This City's Already So Full of Bodies It Does Not Need One More [Open]

[vissernone]

WHO| Eva Salazar and open
WHAT| Eva's alive and not well.
WHERE| The garden behind the Training Center
WHEN| Week 7
WARNINGS| Brain damage.

They brought her back, but they did not bring her back whole.

Eva's vaguely aware of the mechanics behind how the Tributes are revived, and knew going in that the Mentors would only be brought back with experimental technology. She didn't know what that meant until a few hours after she woke up from death, reading and rereading the pamphlet about blood flow to the brain without retaining information. Your brain was dead. We brought it back.

Bright lights and loud noises take a physical form, smothering her, smashing through her thoughts like bullets. Crowds seem to raise the barometric pressure in a room. Her words are jumbled at times, missing patches of sentences at others. Reading, her usual passtime, has become difficult, as whole parts of lines seem to disappear, flaking off the page like mange.

It'll get better as the brain starts to heal itself, they say. She hopes they're right. For now, she keeps away from large gatherings and wears a sheer veil over her face to protect her eyes from the worst of the light.

Unable to get her mind to cooperate enough to read, she instead turns to tending the earth. The garden outside the Training Center is a good place to start, the little isolated, tranquil corner behind the building. Trellis, small fountain, marble path, and a hundred varieties of crossbred flowers.

She rips up weeds and shreds them in her fingers. She tells herself it's physical therapy, using her fingers like that even when they only obey her half the time. She doesn't bother to go out and make apologies to the people she killed. She doesn't look for her allies, either. Without her mind, she feels more alone that ever, just a rickety shell taking up space and muddling through each hour.

At least she'll have Eponine with her. It's something.

Comments

[vissernone]

"Not necessarily people you want saying that, believe me. But it's an angle worth pursuing." Eva gets up and approaches. "May I touch your hair?"

[justoutrunyou]

That was enough to make her worry. What kind of people liked her that she wouldn't want liking her? Before she could ponder that for long though Eva made her request.

"I uh...my hair?" She blinked confused "Yeah sure...why?"

Normally she'd refuse but...well Eva seemed OK if a little intense. At least she liked Sandy.

[vissernone]

"Because I always ask permission before I touch vulnerable people."

It's a courtesy she wishes others afforded her. Even Sponsors aside, people who don't outright avoid her in the Capitol seem to think she's public property. They want to touch scars, muscles, the gut she's starting to pack on, the dark curling locks that are so different than the Capitol's by virtue of being untreated by chemicals.

She smooths Sandy's hair.

[justoutrunyou]

"A-ah."

Something about the term "Vulnerable", both stung and yet seemed incredibly fitting.

As Eva smoothed her hair she found herself relaxing, she couldn't help it. Something about it touched on a nostalgic feeling she couldn't quite grasp. She even closed her eyes leaning into it gently.

Hair hair was thick and strong. Clean though it was clear she never brushed it as much as her stylists would beg her to.

[vissernone]

"I'm afraid with as many young people in the Arenas now as there have been lately, I can't be giving you individual attention. Especially as you're not in my District."

She reaches a hand over and softly braids a few locks together. Her hands are shaky and her fingers don't seem to obey.

[justoutrunyou]

She remained still, breathing in through her nose and letting it out through her lips.

"I wouldn't ask you to." She mumbled "I'm not any more special then the other kids in there." If anything she felt less special.

"I'm surprised they let you guys give attention to other districts at all. Don't they get mad at you?"

[vissernone]

Eva snorts. "As if they aren't already? Every year for more than thirty years, I was the one who was supposed to keep their children from getting slaughtered. I wasn't very good at my job."

The corner of her mouth twitches, not out of any emotion but some sort of spasm. "Unless you mean the people in the Capitol."

[justoutrunyou]

"Well yeah." She opened an eye glancing up though she couldn't see Eva right now.

"I mean the District aren't the ones that are gonna kill you if you make them mad. Or worse." Because there was always worse then death.

The part about not bringing home any of their children actually hurt though. She felt it like a weight in her stomach. Was she really saving lives by being the Capitol's chew toy?

[vissernone]

"The Capitol? They don't care which District wins so long as they get a good show. They couldn't care less about my fraternizing with my enemies." She lets Sandy go and wanders back to the hole she's been digging in the garden.

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy follows her quietly as she considers the words.

"They aren't bad people." She began trying to sort out her thoughts. "The Capitol Citizens. When I got here I thought everyone was against me. Cruel and crazy for letting this stuff go on."

She knelt down to watch Eva work.

"But The more I talk to people who were born here...you're just like anyone else anywhere. The Mentors see things better because they actually went through it all. Worse then me because I just keep coming back."

For a kid it was alot to wrestle with, but Sandy had always had an mind for such things.

"I actually feel bad when I die you know? Like I'm letting other people down. I don't even know if I'm angry for being killed. Just angry because I let it happen."

[vissernone]

"They're blind. Willfully so, but blind." Eva moves her hands rhythmically through the soil, sifting it more than actually doing anything productive. Her eyes are closed as she works.

