[EVENT - MINGLE] Home for the Holidays

[sixthiteration]

At the Inn, there are a number of tables set up with neatly labeled place cards. At each place is a favorite dish from home, something that kindles warmth and goodwill — But try to move seats, and you will find a surprise: Your dish refuses to move. It seems that if you want to indulge, you're stuck with whoever happens to be at your table for company.

Outside, a gentle snow is falling - not enough to discourage any patrons but just enough to blanket the world in clean, soft white.

Comments

OTA

[71st_victor]

If it weren't for the fact that sitting alone in Baze's house would've gotten her glared at, Johanna would have given the meal a miss. She's seen too many Games to know that when you're summoned to a feast of this nature, there's usually blood by the end of it. Tucking a knife into her boot, she goes prepared for anything. What she's not ready for is when she shows up, there are names on tables.

Squinting at the names beside her, she doesn't entirely hate them, but she's annoyed that it's not with the few people that she actually tolerates. She's ready to go when she spots the plate behind her name. Squab, potatoes that look crispy golden fried, and something that looks very much like a marionberry pie. While the Capitol was all about rich food that could choke you with expensive taste, they could never mimic her mother's pies.

Staring at it, Johanna feels like she can endure at least twenty minutes of conversation, if only to enjoy this. Settling into her chair, she focuses straightforward, missing when her hair was longer so she could use it to block out anything in her peripheral vision that doesn't warrant her attention. Still, as she drags the pie towards her first (ignoring the actual dinner), she thinks that anyone who disturbs her better be ready to see how a fork can be used as a weapon.

[chirrutsluck]

What about housemates? Does Baze get a fork-attack, too, pausing at her table after visiting his briefly just to see what's there to see what they gave to her? "And what is that made with?" he has to ask, curious.

[fishermansweater]

Finnick is mostly keeping an eye on Annie -- they're here because they'd decided long ago they needed to be at least a small part of the village, but they hadn't planned on being separated -- but there's someone else here he needs to check up on, as well. Something terrible had happened to Johanna back in Panem, and Finnick can't help feeling some responsibility for it, because they'd been meant to be in the revolution's plot together. He'd been going to protect her.

Whatever had happened, he wants to watch out for her here, as much as he can with someone as stubborn an independent as Johanna. (Besides, he still doesn't entirely trust the feasts here.)

So he makes sure to stop by her table, craning his neck to study her plate.

"What have you got?

OTA

[womanofvalue]

Peggy's always wary of this place, of course.

Two feasts in two months is strange, but what makes this one odder is how the meals seem pinned down to the placing. The instant that Peggy had arrived, she'd seen the food behind her name (an old favourite, tea and a lovely shepherd's pie), but the instant she'd tried to pick up the plate to move to sit beside Stella, the plate wouldn't budge. No matter what she tried, nothing. She suspects that even with someone's enhanced strength, they would have simply ripped up the table on either side and had no luck with the plate.

She attempts this for another two minutes before the ridiculousness of what she's doing strikes her and she settles into her chair with a mild huff, grateful that for the most part, she recognizes several of the names on the little cards that circle the table. It does make her wonder, though: Why these people? Why now?

Is there some sort of conversation they're supposed to have? Peggy supposes that if she wants to go hungry, she could go anywhere, but the food is terribly tempting. Besides, if she finishes with the meal, she can dig into the Battenberg cake sitting with such terribly lovely colours just beyond it. Steadying herself, she decides that she'll make her rounds and say hello to others later.

For now, she's got tea and a meal to enjoy.

[treadswater]

"It's," Annie begins, and then she has to start over. This is the trouble of being as tightly wound and wary as she is presently, speaking seems an extra energy drain that her body tries to shut down. The words get stuck in her throat. But, still, she tries again.

"That's a pret, pretty cake they gave you."

She's not lying, either. She might not recognize what kind of cake it is, although something in the arrangement of colours is familiar from the Capitol. Something in the arrangement, anyway, no Capitol baker would have such a simple cake with such pastel colours leave their kitchen. But regardless of what she does and does not recognize, the colours are pretty and it looks nice. And if she's going to be stuck sitting next to Peggy, she might as well try to say something.

