house of origin ➥ 90th mutt team

Others had tried and failed, time and time again over the years, always so focused on bigger and stronger and it never worked. The dragon was slain, the war elephant slain, the shadow monster slain. All the biggest, all the baddest: slain. Amateurs.

He may have thought himself a god, but Hades Lochlan was wise enough to know he could not rule alone. No one could. Enter the team, fronted by Saber as the official junior and featuring face after familiar face lined up and ready to do their duty to the games. He rounded up the best of them, screened them personally so that they understood the new parameters, understood exactly what was to come. It wasn't ever supposed to be about bigger. It was supposed to be about more, sure, but mostly, it was about being hungrier. The mutts in this arena were soldiers in a war- designed to kill any who did not belong. And they didn't work alone anymore, no- they attacked in groups. Entire packs of already previously-feared muttations.

Of course, he knew their specific instructions this time were to avoid any deaths. He was on edge all morning, shoulders rigid and neck stiff as he watched each careful movement of his staff below. At any given point, his finger hovered over the override button- practically vibrating with nerves and ready to twitch a bit too far at the slightest provocation.

He initially watched Quartz with a pleased smirk. Plant mutts were notoriously under-utilized and he was pleased to see Petelia's want for that to change. And then he noticed her lean forward a bit too much. Her eyes began to narrow a bit too far, her bottom lip being bitten a bit too hard. She was going for a kill. Of course, she had no idea what the situation was with Parker and his absolute fucking idiot coworker, Maryn. He was furious about what had transpired already, and was both annoyed and reluctant to let it continue, but in fairness, Parker had followed command perfectly thus far. Punishing her seemed unreasonable, and even though a reminder of how easily expendable she was might have served Parker well, Hades thought better of it.

By the time Quartz had executed the command, Hades was already overriding its system and forcing a reconnection. He watched as Parker and Wes saw their opportunity and took it, smirked as they got away. Put on a very convincing poker face as Petelia came to realize the glitch's occurence.

"Running a diagnostic now," he said in a level, slightly irritated tone. Then, "someone get maintenance here now." He sighed.

He'd have to fire someone for this.

He hoped Maryn's game continued working, because if it all caught flame, he wasn't getting burned. In fact, as much as he wanted to root for her, he'd sooner douse the bitch in gasoline before he let her take him down with her. That meant stuff like this couldn't happen on his watch without serious punishment. Maint crew was Yamil and Copper today. Quickly, he decided he'd fire Copper. He had a kid but Hades was pretty sure the partner was also working, so. Or was Copper the widow? Meh. Yamil left cinnamon rolls in the lounge every day and was two years from retirement. Hades liked Yamil.

"Looks like a command link error. That was supposed to be fixed with the Rowan Combe procedure and it obviously wasn't."