thecapitol | (no subject)

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Who | Fitz and YOU!
What | Fitz has been dragged away from his Extremely Vital Quest and dumped in a weird city. This does not please him.
Where | Around and about
When | A few days after the Crowning
Warnings/Notes | None yet; will update if needed

A: The District 11 Living Room

Fitz awakes aching and exhausted, and lies for a while in the darkness behind his eyes, feigning sleep as he pieces together what he knew. He had just come from the Elderling city, mired in the tug of the Skill, when suddenly he had awoken in a cold, bare room, foreign in its strangeness. Awareness of the severity of his situation had come in waves; no Skill river in which to reach, not a flicker of life showed to his Wit-sense, not even an awareness of the distant bond with his wolf. He had no weapons, and they had taken his clothes and his pack, and with them his elfbark and herbs. Locked up, alone and unarmed in a strange land, it's no surprise that when the Peacekeepers came for him, he hurled himself into them, trying to get past them and away. He had, he recalls with a flicker of pride, knocked the teeth loose in one’s mouth, and kicked in one’s knee with a force that would not soon heal, but in return he received a solid beating, and a blow to the head which sent him spiralling down into one of his seizures, to awake here. The bed is soft and silk-sheeted. There is blood in his mouth where he has bitten his tongue, and the area above his eye feels tight and bruised. At least one rib is bruised if not broken. But mostly, he felt wreathed in the unbelievable sore tiredness that followed a seizure. And mostly, he’s bone-tired, stiff and sore from his seizure, and cursing himself for showing that great weakness.

Without his Wit, he can’t tell if there are others in the room with him. Certainly, he’s no longer in the cell he woke up in before, but was he moved by his captor or rescued by someone else? Either way, it seems likely that as soon as his hosts know he’s awake, someone will come for him. And unarmed and disorientated, he has little chance of escaping this room if they do. Best to move fast. Cautiously, he cracks open his less-sore eye. The lights hurt his head something awful, brighter and harsher than firelight or daylight. The room is empty. He lies still a moment longer, gathering his thoughts, eyeing the room from under his lashes, then moves sharply.

He swings himself out of the low, soft bed, ignoring how the room swims around him, and, lurching slightly, makes for the door. To his surprise, it opens easily. The first door leads into an odd ceramic and silver anteroom, walled with mirrors; a dead end. The second leads into a hallway, and from there into a glass-walled room, laid out with low tables and soft chairs. He moves into the living room near-silently, warily, like a caged wolf. Distracted by a combination of concussion, Skill-headache and exhaustion making his vision blur, and lacking the familiar warning of his Wit-sense, he doesn’t notice there’s someone else sitting in there until he’s already moved out of the cover of the corridor.

B: The streets of the Capitol

Later, after having this place explained to him (however loosely) and after his test, he is surprised to find that he is free to leave the building. On the pretext of visiting the market, he has determined to find the edge of the city and plot his escape before they throw him into this deathmatch. But now he’s out in the city, he finds it almost distracts him from his plans. If the magical tower with its sourceless light and great glass walls and self-opening doors was strange, these streets are incomprehensible. He recognises not one in a thousand things that the huge glass-fronted stores display in glittering mounds, there are vehicles that make no sense, and even the people passing him, with their impossibly colourful hair and skin, and shimmering, shifting, oddly-cut clothes, are so alien as to be barely recognisable. They seem barely human. Elderlings? he wonders briefly, but puts the thought from his mind. If they are Elderlings, they seem hardly likely to come to the aid of the Six Duchies, when they are so venal and sick as to battle humans for sport. What’s important is to gather what information he can, then return to his friends and to Verity.

Admittedly, that currently mostly seems to take the form of standing, rather dumbstruck, in the street, looking very lost. This place is so confusing.

C: The Training Centre

There is one place in this odd city that seems almost familiar, and that’s the training centre in the building. The room itself is as strange as everything else, but the familiar weight of weapons in his hands is oddly comforting, especially when, bereft of his weapons, his Wit and his poisons, he feels much more vulnerable than he’d like in this strange and hostile place. And, having decided it best to present himself as a predictably aggressive soldier, he feels no qualms about being seen here. Not to mention, the more he sharpens his rusty skills, the better his chances of survival.

Hefting a suitable sword, he goes through familiar drills swiftly and neatly, one by one. The physical exertion frees his mind, takes him back to a time before everything went so wrong, running the same drills again and again out in the yards before Hod the Weaponsmaster’s sharp eye and critical tongue. By the time he pauses, panting, and notices that he isn’t alone, he feels almost cheerful despite his situation. The exercise is good, and he is feeling the benefits of relief from the constant guard he has had to keep on his Skill for the last few weeks on the Skill-road.

