thecapitol | (no subject)

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WHO| Effie and Darius
WHAT| A stressful period is about to be made more stressful.
WHEN| Mid-day
WHERE| The Tribute training center.
WARNING/NOTES| None atm.

This was not good.

Katniss and Peeta were missing. And of course, she and Haymitch were use to going at this solo, but there was...a difference. Because usually they were not stressed about missing mentors and their tributes.

At least she assume Haymitch was stressed. If his drinking habit were any indication, at least.

"Hold the elevator please." She said, tone clipped as she picked up her pace, sorting through files as she went. There was a party, tonight, to try to gather sponsors, but she might be flying solo. Which might be better all things considered.

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He did his best to be invisible, standing straight and still in his corner of the elevator, barely breathing. His eyes flicked to her once, but she obviously didn't need anything from him, and so he looked forward again, even the muscles of his face trained to immobility.

Having an Avox so close, and so hard to ignore was more stressful than Effie expected. Usually they just...vanished into the back ground. But it was hard to ignore someone when you were the only person in such a small space with them.

Luckily it would be a short ride. In fact...she frowned, looking at the display. They should already be moving down...

As if realizing it had been noticed the elevator dropped a short distance, lights flickering. Effie let out a shriek, gripping her files to her chest.

"Oh...oh my..." She chuckled awkwardly, glancing over. "Well, that was exciting."

Darius remained silent, but his blue eyes went wide, hands white-knuckled on his pail of supplies. It wasn't the drop, though that had shaken him, it was the flicker. The threat of darkness in this tiny, tiny space. He didn't look at her for comfort, didn't acknowledge her, half-stunned by fear.

And then the lights did go out, with a mechanical groan that made the whole elevator tremble, and he made a choked, terrified sound.

Effie let out and outright shriek that time, dropping her files and pressing back against the wall. She could hear the papers settling to the floor, but right now...she did not actually care.

"Do you...can we call mati-"

And then the floor dropped.

Darius let go of his pail, the supplies all clattering to the floor in a racket that seemed deafening. He backed heavily against the wall as the brakes of the elevator screamed uselessly, almost drowning out the creaking, guttural moan of terror as they fell.

For a horrible, terrifying moment, there was nothing but the falling, but then the noise of the brakes stepped up to a shriek, almost human, and the elevator lurched to a jerky, violent stop, flinging the two people inside to the floor.

Did they jump? Did the crouch down? Before Effie's panicking mind could find an option the elevators breaks finally did their job, and she was thrown down, banging herself up in the process.

In the dark, suddenly exceedingly quiet little room, all she could hear was their breathing. It was suddenly comforting to be in here with someone else. Even an Avox.

"Are you alright? Uhm." He couldn't answer that. "Never mind, I forgot. Clap if you're all right. Or...something."

He didn't clap. He wasn't all right. He wasn't injured, but he was not all right, not here in the claustrophobic dark. Almost before the elevator had stopped moving, he'd drawn himself into a tightly curled ball, arms over his head.

Oh god, he was dead.

No, that was ridiculous. Nothing in here could kill you.

...unless he had had a heart attack. He had seemed young, but all Avoxs looked so different it was hard to tell. And the idea of being in here with a dead body sent her into a panic.

Reaching out, she groped around for him. To check his pulse, or...something. However you checked that someone was alive. The rational part of her mind said he had probably just hit his head. Or didn't understand English. Or something.

He whimpered when she touched him, an almost childlike, terrified sound. Flinching away, he tried to make himself disappear into the corner. Little black rooms were always a punishment, but if he didn't know what he had done wrong, he didn't know what they would do to him in here.

Well, he was alive, and that was something.

Still, he was the only one who might even have an idea of what to do, and he wasn't...much use.

She reached into her bag, pulling out her file pad. Clicking it on, the crisp white light illuminated the elevator.

"There."

He made a whimper of relief at the dim flood of light, eyes wide under the shelter of his arm. He lifted his head enough to stare at her, terrified.

Seeing his face like that gave her a start, followed by a pang of sympathy. The poor thing looked like a mess, scared out of his mind. She pressed her lips together, trying to calm down her pounding heart to think through this logically.

