Stargazer, heartbreaker

[gardienne]

Who: Eponine and OTA
What: Taking a break from the fighting to contemplate her most recent murder and the beauty of the stars.
Where: On an upper floor of the space station
When: Soon after the Cornucopia
Warnings: Bring your own. But it is Eponine so take that as a warning!


The Capitol very rarely surprises Eponine any more. The longer she's been there, the more jaded she has become and she has simply given up caring about anything any more. But this arena is breathtaking.

Now that the trauma of the Cornucopia is over and Eponine has managed to grab herself some supplies and get out completely unscathed, she has the time to appreciate the beauty of the Capitol's creation. She stops to wind the rope she snatched from the Cornucopia around her skinny waist, threading the medical kit and the strange gels onto it as well.

Abandoning all other thoughts of hiding places and weapons and even food, Eponine runs through the station, her orange suit a beacon in the dark. She traverses each of the lower floors, going up and up and up until she finds a window that looks out at the stars. And then she stops.

"WOW." She breathes, her nose and palms pressed flat against the glass as she gazes out. "Such beauty. And so close to a star. I wish I could touch 'em."
But she dares not to leave the building again. Not now that she knows the horror of death outside the walls.

Comments

[keep_surviving]

It's pretty hard not to notice Eponine when she's running around in one of the most eye catching colours ever and is making no attempt to hide herself.

But that's exactly what's so unnerving.

In the arena, the ones looking to be noticed or making no attempt to hide were usually the most dangerous.

Not that Eponine was especially dangerous. Diana's almost positive she would overpower the girl if it came to an outright brawl.

But the girl's mood swings are unpredictable at the best of times. If she's hit the breaking point of running around and looking for fights Diana doesn't want to be on the receiving end.

Maybe if she keeps walking quickly, she can get past before Eponine turns around?

[gardienne]

But Eponine, as distracted as she is by the beauty of the stars, is on high alert. That Sandy has a lot of friends, and if word gets out that Eponine caused the little girl's death, she knows that she'll be a massive target. So as soon as she hears Diana, she whips around, hands going to the gel tied to her waist to ensure a quick getaway. But she realises that it's Diana and stops herself.

"I have not seen you for a long time, Diana." She calls out, quite put out that the girl is apparently sneaking past her. "Should I pretend not to see you again now?"

[keep_surviving]

Diana stops midstep, allows herself a small roll of her eyes then turns to face to Eponine. "Oh, it is you Eppy."

She starts walking over slowly. "No need to play the guilt card. We're in the arena, I'm not going to go hurrying over to give everyone a friendly kiss, am I?"

Her eyes look the other girl over for weapons then she smirks. "You're not going to stab me if I come over to smooch you, are you?"

[gardienne]

"I don't have any weapons." Eponine shrugs. Does she care if Diana kisses her? Not any more, not really. Oh, but hasn't she and Felicity... well... Well, at least her reply is noncommittal enough. Doesn't make her look over keen. It lets the decision lie with Diana... and Eponine is fairly certain that Diana will do whatever she wants to anyway, and quite frankly, she can't be bothered arguing something she knows she'll lose.

"But if you kiss me, Diana, Felicity might be having words with you."

[keep_surviving]

Seeing Eponine's rather apathetic stance Diana relaxes and closes the gap between them.

"Hmmm..." Diana tapped her bottom lip in mock thought. "Nope. Never heard of her."

But if it was going to upset someone, well... That was just more reason to do it.

She cups Eponine's chin between her fingers and lifts it up to steal a kiss on the lips before looking down at the girls waist.

"I see you've done pretty well for yourself."

[iphigeneia]

Felicity had been looking for Eponine. Call it a misguided attempt at friendship, or perhaps a childish crush that propelled her onward, but either way she felt driven to seek out the girl and make sure she was alright. They'd been through so much together, by now, these Arena visits were practically second nature.

Eponine was quite easy to spot in her bright orange suit. Felicity looked subdued in her red by comparison, though her dyed black hair gave her an unfamiliar, almost sinister look as she turned the corner to see Eponine with her nose pressed against the glass. Against the backdrop of stars, Eponine was practically shining.

"There you are. I've been looking all over for you." Fee smirked a little, clutching her case of supplies in one hand as she approached.

[gardienne]

"Yeah?" Eponine grinned at Felicity, and reached out for her hand. "Look! Come and look." She wanted to urge Felicity to the window, to stare back out at the stars.
"Aren't they beautiful? The stars? I have always wanted to see the stars proper close."

She stared for a few minutes at the stars, silent. Can she confess her murder to Felicity?

She pulled Felicity into a hug. "I am so glad you are well. But I do not like your hair. You look ill. Why is it black? How did you manage the Cornucopia?"

[iphigeneia]

The stars were very beautiful, Fee couldn't debate that. In fact, they might just be the most glorious thing she'd seen outside the Realms. There was something so peaceful about them, so calm and gorgeous. There was a tranquility there, that she knew wouldn't last but she desperately wanted to keep together anyway.

"My stylist insisted that it was time for a change." Felicity frowned, wrapping her arms tight around Eponine, then gently kissing the top of her head. "What's the matter? Am I not ravishing anymore? You wound me, Eponine. I thought you should think me a beauty."

