I'm BACK! With an extra-long chapter, because the last one is short, and I finally hit 10k words!
*does a happy dance*
Anyways, here's your extra-long chapter!
DISCLAIMER: I'm not Suzanne Collins. Therefore, I do not own the Hunger Games. Also, I don't like escalators.
I sneeze and flick open my eyes.
Prim gasps in surprise. "Oh! Peeta! I didn't know you were awake!"
"I wasn't," I smile at her, "not until about a minute ago."
"I'm so sorry," she apologizes profusely.
"No, really, Prim, it's okay." I try to give her a pat on the head, but I can't move because of the restraints on my arms on legs. "Huh?"
"We were watching you, and you kept twisting and turning, like it was a really bad nightmare," she explains. "And Dr. M decided to put the restraints on you so you wouldn't fall out of bed.
"Oh, okay."
"Ohmigosh!" Prim shrieks. "I need to tell him!" She flies out of the room and tows a grinning Dr. M into my room minutes later.
"Hello," he says, and I answer his greeting with another, "Hi, Doctor M."
"I think we can take these restraints off and take you to your room." He says. "You're a lot better. We have been injecting some medicine and it really helped. So now you're ready to be discharged!"
I grin.
Fifteen minutes later, I stand in my new room that I'm going to share with my older brother, Rye. My other brother, Chris and my father have the room right next to us. It's separated by a door on the inside of the room.
"So, little bro, how have you been?" Rye slaps me on the back in a typical greeting for us. I punch back.
"Not so great," I answer honestly.
"Oh, then I'll just have to fix it," he says cheerfully. This makes me nervous, because Rye is the family jokester.
"Sit in that chair," he directs. I decide that the chair can't hurt me, so I sit.
There is a loud farting noise, and I leap of the chair. Across the room, Rye is howling on the floor. I pull a whoopee cushion out of the chair.
I walk over to Rye. "This," I say nastily, "is not funny." I proceed to whap his head with the whoopee cushion.
Just then, my father comes in. "Hi, Dad!" Rye yells from on the floor.
He smiles, a crinkle in his eyebrows and wrinkling his cheeks. He looks much older than he really is, but when he smiles, he looks years younger.
"Hi, Peeta."
"What have you got?" asks Rye.
I punch him. "That was my question!"
He hands it to me. "See for yourself."
It's like a tiny television. I press the on button, and immediately I see Katniss's beautiful face.
It's a video. I press play.
"Hey, Peeta," says Haymitch from the video, looking actually pretty sober. Rare. "So how are you doing? I bet you're wondering about your pretty little Girl On Fire. Well, she's still alive."
"Haymitch!" shrieks a female voice, one I don't know. A hand reaches out and slaps Haymitch across the face. I chuckle. Not many have the guts to do that.
"Hi, Peeta," says the woman. "I'm Myla, one of the District Four mentors. Anyways, we heard you're getting a lot better, so we just wanted to say hello. Oh, and if you have any questions, ask your brothers or your father."
The screen fizzles and goes black.
"Is Katniss alright?" I ask.
"She's fine," my father replies. "She's still in the arena, but a hovercraft was sent to get her. They're going to break her, Finnick, and Johanna out. And Mags and Wiress."
"Where's my mother?" My father's face and Rye's harden, but Chris speaks up. "She was..killed."
"WHAT? HOW?" I yell, probably a lot louder than I should have.
"After you were picked up, the television screens in 12 went black. Nobody knew what to do. But in ten minutes, there were hovercrafts in the skies and bombs were raining down." Explains Chris. "The Hawthorne boys…Rory and Gale and Vick, I think, were running around town telling people to run for the woods. Us three made it," he indicates him, father, and Rye, "But your mother wanted to get something. She was too late."
"Oh," I say quietly.
Rye resumes where Chris left off. "Gale, the oldest one. He led us to a lake where we all took shelter. There were about 500 that survived. Well, the bombs were gone, but we were stuck. We couldn't go back to town, there was nothing. The Victor's Village survived though, nobody knows why. Anyways, Gale got some knives and three bows. We don't know where. Well technically, we do." He winks at me.
"Then he made more spears, and bows, and arrows. All of us who were able bodied helped feed and hunt for food. We were like that for three days until the 13 hovercrafts showed up. Then they took us, and well, here we are now."
"Okay…Um…So….I'm in District 13?" I ask.
My father nods.
"I'm starving."
My family wears identical expressions of confusion on their faces. I guess if you were told your mother just died and our hometown was bombed, you were supposed to be sad. But I'm just hungry.
"Er, okay," says Chris haltingly.
So we all walk up to the cafeteria together. Turns out they're hungry too.
A board reads the options for lunch. Stew with beef and mashed vegetables. A salad with turkey meat and tomatoes. A pasta dish with unfamiliar spices.
Rye opts for the pasta, Chris and father opt for the stew and I pick a salad because the other two look a little…..too much.
We sit down, at out assigned seats near the Hawthornes, and I notice, conveniently placed next to the Everdeens. Soon after we begin, Mrs. Everdeen and Prim come to sit at their table, which only has two seats.
"Hi, Peeta!" Prim waves to me.
I smile back. "Hey, Prim," It's a good thing she's working in a hospital. She's so bright and eager to learn, and it looks like she's pretty talented as well. Mrs Everdeen also works in the hospital, Prim tells me, but as a doctor instead of a trainee.
Prim and I chat while eating, and I share stories of the Capitol's lush buildings and the delish food, and she shares stories of District 13.
