Tales of the Ghosts of the Future

Chapter 1: The New Pilgrims

"You say you never had planned to fly over Panem territory." Romulus Thread viewed the small girl sitting in the creaky wooden chair with a good deal of xenophobic suspicion. "You claim you were shot down and had no choice but to make a landing here given the weather."

Romulus Thread never had much of an imagination and the fairy like creature sitting in front of his desk demanded the utmost from his ability to cope. The girl and the boy pilots had come from the outside world and were 'artificial humans' or as he knew it: cyborgs. Both of them had small slender, fit bodies, dark brown hair and amber eyes. The Capitol had its share of oddities; they would fit in had that been the only thing odd about them. As Thread questioned the female pilot, she flexed a set of fine, yellow wings with black borders made up of black diamond shaped yellow spots.

"We weren't planning to land here but we had no choice." The little pilot sitting in the uncomfortable wooden chair sternly objected. "We were flying well over two hundred knots off the coast when a missile struck us and took out our starboard engine and damaged the wing. We had no choice but to try to find a place to land because our plane sustained too much damage to make it back to Reykjavik or to fly on to Kingston."

"We found a good deal of equipment on your aircraft perfectly suited for spying." Thread sat back in his throne like wooden chair and tapped his black wooden desk. Thread watched her for a moment. She looked harmless but no one had any idea of her full capability. Both of them could fly and flew very well – a creature with flight made the best pilot. He had seen her unfold her butterfly like wings: a single flap held enough power to send papers and files flying. Her wings remained folded and behind her over the back of the chair.

"The Caribbean Republic ordered a weather observation plane and my colleague and I had the contract to deliver it!" The little pilot banged her hands on the desk in protest. "The Caribbean weather office needed the equipment for forecasting tropical storms and hurricanes."

Thread gave her a long thoughtful look. She had curious amber eyes, a uniform consisting of a gold and red trimmed black tunic that came to just below her knees and a sturdy set of boots with loose fitting red pants. She wore her dark brown hair in a delicate bun held up with a gold hair pin. She proved hard to read except for a certain dislike of him and District 12.

"So you and your friend Karo are ferry pilots?" He said unemotionally. "You fly aircraft to customers around the world for The Sukhoi Aerospace Group?"

"I have explained that. We're ferry pilots." The young girl moved her long bangs out of her face. "You took all of our papers in your looting."

Thread took out a thin blue book from his desk. "You are a cyborg? A Hyperdine Model GF450 Pilot Series? You and your co – pilot are the same series and were brought online fourteen years ago? You two look a good deal alike." He leafed through the book. "I understand the Sukhoi Corporation holds your current ferry contract."

The girl nodded as she prepared to leave.

"I have sent off copies of the documents on the plane for translation." Thread leaned forward in his large leather chair. "I trust your word and the words of the translators will agree in all but the most trivial respects?"

"If you have proficient Japanese translators then they should."

Romulus Thread put the blue book back into the drawer of his desk and it locked as he slid it shut.

"Well...we have spoken with both you and your friend Karo." Thread motioned with his hand for the girl to remain. "He told us much the same story; in fact he told us everything you have down to the last details. For now, I'll attribute this to your perfect electronic brains and picture perfect memories." He motioned again and two guards appeared from the hall outside. "We've decided to put you up in a place called Victor's Village as we don't want you talking to the locals. You will stay away from the fence around District 12: we have it electrified around the clock for security purposes."

The guards approached slowly.

"You will go with these two gentlemen." He waved and pulled out a tablet computer from his desk. He had ruffled the pride of the girl which was a good start.

Thread began a report as soon as the doors had closed. Cybernetic technologies in the outside world had surged ahead as Karo and Azula – the two pilots showed. They were a full head shorter than the teenagers their age but this made sense – a small pilot weighed less. He had a coup with these two: President Snow and his scientists owed him for bringing them such fine examples of high technology. He began to dictate into his computer.

She had a Peacekeeper on either side of her and their automatic weapons meant business. They didn't look like trained law enforcement and she was new to the District; perceived as a threat by their boss. She wanted to flex her wings as the cold air soaked them but she feared she might hit one of them. Her wings could lift her off the ground and had the power to break open a human skull.


The Peacekeepers must have understood this. They waited for her to comply and never used force as they led her to her new home. They trudged through the deep snow. The Peacekeepers found it knee high although Azula found it came up to her belly and her wings dragged along in the fresh snow making them even colder. If Thread wanted her to stay in one house, the snow served to imprison her quite well.

Karo had made the same trip prior in the day and Azula saw him resting on a ruddy red couch as the Peacekeepers led her into the house.

"I love this place." Karo helped Azula to the musty smelling couch. "We have been made to feel most welcome and the police ensure we won't have any parking violations."

Karo had felt the cold and the snow. He had dragged his wings through the cold stuff and now felt completely chilled. He could stand the cold but the snow had worked its wet way into his clothes and he felt completely chilled. He had the reaction of someone thrown into cold water and he still had not managed to quit shivering and his brain worked slowly and kept taking time to find words. He understood full well he couldn't leave the house for long in the deep snow: if he fell and got stuck, he'd die. He had an ugly pink comforter for Azula.

"They think we're a joke." Azula stuttered as she grabbed the blanket. "We're machines to them. How do we prove them wrong and get out of this?"

Karo had never thought about this. He had always had a certain purpose in his life, the instincts engineered into him to carry out his duties and whether by design or because of a personality quirk; he had never thought too much about being a machine. Technology had made genetic engineering sophisticated enough to make humans to order and millions of people had acquired partly artificial brains and would have died or been crippled in horrid ways without them. He viewed himself as a human with modifications.

