The Fifth Annual Writer Games: The Fall

District One Male: Chet Jackson [CrocodileRocker]

Name: Chet Jackson

Age: 18

District: 1

Sex: Male

Appearance: Lofted blonde hair that will flop over his eyes with the slightest bit of perspiration. A bit undersized, in both height and build, for a trainee from One, a bit grotesque in an unexplainable way. Well, indescribable. It's very easily explained by his everlasting obsession with fad workouts and magic diets to overcome all his inadequacies. Just about the right build for the average One man. He fits right in with the inbred blur that his district has become. Something like blue eyes. Baby skin if the baby had just gotten into a mess it wasn't meant to. Layers of moisturizers and tanning sprays laminate himself. Even if they were scrubbed away, their stains would remain.

Personality: A pathetic flop-sweat of a man, his competence is always surprising. Most of all it is himself who undermines it. At times all he does is undermine. Inadvertently undermining himself, undermining others ...advertently. Fragile, petty, irritable; a button-mashing anger management case. Somewhat charming if only because of how earnest he is in all of his superficial exploits - especially to the Capitol, a city full of Chet Jacksons. You know, the kind of guy to use a shake weight.

Background: Quick maths: he was eight when the first Game was played, and every district was on equal footing give or take a month of practice. It was a hit, and it doesn't take a second for anyone with inspiration to want a crumb from a loaf of such magnitude. The next year, any district whos plurality wasn't distracted by such menial things as tomorrow's supper had prepared for a year. The sport of it weaseled its way from television screens to town rings, lower and lower skill levels drawing crowds and the admittance pittance funding training centers to bring younger and younger children to those levels. The economics of it were even more influential. Tesserae resellers illegal infiltrating the already illegal enough gyms to inspire volunteers to come forth and take the blow from whichever of their maxed-out bread winners inevitably get reaped. Seedier tesserae resellers did the same exact thing, but would specialize in whole grain bread with flax and stuff in it. The really seedy ones would approach able-bodied teens on their way home from school or whatever and just hand over a cute little note that would read something like "volunteer or ur kill xoxo." Different strokes for different folks. Gambling's another big one. Self-explanatory, that. And then there are sponsorships. Different from the ones you're allowed to know about, these involve various companies and enterpreneurs to approach tournament front-runners to be spokesmen for whatever they - the companies - are selling. By no means a perfected process, this will usually involve promises of cash before the Games and funds for the family at the end no matter the outcome. As well as influential people having an interest in your success, which never hurts. All this for the low price of your soul.

Chet was one of the first crop used to seed the training industry. A young boy, parents present enough to pay, but not protective enough to pull him away, athletic and vaguely handsome. One of many punts taken. He never grew as much as his peers, so it didn't pan out. Until it did.

Reaped or Volunteered: Volunteered.

Preferred Weapon: A backsword, light and swingy.

Token: A cotton sweatband, faded blue in general with a strip of dirtied white running along the center. Pow-Powder is emblazoned on the front in big block letters.