Flecks of the Heavens' Spat Out Spit [OPEN]

[whatisay]

WHO| Jason Compson and Open; Jason and Swann; Jason, Rick and Daryl
WHAT| Jason gets a migraine and is helpless; Jason beats an Avox; Jason gives Swann a gift; Rick and Daryl get the shotguns.
WHEN| Week 6
WHERE| D7 Suites; Swann's place
WARNINGS/NOTES| Avox abuse, migraines, general Jason awfulness. If you're going to tag the second prompt, please PP or PM me first so we can figure out where it's going and how far to take it, because Jason won't hesitate to put someone in jail.


I. Open

He knew he was going to have one of his headaches from the beginning of the morning, when every light seemed to have a ring radiating off of it and everything seemed to smell like rainwater. The one upside to the curse of these migraines is that he usually gets a few hours head start on them, with the feeling of deadly premonition, and so he spends most of the day trying to finish up everything as quickly as he can and clock out early. The calls to Sponsors and thank you cards to donors becomes a race against time, one which he sees himself losing too late to actually prevent disaster.

First he can't see, and then he can't move. Even breathing seems to put too much strain on him, and the throbbing, tightening hammering in his head gets worse with every exhale. The inside of his body feels like a live wire, sparking away inside his skull at camera-shutter speed. Nausea roils inside his throat and stomach, furling and unfurling like the tide.

When he opens his eyes the light is too bright, speckled with floating spots and halos, and he feels like the universe itself is trying to cram itself through his eyesockets and that his bones have made the opening too small to fit. So he keeps them shut and rolls over on the District Seven couch until he's facedown in a pillow, sweating slightly, trying not to whimper.

He has no hope of driving himself home, and even the idea of getting up seems a cruel joke. He tries twice, and both times a surge of nausea and a thunderclap of pain force him back down. So he lies there, hoping to whatever powers that be that his Tributes stick to their schedules and don't come bother him.



II. Open (please read note)

What started off as a strong Arena quickly loses those good odds as the District Seven Tributes die in the field and the District Suite gets repopulated. The worse it looks, the worse Jason's temper gets, until he's liable to throw something at the slightest provocation, which the Games video updates seem eager to supply him with. At least twice this week he's broken a glass, and yesterday smacked a table so hard that he has a ring of bruising around his finger like a wedding band.

With only Nick left in the Arena, Jason and Emily's chances are getting desperate, and the worst blow comes to Jason's ego when he realizes that no amount of fawning and flattery and networking seems to be enough to get Nick more supplies in the Arena. It stings to feel powerlessness, and to make it worse the only person willing to spot Nick a fire-starting kit's funds will only do it on condition that Jason go drinking with him - no sobriety allowed. Jason turns it down, but doesn't leave with his head held high so much as rankled and humiliated, and every ungrateful glance from his Tributes reminds him of how his family used to practically own this damn country and yet here he is, exposing his belly to anyone with money, helpless and inept and so, so frustrated with his life. Dressed in a suit he got from someone else's charity and supporting a home full of ingrates and lonely and with a fury as endless as the sky.

Whatever it is that set Jason off this time, it isn't sated just by smashing a piece of kitchenware. This time he backhands the Avox who rushes in to try and clean up the coffee mug he throws against the floor, sending them into the couch.



III. Swann

For someone who usually agonizes over every half-assi that goes to a necessary cause, Jason doesn't seem to mind spending money on Swann. He complains about it, at times, but it's more to go through the motions of complaining than because it actually bothers him. He buys her coffee when he can and tells her to save her money when they get lunch, getting sulky and defensive when she insists on splitting the tab. Sometimes he buys her a pastry on his way to pick her up for carpooling, although he doesn't let her eat it in the vehicle, and he has yet to ask her to help pay for fuel.

Today he shows up at her place with a large carrier in the back of his car, covered by a blanket, with a towel underneath it to protect the seats. Something inside is making scratching sounds. Jason looks a little frazzled, and shows up a few minutes late from a different route than he usually takes. He presses a button inside the car and the door opens for Swann.

"You coming, Honeymead?"



IV. Daryl and Rick

The rumors spread quickly after the Crowning, and all of them rub Jason the wrong way. A few photographs of him and Beth at the Crowning, him whispering into her ear, have made the rounds on tabloids, some of them even frontpage for the publications hungry enough to fabricate a scandal for readership. Jason's certain that he wouldn't ever touch a Tribute like that, but the fact that people are so eager to believe it of him leaves his pride feeling excoriated.

For his part, Jason doesn't treat Beth any differently, except for being a bit more stiff and cranky with her than he might have been before. But whispers swarm around them like a plague of mosquitoes, making a to-do out of something as simple as him Escorting her to a photoshoot with horses (A PONY FOR A PRICE?, a headline questions; another goes even more outrageous and wonders if Beth will say 'neigh' to marriage). He can only imagine the explanations she's making to the passel of Southerners who seem so eager to protect her.

