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mechaspirit · 7 years ago

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In the Eyes of the Endless

Author’s notes: Alright, finally done one of Christmas stories for Choices that I’m trying to do. I’m going try to do more between now and the beginning of January. This one is for Endless Summer, which takes place before the event. And let’s just say that I hc that ES MC may have experienced a couple of visions before he/she went to that mysterious island of hell.

Disclaimer: Do not own Choices or the characters. Those rightfully belong to Pixelberry.

Rated: T

Story: Endless Summer

Pairings: MCxDiego (platonic, of course 😊), and I may or may not include couple more pairings at the end somewhat...heehee.😅

Summary: Christmas isn’t just about presents and celebrating what you have and had happened to you, but it is also about celebrating for what is about to come. Even if it’s when you least expected it.

Sending thoughtful wishes your way in the hope you know the joy and treasures that come with the Christmas season.

Christmas Eve appears to be the busiest in the shopping district of Northbridge, and the crowds are scrambling to do the last minute shopping. Two close friends, Diego and Yurika, managed to get everything they need (which consists of simple Christmas decorations for their apartment and snacks for movie nights) and stopped by a nearby cafe for some Christmas special hot chocolate mix to bring back home. Normally, the students of Hartfeld would go back to their homes to celebrate with their families but these two choose not to for different reasons. Diego still has a strained relationship with his parents and couldn’t find a heart to go back home while Yurika just didn’t really have anyone whom she considers family to go back to. For now, they’re content with staying in the main campus for the holidays, celebrating Christmas with only each other.

As they made out of the shopping district and deep into the conversation about which movies, Home Alone or The Polar Express, a cold wind hit them, and they looked up to see every trees and building decorated with Christmas lights glowing at the starry night. They admired the beautiful sight until they noticed a young, dark-haired woman and a tall, handsome man outside together nearby a giant Christmas tree. It was hard to see it from the distant, but a pair of odd, but adorable friends noticed that the couple were sharing a gentle, but loving kiss underneath a mistletoe, making them awed at the sight.

“Aww, aren’t they adorable?” Yurika commented adoringly at the romantic sight.

“They are. Even more adorable than any couples in every rom-com Christmas movies we saw,” Diego agreed before letting out a longing sigh, “I just wish I can experience that even if it’s just for a moment.”

Yurika turned to her best friend and playfully pulled both sides of his cheeks, stretching it upwards as if to make him smile, “Hey now, Diego. There’s no frowny face allow on Christmas Eve. We, as hopeless romantics, are going to make most of our Christmas time high in holiday spirits in our own way. Now smile, smile.”

“Amrfphed, fmed. Mrrmphed. Mrphed,” was all Diego could mutter, but the young woman could tell he was saying “Alright fine. I’m happy. Just let go”, and let go of his face.

“Besides, I’m sure someday, there’s going to be a special guy out there waiting for you, and he’ll be exactly who you’re looking for all along.”

Diego smiled at those encouraging words while rubbing his cheeks containing red, stretch marks, causing Yurika to laugh. The dark-hair then noticed something else that his friend said.

“Wait. You, Rika? As a hopeless romantic? You haven’t even dated anyone since high school,” Diego pointed out, thinking that his best friend, beautiful, smart, and funny woman, has a better chance of finding someone special than he does right now. But then again, he knew for the fact that Yurika has an acquired taste.

Yurika shook her head, walking towards the same Christmas tree they spotted earlier, admiring the colorful decorations and the lights shining around them. “I know. But I’m not into dating anyone right now. Maybe it’s because I haven’t found someone special yet, either.”

“So why is it that you aren’t looking for that special someone right now?” Diego asked his best friend in curiosity.

Yurika hummed in reply as she watched all the Christmas lights glowing around them with a thoughtful look on her face. She then shrugged, “I’m not entirely sure, to be honest. It’s strange to think like this, but maybe there’s already someone out there for me. Like way out there. I guess I’m just waiting for a right time to meet that person.”

Diego tilted his head in curiosity, “So you’re saying that you’re possibly looking for a soulmate?”

“…Something like that,” the blonde woman answered and sighed, “Forget it. I think I’m being weird just thinking about it.”