He throws the newcomer a wolfish smile, tossing his sword from hand to hand. “Looking for a sparring partner?”

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"Never heard of it," Merlyn says briskly. "Though that's hardly unusual here. There's quite a range of worlds they've dragged us from. Come over here, do," he adds, beckoning Fitz over to a nearby bench and sitting down. The bird in his beard lets out another disgruntled little peep, scrambling out and up onto his shoulder. Merlyn gives it a Look over his horn-rimmed spectacles, digging in his shopping bag and coming up with a thermos.

"One advantage of this place," he says, stretching out his long legs and pouring himself a mug of tea, "is that one can take tea wherever one goes. And it doesn't even leak, as they used to in my youth!" He proffers the flask to Fitz, sipping at his own cupful. "We can talk a little easier in the street. There are still cameras and whatnot, and of course there'll be people watching us in the crowd, but the noise does cover what we're saying a little. Come along. Sit down, do. I'd offer you a biscuit, but I left them back in the tower."

Slightly baffled, Fitz obediently follows his lead, joining him on the bench and taking the flask. He doesn't drink until he's watched Merlyn take several sips, being on the cautious side, but after the day he's had he appreciates this little kindness hugely.

The warmth of the tea suffuses and revitalises him, and he actually manages to relax slightly, visibly. It's an odd flavour to him - familiar enough, but he's more used to herbal and fruit teas - but it is good. And it's good to know that the old man is as conscious as he is of their watchers (and...cameras? He files that away for later investigation. Obviously that word means something he should know about).

For a moment, he leaves aside the desperate situation they're in, focusing on mundanities. "This flask is good," he muses. "I could do with one of these, on my travels." He can imagine that his life would be much improved by this - having to hand the elfbark tea which is so often the only thing propping him up would make life a great deal easier.

"Mm. Quite." Merlyn closes his eyes, holding his cup up so that the sparrow on his shoulder can dip its beak. "Though I'm very much afraid, my dear boy, that your travels may not resume as quickly as you'd like. Do you think I would still be in this oligarchical hellhole of crass consumerism if leaving were so easy?"

Well, yes, he probably would. But that's only because Merlyn is irresistibly drawn towards hopeless situations - most particularly those caused by people being wrong. Give him a door to leave through, and the knowledge of all the people he would be turning his back on would probably keep him here. He'd never say as much, though, certainly not where the Capitol can hear him.

He reaches over, patting Fitz's shoulder sympathetically. "I'm very sorry to be the bearer of bad news, my boy. Arriving seems to be hard on all of us, but I imagine having something urgent to get back to makes it worse. It might comfort you to know that time seems to work oddly in the process."

"I'm beginning to get that impression," Fitz replies bitterly, his hands tightening on the flask, thinking of their hopeless quest and Verity's fading presence, of Regal closing in on his friends. Kettricken and Nighteyes would fight as well as they could, and he suspected Kettle would aquit herself better in a fight than she seemed, but Starling had no warrior's skills, and the Fool, delicate as he was...He presses his lips together tightly and banishes the thought from his mind. They are no more in danger without him than with. And there is no benefit in worrying at the future, how he can catch them up again or if Verity will still be waiting at the end of their quest, until he can escape the city. One thing at a time.

He sips his tea, and turns the flask in his hands, leaning his elbows on his knees as he stares at the crowds passing by. "When you travel too long, it becomes a habit. I have spent much of the past year on the road, it's difficult to adjust to a more settled life. And, as you say, I've things to get back to. But I suppose they'll have to wait." Inwardly, he steels himself to beat this depressing prophecy. The events in motion in his world will not wait for him. He needs to get back. His discomfort with the idea shows in his poise; he is tense again, impatient, despite his words. He toys with the top of the Thermos, thinking.

"Oddly how?"

Edited 2015-07-20 04:20 (UTC)

"Oddly," Merlyn said slowly, "in that time outside this place seems to have no bearing. I mean, I thought it was queer from the beginning, but given my... particular relationship with time ordinarily, I had all but written it off." He sips at his tea, looking up at the flawlessly blue sky with an expression of ponderous consideration. "But it seems, from what others have told me, that 'odd' is the best consideration."

He looks at Fitz properly now, over the sparrow's back, and his large blue eyes narrow a little over the tops of his spectacles. "There are people here from different points along their own timelines. One man may know another, while the other will not meet him for years. And yet the fabric of their timelines seems unbroken. Now, there are two possibilities..."

