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

[homicidium]

"That's all right, then." She nods firmly, agreeing to this deal, then shrugs. "I think that a lot less people would expect a monkey to be an assassin than a person. Monkeys can learn to do stuff like pour poison into soups."

Wednesday places Virgil back into her pocket and nods again, standing up and taking his hand as she head toward her bedroom. "I got a new book about serial killers in the Districts. One of them in Three used to reanimate the heads in his living room and talk to them while they blinked and convulsed."

[whatisay]

Jason wonders if he could get Ben trained to poison people. Probably not. Jason would probably get killed by accident.

"Alright. That sounds appropriate." Jason's pretty sure he never read stuff that morbid as a kid, that the Compson's nanny read about the heroic adventures of Capitol adventurers in the dark, untamed regions of the Districts, but Wednesday sleeps better than most of the Tributes and Jason won't fuss with success.

He lets her take his hand, not squeezing back but just allowing himself to be led, not pulling away. "Honestly, a severed head would probably be better company than most we got around here."

[homicidium]

"Smarter than Ruffnut, at least," she concurs, and her bedroom isn't very far down the hall. It's dark and dreary, with black wallpaper and heavy burgundy curtains that remain closed at all times. The overhead light has had its bulbs removed, so only small lamps provide any visibility.

Wednesday sets Virgil in his cage, then gets the book from her schoolbag and hands it to him, climbing into her bed. The mattress is rather hard, but her blankets are soft and warm, and she clutches a headless doll as she curls up next to Jason, so she can see all the morbid, black and white pictures. Turning to where she's bookmarked a page, she points. "Here's where I left off, The Laughing Lumberjack," she says, and there's a booking photo of a wild-eyed man from District Seven, according to the caption. It goes on to mention that he sawed all the limbs off his family members with a chainsaw.

[whatisay]

Jason's always allowed the Tributes to decorate their own rooms, so long as they don't dip into the budget for it. There's allowing someone to customize their space and then there's using up resources for frivolous aesthetics that he can't use for photo spreads. Wednesday, thankfully, brings in enough income of her own from Sponsor spreads.

He sits next to her on the bed, not tucking her in but not pulling away from her either. "In the mountains of District Seven, death comes in many forms: poxes, accidents with axes and timber, hunger, cold, but the Laughing Lumberjack introduced it in an entirely new and titillating fashion..."

He continues on until Wednesday is asleep.

[homicidium]

She listens, fascinated, makes him do voices when there are little transcripts of interviews in the pages, laughs at all the most gory parts. But she's asleep within a chapter or two, slowly growing more quiet until she's not making noises anymore, and her weight is heavy against his side. She never lets go of that doll, either, clutching it to herself the way most children would hold a teddy bear or a security blanket.