Reputation (Finnick Odair)

Chapter 12

     Dinner that night is uneventful as usual. Atlas sits quietly and picks at the food that's been placed on her plate by Mars, Mars flicking peas across the table at Olympia, Olympia is whispering quietly to Apricot and Apricot it trying to remain proper while she downs a whole bottle of wine. Atlas didn't mind the quiet, at least the silence was more comfortable now than it had been previously. But eventually someone had to talk.

     The discussion is boring. Olympia goes back and forth with Mars about his skill and Mars reveals that he "accidentally" threw one of the weights into the bow and arrow rack, simply shrugging when Olympia suggests he did it on purpose. Atlas tunes out most of it but then the topic is shifted to her.

      "What about you Atlas?"

      Atlas shrugs, her eyes not leaving the dinner roll she had been carving shapes into with her fork, "Threw some knives. All bullseyes,  obviously."

     Mars snorts, "Egomaniac."

     Atlas smirks wildly, turning and shoving the man's shoulder, Mars just laughs before returning to his food. The younger girl glances back up and sees Olympia smiling fondly at the two. Atlas' smile drops quickly.

      "That's good," Olympia nods. The conversation veers away from their skills but still flows freely for the rest of the evening. Apricot even taking a break from drowning in her sorrows to discuss the upcoming events.

     Once the dinner is over, Apricot quickly pushes them into the TV room. The quartet sits down on the couch. Atlas vaguely wonders where Diamond was. She would usually be her for something like this. As she's turning to Apricot to ask, the elevator door opens and in strolls Diamond, her hair up in an ornate braid.

     "Sorry everyone, got caught up in a design and totally forgot about this," She smiles softly, flopping down on Olympia's other side.

     "Glad you could make it," Apricot smiles tightly, looking more nervous than grateful. Atlas assumes Mars could hear the tension in her voice because he raises an eyebrow at her before tilting his head towards the escort. Atlas just shrugs. She honestly didn't really care.

As Atlas looks away from Mars, the TV lights up and the room goes silent. Atlas isn't sure why, the scores didn't matter much. No one in the room is very surprised when Mars gets a 7. Atlas throws a grin across the room at him and the man just smiles and shrugs modestly. Mars getting a seven was surprisingly good considering the state he had been in a few days earlier. If he got a score on the higher half of the ratings, Atlas thought that was a good sign that he could maybe survive in the arena.

The group looks back up to see Atlas get a ten and a grin breaks out across her face. Mars starts cheering from across the room and Diamond reaches over to shake Atlas' shoulder, donning a warm expression. Olympia just nods her head and Atlas laughs. High praise from Olympia.

"We'll, that's all we'll and good," Apricot says while she stands up, her expression a little less pained that earlier, "I'm afraid I'll be taking my leave now."

     "Leaving so soon?" Mars moves to take a drink from his glass, the red liquid inside reaching toward his lips. His eyes stay locked on the glass though and he sets it down before he can ingest any of the contents.

     Atlas smiles softly at Mars and he looks away abashedly, instead turning his attention back to Apricot. Every one in the room looks at Apricot and for a few seconds she looks very composed and polite.

     "I-," Apricot starts but she quickly breaks down into sobs.

      "Woah!" Atlas exclaims, eyes darting around the room while Diamond stands up quickly to lead Apricot to the closest couch, setting the woman down gently.