Prompts in Panem AU week day 7: What if Katniss was reaped instead of Prim? - "I volunteer! I volunteer as tribute!" As I hear this, my heart sinks. My sister has taken my place, and there's nothing I can do to stop her. Prim will be going into the Hunger Games.
"Katniss Everdeen!"
I can't breathe. All those years of tesserae have finally cost me. Effie Trinket just called my name. I've been reaped into the Hunger Games.
But before I can even take a step, I hear Prim. "No! No, not you, Katniss! It can't be you!" My heart sinks, because I know what she's going to say next.
"I volunteer! I volunteer as tribute!"
...
I don't remember much of what happened after that. I know I tried to run to Prim, but she was already surrounded by Peacekeepers, and Gale grabbed me to stop me from interfering with them. He must have brought me to the edge of the crowd, because I don't remember being in the way when I lost the will to stand and fell to the ground. I guess Gale also brought me inside the Justice Building after the ceremony, because the next thing I remember is entering the little visiting room, Prim and I collapsing into each other's arms.
It isn't until the Peacekeeper at the door tells us we only have one minute left that I get some of my wits together. "Prim, you have to try your hardest. Okay? You got that?"
"But Katniss-"
"But nothing!" I have to put the best face on this. Prim has to try. "You know plants, you'll be able to find food. Half the tributes won't be able to feed themselves; you'll outlive all of them. You're small, and you're quick. You'll be able to run and hide. You can heal yourself if you get injured or sick. Just stay safe and let the rest of them kill each other."
"But I'll have to kill someone eventually."
"Not until late in the Games. When they've been starving for weeks and you've been gorging yourself on all the plants you know. Then all you have to do is sneak up on them; someone as small and quick as you can sneak up on someone."
"Katniss, I don't think I can kill."
"Prim, you have to." Her doubts and fears are starting to make me frantic now. "You have to come home to me. Promise you will? Promise you'll do whatever it takes to come home to me, Little Duck? Promise me!"
I didn't hear the door open, but just then a Peacekeeper picks me up and starts dragging me out of the room. "Promise me!" I scream one more time, but the door closes between us before she can answer.
That might have been the last time I'll ever see Prim. No, I can't think like that.
I look around for Gale, but he's nowhere to be found. Probably in with Prim, I think. I find my friend Madge Undersee waiting in line to visit Prim. "Madge, who was the boy who was reaped?"
Madge gives me an incredulous look. "You missed it?"
I look down at the floor. "I don't remember much from after Prim volunteered. Please just tell me, who is the boy tribute?"
Madge looks at me with sad eyes. "Peeta Mellark."
For the second time today, I forget how to stand.
...
"Three minutes," the Peacekeeper says before slamming the door.
The sound of the door startles Peeta out of whatever trance he was in, and he looks up at me, astonishment quickly covering his face. Suddenly I have no idea what I came in here to say. Thanks for the bread, hope you die?
"Katniss?" he asks, as if he thinks I might not be real.
"Um, hi," I say stupidly.
Neither of us speaks for a while. He is the first to break the silence. "Don't worry. I'll make sure she comes home."
Now I'm the one to be astonished. "You- you will?"
"I'll do everything I can to keep her safe," he says, and I believe him. His eyes, his face, everything about him is so sincere, I believe him.
"Thank you for the bread," I blurt out.
"The bread?" he asks, as if he's trying to dredge up a lost memory. "What, from when we were kids?"
I nod at him, not trusting my voice. He just says, "You're welcome," as if it were some small thing. He doesn't understand what he did for me.
"That bread, it saved my life. It saved our lives. But it was more than that to me, it gave me hope. I was done, I had given up, But when you gave me that bread, when you took that beating for me-" his eyes widen at the realization that I know about the beating "-it gave me the will I needed to keep trying. It meant that someone thought I was worth fighting for, and if that were the case, then I needed to keep fighting for myself."
"It was just two loaves of bread," Peeta says. "And they were burnt, at that."
