Chapter 14 – FIRST FLIGHT
Haymitch sat in his chair in the control centre and stared at a screen that hadn't shown anything new in hours. Government troops moving into District 2, a sabotaged railway in District 11, a list detailing supplies for the arms factories. Beetee got better and better hacking into Panem's data-streams. But it took time, and time was something they did not have.
The team had gone up to level 3 for dinner, and maybe he should go as well. But that meant facing people, and all that noise. And the food. He'd never much cared for sustenance in its solid form. One ate to keep the body functioning, simple as that. But not even he could stomach protein mash and carbohydrate slices day after fucking day.
In a flashback he remembered the burnt toast Rose had served him the first night he'd slept in her cabin.
Ah, sleep…
He hadn't slept without nightmares since they'd reached District 13. Chances were he never would ever again.
The door opened, and in the flickering light of the dozen or so screens he recognized Hazelle. The woman had opted for cleaning duty, claiming it was what she did best. Haymitch assumed it served her well. Like him, she preferred to work alone, be her own boss.
"Look who we've got here? And how are you on this fine evening, Abernathy?"
"What do you want, Hazelle?"
He switched off his screen and swivelled his chair so he faced her.
She shrugged and set the bucket down. "Can't we just chat? Thirteeners do that all the time."
"Last time we chatted you slapped my face." He frowned at her. "Kindly remind me which side that was, so I can present the other cheek."
"Ah, thank the fates, he's back to his own true self!" Hazelle commented dryly. "I knew the silent moping was only a phase."
Haymitch shot her a dark glance that didn't much impress this woman who'd known him all his life. "I never moped."
"Sure you did. Worse than Vick when he thinks his brother got more sweets than he." She smiled in reminiscence, and then her face grew serious again. "Before all this ... mess." A flutter of her hand encompassed the command centre with its shiny machines and flickering screens. "Before the Last Games and the bombing of 12, you never moped. Oh, make no mistake, you were a miserable bastard half the time and drunk the other half. But …"
She shrugged helplessly, lost for words. "You were focussed. We all knew you had a plan, only you wouldn't tell us until it was time. But now…"
Haymitch turned away from her too keen eyes and faced the wall. "I had a plan, alright," he said quietly. "And look where it took us. District 12 doesn't exist anymore, Panem is at war and we are refugees on sufferance."
"And your woman chose another man." Hazelle's eyes were full of sympathy but she kept her voice carefully schooled. She knew him so well, had hated him for so long, and had blamed him for her brother's death all those years. But now – Why? What had changed? – she could let go of all this and see him for who he really was: a man who'd tried his best, who'd been hurt again and again, and maybe had received one too many blows.
"I guess that means she wasn't my woman in the first place," he answered; still so quietly she could hardly hear it.
"I don't understand." She emptied the wastebaskets to keep busy – not that there was ever much waste in the bunkers of District 13. "You and Rose, you were right. We all knew it. You were perfect."
"Perfect." The word sounded like a swearword when he said it. "Hapless drunk and kind teacher. Reformed by the love of a good woman and all that?"
"Don't be silly," she snapped and started wiping the screens. "There isn't much that could reform you, save a time machine." She pushed his chair to the side to get better access. "Do you ever ask yourself if there was one moment, one minute, when you could have turned your life into another direction?"
"Nope. I do my best avoiding that very thought. Liquor helped when I was a victor." He nodded at his tea mug. "It's a lot harder now that I'm a rebel. Do you have regrets?"
She carefully picked up Plutarch's notes, wiped the desk and set them down in the exact same position. "Sometimes. I made my share of mistakes."
"Like trying to give your brother an edge in the arena?" She'd traded her body for that edge, and Haymitch had been too desperate and drunk to refuse her offer.
Now Hazelle smiled. "That decision resulted in Gale, and you know quite well I'd never change that. But other things ..."
He stood and helped her move the chairs so she could sweep under the conference table. "You shouldn't have married Allan Hawthorne."
"And never have had Vick and Rory and Posy?" She shook her head fervently. "No. But I should have left him the day he first raised his hand against me."
Haymitch just looked at her.
"I thought I wouldn't make it, with four children, no education, no money …"
"You could have asked me. I would have helped."
Hazelle wrung out the rag. "I know. You helped so many." She shrugged and rolled her shoulders to relax a bit. "Funny how in the end I had to make it on my own, anyway. The day Allan died in that mine-explosion set me free. And I found I was much stronger, much more resourceful than I'd ever thought."
"And that made you proud." He nodded in understanding.
"Yes. It did. That I was able to feed my kids, and keep a roof over their head, and make them go to school …"
"Well done, Hazelle."
"I like to think so, too."
She beamed at him and for a moment he saw not the life-worn woman but the vivacious girl who'd come to his bed to bargain for her brother's life. Then her face sobered and she sat down next to him.
"Listen, Abernathy. I'd never give up my brats. But I'd give up anything else for a chance at love."
When she saw the sudden panic in his eyes, she laughed – a hearty, joyous laugh. "Not with you, you big oaf! You are way too much maintenance for my liking. But if I could find the right one, I'd grab him and hold on. I'd fight tooth and nail for that chance."
"I am tired of fighting, Hazelle." He let his head fall back and closed his eyes. "I am so tired."
She boxed his shoulder. Hard.
"Then it's time to wake up! You think the Games were your big fight? Well, you're wrong. This is it!"
He avoided her gaze studiously. "I survived so far without love, I can go on and be fine."
Hazelle stood up and looked down at him, sympathy misting her eyes. "No, you can't."
She picked up her pail and broom. "The chance for love is still there, Haymitch. Don't wait too long."
/
Haymitch let a sixteen-year-old girl go to war! Rose fumed inwardly, but knew all the decision makers involved too well by now to admit how futile any protest would be.
Katniss was stubborn as a mule and saw it as her duty to be the symbol of the revolution now she'd made a deal with Alma Coin. Plutarch wanted a figurehead, an action girl, a symbol he could use in his propos and news feeds. And Haymitch ... he'd understood very quickly where the problem with Katniss lay. The girl could not act if her life depended on it - so he had to make it real. He'd forced Plutarch to delete all material they'd shot so far. Then he virtually remade the Mockingjay. With keen perception he'd isolated what people loved and admired about Katniss. Her courage. Her beauty. Her love for her sister.
From now on, whenever they saw the Mockingjay, they'd also see courage, beauty, love. When they thought about the revolution, they'd think about courage, beauty, love. But to make the image stick, people had to see her, and often. If he had to send the girl into a war zone, so be it.
It was not that he did not love Katniss, in his own strange way, Rose knew. But while he loved Peeta for being something he himself could never be, he worried about Katniss for being so much alike him. Oh, he was impatient and derisive and sometimes downright cruel - but only because he knew it worked with her.
