Author: Howlynn
Realm: The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
Story Title: The Mockingjay and the Chameleon9
Summary: Lessons with Finnick
Character/Relationships: Katniss and gale/haymitch/peeta/finn , lots of other off camera pairings
Chapter 9
Our Team found little luck even upon landing. We parachuted in and landed right on a pod. It was full of little walking tin cans. We stared at them in confusion. They looked like lurching little child's toys. They stumbled around. One settled down and seemed to nestle next to Gale. He kicked it away. Nothing happened and everyone began to kick them. Whatever they were, they appeared to have malfunctioned.
We began to group up and the tin cans wandered blind and now ignored. Then one released a sticky thread and wound itself up Boggs leg. And two more had attached themselves by the time he got the first one off. He looked down and franticly tried to yank them off when they exploded. Gale went into action immediately and began shooting the damned things as we tried to drag Boggs into a building and administer first aid. There was no chance. I came outside in time to see that Gale had ordered the others inside as he'd stood shooting the devices.
"Gale!" I screamed. One of them was on him and he'd not even noticed it because he was focused on shooting them and they were focused on him now. I ran toward him as chunks of his flesh suddenly no longer existed. I grabbed him and drug him inside and sent an exploding arrow at the rest.
It set off a terrible round of explosions. Gale had taken a terrible hit and lost half of his leg within five steps. I couldn't go back to get it. He was covered in shrapnel and there was no fixing his internal injuries. Boggs lost both of his legs. I lifted Gale to the soft couch. I told him he was going to be fine but his eyes told me he knew he was saying goodbye.
He held on to me trying to say too many things. "I know I drove you to him with my temper. I didn't mean to call you a whore. Never thought that. Guilt about Jo. Meant to fix s... someday..."
I smile at him and tell him I will love him forever and we fixed it in the woods. I am trying to get rescue on the phone, even though I have seen enough death to know he's already gone. I hold him and feel like screaming, but I swallow it.
"Coin is going to kill him Katniss. She will kill Haymitch..." he says just above breath.
"Hang on Gale. Please don't leave me. Johanna will never forgive you..."
"Catnip. Are we going hunting today?" His eyes look at me but I don't think he sees me. "I will wait for you at our rock. Try to get away if you can. I think that lynx must like you. I saw him trailing you. No. Catnip? Why did you kill the lynx? He was your guardian? It was like watching you kill a friend."
I have never heard him say this and it makes me feel guilty. It makes me feel like all the horrible in the world is my fault for killing that damned cat. "Gale. Stay with me?"
"Yes. I'll run away with you." He coughs but his eyes open and he looks right at me and he shakes his head a little. "I am sorry. Catnip...tell Jo I…Tell Jo…" was the last thing he said as he began to choke on his own blood.
We had to leave them behind. My earpiece crackled to life and Haymitch in my ear whispered to me. "Alright Katniss, may the seventy sixth hunger games begin. I am going to keep you alive no matter what. Now say Goodbye to your cousin and let him do what he must. You have to move and you can't leave them alive."
Tearfully I kissed Gale. "I love you." I whisper to him as I put the pill in his mouth with shaking fingers. He bites down on the nightlock capsule. It was quick and relatively painless. I hovered there for a moment and kissed him again before laying him down and covering his face with a fur coat I found in the abandoned apartment we sheltered in. Boggs died and Peeta covered him as well. Finnick pulled me away from Gale.
"Come on Katniss we have to move. We have to go into the tunnels." He leads me away as my vision clouded in memory of Gale. We moved from house to house as we made our way to the mansion. We were trying to access the underground when Haymitch began screaming for us to get out, it was a trap. We move as the building explodes.
We are in an apartment, scavenging for food when Haymitch is in my ear again. "Sweetheart, they have found you. You're surrounded. It is over; surrender and I will save you." The television in the apartment flashes on and we are treated to the vision of the entire block filled with peacekeepers. They cover the rooftop and every building. They are announcing that if we surrender we will be shown mercy. My heart stops as Snow himself begins discussing what the next step is, if we have to be taken. Finally Castor and Pollux, the camera crew, find access to the tunnels. We come up with a plan. They remove the equipment and we leave it sitting in a chair facing the doors. The feed shows us all waiting for the battle, we vow not to surrender, but behind the cameras, we are setting the destruct sequence for the device Boggs has trusted me with. One by one we sneak down into the sewers of the capital and watch the feed on a hand held screen to know when to press the detonation.
