Barbara Wilson (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thatwasme) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thecapitol2014-01-03 05:45 pm
thatwasme) wrote in thecapitol2014-01-03 05:45 pm
( open ) i think i found hell, i think i found something
Who| Barbara Wilson (AU) & OPEN
What| Another District 9 Mentor has arrived back in the Capitol just in time to help get Tributes together for the upcoming District Tour.
Where| The Tribute Training Center: Elevator, District 9 Suites.
When| January 3rd
Warnings/Notes| None at this time.
She'd worn the same sort of smile since she boarded the train in District 9, the kind that seems unselfconscious and to belong to someone of cheerier overall demeanor. Barbara has had years to perfect that smile, masking whatever thought process was going through her mind. Right now it was the freezing killing people off every day (not just night), and the perpetual worry about Alfred. Consternation mixed with fear of what it might mean if she couldn't pull this off, and how ridiculous it was to care so much for someone she was basically never allowed to see.
Yet it'd been intimated that there might be a way to find him a working cure, if... If she were back in the Capitol.
Barbara was all smiles and small talk on the way to the Tribute Training Center, feeling the tower looming like a presence in her subconscious as they drew close. "See you all later," was a half distracted platitude at the entrance, bracing herself internally before she walked into the den of the news hungry and the excitement craving. The Capitol, a place feared and envied, so caught up in it's own largess as to almost be comical, if one didn't have to bear the weight of all that entailed on their shoulders. She shunted that thought off to the side, bringing up parts of Alfred's most recent contact, analyzing what he's said.
I have to find a cure. The thought mobilized her, sending her through the front doors with a smile and a wink for the nearest camera. She'd come dressed exactly like she'd come out of the fields according to some romanticized version of farming: fresh cut somethings trailing as a scent where she moved, hair tousled, mud splattered up the side of sturdy, patched jeans, her shirt a blouse that would be wickedly impractical to do actual fieldwork in. The point wasn't practicality. The point was setting a certain mindset, so the impractical shirt, paired with the worn pants and the unbound hair and bit of alfalfa she rolled around between her fingers, it didn't need to be real. It needed to seem like what someone wanted to be real.
She wound her way through with a few nods of her head and a call or two of "How's the family doing?" No one really wanted to hold her up, not with the apologetic looks she shot them for her state of dress. They'd be happier for her getting cleaned up, though for now it was enough of a Capitol version of a novelty to think of a Victor who did any sort of work in the field being in such a rush to be there for the next event they came at a literal drop of the hat. The headlines almost wrote themselves.
( A ) The elevators were on the ground floor when she reached them, darting forward and holding a hand out to prevent the doors from closing. "Ha!" she exclaimed, sliding in and tapping two fingers over the Door Close button. "Just in time!" She waved at someone outside the elevator's closing doors, finally turning to examine anyone else heading up or down once they're closed. "I didn't want to get caught up waiting when the one thing I want most in the world right now is a hot shower!"
( B ) Once she made it to District 9's suites, she barely spent time looking around. Barbara cut a straight path toward the mentor's rooms, bag slung over her shoulder. She ran her free hand through her hair, breathing out slowly, keeping a ghost of a smile on her face for the sake of whatever was watching now. "Greetings from home, Eva," she called out, unconcerned if the older woman was even around to hear what she was saying. A cursory knock on an open doorframe was her other announcement, scanning the room for any obvious signs of inhabitants.
Once she judged it clear, she'd step inside, carefully setting her bag down on the bed and starting to undo the buttons on her blouse. She hadn't been kidding about that shower earlier.
What| Another District 9 Mentor has arrived back in the Capitol just in time to help get Tributes together for the upcoming District Tour.
Where| The Tribute Training Center: Elevator, District 9 Suites.
When| January 3rd
Warnings/Notes| None at this time.
She'd worn the same sort of smile since she boarded the train in District 9, the kind that seems unselfconscious and to belong to someone of cheerier overall demeanor. Barbara has had years to perfect that smile, masking whatever thought process was going through her mind. Right now it was the freezing killing people off every day (not just night), and the perpetual worry about Alfred. Consternation mixed with fear of what it might mean if she couldn't pull this off, and how ridiculous it was to care so much for someone she was basically never allowed to see.
Yet it'd been intimated that there might be a way to find him a working cure, if... If she were back in the Capitol.
