A/N: Welcome to Even if You Cannot Hear My Voice. This is the third book in the Light Up series. You can obviously delve right in if you want, but I'd suggest checking out As if You Have a Choice (1) and I'll Be Right Beside You (2) if you want to be fully caught up to where these characters are. To those following me from the previous two... hello my lovelies!
District 13 is a mechanical place. People value order and predictability. Their way of life is ceaselessly monotonous. They all walk around in the same gray clothes and eat the same bland food and wear the same worn shoes. Nothing here is new, so when the district was flooded with nearly a thousand refugees, most of their residents didn't know what to do. The people of District 12 were welcomed with open arms, yes, but those from 13 were almost too enthusiastic. Some stared. They watched. People from 12 smiled. No one knew what to do with that.
The people from 12 feel a kind of safety they've never known. There is no chance of starving here. No chance of being purposeless. No chance of a child reaped, no chance of a meaningless, unnoticed death in an alley or behind a trash heap. No selling your body for food, no sacrificing your children for tesserae, no tampered education or class system. Everyone is equal here, almost to a fault. Everyone is the same. But sacrificing self-identity for a full stomach doesn't seem to be much of a problem for most of the huddled masses from 12. Those over fourteen are given entry ranks in the military and addressed respectfully as "Soldier." Every refugee is granted automatic citizenship in 13.
Still, I hate them. I hate everyone. I hate myself most of all.
People talk more at me than to me. Plutarch. His calculating assistant, Fulvia Cardew. A mishmash of leaders from 13 that all blend together in my head. I have a hard time distinguishing between people down here. Haymitch is conspicuously absent, and I don't bother asking where he is. In fact, I don't talk to any of them at all. I am mostly quiet or sometimes entirely nonresponsive, but I'm here for a means to an end. If I'm going to get to the Capitol, filing in among 13's ground troops is my best shot.
The one person in 13 who doesn't talk to me is their president, Alma Coin. She watches me with an expressionless face. I find myself staring at her, too. Examining the gray sheet of hair that hangs precisely along her face, not a strand out of place. It's almost too perfect. Maybe it's a wig. Her eyes are gray too, but not like Seam folk. They are pale, almost as if someone sucked the color out of them and this is all that remains. After a particularly unproductive meeting, where I sat silently and listened to them discuss plans for the role they designed for me, I walked out without a word. I heard her voice carry. "This is why I wanted to save the boy."
I couldn't agree more.
Instead they got me. Uncooperative. Callous. Spiteful.
Each day I put my arm under a scanner and a schedule prints in purple ink. I go to anything I think might help – weapons training, military strategy, field medic courses. Anything I find disinteresting I don't bother attending. At first, this causes a real disruption. No one in the 13 ignores, let alone disobeys, their schedules. But during Underground Plant Production or Geometric Theory, I hide in storage closets and behind metal pipes. I close my eyes and try to remember to breathe. I grieve in a type of quiet desolation that looks like apathy, but feels like entropy.
Gale and I land in the hanger deck. The hovercraft unloads wordlessly, and we walk from the landing pad to the Dining Hall. We're late, which earns an unreasonable amount of staring. I grab of a tray of plain looking food and sit at an empty table. Gale follows me and sits.
"What am I going to tell Mom and Prim about Twelve?" I ask through a mouthful of indiscernible food. I think it's okra, but it's hard to tell in blended form.
"I doubt they'll ask for details. They saw it burn. They'll mostly be worried about how you're handling it." Gale lifts his hand and touches my cheek. I lean into it. "Like I am."
"I'll survive," I answer. Gale drops his hand again and fidgets with his communicuff. I stare at it blankly. The device means you have a sort of special status around here. Gale earned his when he blew up the train station and rescued the refugees of 12.
My bag moves on the floor.
"It's unbelievable no one's noticed that thing," he grins.
"I should go," I say, rising to my feet.
"Katniss–", he starts, but whatever Gale was going to say is left in his throat.
I walk the path to Compartment 307, which I share with my mother and sister. I hesitate outside the door, and finally push my way inside. There aren't any words, but their faces are etched with concern. Before anyone can say anything, I empty my bag and Buttercup scurries across the room. Prim weeps tears of joy at the sight of her lost love. She sits on the floor and rocks that miserable cat like a baby in her arms, and he purrs until he occasionally meets my eye, and then he looks smug.
"Don't let them see it," I tell her, referring to the cat.
