You Talk Far Too Much for Someone So Unkind [OPEN]

[whatisay]

WHO| Jason and OPEN, especially to D7 Tributes
WHAT| Jason's D7 District post!
WHERE| D7 Suite
WHEN| After the mini-Arena.
WARNINGS| Jason being awful.

The first thing Jason does when he gets back to District Seven from his week off on Monday (at about five a.m.) is wake Cassian, and thus the rest of the floor up, by screaming at the Stylist about how August 31st is, actually, a real date and that scheduling forty-seven meetings for it is, at best, unfathomably stupid and at worst an attempt at outright sabotage.

The second thing Jason does is slam out new schedules for every single Tribute and slap them onto the front of each door. To his credit, everything is set up so the Tributes can maximize their incomes and media exposure, and it seems that he's back to courting Sponsors with a vengeance. On the downside, there's very little room left for Tributes to relax or do anything of their own volition. Furthermore, there's not all that much time for Jason to do anything but aggressively catch up and work intensive overtime.

The yelling, throwing things and shoving Avoxes around has been dialed up to eleven, and seems aggravated all the further by any attempts to offer condolences or point out the small details that he seems more prone to miss than he used to.

Friday, after a full week of working his Tributes into the ground, chainsmoking and meeting with Sponsors in hallways and dance halls until he actually wears a hole into his dress shoes, he sets up with an anonymous-looking videographer in the District Seven Suite. The hologram window is set to a peaceful forest. Jason sits on the couch with, oddly enough, a capuchin monkey in a diaper leashed to his wrist and sitting on the backrest.

"Alright," he says to each Tribute as they enter at the scheduled time. "You're going to record your apology to District Seven for fucking up the last Arena and letting their children starve."

Comments

[conifer]

"If that's what you were yelling about first thing this morning, I can guess it's something terrible." She frowns as she darts her glance over to the decorations on the wall in lieu of Cassian himself. "I wanted to take that over, but he insisted. I'll know better than to give him actual responsibility if he can't even handle making appointments."

She looks a little uncomfortable at the memory of the last time she'd seen him, swallowing heavily before responding, though truly grateful to him for his continued concern over the matter. "I'm all right. I've tried not to think about anything except for holding the fort, it's easier that way." She shifts awkwardly as she gazes at him, feeling her own concern for his wellbeing and knowing that it may not be welcome. "I was sorry to hear about your mother. If you need anything at all..."

[whatisay]

"Forty-five meetings for one day because he thought August 31st wasn't an actual date. Nevermind that even if he was were right about that, that would be a terrible idea." Jason throws a pen against the coffeetable, shaking his head.

"I don't." He says it quickly, betraying it less as truth and more as a way to avoid actually talking about any of it. The funeral's over, the arrangements for the house are being made, and he's moving forward less for the future than to just put it behind him as much as he can, as fast as he can. "Hope I didn't give you so much to hold down that it stopped being easier that way."

[conifer]

Emily gives an irritated sigh. "It would be even worse if it weren't a real date. Everyone would think we were just avoiding them, and they'd take their sponsorship to another District." She wanted to have words with Cassian about his idea of 'help' herself, except that she was sure that he'd had about enough of a reprimand from Jason already.

"All right." She sounds a little uncertain, knowing that she'd need all the support offered to her if it was her own mother, but not wanting to press the issue. It was nice feeling that her and Jason were on the same side for once, and she doesn't want to rock the boat. "No, don't worry about that. It was nice to keep busy." It made her able to just focus on what she was doing, and not think about the many things that were troubling her. "Want me to take half of those appointments Cassian made?"

[whatisay]

"Exactly. I hate to say it, but having to look completely incompetent and reschedule everything is actually the better scenario he left me with." Jason rubs his palm against his forehead and gets up to get more coffee. "You shouldn't take half. Most of these are contract drafting anyway, and since you're a Districter, you know."

It doesn't matter that he knows Emily's capable. What he isn't saying, the backhand inherent in the comment, is that he doesn't think she can read well enough to do it.

"Glad I didn't leave you in too much of a lurch."

[conifer]

Emily turns red in the face. She knows Jason doesn't mean anything by it, but the gulf between them has opened up again, and she's starkly reminded of her place as a Districter. Jason's quite right in that drafting contracts would be beyond her, but that just makes her even more determined to gain the skills needed to be able to do it. Merlyn's been orating literature to her so far, but she wonders whether he could teach her how to read better and more critically too.

"...Oh. All right, but I'll take what I can."

[whatisay]

"Alright, come over here." He pats the couch and scoots aside to make room for her. "I'll show you which ones you can take on and we can come up with a strategy for the next few weeks."

He pulls out his device and sets it on the table, to show off the Tributes as holograms of their faces. "Word has it we might be getting Nick back. Now, Gritta and Wednesday are practically selling themselves, and Ruffnut has niche appeal. Do you have ideas for Vivi and Alain?"

[conifer]

She seats herself next to him on the couch, one leg crossed over the other and arms folded over her chest. "Vivi has the 'cute' appeal. There's already a plush toy, so how about a lunch box or breakfast cereal or something along those lines? Alain..." She frowns a little, making a series of tiny wrinkles in her forehead. "Alain's a little more difficult. My ideal would be to team up with District Four and try to market him and Roland together, but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to go with that."

[whatisay]

"I don't have anything against it morally. I don't really care."

Jason's monkey starts to try and groom Emily's hair. Jason chews the corner of his tongue.

"It's just that sooner or later, the Gamemakers are going to realize that Districts are going to stop seeing each other as the enemy and start seeing them as potential allies if they keep seeing that story repeated in the Games. I mean. You know how impressionable everyone out there is."

[conifer]

Emily forces herself not to reply that such a thing would be impossible, that the Districts are far too far away from each other to be able to ally and that the Capitol must be weaker than she thought for them to take such a worry seriously. Instead she shakes out her hair so the monkey can reach it better, enjoying the sensation of its tiny fingers picking through it.

"I know that. It's just difficult, when they already have such strong alliances before being brought here." She's certain the Gamemakers were just trying to make her job more difficult there.

[whatisay]

If Emily and Jason ever started seriously talking about the weaknesses the Capitol has, they'd both get arrested in five minutes. There are things Jason knows, as the child of the military lineage of the Capitol, even though all the war gave out of the Compsons a generation before it could get to him. It's in the atmosphere, the unspoken vulnerabilities and paranoias.

"It is, and it doesn't help that the other Staff teams encourage it. It's like they've forgotten that the Games are about dividing and conquering." He waves his cigarette at the monkey. "Don't let him do that. I've seen where his grubby little paws have been. You don't want them in your hair."

[conifer]

Reluctantly she reaches up and twists her hair behind her other shoulder, out of the monkey's reach. "Dare I ask why you have him here with you?"

[whatisay]

"Well, I can't trust Ben to watch him. I'm supposed to give him at least ten hours a day of attention, which, for the record, I never agreed to, but he's mandated." Jason sighs and kneads his fingertips over his temples. "He's supposed to help me deal with grief, which would be appropriate if I were actually dealing with grief and not just celebrating every day I don't have to wake up to my mother's bitching."