"Cut!" Cressida stomped through the muddy grass between the crew and Johanna, who was dislodging her axe from the tree she had emphatically struck it into. Cressida placed her hand on the younger girl's shoulder. "Johanna, that was great. I think we've gotten all we need for today. We're wanted back at the base."

Johanna shook her head and tucked her hatchet back into her belt. "I can't believe these propos are even airing. Who wants to see me chuck hatchets into a tree?"

Cressida smirked. "I bet you District Seven will find that very inspiring." Johanna shrugged her shoulders. "Oddly enough, any images of you are compelling to the audience. Though I do agree, it's been tough since they won't clear you for combat yet."

"How is that odd?" Johanna inquired, imitating offense. She hooked her arm over Cressida's shoulder. "You're the one who risked your life to go to Thirteen just for me. You should know the power of my strong good looks and the allure of my charisma."

"Not for you," Cressida clarified with a cheeky grin. "Because of you, yes. Is that why your ego is so large? I could barely fit it in the frame."

Johanna stuck her tongue out and kicked some loose twigs as they trekked back toward the Command Center for the rebels of 2. "I could strip," she suggested with a salacious grin. Cressida shot her a dirty look. "Oh come on. 'The Mockingjay Bares All.' If I flash some boobs maybe things will start picking up here." District 2 had been somewhat of a letdown to Johanna; all the fighting was in the villages surrounding the Nut, and she wasn't allowed anywhere near them. They moved her and John around the outer villages, and transported them back and forth between their cabin and the command center for meetings.

"As intriguing as that sounds," Johanna raised both her eyebrows, "I'd rather you kept your clothes on in front of the camera," Cressida instructed.

Johanna nodded her head and leaned toward Cressida's ear. "But behind the camera?" she drawled, brushing some hair from Cressida's neck. The blonde shoved Johanna away from her playfully and shook her head and chuckled.

Living above ground was a giant improvement for her physically, if not at least a little bit emotionally. The villages were not unlike the buildings in the Market back in 12. Not as dilapidated as the Seam, but not as nice as their Victor's Village, which was still under Capitol control in 2. Johanna found the return to nature relaxing and cathartic, even if a lot of that meant hard sobbing alone underneath a tree, mourning the loss of Katniss. Still, it was a large improvement over shivering in a janitor's closet in 13, hoping no one would find her. The fiery sun persisted in rising, so she made herself stand. A world without Katniss should lack color, but here she was in the middle of these mountainous woods, surrounded by majestic purple summits and deep verdigris forests. Maybe it was just a small reminder that life would go on.


The rebel base of operations had quite a view of the Nut itself from one of the windows, which is where Johanna sat for most of the meetings. It was nice to be invited to the meetings, which usually consisted of Boggs, Commander Lyme from 2, and a few other rebel fighters Johanna didn't know. Johanna couldn't contribute much but her opinion on something one way or the other, since she had no real battle expertise. Fortunately, though, nobody seemed to think she was a liability. She was glad for the training back in 13 though. Between her brother and the rebels from 2, everyone was so fit and in shape. Her sickly, slim physique would've been embarrassing.

Two days prior, they invited some of the "brains" from 13 to come and help them deal with taking the control base for the Capitol. Gale was amongst them. Johanna looked across the sill at him as he watched the Nut carefully; with the same furrowed brow concentration he used to have back in the forests of home. Now his efforts were making bombs and snares that could kill not just lame prey, but hundreds or thousands of people. Johanna wasn't sure what bothered her more: that Gale was orchestrating such dastardly deeds, or that she didn't mind.

Killing Snow is what occupied her mind when she wasn't in the planning meetings with the rebels, and even most of the time when she was. Even now, as she sat on a windowsill with Gale staring out at the Nut, all she could think about was putting an axe through Snow's throat. The meeting inside was getting rather heated, with several of the rebel leaders suggesting various and useless ways to take the Nut down. Commander Lyme grew more and more frustrated and Johanna turned her attention to the tall, muscular blonde.

