the world is on my side I have no reason to run; closed

[orestes]

WHO| Venus and Enjolras
WHAT| Ill-fated attempts at bromantic drinking.
WHEN| The evening of the network hack.
WHERE| District 5 suites, and then some altogether too fancy bar in the Capitol.
WARNINGS| Fixing problems with booze, a perpetually awkward not!romance.



He dressed quickly, impotent rage at, well, everything to do with the Capitol still vibrating from his chest to his fingertips. She was right, of course, she was perpetually right and far more prudent than Enjolras himself could ever stand to be. The network was no place for these conversations and he was letting his anger get the better of him lately. It wouldn't do.

With long, purposeful strides, he made the walk down the hall to her room. Sometimes he regretted their proximity, it always seemed as if he was in front of her door before he had time to properly collect his thoughts. There was enough time to come down slightly from the righteous high of his fury, but not enough to come up with a plan for dealing with Venus. He swallowed hard, and raised a hand to knock. There was no turning back now, she could probably even hear him standing in the hall like a fool.

There was nothing to this evening but two friends venting frustration the way friends have always vented frustration. Were Marius not married now, it would be him Enjolras was calling on. He steeled himself with these thoughts. A part of him knew they were false and that he was tricking himself into a situation for which he was perhaps unprepared, but it was enough to do the trick. Moreover, it would be easier to delude himself when drunk.

Comments

[celebrityskinned]

"Gimme a minute," she calls, trying to find her bra. Normally she'd just throw on strapless shirt and go without, but she has a feeling that might fry Enjolras' ability to talk to her entirely, so it takes her a moment to dig it up from under the bed and wriggle herself into a turtleneck.

Honestly, she'd rather just stay in and drink on the bed, but deviating social norms say that that option is Right Out. She opens the door while she's still using the other hand to put the backing on an earring of a Bastet statue.

As soon as she sees him, she smiles, but it's tense, too. She could slap him upside the head for how he's running his mouth off on the network. She can see the cracks forming, his righteousness turning from conviction to a desperate need to hold onto something, to defending his beliefs like a cornered animal, and it makes her stomach tighten with concern. Selfish concern, in many ways; he's still the closest thing she has to a friend here, no matter what their relationship may entail these days.

"Are we feeling like a high-end bottle or just whatever gets us talking with relative insobriety?" She grabs her coat and tosses him a saucy grin that her agent would have tried to trademark.

[orestes]

He stands for a moment in the doorway, too uncomfortable to just step inside a woman's room. It takes hims several seconds to get over it, but even so, he looks stiff and perhaps a little wide eyed as he surveys her room. It's different form his own both in structure and in decoration, but still distinctly of the Capitol. More than that, though, she seems to permeate every part of it. It's slightly overwhelming.

"I hope you will not think ill of me if I say that I simply wish to be drunk. So drunk that I cannot remember any of the nonsensical prattle about the network right now." After all, if he could remember it that it's still happening, he'd feel compelled to re-engage and that would, apparently, do no one any good. Absently, he chewed his lower lip. "I know of a place, but I am open to suggestions as well."

They couldn't simply stay in. He could stand in her room while she found her coat, he wouldn't be able to just linger for very long.

[celebrityskinned]

"Honey, I've worked with way too many actual alcoholics to judge anyone for wanting to get blasted every once in a while. Especially in a place like this."

She zips up her coat and walks out the room, not bothering to lock it. There's nothing in there she'd consider private, nothing that belongs to her that she'd mourn if it were lost. Her style team brings her her pills every day, so there isn't even medicine. She takes charge of the elevator, subconsciously filing it away as one of those things Enj might still be learning, technology that he might not want to fluster himself with in his current mental state.

"Show me where you're thinking, and I'll have veto power if it looks like some place that'll give me hepatitis."

[orestes]

It's easy enough to nod along and follow her lead. Some things she says confuse him, but he can extrapolate decently enough what alcoholic in reference to a person might be, even if something like hepatitis leaves him in the dark. When they reach the elevator he frowns as she punches the buttons, not for lack of understanding but for everything the unnecessary convenience represents. Had they created such technology merely for this?

"That seems agreeable." He doesn't know what to say after that and lapses into a silence which is somewhat awkward. It isn't intended to be rude, but he can't help but feel it's rude all the same. He had, after all, invited her out. He should make some effort to be entertaining. "Was-- Did you have a good day, Venus? I trust our captors let you alone well enough."

[celebrityskinned]

"Decent enough. Exercised. Watched some TV. Read some more of the Kant book, even though I don't know why you read Kant for fun. At least Camus tells a story with his book."

Venus politely averts her eyes as they walk past the conspicuous statue on the first floor. As happy as she is to play it up for talk, that's when she's unaware that Enjolras is upset, and she doesn't see fit to exacerbate any mood he's in now. Especially when he has people to yell at on the network.

The cold is biting. Venus pulls the lapels of her jacket up.

"So. Now that we're outside. You do realize not everyone rallying behind you on a public, recorded network is some mealy coward hiding behind you?"

[orestes]

"I am aware." The answer isn't angry as much as it is frustrated. People being afraid of their own opinions, or only superficially supporting of them isn't exactly an unfamiliar problem to him. When he finally does collect his thoughts into something other that impotent and increasingly vitriolic rage at everything from ideological cowardice to the ridiculous excesses represented by the more ridiculous statue they rush past, he eyes her tentatively again, studying her expression. The cold has turned her dark cheeks a dusty rose color. She shouldn't have to be dealing with all of this, and wandering around in the cold night just because he's upset. Abruptly, he pulls the red scarf from its tight knot around his neck and hands it to her.

"And I am not a fool enough to think that my newly acquired victory protects me from any retributions. Azula has suggested that I should learn to control my temper if not for myself than for you," There's a pause. She'd meant every Tribute in District 5, but there were definitely those more meritorious of his attention than others. "If you knew what I had been doing in Paris prior to being brought here, perhaps you might better understand. Or perhaps that makes no difference at all, and I have simply decided to attach myself to it because I have never had a mind to live any other way. The truth is that I have no idea how else to fight this and if making myself into a target for them will assist some other more serious effort, even as a distraction, then I am alright with doing so."

The words tumble out, and he feels a sudden weight off. It's relieving to admit that he has no idea what he's doing in so much of this.

[celebrityskinned]

She takes the scarf, put a little off-guard by the gesture. "Thank you." She wraps it tight around her neck and chin, letting the air from her breath warm her. And she listens, politely and sincerely.

Than for you.

After a moment she says her own piece.

"Azula's right. If you make it too obvious you want to be a martyr, they're just going to come after the people you care about instead. That way they punish you, but you don't get what you want." She nods in agreement with their absent Mentor. "Look, I know you don't have a ton of respect for what I did before this, but most of it was about cultivating an image. Giving something for people to root for. Making them care about things. I sort of know what-"

She pauses, noticing a strange greenish-brown spray of paint against a coral background down the empty street. "Look."

Graffiti. PANEM PLAYS WITH FIRE.

[orestes]

There's an audacity to the display that makes him smile. It's probably just as anonymous as anything of the words floating intangibly over the network right now, but the physical presence here is more real and more viable to him. It meant, in no uncertain terms, that there were similar sentiments among the people somewhere. And he would find them, eventually.

Reluctantly, he turns away from the sickly green graffiti. Hopefully, it would still be there to remind him whenever they manage to stumble home.

"It isn't far from here. The place I wanted to take you, I mean." There's an awkwardness to them still that makes him uneasy, even as thoughts of violent popular rebellion somehow bring him comfort. It's hard to articulate a response to her statement, and he stumbles over it, his disagreement with the sentiment bleeding inconveniently into his hope at the so-called street art. Instead of a true answer, he instead launches a volley of questions, most of which are quite rhetorical. "And what would you have me do? Play into their image of me? Do you know half the things they say about me? Half of what they say about you? Shall we become those characters for their amusement?"

He hadn't given them the satisfaction of a show in the Arena, and he has no intention of doing so in the Capitol, at least so long as it doesn't further his cause. "Do you remember at all what we discussed in the Arena? I was very tired and very hungry, but I remember pieces here and there. I remember making a Cartesian argument against the existence of the true self and now the idea that such a thing could be true hurts me to my core. I know myself, Venus, and I would like to think that I know you. We do not have to be whatever it is they imagine us to be."

[celebrityskinned]

Her face is solemn as she gazes at the graffiti, as she tries to extrapolate the most she can from a simple four words. "We should come back here later."

Then she get back to walking, picking her booted feet delicately through the snow. She doesn't have an answer that may satisfy him, because she doesn't know a way to say 'wait, wait for the opportunity' in words kinder than the concept allows. "Why do you care what they say about you but not what they're going to do to you, anyway?"

She closes her eyes for a moment to call back that memory, call back more than just the feeling of his hand on hers, of their relationship rising from its shallow grave.

