thearena | My, that's a nice shiny you have there...

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My, that's a nice shiny you have there...

WHO| Garrett and anyone unlucky enough to wander by
WHAT| Thefts and attempted thefts
WHERE| The birch forest
WHEN| Wednesday night of week 3
Notes/Warnings| tbd

It's late, it's dark, and it's cold. While Garrett prefers the first two to daylight, the cold is proving to be a bit of a problem. The meat he'd managed to scavenge so far has frozen solid, for one, and his attempts at starting a fire without a match have been fruitless. He'd survived a major plague, a fire, monsters, and countless armed guards, but this environment was going to be the end of him if he didn't get some better supplies. With no sign of any more boxes, and no bodies to steal from, there's only one way to get them.

And so, Garrett finds himself out in the forest, surpressing shivers even with his winter camoufage blanket-turned-cloak, watching and listening for unfortunate passerby. He is all too aware that at least some of the other "contestants" here have better weaponry and combat skill than him, so every skill he'd ever learned from his life in the shadows of the City is being employed now as he skulks in the woods. When he does spot a target, he begins to slowly, cautiously close the gap, his every movement as silent as the snowfall itself...

[OOC note: just type SUCCESSFUL or UNSUCCESSFUL in your title to say whether or not he's, well, successful in robbing your character.]

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This particular contest is one of the more unusual ones. Where most of the people in the arena are bipedal someone who's not stand out all the more. The fact that Iskierka is, in fact, reptilian only makes her stand out the more so, especially when her red scales stand out against the stark white of the cold.

True, they stand stand out somewhat less so, now that the sun's set, but that only make it all the easier to see the intermittent jets of steam that come from the various spines that run down her back and over her sides.

She doesn't notice Garrett. She's far too focused on find somewhere dry to spend the night. Warm isn't too much of a problem, judging by the half-melted tracks in the snow she's leaving behind, but puddles are somewhat less than good to actually sleep in. Worse still, while she does have things that could be useful enough to be worth they're all tucked into a sort of netting that's snug against her belly and fastened over her back with a variety straps - successfully liberating anything is going to be no easy task.

[...A dragon. Okay, that was new. Everything else the arena had thrown at him had been realistic, if much, much larger than he was used to, but a dragon? They couldn't just settle for really big burricks?

Then he sees that it's carrying tools. That's...odd. Was someone trying to use it as a pack animal? He follows it cautiously from up in the trees, moving as cautiously and silently as he can manage, watching its behavior. Nothing about it inherently says it's aggressive, but he'd rather not take a chance without knowing for sure. The thief gathers up a clump of snow from one of the branches, and throws it, hard, at a tree off to the dragon's left.]

Not as a pack animal, no. Or at least, if they are they're somewhere else entirely. Not to mention that Iskierka herself would have had more than a few words for anyone even trying to use in such a manner.

On the other hand she doesn't look immediately aggressive. Instead, her body language - or what of it can be read - looks entirely self-assured. As if she has every reason to believe that know is going to simply attack her out of the blue and never mind that some people have before. It's not until the snowball hits the tree that anything changes; her wings momentarily half-spreading in surprise.

A moment later her head whips around, not to the tree the snowball had hit, but in the direction it must have been thrown from; she hasn't quite spotted Garrett yet, but she's very clearly looking all the same.

[He ducks behind the tree's trunk, concealing himself as much as possible while still being able to keep an eye on the dragon. He's been in this situation before: a target, likely much stronger than him, trying to figure out exactly where he is. He waits until she isn't looking straight in his direction, then slips across to another tree like a shadow in a room lit by a single candle.

He's closer now, just that little bit closer to his target and her supplies. The problem lies in getting those supplies off of her. With the abilities granted by the shard of magic stone in his eye out of commission, he was going to have to try doing this the old fashioned way. He puts a hand on the hilt of his knife, ready to cut her belongings free of their restraints. The thief takes a small breath, and sneaks closer.

He pauses just above her, hesitant. No risk, no reward. Before he can second-guess himself, Garrett drops down on her back and immediately tries to cut the ropes.]