Oh, dear. He's gone into lecture mode, complete with half-raised finger and declamatory tone.

"Firstly, that the theorists who hypothesise branching realities are correct, and that the related people are taken from neighbouring realities. This seems possible, but goodness, it seems quite the coincidence to dip into so many neighbouring realities and not pick up two from the same timeline.

"Secondly, my preferred theory, we have not been transported here at all. We are, in fact, copies. That makes far more sense. The virtual is, after all, cheaper and easier to transport than the physical, and with the technology at this world's disposal, it would be easy to construct a rough clone to hold the translated information. That would also explain how they seem able to constrain our linguistic and metaphysical skills.

"Either way, it seems very probable that in some timeline or other, you are still home and doing what needs to be done, which I gather by your tone is probably important." He sounds rather satisfied with that little lecture, settling back on the bench with one bony ankle crossed over the other. "Cold comfort, I know. But cold comfort seems to be most of what's on offer around here."

Fitz thinks on that for a moment, and then a little smile starts to play around his lips. He laughs quietly to himself.

"Your pardon," he catches himself, realising that his laughter could be construed as mocking. "You remind me of a friend, back in my world. He, too, becomes harder to understand the clearer he tries to make himself."

Merlyn looks rather affronted, but underneath that, is actually quite glad to see the young man smiling, even laughing. It isn't much, but the old wizard has a tender heart under all his crochety grumping and bad temper, and if that's all he can do to make this a little easier... well, it's something.

"Have you considered," he says, rather acidly, "that the problem may not lie with the people trying to explain, but with you failing to understand?" Then, in a rather softer tone, "In simpler terms, then. I think you're still there, even when you're here. It's what makes the most sense."

"It's been suggested. Repeatedly." He laughs again, softly, clicking the top of the thermos open and closed. "I was raised by some very practical men. My understanding tends to stop at swinging a sword, moving a pen and caring for a horse. I was never schooled for metaphysical puzzles, though they seem to dog my life of late." Again, he chooses not to mention his assassin's training, but it comes to much the same thing. He understands well the theory of that which is useful, but he's never managed to wholly wrap his mind around the talk of fate and time that seem to be all he's surrounded with on the road.

He leans back on the bench, holding the thermos in both hands on his lap. "I hope you're right. I hope I haven't abandoned my king when he needs me most. I hope my friends are not waiting for me on the road with enemies approaching. But hope never seems to get me very far."

Merlyn's expression softens a little, and, taking a long draught of tea, he reaches over to place a hand - knobbly and thin, its papery skin marked with callouses and scars as much as age spots - on Fitz's shoulder. "It isn't abandoning your king," he says quietly, "to be dragged from his side. I know how it hurts to know you have left people in need of you, to fear for them without any way to help or even watch over them." He closes his eyes. Having gone through it backwards didn't entirely ease the sting of that knowledge for him. Knowing that someone you will care for is suffering and dying in your absence is not, it turns out, a great deal easier than caring for them already.

"It isn't abandonment," he says again, after a moment, and squeezes Fitz's shoulder before withdrawing his hand to wrap it around his cup again. "It only feels like it. Abandonment is in the act of leaving, and you didn't leave. You were taken." Then, with a rather tired little smile, "I don't advise hope, particularly. But I do advise putting your worries about it aside as much as possible. Better to turn your energies to what you can change."

Conscious that in his thoughts, he's revealed more than he'd intended to about the nature of his quest and his position, Fitz takes a deep breath and his shoulders tense under Merlyn's touch. But despite his concerns about giving too much of himself away, he does find the old man's presence and words comforting. It's been too long, far too long, since he has spoken to anyone who cared for how he felt without it being so wrapped in expectations and fears and doubts that it did as much harm as good. It takes a conscious effort of will to remind himself that he can't trust the old man. He's in a place where everyone stands to gain from his failure. Still, he appreciates the sympathy Merlyn extends to him, even as he reminds himself to keep a tighter lock on his secrets.

He sips his tea, and sits in silence a moment. "Whyever I left, the effect's the same. If I'm gone from my task, my task goes undone, and those who need me to act fast will suffer for my lack. But I suppose as much will be true of this place, if good performance in the Arena can mean the difference between the people of my District eating or starving." He leaves that hanging, hoping to steer the conversation away from himself and glean a little more insight into how his companion feels and how he expresses himself under the constant watch of the Capitol.