"I'm not saying that's what we have to be, I'm just - Jesus, Enj." She rubs her face with her hand. As far as she recalls, they argued that her impression of her true self is only as real as his impression of her, and vice versa - and thus the Capitol's view of them would already be valid in all ways that matter. "Things aren't as black and white as you're seeing them."

[orestes]

In that moment, she vaguely reminded him of Combeferre, whose arguments against his constant desire for rigidity were both impossibly familiar and yet rapidly fading from his memory in the man's absence. He liked to box things, his friend had once said, to put them neatly into orders and places that only took the most pressing or obvious concern into account and ignored any other nuance or complication. Is that what he's doing now? Does he still need to be reminded how foolish that can be after so long?

And, on a less self-reflective note, he can't answer her question about why the rumors about him bother him more than the idea of torture and death. Perhaps it's because obfuscation is an inevitability in death, but life doesn't have to be about fighting slander. Nevertheless, she has him for the moment, and there are too many points to argue against, with too little actual logic to back it up. Without a suitable rebuttal, he falls into silence, feeling vaguely like a child throwing an ideological tantrum. The excess anger reflects in a frown that borders on an equally childish pout, and long quick strides.

"You shall have to explain to me how you see it. I should like to have your perspective on this as it seems more hopeful than my own." And fortunately he doesn't have time to truly examine that thought before they arrive in front of a small, ornately decorated facade. It's less of a dive bar and more of a cafe, but from the outside it seems less sterile than most of the establishments around the Capitol, and the lights seem cast everything in a pleasant, golden hue. "Does this seem appropriate to you? I should hate to be the cause of some illness."

[celebrityskinned]

It's difficult not to take the deep frown on Enjolras' face as an indication that he thinks it was a mistake to go out walking. For a moment, she wonders if she should just play along and shake her fist with him, but as good an actress as she is, she doesn't really have the heart to lie to Enjolras when he's already scrabbling against stone to keep afloat.

Venus isn't quite sure why, but she expected the place he selected to be a little more sterile, a little bit more refined and organized. Instead, it seems like a cafe where college students back in Loyola would sit and do their homework. There's even a bookshelf filled with texts for bored visitors to pour through as they drink. "This is perfect."

Once inside, she claims a table for them near the window, so she can watch the snow flurries outside. She drapes her coat over the back of her chair and sits down, letting Enj order for her. When he returns, she props her cheek against her hand. "Look, I agree with you that something needs to change. And I..."

She didn't think she'd be saying that, she realizes. A game ago she was completely content with the state of things. But now she can't block out the image of Enjolras, humidity draining the youth from his face, and especially of Ellie, a fourteen year-old begging a much larger figure to stop, please, no, before her blood was spilled.

Venus is a killer, but that doesn't preclude a sense of justice broken.

"I didn't come in here thinking that way, alright?"

[orestes]

He returns with a bottle of wine and two glasses, setting one in front of each of them before proceeding to pour a generous amount from the green glass bottle. It's a murky dark red, thin and smelling of fruit and alcohol as it tumbles out of the bottle. Her words hit him as he finally settles, preparing to take a sip of the much-anticipated drink. Instead, Enjolras sets it down in front of him again, blinking in confusion.

"You--" Eloquence is a struggle for him in English, more of a struggle around her for some reason. The question he's reaching for is an inarticulate mess in his head, pervaded by a tentative sense of accomplishment as well as several other emotions he's unwilling to consider in much depth. "May I ask what has prompted this change?"

It isn't quite what he wants to say, but it's good enough for now, and he finally lets himself take a drink. The wine in the Capitol isn't as good as the wine in Paris, but it, like his clumsy question, will do in a pinch. It doesn't burn on the way down, nor should he have expected it to, but it's disappointing all the same. "Not that I have a problem with this development, of course."

[celebrityskinned]

Venus picks up her glass and reaches over, pouring a little of hers back into Enjolras' before she takes a sip. Even if she rides over her limit today, she'd rather not hurry the process.

"Why, you want to take credit?" She grins at him and then settles back, letting the heavy coat behind her cushion her lower back. "I just..."

It's difficult to put a marker on where, in the timeline, the unfairness of it all struck her. Was it when she ran into Enj in the Arena and found him so unhappy, found what appeared to be solid steel at his core gone rusted from the blood? Was it watching Ellie plead, or was it the smile on Ellie's face afterwards at her first ever birthday party? Was it realizing, with Maximus, how selfish their lust for death was becoming?

