Another Chance // [D10 Tribs]
Sept 12, 2012 0:32:35 GMT -5
Post by Baby Wessex d9b [earthling] on Sept 12, 2012 0:32:35 GMT -5
for what it's worth, I have a slow disease that sucked me dry... I always aim to please
but I nearly died
Mace had gotten up long before dawn the day of the Reaping. He hadn't expected to find sleep. Not before being handed two more lives. Not without Julian. It was strange not to be with the victor from Two, now that their lives had become so tangled around one another. Leaving from the upper district had been a brutal reminder of what life would be like without the boy that made it worth while.
Still, he couldn't find too much remorse about taking a break from Two. Life just moved at a different pace in Ten, one that he had learned the rhythm of long ago. He still wasn't sure how to navigate the social structure of Two, and it frustrated him even to try. But he would. For Julian. For the hope of a future that didn't constantly cause him pain. It still felt like coming home, hurtling towards Ten the day before the Reaping, settling into his victor mansion, which had been well cared for and fully occupied while he'd been gone, Reggie informed him.
It was too late by the time he stepped in the door to prepare himself to find her and her gap teeth instead of Elon and his shy smile. It was a punch to the chest, and Reggie had to drag him in from the doorway. It took him awhile to realize that she was being entirely too perky and chatty. As it turned out, she'd taken up space in his master bedroom while he'd been absent. Her clothes were in the drawers, her carvings lining the window sill.
He'd given her ten minutes to move her shit down the hall, or he would do it for her, while he scrounged up some food. He'd filled himself with an apricot-baked chicken breast and fresh corn before he'd wandered upstairs to find his room messy, but thankfully free of girly accouterments. The bed still smelled of her though, not of Julian, and that thought distracted him long into the sleepless night. He showered, and left the steam running, hoping it would clear Reggie's perfume out. The warmth was a comfort, another gift of summer as he dressed in pressed khakis and a soft plaid shirt.
The Reaping passed in a blur, which was it's own sort of gift. He blinked and it was over, two tributes being led into the Justice Building. He rose from his lonely spot on the stage and made his way around the building. No one bothered him now. He'd been victor for too long, and without Julian at his side, there was really nothing interesting at all about Mace Emberstatt.
He hopped onto the train, depositing his backpack in his room - the same as last time - and passed Olive in the cramped hallway. She practically whimpered as he flashed her one of his old grins, the sort that showed too much teeth and a promise that he'd lock her in a closet again if she got out of hand. He hoped that was enough to scare the escort off for the remainder of the train ride. He didn't need her to handle his tributes. And he did plan on handling them both. This time.
He felt the constriction in his chest, scratched at his neck as he narrowed his thoughts, pushed aside those of the previous Games. Instead he availed himself of the dining car, snacking on a date-centered trail mix before moving onto a snappy white peach. He had a knife into it, slicing off piece by piece, when the tributes finally arrived. Mace glanced up, his dead eyes finally registering them. The girl looked impossibly young, her blue eyes wide and bright. He'd underestimated his own female tribute before, so he refused to make more of her than that. For now.
The boy was teetering on the edge of manhood. Perhaps not teetering. Looming. Mace leaned back in the plush armchair, and felt a ghost of a smile tug at his lips. Had he ever looked so... eager? Had anyone from a lower district? Charas Harp, perhaps. Sadly, he did not have her legs.
"Have a seat. Dinner's on me," Mace said, silently congratulating himself at his little joke. And it was leap, not a step, for the former victor to even consider joking with his tributes. This was not the Mace of the doomed 61st, nor the gut-wrenched 60th, or the even hopeful 59th. This was a man possessed of himself, who knew while he was surely carrying at least one of these tributes to their death, he was also every moment getting closer to being reunited with Julian.
banner credit: jurate
lyrics:placebo for what it's worth
lyrics:placebo for what it's worth