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

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

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.

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Maximus and Wyatt could spend hours without a single sentence between them, so the sudden barrage of words was almost overwhelming. He tried to follow all of it but he got lost somewhere in the army and caught up again when it came to singing.

Wyatt's slow, measured drawl let him fall back into understanding a little more easily.

"As far as escape goes, you indeed have no chance," Maximus said heavily. "Whatever means they possess to keep us here, they are unbreakable. And they do not revive every man who falls. But they are unlikely not to bring back a tribute after their first game. The Capitol will still have interest in you, yet."

There'd been a shootout at the O.K. Corral- in a mess tent of a MASH unit stationed three miles from the fighting front, resting on the outskirts of the village of Uijeongbu, too. They had happened several years apart, and one was decidedly much more real than the other.

What were the odds the game would turn so real? All Hawkeye had ever wanted was a laugh, a chuckle, some movement and bloodspill that was just pretend.

So he was the fourth. So he wasn't the only one who dealt with blood as a career -and the shiver down his spine is real- and he wasn't the only one in Uncle Sam's flock. The same, his ass. He's breathing hard and the next breath is the heaviest sigh he can muster instead of dealing out a scoff- just to clear his lungs, since he can't seem to clear his head. They didn't make sense. They didn't understand. Don't they know how frustrating that was? "Yeah, well, I'll find a way." He tells the general with the prosthetic leg. Less agitated, more fact-of-the-matter, more decidedly stubborn, and definitely louder compared to the present company. Generals never saw all the options before them. Hawkeye was pretty sure gladiators did, when they swung their swords and the audience cheered. But besides his mock-up bravado, what else was there? Something vague about revival. Something very clear about capture.

Silence, for a while. Another glance at the jungle behind the duo before him. At Wyatt's stupid mustache. At the gladiator's fake leg.

He plants a hand on his hip. Cocks it. "Won't someone tell me the capitol's name or do I have to keep guessing?"

"That is its name, so far as I've ever heard," Wyatt clarified, the mustache in question pulling over his lip as his mouth thinned, pressing together. "Now the country's Panem to them, but to you an' me, she's what's left of the United States."

His mouth fell into a frown, his words growing heavier with the weight of the years. Of a loved memory turned and twisted.

"Somethin' happened to it, an' everythin' changed."

Maximus said nothing - after all, Wyatt had said it for him, with more feeling than he had on the subject. He glanced back over his shoulder to take in the man's expression.

He knew the pain. Rome was so far and so long gone that there was nothing left to even reach for. He had to imagine that for Wyatt it was worse: having his world nearly in his grasp but still just as impossible to grasp as Rome itself.

He doesn't particularly care if he interrupts anything Wyatt says now. The man's proven himself patient enough to deal with it, and vaguely Hawkeye wonders when he lost respect for the man and tells himself he'd have to make up for it after. But he hears he's standing where he wanted to go back to for so long, and he just rolls off the words "God bless America."

There should have been a bite there but it wasn't present. The incompetence of himself and his new world came crashing back into the forefront of his thoughts. It should be easy to accept- this was some twisted future. Different worlds came together. If Hawkeye didn't think about it so much in so little time, he might have let the subject slip away long ago. He still wasn't sure he got it.

America being not what it should be, though...

That he could get.

Insanity he could understand.

The disheartened Captain turned to Max, the Roman, and asked intently, "But is she Communist?" Because he's got to know this one very important thing.

Wyatt was used to newcomers not believing him and he'd faced a wide range of reactions, from Katurian's - the first Katurian, that was - nearly violent outburst, to Ellie's biting curses. But that, Hawkeye physically turning away to address someone else, as if he was expecting them to call Wyatt a liar and him differently... that was a new one.

Part of him was offended, but more of him understood. Recognized that desire to hold onto the possibility of a better answer (a way out, a chance).

He didn't take it personally.

Glancing at Max, watching the question wrinkle the Roman's brow in confusion, he tried to help - even if the Captain didn't want it.

"They call the man in charge President, if that's what ya mean. President Snow..." he said, hoping the context was related (unlike so many of the other things the man had said). He paused, glancing at Max again. "But I've been here as long as anybody an' I ain't nothin' about any elections."

Maximus simply had no idea what communism was, and the word meant absolutely nothing to him. Between the two men standing with him, he easily knew which one was the more insane.