Table 2 & ota

[frankensteinian]

Erik, like many people in the village, doesn't trust most of this situation, especially when things just appear out of nowhere. He treats feasts cautiously, but has discovered that so far, they seem to be relatively safe. Safe enough that he doesn't see any reason not to partake, anyway.

This is a lot more intrusive though, not being just food laid out on a table for them to serve themselves. This is aimed directly at specific people, and he can't shake the idea that there is a catch to this. That accepting this food now will mean something later.

But whoever's behind this designed it specifically to tempt him. Pierogis like those made by Magda and latkes like those made by his mother, and a German beer (whatever his opinions on the Germans may be, they do make a good beer).

As much as he dislikes the idea behind all of this, it's been so long since he's had a meal like this that he can't resist. Whatever comes about as a result of this is better than going hungry, right?

[chirrutsluck]

Baze prods at his own meal half-heartedly, not because it isn't good, or even that he suspects foul play-- he's come to the conclusion that foul play comes when he least expects it, around here, so worrying all the time about it is too exhausting-- but mostly because it makes him homesick. Much like Bodhi's meal at table four, albeit with fewer peppers and more roots and an alcoholic brew instead of tea, it's still very Jedhan, and he misses everything about Jedha.

He's the oldest at the table, but not by much, and Erik is at least somewhat close to him in age. So he taps Erik's cup with the rim of his own. "Did they give you anything good?" he asks, at least making an attempt at being social. Better put on a good example for his grumpy housemate over at table six, right?

OTA (Table 4)

[onlyeverdoubted]

Bodhi himself is more or less at home like this. Quiet, since he doesn't know anyone at the table well--despite having been at Finnick's wedding. That was all Johanna, though he'll always be distantly fond of the guy who pulled his drowning ass out of the fountain. But landing at a table with near strangers is just sort of what happens when you fly cargo. If you're lucky it's a cantina with decent booze and they're compatible if not familiar, pilots and techs looking for the same thing you are, and if you're not it's the canteen for a top secret base and not even the droids want to chat with the help, you're just there to drop off the boxes. He doesn't even notice his bowl seems to be glued down for a while. He's not enthusiastic or chatty, but it's fine.

The meal itself is considerably more obtrusive. The air around the bowl of noodles seems to shimmer and sizzle, and sensitive noses anywhere nearby might start to burn. the noodles are faintly brown and unremarkable, but the vividly red broth, turned that shade by the sheer, wild recklessness with which peppers have been introduced, certainly pops. Off-white, slightly shriveled lumps that started life as deep, woody root vegetables and subterranean worms taste just like home, and Bodhi's grateful that he's out of practice with the heat. A little trouble keeping his cool can be blamed on the punishing chemical weaponry he eats for fun.

As open as he is to the seating arrangements, he's up and out of the chair as soon as he's properly enjoyed his dinner. He has people to find.

[chirrutsluck]

Pausing by the table that isn't his mostly because of the familiar if slightly overpowering smell, Baze squints at the meal at Bodhi's name in mild amazement. "Just how many peppers did they put in that?" he demands as soon as Bodhi makes it close enough to register it himself.

[theintercessor]

Jude's plate had been some kind of recreation of Charlie's sloppy, smokey barbecue, including the pickle and sweet yellow buns. Caught somewhere between choked up and the embarrassment of the kid eating the free chicken sandwich on pizza day, he'd spent a lot time at his table, just staring mutely at his plate, not touching it.

Once he had, the food hadn't lasted long. He could have had any kind of company and still wished to drag his plate away, just to be alone with the homesickness.

The cure for it really isn't a cure, just the distraction of what he's gained being away from it. Parts of school had been like that--new friends, interesting classes, access to resources. Just at a cost he hadn't realized the weight of until he paid it. Now he's paid something steeper, harsher, and he has--where is Bodhi? Making a round of the tables, he notes a few empty seats, and a few people sat sideways away from food that doesn't seem to be their own, already picked apart. The bottom of a bowl catches his attention, curiously off-putting red liquid and white solids, and. Well, of course that's Bodhi's name on the card, but no Bodhi.