Still.
A girl, armed with only a bow and a bundle of arrows ... genius-enhanced arrows, but nevertheless arrows!
The government had fire bombers and mortars and who knew what. And they were willing to use it against any rebel, and certainly against the girl they'd see as the root of all their problems.
The Mockingjay would be the target for all and any capitol forces.
Rose reset the screen in the command room and checked the audio feed. Haymitch had gone with the camera team and Katniss and Gale to keep an eye on them. Which meant he'd dictate any move they'd make. She and Beetee were stuck here where they could only watch and provide Haymitch with any incoming additional info about the rebel stronghold in District 8.
They'd planned every step of this mission, every possible danger, every glitch that might happen. They were prepared, with not only a plan B but also plan C and D.
But this was war, thought Rose with a sinking feeling. Nobody could plan war.
And although she'd never admit it, she was even grateful in a way. Not that people would die, never that. But all the preparations kept her busy, gave her a safe place away from the niggling doubts, away from Jacob's cool demands and Haymitch's bitter incomprehension of what she'd done.
Again she checked the controls, suddenly anxious.
Finnick, who hadn't been allowed to go with Katniss and Gale, sat in one of the command chairs, hugging his knees. Haymitch's point-blank refusal had caused a fit of sulking at first.
"Of course he was right, no team leader in their right mind would take me with them, the way I am now." Finn tenderly touched the trident Beetee had fashioned for him. "But I'll get better."
He would, Rose imagined. Certainly one of the major steps toward "better" was wearing pants. And shaving off the gruesome stubble he'd grown in the weeks since their escape from the arena. But the hand that held the weapon still trembled, and nobody, not even Finnick himself, was sure how long he could hold it together. Still, it was a beginning. If only they could free Annie... If only they could free Peeta... If only...
Rose took herself to task. All this self-pity would take her nowhere, only deeper into despair.
"Do we have audio?" Haymitch's voice crackled through the speaker. "I can't hear a damned thing, Beetee!"
The engineer grunted and fine-tuned the receiver. "Better now?"
"I guess."
Beetee sighed. "You're supposed to say "roger", you know."
"Come again?"
"Roger. The military term for 'received'."
"You kidding me?
Rose could just imagine Haymitch's sneer. Coin's advisers had argued vociferously against letting him go on this mission; one of their arguments being that he refused rank and uniform and would not fit into any chain of command.
It had taken Plutarch two days to convince them that the success of the whole endeavour rested on Haymitch's shoulders, uniformed or not. "Katniss is a girl. A great girl and all that, but in the end she is only sixteen." Seventeen to be exact, but Plutarch always cared more for effect than details.
"She needs someone to keep her straight. Someone she trusts. She'll insist on making her own decisions, you have witnessed that. " A smirk when several advisors flinched. "But she needs someone who'll think ahead and provide her with a solid base for said decisions."
So they'd let Haymitch lead the team - as so much as Katniss and Gale and the camera crew were concerned, - wool cap and jacket and all. One of Coin's most trusted men, a scarily efficient soldier named Boggs, would have overall command, and in theory Haymitch would answer to him.
"Well, theory is a many splendored think," Plutarch hummed under his breath when he'd informed them about Coin's decision.
Thank the powers that be for Plutarch, Rose thought grudgingly. True, he'd endanger any and all of them if he thought it furthered his ambitions, but it was the former Gamemaker who held their diverse team together.
There was Katniss, still traumatised by her stint in the arena and the way she'd been extracted from the Capitol. The prep team, who still looked like ghosts, ripped out of their habitat and dropped into a nightmare. Gale, who'd seen his hometown burn, who'd saved so many; just to find that the war had only just begun. Beetee, who communicated much better with computers than his fellow humans.
And Haymitch, who had cut her off completely.
Rose's hand gripped the edge of the table. Since she'd told him about Jacob he had not spoken a word to her. Most of the time he didn't even acknowledge she was present. That was why Plutarch had arranged for Beetee to stay with her on controls. Since Haymitch refused to talk to her, the engineer would have to pass on the data Rose received from their sources in District 8.
Which was quite ridiculous.
Still, who was she to complain? She'd hurt him badly, she was aware of that.
And now he went to war, into deadly danger, and all she could do was stare at the screen, listen to his voice, and try to stay as cool and efficiently as possible. He needed no diversion right now, not when he was moving pawn on a board that existed only in his mind.
She flipped the switch and kept her voice calm and even. "Archer, we see two convoys approaching."
Beetee rattled off the data, and "Archer" – Plutarch came up with these names, and she could only assume it had something to do with chess – answered with a short confirmation.
And so it began.
The Mockingjay was taking flight, and nothing save a bullet would ground her.
/
Katniss and Gale crouched in the questionable shelter of a brick wall and watched the bombs rain down.
"Like shooting fish in a barrel," Katniss murmured.
Gale's grin flashed white in a face blackened with grime. "Your dad used to say that, didn't he?"
Katniss nodded and then jumped when Haymitch's voice sounded in her earpiece.
"What? Yes, what? I'm here!" she answered warily.
"Listen to me. We can't land during the bombing. So don't get spotted! Stay where you are and keep your heads down."
Katniss exchanged a quick look with Gale. He mouthed a question, and she repeated it for Haymitch. „
„So they don't know yet I'm here?" She felt the relief when he barked a „No. Not yet."
She had to get used to being the prey. Snow would destroy the whole district if it meant getting rid of her once and for all. But apparently not this time.
"Intelligence thinks this raid was already scheduled," said Haymitch. „But that doesn't make you invisible or indestructible."
Now Plutarch's voice came up, calm but forceful – a man who was used to everybody obeying his orders.
"There's a bunker in the far north corner of the blue warehouse. Can you get there?"
"We'll do our best," said Boggs – which meant that Plutarch and Haymitch must be in everyone's ear.
„Forty-five seconds to the next wave," snapped Plutarch.
"The hospital!" Suddenly Gale shot up, shouting and pointing at the advancing air-crafts.
"They're targeting the hospital!" Katniss whispered urgently.
"Not your problem," said Plutarch firmly. "Get to the bunker. Now."
"They are bombing the hospital." She felt her heart beat faster, her stomach shrink into an icy ball. "But there's nothing there but the wounded!"
"Katniss."
There was a warning note in Haymitch's voice. Haymitch who made plans and moved people like chessmen. Haymitch who'd left Peeta behind...
"Don't you even think about…!"
She yanked the earpiece free and gave Gale a signal.
„Lets go!"
