Disclaimer: I twisted the universe, Suzanne Collins invented it. She makes the money. I get nothing.
This came about mainly because I don't think Catching Fire was right. So i'm pretending it's not real. And that Katniss dies, because i'm not so sure if i like her anymore.
"You're empty from all of the pain... so how do you call it divine?" - Divine – Lee Broderick
Peeta Mellark, Victor of the 74th Hunger Games
Collapse.
My chest explodes and I yell out, half-screaming, half-whimpering and feeling my world crashing in on me, my stomach clenching as I pushed everyone else away and held her close to my chest.
"Katniss?" I whimpered, tugging at her braid to try and get her to respond. She didn't move and I shook, my arms barely holding me over her as the tears I was shedding dropped onto her face, streaking down her cheeks and hitting the dry, hot floor.
The cannon fired and I heard Caesar's voice shouting about me.
Just me.
I groaned again, trying to lift myself to my feet. My leg gave out and I collapsed beside Katniss, still holding onto her hand and not daring to let go, because I was afraid if I did, I would end up dying myself. I wasn't strong enough.
I was faster; I didn't choke on the berries. She swallowed before... before...
"Katniss?" I sobbed now, rolling over and pulling the Mockingjay pin from her quiver-strap, feeling it stick into my finger as I pulled away and let my eyes close, trying not to look around, and trying not to focus on the girl lying beside me.
The hovercrafts come, but I don't want to think of it. I shut my eyes and just let myself feel my way. I sighed as the humming of the hovercraft went silent and I was engulfed in darkness once again.
"Breathe, Peeta." I told myself, trying to forget the world around me. I had to leave. I had to change my face. I couldn't be around here, I couldn't be around her.
How could I face the district with everyone else expecting me to... I loved her. She was everything to me and I failed. Haymitch will kill me. Gale will kill me. Everyone I know will probably kill me.
I really, really didn't want to move.
When I opened my eyes again, things felt weird. My lips were wet, I may have licked them, I don't know. My leg was on fire, though. Every part of my body felt as though it was trying to destroy itself, I felt like my skin was betraying me, crawling as though I was covered with spiders. I shuddered and lifted myself into a sitting position, pulling myself up and looking down at my feet.
One was partially silver.
"What's going on?" I heard myself yelling but my voice seemed to be far off in the distance. My arms shook weakly and I felt myself fall back down onto the flat, cold surface, my head hitting it hard, snapping back with a loud thunk. "Fuck!" I couldn't help but swear. It damn well hurt.
"Mr. Mellark, you're with us!" The voice was in my head, high pitched and close. Effie Trinkett span into my vision and I blinked hard, trying to work out what was going on.
"Where's Katniss?" My throat managed the words, hoarse, cracked and dry, and I felt my lip split right in the centre, a drop of blood dripping down my chin.
"She..." Effie looks around for another explanation, something to say to me to placate me, because in that second, I remembered.
Berries. Blood red, my throat burning but then a klaxon wailing and she was choking, I was washing my mouth out, desperate to banish the too-sweet taste.
"Katniss is dead, isn't she Effie?" My head fell into my hands and I let out a half-wail, half-scream, desperate to be away from the feeling.
"Would you like to try walking, Peeta?" A Capitol man with a blank face almost pulls me from the bed I'm laying on, his grip so tight around my arm that I'm sure it'll bruise. i yank my arm from his grip and growl, furious at his arrogance, determined not to get too close to these people.
They took my Katniss.
They did it.
"I will." I lick my lips and feel the sting, remembering the split too late, wincing because i wasn't expecting it. "Damn." I slide off the table weakly, looking anywhere but at my feet, and trying to walk as normal.
Tentative steps taken: 4.
Haymitch appeared in the doorway as I reached the supplies cupboard next to the portal. I swallowed, a little afraid to look at him, my heart pounding as he raised his arm, brought it forward and touched my face gently.
"Good." He nodded at me. "Well done." I knew he wasn't just saying well done for the steps I had taken across the room.
He seemed sober and he seemed shaky on his feet. He wasn't staring into space, as usual; he was focussed directly on me. He gripped my shoulder tight, but it didn't hurt - the pain in his eyes enough to subdue me.
I wasn't supposed to survive. This wasn't supposed to happen and I wasn't supposed to be around, looking at him like this, wondering why it was me that survived those berries and those... horrors.
"Why?" I managed to hiss, my lips sticking together because of the blood, the pain in my chest amplifying as i saw her again. Katniss, lying on the floor. "Why her?"
"Because." Haymitch said softly. "I know, Peeta." He spoke after a long time, a long silence. "Things won't get better until you understand that... things happen. You won't understand it for a while, either, i don't think."
I blinked and he let my shoulder go, my skin still crawling. My leg chose that second to sear pain through my entire body, i shook and felt my knee give out, my left leg collapsing, sending me straight to the floor. I swallowed loudly and tried to stand up, falling sideways again, but feeling Haymitch beside me, holding me up.
"Thank you." I hissed, trying to stay upright long enough to retrieve clothes and dress myself. I swallowed again and pulled on a jumper, a pair of jeans, wrapping my arms around myself as i tried not to think.
I think the Capitol took pity on me. I really do, because i was back at home within three days, nobody could see me, nobody interviewed me.
I didn't have to play up the sheer volume of grief that engulfed me. My stomach hurt every time I thought of Katniss, but every time i tried to do anything, i think of how it should have been her sitting there, reading antique books, sitting there, looking mindlessly into space.
