(open) Attention, all personnel. There's a loon on the loose.

[swill]

Who| Hawkeye and the unlucky who run into him
What| A crash course and a sorry welcome
Where| Heading southeast though he hasn't gotten far from the Cornucopia
When| Tail end of week 2
Warnings/Notes| Can't think of any now, but I'll update as needed

It's been a... day? One day? Had everything really happened in only one day? They could have had the goat. But did they listen to him? No. Their loss. He's long since tucked the dog tags into his shirt to keep them from sounding his presence with every step. Now all he had to worry about was him sounding his presence with every step. Twigs and leaves and mud and bugs-- it was their loss, you know. They could have had the goat. It would be quieter, possibly. --Ha! Nah. Hawkeye knew goats. You know, unfortunately. They weren't quiet, no. So that's one thing to take pride in, and he'll take any ridiculous opportunity to boast. He's quieter than a goat. He's also sweatier than one. And if he finds one, just randomly in the middle of the jungle, he'd like to eat it. It'd be like lamb, but maybe with a more wild, tangy taste. Tougher meat, but he'd still love it. Or maybe 'love' was too strong a word. He'd like it. He'd appreciate it. He's hungry. He's just so damn hungry. And so much for trying to be quiet, all non-existent survival instinct and training showing off now in his supposed time of need. There are sounds in the jungle, but Hawkeye hates to think how easy it is to distinguish between what steps belonged in the setting and which didn't. His didn't. His steps had already landed him in danger. He had already been captured by that... that one guy. He had high tailed it out of sight the second the swap was made. A prisoner exchange except he'd been the only prisoner. More than leaving with just a wounded pride -what kind of guy sets foot in a trap so soon after being labeled game?- his confidence, not that he'd had any to begin with, well... well, shit, that sure was shot. And all the while after, all he could admit to thinking was 'well, prisoner exchanges are nothing new'. And 'that went well'. And 'one day I might get used to almost dying'.

He titters. He can't hear anyone else around. His legs hurt, his stomach hurts. Maybe he should have taken calisthenics more seriously. Just maybe. There's a pole. A rod. To his left. "Uh huh."

And there's another to his right. He has no idea what they do. Are they radio towers? He didn't have a radio, so it wouldn't be worth the while to figure it out. What a lousy design! Ruin the majestic moss and rubble, all radiating green, by sticking two poles just there. "I take back what I said," he declares, again, to nothing. "I don't- I don't like this. You could have at least disguised them as trees." The rods were just there! They really messed with the atmosphere of the place.

They really helped drive the point home that he was going to die.

A death in a jungle would be, to a point, normal. Plenty of people wandered off into the wilderness, got lost. Were never found. A jungle was wild- who could blame it if it got a little hungry now and then? But this was man-made. Altered, at the very least. A planned death, one the unsuspecting sap doesn't know the day or cause of, that's... that was never good. Do you know what else wasn't good? Yelping. Yelping when you're trying to be silent and pass under the radar. But damn, Hawk could have sworn something touched his foot and something green slithered on the ground in front of him. And he hears a buzz and his break time's over. He doesn't know why -it might be because his newly found, shallow acceptance of his imminent death- but he shudders loudly and violently, all because he could. He catches sight of movement again and hop-steps forward with a hasty "Alright, alright, I'm moving already!" And move he does.

The sun's falling and he's wet and hungry and tired and lost. Drafted again. Everything's a pleasure, a joy. He finds a grin snake onto his expression. It hurts to keep but it'll do the trick.

Nobody would blame him for humming a tune. It rained all night the day I left, the weather it was dry. Nobody was around to criticize. He had heard and made sure. But he was sure he'd lose it if he heard nothing but birds any longer. Oh, Susanna! Oh don't you cry for me. Keeping his mind on the pitch of unsung lyrics kept it off of the rising panic and his stomach which was resolved to eat itself through. Ladies and gentlemen: the captain is here.

Comments

Up for a near-death experience?

[vissernone]

It's not as if Eva's bloodthirsty, at least, not in any way she'll admit. Admitting to bloodthirst doesn't do anyone any good - it isolates you, makes you the scary person at a party, the subject of lurid conversations and healthy distances rather than a participant. So Eva never lets on that what she and everyone else call repressed anger is, just a little bit, bloodthirst - it's unbecoming.

When she gets out of this Arena with her clothing saturated red, they'll call it survival. Wrath. Self-defese. Necessity. Revenge. But they won't call it what it is, and she's alright with that, because that allows her to delude herself just as badly.