"Two loaves of bread are a lot when you haven't eaten in three days," I counter. "Me, and Prim, and my mother, none of us would have survived the night if we didn't have that bread to eat. And we never would have survived the last four years if I didn't have that push to keep fighting. I could never repay you for everything you did for me."
"You don't owe me anything, Katniss."
"But I do!" Why doesn't he understand? "I owe you my life! And so does Prim! And now you're sitting here offering to die for her as if it's nothing!"
"Nothing?" he says, a note of bitterness entering his voice for the first time. "I'm going to die, Katniss. It's sure as hell not nothing."
"Then why?" I ask, my voice growing frantic once again. "Why won't you fight for your own life? Why would you place my sister's life ahead of your own?"
"Because I could never live with myself if I let Prim die," Peeta says. "And neither could you."
The sincerity in his voice takes me aback once again. "But why?" I ask in a small voice.
"Because I-"
Just then the Peacekeepers burst in. "Time's up!"
Peeta jumps up and tries to run to me, but he's being held by a Peacekeeper even as I'm being removed from the room. "Katniss!" he yells. "You need to know that I-"
The door slams between us.
...
Peeta and Prim look spectacular in the tribute parade the next night, as if they were dressed in flames. The way the keep smiling at each other and hold hands throughout the ceremony signals to all of Panem that they'll be a team in the arena.
At the interviews, I don't even pay attention to the other tributes. The girl from One is pretty, the boy from Two is monstrous, the girl from Eleven is cute. But nothing really impacts me until Prim comes on. She looks beautiful, in a knee-length yellow dress that looks like soft candlelight.
When asked about her strategy in the arena, she says, "I'm small and quick. I can sneak up on some of these big, lumbering brutes, and be gone before they even know what hit them."
"That sounds pretty similar to what little Rue just told us," Caesar says. "You two aren't conspiring together, are you?"
"Maaaaaayyyyyybe!" Prim answers coyly, maintaining her adorable little girl image and earning roaring approval from the audience.
"You only scored a 6 in training," Caesar says. "Do you think that bodes ill for you in the arena?"
"No," Prim answers sweetly. "They were just judging me on my weapons skills. As if I was going to impress them with how well I use a sword!" The audience laughs at her joke, and she mocks flexing her arm muscles for more laughs. "I think it's obvious that I'm not going to win these Games because of my fearsome strength, Caesar. We didn't need three days of evaluations to figure that out. No, when I win, it'll be because of my smarts."
Finally, Caesar asks about me. "Tell us about your sister. You volunteered to take her place. Why?"
"Katniss is the best sister anyone could ever hope to have," Prim says, and her adorable little girl act is gone. This is the real Prim. "She works so hard to help support our family, ever since our father died, we never would have made it if it wasn't for Katniss. She always puts me first, she spends her whole life helping me and supporting me and protecting me, and I thought this was one time when I could protect her."
Finally Prim is finished and Peeta takes the stage with Caesar. Their interview starts off light, joking about the Capitol showers, but then Caesar asks Peeta about his relationship with Prim.
"I think of Prim like the little sister I never had," Peeta says. My heart catches in my throat to hear him say that; he already told me he's try to protect her, but he makes it sound like he loves her like family.
I miss the next little bit of the interview because I'm so taken with his care for Prim, and when I zone back in Caesar is asking Peeta about a girlfriend back home. Peeta shyly shakes his head, a move which seems designed to get Caesar to ask again, which he dutifully does.
"Well," Peeta finally admits, "there is this one girl. I've had a crush on her ever since I can remember. But I'm pretty sure she didn't know I was alive until the reaping."
"Did she come visit you before you left?" Caesar asks.
"Yeah."
"And did you tell her how you felt?"
Peeta blushes. "I tried to, but we ran out of time. The Peacekeepers dragged her out of the room before I could say it."
Oh, no. He's not saying what I think he's saying, is he?
"So, here's what you do," Caesar says, leaning in as if he's giving confidential advice. "You win, you go home a Victor, she can't turn you down then, eh?"
Peeta shakes his head sadly. "I don't think it's going to work out. Winning… winning won't help in my case."
"Why ever not?" asks a mystified Caesar.
