stillplaying | 19th Game [written/action]

[How long has it been since she last opened the journal not to peer at the other entries but to make one herself? It feels much longer than the couple of months that somehow managed to move by so quickly. Forever, perhaps. And yet, in that short time, so much has changed. People have left. More importantly, people have arrived. Rue, Johanna, Peeta... And none of them have yet disappeared.

Two months of knowing Peeta's so close. A trip across town to his apartment. Walking by the bakery. His memory is no longer a ghost that haunts her. Instead, he's something real. Something entirely too real. Two months and she hasn't yet figured out if she's relieved to have him back. Or if she's more frightened of losing him. There's limits to the filial magic, as she's starting to discover. And those limits worry her. Will she lose him all over again? Lose Prim or Rue or Richard or Teddy?

If there's one thing that hasn't changed in these two months, it's her growing weariness of the disappearances in Luceti. Even Sokka, Sokka who had been here for four or more years, was now gone.

Who was next?

It's a nightmare that wakes her. A nightmare of losing everyone she loves. Watching them die at the hands of lizard mutts, necks ripped out by wild dog-like creatures with the eyes of lost children, others murdered in drafts against the Third Party. She wakes with a start, skin covered in a sheen of sweat, eyes wide and frantic. Her throat is soar from screaming in her sleep and she gasps. When her senses return, she turns on a lamp and reaches for her journal.

She can't lose anyone. Not even to something like returning home. But she takes the coward's way out and she pens her thoughts rather than admit to them aloud:]

There was someone here once who asked if it was possible to bring people here from home. Has anyone ever tried the opposite? Tried to keep people here instead?

action;

[That done, she throws on a leather jacket and boots over her sleeping clothing. She can't go back to sleep. Not right now. And she can't be in here either, not wanting to disturb her housemates any more than she already might have. Her bow is slung over a shoulder with her quiver, just in case.

It's cold out there but she doesn't care. There's something comforting about being alone in the night, no longer surrounded by oppressing walls. The nightmares don't seem so bad now, away from her bed. She can almost pretend things will be okay, regardless of whatever responses she might have to her inquiry when she gets back.]

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[He huffs, because people should really look into these things more. But they should probably get the information out more - as someone who knows its importance, he's partly to blame for that, he knows.

But he stows it for another time.]

He used to be CEO for the Malnosso, a couple years ago. Part of his ambition was to find a way to link the dead to different worlds. For reasons he wouldn't go into, no one dead can return to their own world, but he thought it was possible that they could be rooted to someone else's.

[It's not an awful possibility. It's the sort that makes her smile. Even if it meant that she and Prim could never live in the same place again, knowing that her sister was somewhere living her life? Living the life she deserved to have? She thinks that she can live with that.

Quickly, she writes:]

What happened toh im?

What happened to him would be a more complicated story to tell. This project was one of the last he oversaw, however. He surprisingly got many volunteers for it, but something went wrong. According to what little we were told, someone stole Bil's research and sabotaged the project.

[She wouldn't be surprised if it was the sort of thing the Gamemakers here would do. Get people's hopes up and crush them, just to have fun. It's the sort of thing that tends to be done here. Playing with emotions rather than life and death. But that doesn't make the game here any easier.]

No one knows who took it?

My bet is the Rogues.

[She considers this for a moment, frowning a little at the suggestion. It's close enough to Gamemakers to her. Anyone in any sort of position of authority here is. But she still needs to clarify.]

The Third Party?

[If this were voice, the pause would be more obvious.]

Cultists. Those guys we fight on drafts.

[Isn't it all the same? It seems that way to Katniss at times. The Gamemakers, the Capitol, the Malnosso - cultists or Third Party or those that keep them trapped in the enclosure. It doesn't matter. In the end, they're the people with control. The people that make the decisions.

The people she's come to despise.]

Close enough.

Could be, but that's another discussion in and of itself.

[Now that Zompano's in with the Third Party, he wouldn't doubt the Rogues are working with them too, even if CJ shot that down. Maybe because of it.]

The Rogues, though, are a sect within the Malnosso.

The ones that keep us here?

[She's trying to recall if she's ever heard something about this before. Normally, Katniss does her best to stay away from the politics here. She's done it once. She's gotten involved once, back home in Panem. And in the end, she lost Prim. So why should she? Why should she bother to get involved ever gain? All that mattered now was surviving. Keeping herself and those she loved safe.

That's all she cared about now.

But if learning just a little bit more would maybe help in keeping Prim here? Fine.]

No. They're the ones behind the droid kidnappings. Probably the more questionable experiments, too.

[It's even more complicated than the politics back in Panem. At least there, it had been relatively simple. President Snow and President Coin. dealing with an uprising. Watching her world fall apart. Here, she wasn't certain that she'd ever understand everything. Especially so long as she remained caught up in her own little world.]

There are too many of them.

[He actually barks in bitter laughter on his end. Jeez, ain't that the truth of it.]

Yes. It's a pain in the ass how complicated it is.

They're who I was referring, though - the ones most likely to have interfered with the blue man's project.

Too bad.

[Because it's a project that might just have been worthwhile. If just for the chance to ensure that Prim have the second chance at life she so deserved. She really would give anything to ensure her sister have that opportunity. Even her own life.

19th Game [written/action]

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