Brutus wakes up stiff and sore and itching from a morphling spike comedown, mouth tasting like something crawled inside and took a shit before it died, but at least when Brutus opens his eyes they actually listen. Grey walls, grey blanket, aged and repaired, cracks running up the walls, instead of smooth, blinding Capitol white. That convinces him that if nothing else, he's not back at the hospital in Games Command.
There's a glass of water beside his bed, half full of melting ice, and Brutus gives his limbs a test run by lurching to the side and grabbing at it. Success, thank Snow, and Brutus manages to pull the glass toward him without spilling it all over himself, only to stop and glare at the Games-damned straw someone stuck in it like he's a damn child. Brutus glowers at the air, and he flicks the straw away and downs the water as fast as his body will let him. Water dribbles down his chin but he wipes it with his forearm and gasps at how good it tastes, clear and cool and sharp, after the warm, semi-sweet sap water of the Arena.
He doesn't bother worrying if they've drugged it; at this point they could've done that a million other ways.
"I told them not to put the straw in it," says a voice from beside the bed, a different one from last time, and Brutus blinks as he registers the man's presence. He looks to be around thirty, similar in age to Brutus' boy Devon, and he holds himself with military precision even as he sits casually in the chair next to Brutus' cot.
Brutus narrows his eyes. "Bullshit you're from Eight," he bursts out, and that's not the way he usually starts a conversation with a polite stranger, but excuse him if he ain't exactly fit for company manners at the moment. There's no way this kid with his short hair and Career bearing and crisp white uniform comes from a district of half-starved factory workers.
"No, I'm not," he says. "I'm from Two, same as you are."
That explains a lot and nothing all at once, and a second later Brutus slots the bits together and comes up with the answer: Peacekeeper. Not that it tells him what the hell a Two Peacekeeper is doing here with Brutus in the bowels of Eight, stuck in some repurposed hospital with people talking treason like it's no big deal. Still, if he's got a Two at his disposal, Brutus won't waste it, even as he reminds himself that they've sent this kid here to talk to him because they know Brutus will respond better. He might not like it, but they have a point.
"Whatever happens," Brutus says, meeting his gaze and holding it, "I don't want you to bullshit me. Are we clear?"
"No bullshit," he agrees, acknowledging the request with a nod, and this is so much better already. "My name is Rigel, I was a Peacekeeper. My squad was in the hovercraft that pulled you out of the Arena."
The one, if the other man hadn't been lying, circumvented whatever nerve gas that killed Brutus to bring him back to life. Brutus lifts the glass and tips an ice cube into his mouth, sucking on it to give himself a second. "They said you - revived me." Rigel nods again. Brutus lets out a breath and shoves the ice into his cheek with his tongue. "That's treason," he says, and he's met a few Twos who've made him raise his eyebrows but never one who actually turned.
He watches Rigel for a reaction, but the man just tilts his head. "You're our Victor. We couldn't let you die."
The ice rattles against the glass as Brutus' hand shakes, and he hastily drops it back onto the side table. He didn't ask for this, didn't ask for people to go against the Capitol for him, what kind of a batshit thought is that? Brutus has always encouraged loyalty and faithfulness and absolute, unconditional fealty to the Capitol no matter what happens. He always thought he inspired the same.
"Fuck," Brutus says finally, because what can he possibly say? This man and his squad will have friends, maybe even family, and now that's all gone because they chose to keep Brutus breathing. For what?
Rigel gives him a crooked grin, like he knows what's going through Brutus' head and would tell him it didn't matter if Brutus said any of it aloud. But then the smile fades, brows knitting together, and he lets out a breath. "I'm just sorry we couldn't get Enobaria out," he says, and oh.
Brutus closes his eyes, and for a second he considers reaching over and hitting the morphling button himself, but no. He is Two and Two will endure, if she's in the Capitol then Enobaria is safe and better off where she is. Except someone from Eight might lie, but someone from his home district ...
"Fuck," Brutus says again, quietly this time, and he lets his head fall back against the thin pillow. Please let her be all right; they have to know that whatever else happened in the Arena, Enobaria's loyalty is - well, her loyalty is to herself, and to her mentor, and then maybe to her district, but it sure as the Reaping ain't to the Mockingjay and her little crew of traitors.
