thecapitol | Crispy and crunchy

Entry tags:

Crispy and crunchy | OPEN

Who| The Disciple; OPEN
What| Di discovers there are ways to get the eats she so desperately misses
Where| Anywhere from petshop to tower
When| Before the Crowning
Warnings/Notes|Eating bugs

Everyone had looked at her odd in the beastshop. She'd stepped in to peer at the purrbeasts, small and colored in a rainbow of hues. Orange, pink and blue cover her hands by the time she notices the rest of the shop. Specifically that box full of very familiar sounds. She could feel her ears perk up, ready for a pounce.

She doesn't realize it's pet food. It takes several frazzled and slightly confused shop workers for her to comprehend that they don't eat these crickets themselves. It makes it even worse on them when she insists on two full bags of them.

They're jumping around madly inside the paper bag, making skittering noises that just make her mouth water. She grabs one as she steps outside, pops it in her mouth, and crunches. Delicious. It takes most of her willpower not to down the whole bag honestly.

Inside the tower, she notices someone watching her, hearing the skittering chirping bags, and offers one by its little wings.

"Want a --" She looks at the bag, "Cricket?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Fuck yes!" Karkat says, snatching the cricket out of her claws and stuffing it in his mouth. It makes a satisfying crunch when he bites down. "Holy shit," he says, after he swallows, "where the fuck did you find chirpvermin in the Capitol?"

Edited 2014-07-15 01:19 (UTC)

"Something called a petshop." She pulls out another and tosses it in her mouth with a grin. The bag is then gently tilted towards him with a bit of a hole for him to get them out without the whole bag taking flight.

"They feed them to their scalebeasts, can you believe that? Such a waste of good food."

He plucks one out delicately with his claw and crunches it. "I wonder what they'd taste like covered in chocolate," he muses. "They do that with oinkbeast flesh, you know. Dip it in chocolate. It's so you can have sweet and savory and salty all at the same time."

She ponders that for a moment, looking in the bag. It seems a little wrong to ruin poor chirpvermin like that.

"You'd have to kill them first. Or I guess you could dip them in it. I think I'll eat them as is. I've never been a fan of mixing my flavors."

She shakes the bag and catches one as it makes an escape, "We could find some chocolate if you want to try it, though."

Edited 2014-07-15 02:20 (UTC)

He shakes his head. "I can wait. These are pretty good on their own. So, wait, does the Capitol just feed their normal bugs to their companion animals? How fucking decadent of them."

She rolls her eyes in agreement, "Ridiculous isn't it? It seems like their sort of thing though. Decadence is their game. They serve fish raw nowhere near water, feed their pets chirpvermin--little would surprise me at this point."

He was just passing by. Just moving on casual, not even looking at her, in his normal slouching onward march. She might not have even been talking to him. All truth told, he might not have heard her at all.

But he hears the chirp.

He stops midstep and abruptly turns, reeling on her. Or more specifically, the bag she's got. His face becomes one of awe and want. A whole fucking lot of want.

"MESSIAHS AND MISTRALS ABOVE. Are those motherfucking sweetbugs? THE SONG SINGING SCURRIERS, the clamorous choristers delectable..." Oh Mirth. It took one hot second for him to get to her. Now he's reaching out like he's mesmerized and he only just catches himself. He looks up to her. "WHERE. Where all did you find them?"

She takes a step back when he rounds on her all of a sudden. To be honest, she hadn't even been talking to him, but there he was, stepping in front of her and hand out to grab the cricket. She doesn't have time to pull it back before he's there.

"...A shop?...I was happy to find them but you seem to think they're the most delectable thing on earth.

The cricket is still held out even if she has an eyebrow raised. Ridiculous.

"DON'T YOU MOTHERFUCKING JUDGE ME," He starts, pointing a digit.

He reaches out slow. Real slow. And careful, toward that cricket in held out in her hand. And then, like lightening, snaps it up and pops it in his mouth. He eyes her all the while. You going to stop me?

He swallows it down, stifling a pleased noise, but he still looks at her like she's going to reach down his throat and pull it back.

