Oh, sing sweet nightingale, sing sweet nightingale

[etcircenses]

Who| Anyone who's anyone (and of course, those signed up for the plot)
What| It's a games-watching party! A medieval ball and renaissance fair in one!
Where| A Capitol Ballroom.
When| Friday evening! This log is forward dated!
Warnings/Notes| Please do not comment in the placeholders! Those are needed for the later event. More details to come...

Hennins, masks, crowns and gowns. This is a ball built for playing the part. Although some guests have come in masquerade, it's certainly not mandatory. In fact, while attempts for some historical accuracy were made, that isn't mandatory as much so either. Medieval people were so drab! It shouldn't hurt to bring in a little fab.

The ballroom is big and beautiful, painted ceilings, gilded sculptures all up along the walls, shining chandeliers and marble floors. Paintings hang of President Snow, his family, and other infamous Capitolite families, all of whom also have coats of arms. Tapestries hang too along the walls depicting scenes of the Dark Days and recent arena both, all in Medeival styling.

Guests enter through wide doors and red-carpeted stairs leading down. The way to the gardens is a back opened wall on one side for guests to go to and from as they please, or observe the shows taking place outside.

Guessing games are had among the masked, and in one corner this has been taken to extreme. Black robes and eerie plague masks have been left for people to dress in so friends are forced to guess who they are through miming or voice. In another corner, a magician wows audiences and a women with a fogged crystal ball reads palms and gives fortunes.

The tables are set to the sides of the ballroom and far apart to allow plentiful dancing space. The food is, of course, a marvellous feast of all sorts of fruits, meats, breads, and more. One doesn't even need rise from the table to talk to another across the room; in each section a messenger bird, a colorful falcon-hawk muttation, awaiting notes that may be offered to it and the instruction as to whom they need deliver to. Notes can be signed or left unsigned and written in fullest honesty. The messenger birds are as obedient as any Avox, but far more fun! If perhaps slightly more susceptible to trickery, stealing napkins, food, and other things as commanded by mischievous children and adults alike.

Outside are all manner of games and shows in a great festival lit by torchlight and friendly glowing lightening-faerie muttations. Jugglers and jesters, stilt-walkers and fire-eaters. There's no end to the entertainment. There are medieval stocks set up for individuals to enact vegetable justice upon the volunteers, and some to simply take pictures with.

A chained bear dances to music played upon harps, drums, lutes, viols, crumhorns, pipe and tabors, and more! Both outside and within the ballroom dances are taking place. Some dances have patterns that can be easily follow and kept up with. Others are rehearsed by that of performers. The music plays soft and gentle, fast and lively, and all in between, some featuring bards singing their songs. Some of these songs may just be about you.

In brewing witches pots, sparkling and smoking with their magic, projections of the arena can be watched. Small ones are set upon the tables while larger ones sit outside. When those feasting are not cheering for that, they may do so for the rounds archery done with suction-cup arrows. Or perhaps the Jousting, of which there is both an option for guest participation with foam lances, cushioned ground, and animatronic horses, as well as the option of observing the real deal of jousting, with professional riders and performers, one for each District and The Capitol as well. Or perhaps you might head on down to view the axe-throwing competition? Or maybe you will sign up for pageant of beauty and talents. There's a place for children to play Nine-Man Morris and of course a keg and bar for the adults.

There is a stable, a pond, and a beautiful garden beyond the shows and performances. A gazebo goes out over the water, unintentionally modern as a part of the original building, but lovely nonetheless.

Why, there's just so much to do, it's hard not to see why the place is crowded and full with attendants. In fact, it's just noisy enough that some people might get away with saying a word or two they wouldn't be able to elsewhere. Things, and people, could easily hide right in plain sight...

Comments

[revvinguptheharley]

"I found someone's missing button." calls a voice from down on the floor.

Harley had wobbled her way over to the huddled group and then promptly fallen over. Having a numb body made it increasingly difficult to maneuver her way around, she had been trying to sit down and missed completely.

