thecapitol | stripping down to dirty socks [OPEN, OPEN OPEN OPEN]

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stripping down to dirty socks [OPEN, OPEN OPEN OPEN]

Who| Stephen and anyone who wants to react to or be part of that hot mess
What| Stephen being an embarrassment to four generations of Reagans
Where| All over the Capitol
When| Largely after the Arena, though if you want to backdate, be my guest! Just let me know, and be aware that he wouldn't be hammered in public before the Arena end.
Warnings/Notes| Warnings for the kind of things you'd see on ONTD for something on Ke$ha about five years ago. Also, anyone who's been in the Capitol lately will have found out from the tabloids that Stephen has been up to these shenanigans for a while. He has mispronounced his Tributes' names (poor Darcy Lewis), faceplanted onstage during a Flickerman interview (and made a fantastic face), worn utterly outrageous clothes (notes in log), gone off on rants practically unprovoked (but almost never against a Tribute or Mentor), and generally shown his ass but good.

A: Closed to Six and anyone who would be in the Six rooms in the wee hours of the morning

The door swings open, and Stephen stumbles in. His hair is mussed, his clothes are disheveled, and his feet leave behind prints of glitter and grime.

He makes it to the couch, and lands on it face-first.

The hour is somewhere between two and five. Stephen's lost track, somewhere along the line. Anyone who walks in between now and morning will find him lying on the couch, leaving glittery eyeshadow stains on the cushions. Somebody bring him some water, for the love of God.

B: Open and looking for trouble

Being a tabloid-worthy mess was sometimes a lot of work and sometimes completely easy. Tripping onstage with Flickerman had been easy. Getting into fights is hard. Stephen doesn't want to rail at someone from the Districts. Therefore, he's chosen today to wear outrageous clothes and just wait for someone from the Capitol to comment on it.

It could be anything that Stephen is wearing. It might be an outfit made entirely out of feathers. It might be a suit with Caesar Flickerman's face printed all over it. He might be waring pants and a vest made entirely out of tire treads. Distressed leggings, hot pants, a jacket made from what looks like an entire wolf, excessive amounts of layered jewelry, shrink-wrap, lime-green dragon scales, and a baseball cap have all appeared in different combinations, accompanied by liberal amounts of glitter.

You might see him drinking a martini out of a whiskey tumbler with about six olives at eight in the morning and ask him what he's planning to do with his life. Or, you might see him already engaged in a fight with another Capitolite, insisting that his clothes are daring, not ugly, and the hapless citizen just does not understand art, and like, why would you, you know?? Or you might have a completely different reason to approach him. Either way, he's wearing something eye-catching again, and may or may not have someone on his arm.

C: Closed to PG

It's early evening. Stephen woke up a few hours ago. He's had time to clean up, to dress up, to get his makeup on. He's stretched out on the couch flipping through whatever's on his tablet, but he perks up when he hears someone come in the room.

[OOC: let me know if you need more!]

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"What the hell is in the District 6 water supply?" Leonidas blinked at this human disaster, trying to make sense of Stephen's outfit and the man's direction in life. First it was Linden jailed for attacking Compson (albeit not that frowned upon), now this.

"Reagan, put that thing down," said the man drinking a Long Island Tea or whatever he had on his hand, "You look like something the Stylist dragged out of their shoes from the goodwill."

Cyrus is probably having a heart attack.

Linden has not made a decision on whether or not to taper off of Morphling or continue his efforts at quitting cold turkey. Recent events require him to reevaluate his current course of action, though, and it's one reason he's up so late, staring into nothing from his place upside-down in an armchair. His legs are kicked up against the backrest, his head is very near the floor and his face is flushed with the effects of gravity on blood. Feeling normal is still so foreign to him that he tries to find ways to shake it up a little, even if it's uncomfortable or unpleasant.

He hears the door and glances lazily toward it, but when he sees who's coming through, he's righting himself so he can better stare. He sits up fully just in time to see Stephen's glittery faceplant.

He shuffles to the kitchen and gets a glass of water, but instead of trying to wrap Stephen's hand around it or gently rouse the Escort, he takes a more "Linden" approach, standing behind the couch and slowly and impassively trickling the water onto his face and hair.

"Hey. Heeeey. Did you manage to go unseen by anyone tonight? In case you haven't noticed, District 6 aren't media darlings right now," he says in a loud, demanding monotone.

Edited (Mobile typo ) 2015-03-19 20:37 (UTC)

The nothing-but-feathers outfit catches Torin's eye. He's been in one very much like that, though it was years ago when he'd first been brought to the Capitol as a Tribute, and the stylist became very unfortunately inspired by his last name. He feels a momentary bit of pity for the man, though as he approaches, he realizes that Stephen is actually wearing that monstrosity willingly. At least, that's what the yelling at the Capitolite he's bickering with would seem to indicate.

