AN: Short one-shot. Gale's POV about Katniss assassination of Coin and their deal.
It's been months. I've hardly gotten to see her, but something in me surges when I watch her walk out onto the field. She's burned and scarred—we all are in some way. And I can't help but think she's never been more beautiful than in this moment.
For so long, she's lost her way. Been without purpose since…Prim died. I can feel my hands clenching at my side. It's my fault, I know it. I know that…and she knows it too. Even if she never ever says it. She'll never look at me that way again. There is no hope for us.
The beautiful, scarred, and broken Mockingjay can't fly anymore. But it's not me that can heal her wings or help her back into the skies like she belongs. I can only bring her death. My hands aren't meant to help her—my anger is a killing thing. All I've done is fuel the fire until she's been burned with it—consumed by my rage.
As she stands down there, like she's in the arena again. I can remember my words, and how they haunt me now. How they must haunt her too, "How different can it be really?" Killing. It had come so easy to me. I didn't like to do it, but I could understand that sometimes it had to happen to survive. I'd needed it to survive…and somehow, I came out okay. My family was whole even if it wasn't the same. But my words, so careless—just trying to help her survive the games are probably now embedded in her mind.
I know she doesn't' hate me. Not really, but she doesn't love me either. I killed her sister with my carelessness—with words I only said to help her live. Now they've come back to haunt me. Just a little duck pierced by my arrow—another thing Katniss has lost because of me.
When she raises her arrow, I understand perhaps better than anyone what this is costing her—what this means. The arrow moves up and Coin is falling. I feel satisfaction, because I know that she knows—even if she doesn't ever forgive me that she knows what Coin did. That just like the Capitol played her to believe she didn't love Peeta, Coin tried to make me a villain.
It wasn't hard…because even I think I'm the villain now. When her eyes go wild searching, I know it's not for Peeta but for me. She knows our promise we've made. Dying is better than capture. She knows she can trust me to kill her—she knows I can do it. She knows that Gale Hawthorne knows how to bring death.
I see her lips move, and I know that she's whispering to the bow to silence it. It's like a whisper straight to my heart. "Goodnight."
Goodnight Gale. Goodbye. Kill me. Don't let me suffer. Make it a clean shot.
I know that's what she wants and in the chaos my hand is reaching for the arrows on my back to thread my bow. It's humming just like hers. But I stop, and I whisper back. "Goodnight."
Because I can't kill her. Even if she thinks it would be easier, I can't. I won't. I've taken so much from her…but this I can give to her. I can give her a life with Peeta. All she has to do is live. Even if she doesn't forgive me for not killing her.
I know she'll find him again, as she's always been meant to find him. He'll heal her broken wings—she'll fly again. Maybe not the same way as before. She'll struggle and falter—even have to fight for every single beat of her wings—but he'll bring her life. Where as until now, I could only bring her death.
I watch in fear as she turns to bite the capsule. Goodnight. Nightlock. Death. Darkness. But he's there, there to stop her from destroying herself no matter how bad he gets hurt in the process. And I see the way she looks at him, even in her anger there's something there—something that has never been there with me.
There's a strange kind of flicker of hope before it vanishes. Maybe she doesn't even feel it as they drag her away. Maybe she's too used to the death I bring into her life to feel that this is her chance at living.
I know I can't see her again. I can't confuse her or let her know I love her again. I can't break her wings and let her be eaten by the flames of hate that seem to spill off of me in toxic amounts. I can't let her be smothered by that.
Only one glance in his eyes gives her hope. One glance in my eyes brings her death.