iaso gouald, district 3 tribute. (whatodds) wrote in colosseum, @ 2013-12-13 17:29:00 |
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He’d begun measuring time in Before Lilac and After Lilac. He still couldn’t believe that a d12 had injured him—had nearly killed him, and even now, with Iaso, stumbling every twentieth step though he pretended he wasn’t, he couldn’t believe what was happening. Everything was frustration and pain and searing jolts of fear, like when Laurel and Buck had left. Fear of being killed in his sleep by his former allies. Fear of stumbling across Careers. He had no knife, not after Laurel had left, though he’d used Lilac’s example to painstakingly craft a sharpened wood spear/walking stick with the sai Iaso had. There were the throwing stars, which he took without protest, but he couldn’t tell Iaso that half the time he couldn’t make out what was around the bend, let alone how to aim and throw, throw to kill. He supposed that if it came to it he could stab someone with the star and have his own hand mangled in the process.
But today had been a good day: the parachute, with hope, and then they’d found a goat already weakened by another tribute or mutt that Iaso had taken down. Now with fire they had a moment to rest—and plan.
“Gotta go Beetee on it,” Mouse mumbled. He mostly mumbled now. He wanted to speak to the cameras but mostly he murmured comments; louder noises pained him. “What’s on the other side of the meadow? Dunno. This, here, though.. fire, rocks.”
“We’re going to have to something spectacular with what we’ve got.” Iaso was worried about Mouse, worried about the head injury he’d sustained. But there was only so much she could do for him out here, and rest was going to be the best option anyway. “You know they’re expecting it. Beetee, Faraday. People back home.” She smiled a little at him. “A chance to impress the Gamemakers.”
Mouse smiled back at her, and he thought it probably looked like he meant it. “Oh yeah, them,” he said, but then didn’t have the heart to do a wink towards the lens he knew was probably four inches to his left. His heart sank in his chest. It wasn’t that he hadn’t given up on being a Gamemaker—he’d just quietly begun giving up on everything else. How had he done nothing so spectacularly? All he’d done was freeze and starve and bleed. He had wanted more from himself. But there was nothing.
Mouse cleared his throat. “Could rig one of the entrances. We know our side’s got food, water… What about the other side? We can see. Y’know, take a walk, and pick one. Trap someone in this meadow, or on the other side, or have ‘em be crushed. Or.. fire. Remember the 40th Games, burned to the ground?”
“Was it that year?” Iaso didn’t have the encyclopedic knowledge of the Games that Mouse did. She didn’t care like he did, not at all. The Games had always been something to endure and to forget as soon as possible. She used a piece of crate to nudge the fire, making sure it stayed cheerfully lit.
“I remember Beetee’s year. Or well, I remember seeing all the repeats. Electrocuting the tributes with his trap.” She looked over at the wire and battery. “I’m sure that’s why he sent that to us.”
“Some techhead is excited we’re both still ‘live,” Mouse said, following Iaso’s look. “Hoping we do miracles.” He paused, then smiled at her again, a little pained. “Not saying we can’t do it, but we gotta pick the battle. One of us has to be bait, at least, so there’s only two chances… at best. To round them up. And I’m sure everyone else remembers Beetee’s year, too.”
“We’re the only non-Career district with two tributes left. Surely that’s got to count for something.” Iaso returned Mouse’s smile. “Or we have to make it count.” Iaso wasn’t sure how long Mouse would last for, there had to be effects from the head wound he wasn’t telling her about.
“Something in the meadow, or the Cornucopia. It’s the place most likely for people to return to. Looking for supplies, or shelter. Or both. One of us can go check it out, see if anyone is camping around there or something like that.”
“The Cornucopia.” He turned to look towards it, somewhere in the distance. “That district one girl is dead. The Careers are going to be all broke up—there’ll be a fight over it, soon. I think. But they won’t be at it the whole time, not this late..” He didn’t say that this late the place had been looted over; it was true that some supplies would always be there, too numerous to run through. “You’re faster,” he said. “You check, I hold the stuff, we run if they’re there? If not, we can hook this up fast. Turn it into a death zone. But we need insulators for us.”
“Water. Snow.” Iaso’s mind started working again. “Maybe we can carry enough to make a moat… or at least dampen down some of the grass. We build ourselves something to hold us off the ground. Use whatever crates are left there. Let our shoes take care of the rest.
“I wonder if there’s something we could use as an explosive. Catch attention. Draw people in. That’d work, right? Or we trigger it if the Gamemakers call a feast. Surely it’s time for one. How long has it been?”
“Ten days,” Mouse said, instantly. Some facts, habits, not even his pounding head and blurry thoughts could obscure. “But feasts aren’t time based… gotta have people bleeding out. People starving.” He licked his lips. “Kills been coming in.. slow. Hard to say if people are hiding or people dying of stuff.” Catch attention. “Make a fire with empty crates? But who’s gonna run towards it? Maybe Careers?”
“They’d seek out any one they could. But they’d be cautious, we’d have to make sure the wire wasn’t easy to see. Maybe around the base, hide it amongst the debris and the grass? Extend some of the wire out, so they have to walk over it.”
How did she get to this point, where she was figuring out the best way to kill people, to trick them into a trap? She wasn’t even sure this would work, that they’d be able to fool anyone. But they had to try, right?
“Distraction,” he said suddenly, a real grin spreading on his face. “Set another trap, with the thread, make it easy to see. Make it look bad, but not on purpose—if they’re looking at it, they won’t be looking at something else.”
“And some of the stars. Make it look like we’re trying to cut them off at the knees. Or the ankles, the achilles tendon is the weakest spot.” Iaso returned his grin. Despite what they were planning, it was fun, in a way. Being clever again, not just struggling to survive.
“The fucking stars,” Mouse whispered, and for a moment he was truly distracted, truly not struggling with his injuries, his aching ribs, the way every breath was a pain. Something they could do. “Why not both? Why not both work? The best traps,” he told her, “drive ‘em into a bigger trap.”
"Exactly." Iaso was energised, in a way she hadn't been in a long while. "Okay, we'll need to split up. I'll check out the Cornucopia, make sure no one is camping out there. You could collect us some more water and snow, we can dampen the thread and what we can of the ground so it carries the electricity better. We can meet back in the pass, where we first met. Sound good to you?"
“Sounds good,” he believed it. It would work, he knew, on someone—they might not die. But it would work, and even if they died they wouldn’t have died hiding, injured, useless. After a long pause, he spoke again. “Thanks, Iaso,” he said quietly, “for sticking by me. Concussed lump I am.”
It was a long while until Iaso replied, and then she shrugged, uncomfortable with the thanks.
“It’s my best chance of survival, not being out here by myself.” Another pause. “And we nerds have to stick together.” She attempted a smile. “One of us has to go home. Give Faraday or Beetee a break from mentoring.”
Iaso wasn’t about to say she’d make damn sure it was her rather than him. It would just ruin the moment.