/
"You stupid morons!" Haymitch roared when he caught sight of Gale approaching the rebel hovercraft. He jumped down onto the narrow tarmac strip behind the heap of rubble that had once been District 9's hospital. The air reeked of acrid smoke. Even now, hours after the bombardment, small explosions boomed where rescue workers accidentally set off booby-traps the government crafts had dropped all over the area.
The rest of the team had returned to the craft a few minutes ago, the camera crew following right on Gale and Katniss' heels. And high time it was! They had intel about troop movements on the district border – and Haymitch didn't feel like waiting for another damned Peacekeeper battalion to arrive.
He held out a hand to help them board. The boy supported Katniss who could not walk, only hobble on the leg the shrapnel had hit. The leg of her trousers was sliced open, the wound taped with a field dressing. She'd live … but still!
Gale hoisted Katniss up to the boarding platform. "Nothing happened. It's just a scratch, she said it herself."
"They patched me up, I'm fine," she hissed through gritted teeth when Haymitch heaved her up and carried her to one of the bunks.
Haymitch shot her a disgusted look. "That's not the point! We talked this through, step by step. And the first chance you get you are like … screw old Haymitch, lets have some fun!"
He waited until Katniss had buckled up, then he force-marched Gale with him into the navigation chancel. The pilot gave the signal for lift off, and Haymitch pushed the boy into a seat. After checking the com channels, he nodded at the window, towards the chaos and destruction outside. "This is not your hunting grounds in the forest beyond the fence, boy. This is war!"
Red with anger and embarrassment, Gale spat back. "For your information: I am not a child! Haven't been a child for years."
"Yeah? Then why do you behave like one?" Haymitch flipped a switch so Beetee and Rose would not witness this conversation. "Katniss knows you since the two of you were shorter than a bow. What do you have to prove? That you are tougher than Finnick? Braver than Peeta?"
Gale hit him. Not hard, but with enough intent to wipe the headset off.
Faster than the boy could conceive, Haymitch had him in a merciless headlock, the razor-sharp edge of a knife against his throat. Gale's breath caught. He froze, did not dare to move.
"Sorry," he rasped.
For a moment Haymitch saw red, then black. He so did not like being hit. By anyone. He took a deep breath, then another.
Let the boy go.
Put the knife back into the sheath hidden under his sleeve.
"At least I'd fight for my girl," Gale spit. "I wont stand by and watch her shack up with another."
"Her decision." Haymitch kept his eyes on the screen, focussed at keeping the blade-man back.
"Fuck her decision. You bled for her. You almost died!" It was as if Haymitch's inner voice, the voice of the blade-man, spoke through Gale. It was all so true – and still not right.
"That's not how it works."
A deep sigh from Gale. "No. But it should. Guess you are a fool where love's concerned." The young man punched the back of Haymitch's chair. "And of all the genes you passed on to me it couldn't be the one for knife-fighting or strategizing … oh no, it had to be the fucking heart-break gene!"
"Hm." Suddenly insecure, Haymitch avoided looking at Gale. "So she told you about it."
"Mom? Yeah, she did. The day they took you away to the Games for the second time. As soon as the train left the station."
A moment of silence, with the quiet hum of the hover engines the only sound. Then the pilot got permission to land and took them down in an elegant curve as close to the waiting medics as possible. No time to waste. Katniss was not the only wounded on board.
Haymitch sighed. "So?"
"So what?" Gale frowned.
"What you think?"
A shrug. "It would be a lie to say I suspected it all along. But…" He raked his fingers through his hair and Haymitch winced, the gesture being so familiar. "My dad … I mean, Allan Hawthorne …"
"Who was much more your dad than I could ever be." Haymitch had not liked the man but he'd done a damn good job raising this boy.
"I guess. He sometimes looked at me in a strange way. Like he knew." A dry laugh. "Beat me just like my brothers, no discrimination there."
"I watched the two of you. Sneaking through the fence, going fishing."
"He made me my first bow. Taught me how to shot, how to track." Gale sighed in nostalgia, then shrugged it off. "But there were nights when I held the knife he gave me for my fifth birthday and thought about killing him in his sleep."
"I know."
None of them had been in a position to help Hazelle, who had suffered her husband's wrath and frustration every other payday.
"I promised your mom to leave you alone. Still, I meant to tell you, when the mine blew up and Alan died down there. But …" Haymitch helplessly raised both hands. "What good would it have done you?"
"Not much, I guess."
"More leverage for the capitol."
"Yeah."
They'd have used his son against him to make him comply with their demands.
"Well, you let me play at rebels with you," Gale smirked. "Remember how we hid those messages in Rose's bee-hive until we could smuggle them out of 12? I once opened one of the discs. Just a jumble of letters and numbers."
"What did you expect?"
"Something in the vein of: Kill Snow and down with the Capitol!" A grin, now that of a young boy. "I watched you and Plutarch play chess. That's what the messages were about, weren't they? Panem a chess board, and every message a new move."
Haymitch nodded. Letters and numbers that had – slowly, oh so very slowly – laid the foundations for a revolution.
"Remember how we lay in hiding at the bridge, waiting for the train?"
They'd attached the magnetic discs containing the messages onto the last carriage of the heavily guarded ore transporters that left the district once a week.
"We're lucky your mom never found out about that, or we'd both be dead."
They exchanged a wry smile.
The craft landed with a soft thump and was anchored to its landing-bay. Haymitch logged the data and switched off the screen.
They'd landed on a field of rubble, next to a low building. Grey in grey. Sand and stone. Within the hour the hovercrafts would disappear under a camouflage net, and no-one would suspect that this barren piece of land was an airfield. The underground compound of 13 was a good mile off through a tunnel; it's entrance the only building in the vicinity.
A small ambulance craft hummed from the tunnel exit onto the field. It would transport Katniss and other non-walking casualties to the med ward. No body-bags. Yet.
"And by the way…" Haymitch yanked the handle that unlocked the loading bay to let the medics in. The hydraulic doors hissed open. "Your girl … Katniss is not her."
"How would you know, old man?"
Haymitch puffed out air to hold on to his patience. "Got eyes to see, haven't I? Knew it all along. You love Katniss, alright. Like a sister. But the Undersea girl …"
Immediately he felt sorry for the boy. Gale's face had lost all colour. A casual bystander would have blamed the sudden drop of adrenalin after the battle rush. But that was not the case here. Haymitch was pretty sure that right now Gale saw not the landing strip next to the bunkers of District 13, but a charred field of rubble and bones.
"She's dead." His voice was bleak. "And it's my fault."
"It was the capitol who bombed our district. There was nothing you could do."
"Nothing I could do." Gale's haunted eyes met Haymitch's. "You once told me that sometimes a man needs a damn good lie to tell himself, if he wants to make it through another night." A bitter smile. "Nothing I could do … That's my lie, and I'll stick to it."
