No Matter What

They'd come for her early the next morning, tossing her a plain grey pant and shirt combo for her to wear. The two female guards had waited only until she pulled the shirt over her head before grabbing her and practically dragging her to the transport below. She did not resist in the least and would have gone with them under her own power if only they had let her. They didn't tell her where they were going but she only hoped it was to see Peeta as Miss Snow had promised. She didn't see Finnick or her tormentor before she was escorted out of the building's doors and into the sleek, black transport that could have held ten people. She felt odd being the only one in the luxury of the large vehicle.

The transport must have had some significance to it that she'd been unfamiliar with. She noticed that everyone, from avoxes to expensively dressed citizens, cleared a wide path long before it reached them and all stared at it as it passed. Katniss was thankful that the windows didn't allow the onlookers to see inside.

For today at least, she supposed she couldn't fault the Capitol for all of its creations, especially if what Snow had told her was true. Could they really give Peeta his leg back or something like it? Finnick seemed to think so. When she'd told him, he'd given her a smile and kissed her forehead.

"These are the kinds of things you have to hold onto in this place. They don't give you much and they take away ten times more, but what they do give can be priceless."

She kept replaying those words in her head to keep the bracelet on her arm from giving her its cool breath. She wanted to be just herself, not some drugged version when she finally got to see him. She'd thought of hundreds of scenarios already. She thought about kissing him before he could say anything to her. She'd thought that maybe she should be quiet and let him speak if it's what he needed. She'd thought of telling him that she was ok and was going to survive this and that he needed to as well. She'd thought of so many others but not one included any mention of what she had seen the day before. She would never tell him; she would give him that much.

They arrived almost an hour later at a large, white building that lacked either the normal flair of the downtown buildings such as the training center or the old world grandeur of her cage. Once more, she was escorted like some sort of flight risk until she was practically thrown into a sterile white room lined with couches on three sides and windows on the forth. They closed the door and she heard the distinct sound of a locking mechanism being engaged. Then they'd made her wait for over two hours. A fact she could discern due to the broadcast screen present on each of the four walls, which she couldn't turn off, which kept the time in the lower right hand corner. The wait was bad enough but having to listen to commentator after commentator talk about the excitement in the capitol concerning the Quarter Quell and its year of games was enough to finally force the bracelet on her arm to issue a small dose of calming medication. She cursed it and wished she could rip the damn thing off her arm. Then, almost as if the hospital itself had heard her, the door opened and three attendants and a doctor entered.

"Please sit, Mrs. Mellark." Instantly she worried that something had gone wrong with Peeta and his upcoming surgery. It wasn't until a fourth attendant entered the room with a surgical cart that she realized they weren't here about Peeta at all. Though she hesitated for a moment, she sat down after the thought of being sent back to her enormous round room without getting to see Peeta forced her obedience.

He didn't say anything else to her the entire time. In fact, he treated her more like an animal than a person. Three of the attendants surrounded her seated position, one grabbing her cuffed arm, one holding onto her shoulders and the other nearby looking ready to spring into action. The fourth aided the doctor in what he did next. With several tools whose function Katniss couldn't clearly determine, one a wand of light, another some sort of magnet and a third that looked more like something that belonged in a butcher's shop than a hospital, they removed the medicating bracelet from her arm. Katniss couldn't help be a little horrified by what she saw underneath. Though she hadn't been able to feel it, there had been several rows of sharp needles all around the circumference of the band that had been imbedded in her flesh the entire time.

Besides medicating her to control her mood, the band must have also been simultaneously releasing some sort of numbing agent into her as well. That's when the three attendants became necessary. They held her securely as the doctor pulled it out of and off of her arm before grabbing a second, smaller cuff off of the cart. Suddenly Katniss didn't want to cooperate anymore. Suddenly she wanted nothing more to do with this hospital. She felt nauseous, her throat felt like it was constricting and her vision was quickly fading. Panic filled her as she felt like she was about to die. Then, less than one minute later, she felt fine.

With the new, decorative bracelet in place, the attendants released her and all five people left without a word. Katniss had to take a few deep breaths before trying to determine what had just happened. She looked down at the cuff, lightly touching it's tooled surface. What she'd just felt, that near instant state of complete, mindless panic had occurred because they took off the band. Was that why Haymitch had told her to never try to remove it? She rubbed at the part of her arm that had not been recovered by the smaller model and wondered at the sheer number puncture marks she could see encircling her arm. There had to be at least a hundred, maybe two. She shook her head and let go of her arm. She didn't want to think about it right now. This may have been Snow's real reason for asking her here but it wasn't hers. If they hadn't taken her back yet, she must still be here for Peeta.

Another hour passed before the door to the waiting room opened once more. This time, it was the same two female guards that had escorted her here this morning. They motioned for her to follow them and she did. One walked in front of her, leading the way, while the second trailed behind, ready to pounce on her if she made one false move. Finally, they stopped in front of a door and pushed her inside. What she saw inside let her new bracelet demonstrate its effectiveness for the first time.