Too many questions swirl in Brutus' mind, and he might still be pissed at the guy from yesterday but he did have one thing right; Brutus needs the facts. "All right, fill me in," Brutus says, pushing himself up to a sitting position. "Where are we?"
"There is a rebellion against the Capitol, led by a woman named Alma Coin, that's based out of District 13," Rigel says. "The people who contacted my squad after we revived you is a fringe group that split off from her organization some years back. They believe that somewhere over the years, Coin's rebellion lost sight of its goal of a free Panem and began working toward a Thirteen-run one."
"Cut off the dog's head and sew another right back on, huh," Brutus says grimly. He's not surprised. That's the whole damn problem with rebellions; they don't think long-term, and people, no matter who they are, rarely want to share power once they've taken it. He quirks an eyebrow, pleased when his face actually obeys. "But not this one."
Rigel pauses, and Brutus hasn't missed the way he used 'we' for his own squad but 'they' for the outfit they're in now. He might be working with them, but he doesn't trust them, not yet. Oddly enough, that makes Brutus feel a little bit better. "I believe they're telling the truth, and that they believe what they're saying. That's a start. They offered my people protection if we didn't want to stay, said they would help us disappear and not come after us, and I believed them there too."
Brutus nods. "So they got you by accident, and now you're doing what?"
Rigel gives him a small, grim smile. "My squad and I are working with rebel intelligence to locate the captured Victors and free them. Including Enobaria."
Brutus lets out a long breath. He just saw a third of the remaining Victors wiped out in a matter of days; it would be nice to know the rest of them aren't next. Does that thought make him a traitor? He looks at Rigel, wets his lips as best he can with his dry tongue. "But my people - the Twos - they're all safe? I think the other guy, he said they got to go home?"
"They let the mentors from One and Two go back to their Villages," Rigel says with a nod, but his face goes tight. "All but Enobaria are accounted for."
Brutus narrows his eyes. "What ain't you telling me?" he asks, keeping calm just in case he's paranoid and crazy from dying and being dragged back and Snow knows what all else. "Accounted for just means you know where they are, it doesn't mean they're safe. Don't lie to me!"
Rigel sucks in air through his teeth, but he nods. "No bullshit, I was getting to that. Lyme and Claudius didn't return to Two with the others. Instead they went back to District 13 with a hovercraft of Coin's people the night you died. They've been there ever since." He folds his hands and waits, probably for Brutus to explode.
For a minute Brutus thinks he might, until he tries to fling the blankets off and only gets partway before exhaustion pulls at his muscles. Lyme. Of course it would be Lyme, of course she wouldn't just go home after watching him die. And she would have, at the console; she would've had a prime seat to all of Brutus' twitching and oozing and every last humiliating second of it. Of course she grabbed her boy and ran.
Brutus always knew it could happen, it's why he and Lyme never talked about it, why Brutus rarely shared his own doubts even when they gnawed at him because he didn't want to give her any encouragement. He doesn't know what it is, her temperament or her mentor being soft on her or her tendency to pick the crazy, needy tributes who flamed out hard, but Lyme never managed to square mentoring away like she should have.
One night, after they both lost a tribute together, she and Brutus had gone to one of their favourite haunts; a quiet bar with dim lighting and no cameras pointed at the back booth. She'd asked him how he could be so loyal, year after year; Brutus had told her the truth, that he didn't know any other way to be.
("What's the alternative?" he'd asked her. "You've seen what happens to everyone else when they think they know better. Follow the rules and you get rewarded, that's the deal we made and that's what I plan to do."
"What happens if that's not true anymore?" Lyme countered, staring at the table. "What if one day they ask for something you don't want to give?"
"Everything I have is by the Capitol's grace and mercy," Brutus had responded, stubborn and angry and afraid to hear her talk like this. "There's nothing I have they don't have the right to ask me to return.")
It all swirls in his mind now, and the air sticks in Brutus' chest and he's tired, so tired. He glances at Rigel, watching him with polite distance, and Brutus blows out a breath and pulls himself together in front of his audience. He drags both hands down his face and closes his eyes. "I need some time to think."
