He Makes the World Make Sense, a hunger games fanfic

Note: All right, maybe I should explain this before I start.

I was just reading Mockingjay for the 89765897th time when I got to the part where Beetee explains to Katniss roughly what the plan to break Peeta, Johanna, and Annie from the Capitol is. The description's kind of vague- the exact words Suzanne Collins uses are "It seems to have involved knockout gas distributed by the ventilation system, a power failure, the detonation of a bomb in a government building several miles from the prison, and now the disruption of the broadcast." (Mockingjay, page 174). This really caught my eye, and all I could think about was how that plan would look through the eyes of Annie, who probably had no idea it was coming. And thus this little story was born. I tried to make the writing sound like it could be coming from a crazy person, which is why the formatting's a little weird. But in all, I'm really proud of this one. :) Enjoy!

Click, clack.

A steady beat.

Click, clack.

A relentless rhythm. Dripping, dripping from some source I can't see.

Every couple of minutes, a scream.

I clamp my hands over my ears. I can't let it get to me, I can't I can't I can't-

Inhale, exhale.

Breathe steady.

I can hear Finnick's voice in my head, the same advice he used to give me, before this summer, before he got taken back to that place with Mags at his side, whenever I started to feel myself slip away. And I can hear him now, even though he's nowhere near me, even though he probably never will be near me again because I'm trapped in the Capitol in a center where all they do is hurt and they've dumped me in a room by myself-

Just breathe, Annie. As long as you can get yourself to breathe, you know you're still alive.

My breathing's shallow, I know it is. Because here, in this pure white room, alone, surrounded by the sounds of other people screaming, I'm not sure I want to be alive anymore. Not when Finnick almost certainly isn't.

Click, clack.

I make myself use the dripping as a way to control my breaths. Every time it's a click, I force myself to inhale. On every clack, I breathe out.

Click, clack.

A scream.

It takes me a moment to be certain that the scream isn't mine.

I know people call me crazy and I know that they're right, I am, but it wasn't until they dumped me in this painful empty room that I realized just how far gone I really am. And the sad bit is that unless Finnick is by my side, I don't even care. I can't even remember what it's like to be sane.

I bet it's real nice.

Click, clack.

But wait. There's something different going on.

Lights. The lights, they're all gone.

I'm suddenly submerged into a darkness so thick, I've got to assume I'm dead. There's a long moment- minutes, hours?- where I'm simply sitting in the dark, letting the black swoop around me.

And then I hear the dripping, and know there's no way I'm anything but alive.

I wonder if I'd be better off dead.

And outside the door of my room, coming nearer and nearer, voices, male ones, frantic and tight with a stress I know all too well.

I'm still curled in the corner of the room, my knees drawn to my chest, my hands clasped over my ears.

It's not until I feel the ground move away from my bare toes that I realize I'm rocking back and forth.

Finnick's voice again, in my head, gentle but commanding.

Annie. You're safe with me here. They can't hurt you, I swear they can't.

I can almost feel his hands grab my wrists and pull down, and in a moment of actually believing he's here, I bring my hands down from my head, pressing against the concrete floor.

And with my hands finally away I can hear what's being said by the people outside the room and I sit there and hold my breath as I realize they're talking about me.

I know what that means. If the guards are talking about me, I'm next, and they're going to hurt me, they're going to make me hurt and hurt and hurt and more crazy and Finnick's not here and I just want Finnick-

But I force myself to breathe, letting the words from outside roll over me.

"Room 286. You're sure this is the right one?" It's a young man's voice, hesitant and worried.

A second voice- older, more gruff- answers him. "Let's hope so. We're running out of time."

I sit very, very still. Maybe if I don't move, the men in the hallway won't know I'm here.

But slowly the large air-tight door to my room opens, and a beam of white light enters the room from the darkness in the hallway outside, searching the cell.

As soon as it lands on me, I scream and scramble backwards, kicking outwards in my struggle to remain hidden. Don't look at me don't look at me don't-

The man who has come inside lowers the light in his hand a little, and I actually stop squirming to look at the person that's going to be hurting me. There's a weird-looking mask covering his mouth and nose, like it's helping him breathe. As he nears me, though, he moves it away from his mouth, looking down at me.

"Annie Cresta?" His voice is cautious but still loud, too loud for me to want to listen to, and I wince.

Please don't hurt me, I want to beg, but I can't seem to force the words past my lips. I sit in the corner of the room, watching him with wide, frightened eyes.

"Annie, my name is Liam Boggs. I'm with District Thirteen- we're getting you out of here."

But I shake my head, my lips pressed together in a tight line. People have come to rescue me countless times, in hundreds of different ways, but as soon as I get to the door of the room they disappear and I realize I've only imagined the whole thing. In here, it's hard to tell what's real from what isn't, and I'm sick of believing the things my head tells me are there.

They never are.

The man steps closer again, his eyes examining me warily. "Are you hurt?"

I'm still shaking my head but something about this question makes me freeze. Yes, I'm hurt. Hurt in a thousand different ways, literally falling apart at the edges and the insides and everywhere and everything that I am. But that's not what I say.

"You have kind eyes," I tell him.

He looks a little taken aback by this, but his blue eyes get kinder. "Annie, we need you to get up. Finnick is waiting for you back in District Thirteen- he's desperate to see you. But you've got to come with us and do as we tell you, okay?"

