fuckthemission | 02 | Action/Voice | Beds aren't doing their jobs of making me restful.

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02 | Action/Voice | Beds aren't doing their jobs of making me restful.

[Doyle wakes up often in the middle of a dead sleep with his heart pounding and a swear word on standby, masked in a thin veil of sweat. It's times of the night like these that he slips up out of bed and paces around his room, working his arms and shoulders and leaning against his window until he's too cold to remain there. But if he travels back to his bed and lays back down, he feels smothered. Growls a 'shit', slips on his shoes and jacket, and goes outside to walk.

He's got a bandaged arm from a vampire trying to kill him two days beforehand—stitches and everything—but the thought of being hurt again is illogically pushed aside by the need for the dewy cool outdoors. Whatever. He could deal with vampires over persistent night terrors. It's why he slaps his hand against the windowsill in frustration and goes out for yet another night in a long string of nights.

It's his morning trip, right before the sun rises up over the distant canopy, that he finds something familiar in the shop: it's a sniper rifle scope, without the actual rifle. He rolls it in his hand, humming a sound of contentment. Just a harmless little spyglass as-is, but he appreciates having it. Doyle sits on the bench he'd appeared on two weeks ago and lazily stares through the scope at the people passing. Sorry, man, he feels like snooping on y'all.

When noon is creeping up on him he's out in the forest wandering. Can't do much until his arm's back in full commission, but he can at least go to the lake closest by and practice bouncing some stones across it, or perhaps use that little rifle scope to spy on the nature beyond the lake itself, or even go fishing like he's been working on these last few days (though it's a little less fun when you're working around said arm injury.

It's all slow and quiet and in a way meticulous, but he was alright with it. He simply needed something to occupy his hands with while he thought about things.]

[Voice]

This book is pretty damn good for asking a lot of pointless and not-so-pointless questions, ain't it? Good way to keep your mind focused. I'm sure some of you probably agree by now, especially the old-timers who've been here for a while... but see, the problem is, I'm complete shit at picking out decent questions. Why is the sky blue, what's the numbers for pi, why did the chicken cross the road, etc., etc.

So... how about... [he rubs his chin]

You ask me a question instead, and I'll try to get a good one to throw back at you; don't care what it is, as long as it keeps me occupied. A little company goes a long way. Besides, you guys probably got your own topics you'd rather shoot the breeze with, not my crappy attempts, huh?

[And then after this voice entry, more exploring of course, because Luceti's forests are pretty spacious.

After a while of ~~boyscouting~~ traveling he gets hungry and goes to eat at the restaurant, but sooner or later he'll get to the bar, because that's just a place he's been finding himself at lately. Sometimes he drinks a little, sometimes he drinks enough to get drunk, and other times he sits in the back and reads a book. Today it's a sensible glass of whiskey next to an old copy of First Blood, and he's thumbing quietly through it in no time while he's at the bar.

He'll shuffle on home, but no doubt end up on one of his nightly or morning walks yet again, with no real destination in mind.]

((ooc: it's dated for the 29th unless you wanna tinker with the date; lemme know.))

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Where'd you keep it?

[Because the machine she's imagining is rather big. Would have to be, wouldn't it? To crush ice into snow?]

[He blinks, looking up.]

Well, the cupboard, of course. Some top shelf, or something, I'd guess. I don't snoop into their stuff when I visit too much.

Though, I used to move Kenny's wife's house decorations around just to mess with her. She had a unnatural eye for when things moved. Turn a candle half a circle and she'd know from across the room.

[... getting into family history here, doyle

whoooops]

...

Anyway, it fits in a cabinet.

[If it fit in the cupboard, it had to be small. So small amounts of ice? Probably. But she could still just as easily picture some bigger version being used in Games that no longer exist.

She watches him as he talks. This is the first time someone here, Rue excluded, has told her this much personal information. It's kind of nice. Nice to listen to.]

Who's Kenny?

Ah, Kenny's my uncle - from my mother's side. He's sort of like a second dad...

[A pause, and a shrug.]

I'd loved my dad n' all, but he had his own problems to work out, so most of my support when I was around your age had been from him instead: kept me out of trouble, for the most part, supported me and my decision to join the army, all that important stuff.

[It's... really sad when he thinks about never seeing uncle Kenny again, or his compulsive wife, or his polar opposite children.]

