thecapitol | The Crowning of Tony Stark

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The Crowning of Tony Stark

Who| Everyone.
What| The Crowning of Tony Stark.
Where| The New Capitol Stark Expo!
When| Friday, late afternoon into the evening.
Notes| This event is mandatory for all Tributes to attend. Even if you do not tag in, your character will attend this party. Peacekeepers will be on high alert, so no funny business.
WARNINGS| Alcoholism / References to Alcoholism.

The Capitol might be known for its extravagance, but Stark Expos have never skimped on a show. Combining the two together could only be a recipe for the most wild indulgences. The center theater takes styling after a arc reactor, with glass ceiling and glowing blue lights set right within the metal and putting a glow to the sky. Lightshows go off on the main stage, the stark logo overhead and a massive screen displaying the Panem flag and Tony Stark's image just behind the dancing Ironettes. A circle plattform going off from the stage, clearly reserved for the guest of honor, features a design Panem's bird in red, gold, and glowing blue.

A globe is featured in the outside gardens, showing off a map of Panem, and the park is filled with artistic statues of destroyed Iron Man amror. But there's no quiet here, not with the fireworks going off all night and the consistent playing of music that is not but sounds an awful lot like that of Daft Punk, Eifel 65, ACDC, and one other song that breaks them up.

Various shows can be found about the gardens, including display models of some of Tony Stark's old weapons and Iron Man suits. Further along guests may find the Avengers display, featuring large portraits of the Avengers and their allies, large red x's going over greyed out portraits of those deemed dead, including Phill Coulson, Natasha Romanoff, and Thor. Along with these portraits can be found the Stark family tree, featuring the Victor Tony Stark and all his relations including apparent son Dave Strider, and Arya Stark, Ancestor of the Stark family, not to mention the great Howard Stark who's accomplishments (and tragic lack of care for Anthony) are lovingly illustrated. One such accomplishment being a "flying car" just a short walk over.

There's plenty for guests to do besides just ogle the brilliant sights however! A bar has been set up with a whole variety of drinking games available from Sink The Battleship and Drink Roulette to an extravagent variation of the classic game, Beer Pong, and an ongoing run of the Games with rules of drinking for each emotional scene, funny incident, or death. Those under the age of eighteen will be served fizzing juice or soda instead and can participate in junior versions of the very same games. All the cups are made from the finest glass with Tony Stark images over them. Avoxes are on scene to clean every spill and break of glass that might come.

A cave has been crafted of artificial and real material, designed to look like the Cave in which Tony Stark became a real hero, but with a twist; it's been made into a fun-for-all maze! Guests can attempt to navigate their way to the labyrinth and reach the core, avoiding those nasty pop-out rebels along the way. Those who make it to the fire-lit center may receive a limited edition "Tony Stark Heart" miniature arc reactor in a beautiful glass case.

An indoor sky diving station is also available, large enough that many guests may enter at once and still find it spacious. Here, guests can don Iron Man themed sky-diving suits and experience the sensation of flight, just as Tony Stark once did. Of course, the party doesn't start until the Victor comes in; he'll be appearing by Capitol-controlled suit to make his entrance at center stage. It is here that his Throne shall be raised up through the stage and his crown gifted to him. Following the official Crowning Ceremony will also come a speech from the Capitol's very own, Cyrus Reagan.

Tributes are dressed in formal wear with robotic accents. Such as a full mask or metal armor. Capitolites can be seen with Tony stark styled hair, bearing tattoos in his image, and even with surgically implanted lights, in honor of the new Victor. Available for purchase are handcrafted Tony Stark dolls, Iron Man action figures, and models of beloved robot-pet "Dum-E" in both small and life-sized. The Iron Man light gloves come completely free for all guests.

The Crowning ends off with a bang, as in the center of the sky, a massive "wormhole" opens up showing a vast darkness full of sinister creatures just on the other side, sure to inspire some screams from fans. Guests near to the Iron Man suit displays are asked by peacekeepers to step back-- far back-- but may be the first to witness the incredible scene of all those suits launching into the sky and exploding around and "in" the wormhole. The wormhole shifts to a message stating the show to have been brought to you by the Hunger Game's skilled Sky-Display Designers before going into advertising for the rest of the night as the party dies down.