Peeta sucks in a deep breath before spitting out his answer. "Because she'd much rather see her baby sister win the Games than me."
Yep, he is.
...
Gale stops coming over to watch the Games with me after that. And it's just as well, I don't need his angry glares or his nasty comments about Peeta.
Peeta and Prim do ally with the little girl Rue from Eleven right off the bat, and the three do remarkably well for themselves. Prim and Rue know plants, and Peeta brings strength to the team. Rue shows Prim how to use a slingshot, and they get a sponsor gift of some explosive pellets to fire with it, making any shot to the face or neck a kill shot. It's a gruesome and bloody death, but seeing gruesome death handed out by two adorable little girls will probably get them lots of Capitol sponsors. Peeta proves very handy with a knife. His wrestling skills have translated well to hand-to-hand combat in the arena.
Their run-in with the Careers and the incident with the tracker jackers is harrowing, but they manage to emerge relatively unscathed. Their plan to destroy the Career's supplies scares me, not the least because Prim insists on attempting it because of what I told her in the Justice Building. But it goes relatively well, meaning none of them die. They find a cave near an isolated part of a stream, and the three of them hole up in there to regain some strength and let their wounds heal.
They wind up spending several days in the cave, healing, eating, and telling stories. Peeta tells bout the first time he saw me, singing the valley song on the first day of school. Prim tells about the time I got her her goat Lady for her birthday. Rue talks about her younger brothers and sisters, how they all look up to her like Prim looks up to me. It breaks my heart to hear that, knowing that for me to get my sister back, they'll have to lose theirs.
The relative safety of their cave lasts until the Games are down to the final eight competitors, at which point Games host Claudius Templesmith makes a shocking announcement: A rules change. A rules change! There are no rules in the Hunger Games, other than if you step off your platform too early you'll get blown up. Cannibalism of fallen tributes is frowned upon, but there's no hard rule against it.
No, what Claudius Templesmith is saying is that this year, two tributes from the same district can win together! Peeta and Prim could both come home! But not Rue, I realize at about the same time as the three of them. The Gamemakers did this to break up their alliance. After some discussion, they decide that the next morning the three of them will set out to find Thresh, Rue's district partner, and then the four of them will decide if they want to remain allies or go their separate ways.
But just a few hours into their hike they run into the remaining District One tribute, Marvel. He spears Rue before anyone can do anything, then he and Peeta fight it out while Prim tries in vain to help Rue. The cannon sounds for Marvel, and Peeta joins Prim in kneeling by Rue, just as Thresh bursts into the clearing, gets the complete wrong idea about what just happened, and attacks Peeta in a blind fury. Rue tries to stop him, but instead of talking she just coughs up blood. Her cannon sounds while Peeta and Thresh are still fighting. Thresh has Peeta pinned to the ground with his forearm across his neck, when Prim retrieves Peeta's lost knife and buries into Thresh's back.
Prim just killed a man in cold blood.
...
The Games go quickly after that. The girl from Five poisons herself when Peeta accidentally collects nightlock berries and she steals them from him. Prim keeps the berries, thinking maybe they can trick Cato and Clove in the same way. I doubt they'll get that lucky.
Amazingly, when the Two tributes chase Prim up a tree and she "accidentally" drops the pouch of berries, Cato does indeed eat some, leaving Clove for Peeta to deal with. She fights ferociously, and Peeta does not emerge unscathed, but in the end his size and strength advantage is too much. Peeta and Prim are the last two tributes alive. Peeta and Prim are coming home.
But then Claudius Templesmith makes another announcement: The rule change has been revoked, there can only be one winner.
Well, shit.
...
"This is the way I always planned it," Peeta says. "I'll die, and you'll go home."
"No!" Prim insists. "I don't want to go home without my big brother! I won't do it!"
"Prim," Peeta says patiently, "Katniss is waiting for you. She needs you to go home."
"Katniss needs you too," Prim says. "She spends her whole life taking care of everyone. She needs someone to take care of her."
I want to deny what she says is true, but every time I look at Peeta taking care of my sister my heart melts a little bit more.
"I would love to be that for Katniss," Peeta says. "You have no idea. But I'm not going home, Prim. You are."