"You ain't even up and know how long he's got at for a want, aight?"

"Just as long as I have?" She teases for a moment but in a vague idea that making peace is probably better than withholding delicious treats just to be stubborn and selfish. She is a little proud of herself. She found them when no one else did. Between water insects and these crickets, she had a lovely supply of snacks and it was almost worth gloating about. If she gloated about such things.

She holds out the bag, still keeping a firm grip so he doesn't run off with it, but the top is clearly open for taking a few.

"I've shared with others, might as well."

"HE WAS HERE BEFORE YOU WAS," He insists for the simple sake of being right.

But she offers them. Even all despite. Half of him still thinks it must be a trick, maybe the bugs are poisoned. All such a thought passes with him gnawing at his lip. He decides though, fuck it, it will be worth it.

It's true, he may be over-valuing that of some bugs. But he is and has always been one of simple pleasures, and food is one of those. He would likely break down to weep for a motherfucking Elixir proper at this point.

So he reaches in the bag, taking more than he likely should and pretending it's just because his hands are abnormally bigger- still a "handful". Then pops a sizeable portion of that in his mouth, to the point the little bugs can be seen in the stretch of his cheeks.

He is looks stupidly pleased, eyes closing with it. And by the little sound he makes, he really is.

She snorts, almost involuntarily, at the sight of him with his cheeks full of bugs and pleased as anything. Amusing, wriggler-like. She glances back into her bag with a sigh and rattles around the few left.

"I didn't mean to let you take half the bag. I swear, what are you two?"

She tucks the bag to her chest and delicately takes out a single bug. It crunches between her teeth, satisfying and delicious. If he was one for gulping down half a bag, she wanted to savor it.

"And you might have been here before but apparently you didn't look very hard."

"Eight," He corrects quickly, automatically, the moment he is able to do so without speaking through crickets. Then he pauses, thinking. Was that right? Yes, probably. He's fairly certain. And so he'd be nine in another half sweep. He nods, more to himself.

"AND HE DIDN'T TAKE HALF THE BAG THERE'S STILL..." He squints. "There's still some left... AND FUCK YOU. He's scoured this place up and motherfucking down, all getting a watch on for the wicked elixirs and he never found no chirpbugs. THAT'S WHERE ALL A SENSIBLE CIVILIZATION WOULD KEEP THEM. Chirpbugs, elixir." He gestures in a way that says they should be side by side, on shelf, in market, so on. He states this as absolute irrefutable fact.

She is about to gloat--just a little, because he seems so torn up about this whole thing and she can't help the need to tease him, even if they're trying to work this shit out--but he corrects the number and she stops, hand halfway to mouth, cricket squirming by its wings.

"You're really only eight?"

There is slightly more emphasis on 'only' than he'd probably like. Sure, her moirail was younger than that, but it's still startling to realize this troll capable of thousands of sweeps is so very young.

He bristles because there is more emphasis on that "only" than he gets on as to fancy. This is it. This is where the troll gets as to ask why he has a title. This is where all the "Initiate" part starts making sense to motherfuckers and he already ain't looking forward.

"YEAH, SO? What the motherfuck about it?" He says, fighting a pout. He'll give a little lee-way to see if all it might get as to turning any which way. He stands up a little straighter. Just to show he's still a soldier. And still tall.

"It's just weird they brought you so early in your lifetime. All the sweeps ahead of you and to bring you so young."

Weird really. It makes sense in her case, too much longer and the wounds are just scars under scars, not still the bright vivid lines on her heart, her mind. If they wanted to hurt him, bringing her far enough along to be broken but not far enough to have moved past it all, that makes sense. He wasn't brought to hurt anyone.

They could have brought him older and more full of hate. More murderous, less forgiving, more violent. She wonders who made that mistake. Who brought him young and how they paid for it.

Oh. Well that's not the direction he thought this would go.

"THEY WOULDN'T HAVE BROUGHT HIM ELDER. He would've culled them all too easy. IT'D HAVE BEEN A GODDAMN DISASTER UNTO THEY. They wouldn't have been able as to stop him without no casualty. I AIN'T WEAK. But he would be stronger natural."

