thecapitol | Stretching Those Post-Arena Muscles

WHO| Neeshka and Draco
WHAT| Exercise is important
WHEN| Day 9 or 10 of the arena, afternoon
WHERE| The training room
WARNING/NOTES| Kickboxing and arrogant snark

The novelty of television had worn off quickly, particularly since they all only seemed to be showing one thing: the arena Neeshka had spent a week inside, and found she really didn't want to look at ever again. There weren't any parties during the day, and it turned out Tributes didn't get money, so she couldn't go shopping.

She could go stealing, of course, but she wasn't quite comfortable enough with the level and ability of local security yet to be sure of eluding them. She'd get there, she just wasn't there yet.

For now, though, she was working off the overindulgence from her first big party since she'd been resurrected. There'd been so much food! Her street-rat self had been overcome with the kind of greed that wasn't necessarily a good thing, and she had sure eaten more than she should have. And with another arena coming up before too long, and the potential for picking pockets, she did at least want to stay in shape. So here she was, in the training room, attacking a sandbag dummy with feet, fists, and occasionally tail.

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"That is the whole point of this thing," Neeshka grumbled, eying his stance and resisting the urge to correct it. He didn't deserve it. Besides, if she kept talking, she might just cry, and then where would she be? She just stepped back and turned back to the dummy, not wanting to continue this conversation and risk embarrassing herself.

"Go find someone else to be a jackass to, mister. You've done a fine job already, here."

"That would involve leaving and finding someone else. And you're right here," he drawled, voice leaning on the condescending and simpering. He was absolutely not the nicest person in the world, and only itched to prove it, to prove to them that he was worthy of at least a little bit of fear out in the Arena. Even if it was a lie - both to them and himself - concocted in order to make him feel better about himself.

As if Neeshka was going to be afraid of anybody like him! Ha! Even if she did kind of still feel like bawling. Jerk. Jerk jerk Mask-bloodied jerk. She stuck her nose in the air and set about practicing again. A little more viciously than she had before, but she was pretending he wasn't there, so he couldn't see it. Even better, she was pretending she was kicking and tail-smacking and sucker-punching him.

"Oh, and now you're just not going to talk?"

Draco rolled his eyes again, sneering at her back. "Very mature of you. Well done. Well, here's hoping it actually helps," he amended, briefly peering around her to see how she was hitting the bag. Thankfully, he learned well no matter how the information was presented - he wasn't nearly top of his classes for nothing - and he quickly adopted a slightly better stance in front of his own bag, delivering a blow to it that actually didn't hurt. Admittedly, the bag didn't do much, but his knuckles weren't screaming at him to stop this time around. He preened briefly.

"Like you're being any more mature by talking?" Neeshka sniffed, despite herself, before biting down on her lip to keep from talking anymore. She turned away from the bag to try and find somewhere else to work.

Aha. Knives. Much better. She turned her back on Draco and stalked over to investigate the throwing knives. Never too late to brush up on one's aim, right? And it put her a good thirty feet away from him. The jerk.

"Brilliant comeback," he drawled, keeping his eyes locked pointedly on her back. No way was he letting her out of his sight, not with all of the potential weaponry around them, just waiting to be used. Draco wouldn't exactly put it past her to just stab him in the back.

"Is there proper form for that too?" He called over to her, still residing casually at his punching bag.

What a smart fellow he was. Best not to let her out of his sight, anyway, even if she wasn't planning on doing and stabbing just yet. She did glower, though, and started sorting through knives. She was done offering help to him, of any kind, even accidental.

Well, she couldn't do much about accidental help, but still.

"Oh, no," she said instead, somewhere between airy and sarcastic. "This kind of thing you don't need it. After all, you're not going to be hitting anything, so you won't hurt your hands."

"Are you always this much of a bitch?" Draco asked plainly, knowing full well that it was probably his fault. And not much caring. What should he care if he hurt some girl's feelings? "Really, it's no wonder you don't have any friends," he went on, rolling his eyes.

Her temper getting the better of her again, Neeshka hurled the dagger at-- not Draco, at least, though it was close-- the sandbag dummy behind him. Unlike her testing throw, this time she actually hit it. It wasn't a killing shot, but it did make a satisfying thud into it.

"I have friends! I told you that! You just shut up about them, they're all worth ten of you! Well, except maybe Elanee and Qara. But the rest!" Even Casavir, when he wasn't making her teeth itch, was at least kind of decent.

He did his best not to flinch when he realised that knife was flying straight at him; it was basically all he could do to not move, though he knew one of his hands, tucked into his pocket thankfully, was trembling like a leaf. It hid the dummy with a soft sound that only just made Draco feel slightly better: either she hadn't been aiming for him, or she had been and her aim was just rubbish. He wasn't sure what was better.

"Well, aren't we a little defensive? All right, say I believe that you have friends. You certainly won't if you act like that all the time," Draco drawled, pleased when he noted that his voice didn't hold any of the nervous waver that his hand did.

"My friends aren't arrogant little snipes like you," Neeshka growled, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring. She wasn't throwing herself after the knife. That was restraint, right there. "They're actually nice to me, so it's really easy to be nice to them. I'm wondering just how you manage to have any friends, if the first time someone offers to help you out you start insulting them and being a little brat!"

"I don't need your help!" He replied, voice hitching into the hysterical, and that right there seemed to be the problem in and of itself. Doubtless there hadn't been a way to win in the first place, but the fact that she had offered to help him like that didn't rank her very highly in his books. Perhaps higher than the people who ignored him to begin with, but he still had too much pride to accept even that.

"Oh right, sure you don't." Neeshka rolled her eyes. "If you didn't need my help, you could have just said so, you know, politely instead of being a jerk about it. I was just trying to be nice, you know! But if you don't like people being nice to you, then hey, whatever. That's your fault, not mine."

She unfolded her arms and started for the door. She was so done with this. She could do some stretches and acrobatics in her room, and come back to practice later. When the jerk was gone.

Draco levelled a dark stare at her, still sneering. As if it wasn't bad enough that he didn't have his magic for whatever reason, and he had to go back into that Arena at some point, he had people like this trying to tell him what he liked and what he needed. "Oh, do fuck off," he stated, tossing the comment idly after her, as if it was his idea for her to leave, rather than her own.

"In your dreams!" Neeshka tossed back with a flick of her tail that she'd wanted to look sassy. It just looked irritated. She gave up and scuttled out, furious at him and herself for being chased away.

She could at least comfort herself that maybe she'd scared him. A little. Right?

Stretching Those Post-Arena Muscles

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