thecapitol | (no subject)

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WHO| SEMI-CLOSED - Ellie, Howard, Venus, Mindy, Orc, R, Wyatt, Hawkeye. (If you think your character has a good reason to be there, ping me and we'll see if we can work them in.)
WHAT| Ellie's birthday.
WHERE| The Laser Tag place.
WHEN| A couple days after the crowning.
Warnings| None!

The crowning had been weird as fuck, no lie about that, and Ellie was having a hard time really integrating into her new home, despite having been there since before the Arena had started. She was fairly cheerful - outwardly at least - but deep somewhere inside everything was still eating at her, slowly.

The idea of a birthday party was a welcome distraction.

She'd never had a birthday party - not a real one, anyway. She'd once gotten an extra ration card for her birthday from Riley, but that was about all she could think of. Birthdays were generally only marked with a 'oh, so you've survived this long' - kids were more mouths to feed and usually unwelcome ones, especially after her mother had died.

But this wasn't home, and no one had yet told her that dying in the arena meant that she wouldn't age - that though her birthday should have just passed, she was in fact back to herself a month or so <i>before</i> her birthday. Thankfully ignorant, however, she could celebrate. And she knew who she wanted.

Howard figured out most of the details and she had let the rest of them know where to meet - just in the lobby of the Laser Tag building, before they got all geared up. Ellie was brimming with a low-key excitement, she'd never played laser tag before but it sounded like something out of a science fiction comic so she liked it. She was there first - way too early - and waited for her friends to arrive.

Then, after everything, they'd have cake.

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Waiting for the birthday girl, Wyatt was at no loss for things to take in. From the wild children, laughing and chasing each other round and round, to the muffle high-pitched whine he could hear in the distance, to the cake, which he could smell - sweet and sugary - from where he stood by the table.

Watching a pair of smaller children gallop by, toting their strange weapons, he spotted Mindy, a stranger to him, but, he figured, a friend of Ellie's.

Politely, he reached up to tip his hat in greeting.

Man, this guy was...old school. But this was in a good way, like in a kind of "cool, loner guy" kind of way. She was wondering, of course, how long she could keep her mouth flapping before she made him uncomfortable by her lack of child-like qualities. Certainly she was nothing like these screaming kids. Guess this was just something she was gonna have to get used to this herself.

She did walk up though, gift in hand. "Here for Ellie's party?"

A tribute, Wyatt figured, with a quick measure. (They always looked different, from the desperate attempts to control their own wardrobes, to the eyes and the still waters than ran behind them.) But that was the only judgement he made.

Wyatt tried to give everything their own fair shake.

"I am," he replied, with a small nod. He held out a hand. "Wyatt, Wyatt Earp."

So far, so good. Strong silent type, but overall ok dude.

She blinked at the name. Sounded like a name of a movie her dad would have seen.

"Cool. Kinda old for a birthday party, but I won't judge. Name's Mindy, Mindy Macready."

Kinda old, huh?

Amused, he snorted, a gentle push of air through his nose.

"Well, Mindy, I'm a firm believer that yer never too old for friends," he chuckled. "'Specially here, where they can be so few an' far between."

Ok, so she was jabbing at him a little.

"Guess you have a point," she said, shrugging. "I mean, ones that aren't mad you went and killed them in the Arena. Kinda puts a damper on the whole thing huh?"

"No," he agreed, mustache twitching as his mouth pulled into a small smirk. "I ain't sure that'd be much of a party."

"Not that we need to talk about death when were celebrating life, right?" She said. "So tell me: how good are you at shooting a gun?"

One of his eyebrows shot up.

Plenty of tributes knew his name even before he'd introduced himself. Even back home, he'd been infamous, amongst his fellows - and those who'd found themselves on the wrong side of the law.

"Well, I ain't never heard any complaints," he replied, teeth flashing in a smile.

Oh good, that would mean he would at least be a good sho-

Wait a minute. Wyatt Earp. Like, the famous cowboy Wyatt Earp?!