"The next person who suggests we take the entrances better have a brilliant plan to do so, because you'll be leading the attack yourself!" the leader shouted, slamming a blueprint on the table. Johanna liked Lyme. She wasn't sure when Lyme won her Games, but she was assertive and smart and Johanna knew she was in the presence of a former victor. She liked it.

"Is it so important that we take the Nut? Would it be enough to just disable it?" Gale asked quietly, gray eyes still fixed out the window. Beetee rolled over to their windowsill, peering out at what they were looking at.

"That would be a step in the right direction," Beetee responded carefully. "What were you thinking?"

Gale continued to stare out at the mountain, deep in thought. "Think of it as a wild dog den. You're not going to fight your way in. So you have two choices."

"Trap them inside or flush them out," Johanna finished for him, nodding her head. She understood what Gale was getting at, even if the rebels weren't sure yet. He wasn't just going to disable the Nut; he was going to kill everyone inside. They had done it a few times back home with a pack of wild dogs that had been killing their game. Flushing them out meant potentially letting loose a pack of wild dogs on just the three of them. Instead, Gale set a trap that closed the entrances; Katniss lit an arrow and set the inside on fire, and suffocated all the dogs within the den.

It was gruesome, but it worked. "We've tried bombing the entrances," Lyme inserted. "They are set too far in the stone to do any real damage."

"That's not what I was thinking." Gale stood up so Beetee could get a better view of the mountain. "See? Running down the sides?"

"Avalanche paths," Beetee whispered, adjusting his ill-fitting glasses. He stood up shakily from his chair and gripped the edge of the windowsill. "It'd be tricky. We'd have to design the detonation sequence carefully. And once we set it on motion, we couldn't hope to control it."

"We don't have to control it," Johanna supplied, "if we give up this obviously dead idea of trying to keep it. We just need to shut it down."

The rebels paused to consider this, talking amongst each other. Their entire plan was to rob the Nut from the Capitol, but perhaps ruining it all together would serve just as well. There was a general consensus that it was the best idea they'd had so far, until Boggs spoke. "You risk killing everyone inside. Look at this ventilation system." Lyme peered over at the blueprints, at over six feet tall she was able to see over his shoulder, not an easy task. "It's rudimentary at best."

"They could still escape out of the train tunnels," Beetee assured them.

Gale shrugged. "Not if we bomb them." Johanna gazed around the room as the full reality of Gale's plan played out on their faces. The gravity of his idea seemed to pull them all downward. Boggs took a seat in a nearby chair, rubbing his hairless chin with his fingers.

"The majority of the workers inside the Nut are citizens of Two," Beetee informed in a neutral tone, sitting back down in his wheelchair. Johanna watched her brother rise from his chair in the room and begin pacing back and forth.

"Who cares?" Gale asked, shrugging his shoulders. "We'll never be able to trust them again."

Lyme shot him a glare. "They should at least be given the chance to surrender."

"That's not a choice they were given in Twelve, now was it?" Gale accused, narrowing his eyes. "Children burned to death and no one could do anything but watch!" he screamed, clenching his fists. "Two young teenagers had to take care of hundreds of people. But you've always been so much cozier with the Capitol here." Commander Lyme stiffened her posture. "Do you think I care if they're soldiers? If I were in there, you'd know what I'd say? I'd say bring on the avalanches!"

And he would, Johanna knew. Gale would give his life for the rebellion. Johanna nodded her head. "This is how we should do it. Take down the Nut. We don't need it anyway." A few of the soldiers looked at her and she shrugged. "I'm with Gale, I'm sorry. What's everyone's problem? That the people inside won't die immediately? That they'll have some minutes, perhaps, to reflect on their lives? Big deal."

"It's just like how our fathers died," John said in a small voice. Johanna, for a moment, hated him for his youth. For his naiveté. She hated how he could still find sympathy and morality in life considering how much they had lost. "And our sisters."

"I don't care," Johanna replied tiredly. "There are rebels in there, sure. They might die. But how many more people are going to die if the Capitol continues to have its lifeline here? Hundreds? Thousands? We can't afford it."

"Exactly," Gale supported with a firm nod.

