Moves and Countermoves: Hannah
Chapter 8: The Training Centre: Training Day Two
Thursday 3rd July
The Capitol.
Hannah woke up, tangled in them. Her ears were pleasantly squished between their heartbeats and it lulled her back to sleep. When she heard Euphemia Coin's voice try to lull her to awaken, she just nestled herself further into the woman's softness, her warmth, her smell. She felt her kisses on her forehead, on her hair, on her eyes. "We can't do this today. We've all overslept. Any other day but today, Hannah".
She then felt a more forceful tapping on her shoulder blade. Her father. "Hannah", he said sharply, and she knew he was angry at her and that she would have to get up. "Quit playing around".
Hannah opened her eyes into a blanket of white and stretched. Her eyes found Euphemia Coin's smiling down at her from where the woman still had her held in her embrace. Hannah knew she should feel embarrassed or angry with herself for being caught like this with the Angel of Death, but she couldn't, her heart felt happy and she was ... content.
She then felt the harsh fingers of her father prod her ribcage as he picked her up out of the woman's embrace and put her in the bathroom. Euphemia Coin's eyes looked hurt and sad, almost as if she was going to cry. "One minute is all you have", he said before closing the door.
Coming out of the bathroom, it was just half dressed Haymitch and her training clothes that had been laid out for her on the crumpled bed. Haymitch made her drink a whole glass of water and then gave her some sort of rectangle cake thing and said that the male stylist would be escorting her to the Gymnasium this morning, and that he would join her there soon in the viewing block. He then rubbed her cheek with his rough hand.
In the elevator the male stylist weaves Hannah's hair whilst she eats the food Haymitch had given her. She catches Pig Boy watching her and she gestures him to have some. He shakes his head, no, but smiles. Hannah shrugs internally, finishing her food in silent contemplation, wishing she was back in bed.
~xXx~
They had made it to the gymnasium on time and when Atala had stopped speaking, Hannah followed Pig Boy, not because he went to a station she wanted to practice on but because she felt unknown and he was someone to follow. It wasn't until after five minutes of staring at Pig Boy's hands did she realise it was the camouflage station.
She should have had a cold shower whilst she was in the bathroom as she felt she was still asleep. She felt she was still lying in bed with her head between her father's and her mother's heartbeats.
She watched Pig Boy paint for another five minutes, before she got up and looked for another station.
She found that she went through the stations on autopilot. She wasn't taking any recognition of her score, how well or unwell she was doing, but her voice inside her kept telling herself that she should be remembering to make mistakes. But Hannah found she just didn't have the energy to comply.
She started to wake up on the archery station.
Like yesterday, she couldn't go on it just once and that was something promising. She was probably on her third round when Atala called lunch. Sparks were flying between her brain, she had finally woken up out of her weird dream like behaviour.
She looks up to the elite viewing platform for the first time that day, she finds Haymitch in the crowds and despite all the people surrounding and talking to him, he does turn to her and gives her smile. She can still feel his rough hand on her cheek. She can't see Euphemia Coin, but she could be waiting for her to take them to lunch again.
Hannah waits where Euphemia Coin had met her yesterday, Pig Boy joins her and they wait in silence.
"Maybe she's not coming?" Pig Boy says, and Hannah isn't sure, but she thinks it's the first time he has ever spoken to her.
"She said she was coming, so she's coming", Hannah says, angry that Pig Boy thinks that Euphemia Coin would not be here when she was the woman's only child, her only concern.
The head trainer, Atala, walks over to them. "Your escort asked me to tell you both that she is very sorry, but she won't be able to join the both of you. How about I show you where the lunch hall is? You can eat with all the other tributes".
Hannah's heart sinks, but by the time she reaches the lunch hall and has put the food on her plate, she decides, she doesn't care. She can feel her body build back it's armour it had seemed to have lost and decides it is for the best.
There is a long table where everyone is eating food, everyone seems to have sat in District order and there is some space at the end of the table.
She follows Pig Boy. She never did really get on with other children the short time she was at school, no matter how big she smiled, they always seemed to ignore her and not want to play with her. Like despite her pretending to be her Sae's granddaughter, they knew she was cursed.
