Work Text:
This job is tiring.
James isn't used to the workload, if he's being completely honest. Being a District One senator was hard enough, and he begins to think that at some point that he's just not cut out for this. Then again, politics have always kind of been his niche, and it'd be a shame to abandon it now, after all of the work he's put into gaining his position.
The Senate is weary as ever. He presides and does his best to mediate, but lets be honest, here: the Districts are not his biggest fans. He's marked by his social media presence. They see him as a makeup artist, as a flimsy, floundering senator with a head full of cotton.
It makes him mad. He's James Charles, for the solstices sake, and he should be treated with some damn respect. He's not a senator anymore--he's the president, and he couldn't have made it if it weren't for his political abilities.
"I wouldn't worry about it," Beast says once, rolling a pen between his fingers. "There's always opposition. You just gotta put em back in their place."
"I mean, that's fair," James says. He's exhausted; the riots in 10 have escalated, and the peacekeeper force he deployed this morning doesn't seem to be doing much to quell the fighting. "Just kind of hard to do shit when nobody takes me seriously."
"They will," Beast insists. "You just gotta show em you mean business." He shifts, pushing the pen across James' desk. "How's 10?"
"Garbage," he says, holding his chin in his hands, fingers carefully placed as not to smear his makeup. "Peacekeeper's aren't working."
"Time for an address?" Beast asks.
"Maybe," James says, taking the pen with shaking fingers. "Maybe."
Beast swallows, and through the fear in his eyes, James can nearly make out the child who is Jimmy; they're not really cut out for this, are they?
"You'll stay for dinner?" James asks carefully, dropping the pen into a cup full of identicals.
"Can't," Beast says. "Got things to do. Things for the Summer Solstice."
"Of course," James says, trying to hide his disappointment behind a firm handshake. "I'll be seeing you, Beast."
And it only seems to get worse. Grian asks him to stop his forces--but he can't, really, can he? He's too deep now, and District Ten seems to only get madder. A force 1,000 wide seems to only quell riots near the transportation hub, and even then, the people seem to boil angrily beneath the careful hold he has on them.
"Listen, man, it's exactly what Jim said," Jackson says over dinner. "You just gotta put em in their place."
"I mean, force isn't exactly working," he says, chewing an oyster. The food nearly makes him sick, stuck up here in this penthouse like this.
"So just talk to them," Jackson insists. "Make Grian give an address, I don't know."
"No, it won't work," he mutters.
"It will if it's you," he says. "They believe you. Respect you? Maybe not so much. But you keep shovin em peacekeepers, they'll keep believing in your power."
And he's probably right. 67 is going to be a hard year for all of them; the tension around the last victor is just as thick as it was when he won, and despite the numerous, harried discussions with RT, he doesn't seem any closer to figuring out why they let a 12 win.
Whatever. Whatever, whatever. Grian keeps his distance as tensions rise. The justice building is nearly burned to the ground, and that's about when it all comes to a head.
"I need to give a speech," he says. His receptionist gives him a weary nod and types away at her computer. "Get Brydges and Kay on the train, okay sister?" Another nod.
A presidential address should be a piece of cake. Truly. He's good at talking to an audience, and the Capitol loves him; hell, maybe if he's convincing enough, he could get them to stage an attack via social media. Twitter or youtube seems a good place to start. Enough pressure and they'll cave, something in him insists, the voices of Kay and Beast blurring together and into his. Enough pressure, enough force, and they'll bend.
The introduction is short and sweet. Thousands of eyes on him, watching his every move; he has to be perfect. Any show of weakness, and he's dead; any crack in the facade and the illusion he needs to keep up comes crashing down.
Well. At least his makeup is flawless.
"Just a quick one," Brydges says, voice sharp. "I wrote the cards. No improv, but you can intro and outro yourself." He nods, swallows, and takes the golden cards with fingers that don't shake--and he's on the stage. The camera's are on him, thousands of Capitol citizens gathered to watch him speak. Thousands more within the Districts.
He holds the cards. He controls them, not the other way around.
Time to make that known. Time to gain the respect he's been lacking.
They could do with a little pressure around here.
He steps up to the microphone, ignoring the hollering crowd. Bats his eyelashes. Holds a hand up for a fluttering wave and in wait for silence. He inhales as they still, clears his throat, and as clear, bright, powerfully as he can:
"Hi sisters!"