threadthefire | 1st Design [voice]

1st Design [voice]

[There’s a wry male voice, albeit a slightly confused one, speaking over the Network.]

Well, this certainly isn’t the Capitol, the fashion on the streets isn’t any I recognize and I could have sworn I was in a studio audience taking my bows just a moment ago.

...pity you couldn’t see the reason, it was absolutely perfect. She was perfect.

All of that aside, if someone could just tell me what District I’m in, that would be appreciated. I really should get back, I have more work to do.

[ooc: Sorry, guys, I was supposed to be off work three hours ago!]

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A loose a competitive advantage? I may wish to recreate it sometime for a new audience.

Do you know how long they've been here?

Whatever, just curious. I've been around and in some crazy outfits in my time.

Well, there's crazy and there's making a statement, although where I come from those statements are often bad.

[The first thing that is clear, perhaps twice over to her, is that Cinna yet believes they are still in the sights of the Capitol here. It isn't unreasonable and it took quite some convincing--she remembers, it wasn't all that long ago really--for her and Peeta to believe it themselves.

But after a while of no one at all knowing who they were or what Panem even was, it was difficult to operate on any other system of understanding. She does as directed however, seating herself at the table, the chairs closer to each other rather than directly across. Folding her hands in her lap, all too aware again of how even the smallest of fidgets can show up on a camera, it is telling that the second-nature returns so quickly, that of the public face and what one shows, and what one never will.

For instance, when she is labeled the pride and joy of the Games it takes everything in her not to scowl, not to furrow her brow, not to look away angrily, but she manages. This time for her it isn't because of cameras that aren't even there as far as she knows, however, but because it's habit.]

I tried to---- I try to be.

[It sounds a bit hollow to her, and she glances out the glass window to her left and his right and it is a minute or so before she says anything else, trying to pick her words with as much as care as she knows how, which isn't much but it will have to do.]

What is going on...at home, I mean?

[If anything will drive home the concept of not being anywhere in Panem, maybe it is the utter not-knowing of its goings on.]

Oh, it's always been about making a statement. Okay, usually about making a statement.

What do you mean by bad?

About four months? Since May. And it's August.

[Cinna takes his own seat, watching Katniss' careful movements. He will have to get her somewhere she could relax sooner rather than later, but for now... Now the conversation becomes trickier. The last thing he wants to do is tell Katniss how badly she and Peeta will be punished for their success, but he realizes that he's already mentioned certain things that must be explained. The young woman next to him might not be as good at reading and playing to crowds as her partner in defiance, but she's far from foolish or stupid.]

The Quarter Quell mostly. More of the same only bigger, brighter and with more... interesting designs from some of the teams. You and Peeta are still the talk of the Capitol, though.

[It was only true. They were. Peeta and Katniss, the star-crossed lovers who never had a chance. Would either of them survive the Games again?]

Bad design says nothing about who the person is. One should tell a story with their clothes, and those who can't manage that leave their victims in whatever fad that passes their fancy.

Yes, someone would have noticed them disappearing for that long.

That's because time has stopped during the period they come from.

I'm fairly certain it kept moving. I was there, after all.

I think you can make a statement, tell a story, without 'good' design. I mean that more for people who put together their own outfits, though. I've never really been comfortable letting anyone else dress me, but Brian had his own designer.

Uh, I'm a musician.

[She listens carefully, for the things they could never say over the phone to the things lately even in person she would have hesitated to address. It is Katniss' worst fear that those she cares for are harmed because President Snow sees her as a threat, or sees what she could stand for as a threat when all she thinks she meant at the end of the Games was to leave with Peeta alive. It wasn't intended as an act of rebellion, though she knows it would be too ignorant to say she couldn't see how it was taken as such.

The Quarter Quell makes her sick to hear about, and this much she has difficulty disguising entirely for a second but just as quickly she masks it again, toying with her napkin instead. Fidgeting, but better to focus on something than to give herself away entirely. Something in her friend and stylist's voice has her look up again though; Peeta and her are still the talk of the Capitol. Not surprising, as much as it frustrates her that even the safety of coming out victors has become more of a life-sentence into the custody of their government. Not that the people know this. To them it is all very, very real. As real as a television show can be, though it may not be fair of her. To be so critical.

They don't know any better, she reminds herself.