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"You know, doing something that displeases the Lord. Lying, cheating, stealing, fighting, cussing. There's seven of 'em deadly, but I'm afraid I can't recall them all at once when I try, usually. Um..." Bayard counts off on his fingers. "Vanity, envy, gluttony, sloth, wrath...I don't remember the other two."

He doesn't look terribly abashed at that, like it's more of a concern to other people that he's forgotten his learnings than it is to him. He's glad his Granny isn't here right now, even though in secret he longs for her at night and morning. She would want to whup him.

Bayard wraps his arms over his knees, looking at Linden with that same excitement to be sharing something, imparting knowledge (imperfect as it is) as if by being a conduit for a fraction of human experience he is giving himself the greatest kind of worth. "And you repent by praying for forgiveness and acknowledging where you done wrong and making amends. No man can go his life without a little sinning, but if you see it for what it is and face it with honor, the Good Lord can't help but see your heart is pure."

"Maybe murder?" Linden suggests, though he's not quite sure it fits the theme or in with those sins. Maybe it falls under one of them. He's about to suggest something else, but Bayard's age and the air of innocence he maintains stops him. He keeps his tongue behind his teeth rather than suggest crimes of a more lascivious nature.

The kid is so excited to be telling him about what sounds like the very nature of goodness itself, and Linden gamely listens to the infant sermon. "So, how do you pray and prove your heart is pure? Would you show me?"

"No, it's not murder. Because you can murder for plenty of reasons, and it's the root that's what makes it a sin. If you murder defending yourself, or defending your country or your freedom or your soldiers in arms...that ain't a sin, I don't think. But if you murder for wrath or for...greed, that's another one! For avarice, then that's what makes it a sin."

It's not something Bayard's been expecting, and yet he tries, gamely, to live up to the importance of the task. The tablecloth walls around them become the towering masonry of a church (grander than any Bayard has ever seen, for Jefferson's is made of wood, but the cathedral in the mind is always more fitting for the grandeur of God than the church of flesh and earth).

"Alright, put your hands like this." He folds one hand over the other. "And just...talk to Him. Ask Him to forgive you for what you done and to do good for you when you ask kindly. And good for others, I pray for Father every night."

"What if you're killing for your country, but you kind of like it, or it turns into something angry?" Linden asks, canting his head sidelong. He killed in his Games, and wasn't happy about it, but there was more than self-defense behind the way he'd shoved Scorpii.

He puts his hands together, stiffly following Bayard's example; his furrowed brow says plainly enough that he doesn't understand the significance of the gesture; to him, they are still merely under a table. "Hello," he starts, chewing his lip. "Forgive me for what I did, and I kindly request that you do... good for me." He frowns, then shrugs. "Also for others," he finishes.

"I don't...I don't know," Bayard says, sucking at his lower lip just a little. He suddenly feels as if his footing has unsettled a bit, something having shifted beneath him, and he finds his balance again by determining on a simple course of action. "I ain't a preacher. I reckon we can find one who can answer those questions better."

He watches Linden excitedly, and when Linden finally looks back up he'll see a grin that's both entirely genuine and much too pleased for the actual quality of Linden's prayer. "That's a start. It comes naturally when you do it long enough, I think. My Granny knows hundreds of prayers."

Then Bayard closes his own eyes and frowns a bit as he formulates in his head. "Dear God in Heaven, please forgive me for taking your name in vain. And for cussing. I've been cussing a lot. And please forgive me for taking the fruit from the kitchen without asking no one. Please look after Granny and Ringo and bless Jefferson and the South and Mississippi and Father's regiment. Amen."

Linden quirks a brow at the baby proselytizing, offering a noncommittal shrug when Bayard tells him that they can probably find someone better suited to answer questions about this. Linden can't claim that he doesn't have many, but he also can't pretend that he expects any of them to be answered satisfyingly, regardless of who's doing the talking.