"It's not your fault, Ms. Marko. Do you really expect to win? The fact that you make the effort is impressive in itself."

[justoutrunyou]

Something about that question hit Sandy particularly hard and she felt her stomach drop into her feet. She hung her head shamefully.

"No not really. It would take a miracle to have me survive till the end. But there are people who want me to win and keep trying to help." And those were the people she had to face each time the arena was over and she had once again died in a gruesome and horrific fashion.

Apparently she missed the part about her effort being impressive.

[vissernone]

"I don't think people are looking for you to win so much as to not suffer. Then again, I've been let down by my country before."

She digs her fingers in deep and yanks a root out. "People wouldn't continue to spend money on you if they didn't think you're doing something right. First time's a gamble, second time's an investment."

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy couldn't help but wonder if any of those "investors" felt like they'd wasted their money.

She watched Eva work for a moment more, another weed gone. More soft soil.

"Your hands are shaking." She observed softly, like she wasn't sure she should mention it. "Do you need some water or something?" When her mother was hungover and shaky sometimes water helped.

[vissernone]

"It's from the Games. I didn't recover well."

Although it's true, alcohol helps.

"You needn't point it out."

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy flinched at the rebuke and leaned back just a little.

"I was just worried." She muttered before turning away. She vanished through the doors of the training center and came back minutes later with a bottle of water and a towel.

"Most the time when adults tell me their OK it's a lie. I just figured I'd cut to the chase."

Too many adults had told her too many lies. Starting with her father. Maybe when she was an adult she'd lie unconvincingly as well.

At least the unconvincing lies hurt less then the convincing ones that were revealed later.

[vissernone]

Eva's brow knits into an expression of concern. It had been so many years before people tended to her - and now both Sandy and Eponine are fussing.

"Thank you." She gingerly takes the bottle and water. "You're fairly perceptive, you know."

[justoutrunyou]

"Sometimes. Other times I'm still an idiot." Because it would take a long time for Sandy to ever be able to accept a compliment at face value.

"Besides, just because you're a mentor doesn't mean you don't need people. Everyone needs someone. I just need more then others I guess." She smirked a lopsided sort of bitter smirk.

"Never woulda guessed that back home."

[vissernone]

Eva sits back, wiping dirty hands on her thigh, on the dress she spent so much money on and can never wear again.

"I try not to need anyone. I'm sure you can imagine why." She pauses. "Tell me about your home."

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy took more note of Eva's comment then she did the ruined dress. Even if she was more comfortable in wearing fancy clothes then she used to be that didn't mean she had to care.

Home had been a sensitive subject for a long time, but she was finding it easier to talk about the more people asked. "Well it was alot like the Capitol but darker." She explained and knelt down to watch Eva some more.

"Tall buildings, lots of metal and concrete. It's called New York City and before I was born they decided that they didn't like how the rest of the world was run. So they cut themselves off and closed all the bridges and roads leading into and out of town. Then they built this big cage out of lasers that kinda made a web over and around the city so nothing could come or go. And it always rained. All day every day."

In fact the frozen arena was the first time Sandy had experienced snow, sunlight and clear skies as terrible as that was.

[vissernone]

"I've heard of New York City." And of places in Panem that had suffered a similar fate during that oft-remembered war. Not of purposeful isolation, but simply left to their own devices, with their entrances and exits washed out, covered by debris, irradiated, until all the people inside starved.

"But your New York City doesn't sound like the one we remember. Do you enjoy time spent outside more, now?"

[justoutrunyou]

That actually made Sandy laugh.

"Yeah I guess. Less rain." Though to be honest she missed the rain now.

"But my first time seeing snow was my first arena. My first time sleeping under a clear night sky was my second arena. My first time exploring a forest was my fourth arena...know what I mean?"

Mostly that every experience she'd had with nature up to this point had involved life or death situations.

"At least the peacekeepers here don't yell at me for minding my own business like the ones at home." She reasoned. "But I can't go out at night and I can't explore anymore." There seemed to be a pretty firm rule about letting Sandy explore but never letting her get too far lost in the city.

[vissernone]

"I suppose you'll have to become a creature of the day." She pauses, then ties her hair back again so the flyaways stop getting caught in the beaded loop by her veil.

"You know, the Capitol used to advertise the Games as a blessing to the Tributes who were reaped. They'd be able to escape their sorry existences and spend time here before being out in the world, in touch with their base natures."

She was never lucky enough to not be grateful - to not have that gratitude become the poison of guilt.

[justoutrunyou]

Sandy made a snort of disbelief at that little revelation and resumed watching Eva's hands as they tied up her hair.

"And how many of you actually believed that garbage?" Because Sandy may be young but she wasn't as stupid as most kids her age. Even before dying in the first arena she'd been in she believed that she would have been smart enough to see through that smoke.

[vissernone]

"Not many." She snorts back. "But...it was nice to see the desert, in my first Arena. I daresay I didn't get all that much of a chance to really enjoy it."