Pig Boy sits and she sits next to him, he frowns at her but then smiles.
Hannah catches the eye of the District 11 girl staring at her from the opposite side of the table with an expressionless look on her face and shuffles closer to the boy.
The children school used to just stare at her. Not smiling, not frowning or laughing, just staring.
Hannah starts to eat her food.
~xXx~
Gymnasium
When lunch is over the first thing Hannah does when they return to the gymnasium is look up for Euphemia Coin, she spots Haymitch, but she can't see her. A cold feeling starts to fill her.
"I'm sure she is fine", Pig Boy says next to her. The second thing he has ever said to her.
Is that what is wrong with her? Is it worry she feels for Euphemia Coin.
"You can't know that", she replies, because it's true.
Haymitch did say that she could end up with her head on a spike, and he was worried that those Peacekeepers were going to hurt her last night. President Snow had told her to play by the rules or the odds were not in her favour. And Hannah didn't understand why, she was Capitol and Haymitch said everyone loved her and Euphemia Coin had all these rules that she said was very important to follow, she couldn't imagine that she wasn't also playing by the rules.
"Do you think something has happened to her?" The Pig Boy stops and he looks worried. His stupid glasses making his eyes look bigger than they actually are. How is he going to keep them on in the Games? What if he looses them? Then Hannah reminds herself that this boy is not going to make it past the Cornucopia. Maybe she will kill him herself for mercy.
There is loud laughter that comes from above and Hannah finds Haymitch again.
"My father would know if she was in trouble and protect her", she says, feeling better herself, before leaving Pig Boy to go back to the archery station.
When Atala blows the whistle for the end of the training day, Hannah feels like not even half an hour has passed. She looks for Pig Boy and they follow the line of tributes before it breaks away into their own separate District rooms. Euphemia Coin is waiting for them with a big smile on her face.
Hannah is at first relieved to see that she is fine and looks unhurt. Then she is angry that Euphemia Coin was not here to take her to lunch like she said she would yesterday, that she wasn't watching her from the elite viewing platform like she did yesterday - and she had checked regularly throughout the second half of the training. But then she reminds herself she doesn't care, and walks up to her slowly.
"My Darlings", she says, holding out both her hands. Pig Boy takes one easily. "I have a surprise for you upstairs, and then I thought we could play some more of your games before dinner".
Hannah takes the woman's hand and the woman squeezes it.
~xXx~
Penthouse Apartment
The surprise was a small late afternoon tea set up in the dining room, which after washing and dressing for dinner, Hannah and Pig Boy ate in happy silence whilst Euphemia Coin and the female stylist talked loudly to each other whilst drinking tea. Then the female stylist, Portia, taught them how to play one of the games which used the screen, it was 'interactive', a bit like the archery simulator. Pig Boy was much better than her, and it annoyed her not only because he was better at something than her, but also because it was a game of sports, and in real life, Hannah would clearly be better than Pig Boy at sports. Still, she continued playing it and got better, and she forgot about Euphemia Coin and the female stylist talking loudly behind them on the settee; forgot about the cameras and microphones in the room; forgot about the Avoxes who had their tongues ripped out and made to be servants; forgot about the games; forgot about District 12; forgot about all the funny thoughts and visions.
"What in hell are you wearing?" Haymitch's rough voice cuts through her fun and Hannah takes her eyes off the screen to look at him. Her smile disappearing when she sees how tired and displeased his look is on her. He wasn't here when they returned, Euphemia Coin said he still had work to do but he would be back to join them for dinner before they all had to go out again to find sponsors.
Euphemia Coin had dressed her in one of the fancy costumes Madame Coin had gifted her and the butterfly wings.
"Doesn't she look like such an angel, Haymitch?" Euphemia Coin sings from behind her, sounding very pleased.
Haymitch snorts, "well when you put it like that, I guess it is a fitting costume, isn't it Princess?" and Hannah follows her father's gaze as it moves from her to Euphemia Coin.
Euphemia Coin's eyes suddenly flash with hurt.