He listens to Bayard's prayer, and thinks he gets the idea based on the kid's example.

"I don't think I can actually say those kinds of prayers in front of a kid," he admits. "Not to condescend, but if I said anything I actually feel guilty for, you'd probably have to say more prayers just for having learned that certain things even exist well before you're supposed to."

"You needn't say them out loud. You can just think them. It won't stop Him hearing it." Bayard turns those doleful eyes to Linden again, sucking his lower lip a bit as he considers. "You don't need to tell me, but don't think I won't listen if you do, and don't forget that Father's in a war and I'm the head of my house now. I'm a boy but I'll be a man soon enough."

It's an open offer he doesn't expect Linden to take, but he figures an ajar door matters plenty even if it's never used. He knows that it calms down animals not to feel trapped, to know there's a way out if they choose to use it.

"If you can just think them, it seems almost too easy. If you can just apologize for the bad things you do, privately and to yourself without the judgment of other humans... I guess I don't know what's stopping a bad person from doing bad things."

He thinks this over for a second, along with Bayard's offer. It's sweet; too sweet for the Capitol, and it still manages not to be cloying. He suspects it's because Bayard doesn't know, and perhaps lacks the life experience to guess, the extent to which Linden has sinned.

"Your father's in a war? What war?"

Edited 2015-05-28 02:08 (UTC)

"Because they're still bad, and it's only by His grace that you're forgiven. Repenting don't count if you just plan to do it again." Linden appears, to Bayard, to be looking at it in a dreadfully pragmatic way, one which doesn't mesh at all with honor or faith, one which Bayard wants to refuse to believe is how most people would address it. He believes people have faith, even if they must fight to keep it, the same way he believes that both rain and sun come from the same sky.

"The war against the northern invaders. The Yankees." Bayard doesn't understand most of it, just the propaganda he's been given, just the stories Father tells him. He knows not of the politics, just of fear and food-rationing and the stubborn vanity of his people that has started to seem desperate. "They'd take our freedom if we gave them half a chance."

"It comes with a lot of rules then, after all."

These sorts of things always do, Linden realizes. There's never a situation where there are truly no strings attached; it's always some hidden cost.

I do drugs. I drink until I pass out. I sleep with married women. I won the Hunger Games, and no one decent EVER wins the Hunger Games.

Faith, incidentally, is not within Linden's grasp.

"Yankees?" Linden tastes the word, again affecting the boy's accent. "What freedom? Were you enslaved?"

"It does. That's why some people spend their whole lives studying it. Not me, though. I ain't got the brains to be a preacher, or the calling." He's sure it'd please Granny, but when Bayard thinks of the future, he imagines himself a glorious soldier or tending the land with the slaves, both as his father did. Though the Sartorises know hard times, so long as Jefferson survives they'll always be alright relative to the town, since they own land, and Bayard knows that he's lucky to be able to say that.

If Jefferson falls - if the South falls - that's when the Sartorises, too, will collapse.

"No," Bayard says, rubbing his lips together as he thinks of how to explain the toxic air he's been breathing since before the war even started, the paranoia and uncertainty and persecution that he's internalized. "But they're the Northern invaders, and they're trying to tell us how to run a country when they ain't ever worked the land a day in their lives, and they come down to our cities and they burn them and steal our cattle and ravish our women. They ain't got no morals, and so they're trying to destroy ours."

"Hey, wait... why do you say that?" Linden asks, frowning. "You don't have the brains? Who's to say? You seem pretty smart to me."

It's a kneejerk reaction, probably elicited by years of being called an idiot and a dolt for letting his attention wander from his machines on the factory line. District 6 was a wasteful place for a genius to be born, and such remarks sting, even if a child is clever and cocky enough to know they're not true.

"'Ravish your women?'" Linden asks, eyebrows raising. "Do... you know what that means?"

He doesn't say it, but all of that sure sounds like a child overheard adults and is parroting them as passionately as a parrot can.

