You're Still No Hero Diving in the Blue [Closed]

[celebrityskinned]

WHO| Venus and Wyatt, Venus and Guy, Venus and Courfeyrac, Venus and Enjolras
WHAT| Catchall for Venus meeting with her fellas again after the mini-Arena
WHEN| Before the Thicker Than Blood plot
WHERE| Tribute Center
WARNINGS| Mentions of death.

She sits up and laughs when she wakes. Not a long laugh, not even an especially humor-filled one, but it's a surprised sound that comes right out of her, because she had been told that she wouldn't be coming back and yet here she is. The Capitol's lied many times to her before, and yet she can't recall it ever being so blatant. So rarely have the contradictions come so soon after the original statements.

She lets living again flow through her. She examines it, sitting on the bed, feeling her heart beating away in the body the Capitol gave her, twisting a tiny braid in her fingers, letting herself feel the disappointment and anger and grief she felt while in the Arena have a smidgen of time in her right now. She breathes deep, in her nose and out her mouth, and counts, over and over again, to thirty-five. After some time, she opens her eyes and feels, while not clearly, somewhat less overcast.

She puts on a dress and socks and makeup and listens through Enjolras' door for a moment in the hallway, not wanting to interrupt if he's getting some much-needed sleep. She doesn't hear the typical rustling of pages or scratching of a pen, so she leaves him be for now. She slips one of her hair ribbons under his door, so he knows she's back and well. And she asks an Avox if Guy and Courfeyrac made it back, and sits down on the suite couch with relief when she gets news that they did.

An Avox gets her a cookie-dough milkshake and she watches Wyatt win on a rerun, and Hans, and Harley and Eliot. She replays it to relish that one of her team made it out relatively safe and sound. Since she's only been back a few hours, she leaves watching all the deaths for later. No need to see what happened to little Pruna when the day is so fresh. And when that's done, she puts her feet up, flicks off the TV and starts her way into Sartre.

Over the next few days, she goes and finds the people she owes celebrations and the people she owes apologies to. Guy, Courfeyrac, Wyatt. She finds them in the Tribute Center lobby and greets each of them with a hug.

Comments

[libertin]

"That she is." And for that he was grateful. He didn't ever have to wonder if he was in her good graces. She was obvious and abundant with her affections, and more so when she was angry. "And you, mademoiselle? How goes your little affair?"

[celebrityskinned]

"It's not an affair," she says, suddenly stern. Clearly the 'mistress' word still haunts her a little bit. That insecurity has turns to a scab, not a scar. "And anyway, it's going just fine."

[libertin]

Courfeyrac scoffs at her, not seeing the big deal. "Have I done something to offend you?"

[celebrityskinned]

"It's just the way you Frenchmen talk about your women. Like it's a foregone conclusion that we're disposable, or something." She wrinkles her nose. "I'm probably just being sensitive."

[libertin]

"You are being sensitive. Overly so." Courfeyrac says this completely unapologetically. "And I find it rather alarming that you would think my compatriots and I are so insensitive and destructive with our lovers. Is not love a major component of that word? Does one treat the person they love as if they are garbage?"

[celebrityskinned]

"It's a translation thing. It has to be a translation thing. Affairs and mistresses and just- gawd." She shakes her head and spoons some more whipped cream into her mouth. "I'm just afraid that someday I'm going to stop being able to keep up with you all, you know, mentally, and then that's it. That's all I'm good for is my body and that doesn't last."

[libertin]

Courfeyrac is less than impressed, to be honest. He's always thought more highly of her and it stings to hear that she thinks so poorly of him and his friends. "Have any of us treated you so badly, I wonder? What in heaven's name has given you the idea that we, any of us, would behave in that manner?"

He took a long sip of his beverage. "That said, I see no reason why we should hold ourselves back for anyone. If you cannot keep up, you cannot keep up. I do not mean to sound harsh, my dear, but there are certain principles to which we must attend. No one can stand in the way of this. If anyone were to become a hindrance, they would be left behind, whether it was you or myself or even Enjolras. The ideals to which we hold ourselves is far greater than the desires of the individual. If that is not something you can accept then perhaps you are barking up the wrong tree, as the saying goes."