"Is there a problem here, gentlemen?" Breaking up the argument before it turns into a full-blown fight seems like a good idea. District 6 doesn't need more staff going to jail any time soon.

Said person is a man who is looking for the nearest source of beer. Phillip had yet to explore the Capitol on his own other than a bar or two, mostly to avoid being seen by the public eye. He heard about Linden's retaliation towards Jason Compson, which, with his own lack of public experience from Freddy's, made him want to stay inside even more. The closing of the Arena made him exhale a breath that he had no idea he was holding onto.

Oh, someone's in here, Gray thought and smiled, Probably dinner time somewhere. Upon closer inspection...

"Hey Stephen," he greeted before he realized, "Okay, what hair band are you trying to emulate?" Phil didn't mean anything of it, he thought this was a Capitolite party theme or something. No sane man wears that many feathers unless they're in costume.

Oh, probably.

Stephen frowns at Leo. He'd never had a problem with the man, but that kind of comment was exactly what he'd been planning to snap at.

"Excuse you, I look fabulous," he insists, shifting his drink in whatever direction was opposite Leonidas. "Goodwill chic is in. Or if it's not, it will be, soon. This is avant-garde."

Is he laying it on too thick? he wonders.

A long groan.

"Linden, that's cold," he complains, turning over so it's not going down the back of his neck and putting up his hand to shield his face.

"Oh, there's a problem, all right," Stephen says, whirling around to face Torin. "This good man here is racist against birds."

(Cue stuttering, bewildered protests from the Capitolite.)

"All of them," says Stephen. It's the first thing to come to mind. He's completely unbothered by Phil's comment: rule one of dressing like an idiot was to carry yourself like the Queen of England.

"Are you heading out?"

"No not really, not much of a club type of person myself," Phil admitted with a sheepish grin, bars were fair game though. The sheer audacity of the outfit though, that takes commitment.

"What about you? You look like a man about to hit the town," he added, uncorking and taking a sip of his bottle.

"Racist against...birds." Torin finds himself repeating that as though it will make some sort of sense. The repetition does not help.

He looks at the Capitolite like they might offer him some clarification, but no, there is only stuttering and bewilderment. That's okay, Capitolite. Torin's clearly bewildered, too.

Since coming back from the arena and his brief jaunt back to Paradox Space, Karkat has been 1) emotionally compromised, 2) confused about human-troll romance, 3) emotionally compromised, 4) extremely tired, and 5) emotionally compromised. It's been a ride.

But as luck would have it, he is none of those things at this moment, with sleepiness hewed to a minor weight and any emotional compromising coming solely from the dramatic turns of the current romance novel he's reading. At least the Capitol has those, even if he has to frequently roll his eyes at the cultural oddities brought with it.

It's getting late as a troll might call it - more like early in these predawn hours - when he hears someone stumble in and collapse somewhere in the common room. At least it sounds like they hit something soft, but what is it now? He debates for a moment just scrunching further down in bed to read more, but his curiosity gets the better of him. If it's stupid, he can always just tell off whoever-it-is and go back to his room.

The trouble is that, once he's bookmarked his place and come out into the common area, it's not a Tribute that he finds. It's... is that... is that Stephen, under all the glitter?

"Oh my disgraceful pail crust." He brings his hand up to pinch and rub his nose. This is going to end in a headache; he just knows it. "What the hell happened to you?"

"How long have you been telling yourself that?" Cora immediately jumped on that, "Because you need a touch more practice."

What was going on with this man? The faceplants, the ridiculous outfits, "Did Cyrus try to cut you off the Reagan estate? Or did you somehow fuck up more than usual?"

It's morning when she happens across a familiar face in the Tower Commons, and the sight of Stephen has Porrim stopping in her tracks, the neat click of those six inch Lita boots halting abruptly. It seems her fellow Escort is on a bit of a bender; and from the looks of him, he's even more of a hot mess than usual.

She reroutes so that she ends up behind the sofa he's sprawled across. "Oh, honey," she murmurs, taking in the full, awful effect of his outfit. "What's, ah--what's going on?" A lot. There's a lot going on. Good god, where does she start?

Linden knows damn well it's cold; he made sure it was as cold as tap water could get before he'd returned with it. He responds by dumping the rest abruptly over the Escort's head and then dropping the sturdy, weighted glass in a way that it will drop onto Stephen's side and roll off, unharmed and empty, under the coffee table.

"Is this a competition, now? Are we playing some kind of game?" he asks in the same impossible-to-ignore tone. "Is self-destruction transferable in this District, now? Just because I'm trying to get clean doesn't mean I'm out of the dark. People talk, and you've been coming up a lot lately, and our Tributes only deserve one screw-up at a time trying to handle their affairs and help them."