It's a wonderful lunch, but there's one thing missing.
Katniss.
As I stir awake, I notice Johanna and Mags sitting together,eating. Finnick and Wiress are still sleeping, though.
I comment, "Man, Finnick is a heavy sleeper."
Johanna snorts, and I continue. "I'm going to wake him up. Want to help?"
She humphs and walks over, but I can tell she wants to do it anyways. We each smear a little mud on our faces and lean over Finnick.
"Finnick," Johanna whistles, "time for wakie-wakies."
Now it's my turn to snort.
Finnick opens his eyes and yells, frantically grabbing for his trident before he realizes we're his allies.
I fall onto my back laughing and Johanna grins evilly, her version of laughing.
"Oh my gosh, you," he says, "shame on you, waking a victor so very rudely."
This just makes me giggle more.
When I finally stop laughing, I ask, "Where are we?"
"The arena," Finnick replies, popping a shrimp into his mouth.
"I thought you said we were leaving the arena.
Finnick shrugs. "Yeah, we have," he says, "To them. Look at your arm."
I look down at my forearm and gasp at the bloody bandage wrapped around it. Everyone else has one too.
"Cut out our trackers." Johanna replies.
"Oh." I say. Then, "Where's you put them?"
"I threw them into some bushes."
"Oh." This seems to be my new catchphrase.
I notice Wiress is awake as well, Apparently so does Finnick.
"Let's go," he says, shouldering his trident.
So we all go. This arena is huge, I notice as we trudge through the grass. It's not anywhere we've been before, which is weird. We went to the end of the one wedge, and they all were the same. We must be outside the forcefield, I notice just as Finnick stops in front of a, you guessed it, forcefield.
It's shimmery in the heat, but I can still see the other side. I twist Peeta's necklace around my fingers, wishing the real Peeta was here with me. He would know what to do.
"Now, we wait," says Finnick.
And amazingly, not five minutes later, a hovercraft appears. I squint at the insignia on its wing. District 13. I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding.
Finnick and Johanna wave their arms, to show where we are, so I join in. The hovercraft drops a ladder down to us. We climb on. It freezes us in place, like the one from my last Hunger Games, as it reels us upwards.
As soon as we get in, we're snatched away by white-coated men. The last thing I remember is shouting for Finnick and the rest not to leave me, but a flash of golden hair comes up behind me.
Fuzzy lamplight burns my eyes, and I flip over. And open my eyes, which are about two feet from Haymitch. He dozes with a knife in one hand.
"Haymitch?" I whisper tentatively. He jerks awake, brandishing his knife.
His face goes oddly slack for a second when he sees me, but then flashes away. "Hey, sweetheart," he says, not sounding as drunk as he usually is. Weird. Then I notice there's no bottle of alcohol near him. Even weirder.
"Haymitch." I say. "Where the heck am I?"
It takes Haymitch the better part of ten minutes to explain where I am, where Peeta and my family are, and what I'm supposed to do here. And why he has no alcohol.
The door creaks open, and I jump. But then I sit straighter as a blond head pokes in. Prim. "Katniss!" she shrieks. "Katniss, they said you were here—but I didn't know, and it's you! It's really you!" She flies over to my bed and gives me a bone-crushing hug, which I gladly return.
Then I realize something. "What day is it?"
"Second week of October," answers Prim promptly. "Why?"
"When did you rescue me?" I ask, feeling a sense of doom drawing nearer.
"The last week of August," says Haymitch gruffly.
Oh my gosh. I've been out for over a month. "Oh my—"
"Everyone's fine," Prim says reassuringly. When did my Little Duck become so mature? "Peeta's here too, and Mother, and Peeta's dad, and his brothers, and Gale, and Posy, and Hazelle, and Rory, and Vick.
While Prim lists the names of people that are here, I can only focus on one thing. Peeta is here.
"I need to go see Peeta," I say, slipping out of bed, not minding the ugly hospital gown, or the I.V. Tube on wheels. I put on some slippers.
"Well—Katniss—" says Prim "You're really supposed to stay here…"
But I can tell she doesn't mind. "Where is he?" I ask, and Prim leads me out the door with Haymitch following, dragging my I.V. because Prim told him to.
After countless corridors, two elevators and a small set of stairs, we reach a door that reads, 1303.
Prim knocks, and the door creaks open.
An eye peeks through the peephole, and the door flings open.
There's Peeta ,nothing but love on his face as he grins and pulls me in for a hug and a kiss.
All I can think is, Home.
Hooray! Everlark fans, rejoice! They're back together! *does another happy dance* I've been looking forward to this chapter, because it was just fun to write and I was happy to put them back together! :)
Also, Beetee's killing wasn't random, it was planned...it'll be significant in the future. Don't forget her's dead. (Gosh, that sounded so wrong.)
Chris and Rye's names are a tribute (no pun intended!) to ArthursCamelot HG rewrite. It's awesome. Go check it out.
So the summary for this chapter? Rye plays a joke, the Mellarks eat some food, Finnick and Johanna do the hula, Prim makes Haymitch into a servant, and PK are reunited!
This chapter's random review topic is bread. Make of it what you will. That review button is your friend. A quote, a joke, a favorit eline or two. It will make me happy. Happy authors kill less characters, so make the author happy! Feed her...feed her!
I believe that's it. If you read this entire thing, you deserve a Peeta-Mellark-frosted-cookie. Hooray for you!
Until next time-
~~FuzzySocksAndWriting