thecapitol | The Crowning of Maximus Decimus Meridius

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The Crowning of Maximus Decimus Meridius

Who| Everyone
What| Maximus' crowning
Where| Victory Hall
When| Today
Warnings| Violence.

Prior to the Crowning, the Stylists and Escorts were given information: the color scheme for the Crowning is brown and gold, the theme is fire, and for Tributes, Games Staff and Victors in the Capitol alike, attendance is mandatory. No exceptions.

The Victory Hall has been completely refitted to the theme. Great brownstone pillars reach up from the floor, now made of polished marble. Rose petals and dying embers flutter from the ceiling like confetti, and long panels of fabrics embroidered with Maximus' kills pour down the walls. Rather than tables, Tributes are given wooden chairs to sit around fire pits in groups of four, where pigs and sheep are roasting whole, tended by attentive Avoxes. The smell of charring flesh and rosemary wafts through the hall.

In the center of the hall is a pit, fifteen feet deep, ringed with brick and filled with sand. Torches line the inside wall, casting light in every direction. A circular screen up above lets those not close to the edge view the contents of the pit in real-time video.

Maximus' private table has a theme of anachronisms; Tributes from 'less-developed' timelines and worlds are seated around a long table, facing the gladiatorial ring where, at the moment, a full-grown, well-fed Bengal tiger paces. Compared to the muttations of the Arena, it may seem positively demure, up until it bares its fangs and reveals that it's been modified to have saber teeth gilded in gold. Occasionally an Avox will dangle something into the pit and jerk it away if the tiger looks bored and lays down.

Occasionally, with fanfare of music pumped in to announce it, a challenger enters the tiger ring - a hologram of one of the Tributes who were cuffed and marked by the Capitol. The hologram must be affixed with smell, too, as the tiger takes note and attacks like a kitten following a laser pointer, making dramatic roars as it does. The holograms put up valiant fights, and their deaths are brutal, illusory blood flying and the sounds of death rattles and bones cracking coming from speakers embedded in every table.

"A speech," Maximus' Escort says to Maximus. "The General must give a speech."

Tributes who attended Wesker's Crowning ceremony should notice a remarkable increase in security. Visibly armed Peacekeepers lurk behind the panels of fabric, and bulbous, obvious cameras dot the ceiling. Even the Avoxes seem shiftier than usual, and are equipped with discrete tape recorders pinned to their rough-hewn tunics.

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It was probably through what, the fifth or sixth kill before R finally found Peeta.

The human stared down at the pit, his shoulders tight as razor-wire with tension; when R shuffled closer, he could see Peeta was white-knuckling his fork like he wanted to stab that tiger with it. R plopped down at one of the temporarily empty seats before the Avox could gently turn him around. His Dead-gray eyes fluttered from the pit to Peeta's face. R's mouth worked behind the muzzle as he realized hey, look, Peeta was upset. Obviously. Even he could see that and he was a corpse. Probably had something to do with the tiger. Maybe the fake-deaths - the ones that looked so real but didn't smell quite right to R (not Alive enough; the hunger wasn't screaming at him). Maybe they were people Peeta knew?

R better shuffle cautiously here. Show some tact.

Don't talk about the defective tiger.

"You...okay?" R groaned where he'd listed against the table. There. That was safe and tiger-free. Good job. The zombie leaned forward toward Peeta, muzzle gleaming gold today.

Edited 2013-09-04 05:36 (UTC)

R, his friend. Peeta was usually the one with a smile, the guy making jokes and having a good time no matter what it was. But this? He couldn't do this. When he turned to look at R, he tried for a smile, but it didn't really work. His jaw just tightened at another roar.

"I'm..." He breathed in deep through his nose. He was barely hanging on with all of this. The tiger, the atmosphere, the looks of everyone. He thought he might be sick, but you couldn't, and he couldn't, and he couldn't...

"Not doing that great." He said softly, hoping he could hear it, even at this low of a tone.

That didn't look remotely close to a smile. R frowned, leaned forward to get a better look at Peeta and this close he could see the classic signs of Living distress - flared nostrils, jaw razor-wire tight, the human's eyes dilated and blown out. Peeta's smile was wan, barely there. It flickered at the roar underneath them, cracked a little bit more at the edges.

"Let's...lurk. Not...here, okay?" R was already reaching out toward Peeta, his head hanging to one side. Peeta seemed like he was holding it together, but only barely. What he needed was a nice, quiet corner to lurk in, get his thoughts in order, and R was relieved to say he knew plenty of spots he could suggest.

All of them were tiger-free, too.

Lurk? He had to think about it for a second. When he thought of things lurking, he thought of... bats, maybe. Or monsters in the closet. At another roar, his eyes closed again. A monster would be better then this right now. He gave a nod, opening his eyes.