Peeta.

He was lying on a hospital bed, wearing a gown that fell just above mid thigh. His prosthetic, which she'd never seen him without, was gone. What made the bracelet give her a second does was not his missing limb however; it was the backside of the small, silver case that he sat watching while tears ran down his cheeks. She'd seen a case like that before. It was the same as the one from the train when she'd discovered that Peeta, Haymitch and Gale had all witnessed what happened to her in the Justice Building.

He looked up at her with eyes so full of surprise, then longing and finally despair. All of the possible scenarios of this visit that had run through her mind before had just gone out the window. He knew already what she was going to keep from him and she couldn't stand what she saw in his eyes. He blamed himself and she couldn't live with that.

"Katniss, I'm so sorry." He just shook his head.

"Don't you dare." She ran to his prone form and immediately started raining down desperate little kisses all over his face. "You did…" she kissed his cheek, "what you thought," she kissed his forehead, "was right." She managed out each word between the little caresses of her lips.

"Katniss, I…"

"She made you do it." She kissed his mouth. She wished she knew how to deliver the types of kisses that made your mind go elsewhere but all she could manage was a soft-lipped touch that begged something more.

"I didn't know…" She silenced him with another kiss and was thankful when she felt his hand, the one not covered in tubes, lace into her hair.

"She's a monster." She kissed his neck, determined to make him forget everything but her. She'd played games like this before; she hoped her skills had improved. She'd failed to convince him in the past.

"She…" Katniss wished he would try to stop talking. "Wait…" She stopped him again but then the hand in her hair tightened and pulled her away. "What do you mean, she?" He asked, his eyes filled with a new desperate look.

Katniss felt the knot try to form in her stomach before the new cuff chased it away but the new sense of dread remained. "She made you."

"He made me." He looked at her intensely for a moment, confusion obvious in the furrow of his brow. Then his eyes widened and in a sudden fit of mind numbing panic, he pushed her away. It was only then that Katniss saw the front of the screen and the final image on which it was frozen. It was of her but not of her bound to a chair. It was of her on her bed in the train. He'd just seen their last morning together, not yesterday.

"No." He said quietly.

Katniss just stood there. All thought gone. She had no idea what to do.

"You saw?" His voice cracked. All she could manage was a small nod. "Oh god." He turned his head away from her and seemed to push himself into the bed, like he wanted to pass right through it. It made her snap. She went back to him and this time didn't try to foolishly kiss his fears or pain away. She just tried to hold him. He pushed her away. Undeterred, she grabbed him again.

"Don't." She warned in a deadly sounding voice she didn't know she possessed when he tried to shrink away from her again. "You got us one week. We get to be together. I needed that, I don't think I could have done any of this without that." She didn't know if she was telling a lie for his benefit or if she what she just said was really the truth. She grabbed his cheeks then and forced him to look at her. "Thank you Peeta Mellark, my husband, my savior." And then she really kissed him. Not some desperate little thing but really kissed him. She felt tears running down her cheeks when she finally felt him relax. He wrapped his free arm around her and held onto her like she might disappear.

"I love you." He whispered.

"No matter what happens?"

"No matter what happens."

OoOoO

AN: Even when I throw you Kat/Peeta folks a bone, there's always a string attached it seems. I like to torture my readers as much as the Snow's enjoy torturing these characters.

bluestriker666: Thank you.
Ambrosia: Everyone get's busy. I'm glad you were able to fit it in. Thank you!
MaidenAlice: Pshhh, read what you want, to hell with everyone else. :) I'll try to keep it up.
Loli-pop0394: Yeah, 'power', Miss Snow seems to enjoy incomplete answers. She continues to be an enigma. We know she's cruel but do we really know her motivations? 'Because we can' and 'power' are all she's offered so far. She'd just had the ever living snot beat out of her right before that chapter too so I guess you'll have to make your judgments base on that small amount of info so far.
enginette: Fantastically concise.
Bibi: Wow. That's some claim. Thank you for the praise and I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. I now have six chapters for Act III written… no way I'm stopping now.
Carla: I'm glad my explanation made Peeta's progression make more sense. I wasn't a fan of the character destruction either. It left me wanting and that's probably a factor behind my writing this little tale. Snow remains an enigma. You'll learn more and more, I promise. Haha, I feel the same way but in the writing side of things. I've been tempted to pull out the laptop at work and punch in a few lines but have been able to limit myself to a couple of jotted down ideas on a notepad. Had a heck of one yesterday, yet another for the third act but it got me excited all over again.

Superfluous note: Haven't felt I had room for these the last couple of times due to massive review responses but I'll take advantage of this one. I had a real-life dream the other night with Prim in it… it was creepy (I think about this fic too much). I'll be adding a couple elements of it to the story down the line. Also, I've been asked about other dark fics. I just came across one due to a story alert subscriber's favorite's list, "Hold On To What You Believe". If you think my story is emotionally draining, then you have no idea. It's a one shot that left me feeling… can't explain it but it was phenomenal.