she_sells_seashells | in a supposed democracy

Snow's death is announced on television the day after it happens. The announcer speaks of "sudden illness".

There are going to be emergency elections to replace him in three days. Without advance notice and the standard scheduling of elections, they're going to be setting up polling places in the Capitol at a limited number of sites. Some outlying neighborhoods will be served by schools and the like. But most of the city will be congregating at the Memorial Dome to cast their votes for the next president.

(There follow thirty solid minutes of campaign ads. The district imports comptroller, the chairman of the traffic control commission and former Gamemaker, the deceased Snow's personal assistant, and a handful of lesser individuals are running. Bell hates them all.)

"Suppose the Memorial Dome caught fire," she says to Sherlock and Tony, frowning at the TV.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Okay. Dye and makeup and one ridiculous Capitol-fashion outfit from Bar, I guess, and then I stand around looking like I'm... waiting for somebody? before I go in and vote? and find a place to start the fire, and then I suppose I have to run away looking terrified when everyone else does - where can I go then? I don't strictly need to see what I'm doing but I can keep the collateral damage down much better if I can."

From:

sicaria

"I can accompany you if you like," says Sherlock. "I have some leeway to wander around the city by myself."

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Even with the Memorial Dome on fire? You don't think a Peacekeeper will insist on escorting 'you and your friend' to a safe place?" asks Bell. "Even if you can take a Peacekeeper, having to take a Peacekeeper isn't very discreet."

From:

sicaria

"I am very good at finding places to hide and then hiding in them. I cannot tell you right now from memory a good vantage from which to watch the Memorial Dome burn without being disturbed, but I can find one when we get there."

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Okay," says Bell. "We'll go with that, then. Since Tony can't always find a door - might be a good idea to look for one to Capitolize me starting now? I completely made up the triangles and blue hair thing, does that make any sense or should it be something else?"

From:

sicaria

"That would be adequate but perhaps not optimal," she says. "Geometry is good... I will think about it."

From:

ferratus

Tony gets up and opens a door.

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Nice, first try," says Bell, getting up. "May as well start with the blue hair. I know blue hair is a thing. Unless it became terribly last season when I wasn't looking."

From:

sicaria

"Painting your face in angular high-contrast abstract patterns would be both fashionable and an effective disguise," says Sherlock.

From:

she_sells_seashells

"High-contrast. So not white, but maybe more blue? Shades of blue? Blue and red?" Bell asks, going through the door.

From:

sicaria

"Blue, red, yellow, and black," Sherlock suggests, following.

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Quartering my face centered on my nose and a triangle of the opposite color in the middle of each section," suggests Bell. "Half my hair navy blue and half white, curled into obnoxious ringlets and with a stupid little hat pinned to it. And stick me in a dress with enough ruffle to it that no one can tell I'm a skinny District kid. My own parents won't recognize me. Which, come to think of it, could be important."

From:

sicaria

"A fine plan," says Sherlock.

From:

she_sells_seashells

Bell goes up to the bar and orders pots of makeup and dye in the relevant colors, and pins, and a stupid hat that she bases on the District Four tribute escort's hat but with changed colors and a higher lace-to-fake-flowers ratio, and a truly, epically stupid dress that's mostly gray on the left and mostly sky-blue on the right, with accents in red and ruffles in canary yellow.

She picks up her items with undisguised disgust, but thanks the bar politely.

From:

sicaria

"You will look like a disaster," she says. "But not a recognizable or a memorable or a notale one."

From:

she_sells_seashells

"That's the idea, yes. Ugh, Capitol aesthetics. We should do my hair here. No point leaving evidence around the house we don't strictly have to." She heads for her room.

From:

sicaria

Sherlock follows.

From:

she_sells_seashells

There is a bathroom in her room. Bell reads the instructions on her hair dye, takes the stick out of her hair and sets it aside, and starts combing out minor tangles with her fingers in the mirror.

From:

sicaria

"Do you need any help?"

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Yeah, actually, this stuff gets combed in," she points out a little comb attached to each package of dye, too small to effectively detangle but decent for incorporating a substance, "and I can't see the back of my head." She's smoothing out her hair and making a zig-zagging part down the middle with her fingernail. "If I hold the left half out of the way can you comb the dye into the right half and vice versa?"

From:

sicaria

"Yes I can," says Sherlock.

From:

she_sells_seashells

"Swell." Bell double-checks the neatness of the part. A Capitol person would have had this done by a professional stylist; she only has to stand up to casual scrutiny, and there'll be a hat, but she really shouldn't half-ass it. Finally she gathers the right side of her hair into a pigtail, smooths down stray wisps on both sides with drops of water from the faucet, and says, "Okay, start with the blue on my left?"

From:

sicaria

"All right," she says, and there she starts.

From:

she_sells_seashells

When Bell's hair is blued, she picks up that half and twists it into a pigtail to keep it out of the way while Sherlock bleaches the other side. It's not supposed to stick to anything but hair, so she's not worried about her shirt or the blue stains on her hands, but she does get out of the way so Sherlock can rinse dye off of her own hands before doing the second half.

Finally her hair is its ridiculous two-tone self, and she holds both sides out and away from her head so they don't touch each other while the dye sinks in. "Do I look suitably disastrous?" she asks dryly.