New kind of victory.

[etcircenses]

Who| Everyone on the District Tours.
What| The Celebration dinners for all the Districts.
Where| Specified in thread.
When| The second night they are there.
Warnings/Notes| Find your district below. Leave any questions here. And please add any needed warning into your subject line when appropriate.

Comments

[polyturtle]

"Its a lovely place," Don replied, as he linked his arm with Barbara's again. "They're incredibly kind and open. Its...pretty refreshing."

And he did, indeed, notice. It was...nice. Not to be looked at as a freak, or a curiosity. It was actually...really nice.

[thatwasme]

"We're in the holiest place in town," she said, voice low and amused. "If they were anything else, I'd be surprised!"

Well played, Capitol, though you know not what you touch.

The twisted around each other once more, then broke arms, heading back to their respective lines.

[polyturtle]

Oh, that they did not. Once they parted, Don let out the clap, as the music died down again.

"Never did a line dance before tonight."

[thatwasme]

"So what do you think, now that you have?"

People moved into places for the next dance, but Barbara inclined her head toward the side, where the faux haybales lined in a not quite ring.

[polyturtle]

"Well," Don replied as he figured out her hint, walking towards the bale. "It was simple. But...fun!"

[thatwasme]

"Fun!" She laughed, not meanly, giving a nod of her head as if to agree. "That's what dancing's meant to be. I never could tell with all the fancy, odd stuff they call dancing in the Capitol! Guess I'm too country-grown in the end." Everything was light -- the church, her manner, her dress, even the press coverage. Most the Peacekeepers are watching entrances. She wondered when the children were going to be allowed to go home to their freezing-if-not-frozen beds.

Barbara sat down with no sense of flourish, simply folding her legs and using a hand and her rear end to break her fall onto the hay bale. "How've you been settling in with the Capitol appetite?"

[polyturtle]

"The best-known 'dance' back home that I could kind of do was the Macarena." Don sat down next to her. "Not that it would be a good idea to recreate it - it involves a lot of flailing hands."

He crossed his hands together. It was nice that not all eyes were on him, like back in the Capitol, he had to admit.

"The appetite? You mean food-wise or coverage-wise?"

[thatwasme]

"Both," she said, smile on her lips, leaning toward Don as if they were sharing some sort of mutual amusement at the situation, basking in the aftermath of quaint boonies celebration. "Might be the small town girl in me, but it always leaves me breathless."

Difficult to tell if it was a good or bad kind of airlessness being implied.

[polyturtle]

"It...can be...well..." Don admitted. "Even now. I'm still..."

He paused, trying to find a way to explain it. His voice lowers a bit.

"...I'm still a monster, I feel, in their eyes. A mutant. Regardless of my actions, in and out of the game. Even if I hadn't...had everything happen, I'm not human. I know that I'm not like because of who I am. Its because of what I am."

He nodded.

"...Overwhelming is the better word for it."

[thatwasme]

"Overwhelming sounds like a good one." Part of her wanted to point out that even the human beings were treated as subhuman, but she didn't feel that would be as helpful to him right now. Instead, she allows a certain degree of conversational meandering. "Overwhelmed... I wonder, do you think you can ever be just whelmed? Or even underwhelmed? No one ever talks like they are."

Her lips quirked up as she looked toward the milling crowd of bodies, organized into another semi-familiar dance. "Think we can bring it into popular use? 'I was pleasantly whelmed by our reception.'"

She looked to Donatello, quirking up an eyebrow and waiting for a response. Perhaps a rejoinder?

[polyturtle]

"...I think whelmed sound like a good idea."

At that, Don stood up.

"The night's still young, after all. Right?"

[thatwasme]

She grinned, apparently amused. "I don't see the sun peeking over the horizon yet!"

[polyturtle]

With a nod, Don offered his hand to her.

"Shall we?"

[thatwasme]

She looks back up at him, thinking for a split second. Then her hand comes up, accepting his offer, and she lets herself be pulled back up on her feet.

"Why not?" She'd rather be moving than sitting down, letting things catch up with her. "Ready to learn another country dance on your feet, Turtle-boy?" She winks, letting it be a playful statement, and a partial challenge.

[polyturtle]

"Looks like I am," Don replied with a smile. "I wasn't too bad at the first one, after all."

[thatwasme]

"Let's see if you can keep up at double speed!"

End here?

[polyturtle]

Oh dear. Well, here was hoping for the best. But, he could tell by the smiles and laughter that, even if he failed, they weren't upset. In fact, they...almost seemed proud of him. And Don knew. Even if he didn't know them personally, they were good people.

They didn't deserve what was happening to them, and he had to do something. He couldn't fall apart, not again. He just didn't know how. With all he knew, and all he'd gone through, how the shell was he going to help with something more than just getting people out of the Arena, or watching over a few allies?

Perhaps he could figure it out, after tonight.

They didn't call him the brains of his brothers for nothing, after all. Right?