friend or foe {derecho/kassia}

The wolf was stalking his prey, or at least that's what Kassia thought he looked like. As she tried and tried again to hit a target with a knife, she could see him from the corner of her eye. As her millionth or so knife clattered to the ground, she sighed and gave up. It was futile. If she wanted to win this, she'd clearly have to find something else that could make her a killer.

He definitely knows how to be a killer.

She watched him watch someone else, another tribute in the distance doing something with a sword. Maybe it was Cordelia showing off some moves for a better score from the gamemakers, Kassia couldn't tell from afar. The suits they all had to wear kind of just merged into one at some point. Keeping her eyes on him for a minute, names danced through her head as she tried to remember who he was. She remembered watching him as she replayed and analyzed the reapings the night she arrived, but couldn't place an identity. He was definitely one of the careers, probably two or four--he didn't have the right air of aristocracy to be from one.

Derecho, that was it. One of the ones she made a mental note to stay away from. One of the other two volunteers here, and he looked a lot more confident than Kassia felt.

He was listed in her notes under the section 'Do Not Get Into a Stabby Stabby Fight With,' but who knows, he might be helpful to her if she could get on whatever good side he had.

Dropping the remaining knife down, she looked up at the trainer who was supposed to be helping her. "Yea, I don't think this is my forte."

"I mean, you could try using the throwing knives and not the stabbing ones." she said as Kassia began to walk away and towards Derecho.

Stopping in her tracks, turning to face the instructor, sardonic contempt drips from her. She could feel her face begin to heat, hopeful that none of the other tributes saw what had happened for the last hour and knew what was going on. "I just spent the last hour with the wrong knife, and you didn't want to tell me that?"

Atticus would probably kill her himself if he found out.

"You just looked so into it. It's not my job to kill your vibe."

"Yea, it's your job to help me kill people."

With a heavy, exasperated sigh, she returned to the task she set before she had been so rudely interrupted. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she approached from behind him.

He seemed to be lost in thought, staring at the sea of weapons and tributes. Trying to think of some form of introduction to get him to like her, she opens her mouth, ridding herself of exasperation and placing on a more jovial tone.

"Hey man, creepily staring at the tributes is only cool when I do it."

Suddenly regretting her joke at the memory of how excited he looked to volunteer in the reaping recap video, she started to feel panic swell in her again. Maybe another joke to ease the tension would help?

"What's the deal anyway? We aren't supposed to start killing each other for at least few more days."

She cursed herself inwardly. After already making fun of the gamemakers to their faces at the pool party, she desperately needs to get better at making people not want to kill her.