And not for the first time she thinks, as she looks at Cinna, trying to guess everything he isn't telling her: but you know. How, she wonders, realizing also not for the first time how little she knows about him. But maybe that is on purpose too.

There are just too many wrong ways to step in Panem and sometimes less knowledge is a gift even where other times--she thinks of District 11--it is a death sentence.]

They haven't picked new favorites yet?

[It is a weak reply for all he has given her to work with, but she is yet sorting through the idea of mentoring anyone, still trying to get over how terrifying it is to think she is sending some girl who could be as young as Prim or Rue, into...

...she can't even finish the thought, choosing to focus entirely on the glass of water she now drinks from.]

[He realized early on how Katniss felt about the Capitol and those that lived there. In many ways, he agreed with her, there was much to despise, the artifice, the slavish devotion to whatever fad. But there was potential there, in only it could be encouraged. And if not encouraged, he was well aware how it could be harnessed. The government had done it for seventy-five years, and with a single act of defiance, the girl, woman next to him had turned it all on its ear.

It was a dangerous Game Haymitch and the others were playing with these kids. He hoped they could handle it if they could survive long enough.

But the fidgeting is a clue that she is anxious about something and he reaches out to place what he hoped was a reassuring hand on her shoulder.]

They'll always find someone pretty and new, but you're their girl on fire. They will always have room for you.

But enough about home, tell me about this place. Or if you're up to a stroll, you can show it to me?

[Playing tour guide would be give her something else to focus on and give him time to sort out his own thoughts.]

Ah, what do you play?

Time doesn't work that simply in this place. It bends a little.

Hm.

Well, mostly I sing, but I also play guitar.

Sounds lovely.

Lovely is...probably really not the right word in this case. I mean, it's a rock band, called Time Bomb. And before that I had the Rats.

I'll hold my approval, then. But it doesn't seem any worse than what's common in the Capitol.

[A hand on her shoulder makes her both worried and at ease all at once, a contradiction that she is glad to shake herself free of as she stands, nodding to him at the comment concerning a stroll. What he says of her, about the girl on fire, well that she can only nod to briefly, acknowledgment that she heard but never full acceptance of what that has come to mean to the outer-lying Districts...and maybe the others too.

She makes for the door and holds it open behind her toward him, glancing back as if half afraid he'll disappear. This place is beyond strange, filled with something too beyond her for a word to define. It's a power not of man's make, no President, no government, no Capitol. How to explain it is still elusive to her however, and it is helpful to be able to point and explain a thing rather than the whole idea that worlds meet. Something Katniss can't even quite digest even now. Worlds?

Her world has for so long been District 12, The Seam...Panem.

It's just never occurred to her that there might be more; there has never been time.]

This...I can show you where we've been staying.

[ And other things along the way, but she figures he caught onto that part. As they walk, she glances up and over at him, between him and their surroundings intermittently while trying not to look like her nerves don't know what to do with themselves, even though this is mostly the truth. ]

Who is she?

[ She pauses here, surprising herself by having asked now that they're in fresh air and moving. Maybe it loosened some of the apprehension, and maybe it's the opposite and she just needs to know now rather than later----the opposite of Peeta, but this is not too surprising. ]

The...tribute.

[ In case she needed to clarify, she does, though it probably wasn't necessary considering how she verbally seems to stumble over the word like it's foreign to her when that is the last thing it could be. ]

What's common in the Capitol? And what is it the Capitol of?

[He sees her look back and he gives her a smile as reassuring as he can, it's the best he can do in a situation like this. It almost feels like being back under the Arena, waiting for the start of the games, wanting to say things that just won't ease her mind. Granted here, he hopes the stakes aren't quite a dire, but the hopelessness feels the same. He's not an orator, his expression always found another form.]

I think I'd enjoy to see where you're staying, is it comfortable?

[He follows willingly, taking in the sights a bit more now that he wasn't responsible for stopping his own panic attack before it began. The place had its own wonders, but it was a city with people moving about their days. He's sure he'll adjust soon.

But her question gives him pause. How does he possibly answer that question? Does he lie and risk her finding the truth later, or does he admit that she's perhaps stronger than even she thinks and give her the truth.]

She's someone you don't need to worry about right now. Tell me about the people here. Are they like your friends in the District? I've spoken to some of them, they seem friendly enough.

[Perhaps it's the coward's way, but he doesn't feel right lying to her. He never has and this isn't a time to start.]

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