thecapitol | I've never seen a place quite like this

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I've never seen a place quite like this

Who: Ruffnut and you
What: The Viking girl explores this strange new world.
Where: District 7 Suite, The Training Center, a bar in the Capitol.
When: After week three of the arena.
Warnings: Some violence, cussing who knows what else? We'll see when we get there.

The District 7 suite

Ruffnut didn't know what to make of the place she had woken up. Everything was so smooth and soft!

Running her hand along the walls there was no bumps or grooves like in a wood house, and when she gazed out the window she nearly cried out in shock at the world spread out below her!

Everything was so shiny and bright! She squinted her eyes shielding them as she backed away from the sun glinting off the city below.

Of course some things took precedent, starting with food. Leaving the room cautiously she held a lamp firmly in hand as a makeshift club and tip toed into the common area. All too quickly she was distracted by the mountain of fruits, pastries and other assorted finger foods set out in the dining area for tributes to snack on at their leisure.

Seated at the table she proceeded to scarf down anything within arms reach, moaning in a vulgar manner at how flavorful and sweet some of it was.

This was nothing like the salty meat and cabbages of Berk. This even surpassed her favorite snack of smoked eel.

It wasn't until her second plate that she slowed down to look around the room and wonder what lay beyond those other doors.

*********************************

The Training Center commons.

Ruffnut was not at all pleased to be met in the common area by some reporters who had been here reporting on another tribute only to see a chance to interview one of the newest additions to District seven.

"What do you think of the Capitol?" The woman asked looming over Ruffnut in ridiculous heels and with lips that resembled two fat worms trying to wrestle each other into a smile.

"I uh..." Came her baffled response.
"Do you regret not lasting longer in the arena?"

That earned the woman a sour look as Ruffnut snapped from confusion to embarrassment.

"Will you be seeking revenge in the next arena?"

Having had enough and not knowing what to say to make this sharp shouldered woman leave, Ruffnut tried the same trick that had failed her with Kevin "Look over there!" She gasped pointing behind the reporter before trying to make a quick retreat for the doors.

Unfortunately like Kevin, the reporter was too smart for that and scurried after the blond girl chasing her around the commons area.

**************************

The Trap Door Bar.

Having wandered the city for hours Ruffnut seemed to have gotten herself properly lost.

If she could have found something she recognized she might be able to retrace her steps, but for the time being it all seemed so new and clean that she was starting to long for the arena. At least things were properly filthy there.

Even she herself felt too clean. Her hair was shiny and not oily the way she liked it. Her clothes were soft and breathable instead of leather and fur, and worst of all? They'd completely removed her body hair. Nothing left but what was on her head! She had ranted loudly about that when she was finally introduced to her stylist. Didn't he know how important body hair was? She was sure she was going to freeze to death that night.

Drawn through a door covered in stickers she found her way into a bar where the band was playing something heavy on the drums and as rough and subversive as was allowed in the capitol. The band were dressed in primal fashion with face paint and fluffy boots and on the drum set the name "Sabertooth Cavemen." was displayed...not that Ruffnut could read it.

Sitting at the bar she thumped the wood and tried to ignore everyone starring at her. "Drink!" She demanded as the bartender himself gave her a fish eye stare.

Finally there was a tall glass of something amber colored in front of her and Ruffnut all too happily drank deeply. The face she pulled indicated it was nothing like the drinks she was expecting...but she took another drink anyway.

This world was so different then the one she knew. In a way it was great because that gave her so much to explore.

In another way she was absolutely overwhelmed by everything she saw and heard coming at her from all sides.

And if one more person asked her about being eaten alive she was ready to start throwing things.

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It was one of those long (and annoying) days where Mindy was actually taking a swing down to the bars. It helped to know what place had people with loose tongues and which were loyal to the Capitol. She knew exactly how much to drink with the latter, and how liberated she could be with the former. Usually, she came in to share a drink, get some information and get to know some of the tributes who weren't in her District. As it would happen, look who showed up?

Mindy casually sat by the girl, ordering a tall mug of ale, and taking a moderate sip before turning to the girl. "You're Ruffnut, right? The viking girl that got eaten. The second one too, jesus."

There was a very visible twitch in her eye as Mindy oh so casually brought her up with that identification. Ruffnut's fingers curled tightly around the handle.

"Nope, must be some other girl." She lied unconvincingly. Suddenly she was longing for her idiot brother. At least then she could pretend to be him.