Right now he's in the District Seven kitchen, glasses parked precariously on the tip of his nose as he writes by hand some math for the District budget. He's taken to putting most of his notes on his phone lately; he used to be able to leave writing around, but that was when most Tributes were entirely illiterate. His suit jacket hangs over the back of a chair and his shirt sleeves are pushed up to his elbows. A cup of coffee, long-cooled, sits beside him, and he occasionally asks his phone to answer some percentages questions for him.

Comments

[rictator]

A slight, involuntary twitch of his upper lip betrayed the depth of that particular wound, his eyes narrowing. Jason's methods were subtle; he'd taken the easy route in attempting to weaponize their connection with Beth. Unfortunately, easy also proved efficient in this case, as Rick couldn't deny the undercurrent of truth in his words. He needed no reminder of just how things had fallen apart, or where the blame for that fell - He felt the weight of it every time he looked at her.

The unconvincing smile slipped from his face, his gaze flickering down somewhere below the table's edge.

"I saw the magazines," he stated at length, his tone measured, even. What he did not see, however, were Jason's hands. Even before the turn, as a sheriff deputy, that small detail would have made him wary. Now, the potential threat of it was enough to tighten his grip on the back of the chair on front of him, forcing him right back on edge. The unknown variable piqued his survival instinct, his deeply-rooted paranoia all too willing to fill in the blanks with worst case scenarios.

Jason was baiting him. For what? To convince him to attack? Seemed simple enough. If he had a gun, he just had to cry self defense, and what would the Capitol care? One dead tribute, maybe two. If he was lucky.

Rick wasn't a murderer. He had no intention of making a move unless Jason gave him damn good reason to. Unless he proved himself a legitimate threat, to himself or the other two. It was only then that he'd have utilized one of the various ways he'd already mapped out to neutralize him. The kitchen had weapons enough for the task, both real and improvised, and between him and Daryl, there wouldn't be much of a fight.

It wasn't about feelings or rumours or anything else, at that point. It was about being smart. Safe, or whatever passed for it here.

"Figured it's only fair we hear your side."

[weaintashes]

As far as Daryl was concerned, Jason's condemnation of them didn't hold water — Beth hadn't died through any fault of theirs. Daryl himself had died protecting her, Rick had ultimately gotten trapped and killed in the caves. The truth of the matter was that Beth had been gunned down in cold blood, by one of her own districtmates, no less, and how convenient for that detail to go unmentioned. He huffed a humourless laugh.

"Saw the footage," he mumbled around a finger as he sucked the peanut butter off it, glancing from Rick to Jason with his eyebrows raised. "The guy that murdered her's from her own district. From your district. Sure was a winnin' strategy," he said dryly. If they were going to delegate blame and assign failure, there was more than enough to go around. Not that he believed Jason maintained any real control over any of the District 7 Tributes, at least within the confines of the arenas. Outside was another matter altogether, and the reason that brought them there.

Back to the point.

They weren't the only ones willing to protect Beth, but it seemed as though they were the first to get the proverbial shotguns and confront Jason about things. And with the stranglehold of the Capitol leaving them with exceedingly limited options, that was about all they could do, here — ask their questions, get some unsatisfying answers, and continue to have their hands tied. Unless Jason chose to escalate the confrontation into something it didn't need to be, something that he suspected a part of Rick would welcome. Solve the issue in a more permanent manner. But it simply wasn't worth the potential risks or consequences.

Daryl prised open the can of spray cheese, tipped back his head and sprayed some directly into his mouth, appearing largely unconcerned about matters. In actuality his nerves were virtually thrumming with nervous energy, his senses alert, and he remained entirely aware of his surroundings, particularly mindful of Rick's increasing tension. Much more of that and Daryl was going to intervene.

[whatisay]

"Well, I think you saw up and personal how little control any Escort has over their Tributes. You certainly benefited off it," Jason says, words clipped and irate. He thinks of the pressure on his fingertips as he wrote notes to Beth, stop fucking sharing stop FUCKING sharing repeating as mantra in his head and then slipping out in one dollop onto the notepad and then taken, printed into neat uniform letters in a sterile font, delivered by mechanisms Jason couldn't even guess at even if he held great interest in knowing how the orders he places get from his order forms to the Arena.

That's the problem, isn't it? Beth's the 'favorite', and Jason touts that she cooperates with him, and her small transgressions - feeding her friends, sharing her parka with that little boy - are the highlight, the curve of bright silhouette, on how powerless he is over any of them. That those transgressions have taken flesh and chosen to approach him in his small dominion of the seventh floor kitchen stokes the indignant fire that burns incessantly in him.