He was just lucky that Wyatt could make some sense of the conversation for him.

"No. He may as well be Emperor in all but name. I've not even heard of Senators, in this place, so she is no Republic."

So.

So his new buddies clearly didn't understand how much he didn't care about the whole thing. How little it meant how the civilization was run if it meant the morals that kept people from pitting people against each other were shot to shit.

Hawkeye keeps his gaze on the gladiator.

Yeah, he's thinking about you, chum.

Surreal was too nice and orderly a word for this all. He'd scream and tear his hair our in frustration, but that'd just be returning to square one. What little progress had been made here would have been lost if he'd done what he wanted and taken the marshal by the shoulders and hollered are you crazy, and don't you understand.

And it's not defeat. It's not acceptance of the strange theories, the tales. He just. Hawkeye just wouldn't get anywhere if he continued asking questions that made no sense to himself. He stays quiet. Maybe the two have learned to expect an outburst after the silence wears itself out. Finally, he turns back to Wyatt. The marshal. And his blue eyes lock on the smaller man's and search and maybe plead. For what, he isn't sure. So he distracts himself. "Don't worry, it's stupid anyway." He says quietly.

And then, gentlemen, the outburst: "Führer Snow doesn't sound so catchy," he says. He drops his hands and the sassy, stupid pose. He wants to pace, and this time he does. He walks a yard away, to the left of them. He wonders if he can bolt it to the treeline. Realizes he really can't. Flaps his hands like an exasperated school teacher instead. "But they weren't communist. Don't worry. Snow? Sounds like a teddy bear!" He's not shouting. He should be shouting. He was just afraid of losing his hide if he did, suddenly. "The only teddy bear I know is called Bear." --he thinks. He stops dead in front of the two again.

"You two are partners?"

Wyatt watches him like a bouncing ball, head turning to follow the quick, jerking movements. The man like a puppet, all hard turns and waving hands, some unseen master yanking on his strings.

He actually recognized the German - the sound of it, if not the word itself - having heard it often enough in the border towns, a good many immigrants making the push west (distantly, he could remember the priest, traveling with his family, riding in the wagon behind the Earps). But before he could comment on it, Hawkeye was turning to talk of teddy bears and the memory was lost again.

He looked carefully at Max again - was just about to cock his head toward the trees, a silent suggestion to get while the gettin' was good - when Hawkeye spun to face them again.

"Yes." He said after a beat, waiting to be certain more wasn't coming.

A simple, direct reply. The truth, as Wyatt saw it.

Felt it.

Edited 2013-11-27 00:09 (UTC)

Maximus nodded as Wyatt replied for both of them, happy to let him speak because he honestly had no idea what Hawkeye was takling about, half the time.

Though he had been introduced to teddy bears.

He wondered vaguely where Venus was, at that moment. He hadn't seen her face in the sky, so she was still alive...

And for once, Captain Pierce decided to play it straight. He received the answer he had anticipated and wanted from the marshal and he looked to the general when he nodded and took it to mean as nothing more than what was shown and said: the truth. A truth. Their truth, now his too. Layers, he knew, or suspected-- there had to be layers to his question and each one may get him a different answer on any different day. But he was exhausted, and today was today. And his friends -blame Wyatt for bringing the word up first- were growing weary and who could blame them? Certainly not him.

So he clasped his hands in front of him, instead of running them through his hair. There's a brief and pained expression that passes through him, but it's schooled nearly instantly.

"Why?" He asks and feels like a three year old but sounds ten times as old. Still young, in a way. "The way I heard it, there's only going to be one man walking out of here alive." Face value and trusting so... blindly. He wasn't used to that. He just didn't have a choice here, did he? Gee, he loved these men, Hawkeye realized in a spur. Gee, he'd love even more to be that one man alive. But what a lousy way to achieve that goal.

Wyatt looked at Max, a long, silent contemplation. He wasn't even sure there were words enough to explain it. None good enough to make the man understand.

How did you tell a stranger you were willing to die for someone? That you were willing to give up your safety just to be by their side when it all came to an end?

Finally, he turned back to Hawkeye.

"Death's a funny thing, here. It ain't always as permanent as it aught to be. But even when it is... some things are worth dyin' for."