"Then it's not different than the Hunger Games, is it?" John questioned angrily, raising his voice. Johanna hadn't noticed how the timbre of his voice had dropped a little since she left for the Quell with Katniss. He really was becoming a man; it was a bittersweet pill to swallow. "Minimizing deaths for the greater good? I bet that's what President Snow thought when he bombed Twelve and destroyed our home. 'Losing one district is better than losing all of them.'" He clenched his fists at his sides. "Seventy-five years ago, is this what they did? Sat around and thought, hell if we only kill 23 kids a year that's better than killing everyone?"

"This is nothing like the Games!" Johanna barked at him, eyes wild. "This is war! And if we're snatching a page from Snow's book, so be it. Sometimes to destroy your enemy, you have to think like him."

"And when we do stop thinking like him?" John peered up at her with barely disguised disgust. "When we're done killing our own people? That's when we stop?"

"We stop when it's over," Johanna commented darkly, narrowing her matching brown eyes at her brother. "We don't stop until Snow watches everything he loves die around him. Until he has sucked in his last, desperate breath."

John stood firm and shook his head. "These people deserve a chance at mercy." He looked around the room. "I was in Twelve. I saw the bombings. Both of them." He shot Johanna a glare. "I smelled the burning flesh of babies and little kids. I heard the screams of people burning alive. Is that who we are? Is that why we're rebelling? So we can become as ruthless as the Capitol?"

Johanna stepped forward and using the slight height advantage she had on John to look down into his eyes. "Stop being a child. You're a soldier." Johanna knew exactly where to aim at her brother to hurt him. His stern face crumpled beneath her insult. "This is not about right and wrong anymore. That black and white place doesn't exist, it never did. This is not about mercy, this is about revenge."

Johanna's last words settled uneasily around the room and she stalked toward the window and sat back down in a huff. Boggs moved his dark eyes over to her and Gale. He took stock of them for a few silent moments, and then sat forward in his chair. "You said there was two ways. We could flush them out. Let them escape through the tunnels, and be waiting for them."

"You'd better be heavily armed," Gale warned. "They will be."

"We will," Lyme agreed with a nod of her head. "We'll have as much force as we can waiting for the trains."

Boggs sighed and stood from his seat. "I better let President Coin weigh in on this."


Johanna took to the woods again after the meeting while the rebels began making preparations to bomb the Nut. She knew President Coin would agree; it was unsettling how alike in their thoughts the two of them had become. President Coin was a pragmatist. Johanna was sure when they relayed the plan, she probably sat back and calculated the cost. How much it would cost to bomb, how many lives would be lost. How many potential rebels there were inside. What was the risk of letting them out? And would bombing the entrances seem too ruthless? Certainly she considered all of this, and disabling the Nut whilst still allowing potential escape was the best option. Johanna knew that deep down, if no one was looking, Coin would've leveled the whole district if it seemed more efficient. Johanna hated the large part of herself that would've agreed with that plan. Of all the things Snow had robbed her of, her empathy was most glaringly missing. She wasn't sure she'd ever get it back.

John forsook her company in favor of going back to their cabin, and Johanna didn't blame him. She embarrassed him and made him feel like a child in front of people he admired and respected. And he wasn't wrong. However, she was in no mood to be condescended to about mercy. The only person she had ever loved was stolen from her, a shrieking shell of her former self. The Capitol deserved punishment for her father's death, for her participation in the Games, for her sisters' deaths, for the bombing of Twelve. For little girls like Rue who had their lives stolen and countless others who needlessly suffered. And if aiming at the Capitol meant blood splatter on District 2? Johanna couldn't bring herself to care.


Short days later, all the preparations were in place. Johanna and Gale insisted on being on the forefront of the rebels waiting for the trains, which Boggs reluctantly agreed to. They waited, along with the rest of the rebels, for the trains to begin pulling into the square once the Nut had been shut down. Sirens screamed in the background, echoing the wailing that happened the day her father perished in the mines, but Johanna held firm. Her brother stood beside them, confidently aiming his gun down the blackened train tunnel.

"Johanna," Haymitch cut into Johanna's earpiece. Even after President Coin gave her approval for Gale and Johanna to be involved on the ground, Haymitch was the sole dissenter to that decision. "Be very careful."