/
The ward was quiet, but there was a calm intensity to the traffic on the hallways. Nurses walked quickly and purposefully, teams of doctors vanished into the operation theatre. They were still busy with treating the injured from the last campaign. From what she'd seen and heard, Katniss' first foray was deemed a success. Plutarch was overjoyed with the vid Cressida's crew had shot. Right now they edited a short clip with Katniss standing amidst the smoking rubble of the hospital, her wound bl. The clip was destined to be fed into Panem's news stream as soon as Beetee could unlock one of the loopholes he built into the security shields.
The hovercrafts had returned, evacuating as many wounded as they could lift. Subsequently medics and supplies from 13 had been transferred to the field hospital in what had once been the biggest town in District 8. It was all more a gesture than real relief - too many wounded, too much destruction. No district, and certainly not 13, always on the brink of extinction could take it on alone.
But Plutarch insisted it was important the other rebels must not see District 13 as a threat. There were so many legends about the lost district, and the scarier ones were all about how 13 would rise from the ashes and take revenge. On ALL the districts, not just the Capitol. Plutarch was working hard to transform that into the tale of a people who'd survived the worst odds and still helped their fellowmen in need. With no aspirations to take over from the Capitol…
The truth, Rose mused, lay somewhere in the middle. She could easily imagine President Alma Coin replacing Snow. Some wrongs would be righted - and other wrongs committed. Prisoners would be freed – only to be replaced by others. But since District 13 needed the other districts to win this war, they'd have to cease some of the power of a future government to their allies.
What really mattered was that Katniss and Gale and Haymitch had returned from the battlefield in District 8, if not unscathed so at least not gravely injured. Gale was still over the moon, almost drunk with battle glory, telling anybody who'd listen they'd shot down a hover craft! A capitol hover craft!
Katniss had caught a bit of shrapnel but she was young and fit and already on the mend. Haymitch had been pale with fury at the debriefing. Obviously the girl had chucked the earpiece he used to advise her from his position in the hovercraft and made a mad dash for the hospital. But from what Prim told her, Katniss was on the mend and would be released the next day, since they needed the bed for the next transport from District 8. So the Mockingjay's injury could not be too serious.
Rose had come down to level E to visit little Briar Oconnell, who'd managed to break her ankle sliding down the hand-rail to the machinery-deck. Now that the first shock of pain had passed, the child reclined on a mound of pillows and proudly presented her cast to all visitors. Rose inwardly thanked the fates that District 13 did not stint on pain killers where children were concerned. Non-combatant adults had to grit their teeth and bare it, but children got any aid and support possible.
Since she was here, maybe they'd allow her to see Katniss.
"Oh hallo!" Soren, the blond nurse who'd cared for her on the day they'd arrived in District 13, waved at her genially. "Don't tell me you took part in that mission! The other nurses and I love to know you happily-ever-after in your husband's arms, and not out there in the war-zone."
Rose sighed inwardly. The story of how she and Jacob had found each other against all odds, was now a beloved tale in the underground hive. Virtual strangers approached her in the messhall and wanted to shake her hands or wish them luck. From Jacob's reaction Rose could only conclude he felt flattered with all the attention. He rather enjoyed telling them about their life in 12A, and how fate had separated and then - against all odds - reunited them.
Rose on the other hand found it hard to keep up a polite facade. Of course their admiring audience didn't know that they found it hard to talk with each other when they were alone. Maybe it was the long separation, maybe they'd just grown apart. Or maybe they'd never really fit anyway. As it was right now, they hardly saw each other, with him in the weapons lab and her in Plutarch's team. Only at night, when things were even more awkward…
She forced a smile. It was not Soren's fault she found it so very hard to readjust to married life. Or to be more precise, her husband.
The nurse tapped on the data screen. "You'll want to see Soldier Everdeen?"
"I came for Briar Oconnel, but if it is allowed I'd love to have a word with Katniss?"
If only to give her a piece of her mind for scaring Haymitch so much…
"Well," Soren frowned. "You are the first to ask if it's allowed. Everybody else keeps barging in at all times. But I guess what's what you get if you have a heroine on your ward." She touched Rose's forearm with a scan-wand and registered her as a visitor. "Go ahead. Just don't overtax her. She already had quite a crowd in there today - her family, the President, her cousin Gale..."
"She'll throw her bed-pan at any unwelcome visitor, don't you worry."
The nurse laughed and shook her head. "Everdeen has the best treatment and friends and family. You should see the children we get in from the bombed hospital in District 8. They are the ones I worry about."
"Just children? What about their parents?" Rose asked, taken aback.
"We can only accommodate the most severe cases, those who have absolutely no chance out there because they already lost their families or are in life-threatening condition. It's not the lack of rooms, we've plenty. But drugs and doctors? Not so much."
The dark shadows under Soren's eyes told Rose of sleepless nights and constant worry. "If I can do anything to help ..." she ventured. "I am not a doctor, but I know a bit about first aid. And I could dispense food or clean the floors or something."
"That's very kind of you, and welcome. But we have enough people offering already. Everyone in 13 loves children. We have any number of volunteers."
Rose had already noticed how the citizens of 13 cherished the few children among them. If it was true that a good part of the last generation had been rendered infertile by the epidemic they'd suffered, it was no wonder.
"Anyway. If you need me, just let me know." She'd brought a few valuable sheets of paper - and what a fight that had been! - and a crayon for Briar, and they had practised multiplication tables for an hour. Once these other children were better, they'd need some kind of school. Coin would not send them back to their war-ravaged home districts, would she?
Rose smiled, as she walked down the corridor to Katniss' room. Maybe there was another classroom in her future, after all.
/
They were all idiots, risking their lives, playing around as if there was no war, no enemy, no danger... Haymitch grit his teeth and silently closed the door of Katniss' room in the hospital ward. You did your best to protect them, shield them from danger – but did they acknowledge it? Nah. They acted as if this was a great adventure, real fun, and they sneaked away from their body guards and removed their ear pieces and ...
His fist hit the wall.
Stupid, stupid idiot of a girl. Did she ever listen at all? Hadn't he made it clear that he had to know at every time where she was going?
And Gale, not much better.
And Finnick, out of his mind with fury for not being allowed to join a mission yet.
All of them, so very young and invincible. Until the first bullet hit. Until sparks and debris flew and other young and invincible people did their very best to kill you.
But did they listen to him?
He scowled at Gale who kept watch on a chair by the reception desk. „She's all yours."
The boy went in, not without giving him an angry sneer. Hazelle had cuffed his ears as soon as Haymitch had told her about Gale and Katniss' defection. But everybody else had hailed them as heroes, Haymitch thought exasperated. Only in Boggs he'd found an unexpected ally. The big silent man with the menacing stare had made it quite clear what he thought about the youngsters' solo attempts.
Teenagers! All the tributes Haymitch had accompanied on their way into the arena, into death… Did they ever do what they were told? Of course – but only kicking and screaming. He doubted the doctors in District 13 would agree to implant the com-device in Katniss' ear, as much as he'd like that. But it was a good threat and had for a moment alarmed her enough to grudgingly promise to never try a stunt like that again.
Not much use threatening them with things they didn't fear. With Gale it was his damn pride, with Finnick it was Annie, with Katniss it was autonomy. How he knew?
He saw his own face, ashen from lack of sleep and sunshine, mirrored in the glass window of the reception desk and bared his teeth in a mirthless grin He was good at threatening people with a leash. Because it was the thing he himself feared the most.
Besides losing these ... children.
Another scar on his forearm. Another youth dead and their blood forever on his hands.
One really couldn't blame them for being young and stupid. They'd outgrow that phase if they lived long enough…
So yeah, if he had to be the grumpy commander, spoilsport to their fun games – he'd be just that.
To keep them alive.
/
That night they watched a live broadcast of the regular Capitol news program. Rose threw a glance at the small audience in the command room. Plutarch, Katniss, Finn, Haymitch. The prep team, President Coin, Boggs, some soldiers. At the last moment Gale tiptoed in and found a seat in the back.
Beetee was suspiciously absent. After the public uproar at similar vids in the dining hall, Alma Coin had decreed that all capitol broadcast had to be "filtered". Rose assumed that "censored" was the more fitting term. So the engineer probably sat in another control room, ready to wipe out images not fit for the public.
President Snow, his snake eyes cold as ever, made a live appearance and greeted the nation. The camera slowly panned to Peeta. This was the third or fourth appearance of Peeta as a spokesperson for the Capitol - but today something was different.
Plutarch's fingers nervously drummed on the desk. Haymitch raked his fingers through his hair every other minute until it stood on end, and he wasn't even aware of it. So something was going on, and they had not told the rest of the team about it yet.
The hatred of the audience was not as intense as the first time. Moans of disgust whenever the cameras cut to Snow, and once in a while an object thrown at the screen and at Peeta, but not the common outbreak of ... hurt and betrayal, Rose assumed.
He looked ... frail, just a brittle shell. Where was the strong boy she remembered? Maybe curled inside. Maybe already gone. She'd seen that empty gaze, the deep despair before, in the few who'd returned from stints in the Peacekeepers' prison in District 12. No-one had ever returned from the central prison in the capitol.
Rose herself had looked in the palm-sized piece of tarnished tin in the wash room of the women's ward in Prison 12, and had seen the very same despair. Detention did that to you, and fear and hopelessness. At least she'd never been tortured. Just arrested and tried and sentenced to death. She'd been a common prisoner, just waiting in line for the firing squad.
But there were others, "special" places for "special" prisoners. People in the districts whispered about these prisons, and her granduncle Silas still screamed about it in his nightmares. It was a universally known truth that your mind and your memory and your soul was your own, not to be touched. Or so most people still believed. The Capitol had proved them wrong. It was a wicked game the torturers played - they called it "highjacking". In his lucid moments Granduncle Silas had told Rose about the game, about it's cruel rules and players. Pain by pain, word by word they wrecked your world. Then they "helped" you rebuild it, only it wasn't your world anymore, it was theirs and they ruled in it and could make it come crashing down on you any minute.
Suddenly the image on screen flickered, blacked out, and then there was Katniss, standing in the rubble of the bakery.
Plutarch jumped up, his voice triumphant, fist pumping in the air. "We got in! Beetee did it!"
The first interruption lasted only seconds, but then longer snippets of rebel broadcast got through. Finnick talking about Rue, Commander Lyme – a former victor, now commander of the rebel forces in District 2 - describing how the Capitol had more than once rigged the Reaping to put pressure on certain families.
Then again Snow and his show of power and stability.
Rose could only imagine the fierce battle of data and frequencies going on in the background – because this was war, just another kind of war. Each short clip was like a bullet, breaking through an until then impenetrable armour.
The burning Mockingjay symbol whipped out the president for a few seconds, and Gale whooped with joy. Here was proof the rebels were more than a negligible unpleasantness - they were a serious threat, not just loggers with axes, not just farmers with spades.
Rose felt growing unease, even with Plutarch's pride and everyone's cheer at their success. Unintentionally her eyes met Haymitch's, equally disturbed. She knew what worried him. Snow had made Peeta a capitol symbol by association. The rebels had already forgotten that the baker's boy was one of their own. Now that they saw a real chance in overthrowing the capitol, they would waste even less thought on the victors Snow still held prisoner.
Katniss chewed her thumb in distress. She also knew what this meant for their chances to retrieve Peeta alive.
The interview was almost over, Beetee's interceptions now mostly a jumbled mess of bits and pieces of sound and images. Snow asked Peeta if he had any parting thoughts for Katniss, and the camera zoomed in on them when Peeta suddenly looked straight into the lens.
The intensity of his gaze almost made Rose sit up. It was as if he looked right at her, urged her to listen carefully. His voice, not as smooth as it had been at the start of the series of interviews, almost cracked.
"Katniss, how do you think this will end? No-one is save, not in the Capitol, not in the districts. And you ... in Thirteen..." His eyes were black in despair, almost insane. "Dead by morning."
Off camera, Snow's voice cut sharply through Peeta's. "End this!"
The image on screen exploded in a firework of Beetee's making - but in between they got glimpses of what happened in the studio. A camera knocked down, boots scuffling. A chair crashing onto the tiles. Then a gasp, a cry of pain.
And blood splattering the white floor.
"They are coming for us!" Katniss' face was ashen with terror. "They are coming tonight!"
Gale scoffed. "Oh please! Don't you see that they've turned him? He's Snow's puppet, sitting there in his pretty white suit on his pretty white chair …"
Katniss backhanded him. Hard.
Everyone gasped in shock.
Haymitch shot up and held her in a headlock before she could jump Gale. He growled something, so low nobody but Katniss could understand it. A tremor went through her, then she collapsed onto the chair.
Gale wordlessly wiped blood from his lip.
"Mr Heavensbee?" President Coin painstakingly avoided looking at Katniss. "Your evaluation?"
Plutarch rubbed his temples. "Haymitch?"
"Katniss is right. Peeta tried to warn us. Better take this serious, or we'll all suffer the consequences." Haymitch stared at the now black screen. "The boy will suffer them, anyway."
Coin's face remained a blank mask, then she nodded. "Understood. We haven't had an air raid drill in quite a while. Boggs?"
The tall man sprang to attention. "Sir?"
