For the next eight hours, Haymitch locked himself in the library, refusing medical assistance when he took himself off of his oxygen and doctors tried to force their way into the room. Haymitch didn't care if the lack of air to his system made him shrivel up and die choking on his own blood as he tried to suck in breath. Confronting Snow had taken everything he had left to give, and Haymitch had finally shot the ex-president down by degrading himself. What a victory.
At Snow's execution, the old man wouldn't be able to see him anyway since the stands around the gallows would be blackened out so that only a spotlight shone where Snow would be. The idea was that, as Snow had deemed human life expendable, he need not see any in his last moments. But Haymitch didn't even want to go now, not when it would be so much easier to sit here, hidden away from the world—
"You let me in right now, Haymitch!"
"Go away," Haymitch called back.
"I'll break the door down, see if I won't!"
"Go away!"
"Open the damn door!"
If only to stop her screaming, Haymitch pushed aside the desk, chairs, and bookshelves that he had piled in front of the door. Before he had moved the last piece of furniture, Katniss kicked the door open, but it rebounded and shut itself so that she had to open it more slowly with a scowl as she squeezed into the room.
"What the hell is your problem? Alaida wanted all of us at that last dinner to pay tribute to everything we've done and everyone we've lost and guess who didn't show up? Are you trying to go into seclusion again? Do you have booze stashed around here somewhere?"
"No, feel free to look around, though."
"You're not doing this again. It took me over a year to sober you up and get you clean and you're not going to ruin that just because you…what, exactly? Why are you acting up?"
"Did Peeta propose to you for real this time?" asked Haymitch, fiddling with the bandage over the spot where he had last had an IV feeding him blood.
"Did he—I—no, he hasn't yet."
"Yet? You expect him to?"
"Maybe, I don't know—what does this have to do with you?"
"So, you have something to go back to in Twelve, then?" said Haymitch pointedly.
The Girl on Fire never had a friendly face to spare, even for Haymitch, but it softened now as she understood why Haymitch had sought solitude instead of the company of the only friends he had.
"Does this have anything to do with what you and Snow talked about?"
"He knows me better than I do," Haymitch admitted. "He said that he already knows I don't have a place to go that actually needs me, so there's no sense in continuing to exist."
"He was saying everything he could to beat you down one last time, Haymitch," said Peeta, having snuck in behind Katniss. "Since he can't threaten you anymore, he's using his intellect to hurt you before he goes to his death. You have a place in this world. You don't know what to do with yourself, that's all. You've never had to get a job or face day-to-day life without fighting to accomplish something like keeping me and Katniss alive, or training for the siege. But there's so much you can learn to do, so many ways you can contribute. The best thing to do is just keep busy, whatever it takes."
"I'm no good at anything worth being good at now that the Capitol's fallen. I was good at surviving and for directing my hate towards Snow, but after today, I won't have to do that anymore."
"You won't know what there is to offer until you get home. And you are coming home. I'm not leaving the Capitol without you," said Katniss.
"Me neither," said Peeta.
Kids. They were still just kids, yet they had better ways of consoling him than the trained doctors who had been specifically assigned to Haymitch's case. And they loved him enough to not give up on him when he had every intention of giving up on himself.
"Get dressed, Haymitch. The car will be here to pick us up in fifteen minutes."
Just as promised, the stands around the gallows went dark as soon as the people had taken their places. None were seated, but everyone in attendance was either from the districts, a rebel, or a high-ranking official who had helped serve Praxis. Capitol citizens and former Peacekeepers had to stand furthest back and outside the stands to watch on television since there wasn't room to accommodate all. Fellow conspirators and those who worked under Snow would also watch from their cells as a reminder of what was to come. Haymitch and the Command team had a spot behind Alaida who stood directly in front of Snow, but still hidden in the shadows.
When Snow was led out, wrists chained behind him and ankles shackled together, there came a rise of boos and curses from the crowd, but unlike with Haymitch and his fellow rebels who had been captured and brought out to be executed in front of the press, no one threw anything at Snow. Alaida had each person searched for weapons and objects before entering the stands to set an example. Already she was proving to be a fine president and Haymitch suspected that, had her father lived, he would not have approved of her merciful ruling, but the people already adored her.
A man in official-looking robes read a final sentiment for Snow, addressing the date of execution, and the reason for it, then asked Snow if he had any final words.
"Don't let it happen again," said Snow pleasantly, and a ripple went through the crowd. What did Snow mean? Don't let a president have all the power again? Don't let something like the Hunger Games force a nation into disarray and poverty? Or don't let the people think they knew better because they had won their freedom?
