thecapitol | There are Some Things Mayonnaise Can't Fix

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There are Some Things Mayonnaise Can't Fix

Who | Kousuke Nitou and you!
What | Nitou has realized Haruto isn't coming back this time.
Where | The Tribute Center and any outdoor location with a convenient bench.
When | Shortly after the Arena ends.
Warnings/Notes | Discussion of death and violent Arena-type things. Moping. Mayonnaise.

That was it, then. The Arena was over, a Victor had been crowned, and everyone had come back.

At least, everyone who was coming back had come back. Haruto hadn't returned. Nitou hadn't wanted to believe it, but after this long? Weeks? Revival hadn't taken that long before. Not unless whoever was supposed to be revived just wasn't going to get revived at all. Nitou had to face facts. He was alone now, rival-less in this strange and inhospitable place.

[A - Tribute Center, anywhere with a TV]
Nitou has never been good at coping with things when there isn't anything he can actively do about them. This certainly qualifies. Once more, he'd ended up getting himself killed before Haruto. Whereas before, it had merely rankled that his rival had lasted longer, now, there was a certain sort of survivor's guilt kicking in. If he'd lasted longer, he could have done more. If he'd lasted longer, maybe Haruto could have won.

If he'd lasted longer, maybe it could have been him instead.

Nitou's thoughts are none too cheerful as he's parked himself on one of the couches in front of the TV (where the TV is, he doesn't really care, and he just might have wandered into some other District's suites on accident), which is playing a cooking show. Not that he's paying the cooking show much attention. He has an entire gallon of ice cream, and he's glumly digging in as though it can provide him some sort of absolution in the form of fat and sugar. He looks pretty dull and listless, but he's not quite down enough to forget to put his favorite topping on that ice cream. He grabs his omnipresent squirt bottle full of mayo, tries to squirt some into that ice cream bucket, and manages to squeeze it exactly when the chef on the TV goes on and on about making a dragon-shaped cake. As a result of the mention of a dragon reminding him of a certain someone, he's squeezing that mayonnaise bottle entirely too hard, and entirely without the finesse he usually has.

Whoever's walking into the room had better duck. Seriously. Incoming mayo, courtesy of one depressed and inattentive wizard, coming your way.

[B - Around the Capitol]
After the Peacekeeper Nitou had hit with an errant mayo spray of sadness had firmly insisted that he get out for a little while, he thought a bike ride might be just the thing he needed. Only not really, because he lost interest in the bike ride pretty quickly. He's parked the bike next to a bench somewhere, and he's currently lying face-down on the bench having himself a good mope. He looks not unlike a homeless guy passed out there, and there has already been a quick flurry of paparazzi snapping pictures of him before running away somewhere.

He's also not paying much attention to his surroundings. The paparazzi have been totally ignored, the reporter that's come by to shove a microphone into his face has been ignored, and Nitou doesn't even seem to care that there's now a pigeon strutting around on his back. Whatever else is going on in the world right now, Nitou just doesn't care.

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Trish might not have the reflexes of some of the Tributes she's seen since this Neverending Quell started, and even from before then, but she does have a strong enough sense of self-preservation that a glob of something or other sails past her and splatters itself all over the wall. She stares at it, then at the only other person in the lounge with the ability to have a shot like that.

"You know, I think they might arrest you for ruining the wallpaper here." That's some damn nice wallpaper, she wouldn't really blame him. The decor in this room is probably worth a lot more than he is. She mocks up a frown then glances at the TV, then at the ice cream bucket, then at the mayonnaise, then back to him. "That is both gross, and really cliche. You're not actually moping, are you?"

Okay, sure, she expected some disappointed faces. She wasn't entirely sure what to expect, really, since the idea of Tributes coming back after losing the arena sounded like it would be more well-placed in a horror movie. Moping hadn't really been high on the list of ideas though.

Nitou glances back at he wallpaper. "I dunno, it's not as bad as what I did to one of the couches, and they didn't arrest me for that." So there, nothing to worry about! Even if it's hard to work up much worry over anything in this level of mope.

"I'm not moping," he protests, even though it's not quite as energetic as what he might ordinarily manage. "I'm just having a snack." He looks a little confused. "And it's not gross. Mayo's the best food!"

"Three strikes, you're out. We take decor harassment seriously here."

Crossing her arms over her chest, she steps in further to actually peer into the container, wrinkling her nose and making a fake-gagging motion. That is probably the most disgusting thin she's seen in a long time. She's starting to wonder if maybe the things she's heard about off-worlders aren't really as over-exaggerated as she thought...

"What's your name?" She demands it with an air of suspicion, then after a brief pause adds, "You're not one of mine, are you?"

"It's just mayonnaise! It'll give it a nice shine when it's wiped off!" Because mayonnaise is magical that way.

And oh, wait, is he one of hers? He never knows with these Capitol people anymore. "Kousuke Nitou, District 5." He looks at her curiously. "One of your whats?"