"Oh bullshit. There are, like, two viking people in the Arena, and I happen to know really well the last one, so it was you. Don't be ashamed: that guy was fucking creepy and he had you cornered. I mean, I probably wouldn't have run from him, but I believe in making people earn the win they're shooting for."

She took a long drink, then set it down. "Trust me, the eating fatalities? They're pretty infamous."

"Yeah, that's great. I feel tons better now, thanks for that." She muttered starring moodily into her drink.

Was she really being told not to be ashamed by a girl who looked like she was half her age?

"It was your first run in the Arena. No one is ever really prepared for everything that's going to happen. Even I wasn't."

No point in moping about it, really.

"Are you like...new to this pep talk thing or is this just an off day for you?" Ruffnut shot back taking another long drag off her drink.

She knew she should be more grateful that anyone was showing her empathy over the whole thing. But after a day of people asking her about the death over and over again a billion times she was in a foul mood.

"I'm new to trying to be nice to people, yeah. But if you want the truth? You should have shanked him, or at least cut off one of his limbs. You never let an opponent get the drop on you so long as you have two legs, two arms and some kind of weapon."

Mindy was tired of being nice and SO done with offering olive branches. The loss to Azula still stung, and if people were going to push her congeniality? She was just going to be herself.

She made a rude noise with her lips. "Yeah sure, I should have cut his limbs off with what? My bucket helmet?" That made her laugh bitterly and she thumped the bar for more beer.

"I bet it's real easy to tell people what they shoulda done when you just watch it on these magic window things." She shot back moodily pointing at a TV over the bar which currently featured a girl made of stone hacking away sullenly at a monster while a larger monster stood on it's back. Mindy would recognize them as Sandy and the Initiate.

"You ran into a house of mirrors. Duh. Break the mirrors with the helmet, grab yourself a shank carefully and wait. Those teeth won't mean shit if he's chewing on glass and blood. Or hell, go for the eyes if his strength's going to be a problem. Hell, if you REALLY want to fuck with him? Give him a sharp stab in the stomach. It'll take forever to bleed out and it'll be painful as fuck."

When she looked at the screen, she was transfixed a moment, looking at Sandy, and a fleeting gaze of concern was clearly there, then passed. "Yeah, have you figured out yet that there's a reason for that?"

"So that everywhere I go people can ask me how it felt to get ripped apart by a crazy eyeless guy?" She shot back with her mood only getting worse.

"Who by the way? Is wearing my hair! How messed up is that!? He's got one of my braids around his wrist like a bracelet!" She was shouting now and the bar was turning to look at her.

"I mean a trophy is a trophy! Hell I'd take a tooth, or even an ear! But he called it a friendship bracelet. I do NOT wanna be his friend."

"No, so that people know that you're no one to be fucked with when someone's coming after you. Now people have no choice but to ONLY see you as the girl getting ripped apart by the crazy guy. It hurts your chances with sponsors."

If you didn't know how to play your angle anyway.

"And quit shouting, it makes you look stupid."

"I don't even know what a sponsor is!" Ruffnut shouted in defiance "And that's stupid, why would people think they shouldn't mess with me after seeing that?"

It seemed to Ruffnut that if she saw someone get eaten and they came back she would just laugh at them.

"Besides, I may look stupid but the jokes on you. I totally am so there!"

Queen of comebacks, Ruffnut.

"Oh god," Mindy muttered, covering her face with her hand. "Seriously, sit fucking down, you're embarrassing yourself. I was SAYING you should at least have cut the fucker, so people knew you meant business. You didn't even kill anyone, did you?"

She hadn't the first time either, which just made this harder.

"Yeah, I figured that out. Anyone yelling in a bar can't be the brightest."

"Thor almighty if I can't shout when I'm drinking how am I supposed to have any fun?" She roared feeling exhilarated by finally letting all her feelings out after a day of glowering with embarrassment.

Blazing with hot blooded viking needs she thrust her foot out at Mindy's stool knocking it out from under her.

That was poor planning. See, Mindy was just about to take a drink when the stool was knocked under her, so she was able to brace herself on the table...with her face hitting it.

The bar, at this point, went quiet. There was fighting at times, certainly, but the idea of someone that wasn't the Capitol hitting a mentor? That was unheard of.

Not that Mindy cared about any of that. Now, she DID care about the blood from the side of her head and the ringing in her ears. But she'd be fair.

"Get up on your legs and put your fists up." She was quiet, but her face held none of the casualness of earlier. "Because now we are fighting, fucknut."