Karo stood up and paced the room and in his quiet manner stated: "I haven't got an answer for that."

"You saw the gallows."

Karo felt the room grow dark in spite of the bright light of the midwinter afternoon.

"Harsh conditions make for harsh people." Karo looked out of the window of the aging house. "At least we haven't seen it put to use."

"They will take us apart." Azula had begun to shiver less.


They had been provisioned with a fine old wood stove and some sensitive soul had stoked it to drive off the cold he found so horrible. He decided to suppress the image of the gallows as best he could and let the wood heat warm him up.

"What they won't find is what makes us – us." Karo watched a pumpkin orange cat run across the yard between their house and the neighbor's.

The television offered gruesome reruns of previous Hunger Games which deeply offended Karo and Azula's tastes. The forty two inch screen up on the wall had nothing else on offer – nothing other than one channel run by the state and one prime time show – reruns of the Hunger Games. Karo and Azula agreed no to ever turn it on and hoped the authorities couldn't force them to watch.

The Peacekeepers under the command Romulus Thread had confiscated everything they could carry off the plane. Karo and Azula had their clothing and harmless personal items returned but the authorities kept anything that looked advanced or suspect and Karo already imagined they had plans to take the plane apart and ship it to their engineers.

The day made him feel a bit better. He could feel the warmth of the sun through the living room window and despite the banks of snow in the front yard; he wanted to go out.

"We're we expecting to be arrested?" Karo asked Azula as she tried to make tea on the wood stove. "Someone's knocking at the door."

Karo had stared out of the living room window all morning and even an arrest or another one of Thread's interrogations would break the boredom.

"Yes?" Karo opened the door without hesitation.

A blond haired boy with blue eyes and blond hair stood in the doorway with a wicker basket.

"I'm Peeta. I live next door." He smiled.

Karo had never had seen anyone in District 12 smile at him.

Peeta had seen these odd little people that morning struggling in the snow trying to walk. They didn't belong. Karo's amber colored eyes had a strange look in them – amber eyes weren't uncommon in the Capitol. Unlike people from the Capitol working their way into debt with cosmetic lenses, Karo didn't blink like a human. He had never seen a person with butterfly wings outside of children's books and it him time to collect his wits.

"I brought some bread for you." Peeta announced and pulled a white towel off the basket showing two well made loaves. "Welcome to District 12 – you may not feel welcome."

"I've met Thread..." Azula said sadly as she waited for the kettle to boil. "We're not suppose to mix with the locals."

"The Peacekeepers give those in Victor's Village a few liberties." Peeta answered back. "You can't expect to arrive in the neighborhood and not be welcomed."

Karo motioned the young man inside as the cold air wafted into the house. "Can you get us past the electric fence?"

The answer was no.

Peeta carried Karo on his shoulder. The distance from Victor's Village to the town square was under a kilometer but Karo and his friend Azula were not at all able to cope in the snow without looking pathetic as their wings dragged, they strggled and fell over or got stuck. They looked like pathetic little children as they struggled to keep their footing and they getting trapped in drifts. Peeta offered to carry Karo to the town square expecting the little pilot to weigh as much as a twelve year old child. Karo was freakishly light; far lighter than he ought to be. Karo was freakishly strong as well. He spread out his orange and black wings that reminded Peeta of those on butterflies and when they caught the slight breeze, Peeta felt a push that almost had enough power to knock him over.

Peeta had heard rumors the two foreigners were artificial people; made by some powerful nation as spies. If Karo was a spy; he had unorthodox methods or was completely incompetent. Karo chatted constantly about music or science or what Peeta thought of this or that. Peeta had to steer clear of anything hinting at politics or religion even if Karo felt free to offer up his opinion. He talked to Peeta about the warmth of the sun and how he had never seen a snow storm. From time to time, he'd stop speaking, his ears twitched as if picking up some unheard sound Peeta couldn't hear. Karo began the conversation where he had left off. Peeta found him odd but a pleasant enough person.

Thread watched through his office window. Peeta had a kind heart and to him, it made sense he had become friends with Karo. In Thread's mind, this wasn't a bad thing because it distracted Karo. He had begun the process of looting the plane and sending every piece of high technology off to the Capitol for analysis.

Peeta gently lifted Karo to the ground. While chatty, Karo was a rare cheery soul.

"Don't stray too far." Peeta cautioned. "I'll take you back in an hour. If you grow cold, you can go in the bakery and warm up."

Karo nodded in a polite manner and Peeta walked off to help his family. Karo walked along the freshly dug out streets and whistled. Unlike the locals, Karo whistled new and oddly compelling tunes and ignored the stunned looks of the locals: they had heard the news of the odd arrivals but most had yet to see on of them.

Thread watched through his office window which overlooked the town square. Karo ran along the path cleared with snow and with a single leap, caught the air and flew up. The takeoff looked a bit clumsy but once in flight; Karo showed utmost grace.

The locals heard a massive rush of air as Karo lifted off the ground and in a perfect ascent cleared the leafless tops of the trees around the courtyard and turned into the sun. The cloud of snow Karo had kicked up had only begun to clear when Thread came out of the Justice Hall and watched Karo sail out over town on a heading toward the Seam.

Thread had called the two newcomers into his office. He had orders to leave them unharmed that had come from President Snow but he felt the flight of Karo needed a good dressing down. Karo and Azula trotten in the office as the two guards Thread had sent guided them in.

