thecapitol | Wake up in the morning feeling like P Diddy

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Wake up in the morning feeling like P Diddy

Who| John Watson, Sherlock Holmes and anyone they encounter
What| Exploring, complaining, all that wholesome stuff
Where| Throughout the Capitol
When| After John's introduction as punishment for Sherlock messing with the cameras
Warnings/Notes| No warnings as of yet. This post can also be used for meeting just John or just Sherlock, we can engineer them splitting up for fact-finding a la Scooby Doo if you prefer!

Having been given a quick crash course on everything Sherlock had learned during his stay in the Capitol and his rather unpleasant experiences in the Arena, John had asked if Sherlock wouldn't mind showing him around some of the more interesting places in the sprawling, decadent city. He felt like having a rather stiff drink, actually- something to wash down the hideously confusing day he'd had- though he doubted he could convince Sherlock to join him in destroying a few braincells at whatever passed for a pub in this ridiculous place.

"So, where's next?" he asked, as lightly as he could manage as he stuffed his hands into his pockets.

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"I just don't want to run into a few people from the last arena. Besides, the TVs there show the last Games a lot. It's not really good for your appetite, you know?"

The cafe, on the other hand, is quiet. Apparently it's supposed to be about looking at the fashions, and the baristas wear powdered wigs and white leather. Big art books of popular designers lay on the glass tables, and the chairs appear to be made of mannequins covered in plush cloth. A sort of tuneless piano music plays in the background.

"You paying?"

"The Capitol is, isn't it?" John said, pulling the card out of his wallet and examining it thoughtfully. He'd been told it would be good for practically everything he could want- and having done precisely nothing to earn either it, or, of course, the bizarre punishment holding such a card was meant to compensate for, he felt more than justified in using it. "Coffee, please," he asked one of the strangely costumed staff politely. "Make it a large one. Tea, and a couple of biscuits, if you've got them, thanks."

He gestured towards a table.

"Trust me, I've seen enough of the Games already and I haven't been called into one yet. Sherlock insists on studying the playback, as if it's good for anything beyond appetite suppression."

Howard takes a seat where he can see all the entrances to the cafe. He wants to know if anyone he's trying to avoid comes in. Unfortunately for John, that means if he wants to sit across from Howard, he'll have his back to the doors. And secretly, Howard's looking to see if John minds that.

He takes the coffee and loads cream and sugar into it until a few drops spill over the brim and into a ring around the base of the cup. "No, he's got the right idea. You need to watch them, know what to look for, know what you're getting into. If you go in blind you're not going to last long, probably."

John's fingers curl and uncurl uncomfortably for a moment, and there's a slight tension in his shoulders- but he sits anyway, clearing his throat as he settles himself into the strange plush chair. He wets his lips.
"No, you're right, he's right. It's important, and to be honest, I've seen worse."
He looks up with a tight but politely grateful smile as his order is placed in front of him and pulls the cup close, curling his fingers around it as if for warmth. A sip of tea that's really still a little too hot to drink seems a more palatable option than continuing on that line of thought, so he lifts it to his lips.

"Yeah, me too." Howard doesn't drink from the coffee yet, waiting for it to cool a bit, because he wants to guzzle it and he knows it'll burn his mouth. He frowns and sighs. He thinks he's too young for all this crap, but then again, maybe if you get a load of trauma when you're fifteen that just means you have more years in your adult life to get over it.

"Okay, so." Howard pulls a basic first aid 101 guide out of his backpack. "I been reading this book and it mostly makes sense, but a lot of it seems to be about not moving the body or keeping people calm until an ambulance comes. There's no ambulance coming out in the Arena. What do you do then?"

Kind of a broad question, but.

John put his cup down carefully and scanned the cover of the book briefly, reaching out to examine it a little more carefully.
"Well, to be honest, there's a volume of medical knowledge that you just won't pick up in less than a year," he explained. "Basic emergency responders need a great and a half of training, and their job is to stabilise and get you to a hospital. First aid is definitely a start, but I get the feeling if you need much more than that in the arena you might as well count yourself out unless you can get a sponsor to help you."

"I don't like relying on other people." He folds his arms around himself in a guarded position, eyes flicking from his coffee to the doors. "I just need to be able to put myself together long enough to find a place and recuperate if I bust an ankle or get a laceration without getting an infection or making it worse."

He nodded, understanding the sentiment, though he couldn't personally agree. Being a soldier meant you relied entirely on your faith in the abilities of the rest of your unit, after all, and they on you.
"Yes, getting yourself to somewhere safe and keeping an eye on infection would work if you weren't being put in an arena where they will make sure you can't just hole up and wait it out. Mostly, if you can stop the bleeding and keep wounds clean- that's your priority."