"Of course," Rigel says, and Brutus appreciates the cool Two professionalism even after dropping a bomb like that. "But just so we're clear, you're safe here, for now, and you're being looked after. You're not a prisoner, but you're also not recovered, so they'd like you to stay put for now. I'll be back in a few days after my next mission, we can talk more then."
Brutus nods, and he doesn't wait for Rigel to leave, just turns over on his side and stares at the wall. He ignores the itch to pound the morphling button because he is not a fucking addict, thank you, and Brutus squeezes his eyes shut and forces himself to fall asleep the old-fashioned way.
The first time Petra ever set foot in Snow's mansion she'd been nearly delirious with pain and emergency medication because a shattered knee and half-regrown hip was no excuse for not standing in the president's presence. Brutus had argued, said she would be allowed a wheelchair, but the thought of meeting President Snow sitting in a chair like an invalid had set Petra off into a fit of panic until Brutus had to hold her down and the medics jabbed her with a syringe full of sedative.
Brutus had understood, in the end, and so he'd carried her through to the mansion but set her down when they got to the door of the audience room. Petra's brain had been fogged with enough painkillers to bring down someone twice her size, and every time she moved the pain tore through her like a mutt taking a huge bite out of her side — but it had been worth it to stand in front of the president and have him invite her to sit, instead of having to beg for an indulgence.
Now it's three years later and Petra stands in front of the room with the giant oaken doors of her own accord, and the residual pain in her hip is nothing to the fire burning in her chest. Her country is bleeding, dying, ripping itself apart, and Petra is here to do her part to save it.
Brutus is dead — she tells herself every morning and every chance she gets, Brutus is dead, and it hasn't stopped hurting yet but one day it will, it has to — and Petra can't imagine a world without him, but at least she can try her hardest to make sure there's still a world to live without him in.
Ronan stands beside her as they wait, tall and silent and strong, his back unbowed by age. He uses a cane to walk the same as Petra, and three years ago when she'd railed and screamed and begged Brutus not to make her use a mobility aid Ronan had come to see her. He'd stood in front of her — and how must she have looked, her face red and puffed from crying, hair mussed, wearing one of Brutus' cast-off shirts as a nightgown — with one hand on a cane made of polished wood, and he'd pierced her through with his sharp, blue-eyed gaze and asked her if she thought him weak.
Odin carved her the cane she uses now, using a bough of good, strong Two aspen, and Petra leans her weight on it more for the emotional support than because she's sore. The president will make this right. He has to.
Finally the door opens, and an aide waves them through. President Snow stands to receive them at his desk, and he waves them both into customary chairs — Petra's is sized for her, short so she won't have to scramble up onto it but won't fall with a thump from it being too low either — and then sits himself.
"Good morning, Miss Petra," President Snow says with a small nod. "Ronan."
"Mr. President," Petra says, heart fluttering, and Ronan nods in return. Ronan was all but silent this trip up, staring out the window instead of chatting with Petra to keep her nerves down as usual. The war has affected all of them, but it will get better. That's why they're here.
President Snow tilts his head to the side. "Something looks different about you, Petra."
Heat flares in Petra's cheeks, and red hair might have meant a lot of predictable 'fiery' comments during her Games that made it easy to play to the crowd but it also means a blush that not even Centre training could make charming instead of ridiculous. Petra knows exactly what's different; the question is whether she should bring it up.
She glances to her side to ask Brutus — Ronan's — opinion, but he's preoccupied, watching the president with a slightly narrowed gaze that's focused and distant at the same time. Finally Petra swallows and takes the leap. "It's the clothes, I think, sir."
"Ah, that's it." President Snow leans back in his chair and makes a vague twirling gesture with his fingers. "No more ruffles."
"No, sir." Petra digs her fingers into the arm of her chair to stop herself from twisting her hands in the fabric of her pants — pants! when was the last time her stylist allowed her pants in the Capitol, she can't even remember — or toying with the front of her jacket. It's a suit, tailored and sleek instead of masculine like the ones Lyme would wear, but it's still a suit. For three years Petra wore nothing but frills and little girl dresses so the Capitol citizens could cluck over the poor child who'd come out with such a terrible injury. She'd sliced every single one into ribbons as soon as she returned to Two and given the fabric strips to Devon for his macrame or Emory to make into rag dolls for the orphans in the community home. "I didn't request a change from the stylist, sir, this is just what they gave me."
