"Sounds lovely." There is a note of genuine wistfulness under the sarcasm. "I mean..." She doesn't actually take a deep breath. "You probably backstab each other all the time, but at least it's just a byproduct, not the objective?"

sure it is no, actually, she is actually not going to tell this stranger who doesn't know about malia and is not in danger of being murdered for it that maleficing exists. She does not have to do that. Like, all.

"Mm."

"...why would backstabing ever be an objective?"

"Ask my government," she smiles brightly with way too much teeth. This is probably as much sass as she can muster while possibly on public TV.

"Don't governments usually... not want to be backstabbed?"

"Funny you would ask, that happens to be exactly why I found myself in this situation!" Zeph gesticulates wildly with the mug of cocoa and the lets the grin fade. "Some people tried backstabbing-" She shrugs annoyedly, apparently deciding she doesn't actually want to stick to the gimmick. "Tried rising up against the government a couple decades back. That didn't go so well and now to remind everyone what an idiotic fucking idea that is, two dozen kids get randomly chosen every year to go on TV and kill each other till there's only one left."

"What the fuck."

Zeph shrugs theatrically.

"Yeah, it's not great. I've been doing better than could be expected, though, thirteen down, ten to go." She takes a long sip from her mug. It's taking every bit of self-control for her not to self-flagellate before Basira, ask for understanding or forgiveness or to explain herself. Why would she?

"How does - doesn't - why - how does killing people's children stop them trying to destroy the government?"

"...empirically?"

"The Hunger Games are already—extreme, most people would rather not see what's the Capitol's next idea."

"...is 'the Capitol' a city or a - an alien spaceship invasion mind-controlling everyone?"

"Just the really rich city where the government hangs out."

"They're just... rich. No - no monsters, no magic, just - killing people's children, on TV, and no one stops them because - because, what, at least it's only two dozen?"

This gets Basira a choked, bitter chuckle.

...actually no, that's a full-fledged laughter, short but dangerous.

"Is that you," the next word seems to amuse her for some reason, "volunteering?"

"I don't have kids."

Zeph swallows the "I thought so" she has prepared on the tip of her tongue and just blinks.

"It's - that's what the Scholomance is, it's - most people will do anything to protect their kids as far as they can. But... made out of metal. Uh - I don't know how the world works, if that isn't a thing."

"They do protect them, of course they do, they just-" she sighs exasperatedly, frustrated, offended on behalf of every single District parent who ever starved to death while giving their last piece of bread to their merely hungry child. "Protesting the games is not like throwing yourself in front of a magic monster to let your kid get away, it would be like holding their hand while walking into its maw."

"The guy who designed the school is being tortured, right now, forever, because it - broke, he came in, tried to fix it and that's... what happens, sometimes. If a 'maw' mouth gets you.

"People stopped trying to fix it that way, I guess. Most people won't risk one even for their kids.

"His great grandson's alive, though. He's in my year."

"I guess that guy's allowed to judge my world if he ever catches a break."

"Sure, we ever figure how to pull people out and reconstitute them from - mouth-eye slurry, I'll send him right over.

"- it's not -

"1600 kids come in each year, most years it's... 400, who graduate, more or less. Our year's doing better so far, and that's not any of the parents doing stuff it's... we just don't have a quota, is all.

"Might be mostly what I'm confused about is just, why anyone thought it would work, back when they started that. How they looked at the world and thought 'yeah, killing people's kids, on TV, that'll make them less likely to overthrow us'."

Zeph's lips bend into a wistful, if bitter, smile at the first half of Basira's little monologue, but the dangerous look from before returns when she explains her confusion. At least she's not laughing this time.

"I don't know, okay," she snaps, but it's not threatening, just broken, "I don't know why people don't try something, I don't know why they won't cooperate to save their kids, or for that matter just to help a neighbor when she's sick and hope she'll help them when they need it, I just know it doesn't happen and that's what I'm working with."

"Right? Now tell that to my mom." She relaxes, a little, in her own spiky way. This makes sense, even across universes. She was right.