.{dès le premier jour}. <sky>

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how does a heart love if no one has
noticed its presence and where does it go?
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Once had been awful enough. Twice had been absolutely grueling. But three times? A monstrosity. Why was she back here again? Did she not have any sense at all? Shouldn't she be avoiding this place at all costs? It only brought back horrible memories, nightmares that left her trembling under the covers of her precious sleeping bag as she awoke abruptly in the early hours of the morning in a bed that didn't belong to her. After all, they couldn't make her do this, could they? Except yes, they could.

They could make her do anything. More often than not, Topaz Ross felt as if nothing was her own anymore; not her body, not her thoughts, and most definitely not her will. They controlled everything, now that she won. They controlled who she saw and what she said and how she felt and whether or not she was miserable enough to need to go out and get hopelessly drunk so she could forget everything, even if just for a few hours. She was the puppet, and the Capitol was the master. Perhaps it would've been easier if she wasn't such a prized victor - but in the wake of a series of unexpected, underdog District Twelve winners, Capitolites clung to their strong, stable, (or seemingly, at least, because in reality she was far from stable) exceedingly social champion from their favorite district, One. She was more familiar to them. And they were more familiar to her. They liked how she didn't look at them like deer in headlights, or with gazes full of anger, fury for what they'd been put through. They liked her, because she appeared to like them back.

But did she? When Topaz asked herself this question, she was surprised to find that the answer was yes. She'd never hated the Games like those from the lower districts - still didn't, really. So what reason could she possibly have for hating their vapid, narrow-minded supporters? She didn't. They were fun, friendly, and rarely asked her questions that made her squirm or looked her over searchingly, expecting some deep confession or something, like the people back home did. She could enjoy herself with the Capitolites. She could be someone else, someone the old Topaz had desperately wanted to be, and someone the new Topaz only liked being because it gave her an escape. So she liked them. She liked the Capitol. There was one place she still loathed, though - and just her luck, she was there.

The redhead let the door of her room in the Training Center close behind her with a small click as it locked itself automatically; she didn't want anyone else in there. Obviously the tributes would be too intimidated to pry, but Carmel - who was still the District One escort, and was always prying into things - was still as annoying as ever. The Capitol woman still acted surprised whenever Topaz ate anything nowadays, considering as a tribute in training, the Career had taken to starving herself out in hopes that she would get used to hunger by the time she actually went in the arena. The attempt had been futile, though; it was impossible to grow accustomed to such a horrible, gnawing feeling, so a few days after leaving the arena she'd begun trying to eat normally again. After she'd accepted that she was back in the real world, and she wasn't going to die. Though sometimes she wished she had.

The tributes. She'd watched the dynamic duo of cousins, Anastasia and York, get picked off fairly early last Games in their unforgiving wasteland of an arena, which hadn't been heartening at all. You mentor someone, and then a few days later watch them die a horrific death, without even a chance to put your advice to good use? Now that was far from fair. If she'd had the choice, she would absolutely choose to never mentor again. But she didn't have a choice about anything anymore, did she?

They weren't that impressive this year, though. Soyala and Allen, their names were; she'd never heard of the girl before the Reaping, but the boy she most certainly knew of. How could she not, after hearing the last name? Hearst. Hearst, Timothy Hearst. Allen's brother. Her district partner, from the 56th. The one her alliance had so brutally murdered in the Bloodbath. How could she possibly look his brother, his twin, in the eye after doing that? So she'd been avoiding him. Perhaps it wasn't fair, to favor one tribute so blatantly over the other, but Topaz was far from caring. She wasn't going to put herself through those kind of accusations if she didn't have to; she'd rather deal with the tribute she didn't have any sort of prior connection with.

After stopping in the dining room to grab a piece of lightly buttered toast from the platter that had already been set out, Tope slowly made her way to the sitting area where she had told Soyala she'd meet her that morning, to discuss things. The arena was very, very near - only a day away. Though she didn't particularly like it, she assumed it was her job as a mentor to assess her tributes capability to deal with it, with the maelstrom of fear and emotions that came with being thrown into that death trap. So that was what she intended to do, and she did so as soon as they were both seated in front of the fireplace that was roaring with flames, even though it was definitely not cold in the room to begin with. Swallowing her last bite of toast, she gave the small, skinny fifteen year old a long look. "How do you feel?"