He'd have turned the tribute tower to gore, basically. He knows that. He doesn't even truly know his older self and he knows that. They pretended they had power by having him at their supposed control but they feared him still.

"BECAUSE HE'S BEING A SOLDIER TOO, BE WHY. Soldier's go on order. KINGS GET AS MAKING THEM. They probably got as to up and figure." It was the difference where Terezi could stand him and where she thought his older self an unknowable boogie man.

"S'BETTER AS SUCH. He's being alright with it, that they did as all they did." Because he got things he wouldn't have. People. Experiences.

Fear up and being if they ever send him back only as to return him here. Fear that so many sweeps would wipe out what he has in one fell swoop. But he keeps that quiet. They hadn't done it yet and he should hope to keep it that way.

"Oh--I didn't really think of that." She frowns, "They would have loved you in the arena though. Probably killed you off somehow to keep you from winning, keep you in the arena for a while."

She can just picture how they might have done it, "And I doubt you'd have had allies. I suppose they traded one sort of entertainment for another."

And that seems harsh, suddenly, because while she knows they're all just entertainment to them, calling his allies entertainment just feels wrong. She stumbles over her words to correct it.

"I didn't mean--they like to see us suffer. Letting us make allies gives us more place here, gives them more ways to make us suffer--you know?"

I doubt you'd have had allies. It's true, probably, the tributes here didn't all fancy him as he was now. He couldn't hardly blame that no one would go near then. But, for foolish reasons, it stings anyway. Hate his future as much as he does, it's still him. It still hurts to think-- know-- he'd have been dodged all like that.

"AND DONE WHAT WITH HIM UP IN THE TOWER? Chain him? PUT HIM ON WATCH CONSTANT, ALL MOTHERFUCKING EYES OF HE?" He says wry. Then he shakes his head. "I know you ain't mean you, sister. CAN TALK POLITIC TO HE WITHOUT HIM GETTING NO CONFUSE ON. I know the cruelty of care. I KNOW WHO DINES UPON THE DEAD MEAT."

He breathes deep. "Say true, she'd be right he supposes. THEY GAMBLED. If he had been let alone he'd still be their monster. BUT THEY GAMBLED ODDS THEY FAVORED EQUAL."

And gambled wrong in a hundred other ways. Way where they'd made an enemy out of him, when they could've had otherwise. But oh well. Fuck them.

She shakes her head, rattling her bag for the last few crickets and nabbing one as it tried to escape. She supposes it could be equal odds. But what strange things they had to weigh. Was it worth the bother?

"It's strange. Their choices are so...random. Why me--why Terezi? Why you or Signless or--or any of the humans? Pruna or Sandy--why bother with any of us. I don't understand why they wanted us trolls at all. To push us down, show dominance over us?"

The false calling of the Nameless brings a frown, what all with her going. He didn't realise the two were close, her and Sandy either. He sighs, rubs at his neck.

"The thing what be with punishment done up times being any," He says, "Is what be taught. AT WHOM IT MAKES LIKE TO BE, THE TEACHING. Signless and yourself be obvious; example to the rebellious. HIS BE A SHOW OF POWER, SEE US TAME THE MOTHERFUCKING BEAST, DO NOT DARE THINK TO CHALLENGE. Nameless, Sand sister, Terezi. ALL AND EVERY GOT FOR PURPOSE. It ain't to punish our ownselves singular. IT IS TO TEACH THOSE OF THE MASSES WHAT AS WE REFLECT AND REPRESENT."

He shrugs his shoulders then. That's his theory, not a true answer. "Still does make as to be randomlike though. MUST BE SOMETHING WHAT GETS AS TO RESTRICT. Something what do and don't get on allowing the wicked shit. IF IT GOT OF CHOSING ONLY, THEY COULD BE AS SIMPLY TO PULL OF FUTURES OF THEIR OWN, OR TIMELINES ALTERED, TO GET WHATEVER ALL THEY WISH."

Anna draws back from the woman (woman???) offering her what appears to be a live insect, and blinks.

