space invaders {kire}
May 11, 2016 10:43:34 GMT -5
Post by Onyx on May 11, 2016 10:43:34 GMT -5
Baby, the good old days have died
so won't you dry your pretty eyes?
Tiredness hangs on her face like a shroud, darkening her usually bright features and dulling her blue eyes with a dense fog of drowsiness, but as always Suzanne fights through it to carry out the duties of the day. Although sometimes she wonders how easy life might be if she was anyone except who she is, she's never regretted having the life she has. For a start, the benefits have always been worth it - beautiful clothes despite the squalor that surrounds her on every side, the best education, private tutors who teach her history, mathematics, literacy and, secretly, foreign languages, but above anything else she is thankful for having access to any piece of media, whether it be book, music or film, she could ever ask for - within compliant reason, of course. Thanks to Suzanne's limited imagination, she's never wondered what would happen if she asked for something that she wasn't allowed, nor has she ever thought of anything that might be forbidden. Instead, her pretty little brainwashed head is exactly what her father, a lumber tycoon, friend of the Capitol and All Round Reputable Fellow, wished for in all his children.
Each of Suzanne's siblings and her parents gave an excuse for not coming on the District Visits with her today. Her father, of course, had business to attend to - although Suzanne wasn't to find out that business really meant finding the rebels who had tried to burn down another paper mill, and Suzanne's brother was accompanying him. Her mother and both of her sisters claimed fevers, much to the chagrin of the father, who said it has always been the lady's place to meet with their subjects. When Suzanne's eldest brother, who preferred to protest against his father's empire than support it, then reminded his father that he may be rich, but he wasn't the Mayor, he too became unable to publicly present himself due to the great cut his father's ring had dug as he slapped him across the face. And so here Suzanne is, smiling pleasantly but tiredly as she approaches the Orphanage, doing it as much out of the good in her own heart as for her father's failing public image.
The woman who greets Suzanne has a smile like last summer's bunting - thin, flimsy looking teeth which never knew the benefits of good toothpaste like Suzanne did. She welcomes her in, raining compliments down upon her and telling her how her family's lumber is the only lumber for the Orphanage, built the house itself, so it did, and all the books are made with her paper too. Suzanne smiles graciously as the carer continues to talk, letting her thin form be blown through the house by this bluster of a woman. Out the corner of her eye, she sees tiny fingers latch themselves onto the doorway, and two sparkling eyes stare straight at her. Suzanne smiles, disengaging her attention from her host and waving at the small child, whose eyes widen, a surprising feat considering how large they were to begin with, and who scampers off before he can be caught by another matron. Laughing merrily, Suzanne stands before the woman can continue swaddling her in her empty praises, and says, "this really is a lovely home. Perhaps I could meet some of your children?"
Although Suzanne, obviously, has never experienced orphanhood, she does understand what it's like to feel lonely, sometimes to the point of neglect. Being a fifth child means that by the time she arrived the excitement had gone out of parenting. She taught herself to walk and talk with very little help, and grew much closer to the small team of staff than to her family. She started walking in the forests when she was seven or eight, stalking out the best lookouts, teaching herself to carve dolls out of wood and inset them with stone eyes, at one point even finding a wild grass snake in its burrow, and returning day after day with rodents from the ratcatcher's display to make sure he was well fed. For the last couple of years, however, she began to be chided for returning home with a knife in her belt, or leaves matted into her thick blonde curls. It wasn't ladylike, and Suzanne wasn't to go adventuring anymore. For all of this, Suzanne can understand how the orphans might feel being raised by someone who never truly knew them, and hopes she can show that she knows it better than most.
The corridors stretch out like arteries, but the only flow of movement must be behind every one of its closed doors. Music escapes underneath several of them as Suzanne wanders past, and she begins to hum one which is a familiar tune. As they walk, the matron reels off a list of names and ages, and often special talents or interests. Suzanne isn't surprised to hear her sound especially proud when she says any of the children are skilled with knives or axes. Even in an impoverished place, where death could reach its hand out to any of these children at any moment, it is the threat of the Games that frightens everyone the most.
"And this," the matron begins at the end of what appeared to be one long breath, is "Q- Alphie." Suzanne raises one eyebrow and smiles warmly through the only open door she's walked past. A quick glance around the room tells her some hard facts already, which she tries to turn into a question to engage the black-haired boy in conversation. "So you like rocks, huh?" From where she stands, she can see at least sixteen, some perfectly smooth and some ridged, some dull and some shining like foreign suns. She points at one of the latter and says, softly, "that one's beautiful. What's it called?" The matron, Suzanne notices, has started to back away after assuring herself that Suzanne has found someone else to represent herself to. Perhaps she didn't care about looking after her orphans as much as she made out, abandoning them with strangers rather than staying to introduce them herself. Or perhaps there's some reason why Alphie makes her wary? Oblivious to this second though, Suzanne takes one more step towards the doorway and rests her hand on the frame. "I'm Suzanne," she adds, before grinning slyly and adding, "and something tells me that Alphie isn't actually your name?" Finally, the girl is starting to perk up, with any luck this orphan- no, just a stranger like any other - will prove to be an interesting acquaintance. And more than that, Suzanne thinks she might really enjoy finding out.