Jude wonders if he should pick it up, start asking have you seen this man, hold it like a sign at the airport. Instead, he just marks the table in his mind and sets out again, searching as people start to stand and mill about in the room.

Table 4 & ota

[seekingcrocodile]

Killian doesn't know what to make of this, exactly. There have been feasts before, but none quite like this. None that seemed to know that they're giving him exactly what he doesn't know he wanted. Roast beef, with potatoes and carrots, like he remembers his mother making in the years before she died. Served with rum, of course, though he only gets a glass of that, not a whole bottle. At least he won't have to dip into his stash tonight.

Which doesn't mean he accepts this offering lightly. This isn't whoever orchestrated this apologizing for the trouble they've caused. It never is. There's a reason behind this, and it infuriates him that he doesn't know what it is. He suspects it would infuriate him to know what it is, too. There's no winning around here.

Except for right this moment, he supposes, when there's this meal in front of him. It's here, he may as well enjoy it.

[cleptes]

Bela wondered if there would be a price later on for this meal. One that had been tailored to her own desires, instead of a general feast with all kinds of food on offer. She also wondered if other people had received a meal made specifically with them in mind: one that they had once back home or perhaps more frequently during their childhood.

Killian is a new face to her, but she crosses his path on the way towards the bar. Bela was looking for something to take the edge off, much like she did during the last feast when Kira shared a bottle of vodka with her.

"Hello." She greets him with a polite smile. "I don't believe we've met before."

OTA esp for table 3

[warriorborn]

It's starting to seem almost familiar to come down to the common area of the Inn to find a sumptuous spread laid out for them to enjoy; after all, this is the second feast in only a handful of weeks. It takes a certain amount of strain off the larder, for which he's grateful, but he still finds the whole thing suspicious.

Not so suspicious that he doesn't take some time to weave through the tables, reading the place cards in front of each setting with a raised eyebrow, noting the writing and its neat, uniform appearance, almost like it was produced by a printing press and not written by hand. As if he needs another reason to believe that no one in the habble is responsible for this. The arrangement of seats seems odd. What's odder still is that when he tries to switch out the place settings — it's only standard for a man to sit across from his wife, after all, not at entirely different tables — they refuse to budge. He can't shift the plates, or even the little name cards in front of them.

He'd be more upset by that if there weren't names he recognized at his own table. More than that, the plate sitting in front of his name card is piled high with the dumplings he used to buy in the market of Habble Morning, from the soft, soup-filled dumplings that you have to eat in one bite, all the way to the big pillowy steamed dumplings with the sweet bean center that he and Gwen always used to peel like an orange to try and let the steam out because they were too impatient to let them cool. Deciding to worry about whether or not he can sit next to Kate after he eats, he slides himself into his chair and immediately sets to peeling the skin off one of the fat white dumplings, hissing happily as the heat burns his fingertips.

Table 3 Party

[ithuriels_blood]

Clary didn't have the same reservations as Benedict. Yes, it was creepy as hell that their captors dictated where they sat and didn't let you move your food but on Clary's plate was two very large slices of cheesy flat greasy amazing New York style pizza.

She hadn't bothered to look around at everyone else's food but planted her butt and took a bite of the amazing meal. "So good." She sighed as she took a second bite and then a third. After that, Clary decided that she needed to slow down and saver the food that she had been blessed with.

Bright green eyes looked over at Benedict and then down at his food. Dumplings, nice. "Hey." She flashed him a warm smile. Clary had met Benedict briefly when she had first arrived in the village and had seen him around a few times since then. They hadn't really ever talked and she didn't know anything about him except what he looked like.

"Where are your dumplings from?" She figured it was a good conversation starter since dumplings can be bought anywhere nowadays.