Hannah could feel her father walking towards her and she turns to look back at him. He has a small smile on his face now and looks confused instead of angry.
"You like all that paint on your face?" He asks, standing over her and using one of his rough hands to rub her cheek.
Hannah looks up at him frightened, suddenly aware that she has let the Capitol women paint her like a clown.
Haymitch kneels and smiles wider, his eyes now only showing kindness. "It's OK if you do", he whispers. "I ain't going to be angry", and he kisses her cheek, before picking her up into one of his arms. He uses the other arm to pick up Pig Boy - she spots the kiss he gives the boy on his cheek- and he walks them over to the large Penthouse Apartment windows that show all of the Capitol. "Have you both had fun today?"
"Yes, Mr Abernathy", Pig Boy.
"Yes, Mr Abernathy", Hannah copies, because it's a new name she has never thought to call her father and she likes the way it presents her father. Authoritative and respected.
"Well, that's all that matters", he mumbles.
~xXx~
Dinner was exciting. It was a 'cuisine' all the way from the, 'Orient', which was a landmass outside of Panem, and Euphemia Coin had specifically requested it for her and Pig Boy. They were given two thin sticks as 'cutlery' which the female stylist taught them how to pick the food up with. Hannah enjoyed trying to learn to eat like this because it required both balance and coordination. Pig Boy was terrible at it and had to be brought normal cutlery but Hannah was having too much fun to care how much actually went in her mouth and how much on the table. Some of the tastes were familiar, some of the tastes were new and exciting, and some she just swallowed and avoided a second mouthful. When she looked over at Haymitch to see how he was handling this new food, she found him eating it easily with the two sticks and concentrating on explaining the different pieces to Pig Boy.
Everyone had again been seated in the same places as dinner yesterday and the two breakfasts, which meant she was next to Euphemia Coin again and far away from Haymitch. Euphemia Coin explained the different foods to Hannah as she picked them up - inbetween her loud talk with the stylists - but it was different.
"You must eat", Euphemia Coin whispers to Hannah, pulling her gaze from Haymitch and Pig Boy, before moving Hannah onto her lap. "So you have lots of energy for your Games", hugging her.
Hannah nods, wondering what it was Euphemia Coin thought she had been doing before. It was harder to watch Haymitch and Pig Boy from this angle with Euphemia Coin's and the female stylist's even bigger hair.
Euphemia Coin kept Hannah on her lap throughout the rest of the dinner courses. When Hannah couldn't eat any more she had tried to move but Euphemia Coin only increased the grip on her, securing her with a kiss on the top of her head. Full and quite sleepy with food, Hannah decided it was easier to just make herself comfortable where she was sat. She ignored the conversation and instead watched as the table became a clear rectangle of wood.
"How about you get one of your boardgames and we pick one to play before bedtime?" Euphemia Coin asks, and although her frequent kisses did have Hannah on the verge of falling asleep against the woman's soft chest, at the promise of a boardgames, Hannah pushes herself off the woman returning quickly with the pile of boardgames.
Euphemia Coin picks one of the new ones and Hannah hadn't realised that she had sat back on the woman's lap until she suggests that everyone 'pairs up'. Her long painted nails digging back into Hannah, "Hannah and I will be a team. Haymitch, I don't think you've played this before so you can pair up Cinna, and Theodore, My Love", she smiles at Pig Boy, "you can pair up with Portia".
Theodore.
It is the first time Hannah hears Pig Boy's name, or perhaps just the first time she has listened. It was a Merchant name. Hannah had learnt all about the class difference in District 12 from the children at school. There were Seam people and then there were Merchant people. The Seam people were poor and lived on the edge of District 12 near the coal mines where most of them worked. The Merchant people had more money because they worked in shops and lived in the city centre. Even though Hannah lived in the Seam with her Sae, the children used to call her a Merchant because of her light hair, eyes and skin. Merchants were from families which migrated from the richer districts, mostly District 1, after the Great War. Sae said they thought that they were better than everyone else, but they weren't. Seam people were from District 12, some were from other poorer Districts and had escaped through the woods. Hannah had seen people like them sometimes in the woods. Runaways. Most of the time the Capitol hovercraft would find them, but sometimes they didn't and they went further than District 12.