The hooded executioner placed the noose around Snow's neck and in the seconds before a black hood much like the one Haymitch had been forced to wear was pulled down over the dictator's head, Snow's eyes found Haymitch. It might have been a trick of the lights, or Haymitch's exhausted mind playing tricks on him, but in those crucial seconds before the piercing blue eyes were covered, Haymitch could have sworn that they locked onto him, hidden in the dark. He took an ungainly step backwards, but at least four hands were there to hold him up, all from his team.
A drum rolled out the countdown as the spotlight closed in on Snow. The trapdoor beneath him fell away and for about eight seconds, his feet kicked uselessly as his neck snapped sideways, and then it was over.
Haymitch had no memory of the car ride back to Snow's mansion, nor did he remember bidding Peeta and Katniss goodnight, but he did come to when the rest of his team came to the library to say their farewells to him. Beetee would be helping set up a new system of communication in the Capitol, since his hacking into the previous one had destroyed it. Silica promised to come out and see him soon, but not until she had helped with the destruction of the fortifications around District 2's main military units. Bastian, who was now overseer of reconstruction of the city, shook his hand in the kindest gesture Haymitch had ever seen out of the man. Haymitch's concerns about Stave living on his own after even more traumatic experiences during the war were addressed when Slone and Farler stated that they had taken up a shared residence to help train the new police force that Alaida had renamed simply The Guards. It was also a bit of a shock when Stave put out his arms for a hug from Haymitch since neither of them liked physical contact, but Haymitch humored him. Nollie from Ten would also be staying in the Capitol to help plant gardens where torn-down buildings used to be like the Tribute Center and former arenas. Gerrod would be returning to Eleven to pick up his family before moving to Twelve per Katniss's request and Niles asked for Haymitch to send him updates from Twelve so that the two could keep in contact while Niles carried out his duties as Head of The Guard. Jax jokingly warned Haymitch to keep a close eye on Prim since he and Katniss's sister had developed a close friendship since those first and only minutes of the Seventy-Sixth Hunger Games.
And then Haymitch was left alone to pack nothing and wait for morning when the train would take him home. He had not even begun to wonder how he was going to while away the time when someone knocked and entered without invitation. He wasn't at all surprised to see Caesar with Isla wrapped in her favorite scarf, now in a carrier that allowed Caesar to have his hands free.
"Are you up for a game of chess?"
"No."
"Good, because I don't know how to play. I just came by to ask what you were going to do until you have to go home."
"Wait."
"How exciting. I know I won't be able to sleep because they're moving me out tomorrow, making me collect whatever I want from my home before I return to Thirteen to gather up Meela's things. Then I'm coming all the way back out here to lay a few of those things at her grave, but I want to keep some for Isla."
As if just noticing the forlorn look on Haymitch's face, Caesar gave an impartial shrug. "What's wrong with you now? You should feel accomplished. Snow's gone and you gave him a giant 'fuck you' before he went. You won."
"Yeah, I've won, alright. Snow died and I get to do—what, exactly? I don't have it in me to slit my own throat, otherwise I wouldn't have hesitated when the Peacekeepers first captured me in that enclosure, so I have to stick around. I made do with consumption for twenty-four years and the past year I've been in training to get here, only I never planned on getting past that. It was a given that I was supposed to die out there on the streets, but I didn't, so I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to do."
"Let me ask you something, Haymitch, if Snow hadn't killed your family, if you still had those people that you loved, do you think you would have had as strong of a desire to bring their murders to justice? Do you think that you would have fought as hard to protect Katniss in the arena or would have willingly participated in the war when Praxis came for you on the train?"
"If you're saying that it was in Panem's best interest for my family to be slaughtered, I'll stab your fucking eyes out."
"I wasn't going to say that," said Caesar impatiently. "I'm asking you if you think that you would still have as much of a hatred for Snow and the Games if you still had your family?"
"I don't know."
"I think you do know. And I know I do. Your family's murders didn't change you; this was always who you were meant to be, only you've decided not to let yourself be this person for a quarter of a century. You hid away from it all because you couldn't do anything to fight the system, but now that the system no longer exists, now that Panem is safe, and you don't have to fear for your life or the lives of the few people you've grown close to, what is there left for you to do, you wonder. Now that everything is as it should be in order to prosper, what can you do? Live, Haymitch, for all you're worth."
