thecapitol | (no subject)

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WHO: Julian and Johanna
WHAT: In a fit of Mentoring responsibility, Johanna fulfills her duty in dragging Julian out to try to salvage his reputation after a disastrous showing in the Arena.
WHEN: Sometime soon after Julian has returned to the Capitol
WHERE:
WARNINGS: Johanna's brashness generally comes with a warning. Probably chat of sponsorship - does that need a warning?

Johanna hated this part of her job. Actually, she hated most parts of her job. But she loathed this part of her job. Dragging the Tributes out to build up their reputations and trying to keep them alive. Since she had won her Games, Johanna hadn't succeeded once. And it didn't look like Julian was going to be much different.

Still, it had to be done, to shut everyone up. Just once. Bam. Throw him into the party. Tell him not to look at the potential sponsors. Done.

Before she could change her mind, Johanna hammered on Julian's door.

"Open up. Now."

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Julian had, for the most part, kept to himself after his unceremonious ejection from the Arena. He had very little he wished to prove to these people, less so every day. He hadn't gone down to the training center--God only knew it was nothing but a matter of time until Johanna got on him about that--had enjoyed the relative quiet for once.

And there it was, her pounding down his door, breaking his reverie.

He debated, for a moment, how much of a petulant child he wished to be. He had nothing against Johanna, she was simply doing her best by them as she could--and it certainly wasn't her fault he was here. Or that he'd been bloody electrocuted.

Sighing, he levered himself up out of the chair he'd been occupying by the window. He'd found quite quickly the controls to change the projection, and had been staring out at the simulated starscape he'd set it to for the last few hours. He was surprised she'd let him alone this long, really.

"I can hear you perfectly well without your beating the door down," he calls mildly, before swinging it open.

"Then answer the door quicker."

She moved forward, putting her foot in the doorway so that he couldn't easily close it in her face.

"Get your shoes on. We're going out. Now."

Any number of responses flitted through his head, before settling on merely a shrug, a shake of his head, and toeing on his shoes as requested.

One did have to choose their battles, and he didn't want to put forth the energy for this one.

"And where, pray tell, are we going?"

"The Speakeasy." At least there, she could have it out with him in relative privacy. Relative being the operative word. But quite honestly, Johanna had been so hopeful. Julian had seemed the most responsive to her, and even Johanna could see that he would make a better Mentor than she. And then he went and messed up, and here was she, picking up the pieces.

She watched him put on his shoes.

"We need to talk."

"Never good words."

He also took his jacket--it was cold, he preferred to stay at least somewhat warm.

"And here I'd been enjoying the quiet, without Justin about." Being able to walk around without high-grade earplugs in all the time was amazing.

"Haven't we all?" She shook her head. "One of these days, I am gonna rip his throat out. I don't care if he's a damn Tribute. I don't care if he's MY Tribute! He's more annoying than the rest of you together. And that's saying something."

Johanna waited 'patiently', tapping her foot whilst she waited for Julian to wrap up. But once he was ready, she grabbed his arm to steer him non too gently to the door to the suite and along the street to the Speakeasy. She didn't speak whilst she walked. Instead, she kept her head well down, and her free hand out, to push paparazzi away from them both.

Once they reached the Speakeasy, Johanna glared at Julian. "In."

"I'm sorry we're such a bother for you." Julian has turned his British politeness up to eleven, to the point where it sounds passive-aggressive. Maybe if he antagonizes her enough, Johanna will be done with him.

Whether that means she'll merely leave him alone aside from cutting glares or decapitate him, he's not altogether sure. She is somewhat unpredictable.

When she commands him into the building, he just gives her a raised eyebrow and walks in, head held high.

She pushed past him, and walked towards an empty booth in the corner of the room.

"In." She pointed, choosing to ignore his passive-aggressiveness. Or perhaps, if not ignore it, to ramp up her own impatience.

Truly they have the best relationship. Very healthy, no issues whatsoever.

"If you're done speaking to me like I'm a misbehaving dog?"

He sits, as requested, but some part of him is wondering just how far he could get if he just walked off, right now.

Not the wisest of plans. She wouldn't hesitate to attack.

Well, not much.

"If you're done acting like a dumb animal then I'll stop speaking to you as if you were one."

She slid in after him, and glared again.

"So what were you playing at in that damn arena? I get it's your first one, but back in the day, back when this was more than a damn game, when it actually meant something, you only got one chance. And you blew it."

"It's hardly a game now." Julian's eyes flash, his voice drops low. He's been raised to hold all life sacred, reinforced that with vows that he was loathe to break, even when he had to. Especially for this.

"Perhaps I'd rather be able to live with myself than simply live, as someone's bloody tin soldier, ready to wind up and let loose."

"You don't get it, do you?"

She narrowed her eyes, really studying Julian's face. He REALLY didn't get it, did he? He didn't have a clue. She burst into almost hysterical sounding laughter at his ignorance.

"A game is exactly what it is, and you're an idiot if you can't understand that, Doc. You're not a tin soldier. You're not anything, except entertainment for these idiots. Same as me. Same as Finnick. Same as anyone else in this damn place. And if you wanna survive, AT ALL, you better start playing by their rules, because BELIEVE me, these people are not messing about.

