thecapitol | All My Instincts Have Failed Me for Once [Closed]

Who| Maximus and Howard
What| Howard meets the tiger.
When| Before the aliens plot.
Where| Max's room.
Warnings| None yet.

Graffiti's petty and Howard doesn't care. He knows full well that he won't be able to muster up the stubbornness or strength to stand up to the current Victor, who oh so casually turned Sigma and Eponine into zombie chili. He knows he's not brave enough to actually take any kind of revenge that matters.

But it's important to pretend he can, so he picks the lock to Maximus' room after visiting Eponine and lets himself in with a can of spraypaint. The room seems spartan to him, and he heads over to the bed with full intention of fucking it up. He can't do anything that can too easily be traced back to him, lest Eponine suffer for it, but celebrating the person who decapitated his girlfriend is too much for him. He can still see her in the screen, wriggling like a chicken laid on the stump.

He holds the spraycan up, then reaches for the lighter in his pocket, deciding. He didn't realize that Max got to keep the tiger.

It's only because there's a mirror in Max's room that Howard moves out of the way before Ferox sinks those gilded teeth into his neck. Howard throws himself to the side and falls as he grabs the handle of the closet door, feeling a pop in his shoulder as he wrenches the closet open, and lunges in before slamming it behind him.

Howard doesn't scream. He's used to the idea that there's no one coming if he screams, except maybe someone to pick over his corpse for loot. Instead he grabs the curtain rod in the closet and lifts his feet up, hanging on it until it bends and then snaps under the weight, and, with clothing on hanger still dangling like drying fish, shoves the rod against the door as the tiger's weight slams at it.

It's paltry protection. He looks for something else to jam the door, something to keep him from being eaten here in someone else's room. He holds his knife in his hand, despite knowing it's like trying to mop up a tidal wave with a wet wipe. So he just presses to the back corner and shakes.

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Though he took Ferox with him often, he never took the beast to meals. It was too much for the creature and he disliked the pathetic look it gave him when it realised that this was Maximus' feeding time and not his. So instead he went to eat alone, and brought back a meal for the beast to eat.

He didn't expect to hear it growling as he approached the door.

He opened it, frowning as he stepped inside, to see the Tiger glaring at the closet - its haunches tight, tail swishing behind it, its entire body tense. Ready to pounce.

"Ferox. Enough."

The tiger snapped its eyes around him, unsure of whether to follow the command or to continue its hunt, but eventually whatever programming the capitol had given the creature to obey him won out. Sulking, it glared at Maximus and wandered over him to circle his legs. He gave it a quick scritch behind its ears and then approached the closet.

"What held your fascination so tightly," He murmured wonderingly at the tiger as he tried the door.

There's no relief from the fear once the tiger stops snarling. That just means Maximus is back. Which means he may very well be dead, and no one will ever find his body.

Max seemed nice enough in the Training Center. Wyatt likes him. But Howard's also seen footage of him siccing R on Eponine while she was still alive, still screaming for Sigma's help. No instructions on throwing knives can overcome the sound of R's gobbling, of Eponine's gasps.

"I'm a friend of Wyatt's!" Howard gasps as the door slips open, then hits its handle the rod holding it shut.

He stops, frowning, the door jammed effectively, and there's a long pause as he tries to link the voice to a face, to a name.

Ah, there. He has it.

"Howard?" He asked, the confusion obvious.

"Why are you in my closet?"

"...Looking for Eponine's room?" he squeaks. It's a shitty lie, but he can't think of anything better right now. The door hasn't opened yet, and Howard tries to savor each second, even though they seem to whip by so quickly. He knows his reprieve will be brief.

"In my closet?" Maximus asked, his voice bereft of humour though he did find the situation humourous. He had no false illusions of privacy, in this place.

"Somehow I doubt she would nest there." He motioned to the tiger as it went to lie down across the room, sulking.

"Ferox will not harm you. You can come out."

"I'd believe that more if he hadn't lunged at me like I was his idea of Lunchables," Howard says from the inside. But he can't stay in there forever - he doubts Maximus will leave and let him walk out without questioning.

So he starts to undo the rod on the door, but does not throw it open.

"You invaded his territory. He was protecting it."

As he heard the rod come loose, he pulled the door open himself, though the closet was still cast almost entirely in shadow.

"You cannot blame him for his instinct. We all protect our homes. But I am here, now, he trusts me to do the protecting."

"He was going to protect it by eating me like a biscuit!" Howard squeals, pressing himself into the corner of the closet as if hoping he'll pass through to Narnia or something. He's shaking all the way through his skinny bones. The baggy clothing he wears feels like it's too tight, not enough to hide in. He looks at Maximus like a deer looks at an oncoming truck at night.

"Wyatt likes me." He repeats the sentiment in a whimper.

"Then I'll think twice before letting Ferox eat you," Maximus said, the sarcasm obvious though probably it wasn't the best time to tease someone obviously terrified.

"Come out, Howard, you've nothing to fear."

Howard waits a few seconds, then slowly, taking tiny steps, emerges from the dark of the closet. He blinks in the light of the room, shrinks in Max's shadow.

Maximus lets out a long breath, watching Howard and trying to decide just what do with him.

"It is good that you are fast. Ferox is no tame cat - he takes orders from me and ignores the avoxes, but otherwise he is as wild as he wishes he was." He tilted his head.

"Eponine's room is entirely on the other side of the suite, but I imagine you knew that."

Howard tilts his head back in mimicry, although his neck seems shrunken into his shoulders from the withdrawn pose.

"Nope. Had no idea. She didn't exactly draw me a map."

He raised an eyebrow but his expression otherwise didn't give a hint as to the emotion behind it.

"Would you prefer me to escort you to her quarters?"

Howard's eyes dart back and forth between Max's face and the doors.

"Nope. Pretty sure she's going to yell at me for being late."

The longer it went the more obvious the lie, and Maximus let out a hard breath, glancing back toward the door.

"You're right. Wyatt is fond of you," He said after a moment, before turning back his eyes. "And I would be fonder if I had the truth."

"I don't know what you're talking about, man," Howard says, looking Max right in the eyes.

Maximus was not a man to blink first, and he didn't now, his gaze firm. He didn't even turn it away, his eyes steady on Howard's even as he spoke.

"Go, then."

He would have to ask Wyatt about it later.

And go he does, scrambling out and slamming the door behind him, leaving his can of spraypaint nestled haphazardly next to one of Max's Capitol sandals.

All My Instincts Have Failed Me for Once [Closed]

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