"Oh thank god." She doesn't try to hide the fact that she breathes a sigh of relief. "One of my test subjec-- I mean, Tributes. District 6, stylist. Name's Trish."

She looks around, trying to spot any more collateral damage, but finds herself still unsure. "Am I going to sit in anything gross if try to sit down here? These pants are new, you see. Can't take any risks."

Nitou arches an eyebrow at that "test subject" remark, but since it doesn't apply to him, he lets it slide for now. "Huh? Oh yeah, it's not like I've been spraying it anywhere but there." He waves the thought away. "It's clean."

The pigeon leaves. Someone decent would have shooed it off to leave the poor moping man in peace, but this is an auxiliary goal to what Gary is really trying to accomplish.

That being, sitting on Nitou. No hesitation, no warning--he's already watched to see if the guy would move, and he hasn't, so instead Gary just trots up and parks his bottom on the small of Nitou's back. He'll wait to see how that goes over before he worries about any sort of formal greeting.

The pigeon hadn't weighed much. Gary weighs significantly more. "What the hell?!" There's a little indignant sputtering and flailing, and Nitou is suddenly much more awake than he had been. "Get off!" He has no idea who this even is.

Success! In that Nitou's awake, not necessarily that he's apparently very irritated at him. Gary supposes this is a required part of the experience. His hands snap up to grab the back of the bench, which helps keep him firmly planted on Nitou's person while he struggles underneath, deadpan and apparently oblivious.

"Why?" he asks, affecting the most baffled tone he can manage. "You're really comfy!"

"And you're really heavy!" It seems that Nitou's moping is momentarily going forgotten while Nitou continues to try to get Gary off. It's an awkward position to be in, and he doesn't have much in the way of leverage.

But hey, at least he knows who's on top of him now. He's taking a few wild swings towards Gary like he's trying for some weird backwards flopping punch. Good news is that it's at such an awkward angle, Gary would have to try to get hit.

"That's the idea!" Nope, not moving. Gary is confident enough in his position that he even removes a hand to playfully bat at Nitou's swinging fists as they pinwheel at his sides. "Isn't this what you wanted? You've been lying here for, like, hours! I thought you were trying to become the bench. I want to help you."

"Dude, get off!" There is more wild flailing Gary's way. This too accomplishes nothing. "I'm not trying to become the bench! That's stupid!" Gosh, Gary, can't you see when a guy is trying to mope about the loss of his rival?

On some level, Gary realizes that this isn't helping. But more importantly, it's a distraction--something that will keep the both of them occupied instead of thinking about Haruto. And that's for the best, right? Otherwise Gary would be right there on the bench with him, moping and being somber and generally not any fun to hang around with, and man does that sound like the most boring existence to him. Having Nitou flailing around under his ass is much more exciting.

"I dunno man!" Gary lazily leans back and stretches out his legs. "It could be, like, a zen sort of thing, y'know? Remove yourself from the world--" he swipes his palm across the horizon in a vast, mystifying gesture. "--become part of the world. I think I saw that in Celebrus once. Some de-stressing technique for if your pedicure doesn't turn out right or whatever."

This is certainly a distraction, but it's far less fun for Nitou than it is for Gary. "Do you really think I care about Celebrus's pedicure tips? Or Zen?" He struggles a bit more, then asks, "Dude, what have you been eating, bricks?" Really, he's got more life in him than he's had since he realized that no one else would be coming back from that Arena.

An improvement, then! Gary still isn't moving. "Eh! I doubt it," he shrugs, casually inspecting his nails. "You know how the marketing is around here--see it in one place, see it everywhere else. If I don't see fifteen other people doing exactly what you were doing five minutes ago, either because I made something up to back it or just because they saw you doing it first, I'll eat my own shoes. All of them. And my shirts. And then maybe chase it with some ice cream. D'ya want some ice cream? I'm really hungry all of a sudden and it's kinda hot out here."

"Ice cream? I could go for that." Ice cream is a welcome distraction from all sorts of things, like Gary's spot-on assessment of the Capitolite lemming tendency to imitate popular things...and like the whole moping for Haruto thing Nitou had going. "Where are you thinking of getting it?" There's a pause. "Dude, it's hot out here because you're sitting on me and it's way too warm out to be sharing body heat, especially with other dudes."

If this wasn't a classic example of Gary's incredibly short attention span getting the best of him, it might be tempting to say that he's realized Nitou shares a similar trait and is actively working to cheer him up. On some subconscious level, maybe he does. But really, the guy just wants some ice cream, and Nitou's counterargument here is far more convincing when it panders to something Gary wants.

"Yeah, whatever." Finally, Gary shrugs and hops off Nitou and the bench, casually dusting off his pants as he goes. "I dunno, we'll probably run into one eventually. You'll come with me, right? Are you done with your weird zen moping or whatever?"

Nitou scrambles into a sitting position and rubs at his sides as soon as Gary's hopped off of him. "Yeah, yeah, I'm done with the zen mopi--it wasn't zen!" He waves it off. "Alright, alright already, you win!"

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There are Some Things Mayonnaise Can't Fix

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