He shifted, moved closer to the light, but stopped shy of touching her, taking deep breaths as he tried to calm down. There was nothing of logic in his eyes, no reason or anything but fear.

Edited 2012-07-12 09:21 (UTC)

"All right. I'm going to set this down here so we have light. Ok?" She spoke to him like a child, gently and slowly setting her tablet down on the floor between them. And hoping he didn't do anything to it. She had never seen an Avox like this and had no idea how they would react. Slowly, carefully she rose and went over to the elevator panel, running her fingers over it's black face. Nothing. There was no buttons, no light, nada.

"Oh no...."

He gritted his teeth as he watched her from the floor, eyes huge and dark in the dim light, his blue turned to black. He wanted to get up, tried to get up, but could not make his arms and legs answer him.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no...." She just repeated. There was not power, no emergency light, no nothing.

They were going to die down here.

She knew it was an illogical thought. There weren't that many elevators, they'd have to notice eventually. But with the way everything had been going with...well, with everything, Effie was strung too tight. Slidding down the elevator wall, she buried her face in her hands and started to let out soft little sobs.

Slowly, infinitely slowly, he began to be able to move, so long as he didn't take his eyes off of her. Her small sounds reached deep, somewhere as deep as the fear, and he hesitantly put out a hand to touch her shoulder.

Effie started, looking up at him with wide blue eyes. Was he...was he trying to comfort her?

With everything going on, everything going wrong she hadn't had time to talk to anyone. If anything she had just been doing her best to keep Haymitch going, so their tributes would do well. But she was so scared, so worried about Katniss and Peeta, and just everything was going wrong. Even the little things. And now this?

So that little bit of contact completely undid her. Her face crumbled a little, and sure folded down into herself, leaning against him.

For a moment, he could not remember what to do. He simply sat, hands awkward and not touching anything, still trembling himself. He looked down at the light, and carefully shifted it closer to them both before slowly, tentatively wrapping an arm around her shoulder. When she didn't reject that, he squeezed a little, trying to be comforting without making a sound.

She leaned into the squeeze, letting it out. Effie was far better at taking comfort than she would ever be at giving it (no matter what she though about it.)

Finally she lifted hr head, producing a handkerchief out of somewhere and dabbing at her face.

"I'm so sorry for that." Apologizing to an Avox wasn't normally something one did, but neither was crying on their shoulder.

He smiled for her, an expression that felt unpracticed and strange on his face, looked odd with the too-bold makeup. Gently, he took the handkerchief from her hand to fix a bit of her makeup that had gotten smudged.

That was even more unexpected.

Effie held still, letting him move to fix her makeup, and gave him a smile when he finished. Because it was such a kind thing to do, and so...un Avox like.

He folded the square of cloth neatly, offering it back to her, and never took his eyes off her. That was the key, maybe, for him to stay floating above the terror that still sat so close.

She put it away and settled to the floor.

"I don't know what else we can do?"

But the panic was starting to subside. And logic set back in. Clear thought process. Such as...

"We certainly fell very far, didn't we?"

That elevator didn't move slowly when it was working properly. She knew there were some sub floors, and everything had gone by so fast, but it still felt...wrong.

He released her slowly, kneeling beside her instead, and still didn't look away, but he was clearly listening, and nodded slightly. Hesitantly, he gestured to himself. Maybe they were at the Avox levels? They were the deepest he knew.

If took her a moment to get his meaning, and then she sat back, looking up into the darkness to consider it. Normally it was a 12 story drop she was use to, a few more on those rare occasions she had gone down to the training area. She knew the Avoxs were under that but...she shook her head.

"No, I think we went farth than even that. It felt farther."

And how much farther she had no idea. All she could remember was dropping far to fast.

He shrugged, a gesture that felt shockingly casual to him. But he didn't know. And he wasn't sure he wanted to. Looking away from her, at the doors, made his heart start to race again, and so he snapped his gaze back.

She felt another pang of sympathy for him as he looked back to the floor, before redirecting her attention.

Out. How could they get out of here.

"Maybe if we climbed up..." Because she was going to do well in her smart business suit, wig and 5 inch heels. Truly good climbing attire.

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