Unfortunately, a fair fight was not what vikings were all about.

Rather then standing up Ruffnut responded by throwing half a mug of beer into Mindy's face and following it up with a headbutt. The rush of pain from skulls connecting always sent a wave of euphoria through the viking girl leaving her feeling wired.

This was what she should have been doing all along. Being separated from her brother had thrown her off. But she was finding herself again.

The bartender called the peacekeepers. They would have less then five minutes to settle this before they were hauled away.

The first hit she hadn't seen coming. A MUG though, that was different. She deflected it quick, which of course left her open for the headbutt.

She had to admit, it hurt, but as it turned out, the little girl had a harder head than the viking would have anticipated. What was more, taking the hit gave her enough time to get close enough to land a hard upper right punch to the throat.

Mindy was having a bad, BAD week. This was making it a lot better.

The punch was enough to crumple Ruffnut's windpipe for the moment and she made a hillarious sort of squeak as she fell backwards off her stool. She landed flat on her back as the stool skittered into Mindy's legs simply by the force of Ruffnut's fall.

Wheezing the blond girl was wide open as she took a moment to struggle to her feet. Some of the crowd was screaming and fleeing...some were cheering them on.

Mindy winced slightly when the stool ran into her, and she kicked it hard, enough that it broke as it flew across the room. She was already getting into the groove of the fight and was going straight for the face now, pounding hard.

If they wanted a fight? They would get one. It hadn't been long since her last one: you could even see some of the faded cuts on her top right temple.

Unfortunately as far as fights went this one was very clearly one sided. Ruffnut had strength and durability on her side but Mindy had training and much more built up anger.

Managing to get a hand on Mindy's face to blind her Ruffnut could only see out of one eye now as the other began to swell. Boney knees jabbed at Mindy while the duo tumbled and rolled around the room knocking over a table of drinks.

Mindy had no problem with boney knees of course: she's had much more than that smashed against her, and in no time, Mindy had the girl effectively pinned to the ground, though not without her share of bruises and a swelling on her right arm.

"Say it. You know you have to."

"Say what?" Ruffnut asked before lunging her head forward to bite at Mindy's shoulder. The girl had some thick strong teeth for coming from a world that hadn't discovered proper dental practices yet. Her scrawny arms and legs strained and kicked, surprising strength earned from years of growing up rough and wild.

Oh, you wanted to do that? Fine. Mindy smashed her shoulder hard into the girl's mouth, sucking in her breath when the teeth came into contact with her flesh. She wasn't done yet though, and was still able to block a few of the blows before delivering a well placed body check full force.

Ruffnut let the wind out of her lungs as she was flattened to the floor by someone half her size. It was almost frightening to see someone so small with so much force behind her. Where was it all coming from?

The door to the bar was kicked open as men in white full body armor arrived. Peacekeepers! But Ruffnut wasn't distracted and in her winded and weak state she grabbed a fistful of hair to yank Mindy's head before slamming a fist into the side of her head.

"BACK OFF!" She hissed as the peacekeepers aimed their tasers.

Oh man, she had a pretty damn good right hook, and it helped her more when she had a fistful of her hair. Of course, Mindy HATED having her hair pulled, so a pretty vicious forearm to the face. Ruffnut would be seeing stars after that one.

Of course the peacekeepers came. Mindy held up a hand to let them know they were dealing. After all, they didn't plan to KILL each other, just have a nice, clean bar fight.

Which she would win, damn it.

Ruffnut was seeing stars, and unfortunately she liked that. Her face was in a crooked, manic grin as the blood poured from her nose. When Mindy's hands came up she swung again catching her in the jaw before ten different sets of taser needles lit up her back like a Christmas tree.

It was like flipping a switch. The gangly girl dropped to the floor and began seizing and twitching wildly. Her muscles were firing in all different directions at the same time leaving her completely incapacitated.

And thus would end Ruffnut's first day among modern society. Twitching on the floor of a gay bar with a broken nose, a black eye and a tiny sense of accomplishment.

Mindy took the hit, and a moment later the taser did its work, incapacitating Ruffnut. Mindy sighed, watching the girl twitch on the floor.

"It's just a bar fight," she muttered, glaring at the bartender. "We weren't trying to kill each other, just beat each other up!"

The bartender seemed pretty pleased with the outcome and resumed their work washing glasses.

"Bar fights break furniture. And furniture costs money. If you wanna break bones and draw blood do it somewhere else."

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I've never seen a place quite like this

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