Iskierka's used to the weight of people on her back. She is not, however, used to the feeling of people dropping onto her back; without even a second thought she rears up onto her hindlegs, wings spreading wide to help her keep her balance as she tries to throw Garett off.

From this angle, it's easier to tell that it's not ropes that are holding the netting in place, but leather straps. Something very deliberately made for this purpose, and something that might be a little more difficult to cut through, in the long run. And if that wasn't problematic enough, there's the fact that she's not exactly a comfortable seat, between the fact that the assortment of spines running down her back and over her sides are a little too warm for comfort and the fact that her hide seems to be slightly damp besides.

To say nothing of the fact that she's still bucking like a wild horse.]

[For someone who avoids horses, Garrett manages to stay on surprisingly long: about 4 seconds. Then he finds himself flying straight into a tree, and hits it upside-down and shoulders first with enough force to knock the wind out of him.

Gasping desperately for breath, he looks desperately up at the dragon.]

Nice...dragon?

[...He was going to die, wasn't he?]

She's not pleased, that much can be told by her expression. But she's not attacking yet either, for all that she isn't making even the slightest attempt to pick him up out of the snow either.

"I am hardly nice," she answers.

Or rather, she's nice only when she feels like it, and just at the moment, she doesn't. Garrett might not have actually succeeded in his attempt to steal her hard won odds and ends, but the attempt itself was still made.

"And certainly not to people who think it is better to ambush someone, rather than announce they are present."

[He blinks, surprised.]

You can talk?

[Then, he coughs.]

Of course you can talk. Look, that? That was nothing personal. You could say it's a bit of a habit.

[A habit developed to get him as much as he could take with as little effort as possible, but a habit nonetheless.]

"I have always been able to talk."

Even when she'd only just hatched she'd been able to speak, and even after so long in the Arenas there's still a moment of surprise in finding that there are people who aren't used to either the idea of dragons, the fact that she can speak, or both. Needless to say, she's not entirely certain she approves of the worlds that haven't got dragons.

Not that this is a point that she's inclined to bring up now, of course. Right now she's more concerned with the attempted theft.

"Habit or not, it is terribly rude to simply jump on someone's back."

"I thought you were an animal. I don't know what people are like where you're from, but we don't generally ask animals for permission before we jump on them."

He hopes like hell that she accepts his explanation. Because if she doesn't, he suspects that she can easily run him down and fry him to a crisp. If he'd have known she could think and talk, he probably would have passed on trying to rob her.

Accepts is perhaps not the right word. She can almost understand that she might have looked like something that she isn't, but the fact that she'd been taken for a mere animal doesn't sit well. It never has, really, even despite the fact that it's come up time and again during her stay in Panem.

(On the other hand, it's never come up quite like this before.)

"I am not certain that is a good excuse. But I suppose as long as you do not try to do so again it will be alright."

He throws up his hands to try and show her that he's being honest and understands he's outmatched.

"I'm a thief, not a gloomer. You breathe fire, right? I'm not stupid enough to become charcoal from trying that again."

Fortune might favor the bold, but untimely death always caught up with the stupid.

"Why'd they drag in a dragon, anyway?"

"They have hardly said why they have dragged any of us here."

She thinks. She's not in the habit of asking people and she's not really interested in poking her nose into the sorts of places that she'd need to poke her nose into in order to learn. So she contents herself with staying as she is, and if that should happen to mean staying mostly-blind to the goings on behind the scenes, so be it.

On the other hand, Garrett holding up his hands is good enough proof for Iskierka on the not-about-to-attack front. If he changes his mind, it might not end well, but for the time being she's glad enough to continue on as they are.

"And of course I do! I should hardly be a Kazilik, otherwise."

"Seems like they just grabbed all of us and threw us in here. And they expect all of us to just become mass murderers."

He wondered where the logic was in that. Surely trained killers and murderers would be more entertaining to watch than a bunch of people hiding from everyone else and trying to survive?