"We can't have you two taking off and heading anywhere they want to go." Thread paced his office and glowered at the two pilots. "The locals can't have the impression such a freedom exists or they won't keep the peace and I'm here to keep the peace."

"I can't go very far." Karo answered back with confidence. "I have flight as a safety feature so I can bail in the event of an accident. Think of it as a built in parachute. Five clicks in this weather and I'm knackered."


"I have an issue with you leaving the district and flying past the fence." Thread found himself feeling slightly ridiculous for having to lecture a midget for flying under his own power. "We have the fence because wild creatures such as wolves and bears roam the woods and they should have no problem making a lunch out of you." Thread straightened up. "You don't want to be torn apart by wolves – do you?"

Karo had discovered the shabby fence around District 12 served to keep the people in the town. He had made an attempt to land on one of the support posts but the tiny hairs on his wings picked up a deadly electric field. As he approached, the feeling of 'hair standing on end' drove him away from the fence.

Thread walked behind Azula. "We haven't yet come up with a method of disabling your flight that wouldn't kill you. The Capitol wants you intact and so far that has kept my hands tied." He brushed Azula's fine wings with his hand. He felt the fine hairs and enjoyed Azula's discomfort. "What a wonder of genetic engineering! Imagine what a creature like you could do if it had a mind loyal to Panem."

Azula unfurled her wings and shook them. Thread stood clear: while cruel, he wasn't stupid. He had seen Karo lift himself off the ground. He had done the mental calculus and realized Karo and Azula were a threat devoutly to be avoided: the same power that lifted Karo into the air that afternoon had the potential to break bones.

"I spoke with Peeta." Thread walked toward Karo. "He'll certainly keep an eye on you in the future if he takes you out shopping."

Karo stretched his wings. They looked like butterfly wings but they kicked up the air and spilled papers off the desk onto the floor.

Thread had to decide for himself if this constituted an act of defiance.

Thread and his Peacekeepers had a network of closed circuit cameras around the town, in the mines and on the electric fence. He watched a tape of Azula's excursion last evening. At around midnight, she braved the cold and took off down the paved road of Victor's Village. The night vision cameras captured details scientists in the Capitol would find most interesting. Azula took off by running down the street until a powerful jump allowed her flapping wings to grab the air. The takeoff lacked grace but once firmly supported by lift, Azula flew with great skill.

Thread decided to let any minor infractions slide. He could learn more for The Capitol by watching her and her odd friend. She wasn't stealthy and flight carried a huge metabolic cost since she began to warm up as she flew and gained altitude. The Peacekeepers with their night vision glasses could pick her up as a large thermal mass in the air.

She had great agility. She flew low through the town square and evaded the unlit trees. Thread had no idea why she liked doing this sort of thing but she made several low strafes of the square. He had to admire any creature able to fly in darkness through trees and along streets and avoid being tangled in branches or power lines. She could hover for a few moments as she did when nearing the electric fence or when she floated down to the ground or on a post to land. She always backed off. Even hundreds of meters above it, she never crossed over it.

Karo flew around the town just like Azula. The little bats showed very similar agility but hated the electric fence. Thread watched several of their flights and both of them avoided the fence. Such practical knowledge helped make his reports vital and interesting reading.

'What made the electric fence so unnerving?' Thread thought to himself. Scientists in the Capitol could work that out. They had done genetic engineering and had the knowledge of animal behavior. Azula and Karo could clear it by a huge margin but they hated being anywhere above it. Somehow they disliked the field or could see the wilderness beyond it and feared becoming prey. One interesting piece of night camera footage revealed Azula flying along it as if 'sniffing it out' but she flew as if guided: she kept the exact same distance from it at all times. The exact figure didn't matter to Thread but it showed him the little robots could sense the fence.

He found he had little need to contain them. If he kept the electric fence on all the time, they would stay inside of it. If they defied the fence; they didn't fly fast nor could they fly far without rest. He didn't think they posed much of a threat.


He hoped to gain influence among the commanders at the Capitol. He had pacified District 12 – the home of Katniss Everdeen and now he had the two cyborgs from the outside. He decided to make detailed reports and collect all the information he could until The Capitol decided if the diplomatic threats were worth the price of keeping them.

Azula came in low as she prepared to land. The problem with the street in Victor Village came down to Haymitch. From time to time, he lay in the street drunk and paralytic. She needed to have some space to land – a street could do provided it had no obstacles – but once she had made the commitment to land; she had to land lest the ground come up to greet her. The winds had begun to gust and as she slowed down she had to constantly keep reworking her descent. She made it look easy but her light frame hanging in midair meant she was like a helicopter more than any bird and she had no friction to keep her in place. Winds could force her to hit the street with bone jarring shock or send her tumbling into the snow. At about a meter, she could begin moving forward and this allowed her to slowly land and hit the ground at a walking pace. The snow stung her face as she stirred it up and her feet hit the ground and took her weight: she faced the front door of their house and wondered why Haymitch wasn't playing his role as the human speed bump.

The Everdeen family heard a hideous hiss at high volume.

"Why the Hell are you here?" Azula screamed. Her voice made Prim jump because hadn't heard it that loud before.

"What?" Haymitch sounded barely aware of the near call with death.

"I have this idea that no one sleeps in the street during a storm." Azula hissed again.

Katniss went outside. She had seen the outsiders and wondered at their beauty but also had no idea if they could kill.

Azula hissed at Haymitch and began to herd him. Katniss found this amusing and had hoped to see it play out. A little girl had her wings spread out and hissed and Haymitch, her mentor retreated.

Prim went to Azula.

"Can you calm down?" Prim said as she approached.

