thearena | Pretending There's Nothing That You Aren't Prepared For [Open]

WHO| Venus Dee Milo and open!
WHAT| Venus teleports around the Arena setting off danger and distributing supplies.
WHEN| Week One
WHERE| Everywhere in the Arena
WARNINGS| Death, explosions. Venus having some suicidal thoughts.

Venus has been dying for far longer than the two days she's been in the Arena. Ever since she got herself banged up on that mission against the Capitol, she's been biding time with increasing difficulty, trying to make it to the Arena so she can cover up for the internal bleeding that's killing her from the inside out. It's gotten more difficult, but thankfully she's had Porrim on her side, who's been able to taper off the amount of in-person interviews Venus has had to do and cut semi-nude shoots down to zero.

To finally be able to die instead of fighting it is a strange form of release. Venus thinks to herself as she crawls through the wormholes she rips into the fabric of space and time that it probably says something about her that death always feels like a relief, like relaxing after a long day's labor, rather than as something to fear. Having to stay alive has always been such an inconvenience for her, and she became a superhero because it was a clear-cut path towards dramatic, beautiful, and permanent ruin. It's eased in the last two years, this dogged pursuit towards a final end, and yet it's always there with her.

And so she's strangely sort of happy as she teleports around the Arena, looking for worthy allies to disperse her Cornucopia supplies to. The Gamemakers are coming for her, with rats and fires and claps of lightning. She emerges from nowhere, literally pulling herself from places out of eyesight or earshot, like a migraine in quick-motion to anyone watching where she blips back into reality, with a wild, jagged, beautiful smile on her face and a bag over her shoulder.

"Hey! You!" she'll call.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Steve has seen a lot of strange things in his time as a tribute, but someone reappearing in reality is probably one of the strangest for him. The way it made his head ache and his already damaged eyes fuzz out even more, it was disorienting, but then suddenly she was there. As if she has always been there but memory tells him otherwise, especially with them being in an empty field, it's not like she walked out from behind a tree.

When she calls out to him, he tenses more, unsure what she wants or her intentions, it's not that he doesn't recognize her once he focuses his eyes, but it's that he barely knows her. He remembers her voice, dancing with her briefly, sharing some light banter, but then it was over. That was that. And even as he looks at her, something looking off about her, he couldn't say what was wrong or if he was even right about it. In the end, he just doesn't know this woman.

Still, seeing her use her powers, come out looking pretty pleased with herself sets off a warning bell in his mind. He's seen what powers do in this arena so far, he's seen people get themselves hurt, seen people get other's hurt. The Cornucopia had been a mess.

"You should be careful, using abilities" there's concern for her safety in his voice, but also wary of becoming a casualty of her using her abilities.

"You should. I'm fine," she says, all brazen confidence and exhilaration. She's become invincible with her abandon, her complete disregard for her own life because she's been dying since the mission where Steve was captured, she's maybe been dying all her life and came to terms with it long ago, and because she has god-like powers inside every cell of her body.

Her face, made hard with wildness, softens a bit when she seems him - and sees the state of him.

"I come in peace!" she yells, taking a few steps forward as if she's approaching a horse she knows well, with only cursory care given to caution. She raises the bag of supplies off from her shoulder. "I come bearing gifts!"

Steve gives her a look that clearly says he thinks she's a bit out there in a way that he's not entirely sure about. But there's something about her confidence that puts him at ease almost, like she really does have this under control even though he's not actually sure he believes she does. In the end, he figures it's her life, so long as she doesn't hurt or endanger other people, she's welcome to take all the risks she wants really.

When she moves to approach him, he leans back a little, tentative of her intentions, but he doesn't take a step back, holding his ground for the moment. He stays on his guard though, his ill seeing eyes never leaving her.

"Gifts? Not exactly how I pictured you to look, Santa," he sounds unsure at first, but quickly covers it up with a dumb joke.

"What? Santa can be a black woman." She laughs and pulls out a packet from her bag. "Here, I can trust you to be a good guy, can't I? I mean, you're Steve Rogers."

She gets close enough to him to make contact and holds the packet out - it's full of little rubber earplugs. Up close it's somewhat more obvious that she's injured, that something about her pallor is off and her eyes are lightly unfocused, despite the brazen grin and the swagger in her walk.

"Got a bunch of these at the Cornucopia. Figure they'll come in handy eventually, right?"

"More I didn't picture Santa being so pretty," he pauses and realizes that might not be appreciated, "Not that-" he just shakes his head and fidgets. Talking to women is still difficult at times, but even more so when he's already scared and unsure for reasons that don't have to do with talking to a beautiful woman.

But when she moves closer, he takes half a step back, more in caution than actual retreat, just not having expected her to close the distance more than it already had been. But her calling him a good guy, knowing who he is, it gives him some courage, as does how he can now see she's hurt. The realization quickly shifts his concern for his own self to her well being. He takes a step closer now, careful to accept the offered packet with a "Thank you."

He pauses before continuing, "You're not looking so hot, maybe you should sit," the concern is clear, but he knows they barely know each other, she might not want his help, but he can't not offer it. "I can- Let me help you?"

"Well, now you're just being a charmer." By contrast, Venus acts entirely at home talking to men, tamping down any insecurity she might feel under the way she's been told she was beautiful since she was a teenager talking to talent scouts, that she had 'natural charm' and a 'killer body'. She talks to Steve the way she does most men, keeping them in that arm's length area where he's flirted with but would have to fight his way in to learn anything important about her.

She puts a hand up in a gentle gesture and doesn't come any closer, lets him approach her and take the pack, and when he tells her to sit she lowers herself with the kind of artificial grace that isn't really conducive to healing so much as looking good.

"Nah, Steve. This kind of hurt isn't something you can help." She smiles at him, entirely at peace with her own mortality. Embracing it, even, as the potential for an end. "I could use company until I make my next jump though."

"Yeah, well, that doesn't get said about me often," Steve gives an uneasy shrug, one that makes his shoulders pop, his the wry tone more self deprecating than actually amused. Maybe he's charming when he has a script on stage or when he's comfortable, but this is neither of those things. He's just being awkwardly honest, not even flirting.

Steve's face falls a little when she says he can't help, but he gets it too, he can see in her what he's seen in himself before: she's made her choice. And Steve can respect that. He's not about to strap her down and force medical attention on her, not after all he's been through.

He gives her an understanding nod, no pity there, just empathy. "I- yeah, I think I could do that," Steve hesitates for a second, before sitting too, keeping some distance between them. He's quiet for a long moment, "So, you, uh, teleport?" Honestly, he has no idea what to say, he guesses this is better than pointing out all the places he's been beat up over the years.

"I have a hard time believing that." She almost makes a comment that he hardly needs charm when he usually has the sort of bodies most men dream feverishly of, but she knows that at this moment that could be considered cruel. When her face was branded, when she lost her beauty, any reminder of the gap between the power she had when pretty and the power she held while ugly twisted in her gut like a knife.

She nods. "Yeah, ever since before I was a teenager. It's like, you know, looking at a travelogue? All these amazing destinations? And I just pick one in my mind and then I wiggle through timespace a little and I'm there. You know, it should have been easy, but it took me a long time to realize what an amazing power it is."

She shrugs. "And it's limited in here, but I guess it's nice to see the whole place before I expire."

Pretending There's Nothing That You Aren't Prepared For [Open]

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