A/N: I hope you guys are enjoying the story! Please review. The feedback helps me improve my writing and it motivates me to write more. Next chapter the games will start. This chapter is the things that happen in between the reaping and the games. This chapter is from Finnick's POV.
Finnick:
I wake in the morning to Annie sitting on the edge of my bed, staring off into space.
"Are you ok?"
She looks at me and smiles, nodding. Tears stained on her cheeks.
"No, you were crying. What happened?"
"I had a nightmare. I'm fine now." Her voice is still shaky. I move closer to her and pull her against my chest.
"What's wrong?"
She takes a shaky breath. "Coin, she's just going to let the Victors die in the arena. Only us, Katniss, and Haymitch will be rescued." Her voice is quiet, low enough so that the bigs can't pick up her voice.
I press my head into her hair, muffling my voice to the bugs. "I know."
"She isn't going to even try to save them." Her voice is a soft whisper, gentle and cautionary.
"She can't save everyone, and Katniss is the one Panem needs."
"The others don't deserve to die." Her voice is quiet and shaky, but sure at the same time.
"I know, but she can't save everyone. It'll look suspicious if everybody but the careers team up, Snow is smart. He'll probably guess that something is up once we team up with her."
"I can't believe we're going to lose so many friends, and so early into the fight."
"I understand." I press a kiss into her hair. "I love you." I say this in a normal voice, silently telling her that we need to stop talking about these things before the bugs pick up on it
She looks up at me and smiles, her cheeks still stained with tears. "I love you too."
We get ready in silence, getting dressed and eating breakfast quickly. When we head down we are the first to arrive, so I head to the trident station to warm up. Annie heads for the sword station, still shaken from this morning. She doesn't like the idea of killing, but even she can find something calming in slicing through dummies. She never cuts off the heads, it reminds her of Mason too much, but she likes to slice through the torso, and the simulators the Capitol has been buzzing about for this year's training center interested her when she first heard of them.
I look over to see her slicing through dummies, and I begin to throw tridents at targets. We don't speak, there is no need to we both have the same things going through our heads, and we're both doing the same thing, distracting ourselves. The other tributes arrive and we clean up the stations we were at. When everyone is here a brief speech is given, summing up the stations and then we are set free. Katniss heads over to the archery station after a while and I head over to watch her in the simulator.
She is amazing with the bow, better than I am with the trident. She kills all 24 of the 'tributes' and when she is done almost every tribute is standing at the glass watching her. Wiress begins to clap, and Annie smiles.
Annie walks off, the gears in her brain turning. We head over to the edible plants station.
"We should ally ourselves with her. If we can gain her loyalty she will protect us and we can make it to the end, then a Trident can be put in her back, and you'll go home."
She's saying this for the bugs, making it seem like we'll team up with her for a boost, then kill her when it gets down to it. We both know that we'll be taken from the arena before it gets down to that.
"That sounds good to me. We'll have to convince Haymitch to join us, I have a feeling the old drunk will want to stick by her side. Even he doesn't want the young girl to go in there alone, not when so many are after her for putting us here."
The four careers will definitely want to kill her for sending us back her, even they aren't happy about this mess.
Haymitch will be the easy one to convince, it'll be Katniss we will need to convince. From our brief conversation during her Victory tour seems like she doesn't like me.
"You can talk to her, I'll tackle the old drunk."
I'll have the easy task, but Annie is better at talking to people. Katniss is more likely to agree to team with her, rather than me. Katniss seems to have a soft spot for the weak, such as Rue. she was talking with Wiress and Beetee yesterday, that's They are both very important to the revolution. Beetee's inventions and brains will be of much use in the war. Wiress is calm, even in the midst of war, and good at negotiating, as well as technological skills. Coin quite likes Beetee, and he probably knows about the plan already. An alliance of 6 against the four careers. Enobaria, Brutus, Cashmere and Gloss. They'll undoubtedly try to team with Chaff and Cedar. They'd try to team with me and Annie, but they don't trust either of us, we both betrayed the alliance in one way or another to win, and they never approved of our relationship anyway.
The bell tolls, and we head back to our floor. Mags is waiting for us when we get there.
"Any sponsors?"
She nods. The Capitalists love us, they are all over 'the star crossed lovers of district four' as they have deemed us.
"Thank you."
It's not easy for Mags to see us going into the games again. Over the years Mags has been like a mother to both of us, and she would rather die than see us go back, that's why she tried to volunteer for Annie, but Annie wouldn't let her go in, Mags doesn't stand a chance in that arena, not since her stroke. She wouldn't kill anyone either, just like Annie she would rather die than see someone else hurt by her hand.
We eat dinner in silence, the games looming over everyone's head. Annie sits with a thoughtful look on her face, and I can tell she's planning out what she is going to say to Katniss. I decide to ask Haymitch tomorrow. He'll agree, and then it'll be up to Annie to get Katniss on board. When he explained the plan to me Haymitch didn't mention anything about her knowing, or knowing about thirteen for that matter. I'm assuming Coin doesn't want her to know, for one reason or another. Annie can't tell her here in the Capital anyway, the bugs will pick it up and the rebellion will be over before it really begins.
