#actescort55

Well, by definition, but knowing the sweet old lady, she would never hurt somebody on purpose. It just so happens that over the course of three months in her eighty-first year of life, Mildred’s cataracts seemed to develop, and she swiftly ran over a few unlucky j-walkers. 

It was never on purpose, though. 

And technically, it wasn’t her fault if she ran over people crossing illegally. So she was never allotted any jail time. But, she was considered a threat to public safety, and so government officials figured that the best way to get her off of the roads was to get her onto the trains. 

Growing up in the poorest district in Panem is tough. Doing so with seven younger siblings is near impossible. To do so with a drunkard father and a flighty mother who more often than not wasn't around? Well, for Ester Atlana, life seemed to have dealt her a losing hand.

Barely older than a child, Ester dropped out of school to beg for a job at the only place that would take her, the mines. The foreman needed the miners and didn't give a shit really who was working for him so long as they could swing a pick. So, from sun up until sun down Ester would descend into the mines, chipping away at the seemingly endless supply of precious black coal. When she was done for the day her meager earnings were spent on food for her siblings. Some days she would get to eat too. Some days she wasn't so lucky.

Ester earned her nickname as the girl of steel long before her introduction to the Capitol. Her fellow miners at first tried to break the young girl who'd joined them. After all, hardly any girls worked the mines, let alone one as young as Ester. Their efforts proved futile as day after day she worked just as hard if not harder than any of them, never breaking or even acknowledging their jabs at her.

The reaping for the 21st annual Hunger Games was just about the first time Ester had cried in recent memory. Instead, she turned to her oldest brother and informed him it was his turn to work the mines. She mounted the stage and soon was whisked away into the whirlwind that is the pregames. In the Capitol she remained as icy and closed off as she had been in Twelve, refusing to bend or break for the audience.

A modest training score, refusal to acknowledge her competition, and complete lack of openess at her interview got people wondering just what was brewing beneath her steely surface.

Luckily, her lack of allies or enemies had left her relatively low on most tributes' hit list and she escaped into the arena unscathed. Years of working the mines had left her strong, resilient, and with excellent vision in the dark, all skills that served her in the almost perma twilight of the arena.

Even as Ester plunged her dagger into the skull of the boy from Four, she didn't let a slip of what she was feeling peak to the surface. No smile of victory, tears of regret, laugh of relief. She simply tossed the dagger down and grabbed hold of the hovercraft ladder. Ester left the arena and the Capitol as enigmatic and unchanging as she'd entered.

Years have past, her fortune split between her siblings allowing them money to start families of their own, something Ester has never been able to bring herself to do. Living alone in her house in the Victor's Village, she spends most of her time back at the mines where she's taken over as foreman, every bit as tough on her miners as her foreman was on her.

It seemed that from birth Yancey Proulx had his destiny planned out for him. His mother was secretary to the president, her father before her had been a high ranking government official, and his father before him was a governor in the country that existed before Panem. His political legacy stretched out before him, Yancey took an internship right out of school, a fresh faced youth.

Eager to prove himself, Yancey took up any and every job he was given. He campaigned, he grabbed coffee orders, he stayed up night after night working on advertisement, ironing suits, doing whatever it took for him to rise in the ranks. Years of family conditioning had left him the perfect politician, quiet until spoken to, polite, handsome and well dressed, and finally, it seemed both his and his families efforts had been worth it.

Panem's defense minister had recently lost his assistant and had asked specifically for Yancey as a replacement. Ecstatic, Yancey jumped at the opportunity and soon found himself rubbing elbows with some of the most influential people in Panem. People who could make Yancey's career. For a moment everything in Yancey's life seemed about as perfect as he'd imagined.

That is until one night, after staying late finishing up filing some paperwork for the minister he heard a commotion coming from a part of the building he'd never been to before. Going against his best judgement, Yancey found himself peering in on the minister and his former assistant, along with two others, in chains suspended from the ceiling. The minister was holding a gun up the one of their heads and though Yancey had missed the conversation, the sound of the gun firing and the screams of the two still alive.

He lived well, but then all the Dearhearts did. Married to a woman just as rich and even more powerful, Maximus had a high-profile job as a government official and a huge house. When he mentioned to family and friends with characteristic good-natured confusion that he did not, in fact, love the woman, he was met only with friendly laughter.

“Max, please! You only have to see her at home! You want other women? You can have whoever you want!”

