Staffer's Retreat

[whatisay]

WHO| Every Escort, Stylist and Mentor. Any Capitolites or Peacekeepers who might have reason to oversee or visit.
WHAT| A professional retreat for the overworked, underpaid, and super underappreciated Tribute Care Teams.
WHERE| A chalet in District One, easily accessible by train.
WHEN| Before the next death roll.
WARNINGS| Typical Capitolites being entitled asshats.
NOTES| I've put up some subthreads for various activities, if you want to add more just do so under the appropriate day subheader!

Staffer's Retreat. Mandatory. The teams for each District are given a handful of days to prepare for the weekend, which, they're told, is going to be scheduled for a weekend with no big shake-ups in the Arena and perfect weather for outdoor activities. On Friday morning, they're taken by train to a small chalet tucked into a mountainside. A few inches of snow covers the ground but the sky is clear, reflected in the beautiful lake at the base of the mountain.

Until Sunday evening, their days will be packed with "professional development". The schedule looks something like this:

Friday:
Icebreakers
Trust Falls
Hypothetical Scenarios: How to Be the First Person Chosen for a Bomb Shelter
Three-Legged Race
Self-Care Hour: Mandatory Yoga
Dinner
Breaking Down Stereotypes Workshop

Saturday:
Mandatory Mentor Group Therapy: PTSD is Not An Excuse
Mandatory Escort/Stylist Workshop: Building Trust with Your Tributes
Mandatory Sexual Harassment Training: Focus on Tribute/Mentor and Tribute/Escort Relationships
Lunch
Capture-the-Flag
Group Lego-Building
Dinner
12am Karaoke

Sunday:
5:30am Continental Breakfast
Compliment Circle
Journal Hour
Farewells

Comments

[conifer]

"Maybe," she smiles. It was far safer to resent him than the Capitol after all. Perhaps he wasn't as ornery as he made out to be then, but was playing a very clever game. Emily knew that it was really too much to hope.

Her brow furrows over as she tries to recall the name, but she'd deliberately distanced herself from the Games during her time in Seven, preferring to be alone in the forests than watching the bloodshed on TV that invariably gave her the flashbacks to her own Games, and the nightmares. "Penny?"

[president_evil]

His attention refocused on Emily, lights playing off the dark lenses of his glasses as his head turned back toward her.

"Hsiang Jiao," he clarified, giving her a beat to see if she recognized the woman by her given name. Then he went on, passing over the moment as if it hadn't happened. "She was a Peacekeeper, in much the same sense that one might call I one."

A broad name, for their specific purpose.

"She too had a way with the tributes, and eventually one of them killed her for it."

That much, he was certain Emily had heard about, even out in the Districts. The subsequent arrests of a dozen tributes, the failed escape attempts, the brandings.

"If they got to her, one shudders to think what they could do to an Escort."

[conifer]

Emily blanched a little as she recalled the bits and pieces that had filtered through to the Districts. He was right: if they could do that to a Peacekeeper, the Escorts stood no chance. She reflected how stupid it was of the Capitol to train the people who surely hated it most of all in deadly armed combat.

"Well, that's part of why I'm here. To balance him out somewhat, so the Tributes don't hate him too much."

[president_evil]

Wesker considered for a moment, recalling his single conversation with the man, his senses burning again with the memory.

"I'd ask for a raise, Miss Finch."

[conifer]

Emily chuckles a little at that. She would, if they thought she'd actually get one. As it is, she's happy just to keep her family in the far nicer house in Victor's Village, and ensure that her brothers never have to go into the reaping with the new format of the Games.

"What about you? Anyone you find difficult to work with?"

That seemed a far better question to ask this weekend rather than all of the pointless exercises to get them to work better.

[president_evil]

"It might be more effective to list those I find easy to work with," Wesker muttered, tone again dry, like a breeze over a desert. "Most of my tributes are the noble sort, and they chafe at any attempt to prove that victory has benefits not just for them, but their fellows."

His head twitched in a small movement, a sharp derisive shake.

"Highly frustrating."

[conifer]

"I haven't had the chance to get to know my tributes that well yet," she admits. "I'm sure there'll be a couple like that, though. Especially now the Capitol revives them. The stakes just aren't the same for them."

[president_evil]

"One would think that would make it easier for them. They could just play the game and be done with it."

And move to much more important things, if they were really so inclined.

"But they insist on being so short-sighted. It baffles really how so many of them have managed to survive this long."

[conifer]

"Because the Capitol finds them entertaining," she replies dryly. "Let's hope they stay on the entertaining side of the line, rather than becoming a real problem. For anyone apart from us Mentors, anyway."

[president_evil]

"From one victor to another, Miss Finch," Wesker said, his pale eyebrows arching above the dark lenses of his glasses. "I wouldn't suggest not holding your breath on that."

Though on which count, he didn't say.

At the head of the room, the moderator called time.