"Ah. Well, fire's better than what we've got back home."

That's the question of the day, really. Iskierka generally supposes that there must be a reason they've been chosen and not someone who might be better suited to such things, but that's about where her train of thought usually stops. What-ifs and could-bes are really not her thing by any stretch of the imagination.

"Oh? What is it that you have at home?"

Regardless of just about anything else, she's always interested in hearing about other kinds of dragons.

"Burricks. They've got all the majesty of hagfish. Dragons breathe fire; burricks...belch explosive gas."

As useful as they could be as guard animals, there was just no denying that they were an embarassing enimal. At least they really were as dumb as they looked; sneaking past them was easy enough once you knew a few tricks.

The name means nothing to Iskierka. Which isn't anything of a surprise. Other worlds aren't something she cares much about - and as far as she's been able to tell whatever burricks aren't dragons, at which point she's stopped being quite so interested in them. Or rather, in what they might loo like. The idea of something that belches some kind of gas, on the other hand, is interesting.

"Oh," she comments. "I do not think we have anything quite like that."

Fire breathers, yes, and more than a few other things besides, but nothing that's explosive in quite the same way.

"You don't want anything like burricks. Trust me."

He raises a brow now, genuinely curious about this creature.

"So, can you fly, too, or are those wings just for show?"

"I should be a very poor dragon if I could hardly fly."

The answer comes almost immediately, and with no small amount of pride besides. True, she doesn't immediately jump to an an actual demonstration, but that may be more due to the fact that there's not exactly a lot of space in between the trees as opposed to a general lack of interest in proving that she can.

"Sorry, I've just never seen anything bigger than a bird fly."

His eyes metaphorically light up as he leans forward a bit in genuine excitement.

"Can you show me?"

Whatever scraps of his inner child survived his childhood bubble up to the surface now.

"It would be more impressive were there more space," Iskierka comments and it's at least partially a complaint. For all that she's fond of showing off she likes it a lot better when she do it properly. Make it the show it deserves to be, as opposed to something that's only bits and pieces.

That said, she's already half-spreading her wings. She might prefer the more impressive sort of showing off, but if Garrett would prefer something more immediate she's at least not unwilling to make her best attempt.

Trapping is dirty work. Thankfully, it's been years since Jane was the sort to shrink from anything like that. Practicing in the tribute center had paid off, much to her surprise. Even back home, she had rarely done this well.

Two hares are strung around her shoulders on a cord made from strips of clothing, one dangling over either side. They hang heavily, dead weight settling below their broken necks so they swung like corpses from a gallows with her every step. She's on her way to the water's edge to skin them, something she's gotten the bulk of her practice in here at the arena, though she had done it before as well. The rabbits are a good size, but they won't be dinner tonight-- older kills need to go first, and with the snow, these will keep for a while yet.

[He follows her for a while, patiently closing the gap between them without giving himself away. He sneaks up behind her, matching her footsteps so it still sounds like one person, and unsheaths his knife. He could stab her, sure, but that wasn't his style. Never had been.

Instead, reaches out and cuts one hare free. He'd take the second, but she'd definitely feel the change in weight. Even taking one was a risk, so he immediately heads up the nearest tree and pulls the blanket around himself to try to hide from her.]

Garrett may be as deft as they come, but Jane would have to be asleep to miss when one rabbit slips over her shoulder and the other falls to the ground. She curses, suspecting at first that her cord snapped or came loose at one of the many knots holding it together. Her mistake gives him the precious second he needs to slip away before she finds half of her quarry missing and goes for her knife.

The blanket does its job hiding him initially, but the footprints Garrett leaves in his wake lead her straight to the tree he fled up. She kicks the trunk once so there's no mistake that she found him.

"Drop it, shithead." Her voice is an unsympathetic growl, not meant to be heard by anyone but him. "I'll cut this fucking tree down before I let you take my food."

Edited (cat on keyboard posted my reply-- classic.) 2015-03-09 06:36 (UTC)

[There were footsteps criss-crossing all over the woods! She just had to find the set that led her to him, didn't she? He glances at the other trees, judging the distance between himself and their branches.]