“Maybe. But I believe it’s a good kind of weird,” Diego assured her, causing the latter to smile. Then, his brown eyes widened as he noticed something in the sky, “Oh my god…Yurika, look!”

The young woman looked up to see tiny snowflakes gently falling from the sky, making her gasped in surprise and excitement. All the people surrounding them in town had the same reaction and cheered at the unexpected, but most wonderful sight during Christmas Eve. Yurika held her gloved hand out in the air, letting few snowflakes dropped into her palms. She looked to see how the snowfalls matched the decorations around the district.

“Oh wow. This is beautiful,” Yurika said, admiring the newly-formed Christmas scenery.

“It is!” Diego agreed, holding onto his best friend’s hand with his, “Maybe this is a sign that says that Christmas isn’t going to be so bad this year and that more of what’s to come.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice?” Yurika replied and squeezed back Diego’s hand. As she does that, a painful headache hit her, and then her vision turned white. As the light faded, she opened her eyes and gasped, seeing her best friend, with a beard grown and slightly longer hair for some odd reason, standing next to the tall silhouette looking at the strange, but beautiful light at the starry sky. She saw the two turned to each other and barely make out the words they are saying to each other.

“So…these mean good luck, huh?”

“Yes. And I know they are always true.”

“How?”

“…This tradition of yours. Kissing at midnight.”

“Well…ahem. It’s not, like, my tradition…”

“May I kiss you?”

Then another light flashed, leading Yurika to a different place…a country-themed bar to be more specific. She looked down to see that she’s in her own body. Just not in complete control of it since her feet moved on this own. She unintentionally made her way around the corner to see an unknown silhouette sitting on the ground, possibly looking crestfallen. As she sat down beside the figure, she could hear him speak.

“I ain’t given a damn about people in a long time, Princess. Then you came along and pretty much blew that whole plan straight to hell. Anyway, thanks to you, I’m finding myself all torn up inside over your gang of Little Rascals. And it’s all your fault.”

“My fault? How do you figure that?”

“…Not sure if you noticed last night, but you kinda blew my mind.”

The vision ended in a flash, and Yurika blinked in confusion. Diego noticed a perplexed look on her face and stared back at her, looking concern.

“Something wrong, Rika?”

But Yurika didn’t answer. Instead, she stared blankly at the starry sky, completely lost in thought.

…What was that?

#playchoices #choices stories you play #Endless Summer #mc #Diego Ricardo Ortiz Soto #and I may have include a Na'vi and a certain pilot at the end...cough #christmas story

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ellanainthetardis · 7 years ago

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Loved today's prompt! Just out of curiosity, what's your Effie/seneca headcanon?

Thanks! My Effie/Seneca hc mmmm... I put a read more bc it got long.

I’m not in the “they used to be a couple” bandwagon but I like to hc they knew each other very well because they’ve been in the same circles forever so they’ve known each other since childhood. I think they’re the kind of friends who make-out after a long night partying, when you’re drunk and a bit high on dancing and fun and you want somebody you love close, sometimes maybe it had gone further, but it always stays entaglement free, it’s easy, affectionate. I strongly hc that while Seneca is fluid, he’s more into men than women so whatever happens is mostly recreational and there’s never any ambiguity between the two of them, never any unrequited love.

I think they’re very good friends in a way that’s not always common in the Capitol because they recognzie themselves in each other: young, beautiful, deadly ambitious, probably with hard to please parents... I like to think there’s something pure to their friendship because Seneca genuinely loves Effie (in a friend/almost family way) and she loves him back the same way. I think he would risk a lot for her because he’s pure of heart when it comes to his friends (unlike Plutarch who I hc Slytherin, I think Seneca is more of the Ravenclaw/Hufflepuff variety) and she would go far for him but not as far as he would, not as far as she would go for Haymitch or the kids, she’s too pragmatic and has too much self-preservation. And I don’t think she realizes just how deep he feels for her.

While she might be amongst the people Seneca would do anything to protect, he’s not in hers because... I think at some point, probably 2 or 3 years after she starts being an escort, Effie stops trusting anyone Capitol and above all anyone who works for the Games. It might be unfair but that’s how it is.