Maximus laughed along with them, but even he could see the flaws in the statement. Still, he went along with his friends every now and then and joined in the ‘fun’. If his wife ever found out, everybody knew she would find a way to ruin him, so his friends made sure to coach the blabbermouth on ways to hide their underground doings. And, for a while, it worked. Max and his wife had two children, and both rose in the ranks. In fact, life may have carried on as it was, had he not made the acquaintance of Carnation.

Now, Maximus fancied himself in love with every girl he slept with, but Carnation was different. She was so out of place, so innocent, so broken. He wanted to protect he. He, unlike his friends, didn’t even want to sleep with her. He would have been perfectly content just looking at her all night, taking in her youth and beauty. Had he been the sort to conceal his feelings, things might have gone differently but, Max being Max, he told her this. Carnation stared. Since her victory, she had never met a man who had been interested in more than her body, and she turned this flawed and pretty pathetic man into a hero in her eyes.

They fell in love, despite a twenty year age gap.

In his defense, Max genuinely loved her. Aside from his wife, he saw no woman other than Carnation after meeting her, and spent thousands on making sure she was comfortable, well clothed, and with everything she could desire. She, in turn, saw no other men, and cut off her gorgeous hair as a gesture of true love. Maximus was, for a time, blissfully happy.

And then his wife discovered.

The white envelope didn’t look too threatening, and nor did the message inside, informing him that he was to be the Escort of District Eight for the 55th Annual Hunger Games. But Maximus was not in the media, not the kind of person who was normally selected. He knew that this was his wife’s doing, or even the President’s. High-profile officials were not allowed affairs with young Victors - or, at least, they had to conceal them better.

And even to Max, the true message of the letter was clear.

WARF: So, it all started so long ago, after well…

*STICKS FINGER IN AND OUT OF MOUTH WHILE SHUSHING THE CROWD*

WARF: And I came into the world! Handsome as ever and ready to win over the hearts of the Capitol at once! Now, what was I like as a kid?

*WARF DOES A TWIRL AND WINKS AT THE CROWD*

*CROWD ERUPTS IN A MOMENT OF CHEERING AND A FEW FAINT*

WARF: I was handsome. I was charming. I was able to befriend everyone I ever met. I became known as the one you could trust. Trust with your secrets. Your wishes. Your sins. And if you were wondering…

*WARF CASTS A SEDUCTIVE LOOK TOWARDS THE AUDIENCE*

WARF: The pink is all natural.

*WARF WINKS AND SWOONS SEVERAL AUDIENCE MEMBERS, MALE AND FEMALE*

*AUDIENCE MEMBER STANDS UP*

AUDIENCE MEMBER STANDING: No one has pink hair naturally!

*WARF LOOKS OFFENDED AND SHOCKED, GRASPS HEART AND JEWELS*

WARF: Oh, my! How rude.

*WARF PULLS OUT A DAGGER FROM HIS LINGERIE AND THROWS IT TOWARDS THE AUDIENCE MEMEBER, KILLING HIM INSTANTLY*

*WARF FLASHES A SEDUCTIVE SMILE AND THE AUDIENCE CHEERS*

WARF: Anyway, I was a happy child, and as a teen I grew to possess these looks I posses today.

*WARF SHAKES HIPS AS HE RETRIEVES A BOOM MIC FROM HIS LINGERIE*

WARF: You see, in a flash I was known around the Capitol for my looks and my willingness to do any gig.

*WARF RAISES EYEBROWS*

WARF: Mostly comedy, but every once in awhile it was a bit more serious.

*WARF WINKS AND ANOTHER FEW AUDIENCE MEMBERS PASS OUT*

WARF: Before long, I became famous and got this talk show, which I’ve been running for ten fabulous years now. Through it, I’ve been able to meet so many scrumptious people, and even a few delectable ones.

*WARF ENTERS THE STUDIO AUDIENCE* WARF: And now, even more exciting, you all will be the first to hear some exciting news...I’m going to be the new District Four escort for this year’s games!

*AUDIENCE BREAKS INTO HYSTERICS*

*WARF SHOVES THE BOOM MIC DOWN A FEW THROATS TO SIGNAL THAT THEY NEED TO SHUT THE FUCK UP AS HE SMILES SEDUCTIVELY AT THEM, THE GLINT OF HIS DAGGER SWAYING SENSUALLY IN THE LIGHT*

WARF: Now, I know it’s all very exciting, but that’s just about all I have time for tonight. That’s all we have funding for as well! See you next week Panem, and while I’m gone, stay sassy.