. Fear is such a valuable thing, but right now the fear of another human only presses further within my bones. My aunt and uncle swore I was rude, swore that sitting silently during a meal was very improper, and right now I'm still wondering why I even spoke. It's obvious it isn't the smartest move I've made, and I've scared this kid more than I thought I would.

It takes all I have to stop laughter from bubbling over. It's wrong, but when did I ever care about right and wrong? Only liars exist in the world, and I'm sitting here wondering who's telling the truth.

Sighing quietly, I look away before lifting my napkin to wipe my mouth. Silence is always the answer. It keeps people calm in the harshest of environments. A broken calm before the storm. Right now we're all gathered in the eye awaiting the rest of the storm to hit us. It's a shame, really, but none of that is fact or fiction.

"I appreciate the thought." My voice is quiet and emotionless. Not a single word matters, and I'm about as amused as this piece of meat lying on the plate in front of me. With a quick nod of the head, I take a quick swig of the water; "I understand not wanting to be rude. Most want to be left alone. Smartest thing to do kid. Keep to yourself and stay away from unwanted attention."

A casual grin slowly spreads from ear to ear - Do I tell him my name or leave it to chance? It doesn't matter because soon we'll all be faceless as our lives flash through the sky for the sole survivor to see. "And yeah, I like to eat my food, but mother and father always refused to eat in silence." I pause for just a moment lifting my glass before inhaling the largest breath possible; "The name's Chester."

It might be a lie, but it's one this kid doesn't need to know because every truth is shared with a slight exaggeration. Silence makes enemies while talking can make friends.

And that's all anyone ever needs to know.