Molotov has not been happy since returning. Another Arena, another round of making it to the last bunch, another death cheating her out of her rightful win. And then, when she got back, it was only to hear that Stephen and Linden were apparently devoting all their efforts to trashing Six's name, which is, of course, not good for her chances next Arena.

She's not putting up with this anymore.

It's early, ridiculously so, but Molotov needs coffee before she goes to the gym. When she emerges from her room in bare feet and a tiny silk robe, she glares at Stephen's passed-out (?) form for a moment before going over and prodding him with her foot, her arms tightly crossed over her chest.

"Hey. Hey, fuck up. What are you doing, passed out here like a hobo?"

"Hang on, hang on, more than usual?" Stephen demands, jumping on that avenue of conversation. He doesn't confirm or deny that Cyrus tried to cut him off: the more rumors that didn't have to do with his party loyalty, the better. "First, this outfit is deliberate, it's meant to be a departure from the pristine and formalized direction that is precisely what is making Capitol fashion stagnate, and second, you're going to have to explain what you mean."

He's hitting his stride, now -- his eyes are flashing, his drink hits the bar and splashes a little over the side, and his tone of indignation is perfect.

Stephen doesn't uncover his face.

He can't tell Linden why he's doing this. Stephen can understand why Linden's upset -- he can understand it perfectly. It's not only the current Tributes that might suffer if Stephen falls on the wrong side of the line and makes himself a pariah, but what District 6 is sent from a victory in the Games is also at stake.

He can't tell Linden that he's actually getting more party invitations now. The most recent thing in people's minds had been the cuff; now, it's what an entertaining trainwreck he is. The amount of parties people want Stephen Reagan at is finally coming back to its post-jailbreak level. There's just no way to explain that without giving away that he's doing this to cover up the traitor accusations.

He especially can't do it when he's drunk.

"Don't you try to mother me, Linden," he slurs. "Don't you even start. That's not how this goes and you know it."

"Exactly," Stephen presses. "It's an unacceptable level of prejudice against avians and avian fashion that I am ashamed to see from a Capitolite."

"I was thinking about it," he says, drumming his fingers on the counter. "There's a place I've not been to for a while. It's kind of a dive, but the girls are pretty, and they know me." The corner of his mouth pulls into a broader smile. "Want to come along?"

"You did not just call me pail crust." Stephen's voice comes muffled from where his face is smushed into a pillow.

He doesn't actually know what it means. He's just hung over and picking a fight out of habit.

His eyes light up when he sees Porrim. "Do you like it?" he asks, brighter than usual. Of course there's a lot going on. This is a very involved outfit, incorporating lots of different kinds of clothes. "You get it, right?"

"I'm not a hobo," complains Stephen into the cushions, not reacting to the foot. "I live here."

Stephen had not given Phil any reason to doubt his trust, and Gray felt he should at least make an effort to be more open with the people hosting his survival.

"Sure, if it's not too much trouble, I'd like to join you," Phil agreed with his usual smile, then paused, "Do I have to match your outfit though? I don't think I can pull that off."

He really should've paid more attention to Stephen's grin, the man was planning something.

"I did." He steps over closer now, still keeping a space, but enough that he can better take in the full extent of the mess that is Stephanus Reagan. "And I would call you worse things if I felt it wouldn't be a waste of time."

He motions at him. "Did you even hear the other thing? What happened to you?"

Linden might not know the full story, but he's sharp, and being off of Morphling has only made him more so. He's unhappy with the change more often than not, because wouldn't it be so much easier to just take Stephen at face value? To accept that 6 is headed toward just being laughingstock in general, with staff that can't handle their shit in any meaningful capacity?

He leans hard against the couch, attempting to tip it, but even though a man of typical strength and robustness could probably manage it, he doesn't possess either. After a few moments of fruitless trying, he simply climbs over the backrest, bracing himself against it and shoving at Stephen with his bony heels in a wiry but fierce attempt to dislodge the sloshed Escort.

"I get what you're saying. You're saying you're done caring and it doesn't matter anymore. If it did, you wouldn't be fucking around when 6 needs you to hold it together! If this is 'how it goes,' get up. I have catching up to do. We're going out right now and scoring because I am not going another day suffering and pushing myself to my breaking point. I'm a better Mentor on Morphling and this is the wake-up call I need to own up to that. Come on!"

He stands, yanking at Stephen, with every intention of dragging him back out the door.

Edited (Mobile) 2015-03-25 20:26 (UTC)

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stripping down to dirty socks [OPEN, OPEN OPEN OPEN]

B get ur life together stephen

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C, it's happening

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A; jeezy creezy Stephen what a mess

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