Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine. Any lines from the books are hers too.
AN: Same warnings as the first chapter apply. Also, thanks to those reading this story. It's hard to read about OC's and I'm glad anyone is even looking at this.
Made Unbreakable, pt 4
"You'll do wonderfully! Such a natural with eye contact and lovely clear speech!" Lineus shrieks, beside himself as he passes along less than helpful tips for the interview.
Miss Mary, misinterpreting Birdy's middling score as an indication she wants to put up some kind of fight, makes her walk in heels, practice smiling sweetly and giggling, all while giving her unwanted pointers.
"Make them think you're sweet," she advises. "You've got a childlike aura about you."
"I am a child," Birdy reminds her, nearly twisting her ankle in the awful heels. "Do I have to practice this? I mean, I'm never gonna wear these things."
"On stage you will," Miss Mary tells her without so much as a smirk. "You need the height."
Grumbling the entire time, Birdy practices until Ursula arrives and drags her to her room to dress her.
Miss Mary stays in the room, overseeing the entire painful process, which involves curling Birdy's hair into tight spirals and dusting sparkling dust over her whole body.
"It burns," Birdy complains.
"It brings out your eyes!" Ursula chirps.
Unless she's sprayed it in Birdy's eyes as well, that statement is nothing but mad chatter.
The dress, which Birdy fears is going to be gingham again, actually turns out to be pale blue.
It's sleeves are puffy and there's some itchy material under the skirt to give it 'volume', but other than that, it isn't wholly bad.
It's not 'just the most beautiful, wonderful thing ever!' as Ursula and the prep team deem it, but it is far less horrendous than the opening ceremonies outfit. At the very least there's no bonnet.
Once the finishing touches are in place, which includes globing a thick goop on Birdy's lips to 'catch the camera's eye', Miss Mary takes her down to await the interview.
"They've changed it again," Miss Mary murmurs as they step into the room.
It's starkly white with metal benches, cold white lights burning dimly in the ceiling. Several of the other Tributes are already there, including Laisa and Dash.
Taking Birdy by the shoulders, Miss Mary forces a smile. It looks more like a grimace.
"Promise me you'll do your very best out there. No being smart-mouthed. Got it?"
Birdy nods mutely, unsure why it's so important she do well and wondering if Miss Mary is this maddeningly pushy with all her Tributes.
Her silent agreement isn't enough for Miss Mary. She gives Birdy a slight shake. "Say it. Promise."
It startles Birdy into speech. "Yeah, yeah, I promise."
Miss Mary grimaces again, then tugs one of Birdy's too tight curls. "Remember to smile."
Birdy gives her the biggest, cheesiest smile she can muster before a Peacekeeper comes and escorts Miss Mary away, leaving Birdy to wander over to where her allies are restlessly practicing.
Laisa is sitting, smoothing her tangerine colored dress on her legs anxiously, while Dash is pacing, muttering to himself. He's so distracted he nearly trips over Birdy.
"Nervous much?" she asks, trying to stay on her feet in her heels.
Dash grunts something that sounds like 'affirmative' before turning on his heels and pacing some more.
Laisa chews her lips and shrugs. "A bit. You?"
"What's the worst that can happen? I mean, look where we are."
About to pretend to care what the Capitol thinks of them in some misguided attempt to survive at their mercy. Not exactly a great position. Nerves won't change a thing.
Laisa grimaces as she looks around the room, now filling with the other Tributes, then nods in resignation.
Birdy almost feels bad for possibly zapping what little hope the other girl might have, but pushes the feeling aside. There's no place for false hope for people in their position.
Dash slumps down on the bench, looking paler with each passing minute and Birdy is considering asking him if he should put his head between his knees or something, when an elbow makes soft contact with her shoulder.
Looking over, she finds Gus leaning lazily against the wall beside her.
He certainly fared better than her this round.
His shirt is simple, light blue to match Birdy's dress, and plain black pants, boots, and a Stetson.
"Not bad," Birdy tells him, eyeing his outfit critically. "Apparently you can shine a turd."
"I was gonna say the same thing myself," he chuckles before grinning at Laisa and winking. "Lookin' good."
In place of a reply Laisa blushes furiously and mumbles something unintelligible.
Either ignoring her very blatant crush or being too obtuse to notice, Gus looks back to Birdy.
"What were your marching orders?"
"Be sweet. Don't be a smart-ass. You?"
"Be charming."
Birdy nods thoughtfully. "So we'll both be playin' against type. Fabulous."
Laisa chuckles a little at that and Dash makes a noise that Birdy would almost call a laugh, before they glance around and motion for the other two to do the same.
"What's the plan? For tomorrow," Dash asks, sweat beading on his forehead.
Birdy almost jokes that there's not much need for a plan, they'll all probably be dead by the time the gong stops ringing, but gets cut off by Gus.
"Tomorrow, we stick together. We get away from the Cornucopia and stay together."