"I think I know what we're looking at with the arenas better than you do," Howard says, suddenly hostile in his tone. "I lasted five weeks in the last arena with a fucked-up ankle. Five weeks where it just got worse and harder to walk on."

John's eyebrows raised. "I'm not saying I have a better understanding of the arena than anyone, trust me. I've just been told that holing up isn't an option. Your ankle- did you try splinting it?"

The aggression seems to leave Howard, but his eyes are still narrowed. He leans back in his chair, like a surly teenager being interrogated by the school principal. "Yeah, I did."

He doesn't mention with what, because John doesn't need to know that Howard is very, very good at being a crafty, resourceful scavenger. "Holing up's not a great option, but since I'm not exactly a heavyweight prizefighter, I don't got any better ones."

He nodded. "None of the options seem good to me, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't wish I was still in combat condition. Or that I had some kind of superhuman power... it doesn't seem like the Capitol has much of an idea of fairness."

"Oh, yeah. Poor you. You're really at the disadvantage here." Howard rolls his eyes and starts to drink his coffee. It takes effort to do so slowly, instead of just chugging it down.

"Well, it's true I don't have your winning attitude," John agreed with a slight smile. "But I'm sure I'll manage. Look, I'm happy to answer any questions you might have about field medicine, but most of the protocol I'm familiar with involves a long-term plan of moving a patient to a care facility, or equipment neither of us is likely to have. Beyond that, I'm just here for breakfast. If you want to go, that's fine."

"No, I'm fine." Howard's demeanor suddenly turns meek and he looks down. "It's good coffee, too."

Well, most food in the Capitol is good. He picks at the edge of a napkin with his fingernails.

"Not using the training centre or the credit line?" he asked, conversationally. "Not judging, just curious. I don't mind spreading out my allowance, I'd never use it all- but if there's a reason I should know about, a reason not to use it, I'd appreciate the heads up."

"Maxed out my credit card." An unfortunate side effect of eating out all the time, and eating unhealthy amounts. Howard's trying to put some weight back on his starved body before the next arena, and there is the fact that food is a comfort. "I got, um. I got cut up by a guy last arena, and I'm avoiding him, so that's why I'm not at the training center."

He tries to sound like that doesn't deeply bother him, but his face goes a shade pale remembering it. He keeps fiddling with the napkin and staring at the tabletop, the swirls in the coffee.

Edited 2013-03-12 02:27 (UTC)

John clears his throat, a little uncomfortably. Having had a diagnosis of PTSD himself, he's more than a little aware of the common elements between his condition and the symptoms Howard is presenting. Frankly, he's surprised more of the returning tributes aren't crippled by it.
“That... definitely makes sense to me," he offers carefully, not sure what else to say. He's no psychiatrist, even if Howard was asking for one- which he's sure he's not. "I'd probably do the same."

Howard grits his teeth in the back and takes another gulp of coffee. "Yeah, well, I guess I'm just supposed to get over it, here. What happens in the arena stays in the arena, right?"

He wants to believe that it can be that way, at least. He feels shaky, and he tries to shrug it off, because there's no need to seem any more vulnerable in front of a relative stranger. John hasn't done anything too suspicious yet, although Howard's noted the reluctance to sit facing the wall instead of the door, but Howard's in no position to be trusting these days. "Anyway, it was the guy I went to for help with my ankle. That's why I'm trying to learn to do medicine on myself, so I don't make the same mistake twice."

He nods, beginning to understand. It seems that he's only just begun to grasp the full horror of this place, after all, though he doubts any of the tributes would accept psychological care from the Capitol, even if it were on offer. He'd had enough trouble trying to accept help from his therapist back home even when it'd been a compulsory condition of his army pension, and for all her faults she'd never been part of a culture that actively enjoyed his suffering and found it entertaining.
"Can I ask a question? What happens to whoever wins the arena- do they get their injuries healed too?"

"Yeah, they don't want a corpse as their Victor, you know? It's only after they're old news that they cut their tongues out and stuff."

Howard drains the rest of his coffee and searches through his pockets for some cash. He's been pickpocketing most of it, so he has enough to feed himself outside the training center in spite of having run up his credit limit long ago, but he still waits to see if John will offer to buy more.

"Cut their tongues--"

He cut himself off, not quite able to mask the horror quickly enough. Clearly, this was an aspect of Capitol life Sherlock had yet to inform him about.

"Wait. If you win, they cut your tongue out?"

"Sometimes. As like, a bonus prize." Howard watches the horror with a sort of satisfaction, no longer feeling like the only one at the table off-balance. Keeping John on his toes means Howard can back away from the memory of Aunamee on top of him with a knife, punching holes through his clothing and through his gut with a seven-inch blade.

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Wake up in the morning feeling like P Diddy

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lol damn you autocorrect great=/= year

haha it's okay, I got the meaning

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