"No, I thought I'd just start shooting everyone," she sneered with a roll of her eyes.

"Cute, but you know what I mean. Don't take any unnecessary risks." Johanna huffed, but nodded her consent. He could probably see her, she reasoned. "Interesting turn of events with Katniss this afternoon, I thought you should know." Johanna paused, steeling herself for the news. Interesting didn't necessarily mean good. "We showed her the clip of you singing 'The Hanging Tree.' It was never aired, so the Capitol couldn't have used it against her. She recognized the song."

Johanna felt the tears well up in her eyes and she wiped at her face against her Mockingjay suit. "What happened?"

"She said she remembered her father singing it. How the mockingjays would fall silent." Johanna's stomach twisted. "And she said she remembered you singing it to her before the Quell. She got very confused, but not angry. First time we've mentioned you and it didn't trigger a total meltdown."

Johanna didn't trust her own voice. In spite of the huge spotlights in the square and the fall of night, she tried to imagine singing in the meadow. Listening to Katniss sing to the mockingjays, hearing them sing back. She tried to put herself back there, wrapped into Katniss's arms, far away from this place. But that meadow was a graveyard now, those mockingjays certainly long gone. The cold chill of the breeze replaced the warmth of Katniss's arms in 2.

She couldn't fall into that trap of feeling sorry for herself because of Katniss. Katniss could be gone forever. The only thing that was certain, the only tangible goal she could feel in her palms, was getting to the Capitol and killing Snow. The heat coursed through her veins and gave her the only reason she had to wake up in the morning. The only reason she still had to turn into the Mockingjay.

Kill Snow.

"It's something Johanna. I know it's not much. But it's something. Don't do something stupid like throw your life away because of the girl. Not just because maybe there's hope, but also because it's really fucking stupid."

Johanna snarled and hissed into her microphone, "Shut up, Haymitch."

The screech of the train's wheels against the rails jerked Johanna's attention forward. She and the rest of the rebels fell back, waiting anxiously for the people to disembark. Slowly, blackened figures ridden with ash came pouring out of the doorways, gasping for air and coughing wildly. Johanna took a few steps forward, breaking herself from the line of rebels.

A man came toward her, stumbling to his knees. He looked like an ash-covered scarecrow, not well fed, with scraggly hair and bloody hands. Johanna raised her gun defensively at him, and he did the same toward her. Until, two tiny figures emerged from within the train and came running toward him. He stood up and they encircled his legs.

"Daddy!" the littler one shouted, hugging around his leg. Johanna scrunched her eyebrows in confusion, but kept her gun raised. She looked over at Johanna, wide blue eyes big and bright against the soot on her skin. "It's the Mockingjay!"

Johanna winced. "You brought your kids in there with you?" she asked incredulously, shaking her head in bafflement.

"Where would I bring them? The school isn't safe anymore. Rebels took one part of our village, the Capitol took the other part. My wife was killed in a firefight two weeks ago drying our laundry." He narrowed his eyes at her. "I keep them with me, so I can keep them safe."

"No such thing as safe."

"There was," he growled, placing his free hand on the back of one of his daughter's heads. She was blonde, the little one, shaking and clutching to her father. The other one was a bit taller with long brown hair, staring wide-eyed at Johanna. "There was until this rebellion started. Now my wife is gone. My family has been through enough. This has to stop."

"How does that stop? By your kids watching me kill you in front of your entire District?" One of the girls let out a scream and Johanna screwed her eyes shut.

"Please, don't," the older sister begged. "Please don't, Johanna."

Is this who she was now? Someone who killed a widower in front of his children? "I'm not the enemy," she said quietly, more to herself than to him.

The man scoffed. "You're not? Some girl from Twelve wants a revolution and my wife gets shot," he coughed, his voice strangled in emotion. "My two little girls nearly die in that avalanche? And you're not the enemy?" Johanna looked down at the girls. How fitting that they should look like Celadine and Aurelia, and how devastating to see what her actions did to them. Was she really no better than Snow? "Give me a reason why I shouldn't kill you right now."

