( picture prompt meme )

[socketeer]

the picture prompt meme I — Comment with your character. II — Others will leave a picture (or two, or three...) III — Reply to them with a setting based on the picture. IV — Link to any pictures that are NSFW, please. V — Be aware that this meme will be image-heavy. Link to an image: <a href=IMAGEURL>TEXT</a> Embed image in your reply: <img src=IMAGEURL> Image width and height: <img src=IMAGEURL width=500> OR <img src=IMAGEURL height=INSERT>

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[cisskabob]

[That gets a small, slightly strained smile. It's an expected question; it's the one everyone's asking these days, or variations of it. It just never makes it any easier to answer. Cissie considers, very briefly, giving the usual sanitized, edited version of her answer.

But this is Georgia Mason she's talking to, and if she wants a chance to call her "boss," she's going to have to go with the whole, God's honest truth.]

Would you believe I never actually wanted to be an Irwin? [Cissie's smile is quick, and wry and a little sharp. More than a little pained. She can still see the testing unit lights blinking red when she closes her eyes.] My mother was my... manager, I guess. For lack of a better word. She taught me, and she directed me, and she handled the publicity and the site. My job was to be the Irwin, so I was.

[She stops there, for a moment, taking a deep breath. They say talking about it makes it easier, but she hasn't found that to be true. Especially when she really tries to talk about it, and finds that "how are you" doesn't actually ever mean "tell me the truth."] It was supposed to be a filler piece, to run on a slow week. But there were more of them than we realized, and I couldn't have taken them all on my own. I might have been able to run for the van. I might even have made it, except that Mom--she came to help me. [She flashed another brittle, quick smile.] She shot several of them at close range. But she wasn't wearing a face shield, or eye protection. She couldn't get back in the van.

[choosetruth]

[The story is a familiar one. Things got hairy, someone important ended up zombie chow. Cue the tears, the headshots, the trauma, the regret. The details change, but the story stays the same.

Also, Georgia did her research. Finding Bonnie King on the Wall had come up at first google. This specific story is pretty familiar too.

She doesn't flinch, or move much at all except to take a sip of her Coke. If there's sympathy in her eyes, no one will ever know. Even without her glasses, Shaun's the only one who can read her flat, black, virus-ridden eyes.]

In my experience, when something like that happens, as it often does for Irwins, they either quit altogether or push themselves even harder until they're dead too. You've explained why you'd want to stop being an Irwin, Miss King-Jones, but not why you'd want to become a Newsie.

[It's probably cruel, pushing her like this, not showing sympathy and warmth and all those other things you're supposed to do when someone shares a personal and painful story. But Georgia isn't much good at sympathy in normal situations, and this is a job interview, not a normal situation. Being in Factual News might be safer than Action News, but only slightly. Newsies died too. Newsies certainly befriended people who died too. She needed to know that Cissie was ready for that. She needed to know that Cissie could put up with Georgia's particular style of leadership, and most importantly, she needed to know why Cissie wanted to be a Newsie. Wanting to be not an Irwin wasn't enough. Being good at writing and good at holding a gun wasn't enough. She needed to see that same dedication to finding the truth that George herself has. Otherwise, this isn't the right candidate for her site.]

[cisskabob]

[Strangely enough, it might have surprised George to know that her reaction is actually exactly what Cissie needs. Getting sympathy in the face of tears or emotions was a thing that had stopped when she was five and lost her father. Bonnie King was a lot of things, but nurturing and supportive was not necessarily one of them. And while Cissie is a fairly emotional person by nature (contrary to her mother's efforts to stamp it out of her), she long ago learned how to repress those emotions until she is alone.

So now, she takes another breath and straightens in her chair, looking right back at George--if she could see her eyes behind the glasses, she'd be meeting them straight on.]

I mentioned that I never wanted to be an Irwin in the first place. I never had a choice about it, while my mother was alive. That's not a criticism, that's just fact. But if you've seen any of my pieces, you'll know I wasn't a very good one. In fact, I doubt I'd be here for an interview if I'd applied for an Irwin position, would I?

[She smiles, showing there's no heat or bad feelings. It's the truth. She's good enough to stay alive, but she doesn't have the heart it takes to be a great Irwin. Or even a good one.]

But that doesn't answer it well enough for you either, does it?

[choosetruth]

It doesn't. [Though she gets points for realizing that on her own. Not that she'd know it to look at George, whose face is as impassive as ever.]

Lots of people don't want to be Irwins. That doesn't mean we're going to hire them.