She chose allies as much because she cared for them as for their weaknesses. It gives her an excuse to go out into the woods and justify any fellow Tribute she kills as a necessary evil. She's protecting herself, protecting a sick, heartbroken young woman she's taken under her wing. It's simple mathematics - take out another Tribute and get herself and Eponine one step closer to victory.

And it has nothing to do with the way she's forgetting what it felt like to rip a teenager's face off with her bare hands. That sometimes she hates that she's forgetting the most traumatic experience of her life. That sometimes she wants to remember so badly it's mistaken for need.

Her hair is braided to keep it out of her face, but stray locks twist and twine in the wet air. The humidity has made her look younger, almost, filling out the wrinkles of middle age with a little more doughiness. Her breathing is shallow with anticipation, her palm clammy and tight around her spear. It's a throwing spear, which she finds comedic give that they're in the jungle, and getting a clear shot is a pipe dream. The shiv she's made of the other spear's head is tucked into the back of her pants.

When Hawkeye gets near, she lunges forward from behind an overgrown plant with a feral snarl, thrusting the spear forward in an attempt to run his guts through.

Always!

[swill]

Terror was an easy thing to fall back on. Hawkeye had said it once before and it's a claim he'd stand beside any day of his life. Terror was reliable and always just a call away. It'd always grip you and wrap you in its arms when nobody or nothing else would.

He's humming. He's drumming his fingers on the trunks of trees he passes near enough to touch. Give me five minutes more, only five minutes more. Let me stay, let me stay in your arms. It's a Sinatra song. He's a sucker for romance. Seeing as Terror was his sweetheart this day and night, Hawkeye figured, exhausted, worn, the best he should do is humor her. The insides of his eyelids he'd seen enough of. The new world around him he'd seen too much or not enough of. He hadn't decided yet which it should be. A day of contradictions, of yes and no and hesitance. That was what was killing him. His boots seemed to be made of iron. He's stepping loud and heavily.

He needed shelter. He needed to turn in for the night. Wandering around aimlessly wasn't getting him any results he wanted. Only five minutes more of your charms. But he fades out of song half way through it. He forces the final words out as simple grunts. He becomes more quiet in his treading. But it's too late, he knows. Being found half a dozen times... well, gee. Anyone would learn that feeling a pair of eyes on your back meant there was a shadow that didn't belong to you. Suppose he had been quiet since the get-go, he thinks. He wasn't good at hide and seek. He wasn't good at hiding and he had no intention of seeking- not by the competition's rules.

But what he thought of the rules didn't matter. Never did.

He hears an animal.

Hawkeye sees the spear first, and only. He shouts because he doesn't know how else to release the heavy weight built in his chest and though all of him feels lousy and slow he pushes his every bit to backtrack, to just swerve and feel his heart pound painfully and the weapon fly past. The foot he had shoved weight on slips in the mud. He stays standing. --a woman. Walking backwards is how he had landed in a vine trap. It's also a very real way to back himself into a corner he didn't know existed or-- but Hell. Hell, he's not going to turn his back to the woman with murder in her eyes. There's fire in his, too.

"What the Hell are you doing?" He shouts, hands outstretched and feeling for anything around him. He's moving, moving back, he doesn't know to where. "What are you, trying to kill me?!" His eyes sting. They really do. He didn't get this at all.

[vissernone]

Eva would answer, if she were the type for pithy one-liners in the midst of combat. While humor makes an appropriate shroud in the Capitol, she's long shed it here. There's no point in wasting one's breath explaining herself to someone she's going to murder.

Honestly, there's no point in even remembering Hawkeye is human and not some overgrown bipedal boar to slaughter.

The spear's out of her hands, but Eva quickly moves to make sure that it can't be in his either, lurching to put her body between her and it as it clatters over roots and dirt. Her right hand swings back behind her body, finding its hold along the shank that she's made. The spearhead catches a stray string in the back of her pants that remains tangled around the point when she brings it forward to stab at Hawkeye's gut.

She meant to skewer him, not startle him, and she's aware that the longer she spends trying to kill him the less likely she is to accomplish her goals. She's a middle-aged woman with a limp; her advantages are surprise, experience and fearlessness, not combat skill. She throws herself forward with the spear head aimed at his stomach. Five steps to collide.

[swill]

Nuh-no. No-no. He's not going to die here. He's not going to die- period! Live forever or die trying, that's the good doctor's motto! Well, now it was.