"I can't," Johanna replied immediately. She put her gun down on the ground and kicked it toward him. She unhooked both her hatchets and let them clang to the ground. The bow, the stupid bow Beetee made her wear, she dropped that at her feet. "There's no end to my nightmare. I wake up every day and most of the time, I wish that I hadn't."

"And?" More of the rebels and 2 citizens continued to pour out of the trains, filling the square around the two of them. The armed rebels behind her kept their distance, and Johanna could hear John and Gale's voices instructing everyone to stay back.

Johanna sighed. "And... well, I force myself to get up, every day, with one thought. Kill Snow. Not kill the Capitol defenders, or the Peacekeepers, or any of you here in Two. All I want to do is kill President Coriolanus Snow. I tell myself that ten times a day." Johanna put her hands up. "You want to kill me? Fine. I'm done killing the Capitol's slaves for them."

The man trembled in anger, the whites of his eyes bright against the spotlights. "I am not one of their slaves."

"I am," she shrugged. "I became exactly what President Snow wanted me to be. A slave." Johanna looked up at the roofs of the buildings, teeming with snipers. "You see these people? These are your people, not your enemy. Commander Lyme, who was your victor, you fight against her?" Johanna sucked in a deep breath. "All we need to do is stop fighting each other, and start fighting the real enemy. President Snow. We kill Snow."

"Kill Snow," the man repeated, lowering his gun hesitantly to his side. "Kill Snow," he said again, louder, his voice strangled in his throat. "Kill Snow!" he shouted, raising his gun in the air. Others followed, chanting the two-word mantra that Johanna herself had repeated ad nauseum. Soon there was a chorus of "Kill Snow!" in the air, the picture of the rebels on the big projection screens rallying behind that thought. They'd better be filming, Johanna thought, because it didn't get much better than this.

Johanna looked back to smirk at Gale and when she turned back around, a shot rang out. There was shouting all around her but Johanna's ears filled with a loud hum. She could feel the thumping of her own heartbeat, and felt the cold gravel of the ground against the back of her head. There was a sharp tingling in her side and as she blinked up, she saw Katniss backed against the starless black sky. She was dressed in her hunting outfit, her father's worn old leather jacket hanging off her shoulders, her bow at her side. She was staring down at Johanna coldly, and then knelt next to her. Johanna's eyes followed Katniss's gray gaze to where her side tingled and she saw an arrow sticking out.

Katniss wrapped her fingers around the arrow, braced one hand on Johanna's abdomen, and yanked the bloody arrow out. Johanna felt her lifeblood pour from the wound.

The heartbeat in her ears slowed to a stop.


The first thing she felt was warmth. Someone's hands were around her own, rubbing them as if to coax warmth into them. She flexed her fingers and opened her eyes to stare at the white ceiling of the hospital in 13. Her head lolled to the side and she got a glimpse of the man giving her hands warmth. Cinna.

His warm smile emerged on his face as he watched her open her eyes. "Mockingjay. I knew you wouldn't be down for long."

Johanna nodded and looked down at her hospital gown to assess where her injury was. "What happened?"

"You were shot," he filled in, placing a gentle hand on her abdomen. "Luckily, your brilliant designer fashioned your suit to deflect bullets." Johanna smiled weakly at him. "Ruptured your spleen, but fortunately you don't need it."

"I guess it isn't what's on the inside that counts. As long as they didn't ruin the moneymaker." Johanna lifted her hand and brushed it over her face. Cinna let out a short laugh.

"No your 'moneymaker' is still as beautiful as ever. But we need you whole to finish this rebellion." He paused. "They took Two."

Johanna's eyes widened in surprise and barely constrained hope. "Yeah?"

"Not officially," he replied quickly, waving his hand. "But that's what I've heard through the grapevine."

"Mm," Johanna pursed her lips. "Word travels fast down here."

"Then perhaps I should also tell you that there's been improvement in Katniss as well." Johanna heard the beeping of her heartbeat sound a little faster as she turned all her attention to Cinna. "They aired the taking of Two live here in Thirteen. They showed your propos and everything, but all that went down at the mountain with the trains? That was aired live at Haymitch's request. He insisted Katniss be allowed to watch it."