OTA - Table 2 and others

[chirrutsluck]

Baze's meal is similar to Bodhi's, only it looks and smells slightly less toxic as he is slightly less enamored of the most extremely spicy peppers. There's more noodles, less pepper, and some kind of alcoholic beer-like beverage instead of tea. He's skeptical until he dips a spoon in to try it, and then he's a bit melancholy, because it tastes so much like home and the temple and Jedha that it almost hurts.

He still eats it all, though.

Before settling down and tasting his specially-tailored meal, and after he's finished, he wanders from table to table to investigate everyone else's offerings. None of them except Bodhi, after all, are from his part of the universe, and everyone's seems pretty different. He might as well be curious, since he can't really do much work in the snow, so he might as well at least attempt to be social. Be a good example for his even less social housemate. Something like that.

[cleptes]

Bela was half-way through her meal when she spots Baze looking in her direction. She soon realizes that he had been sitting at the same table, but she hadn't managed to speak to him yet. Before saying anything she finishes off what she was eating first, not wanting to be impolite.

"Hello." She says, nodding at him. "Was your meal to your liking?"

It was an ice breaker of sorts. Especially when they didn't know each other.

OTA and Table 4

[fishermansweater]

Finnick and Annie made a decision months ago -- it must be a year now, at least -- that they should take part in things like village meetings and feasts because they've been apparently rewarded for it in the past, and because being on the outside of a community is dangerous if things turn. So when Finnick finds out there's a feast spread at the Inn again, he goes home to get Annie.

He's wearing the new outfit he'd found in one of the gift boxes from the Gamemakers: heavy sweater, cap, gloves, light-coloured pants, good sturdy boots and a new blue coat. It's been a long time since he'd gotten new clothes, and Finnick's enjoying looking less dishevelled.

What he isn't enjoying is the fact that there's allocated seating, and his wife is at the table next to his. If it weren't for the huge plate of sweet flavored fish rolls, he'd be tempted to just go sit with her, but the food won't move when he tries to. Typical of the Gamemakers, he thinks, to force them to sit apart like this. So Finnick converses with his tablemates, but there are also plenty of moments when he can be spotted glancing quickly across to the next table to make sure his wife is all right.

Once he's finished a little, Finnick circulates, mostly just looking around at the new people he sees at the other tables. He'll smile, disarmingly, if he's caught out, but he makes his way steadily back to his wife and her table. He wants to be ready if Annie decides to go.

@ Table 4

[chosenbytheocean]

"Would you like to try some of mine?" Moana asked Finnick with a smile. She wondered if the overseers had made it impossible to share their food or if it was just removing the plates. The obviously had to have the ability to move their food into their mouth so what if they put it on another plate and then moved?

Moana was very interested in testing the options.

Her place had pork on it, prepared with familiar spices from her island. Around the meat was a wide variety of tropical fruit, both grilled and raw. They were cut and prepared the ways that she was used to with little need to do more than pop it into her mouth.

She hadn't been given silverware, as if their hosts knew that Moana usually ate with her hands.

OTA and Table 6

[ad_dicendum]

The Inn is often filled with the fragrance of food, but the surprising thing about their unexpected feasts is the way that food appears with no apparent preparation, and Gracchus still doesn't understand how that works. He's used to offerings being made to the gods, not being returned in physical form.

Today, he hears the word being spread at around the same time as he notices the smell, a complex mixture of the aromas of food all competing with each other, like walking past the food vendors with their counters full of their street food. It turns out that places have been chosen, and each place has a different foodstuff at it. When Gracchus finds the place card with Gaius Gracchus written neatly across it, it's next to a plate laden with cooked vegetables an a huge helping of roasted chicken encrusted with exotic spices, its skin speckled with little spots of flavoring and a rich honeyed sauce poured over the meat.

His face brightens, and it's only then that he looks around to see who else is at the table. Some of them he knows, and others he does not. He's always eager to meet people he doesn't know, or to speak more with those that he does. He'll happily talk to the others at his table, and later in the meal, he gets up to circulate, stopping to greet people he knows, almost as though this were some sort of political campaign.