"Oh, I'm aware." The president favours her with a small smile. "I requested it. I think it's time for everyone's favourite little girl to grow up, don't you?"
Ronan exhales slowly, nostrils flaring before he catches himself, but Petra sits up straight. "Oh yes, sir!" she bursts out. "Yes, I — I would like that."
President Snow nods. "Petra, do you know what you are?"
That gives her pause. Petra is a hundred things — a tribute, a Victor, a Two, a loyal citizen, a weapon; she's also a girl of twenty-one who cries when she's emotionally overwhelmed despite killing more than a dozen people in her lifetime and misses her mentor so much she can't breathe at night — but which one is the right answer, that's trickier. Half a dozen options flick through her mind in seconds, but Petra squares her shoulders. "Whatever you need."
This time the smile widens. "I knew I could count on you," the president says, and he reaches into his desk and pulls out a round, metal tin. "Would you like a biscuit? They're Ronan's favourite."
He slides the tin across the desk, and Ronan reaches forward to take one except that President Snow raises his eyebrows. "Ronan, manners," he says, chiding, and Petra almost giggles. She can't remember the last time anyone scolded Ronan about anything, and it's even funnier because manners is what he likes to say to young Victors who've forgotten their place. "Let the young lady have first pick."
Ronan withdraws his hand, curling it into a fist at his side as Petra chooses a biscuit and pops it into her mouth. It's shortbread, something she's only had a handful of times even though she's a Victor and can have anything because all that milk and sugar and butter still feels like a luxury after growing up poor and Petra doesn't want it to stop being special. It melts slowly on her tongue and Petra savours the taste of it; finally Ronan gets to choose his, and he eats it with a nod of thanks. Well, after having tea with the president twice a year for the past fifty, Petra supposes even the most amazing things can be commonplace.
"You're a warrior, Petra," the president continues, waving over his aide with a pot of tea and three delicate cups. "You're a soldier, with battle scars that would have crippled a man twice your size but here you are."
Petra's eyes prickle, and she's glad for the tea because it helps dissolve the rock in her throat. "Thank you, sir," she says finally.
"I should be thanking you," President Snow says, and Petra nearly drops her cup. "I admire your strength, Petra. The people of this country are lost, confused. They need stability. They need strength. And you, Petra, are a rock. People like you are the reason this country has stood for so long. We need you. This country needs you."
"Sir —" Petra aced her acting classes and image training, and she's had practice with speeches and sound bites and a hundred other ways to be impressive in public but they all fade away under the president's gaze. "Sir, I'm honoured, I —"
"She's a child," Ronan interrupts, almost sharply, and Petra jumps. "And she's just lost her mentor."
"She's a Victor," President Snow corrects mildly. "And I think it's time the nation remembers what that means."
Petra holds her breath. The world is tipping, she can feel it, and she's always been agile. She won in an Arena intended for the most brute-force of tributes by adapting her strategy on the fly. She can do it now. "It means loyalty, sir," Petra says, not waiting for permission, but the tea sits warm in her stomach and she can't help it. The president waves her on, and Petra leans forward. "It means never forgetting who gave us this honour in the first place. And it means being an example for the rest of the country to follow. The people —"
She shakes her head, and the anger that's been bubbling up since Katniss Everdeen inspired her mutinous uprising comes tumbling out. "They need examples, good ones. Right now they're following the wrong one and hundreds are dying — maybe thousands. Does Katniss Everdeen feed their children when they burn their crops to protest? Who starves when they bomb the supply trains in her name? She doesn't love them. She doesn't even care. If she cared she'd tell them to stop. They need to remember the truth."
President Snow taps his fingertips together, and he shoots Ronan a look that's decades old and Petra can't even begin to read. "See, Ronan, I think she'll do just fine," he says, and Petra swells with pride. "Petra, my dear, I think I have the perfect job for you."