I see them as fake-dating from time to time, because... Well it’s a wider hc but while I think sexuality in the Capitol is very free (like nobody cares about preferences) and it’s totally okay to be gay, it’s a little more proper to be married to the opposite gender in certain high circles and families. There’s a clear discrepency in the city about what you do behind closed doors and what you do in public, about being wild because that’s how they live, in total excess, and being proper because you’re the “civilized” part of the population in opposition to the savages Districts (which also paradoxically are more traditional)...

So, yeah, I think Seneca is totally at ease with who he is, who he prefers, but I also think he has an overbearing politician father who would prefer him to marry a woman instead of a man - and he doesn’t quite have the courage to tell him to fuck off, because there’s a lot of money, influence and pressure and he’s been groomed since he was a child to be the next Crane: head gamemaker is only a step on his way to goverment.

As for Effie, there are moments when she doesn’t want a boyfriend/girlfriend (because of Haymitch) and others when she doesn’t have a boyfriend/girlfriend for several months/years (still because of haymitch), and while she’s seen with men and women at red carpets and events, there are talks about how she hasn’t been in a steady relationship for a while.

So it works out. They pretend to be a couple for a while, they have fun because they’re good friends, gossip dies and moves on to something else. They have an amicable break-up in time for the new Games season.

While nothing is ever made public and they deny it at the top of their lungs, I do believe the affair between Haymitch and Effie is kind of an open secret in the somewhat small Games staff world. Even if they’re trying not to be, they’re a bit obvious at times but mostly, in there, nobody cares because it’s not that uncommon for escorts to hook up with a victor or a Gamemaker, it probably happens often. It’s like being trapped in a terrible situation with someone for a certain amount of time, at some point, that person no matter how much you dislike them becomes the only one you can rely on, as twisted as it might get.

I’m also pretty sure the penthouse is bugged so, truly, there’s not hiding that they’re sleeping together even if they’re adamant it’s just a casual sex-friends thing.

And Seneca being Head Gamemaker, he’s the first made aware probably.

I think it amuses him at first because Effie denies and denies even if she must know he knows - and isn’t that a little embarassing - and he teases her about fantasies and about how she probably has wanted to do that since she was a teenager... He does see the appeal but Haymitch is not his kind of men.

After a couple of years though he starts getting concerned and I think he would urge her to cut him loose. Seneca is good at seeing patterns, at anticipating what’s going to happen, and he sees the train wreck in the making. He’s never as adamant as Chaff is with Haymitch because he respects Effie’s judgment and trusts her to make the good decision but he’s not entirely happy with the affair and lets her know. It probably causes a much larger rift between them than her wavering trust in anything/anyone Capitol.

I think Seneca was very much her closest friend before Haymitch took that place. She trusts Haymitch like she never trusted anyone. She trusts him blindly and completely, he’s her ally, her partner... He’s never lied to her even if the truth hurts sometimes a lot...

For Seneca, it must feel like Haymitch replaces him even if they never had the same degree of a relationship. He was Effie’s go-to person and now he’s not and she is still his so it leaves them unbalanced.

More generally, I don’t think Seneca is a bad person. He’s not a rebel, he never was. I think he does believe in the necessity of keeping the Districts under the Capitol thumb and he doesn’t exactly love what he does with the Games but he sees it as a control tool, he rationalizes it, he makes his peace with it. He distances himself from the tributes in the arena, they aren’t real to him until they become victors. He doesn’t think he will be Head Gamemaker forever. He’s been a Gamemaker almost as long as Effie’s been an escort, he’s been Head Gamemaker since the 70th HG, he’s the youngest Head Gamemaker ever... It’s only a stepping stone. Head Gamemakers are usually promoted to a high ranking ministry in less than 10 years if they do a good job and show indefectible loyalty. That’s his end goal.

What he does try to do and that other Head Gamemakers haven’t always bothered with is try to make it safer for the victors (and the escorts) on the prostitution front. It’s not much but for instance he makes sure that if a “client” is too brutal or something to the point of the victor seriously being injured, the client will not only ever be allowed to buy again but that he will get a bit of a fear. That’s something Snow is willing to work along with because victors are investments and messed-up investments aren’t any good.