It's not, except that in some ways he is. Gaining support from people here will be important to continuing the work he and Mark and Kate have been trying to do.

[ethnobotany]

Beverly only really manages to get around to mingle with those she's met or might want to meet after most everyone has already managed to eat. Eventually, she spots another familiar face and makes her way over. She hasn't had the opportunity to really talk to him for a while and she's been wondering how he's been doing.

"Well, hi there," she greets him warmly. "How have you been? Did you enjoy your meal?"

Table 2 and OTA

[cleptes]

The meal in front of her is not one from Bela's childhood. She doesn't have a favourite meal or positive association with that chapter in her life; no special dinner made lovingly by her mother because she knew that Bela would enjoy it, no sweet treat for afterwards. Her mother wasn't thoughtful like that.

Today she had been provided with a three course meal, one that Bela had been served once in Italy. Bruschetta to begin with, topped with tomatoes and olive oil. Next came mushroom risotto, accompanied with some bread for dipping into. Dessert was a selection of gelato, tiramisu and pandoro. To finish this off she had an espresso which smelled exactly like the one she had the last time she was in Italy.

She didn't recognise some of the names on the place cards laid out on the table, and well, she doesn't really care either. Bela hasn't made any real deep connections with anyone yet so she isn’t going to become snippy about who she was sitting beside for a meal. If anything, this was the perfect opportunity for her to meet more of the villagers and find out if any of them could be of use to her in some way.

After she has finished Bela decides to mingle with the rest of the people who weren't at her table, offering them a polite smile.

OTA

[minus1twin]

Wanda didn't know Bela but she had recollected running into the woman during the time that her memories had been tampered with. It was an uncomfortable position to be in but she wanted to offer Bela some level of thanks for trying to help her when Wanda gave her absolutely no reasons too.

She waited until after the meal before walking up to Bela.

Wanda was dressed in a pair of tight jeans, boots and a dark maroon leather jacket. Her tongue dragged nervously across her lips before she spoke. "Hello. We had run into the forest before." Her accent wasn't as heavy as the last time they had met.

"I wanted to thank you for back then." She lifted up her hand to show that her knuckles were fully healed sans a thin scar along the joints of her fingers.

table 1 and OTA

[ethnobotany]

The dish on Beverly's place suggests Scottish roots, for any Earth people who might happen to notice. Mincemeat, puddings, biscuits, shortbread, marmalade, and the like. And, of course, if one happens to look, off to the side can be found coffee and croissants.

Naturally, Beverly wants to spend a feast with the people she's grown close to over her time here, especially the ones she knew from home. Of course, that seems only partially successful as she notices that her plate is situated directly next to Clint's. At least she's sandwiched between him and Ned. As far as forced placements go, it could certainly be much worse.

She does shoot a glance over to Jean-Luc once people begin to sit down, hoping to catch his eye to see what he makes of all this.

At some point, she spends time mingling with everyone else who's decided to come, looking for people she knows, even if they've not spent appreciable time together yet. Naturally, she gravitates towards her housemates, Nerys, or her clinic colleagues, though she isn't above saying hello to anyone who looks in her direction. If any of the food looks interesting, she can be found asking about that, too.

OTA at table 5

[treadswater]

Annie is calling it a success that she's turned up at all. Those who were around when she and Finnick first turned up will recognize something in her too-wide eyes, the nervous tension humming through her body. She's not the only one to receive a note telling her to hurt someone; who knows how another might react?

(She does. She knows. She's studied the Games after all.)

But she's here, and she's even managed an effort with her appearance, with that off-the-shoulder sweater she received last year and some military-style pants she claimed. The nicely warm winter coat, another salvaged attempt, is hanging up all proper at the inn's entrance. (If need be, it shouldn't be too long to run to her and Finnick's house. She doesn't need to have everything on hand. No, no, no she doesn't. She can sit and she can eat, and she can.... she can roll with the trick that her plate won't move to let her go sit with Finnick. She can. Some at the table she knows, others she doesn't. But she can do this.