"Okay. Yeah, let's do that." His smile, what there was, became a little more sincere, and you could hear it in his voice how grateful he was for the help. Anything would be better then this, and he got up from his seat, pushing it back. Lead on, R, since you know where these corners were!

Slightly better, but still not up to par with Peeta's usual smile. R nodded, wheeled around, and began tottering off. Considering several of the guests were already staggering and bumping into their friends, he fit right in as he led the way to one of the prime lurking spots he knew was close(ish) by. He hadn't really lurked with a human before - at the same time, it was Peeta. It'd work.

R stopped at a corner that was dark, this side of spooky, and definitely the kind of corner the monkey part of a person's brain would get nervous about. Things go bump in the night in corners like these.

"Home...sweet h-home," R flops a hand to the lurking corner like he's a butler. Impressed yet, Peeta? "Better...?"

As far as creepy lurking corners went, this one was perfect. It provided everything that he would need to hide out in a corner, and his smile lifted just a little more. Because how many times had he really wanted to hide in a corner? Being sent to a corner was definitely different.

"Much better," Peeta answered, looking around furtively, like he might get in trouble for this. Thankfully, everyone was way too into the tiger, and the food, and the whole craziness that was this crowning.

Peeta gratefully leaned against the wall, pressing the bottom of his palms into his eyes, breathing slowly. "Thank you, R. I just... can't figure out how anyone thought this was a good idea, as far as crowning ceremonies go."

Good, he'd been wondering if he needed to think up another spot. R quietly propped himself up against the other wall, letting his corpse rest against it. It was easier to hold a conversation if he wasn't concentrating on standing upright on top of that. His eyes traveled to Peeta's hands, hands he knew could create such amazing paintings, to his face, waiting for him to talk. R could literally wait 'till kingdom come if he needed the time.

"Bad...i-dea," R's groan was quietly sympathetic.

To anyone else, he'd probably sound bored. Not all there. But there were shades to a zombie's groan, the slump of his shoulders, how many degrees his head sagged to the side - little tells R couldn't hide.

R sucked in a stale breath and went on. "Capitol...wasting...gifts. Un-cool."

Joan had told him to keep sentiments like that to himself. R ignored her advice; after all, this was Peeta he was talking to and they were in a dark, zombie-approved lurking corner. Seemed fine to him.

Peeta swallowed heavily, letting his hands fall back to his sides. Red and black dots swam in front of him, thankfully covering up all the gold for a moment. It was a bad idea. A terrible idea. He was hoping that the next crowning would be for someone... not like this one.

It helped to hear it from someone else. Especially someone like R. Not that he was the end all of end alls when it came to bad ideas or anything, but if the dead guy in the group who also sometimes eats humans was saying that it was a bad idea, then you had to listen to him.

Still, you couldn't say the next part. You could, but you shouldn't. People might not be paying attention to them, but the Capitol had eyes and ears everywhere.

So Peeta looked directly at R and nodded in agreement. "They're not really wasting it. It wouldn't be right, to not have something big for the victor, when everyone else had something like this."

R frowned, puzzled. Had he said something wrong? He thought they were on the same wavelength here, one Living and Dead boy actually agreeing. Now R wavered, unsure, as Peeta told him he was wrong about the Capitol. Maybe he wasn't looking at this from the right perspective. After all, he had the whole corpse thing going for him: how could he know better about how humans thought than someone with a pulse, like Peeta here. They had to know their own.

He didn't realize he'd been staring at Peeta, his grey face having twisted into a baffled look.

"They work...mira-cles but...won't...sshhare. Waste," R groaned. Maybe if he explained himself? For some reason it was important he get Peeta to understand, to really really understand. They were friends, right? They hugged and talked and if that wasn't friendship, he didn't know what was. How to underline how this was a waste? It wasn't just about Maximus winning, in R's opinion.

Okay, maybe R didn't get that one. Peeta wasn't feeling his best, so he thought that he hadn't really explained it, in a way. Explained what he was doing. If he wasn't so distracted, this wouldn't be a problem, and he blamed himself for that.

How to do this? Peeta sighed, reaching a hand out and putting it on R's shoulder. God, this was a tough one. There was only so much he could do, and if they talked softly enough? He wasn't sure, but he didn't want R to not understand. But what if he said something that hurt his tributes? Hurt Katniss? Hurt Prim, she was here, and he had to think about them. They all were on thin ice already.

"I don't know if I'd call them miracles," Peeta said loudly with a laugh. His voice then dropped down to a much softer tone. The roar from the pit was a good enough cover, as he leaned in close.

"It is a waste. They take what they have and spend it on something like this, and it's not right. It's not right, R. But there's... there's nothing we can do." Taking a moment, he swallowed. "I just don't want you to get hurt for something I agree with."