"Yeah? I see magazines too. Maybe I should tell you two to wrap it before you get it anywhere near Beth, since multiple partners is risky sexual behavior."

He would be raising an eyebrow, affecting that deadpan disgust, except a much more genuine disgust is crossing his face as he watches Daryl empty a can of spray cheese into his mouth. Jason's upper lip pulls back from his teeth, deepening the little lines beside his nose. Jesus Christ.

"She drove me home one evening because I was ill. She had to stay the night - in my niece's bedroom, for what it's worth, completely other wing of the house." Jason doesn't say 'because I couldn't afford to cab her back' and so he doesn't, leaves it unspoken even as it flushes his cheeks with a pinkness.

[rictator]

It was only by ignoring his insinuations that the conversation was able to continue at all. Whether the comment was justified or not was debateable, given Rick was essentially accusing him of the same thing, but it didn't make the idea any less repulsive. They so much as made eye contact with someone within the purview of the Capitol, and they were in the midst of some secret tryst. But... it was rarely ever said to his face. Hell, after this conversation, they'd probably be writing the same of the two of them.

Rick wasn't ignorant to how things had gone down once he'd been killed, even if he had avoided watching events himself. The man who'd finished Beth had been from her own district, another of Jason's tributes. It was only fortunate that he didn't believe the escort had been the one to make that call, given how far out of his way he'd gone to keep her alive. Why waste the money on supplies only to have her killed? Better yet, why gamble on one tribute, when he could have kept two in the running? It didn't make sense, and regardless of his personal feelings, Jason was smarter than that.

In the end though, it hadn't been by this man's generosity that they'd survived. They'd pooled their resources, just as they would have back home; between the game Daryl brought in and what they'd scavenged from the cornucopia, they had been more than set. Meager rations and limited supplies were commonplace in their world, but had they ever thinned to dangerous levels, Beth would have been the priority.

But even the small help was better than nothing.

"Yeah... It is worth something."

Rick spared a brief glance in Daryl's direction, hoping to confirm they were still on the same page. It was worth more than the non-answer he'd been expecting, anyway. It didn't make it the truth, and the blush said as much as the words themselves had; part of the story was still missing, though he wasn't holding his breath that they'd get much more out of him.

"I appreciate what you're doing for her." It wasn't an easy thing to admit. "In a place like this, it's good she's got someone like you in her corner."

It was in Jason's best interest to keep her alive. It had never been about her, or Daryl or Rick... But that was alright. So long as he kept supporting her, kept her sponsors supporting her, it bought her time. If it was enough to buy her a victory, instead of yet another grisly death, well... It wasn't an alliance Rick was keen on, but he was running out of options.

"But let's get one thing straight - I don't care who you are. I care about Beth. Anyone threatens her, in any way, they're gonna have a lot more than rumours to worry about."

... Well, alliance may have been a strong word.

[weaintashes]

The Capitol's ubiquitous cameras had captured all too many private moments shared between Rick, Daryl, and Beth, their concern for one another, their small gestures of affection. And none of it was fabricated or a ruse to lure in sponsors, it was the truth of their friendships laid bare for public consumption. That it was used as propaganda to fuel gossip and entertain the masses was disturbing enough, but to have it flung in their faces so crassly like this... it was nearly too much. It hit a little too close to home, and the implication that they'd ever prey on Beth like that was beyond vile.

Jason's words caused Daryl to grow very still, his expression closed off in a way that, in the past, had often preceded violence. But he refused to give the Escort the satisfaction of it here. His anger was a different animal now, slow burning and patient, something he could employ with greater precision and use to his advantage. The thing of it was, there was no clear advantage to be gained here. It was in Beth's best interests if they played nice with Jason, and she would be the one punished if they didn't; Jason had the upper hand.

And it was truly a goddamn shame Rick also recognised that fact and let the remark slide. Daryl would have liked nothing more than an excuse to bust open the Escort's face against the table, let him choke on his own blood for his audacity.

He couldn't wholly mask his anger, and it was there in his face when he met Rick's glance. But it hardly mattered. In all things, he had his friend's back no matter what, always would, even when questioning his decisions and sensing the disaster they might cause. Whether this would turn out to be one remained to be seen — Jason's apparent honesty was something, certainly more than expected, but the colour coming to his face seemed incongruous, raised more questions than it answered.

Leaving the condiments on the counter, Daryl returned to Rick's side, body angled toward him but keeping Jason in his sight. It galled him something fierce that gratitude was expressed to the guy at all, and he knew better than to even open his mouth at this point, not trusting what words might fall out. Instead he conveyed his thoughts with a touch to Rick's arm just above the elbow, and held on, fingers curled into a tight grip.

[whatisay]

"I wouldn't touch an offworlder. Don't insult me with accusations like that. It's bad enough the tabloids are speculating on whether or not I'm going to risk my health with your backwater herpes or whatever disease you swamp people carry."