It was that simple. Live. Live instead of exist. Live instead of wander. Be something, do something, and keep going, whatever it took. Leave it to Caesar to put it all into perspective with one simple word.
Now, suddenly realizing that Caesar hadn't stated a final destination, Haymitch asked, "Where will you go?"
"I'm not sure yet. You know, a few days ago, I was given the opportunity to sign a modeling contract. A modeling contract. Apparently a wigless, feisty Caesar Flickerman is all the rage now and people are dying to know the real Caesar, but tough shit for them, because I'm not sharing, especially since they want to do a sort of a post-war bit on big-name or big-job soldiers so that the people in the districts know who their, and I quote, 'saviors and liberators are'. And if that doesn't make you want to vomit—"
"Alaida won't let them turn this into something blown so out of proportion."
"Well, they're after her too, but she can't threaten them to silence them, so she has to agree to do small interviews, but she's politely asked them to not idolize the featured soldiers."
"Anyone else we know who's in the spotlight?"
"Oh, yes, they went after Primrose after they got a hold of the footage of her staying behind to fix up Jax, but Katniss put her foot down and said that she didn't want a camera near her family ever again and that she would make it her new mission in life to destroy anyone who attempted to invade her privacy."
"She's already making enemies again—"
"They want to feature Jax as Alaida's unlikely lover, a boy who followed in his victor siblings' footsteps to pursue a woman seemingly out of reach, only to lose his brother in battle. That bit will fall through instantly, though, because Jax actually just proposed to Alaida, and once the press gets a hold of that—"
"When did this happen?" Haymitch demanded.
"While you were holed up in here. He proposed at the last dinner for all of the Command team, so you missed out. But other soldiers include Niles, of course, Stave, Slone, Silica—"
"So, just the victors. This is Game-propaganda all over again."
"Well, now, you didn't let me finish. Alaida agreed that they could do this feature only if every fallen soldier was given recognition in the magazine they want to print this in, and if they also included highlights on non-famous names like Flax, Crewe, and Cyan. Basically, everyone from the Command team, except for me."
"And why are you exempt?"
"Because I gave the people most of my life by living it falsely, so I'd like to spend the time I have left by living it in truth with my daughter. If the press wants information on me, they can dig it up from another source."
"Which brings us back to the question I asked you before, where'll you go now? Four?"
"I don't think I could return there just yet."
"Will you stay here in the Capitol?"
"Good God, no, I'd have reporters outside my house day and night trying to flash a camera at Isla, and that's not an environment I want her to grow up in. Gerrod told me how, now that they've torn down the walls around Eleven, that it's quite peaceful, but rather depressing in the winter because it's flat lands with nothing to see but barren snow. Stave mentioned the forests in Seven, which are actually quite appealing, but I haven't decided for certain. I won't go anywhere too industrial, so Eight, Two, and One are out of the question. How's Twelve?"
"Black," said Haymitch. "Even if they've shut down the coal mines, there's still a layer of the stuff coating the district. But we have meadows, mountains, you know, a village district. Secluded."
"That's a possibility that I'll keep open."
"Look me up if you decide to come visit, then."
There was a pregnant pause in which Haymitch wondered what else he ought to say. What does one say at the end of nearly a year of mutual dislike for the other's habits and attitudes? What does one say at the farewell between two soldiers who survived war and execution and despite all the hate thrown their way, still managed to become friends?
"I never thanked you," said Caesar, "for speaking out on my behalf back in Thirteen when Praxis was having me interrogated."
"I didn't expect you to because I never knew if I had actually done you a favor by letting you live. Answer me this, though: was it worth it?"
Caesar looked down at Isla who was fast asleep against her father's chest with one tiny fist curled. He brought it to his lips and kissed it. "Yes, it was."
"Then you're welcome."
And as Caesar walked out the door, Haymitch saw a flash of possibility awaiting him in Twelve, of letting sunlight stream into his house as children laughed in the open meadow and the people dedicated the former Reaping Day as a memoriam for all they had lost. No fear, no hate, no grief, no loss.
"Live, Haymitch, for all you're worth."
Live.
Sorry, epilogues and "Ten Years Later"s are not things I think I can write convincingly, so I won't. I don't remember when I first started writing this story, but I am so very glad I finished, just in time since I start my final college semester tomorrow and will have NO time at all for my own writing since I'm taking about four literature/writing classes, all of which are for my major, and a history class for my minor. Goodbye sleep, hello keyboard. Thank you all for reading, for peeking, for stopping by, for saying hello. Your reviews and viewings helped get me here, so I leave you now with this image...
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