Two days pass according to the watch on Lyme's wrist, not that District 13 appears to follow any kind of automatic circadian cycle with its lighting. There's a switch on the wall that changes the overhead fixture from glaring white to a less eye-straining orange, and Lyme slaps it every twelve hours or so just to give her and Claudius some kind of rhythm. They get meals brought to their door twice a day, standard cafeteria hash that tastes like recycling, but no one will answer any questions and there's no word on how long it will take Command to acknowledge that they're here.
It's a big enough room, at least, the two twin beds pushed on opposite walls so Lyme doesn't have to argue with Claudius that the mentor sleeps on the floor, and space enough to go through workout routines without hitting her head off any walls or furniture. Lyme spends most of her time going through bodyweight exercises, round after round of pushups and sit-ups and burpees and squats, using the beds and the benches as leverage.
"This is not why I turned traitor, boss," Claudius complains the second morning, when Lyme boots him out of bed and tells him to drop and give her fifty. "I didn't come all the way across the country to do a bunch of exercises before choking down some protein slop for breakfast. If I wanted that I never would've left the Centre."
Lyme just rolls her eyes and gives him a tap in the ribs with her foot as a note to correct his form, and Claudius blisters the floor with his swearing but doesn't argue. Whether it's because Claudius listens to his mentor or because he's guessed the reason, it doesn't really matter; either way Lyme needs to keep them busy, keep their muscles working and their brains occupied counting sets and repetitions so they don't have time to think.
When they're not working out they're sparring, and the adrenaline and sheer physicality of it, even in the tight space, comes as a welcome relief after days of hunching in the mentor's chair or sitting up straight and smiling down in the sponsor den. It's all the aggression that Lyme had to bottle up and hide behind a smile, and she and Claudius fight and lash out until they're both bruised and trembling.
It won't bring Brutus back but it stops Lyme from screaming every time she thinks about it — or from curling up in a ball when she remembers her mentor and other Victor back home, who will have noticed her absence and guessed what it means by now — and that's enough.
Lyme flops onto her cot after another match, stretching out her shoulder with one arm over her head, opposite hand wrapped around her elbow. Claudius picks up his pack and fishes around in the bottom, pulling out a thick black case. Lyme blinks. "Is that your violin?"
"Not the full one," Claudius says, ducking his head and opening the lid. Inside is a collection of wood and strings and plastic, set carefully into depressions in the velvet lining. Lyme's chest tightens; Brutus ordered the collapsible violin from a local craftsman for the fifth anniversary of Claudius' victory. "I didn't think I'd feel much like playing, but it felt weird not to have anything on me. I forgot I had it until now."
Lyme lets out a long breath, then lies back on the hard mattress and closes her eyes. "Play for me?"
"Sure thing, boss," Claudius says, screwing the pieces of the bow together. Moments later the low, haunting shiver of the bottom strings fills the room — the high notes tend to saw into her brain and drill into her eyes and set up a wicked headache so Claudius avoids them when she's there — and Lyme lets the music carry her off into a doze.
Lyme has her feet on the bed and her hands planted firmly on the floor, counting through a series of inclined pushups, when the door opens off-schedule and a pair of boots enters her field of vision. She raises her head, sweat stinging her eyes, and takes in the stone-faced woman who stands in the doorway. She's a soldier, standing tall and straight with the kind of military bearing Lyme only ever sees in Peacekeepers, and she wears the plain grey uniform with a quiet pride. This is no backyard operation.
Claudius swings his legs over the side of his cot, fingers tense against the edge of the mattress. He keeps his face carefully blank as Lyme drops to the ground and stands, brushing off her hands.
"President Coin will see you now," the woman says, and her gaze flickers to Claudius. "She would prefer to speak to you in private."
This isn't exactly the time to start making demands, not when they showed up based on the invitation of someone who apparently jumped on an opportunity without contacting their leader. Then again, Lyme might not be carved from the bedrock of Two like Brutus, but that doesn't make her a pushover, and she's worked the sponsor floors for eighteen years.
"I trust him with my life," Lyme says simply, and Claudius straightens up a little at the corner of her eye. "Claudius is my Victor. If the president is willing to give me a chance, I promise she won't be risking anything else by letting him come along."
There's also no way that they could ask a District 2 mentor to keep secrets from her Victor in a case like this, either, and they'll have to know that. May as well lay that out on the table now.