"No I'm not, not without you," she says, and pulls out more nightlock.
I can't breathe. I can't think. All I can do is watch as Peeta and Prim argue back and forth for another minute. Then Prim pours some of the nightlock into Peeta's outstretched hand. Part of me is screaming No! No! No! but part of me is screaming Yes! Yes! Yes! and I don't know which part of my heart to follow as my sister who I love more than anything and the boy who saved my life who loves me more than anything stand back to back and simultaneously tip their palmfuls of nightlock into their mouths before Claudius Templesmith interrupts the Games for a third time.
"Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Primrose Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you – the tributes of District Twelve!"
I sob until I pass out.
...
I don't know what comes over me at the train station, but when I'm tearfully embracing Peeta and trying to thank him for bringing my sister home and the crowd starts chanting Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! I do.
It's after midnight when Haymitch pulls all three of us back to his house, into the second-floor bathroom, turns on all the faucets and shower heads, and lays out the situation for us.
"The Capitol is pissed beyond measure, because a twelve year old girl outsmarted the Games and made them let you both live. It only makes it worse that you bragged about outsmarting the Games in your interview. If a twelve year old girl from the poorest, weakest district can stand up to the authority of the Capitol and win, then others might try it too. It might lead to uprisings. It might lead to revolution. They will not allow that to happen. They'll kill all of you and bomb Twelve to the ground before they let that happen. So you all need to play along with you new Capitol-assigned roles."
I'm disturbed by how often Haymitch stops to drink from his bottle of white liquor, but it doesn't seem to bother Peeta or Prim and they know him better than I do. "Sweetheart," he says, gesturing to Prim, "you never had any intention of defying authority, everything you did was because you love you sister so much, you couldn't imagine denying her such a great guy as Peeta."
He turns to Peeta next. "You, Lover Boy, same thing: Everything you did was because you were blinded by love of your girl, at the very end you just sort of went crazy at the possibility of never seeing her again and that's why you went along with that berry stunt."
With a heavy sigh, Haymitch turns to me. "You're going to have the toughest acting job, Scowly. You need to convince Panem that you're worthy of the devotion these two have shown you. You need to make every woman and girl want to be your sister, and make every man and boy want to be your lover. You have to be the perfect doting sister to her, and you need to be the perfect affectionate girlfriend to him, any and every time you are ever seen in public. No more sneaking off into the woods with Hunter Boy, you don't need it anymore and you don't dare be seen out with any man other than Lover Boy here. You got me, Sister?"
Even though we all live within a few houses of each other in the Victor's Village, the walk home seems long after all of that. When Prim goes to our house, I instead follow Peeta towards his.
"Peeta can I ask you a question?"
Peeta stops and looks at me. "Of course, Katniss, you can ask me anything."
I take a deep breath to try to work up the nerve to ask what I need to. I'm no good dealing with words or feelings, but I have to know. Especially after everything Haymitch dumped on us tonight, I have to know.
"Everything you said about… about me, about us. Everything you said in the Justice Building, in your interview, everything you told Prim and Rue. How much of that was true?"
Peeta's face flashes in pain at the mention of Rue, but he doesn't hesitate when answering me. "All of it. I didn't make that up. I love you, Katniss. I have for a long time, and I can't tell you how sorry I am about all of this, that my feelings for you have turned into a life sentence. I wish there's something I could do, I wish I had just died in that arena like I had planned to so you could be free. I'm so sorry that you're stuck with me, that my love has become a prison for you. Believe me, this is not anything I ever wanted."
I don't know what to make of Peeta's answer. He's beating himself up over things he has no control over, but I don't think I have the words to convince him of that. So instead I say something I never in my life imagined I would ever say.
"Maybe it won't be so bad. Being stuck with you." At Peeta's shocked face, I continue, "Maybe I'd want to be here anyway."
I've never seen anyone smile so wide.
...