Go right ahead.

[And with that, he leaps into the next tree, making his escape and disappearing into the night.

...Until one tree branch betrays him, snapping and sending him crashing loudly through the rest of the branches. He hits the ground hard, but springs to his feet almost immediately. No time to waste, after all; she'd be right on him.]

This part of the woods may have seen its share of traffic, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that the tracks leading immediately away from you are the ones to follow, and Jane's a pretty sharp tack.

Pretty sharp, but not the sharpest. As futile as a pursuit on foot may turn out, she's a little too incensed to give a shit. His agility does not go unnoticed either, and she's swearing up a storm through teeth gritted like a vise, trying to keep her eyes on him through the cover the trees provide him.

The sound of the first branch snapping is music to her ears, and she's feet away when he lands. Jane wastes no time, flinging herself at him bodily, fists and knees ready to rain down on whatever part of him they can reach. He's got a knife on him, she knows that much from the clean break in her snare-- but then again, so does she. And what's more, she knows how to use it.

"You fucking son of a bitch."

He flails and tries to throw her off. Dammit, why did they take his blackjack?! It's not like he'd made a habit of killing people with it! He grunts as his lip splits, and knees her hard in retaliation.

"I could have killed you!"

It's a great feeling when that punch connects, the sting familiar against her knuckles as she pulls her arm back to wind it for another punch. She hangs in there when his knee slams into her side and knocks the air out of her lungs, fingers digging into the front of his windbreaker so he doesn't finish her loose. In the tumult, she's wound up on top, attempting to get a leg on either side of him so she can pin him to the snow. There's no sympathy in her eyes at his exclamation, and it does nothing to soften the second blow she has lined up for his face.

"Bet you're wishing you had now, aren't you?"

Edited 2015-03-09 07:36 (UTC)

You don't survive long on the streets if you fight fair. He yelps at the second hit, and repays it with a vicious headbutt.

"For a rabbit?! Are you crazy?"

There were things he was quite willing to kill for, but one single hare wasn't one of them. Not when he still had other options, anyway.

The way he spits his answer so honestly takes Jane aback, eyes searching Garrett's face for any sign that he's trying to get her to lower her guard so he can regain the upper hand. If someone's going to let up, it's not going to be her. Back home, she'd heard of people killing for less, seen it too. Even the promise of competition for resources had led to fights that didn't end until only the stronger side was left standing.

His headbutt connects with a crack she feels clear down into her neck and sends her sprawling on her back with a howl. Her knife is in her hand instantly, swiping blindly as she scrambles to right herself and blink the spots out of her vision.

She's off him, and she's blinded. That's all he needs to roll back on to his feet and shoot up the nearest tree again. Once he's perched up there, he calls back down to her.

"You shouldn't carry food out in the open like that! There are thieves around here!"

She's just a second too late to stop Garrett, fingers clawing for a piece of him and coming up empty. Rolling upright, Jane stands and slams the heel of her boot into the trunk of the tree he vanished up, wishing for all the world that she could cut or burn it down.

That he spared her life means approximately jack shit to her when he's making off with something that took a day's work, that tomorrow can't guarantee her. Her food in his gut means she's that much closer to going hungry, which makes this an attempt on her life as far as she's concerned. Memories of being half-starved and dehydrated in the spaceport are still too vivid for her to keep her cool. Her heel meets with the trunk again and again, snow coming down in drifts with each violent connect, dusting her hair and melting down the collar of her parka.

"I don't fucking care if all you're trying to do is stay alive-- if I catch you on the ground, I'll kill you." She doesn't yell, hardly raises her voice to be heard, but as she turns around to stalk back to camp, there's no question that she meant every word.

Edited 2015-03-19 05:58 (UTC)

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My, that's a nice shiny you have there...

Unsuccessful

Pardon me while I laugh at Garrett thinking about doing really stupid things

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i want this two to tussle ngl so maybe he snatches them but she takes him down?

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Those darn cats, huh?

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