"He's winning." Maximus said, barefaced, pointing a thumb in Wyatt's direction. He had none of the hesitation that Wyatt had.

It wad a very simple equation after all.

"I am already a victor - I won the last arena." He let out a breath. "Even if I hadn't, allies are useful. You're more likely to survive to the end with one than without."

He paused, looked back towards the trees. There was something else, though, something that he wouldn't say when he knew the Capitol's ears were in the trees. So instead, he merely murmured:

"We're stronger when we stand together."

So the boys ogled each other, and Hawkeye felt increasingly more uncomfortable.

It was a simple question and the pair had kept up with him so well so far. He was about to open his mouth and say something about the afterlife, though he wasn't sure what that would be, when Maximus' voice broke through and Hawkeye wouldn't dare call Wyatt a liar any longer, even if he wasn't sure he was ever going to. The word 'victor' is new to him. Some day soon he'd learn it was a title worth having. He just found himself stepping back at the not-too-shocking revelation, some spur of self-preservation insisting he do so.

He could argue about the worth of surviving when survival didn't mean living, but he wouldn't believe it himself. The final comment, shushed and direct, finds him looking at the marshal. He still couldn't fully believe it. Henry Fonda? Here? All deliberate stupidity aside, it was difficult to think of the pair of men as being as intelligent as they were. It's just what happens when so much makes so little sense. That old dilemma about shooting the messenger, the poor bastard. "And everybody would be happier if nobody murdered each other, but that's never stopped humanity before." He counters, figuring a second after that he didn't quite catch the hidden meaning. "And speaking of standing," and here he took another step back and felt his nerves start to run again. He addressed the general. "I sneaked a peek when you were walking. Great legs. Holding you OK? It's my job to know, so don't get any ideas to lob my head off. Does your buddy know? Support system, and all."

"Don't mistake me for a pacifist," Maximus said, which was about all he was going to say on the subject. He'd killed enough people in his life to know very, very well about the murderous side of humanity. He had come from a world where assassination was a very valid and tempting option to ones problems. He simply disliked discussing that truth around Wyatt. When it came to the leg, however...

"Of course he knows," Maximus said, looking at Hawkeye as if he was now going to explain things to a rather slow child. "He was there when I lost it. If you believe it would give you any advantage in battle, I assure you that you'd be disappointed."

"Easy, Max. I don't think the man meant it like that."

That easy drawl, no more hurried than it had been a moment before, despite Wyatt knowing well just how easily Max would prove the statement. The Roman would have been a victor with or without Wyatt's help.

He slanted a look at Hawkeye. A warning, silent, but no less powerful than when he'd held a spear to the man's throat.

See? See how glad he was to have stepped back like he did? Hawkeye would feel insulted if he didn't feel relieved, through glowers and all. Heck, he was sure he still was and if he could have only kept quiet a second to think he could have snapped up a retort.

Enough of that, though. The meek shall inherit the earth or something.

Up go his hands again, seemingly the only submissive gesture he'll never tire of. "I was just asking. Doc-tor, remember?" And he points at himself, because parroting Maximus' slow way of explaining things obviously hadn't been enough. He's quick to shake his head, to let on this sort of silent apology that had its roots deeply planted in don't thrash me. "I'm not going to fight." And he wonders if that was just a really stupid thing to say. But he speaks up louder and with more confidence. Because he could show bravado, too. "--surgeon, actually. Butcher, if you want. I come from spending forty hours a day slicing bodies and rearranging organs hoping whoever my hands are inside of gets better when they wake up. War's no picnic, and you boys know that." And boy, he'd regret that.

"And you don't think I know what happens when you pick fights you can't win. Let me tell you, I spend a lifetime picking up someone's mess every time that happens." Outburst, sure. But hell, Hawkeye had kept calm through it all. He could get struck down now, he thinks, voice wasted.

He'd really rather not, though.

"I'm not going to hurt anyone. Not just because I'm a doctor, either. I--" he holds up an arm so it's perpendicular to his body. Points at it with his other hand and makes a fist of the extra cloth that clings to it, effectively showing off the lack of muscle. "Do you think I'm going to be picking fights? You think I'm nuts? I'd rather talk to you death, which I admittedly probably already am." And down go his arms. And up they go- and fall again as a sort of shrug. "And I'm not sorry about it, either." So. Nyeh. So he just takes a breath. "Do any of you fine gentlemen have a recommendation on where to go from here?"

