Mass murder was the last straw [OPEN]

[formersurgeon]

Who| Joan Watson and OPEN
What| Joan is talking to friends, and to people she hasn't met yet, looking for allies to help her bring down the Capitol.
Where| The Speakeasy, the Training Center, the park
When| After the revelation of District 3's destruction and Penny's predictable lies.
Warnings/Notes| If you would like Joan to approach your character in one of these places, tag in with what your character is doing and I'll have her initiate contact.


I. The Speakeasy

"The Speakeasy's theirs."

That's what Wyatt had told her when they had only moments to speak freely to each other while the Capitol was unable to look in on their thoughts. So when Joan goes looking for potential allies, she starts there. The dive is, as always, dark and loud, perfect for hiding lips and faces and drowning words. She goes to the bar, orders what passes for beer in Panem, and carries to a booth in the corner where she can see the whole room, as well as the door. She looks for people she knows, people she recognizes.

II. The Training Center

Joan has met a number of people in the training center. It's one place where she knows she can find Tributes without going floor by floor, which would be both time consuming and suspicious.

She walks into the gymnasium and surveys the stations. If she sees no one, she makes her way to the shelter-making station, and looks over the different supplies.

III. The park

Joan isn't exactly looking for anyone in the park. Instead, she's looking (without looking like she's looking) for spots that might be sufficiently free of cameras and microphones to make good meeting place for sensitive conversation.

Of course, that doesn't mean she isn't also aware of the people around her. Sitting on benches, passing her by...following her...

Comments

[formersurgeon]

"I haven't seen you in a while," she said, facing him and leaning one elbow on the bar. "You know, now that you're too good to die in the Arena with the rest of us."

She delivered the gallows humor with a wry twitch of a smile.

[the_marshal]

Despite himself, he felt his mouth twitching around a mouthful of bourbon.

"Out here, in there, we're all gunna end up in the same place."

The liquor burned pleasantly down his throat, gave an even deeper huskiness than usual -- but still did nothing to warm the lingering chill along his spine.

"How've ya been, Joan?" he asked, turning a bit to meet her gaze, the wry humor fading as he looked her over. "I'm condolences, 'bout Sherlock."

[formersurgeon]

Her smile faded, and she swallowed and looked away, her gaze falling on her glass. She closed her fingers around it, the condensation gathering where her skin met the glass.

"Which one?" she asked with a slight, joyless smile.

[the_marshal]

He stopped pretending, the last of his already weak humor slipping away, face slackening, eyes darkening.

Nobody here was a stranger to pain, no sense trying to hide it.

"Both," he sighed.

[formersurgeon]

"Thank you," she replied softly.

She considered her next move for a moment, lips pressed. Wyatt wasn't close to Sherlock, at all. He might have even still held some animosity toward him for what Sherlock had done to Howard. He wasn't someone the Capitol would look to to be properly mournful of what had happened. But he also was certainly not someone to go spreading this type of information.

"So, if I were to tell you something, could you promise to be discrete with the information?"

[the_marshal]

Holding another mouthful of burning liquor against his cheek, he glanced over at her, then back, gesturing to the Speakeasy wordlessly.

He kept their secrets. Her's would be just as safe.

"Cross my heart," he promised, shifting a fraction closer to make it easier for her to keep whatever was on her mind low.

[formersurgeon]

She shifted closer as well, and looked around one last time to make sure no one could listen in. Satisfied, she turned back to Wyatt.

"Sherlock faked his death," she said, quiet and simple. "He's alive."

[the_marshal]

Wyatt blinked and unconsciously his eyes slipped past the bar and over to the door that lead to the back rooms.

We are working to get people moved to District 13.

Catching himself, he blinked again and squashed down the immediate questions he had. The sudden lurch in his gut that had nothing to do with Sherlock.

"Congratulations then, I 'spose," he murmured. "Instead'a the other."

[formersurgeon]

She shook her head miserably. It wasn't an easy thing, being without Sherlock. She missed him terribly. And now that "her" Sherlock was gone...

"You're the only person I've told. There are friends of his that still think he's dead"

[the_marshal]

He reached out and rested a warm, callused hand on her arm. Reassurance.

"Yer secret's safe with me, ya got my word."

There might not have been any love lost between him and Sherlock, but he considered Joan a friend and what he could do for her, he would.

[formersurgeon]

She put her hand over his and squeezed it gently in gratitude.

"How are you doing? What's the life of a victor like?"

[the_marshal]

He shrugged.

"I 'magine everyone's in jus' about the same boat now," he replied. "What they did to three...."

It hung over everything. An inescapable cloud, darkening the already uncertain horizon.

"We've all got our hands tied."

[formersurgeon]

She shook her head a little.

"It's the most disturbing thing the Capitol has done yet. Aside from killing all those people...it's the act of a crazy person. I can't see any benefit to them. It's not a show of force, because they deny even doing it. They destroyed workers and factories that they need to fulfill the massive demand for tech in the Capitol. As far as I can tell, they threw a temper tantrum and pushed the button."

[the_marshal]

"Does it matter much why?" he asked with a deep frown, even the liquor seeming to loose its taste then. "Don't change it. Those people are gone - were murdered - an' there ain't any reason that's excuse for that."

And there was nothing to be done it, now here, not now.

For where it really counted.

[formersurgeon]

"It doesn't change anything," she agreed. "But it tells us about future actions. We know now that we can't count on them acting in their own best interest. That's important to know, if we're going to fight them."

[the_marshal]

He chewed the inside of his cheek, trying to force down how it made him feel. The growing sense of uselessness, of helplessness, in the face of things that could not be changed. Couldn't be fixed. Couldn't even be eased.

Blowing a breath out through his nose, he tried to focus again on what he could do.

"It means we ain't a shot alone. They took down a whole district, us workin' against one another - tributes against tributes, tributes against the districts, one side versus the other, ain't gonna get anybody anywhere 'cept in a shallow grave."

This house divided, cannot stand,, as true now as when Lincoln had said it.

[formersurgeon]

"It's true. We need to work with each other, as much as we can."

Joan knew that conflict amongst the Tributes, the rebels, the Districts, was inevitable, though. The best they could hope for was to minimize it. To be peacemakers even as they waged war.

[the_marshal]

To that effect, he leaned again, lips dropping closing to her ear.

"There's a man here," he told her, the words slow and careful - more for her than him. He didn't want to have to risk repeating himself. "In the back, he's working for the rebels. He's hopin' to find tributes here who can help."

[formersurgeon]

She listened carefully, not wanting to miss anything, or make him repeat himself.

"Do you have his name? Or what he looks like?"

[the_marshal]

He shook his head. Not honestly knowing what name Elias would be going by this time, or what disguise he'd be under.

"He'll find you." That, however, he was real sure of. "Come here. He'll find ya."

[formersurgeon]

She squeezed his hand again.

"I will. Thank you."

[the_marshal]

He nodded and toasted her again with his glass as he took another drink.

Still something he could do after all.