Bayard shakes his head. "Ringo's smarter than me. Most boys my age are, I hear, although I ain't met many. It's alright. I've other virtues."

He's thinking of school, of how long it's taken Granny to teach him his letters, of how hopeless he seems at math. There are other sorts of intelligence, but Bayard doesn't know that, doesn't quantify it that way, doesn't realize that what others call even temperament or thoughtfulness in him is its own sort of smarts.

"I know it's terrible. That it's the sort of thing no man worth his salt would ever do to a lady, or to anyone else." Bayard doesn't know what it means - either through naivete or goodheartedness he lacks the ability to even conceive of what sort of thing it could be, and his young mind is only capable of conjuring the most overblown and dramatic ideas of what it could entail. "It's because of the North that we've no food or trade, and that Father's away at war and that so many of our men are dead."

"'Most boys', huh?" Linden asks, pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his chin on top of them. "Well, I've met a lot, and I was a boy once, and I can tell you that there's only so much that kind of intelligence is really good for, anyway. It's no measure for success."

Hell, he's living proof of that, isn't he? Being too smart for District 6 hasn't exactly made Linden's life better. Maybe if he'd fit in more, been more reliable on the assembly line, his name wouldn't have been in that maybe-rigged drawing so many times and he'd be building a hovercraft right now, living and dying quietly alongside other dark-haired factory workers.

"Well, you're right about that, at least," Linden agrees. "The details aren't really important, as long as you get the main point. I guess the point I'm getting out of it is that the North didn't exactly breed gentlemen, and time will tell if you feel any differently about this place."

Bayard nods. "I know it." He reaches forward and takes another sugarcube, tipping the bowl forward a bit with his knuckle to encourage Linden to take another as well. "I reckon even smart as he is, Ringo ain't ever going to be anything but a slave. I think more often than not that that ain't fair, since he's no different than me where it counts."

That's as far as Bayard's venturing into equal thought will go, however - the rest lies behind a veil of maturity and of the propaganda he's been swallowing about the Yankees, about the awful things they say about the South. Barbaric, backwards, inhumane. But it's a seed. Given a few years, it'll grow into something.

"I'd like to think I've already met one." He smiles at Linden, popping another sugarcube into his mouth. "Unless I got you pegged wrong."

Linden needs no encouragement when it comes to sugarcubes. Like the late Mentor Finnick Odair, he shares a taste and philosophy when it comes to sweet things, fleeting pleasures, gratification that he might not live to delay. A lot of Victors feel that way.

"No, it's not fair," he agrees quietly. "But everything's a lottery when it comes down to it, right? Where and how you're born is no one's choice, and I think about what could have been different very often. I'm sure everyone does."

He gives a half-hearted chuff of laughter at Bayard's implication, sweet as the sugar cubes and more naive than most native-born Districters of his age have the privilege of being. "Maybe, in some ways. But anyone who is too eager to call himself a gentleman probably isn't."

"I think most of the people I know don't think of it enough." Then again, there are some hypotheticals Bayard won't wander into. He won't ever wonder if there's a boy just like him up North. He'd sooner wonder if there's one just like him in the Districts of this entirely foreign world.

"That's why I said it for you, so you wouldn't have to puff yourself up none." He pokes his head out from under the table. "I reckon I'll look around a bit more, try and get used to this place. Do you want me to bring you anything from the food table, Mr. Lockhearst?"

"Between us, most people don't think enough, period," Linden shrugs, moving aside to ensure that Bayard has enough space to maneuver without drawing undue or unwanted attention. He thinks about asking for alcohol, because his bottle has warmed in his hand; he's actually been talking to Bayard for that long (and that means he hasn't been drinking).

"It's all right. I should actually probably go talk to sponsors. I've played hooky for a pretty long time and my Escort will be looking for me if I stay away much longer."

"Alright. I imagine I'll be seeing you around." Bayard smiles and dips out from under the table, vanishing into the party.

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The Crowning of Tony Stark

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