This is probably very AU and I haven't read the books in ages – I just got the muse for this and decided to write it x I know that some of these people aren't even alive/involved in the story at this point but who cares... Please read and review x

Gale

He was watching from the sidelines as Finnick sat slumped in a chair telling his harrowing story to the television crew with dead eyes and a haunted expression. Something deep within him, not yet corrupted by pain and fear and anger, welled up in protest at the tale but he forced it back down. Wars were not won with sentiment. Feelings could cost you everything.

He'd learnt that with Katniss.

But then Finnick had mentioned that other tributes had been forced to sell their bodies as he had.

And his heart stopped.

And started pounding faster than ever when he saw the sad look Finnick threw Katniss as she leant against the wall with glazed eyes, remembering.

Gale was beyond words, his eyes wide with horror.

Almost as if sensing him, Katniss met his eyes and gave him a slow sad look before turning and slinking away into the shadows.

oOo

Cinna

He could just tell. The minute she walked on-screen he knew what had happened. Living in the Capitol, you heard the rumours floating around, for the bits that the Districts didn't see. And, more than that, he knew Katniss.

He might not know her favourite colour, when she'd first picked up a bow or what day of the week she was born on, but playing the Games they'd understood each other. And all you really had these days was understanding. And horror.

And he felt horrified that he was part of the system that had reduced her to this. His girl on fire, the one person he would bet on had been reduced to wilting. No, that was too sweet.

She had been burnt to ashes. Ashes that were crumbling in the wind.

oOo

Haymitch

He knew straight away as well. He'd lived in the Capitol's games for too long and he'd seen what they did to the pretty ones. To the ones with fire.

The fire that the men in the Capitol thought they could stamp out and they were willing to try and to pay for it.

Ultimately Katniss was the one that paid in the end.

But she was a good girl – kind and stubborn and not willing to let anyone see her fear. She reminded him of Maysilee.

So he raised his glass at the TV and drained it before knocking back the rest of the bottle.

oOo

Prim

She was supposedly the innocent one. The picture of Katniss volunteering to save her twelve year old sister had never been forgotten and it had immortalized Prim as some innocent naive figure who had absolutely no idea what was going on in the world.

But she was a teenager now.

She knew exactly what Finnick was going on about when he said how the Capitol sold their bodies, despite her mother pretending otherwise. She knew he was a friend of her sister's – or as close to a friend as Katniss could have now days. She'd never been the most sociable of people and the Hunger Games weren't exactly a method of friendly socialising. The people you met often died by your hands.

She also saw the sad glance he threw at someone just at the edge of the screen, who turned around sharply and their hair whipped across the left hand side of the screen in a long, single braid.

oOo

Mrs Everdeen

Iona wasn't a strong woman. Not anymore. Losing her husband had taken that out of her, and by losing her herself she'd lost her eldest daughter. Their relationship had never been the same again.

But it was still her daughter and she still had a mother's intuition.

She knew there was something wrong with that Capitol (then again, what was right about it?) but she didn't know what.

Now it seemed she had found out.

She didn't know if she was better off in the dark.

She wasn't strong enough for something like this.

(Neither was Katniss.)