The Crowning of Enjolras

[etcircenses]

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.

Comments

[knifewithnoname]

"It do be being really hot and dry even though it do be being near the ocean." She told him, "Sometimes we do be having huge storms though, it do never be getting stupid cold like it do be being here."

[fire_punk]

"That sounds nice. Nicer than home, too."

[knifewithnoname]

"Why, what do your home be being like? You do be being a stolen tribute, right?" As opposed to a victor like Eva who came from this world. Though she knew the districts were different than here as well.

[fire_punk]

"Yeah, I am. It's... It gets cold in the winter, kind of like here. And it's a city, too. Summers get hot but it's not dry." He shrugged. "It was boring."

[knifewithnoname]

"How do it be boring?" Pruna couldn't imagine any place being boring, but she was twelve and tended to find adventure around every corner.

[fire_punk]

"Yvette wouldn't let me go anywhere unless she needed me to help her get another Djinn. And I had to hide from the Wardens Council. Or she said so, anyway."

[knifewithnoname]

"What do a Djinn be being? And a wardens council?" She asked, curious.

[fire_punk]

"Does your world have genies? Or stories about them?" Because they're really hard to explain.

[knifewithnoname]

"Genies..." She shook her head, "No, I did never be hearing of them."

[fire_punk]

"Oh, umm..." That made things harder. A lot harder. "Well, they look like people. And if they're yours, they have to do what you tell them to. Kinda." He remembered how Joanne had talked about the different ways she could do what he said and how bad some of them had been. "And they can do things people can't. Well, humans."

[knifewithnoname]

"So they do be being slaves?" She wrinkled her nose at that, "What kind of things can they be doing?"

[fire_punk]

"Most of them, yeah." He thought for a minute. "Well, they can take you places. Like right away. Or make or stop a storm. Or a fire."

[knifewithnoname]

She nodded, wrinkling her nose a bit in distaste. She had a good, world wary dislike of slavers, that every child running wild in Gauig shared. But the idea that they had magic was new.

"But how do you be enslaving magic users, they would just be killing you."

[fire_punk]

"You grab a glass bottle and say you claim them three times. Then, as long as you have that bottle, they have to do what you say. And you can tell them not to hurt you." Now that he said it, it sounded pretty bad, though.

[knifewithnoname]

So different kind of magic users, because she knew that in her world at least magic users wouldn't be stupid enough to be caught by bottles and words.

"So did enslaving them be being your job?"

[fire_punk]

He shook his head, making a face. "Yvette did it some. When she wasn't stealing them."

[knifewithnoname]

"Stealing from other slavers?" She nodded, understanding that. "So did your job be stealing them?"

[fire_punk]

"Kind of..." He shrugged uncomfortably. "I didn't have a job but she made me help her."

[knifewithnoname]

She blinked confused at that, "But if she did be making you help her then it did be being your job, right?"

[fire_punk]

"Not really. And it wasn't the only thing she made me do."

[knifewithnoname]

"What else did you be doing?"

[fire_punk]

He scowled and muttered something under his breath. He didn't like thinking about that and yet he couldn't forget it.

[knifewithnoname]

"You should be saying all your words clearly." She told him wrinkling her nose.

cw: mention of abuse

[fire_punk]

He crossed his arms, glaring at the floor. "I said we fucked."

I feel like I need to apologise for her again

[knifewithnoname]

Pruna wrinkled her nose, not understanding. Fuck was a curse work but it made no sense in this context. "You did be cursing?"