Well, the good news is that Fitz has hit upon the exact right way to figure out Merlyn's feelings on the Capitol. The better news is that by now, the old man has gained just enough sense of self-preservation not to get them both arrested with another loud, public rant. Instead, he talks just as conversationally as if they were discussing the weather, looking down at his tea.

"Ah, yes. The zenith of the crude feudalistic capitalism in this place. A classic tactic, of course. Create strife and competition in those under your heel, make them blame one another for the hardship that comes directly mandated by a government which lives in storied luxury. Pour me a little more tea, would you?" He holds out his - by now mostly empty - cup for Fitz to top up from the thermos. "The good news is, we have only just finished up the most recent of those ghastly gladiatorial matches, so you ought to have a little time where your performance is relatively irrelevant to the people you've been assigned to. Hopefully. Of course, as I've never met the people in question, I'm going purely on the propaganda and poppycock spewed by our erstwhile captors."

Fitz tops up Merlyn's cup obediently, then sips some tea himself, replying in the same light tone. "Then you've never been to the Districts either? How long have you been here?"

"Hm, let me think." Merlyn settles his cup in his lap, frowning a little at the bird on his shoulder. "It was, what, two months in the Arena? Although I died a month or so in, of course - a fascinating experience, I must say, albeit an unpleasant one. And then before that, hm... a month, perhaps, or two? Let us say four months. That sounds about right. Though I can't say I've kept much track of it. When you are as old as I am, one day tends to run into another. Long enough to make myself thoroughly undesirable in the eyes of the regime. Short enough for them to have only beaten me to a bloody pulp once so far."

"Fascinating," Fitz repeats wryly. "That's one way to see it, I suppose." It's disconcerting to hear a man as elderly and frail-looking as Merlyn talk lightly of being beaten down. He files that away in his mind and moves on. "Know you if anyone here has seen the Districts? It seems so strange, though I'm sure they've their own reasons, to ask us to champion for those who are so distant, and to ask them to accept our championship in turn. I've been told that there's little chance of leaving the Capitol, so I may content myself with books and scrolls, or whatever they have here instead, but if anyone's been to the other lands here, I'd give much to hear their accounting of it."

"Hm." Merlyn frowns, stroking his beard, then adjusts his spectacles and clears his throat. "I believe there was once a tour of them. But for the most part, it seems the only people who have seen the Districts are those from the Districts. I might suggest you talk to Emily, who works with District 7. A charming girl, and she hails from that land. There will be others, though. As for the geography and history, what I can glean from documents and their frankly impenetrable digital storage, I have collated as best I can. But there's little enough of it. This city has little interest in most that lies outside its walls." He harrumphs again. "The geography appears to map neatly to the America of my own world. On that basis, I can make some educated guesses regarding climate, flora, fauna, and so on. But really, trying to piece together real information around here is like pulling teeth."

Fitz sips his tea, looking sidelong at the old man with obvious interest. "I know less of this America than of Panem, but I'd be much obliged if you'd grant me a look at what you've collected. It seems churlish to me to go into battle for a people I know so little of, I'd feel much better with a little idea of what I fight for."

"I would hardly have mentioned it if I was averse to sharing it," Merlyn says, almost reproachfully, and looks at Fitz over the top of his spectacles. "I don't have it with me, of course. But perhaps I can answer any questions you may have?"

Fitz half-laughs. "Where to begin? I know a little of the Capitol now, but little enough of my District that there seems an endless sea of don't-knows. I'd look over some maps where I can, for my uncle taught me that a man learn much from the ways people map their lands. Let's begin at the beginning, and assume I'm as half-witted as I seem. What are these Districts?"

He injects a little acid into his voice as he continues - a delicate balancing act, enough to align himself with Merlyn and gain his trust, but not enough to seem a traitor or a dissident.

"That they serve under the Capitol, I know. And that they produce Panem's resources and trade goods, to be sold and distributed by the Capitol. Beyond that, nothing. I would know their names, their lands, their peoples...have they different cultures? How does their way of life differ from the Capitol, and from each other? How great are these lands, how far-reaching Panem's borders? And beyond Panem, what trading partners, what allies, what enemies?" He takes a deep breath, and lowers his eyes to examine the thermos. "Forgive me. I do not mean to flood you with questions, and I understand that there's much that's still unknown. I've travelled far and wide, and never have I seen a world so wondrously strange. I confess, I've been abuzz with curiosity since I set foot in these streets. Let me start again. What are the Districts bordering the city, and where do they lie from here? And what beyond those? I suppose, by its numbering, that my own District 11 must be some way out from here, beyond at least the inner Districts?"