"Him, Katniss," Prim corrects, her loving gaze never leaving the lumpy, miserable creature.
My eyes meet my mom's. It's the same silent question I ask her every time I'm absent for a period of time. She shakes her head. There has been no word from the Capitol on any of the missing tributes from the Quarter Quell. I imagine that means they are dead. The Capitol wouldn't have wasted weeks when they could have been used for propaganda. Made examples of. Most of the districts are in outright revolt. The Capitol has executed key members of the revolution on television. They've executed anyone associated to a rebel. The night they executed Peeta's prep team, I locked myself in my room and didn't come out for days. I have no idea where my prep team is.
I look at my arm. "I have weapons training," I utter to myself more than anyone else, and slip out of the compartment before they can say anything else. When I get to the assigned room, however, the instructor stops me at the door.
"Soldier Everdeen, they are asking for you in Command."
I look over his shoulder and notice Gale is absent as well. Great. Probably another relentless Mockingjay meeting. I've been less than cooperative. I fail to see how playing their little part gets Peeta back, and that's all I'm thinking about. My mother is safe. My sister is safe. The people of District 12 are safe, and those that are not safe are dead. I don't think my trumpeting around like some puppet will help those rebelling in the districts. All I see it doing is drawing a bigger target on Peeta, if that's even possible. I trudge the familiar path to Command, which is really like a high-tech war room. It's full of gadgets and electronic maps and other things I'm not supposed to touch.
I find Gale but he averts his eyes from mine, staring at the floor. No one else notices me. They're all gathered at the far end of the room, staring at the television that plays a 24-hour feed of the Capitol broadcast. I think I might be able to sneak away, when Plutarch, whose ample frame has been blocking the screen of the television, sees me at the door and urgently waves me forward.
I reluctantly move toward the group. It's always the same continuous loop of war footage – the burning of 12, an ominous message from Snow, some important execution I don't want to see. Propaganda. Threats. Displays of force. But when I raise my eyes, the image I see instead is entirely new.
Peeta.
I make a sound that is somewhere between a gasp and a groan. I shove my way through the people until I'm immediately in front of the screen. I rest my hand on the glass, as if I could touch him through it, and my throat swells. He's alive. He's alive and out of reach. He can form words. He looks okay. It doesn't appear that he's spent the last five weeks starved of food or beaten. He certainly doesn't look well, not like himself, but I was imagining much, much worse in the constructs of my mind.
The camera pans to Caesar Flickerman, and I realize they are doing an interview, almost like the ones we did after our Games. Peeta sits across for Caesar on a plush couch. He's dressed in a white suit. I wonder who prepped him. I wonder if he knows what happened to his team. My mind concentrates on the little details I can handle. His hair is brushed away from his face. His hand is shaking slightly, but he's trying to hide it.
"I have to confess, the night before the Quarter Quell, I assumed we'd never see you again!" Caesar starts. I suppose that's an easy lead. Pretenses have been dropped. We all know the truth of our situation.
"This certainly wasn't my plan, no," Peeta admits. At the sound of his voice I feel my knees give slightly, and I lock them under me.
"I think it was clear to us what your plan was. Sacrifice yourself to save Katniss and your unborn child," Caesar urges him on, and Peeta nods in agreement.
"That was it," Peeta answers, and offers nothing more.
"Why don't you tell us what happened that night? The night the Arena fell?" Caesar asks, looking at him with the perfect mix of concern and curiosity. Peeta stares at him fiercely, his jaw locked. "We all saw the footage of you attacking Katniss," Caesar leads. I realize the Capitol has probably manipulated what has been seen. After I blew the Arena the live feed cut. They must still have recordings though. They must be showing Peeta smashing my head again and again, as if he's brutalized me. Turned on me. Coin must know this, they see all the Capitol footage. I'm being kept in the dark. Again. "You attacked her when you realized she was a rebel all along. That she'd lied to you," Caesar tries to press Peeta forward. Clearly he's been given a script. Peeta's supposed to betray me, blame me, call me out. He grips the arms of his chair.
"We didn't know about the plan. Either of us," Peeta mutters.
Caesar isn't expecting this answer but recovers. "It certainly doesn't look like that, Peeta. It looks like Katniss was in on it. She's the one that took down the Arena," he asserts.
"She didn't know!" Peeta yells, leaning forward in his seat when his eyes suddenly dart off camera. He settles back down again. He's being watched. He's being threatened.
