thecapitol | Here comes a candle to light you to bed

Who| Wednesday Addams and you
What| Second place is just the first place loser. Also she kind of hates the Capitol.
Where| D7 Suites, Sublevel 1, the Roof
When| A day after the end of the Arena.
Warnings/Notes| Standard macabre Wednesday stuff.

I. Wednesday wakes up in her room, as everyone does, and takes a few moments to get her bearings. She throws away pretty bouquets, bright and beautiful, and figures out how to change her holographic window into a dark night scene with a full moon and bare tree branches swaying in the wind.

Then she can only do what feels natural. She goes to her bathroom and brushes her teeth and hair, braids it into her two sleek plaits. She scowls at her closet, at all the sparkle and embroidery and color, but then eventually settles on the least embellished dress in there -- it's black and simple, but there's still rhinestones on the white collar, and frilly ruffles along the hem.

She's equally as grumpy in the common area of the Suite, where she's forced to watch herself lose over and over again on the constantly-playing screen. She tries to find food, but it's all sweet and colorful, and none of it even moves or has eyes or occasionally emits a burst of flame.

Miserable, she finds a kitchen knife and sits at the table with her hand spread flat, sadly playing hand roulette to try and make herself feel better.

She misses the Arena.

II. She didn't really know what she'd find when she pressed the very bottom button on the elevator panel. It seemed worth it either way, since it couldn't be worse than the brightness and volume of the Lobby or anywhere else she'd seen so far.

It's not terribly surprising to find what looks like a large parking garage combined with a storage unit, but it's at least sort of dark and dank purely by virtue of being so far underground. It's the most comfortable place she's found in her time here, so she decides to stay a while.

Wednesday can be found here most of the day, sitting in a chariot by herself, curled up with her chin on her knees, quiet. She's sure that she probably shouldn't be here, but then they really shouldn't have given her access, should they?

III. The roof is only somewhere she dares venture after dark, once the sun is gone. The flowers disgust her, but if she sits in the right place and faces the right direction, she can see the mountain range in the distance, past all the city lights, and that's sort of comforting to look at, with the moon hanging low over the far off peaks.

Mother would like that, to go up that high and moonbathe.

Wednesday thinks about lost travelers and those crushed in avalanches, and she feels a little better, running her finger along the embroidery of the cushion she sits on, murmuring to herself.

"Who killed Cock Robin? I, said the Sparrow, with my bow and arrow..."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

To be fair, Wednesday rarely seems to feel much of anything, but that's just an external thing. However, she finds it difficult to find it upsetting to have killed someone who isn't dead.

"I don't like it anywhere else," she says simply. "I hate it up there, everything is bright and sparkly and ugly. At least it's quiet and dark down here, and I can hear the water dripping from the pipes, and it doesn't smell like flowers." It smells slightly moldy in the basement, damp and musty.

She wraps her arms around her knees and balances her chin between them. "I want to go back to the Arena, it was nice there."

"We all want to go back somewhere." Éowyn picks at the bandages on her hands, her lips pressing together. The worst part is, with all its attendant horrors, she rather misses the Arena herself. She could be of use there. She had a sword in her hands and, for a brief time, she rode again. Things felt more real in that false stage of a place than ever they have in the Capitol.

More than that, of course, she wants to go home. Back to Rohan's plains and open skies, or to the dappled shadows of Ithilien's woods, or anywhere not here. Anywhere where she can speak freely, and move as she wills, and not feel so hideously caught.

"That world is dead. This city, hideous as it is, is all we have. Get used to it."

Wednesday finds this woman to be rude and unpleasant, which are fine, but she's also abrasive and Wednesday's patience isn't running at full steam right now.

She feels like it's been a million years since she smelled a swamp or played with a spider or dumped arsenic on someone's plate. What she wouldn't give to put a scorpion on Pugsley's sleeping face right now.

"Everyone says it's not dead. I'm just not there."

In fairness to Éowyn, she isn't at her best right now. In fairness to Wednesday, that isn't really an excuse for how sharp she's being, and when Éowyn looks back on this conversation, it will be with embarrassment. For now, though, she just pulls her hair back with one hand and closes her eyes.

"It may be better," she advises quietly, "to think it dead, and drive it from your mind. For it makes no difference whether it is there or not. We are here, and cannot leave." Turning away, she takes a deep breath. "I am sorry for my sharpness. Arya is very dear to me. It stung to see her lost."

"She's not gone, they said she's still here on that TV show."

With a frown, Wednesday goes back to eating her fig, no longer very interested in this conversation. She picks a bit of skin off of it and flicks it to the ground.

"Maybe you and that tree creature are being overprotective. She seemed fine on her own."

Anger flashes across Éowyn's face, hot and sharp. "You speak of what you do not know," she snaps, her voice taut. "Not all who die in the Arena are returned to us. I will not let that happen to those I love. Not again."

"She lived longer than you did. I suppose you need more protection than she does."

Wednesday's voice is flat, and she doesn't look up, because she's only speaking in fact. She's watched enough of the Games playback to gather what happened in those final hours, the four of them, and it seems obvious to her.

"And you wanted to kill the person that protected and helped her the most anyway. He was helping her make her kills."

Éowyn bristles at that. "I need protection from nobody," she snaps, and immediately curses herself for letting this little girl get under her skin. "As for that... man, I would not trust him so far as I can spit to make the right choice between himself and her. I have met too many like him, snakes in human skin." Though not always human, judging by her experiences with Tom and his almost Ent-like appearance in the Arena.

"You don't have to trust him. But she does."

And rightfully so, apparently, if his rage toward Wednesday had been any indication. She hates him, but she can't begrudge him, as she can only imagine her own father in the Arena, how badly he would have destroyed Tom for hurting his girl.

"It doesn't matter anyway. He won, so he won't be part of it any more. You can stop thinking about him."

Éowyn grits her teeth, her face hard with anger. "Not so easily," she says, her voice taut and cold. There's too much anger behind it for her to risk letting any of it out. "When you are older, child, you may understand. But I pray you never do."

And she turns on her heel to stalk away, feeling all the worse for having been, essentially, bested by a child.

Here comes a candle to light you to bed

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject