{~turning tables~}Geebs
Jan 8, 2013 21:35:01 GMT -5
Post by Rosetta on Jan 8, 2013 21:35:01 GMT -5
~Leianna Phiabac
For Leianna, the conference was another hassle. “Aren’t you Lila Phiabac’s daughter?” It was an interrogation of sorts where those who had known her mother looked the woman up and down, sizing her up. Is she anything like her mother, the legendary Peacekeeper, was? It probably didn’t matter. Until Leianna had entered the force herself, no one had known that Lila had had a child before becoming a Peacekeeper. She hardly found time to mention what she’d rushed into when she was rushing about keeping order.[/blockquote][/color]
And so each time she was asked, Leianna would answer with a simple “yes” and when a hush would fall over the white-uniformed seated around the long table, she could finally relax. The Annual Peacekeeping Conference had begun just two days prior. Around the table, they sat like statues, stiff-backed and not from the train ride there, dressed all in white, a note of irony to their impurity, helmets placed in front of them. There were greetings, the Treaty of Treason read and then, their Head honcho, the one and only Silana Tack got right down to it.
First on the agenda was the new Victor. “Good one,” one hook-nosed man had commented, “I like him. Strong.” There was a murmur of assent. Leianna had really no opinion on the new young Victor, Peridot. Stationed in District Three, the non-Career District wedged between the Big Guns, Leianna never saw much interest in the Games after the deaths of the District’s tributes which was usually early on. Even Leianna didn’t have much interest, despite her upbringing in District Two.
When she was young, Reapings weren’t measured in how many names she had in that bowl, but rather when she’d see her mother again.
“Is Mother going to be home soon, Father?”
“Soon, sweetheart, in thirty days. That’s a month.”
Reapings were measured in her scabbed knees as she tripped and fell, trying to make it to her mother’s arms before she was whisked off again. The ceremony passed in jiggling legs and sweaty hands, but not for fear that her name would be called (Lei, like the other District Two kids around her, would surely have welcomed the challenge), but for catching every glimpse of her mother’s face, hidden under that white helmet that betrayed no daughter nor a husband, the ones that was disowned until she finished her service.
Reapings were days of reunion as her mother came to the District to oversee the ceremony. They weren’t days of torn apart families, promises of victory that may or may not befall the new tribute or trembling lips, but rather days of smiles and hugs.
Leianna stiffened at the table, much like her fellow Peacekeepers, sensing the weight of times gone past pressing down on her back and tuned in to the conversation. Today, they were discussing recent crime in their Districts. A theft here, a brawl there. Leianna had experienced it all, but since being appointed Head Peacekeeper, she’d worked hard to squash it, calling upon the Peacekeepers under her and training them, grinding their noses into the dirt. Forcing them to keep order. And as far as Leianna knew, it worked in most cases.
No one could say she was less effective than her mother.
Exhausted at the completion of the day’s work, Leianna instantly retired to her room and forced herself into bed. Her mind was racing for the meeting, mention of past time, Peackeepers, it reminded her of Lila. Clearing her mind of her mother’s face, so very much like hers, of her tears when her mother donned the helmet again was like trying to clean a stain out of a shirt. Terribly hard and the last image Leianna had of her before she finally fell into a fitful sleep was her mother’s body in that casket. In accordance with tradition of those who died while in service, Lila’s face was covered with the helmet Lei hated so much on her.
On her, but never on herself.
It wasn’t morning when Leianna found herself jerked from her sleep by sounds outside her door. Shouting. Hurried footsteps and…Lei’s heart skipped a beat…was that a scream? Her instincts were quick. Leaping from the bed, she grabbed her uniform off of the chair it had been carefully laid over, pulled it on over her pajamas and departed from the room, helmet under her arm. And instantly, she knew something was wrong. The noises were disembodied and the halls were foggy, hard for Lei to see and for a moment, she thought she was lost in some kind of dream…before realizing, with a jolt deep in her fluttering stomach, that this fog must’ve been created by some real, tangible force. What was going on? Hallucinations? Uprising? Some kind of joke? Racing through it, Lei’s tense muscles relaxed when she saw another white figure ahead of her, only to seize up again when she saw who it was.
Cassius. Cassius Clayburn.
Lei’s cheek tingled, her scars searing and she was on her back, in bed, heart racing, eyes wide. Slash. Slash. Pain. Lei’s hands tightened into fists. That bastard. Rushing forward, she spun the man around and gripped him by the collar, dropping her helmet. “What the hell is going on?” she growled into his face, spraying him with spit and she knew he could see her scars. “Do you have something to do with it, you sonofabi-”
Lei only had a second to regret dropping her helmet. Because at that moment, something hit her very hard in the back of head and her entire world went black.
{Geebs, I hope you don’t mind her grabbing him. I wanted to ask you, but you were gone and I just wanted to post this post and go to bed. Tell me if you mind and I’ll change it!}