"Just say what they want," I whisper. Do whatever you have to do to stay alive for me.
"What about your mentor, Haymitch Abernathy?" Caesar asks.
"I have no idea what he knew," Peeta replies bitterly.
"Could he have been part of the conspiracy?" Caesar counters.
"He never mentioned it," Peeta says, staring at his hands.
Caesar presses. "What does your heart tell you?"
Peeta is silent. There are so many intricacies about his body only I know. I can tell his breath has gotten shallow. He's trying to keep calm. His eyes keep flitting off screen. He's terrified, and Caesar is not getting what he wants out of him.
"Peeta, is there anything you'd like to say to the rebel forces?" Caesar sets up.
Peeta looks at the camera. A prepared speech sits in his throat. They want him to condemn the rebels. I know when he's performing. His stature changes, he's more articulate. He tries, but his shoulders fall flat. Say it. Say it. Whatever it is, just say it. Instead, he shakes his head.
The feed cuts, and I find my hand pressed against a black screen. It's illuminated again with footage of a Peacekeeping force, and I let it slide down to my side. My chest burns with indignation.
"I want him out of there," I turn around, tears burning in my eyes.
"That's ridiculous. It's not at all prudent to save him at this time, especially after he just had an opportunity to pledge his allegiance to the alliance, to unite the people, to condemn the Capitol, and instead he chose to stay silent," Coin says, her voice even. "What value is he to us?"
"Either you help me save him, or I will march on the Capitol myself and you can watch them slaughter your little Mockingjay on live television!" I spit back. They stare at me. My voice drops low. "You think I'm joking? Try me."
I turn around and storm out of the room. One of Coin's men lays a hand on my arm, not aggressively, but after two Arenas I take any unexpected physical contact as an assault. I rip my arm from his grip and run down the hallway. I find a familiar supply closet and duck inside, curling up against a crate of white chalk. After a few minutes, I hear a soft knock at the door.
"Katniss?" Gale whispers. I turn the handle and he slips in, closing the door quietly behind him. He slides down on the floor next to me, blood running down his face.
"What happened?" I ask, by brow fretted. I use my sleeve to wipe his nose.
"I got in Boggs's way," he replies, flinching at the contact with my shirt. I try to be gentler.
"Which one is he?" I ask, my eyes still on his nose.
"The one who touched you," he replies coldly. He looks up at me and there's a moment of anxiety between us that's never really faded. He pushes it down.
"You fought with Boggs?" I ask. He's just as foolhardy as I am.
"No, I just blocked the door when he tried to follow you and took an elbow to the nose. I think it was probably an accident, but either way…" His voice trails off.
"You're going to get punished," I say quietly.
"Already have." Gale waves his bare wrist in the air. They've confiscated his communicuff. I bite my lip and try not to laugh, but the whole thing just seems ridiculous to me.
"I'm sorry, Soldier Hawthorne," I smirk.
"Don't be, Soldier Everdeen," he grins. Laughing lightly, he stands and wipes his hands on his pants before offering me a hand up. "I need to go see your mom. I think you made this worse," he says, gesturing to his face.
I walk Gale up to the hospital ward. My mother has been volunteering her time there. When she sees us at the door she immediately whisks Gale away to a curtained off bed, and my feet wander the familiar path to Finnick's room.
Eventually I forgave Finnick. It was impossible not to in the miserable state he's in. Snow has Annie. We've been able to confirm that. While she hasn't been seen since her abduction, multiple sources from 4 have verified she was taken by the Capitol. He doesn't eat. He sleeps all day. The doctors say it's from the electrical shock he received in the Arena, but I know it's more than that. Finnick can't concentrate on what's happening in front of him in 13 because his mind is trapped with a mad girl in a prison. He doesn't leave the hospital ward. He doesn't focus on anything at all.
I'm an exception. When he sees me at his door, he smiles weakly and I plop next to him on the bed. I don't know how he's going to react to what I tell him.
"They put Peeta on TV tonight," I state directly. Finnick's face shifts.
"Was he… okay?" Finnick asks.
"Um, he looked okay. He looked…" I can't even find words.
"Was it just Peeta? Did you see Johanna? Or Annie?" There's a little too much hope in his voice, but he deflates when I shake my head. I look at him seriously. I take his hand in mine.
"I'm going to get him out," I breathe, and Finnick's eyes snap up at me. His face hardens.
"I'm coming with you."