I'm doing science and I'm still alive. (goldenwire) wrote in colosseum, @ 2014-04-10 23:44:00 |
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Entry tags: | ! 57th games, - capitol, victor: 33rd beetee latier |
WHO: Beetee Latier
WHAT: Still creepin'
WHEN: During the 57th Games
WHERE: The Capitol
STATUS: Completed narrative. I should have done this a while ago oops. Also prompt: beer, when I get my table up.
Nobody seemed to notice that Beetee kept to himself more than usual. Perhaps it was simply a consequence of not mentoring, and nobody deigned to comment on that either, thanks to Mags, Woof, and Bolt's returns, stripping Bit's farewell tour of its novelty. For all of training week, Beetee barely spoke with the tributes, or even Bit and Faraday. Instead, he hid himself in his quarters. Alone with his computer screen, he pored over pages of code, erasing traces of his digital presence. He disarmed dormant bugs that he'd programmed years ago, reset timestamps. Only the cold light of his computer screen shone in the darkness, reflecting off of the lenses of his glasses, tinting his skin blue. Sometimes, he would look over a schematic with Wiress. He was never safer than when he was with her. Wiress always knew when something was wrong, and she would know before he did if something were to happen. But nothing happened. All week. Not when he was with Wiress, not when he was alone. He was never summoned, he never had a visitor, and, as far as he could tell, his computer wasn't monitored any more closely than usual. It should have reassured him, but it didn't. By the time the tributes had been in the arena for two days, Beetee had grown anxious, more so than before. It wasn't like Snow to wait or to toy with his enemies. Beetee didn't have nearly enough data on the situation, and so he decided he would gather some. Never mind that gathering data had supposedly put him in this situation in the first place -- not knowing was worse. He didn't find his name mentioned anywhere beyond the expected in low-level official Games correspondence, but that wasn't a surprise. He might have a codename, and perhaps discussion of wayward victors stayed in higher-level communications. So he checked those. His findings there weren't bare (ordinarily, he would have sent records of the Capitol reaction to the short-lived strike attempt in District 8 straight to Dominic Day, his handler in District 13), but Beetee still didn't find what he wanted. It was like the message he had found a year ago didn't even exist. It couldn't have been a mistake, he told himself. His decryption program was impeccable. But for months he'd known that something didn't quite add up. He hadn't given Wiress all the details, but a mistake on his end would explain why no threats had twigged her impeccable intuition. Resigned to his failure, Beetee sought out the original message that he'd taken for a discovery. With a year's worth of tweaking on the code, his program might find something new, something that might clarify. At least they're still fighting with each other. I don't think she even knows what she's doing. It's not as though we have another victor in communication with District 13. Even if we did, she's old. It'd be easier than Calixte… Beetee felt the blood drain from his face as he read. Had he ever been so wrong in his life? He'd wasted a year in paranoia and anxiety, all because of a misread fragment. He sat back in his chair and pressed the button to call for the Avox. Beetee rarely turned to substances to control his emotions or escape his life. Usually, he had no need, but this was different. He sighed. "Bring me a beer." |