She jangled her little case of supplies then, to show it off. "I've made out all right. I shan't be in any trouble tonight at least. And you? Did you run for it this time?"

[gardienne]

"It is funny, no? They dyed my hair blonde for the last arena, and now you as dark as I. And yours is nicer than mine." Eponine ran her fingers over one of the French plaits her hair was weaved into. "But I think blonde is nicer. Princesses and angels are blonde. The devil has hair like me. But..." She grins. "Always beautiful. And you know it."

She is just going to push that twinge of guilt to the back of her mind. The change of subject is welcome indeed.

"I ran." She indicated her waist, where she had wound her thick rope, and suspended her grabs, her medical kit and her gels. "I... I... you're going to hate me when I tell you."

[iphigeneia]

"What?" She crinkled her nose, looking Eponine up and down. "What makes you think I should hate you? Tell me what's the matter. What's made you say such a thing?"

[gobananas]

Marco, being a clever kid, did some research on the other competitors before he started this Arena. He decided early on that Eponine was someone he'd want to keep track of; she's been in the Arenas plenty of times, but she doesn't have any particularly stand-out skills, and just about anything she can do he can probably manage too. Probably most importantly, she's not the kind to just stab first and ask questions later. Thus, if he gets a chance, he's following her.

That's what he finds himself doing about an hour after the Cornucopia. His heart's hammering away in his chest, but he's doing pretty well at not freaking out running around a space station with people trying to kill him (probably because this is entirely old news to him). Fear never dies completely - fear is a gift, fear keeps you safe - but it becomes much more manageable when you repeatedly cow it into submission.

"Hey." He peeks around a corner and sees Eponine all but making out with the window looking at the stars. "So how 'bout that bloodbath?"

[gardienne]

Eponine turns when she hears the boy calling, her hands automatically going to the rope around her waist. Fat lot of good a rope would do her anyway. But then her hands fall limply to her sides as she stares at Marco.

"Don't I know you?" she asks, staring.

She does know him. She does - definitely. But... but from where? But... OH.

Hasn't she seen that face, those eyes, staring back at her over and over whilst she has packed up Eva's little house and sorted through photographs. It's him - Eva's baby, returned. Is it? Would the Capitol play such a trick on poor Eva? On him, the baby? Even on Eponine?

But of course...

Disbelievingly, she comes towards him. "Is it you? Oh - oh god. I recognise the eyes. And they are SO cruel to do this."

[gobananas]

Marco jerks his head back a little and steps away from her. "What? You don't know me, what are you talking about?"

His brain, wired by some angry god or something to come up with worst-case scenarios, immediately goes into overdrive. Does everyone here know about him, who he is, his secret identity as that kid who turns into an ape to save the human race? Is Eponine's special brand of crazy triggered by his handsome face?

[gardienne]

"No?" Eponine pauses, uncertain. Perhaps it's not him. Perhaps she's seeing things just because she wants to. Perhaps she's just so desperate to have Eva hig her again, she'll see her features in the face of a perfect stranger.

"I'm sorry... I didn't... well... It don't matter. Perhaps I am just mad at last? I don't know." She swipes at her face, rubbing the traces of vomit from her lips. There's nothing she can do about the dried in splatterings in her hair. She is making a fabulous first impression.

"I am sorry... Perhaps we ought to begin again, if you would like?"

[gobananas]

"Yeah. Yeah, let's do that." As much as the strange recognition makes Marco want to squirm out of his skin and take off, he knows that someone who might have a clue to his identity could be a very real threat. It's not just curiosity that makes him want to follow; it's a matter of survival. He feels his pulse fluttering inside his wrist like a trapped bird.

He tries to ignore the vomit in her hair. God knows he's seen worse. Blood, guts, fragments of bone, the kind of images that dance around inside his head when he's trying to sleep.

"I'm Marco." His name'll be common knowledge soon enough anyway. No need to hide that.

[anachronologistics]

At least, being orange himself, it isn't very hard to fade into some of the more garish backgrounds of this place. It doesn't surprise him that Eponine doesn't notice him floating near the brightly-colored ceiling; it actually comes as a bit of a relief. Not because it's her, mind, but rather because it's confirmation that he can still hide if he needs to -- just as much as he can still fight, if he needs to.

For a moment, he thinks about silently floating back out again, to leave her be to look at the stars. It's only for a moment, though, before he remembers their conversation back to the day they met. How many arenas she had said she'd been in, and how she hadn't believed in his ability to fly.

Welp.

She might catch his reflection in the glass as he floats down from the ceiling. Everything about him is faintly orange-tinted. Even though he's in the air, his wings don't flap to keep him there; rather, he just floats on his own. What was a pair of legs is now a long ghostlike tail, and it's hard to say whether it is made out of something solid or not.

He hangs in the air with his head tilted and expression pulled into one of almost boredom.

"Doubt you'd wanna do that. Touch 'em, I mean."

[gardienne]

It takes a minute for Eponine to realise that there is a face reflecting back at her - especially an orange face, but when she does spot Davesprite's reflection, she jumps violently, and lets out a muffled gasp.

