thecapitol | The Distraction of an Everyday Routine (OPEN)

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The Distraction of an Everyday Routine (OPEN)

A. The Gymnasium

Thunk.

The sword slams into the dummy with a weird kind of finesse, driven by determination rather than any sort of skill. Sayaka teeters off-balance for a moment, then rights herself and swings again.

Thunk.

She's been at this pretty much since she woke up and found out what she was here for. Even after her hosts had politely come in at lunchtime and told her that refreshments could be found in her suite and she really ought to take a break, Sayaka had kept swinging away determinedly. They'd told her she had free run of the city, but she couldn't think of anything she'd enjoy doing - not here, in a city she'd never even heard of before, alone. She had to admit that the thought of the music hall had tugged at her heartstrings a little, but there was no point upsetting herself.

Thunk.

A crescendo began to build in her heart. 'This world doesn't need me,' that's what she'd said. Maybe it really didn't. Her grip on the sword tightened. Un-needed in her own world, unwilling to participate in this one. She really was useless.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

This time, when she teetered off-balance, Sayaka doesn't manage to pull herself back up again. The sword clatters to the ground with an embarrassing clatter. She leaves it laying there and just stares at the dummy, her eyes hollow, her chest heaving.

"I'm really no good at this." She mumbles between breaths, and then, a little louder: "What am I even doing here?"

B. Outside the Concert Hall

She really was a fool. Had her feet led her this way all by themselves, or had her foolish head directed them? Either way, here she was, stood seething outside the Capitol Concert Hall.

She should go, Sayaka thinks, looking around for some escape, but then the orchestra starts up, and the music is so beautiful, and so unfamiliar, that she can't help but listen. Even through the walls of the concert hall, she can make out the melody. She sits herself down on a nearby bench, closes her eyes, and listens to the opening notes.

She can't help it - she wonders what Kyousuke would think of all this, and soon her eyes are welling up with tears. She wipes them away on the sleeve of her shirt, and tries her best not to draw the attention of the milling crowds.

She didn't want to cry, but she'd been doing a lot of things she didn't really want to lately.

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Karkat's trips to the training floor are a regular thing, set by the clock and Jane Shepard's insistence. Morning by morning he comes here to practice, learning from her or honing skills he already has. But now and then he comes alone, be it to work out energy or take his mind from other subjects. He's had more than enough for that lately. Problems never cease in Panem.

He's been practicing with a sickle when his attention slides over. A new face always gets at least a glance, a look to see who he might have to watch out for in the arenas and what they're capable of, or to gauge abilities if they ever end up an ally. And she looks normal, if young, blue hair nothing strange here in the Capitol. Not next to a grey-skinned alien like him.

Instead, what gets him to actually approach is her words.

"Training to not be crap is the idea," he calls over. His voice is rough, and he doesn't look much older than her, not helped by his short height. "If you're set on learning swords, there's bound to be someone who can teach you about them."

Sayaka instantly turns her head toward the source of the voice. When she sees it's another tribute, and one that sounds tougher than she is, at that, she hauls herself to her feet and doggedly takes another swing at the dummy.

THUNK.

She really wishes she hadn't drawn attention to how little actual experience she had. Swinging a sword around was a lot harder without magic powers to back her up. This time Sayaka strikes a little bit too hard, and the sword ends up stuck firmly in the foam of the dummy. She pulls it out with some difficulty, and turns back to the stranger.

"I'm doing fine." She calls back, and hesitates before she continues: "I don't need help."

Still, she wonders if she was being harsh. Maybe the stranger was only trying to save her further embarrassment.

Edited 2015-09-04 22:50 (UTC)

Fine, she says. Doesn't need help, she says.

Karkat rolls his eyes. "Uhuh, and I'm the most human of space monkeys to have ever crawled out of a mammalian Earth mother. Don't lie, dumbass, it makes you look insecure." Not that he'd know anything about insecurity.

Instead of leaving he treads closer, not within sword range, but enough to get a better look at her and what she's doing.

"Seriously, if you need someone to train you there are people who will do it. There are going to be people and monsters out there after your blood, and there is zero shame in taking proper instruction to avoid your own hapless death of overblown pride. I can't help - swords aren't my thing - but just take the advice, you stubborn grub."

Sayaka understands at least one of those words, and she's not happy about them. Who's this grey guy to call her a space monkey?

She is a dumbass, though. Even she knows that, but it's not going to stop her from just carrying on taking potshots at the dummy. They're getting increasingly more frantic as Karkat talks, and eventually she swings so hard that the sword gets stuck again. This time, it's not coming out.

Her face red and her breaths ragged, Sayaka turns to Karkat.

"I've fought monsters before." She argues, "and I'm not scared of dying." The look in her eye shows that she means what she's saying, but in the back of her mind she's trying to work out why she just blurted all that out like that. If the stranger before her thought Sayaka was pathetic before, he's bound to think less of her now.