Johanna tried to form saliva in her mouth to swallow but none came. Instead she licked her lips. "What happened?"

"According to what I've heard, it was very encouraging. She was rooting for the rebels. For you." Johanna closed her eyes. "And when she saw you get shot, she was very upset."

Johanna's brown eyes opened and bored into Cinna's. "Yeah I bet she was real upset. Real upset she couldn't pull the trigger herself."

"She was worried about you," he replied with a smile. "Confused, but very worried. They called that young boy in to help her calm down. From what he gathered, your being shot disturbed her. Her concern for you seemed to temporarily override the lingering hatred she harbors. She asked him a lot of questions after that, but never flew into another rage."

Johanna tried to blink back the tears; feeling like she needed to retain her fluids, but the tears escaped her eyes and rolled down the sides of her face into her hair. Cinna used the soft pads of his thumbs to wipe the wet little trails her tears left down her temples. She relaxed back into her pillow. "That's good."

"Very good. I'll let you rest now but since you're awake, I'm sure the doctors will be around to check on you." He gave her a pat on the thigh as he rose from his chair.

"Cinna?" The curly-haired man turned around. "Would you mind talking to Katniss? I know they've sent in her family and Peeta, but I thought maybe you could help too. She knows you. Trusts you."

He gave her a nod. "I'll check with her doctors. Get some sleep, girl on fire." As he went to exit he passed John, who flashed him a brief smile before walking toward Johanna's bed.

"Hey kid," she greeted in a hoarse voice, giving him a wide smile. She dropped her voice to mimic Boggs. "What's the status of District Two, soldier?"

John let out a laugh. "Still some pockets of resistance in the richer villages, but we have it." He beamed proudly down at her. He was dressed in his normal District 13 jumpsuit instead of his soldier gear, indicating it was either Reflection or maybe dinner. He sat in the seat Cinna had been in, scraping it against the floor to bring it closer to her. "Look, I uh," he scratched the back of his neck with his short, grubby fingernails. "I'm sorry about how I acted in Two. I was being childish and I know that."

"It's not childish to have compassion," Johanna replied. "It's very brave, especially in these times, to have compassion for people on the other side of the fight. I'm sorry for what I said." Johanna smiled and rubbed his short hair affectionately. "Dad would be proud of you."

John rose and sat down on the edge of the bed, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. "I miss Dad a lot. And, I miss home, but I like it here. There's a lot of guys around, you know?"

Johanna grinned. "Didn't enjoy the chicken coop back home, eh?"

John shrugged, his pale skin blushing on his cheeks. "It was okay. I just didn't like being the only boy. It's nice now that Gale is around, and Vick and Rory. And Soldier Boggs said I'm the best in the class." He gave Johanna a proud smile before his stoic expression returned.

"I bet Prim is pretty impressed," Johanna said innocently, keeping her expression blank and John turned to her to gauge her sincerity. "You're both doing really well here."

John nodded. "I don't get to see her much; they have her in the infirmary a lot, or she's in medical classes. We eat lunch together, though. And dinner, sometimes, if I don't eat with the guys."

"You two get along pretty good, huh?"

The boy smiled sheepishly and looked away. "She's cool." John looked down at his commissioned communicuff. "Almost sleep time. I should get back to the compartment." He stood up, looking ten feet tall to Johanna in her bed. "Get better soon, Jo. We need to end this, and soon." His brown eyes turned urgent for a moment before relaxing. Johanna nodded, and he nodded back.

The tug of morphling drew Johanna back into a sleep, one that was filled with starless skies, arrows, blood, and enraged gray eyes swirling into thunderstorms that filled her ears and eyes and mouth, drowning her. Sleep was no reprieve from the nightmare of reality. Just a different version of the same hell.


Johanna's ribs weren't fully healed around a week later, but Plutarch and President Coin agreed to throw Finnick and Annie a wedding, and nothing short of being dead would have prevented Johanna from attending. The ceremony seemed to transform the people of 13, who didn't appear to ever have a holiday of their own to celebrate. The residents of 12 and 13, those lucky enough to attend, all gathered around the happy couple as they recited their vows.