We head to bed, sleeping in the same bed again. I sleep through the night, images of previous games flying through my head, with me at the center. Annie is nowhere to be seen, which makes everything much worse. Katniss is struck down by Snow, and Coin stands by, watching it all. I stand motionless, nothing hitting me. I'm crowned victor and I wake with tears in my eyes. Annie wakes to, she wraps her arms around me, I can tell she had a similar dream. We sit there for a while, then we get ready for the day.
Again we eat breakfast in silence, even our bubbly escort has nothing to say. I can tell she's thinking of how much of a tragedy it is that one, if not both, of us will be dead soon. She is among the few Capital citizens that know how to keep their mouths shut when the time is right.
We head down to the training center later than usual, not wanting to be first again. The others are mostly there, and I head out to find Haymitch after pecking Annie on the cheek.
"What do you want?" He asks as I approach "Fishboy." He adds with a smirk.
"You're picking up on her names now?" I smirk remembering Katniss calling me 'Fishboy' last time we talked.
"Seems like it."
"Have any team mates yet?"
"No. Katniss is being picky, almost every tribute wants her on their side."
"I saw her talking to Beetee and Wiress."
"She wants them but, no offense, they'll be very little use in a battle."
"Annie and I can fight, and Annie was going to talk to her today. We'll help out, but annie refuses to kill."
"She's still sticking with that philosophy?"
"She won one game that way, and if I have my way she'll win another."
"You'll die for her?"
"Of course."
"I'll never understand love."
"One day, if you get sober, someone may love you."
"Trade alcohol for a woman? No way." He chuckles. Then, with a serious look. "I'll have to survive long enough to find love."
I can tell he's not just talking about the games. The war that will surely follow will be dangerous, and if the rebellion fails we will all die, and lives will be lost for nothing. I push the thoughts away.
"So, would you like to team with Annie and me?"
"I would, but it's up to Katniss, she's the first one I got out, and I'll do my best to get her out again."
The weight behind his words hits me. The whole rebellion is sitting on Katniss' shoulders. If she can manage to play things right this could work, but if she decides not to play along the effort will all be in vain. Things are made worse when I realize she doesn't even know about the rebellion. She has to make the right decisions without knowing what the right decisions are. This is too important, and I'm glad I had Annie talk to her, she'll pull this off.
"Annie will talk to her. Katniss will want to get further in the games, and she'll realize we may be her best chance." I hope I add silently.
I look over and see Annie and Katniss talking at the sword station. Annie is showing her how to hold her sword, and they tackle dummies and holograms together. They are getting along well. I head over to the knife station beside theirs and throw, hitting the target fairly well. I keep an eye on them. A lot is resting on annie shoulders right now and it's killing me not to be able to help her. She's perfectly capable of getting Katniss on our side on her own, but I hate the feeling of being useless. Not being able to help, or worse, being told I can't help when something important to me hangs in the balance. I like having things under my control.
They head over to the archery station and Katniss shows annie how to shoot. They are both laughing and smiling as they shoot holograms. The bell tolls and We all head back to ours floors.
"How did it go with Katniss?" I ask, once we are back on our floor.
"It went really well. She agreed to be in our alliance. She mentioned Wiress and Beetee to, if they want to join, and Haymitch has to be with us."
"Haymitch said he would, as long as Katniss is."
"Well. I guess we have our alliance all sorted out."
"Seems like it."
Annie looks away uneasily and crosses her arms against her chest, a clear sign she's uncomfortable.
"Are you ok?"
"I just don't want to go back into an arena, or have to kill anyone."
I wrap an arm around her. "I understand, but we can't get out of this. We just have to deal with the problems we face right now, like surviving."
"We will have to kill to survive."
"That's just the way that it works in the arena."
"It's not how I won the first time."
"You'll win again, no matter what." I put a finger under her chin, and lift her head so her eyes meet mine. "Annie, just remember, no matter what happens in that arena I will always love you."
She smiles "I know."
"Then let's go to dinner. No use worrying about something that's going to happen regardless."
"Yeah."
We walk to the dinner table and eat in silence. After that we head to bed.
The rest of the week goes by as normal as possible. Annie, Katniss and I train together, Haymitch prefering to stand to the side and watch us. On the last day Johanna came over and joined us, and without a word spoken by anyone she became a part of the alliance. Johanna is one of the leading members of the rebellion. She is very adamant about the cause, so it will be good to keep her around for the war. Plus, she throws axes as well as Katniss shoots. Our alliance is deadly, almost on the level of the careers.
They canceled interviews for the year, probably for fear of too many Victors speaking their minds about the Quell, and other things they felt the Capital had done wrong.
I woke up on the morning of the games having had a nightmare, Annie was already awake, and I guessed she had one as well. I sat up beside her and wrapped an arm around her. We sat there for a while, not speaking until Mags came to tell us to get ready.
We boarded a hovercraft and sat in silence. Enobaria was shooting everybody glares, especially Katniss, but Katniss was lost in her own world. Haymitch was sober, and by the looks of it he was actually terrified to go back in the arena. It makes sense, he won during a quell, so he knows better than anyone that quells are more horrific than any other year.
When we landed our stylists led us to seperate rooms to get ready. I didn't want to leave Annie, but I kept telling myself that I would see her again in a few minutes, even though I knew I might not. I got dress in an outfit similar to a wetsuit. Water, that's good. I step into the glass tube and it seals around me. I close my eyes as it lifts me up.
The 75th hunger games are starting.