What did I do wrong? I provided for her when she needed me most, helped her in he times of greatest need. So why him?
I throw a punch at a nearby door handle. Dammit, Catnip, I think to myself. What was the final straw? What have I done? Or, perhaps the better question, what haven't I done? I have been her father, brother, and best friend. I am hers and she is mine. Anything else is unthinkable.
I felt it though, felt it in each kiss. There was emptiness, one I had always associated with loss, or misery, emptiness I was trying to fill just by being close to her. But I can see now it was not enough, that every embrace was just the comfort she needed from me until she could receive it from him.
I stalk down the cold and lifeless halls of District Thirteen, walking turns into running, and my feet do not stop until I have reached a wall. Air, I think to myself, I need air. I step inside the elevator to my left, and press the button for the top floor. I close my eyes and rest my head against the cool glass. I wait for a moment, until I realize that I have gone nowhere, my access has been denied. Screwed up schedules, I mumble, and jam my fingertips into the keypad until I feel the elevator motor jostle to life under my feet.
I emerge to the dim lighting of the seventy-second floor, and push my way through the group of socializing guards that stand in my way. I see a window in he distance, a rarity of this godforsaken hellhole, and make my way towards it. Just as I am about to reach the light, I feel a firm grip on my shoulder. I pivot to find myself eye to eye with the leader of this mess, the devil herself, Alma. No words are spoken, and I follow her, grudgingly stepping towards her office.
I thought that this place could not get any darker. Her office is a cube, a grey cube. No artificial light emanates from the ceiling, instead, there is a single box resembling a candle that sends out a dull beam of muted light.
"Mr. Hawthorne," she clears her throat and takes a seat. She moves with a frightening silence. "Just the person I wanted to see."
I scoff silently.
"I won't waste your time, Mr. Hawthorne," She says with a hint of exasperation. "I have a proposition. Our dear friend, lovely Ms. Everdeen-"
My head shoots up, and our blank eyes meet for the first time.
"What do you want?" I whisper, a snarl itching at the back of my voice.
"To be frank, I want your passion, your drive. I want you to channel that into something the Capitol will never forget, it will destroy them from the inside out. A plan, a plan as brutal as you like, whatever it will take to bring them down."
We sit in silence for a few moments.
"What does this have to do with Katniss?" My worry breaks the stillness.
She lets out a cold cackle. "Oh, Katniss, yes. Our lovely little Mockingjay. Well she will be all yours then, that's all. We will dispose of the crazy bread boy and give you partnered positions in our new government, you will live happily ever after, so on and so forth."
"Just like that?" I ask, enthusiastic at the thought. This is too good.
I bury myself in my work for the next few days, not speaking, walking, eating, sleeping. I assemble the plans with Beetee, and although we have our share of failures, the product is magnificent.
As for the execution of the project, I use the past to help me in the present. What the Capitol did to District Twelve was more than cruel, entire families were killed without a moment to say goodbye, our exchange the words they never got to say. The Capitol needed to feel that, to feel the pain, the loss, the emptiness.
Emptiness. It often consumes my thoughts, stays in them, really, and I think of Cat. Is it awful for me to want her when I know that she needs him? But that is just it, I think, I need her.
Seasons change. The leaves begin to burn orange, then brown, until eventually what little life they have left disintegrates into nothingness. We decide on our mission, and bread boy tags along. Whatever Coin wants, I guess.
Everyday is walking. The sky is bleak, only the scattered rhythm of our footsteps and our haggard breathing to fill our ears. I cannot speak of the plan, although I have become rather comfortable with the idea of it; the murder of innocent children. Capitol children. Not real children. They have no sense of life, love, no feelings. They are disposable. I am like a giddy schoolboy, the fruit of my exploit is ripe and the first bite will be explosive. The clouds break momentarily, and my blood begins to race. The hovercraft descends from the fog and I see the hatch crack open, revealing our success. This is it.
I feel a smile creep onto my lips, but suddenly it strikes me. She is there. She is there. Little duck.
And the flames whip around her lithe limbs, frail like the last leaf on the summer oak. I grab Katniss's arm as she beings to run, but she is a screaming disarray. She tears at me, tears streaking the mud caked on her cheeks. She is panting, uttering undecipherable noises, guttural and painful. She drops into the rubble, her nails scratching at the ground, her arms, her eyes. Her crimson blood pools at my feet, dying my boots a rusty brown.
What have I done? What monster have I become? Goddamn Coin, Goddamn Coin, Goddamn districts and Capitol and Hunger Games and Rebellion and Mockingjay-
Coin must have planned this from the beginning; of course this was her plan for me to "end up" with Kantniss, to make me the savior in her time of loss. If only I hadn't been the Goddamn cause.
I couldn't have done that, not me, not her love, best friend, brother, protector, that isn't me. I begin to slowly spiral out of control. I realize I am somehow huddled on the ground, finding warmth among the rubble and chaos.
Everything is white.
In contrast to popular belief, Gale Hawthorne was taken into an extreme care unit in District Seven for a period of time after the rebellion. He was housed in the mental wing, for patients with frequent hallucinations, a common sideeffect of post-trauma victims. He was carefully nursed to health by an interning medical student who was also a fellow escapee of the District Twelve bombing: the handicapped Madge Undersee.