He wouldn't? But finding a Cure like that and keeping a whole city zombie free sounds like a miracle -

Suddenly Peeta was almost whispering, so quiet R could barely make out his words over the tiger's roar and the cheers. What's with all the whispering? First he said it wasn't a big deal and now it was a big enough deal to be a waste. R was starting to get the feeling he was missing something here, the zombie leaning over and wondering if those few centimeters closer would make a difference. He was close enough to feel Peeta's warm breath, not stale like a grave, tickling his ear.

"Don't...hurt," R groaned back. "Talk to...them? Commu...ni....cate."

He wasn't sure why Peeta was worried about his well-being. The human had seen his progress in the Arenas - there wasn't much that could kill him and he couldn't feel pain anyway. He'd be fine. It was Peeta they should be worried about. R reached out to brush his fingers against his friend's sleeve, grazing against the back of his hand. Warm enough to bleed and have a functioning nervous system.

He sighed again, but it wasn't a frustration sigh. More a sigh that conveyed what he felt right now. Defeat. He felt defeated by the Capitol, by everyone looking to him and Katniss for things they didn't want to do. For her bringing up a marriage proposal. For them to send everyone who had been brought here into the arena, again, and again, and again.

Whispering was a little annoying. At R's touch of his sleep, he backed up a little, looking down at it as the spark of an idea happened. Why hadn't he thought of this before? He let his arm drop, but only a little, so he could have R understand that he wanted him to look forward with him.

Then he put an arm around his shoulders. Like they were just two friends (which they were) supporting each other (which they were). Now he could speak low, but not whisper. Just another conversation that people wouldn't think much of, and since they were still in a dark corner, they couldn't see much of them, either.

"It's not something we can do. Everyone is powerless, here. Tributes, victors, even most citizens of the Capitol. There's no way to communicate, because we don't really have any way to get to them; we can't just go say hello." When he talked, he looked at R, then back out. "I know you don't hurt, R. But I do. And Katniss can. And her sister, Prim, and my parents and my brothers, and our friends in District 12. And all of you, here. But I would die to keep you all safe."

R couldn't help it - he leaned into the touch and he didn't care how creepy it was. It felt good to have Peeta's arm slung around his shoulders and he could pretend they were just two guys hanging out a party. He almost missed what Peeta said next.

Was this really what he thought? Peeta's voice was hard to catch at times and it occurred to him that was maybe what he wanted. R strained to listen and pay attention, his corpse wanting to wander off and fantasize about the Livings's pulse he could feel this close. Eyes on the prize. He'd always wanted to communciate - that meant listening and paying attention and not just groaning "uh huh" and "uggh" whenever seemed like a good place to toss one in. His head lolled toward Peeta, catching his nose and mouth cast in shadows, flickering with firelight.

"Don't...want you...to hurt. Any...one," R said, alarmed by the turn this conversation was taking. He hadn't thought about that. "Other...way...?"

It sounded nice and all, except he drew a blank whenever he thought about specifics. The fact was he couldn't come up with a master plan here to fix this. With Peeta's arm around his shoulders, R realized he wasn't swaying and wobbling as much; now he could stand more or less upright, his hands hanging limp at his sides as he worked out what he should say that Peeta probably hadn't thought of already.

It was difficult for him to think these things, especially lately. Back home, it was an unspoken agreement that this is what they did, and this is what everyone else did. And it wasn't right. But back home, what was the point of thinking that way? It didn't put food on the table, or money in your pocket. You did what you had to, to survive.

And thinking this way wasn't going to help in that regard. Peeta heard 'other way', and he looked at R with a little smile. Of course he'd think there was another way. And Peeta would think that way, too, except he didn't know any.

"I don't want that, either." He looked down with the same smile. It felt good to talk to someone about this, in whatever way possible. It felt good to talk to someone about these problems. There might not be a fix, but it's nice.

"It's... really heavy, to think about these things. I'm sorry. It's just nice to be able to say them."

One of the perks about having a zombie for a friend was R was inhumanly good at listening. He didn't interrupt with fidgeting, just stood there waiting for Peeta to decide when he was good and ready to speak again, content to simply share space with him.

It sounded like Peeta had the same problem he did - all these thoughts swimming around his head with nowhere to go because saying them somehow didn't...work. The end result was the same, whether it was corpsehood or the Capitol. R could at least understand the sheer sense of relief that seemed to ooze up from the bones.

"I...get. Need...break from...this." At last they were on ground R felt familiar with. If Peeta was constantly thinking about this stuff, having it press on his shoulders and crush him to the ground, then how could he expect to go on from day to day?