The peacekeepers burst into the room from the back and front. They literally shoot each other in their frenzy and then the screen goes blank for a second as the explosion rocks the entire building we had just vacated. The explosion is so forceful it collapses the tunnels and we are running for our lives trying to not be crushed in the rubble.
Pollux leads us through the maze like he's running through his own living room. Finally he pushes a code on a box by a door and we sink exhausted into a maintenance shed. The TV is active here and we watch the building collapse and the capital announce our death. I realize I have lost my earpiece in the hustle. I don't have Haymitch with me anymore. He will know it is not on me. He would have seen my vital signs and known I was safe. He must think I am dead. I have to push it from my mind for now. I can't think about him or Gale. He will have to hang on for a bit. I will contact him as soon as I can. We can't take a chance over an open line.
They rerun the scene over and over announcing the rebellion is over. They tell the audience to put down their weapons because the war has caused enough grief at the hand of an insane tyrant, meaning me.
Just then Beedee breaks the hold on the feed and Coin begins eulogizing me and others. She speaks at length about Gale Hawthorne and praises my sacrifice, admonishing everyone to not give up and give my tragic death as well as Peeta Mellark's a meaning. They show me on fire in Cinna's many costumes, they flash on the moment I had been shot and how I still had been determined to fight on.
This was all amusing and we were cracking jokes about how nobody knew how much Coin had liked me. We are a little crazy at the moment. Fear and grief have to be set to the side. I have to laugh too as she even manages to scare up real tears at my death. We are in the room eating canned soup and drinking soda from the machine we'd smashed when the fun of this ends for me.
Haymitch stands before the camera shaking in grief. They hold onto his face and I burst into tears at his terrible broken face. He looks a hundred years old. Finally he begins to speak. "The last thing I will ever love on this earth has just been taken from me. Katniss should never have been mine but Peeta was no longer anything but a capital highjacked Mutt by the time we could rescue him. I was a small comfort for her and only his loss allowed her to care for me, but I truly loved her. I want everyone to know that. I loved them both, and want you to know that what little of him that was left died protecting her today. They are gone. Together for all time.
' We must honor them now. We must fulfill their dreams and end this. Fight now without will to survive, like my beautiful girl on fire, did for each of you. She left me, for all of you. I want to read her words to you. I couldn't face saying goodbye to her and most of you can guess what I was up to as she boarded the transports and began her final journey. But I want you to hear her one last time as you make your decisions about what the next few hours mean to you. I know they have inspired me to carry on and fight to the end for her. I give the rebels the last words of our Mockingjay."
Dearest Haymitch,
I loved Gale and I loved Peeta with my soul. When Peeta was removed from my life, all I wanted was death, until I knew you. I wish we didn't have to be more than two people deeply, madly in love. I do love you and I have lay here next to you memorizing you. Know, if this doesn't go as I hope, and I do know the small odds of its success, that you will be the last thought in my heart and the last word on my lips. I can only hope you will find peace in knowing that even apart I will worship what we found until the end if time. If I am not here to see it, make the end of time a better place for the children of the hunger games. Don't end in despair but bring me triumph once and for all. Make the world better, and know every step, I will send you my love. My heart is yours forever Haymitch Abernathy and I was blessed to have had the honor of knowing you watched out for me no matter how stupid I acted.
I know you can't understand why I can't just let this go and stay by your side. I want to be with you my love, but I owe a debt that even my small life will never pay. People believed in me and have fought and died on my word. They have found hope and pain and vengeance in my words. I owe them my best effort. I owe Rue's family and Threshes. I owe Cinna who made me more and died for his effort. I owe so many people that there isn't time to make a list. You know that in twelve, paying debts is honor.
If I just cling to you, and take all the joy you have brought me, I have to lose my honor. It is too high of a price even for you my own darling drunken mysteries magnificent sweetheart. There are no words for you, but you know I proudly wore the dishonor of being true to my heart when others couldn't accept that I had found love beyond childish romance. I loved you, and all others be damned, I cherish you. But my debt is too high to pretend Haymitch and I must go. If you love me like I believe you do, you will let me fall in honor and pick up my torch and let me burn on. Burn for me my love, and feed that fire until the evil we have known is dust and ashes.
Then build the new place and let the bells toll for the dead in freedom. Let everyone know that the man with the bottle was the fuel that warmed the boy with the bread and most of all set the girl on fire ablaze. Thank you for every moment Haymitch. Now raise a toast for me and fight on.