"Goodness." Merlyn looks more amused than really overwhelmed, though, and chuckles a little. "I must say, it's good to see a man asking the real questions around here. Now, let me see... As far as I can tell, the government line is that Panem is all there is. Personally, I find that hard to believe. Since it maps so clearly to North America, I feel quite certain there must still be a South America, and probably a Eurasia and an Africa and all other such continents. But the fact remains, they are most insistent that the world begins and ends with Panem."

Harrumphing, he pushes his glasses up his nose and raises one finger. "Now, assuming I am correct about this, Panem itself ought to be around ten million square miles in area, although only around a third of that area seems to be inhabited. The bordering Districts, according to the maps, are 2, 10, and 9 - those produce masonry and military supplies, livestock, and grain respectively. Your District is beyond that, on the eastern coast, and for some by-our-lady ridiculous reason, is the primary exporter of fruit and vegetables. Never mind that those exports could just as easily be grown nearer, and brought here fresher, oh, no. Never mind that there may well be good quarrying land in the north, or fertile grasslands to the south. No matter! Order must be maintained!" He snorts, his lip curling slightly under his moustache. "The economic situation here is thoroughly underconsidered. I cannot understand how it has survived this long. What kind of drattedly stupid nation transports its fish two and a half thousand miles to another perfectly usable coastline?"

Chin resting on his knuckles, Fitz listens, frowning. "So there's only one industry in each District? I assumed they were primary exports, not all they produced. This truly is a different world to the one I grew up in."

He chews his lip thoughtfully. It seems likely that for today at least, he can get away with some questions the Capitol doesn't like. After all, he's got away with fighting the Capitol face to face. They must be expecting a period of ignorance and adjustment, so it's best to get as much information as he can before he's supposed to know better. He hopes Merlyn doesn't get into trouble for this, but at the end of the day that's the old man's choice to make for himself.

"I was told that our actions here can affect the rationing for our Districts. Does that mean they don't even have a contingent of workers to provide their own food? All the resources go into the Capitol and are distributed from here? Pardon my candour, but that seems neither efficient nor safe. What if supply lines were cut, or an accident befell the shipments?"

"Hmph." Merlyn's prodigiously knobbly nose wrinkles in distaste, and he shakes his head. "It's not me you have to worry about when it comes to candour, my boy. I happen to think it would be a preposterous way to run a town, let alone a nation. The act of a government of petty tyrants who place absolute power over their citizens above minor things such as reason, peace, or common sense. You see, if every District must produce less than its own subsistence, if all property produced belongs to the central State and is redistributed only by its magnanimity, how can its citizens rebel? Such," he adds, rather more meditatively, "is the theory, in any case. The British in Ireland and the Bolsheviks in Russia can both attest to how thoroughly it doesn't work. A common trouble, I'm afraid, when citizens are seen as pieces in a wider game, rather than as humans in their own right, capable of intelligence, resentment, and most of all, hope."

It should be clear by now that it's unlikely to be Fitz who gets Merlyn into trouble in this conversation.

"A man," he concludes, wagging his finger a little, "who has hope and anger in sufficient mixture, will always rebel. No matter how unsuccessfully, or how repeatedly. A fact this government, I am entirely sure from the blinding gaps and euphemism in their histories, has had ample chance to observe. I can hardly believe they are stupid enough not to see over the course of most of a century that their ridiculous pseudo-capitalist fascism is not working."

Fitz has already pegged Merlyn as a potential ally when it comes time to pick sides, but there's a level of talk which he strongly suspects is dangerous to both of them. "Such talk verges on treasonous, I'd say." He speaks quietly but clearly, so as not to draw undue attention but to be sure that if they are being monitored, he'll come across as the reasonable party. "It's my experience that until people are starving, they've far less interest in politics than their rulers think. Unless a country is mismanaged badly, or caught in drought or flood or war, revolt's a distant fear." He's trying to agree without condemning the Capitol outright. It's a tricky line to walk, and one he'll need more practise with this place to master.

"Ah, yes, of course. Panem's circuses." Which isn't quite what he wants to say, of course, but in the absence of proper Latin it will have to do. He has to admit to being rather impressed by how well Fitz walks that line between agreement and plausible deniability. If the rebellion snaps this one up, he thinks, it will be much to their advantage.

But Merlyn is not the rebellion, and has no interest in playing games of subterfuge, so he only smiles, his large blue eyes mild, and pats Fitz's hand. "We can only hope. Nobody wants riot and rebellion in their lives, after all."

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hey look who's finally back

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oh, is it merlyn-rant-o'clock again already?

It is Merlyn-rant-o'clock all day every day

it is in his world yes