Karkat tosses his arms up, spread fingers gesturing somewhere off at the ceiling. "Congratulations! I've fought monsters, too, and died seven times! Eight if you count a technicality!"

One arm drops, the other slipping smoothly to point at her like a jab to the air. "Playing ooh I'm so tough when you can't even fight without losing your sword in the target isn't going to earn you intimidation points, you mewling child. People are going to see right through it, find your openings, and off you without a second glance. Is that what you want?"

Sayaka blinks. The stranger reminds her of someone, and it takes her a moment to remember Kyouko. Instantly, the anger she's been trying poorly to suppress rises up the surface.

"I'd rather die ten times than be a murderer even once." She snaps back, and immediately regrets saying anything as the stranger's words finally sink in.

"What do you mean, eight times?" For the moment, she's more puzzled than angry.

Karkat groans, a rumbling thing not quite at the level of a growl, and puts his palm to his face. He would have answered her just for the first part, but the second guarantees that he won't walk away from her.

"First of all," he starts, "I'm not telling you to kill anyone. I'm telling you that you won't be able to defend yourself against even the animals if you don't learn how to wield that thing properly. And second, I meant just what I said."

His arms fold. He's frowning still, but there's little to budge that off his face. It's nothing hostile, at least.

"I died three times in the world I was in before this. Once on a technicality, twice directly. It's way too complicated to get into when it doesn't affect this place, so chalk up the times I revived to metaphysical bullshit so I can move on. Here, obviously, we're subject to the arenas. It's a giant death match, so obviously everyone who doesn't win dies, but they revive us afterward with their fancy science whatever. I don't know the specifics, but I've been through three regular arenas and two mini versions without winning any of them, so you do the math."

Edited (what on earth is my wording) 2015-09-19 06:03 (UTC)

Sayaka's about to open her mouth to argue - she'd defended herself just fine in her own world, after all - but she's too interested in what else Karkat has to say. She mirrors his pose, her arms folded, but her frown is more on the sceptical side.

At first she thinks there's no reason for him to lie to her - but then again, won't he be her enemy in the arena? It would be easy for him to tell her something like this and let her die thinking it meant nothing at all. But then, why convince her to train harder in the first place?

"So if everyone comes back, there's even less reason to care if I die." Sayaka says, stubbornly sticking to her guns. Still, there's a flicker of worry in her expression. Sayaka might have pushed herself to the brink of death before, but she'd never actually experienced it. This guy had been in the arenas five times, and he was still training every single day just to have a chance of survival.

Sayaka bit her lip. She'd been useless enough in her own world, without being useless in this one as well. It's clear from her expression that she's losing faith in her argument.

Karkat's first response is an almost impulsive frown, but he doesn't miss that look. Worry is well-known in a place like this, something he's seen on many faces, and an expression he's worn quite often himself. For that he doesn't leave.

"It still hurts, dumbass. If you can keep alive longer, you have a bigger chance of winning and helping out your District. Or if you don't care about that--" He decides not to get into the Capitol and its politics. "--then maybe you can keep from looking like a chump who gets offed in the first week. But hey, why listen to the veteran? Just jump off the platform and blow yourself up at the start if you want to get it over that much."

It's not the gentlest way of putting it, but then she's not done much to encourage gentle. Bluntness might put the sense of it in her, he hopes.

"I'm not worried about it hurting." She says without thinking, then bites her lip even harder. What a stupid thing to say.

"What's a District?" She asks, in an attempt to cover up. She remembered there being a group of people in her suite, but they were all grown men, and one of them had horns, and she was pretty sure they wouldn't need her help to win.

There's a part of her, though, that really does want to be able to help. At the very least, the stranger is speaking to her sense of pride - she really doesn't want to look like a chump.

"I'm not going to do something that stupid!" She was willing to believe that the Capitol could heal cuts and bruises, but she draws the line at the idea of them piecing her back together after an explosion.

Sayaka's first answer draws a frustrated sigh, but her question is a valid one--one can he can readily answer. He passes over her last protest with a roll of the eyes and moves on into explaining.

"Panem is divided into different Districts which produce the various goods and materials that help keep everything running. There are twelve total--" So long as you don't count the destruction of District 3 or bring up the officially non-existent District 13, which he isn't going to. "--and we offworld tributes are divided the same way. Whichever tribute wins an arena also wins food for their associated District.

"It used to be that District kids themselves were reaped once a year, one boy and one girl, and put into the games together. A number of Districts still have Mentors from the old games--that is, people who won them and thereby are still around to tell about them. But after the 74th one, they changed things and started bringing us in, with obviously more of us per District than the old games had, not to mention the whole reviving us after part."

It's about as close as he can get to outright telling her how cruel the Capitol is. He's long since learned to watch his tongue, to dance around things and hint or leave the implications of the facts to speak for themselves. It's not his preferred method, but with cameras always watching he has little other recourse.

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