Twisting around to peer up at Peggy she squinted for a moment trying to recall if she knew anything about the woman. Deciding not she brought a fist up to the table and dragged herself up onto her knees. Could she trust this woman?

"You think that guy who scattered his homework might have had something to do with all...this?" She gestured to herself and some of the other tributes standing around.

[wickedgoogly]

It's taken Rose a bit longer than some to come over, but only because her body is being so uncooperative. Since the moment they all fell, it's liking moving through water, or as she were metal and all her joints had gone to rust. It doesn't hurt as such, but nothing cooperates like it should. It takes a bit of frustrated huffing and fishing around before she can finally pull something from the layered ruffles at the waist of her pink dress.

"Ehd znn vrl znuh," she says, knowing she makes absolutely no sense, but unable to make her tongue work any better than her body. She tosses it onto the table: a thin packet of honey bearing a red ink flower. It says, as she tried to tell, "for snow :)" plus a second message in smaller print: "and you if you mess this up".

She then sinks into a chair, not much easier than the rest, and mimes out writing on paper. Her expression is earnest and more than a bit annoyed at her situation. "Bleeth?"

[clotting]

Having tended to Jack, Temple runs to the first familiar person, which, in this case, happens to be Linden. She has her dress hiked up around her thighs so she can rush across the ballroom better, revealing those white legs and the nasty scar a little above her knee. To her credit, she's suitably distressed at the people in her care suddenly dropping, and her eyes have that wild, dead expression as if she's hurrying away from terrors both past and present at once.

"What's happening? Linden, Peggy, what's happening?" She reverts her head and sees that Harley and Rose are also here, Rose holding a packet of honey with words that Temple has to lean in to read. "I've seen that flower. I saw a woman wearing that flower, I didn't recognize it, I usually recognize all sorts of flowers-"

She ducks forward and slips under Harley's arm, helping hold the much taller woman up, seeing that same paralysis that struck some of her Tributes moments ago. She looks to Peggy for answers, caring for Linden but knowing him not to be the leader type and not trusting the offworlders.

[impaledqueen]

Peggy has to give props to Rose and Harley right now. Not everyone can drag their partially paralyzed body to a table and try solving a mystery.

"Someone seems to have decided to attack the off-worlders," Peggy says in the same careful and authoritative voice she uses when training her tributes. She can see the signs of panic in Temple, and the last thing they need is panic. "Linden, would you please pull up chairs for Ms. Lalonde and Ms. Quinn? Temple, you can help them sit and then find something for Ms. Lalonde to try writing with. Maybe her hands will be a little more cooperative than her tongue." Give tasks, delegate. Temple would calm down if she was given something to do. It's instinctive to Peggy to take charge in a crisis situation, and it shows in her calm but authoritative demeanor. "A nervous man drops his papers and then runs away just as half the party gets sick? It might be a coincidence, but yes, I suspect he had something to do with this."

She pauses in her decoding when she sees the honey and the symbol on it. It's no secret that Peggy is addicted to the gym, and it's not much more of a secret that she will cycle through every station in the Tribute Center periodically despite never expecting to be in a survival situation again. She knows the flower because of the hours she has spent at the plant identification station, constantly matching plants to names and functions.

It's poison. Oleander is poison. The poison is intended for Snow. Is this a plot by the rebellion? Is District 13 doing this? But she told them, she knows she told them what she's heard, that President Snow built a resistance to poison by drinking from the same cup that poisons his enemies, that he always smells of blood because the poisons have made sores that will never heal... Would they really try to poison him, knowing the rumors?

Can she point out what the honey is and risk interrupting a plot of theirs? Can she afford not to? Wouldn't it be suspicious that a woman who has spent hours upon hours sorting through plants wouldn't immediately recognize a common poison?

If this is District 13's doing, it's their own fault for not informing her this would happen. It's her priority to play the false Capitolite, so that is what she will do. "I wouldn't suggest eating that," she starts delicately with the same calm but firm voice. "That's a picture of oleander. It's poisonous."