Azula looked at Prim in an unblinking stare. "Yes...but why was he in the street?"

Prim and Azula walked in circles around each other. Katniss had no idea what this meant.

"I can calm down." Azula said softly.

Haymitch retreated into his house. He closed and audibly bolted the door.

"I'm Prim and my sister is Katniss." Prim had somehow understood Azula.

"I'm Azula and my friend is Karo." Azula looked at Prim. "No doubt you heard of him from Peeta?"

"Welcome Aboard the Satellite of Love." Azula told the two teenage girls standing at the front door. "Robot Roll Call!"

The two girls looked on confused.

"Karo thought he'd try to bake bread and he's in the kitchen." Azula explained. "We don't have a sense of smell."

"We came over to check on you two." The girl had a single long braid in her hair but by District standards looked far too free of fungal infections to be a citizen. "Peeta asked me to since he's working at the shop."

"We're fine." Karo yelled from the kitchen.

"I'm not used to this, most people recognize me from last years Hunger Games – I'm Katniss Everdeen. You met my sister Prim." She looked down at Azula but tried to avoid looking intimidating. "Haven't you seen the reruns on television?"

"I watched your state broadcaster once and the violence revolted me," Azula invited Katniss and Prim to come in out of the cold. "In my home country, we have a state television network, but no one watches it and each few months they run telethons to raise money for more programming. They run Dora the Explorer reruns at four in the morning for no reason I could fathom."

Peeta had warned Katniss the newcomers had a chatty nature. He found both of them pleasant but he worried about their care. She wasn't chatty and given her last year, had become even more withdrawn and emotionally damaged.

"I've seen you two flying at night." Katniss sat down in the love seat in the living room.

Karo entered the room with an apron on. "Hello?"

"Katniss Everdeen and my sister Prim." She answered politely. "I live in the house across the street in Victor's Village."

Karo stretched his wings. Prim found this a spectacle and rushed up to touch them. Karo's wings had fine hair and were slightly translucent and she could see a tracery of veins and a set of well spaced thin spurs to give it structural strength. The wing looked biological and resembled a monarch butterfly wing but with a three meter span. Most locals had seen their wings; they had wished to see them up close but Thread disapproved.

Prim walked over to Karo. "You're shorter than me."

"It lets me fly." Karo spread his wings in pride.

Prim had the same color hair in the same braid as her sister and wore a blue checked gingham dress. Her wide blue eyes and open hands gently touched the edge of Karo's wing.

"It feels warm!"

Karo couldn't blush very well and yet Katniss could see his inability to deal with Prim carefully touching his wing. He showed no pain but he looked like a medical patient undergoing an intimate procedure. He retained his calm and kind composure.

"You should leave the poor guy alone." Katniss advised.

The wing felt warm and had a coating of short dense fur. Prim hard a hard time taking her hand away.

Katniss had a cold feeling in the pit of her stomach: the Capitol coveted the technology used to make these creatures. Karo and Azula weren't 'mutts'; they were fully fledged individuals. Katniss lacked Prim's naive acceptance of these little people as living breathing people. Azula and Karo had a certain kindness but they could be cleverly programmed machines designed to relate to humans. If they were simple machines, they behaved as if they had humor, Karo's show of discomfort when Prim touched his wing didn't appear to be the reaction of a machine. That made her feel even worse. If the were 'artificial' as rumored in the town and they had a conscience; they would suffer greatly as scientists tore them apart.

"You have gotten quiet all of the sudden." Azula stood in front of Katniss with a tray of tea.

Prim walked around Karo and acted as if he certainly was a living thing. She stared into his eyes and walked around the opposite direction. Both of them said nothing.

"Our scientists want to keep you." Katniss nodded. "I imagine Thread is waiting for orders to put you on a sealed train and send you off to the Capitol."

Azula clasped her hands.

"Thread has his good points...I can't think of any right now." Azula said in an acerbic manner that caught Katniss off guard.

Katniss had terror baked into her bones by the long reach of Panem. If Panem didn't outright kill in their games; she had seen people shot for trivial offenses and the dainty fairy in front of her had spoken of their possible fate without emotion. The casual way Azula poked fun at the Peacemakers, toyed with Thread and held Panem in unhealthy contempt surprised her.

"You look at me like I should feel something." Azula fidgeted. "I wouldn't know how."

Prim lifted up Karo on her shoulders. Katniss found this very odd as he closed his wings and let her lift him by his waist as if to help her. Prim had an ability to earn trust in these odd creatures.

"How can you be so light?" She gleefully asked as she placed him back on the ground.

"We're made for flight." Karo smiled back as he straightened himself up. "Pilots worked best if they are lightweight and understand flight instinctively."

Prim found this explanation good enough and decided to investigate Azula.

"Yes?" Azula looked at Prim.

Prim lifted her off the ground.

Katniss had nothing but admiration for the kind and dignified way Azula responded to having her dainty frame lifted up off the ground.

"You must be part bird!" Prim held up Azula by her legs.

Prim had a deep fondness for living things and here she had a chance to see something all together new in Karo and Azula. This conviced Katniss, they were alive and thinking beings.

Azula looked down. "Everyone is a little different."

Azula stayed perfectly balanced and moved as Prim's unsteady grip held her by her legs. Prim felt much like she had a bird in her hands.

Katniss watched Prim as she played at falconer with Azula. Azula looked quite fascinated as Prim gently moved her around in a circle. The little girl with the gray blue eyes and the little pilot with the hawk like amber eyes studied each other and Katniss found it difficult to believe Azula was a mindless machine.