"Oh. Um. No, thank you? I don't..." She giggles. "I don't usually eat bugs, or anything like that."

Well, she might. If they were chocolate-covered, maybe.

She pulls the cricket back to look at it. She really doesn't understand why humans wouldn't eat them. They're delicous and grow positively anywhere. Can they really afford to just feed them to pets.

"...Don't humans eat them? They're delicious, I promise. I mean, I can kill them if you'd rather not eat them live. Humans don't eat anything live do they?"

Silly her, that must be the problem.

Anna giggles. "Not generally! Unless we're trapped on a desert island, or something!" She peers at the insect in Di's hand, and then her gaze follows up the troll's arm, to her face, peering curiously at her horns. Wow. Those are wild.

The princess hesitates. "Um, maybe I might? If it wasn't alive, that is." Maybe. It's a really, really big maybe, cause she's eyeing up those legs and she's not sure she could stomach it. But she'd just hate to be rude!

"You don't have to, of course. We have to eat enough strange things in the arena. No need to force something on you here."

Still, it's strange. Maybe it's regional. Maybe it's more like peasant food, things the wealthy can afford better than. Too common to be allowed in the Capitol or--well she runs into a snag with her theory when it comes to the other tributes.

She tosses it in her mouth. The crunching noise is probably a little unsettling at best.

"Humans are definitely a bit strange. I suppose we all eat different things though."

Anna's visibly relieved, but she still watches with interest as the woman scarfs down the cricket like it's nothing. "I mean, wherever you're from--" She flushes. Does that sound insensitive? "They probably eat pretty differently from where I come from."

She cocks her head. "For example, ever had a krumkake? Or, or, chocolate-covered strawberries?"

Her relief isn't that hard to notice and the Disciple closes the bag, rolling the top down for a little extra security. Her treats weren't exactly cheap, even if they were easily replaceable.

"Alternia." She offers in response, "And--well I've had strawberries. I think. I think they were strawberries."

Her brow wrinkles as she thinks about the red fruit she had eaten. Was it the round ones or the drop shaped ones? Not that it mattered, as she'd never had it covered in chocolate. Covering things in chocolate, it seemed, was a human thing to do. Signless had probably had one.

"What's a krumkake?"

"Oh!" Right. Anna has no clue where that is. It's probably fine. But she grins when she's asked what a krumkake is, because it's one of her favorite treats in the whole world, so she's only too eager to explain.

"Krumkake is, well...it's a kind of cookie. You bake it reeeally thin on an iron with pretty designs on it, and then roll it into a cone shape and fill it with whipped cream, or chocolate, and then dust it with sugar. And they taste so good. But I bet nobody around here makes them."

Cookies she's had, but the elaborate way of making it intrigues her. She'd only had one or two pastries in her life before she came here and the idea of there being so many wide variations is appealing. And, most importantly, it is sweet with sweet.

"Is it a thing you only do at home? The people in District 7 had things like that. Things they made in particular. Map...some sort of syrup with trees, they made things like that into pastries and sweets. Or is it more like how everyone makes grubloaf a little differently? They don't make it the same way here?"

Three different trolls would all make it three different ways after all. It was always about what you were used to. And really, didn't all humans come from a world sort of like this. With these things. She's never really stopped to wonder.

"Mmhm!" Anna nods brightly. "I wish I could find them here, though. I bet people would just love them!" She can't help but allow herself a little pout, before cocking her head.

"I...don't want to be rude, Miss. But what exactly are you?"

She's about to ask how exactly you make it, do you need really special things to cook it or can you just sort of wing it with any sort of iron, when the age old question comes.

Well. Almost a dozen perigrees old question.

"I'm a troll?"

"Oh!" A surprising look of recognition comes over the princess's face. "I had no idea. You're so different from the trolls in Arendelle." She blushes.

"I'm sure you get that all the time, huh?"

"Wait--what?"

That has to be the first time someone recognized the name as a thing that existed, not some human fairytale, not some silly 'troll under a bridge' nonsense.

"You have trolls in Arendelle?"