"Red alarm." The president released a trembling breath, the only indication of stress she allowed herself. "We'll go underground and stick it out."
/
Three days and nights bombs rained down on the bunker. The bunker held. As did the minds of those cowering deep in the bowels of the earth.
District 13's protocol for events like this was – like all things military – flawless. Maybe they were not so good with the lighter side of life, but they excelled in organising the survival of large crowds of people. There was an allocated place for everyone, there was food and water and beds. The refugees form District 12 provided the entertainment with songs and charades and games for the children.
Once in a while a particularly fierce explosion shook the walls and everybody froze, but all in all they spent the bombardment down in the shelters in relative calm.
Nevertheless everybody was glad when it was deemed save to move back up to the living quarters on the fourth morning.
Rose carried the small bag she'd been allowed to take down to the shelter. Jacob had not joined her down there, but had – like his fellow engineer – supervised the emergency generators and air condition system.
When she reached their hallway, he came around the corner, hair mussed from a few sleepless nights, but a bright grin on his face.
"Ha! We made it!"
His joy and triumph were infectious. Rose had to smile. This was how she remembered him – full of energy and fun.
"How bad is the damage?"
He shrugged. "Well, they gave us a good threshing. But the surface shield held. There must be a crater a few hundred feet deep."
So everyone on the first ten levels would have died without Peeta's warning. Rose shuddered when she thought about how close they'd come to complete annihilation.
"Plutarch will want to film it, I bet," she muttered. "Great pictures – the Mockingjay rising from the ashes."
"They are already up there," Jacob informed her with a cheeky grin. "But I managed to convince high command, we both deserved a day off. So let them film their propo without you for once."
"A day off?" She swallowed hard when comprehension dawned. "Oh."
"You could try to make a happy face," he whispered. "We could start over, have a baby, be a family."
Rose froze, pressing the towel to her chest like a shield. This was not the first time Jacob spoke of a child. Back home in 12A he'd always found excuses to adjourn that step – wait for a promotion, better quarters, higher pay. But now the subject came up almost every other day.
Since they had been reunited by fate or chance, they shared a bed in the living quarters reserved for married couples. A double bed, not bunks like everybody else. But they had not had sex yet, and Rose was glad about it, even if she'd be hard-pressed to give a sensible reason for her reluctance.
Jacob was gentle, and she enjoyed his kisses. But even when his touch was unintentional, when he rolled over to her side in his sleep or sat too close at dinner, she felt panic rise.
"Don't you remember how good we were together?" he asked, a slight tinge of hurt in his voice. "Aren't you my wife?"
She closed her eyes. They'd had the traditional wedding ceremony. They'd eaten the bread, kindled the flame, taken the vow. In sickness and health, in the light and the darkness. It was not Jacob's fault that fate hat ripped them apart. She owed him at least to try.
When his lips touched hers, she answered his kiss.
The touch was so familiar it drove tears into her eyes. For a moment she was back in 12A, very young, very naïve. Absolutely astonished that this wonderful man had chosen her amongst all the girls in their branch.
She lifted her hand to caress his neck.
He smiled against her cheek. "That's my soft spot. See, you remember."
Firmly she closed her mind against all the other memories – Haymitch in that shack in the arena, so close to death and yet so much alive…
This was now, and Jacob was with her.
He used his foot to push open the door. Rose dropped the bag and let herself be drawn into the room.
/
Katniss stood in the huge crater and felt sick. Even with her hand over mouth and nose she still smelled the cloying smell of the thousand white roses President Snow's bombers had left as a memento.
She knew she'd bungled the first take this morning, and hadn't been very convincing when she'd tried again an hour ago. The thought what Snow could do to Peeta, what he would do… She could not think straight, just wanted to scream, cry, offer herself in exchange.
Plutarch and Haymitch huddled in a corner and discussed the next step – Katniss could seen by Haymitch's set mouth that he wasn't happy.
But Plutarch had had the better arguments, and so now Finnick stood in front of the cameras, his hands tying knot after knot into the rope in his hands. He looked pale but determined.
Ignoring Plutarch and the film crew, Haymitch told him: " "You don't have to do this."
"Yes, I do. If it will help her." Finnick balled up the rope and handed it to Haymitch.
So that's how Plutarch made him do the interview in my stead, thought Kantniss desolately. Something about Annie.
Cressida called for silence. Haymitch stepped out the camera angle.
Since the film-maker had led her into a story about how she and Peeta had first met, Katniss now expected the Finnick-Annie-Story.
But obviously Plutarch had sniffed out a juicier subject – something tailored for the rumour mills and gossipmongers in the capitol.
"President Snow used to sell me. My body, that is," Finnick began in a flat voice. He looked completely detached, like reporting what had happened to a stranger.
He told the camera – never Cressida or Plutarch, only the cold eye of the camera – how Coriolanus Snow had passed out desirable victors as rewards or incentives. How he'd allowed the rich and mighty of Panem to buy the victors for huge sums of money. And how he'd maimed and killed loved ones if a victor dared to refuse.
"So I did it." The tiniest shrug, expressing much more pain than a storm of tears. "My parade of lovers …" He looked straight into the lens. "Each and every one of them paid Snow for the pleasure."
Katniss felt bile rise in her throat and thought about the former Head Peacekeeper if District 12. He'd bought girls with the promise of food. Snow had bought young men and women with the promise to let their family live another day. She wanted to interrupt the interview, apologize to Finn for seeing him as a vain and self absorbed peacock.
But what he did was important, and probably much more effective than any story about star-crossed lovers.
Finn's lips twitched in a mirthless grin. "I was very dear to them. They paid Snow, and then they gave me presents to buy my love. All the money and jewellery I wanted, for the illusion that I came freely into their bed. So I demanded a much more valuable form of payment." Katniss could hear his contempt. "And they paid up. Because they were sure I was nothing but a slave. And who would believe a slave?"
He went on about the secrets he'd been told in return for "favours", weaving a tale of scandal, betrayal and greed. There were names, and dates, and enough private information to confirm his stories. The power games of the mighty, the murder games of the ancient families of Panem. And in the middle, like a spider in its net, the President.
Not a clever considerate politician, a father to his people, a wise ruler – but a ruthless murderer who poisoned his enemies and allies alike. A man who drank poison himself to deflect suspicion and to train his body to withstand small doses.
This tale would stab into the very heart of Panem like a knife, Katniss realised.
Displaced Capitol rebels like the camera crew and Fulvia looked utterly shaken, even Plutarch rubbed the bridge of his nose anxiously. This were people who risked their lives to topple Coriolanus Snow – and even they were surprised by how depraved the man really was.
When Finnick finished, Cressida kept the cameras rolling.
