thearena | Arena 01: Ready, set, go!

There's no word, before they arrive, of what the Arena will look like, what hazards and advantages it will give to the Tributes. It was a topic of interest in the news coverage beforehand, it always is, but as always, it's a closely guarded secret of the Gamemakers. They're gathered from the Training Center, individually, and taken into the hovercraft, where everyone is implanted with a tracking device, buried deep in the muscle of their forearm. It's harmless, but cutting it out would not be.

The hovercraft delivers them to an underground bunker, with only their stylists, and there they receive their one advance clue about the Arena; their clothing. Each Tribute is dressed in thick cloth pants and shirt, given sturdy hiking boots with thin neoprene socks, and a short, weather-proof jacket with deep pockets and a plastic hood. Nothing more.

There's just time to say goodbye to the stylists when the countdown starts. Each Tribute is directed into a glass and metal tube, which then ascends. And the countdown keeps going, a loud projected voice.

25 - 24 - 23 - 22 - 21

It's noon in the Arena, the sun brilliant on water, on cliffs, on the snow high above them. Twenty-four pedestals stand in the span of a wide tide-flat, surrounded by stony mud encrusted with oysters, cut through with rivulets of glistening water.

18 - 17 - 16 - 15

Through the middle of their circle runs a thigh-deep river, the run-off of the massive waterfall that stands a short ways back in the woods, and in the middle of that is the Cornucopia, blinding gold in the sunlight, reflecting the sea and the trees and the mountains.

9 - 8 - 7

They've all been warned, don't step off your pedestal early.

4 - 3

2

And then the gong, rolling out to echo off the cliffs and water, seeming to ring forever.

[OOC: Don't forget the OOC Arena post, especially those of you running for the Cornucopia. And here are your fellow tributes. Every single one of you ought to post to this post. There will be a Cornucopia thread, and anyone else feel free to post as you will. Please add a tag with your character's name.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Emily doesn't bother looking at her opponents - she is above it all, there will be plenty of time for profiling later. The only things that exist in this moment are her and the Cornucopia.

The part of her brain that deflects pain with humor mimics Reid and his innate ability to find the least opportune moments to bring up useless, albeit pertinent, facts.

She tenses each muscle, ready for a fight, as the numbers burn themselves out. She knows she probably isn't the fastest, considering she may well be one of the oldest tributes, but she's willing to bet that she's probably killed more people than them. She isn't about to let them intimidate her - if anything, they should be intimidated by her. She was a federal agent, after all.

That's right, a federal agent. A supervisory special agent. Of the Behavioural Analysis Unit. That's about as elite as it gets.

All these other tributes were UNSUBs, she told herself. Just her and twenty-three UNSUBs and it was her job - no, her duty - to kill each and every last one of them.

But first, she needed weapons. Not that she needed weapons to kill someone, she'd proved that more than once, it just made the whole ordeal a lot faster and easier.

She threw more than a few punches in the scrabble to reach anything that might be of use, not stopping long enough to register if she landed any of them.

[Interruptions welcome! But according to her death roll, she survives the cornucopia.]

In his dash towards dry land and the forest, Tate gets in the way of an unarmed tribute who in the splashes of the area of the weapons, punches him in the face causing his nose to bleed. He doesn't feel the pain of the hit, but it still knocks him down.

In a quick move he turns and makes a grab at her ankle in an effort of revenge.

Emily falls to the ground with a splash in the soggy mud, completely drenched. She whirls around, onto her back, in search of the face attached to the fingers clutching her ankle.

He was just a kid. Tiny. Apparently unarmed, aside from a bow. But she didn't let herself stop to dwell on that fact. The fact that he was probably just a scared and confused innocent like her. She was still picturing him as an UNSUB.

She wrenched her ankle free with a quick twist of her leg, then drew her knee towards her chest, followed by a quick propulsion of her heel into his gut.

The kick throws him off more than hurts him. He falls backward back into the water and almost loses the bow in the process. "F-fucking...cunt." He gasps out realizing that it had struck him harder that expected.

He does his best to regain himself, turning over to be on his knees. The water doesn't seem to phase him as he becomes more intent now on paying her back for that kick as he makes a lunge for her. He was determined in that short moment to show her that he was stronger than he looked. The bow has been tossed aside, it doesn't matter to him if he loses it and instead with his bare hands he goes for her throat.

She scuttles backwards, still on her back until her hands gain traction on a rock.

"I'm gonna give you a chance to get away, kid..." she warns, "Leave now and I'll forget this ever happened."

But in the off chance that he didn't take the deal, she closes her fingers around the rock and tenses her arm.

His eyes narrow. He's not stupid enough to take this risk empty handed. He backs himself away from her and as he does he still points to her in an effort to say, "I'm still going to get you."

His hand find the useless bow again and when he's far back enough that even with a lunge she couldn't hit him, he turns and continues his run towards the woods.

There was one, at least, that she didn't land -- Amy threw herself to the side, the blow missing her by millimeters, and she landed on the ground, flat on her back, the impact knocking the breath out of her.

Didn't mean she stopped moving, though; she forced herself to roll to the side, stumble up and to her feet.

Arena 01: Ready, set, go!

Emily

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