"Oh," she said. "Yeah, we definitely can't be on the same team."

Wyatt wasn't sure it was even a game he wanted to play, this pretend shootout, but her reaction to the possibility was sure interesting. Considering how Ellie had been quick to ask him to join hers.

"We can't?" His leaned back, weight shifting onto his heels, eyebrows quirked down at her. "Here I thought the point of the game was to win."

Mindy was always up for laser tag. It was the closest, for now, that she could get away with doing it nonviolently. It was the fun of a shoot em up at a rave without all the annoying people!

"Are you kidding? We would cream the other team. Ellie is supposed to be a sharpshooter, you're, like, one of the most famous gunmen ever, and this was pretty much my profession. we'll estroy."

He grinned.

"Ah, so yer tryin' to be sportin' about it," he chuckled with a nod. "That's awful fair'a ya. An' lucky enough, it ain't anythin' ya really gotta worry about. I ain't sure this is the game for me."

Mindy raised her eyebrow.

"What makes you say that? We're not really doing violent things, its just fun. Not into all the flashing lights?"

He glanced at the children against, pulling the triggers on each other, making popping noises and whooping in delight as their fellows suits lit up.

"We'll be back in the arena before long, killin' each other for real," he replied after a long beat, looking back at Mindy. "That'll be soon enough for me."

"This is for fun," Mindy said. "And think of this as strategy. You don't get that at the Arena: everything is just thrown at you all crazy, and you have to really only on your wits. This is just, you know, response to outer stimuli and movement and shit."

Yeah, the downer was knowing they would have to be in the Arena at each other's throats, but why dwell on that?

"I wanna train, the Tower's got a whole room for it," he said, fixing his steady blue stare on Mindy. "I got no desire to mix that an' everythin' it means with the little time I got to enjoy with those I care about."

He'd been here for over a year. Facing down death every other month, watching his friends die - some to never return.

He'd had his fill.

Mindy met the stare. It was honestly pretty intimidating, and she could see by looking at him that he meant every word. Who was she, really, to tell him that he should feel differently?

"You know," she said, "my mentor always said sometimes adults can't really dig the shit kids like, but they go through the motions to please the kid. Way I figure it, its her birthday, and she wanted you here because she wanted to spend time doing a pointlessly violent activity that isn't what we have to do. In a way, I guess, she just wants to play a game we chose, not the one they make us play."

Wyatt didn't know her, but that still stung a bit. Her snap judgment that he was letting Ellie down somehow by not wanting to strap on a gun and pretend to kill more people. People that would likely have to watch die for real, right in front of him.

If he didn't die first.

"It ain't a game for everyone. Ellie understands that."

Or at least she'd seemed to, when he'd told her he wasn't sure he was up for the game.

Unless she'd been pretending.

Mindy had to admit to herself that it would have just been fucking cool to have Wyatt Erp as a player in laser tag. Of course the stupid fucking capitol would have to find a way to ruin that too.

"Well, all right." she said, "guess I can't twist your arm. It would have been cool though."

"Well, I ever change my mind an' decide I've got a. hankerin' for it, I'll be sure an' let ya know," he offered, as best an olive branch he could offer.

He wasn't going to stop her or anyone else from playing who wanted to, but he wasn't going to be forced either.

"Cool," she said, grinning. "Actually, its kinda awesome an older guy showed up for Ellie's party anyway. She's the type that should get that, I think. Been through a lot."

From what she heard, anyway.

"She's a good kid," Wyatt agreed with a nod. "Saved my life in the arena. Comin' here, helpin' her celebrate's the least I could do."

"No kidding?" Jeez. Ellie really was able to stay a decent person in the Games. That was commendable.

"That's pretty cool. Met her in the Arena too, and we just clicked."

He smiled again then, a small, gentle thing.

"She's got quite the knack for that," he said. "'Clickin'' with people."

He slanted Mindy a look.

"She save yer life too?"