He did relax, letting his weight shift back on his good leg as he released the tension from it. He knew surgeons - had been under their hands - and knew in the army that sometimes more died under their knife than away from it. But they tried.

He couldn't quite help the phantom pain in his leg at the thought, though.

But he had no intention of hurting Hawkeye so he let the man ramble on, and when he changed the subject Maximus was all too thankful.

"Keep away from the fences," He said lowly. "Sometimes they kill and burn to touch. There is no real place to go- The arena is an island and the water around it burns like fire. Stay alive, is the only advice I can offer you."

That was about the long and short of it, and Wyatt could only nod along in agreement.

"Mind the other tributes," he added, when Max was done. "They're not all as accomdatin'. An' keep an eye out for things out'a place, strange noises er lights - they ain't above layin' traps when things get quiet."

It was the best general advice he could give, learned painfully over his stretch of seven long arenas.

Fences. He hadn't seen wire, but for some reason the idea clicks. He motions-- he just moves a hand up and down, points from the ground to the sky and to the ground again and raises a brow as Maximus keeps explaining. Those things, the rods? Okay, he'd been spooked by those already. So he nods. Water-- well, looks like death would be nearer than he had supposed but oh well. He can't play God and Hawkeye nods again.

'Stay alive'- and he shoots the man a look. No, what a fascinating notion! Really?

He'd talk on. Say how any noise here was out of place to him simply be being. Say how the only lights covered in basic training were flares, and how he hadn't stayed awake during that particular lesson. Instead he keeps his trap shut- and, gee, Trap. If it were the two of them, maybe they'd be along as well as Maximus and Wyatt. So instead of rambling more than he had, he keeps quiet until the end and snakes a grin on his lips and says, "I know not everyone's as darling as you boys. I've been lucky." And the second sentence is so much more serious than the first, he almost feels the whiplash himself. "First fella I saw- I ran right into a snare he had set up. We didn't know what to do with each other." Much like he didn't know what to do with them, now. He wanted to stop talking, but. It was like he was cursed or something. "I helped bandage his leg and he let me go. I don't think I'll see him again but if I do, I hope he keeps his word because he said he wouldn't be the one to skewer me." And he hopes, faintly, they get where he's trying to go with this.

"Keep to bandaging and you won't see harm from us, either," Maximus said, fairly sure he was taking the man's meaning correctly, though sometimes it was hard to tell.

Maximus preferred to kill those who fought back. Or deserved it. (Theft was as good an excuse as any, when a mouthful of food might be the only barrier between you and death.)

Wyatt followed Hawkeye's strange, rambling train of thought, to the same conclusion as Max and nodded again in agreement.

"We've got no quarrel with ya as it stands," he said. "An' we'll remember ya, should we come up on each other again."

It wasn't the game as the Capitol wanted it played, but it was the only way Wyatt could survive it. He was a killer only when he had to be, needing justification for the blood on his hands.

"And you haven't even seen me in bed," he sighs out, thinking hospital bed, looking as pathetic as his noodle self could, but intending the obvious. Unforgettable, him? He knew. He loved it. He loved the men and didn't mean it in a way that would require a confession to the Father. He just looked delighted. Relieved. Up and down all over the place- he was starting to give himself a headache. He waggles his brows- he tries to bring himself down.

"And suppose I didn't even know where I was headed," and suppose he didn't want to find their camp on accident at night. "Where shouldn't I go, or would that clue cost me extra? Answer me this one and I'll be out of your hair, scout's honor."

For once Maximus actually picked up on the innuendo - beds had changed little in two thousand plus years, after all - and rolled his eyes.

"You'll know to turn around if you land yourself in trouble," Maximus said. They moved often enough, but he wouldn't strike the man down if he stumbled into their camp. He'd just make sure he turned around and continued on his way.

Wyatt took a breath at the comment, that long-suffering inhale in through his nose, and followed Max's sentiment with a lean of his spear, helpfully pointing in the direction directly opposite of their camp.

He had no intention of harming the man either, if he managed to wander up on them, but he'd be a liar if he said he was up for another visit tonight.

No offense to him, but Hawkeye was exhausting.

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