The soldier gives Lyme a flat look that registers exasperation but no particular surprise. "You'll take full responsibility for him, then. Anything he says or does is on you."
Lyme doesn't look at Claudius, doesn't reach out to take his hand, only nods. "Always. I'm his mentor."
"Come on, then."
They follow the soldier through the corridors, and Lyme takes note of the people who pass them. A handful of other soldiers with sharp posture and purposeful strides; techs making their way in groups, huddled and chattering and waving their datapads; civilians who stand back against the wall to let them pass and watch them with surprising lack of curiosity. At one point they round a corner and a small child runs into Lyme's legs, then careens away before she can react, shouting "Sorry, sir!" over its shoulder.
"How many people live here?" Lyme asks, trying and failing to gauge the size and scope of the place from the inside.
"Enough," the soldier says after a small pause. "We don't have the population of District 2, but we aren't just a military organization. We have civilians."
There isn't much to say about that, and they walk the rest of the way to the command bunker in silence. At the last minute Lyme remembers the state of her appearance — stained, wrinkled, grimy from sweat and long wear — and wishes she'd thought to ask about a shower. The room she and Claudius had stayed in had a bathroom with a sink they'd used to scrub down quickly, but the water only comes on for ten-second bursts every five minutes and they'd had to get inventive quickly.
Claudius apparently has the same thought, combing his hands through his hair and wincing, but nothing to be done about it now. Their guide brings them to the door, has a word with someone inside, then ushers them through and slips back out.
Inside, the room is dim, lit only by the glow from the consoles and various screens, and it takes Lyme's eyes a moment to adjust. Claudius stands close but not crowding, and Lyme closes her eyes tight, counts to five and opens them again.
"Beetee?" Lyme bursts out without thinking, everything else flying from her mind. "But you were —"
"Hello, Lyme," Beetee says, adjusting his glasses in a way that's likely unnecessary except to buy himself a few seconds. "I didn't expect to see you here."
The last time Lyme had any eyes on Beetee he'd been in the Arena, one more obstacle between Brutus and Victory. The last time Lyme saw Beetee she'd needed him dead, nothing personal, that's just how the Games are played. Now Brutus is gone and here he is, slouched in a wheelchair, nearly invisible in his grey coveralls with eyes cast firmly away from Lyme's face.
Again the words come without Lyme's permission, this time fresh with the image of blood pooling in the water, a pale face looking up, unseeing, at the pink sky. "I'm sorry about Wiress," Lyme says, choking on the inadequacy but unable to let the moment pass without it. At the time — at the time she'd gritted her teeth, struck off another name from the list and moved on with nothing more than the half-irritated thought that at least Cashmere and Gloss could have taken out the real competition when they decided to make their suicide run.
There are no apologies in the Arena or afterward, but these aren't ordinary times, are they. Beetee coughs and fixes his frames again. "Perhaps we should focus."
Focus. Right. Focus on being here, in District 13, both of them alive in rebel territory when their friends are dead and Wiress' blood soaked the water and Brutus' coated the jungle leaves and Lyme takes a deep breath and then another. "Who else made it out?"
"Myself, Odair, and Katniss Everdeen," Beetee says, and Lyme swallows hard. By her count that's only half the people left in the Arena when Brutus went down and the message told her to run. Before she can ask, Beetee adds, "The others were taken into Capitol custody."
Lyme's mind spins — Enobaria, she hadn't even thought of Enobaria, her mind in such narrow focus on getting Brutus out that she'd forgotten about her Victor-sister who'd gone back into the Arena with him — and suddenly Claudius speaks up. "The Arena others, or all the others?"
"The Arena others," Beetee says, giving him a sharp, unreadable look. "A handful of Victors made it here in total, you included. We're waiting to hear on the rest. But now is not the time."
Misha. Lyme's girl was in the Capitol when she left, what does he mean waiting to hear, what else happened, what's going on, where the hell is her Victor and what did Lyme abandon her to —
"Indeed." Another voice cuts through the babble, calm and cold and infinitely reasonable. Lyme has never gotten on with reasonable people, and her fingers twitch even at the tone but she knows to behave. "Beetee is meant to be here, the others too. You, on the other hand, are not. Would you care to explain how you found one of our hovercrafts?"