Each of Suzanne's siblings and her parents gave an excuse for not coming on the District Visits with her today. Her father, of course, had business to attend to - although Suzanne wasn't to find out that business really meant finding the rebels who had tried to burn down another paper mill, and Suzanne's brother was accompanying him. Her mother and both of her sisters claimed fevers, much to the chagrin of the father, who said it has always been the lady's place to meet with their subjects. When Suzanne's eldest brother, who preferred to protest against his father's empire than support it, then reminded his father that he may be rich, but he wasn't the Mayor, he too became unable to publicly present himself due to the great cut his father's ring had dug as he slapped him across the face. And so here Suzanne is, smiling pleasantly but tiredly as she approaches the Orphanage, doing it as much out of the good in her own heart as for her father's failing public image.
The woman who greets Suzanne has a smile like last summer's bunting - thin, flimsy looking teeth which never knew the benefits of good toothpaste like Suzanne did. She welcomes her in, raining compliments down upon her and telling her how her family's lumber is the only lumber for the Orphanage, built the house itself, so it did, and all the books are made with her paper too. Suzanne smiles graciously as the carer continues to talk, letting her thin form be blown through the house by this bluster of a woman. Out the corner of her eye, she sees tiny fingers latch themselves onto the doorway, and two sparkling eyes stare straight at her. Suzanne smiles, disengaging her attention from her host and waving at the small child, whose eyes widen, a surprising feat considering how large they were to begin with, and who scampers off before he can be caught by another matron. Laughing merrily, Suzanne stands before the woman can continue swaddling her in her empty praises, and says, "this really is a lovely home. Perhaps I could meet some of your children?"
Although Suzanne, obviously, has never experienced orphanhood, she does understand what it's like to feel lonely, sometimes to the point of neglect. Being a fifth child means that by the time she arrived the excitement had gone out of parenting. She taught herself to walk and talk with very little help, and grew much closer to the small team of staff than to her family. She started walking in the forests when she was seven or eight, stalking out the best lookouts, teaching herself to carve dolls out of wood and inset them with stone eyes, at one point even finding a wild grass snake in its burrow, and returning day after day with rodents from the ratcatcher's display to make sure he was well fed. For the last couple of years, however, she began to be chided for returning home with a knife in her belt, or leaves matted into her thick blonde curls. It wasn't ladylike, and Suzanne wasn't to go adventuring anymore. For all of this, Suzanne can understand how the orphans might feel being raised by someone who never truly knew them, and hopes she can show that she knows it better than most.
The corridors stretch out like arteries, but the only flow of movement must be behind every one of its closed doors. Music escapes underneath several of them as Suzanne wanders past, and she begins to hum one which is a familiar tune. As they walk, the matron reels off a list of names and ages, and often special talents or interests. Suzanne isn't surprised to hear her sound especially proud when she says any of the children are skilled with knives or axes. Even in an impoverished place, where death could reach its hand out to any of these children at any moment, it is the threat of the Games that frightens everyone the most.
"And this," the matron begins at the end of what appeared to be one long breath, is "Q- Alphie." Suzanne raises one eyebrow and smiles warmly through the only open door she's walked past. A quick glance around the room tells her some hard facts already, which she tries to turn into a question to engage the black-haired boy in conversation. "So you like rocks, huh?" From where she stands, she can see at least sixteen, some perfectly smooth and some ridged, some dull and some shining like foreign suns. She points at one of the latter and says, softly, "that one's beautiful. What's it called?" The matron, Suzanne notices, has started to back away after assuring herself that Suzanne has found someone else to represent herself to. Perhaps she didn't care about looking after her orphans as much as she made out, abandoning them with strangers rather than staying to introduce them herself. Or perhaps there's some reason why Alphie makes her wary? Oblivious to this second though, Suzanne takes one more step towards the doorway and rests her hand on the frame. "I'm Suzanne," she adds, before grinning slyly and adding, "and something tells me that Alphie isn't actually your name?" Finally, the girl is starting to perk up, with any luck this orphan- no, just a stranger like any other - will prove to be an interesting acquaintance. And more than that, Suzanne thinks she might really enjoy finding out.
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