She can read the last part of the message. Now that she can read it, she really hopes that it's not a District 13 plot she's blowing. "It looks like whatever these people are planning, they're planning on doing it when the peacekeepers are away. They plan on doing something today. Maybe we're already witnessing it. Does anyone recognize the machine in Linden's picture?"

[dead_black_eyes]

If anything can be said for so many people being sick tonight, it's that Linden feels like he's in good company. Unlike his situation, though, the symptoms are strange and varied enough to evade easy diagnosis; some people are numb, some people are babbling nonsensically, some people are experiencing extreme weakness, and everyone witnessing this debacle is experiencing confusion and concern.

He shoots Rose an uncomfortable glance when she unsuccessfully attempts to speak, but her evidence speaks for itself, more plainly than his photograph or Peggy's cryptic message. When Temple approaches, her presence puts him at ease as it usually tends to, and then Peggy's speaking crisply and clearly with the poise that anyone would hope for and expect in a Victor. He's glad to let her take control and direction into her capable hands, and he nods briskly and leaves his photo on the desk as he goes for a pair of seats. His attempt to move the chairs will have him winded by the time he returns with them, so he gestures for an Avox to handle it for him; when he's spending the better part of the day committed to bed rest, even minor exertions set him back.

He comes back and leans heavily on the table. He recently revisited the identification station with one of his Tributes, and while Phillip hadn't been great at it, Linden's made it a point to learn what's poisonous and what isn't. He hesitates for the same reasons Peggy does, but when she names it as Oleander and a poison, he takes that as a signal to speak a little more freely about what it is and what it could mean in the grander scheme of things. He slides his picture toward the center of the table, trying to ensure that everyone can see it or reach for it if they want to read what's written on the back.

"We have to consider who would be motivated to attack both Snow and the Offworlders," Linden murmurs. "And what kind of device would be useful to them. My intuition is telling me that the Capitol mechanism that revives them would be an obvious area to exploit, but... having not seen it, I can't ascertain that."

[revvinguptheharley]

Harley takes the time to plant a grateful kiss on Temple's cheek "Thanks cutie, I owe ya one." before she is helped into a chair and turns her attention to the situation at hand.

"Well gee, who one earth would be motivated to attack the leader of this particular slice of paradise? I wonder." She mused sarcastically attempting to bring a hand up to her chin to stroke it. The numbness made her motions clumsy though and she ended up patting her chin rather awkwardly like her fingers were an empty rubber glove. Perhaps the effect was lost.

"And heck, just a couple weeks ago there was that big long rant about how we off worlders should be grateful for the luck we've had to be dropped here."

Bringing her limp hand up to her hat she attempts to pick it up, failing that she brushes the hat off and multiple pieces of paper came fluttering out onto the table.

"I found these once I hit the floor. They talk about October 2 years ago, when the Xenomorphs escaped into the Capitol, security around the "revival mechanism" for Tributes had tripled."

Leaving the hat in her lap she scanned the group of faces around her.

"So it's either gotta be those rebels that keep stirring up crap, or someone on the inside! How else would you get through all that security?"

Rose and Temple swapped order for this tag round only

[clotting]

"Oh, right, it's so hard to be an offw-" Temple makes an 'eek' sound, a high tight hiccup of a gasp, pulling away from Harley but not dropping her at the kiss, that harried, deadened expression in her eyes widening like the lens of a telescope coming to the fore and her heart seeming to leap up in her throat. She follows Peggy's orders, helping Harley to the chair and then Rose.

"Here, dear," she says, pulling a pen and a small notepad from her clutch - mostly it's full of phone numbers and shopping lists, nothing private, nothing important. She places them in Rose's hand. Then she turns back to the group, wringing her hands.

"I don't recognize the machinery. I'm no good with machines. The woman, though, she was talking on a ear-piece the whole night. I thought it was rude, but I didn't want to interrupt anything important, and it's not like I recognized her and had to say hello or risk a faux pas."

She fans at herself with one hand, face contorted into an expression of earnest concern, and places herself in between Harley and Rose as if to fuss over both of them at once.

