thecapitol | (no subject)

Who| Emily and Beck, Emily and Quintus
What| Emily recognises the Peacekeeper who tortured her District six years ago, and reaches her breaking point
Where| Beck's apartment and then Quintus' apartment
When| After Quintus' broadcast, before the most recent District liberations
Warnings/Notes| Warnings for talk of violence, torture, PTSD. Note that this is the last chance for Capitol CR with Emily before her move to D13, so if you'd like a thread for your character on here, let me know at

viridianwings

a) For Beck
When she arrives at Beck's apartment, Emily is pale and restless, her eyes bloodshot from crying and lack of sleep. She feels terrible for what she has to tell her, what she has to do, but she doesn't see any other way forward. The Capitol have played with her life for so long that she thought she could endure everything they had to throw at her, but this was far too personal a betrayal. It served her right for allowing her to get so close to the Head Peacekeeper, of all people, to come to think of him as just another person trying to do a difficult job, another Districter caught between a rock and a hard place, when all this time he'd been looking at her knowing what he'd done to her people. She felt violated far deeper than she ever had been in all her years of bidding.

She knocks on the door, hoping desperately that Beck's not in, that she doesn't have to have this conversation with her. She's not sure she has the courage to face it.

b) For Quintus
She stares up at Quintus' apartment for a long moment, willing herself to become cool and collected, resigning herself to her fate even before she's confronted him. There are a million things she wants to say, a million ways she wants to hurt him. Her hand shakes as she raises it to press the buzzer, and she remembers the first time she came here, comforting him when he was sick and breaking down over his brother's death in the Games and her own ordeals, back when she thought they were coming from the same place, just two hard working people trying to wrest whatever control they could from their situation. Once she would have smiled at the man about to open the door in a genuine camaraderie that few had ever seen from her. Now she could only see him as despicable, the most brutal tool of the Capitol. Her first friend, her enemy, maybe the last face she'd ever see.

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He slams her back against the floor, shifting his position on top of her to keep her down and pulling her arms around to hold them firmly against her back, as though preparing to cuff her.

"What the hell are you doing?!"

"What needs to be done." She meets his gaze and wishes looks could kill. "You're just as bad as the rest of them -- no, you're worse."

"Are you talking about the broadcast?" he asks incredulously. "What are you so upset about? That man nearly killed me. I had to make an example of him to deter anybody else from trying."

Edited 2016-03-20 00:07 (UTC)

"And it's not the first time you've done it, either. Were we the first, or was your brutality the reason you were assigned to Seven?"

That remark renders him speechless for a moment. His grip doesn't loosen, but he straightens a bit, staring at her with his lips parted.

"Those men hacked my comrades to death," he says hollowly. "They almost did the same to me. I couldn't let that happen again."

"All this time you've pretended to be my friend." She almost spits the last word at him. "You're worse than anyone else in the Capitol."

"I was never pretending," he snaps back. "Do you think I hate you because you're from Seven? You weren't part of that revolt. What in Panem would I have against you?"

"I don't care if you hate me." It would be easier for her if he did. "I don't care what you think of me. It's how you pretended you were different from the Peacekeepers who brutalised my District, when all the time you were the worst of them all."

"Would you have wanted me to be sympathetic? Let those insurrectionists off easy? If we don't go heavy-handed against that sort of thing then it only gets worse. You've faced an Arena and a war; you understand how terrible anarchy is." He takes a breath, exhaling a sigh. "Sometimes sacrifices have to be made. Messages have to be sent."

"The message it sends is that the Capitol doesn't even regard them as worthy of basic human rights and dignity!" She screws her eyes shut, the only way she can keep herself from crying. "And you knew-- I told you about that day and you kept quiet enough then. You know it's something to be ashamed of. And now you've done it again."

"I didn't tell you because I--I didn't think you would understand and I guess I was right about that," he says with a shake of his head. "Those men may have been from Seven, but they were criminals. They started a revolt and killed people. They ambushed and killed people that had lives and dreams and families, and you think we should have treated them more kindly?"

He swallows hard, his voice wavering. "I have spent so many nights thinking of the people I've lost. I went out to your District to comfort the dying. So don't talk to me as though I'm some sort of sadistic bastard, because I have always cared--I have cared in spite of every tragedy, every abuse, every time I've had to sit back and watch this nation go to shit! I have cared and I have only ever tried to do right by my profession even when everything has gone wrong so don't--don't tell me I haven't."

"I think if you all had treated them more kindly to begin with, there wouldn't have been any revolt, there wouldn't even be a rebellion right now." He had no right to decide what she would understand or deserved to know. It made him no better than any other Capitolite oppressor deciding to show mercy to the feelings of a Districter who couldn't understand things he didn't deign to explain to them in simple terms.

"I suppose that's something we can agree on. You have always tried to do right by your profession. And your profession is one for men who listen to brutality and orders over their souls and consciences. You can all go to hell."

"What do you expect me to do, coming here like this?" he asks. "Answer for the sins of the past seventy-five years? I'm only one man. I can only work with what I'm given."

He grits his teeth, shaking his head again. "I'm sorry, Emily. You don't want to believe it, but this is the way the world is. It's not going to get any better. I believed, coming up the ranks, that I was going to be able to work some real changes and make up for the losses but this is it. It's this or lawlessness. I know you want more from your nation because I want more from our nation but it's not going to happen! This is all we've got!"

He breaks off for a second, choking with emotion, needing to gather himself. When he looks down at Emily again the frustration is gone from his features, replaced with a deep weariness.

"Do you think taking me out would solve anything? If I had died six years ago--would that have changed anything? Someone else would've stepped up and done the exact same thing and you know it. I'm not your solution. There is no solution."

"You don't get it at all," she hisses, glaring at him with eyes of cold steel, contempt winning out over the pain and despair for just a moment - contempt for him, for herself, for everyone and everything in Panem. "You don't understand anything. I know I can't solve anything, I've known that ever since they day they threw me into the Arena. I've lived for years carrying the weight of my District on my shoulders, of all the children who died on my watch. I can't do anything to change that, for any of them. But I can do something for me. I can quiet the nightmares you've brought me, one way or the other."