Marriages in 4 must be something special, considering how intimate the process was as Johanna watched the happy couple. Back in 12 it was just get a piece of paper, go home and break some bread. Finnick and Annie's ceremony was beautiful, though. Both victors looked stunning; Gale went back to 12 while Johanna convalesced and got one of her dresses for Annie, and Cinna tailored one of Gale's suits for Finnick. Cinna really was fantastic at his work. Finnick's crisp white suit had a glimmer of blue in it when she moved. It somehow captured the feminine and masculine personality of the vivacious victor. Cinna had also fashioned something that looked like a net for Annie to wear in her long red hair, making her look like a mermaid princess.

The celebrations quickly moved into dancing, with Finnick and Annie taking the first dance to the slow strain of someone's fiddle. The people of 13 stood sheepishly around in a circle as the fiddle picked up its tempo, but no one dared start the dancing. Johanna nudged her brother next to her. "Go ask Prim to dance," she urged with a grin.

John looked up, horrified. "Oh, no, I couldn't."

"Why not? You can dance just fine. And look at her. She wants to dance." Johanna motioned across the room where Prim stood with her hands behind her back, tapping her toes to the music. "I bet she'd think it was pretty brave if you asked her to be the first on the dance floor." She shoved her brother forward. "You gonna let Rory Hawthorne get to her first? We Masons do not let another man steal our woman."

John glared at her, but reluctantly moved across the dance floor toward the blonde. He ran his fingers through his hair, and surreptitiously checked his breath, then gave a small bow and extended his hand toward Prim. Johanna beamed at them as they entered the dance floor and began a traditional 12 dance that included some foot stomping and handclaps. Others began to join in, and even some of the 13 residents watched and trickled in as they caught onto the moves.

Katniss would have loved this. Johanna would have loved to dance with her, to hold her in her arms and sway with her to the music. She would've enjoyed watching Katniss dance with Prim, even with Gale, happiness and light in her eyes. Melancholy started to overcome her and she put her hands in her pockets and tried to block out the wave of depression.

My name is Johanna Mason. I am eighteen years old. My home is -

Finnick took Johanna by the hands and dragged her onto the dance floor, encircling her waist and leading her in a simple waltz. "Congratulations," Johanna said, clasping her hands around the back of Finnick's neck. Over her shoulder she saw Gale dancing with Cashmere closely, and she smiled and turned her attention back to the newlywed blonde.

"Thank you. Not just for this, but for everything. None of this would've been possible without you, girl on fire." Finnick grinned her mega-watt smile, but there was a sincerity behind it that had been missing in the Capitol. There was a lot to Finnick now that had been missing in the Capitol. "You know, I spoke to Katniss." Johanna's eyes flicked up from the lapel of Finnick's suit to her eyes. "I think you need to talk to Haymitch."

"Why? She doesn't want to see me," Johanna lamented. "They keep telling me she's getting better, but... she's not here, is she?" Johanna asked rhetorically. "And she probably still thinks I'm a mutt."

Finnick tucked a loose tendril of Johanna's hair behind her ear and cupped her cheek. "Jo let me tell you something. Snow's built his entire career on a throne of fear. The Capitol fears him, the districts fear him, and even his closest confidantes fear him." Johanna nodded her head. "You didn't have to deal with this, because your victory was short-lived, but Snow..." The blonde heaved a sigh and danced them just a bit further away from the crowd. "President Snow used to sell me. My body." Johanna's eyes went wide. "I wasn't the only one. Just about any victor considered attractive and popular, he'd sell us to his friends as favors."

Johanna shivered in revulsion. Certainly that would've been the fate of she and Gale. How much could Snow have gotten for the girl on fire? And she would've done it, no question. "Prick."

Finnick nodded solemnly. "I know. And every time you turned him down, he killed someone you love. Eventually it got down to just Mags and Annie and I - I couldn't. So I agreed each and every time. Men, women, older, younger, whatever. High ranking Capitol officials and personal friends of his." Finnick grimaced in disgust but her eyes held Johanna's firmly. "Every year the amount of us in this group grew. Eventually, we started to talk."