Katniss – burning for you.
I couldn't believe he'd read this whole personal thing before all of Panem. I couldn't believe he smiled as he sobbed and raised a glass of blood red wine to me. In the crowd hundreds of glasses were raised and they murmured two words together. "Ever Remember."
Haymitch smiles through his tears and says tenderly "Farewell, Sweetheart"
Snow breaks in and he rants against me and my acts of war. I sink to the ground in sorrow for what my poor Haymitch was feeling right now. Peeta is beside me then, he wraps his arms around me. "I know it's hard for you to see him suffering, but this is the best thing that could happen. They think we are dead and so it's perfect for us to strike. It will be pure joy for him when everyone finds out and we capture Snow. He lifts my chin and he kisses me softly. I don't know what to say, it is the first contact I have had from him since he choked me.
"Peeta I.."
"Shhh, it was just for old times. I know you belong to him now, but I belong to you again." His face is strong and I do see the boy I loved in his eyes again. "I will get you back to him somehow."
Finnick and Peeta get me through the next few hours. They were not Gale fans, but they know it is eating me as well as my concern for Haymitch.
We sleep for a while as the camera feed shows them making Herculean efforts to recover our bodies. The melted bits of the camera crew are shown, covered with gore as they remove them from the heap of stone that was once a building. They actually pretend that they are trying to rescue me, and say there is some small hope of bringing me to trial. I wonder if Haymitch hopes too, or if he is resolved that in this case, me being dead is better. I wonder if he's drunk yet or if his bleary eyes still watch the feed in horror. I understood his words, if it were me, I would watch him die until I went insane.
It is after midnight as we begin our final journey toward the Mansion and I feel like something is not right in the tunnels. I can feel a whispering and turn to see it is coming from Peeta. His eyes are bright and they are full of madness. We are near the place we need to ascend when the mutts attack.
One by one our team falls as they buy time for the rest of us. I take some out with my ample arrows but there are more to take their place. I am running out of ammunition and they keep saying my name over and over, drawn to us by the smell of me. I hear the screaming as they die, sacrificing themselves for the greater good. But Peeta attacks me and only Finnick can drag him off me. Finnick demands that the rest of us run and I hear the howl of the Mutts as we climb out of the tunnels leaving Peeta and Finnick to be consumed by the horrible creatures that are in the tunnel. I can't think of it right now. I can only think of what I must do. I glance back seeing Finnick smile a teary smile at me and Peeta bucks and screams.
There are few guards and I quickly stumble right into Snow as he rushes from his office into the hallway. I am nearly paralyzed in fear as I smell the roses and blood that is his trademark aroma. He smiles and puts a pistol to my head.
"Ahh, Miss Everdeen, I am not surprised to see you. I knew even death would not stop you. It's a shame I will have to waste all our many pleasures we could share, but I think I will just …" he stops speaking and my eyes widen as Peeta and Finnick reach around him and hold a large knife to his throat. He laughs. "Miss Everdeen perhaps you should look at the television. Give yourself up. I have a remote control here in my hand. See the children?"
I realize what he is saying. Outside in the snow is a holding pen. Hundreds of children shiver in misery. They are capital children.
"Capture me alive and I spare them all, but if my heart stops – they are wired to go with me." He laughs. "I am only asking for a fair trial my dear. People have loved me for so long, they must be entertained."
Peeta adds, "It's the right thing to do Katniss. Even if he wants it, it is the right thing to do." I am so exhausted and Finnick is nodding at me that he agrees. It will get me on TV faster and Haymitch will know I am safe.
"Only if you surrender."
He shrugs and nods.
We hook up the camera. "Ladies and gentlemen My name I Katniss Everdeen and the war is over. I have with me President Snow, and he has surrendered all Captial forces to me. The war Is over. Haymitch, I love you and I am coming home." There is silence as President Snow formally surrenders and the peacekeepers begin to lay down their arms. Then more silence and from outside you can hear the cacophony of celebration.
I have Snow chained and I can't help but watch the children now pouring out of the fence. A Hover craft has released medics from 13 to help and there I pick out my mother leading a line of children and carrying two small forms toward the craft with the Red Cross blazing on the side. I take a deep breath and I shake in relief that I have somehow pulled this off. Then the explosion rocks our building. Horror is no name for the sight.
I spin on Snow and he seems as shocked and confused as I am. "No I didn't. Look. It is still armed. If you kill me it will detonate. And you will never find Cinna!"
