Arena 05 - Chill

[gamemakers]

Usually, the tribute's outfits for the arena aren't accessorized. But today, the last thing their stylists hand them before the countdown begins is a pair of heavy black glasses, polarized and thick-lensed. They look at odds with the thick, winter gear they've been outfitted in.


It's a long rise to the surface today, inside their individual little tubes, much longer than usual. They start to feel the cold only about halfway up, and to hear the wind. It howls across the surface as they reach it, pressing all of their clothes flat against their bodies. And the reason for the glasses is immediately apparent.


20 - 19 - 18


The sky is white. The ground is white (and gray and black and blue but mostly white), the far-off sea is blinding silver. Everything in sight flings light around, fractures it into scintilating rainbows and sheer white beams of reflection. It is strong, cruel light, and it bears no heat at all. The surface is so cold that the little metal trackers ache in everyone's arm, and the countdown has to continue at a deafening volume to be heard.


 12 - 11 - 10 -


The circle of silver pedestals is the only regular shape to be seen. All else is fractured and split, the most uneven footing imaginable. And at the center of the circle, the Cornucopia sports icycles hanging from its lip, almost to the pile of supplies tucked all neatly inside its mouth.


4


3


2


There's a lull in the wind just as the gong sounds, letting it peal out across the frozen glacier, and echo off the high rock cliffs in the distance. And the ice answers, with a loud crack that seems to come from miles down.


Let the Games begin.

Comments

[alldeduction]

The parkas and the glasses had made telling the participants apart extremely difficult, especially considering Sherlock had not met all of them. But there was no mistaking that grating plea. Sherlock sneered as he stood, hoping his height would allow him to look somewhat intimidating.

Every moment he wasted was another piece of equipment, another can of supplies, gone before Sherlock could mark who had taken it.

"Get out of here," he growled, pulled up to his full height, the wind whipping around him. "Get out of here before I change my mind and kill you after all." It was a complete bluff, of course. Not that he didn't think he could - it was a matter of would. He needed Katurian out of here or all the supplies were lost to him forever.

[downbeat]

Katurian didn't need to be told twice. From the moment his back hit the ice, the word run was on the forefront of his mind. He stumbled up from the ground (twice he slipped, once he nearly fell down all over again) and tore off in the opposite direction, running as fast as his feet could take him on the treacherous ice.

His mind was cloudy and his neurons were screaming, but one thing was certain. Surprising, but certain.

This man did not try to kill him.