Funny how quickly everything changes-- but. But nevermind. It's not about thinking, right now. It's about reactions and luck. And he already let slip the chance to get the spear and chuck it out of reach so he really shouldn't keep his eyes on it. A spear! Where the hell did these people get something like that? He can't tell much about the woman -other than the fact that she was mad in the insane kind of way, not the angry kind of way he was- but he figures it doesn't matter. And it's a really strange way to think. And he doesn't think he can pull it off for longer than absolutely necessary. The woman's hands reach around her back and he crouches low and shuffles back. Back, like it's the only direction he should know in his damn life. Away. Away is a good place.

Always has been.

"Yeah, you know, you're pretty spr-"

Shut up, Hawkeye, and move. The woman's charging again. She has her little shank, not the big one, in hand.

So Hawkeye thinks.

And turns his back and holds his hands out and sprints through the first two or three trees. Barrels though. Lets the terror move him. Then he ducks behind the next. "--for your age!" She had a limp. Damn.

Damn.

[vissernone]

In a different time, different place, Eva would laugh at that comment. She could feign offense, or brush it off, or find a way to call Hawkeye not such a spring chicken himself. But she refuses to expend the mental energy in even registering his backhanded compliment, much less retorting.

She leaps over a log and grabs the trunk of the tree to swing around his hiding place, slashing downwards with her shiv. It glistens slightly with juices from the poisonous plants around here. A wordless cry bursts out of her chest as she tries to kill him.

Quickly, because she's not a sadist.

Quickly, so she can get to it faster.

[swill]

He hears the leap, the sound of her landing. It meant nothing was thrown, it meant she had the small knife with her still and that the spear had been left where it lay. His head's pounding with the sound of nothing after he process that she's still coming after him. Of course, he'd invited it. Of course, he didn't think about rationalizing her actions when instead he invested his all into scrambling, into shuffling his feet, into feeling his way around large trunks and slippery mud and crying out when Eva does, falling back when he catches a glimpse of her. Using the tree as his only defense. It's between her and him.

It's like when he'd play tag as a kid and the game would make its way inside someone's home and 'It' would chase him to the living room table. A pathetic little stand off.

"There's a better way to a way man's heart!"

The wail gets his breath and wipes his mind. He jumps a pace from where he had plastered himself to the tree- her arms could still reach. Screw her arms, his eyes were on her feet. Next step toward him he'd run. If she threw it-- too bad. That'll just be too bad. There's no way to hide his intentions. His other option would be to fight back. He would. He would. He had held down stronger boys with grenades.

"What have I ever done to you?!"

Catch a breath, blow it on a shout. He was dizzy from this.

He'd fight but he hadn't a prayer.

[vissernone]

Damn. With the trunk between them, Eva knows full well that lunging either way will continue this game of cat or mouse. More than that, she's running out of energy. Her age and lack of physical fitness is catching up to her; it's not as if she's entirely out of shape, but she's hardly the athlete most of the people here are.

Damn. All she's need is one good strike and she could kill him. The points are even poisoned; she wouldn't even have to get him anywhere that mattered.

Taking deep breaths, she circles the tree, moving one way and keeping her head slightly tilted to the other. She doesn't lunge, doesn't run. He could probably overpower her as is.

Once she finds herself in a good position, she takes a step back. Another. Then she turns and sprints to where her spear is in the undergrowth and grabs it, moving to make her escape.

[swill]

She circles, he circles the other way- it's a very scary game of Tag, yeah. Only Toby's parents weren't around this time to holler at the children to break up the game after something valuable shatters. The point was to break. The point was to shatter.

And he'd never been good at following rules and aw, gee, he just loved being a difficult little scamp.

"So what's your name, huh?" He's panting, not any more athletic than her. His legs felt like they were burning, his shoulders too. But he was a doctor- he knew he wouldn't die from the terrible discomfort. A knife to the heart was a different story.

And he kept wasting his breath on questions, kept seeking out the empty and dizzying moments after he uttered a word instead of holding it all in and risking his hide in a final sprint away. The woman began to step back- then away. Hawkeye felt the disgust of an insult weighing on him. It was offensive, her just turning her tail first. Her, who had chucked the spear at him, who had wanted to wear his hide as pajamas this night. A loss for her, he knew. A loss for him, too- she just. She was just walking away, and no he didn't want to bait her, Christ.

Hawkeye wants to bark at her, knowing she'd understand the language.

No, nothing made sense. He couldn't risk trying to process what had just happened, what was happening. He was furious and not. He'd be exhausted, utterly spent, but then she sprints and so he sprints. --the other way. He doesn't see her grab the spear. He forgot about it, about the knife, about the mad woman and her limp. There was death behind him, and he'd run from it this one time in tact.