What about the people who care about you now, Maximus? Don't you owe them something?

Or was it, instead, that conversation where Hawkeye pretended to care about the little people, and Venus tried to call his bluff only to wade into the depths of her own hypocrisy?

"When I came to do this on my homeworld, it was, I mean, I volunteered. And I never really considered that it was something people might not want any involvement in. And is it..." She purses her lips. "Is it bad that I'm terrified of what I'll see when we visit the Districts next week?"

She's been around poverty, both in her own city and in developing nations. It's not that that bothers her.

[orestes]

Poverty is undesirable but not criminal, poverty is different from out and out oppression. There is a nobility to poverty, one that probably derives from his own romanticism of the condition, but it is not unfamiliar to him either. He doesn't fear seeing it in the Districts. What he is afraid of is seeing just how badly the will of the people has been broken, just how much work he'll have to do to get them to rise up. He blushes boyishly at her insinuation. "No, I would be afraid of you turning credit into blame."

They're similar in certain ways, he realizes suddenly. They have both volunteered for dangerous lives, thrown themselves whole heartedly into things most normal people avoid, and done so without regret. In a different scenario, it could be him suffering the change of heart. That thought frightens Enjolras more than any District Tour might.

"I am excited," He confesses, fixing his gaze on her glass instead of her eyes. The Districts have been a mystery to them for so long, the people they supposedly represent kept just out of reach, the rage he imagines in their hearts teasingly hidden from him. "I want to know the people. I want to know what they would do if--" He cuts himself short, thoughts of barricades and other means of revolution entirely irrelevant to the modern world swimming in his head. He's been yelled at enough tonight to know that such things are imprudent to speak aloud, however. "Well, I suppose you know what I would like from them."

[celebrityskinned]

"I'm hurt," she chides, a smile floating around her lips in the wake of giggle that comes out. "I can take responsibility for my own mistakes no matter whose fault they are."

It's strange, the lighthearted fripperies she ices their conversations with when she knows she's delving into the parts that hurt. These are the places where the wounds are - not just for him, but for the both of them. When he breaks her gaze to confess to his glass instead of her, it almost stings.

She reaches over and puts her hand over his, just for a moment, and then pulls it away. A touch but not, she hopes, an imposition or a demand. "I hope you find it." For your sake even more than theirs. She dares not say more than that where people can hear them.

"I'm just afraid that..." She sucks on her bottom lip for a second, eyes flicking back as if the words are printed on the ceiling of their sockets. She settles on honesty, mostly, although she retroactively applies a little more altruism to her desire to be a star than ever went into her original cocktail of motivations (wealth, a way out of the gutter, an adrenalin rush, adoring fans to insist that someone out there loved her even when she didn't).

"I'm afraid that when we see those teenagers whose spots we're taking in the Games, they're going to break my heart. I've never done this for anyone but myself, honestly, or you know, little girls I could imagine were just like me. Imaginary me's. Hypothetical little Delilah Milos. And you know, as run down and fucked up as I was as a kid, I'm afraid we're going to go there and find a bunch of people so beaten down that there's no kindness can touch 'em anymore. No way to help the hurt."

She needs to believe in hope, or the past threatens to overwhelm her present.

[orestes]

Abruptly, he finds that he misses the warmth of her hand when she takes it back. It's an uncomfortable realization, he doesn't know what to do with it nor does Enjolras think it particularly fair of him. Instead of pondering all of that, however, he settles for drinking more of his wine. That was, after all, the purpose of their outing, wasn't it?

He's listening to her intently when something stands out, catching his attention above her confessions of selfishness. Self-interest isn't a problem to him really, despite his own focus on the public good. Properly reasoned self-interest does nothing but maintain the public good. Waxing rhapsodic on political theory is probably safer than the question he's about to ask: "Who is Delilah?"

They are now delving into things that hurt and Enjolas is aware that she may not want to talk about it, or whatever answer she does grant him might be a half truth. In actuality, they know very little about each other's pasts. They're learning, but the pictures are still fuzzy and imprecise, and the more they define them, the moments like this they will have.

[celebrityskinned]

Venus pauses, the tiny part in her lips betraying how off-guard that catches her. She's been asked a thousand times "so who's Venus Dee Milo, really?" and the answer always talks about a sassy Southern girl ready to save the world before her next pedicure. It's been describing an outfit that she wears, a skin more enmeshed to her flesh than any corporeal form could be.

