thecapitol | (no subject)

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WHO| Any Victors, and every tribute as they are removed from the arena.
WHAT| The Capitol would like to pick your brain.
WHEN| Each person is approached separately, so you can specify when and where they came from.
WHERE| A government office building
WARNING/NOTES| This is mandatory IC. If for some reason OOC you cannot tag in (hiatus, etc) talk to a mod and we can handwave thing.

Much like the Victors who were currently missing, each victor or tribute was approached by a pair in sleek, all black suits, with friendly smiles, who none the less were quite firm in leading their targets away.

It was, from there, a short trip to a very nondescript looking Capitol building, in cars so heavily tinted it would be hard even for those familiar with the city to know where they ended up. From there they are lead to an elevator, which goes down, deep, and out into a white hall way. The first door slid open to a room, as blank as everything else, where a small, slightly pudgy woman with blood red a-line hair gave a wide smile.

"Please, have a seat!"

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"So you're enjoying the social scene? You don't seem like much of a party girl." There was a slight touch of disdain, but only a slight one.

She blinked, unfazed by the tone, "I'm not. But I don't get the feeling I have much of a choice in the matter."

A bit of honesty, and she wondered if it wasn't a poor decision on her part. Perhaps it would pave the way to being trusted, though.

Well, at least she knew her place.

"We do like to entertain here." She said with a smile. "Are you familiar with your district yet? Or with any of the others?"

"Somewhat," Ariadne stated, though she had done as much research as she could into her district, gathering a firm grasp on exactly what it was she was representing. Without having seen it herself, though, she wasn't sure how firm that grasp was.

"Is there a reason we continue to represent the districts, though we're not from them?"

"To give them something to cheer for, of course. And if you win, the district will benefit from it."

She gave Ariadne a toothy grin. Not that it would work with all these tributes, but with this girl she thoughts it would. Win and innocent people eat.

It did get her a little bit; her previous conversation with Elias had started her in on thinking more on that. Her thoughts didn't show on her face as Ariadne regarded the other woman, hands still folded casually in her lap, "Do they really? Get the benefits from the victors?"

"Why yes, of course! The Games are just as muchfor the Districts as for the Capitol. If gives them hope! A victor can change lives for...years to come."

Her voice had a clear sales pitch to it, a well rehearsed line. Unlike some lower on the rung, she didn't believe what she was selling, she knew the truth.

Ariadne didn't believe it any more than she did. Her expression was unchanged, save the tiny wrinkle of her nose and brief, fluttering blink. The only people who benefited truly were those in the Capitol, she had a feeling.

But she knew her questions wouldn't get answered with anything more than canned responses; silence was better.

It flustered the woman to have nothing but silence. She waited for Ariadne to speak, and shifted, glancing nervously behind the woman as the silence dragged on.

Finally she moved to the next question.

"Has your mentor gone over the Treaty of the Treason?"

Her silence lent itself well to watching the interrogator's body language, her facial tics: suffice to say, Ariadne noticed almost immediately that to have such pregnant silences was bothering the other woman.

Duly noted.

"No," Ariadne admitted. She'd heard things about it, snippets and the gist, but never from them. District 6 wasn't exactly known for their outstanding mentors, after all.

Expert fingers flicked through the file before here, before she plucked out a sheet, sliding it across the table.

On the page was a simplified version of the Treaty of Treason, neat and easy to digest.

Ariadne leaned forward, skimming the page quickly, then reading it more slowly. Sure enough, she did indeed have the gist of it; the second reading was more for the details. The things they would use against her and the other Tributes, and things like that. The fine print.

After she finished reading it a second time, deciding that was enough, she gently slid the sheet back to the interrogator, expression still not betraying the deep-seated irritation she felt at the hands of the Capitol.

This conversation was getting too serious for niceties, and she had a feeling Ariadne wasn't fooled by them anyway.

"Do you understand the Games? Why we have them?"

"Well enough. To keep the Districts in line. To prevent another incident from occurring."

She sincerely doubts that it will help, if the Districts are that hellbent on rebelling. But she can't say for certain. Really, her own answers are just as canned: it's appropriate, if you ask her.

"Although that is a side effect, that is not the reason for the Games."

She looked up, looking Araidne directly in the eyes.

"They are a reminder of what we have gone through, and a reminder of what we could lose."

Ariadne held the other woman's gaze for as long as it took to show that she wasn't afraid, and wasn't backing down.

"I'm not sure I quite follow."

"Peace isn't free. But war is far more expensive."

She folded her hand on the table, leaning in to Ariadne.

"Humanity is at a delicate place right now. Force and control, while it may seem cruel, are necessary. Or else there won't be any of us left."

"What's the point of having brought us in?"

She was showing her hand perhaps too soon, but she wanted to know. It was easier to just ask than dance around the words, and perhaps never get around to it.

The woman was silent for a moment. She knew the whys, but she could wanted to choose her words wisely.

"Because a sacrifice can be just as powerful when it is symbolic."

She understood that notion well enough, her expression betraying nothing as she regarded her interrogator. "But we're not sacrifices. We come back. And then we're sent in again, and again. Symbolic or no, someone's going to complain eventually."

Again, she considered what she wanted to say. Ariadne was smart, but perhaps she was the sort of smart that needed to hear this.

"You don't need to stay dead for us to remind the districts how close death is. We bring you back. But we don't have to."

It was a thinly-veiled threat, so far as Ariadne could see. There was no way it couldn't be.

So she bit her tongue at that point, deciding that was as far as she was going. Cobb had never been able to threaten her with death; she had willingly walked into Limbo, knowing full well what might happen. But this? This was a legitimate method of killing her off in a potentially excruciating way.

She was satisfied that she had gotten Ariadne to a dead end.

And with only one last question to go. Which this all segued nicely into.

"Now, do you understand the price of peace?"

Whatever she wanted to believe it was.

Ariadne blinked slowly, making it seem as though she was thinking it over. In truth, she didn't have much intention of answering the question one way or another. She wasn't getting anything out of them, and she wouldn't be giving anything back.

She waited, and when Ariadne didn't reply, she sat straight and gathered up the bits of the girl's file.

"If you have no more questions, that's all."

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buildingreality - 2012-07-17 23:35 (UTC) - Expand

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