Eventually he looked up, and his green eyes met blazed.
"Cut."
Katniss' eyes burned with unshed tears when Finnick just walked away from Plutarch without answering any more questions. She could not face Haymitch, so she stared at the smashed roses their boots had trodden into the charred ground.
„Did this happen to you, too?" she asked very quietly.
His voice was flat and emotionless. „No."
When she did not move, he relented. "They took my mother, my brother, my girl. Two weeks after Snow crowned me victor I had no-one left they could use against me."
"I'm surprised he didn't just kill you." It slipped out before she could bite her tongue.
Haymitch turned to her, deep sadness in his eyes. "I was the example to hold against all those victors who came after me. See what we can do to you, how we can hurt you. That's why he ordered those deaths. Even if it cost him his leverage against me."
"Until Peeta and I came along," Katniss said softly.
She didn't even get a shrug, he just let her stand there in the rubble and the dead roses.
/
The insistent humming sound which woke the inhabitants of 13 every morning – or whenever their shift started – turned into the sound of a dozen bee hives in Rose's dream.
She stood in the small garden of the teacher's cabin behind the schoolhouse in District 12 and carefully lifted the skep to harvest the golden bounty of honey-combs. To her dismay she found each skep empty. Where were the bees, why could she hear their buzzing? When she looked up, there was a huge dark cloud of bees right above her.
The relief changed into bloodcurdling fear when the swarm turned into a hovercraft with the Capitol's seal, watching her every move.
And she'd been wrong anyway – this was not her garden, but the arena, full of traps and mutts and tributes set to kill. The skep in her hand went up in flames, as did the gauzy veil of the beekeeper's hat. The stench of burning hair filled her nose.
With a shriek Rose sat up in bed and patted at her head to put out imaginary flames. When she'd reassured herself that she was not burning, she found Jacob staring at her. He'd just returned from the communal shower, his hair still dripping.
"About time you got up," he remarked mildly. "We can't be late for breakfast."
"Nightmare," gasped Rose. Her breath came in shallow gasps. "Why don't you go ahead?"
"Without you?" He frowned at her. "We are married. People expect us to eat breakfast together."
Rose pressed her face into the pillow and screamed.
When she came up, a bit relieved, Jacob stared at her with both disbelieve and aggravation. "You really must do something about the nightmares, Rosie. Go talk to one of the medics or something. You can't keep dwelling on things that are long past."
"I. Don't. Dwell." She put down the pillow carefully and got up. "Other tributes suffer from nightmares, too. Katniss for instance, and Haymitch.
"Haymitch again." For a second Jacob's handsome face turned into a grimace of scorn. "Now he has done enough to deserve a nightmare or two. But you …"
He stepped in her way when she started for the door, and gently touched her cheek. "You only did what you had to do to survive."
'Not always,' thought Rose and with a sinking feeling remembered the night on the bridge. She'd acted rashly and without a thought about the consequences. And rightfully she should be long dead, executed in the prison yard of District 12.
"I don't think that's how it works. You can't just will nightmares to stop."
She avoided his gaze and tried to bypass him and get to the women's shower at the far end of the corridor. But this time he would not let her evade so easily and blocked the doorway with one arm.
"I don't see you trying. You insist on working with Abernathy and Heavensbee, socialize only with all those refugees from 12. No wonder you can't let go."
She took a step back. "Is that what you did? Forget about the past, about your home in 12A, about your people?" Maybe that was what bugged her so about him? He never asked about his family, his friends, the brother who had died trying to save him.
Jacob's eyes narrowed. "There is nothing I can do to change what happened. Most of it wasn't my fault, anyway." He took her at the shoulders and shook her, just hard enough to make her drop her toothbrush and towel. "We are here and we are alive, and nothing else counts."
Rose starred up at him, taking in the handsome features, the brilliant eyes she'd fallen in love with. "Don't you see them?" she asked softly. "The dead that follow you? All those, whose death you've caused?"
She remembered Haymitch in the arena, talking to ghosts and shadows only he could see. She had her own shadows in dreams now and then – the girl Bristle, who had died on the bridge in District 12, the tributes she'd killed in the arena. How was it that Jacob had found closure where neither she nor the other tributes could?
Jacob held his head high. "Like I said, it was their decision to follow me into the mine. All grown men and women, all experienced miners. If they were killed while they tried to rescue me, it was hardly my fault, was it?"
And for the first time he went to breakfast without her.
/
Rose still thought about Jacob's words when she slipped into the control room, a good few minutes later than her work schedule dictated. Maybe it was her fault, maybe she didn't try hard enough. Seeing Haymitch every day at work didn't make it any easier. But Haymitch wasn't just her lover … ex-lover, her inner voice corrected immediately … he was her friend. She'd made clear she'd honour her vows and acknowledge Jacob's older rights. But she couldn't just stop loving Haymitch. She didn't even want to try.
Why was her life such a damn shambles? Why was nothing ever simple and straightforward?
The room was deserted – Katniss was probably still in the med ward, Plutarch and Cressida's team must be busy editing material they'd shot of at the deep crater the bombs had left . Only Finnick manned one of the workstations, scrolling through endless lines of data.
When Rose closed the door he didn't turn, only nodded at her.
"Are you alright?" she asked gently. She had not seen him since President Coin had sent the whole of District 13 into lock-down. She could only hope he'd spent the three days with Katniss and her family.
"S'okay."
So it wasn't. And it was proof he considered her a friend to even let her know that much.
"Have you been out yet?" she asked. Jacob had told her Plutarch had ordered the film crew up on ground level as soon as the smoke had set.
"Yeah."
"Is it bad?"
He shrugged. "It was never pretty in the first place. Now its ugly and charred."
"Did they film a propo?"
By now she knew him well enough to interpret the flinch her question caused.
"What happened? Finn?"
He shook his head mutely. Not ready to talk about it, yet.
"Where are the others?"
Obviously relived she'd changed the subject, he nodded at the back of the room. "Beetee's in the lab, and Haymitch is asleep."
"Asleep?" Rose cocked her head. On a makeshift pallet behind a stack of chairs lay Haymitch, wrapped in the woollen jacket he'd adopted in blatant disregard of District 13's strict uniform regulations. "About time."
They'd all been worried about him. Somehow it seemed Haymitch had not slept at all since they'd arrived in 13 or at least since he'd left the detox ward. Day and night he'd screened data, plotted and planned the first mission, bullied and cajoled the Mockingjay and the technicians. Even Fulvia, Plutarch's indomitable assistant, lived in awe of him.
She picked up a woollen blanket – patched and darned, and from the look of it a donation by one of the refugees from District 11 – and went to his pallet to cover him.