"No, I must not." He doesn't get how there hasn't been a revolt already, how the people here had simply swallowed years upon years of abuse and such terrible crimes, with only distaste and thankfulness that they weren't getting more.

"People are dying, and people are killing. At the behest of a privileged few. Where I'm from, that's not a game--it's a war crime."

Julian wanted very badly to get up and walk out of here, right now. But his temper exploding was difficult to contain. It didn't end with shouting, his voice remains measured and low, but the look on his face is terribly angry.

"Humanity is capable of so much more than this. Terrible history, great war, or no."

As for playing by their rules--Julian had spent a good part of his life believing himself to be a monster, and had only very recently begun to think otherwise. He's not exactly eager to make that a reality.

"Do you think I don't know that?" Johanna raised her voice as she replied. She was so frustrated - but how could these tributes, these new people, be expected to understand why people continued playing?

"Do you think I like this? Do you think I enjoy pimping you all up to watch you die every four months? Do you think I liked it any better when it was kids from my District, who I knew were never coming back. D'you think I liked that I did it? But you know what? These people in the Districts are SCARED. They're SCARED and they loathe us, me and Finnick and every single other Victor, for what we've done. You have to get it through that thick skull of yours that, for now, we're trapped."

"No, I don't think you do." How could she, she'd gone through it--she'd seen this all her life, she knew how terrible it was.

"Fear stops us from doing quite a lot, doesn't it?" He can't even begin to compare their situations--sure, Julian had needed to hide who he was--what he was--because of the fear of Augments held for well over four hundred years.

"But it's going to take a lot more than fear for me to kill innocent people, Johanna. I'm not going to apologize for that, because I'm certainly not sorry--but it's one thing for me to kill soldiers on a battlefield. That I've done--I've hated that I had to do it, but I have. It's another thing entirely for me to kill people who never asked for this. And that is my choice to make."

Julian set his elbows on the table, resting his chin on his hands. "We're trapped, but it's not in anything of our own making."

They were trapped, but there had to be some way to get out of it.

She ran her fingers through her hair, pulling her short, choppy locks back from her forehead. Deep frown lines were visible - surprising perhaps, on such a young woman - and she sighed.

"Look, you're a good guy, Doc. I get that. I do. i mean, believe what you want. But I do get it. And I wish I could tell you that you ain't gonna crack and kill." She shrugged.

"But you are. And if you're gonna do it, I need you to do it next time. The damn people in my District are starving because you're not winning."

Here it was, the ultimate emotional blackmail. Johanna hated herself, just that little bit more, for even thinking, let alone voicing the conundrum.

"So by not winning, you're killing off like, most of District Seven. It's a cold winter up there, and without food, there are gonna be a lot of funerals. Now I'm not saying it's a nice choice, but... well, they don't come back from the dead in the same way up there. Nobody cares about 'em. They rely on me - US - to win."

He's not surprised. In this environment, this situation, how could he be? He just closes his eyes--it is the worst sort of damned if you do, damned if you don't.

In this case, damning himself if he does, and hundreds--perhaps thousands--if he doesn't.

The Prime Directive states that he shouldn't involve himself. That he should have flat refused from the beginning, even at the cost of his own life. It still directed that he should--when he got back and made his report, he'd likely be arrested and put through a court martial. But he's already broken it.

"Why are you asking this of me? Why not those of us actually willing to follow through?" Julian opens his eyes again to meet hers over the table.

"Making the most of your options is one thing, but...you know what you're asking of me, but I don't think you know what that means to me."

Why does she ask him? Because... because he listens to her. He actually listens to her, with some inking of respect as well. He almost fears her, which is nice. And perhaps... Johanna has a bit of a cruel streak in her, exaggerated by the Capitol. Perhaps she likes to see the pure break, just a little bit. Just like she did.

But she couldn't tell Johanna any of that. And so she pulled her lips into an ironic smile, and said,

"It doesn't matter. Believe me. Let me shatter your soul, rather than it being done on televisions in front of the world. Let me do it now."

"Yes, it does matter. It matters to me, because you're not the only one sitting at this table who has dealt with being feared, for something completely outside of your control. And proving myself a killer in that arena will turn me into exactly the sort of monster everyone feared I would become, and I have spent most of my life trying very hard not to."

Of course, she couldn't know exactly what he means by that. No one truly could, who didn't know the history--the fear and prejudice which has lasted centuries. He can't let himself turn into the likes of Khan, refuses to even come close to it.

He's barely gotten to the point where he can think of himself as human. He'd rather not throw that away. Even if that meant dying, repeatedly. Permanently. It wasn't exactly the first time he'd faced the prospect of his own mortality.

"Doesn't matter. You WANT them to think that. You want people to be so scared of you that they don't want to come near you. Believe me. If you come off all nicey-nice, I'm telling you, you're an easy target. You may as well stick a flashing light on your head. Even outside the arena -"

Johanna leaned in closer. "Look, I'm telling you this for your own good. The Capitol is just as lethal as the Arena if you don't toe the line. You do what you've gotta do to scare 'em off. Like I have. Just... do it."

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dammit I thought I replied to this

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