Anna nods brightly. "Sure we do! Though--" She giggles. "They look a lot different from you." She bends down, placing her hand about knee high from the ground.

"They're about that tall, and they can roll themselves up to look like rocks. But they're super nice, and they know magic!"

That's when the Disciple wrinkles her brow. No--that's not right at all.

"Maybe...maybe we're not talking about the same sorts of trolls. I mean--maybe you all named them that because--I don't know why, but we come from Alternia. A whole other planet from Arendelle."

She pauses, "And I think magic is fake. Lowbloods have powers, psychic powers, which are sort of like magic."

Anna's excitement deflates visibly. "Oh. I suppose that's possible. Hmm." And then the troll woman says that she thinks magic is fake, and Anna can't help but laugh out loud.

"Oh, it's definitely real," she assures her. "My sister Elsa has ice powers. She built a whole castle out of it once!"

Today marks the first day that Nepeta has really been outside after the Arena. Having something that looking like Equius trying to kill her hadn't been the most enjoyable of circumstances and coming back to find that Cuthbert had left as well hadn't really helped. But even she knows that she can't stay indoors until the beginning of the next Arena and so she's decided that it's high time that she makes herself at least a little more present.

And the offer of a cricket is more then welcome besides.

"Of course I would! Wherefur did you get them?"

She leans in to give it to her, offering her the bag when the cricket is devoured. It's always nice to find those bits and pieces of home in their prison.

"They have them in 'petshops'. They feed them to their scalebeasts for some reason. I'll never quite understand humans."

It always is, yes. There'd been the bugs in the Arena, sure, but these ones are much less likely to have something hiding in them. If the bugs were to blame, and Nepeta isn't entirely certain. Isn't entirely certainly what to make of the whole arena as hold, save for that she doesn't want to think much about it.

"Well, I suppawse scalebeasts would be able eat them. But really, I don't know why the humans wouldn't want to eat them too."

She takes another cricket when Di offers, though. This is certainly much better than anything else, and know that she knows where to get them, things are definitely looking up. Especially if there are other sorts of bugs in the petshops.

"Humans are weird." The definitive answer on the subject. She'd found some were quite lovely but weirdness never stopped being a thing. Daylight, strange clothing and customs and a general weird attitude about food were only the beginning. It was the little things that weirded her out the most.

"If you want to get some, they'll look at you weird. Probably have to ask twice if you mention you want to eat them, not feed them to a scalebeast."

"They are."

Nice and oftentimes worth talking to, but still incredibly strange sometimes. Especially when it came to what they were and weren't willing to eat. But the promise of being able to have crickets more often is worth the strange looks she might get for eating them in public.

"And I suppawse I could let them think I had a scalebeast."

"I suppawse you could." She finds herself mimicking her, falling back in younger habits as she speaks.

"Though, really, I don't mind being looked at oddly. And they have the meowst adorable meowbeasts. Like ours but small and in efury color of the spectrum. I saw a pink and blue striped one, it tried to climb out onto my arm."

"Really?"

She's going to have to check things out, in that case. Nothing can ever really replace Pounce, but she certainly wouldn't mind having a meowbeast around. Or even just going to visit them, from time to time.

"Yes!"
And her excitement is contagious. She wished she'd thought ahead, brought back one, but what would she do during Arenas. Would the Avoxs care for it? What is the point of keeping a non lusus around anyways besides her own comfort.

" There was one, covered in patches, in our color, blue and pink. It was quite striking--and well. The color was slightly off hue but they never get the shade to match quite right. Even when they try to dress me in my color."

Nepeta's never been entirely certain about how pets are cared for. Or if they're cared for, over the span of time that marks the Arenas. But it'd almost be worth it to have a meowbeast around again, even if only a small one.

"You'd think they'd be better at matching it," she offers instead. She's bled - they've bled - enough for them in their Arenas that surely they have some idea of the actual color. Assuming they aren't having things filtered by something, but in any case she knows she'd be glad to help them get the color right if they'd only ask. "Meowre than they seem to be, anyway."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Crispy and crunchy | OPEN

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject