thecapitol | The Crowning of Enjolras

The Crowning of Enjolras

WHO| All Tributes and Victor, plus a few Capitol guests
WHAT| The Crowning of Enjolras
WHERE| The Tribute Center
WHEN| A few weeks after the end of the Arena
WARNINGS| Forced medical experimentation, needles.

The atmosphere surrounding the Crowning is both tense and secretive. The style teams flutter around listlessly, having received no information from which to draft their designs. Newspapers take bets on when it will be announced where the Crowning is being held, descending into grousing when no press release is given. Peacekeepers pour in and out of the Tribute Center, accompanied by scientists who occasionally pull Tributes aside and look at the veins in their elbows. Even the Avoxes seem jumpier than usual.

Aside from the Tribute Center's new giant marble statute of a nude Enjolras, posed like the famed David, one could almost forget the party is supposed to be celebratory.

When the day arrives, the Escorts and their assistants don't lead the Tributes to their style teams to be gussied instead. Instead, they hush the Tributes and bring them to their bedrooms, where a Peacekeeper, a white-coated citizen and several Avoxes await them. The Escorts instruct the Tributes to lay down in their bed and close their eyes, and a needle is inserted into their arms that the Escorts insist will 'take them to the party'. It's soon followed by a series of sensors taped to the forehead.

Just relax, the Escorts say, and they do their very best to make sure their Tributes feel minimal anxiety. If the Tributes resist too much, more Peacekeepers are called in, and the Tributes are forced into submission.

The first effect is a sort of paralysis - not the terrifying inability to move, but a signal to the brain that says why move? Moving is so much effort. It's quickly followed by drowsiness, and then a chill that radiates from the needle into the body, and finally, unconsciousness.

And that is when the party begins. The Tributes, now dressed in luxurious 1830's French clothing of a quality beyond even what their Stylists could manage, wake up in the front row of a large stone theater setting reminiscent of, simultaneously, Greek and French architecture. The floor of the theater is filled with buffets of every imaginable sort of food. Rose petals fall from the sky, which displays a sunset worthy of award-winning photography.

For his part, Enjolras sits in a throne made of books on the ring of the amphitheater, flanked by Marius, Cosette, Eponine, and bizarrely enough Venus Dee Milo and Ellie, seated on lush pillows and carpets made of dinosaur skin (with the heads comically attached and eyes lolling).

"Welcome, welcome, our Tributes and Mentors, to the first ever somnofestival, sponsored by Hypnogogia!" Caesar Flickerman, noted talkshow host and Games presenter, appears in a fabulous sequined toga in the center of the amphitheater. He doesn't need a microphone; the acoustics here are flawless. "And congratulations to our Victor! Let us hear it for Enjolras!"

He awaits applause.

"As you may have noticed, you're inside a shared dream, due to the just fantastic technology from the Capitol and certain, ah, biological contributions from our dear favorite Aunamee." He holds a hand out and gestures to Aunamee, anticipating wild applause. "We thought that for our most philosophical Victor yet, we should celebrate in a way that's a little bit…cerebral."

Caesar laughs and gestures at all the food, then puts a cheeky finger to his lips. "By all means, enjoy yourselves. Even the most indulgent desserts here won't show up on your hips tomorrow. The party only last three hours, so you might as well get started!"

He vanishes into thin air, leaving the Tributes to celebrate. Occasionally, the Tributes will hear voices in their heads - chatter from the Peacekeeper and scientist and Escort still in their room, in the waking world. Otherwise, this is a party like any other, if somewhat surreal in nature.

-/-

The party begins the same way for all the Tributes. For an unlucky few, however, it soon diverges as they come under an unfortunate glitch in the system.

They'll look around and find only a handful of their fellow Tributes around them. The sky, rather than being a magnificent splay of color, is now blank white, and yet the lighting in the theater seems dim. A sense of panic, detached from any conscious thoughts, surges forth in them like the tide.

For them, this isn't a shared dream. This is a shared nightmare.

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Sherlock frowned deeper and raised a hand to them, feeling them out with his fingers before making a face. Joan was right. Quickly, he mussed them up, back into something he preferred, but as soon as he pulled his hand away the dream put them right back the way they had been.

"Better?" He asked, oblivious.

Joan blinked as the hair went back to the way it was. She briefly considered telling him that he looked fine, but this particular data point about the experience seemed important.

"It didn't take. It's right back the way it started."

She wondered what other parts of this dream wouldn't respond to attempts at change.

"Well, I suppose that's what we get for dreaming this entire thing. My mother would actually be pleased, for once," He said off-handedly as he looked around the room.

"Shall we explore, I suppose? I'm curious as to the limits of this place."

Joan couldn't hide a look of surprise when he mentioned his mother. Her own Sherlock never spoke of his mother, at all, despite speaking frequently about his father. Considering the mentions of governesses and boarding schools, she figured his mother had either left or died when he was very young.

Maybe she'd press at some point. Now wasn't the time.

"Definitely. This technology is interesting. Impressive."

He held out his arm as an offering, looking altogether too respectable in this particular instance.

"What do normal humans dream about?" He asked amiably. "Flying? Do you think the laws of physics work the same way, in a dream of a dinner?"

She took his arm, smirked at his question.

"'Normal humans' dream about all sports of things, flying among them. We could test it, see if we can fly."

She glanced at him.

"What do you dream about?"

"Work," Sherlock said, simply, straight-foward as he tucked her arm in against his side and led her into the party. After a second he realized that the answer might be normal and felt he had to clarify:

"I dream of cases. Normally. Not generally real ones, to my utter dissatisfaction, but complex puzzles my mind creates to solve." He turned his head to her. "I've never dreamt that I could fly. I am not sure I would know where to start."

"I wouldn't call that abnormal. That's sort of what dreams are. Our brains giving us puzzles to solve. I mean, think what you want about Freud, he at least was right that dreams mean something. Yours are probably a little more ordered about it, which doesn't surprise me."

She glanced around. As far as she could see, nobody was flying around yet.

"I have dreamed of flying, and honestly, even I don't know where to start. Maybe we should try something small first."

Sherlock makes a bit of a face at the idea that he might be normal, and glanced around the room as she mentioned something small.

"I almost wish a murder victim would suddenly appear," He mused lowly as he picked up a strawberry from a nearby table and let it drop to the floor. It went splat and made a nice little red mush puddle on the floor. "Well. Gravity appears to be in effect."

"There's one benefit to having everything in our heads," Joan said, wryly amused. "No clean-up. Otherwise..."

She trailed off, looked to the side, frowned and narrowed her eyes as if listening to a very faint sound.

"Otherwise what?" Sherlock asks, still looking down at the strawberry. "I'm sure they would love the footage to prove I have regular temper--" He pulled his eyes up and saw Joan looking far away, but her eye line didn't reveal anything on interest.

"What?" He asked, a little annoyed that she'd managed to tune him out so completely. "What is it?"

She quickly held up a hand, shook her head sharply, not even hushing him, needing the quiet to concentrate. She moved a finger to his lips, and remained silent, staring intently at nothing.

He looked completely incensed to be so dismissed, and it was good evidence of how he valued their friendship that he didn't immediately go into a rant about it and instead managed to just shut up and wait.

It's another moment before she blinks, her eyes widening, and looks back at Sherlock.

"Oh my god," she said, then took a half step closer, lowering her voice.

"I just heard the people in the room with me. Where I'm sleeping. It sounded like my escort and someone else, maybe one of the techs. Something's gone wrong. They can't hear or see us."

Sherlock froze. "You're certain?" He snapped quickly. "You're absolutely certain?"

He drew in a hard breath. "Any idea for how long? Mere seconds, or--"

"Thirty. Minutes."

She wasn't absolutely certain. She couldn't be absolutely certain. But she wouldn't waste time on that argument.

Thirty minutes. He needed to find John. But first --

"Everything I do is necessarily calculated," He snapped off, his voice quick with laser precision. "I refuse to risk either you or John for attempts at freedom that are more likely to crumble than work. I need you to trust me, and I need you to keep trusting me, regardless of what I say, or don't say. Regardless of what I tell you. I'll leave you a safeguard. If I die, I've encrypted a text file on my computer with the password 221b Baker Street. Space between b and Baker and Street, capitols on the words. There's a separate copy on a USB drive taped to the bottom of my desk, in case they wipe my computer. In the event of my death you must look after John. I doubt very much that it would be an easy thing for him to deal with, so I need your word that you'll look out for him."

Joan listened, her eyebrows raised. She knew that he had reasons for what he did. Of course he did. The bits about the computer and the USB drive impressed her, though. She had always had an exceptionally good memory. It helped her in med school, and helped her even more as a detective, allowing her to remember details of a crime scene, to remember details in the stack of books Sherlock had her read for her training. So she committed all this to memory, knowing her brain would hold it fast.

"I trust you. And I give you my word that if something happens to you, I will look after John. But you have to keep in mind that no matter what happens? I will fight to keep you alive, and I'm positive John will, too. Regardless of what you tell us, or how much we trust you."

"You must not risk yourself." Sherlock hissed, his voice dropping low. "You must not. Fighting them for my sake would only end in three of us being dead. You will know when you can fight but you must not, not a moment before, not even if it means my life."

He caught her gaze and held it, firm.

"There are greater things at stake than my life, and I need you alive and unharmed. Do you understand me?"

"I understand," she answered, her voice quiet, calm and unyielding. "But understand we need you alive and unharmed, too. I promise I will not risk my life unless it's absolutely necessary. I need you to promise the same."

She's not backing down an inch.

"Not unless it is absolutely necessary," He agreed easily. A lie, and one she'd likely hate him for later, but it was easy enough to make.

"I promise."

Joan had ample experience with her Sherlock making promises he fully intended to break, so she knew there was a fair chance he was lying. For now, though, she could do little more than trust him, while keeping an eye on him and confronting him if and when he did something stupid.

One more piece of information before they each went off to spread the word.

"We need to be careful about them being able to read our thoughts. They need electrodes right now, but there are ways they could plant those on us. In our clothes, under our skin..." She nodded toward his wrist. "In the bracelets. We should figure out a way to fight that. Otherwise, we're all screwed."

"The bracelets are unlikely, if they require electrodes. The electrical signals from our brain would be too weak by the time they reached our wrists - to noisy - to be of any use. Anything they could use would be necessity need to be placed around the head. Obviously caution is always necessary but we do need to draw a line between preparation and paranoia."

He paused, frowning as he considered, and then smirked. "If they can read our thoughts, the game is already lost, but there are always ear worms. Beethoven's ninth, I think, will suit me fine."

She smiled a little at that.

"I'm sure I can come up with some god-awful pop song."

She nodded to the rest of the party.

"Go find John. I'll find other people to tell."

Sherlock nodded sharply.

"I won't waste more time. Remember - 221b Baker Street," He repeated, before he turned and fled.

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formersurgeon - 2013-12-31 18:49 (UTC) - Expand

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