Heating the Winter

[Kyle Wick]

Wick walked in and when he saw her there in a chair he paused. Not because he was surprised someone else was in here (thought he was), but because of the chair. Oh shit. Just the night before there had been only one chair in here--and he asked for more chairs--but he had also taken all the screws out of the chair so that when someone shifted their weight too hard in it . . . . it would all fall part. "Gooooooddd morning," Wick offered to the girl, who he was trying to remember her name, his voice almost expectant. He turned to the side to put down his bag, but then paused again.

Oh hell there was another chair and it looked just like the other one. Turning to look at the other side of the room he saw another chair. Again--just like this one. Which meant it was no a game of musical chairs. "Could you sit very still?" He asked knowing he was being weird, and while loving the idea of one of the guard falling but not a girl. He was trying to see if the chair was going to fall part. It left Wick knowing this was either going to be climatic--or anti-climatic.

Wick hurried over to Raven's chair and shook it hard. Nothing. Good. She'd kill him if he made her fall, and she'd do it very slowly. Looking up at the girl he grinned, "Just checking on it." Wick walked over to his station and not looking away from the younger girl. "Cause you never know what . . . uuhhh, gravity does to things." Pulling his bag down in his chair the there was a pop and the whole thing crumbled into all it's parts from the weight. Wick didn't look away from the girl but his grin got bigger. "I didn't build that." he lied.

Wick was struggling in his own way from the aftermath of the mountain. He'd killed someone there, and had seen the woman he loved drilled on while she cried out in pain. Then he'd seen the bodies of everyone dead. While he knew it was different for everyone, Wick dealt with it in humor. He played pranks--a lot of them. It helped him not think about things. "You're . . . . Thea?" He asked, "Here about the plants?"

Made by Riley at THQ

^{Thalia Tait}

[Thalia Tait]

Thalia was sitting quietly in a chair waiting for the Genius Joker that Marcus has told her to work with to help start to prepare for winter. she wasn't so sure about working with this guy. He had quite the reputation... But she suppose it shouldn't be too bad. No one ever really paid her much attention when working with her. Usually it was just a quiet and efficient period in time in which she and the other person simply worked on the same project or job. Well, unless it was someone she knew better, like one of the 100. Then there was sometimes a little chatting. But with the other Arkers that she didn't really know... Things were often quickly dealt with and she was more often than not reduced to an acquaintance one simply smiled at in passing.

Oh she didn't mind! Not in the least. It left less people for her to grieve for and less people to grieve for her in the event... Well, in the future. And this wasn't just a small job or project. This was important! Marcus himself had asked her to work with Kyle Wick . Well, not in the informal and entirely jolly 'oh hey T-Squared!' way, but more like 'hey you can make stuff outta things that aren't stuff, right?' sort of way. Or well, she had interpreted it that way. People always said she could be cheerful and silly but that she had a surprisingly pessimistic view of herself. Oh well. Nothing much to be done about it right? Everyone had their ugly side. Her was...well, it just bled through a bit more. Ever since she had heard that her dad had died in the Culling... Not ever have been able to say good-bye... It just cut deeper into that festering part of herself she tried to cover up with smiles and silliness.

Looking up when someone drew out a very long 'good morning', Thalia took in the sight of him. Her eyes examined him. Picked him apart piece by visual piece. Analyzed the way he moved. The put him back together for her final and foremost impression. "I'm Thalia Tait..." she said slowly, as if trying to remind him of who she was carefully, though it was something she was quite familiar with doing, "We're suppose to-"

Sit still? Why? Her face went from patient hesitation to absolute confusion. He moved around her like he had just had way too much dandelion tea. Caffeinated personality. That pretty much summed up her impression of him. Someone who'd be difficult to keep up with to the point where she'd be left looking like the fool in a comedy duo. He was flittering about, looking around her, then towards some chair in the room. Peering at him with intense curiosity, her question was clearly and honestly written on her face. What in all the Galaxy are you doing?

He was...just checking that chair? What is all the Milky Way had she gotten herself into? Was he like that mad genius Dr. Dracula, who made the monstrous creature Frankenstein? That guy had been rather off his rocker, chasing pretty girls and beautiful men to get their blood so his monstrous creature could live. Absent-mindedly she rubbed her neck. Good thing she wasn't either of those things. For once her averageness worked in her favor... But him not breaking eye contact as he walked over to what looked like a work station didn't put her at ease at all. "R...Right . . . 'gravity does do things'," she repeated, her soul-reading eyes, still trying to put this puzzle of a person together in her mind, "A-Anyway... We're suppose to be working together to-"

A loud clatter and he was sitting on his backside surrounded and on top of parts of his chair. Thalia jumped at the noise and blinked a few times, as if not quiet understanding what had just happened. Even her hands were still up in the air, frozen in the reaction to her wincing jump, their commander not relaying messages as where to be stationed. Finally she settled for standing up, rather quickly, and knitting her fingers together to keep from touching anything. Her eyes nervously went to her chair, then back to him, to his chair and then finally resting on him. 