It takes her longer than it might otherwise to recognize the dish in front of her, and when she does for a moment her bottom lip trembles. Her momma's Soto Surprise never had any consistent ingredients, it was all what they had on hand and what they managed to hoard. But here it is, the blackened spiced fish resting on the tossed wheat grains and potatoes and sliced seaweed and a few other things she can't see clearly because her vision's blurred with tears. It's what her momma used to make, and her abulita when they went to visit her. It's family.

Annie'll answer conversation, eventually. After she's eaten enough of the fish to calm down and regain her bearings. If she's still wide-eyed and jumpy, well, that can't be helped. But at least it'll be a fed wide-eyed and jumpy.

[king_in_the_north]

"Is that your favorite?" Robb asked with a nod to the fish, an attempt at being polite and conversational despite a wariness of his own lingering in his expression. His mother had gone to too much trouble transforming him from unruly child to proper lord for him to simply sit and frown over his rabbit stew.

"I don't think I even realized this was my favorite until I sat down."

Lyanna Stark | OTA | Table 5

[iron_beneath_beauty]

Assigned seating isn't something Lyanna has seen since her days in Winterfell. There was the dais where the family sat during feast days, Brandon beside their father and Ned next to them. She and Benjen were always regulated to the ends of the table, the youngest and least important compared to the two eldest sons. It was only after she left home that things had changed and she had more charge of her life. Something like this shouldn't matter, not something as small as assigned seating. But it was a shock to see it here, in this place.

She hesitates but gathers food for herself and sits where her name card is, looking around the table apprehensively. "Why do you think they are doing this?" She asked, her voice low, as though the Observers could actually hear her. Who was to say they couldn't? They knew their names and for some reason placed them here.

[king_in_the_north]

"I don't know," Robb answered, frowning down at his plate. Until now, he hadn't thought much about the strange, improbable feasts they've been provided, despite the gossip they invariably caused. He kept his opinions to himself, but he still thought it most likely that they were all here by the whims of the gods, and it seemed only natural. Gods were fickle; everyone knew that.

But this felt different. Just as the strange, demanding letters others had been receiving felt different. Every plate was apparently tailored to its intended recipient, and the contents varied just as much as the villagers did, some of them modest, hearty fare like his own rabbit stew, others extravagant and fit for royalty.

Squinting, he slid his gaze to Lyanna, his quarrel with her momentarily forgotten. "It seems as if it must be a trick, doesn't it?"

Clary - OPEN [Table 3 & Outside]

[ithuriels_blood]

There was one thing that Clary had yearned for since day one of her arrival. A slice of New York style pizza. She didn't care what was on the pizza or in what way she managed to obtain it but she wanted that familiar taste of home. This feast decided to give her just that. Sitting at her place setting was two very large slices of cheesy flat greasy amazing pizza.

She should have been mingling but the smell of cheese and oil called to her in a way that nothing else could. She sat at her place and shoved the first bite of pizza into her mouth. She had to remember to pace herself; this will likely be the last time she was able to taste such amazingness.

"Oh god yes." It was practically orgasmic and, no, she didn't look like she was interested in sharing.

Clary tried to make her pizza last but with each bite the delicious meal grew smaller and was soon gone. She was so full but she wanted to keep eating in that way that only true American's can.

Towards the end of the feast Clary decided to take a short walk outside. She wanted to enjoy the lingering greasy taste in her mouth as well as the fact that she now had clothes suitable for the winter weather. Their creepy keepers had been nice enough to gift Clary an outfit similar to the ones that all Shadowhunters wore; which meant that it was black and made mostly of leather. She had a purple pendant around her throat and a dark leather jacket pulled over her shoulders. For the first time since the start of winter she was pleasantly warm while walking through the snow.

It almost looked pretty without the pollution that she was used to in the city.

Moana - Open [Table 4 & Everywhere!]