I think Snow likes Seneca well enough because Seneca is young, full of ideas and determination to get to the top. Snow likes him with some fondness and a spark of interest because he’s promising and if he can groom him into the kind of men he needs, he thinks Seneca could go far. Snow liking someone has never stopped him from having them killed if need be though. On his part, I think Seneca is naturally wary of the President - there are pesky rumors around Games staff about poison and murders - but he’s also been taught to worship him since infancy - don’t tell me Snow doesn’t have a personality cult impleted in schools, it’s tyranny 101 - and because of his own father’s disappointed attitude, he answers favorably to Snow’s gentle guiding and words of praise. He wants to please Snow, he wants to do well. Snow is not quite a mentor but close to that. He’s not blind but he tells himself the horrors he sees are necessary to keep peace and save Panem.

Victors make fun of Seneca (because of the beard and the attitude) and don’t really like him but he’s not the most hated Head Gamemaker there ever was either. He’s decent enough and if they’ve got a real big problem, they know they can go talk it out with him. It might not amount to anything but more often than not, if it’s really serious, he will try to do something. He also tries to temperate Snow’s wrath as much as possible when a victor does something idiotic that deserves punishment, trying to find alternative punishment that won’t be deadly. For instance, I think Jo caused a lot of trouble as soon as she won and he tried to get her to see the light, warning her at least once or twice and sending older victors her way before he’s forced to take much more drastic measures and having her family killed (on Snow’s orders but at that point, he doesn’t seen an alternative either).

The indiference he feels towards tributes morphes into a sort of odd protectiveness when victors are involved, maybe because of a twisted conscience. Maybe because despite his job, he is not a violent man himself. He never threw a punch in his life and he wouldn’t have the first clue how to defend himself if attacked. This being said he never really shows any of that concern. It wouldn’t do because he’s the boss.

He’s a bit like Effie, I think - and most of the Capitols who are aware of the danger of having more personality than mindless drones - in the sense that he has a very imposing public persona. He laughs a lot, he likes being seen, admired, seduced... He’s always amiable, always apparently happy... He plays the role of the successful young man, of the most elligeable bachelor... He has a somber, more contemplative nature though but he keeps that hidden for nights where he stares at his ceiling.

Above all though... I think he has a sort of honesty toward himself that Plutarch lacks in the sense that he doesn’t try to pretend he’s a better man than he is. He knows exactly what kind of man he is, regardless of the face he presents the world. He kills kids for a living, for the greater good maybe, but that’s what his job is. He doesn’t let himself think about that too often, he usually drowns it in champagne, parties and sex, but it’s there, simmering under the surface. Maybe once Snow told him leaders have to make hard decisions, cut a few to save the lot, that what they’re doing in important in the sense that it’s keeping Panem united and safe and he clings to that with all he has.

It’s a lonely life.

Effie’s the one who gets Seneca for Haymitch during the 74th Hunger Games and, ultimately, she’s the one who convinces him to go along with their plan.

I know a lot of people hc that Haymitch did the whole thing by himself and Effie was clueless but, to me, they’re very much partners, Effie taking the place of the traditional second mentor, and everything they do they do together - of one mind - and so Effie is very aware of what she’s doing when she sells Haymitch’s star-crossed lovers idea, she knows it’s risky, but she wants to try and save the children.

I also think, just like Haymitch must have, she knows the rule will have to be changed last minute and that there won’t be two victors no matter what the kids think in the arena. Maybe she tries to get Seneca to stick to that rule but the order comes from above (Snow) and Seneca won’t risk more than he already did. Possibly, he’s a little angry with her by the time they reach the ending because he let himself convinced by Haymitch that it would be good TV but mostly, he did it because Effie pleaded and now he sees how it could so easily go south and Snow is furious and he hates the disappointment he saw in Snow - and he’s scared too.

What no one anticipated was Katniss and the berries.

