Hello all, another Saturday with another brand new story! The idea for this came to mind not long after I posted the last chapter of Chasing Hope and I surprised myself by managing to write all the chapters for this story within the week. I had planned for it to only be 5 chapters long but if you know me, that didn't quite worked out so there are 13 chapters in total (could be more if I decide to split any of it in two.) This isn't an AU and takes place post-mj.

This story is written solely in Effie's point of view, which is a rare thing coming from me, since I often alternate the two in my fics but I like the challenge of trying to get you guys to interpret Haymitch's actions/motivations without exploring his point of view :)

1. Last Living Escort

Effie realised quickly that something was amiss when she was invited – nay, summoned – to the Parliament House.

Either she was in trouble or there was something required of her. Someone of her status and her reputation would not warrant a seat at the Council meeting or have any business at the Parliament, not when she was of no importance to the ruling government.

Effie climbed the steps of the half desecrated building, taking in the sights of the large boulders that still sat at the side of the road and the blown up windows that had been boarded up. The steps and roads leading up to the building had been paved with rubbles and debris a few weeks ago. Now, most had been moved to the side for it to be taken away later. She head there would be plans to fully reconstruct the Parliament soon which would be wise since one cannot have the seat of government looking half blown away by bombs for long.

There was security checkpoints placed at the entrances. Effie placed her handbag through the machine and stepped through the metal detector, please that it did not go off. Grabbing her bag, she stood dutifully in line behind a man and waited to be registered in.

"Effie Trinket," she gave her name to the woman behind the counter.

"No such record, I'm afraid."

Effie sighed tiredly. "Please try Euphemia Trinket."

After a few strokes of the keyboard and with nothing negative forthcoming, Effie assumed that the woman had found her name in the records.

"Purpose of your visit?"

"I was told to be present at two in the afternoon today for a meeting. I was not told why."

"Do you have any documentary evidence to state your required attendance for this … meeting?"

"I'm afraid I do not have such a thing. It was by way of phone call," Effie tried to explain as patiently as she could. "Plutarch Heavensbee called me."

The person she was before the war would have surely kicked up a fuss and demanded that she be let in but it was different now and she was tired. If she were turned away, she would even gladly do so. As curious as she was about the reason the Council wanted her attendance, she was not that particularly interested to answer to anyone or about anything today.

She had given her cooperation and her statements – copious amount of details – as part of her bargain. Both Plutarch and Haymitch had fought for her but there were still crimes she needed to answer to. She was probably, by now, partly responsible for the numerous arrest of politicians and Games officials under Snow's regime.

Effie was sure these people had cursed her name and wished death upon her but Haymitch had convinced her to do it and she had listened, like she always had all these time. She was just an escort, a small fish in the big ocean. They wanted the big players and with Finnick gone, she was the next best person with secrets in her bags, secrets that not even Plutarch as Head Gamemaker knew. People tend to talk to those they deemed inferior after all, those of lesser position, and it made her wonder how often she had let her tongue loose in front of an avox.

The newly elected government was wiping out every connection there was to the Games. They were ensuring that nothing and no one from that era would make it to the next without facing some form of justice so the fact that she was still free was something of a miracle to her.

Haymitch… Haymitch had made sure she walked free.

Peeta had vouched for her.

Katniss had done the same too during a rare phone call that Effie heard Haymitch had made her answer from District Twelve.

Johanna and Annie, as well.

She had the backing of several victors which lend incredible weight to her case and had it not been for them…

Effie was exhausted. All she wanted to do right now was to head home and curl in her bed. She wanted nothing more to do with this Council, even if President Paylor had always treated her with a modicum of respect. She wanted to be able to think of the next plan now that most of President Snow's people had been imprisoned and she could probably stop looking over her shoulders for them.

She didn't think it would be that easy, of course, but she could at least try.

"Effie!"

At the sound of her name, she turned and barely braced herself before he pulled her into hug. While she and Plutarch had never been what one would consider friends before, he had certainly been quite present in her life lately. He kissed her cheeks as was customary and she in turn, offered him a smile.

"She will be coming with me," Plutarch informed the woman with a jovial wave of his hand. "My apologies – I was supposed to be here waiting for your arrival but the meeting ran past the time. You know how it is with meetings…"

"Only too well," she said cordially. "Now, what is this all about, Plutarch? Is there a reason I am being called here? I have given your people everything I have and correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought those people of interest had all been arrested last – "

"Oh, no, no. Nothing to do with that at all. This is quite… It is a different matter altogether."

The Council's meeting room was elegant in its simplicity. Looking at it, one could almost forget that the building itself has a gaping hole on the right west wing from where a bomb had detonated. There were about twenty seats, twelve of which were designated for the each of the appointed officials from each district representing their people.

At that moment, there was only President Paylor together with Cressida and Pollux in attendance. It was not a Council meeting then, Effie deduced quickly.

"Do you know why you're here?" Effie asked Cressida once she had taken a seat.

"I don't. Do you?"

She shook her head.

Once the pleasantries were taken out of the way, President Paylor delved straight into the heart of the matter for which Effie was grateful.

"My government will be setting up a committee and we would like you to be a part of it."

Effie took it to mean that she was being ordered to be a part of it. Perhaps it was all the years of experience working under President Snow but she really could not imagine refusing the president.

Still, she glanced at Plutarch's direction but he sat there, flipping through the pages of his notebook contemplatively.