The revolution, when it comes, doesn't go smoothly at all. President Snow's plans to sell Prim as a prostitute on the Victory Tour, the very idea of which makes my stomach turn, forces the rebels to move earlier than they were really ready for. The night before Peeta and Prim are supposed to leave, a hovercraft shows up in the Victor's Village to evacuate our families. I make sure the Hawthornes come with us, but Peeta's family refuses to leave. They die in the bombing that follows our escape.
The rush means that a lot of rebel organizers aren't able to escape as had been planned. Many victors from different districts had been part of organizing the rebellion, but Thirteen could only risk evacuating a few of them. When we first get there Haymitch introduces us to Beetee and Wiress from Three, and Finnick and Annie from Four, and Seeder and Chaff from Eleven. Peeta and Prim spend several minutes exchanging hugs with Seeder and Chaff and commiserating over Rue.
I'll never regret anything in my life more than I regret those first few weeks in Thirteen, when I let Gale and that damned Alma Coin convince me that freedom from the Capitol meant freedom from having to be with Peeta. It took me far too long to figure out that I didn't want to be free from Peeta, but when I finally did he was waiting with open arms and tender kisses. I could live a hundred lifetimes and never deserve him. Thankfully, I'm not dumb enough to let him go again.
They give Prim the title of "the Mockingjay," after a pin she wore in the arena as her district token. They want her to be the face of the rebellion, with Peeta and me backing her up. In Thirteen you have to be fourteen before you can enter their military, but the Mockingjay has to be seen as part of the fight, so they enlist Prim even though she' still only twelve. The idea of my little duck becoming Soldier Primrose Everdeen is ridiculous to me, but then again she did survive the Hunger Games. Maybe I'm underestimating her.
Prim and Peeta do wonderfully in the propos, speaking with passion and conviction. I can't do either, but luckily all I have to do most of the time is stand in the background and look supportive.
Unfortunately, not every propo is limited to the studio in Thirteen. We visit a hospital in Eight, then have to watch as Capitol bombs level it. We visit Two to commemorate the fall of a military stronghold called the Nut, but when Peeta and Prim are giving a speech a surviving Peacekeeper takes a shot at them. Peeta takes the shot for Prim, and luckily his armor protects him from the worst that could have happened.
Once all the districts have joined the rebellion and the final assault on the Capitol is being planned, Prim, Peeta, and I, along with Gale and Finnick and a handful of Thirteen soldiers, are put onto a team called Star Squad. We're sent to the outskirts of the Capitol, far away from the real fighting, to film staged battle scenes. Our commander, a man named Boggs, has a map of boobytrapped "pods" that we're supposed to trigger and disarm, but out map is faulty. Several pods are mislabeled, and some are not on the map at all. One such mishap costs us the life of a Thirteen soldier named Leeg, one of a pair of sisters in the squad.
To me it just seems like shoddy intelligence, but Boggs has a darker theory. "Here's as much as I know. Sometime in the near future, this war will be resolved. A new leader will be chosen."
I roll my eyes. "Boggs, no one thinks Prim is going to be the leader."
"No. They don't," he agrees. "But she'll throw support to someone." He turns to Prim. "Would it be President Coin? Or someone else?"
"I don't know. I've never thought about it," she says.
"If your immediate answer isn't Coin, then you're a threat. You're the face of the rebellion. You may have more influence than any other single person," says Boggs.
"So she'll kill me to shut me up?" Prim asks. The minute she says the words, I know they're true.
"She doesn't need you as a rallying point now. Your primary objective, to unite the districts, has succeeded," Boggs says. "These current propos could be done without you. There's only one last thing you could do to add fire to the rebellion."
"Die," she says quietly.
"Yes. Give us a martyr to fight for," says Boggs. "But that's not going to happen under my watch, Soldier Everdeen. I'm planning for you to have a long life."
"Why?" Prim asks "You don't owe me anything."
"Because you've earned it," he says.
When we return to the squad, all three of us exercise heightened vigilance. We even talk to Gale and Finnick; we don't give them the whole story but we stress the importance of protecting Prim. We do everything short of deserting to try to keep Prim safe.
It doesn't work.