"Who's Delilah?", on the other hand. That's a question even her therapists never touched. Delilah's a little girl who blew up her family.

"My birth name is Delilah. You know, from the Bible." From what she remembered of the Bible, Delilah was something of a villainous femme fatale who overthrew a kingdom. She never saw herself reflected much in the name. She takes a drink of wine that feels like swallowing marbles, hard and unforgiving as it moves down her throat.

And because it's Enjolras - and only because it's Enjolras, one of the few people here whose opinion she really, truly cares about, she comes cleaner than that. Were it anyone else, she would have left it at that. "I let them name me Venus as a way to leave that past behind."

[orestes]

"It's lovely," he says, and it isn't entirely clear which he means. He can relate to leaving the past behind, at least, but without knowing more of her decision to do so, he doesn't want to press the issue. It's a difficult thing to be inoffensively curious. Demanding answers from people is simple, asking to learn about them is entirely different.

"I have not used my given name since I left Bordeaux, not with any regularity." At first it had been a matter of practicality. His name had been read off of class rosters and teenage boys felt stupidly more mature calling each other by their family names as if they were already men. Over the years it had become habit, and then one day he had decided that it was all well enough, he wasn't the same person his parents had raised and should probably stop pretending to be. "However, I had never thought to ask for a new one altogether.

"I wonder what they will ask of us when we arrive in the Districts." The change of subject is intended for their mutual benefit. A little bit of the past sprinkled in with things that are at least a little bit less sensitive. "The truth is that I do not mind fighting for children, but I do mind that such a thing is considered necessary at all. Even taking their ridiculous paradigm into consideration, they have now robbed the Districts of even the phantoms of their agency. If we fight for them, then what are they? Labor camps, from what I understand, but very little else."

[celebrityskinned]

"Thank you." She doesn't ask for clarification on which of the two names he prefers; if she were to be honest, she isn't sure which she'd rather he liked. It's undeniable that she wishes someone would love the person she was (still is) as much as she desire to become Venus entirely.

"You know, I actually didn't realize until recently that Enjolras," she pronounces it correctly this time, having taken the time not only to learn how it's spoken but practice it with their Escort to get the finer edges right, "is your last name, not your first."

She won't miss it if he tells her what it is, but that seems like information that should be volunteered, not extracted.

"That's what I'm worried about. I mean...where I'm from, little girls looked up to me because I was fighting terrorists and killers and, well, anyone with the label 'bad guy'. It's sort of sick that the only thing they can aspire to here is a trapped killer in a cage with their peers." If they aspire to that at all, although Venus has heard tell of the 'honor' of the Career districts. It's different, she thinks - as unregulated as the X-Statix were, they could always cloak themselves in the idea of good deeds and bravery being rewarded. "What if we're sparing them from this situation and the one they're in isn't any better?"

It makes her next sip of wine taste sour.

[orestes]

"The only men I ever truly looked up to were Terrorists." There's a very slight laugh in his voice, an effort to keep their conversation light, even as it threatens to become too heavy. The the problem with alcohol, he thinks, is that it can magnify any profound feeling. Suddenly injustices seem too severe to exist, despair seems irreparable, and if one is lucky enough to be happily drinking, his happiness will only lead to errors in judgment. "Do you know the root of the word, Venus? It comes from a speech in which one of the most influential men to ever rule France," Because couching Robespierre's regime as anything but a rule is hypocritical and praising beyond even Enjolras' idealism. "Outlined the role of government in our Revolution. Virtue without terror is impotent, and terror without virtue is barbarism. There used to be a word in English to distinguish Terror as I refer to it, and terror as you were just now, but it fell out of use well before you were born. In times of Revolution, a government's role is Terror in the interest of order."

Which is a dangerous conception, seeing as that statement could easily be applied to the actions of Panem. Does the government here see itself in threat of constant revolution? Is all of its tyranny merely a misguided effort to maintain social order? Does any of that matter when its definition of social order is clearly mass oppression rather than mass emancipation? He frowns into his glass, taking another sip of the wine. They're moving through it quickly and he can't decide whether that's a good or a bad thing.

"Alexandre-Marie," He says quietly, the taste of the wine still thick and fruity in his mouth. "We are even now, I think. And, anyway, if we are taking their options away from them we are only obligated to replace them with something better."

[celebrityskinned]

She shakes her head slightly before he explains. For her, terrorism has always been a loaded one, word caked in the jingoistic reflections of an attack on American soil that happened when she was in middle school (the year after she became an orphan, it turns out, and she had been so numbed in her own troubles she only noted, rather than felt, the aftereffects of 9/11). Terrorism isn't really a concept so much as a buzzword, one you throw down in an argument to win it, one you slap onto campaign posters to foment some outrage.

