athena madaki [d5] fin

Athena is among the wealthier families of district five - though the district is by no means poor due to the thriving oil industry. Due to her family's wealth she tends to dress similarly to those in the upper districts, but not near as nice as those who live in the capitol. Along with clothes, she's a fan of jewelry and hair accessories. Her long, black hair is normally in braids. However, she often puts golden accents within it through hair accessories. Furthermore, she likes wearing earrings and bracelets. She tends to wear darker colors with accents of golds and reds.

While she takes care of her hair, it can definitely be a hassle when it ISN'T in her braids. It can be difficult to take care of and keep from looking "matted", which is why she usually keeps it in the braids. Another thing that's a hassle is finding clothes that hide her imperfections and what she's self conscious about. She isn't self-conscious about her body type, but instead of what's on her body. In fact, her body type is fairly average. She's 5'4 and about 120 pounds, putting her at an average size for a sixteen year old girl.

However, due to the business her family runs she has scars all along her body, especially on her hands and legs. Her family is one of those who instead of changing to an energy and oil based focus have instead decided to stay with the districts original industry - animals. They're exotic animal breeders that breed two types of African big cats, African caracals and African sand cats - but more detail will come on these later. In order to breed and get the animals ready to be sold to capitol buyers, a lot of work domesticating and training these animals needs to be done. Athena helps out a lot with the domesticating/training process and has been bitten and scratched by these animals on more than one occasion, resulting in a significant number of scars on her dark skin.

When she was younger she used to be more self-conscious about certain facial features she possesses. For starters, she's always felt that her nose was too big. She normally wears makeup now to contour it and make it appear smaller, but that doesn't change it's actual size or how self-conscious she once again feels when going without makeup. She also has pretty unhealthy fingernails. The cuticles commonly have hangnails and the nails themselves split off a lot, causing them to be uneven.

On the other hand, she of course has features about herself that she likes. She has really good skin. It isn't too oily nor is it too dry and acne has never really been an issue for her, even in her teen years. Athena also loves her own lips. She thinks the shape is nice and same with the size. She wishes she had a more "interesting" eye colour than brown, but other than that she doesn't really have an issue with her eyes either. She likes how dark and thick her eyelashes are and the general shape of her eyes. Though she wishes her eyebrows were dark and thick like her eyelashes, she has really patchy brows.

Athena was born to one of the wealthier families of district five, one of the wealthier districts out of the middle ones to begin with. This wealth comes from generations and generations of exotic pet breeding, something the Madaki family did many years ago when the industry was more focused on animals. Their clientele primarily consist of people from the capitol who want to make their own lives seem more interesting by owning such an exotic animal. The two animals her family focuses on are both African big cats - caracals and sand cats.

Caracals are the large of the two but they're still considered medium sized animals. Caracals usually weigh less than 30 pounds and are about two feet tall; however, they require a fair bit of training as their claws and sharp teeth do present a threat and the last thing the Madaki family wants is a lawsuit. To feed the caracals they breed the family gets shipments of various meats in. They usually only have about 8 of these animals at a time once domesticated. They have two males and two females they use for breeding. The reason why they have two of each is because they partner them up. Meaning female A and male A only mate with each other and female B and male B only mate with each other. This is to avoid incest and also avoiding having to purchase new caracals from abroad too often. They also keep a male and female offspring from each pair. Meaning female A and male A they have a female C and male C as well as a female D and male D from the pair of female B and male B. Once female A or male B become infertile or die, they put down the remaining breeding caracals. Then replace them with the offspring that they kept. They breed female C with male D and male C with female D. This avoid incest and keeps them from having to get more breeding caracals for another generation. Thought after any from this generation die they have to get new animals. As far as the other offspring, those get sold as soon as they're domesticated.

The other animal they breed, the African sand cat is much smaller. An adult sand cat is only about 6 pounds, similar to a regular house cat. For these they have to worry less about the diet as they eat things such as bugs and small rodents that are easily found anyway. The main struggle with breeding and domesticating this cat is teaching it not to bite. It has a significant bite despite it's small size. However, they don't worry as much about it's scratching since a sand cat scratch is similar to that of a house cat. The family has the same "policy" of how many they keep and how they breed the sand cats as they do the caracals. The kittens also get sold as soon as they get domesticated, which can sometimes take longer than the caracals. This is due to the fact that sand cats are prey animals, and thus have a ferocious attitude to try to scare away predators. This has been lessened slightly; however, due to generations of being raised in captivity. The family went with this option rather than a possibly less aggressive choice due to it's small size. Some capitol residents may want a smaller and "cuter" choice than a 20 pound caracal.

Athena was raised around this lifestyle of breeding, raising, domesticating, and training this exotic animals - as well as the business side of things. She's done every aspect of the business including training, taking care of, feeding, taking pictures of the animals for clients, talking to clients from the capitol, negotiating with clients, looking at the finances, and even helping with the lengthy contracts/please-don't-sue-us paperwork. This is due to the fact that her parents expect her to take over the family business once they retire, and she plans on doing so. She genuinely enjoys taking care of and training the animals her family sells. Part of her even wishes she could keep them as pets, though if it isn't bringing in money she doubts the district would allow her to keep them. In fact, their trade of exotic pets is very highly regulated for safety reasons. If an African big cat wandered around district five it would not end well. Honestly this is probably all a big legal gray area, though they can't exactly hide what they're doing.

Outside of her family's business, she's had a pretty good life. Being an only child from a wealthy family she's gotten pretty much everything she's wanted. She gets expensive clothes and jewelry, something people from the lowest districts wish they had access to. She made friends easily as a kid. Sure her quick temper has definitely made her lose more than a few, but friends your mom and dad paid for won't leave so quickly. Her family has always instilled in her the importance of wealth. Whenever they watch the games and watch clips of various reapings they point out the tributes from districts 10-12, and the people in the background of course, to show her what not having money does to people.

Athena has had some significant events happen in her life as well. Her very first reaping is something that will live in her memories. Of course she wasn't reaped, but she remembers that day like it was yesterday. It was a standard reaping, nothing super special happened. She remembers it due to the feeling of fear and adrenaline she felt as a twelve year old. Was she going to get drawn? What would happen if she was in the games? Would she win? Would she die? But, none of those questions except for the first would be answered as she didn't get called. Though she still wonders every reaping what would happen if she went into the games.

Another significant event, as cheesy as it may sound, was her first broken heart. When she was fifteen she was at a party and saw her then boyfriend making out with another girl. Later she would move on, after all it was just a teenage relationship. But, at the time it meant a lot to her. Plus, she hasn't exactly had a tragic life. In fact, her life is peak upper-middle class average.