"The committee will be responsible for the arenas," Paylor went on. "Each of those arenas as we all know was preserved, each one of them from the very first."

"Yes," Effie affirmed.

This was common knowledge.

Those arenas were tourist attraction spots. Capitol children and teenagers loved them – the re-enactments, the pretend play they could have…. There were numerous supposedly 'romantic' Capitol proposals that had happened in the very cave where Katniss and Peeta had hid in during the 74th Games.

"Titus Clemens is talking," Plutarch informed, speaking for the very first time since they stepped into the room.

Effie shifted her gaze towards him.

Clemens was Head of the Capitol Tourism Board. Each year after the Games, the arena would be handed to him for his team to clean up, have any additional elements they deemed fit to attract tourists added, and re-decorate certain spots where tributes had died before it was open to the public.

Effie recalled her nephew telling her after his visit to one of the arenas that the same brick the victor of that year had used to bludgeon the other to death had been placed at the exact spot, dry crusted blood and all. There was a human dummy, similar to those in the Training Centre, and for a fee, visitors could re-enact the scene by purchasing a brick and bludgeoning said dummy repeatedly in the skull. Finnick, if she remembered, had been thoroughly disgusted when he learnt about it from one of his clients.

"He is willing to work with us," Plutarch added.

"Work with us…? And what will he be willing to do exactly?" Effie asked.

She wanted to know what this 'committee' was being set up to do and why the arenas were suddenly brought up.

"To destroy it all, of course," President Paylor said. "His team are well-adverse with the maintenance of the arena and he is willing to give up names of his crew members to assist us with taking the arena apart. It will be unwise to go in blind so his cooperation will be beneficial."

"Mutually beneficial, I supposed," Cressida chimed in. "He wouldn't talk if there wasn't something in it for him. I know Titus - the arenas are his pride and joy. Sometimes he acted as if he had a hand in designing it in the first place."

"That arrangement is classified," President Paylor interjected. "There are arenas that have been out of commissioned and shut off from public – old arenas, mostly from the first twenty years of the Games. Do you know where these arenas are located, Miss Trinket?"

"I have no knowledge," Effie answered.

The earliest arena she had ever visited was from the 35th games and even that went out of style by the time she turned ten.

"No matter," Plutarch closed his notebook together, "Titus knows where they are. The tourism board kept records of each location of the arena. We should be able to retrieve it."

"That is all well and good but what does this have to do with me?"

"Here is where it gets interesting," Plutarch took it upon himself to explain. "You should be the face of it. You are the last living escort, the last public person connected with the Games."

"As are you," she couldn't help but point out.

"Yes, yes," the man nodded with a placating smile. "However, my appointment as Secretary of Communications is quite demanding."

It was clear that he thought she had nothing better to do with her time, unlike him.

"Which is why, Effie, I am delegating the job to you. I have the utmost faith that you will see to the completion of this to the best of your ability. Besides…."

Here, she assumed, would be the icing on the cake.

"The symbolism of it… Just consider it for a second – the Escort destroying the arenas. It is too good a chance to pass up to just any other person, yes? It would certainly do your reputation some good, Effie."

Next to her, Pollux was silently shaking his head at just how cringe-worthy it all sounded.

"They know I am with the Mockingjay. Everyone knows," she argued. "I was imprisoned for it."

"Of course, of course," Plutarch pacified. The mention of her time in Capitol's prison had always made him uncomfortable and Effie would like to think that his conscious was eating away at him for strongly suggesting to Haymitch that she would have no place in District Thirteen which of course, led to Haymitch firmly believing that she would be safer here in the Capitol instead of being a target to President Coin for having nothing to offer. "It wouldn't hurt to firmly seal that position and show them that you are really on their side."

"I have nothing to prove and certainly not to any of these people," Effie retorted.

"No, not to prove to anyone," Cressida laid a hand on her arm, speaking to her gently. "Let Plutarch think that way, let him have the symbolism he wants from appointing you but wouldn't you like to personally see all of these arenas destroyed for them, for the people that have been made a victim from it? You can do this on their behalf, Effie."

Effie fell silent. Cressida's words had a ring of truth in it. She could do this for her victors except….

"They're still alive… The few that still are… "Effie lifted her head then looking at President Paylor and Plutarch in turn. "I cannot in good conscience take this liberty away from them so the remaining living victors should have a say in this too. If they want to take apart the arena, they should do it. Not me. I imagine Johanna Mason would jump at the chance to destroy the arena that destroyed her life. That is my condition if you want me to oversee this … project."

"That is a fair request," President Paylor acquiesced.

"I quite agree," Plutarch added. "You will reach out to the victors, won't you?"

"Do you have anyone else in mind to be the one to reach out to them?" Effie raised an eyebrow. "I thought so. Oh, another condition – I will not have any contact with Titus Clemens."

At this point, it was self-preservation. She thought it was best to stay away from anyone who used to work for President Snow, even if they were now cooperating with President Paylor.

Outside of the Parliament, as she waited for the construction crane to back out of the road, Effie lit up a cigarette.

"Victor's Village is banned from any sort of filming. So, we need to work something out, see how we want to play this," Cressida said, coming down the steps next to her.

"We will, but for now, I would like to go home."

So... what do you make of it from the first chapter? I hope you like the premise of it and I'd be thrilled to read your thoughts.