Days later, we're clearing a block of pods when an unmarked explosive blows off Boggs's legs. Prim, the natural healer, runs toward him to help, and triggers a razorwire net. She bleeds to death before we can cut her out. Both Peeta and I cut out hands practically to mush trying to free her, and wind up having to be dragged away from her body kicking and screaming when another pod spews a wave of poisonous tar and we have to evacuate the area.
Coin has her martyr.
...
We're holed up in someone's Capitol apartment. We just saw Snow on TV bragging about killing all of us, and then Beetee breaking into the transmission to show Coin mourning the deaths of such esteemed heroes of the rebellion. I don't know who makes me sicker.
Soldier Jackson, Boggs's second in command and now our new commander, orders everyone to prepare for the trip back to camp.
I find myself speaking for the first time since Prim died. "No."
Jackson stops what she was doing. So do several others. "Excuse me, Soldier Everdeen?"
"I said no," I repeat. I never really had any loyalty to Thirteen anyway, so I feel no remorse in contradicting my supposed squad commander. "President Coin just killed my sister, there's no way in hell I'm going back to some Thirteen camp."
Jackson sighs. "I know Prim's death is a blow, but you can't blame it on Coin. This was just supposed to be a propo-"
"Boggs blamed it on Coin," Peeta interrupts her. "That's what he told us. That's why so many pods were mislabeled, why so many were missing from the holo. Because Coin wanted Prim dead, so she could be an easily manipulated martyr rather than a person who could speak for herself."
"That's ridiculous," Mitchell says.
"When exactly did Boggs talk to you about this?" Jackson asks.
"Just after Leeg 2 died," Peeta answers.
"Gale and Finnick will remember," I add. "We spoke to them after we talked to Boggs."
"Is that true?" Jackson asks them.
Gale looks like he's about to lie to back me up, but luckily Finnick speaks up first. "They never said anything about Coin. They just said we needed to be extra careful about watching out for Prim."
Jackson just shakes her head. "None of this matters. We're still Thirteen soldiers, under Thirteen command. We have to regroup at base camp."
"No," I say again. "I'm not a Thirteen soldier. I'm from District Twelve. Fuck Thirteen, they've done nothing but manipulate me and the people I love since we got there. Fuck Coin, she's just as bad as Snow, she killed my sister just so she wouldn't endorse someone else to be the new leader of Panem after the rebellion. Fuck you if you're still following orders from that murderous dictator, you're just as bad as any Peacekeeper following Snow. And fuck me if I ever again let myself become a piece in some megalomaniacal asshole's games like I did with Snow and Coin. You want to go crawling back to Coin and report her great success to her? You go right ahead, Soldier Jackson. Here's what I'm going to do: I'm going to kill Snow. And then I'm going to kill Coin."
Nobody says anything for a long time. Finally Peeta breaks the silence. "I guess this goes without saying, but I'm with Katniss."
"Me too," Gale says.
"I am too," Finnick chimes in.
"Us too," Cressida adds. "We need to film this daring mission, after all."
"I'm with Everdeen," Leeg 1 says.
Jackson just looks sad now. "Leeg, come on."
Leeg ignores her, and turns to me. "Coin killed my sister just like she killed yours. I'm coming with you, if you'll have me." I just nod back at her.
Eventually, Jackson, Homes, and Mitchell leave to return to camp. Leeg 1, Gale, Finnick, Peeta, Castor, Pollux, Cressida, Messalla, and I move deeper into the city, towards Snow.
...
Of course, we don't succeed in getting to Snow. We only succeed in getting people killed. We try to approach the mansion hidden in the sewers under the city, but Messalla sets off a pod, and Leeg, Castor, and Gale are mauled by lizard-mutts. Peeta, Finnick, Pollux, Cressida, and I hole up in a hidden room under a sympathetic stylist's shop, and I spend most of that night crying over everything I've lost.
"You're all I have left," I tell Peeta tearfully. "I can't lose you. Not after Prim, and Gale, and District Twelve…"
"You won't lose me, Peeta says. "I'll never leave you."
"But what if you die?" I choke out.
"It's just like when Prim and I were in the arena," Peeta says softly. "We'll face death together. Whether we die or we live, we'll do it together."
