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･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.
"I'm not doing that!" Miles spluttered out, his sweetbread forgotten. "I could hit myself in the head. Just because I managed it one time..." he trailed off, shaking his head. The boy had been nervous about the assessment by the Gamemakers for days now. He claimed to have little to show, and every idea the mentors offered him, he shot down.
"You can't just do nothing," Odette was beginning to lose her patience. They were less than an hour away from the private session. Thalia had her plan all dotted out, she was going to show three skills if she had the time. Miles seemed too nervous to even walk in there. "You said you focused on traps, I still think you should do something like that."
Cecelia was nursing a cup of coffee in her hand, nodding along. "Yeah, that's a useful skill, you'll get a nice score for that."
"But what if I don't?"
Thalia rolled her eyes, dropping her head in her hands. "Stop complaining," she interrupted the conversation. "Just do something. They've offered every single option twice. They're not going to hold your hand in the arena."
It was true, but that didn't mean it was kind. Odette's first response was to reach for her nephew, then to shut the girl up. But the truth of her words and the situation they were in could not be ignored.
"She's right," Neil said, perhaps the only one brave enough to do so. "You can do nothing in there but that won't do you any good. We're here to help, not to do things for you."
It hurt to see him like that. So insecure, scared. There was nothing more Odette could do, and she wished she could. It wasn't fair, she'd already lost her own life to the games, and now she was going to lose Miles'.
He turned his gaze down and nodded. Odette looked away, wanting to leave, wanting to disappear and forget what was about to happen. She wrung her hands together in her lap as the conversation picked up again. Cecelia and Neil offered some more tips and options to both the tributes. Odette felt useless. She should be helping them, too, but couldn't bring herself to speak. Wouldn't even know what to say if she could. After all those years, shouldn't this be something she could do?
Maybe she should have stayed home. She's not helping either of them now, perhaps if Woof was here, he would have known what to say to get Miles out of his own head. She should have stayed home for Holly, too.
"Why are you still sitting around?" Rory marched in the room, his shoes flat for a change, but his hair impossibly high and sparkly. He'd been surprisingly absent yesterday and that morning. "Come on, don't want to be late! You'll want to make a good impression."
Miles shot Odette a panicked look. She answered with her best attempt of a calm and comforting smile and a nod. "You got this," she said to both of them. "You can do this, I believe in you."
