thearena | o.1 ( ARENA 06 )

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o.1 ( ARENA 06 ) | OPEN

Who, Hyperion and Open!
What, First impressions.
Where, Main street, for now!
When, Shortly after Hyperion is throw into the games mid-Arena.
Warnings/Notes, Language? TBA!

His steps are slow, careful, treading the ground like every moment traces a silent, invisible map in his head. His fingers curl into his palm (missing one finger on his right hand, barely a reminder of his past anymore), tense and relaxed, his breath escaping warmly to breathe in the colder air. He can feel it in his arms, behind his eyes - something is wrong with the cybernetic implants, like they were made dormant. His eyes can't focus as well, his arms don't carry the same lightweight sensation. Something was done to him, something beyond the obvious.

He doesn't like it.

It shouldn't be a good idea to walk out in the open like this, but he doesn't look too focused on the dangers around him. Whatever he's looking for - it seems to be one of those times where he'll only know it when he finds it.

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Punchy's spending a moment on Main Street, after having run into Lady. He's finding himself easily winded; his previously interminable stamina is failing him. He knows he may have to rest soon and let his body recuperate from all the blows it took at the Cornucopia - the missing eye is the most evidence problem, but he doesn't know how much blood he lost from the gashes in his face and neck, or if Karis passed anything onto him when she bit him. Furthermore, his naked torso is starting to show signs of a few ugly bruises he doesn't remember the origins of.

He's about to work up the energy to head back to Tomorrowland when he sees someone else in the road - a man, a face he doesn't recognize from the Cornucopia, but could he really be expected to remember seventy-odd faces? Maybe he just missed this one in the crowd.

Punchy, being the trusting sort, leaves the doorframe he was resting against and presumes Hyperion's open disregard for sneakiness is a good signal, a preemptive olive branch, perhaps. He holds hand out and waves, wearing a big grin and not much else besides a sleeve wrapped around the wound on his face and his pants and shoes.

The approach doesn't go by unnoticed in the slightest. Not moments before the hand motions at him Hyperion is already expecting some sort of sign, some sort of move, fists tense with his wrists, wary and prepared. The grin leaves him on an experimental state, neither willing to jump in and return the gesture or take the short cut and somehow make the stranger talk. Said stranger looks like he's seen much better days as it is.

"Hey," he mutters, confusion pressing his brows with the ghost of a helpless smile. There's a pause to appreciate the wounds. "Jesus, you're..." Completely fucked. No - let's try a different approach. "Are you okay over there?"

"Oh, yeah, I'm cool, I'm chill. Got a bit bashed up on opening night but that ain't no big D." While Punchy's gregarious, he's also not totally stupid, so he doesn't come running up. He stays a healthy few body lengths away.

"You, on the other hand, look a bit jumpy, homeboy. You ain't bought into this 'kill or be killed' BS, have you?" Because it'd be good to know if he had, so Punchy could, you know. Not die.

Opening night. Looks like Hyperion has already missed out on quite a bit.

"I'm still fuzzy on the details of this whole thing, to be honest." He rests his hands on his sides, head tilting slightly with a thoughtful frown. He's playing the part of the newcomer, still lost even though he's been given just enough details to get started on the rat maze. Find the center first and you're free to go, isn't that how it normally goes? (Here it's kill the last one standing and you're free to go.)

But let's try to put that aside and talk to the other rat.

"I, uh - I'm new. If that means anything. And it looks like you need it more than I do, but - think you can help me out?"

"Fo' shizzy. You looking for shelter, chow, a piece? Because I can't give you a piece, you might use it to ice somebody."

That's Punchy's strategy. Help people out, keep them alive until he can find a way to save everyone. That the former may frustrate the latter doesn't seem to hugely concern him.

He gestures to the house he's been hiding in. "I got a floor you could crash on if you need it. Can't help with chow, though."

"You're just gonna let a stranger into your shelter?" The slight disbelief in his tone comes with a hint of humor, pinching his brows together and pulling his lips to a lopsided smile. "Awfully trusting of you," Hands raised disarmingly, he falls one step backwards, "Not that I'm complaining."

The building was once the Mainstreet Markethouse. It has scattered wire chairs, a large stove, and barrels of dusty, no-longer-edible former merchandise lining the edges of the room. There's dust everywhere.

"I'm an OG, dawg. Ain't afraid of nothin'." He gestures to a wire chair. "What's your name?"

That's quite a claim. One he'd like to prove wrong, preferably with blood, should the occasion present itself. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, he reminds himself. Certainly there's more safety in patience and satisfying his curiosity.

"Hyperion." He steps in after his host, gloved fingers reaching for whatever detail catches his interest for longer than a second. There isn't much else strong enough to keep it, be it for good or bad reasons. "Hyperion Crius."

Punchy is immediately jealous. He would love to have a badass, videogame-like name like 'Hyperion Crius'. Instead, he got saddled with Matthew, which is in the top ten most popular boys names every single year, and O'Connor, which everyone thinks is like some supreme court judge or something. His attitude gets a little frostier towards Hyperion just out of envy.

"Ah. I'm Punchy." Well, at least he can give himself a good superhero name. "And I only had one person try to shank me since I got here. Peeps is generally chill, for a murdergame."

A name like Hyperion Crius would be the equivalent of Matthew O'Connor where he hails from - times have changes and so have habits. Every child is named after a deity in whatever pantheon the parent can remember, and all the Crius triplets were no exception. Helios, Apollo, Hyperion, all named with the concept of light in mind. Mother and father must have thought it would somehow make things better for them.