When Dash looks like he might have something to say about that, Gus shakes his head.
He looks so adult, commanding and certain, that no one argues with him. He's the man with the plan, and there's no room for discussion. Not on this.
Slumping back onto his seat, Dash nods and keeps his opinion to himself.
Laisa begins fussing with her dress again, trying to pull the neckline up to no avail, and her anxiety begins drifting to Birdy.
"I see One is going with the transparent clothing choice again," she says, looking around, trying to ward off Laisa's infectious fidgeting. "Once again leaving nothing to the imagination, not that anyone from One has any imagination to begin with."
Squinting around, she sees the pair from Four
"A seashell bra? Never seen that before." She waves lazily at the male. "Though not to be outdone, that conch shell cod piece is sure to be a fan favorite. It's so rare that a male Tribute gets to start a fashion trend. Though, as someone who has participated in many a castration, that shell is undoubtedly oversized."
Gus snorts while Dash looks up, squinting at the male Tribute.
"How big are they normally?" Laisa asks, her features pinched up as she looks away from the boy from Four.
Before Birdy can answer, they call them to attention.
"Line up!" An unnaturally tall, too thin woman with a raspy voice commands them, shoving them with her spindly hands into a line.
They watch the other interviews slowly tick by, each as boring as the last to Birdy.
Laisa and Dash do well enough, though they hardly well enough to draw sponsors. At least they can string two words together to form a sentence, something the Twos seem entirely incapable of.
"They may as well just've grunted the whole time," she whispers to Gus.
The boy from Four, whose name is Ray Benthos, doesn't actually seem like a complete jackass as he speaks about his brother and sisters back home, and Birdy feels a twinge of remorse that he'll likely be killed by the bloodthirsty swine from One and Two. It's only a small twinge though. It might've just been hunger pains.
By the time the name 'Phoebe Alameda' is called, Birdy has zoned out, having to be roused from her stupor by Gus. She glances back at him, as the skeletal woman guides her out, giving him one last icy smile before she's thrust into the bright light of the stage.
Caesar Flickerman smiles broadly with his blindingly white, perfectly straight teeth and beckons Birdy with his immaculately manicured hand to the center of the stage.
He's a strange kind of comfort. In all the newness of the Capitol, Caesar is familiar, he's friendly-seemingly genuinely so-and he's going to help her.
Whatever helping her might mean, she isn't sure herself.
"Ah! Our little Phoebe. The baby of our Tributes." He wags a finger at her. "You almost missed your name at your Reaping young lady."
Caesar pats her hand as she jumps up and scoots into the too large chair across from him, her face already hurting from smiling.
"But you made it tonight!" He turns to the crowd which roars its approval.
Birdy just barely manages to keep from rolling her eyes. What was so grand about that?
She forces a beaming smile onto her face and pitches her voice up, twice as childlike. "Wouldn't miss it for the world!"
They eat it up, cheering at her clear delight at being in their presence.
"Well now, Phoebe, you're the youngest competitor this year. How do you feel about that?"
She gives him a mischievous smile; she can almost feel her eyes sparkling in the boiling overhead lights and has to fight to keep them from watering up and ruining her makeup.
"Well, Mr. Flickerman, I'm sure my opponents can function quite well despite their obvious disadvantage."
Caesar looked puzzled for a moment. "Disadvantage?"
Birdy smiles pleasantly. "Their advanced age. I assume that's what you were talking about. I mean, my youthfulness is clearly my strong point."
She'd read the quip, or some version of it, years before and somehow it just seemed like the right thing to say. Judging from the laughter it gets her, she isn't wrong.
Caesar throws back his head and lets out a booming laugh. His canary yellow hair shakes and Birdy wonders if yellow is simply in vogue this year.
"You are a clever little creature aren't you?" He pats her head and she tries not to cringe. "Tell me Phoebe, what do you look forward to doing if you win?"
She tilts her head thoughtfully.
His question throws her a bit. She doesn't plan on winning so she hasn't really put any thought into the future past the next meal.
"I think I'd like the Tour. Get to see all the other Districts." She feels her heart speed up, remembering her life on the move when her dad had been alive and they'd constantly been traveling the plains. "There's so much out there I'd like to see, like the ocean and the big forests."
It's the first honest thing she's said since being in the Capitol, she's fairly certain of it.
"I think that's a wonderful aspiration," Caesar tells her, smiling genuinely at her. "And let's all hope you get to live it out."
#######
Gus' interview goes well, at least as far as Birdy can tell.
He's charming and cheerful, smiles at all the right intervals, and makes the crowd laugh. All in all, the two of them do fairly well.
Lineus titters and trills about how wonderfully they'd done and how they're bound to be raking in the Sponsors by the next morning.
Miss Mary and Mr. Brandsetter tell them both they couldn't have done any better before sending them off to bed.
"You need…you need to sleep." Mary Jacson tells them as she give them both a hug and a quick peck on the cheek. "I'll see you in the morning."