"About what?"

"About how to get back at Snow. We went over the usual things - killing the people he sent to fuck us, trying to kill him ourselves. But we figured all of that would come back on the people we love. The very people we agreed to do it for. But then, I realized something. If Snow was going to use me for currency, I was going to make myself rich in his secrets. I had the ability to reach inside a person and pull out things they never wanted to say. Their heads on the pillow, shrouded in darkness, I could see inside them in a way the others could not."

Johanna scoffed. "And what did that get you?"

Finnick rolled her eyes. "Let me get to my point, Mason. My point is Katniss is not lost to you. She's still there, somewhere, in the muddled madness. I saw it in her eyes. She's there." Finnick's lips turned upward a bit. "She even hated me a little, but for the right reasons. Because of my affection for you. Because of the rebel plot she wasn't in on."

Johanna dropped Finnick's gaze and looked at the crowd of people dancing near them. Annie was just outside the circle, smiling deliriously and swaying to herself. "What if she isn't there?"

"Then you'll find her." Johanna met Finnick's eyes again, but the girl's beautiful sea-green eyes were over her shoulder, staring affectionately at the redhead behind them. "If someone is important to you, you always find them, no matter how hard they are to reach."

Once the song was over, Finnick bowed and Johanna pretended to curtsy, pulling out her standard-issue jumpsuit as if it were a dress. As she straightened her back, she moved closer to Finnick. "You should tell Plutarch what you told me. And anyone else here that might know some things about President Snow."

"Cashmere surely does. I saw her enough," Finnick replied dryly.

Johanna shook her head. "Tell Coin and Plutarch. Maybe Cressida can do a propo and you can smear President Snow. If he's got any supporters in the Capitol, they might desert him after hearing all this."

Finnick mused on that a moment, then nodded her assent. "Okay. Once all of this settles down, I'll have a chat with Heavensbee." She took Johanna by the wrist and smiled. "Don't be a stranger, girl on fire," she drawled with a wink.

Johanna passed by Annie on her way toward Haymitch and squeezed the girl's hand. Once she got to Haymitch, the soft look in her eyes fell away. "We need to talk," she demanded.

"Yes, we do," Haymitch agreed. He clapped his hand on her shoulder and escorted her into a hallway. Once they were clear of other partygoers, Haymitch sighed. "We don't know what's happening to her. Sometimes she's normal, rational, and then for no reason at all, she goes off the rails. She's talked to Gale, to Finnick. Her mother, her sister. Peeta's been very helpful. He seems to get through to her." Johanna quelled her jealousy, but Haymitch noted the flare of red on her cheeks. "He's very complimentary of you." Johanna looked away. "She watched what happened to you in Two."

"So I heard. She was apparently concerned for me?"

Haymitch nodded. "It was extraordinary. Her anger toward you has ebbed quite a bit since you left for Two, but seeing you get hurt seemed to shock her. Primrose suggested we try to hijack her back, showing positive clips of you and then giving her morphling. But after the propo in Two, we didn't think it was necessary. Since then, she hasn't had one of her rages. Not once."

Johanna ran her fingers through her hair. "So she's got run of the place?"

"No, she's still under heavy guard. But I've talked to her." Johanna looked up at Haymitch, narrowing her eyes at her former mentor. "She was angry with me, but because I didn't tell her about the rebel plot. Because I refused to let you tell her. Accused me of being a shitty mentor, all of which is true." Johanna rolled her eyes.

"At least her intuition is still there."

Haymitch gave her a tired look, his lips set in a firm line. Then, Johanna's heart fell into her stomach as Haymitch gave her the news. "She wants to see you."


Author's Note: Updating whilst I'm away; don't say I never gave you nothin'. And, as I have some of the next chap already written - and am pausing on my OITNB fic until I binge the new season on Friday (EEEEEEEEE) - the next should be up shortly.

Providing that my lovely beta Johannas-Motivational-Insults (thank you for your work on this chap!), doesn't mind the work on her vacation. But like, I'm pretty sure I can convince her.