"Prim!" Katniss spoke out. "You should put the young lady down."

"I'm fine." Azula spoke with her usual candor.

Prim watched as Azula's eyes watched her. Azula didn't blink but her ears twitched back and forth locking into sounds in the distance like a cat.

Azula spread out her wings and stirred the air gently. Prim felt the power driving them and saw the parts of her wing make intricate adjustments. She gasped in surprise when she realized how much power Azula and Karo had in their wings and it took all her strength to keep herself planted on the ground.

Katniss could sense the power as air ruffled her hair. Azula looked dainty, Karo looked harmless but she imagined one well aimed blow with those wings and she'd have a shattered skull.

Prim placed Azula back on the ground but had a broad smile on her face.


Thread had little enough knowledge about science, given the Peacekeepers trained not as law enforcement or as professional military but as bullies.

He had sent the air craft to the them piece by piece so any satellites from the outside would find no trace of it.

He had a request from The Capitol and its scientists. In this context, that meant President Snow.

They hadn't yet sent for the two pilots but they had questions about how they could actually fly. They had wings capable of generating enough lift and thrust to allow for flight but the scientists saw the pictures of the pilots, read Threads reports and viewed the night vision camera shots of their flights.

They had calculated many things about their flight characteristics. None of which made much sense to Thread but mattered because they raised more questions. The heat signature suggested Karo and Azula each could generate the power of a four horsepower motor – or five thousand watts on takeoff! This gave off a good deal of heat and the ability to see them at night came from the way the wings acted to wick away this heat and keep the body uncooked. This was anatomically impossible for mammals – in fact deadly as such raw muscular power would crush the chest.

They sent Thread an unnerving small silver box about the size of a snap shot camera with disturbing warnings about X – Ray radiation in red unfriendly letters. The camera included a mounting bracket and an assuring notice that the actual X – Ray radiation produced would never exceed that of a chest X – Ray. Thread had little faith in Panem medical science but orders had to be obeyed.

Thread had his two guards install it according to instructions.

He should have asked Prim or Katniss. Prim had a kind of intuitive biology and she became friends with Azula and Karo. They taught her songs and flew for her and tried as best they could to make her life more bearable. Katniss understood animal anatomy from hunting and had figured out the 'Fairy Folk' as Prim called them had a large keel protecting the chest and lings and locking the breastbone and spine into one strong unit like any bird.

Both of them understood that compared to a mockingjay, Karo and Azula weren't miracles of flight. In flight, they moved as naturally as any bird and had fun performing acrobatics. Landing or taking off for the meter tall pilots was not very pretty. They had to take a run at it in order to take off and flap hard. Katniss came to call this 'kite launching'. Once flying, they had a half hour at the most before they grew tired and came back. They had several methods of landing. The 'screw it and hit something soft' method, was Karo's favorite. He lined up with a snowbank and flew into it raising a cloud of snow into the air. Azula had perfected the 'where the Hell did Haymitch or the cat come from' method where she came in far to fast or Haymitch came out of his house and they narrowly missed and Azula had to struggle to keep her feet under her and slide into the snow. They could pull off a perfect but not pretty landing where they hit the ground running and then slowed or slid to a stop. Katniss realized they were never designed to land on the ground: this made sense as pilots usually had to bail over forests, isolated areas without clear uncluttered ground. They had no problem landing on roofs or posts.

Thread lacked Prim's appreciation for the oddball Karo and Azula.

He looked out his window and jerked back as Azula came in on a steep glide path heading toward his large gust from the winds off her wings rattled the hardened bulletproof glass.'They seek to irritate me' he thought as he wondered if he should dive under his desk.

A cloud of snow roiled up and Azula was gone.

"I wish those fools in the..." Thread cut himself off.

Azula reappeared and came down on a nice glide and hit the ground hard with her feet, closed her wings and slid for a few meters on sheer inertia.

He had called her for a meeting.

Two Peacekeepers ran toward Azula as she gained her footing. Thread watched. They handled her with much hesitation. The Capitol had made it clear these two were to be unharmed and left alone as far as order in District 12 permitted. Azula shook her head and they backed off.

The two guards at the door opened the double doors of the office a few moments later and Azula looking as prim and proper as ever walked in.

"I don't approve of you flying openly in the mid morning." Thread stood up from his desk.

Thread found himself staring eye to eye with Azula.

"You do realize my pilot uniform is made of heat resistant materials. My vest is radiation resistant – pilots have more exposure to radiation than people on the ground." Azula wore an angry look in her eyes.

"How did you know?" Thread held the anxiety in his voice down.

"You told me," Azula moved back, "just now."

Thread decided to have Azula hung if he had the chance.

"You can enjoy your petty humiliation for now." Thread bared his teeth.

"Panem's leaders should ask what will come next?" Azula brusquely rebuffed Thread. "Some people have a good many questions about what has happened to that plane and its crew. We rely on air transport and we do not like these mysteries unanswered." Azula wagged her finger. "We have had a full quarter of a century of safe aviation and important people will want to know answers to many urgent questions."

"The plane is gone. You can't contact your people and Panem is vast." Thread had to control his temper. He opened his hands. "How will they search for you? We have a radio jamming system over all of Panem so you can't send messages."

"All very true." Azula relaxed and put her feet up on Thread's desk. "We have some very large eyes watching you. You have nuclear weapons and we watch them very closely."

"I do as I'm told as I'm loyal to Panem." Thread shoved Azula's feet off his desk. "I try to be polite but you have tried my patience."