Hannah had once asked Haymitch what was further than District 12 and he had said nothing was. But when she asked Sae, she said that there were other Districts. Districts that had their freedom from the Capitol and were no longer part of Panem. The kids at school used to say that you had to be good to the Capitol or else you would end up like District 13. Dead and buried.
Although Euphemia Coin had called the boy Theordore, everyone else seemed to call him, 'Theo', throughout the game. Hannah mostly did not understand the game but the adults seemed to be enjoying it. From what she understood the aim was to buy up the whole of the Capitol. She was happy that Pig Boy didn't know how to play the game and that he looked as confused as she did throughout it. Although Hannah did enjoy it when people had to give her money, or when Euphemia Coin said she could place another figurine house on their 'property', but she equally greatly disliked it when they had to pay others money.
Hannah was only just beginning to understand the game when an alarm went off on Euphemia Coin's smart watch and she said that they would have to 'cash up' and finish the game.
Cinna and Haymitch won, which Hannah did not understand because hers and Euphemia Coin's pile of money was bigger than everyone else. When she had said this, the adults had laughed and then Euphemia Coin explained to her the value of property and showed her that although they had more money, Haymitch and Cinna, and Portia and Theodore had higher money value.
So they had lost!
Hannah hadn't liked that at all.
Haymitch had said it was because Euphemia Coin was a kept woman and knew nothing about economics.
The glare that Euphemia Coin had sent him had all the adults trying to hide their laughter. Euphemia Coin promised that there would be a 'rematch' tomorrow, where they would 'play until the bitter end'.
As the adults continued to put the game away whilst still arguing about the game, Hannah started to get out the game that she and Pig Boy played the other night.
She was laying the playing mat out on the floor in the living room when she feels Euphemia Coin's touch on her shoulder. "It's bedtime, Darling".
Hannah shakes her head, no.
Euphemia Coin gently turns Hannah so that she is facing her and kneels down so she can look Hannah in the eyes. "Haymitch, Cinna, Portia and I are all going out and I need you fast asleep before I leave, or I won't be able to leave you", she kisses Hannah's lips.
Hannah shakes her head again, no.
She wants to win.
She knows she would win this game against all of them.
She turns back to finish laying out the mat.
"Who are you going to play with, yourself?" Euphemia Coin asks. "Come on Darling, everyone is either going out or going to bed. If you go to bed now and get up early enough, you can play before breakfast tomorrow morning".
Hannah turns back round and sees that the stylists have left and that Haymitch has that boy's hand in his again as he takes him out of the room.
It is just Hannah and Euphemia Coin in her silly costume and wig and high shoes.
"Hannah", Haymitch's voice says unfriendly.
Hannah looks defiantly at her father.
"I hope you're not being difficult. It is time for bed. If you're still here when I get back, I will be angry. Tidy up the mess you've made".
He is angry at her.
Hannah looks down at his hand in the boy's again, before turning back round to fold the playing mat and put the game away again.
When she puts the game on top of the other games and Euphemia Coin takes her hand, she feels like her heart is going to combust she is so angry, that or burst out crying.
Hannah stays silent all through Euphemia Coin getting her ready and doesn't answer any of the woman's questions. When she tries to kiss her goodnight, Hannah disappears far down under the covers.
It must be nearing on an hour later and Hannah can only feel sleep coming to her now that she has plotted the different ways she would kill the entire 75th District 12 team if they were all in the Hunger Games together - and the boy from District 1 - when from under the covers she can see her bedroom light turn on.
Heavy footsteps walk into her room and up to her bed, and she can tell by the tread that it is Haymitch. What she doesn't expect is the way he rips the covers off off her bed exposing her.
He grabs her chin in her hold and Hannah couldn't move her head if she wanted.
She swipes a hand at his face but then he catches this in his spare hand, before sitting lightly on her legs.
She goes to hit him with her spare hand.