"Don't wake him before he's had at least three hours of sleep!" warned Finnick. "I don't want my head bitten off before I get a chance to join the next mission."
Rose gently let the blanket fall over Haymitch's sleeping form und tucked him in. In the pale light of the screens he looked deeply exhausted and ill. She assumed they all did, most of them had not seen the sun in weeks. Once again he hadn't bothered to shave, and white-blond bristles covered his chin and cheeks.
Caught in a nightmare, Haymitch clenched his fists and mumbled something unintelligible in his sleep. Making certain that Finn's eyes were on his data screen, Rose stroked Haymitch's forehead.
"It's alright," she whispered softly. "You are safe."
Immediately she felt guilty. She'd never again be able to talk to him like that. Only when he slept.
Desolately she sat down at her workstation and adjusted the screen.
Finn carefully avoided meeting her gaze when he said softly: "So you still have feelings for him."
Rose only sighed.
"Beetee said so," he continued while tapping on his keyboard. "Then again … He may be a genius where wire and chips are involved but not with people."
She had to smile. "It drives him crazy. He just can't figure us out."
The tapping stopped. Finnick turned in his chair and faced her.
"Can't say I can figure you out either." His sea-green eyes were hard and unforgiving. "I watched the two of you in the arena. I watch you now. What's between you is real."
"It's not that easy." Rose pushed a strand of hair back.
"He loves you. You love him. End of story."
How young he still is, thought Rose bitterly. Although Finn Odair was only a few years her junior, he still had the demand of youth for eternal never-changing love. No ifs and buts, no unsolvable quandaries.
She gave him a sad smile and turned to her work.
Finnick pushed off the desk and inserted himself between Rose and the screen to force her to look at him.
"I love Annie," he said in a low voice. "I've loved her since she was Reaped back in '70. That hasn't changed – and believe me, I've met a bloody lot of women since then."
"It's not that easy," Rose repeated.
"It is!" Finn whispered intently. "I'd sacrifice everything for her. This District. All of you. My own life."
"I know." She laid a hand on his arm. "They'll get her out soon, you'll see."
He didn't even hear her. "And if she died … I'd die, too." He shook his head to chase the ghosts away.
"Finn…"
"Listen! I did things to keep my love safe. Awful things."
"Finn…"
His strong fisherman's hands clamped around her upper arms and he forced her to look at him.
"So did Haymitch."
An involuntary shiver made the fine hairs on Rose's neck stand up.
"What do you mean?" she whispered. "What awful things?"
Finnick closed his eyes for a moment, then knuckled away an angry tear.
"You don't even know." Visibly annoyed he pushed back her chair and stepped away from the desk. "He risked his life, risked all our lives, and you don't even know!"
If it were possible to slam a sliding door – he'd have done it. So he just left the control room.
Rose buried her face in her hands. Fourteen more hours to go until she could crawl back into her bed and bury her head under the cushion.
/
Haymitch decided to pick up a mug of tea in the cafeteria before he reviewed the rough cut of the new propo Cressida and Plutarch had just finished.
When the woman at the counter passed him the steaming mug, he stared desolately at the greenish brew. Peppermint and camomile, harvested on the vast barren stretch of land formerly known as District 13. How had it happened that stewed weeds became his beverage of choice?
The forced withdrawal of alcohol had left him with nightmares and spells of hallucinations. The nightmares he could handle, had handled for years – though always with the aid of liquor. Now he just lay on his cot, sweat-soaked and shivering and waited for morning to come. The hallucinations were more worrying. Not just once had he tried to smash insects on his desktop that weren't there in the first place. And sometimes he caught a reflection in a mirror or window he passed – not just his own hollow face, but another one, sometimes two or three silent ghosts following him.
And even disregarding them, he was never alone.
Thirteeners did not like solitude. He understood: there was safety in numbers, especially if all the world – or Panem – was your enemy. But it wore at him, the constant hum of humanity. He happily worked at mission control because it was something he was good at. Very good. He looked at details, numbers, intel, and in his mind could push them around, stack and connect them like a child's building blocks. He constructed patterns, strategies, and some of them held and some did not. Saved lives in the end, Plutarch said, to let Haymitch play around with strategies.
So that was ok.
But so very often life in District 13 demanded of him joining a crowd, standing in queue, taking part in small-talk to pass time. He found that not only annoying but so wearisome he often felt sweat trickle down his back.
Right now he sat alone on one of the long tables in the mess hall. But second shift personal already streamed in for their lunch break and took position at the right side counter. In less than five minutes they'd be eating. And chatting. And banging plates and cutleries around. And scraping chairs at the concrete floor.
Add that to the regular news reports on the two huge screens at each end of the hall, and Haymitch got ready to finish his tea and get the hell out of there.
Then he saw her.
Standing in line, Jacob Cumberland right behind her, waiting patiently.
He could not take his eyes off her.
Was it her fault all his hopes had been focused on her? That there was nothing but bleak despair in his future since fate – fucking fate! – had cut her out of the equation?
Maybe he was going crazy.
Maybe he'd lost his mind long ago, and now what was left of his heart.
Looking back he knew that he'd been the one who made all the plans, all the promises. He'd convinced Plutarch to change the setup for all the QuarterQuell Reapings. He'd stepped up as a volunteer without a second thought, to save Rose's life in the arena. Back in the hovercraft on their way out of the capitol, he'd told her about his hopes and dreams and the life they'd have together.
But Rose had never made any promise. Maybe it had all been in his head from the beginning.
A heavy hand settled on his shoulder.
Surprised he looked up and then down, at the pool of blood on the table and the sharp tines of a fork he'd rammed into his palm without really feeling it.
Damn.
"That's enough, my friend," Plutarch Heavensbee said gently. "It's about time this ended."
/
The next morning the automatic door to the ward Plutarch had seized as his "command centre" would not budge when Rose tried to enter. After several attempts she gave up and took the elevator up to level D.
The women at the counter at work force control took a bored look at Rose's forearm and shrugged. "Seems all normal to me. Should work."
Rose grit her teeth. "Well, it doesn't."
The clerk consulted her screen. "Level C, west ward. Engineering."
"No." Rose insisted. "I'm on level E. With Plutarch Heavensbee's team."
"You aren't, no more." An impatient cough behind Rose told her she'd outlasted her allocated question-time in the queue and was supposed to move on, problem solved.
"But..."
"Engineering. Supplies administration."
"But..."
In the end she had to face she'd been relocated without consultation. She could only assume Haymitch had had enough of cutting one team member and asked Plutarch to fire her. In 13 you couldn't really get fired, of course, they just found another occupation for you.
She'd not see him any more, at least not on a daily basis.
Good. It would make her life so much easier.
If she kept repeating that, she'd one day even believe it.
To be continued.