I suppose you can't tell me anything about how you work?" Thread looked over the desk at Karo as Karo fixated on the camera in the corner. "Can you tell me how you knew we had a camera in that corner?" Thread asked condescendingly. "Did your mate tell you?"

"I've been in District 12 long enough to know that no one can afford a smoke detector."

Thread hated this kind of bland logic embedded in Karo and Azula. Azula made him look stupid by her vast knowledge of mind games. Karo made him look stupid because as a pilot, he had a mind for little details.

Karo held up his hand to the blinking red light in the middle of the white plastic disc mounted on the ceiling in the corner of the room.

"There's nothing about me you couldn't find documented publicly." Karo moved his hand delicately. "The anatomy of my hand and wrist are the same as any human."

"I don't have a library card." Thread leaned over as Karo moved his hand. "You may have a human hand but you can fly."

Karo looked at his hand.

"I can fly." Karo said proudly. "How do your people think we work?"

"I run security." Thread said in a tired voice. "Making an android isn't part of my job."

"The X – Ray camera will reveal nothing." Karo reminded Thread.

"I know, your clothing is opaque to X – Rays."

"Even if I take off my vest, you'll see nothing." Karo offered. "Our bones have cells that produce a kind of carbon composite which your camera won't make out. You can call it 'plastic' and its strong but light." Karo unfurled his wings. "We have two keels to keep our ribcage from collapsing. You should take notes."

"You forget I can make the lives of your friends Katniss and Prim quite unpleasant." Thread broke out. "You like playing with Prim don't you?"

Karo wore a thoughtful look for many moments.

"I take that as a threat?" Karo came back with his reply. "You can't threaten a machine. I suppose you can yell at your car when it stalls in the middle of nowhere on a cold night but it seldom responds. I'm a machine and don't understand threats. If I did, then anyone with a knife and a tropical island destination could make me do their bidding."


Prim and Peeta knocked on the door of the Fairy House as they called it.

"Come in." Azula's voice responded to their knock.

Karo sat on the large recliner as Azula stood over him with one of their tablet computers. In one corner, the television lay in pieces: the LCD panel sat propped up by books, the plastic case was off to the side and they had taken the electronics to bits.

"If you are trying to make me telepathic, remember all the rats went mad." Karo nodded to Peeta and Prim. "Hello. If this works, and she doesn't static me again! We can play movies stored in my brain."

"If I see that git Snow on the television; I'm going to run us both through with a loaf of sharpened bread." Azula smiled at Prim who had a jar of goat's milk and at Peeta who looked uncomfortable with a basket of bread. No one spoke out against President Snow except in hushed voices.

"Lately I've wanted to staple a list of my ninety five objections to his ideology on his forehead." Karo said as he sat back and Azula tended to him. Peeta and Prim had discovered much of their humor consisted of private jokes and as denizens of District 12, they had lost all connection with history and the popular culture of the world at large.

Azula and Azula had spare time and used their ability to steal small bits from the mines and everywhere else and cobble them together to invent things. They had a windmill in the back yard generating electricity. They had managed to cut a large steel barrel in half and attach a kind of alternator to it. They had scientific knowledge beyond anyone in District 12. They had gained a reputation in hushed corners for being clever with gadgets. Since they could fly, they could make off with small items. They never stole from the locals but the Peacekeepers,, the mine and the Justice Hall had a rash of thefts.

"I have too much free time on my hands." Azula explained as she waved the computer in the air. "We hate Panem television so we ripped out the part that picks up signals from Panen and left the display intact. We want to use it for our own purposes."

"Should we charge for movies?" Karo sounded helpless.

"I think I'm just about done..." Azula punched in data in her tablet. A loin's face appeared on the remains of the television. Azula noted with satisfaction as the device indicated it had interfaced with Karo's hard drive and begun to stream from it. The picture shifted to a series of blotchy images – Azula knew it had worked but some tuning was needed.


"I came on account of your cat." Azula addressed Katniss at her front door. "You have an orange one that's deranged?"

"Buttercup?"

"I don't know it on a first name basis..." Azula looked at her nails. "This cat has set up shop in what we call the garage – joke's on us because we don't have a car. Each time I approach it; it becomes all hissing teeth and claws."

"I'll send Prim over...it's her cat." Katniss watched little Azula peek around her. "Anything else?"

Karo bolted over the hedge between the two houses.

"That cat has taken over the kitchen." Karo huffed in the cold. "I bravely fought a defensive action with a corn broom and the cat ate it. We have Satan's cat; I swear it."

"I'll get my cat." Prim trotted past Karo and Azula.

"I think you need a few marines." Karo advised. "So Buttercup is its name? I had put my best guess on the eternal feline spawn from the Fifth Ring of Hell. You owe us a broom."

"I know." Katniss looked outside bored.

Karo felt around his vest.

"Who fixes the windows around here." Karo brushed glass out of his vest and hair. "When Pumpkin took over the kitchen, I bailed by jumping out of the window. As my head smashed through the glass, I saw the metal thing that would have opened it."

Karo began to feel prim and proper again. Katniss had developed a healthy respect for Karo's delicate sense of humor but he was oblique at times. She had seen him crashed and began to develop a healthy respect for how tough his bones had to be to take such a beating.

"Buttercup says hi!" Prim came back with the orange cat and it hissed at the pair.

Azula kept a healthy distance between her and the cat. "Did he finish eating the kitchen stove?"

That cat had earned the animosity of Azula and Karo. The cat not only had a horrible attitude but an evil mind and had made Karo run for his life in an ambush attack.

"Do you want to come in?" Prim offered. Katniss was socially tone deaf but Prim could tell the duo was growing cold. "We can have some tea." She said cheerfully.