Without realizing how easily she falls into parallel with his train of thought, she says "I'm pretty sure that's what Panem is trying to do. I don't know how much you've studied the Games that came before this, but the reason they started the system we have now is because of a young couple who outwitted the Games and, well. The people got moody."

She takes another sip of wine, possibly unwisely as she already feels her tongue loosening. It's pretty, Alexandre-Marie. It fits him, she thinks, even if he's decided to set it aside.

"You're right, when you said labor camps. That's what I'm afraid to see."

[orestes]

"Katniss Everdeen." He's more than familiar with the Girl on Fire, and the mysticism surrounding her, even if he thinks it's poorly placed. The few times Enjolras has met her around the Capitol, she's seemed terrified. Of course, now he's forced to consider if perhaps he judged her too harshly. Victory isn't easy, and he hadn't so blatantly defied the Capitol within the Arena even if he took every opportunity to do so outside of it. Still, he has a difficult time applying terror to what the Capitol is doing . It's fear-mongering, no doubt, but there's no virtue in it.

"I have no doubt that the hegemony of the Capitol will bother us both. It makes us better people than them."

For all of his attempts at keeping the conversation light, they're slipping again into dark territory. At least he isn't screaming his frustrations over the Network, he supposes vaguely. Besides, an intelligent conversation over Panem's problems with someone he trusts is ultimately more satisfying. "However, I also have faith that we will find something worthwhile there. I do not understand technology enough to use it against them, but I can appreciate the efforts of that... What did they call him before? A hacker? That man gives me hope, as does the message we found earlier."

[celebrityskinned]

"There we go. I knew you were an elitist deep down." She laughs, then pours herself a little more wine. It's starting to settle inside her like a warm blanket wrapped around her insides, calming and comfortable even if it makes her sluggish.

"The first hacker was a Tribute. They cut his tongue out behind the scenes. He's, um, he's the redheaded guy, a little younger than us."

That unsettles Venus much more than the idea of death; something about her has already reckoned a hundred times with a grave, but never with being held down, with begging for mercy, with having it denied. She frowns slightly, crosses her legs tightly, tugs the collar of her shirt taut and swallows a memory with the next sip of wine.

"They don't know who the second hacker is, but if they know what's wise they'll stop popping up around important events." And start striking with less warning.

[orestes]

"They want the attention." The observation is dry and languid from the wine. It makes perfect sense to him. They strike around large events for the same reason that he wore red to Lamarque's funeral. If you're going to dissent do so visibly so as to inspire other people to do so as well. "I would not have seen it had there not been a large event. I suspect the same is true for any Tributes who still feel less than comfortable with such devices."

The anonymous element is what bothers him. It's illogical, disparate from his understanding of the situation. Why be anonymous when making clear attempts to rally support? "The question is whether their efforts will translate into anything tangible. And if so, how."

It's then that he realizes his own glass is almost empty. A blush works its way across his face as he hastens to refill it, draining a healthy amount from the bottle. There's a puritanical element left in him that's almost embarrassed by this display, but it's better than the alternative. Perhaps he had been wrong to be so austere before. Perhaps if he had stopped to drown his frustrations in liquor every once in a while he might not have led his friends to their deaths. "Do you think that they are right about me? That I am an idealistic fool who will get myself and anyone the Capitol suspects I care for killed? If you do, it might be wise to leave now. I would not think less of you for an act of self-preservation."

[celebrityskinned]

She meets his eyes. She could lie. She could tell him things to swaddle his ego in this moment, to temporarily alleviate the insecurities that have soaked up from the bottom of his mind. But the lying Venus is a woman of the cameras, rather than one who sits in cafes and gets drunk with people she shares secrets with.

"Enj, have I ever struck you as the sort of person who gives half a shit about self-preservation?"

The smile on her face is older than her years, and her hand returns to his, his that feels cold in comparison, his that she seeks to warm. Her palm folds over his knuckles and she squeezes slightly. It's a promise; she doesn't fear death. She never has. And if her association with him, or anyone else, leads her into the path of oncoming danger, she has forgiveness enough to trample any regrets.

"I don't think you're a fool. I think you come from a place where people just shoot each other instead of hunting down families as a lesson. I think you're slow to adapt, right now, is all. And I think you been given a lot to adapt to really fast."