Rose already sat down in her first tag actually

[wickedgoogly]

"Thnggz," Rose slurs to Temple, if not without a sideways look for that aborted comment. Give her sarcasm when she's not dealing with this.

With the paper and pen she sets to writing. It's more difficult than normal, and she resigns herself to jagged print instead of her usual flowing cursive.

Honey - poison, assassin attempt/fallback plan for failure
Woman - honey given by or for her to use?
Machine - needs money? Modify revival mechanism?

It's somewhat abbreviated, but she sacrifices wordiness for getting her point across when otherwise they'd be here all day waiting on her to write it all. She nudges it forward for the others to read and comment on as she thinks.

Really, she had no idea how they were revived. Surely the Capitol had to do something, but with Sburb relegated to another chunk of reality and her god tier yet unobtained, it's been a mystery to her. Her approach, therefore, is to learn as much as she can even as she tries to help sort out what's happened.

Whoops

[impaledqueen]

Peggy purses her lips briefly. This is not good on so many levels.

"It may be a rebellious plot. It may not be. I could see why insurgents would want to attack the President, but why the Tributes?" Possibly because their deaths would destabilize the Capitol, but she doesn't say that. If it really is a rebellion plot, she doesn't want to say so. (She hopes District 13 isn't behind it. If they are really willing to kill this many innocent people for the sake of confusion...) "Anyone who spends much time with offworlders know that some of them have... questionable loyalties. The rebellion would be throwing away a potential asset by making them all sick. It may just as well be a political rival of President Snow trying to kill him and undermine his legacy. We don't know; all we know is that they're targeting the President and the offworlders."

She can think of more than a few people with the ambition to try it. Poison, after all, is a favored method of assassination in Capitol politics; it's a fact that many Capitolites don't even have an inkling of. But she does, because the elite tell her things they would never dare tell someone closer to their own station. "It sounds like they're targeting the revival mechanism while the security detail on it has thinned. I imagine the money is to pay off whoever is helping to tamper with it; that would easily carry a charge of treason, so it wouldn't be cheap, which implies we're dealing with someone who has resources."

It could still be District 13, since Peggy doesn't know much about their access to assii, but she is really hoping it's not them. "The woman, I'm guessing, has something to do with this; oleander is hardly a common accessory, since there are much flashier, safer flowers to have in one's hair, and it would make her stand out to anyone who was looking for her. Temple, would you be able to describe her face? Do you happen to remember hearing anything she might have been saying? Or maybe something unusual she was doing?"

She sees Linden leaning against the table and belatedly remembers that he's ill. Without a word, she nudges her own chair (which she hasn't been using) towards him. It seems that she and Temple are the only healthy ones here, unfortunately.

[dead_black_eyes]

That kiss Harley plants on Temple gets a flinch from Linden, too; that's the advantage of the classic Victors, who know each other and all their idiosyncracies and triggers and all the best ways to exploit or avoid them. He stands by with bated breath, ready to jump in if necessary in case Temple reacts badly, but it passes, and she's back to what passes for normal, helping the numb Mentor into her chair.

"This doesn't benefit the Rebellion or the Capitol," he says, shaking his head as Temple positions herself between the two ill offworlders. "I mean, unless one wanted to make the other one appear like they were hurting the offworlders, that would be appropriately villainous and certainly sway opinion."

This could have all been planted; it would explain why we've been herded together like this in the Capitol and encouraged to figure out what it all means like it's some little puzzle to occupy our time and impress Sponsors he doesn't say. He's unsure of how much of it is irrational cynicism and paranoia and how much of that sentiment could get him shot for treason well before he can get his liver replaced. There's only so much being a mad classic Victor can excuse.

I can see Snow putting this together. It can't be a coincidence we found these pieces of evidence. It's not like he has any qualms turning the Districts against each other and hurting these people IN the Arena...

His eyes widen for a second, and then he withdraws his hand when Peggy nudges her chair toward him. If he can appear weak, it's probably a good thing; the last thing he wants is for his dread to be clear and easily read by his companions or, inevitably, Snow, even if those who know him well can probably pick up on it. Right now, all he wants to do is come up with a perfectly acceptable solution that will allow them to leave this room and doesn't sound anything like a wild conspiracy theory or grounds for reeducation (or, at this point, going by how dire Stephen's made it sound, would they even bother?)

