#mj.tribute ball

[ingenuitycfchacs]

[ingenuitycfchacs]

she resisted the urge to look over her shoulder at the whispered 'come look at the stars with me, little spider.' he wasn't there, she told herself, instead trying to focus on the other's words. he was a figment of her imagination and a cruel one at that. he wasn't real.

focus was instead laid on trying to connect the stars the girl pointed at. "they're just stars." she said as if there hadn't been a time in her life when she'd spent hours listening to the stories behind some of the pictures they made. "it's not so much the buildings as the lights. there's plenty of buildings in two, but this city seems to think it needs lights on twenty-four-seven." she sighed. it could be overwhelming at times, just as all the noise and chatter.

madge  couldn’t  imagine  the  life  of  a  victor  -  the  endless  eyes  on  you  ,  the  constant  loop  of  trauma  that  occurred  yearly  ,  the  unhealthy  attachment  to  wealth  it  gave  you  .  madge  was  grateful  she  had  the  life  that  she  did  ,  but  she  wished  it  could  have  been  so  much  more  .  

her  gaze  shifted  towards  arachne  ,  recognition  of  the  other  from  years  of  living  in  the  capitol  now  finally  paying  off  as  she  followed  the  other’s  eyes  down  instead  of  up  .  “  not  in  the  garden  ,  in  the  sky  .  ”   to  find  the  smaller  things  in  life  was  forever  madge’s  ultimate  goal  .  if  she  couldn’t  have  the  family  and  future  she  wanted  ,  she’d  search  for  bits  and  pieces  of  it  in  her  every  day  routine  .  of  course  ,  a  party  at  snow’s  mansion  was  never  in  the  cards  until  recently  .

“  here  ,  look  up  there  .  ”   the  femme  said  softly  ,  finger  pointing  towards  the  sky  as  she  tried  to  align  the  redirection  with  each  of  the  brightest  stars  above  .  “  it’s  a  miracle  you  can  even  see  any  of  them  with  all  the  buildings  around  here  ,  but  …  it’s  beautiful  .  ”

[ingenuitycfchacs]

"arachne." it'd been a battle she fought every time, though she had long since given up on it. cashmere could be just as stubborn. her shoulders tensed when cashmere called her out on the hallucinations, but didn't comment on it, merely staring straight ahead and across the ball room. "no, not himself." she muttered under her breath. "not that that fact alone makes any difference it seems." she scooted her own chair closer to cashmere's even as she threw a glare towards a sponsor she caught watching. she could damn well fend for herself, but that didn't mean she didn't unconsciously cling to the bond formed between the two a few years before.

"Ara, stop talking" her tone held a warning, but as she followed the younger woman's gaze to nothingness, her features softened. "Hey, ignore him. He's not there." Logically she knew Arachne knew he wasn't there, she'd come a long way from the girl who'd lashed out at the figment of her imagination. She waited a beat, casting a glance around before speaking lower. "Has Snow approached you?"

[ingenuitycfchacs]

she hadn't been paying attention to the scores or the people around her or well... really any of it. but when someone spoke, they garnered her interest and her eyes flickered momentarily to the scores on display. "well, when was the last time you saw victors going into the arena?"

she still wasn't sure she'd have followed any relation of her's back into the arena even if she'd had the ability. she'd won, she'd already paid her dues to the capitol and the academy. "there's bound to be high scores when nearly half the tributes are victors who've had years to train if they didn't before their own games."

open to everyone .

they feel shaken , because finally , plutarch has shown them what is in store for the tributes entering the arena . fulvia has lived in this city her entire life , but this is another level up that none of them could possibly expect . she has to remind herself to swallow down the excitement which she was raised on her , years of tradition being deprogrammed from her mind is something she still struggles with .

" can you believe this ? " they ask , their sleepy eyes wide in the dimness of the party , music tinkling like glitter in their ears . " i've never seen so many high scores in one games . it's going to be a good year , i can tell . "

[ingenuitycfchacs]

she'd wandered out of the crowd with the constant whisper of 'they're watching. she's judging you. he knows your secrets.' following her in the form of a blonde ghost only inhabiting her mind. "would you shut up?" she hadn't realized the whispered utterance had been loud enough for someone else to hear until the other spoke up. she startled, looking at the other for a moment before shaking her head. "oh, nothing." she tried to follow his gaze. "which dress?"

starter: open where: the tribute ball, snow’s mansion

things felt like static. buzzy buzz buzz loud too loud so loud voices together crashing making head feel like— they always did when dami was close to feeling panicked, close to a meltdown of catastrophic proportions. true, he knew how to hide behind a mask and pretend that he was fine within the capitol to save face, but seeing them being murdered like that— knowing it could be him. his windpipe felt on the verge of closing, his eyes blurring, his ears turning to a white noise before he heard some muffle of a voice by his side. with his glass in hand, dami’s gaze broke away from the fixed point that he had found himself staring into and forced a typical, capitol winning smile on his face as he fell right back into his ‘i’m okay’ facade. “sorry, what was that? i got a little too into trying to tell if the fabric of her dress was from the factory my dad works for.”