She was the one who'd be missed. Nobody has visited me, nobody at all. I looked to the floor as I thought about it. I was average. My parents didn't need my. My family didn't want me, my brother Leemac and his girlfriend Ollive came to offer me condolences, but my older brother Kellin was uninterested.
Most people didn't care. I hadn't seen anyone in days, and i needed to get out. I knew it, but i couldn't face everyone else. I felt destroyed, empty, damaged and in pain.
"Katniss." I whispered, tears dripping down my face as i curled up on my bed, my body shaking, for the millionth night in a row.
Nightmares plagued me, three weeks after the event i was still curled up, waking up screaming and begging for someone to help me, for someone to bring Katniss back, for anyone to provide for me. I needed someone to aid me, someone to... to do anything.
I held my pillow to my chest as I sunk deeper under the covers, my face flushed but sweating. There was a noise in the house, something loud and repetitive, something furious and harried, yet peaceful and totally destructive to my attempts at sleep.
"No relaxation." I felt myself murmuring.
Effie Trinkett. Portia Lesteen. Haymitch Abernathy. Cinna...
It's taken them three months.
"What?" I manage to breathe out, knowing i haven't been in a fit state to entertain for the past three months, and i'm unlikely to have the strength for that to change in the next four minutes.
"Hello to you too!" Effie chimes, though her orange wig is ruffled and she looks unnerved. "Come in, people, we've got lots to do and no time to do it."
She considers me as Portia sets up somewhere upstairs, Cinna also watching me from his seat on the third-from-bottom step.
"Katniss wouldn't have wanted this." They say simultaneously.
"Sorry?" It's the only word i can push from my lips. "You think I want to be like this?"
"Peeta, Effie's trying to help you."
"You've not shaved, Peeta," I bring my hand up reflexively and Cinna watched me, a half smile playing around his eyes, "It's a good look on you."
"Bullshit." I swallowed and looked at Effie, "And you, you're all about image, aren't you?"
"Are you even eating?" Cinna didn't know me, how could he be telling me all this stuff?
"Er... yes..." I managed lamely, but he looked back at me with a light frown, and i looked back at him, "Would you eat if you felt like this?"
"I can't say." I heard his words, but i was so close to killing him, killing everyone in the room. "I think you need to go somewhere, Peeta. I don't exactly know where, but perhaps you should... get out, somewhere?"
"Are you saying...?"
"I'm not saying anything, Peeta! Just... maybe you should go somewhere, do something," Cinna's voice was low, slow and kind, but the look in his eyes was a furious one. I shuddered under his gaze.
"What're you saying? I should go out and get help, or what?"
"I don't know! But you're killing yourself like this, and nobody likes to see it!" Haymitch's voice floated in through the kitchen and i roared curses at him, furious, broken and hurt.
I wanted to kill at least one of them.
I knew i could do it because i'd done it before.
Eithout thinking, i let out a furious roar.
"You want me to get out more? You want me to go somewhere and find something to occupy me?" They were all staring at me.
I almost sprinted from the room, fury blinding me and fear coursing through my chest. i was becoming bloody unhinged, over this! Over an argument. I let out another growl, picked up my keys, tugged a thin hoodie from the pegs on the wall and screamed in frustration as i slammed the door behind me and threw myself outside, into the snow.
I had slippers on, slippers that would totally disintegrate in the snow, i had my pyjama bottoms on – i had only just woken up, i was furious. I wanted to kill something.
I slipped in the snow and landed on my arse, looking up at the sunset framing the market square.
There was someone standing in the far corner, their blonde hair whipped up into two plaits, wrapped around her neck like a scarf. She was wearing gloves, black boots and a cowboy hat, of all things.
Her hands were gloved, knitted awkwardly but they looked warm. I was soaking wet, fallen to the floor, unable to get back up for fear of damaging myself. She had a knife in one hand, and something else in the other.
It was a fruit, of some form, but i had never seen it before. She stepped across the square as i swore, my words ringing out as i slipped back to the floor on the ice, my slippers helpless compared to her thick-soled boots.
"Here." She muttered, stowing the knife into her belt, offering me the green fruit that had a wedge taken out of it. "It's an apple. It won't kill you." She looked me up and down, then tilted her head slightly.
"Who are you?" I muttered, taking the fruit and biting into it. It was soft, sweet and delicious. "Angel?" I murmured. Angel? Where had that come from? Granted she was blonde... but, maybe not an angel...
"Ha!" Her one-syllable laugh echoed through the empty square and she offered me her hand. "Angel? Me? Yeah, right." I looked at her. "Callie." Her voice was low and for a second, i felt a glimmer of hope. Callie, offering me her hand.
"Peeta," I managed hoarsely, and she smiled lightly at me.
"Peeta Mellark?" She asked softly. "The Victor?"
"The very same." She flushes and looks at my unshaven cheeks, my hollowed out eyes and my tired features. I take her hand and she pulls me to my feet, her fingertips warm in the gloves I so desperately want.
She feels the coolness of my skin and pulls the scarf from her neck. It is thin, but black and varying shades of a beautiful sunset orange, interwoven in a tartan pattern. Without a word, she loops it around my neck and wraps it tight, so i can't be cold. I shudder and she gently touches my cheek, her smile not quite pitying, not quite fearful. I think she is genuinely upset, and I wonder why.
She doesn't know me. She can hardly care.
"I know this is probably very awkward, but... would you like a drink?"
:-:-:-:
Would you be out of the door with Peeta? Would you fall on the ice and pray someone helps you up?
Review?
Concrit is always welcome.
I've read catching fire now. I'm happy to rant with anyone?
Love and Fluffy Peeta Hugs (Erm, or something along those lines.)
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