He's reluctant to talk from this point forward, but if he can engage and push things a certain way while microphones are listening, he certainly will. "I mean... I'm not really a betting man, but if I had to put money on who's behind it, I'd say the rebels. Snow wouldn't stage his own assassination attempt; at best, I believe they want us to think he did and be tempted to throw our lot in with them."

[revvinguptheharley]

Harley shot Linden a puzzled look then shrugs "So see? It would benefit the rebels if suddenly all us "Filthy off worlders" fell ill or...or worse!" She went from irritated sarcasm to anxious worry.

"Is someone is modifying or even...dare I say such a fancy word, sabotaging the revival machine...what if the Capitol couldn't bring the tributes back after they died?" Suddenly she's a lot more worried about her remaining tributes in the arena. She casts a wary glance at the TV screens featuring now a screaming girl with burns on her head who was in turn being screamed at by a pale young man with what appeared to be tumors with smiley faces on them.

Harley made a mental note to investigate THAT tribute when...if he got back to the Capitol.

"What would happen to this whole never ending quell stuff if the big boss couldn't keep bringing tributes back to life?" She had her suspicions of course. "It can't be easy pulling new tributes through the universe, trust me. I've been around the multi-verse a couple times and it's almost NEVER easy to move between them."

[wickedgoogly]

Questionable loyalties, huh? Rose wouldn't know anything about that. But as weird as it feels with that subject flitting through, it doesn't dissuade her from helping. For all Snow might have been a target as well, it wouldn't do any good for her to die in the process, especially if it would be the permanent kind.

She writes a little as they talk, putting down ideas so that it's easier to present them without making them wait more than necessary. Harley's comment in particular reminds her of a line of thought she's had previously. What's Panem without its circenses?

She pushes the paper forward again.

Agreed, it's likely rebels. No reason for Snow to willingly look weak. If we die, the Capitol loses its entertainment. Would they have to use District people? Would likely cause chaos/unrest.

[clotting]

Temple casts a glance at Linden; she knows, and she suspects he knows, that staging his own assassination is far from out of Snow's realm if it allowed him to increase security without public opinion cringing.

"The Districts won't stand up for themselves," Temple says, her voice sounding rotten and decayed as if it were coming from someone on their deathbed rather than the pretty young woman standing between Rose and Harley. Less than a decade ago she was reaped and no one intervened, not any higher power or community spirit, because whatever they could pray to had gone dead a long time ago and had ignored the same pleas for generations. At the time, it had died at least sixty years ago, and something that deep buried takes more than a few years to exhume. "If the offworlders die, they'll use us again. You've all bought us a reprieve, nothing more."

She takes a deep breath and answers Peggy's questions as best she can - she can describe the face, although the ostentatious color of the hair and the red dress stand out more, but she never got close enough to see who she was talking to. She pulls one of those embroidered handkerchiefs from her bra cup and fans herself with it, pats at her face and makeup, out of some sort of absentminded habit than because it does anything for her looks or her nerves.

"Don't forget that some of the Peacekeepers have taken ill too."

[impaledqueen]

Peggy picks up on the look Temple gives Linden. She resists the urge to share in the look. They all know that Capitol politics depend on making the opponent look suitably heinous for a complacent public. Staging an attempted assassination is hardly unheard of.

But then Harley and Rose say that, and she can't help it. She laughs. It's not the bright, airy laugh she has for cameras. It's dark and brittle. "Chaos? No, it'll be a return to the status quo. I can think of a fair amount of Capitolites who would be rather pleased with it, even; they've been finding the lack of stakes in the games and older tribute pool to be less interesting." How can these people know so little about the world they live in? "Tributes were exclusively District children for seventy-four years. It can be so for another seventy-four. At worst, there may be some rioting within the Districts, but it's not a problem to kill the protesters and put things back to normal."