"I suppose you two want to know why I called you here?" Thread nodded and the two Peacekeepers let go of Karo and Azula's arm. Thread turned in his large imposing chair and slid an envelope across the desk. "Your government has requested we give this letter to you and have you sign it."

Azula picked up the letter and looked at it carefully.

"I didn't know the Foreign Office took an interest." Azula examined the return address on the beige envelope. She opened it and began reading as she handed the envelope off to Karo.

"They want both of you to give your fingerprint as verification you're alive and in good health." Thread explained.

"Why did you arrest us?" Karo peered over Azula's shoulder. The letter had two boxes with their names below it on the signature line. The boxes had a chemical treatment that recorded fingerprints and a kind of coating to capture skin cells. This precaution made it difficult to tamper with or forge official documents.

"I phoned you and you didn't answer." Thread watched as Azula pressed her thumb on the letter. Thread had orders to see they got the letter but all his attempts to read it failed; as it was in polite Japanese. "In short, I can have you arrested."

Karo stepped forward and pressed his thumb down. Thread could see nothing but a color change from white to gray inside the box that verified the print had been captured.

"Our phone is a museum piece." Azula pushed the letter and envelope toward Thread's waiting hand. "We own an Alexander Graham Bell original: a black rotary dial phone. If we ever leave this Godforsaken place; I might put it up for auction and make a packet. Until then, we want to preserve it's value and we don't use it."

"I expect to be obeyed." Thread slipped the letter in the envelope after briefly looking at it. "If I fail to inspire fear, then I can't do my job and keep these people in line. We have a hardworking, peaceful community and my duty is to see it remains a peaceful community."

"I appreciate the veiled threat." Azula had her hands on his desk. "Shut up and mind your place as guests of Panem."

"Yes." Thread admired and hated the ability of Azula to make every statement an unyielding act of defiance. He could see the defiance in her eyes but remained helpless to deal with it in the usual manner of torment and torture. He had his orders and he didn't dare go against them. Azula would continue rebelling in her way; complaining about everything like an indignant hen. Karo would go about his life quietly with his hatred of Thread suppressed. They didn't interact with the community so Thread could afford to let it slide.


Azula and Karo came home and saw the scary looking black sedan Thread used for patrols in the town.

"It's a beautiful life." Azula stepped up the front porch. "If we're lucky; the Satan Cat has cornered them."

"They'd shoot it." Karo pushed the door open. "Hello?"

"We have noted your television is not functioning." A tall man with bristly dark brown hair spoke sternly. "President Snow addresses the nation tonight and it's obligatory viewing."

"Advanced Public Broadcasters now use terror to extort cash out of the viewing public. For your two hundred dollar donation, you will get the four plate commemorative plates of President Snow! Our operators are debiting your account now!" Azula eyed the guard. "We don't need a television and you've taken quite a liberty by entering our home."

"You do know it is an offense to tamper with televisions?" The man leaned forward to eye back at Azula. "We could have you both whipped publicly."

"Obligatory as in I have to sit on the couch while I age and listen to him lie?" Karo meekly spoke as he examined the broken bolt and the shattered wood where the deadbolt had once held the door closed. "You said we could be whipped publicly – that sounds very unpleasant. I wasn't entirely clear on whether I could take the whipping over the viewing of President Snow? I've never been whipped before – I've viewed President Snow. I wonder what latitude of choice I have."

The second man approached Karo in an obvious attempt to intimidate him. Karo saw him lean over him with a stern look in his beady brown eyes and a bald head shaved clean. Karo wasn't stupid. He could see the man thinking of ways to hurt him. Karo didn't have to blink as his eyes were artificial so he bet on winning the staring contest.

"Boys!" Azula cleared her throat. "Put in the television and leave!"

Thread had made it quite clear Snow's new pets were not to be harmed. The man blinked and his eyes hurt and he wasn't mentally up to the task of intimidating these two. Thread had tried and failed because either these two had no ability to understand intimidation and threats or – much more likely – their engineers had made it impossible for them to respond to intimidation or threats. A hijacker might conclude it unprofitable to deal with pilots who couldn't bend to intimidation.

"Are you going to fix the window too?" Karo asked in a low voice.


"I suppose I should teach you 'Your awful cat is in my basement' in Japanese to add variety toyour lives." Azula walked past Katniss. "I sent Karo down there with a storm lantern and a broom. We may have need of a Shinto priest."

Katniss hated the cat and Azula hadn't earned her affection today.

"Leave him alone and he'll find his way home. He always does." Azula followed Katniss into the kitchen where Prim and her mother tended to a victim of one of Thread's whipping. "You can excuse me if we don't care. The patients haven't stopped coming and we've begun to run out of medical supplies. The cat can wait."

"I will admit I have no way of dealing with the misery and squalor I see each day." Azula looked at the middle aged man's back which was lacerated with deep cuts. The long dim shadows of the lanterns in the kitchen made it even more awful. "I don't have the programming for dealing with this sort of thing."

"I think you should take her home and get the cat." Katniss's mother said gently.

"I'm fine...I had no idea you had company." Azula stood up and brushed off her uniform.

Azula walked out of the kitchen.

"I hate your cat." Azula told Katniss as she opened the door. It had begun to snow lightly and a wind had begun to come out of the north.

"I'll walk you home." Katniss offered. "Since you're some kind of 'artificial person' and you don't have real emotions."

"What do you want from me?" Azula walked down the short driveway. "I have no idea if I feel real emotions or a set of binary commands."

"For a robot, you spend an awful lot of time in your head." Katniss followed Azula to the front door.