Barbara was all smiles and small talk on the way to the Tribute Training Center, feeling the tower looming like a presence in her subconscious as they drew close. "See you all later," was a half distracted platitude at the entrance, bracing herself internally before she walked into the den of the news hungry and the excitement craving. The Capitol, a place feared and envied, so caught up in it's own largess as to almost be comical, if one didn't have to bear the weight of all that entailed on their shoulders. She shunted that thought off to the side, bringing up parts of Alfred's most recent contact, analyzing what he's said.
I have to find a cure. The thought mobilized her, sending her through the front doors with a smile and a wink for the nearest camera. She'd come dressed exactly like she'd come out of the fields according to some romanticized version of farming: fresh cut somethings trailing as a scent where she moved, hair tousled, mud splattered up the side of sturdy, patched jeans, her shirt a blouse that would be wickedly impractical to do actual fieldwork in. The point wasn't practicality. The point was setting a certain mindset, so the impractical shirt, paired with the worn pants and the unbound hair and bit of alfalfa she rolled around between her fingers, it didn't need to be real. It needed to seem like what someone wanted to be real.
She wound her way through with a few nods of her head and a call or two of "How's the family doing?" No one really wanted to hold her up, not with the apologetic looks she shot them for her state of dress. They'd be happier for her getting cleaned up, though for now it was enough of a Capitol version of a novelty to think of a Victor who did any sort of work in the field being in such a rush to be there for the next event they came at a literal drop of the hat. The headlines almost wrote themselves.
( A ) The elevators were on the ground floor when she reached them, darting forward and holding a hand out to prevent the doors from closing. "Ha!" she exclaimed, sliding in and tapping two fingers over the Door Close button. "Just in time!" She waved at someone outside the elevator's closing doors, finally turning to examine anyone else heading up or down once they're closed. "I didn't want to get caught up waiting when the one thing I want most in the world right now is a hot shower!"
( B ) Once she made it to District 9's suites, she barely spent time looking around. Barbara cut a straight path toward the mentor's rooms, bag slung over her shoulder. She ran her free hand through her hair, breathing out slowly, keeping a ghost of a smile on her face for the sake of whatever was watching now. "Greetings from home, Eva," she called out, unconcerned if the older woman was even around to hear what she was saying. A cursory knock on an open doorframe was her other announcement, scanning the room for any obvious signs of inhabitants.
Once she judged it clear, she'd step inside, carefully setting her bag down on the bed and starting to undo the buttons on her blouse. She hadn't been kidding about that shower earlier.
no subject
Torture really only has an effect when there's something to be gained.
"Be nice if they lived more up to their name," she remarks mildly, eying the coffee. The hip she leans with against the counter feels the chill of the surface, sending gooseflesh along her stomach, constricting the skin up along either side of her spine, her torso, even her arms. "What bit does she have in her mouth?"
What was she after this time? If it's more of the usual, the fears and thoughts that led people back around to examining each other hoping to find hints of rebellion where they were or they weren't...
Barbara looks up from the coffee, to Eva's shoulders, then her face. Where was Eva really walking between all these crisscrossed lines? Do I even want to know?
no subject
Not that this ever helps District Nine in any way. Eva wonders how much Barbara will be able to string together from that scant information. Eva doesn't have enough information about the different Districts to really judge what she thinks is happening.
"So be careful for everything you drink. I wouldn't put it past Jiao to poison the entire water supply in a fit of jealousy. The woman makes me look like the patron saint of stability and patience, and I'm sure the tabloids could correct anyone who makes that assumption about me."
Her laugh is entirely humorless.
no subject
District Three. Barbara has her own interests there, but it barely seems to register. She merely nods at the statement, as if it makes sense, though she squints and looks toward the far wall. "Odd they're taking to outsourcing. I thought the Capitol likes to keep everything close at heart."
no subject
She places her hands over her face and massages her temples. "And it doesn't necessarily play well with human bodies."
no subject
Her next question comes after a long pause, the kind of silence that settles in when someone's considering, or seems uncertain about what it is they want to say. She lets her voice carry her hesitation. This is the obvious question, but it's one she wants to ask at least once.
"How bad was it?"
For the Tributes, this wasn't a shift away from any tradition. It was an upheaval of their lives, yes, but to those born and raised in Panem, it was disturbing in more insidious, cultural ways.