He didn't want to tell Peeta to stop thinking. That was way too Dead, even in his mind, and he was still fishing about for something else to groan when the crowd let out a huge cheer. The tiger must've made a spectacular kill.

He wanted to joke about it: who would ever want a break away from this? Which was what he should say. What he had to say. But it was hard to work up the... the... the energy, to do it. Because when something like this happened, if you were conditioned from the start to just roll over and die, then that's what you did.

You rolled over and died. In this case, dying was the same as going with the flow and never speaking up. Panem had been dead for a long time. Seventy five years dead, at this count.

The tiger roared, the crowd cheered, and Peeta dropped his head into his hands and started laughing. Stupidly, tiredly, half-crazily laughing, because there was nothing else he could do. There was nothing he could do.

"Did you know what a tiger was before tonight, R?" Peeta asked, looking up. "Do they have tigers back in your world?"

R stared at the laughter bubbling up out of Peeta. Why...was he laughing? R tried to review the conversation syllable by syllable, turning consonants and vowels over and over and he couldn't find anything particularly funny about it. He was still staring when Peeta suddenly asked him a question.

"Ugggh. Have...idea," R said, feeling like he was in danger of losing track of the conversation here. "Maybe...extinct. Too...much...mouths."

Hard to say. Before the Games, he would've said they had to be long dead: a world full of zombies and not enough humans to go around and he could easily see them going for tigers and dogs and anything. Reaching out, he touched Peeta's elbow, aware that probably wasn't the most positive thing ever he could've groaned. Peeta could use some positivity.

"Kat-niss? See...friendly...face."

Extinct. Sounds like tons of animals don't actually exist anywhere else, and that makes him sad. Definitely not a positive thing, especially to think that there are other worlds that could be like this one.

If there was some way... anyway... no, shouldn't be thinking about anything like that. Not at all. Looking down at the touch on his arm, he gave a small smile, looking back up.

"Yeah, she's a friendly face." He can see her from here, if he turns slightly. There's been so many things lately, things that they had sort of talked about, but more danced around. But she as beautiful. Peeta had always thought she was beautiful, and he couldn't think of any time where he wouldn't think that.

"She's really beautiful. Even without the make up, she's always been... amazing. She doesn't have to be anything she isn't, it's one of the things I love about her."

Something in Peeta's face changes when he talks about Katniss. The nausea fades away just a little and he forgets about that tiger. There's memories there. Foundation. An honesty that R longs to understand and knows he can't, short of biting his way through Peeta's skull and that, he suspects, would kill off their friendship. All he can - should - do is listen. R sways there, the corners of his mouth twitching in a mockery of a tentative smile as he drinks in Peeta's words.

"Sounds....wuh...wonderful," R groans, surprisingly himself with a multi-syllable word. "Makes...you happy. You...make her...gghg...happy?"

The smile blossoming on his face starts to feel more natural, less riddled with rigor-mortis.

Peeta really takes the time to look at her, then, with that same small, half smile on his face. She does make him happy. Even just being around her makes him happy. But the real question is, does he make her happy? Peeta thinks he makes her feel happy, though not in the way that she does for him.

Not in the way that he thinks R might be saying. "I know I make her smile." He knows he can make her smile. "I know I can make her laugh." He can make her laugh.

"I can make her feel safe. Keeping someone safe is never a bad thing." Looking back at R, the smile grows. "Is that how it is for you and Julie?"

Peeta looks like an entirely different person, a better person. For a moment the lines carved into his young face vanish.

"Never...bad," R repeats. His groan sounds a little dreamy until he thinks more about Peeta's question. "Com...plicated. I think...I love but..."

There is - was - Perry Kelvin. You know, the boy I killed? Cracked open his skull like a walnut? His brain was the best brain I ever ate if that's any consolation. There's also the fact he's a zombie and Julie isn't. But there's also some kind of connection between them and he can't deny that either.

"Same. I think," R finishes.

"Complicated." Peeta nods, laughing softly. All relationships are complicated. R was, well. He's dead, and Julie, from what he's seen of her (not as much as he should/needs to) is definitely alive. So it's weird on that, and Peeta doesn't even know the whole story.

He reminds himself that he wants to get that story at some point. He goes and presses close to R's side, putting the arm back over his shoulder. Just two tributes walking around, yes, we are friends.

"How did you meet Julie? You probably didn't see her in school or anything." Peeta jokes.

R pauses, both from the warm weight of Peeta's arm slung around his shoulder and the question itself. It should be simple, something to laugh and say "we met at a bar/theater/etc" and that's that. But instead there's the lab and Perry's head cracking open and his mouth full of his brains and...yeah.

"Saved...her. We...ran into...her group," R groans, his shoulders tense even with his natural slump. "Not..usual mix."

It's hard to explain.

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The Crowning of Maximus Decimus Meridius

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