If they could only see what's left of their precious boys now.

"Punchy? That a nickname?" He begins, brows appropriately arched, eyes focused on the other boy. Hyperion takes one last look around them before continuing, nodding idly with a tentative quality to his tone. "I'm guessing that makes you of the lucky ones. Or just the luckier ones?" Who knows. He doesn't care until the moment he has to. "What else can you tell me about this 'murdergame'?"

"No, it's my real name. It's legit." This is a complete and utter lie; Punchy is not yet a registered superhero and as such, can't even claim Punchy is his legal name, much less his birth name. One can't register until they're 21 and have a certain amount of heroic acts to their name (Punchy has zero, although he does have a few failed attempts, which he thinks should be worth partial credit).

"Yeah. I'm one of the lucky ones." He sighs. He can't forget the four dead bodies on the ground. He can't forget that he failed to save them. "They put us all in the field together and everyone ran at each other. Peeps was capping each other. We got four dead already."

Whether he feels it's unfortunate to have a name like Punchy remains unclear in Hyperion's expression, simply giving it a soft purse of his lips and arch of his brows, as if letting the matter drop where it belongs. He brings a hand up to rub his nose lightly, briefly, listening to the remainder of his story with an attempt to show something more than indifference. It gets hard, sometimes, to remember you need to show emotion to blend in. Pretend you're still one of them.

"That's horrible." A quick frown, bringing his hands back into his pockets, watchful and apparently concerned. Why did they bring him in afterwards? "... Did you know them?"

Punchy seems not to notice if Hyperion's putting any effort into feeling sad. Instead, he seems a little lost in his own head, as if he didn't totally leave the bloodbath even though his body is here.

"Nah, they weren't my crew or nothing. Never even seen most of 'em." And now he'll never get to know any of them. He failed. He failed and it doesn't even make for a good story, because there were too many people for him to be the hero. "You know anyone here? You know if you know anyone?"

Hyperion can only shake his head silently, revealing nothing beyond the answer. "You're the first I've found."

He wonders what it means. If he was simply given an easy target or if coincidences dictate he should take advantage of calm beginnings and wait to move on to a bigger challenge.

"Good. Some of these bitches out here is cray. You'd need to be a pro like me to handle them." He gestures to his slashed-up face as if it's a badge of doing something well, rather than of making a mistake; truly, it was both luck and skill that got him out of the Cornucopia without any fatal wounds.

"But stick with me and I'll look after you, a'ight?" Punchy's now taking it as a measure of faith that Hyperion's a good guy. After all, shady people don't act sad about the dead or give out their real names!

"Oh, you're a pro?" He nods, seemingly amused, arms crossed and relaxed, the same way an adult would be entertained by a child's bravery. There's some room to appreciate the wounds on his face, another to appreciate the fact that he wears them with pride. "I might think about it, Punchy. I got no idea what I'm up against anyway."

"Yeah, I'm a pro," Punchy says, looking a little bit defensive. The one visible eyebrow knits into a peeved furrow. "So you can put your faith in me, a'ight? No second-guessing or nothing."

He lifts his hands, as if to show his intentions have been disarmed.

"No second-guessing. Got it."

There are no weapons on the borded-up Main Street Shops, but there are old t-shirts and stubby pencils, tiny little souvenirs of a time gone by that can perhaps be of use in the future. Aunamee — the prince, the savior, the chosen one — ties them all up in his clean and pristine cape and hoists it over his shoulder as he moves through the street. The air is quiet, absent of cannons, and he finds it disturbing somehow, like the calm before the storm.

He sees Hyperion.

This isn’t someone Aunamee recognizes. That lean figure, that clipped blond hair. Aunamee was always thorough in his research, in examining each and every tribute, how they operated and fought and fell. But no, oh no. This one is new. This one is unpredictable.

He slows his pace, his eyes locked on the other man.

His fingers curl into his palm until his nails comfortably press into the lines of his hands, standing in the clutter and emptiness as though he's been waiting all this time to see Aunamee and Aunamee alone, like their encounter was carefully planned to happen there and then, with one man standing still, the other coming to a stop.

There is nothing to be said. Nothing to be done. Instead Hyperion interrupts the stillness in the air by stretching his lips at him, friendly and unreadable.

It could be an invitation to approach, it could be a challenge to attack. He's curious to see how the reader interprets it.

He still has it, that pathetic shard of plastic he picked up when he met Wesker in the fake graveyard. He doesn't like how this man watches him, how he treats these ruins like his domain and smiles in the face of the unknown. He wants to use the pathetic shard and the ruins and the rocks to wipe the smile from his face.

But on the outside, Aunamee smiles back. Cautious. When his lips fall once more, it's as though he's never smiled in his entire life.

"You're happy to see me."

All calculated expressions, deliberate operations that his brain performs to make him seem human again. Blend in. He waits in a moment of silence, eyes narrowing softly, without threat.

"Could be. Are you happy to see me?"

Are you here to fight or to run?

He doesn't disguise it, how he looks Hyperion up and down, how his eyes pierce and peel and unfold the other man's skin.

"No," he answers simply. "Because we're on a killing field."

He approaches. Little by little. Step by step. Pride pushes him forward like stilts, his boots kicking up tiny pebbles. Dust.

"And I don't know what sort of man you are."

Man is too small a word, he thinks. He's something more. (Something less.)

"Like you said," He opens his hands, letting them hang by his sides, dropping to find their way into his pockets. "This is a killing field. How many can there be?"

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o.1 ( ARENA 06 ) | OPEN

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