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Cigar smoke clouds the air of a thickly lit room, 12 feet below the bustling streets. Concrete as thick as whale blubber surrounds the lavish interior, being only obscured by a thin wall of paint. A beaten down, grimy poker table is surrounded by half a dozen men in prim-cut suits. A fan lightly whirrs in the background.
"This is an absolute travesty. We cannot let this... this... "mistake" win. How could we have not stomped this out before it even happened?" said a tall, blonde man gripping a glass of whiskey and squirming in his seat. His suit had a medal on it, it was dull and scratched like a cutting board.
"Oh shut up, we have it taken care of. Our boys at the front have been working day and night to ensure the protection of the capital, Sir." said a fat, sweaty man in a tight suit, barely being held onto his belly by a single button. He stopped to puff his cigar. He mumbled something nobody in the room could hear and wiped his hands on his silk pants.
"Please. Like those fools at the Guard know what the hell they are doing. A bunch of village boys with nothing but their father's beet farming skills, they are. They can barely handle a noise complaint, let alone that pipsqueak." someone at the far end of the table blurted not soon after the fat man was done speaking. His hair was greasy and unkempt, and looked like burnt paper.
"What pipsqueak?" questioned another man, opposite to the fat man. Short and skinny, with a lousy white bowtie stretching across his neck, as well as a fine grey suit.
"You know, that devil of a rebel." responded the man with the unkempt hair at the opposite of the table. He chuckled as he realized what he said rhymed. "The, uh, teenager. Y'know, the girl?"
"Ah. Yes, she is a pipsqueak." confirmed the short man in the bowtie.
"Wh-What are they even fighting for? Freedom? What freedom?" wheezed the fat man, as he began to sputter with laughter. Spit flew onto his cigar as he gaffed. He snorted and wiped his neck with a handkerchief sitting in the table
Everyone in the room stared awkwardly at the fat man. Deep in their hearts, they knew what the rebels were doing, and what they meant. They just didn't like talking about it, and always tried to take their minds off of it, or pretend that what they do is something that needed to be done. Whatever the most recent state propaganda slogan said is what they'd mutter to themselves as they fondled a cigar or sipped a whiskey. Never once did they question the system, they ran it after all. The fat man is the owner of half of the transportation industry and a large estate outside the capital, and even he wondered how he'd gotten so rich. Every day, he'd wake up with that same thought in his head, and try to shoo it out like an unwelcome customer at a bar. How did it get this bad?
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Apologies if this doesn't go by the suggestions in OP's post. I just thought of something and ran with it.