My eyes dart to the young man behind him- olive-skinned and dark haired. He looks tense and worried, but good. Nothing like the guards here.

Should I trust these people? I want to see Finnick so badly, so badly because I love him and he loves me and he can keep me sane, but-

But what if these people aren't real?

Finally, after the smallest of hesitations, I nod, and Boggs spares me a small smile, stretching out his hands to help me rise to my feet. The ground twists underneath me as I sway, my bare feet cold against the floor.

Boggs' arm is around my shoulder as he helps me stand, and before I know what's going on, he's whipped off his jacket and put it around my shoulders. "Here. You must be cold."

I'm confused for a moment, and then I look down at myself and realize I'm not wearing anything other than the jacket the Boggs has now wrapped around me.

Oh.

Maybe if this were at any other moment in my life, I'd be embarrassed, but I'm still trying to convince myself that this is real and happening and not another one of the countless fantasies and nightmares that I come up with on my own.

"Thanks," I whisper. I don't know if it gets past my lips, though, because Boggs doesn't reply to me. Instead, he turns and barks a command at the young man next to him.

"Hawthorne. Go scout the hall, come back with the report."

Hawthorne nods, grabs the- it's a gun please don't shoot me please don't hurt me- and dashes out into the darkened hall.

Boggs must feel me stiffen next to him, because his kind eyes find me again. "It's okay, Annie, he's on our side."

I don't reply; don't even make a motion to show that I've heard him. But when the dark-haired man comes back with an All clear, Boggs grabs my hand and pulls me out into the hallway after him, with Hawthorne scouting the way ahead of us.

And everything after that is- well, it's a blur. I know we're running down the halls and I know other people join us and I know that there are people who are escaping just like me but all I can think about is Finnick and Finnick and Finnick and Finnick.

Because if this is real and not in my head, I'm going to get to see him and it's going to be soon and it'll be just me and him forever and ever and nothing can ever take him away from me because we've already both almost died but we didn't die, and if I can get out of this cell and he can get out of the second Games, then we can get out of anything and maybe happiness is possible.

And if this isn't real, well, it's better than the reality of being stuck in a Capitol torture cell.

And all of a sudden there's a ratatatat exploding from somewhere overhead and I'm screaming without even meaning to, but so does the young man named Hawthorne because he's bleeding and bleeding and all I can think of is when my partner got killed in the Games-

"Hawthorne-" begins one of the men, but Hawthorne cuts him off.

He speaks through gritted teeth. "I'll be fine. We've got to get to the hovercraft before it has to take off- don't worry about me-"

But anyone can see how much he's hurting and I want to keep screaming and screaming and my shouts are echoing around in my head without stopping.

And then, in a sudden lurch of reality, we race through a door and out into sunlight so blinding that I stagger a little under its heat and brilliance. It's been so long since I've seen the sun, that I almost want to stop and stare-

I feel someone's hand grab my arm. "We can't stop now, Annie!" It's Boggs, of course it is, and he's gone off and dragged me after him, and before I know it I'm running into a hovercraft and so are the other men and women with us, and there are even some unconscious bodies being carried and dumped on board, people I think I might know.

And the next thing I know, all of us are in the air, and I'm about to be reunited with Finnick and I can't quite control my heart because it's dancing, literally dancing around inside my chest. I sit on the floor while people rush about around me, and watch as someone checks an almost-dead woman's pulse and another examines Hawthorne's back, and no one's paying any attention to me until I feel someone sit down by my side.

It's Boggs. He's got something bundled in his arms- a light blue sheet that he must have taken from onboard somewhere, and he's handing it to me.

"Here. I thought this might be slightly more comfortable than my coat. A little bigger, too."

I take the sheet wordlessly, wrapping it around myself without really thinking about it. Boggs watches me sadly for a moment, but smiling too, like a father at his daughter's wedding day. Like he's proud and happy, but the moment's a little bittersweet.

I know I should say something, but I've never been good with words. Finally I force my hoarse voice to work, and I ask quietly, "How's Finnick?"

"Asking about you every chance he can get," says Boggs with a smile. I can tell there's something he doesn't want to tell me and I can only hope Finnick hasn't fallen apart like me. But what Boggs doesn't know is that even if he has, that's okay, too. As long as Finnick and I are together, we can put each other back together again. It's what we do for each other. "He'll be there, waiting for us when we get back."

And my mouth turns up into a small smile. Of course he is. He always will.

Before I know it, we've landed and as soon as the doors open, everyone on the aircraft is rushed below the ground into some place that reminds me of the cell I was in, only better. There are people that have to be doctors rushing around, checking on everyone, fixing the people who were injured and are injured, and my eyes are searching the crowd for the one person who can make it all make sense-

And then I find him.

"Finnick!" I shriek, and there's nothing that can stop me from racing to him, nothing, and I forget for a moment that I'm tired and weak and crazy and only wearing the sheet that Boggs gave me, beause Finnick is rushing towards me too, a look in his eyes I've never seen before, and before I know it we've hit each other and the rest of the world sort of mutes around us.

His arms fold around me and mine around him and we crash into a wall, holding on because there's nothing in the world besides us, just him and me, alone.

Right here with his arms holding me together, I realize briefly that I'm feeling something I don't think I ever really have before: safe. And I know that nothing will ever separate us again.

Because he makes the world make sense.