"M-Mister Wick!" she settled for formal since he was supposedly a genius and far closer to more influential people like Abbey, Marcus, Clarke, Raven, and so on. The dark wild haired girl was gripping her own hands so tight her knuckles were turning white, "Please! We're suppose to work together to figure out how- ...h-how- ...how to..." Her face was turning redder by the second. Her breathing was quickening and all she could hear was her heart pounding her in ear. Swallow hard, she could feel herself floundering, looking around as if trying to figure out what to do. This wasn't going to work. Not with her in it. This was just too much pressure! How was she going to work with a well-reputed genius on the order of Marcus himself for something as incredibly important as....as... 

She couldn't think.

It was just white noise, silent, suffocating, and so LOUD she couldn't hear herself think! She could hardly breathe, struggling to claw the next breath into her lungs like someone who was being buried alive. Too much pressure. Too much pressure. This was all too much pressure! She wasn't a leader or a close follower or even anyone important who could do important things or make important choices! She couldn't even make somewhat influencing choices or work with people who could make them or even work together with those certain people to make them! She was going to get them all killed! Every single person this big project could save, she was going to mess it up and everything would a be a failure just like every other big thing she had tried to accomplish in her life had been a failure. Failure after failure! Failure to be be a proper child, damaging her mother so severely that she died a long and agonizing death, which had tortured her father into his own illness. Failure to be a proper student of the Ark, to be in one specific line of work to keep life moving smoothly and work as her parents had for the good of the whole, like a nice shiny wheel and cog. Failure to be a proper daughter, to steal the medicine that could have saved her father from choosing to die in the Culling and sending him to his own death without ever even knowing if his only child, she, Thalia, were dead or alive. Failure after failure after failure, and these were things people could do so well so naturally. As natural for them all as breathing! Look she couldn't even breathe right-! 

She couldn't breathe! 

Thalia's face had gone from red to white to blue, he throat having constricted from the panic so much that she had forgotten to breathe. Floating Blackhole in the Galaxy! She turned away from the Genius and gripped her throat, stuttered and choking for air, gripping the chair she had been sitting in with her other hand. Gasping, eyes wide, mortified, panicked for primal need of oxygen, she finally remembered that she could suck in air. With a staggering deep squeezing breath, she filled her lung with precious air. She wasn't on the Ark. She wasn't in the Sky Box. She wasn't in the Mountain. She wasn't going to be floated. She wasn't going to be floated. She wasn't floating...

Closing her burning eyes, her throat still spasming for air, lungs railing with need for the abundant air, Thalia's weak knees buckled. In a single stroke of her own genius, she was able to sit in the chair. Putting her head between her knees, she began dragging in air.

Deep breath in!

Push it out slow between pursed lips...

Deep breath in!

Push it out between pursed lips...

Closing her burning eyes, she realized just how stupid and crazy and floating weak she looked. Panicking over what? The Genius didn't even know. Couldn't know. He wasn't one of the 100, so how could he? Blackhole Devouring the Floating Stars... It was she who was the crazy one. How could Marcus have thought she'd be a good choice to work on this project?

Finally, slowly and with head bowed in mortified shame, she raised herself up by her shoulders quietly. Her hands were busy rubbing her knees in a comforting gesture. Looking to the side, then nervously looked up at Wick, then back down again. "I..." she cleared her throat, weakly speaking, "I... I was sent to assist...yes, with the plants." She was staring down and to the side. "We... We should start quickly. That faster we begin the faster you can be done with...it." Yes, it. Because obviously he was hoping to be done with the project as quick as possible and not praying to every single star in the sky that her crazy butt not stay in his work area for more than a few hours a day.  Well...not exactly how she had planned this all starting out. What a shining first impression to give someone who was surely worth ten of her put together. Her lips quivered in a breaking smile.

Thalia cleared her throat again. "I think...we could make indoor farming sections, just like we had on- on the Ark," she tried to sit up straight and professional, as if they could ignore everything that had just happened, get business done with for the day and move on living without knowing one another. Anyone else would take that option, right?