"Together," I repeat.
...
The next day, we get to City Circle just in time to see Snow drop bombs onto innocent children he had penned in front of his mansion as human shields. Many rebel medics who rush to the scene are killed as well.
When we attempt to enter the presidential mansion, we're stopped by the Thirteen soldiers occupying it, and brought to an office occupied by Soldier Jackson.
"Where's Snow?" I ask her.
"He's in custody," she says. "Most of the remaining Peacekeepers threw down their arms when those kids were killed. We arrested Snow when we took the mansion this morning."
"Where's Coin?" I ask next.
Jackson gives me a rueful smile. "She's in custody as well."
She enjoys everyone's surprised expressions before explaining further. "When I got back to base camp I compared our holo with the one issued to Commander Simmons from Squad 357. There were many significant differences, pods labeled differently, pods that were marked on the 357 holo that were missing entirely from the 451 holo. Combine that with what Boggs told Homes just before he died, and it's clear that Coin was sabotaging Squad 451."
We all know Homes is lying, but it doesn't matter. "They're both going to be executed?" Peeta asks.
"Well, we won't know that until their trials have concluded," Jackson says, "but yes."
Surprisingly, it's Cressida who speaks next. "Good," is all she says.
Jackson seems almost amused. "Can I kill them?" I ask her.
"The revelation that the president in charge of the rebellion was sabotaging her own soldiers in the field has shaken everyone," Jackson says. "It would help pull everyone together to have the sister of the Mockingjay and her surviving co-victor there to execute the two criminal presidents. Fire the symbolic last shots of the war, as it were."
I'm just about to agree when Peeta stops me. "On one condition," he says.
Jackson raises an eyebrow. "And what condition is that?"
"After the execution, we go home to Twelve. We're not under the authority of Thirteen, we're not part of the new government. We go home, and we're left alone."
Jackson nods. "I'll have to talk to Paylor, but I think I can arrange that."
"Paylor?" I ask.
"Commander Paylor from Eight," Jackson explains. "She's become the de facto acting president, and is the favorite to win the election they're trying to set up."
I just nod. I remember her from the hospital propo. She struck me as a good person. I'm glad it's her that's taking over.
...
When Twelve was bombed after we escaped the Victory Tour, the Victor's Village was left untouched. Whatever Snow's reasons for doing this, it means we have a place to live when we get home. Peeta and I live in his victor's house; I can't handle the ghosts in Prim's house, so it sits untouched.
My mother avoids Twelve entirely, moving to Four to help build a hospital. After a couple of months, Haymitch shows up back in the village with us. I never liked the drunken bastard, but Peeta swears he helped them survive the Games, and he is one of the few people left alive who knew Prim, so we develop a relationship of sorts. Every few days I'll dump a pitcher of water over his head and make sure he's still alive. He starts calling me "sweetheart" like he did Prim, and every time he says it it's like a stab to the heart, but I know he loved Prim in his own way.
Eventually, about half of the few hundred people who survived the bombing return and start rebuilding Twelve. The Hawthornes are not among them; whether they blame me for Gale's death or they just can't take the memories, they choose to stay in Thirteen.
Peeta and I have a toasting when we first return to Twelve, but I still hold onto my reluctance to have children for a while. Whenever I think of our potential children all I can think of is all of the people they should have in their lives who they never will: Both of their grandfathers. Aunt Prim. Uncle Rye. Uncle Barlee. Uncle Gale. Aunt Delly. Aunt Madge. The list is endless.
It takes five years for me to realize that that is the exact reason to have children, because despite our losses, life does go on. Life can be good again. We don't name our daughter Prim, but the first time I try to dress her up for photos to send to my mother and the back of her shirt comes untucked I cry for half an hour. The boy is easier for me, because I never had a brother, but I can see Peeta gasp whenever he does something that reminds him of someone he's lost.
All in all, life moves on. I hunt. Peeta bakes. Haymitch drinks. The rest of the district pretty much leaves us alone while they rebuild. The rest of Panem does much the same.
Life does move on. Life does become good again. Because even with everything I've lost, I never lost my dandelion in the spring.