[chosenbytheocean]

Moana was dressed in her island-like attire. The fire in the common room of the inn kept the room warm enough for her to forgo wearing shoes or anything that resembled winter clothing. Her top wrapped around her torso with fish sewn in black thread across her chest. She had begun to take apart some of the clothing she'd been given and used the thread to add more elaborate designs to her handmade top. Her skirts were two layers with a navy blue sash ripped from her scrubs around her center to keep them in place.

She found the set up a little odd and took the time to walk around each table to see where people were sitting and what was on their plates. She stopped a few place settings and stared at the food curiously. "What is this?" There are a lot of foods she's never seen before.

When Moana found her place setting she tried to move it and go sit by the fire but it was cemented firmly in place. With a frown she took a seat and looked at the food that was marked as hers. It was a pork prepared with familiar spices. Around the meat was a wide variety of tropical fruit, both grilled and raw. It was all cut and prepared the ways that she was used to with little need to do more than pop it into her mouth.

It was curious. Was there anyone stopping them from sitting at the wrong place setting?

"Would you like to try some of mine?" Moana asked her table, wondering if the overseers had made it impossible to share too.

After dinner was eaten, Moana took a seat next to the fire with a very large Itiiti curled behind her. She can't do very much in this weather so her and Itiiti have remained inside, using the reed that she had collected to make ropes and other useful materials to help stock the inn across the breach.

[triplerose]

This was truly the last place Loras wanted to be. While once upon a time, this was common for him - large meals full of festive spirits and people milling around - he was still achingly out of place. Or at least he felt that way. He'd followed his sister to the inn with his head down, and upon the realization that they were sitting at different spots, a panic had risen inside of him.

But he'd watched enough people try to know the plate wasn't moving anywhere.

So he kept to himself, eyes occasionally glancing up to try and spot his sister, until the young woman seated beside him spoke.

"- What is it?" He had meant to decline the offer, but curiosity got the better of him.

Wanda - Open [Table 6]

[minus1twin]

After hearing about the feast taking place at the inn, Wanda had informed her house hold and then left in search to see what this feast held. It was different compared to the others though there wasn't any apparent reason as to why that was. She walked around the tables, pausing when she reached table 6 where her plate sat.

55 people in the village. Everyone's names listed on a little card.

"Paprikash?" It wasn't like what Vision had tried to make in the Compound but similar to her mother's recipe. She could smell the thick spices that rose from the dish and see the chunks of chicken and dumplings that created the main body of the meal. It was an inexpensive way to make a lot of heavy food with basic flour dumplings and paprika spice.

Her own voice echoed in her head as she took a seat at her place setting.

'Spirits lift.'

Perhaps that had been the intent behind the dish; to lift their spirits. Next to the chicken paprikash was fried pieces of flat bread with green onions as a garnish. Wanda pushed around the chicken and dumplings on her plate, unsure if she wanted to eat the treat or not. She found it difficult to trust their hosts since they had recently forced the young Avenger to lose her memories.

OTA at table 1

[lastofthekellys]

While she's never had much experience with assigned seating, it's hardly a foreign concept to Kate. What is strange is, once she's re-entered the room wearing her pretty blue and situation appropriate dress, that she can't switch around the places to be at the same table as her husband. Nor can Benedict switch his around.

She spends a moment being entirely, decidedly, nonplussed. Then she notices what, exactly, the strange overseers of this place have given her. A large bowl of stew, hot and steaming, with a side plate contained hot buttered potatoes and fresh, straight-from-the-oven damper. Beyond that, clearly for 'dessert', are some light fluffy scones and some dollops of jam and butter on the plate. To drink, tea and, yes, when she sips it, it's full of sugar. Well, all right then, this is... this is nice.

It's more than nice when she tastes the stew. It's not beef or mutton, but wombat. Wombat which only cost the energy to hunt and butcher, no stress about money or the law. Long-simmered to soften it, long-simmered over hours spent doing other chores while the smell would drive her and her siblings mad with hunger and want. But a good hunger, the kind that will be fulfilled after the work is done. Wombat and potatoes and carrots and everything else Kate can't be bothered to identify. The meal tastes of home and safety and warmth on a cold day, and that's what matters.