"Dave? Dave, is it you?" She spins around, eyes widening ever so slightly as she takes in the ghost before her. Is he a ghost? She shrinks back against the glass.

"Are you real? Is he dead? What's happened to you?"

[anachronologistics]

"Nah, no Daves here, just us birds."

It certainly sounds like Dave, at least. He glides down until he's floating in front of her, and then he hangs back in the air as if sitting on an invisible levitating chair.

"No. I'm not real. I'm a figment of your imagination. Who knew that your fantasy consisted of a half-bird-half-ghost freak creamsicle-colored freakshows in space stations? You didn't...." What is he even saying. "As far as I can tell Dave's still alive and kickin'. If my guess is right and we've all been dosed up with power juice, it's gonna be pretty hard to kill him right now, anyway. So..."

He shrugs a shoulder.

"I got juiced up and turned into a bird again."

A bird of sorts.

[gardienne]

"It's not fantasy. It's..." Eponine closes her eyes tight, quite definitely wary of... of whatever he was supposed to be. If he was another voice in her head, if she was imagining him now, then she was getting worse. Before now, she's seen things that aren't real when she's been so hungry she's about to pass out, or so scared and overworked that she can barely stand up. But to see a ghost, a vision, a hallucination now, well, that is a scary thing.

"A... a bird?" Eponine is horribly bewildered. "Dave, please. Please just leave me be. I am sorry, okay? Just stop tormenting me. I am sorry, I swear." Perhaps if she admits her failings and apologises, this particular hallucination will just go away?

[anachronologistics]

Oh.

Well fuck.

For a moment he had been inclined to circle in the air closer to her, but after all that it's... difficult to even really consider it, now. It would be pretty stupid to not expect the occasional reaction like this, especially when so many people knew Dave. It doesn't make him anymore prepared for it when it actually happens, though. Davesprite drifts backward into the air instead, tail coiling upon itself, and brings his arms tight across his chest.

"Caw, caw, motherfuckers," he replies simply, not that he expects her to understand the reference. "Yeah, sure. That's cool. You're forgiven for your trespasses or whatever. No more tormenting. I'll remember to call the boogeyman out of your closet too, I guess."

[a_minute_younger]

"I wouldn't," says a voice, hoarse and a bit breathless but probably somewhat familiar, from somewhere just behind her. "I heard they're really hot! Almost as hot as you."

Eponine did not make it particularly difficult for Gary to see her on the way up here, even with how hectic and unpleasant his run at the Cornucopia had been. He'd lost her on the way up when he got distracted by something delicious and sugary in one of the rooms adjoining, but managed to catch up soon thereafter--and this time, with a convenient gift. The handful of cake (not slice, handful; Gary lacks proper cutting equipment and just did his best to get a little bit of everything in one scoop) is presented by Eponine's face, passed over her shoulder.

"Cake?"

[gardienne]

Stars forgotten, she turns round, delight clearly written on her face.

"You've brought me cake?" Eponine's eyes grow round with wonder and excitement. Cake in an arena - just fancy! She's never seen cake in an arena before now. She reaches out for it, and gobbles what Gary offers down, quite keen to at least have something a little bit nice on her belly before she's killed. It only occurs to her after she's eaten it to ask,

"There is not poison in it, no?" It's too late anyway. "Why are you being nice to me, Gary? It's an arena, you know?"

[a_minute_younger]

"Poison?" Gary looks genuinely taken aback, because he is. Actually there are many alarming things about Gary's appearance: the arm that wasn't used to carry cake is bent at an awkward angle by his side, and small specks of blood are spattered around his mouth. His chest heaves unevenly with each ragged breath. And yet, miraculously, Gary seems completely oblivious to all of these things.

"Why on Earth would I--?" He gives a quick shake of his head. "I didn't even think about that! That would've been clever, wouldn't it? Maybe next time." A beat as he thinks about this, then promptly forgets. "--Why shouldn't I be nice to you? You're a nice girl! We're friends!"

[gardienne]

"Didn't mean no offence. Just... it's an arena." Eponine shrugs away his protests. She has had friends turn on her before, and she barely knows Gary anyway. How is she to know that it is not a pretence to make her an easy kill. But she's glad all the same, that he's not thought that way, and her expression shows that.

"I would rather no next time though. I shan't kill you. I hate to kill in these places. I have done it for this time, and I shan't do it again. Only... has someone tried to kill you?" He does not look well at all, and Eponine, now that she's focusing on him, rather than his cake, is decidedly worried.

"Shall I try to fix you? I have a medical kit here." And no first aid skills to speak of, but that's beside the point.

[a_minute_younger]

"Yeah, I don't blame you." Gary shrugs, which...given his condition is actually a really unpleasant-looking gesture. The odd shifting of his ribs doesn't hurt, but it does make him grimace out of sympathy. He drops the less cheery topic of killing people for the moment to try and shoo away Eponine's concerns for his health.

"Some big guy grabbed me at the Cornucopia," he explains, almost calmly. "It sucked then, but I'm okay now, I think! They gave me my powers back when I got inside. I can hardly feel a thing!"