<div class="floatleft">(http://images.wikia.com/dragonball/images/4/44/Olivia_Wilde_-_my_heroine.jpg)</div><strong>Who:</strong>Rybbon Latimer, mentor<br/><strong>With:</strong>anonymous unnamed Tributes, servants<br/><strong>Where:</strong>backstage<br/><br/>Rybbon slinked across the huge space, politely smiling and nodding to the attendants as they offered or served food and drink. Caressed in her long billowy dress, the deep cleavage she intentionally showed gleamed between dark panels of soft material. Letting her wild curls frame her face, she’d added something glittery to their tips, making her shimmer as she turned her head. She took a position near the huge expanse of window, smiling out over the city, her gloved hands linked casually behind her hips.<br/><br/><em>A new crop, some of them practically babies. Always exciting. Some would be thrilled, some would be terrified, one (or more) might be too homesick to yet be worried over their mortal life. The culture shock of leaving their district much less their home and family, surrendered unto the alien Capitol, would leave a quaking, mewling mess of nerves instead of a ready warrior. Who, by the end of training, would be worth their weight in gold and who was merely a mooncalf looking to get dropped their first minute off their starting block?</em><br/><br/>She took a tall glass of something orange-red-violet, the different weights of the liquids keeping them from blending into a muddy mess. Turning as she sipped the tangy top level, she eyed the huge view screen. A discrete change to her expression later and she turned away, grateful that the noise had been muted. She hated the ceremony of the cannons firing to announce every death during the games. She’d heard 23 too closely and quickly in succession once along ago. The very noise of such remembrance made her gut wrench and she made certain to sit facing away from the Games recaps from years past. She especially didn’t want to see the lingering capture of her own face, cheeks hollowed from malnutrition wet with skating tears at the very moment of her win.<br/><br/>Drinking slowly through her beverage, she lifted her head as young Tributes moved out from their rooms, smiling in what she liked to think of as her practiced soothing expression. A slightly friendlier one would greet those Tributes that spoke to her, encouraging contact if they wanted it, allowing them space if they needed it. She remembered how her insides had shaken when meeting the prospective mentors her first time. She didn’t want to intimidate anyone. There could only be one survivor after the Games were through – no reason to make the others’ times unpleasant. These would be their last days. They’d already said their goodbyes to their families, poor things… and so had she 16 years ago – nearly half her life she realized slowly. In fact, it was exactly half her life ago that her true love had been delivered to possibly this very room just before he died in ignominy.<br/><br/>Holding back a shudder, Rybbon sucked down through the orange layer, toward the refreshingly minty purple of her drink, closing her eyes while her taste buds grew accustomed to the new flavor. She opened them again, green eyes taking in the array of people in the room, ignoring the servants for those that belonged in these, the 73rd annual, Hunger Games.<br/>