"I was contacted," Lyme says, snapping back to the present. "Via the mentor console, by someone with access to the mainframe. They told me to come to the hangar, and so I did."
"I see," says the woman, tilting her head. She has a predatory way of looking, quiet and assessing like she's prodding for weak points, and Lyme can respect that, from one hunter to another. Lyme might be half-crazed with grief and in desperate need of a shower, but she isn't cowed. "That was unauthorized, as I'm sure you can imagine, so now we're trying to figure out how to play this."
"I'm sure," Lyme says dryly, and if the president isn't going to mention the two days in limbo then neither will she. "But I'm here now, and I want to help. The Capitol needs to burn."
"I told you," says another voice in an undertone, and Lyme finally focuses on the third person, seated in the back in the shadows either by accident or for the purposes of skulking or dramatic effect, it's not clear. This time Lyme takes a step back because that's Plutarch Heavensbee, and this is so much bigger than she thought. "I've had her on my radar for years. All she needed was a push."
The grey-haired woman turns and gives Heavensbee a long, level look. "Yes, and yet she didn't turn until one of her own took a hit. That's not a push, it's a personal vendetta, nothing more."
"Madam President, with all due respect, I don't think we're in any position to be turning down personal vendettas," says Heavensbee, also very reasonably, and apparently Lyme and Claudius are just going to stand here in awkward silence while the other two have a confab as though they're alone in the room. "She's here, and she's the only link we have to District 2. I don't think we can afford to let this go." Heavensbee leans forward and gestures between the two of them. "Lyme, this is Alma Coin, President of District 13. Madam President, this is Lyme and Claudius of District 2."
The president folds her hands and rests them on the table. "So, Lyme of District 2, tell me why I should trust someone from the lapdog district."
Lyme doesn't blink, though Claudius lets out a short huff of breath that's as good as a snort from a Career. "Because I want it to end the same as you do. Because my kids get sent into death matches every year the same as yours." She stops, looks at the man from the Capitol and the woman from the only district to never send children to the Games, and Lyme's jaw tightens. What is the Head Gamemaker doing here, and how does he not have to justify himself after years of creating the traps for Lyme's kids to die in? "Or — Beetee's, or Odair's, or whoever else you have here with you," Lyme corrects herself. "We all have our reasons. What do you want from me?"
"I want assurance that this isn't a waste of time, and that you're not here to tear us apart from the inside," Coin says smoothly. "You understand, this is not a game of whose feelings have been hurt worse. I'm talking about the very real possibility that you are a loyalist agent sent here to destroy us."
Claudius growls, and Lyme shoots him a warning look but he brushes her off. "She can't prove she's not an agent," Claudius snaps, and he's been locked in a small room underground when he's had a fear of dark spaces since he was five years old and now someone has attacked his mentor. Shit. "You can't prove you're not anything, that's not how proving works. We've been planning this for years, way before the Quell or Everdeen or any of that. We just didn't know where to go."
"Claudius," Lyme says in a low voice, and he stands down, hands twitching at his sides. "He's right, though. Not everyone in District 2 is complacent, and not all of us Victors —" (Brutus putting on his Games face, letting Lyme taunt him into beating her bloody so he could learn how to shake off hurting a friend) "— had faith in the system. Some of us knew exactly what game we were playing, but nobody told us there was another set of rules."
She doesn't ask Beetee when he knew, doesn't ask him if he'd gone into the Arena with the expectation that a hovercraft would be there to get him out before the final cannon. Even if he had it hadn't saved Wiress, just like eleven years of training only saves roughly one tribute from Two out of six. The question of who else knew, how many Victors went back into that Arena with the hope of another way out, burns in the back of her mind, but that's not for Beetee and not now. That's for the cool, steely-eyed woman in front of her, and another time.
Coin nods, apparently willing to accept that much. "And what do you offer? You can't make me believe you have the key to turning the people of District 2 against the Capitol."
In the far reaches of Lyme's mind, dusty under decades of disuse and behind a few intentionally reinforced and bolted doors, memory stirs.
