Morning dawns on the Capitol.
Except...
The streets are empty. The buildings are abandoned. No cabs line the sidewalks, gleaming in a rainbow of pastel and fumes, and the train tracks are silent. Coffee mugs line up in neat ranks, holoquins pose in windows, advertising hoardings blare their commercial goodwill down onto the streets, but not a person is there to see it.
Almost.
In front of the Presidential Palace, where countless tributes have stood in awe, a circle of podiums rises up out of the ground. The figures on them squint in the setting sun. Perhaps it takes a moment for the mind, so set on the threat of death that features so rarely in the average Capitol lifespan, to realize what it is seeing.
This is the Capitol, right down to every detail except one. And that is only obvious when you get up, up past the silent offices and the elaborate balconies, past the salons and the lounges and the studios, even past the highest point of the Presidential Palace: at the place where the Capitol Center borders the high sectors, there is nothing but a faintly visible shimmer, and beyond that only empty fields.
Do any of the figures, more alone than they have ever been before, feel a rush of relief? Does it look like a reprieve? Scare tactics - a trick as old as the Gamemakers. A shor t laugh, a tight grin. Until the eye turns upwards and takes in its own face, up among the others; most strangers, one shockingly familiar - Gaius Nerodius Gore. And, beside him...
A countdown, reaching zero.
TASK:
- Survive the bloodbath.
- But wait! There are NO WEAPONS OR SUPPLIES at the Cornucopia. All the arena's supplies are in the various houses and buildings and are all things that you'd regularly find in the Capitol. So no shurikens mysteriously hidden in someone's wardrobe!
- The Presidential Palace is strictly off-limits for now.
DEATHS: Up to three in your entries. You can also (optionally) kill one person by ballot, by naming them after your entry.
WORD LIMIT: None
DEADLINE: Those who hand in before 10PM GMT on Monday 7th March will be treated as normal. Those who hand in AFTER this time but BEFORE 10PM GMT on Tuesday 8th March will receive +3 deaths but will still be counted. Any entries after this point will not count and you will be put up for votes. Dun dun duuuuuun.
PLEASE NOTE: If you have not yet handed in your form then you can still hand it in but will receive +2 deaths. If we don't have it by 10PM GMT on Wednesday then you will be removed from the competition.
YOU ARE READING
Author Games: Beta
RandomThe Capitol is celebrating. Gaius Nerodius Gore, a boy from the backstreets of Silver and newly appointed Head Gamemaker, is capping off his meteoric rise with the ultimate title: President of the Nation. But this is no mere street party. Together w...