Azula opened the door. "Please fetch your cat."

Katniss had learned how to read people. Azula was completely alien in thoughts and deeds: she was a strange hybrid of many things biology, genetics and technology but incomplete. Karo and Azula had a painful time telling people apart; had no sense of smell or taste and Katniss always wondered if they had any kind of emotional life.

Karo looked like he had his feathers ruffled as he sat on the loveseat and propped his feet up on the coffee table.

"The cat is in the basement." Karo said nervously. "I consider my retreat upstairs a kind of defeat. The lantern is in the kitchen if you need it."

Katniss didn't need instructions to find the crawlspace. Azula called it a basement but Azula was much shorter and saw the space 'differently'.

"I need you and those eyes." Katniss had seen Karo and Azula at night and unlike her, they had splendid night vision. Their owners flew at night and she never understood if they did this because they felt safe or if they were night creatures. They didn't sleep or if they did, they didn't need to sleep regularly and when they had good weather; they both flew over District 12 in utter darkness. "I've seen you track a mouse at a thousand feet so don't plead weakness."

Azula followed behind Katniss and said nothing.

Katniss hit the bottom of the stairs and noticed Azula's pretty amber eyes had grown wide and a dim greenish gray glow shone out of them. She'd heard rumors of their keen senses at night: some thought they might have bat ultrasound. Some speculated on owl like night vision, while some thought they had a kind of radar.

Azula and Karo weren't telling.

"The cat is gone." Azula paced around the crawl space anxiously tapping her feet on the concrete in an effort to scare the cat out from behind a row of neatly stacked rubber tubs. "You have something to say?"

"I don't think you realize how much danger you're facing."

Azula pulled the green plastic lid off one of the clear tubs.

"Will that information somehow prepare me to face it?" Azula rooted around and held up a small black stick like device as if she had found a treasure. "I place our odds at less than twenty five percent. Even if Karo and I come out of this alive; we won't be first rate. Humans are lucky. They can forget or get drunk. We can't do that." Azula held up the black stick. "Karo has been wondering where his music player had gotten to."

Azula continued to root in the bin as she held the black music player in her hand.

"I wish I had your calm attitude." Katniss sat on the bottom step. "President Snow wants to dissect you. Prim's grown rather fond of both of you and hates that thought."

"I hate that idea." Azula walked toward Katniss. Azula paused for a moment as she processed the idea. Katniss and Azula had never really liked each other but if Katniss intended to make Azula think about her actions; that statement showed a full understanding of her nature – she couldn't harm or cause to harm another human being.

Katniss had wanted Azula to realize the danger of her situation. Karo and Azula had proven harmless; quite charming little people that never fit in well with others. Katniss never quite worked out if Azula and Karo were designed to be appealing or if they simply had a kind outlook.


Another black car drove along the wide drive of Victor's Village. The black car stood out against the white newly fallen snow because coal dust had not yet had time to turn the white snow into gray muck.

Azula had gone out flying in the middle of a moderately severe snowstorm after informing Karo that 'white was a color that could be found in District 12 and she had decided to find it'. Karo disliked the idea and protested that conditions limited visibility but Azula ignored him.

She descended in order to make yet another clumsy landing on the paved drive. Since no one sanded or salted the streets; Azula relied on them being unused to prevent colliding with anything solid or not cushioned with snow. She had icing problems and so she found herself falling and flapping and and hissing and screaming as she fell out of the sky.

"Get the Hell out of my way!" She screamed as soon as she saw the car parked outside of the unused house beside the one her and Karo used.

"Crap!" She narrowly missed clipping the overhead power lines. They never were live in the afternoon and she had hoped to use the heavy aluminum wires to stop herself. She went into a spinning turn, hissing all the way as she flew into the top of a pine tree Haymitch had never had properly trimmed back and hung there gripping the tree trunk.

A slender man with a mustache and unkempt white hair walked toward her as she hissed and hung onto the tree. She had expected Haymitch to come stumbling out and complaining but he must have lapsed into a drunken stupor that made him deaf to the sound of her hissing and breaking a tree.

"What in the phrase 'get the Hell out of my way' didn't you understand?'" Azula looked own at the man in his gray suit and gray wind breaker. "Why do you get a car and we don't is another question." Azula examined the ground and tried to work out how to fall with dignity as she saw Karo come rushing out. "Who the Hell are you anyway is a third question."

I'm Doctor Therius. I work with President Snow as a cyberneticist." He explained. "Are you alright?"

"I see – I thought Snow needed a puppet wrangler." Azula expected another lecture from Karo on taking care and from Thread on guarding her political opinions.

Azula didn't weigh all that much so she jumped back and fell the three meters out of the tree into the snow and hoped for the best. In her mind, the best was that the neighbor cat hadn't left any surprises. A cloud of snow flew up and Azula emerged and brushed the snow off herself.

I came to study you." Therius admitted as he walked toward Karo. "You two are the first time we've seen cyborgs from the outside world."

The sound of Azula hissing had become part of the soundtrack of Victor's Village. Karo never hissed but he didn't take on as many risks on landing and proved rather timid. Azula had come in at high speed swearing and hissing all of the time and Katniss suspected this a kind of expression of anger or frustration at things. Most of the time, her demonic hiss came out when she argued with the cat. She appeared at their door shortly after the hissing died down.

The sound of Azula's hiss had a distinct sound of fear and a loud crunch followed so Prim and Katniss decided to take a look.

"Are you okay!?" Prim asked with concern as she rushed to an Azula who almost mouthed the words: 'you didn't see that'.