Jason stays where he is, only his eyes moving from Rick to Daryl and back again, those and his upper lip twitching slightly like a great cat's ear. He's aware, on some level, of the danger he's in, on the way one man is restraining the other and the air between the three of them seems flush with tense electricity.

"You ought to worry about people threatening her in the Arena, where people are incentivized to do so. Like I say, the only threat she's going to get from me if that I'm going to start weaning her off my charity if she continues to funnel it to you two." He gestures at the two of them, as if counting them off, with his pen, looking for a moment like an ersatz orchestra conductor.

"Now, if you're done here, I've work to do." He pauses, and then says more forcefully, "so get out."

[rictator]

Even seeing his own anger reflected back in the heat of Daryl's gaze, the message was plain enough - Jason wasn't worth it. There was nothing to be gained in getting himself arrested.

Still, had it not been for the hand on his arm, he might have done more than glare at him. Rick shouldn't have been surprised at just how grounding the contact was, and not for the first time, Daryl's presence was enough to cut through the haze of his own rage. Diplomacy, as predicted, had proved to be an exercise in futility, and hearing now that there was nothing between them, that any rumours of that night that Beth hadn't come home were exaggerated, there was nothing else that could be accomplished. Really, whether or not he spoke the truth about his relationship with Beth was irrelevant; his story had matched up with Beth's for the most part, and while there was no doubt he was still hiding something, his disgust was pretty damned genuine.

"The way I see it, it's because of that that it'd be in your interest to have others helpin' her out from the inside," he responded icily, not making any move to dislodge Daryl's grip. "Beth knows how to survive, but I'd think you'd want any advantage you can get... Even if it's from some backwater 'offworlders'."

He was being stubborn now, and he knew it - But Rick was not about to be dismissed. Walk away now, and it was on Jason's terms. He'd retain that illusion of authority over them both, and after this, it wasn't something he was about to stand for. It was why he couldn't bring himself to look at Daryl in that moment, knowing too well that he'd be able to talk sense back into him without ever opening his mouth.

[weaintashes]

When thrust headlong into desperate struggle after desperate struggle, all for the sake of scraping out an existence in a ruined world, a certain degree of one's humanity was not only an expected loss, but sometimes a necessary sacrifice. How much someone could sacrifice without losing themselves entirely was an equation best left untested. After several years of bearing witness to the slow erosion of Rick's capacity for mercy and compassion with outsiders, Daryl had a damned good idea of the other man's limits. Probably knew them better than his own limits, all things considered, and he had to if he hoped to have any chance of ensuring Rick didn't lose himself again. Or worse.

The last time they'd had the misfortune of being unarmed, outnumbered, and with their backs to the wall, Rick had improvised and ripped out a man's throat with his teeth. Rick no longer had the barrel of a gun pressed to his head, Carl and Michonne were no longer in danger of having unspeakable horrors visited upon them, and Daryl was no longer pinned to the ground by men intent on beating him to death, but somehow the current threat was no less concrete. And they couldn't take on the whole of the Capitol on their own.

It shouldn't have been as tempting as it was, the urge to release Rick and goad him into action in the way Daryl knew precisely how to, but the thought of the consequential avoxing and public executions stayed his hand. The fact was, he would bear the imagined humiliation of Jason's dismissal for the both of them, if only to keep Rick — and Beth — as safe as they could be, in this place. Had Rick been in a more stable state of mind and their positions were reversed, he'd have doubtless been willing to do the same for Daryl.

"Head's so far up his own ass he could chew his food again on the way down," he muttered dryly. The conversation was probably beyond salvaging at this point, so he wasn't going to hold back his opinion anymore. "The secondhand embarrassment's killin' me. C'mon." He tugged on the arm he still held, employing enough insistent force to make Rick have to pull against him if he planned on staying where he was. "Rick," he implored in an undertone. This might as well have been another Woodbury, another 'Governor'. There was no reasoning with men like that.

[whatisay]

"I heard that." Jason's fearless when he meets Daryl's eyes, not out of any well-placed confidence but because he's made such an art of burning away any emotion that isn't frustration and fury away, leaving it to sizzle off him like rain on a desert street. He scorches fear out like the inside of an oven.

And he doesn't care, honestly. The idea that Rick and Daryl could kill him here doesn't fill him with any mortal dread. Death is something that only frightens the animal part of him that keeps him breathing, that yearns for food when it's hungry and sleep when it's tired, but he doesn't have a tight-knit enough philosophy to hold death in any sort of existential importance.

"You've done what, two Games? I grew up watching these and have done a decade working them. Pardon me if I trust my sense of strategy more than I trust yours," he says, and his sneer deepens. "Now, are you going to do as I say and get out, or am I going to have to call security on you?"

He adjusts his glasses and goes back to his work.