She Pulls a Razor from Her Boot [Open]

[fearisinthemind]

WHO| Penny and open
WHAT| Poisoning pigeons in the park
WHERE| A Capitol park
WHEN| Week 2 of the Arena
WARNINGS| Animal death. Also, she's a sadist torturer.

Penny doesn't see sunlight often. It isn't an avoidance thing; she just works six days a week and tends to have her servants make grocery runs for her when she isn't feeling like subjecting herself to the faces of others. She loathes smalltalk, and truly only enjoys Katurian's company these days. That he hasn't answered her phone today has put her in a foul mood, and she wafts through the park like a wisp of a thunderhead signaling a storm in contrast to the bright lighting.

An Avox, one of her personal servants, carries a bag of birdseed for her. Penny sits on the park bench (the Avox must stand) and picks out one piece at a time, holding a cup of hot coffee with one hand and occasionally meting out dead-eyed stares at passers by. Her gown is too elegant for a simple park visit, even by Capitol standards, and her slippers are perfectly clean, having been brought by the Avox in a purse and substituted for more comfortable footwear.

The first pigeon seizes up six minutes in. It flutters and tries to flap away, only to fall from a height of only a few feet and collapse to the ground. Its feathers puff, it makes little chirping sounds, and it expires. The other pigeons examine it, and then another suffers the same fate. Then another. It's not long before she and the Avox are surrounded by tiny corpses.

Penny smirks and drinks her coffee.

Comments

[thatwasme]

Barbara looks to Penny, then back to the birds. She doesn't look to the Avox at first. When the gurgling continues, she glances up, but her eyes slide away.

Staring won't aide anyone right now.

"I wasn't much expectin' any to be dying at all," she admits. "It's usually a bad sign, not a, well, expected one."

[fearisinthemind]

"Dying is a natural part of the life cycle. I'm just accelerating Mother Nature." Penny suddenly frowns, displeased with her choice of language. "I'm supplanting Mother Nature."

Credit must be given where it's due.

"Who are you?"

[thatwasme]

Barbara continues looking troubled, but she shakes it off, sending Penny a big smile and waving her hand from close against her body. "Barbara, ma'am. It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss...? I reckon you have a point with death being part of the cycle of livin' and all. Supplanting Mother Nature is a kind of art form."

She sounds admiring. It's amazing how the Capitol has turned out a consumer marketplace for those who did exactly that: augment or supplant the role of Mother Nature.

[fearisinthemind]

"You don't already know who I am?" Penny's scowl crinkles her brow in strange ripples. Her lower teeth show. It isn't a good look for her.

It's only because Barbara compared her to an artist that Penny doesn't lash out entirely.

[thatwasme]

Barbara wears a sheepish smile. "I reckon I might, but then I asked myself, why would such an amazing person be down here with the pigeons in the park? Dressed like that, like she's so beautiful she stepped right on out of a Fairy Story, I'm not so certain you're even real!"

[fearisinthemind]

Well. Penny knows, on some surface level, that she's being flattered, but the crocodile inside her seizes the meat of the compliments and devours it whole. She wants more. She's eternally aching in hunger for this praise.

She holds a hand out. "How sweet. Would you like some birdseed, as a token of my gratitude?"

[thatwasme]

Barbara steps forward, careful where she places her feet. She lets the flush of anger and fear rise to her face, hoping to comes off as embarrassed pleasure. Her eyes flick down, to Penny's robes and then her feet, a suitably submissive and (hopefully) awestruck presentation of body language.

"I'm honored to accept any token an icon like you is willing to offer to someone like me."

[fearisinthemind]

"I want to see you eat it."

Penny's cheeks flush with excitement, like a sadistic child pressed to the glass at a zoo during the lion feedings. She leans forward, thrusting the birdseed at Barbara (at her throat, most precisely).

[thatwasme]

Barbara pushes through her hesitation, bring up a hand to take the birdseed. She puts on a winning smile, nodding her head to Penny. "As you wish!" she says, and the bird seed is at her lips, a portion grinding against her teeth and finding a bitter, unwilling home on her tongue.

Barbara palms the rest as she wipes at her mouth, swallowing convulsively. The seed dries her mouth, making it difficult. Still, she chokes down what had gotten in.

Enough to kill a pigeon with some time to spare. Unlikely to kill something of her particular size and weight. Close lipped, she smiles at Penny again, making chewing motions to try and get the seed down her throat. "Mmm mmm!"

[fearisinthemind]

Penny grins, though it only makes her eyes look like puncture wounds under her brow. And she reaches forward and pats Barbara on the head as if she were a dog.

"Good girl. Now off you go." She waves a hand to shoo her.

[thatwasme]

Barbara straightens, giving Penny a wave as she turns and walks away. She refuses to move at anything faster than her casual pace coming in.

The seed in her hand is a bitter victory. When she gets home, she'll have to see some of what it's made of, and prepare for whatever complaints her body will have as a side effect.

Poison the Districts, indeed.