She'll be a good dining partner if anyone engages her in conversation, although she doesn't know either of the men sitting either side of her that well, and one's a newcomer besides. She'll even, before dessert, get up and walk around, check in on friends and Benedict. She's in a good mood, thanks to the food. She's not sure what the overseers are playing at, but this is nice.

[fishermansweater]

There aren't particularly many people here other than Annie and Johanna whom Finnick feels the need to check in with. Years of being forced apart from the rest of the district by his victory and deliberately keeping himself aloof from his patrons have left him wanting to shelve his natural instincts for gregarious charm most often, including here.

There are, though, some people he'll make a little time for, and Kelly's one of them. So when he circulates the room, he pauses by her table to eye Kate Kelly's meal. It's some sort of stew, rich and fragrant, the visible vegetables simple, accompanied by some of the thick-crusted bread Kelly herself makes.

"What have you got?" he asks, actually curious because he's come to understand how many people here are from worlds where food is not the luxury it is for so many in Panem, but he doesn't get that feeling from Kelly herself.

OTA | Table 2

[digging]

There is absolutely nothing about this that Karen trusts.

She hasn't been here all that long, but she's been digging for info almost as soon as her feet hit the cold ground that first day, and she knows whomever is keeping them here deigns to provide them with "gifts" from time to time. She knows about the food that has occasionally turned up in people's houses with their name on the box, and she knows about the grand feasts that get put on here in the Inn, too, with enough food and drink to drown hardscrabble sorrows.

Oh, and she knows about the girl who turned up dead afterwards that one time, too.

This, though, as far as she can tell, is next level manipulation, and she isn't sure what bothers her most: That whomever has trapped her here knows that her most favorite, last meal on earth would be her grandmother's lasagna with an ice cold beer still in the bottle, or that so many other people here dig in without much hesitation when faced with their own plate of screwed up comfort food.

If she's here, if she's taking part in this upsetting ritual, it's strictly to see what happens. She's got her journal and pen with her and is jotting down notes about anything that might prove relevant later.

Her stomach gurgles in protest. She ignores it.

[cleptes]

Part of Bela knows that she should not trust this. It's the second time she has come to the inn to find food laid out for them that was not prepared by any of the villagers. She should also be concerned that everyone received a meal that meant something to them - how much did the 'Observers' actually know about everyone?

The other part of her is hungry. She hasn't exactly been starving, but back home, Bela would normally eat more than she would in the village. She's also noticed a slight dip in her weight ever since she arrived.

A woman at her table hasn't touched her food, and Bela is curious to know why, looking over at her.

"You seem more interested in note taking than the lasagna." A beat. "Everything all right?"

OTA - Table 2

[thenewways]

Assigned table settings. Nerys is pretty sure this wipes Mark's 'they aren't sadistic' concept off the list. Of the people at the table, she knows only one--Margaery--to any extent, and the rest of the group are people who she's fairly confident don't have much in common with each other. Actually, she's been to a wedding or two like this, both during and after the Occupation, where someone has the misguided idea that people will just open up and talk.

If the Observers wanted that, they shouldn't have put the food on the table that they did, even if it's immobile (the physics of how the hell that works are making her head spin). Nerys' own food is as if someone put her very favorites down on a list: veklava, mapa, larish pie, a ramufta salad, hasperat nearly half the size of her head, and both a small glass of springwine and a steaming raktajino to top it off.

There's no use in sitting around, though it seems to be staying warm and cold, as needed. She tries not to think of the stories that she's heard about the treats collaborators got in the war, tries to think of taking opportunities and that living well is the best revenge.

Nerys looks around her, considers for half a second, then takes a big bite of hasperat. It's so sharp it makes her mouth sting, the pain and flavors delicious, and after she's swallowed and wiped her brow, she lets out a soft whistle. "Whew," she says to the next person over. "I don't know where they got the chef, but that's the real thing. Wanna try?"

There's a faintly devilish glint to her eye.