(Sitting at a desk in a classroom with the teacher walking between the rows, handing out sweet pastries that melted on the tongue but sat heavy and satisfying in the stomach at the same time. "These are from the Parcel," she said, stressing the word and its importance. "Does anyone remember why we get Parcels? Who sacrificed so we can get these nice things?"
Another: watching the Games at school, sitting in the auditorium with her classmates in careful, breathless silence as a tall, blonde girl from Two battled the strong-armed, determined farmer 's daughter from Ten atop a cliff. They all gasped when the girls went down; cries went up from the assembly when the girl from Ten clutched a rock in her fist and brought it down, down, down. A boy in front of Lyme threw his hands in front of his face, but the older boy beside him grabbed him and held him in place. "Don't you dare look away," the big boy hissed. "She's dying for you. They all die for you! Show respect and watch!"
Another: sitting on a hard standard-issue cot in Residential while Astra — who 'd taught Lyme how to kiss and sat with her when she threw spears in a fury and told her, before her first kill test, that they'll be dead either way so remember that — packed her things with quiet resignation after failing her Field Exam. "I choked at the end," she said, shooting Lyme a humourless grin. "I didn't even lose a fight, I just couldn't take it anymore, all that quiet, all that mud. Nearly drowned in the river and that was it. Anyway, I'm putting my name in at the Peacekeeping Academy." She'd looked down at her hands, shaking days after getting pulled out of the mock Arena. "I mean, I was all set to die for my district, right? Least I can do is spend the rest of my life serving it. Just make sure you don't flunk out, one of us has to make it."
Another: a letter in the mail from the girl Lyme had volunteered for, telling her that she 'd had her second child — a baby girl — and named her Lyme, in honour of the Victor who had given everything so she could live. Decades of hand-drawn thank you cards with round, careful lettering every Victor's Day at the start of August from kids the district over, one of whom grew up to stand beside her now.)
"No," Lyme says, breath ragged, and shoves the thoughts away. "You won't turn them, not in time, not without a lot of work and even more blood. But maybe I can stop the slaughter."
"Explain."
Explain, sure she can explain; Lyme has spun stranger stories faster with a tribute's life at stake, only this time the Arena is hundreds of miles across and has thousands of people. Luckily the two days alone in her room gave her plenty of time to think. "If you try to go in with an army, you'll never take it. It's not just about the Peacekeepers, it's about the people. We're fighters, and not just the ones who trained for it. You try to win by force and you'll have a bloodbath, because everyone right down to the poorest quarry miner with the shittiest job is grateful for what he has and he'll fight for it. We learn to accept the gifts we're given and then defend them until we die. We'll block the road with corpses before we let someone take what's ours. It's not about the Capitol, not really. It's about protecting ourselves, our families, and if you go with guns, no one is going to look at who's holding them."
It's funny; Lyme can't remember the last time she used 'we' in a sentence about her district, that's more for Brutus and Odin and their whole branch of quarry-proud, honour-strong loyalists, but as she says it, something strange and bracing flows through her and lifts her head, squares her jaw. It will take more than a few berries and a girl on fire to turn Two, as stupid and naive as that is; the people of Two will defend their home with their last heartbeats just like the children they give away. Every ounce of that faith is misplaced and misused and taken for granted but it doesn't matter. Two is proud and Lyme is proud and President Snow may say that the Capitol is the beating heart of Panem but Lyme knows better.
President Coin raises an eyebrow. "It sounds to me like you're presenting an argument for razing the entire district from the air. Why should I bother to take a bunch of rabid animals when I can just put them down?"
"Because you can't win without us, either," Lyme says, even as Claudius swallows back an inarticulate squawk of rage. "We have the weapons factories and the military facilities. Destroy those and you cripple Two, sure, but you've doomed yourself for the cleanup afterward when you'll need those forces, those supplies. I'm not talking about a massacre, I'm talking about strategy. I can show you where to hit, what to take so you can have the district under control and the people won't know until it's too late. No riots. No civilian bloodshed. A pure military operation."
Traitor, hisses the voice in her ear, like it did in the days before Arena. Traitor, traitor, look who's a traitor now.
Except this time it's too late to push it back and run away. This time Lyme looks at Alma Coin, leader of the rebellion, and doesn't blink. "Madam President, I will give you District 2, and District 2 will give you the keys to your Rebellion."