Seneca cuts ties immediately after the victory. He won’t take her calls, he avoids her, maybe the only thing he consents to tell her when he is forced to offer his congratulations at the Crowning is: to stay away from him. She thinks it’s because Twelve is in deeeeep troubles and she understands that he doesn’t want to get mixed up in it so she respects his wishes. She doesn’t quite get it’s a little more complicated than that. Sure he’s trying to not get associated with her but he’s also trying not to get her associated with him.

Because at that point, Seneca knows he’s dead, it’s just a matter of time.

I kind of liked what they did in the movies with the bowl of berries because there’s such doomness in it, just like if he was forced into an arena too. It’s terrible. He has no choice but to kill himself. How terrible it must be??? Like, he actually has to stand there and do it with dignity or try to fight, know he will lose and be force-fed berries... Personally, I think he ate the berries by himself, that he would feel it more dignified.

But in the books, I don’t think it was that easy, I think he tried to put up a fight because it’s one thing to be locked in a room with poison berries, it’s another to be asked to hang himself. I think they hanged him and it’s a terrible way to die and he must have known it.

Effie is devastated after his death and it happens after Haymitch and the kids went back to 12 so she doesn’t really have anyone to turn to. Cinna and Portia are there of course but she’s been set into this “don’t trust anyone” path for so long it’s hard for her to let new people know her real thoughts and feelings, her friendship with her only becomes completely trusting later, I think, once Haymitch tells her it’s okay and she actually should go to them if she has a problem.

Mostly, like probably all of the escorts, Gamemaker and people in the known, she’s forced to show some sadness but not too much grief because if they’re seen desperate over his death, they might be associated with him and soon join him in the “suicided” wagon. It’s a tight rope to walk on, all the more so because she keeps getting interviewed and asked questions about him because of their close friendship. And she’s forced to lie about how he might have been depressed or sad or about having an inkling he would do something like this.

I think that time is really, really rough for her because she truly loved Seneca. In a lot of ways, he was a masculine mirror and now she grasps soooo very clearly how quickly and easily she could fall. But it’s too late becaue she’s already committed to the children - never mind Haymitch.

She’s not really allowed to grieve. She doesn’t let herself grieve, not even in the privacy of her own home because she knows it’s bugged, she knows she can’t be seen crying over a traitor, not when she’s on thin ice herself. I think she loses it at her parents one afternoon during tea and her mother and sister are horrified, but at least it’s within the family and it stays there. She feels better after she cried it out but it’s still a weight on her shoulders, it’s not a sorrow she can just shake off like that.

She feels very guilty about his death too, terribly so, because she’s the one who brought him to Haymitch, because she’s the one who begged him to go along with the star-crossed lovers thing... She feels it’s her fault if he’s death, she feels as if she killed him herself.

In my hc, that’s why she’s so upset when Katniss mentions hanging a dummy and painting Seneca’s name in CF - and also because she’s been in a lot of stress for months, she’s probably more aware than Katniss gives her credits for, and she knows there’s a sword dangling over their heads coming lower and lower with every minute.

I think Haymitch is aware of how hard it is for her regarding Seneca’s death but 1) he doesn’t really cared for Seneca 2) he doesn’t really get it because while he’s aware they were friends, when the Games were in sessions, they weren’t much in contact (because a Gamemaker/later Head Gamemaker can’t be seen favoring an escort) so I’m not sure he gets how close they really were. He sympathetic of her grief because he sees it affects her deeply but he’s not sorry Seneca’s dead because he was just another Capitol Head Gamemaker who didn’t care about dead kids to him and there are more urgent fish - Mockingjays - to fry.

The rebellion kind of sweep everything under the rug and be it movie canon or book canon, Effie doesn’t have the luxury of thinking about Seneca’s death any more.

I think she spares him a thought from time to time post MJ but it’s a distant one because, once she settles in 12 for good, it’s like... another life entirely. The Games, everything that came before the war... At some point, it’s something she and Haymitch leave in the past because if they don’t cut it off the past and its demons will swallow them whole. It takes a few years, but they get there.

#hc #look it became a novel #who's surprised?#why is nobody raising their hands?#haha #someone should stop him from thinking so much about secondary character XD #but hey #at least Seneca has a canon last name #unlike others XD #seneca crane #effie trinket #sweetheart #meta #seneca #anon #ask

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