That's not entirely true. It would feed into the existing anger in the Districts and spur the rebellion forward, but she can't say that. Even predicting an uprising from her District in public could be seen as treasonous. "Either way, I don't think that whatever this is is just intended to be some momentary discomfort for you off-worlders and the peacekeepers besides. We should tell someone about our suspicions who has access to the revival mechanism. I don't know about any of you, but I don't have that kind of access."

[revvinguptheharley]

Harley's face, numb though it is manages to pull a very dismayed and irritated look.

"Sheesh Louise, I'm not even from this stinking planet and I have more faith in your people then you do."

She turned her attention to Rose and managed a smirk "Whatever, we'll just be over here on team "Hopeless optimism". It'll be great, we'll make jackets and have cake and share it with the districts somehow."

With that pointless little tangent out of the way she added "Can't we just tell the Storm Troopers to go guard the revival junk and try to put it back together or whatever so this crap stops?"

[dead_black_eyes]

Linden shudders when Temple points out that without the Offworlders, the Quell will actually end and the children of the Districts will be canon fodder once more. He also knows that it is depressingly inevitable, but he thinks of Stephen again, the man's conviction that something big is coming.

"Access?" Linden asks, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I don't think any Victor has it, but we can get word to someone who does, even if it's just through the grapevine. This is being recorded anyway and it's likely to get forwarded through the most efficient channels, what needs to be done. It'll almost surely come with an increased Peacekeeper presence, at least those that aren't ill."

That being said, they might wind up thinned-out in the rest of the Capitol as a result. Maybe that's intentional.

[wickedgoogly]

Rose lifts an eyebrow at the way her assertions of chaos are shot down. Of course she knows the old games used the District children; the youth programme, full of propaganda though it is, has told as much. Even if it hadn't, she's been trying to listen and learn and pick up what information she can.

She knows too what kind of punishment can come for wrong actions here. They threatened her with it as a warning for harming part of the arena. For this reason, she doesn't give further comment.

I try for pragmatism over optimism, is her comment to Harley.

She adds after:

Tell the peacekeepers who aren't sick. They're here for protection, yes?

You know. Supposedly. She figures it worth saying, like a show of faith in a system she doesn't actually believe in, and didn't even before this happened.

[clotting]

"Yes, we are from this planet. Of course we don't have faith in it." Temple turns her nose up with the sort of haughtiness that some how makes her seem taller than she is, all the more so since the people next to her are sitting.

She looks down from over her cheekbones at Rose's words and gives a quick, curt nod. She picks up the packet of honey.

"This may be being watched, but we don't know how long it'll take them to look at what we're saying over what anyone else is. God knows they're going to have their hands full." Sympathetically, almost, she crosses her own hands across her lap as she stands.

"I'll talk to Falxvale. Gowan has been very charitable to the Peacekeepers in the last few years, maybe they won't make me wait around if anyone needs to file a report. Is there anything else I should mention to him, aside from giving him this and telling him about the revival mechanism being the target? Probably?"

She flashes her lower teeth with uncertainty for a moment. Really, it's partially that she feels so wound up with panic that she wants to get away from the table, or rather, from the offworlders. If it were just her and Peggy and Linden here, maybe even just Rose with her muteness and pragmatism, maybe she'd be better able to wrangle a hold of herself. As it stands she feels near the point of shrieking.

[impaledqueen]

"Mention the woman you saw. A woman with an oleander flower in her hair would stand out, and it's possible someone else was able to see or hear something she was doing. Falxvale could ask around."

Peggy spares a glance to the offworlders. Harley and Rose are holding up relatively well, but on screen and all around them, offworlders are deteriorating. "And tell him to move quickly." She is a Mentor and she has been given the responsibility to look out for these people when they have no one else. She will look out for them now.

She's not sure if the peacekeepers will be able to move quickly enough, but they're motivated to keep the offworlders alive for the quell as long as possible. They would have to deal with more than the anger of the Mentors if they failed; they would have to deal with President Snow. She has faith that they will do their best to solve this issue quickly if only because of that.