It's too much affection, and Birdy grimaces as she walks away, trying to wipe the lipstick from her cheek.
When they reach their doors Gus turned to her, Miss Mary's red lipstick still marking his cheek.
"Birdy…are you scared?"
She is. It's hard not to be. She refuses to let that bit of information out though. Admitting she's afraid won't change a thing, and she'd like to go out with him believing that she isn't a scared little kid.
Even if it's a lie.
She shakes her head. "Nope." She gave him a half-hearted shrug. "No one really knows what tomorrow brings. We die in the arena or we die in the District. You can't outrun it."
Then end sum is the same, even if the way they get to it is different.
Hester is dead. Matt is dead. Cliff, their mom, their dad, all dead. They hadn't been Reaped and the still died young.
None of it makes a difference.
Gus frowns and nods. "Yeah, I guess. Still we should have probably made a better plan."
All his certainty from hours before has evaporated from his eyes, and Birdy can't stop herself from trying to comfort him. Even if it'll all be cold by the morning.
"We stick together. We get away from the bloodbath and we stick together." She hardens her expression. "The Careers'll tear each other up for us then all we'll have to worry about it surviving whatever the Gamemakers throw at us. We just have to stay alive."
At least until they die, but she leaves that out.
Gus sighs and runs a hand through his hair, setting his curls free, falling in his eyes.
"Yeah." He smiles sadly. "See you in the morning, Bird."
"In the morning," she nods. "'Night."
#######
Birdy sleeps surprisingly well.
She supposes it's the sleep of the doomed. Like all the other nights since the Reaping it's blissfully dreamless.
When she wakes it's to what appears to be a very large canary perched in her bedside table.
"Ahhh!" Birdy skitters back, her head banging on the glass behind her. "Oh, it's you."
Ursula frowns then brightens. "Of course it is!"
Nothing it seems, not even the impending death of the girl she'd dressed for the past few days, can dampen the stylist's mood.
"Be smart. Be safe," Miss Mary whispers to them, giving them each one last hug.
Birdy smiles for her and stays quiet. There's nothing left to say.
Miss Mary only frowns at her silence as she watches the two Tributes being shuffled away.
Then they're gone. Probably never to be seen again.
They're placed on a windowless transport. Gus is seated between Ray from Four and that monstrosity Titus, while Birdy finds herself wedged between the wall and Breaker from Five.
"Arm," a stout man grumbles at her pointing to her left arm.
"Yes, that is an arm. Very good. You clearly have taken some kind of advanced anatomy class."
He narrows his eyes at her. "Just put it out your arm, kid. I need to put in your tracker."
Birdy jumps a little as the tracking device is shot into her arm.
Just like cattle, she thinks duly, rubbing her stinging she's always suspected how the Gamemakers keep such close tabs on the Tributes, she's had never really known. It's a bit of confirmation she could have happily lived without.
They unload a little over an hour later.
The Tributes are ushered into their launch rooms to change and have one last meal.
As Birdy looks around she labels it for what it is. A holding pen before the slaughter.
Ursula chatters on as Birdy changes into her arena outfit, a pants, boots, and a tank top, all in the same endless shade of black.
Ursula helps her pull her hair back into a pony tail, all the while chattering, and Birdy wishes dearly that she would stop when suddenly she does. Abruptly she's pulled her tiny Tribute into a crushing hug, begun blubbering loudly.
"Oh it's been so lovely meeting you!" Her eyes water. "You Tributes from Ten don't seem to make it too far but you always have the loveliest manners."
It's an odd sort of compliment and Birdy almost feels bad for her.
Almost.
When they finally separate Birdy frowns.
"Ursula? Do they let the Stylist clean up the Tribute, you know…after?"
For the first time since their meeting, Ursula looks subdued. She smiles sadly.
"Yes. We prepare the…them before they're returned to the District."
Birdy nods, takes a breath, forcing down tears threatening to pour out.
"Can I ask you a favor? When you send me back, dress me in green. Dark green. And nothin' fancy please. I just want to go home and have them recognize me."
She wants to just be herself one last time.
Ursula looks almost thoughtful, tears shimmering in her falsely colored eyes. "Of course."
A man's voice comes overhead, telling the Tributes to get in their chutes only seconds later.
The glass comes down around her, once she's standing at the center of the room, cutting Ursula off.
Birdy can see mascara tear tracks down Ursula's yellow cheeks and finds herself thinking that despite being obnoxious and self-absorbed, her stylist isn't so bad. It's a hard feeling to hold onto when she remembers Ursula is probably only upset about losing her latest mannequin and will have to wait a whole year to have such fun again.
The top slides open and muted light pours in as the floor raises her up.
Birdy reaches out, bangs on the glass, and Ursula looks up, still crying.
In the last few moments before she's pushed out of sight Birdy mouths the word 'thanks' despite herself.
Then the light blinds her as she reaches the topside.