"Don't", he says, his voice dangerous, and she stops her assault. "Listen to me, are you listening?" His hands close tighter around her jaw, but he is not hurting her. "You are not some Capitol spoilt brat who complains when they don't get their own way. You are a District 12 child. You are my child. Do you understand?"
Hannah understood. She could feel hot tears fall out of her eyes and roll down her face.
Haymitch releases his holds on her and stands.
"I'm sorry, Papa", she says, and she is. She feels ashamed over her behaviour.
"Don't let these Games change you. Don't let them make you forget who you are. Don't let them turn you into one of them".
"Yes, Papa", she manages.
"I'll see you in the morning", he says, before kissing her on the forehead quickly and leaving.
~xXx~
There is a clock next to her bed and it says that the time is 23:32.
So it's not that late. If she went to bed now, it would be the earliest she has gone to bed since she arrived in the Capitol.
Euphemia Coin had said that she, Haymitch and the stylists were going out and wouldn't be back until very early in the morning. Which means it would just be her, Pig Boy and the Avoxes.
She still really wanted to play that game. Just once. She understood that she had to listen to what Haymitch and Euphemia Coin said, that it was important to play by the rules, but she was slowly going crazy lying here in bed knowing the game was not far. It would only be for less than five minutes. She would win and then she would go to bed like Euphemia Coin had told her.
Hannah got out of bed and opened her bedroom, the lights in the corridor turned on automatically and she almost jumped out of her skin when she saw the female Avox watching her from the door outside Euphemia Coin's, looking at her curiously.
"I just need to tell the boy from my district something", she says and walks towards where Haymitch took the boy earlier.
The lights in the rooms turn on as she walks, and she can feel the female Avox following behind her like a snake. When she sees the game she wants to play alone on the small table in the living room, she walks even quicker to her destination.
Reaching a shorter corridor, there are only two doors and the District 12 Peacekeeper. He is standing outside one of the doors and frowns curiously at her, walking towards her.
"I just need to tell the boy from our district something", she says.
The Peacekeeper looks at her and then nods, opening one of the doors.
Pig Boy looks like a scared pig when he wakes. "What's the matter?" He asks, when he sees it's her.
"Let's play a game. Just one and then you can go back to sleep. Please", she adds, already pulling him out the bed.
"I'll need my glasses", he says, reaching for them on the bedside. "We're going to get in trouble", he says when they're in the living room and she is unboxing the game.
"They won't know".
"What about the cameras?" He says.
"They're off", she says, although she doesn't actually know if that's true. Euphemia Coin had told Haymitch the other night about the Peacekeepers waiting until the cameras turned off. She didn't really care, she just wanted to beat the boy at the game.
"Who is going to spin for us?" He asks, and Hannah realises he raises a good point. She looks around the room and her eyes land on the two Avoxes.
She goes to the Peacekeeper first because although he was a Peacekeeper, Hannah remembers he was nice to everyone. But he shakes his head, no.
She then goes to the female Avox, "please will you play with us?" She asks.
The Avox looks her in the eye and there seems to be a storm in both her grey eyes, they seem to light up like lightening and Hannah thinks she recognises her. She thinks she remembers seeing this woman in the woods one time when she had been spying on Hunter Woman and Man. A hovercraft had come after her and a man. ... She thought they both had been killed.
But it couldn't be. The woman's hair was not as red and Hannah remembered her skin was darker.
The Avox nods yes and takes the board from Hannah, who is about to show her how it works, but then the Avox spins it and shows her the results.
She knows how to play the game as well?
Maybe she is also a Capitol Peacekeeper who has had her tongue ripped out and forced to be a slave.
Hannah wins easily and quickly and as she promised herself, she stops after that game and puts it away nicely before going to bed.
~xXx~
Hannah wakes although, she isn't sure she was ever truly fully asleep when she feels Euphemia Coin snuggle next to her and place a kiss on her forehead. She smells clean and fresh and by the way her cheek rubs against hers when she kisses her, she knows she is bare of any face paint. She is District again.
She later feels Haymitch snuggle behind her and they both hold her as they did the other night.
"I was waiting", he whispers.
"That can wait until after the Games. This might not".
AN: Another 2k turned 4k chapter. Until next update!