You probably would have liked him. He and my old man were the hunter types.

[What he says makes her look away. She's thinking of her own mom now. The way she checked out on her on Prim after their father's death. How Katniss, at eleven, had to become responsible for their family. For keeping food on the table, nursing Prim and herself through their own grief. A nearly impossible task for such a young girl.

It sounds like Rick might understand how hard that could be, too.

She thinks back to their first meeting. His attempts at catching a fish for a meal. And she turns her head on the grass to look at him again.] Did he teach you how to fish?

Actually, that's one my dad did manage to teach me. He's not very good at walking because he was injured pretty bad in the war, but fishing was one of those things he could do since it was just sitting.

[Poor old man. He remembers saying those very words to him, and Jeff would growl in good humor and punch his arm hard. He was a good guy, and he misses him a damn lot. Guess they share the same fate of an early punch-card.]

We used to go when I was really young, too, before he got hurt. But I was always scared something would bite my line and pull me into the water.

I wasn't a very brave kid growing up.

Edited 2012-05-17 10:47 (UTC)

[Was she brave? She's not sure. Sure it was illegal to go beyond the fence, the boundaries of District Twelve. Hunting wasn't allowed. But what choice did she really have? Her mother had been so lost in her depression, unable to support them. Gathering had been the only skill Katniss knew. And hunting. A way to provide food and money. To keep Prim alive.

It hadn't been brave. It had been necessary. And it never would've happened at all if Peeta hadn't given her that burnt bread.

Meeting Gale had made it fun. The only time she ever really felt like herself.

In the end, she decides that bravery is unimportant. She needed to hunt to survive. Rick didn't.]

My dad taught me how to hunt.

[He bites his lip, nodding.]

Had a lot of reason to hunt where you're from, right? When I was pretty small we used to eat and sale a lot of fish from the shore, since we lived on the ocean. Of course, the was having a hard time, since a tsunami rolled in and wiped out the harbor.

After we moved, didn't have any rhyme or reason to keep fishing, except at the lake every once and a while.

[Like Finnick, she thinks. Anyone from District Four, probably. He had been so familiar with the different kind of shellfish they could gather and eat in the clock arena. Knowledge that had not only kept them alive, but allowed them a truly enjoyable meal in such horrible circumstances.

People by the shore fish. People inland don't. It makes sense in her head.

She's quiet for a long moment before responding. It's strange, sharing details of her life with someone who knows nothing of Panem. Nothing of her. But Rick doesn't push. And offers a lot in return.]

Hunting was illegal. Before the uprising. But my family couldn't afford meat from the butcher. Not really.

Tough economy then... Your government sounds like it was a piece of work alright.

But you hunted anyway, right? Must've felt like a release from all that crap. Or at least, I'd feel that way, I guess.

Edited 2012-05-20 00:21 (UTC)

[A nod. It was a release. The place she felt most herself. Deep in the forests, alone or with only Gale as company. Those had been her favorite moments.

Before the Games changed everything.

In so many ways, life had been better then. As she stares up into the trees, it's hard to count the ways it's better for her, personally, now.]

... Good. [Casually, he tosses a pebble and it plonks into the water.] Anything's better than nothing, I think.

[And nothing is what they almost had. Would've, if not for the dandelion. And the boy with the bread.]

The hunting's good here, too.

... Yeah. It's nice, most of the time. Real peaceful.

[when things aren't crazy, anyway]

I guess if they could have brought me anywhere, this would have been the place I'd've picked.

[She blinks at that, looking at him through slightly narrowed eyes. Where else would they have been brought? This is clearly the Malnosso's arena. Where else would they have put them? How else would they have obtained the answers - even maybe the entertainment - they wanted?

If the Malnosso hadn't had their own game, their experiments, to play, she doubts she'd be here. Or he would. They'd be in their own worlds. Safe.]

[He blinks in return, because he's not sure what the look is for - and then his expression turns apologetic.] Sorry, I didn't mean... I mean, this place is still bad, but - if they had given me a choice, the forested, wilderness-type place would have been the one I'd picked.

[He itches his forehead, looking back to the water.]

[She frowns. He's still not getting it, is he?]

They'd never give us a choice. They're Gamemakers. It's what they do.

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