Disclaimer: Avengers, Hunger Games, and all other elements belong to their relevant owners; I merely borrow them to write this story
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Falling Hope, Rising Threat
By the time Finnick came to pick Clarke and I up, I was already anxious about what we were going to do about this whole mess. The boys that Clarke had identified as Finn and Murphy had accepted my decision to handcuff them both once they'd registered that Clarke was clearly with me of her own free will, but judging by the awkward glances Clarke and Finn kept giving each other, there was definitely something going on there that I didn't know about. Once we were on board the hovercraft, I relocated our two 'prisoners'- as much as Clarke didn't like to think of it that way, she had at least accepted my decision- to the rear section of the ship while Finnick proceeded towards Johanna and Anya's last location, leaving me to look at my new teammate.
"So," I asked, hoping that Clarke wouldn't take this question too personally, "what's your history with them?"
"Murphy was… well, we had some trouble with him when the dropship landed," Clarke explained, as she sat down opposite me, reaching up to remove her helmet even if she kept her current ponytail. "He had a bit of trouble with my friend Wells when we landed here, then Wells was killed by someone else and Murphy was nearly hanged because I thought he did it…"
"Then what happened?" I asked; judging by Clarke's awkward expression, I was willing to guess that she hadn't tried to hang Murphy herself, but this was clearly still an uncomfortable topic.
"He was exiled from camp for a while, came back and nearly infected us with a virus that some of the other Grounders had infected him with, and then he kept lashing out as some of the people who had hung him until he tried to hang Bellamy and shot Raven shortly before… well, everything happened," Clarke said, shrugging awkwardly at me. "As for Finn… we had a… we were friends early on, then he and I were stuck in a bunker during a storm, and…"
"Oh," I said, not seeing the need to make Clarke more embarrassed than she clearly was by giving me more information. "And it ended badly?"
"I ended it when his girlfriend came down in an escape pod to help us regain contact with the Ark," Clarke explained.
"Ah," I said; I didn't need to know much about relationships to know that a situation like that would make things very complicated.
"Raven's good company, don't get me wrong, and it's not like I knew that Finn was dating anyone when we were in the bunker, but…" Clarke shook her head in frustration at her own words.
"It's not your fault," I said, smiling sympathetically at my new teammate.
My experience with relationships might be limited to whatever I'd had with Peeta and Gale, and I still couldn't define what I had with either of them even if they'd both accepted that I wasn't looking for anything right now, but I hadn't heard anything to suggest that Clarke had been anything less than unfortunate enough to make a bad choice under ridiculously complicated conditions.
"I see them!" Finnick called back to us from his position in the pilot's seat (I would do him the favour of assuming that he'd either ignored our conversation or trusted that I would deal with any potential issues that might come up myself). As Clarke and I turned to face the entrance hatch, I felt the hovership lowering towards the ground before the door opened, Anya jumping inside with a grim expression before an unfamiliar young man and woman entered, Johanna bringing up the rear with a large man wearing a strange outfit of fur and leather held over her left shoulder with her metal arm.
"We got anywhere to chain this guy up?" she asked, looking at me with a pointed stare. "This arm might be able to handle the weight, but my shoulder's killing me."
"Who-?" I began.
"Lincoln?" Clarke asked, looking at the figure over Johanna's shoulders in shock.
"Wh- Clarke?" the boy said, the two of them running over to embrace Clarke as soon as they realised that she was there.
"How did you- what are you wearing?" the girl asked, stepping back to look at Clarke with a grin, as though she'd only just realised that Clarke was wearing her Falcon jetpack and wings.
"It's… my uniform," Clarke shrugged, clearly lost for a better description.
"Your 'uniform'?" the boy repeated, before turning around to look at me more directly, as though he'd only just registered that I was there. "And who are you?"
"Call me Mockingjay," I said firmly; the concept of my identity being secret back in Panem might be a no-brainer after everything I'd done in the war, but I still felt more comfortable introducing myself to strangers as Mockingjay rather than Katniss. "I lead the Avengers."
"You?" the new arrival said sceptically. "You can't be-"
"I am," I said resolutely; I might doubt myself at times, but I wasn't in the mood to be criticised by someone who couldn't have any idea what I'd been through to get here. "Our pilot is the Mariner, and I can assume that you already know the Falcon?"
"The Falc- you're on the team?" the boy said, looking incredulously at Clarke as he realised who I was referring to.
"Cool!" the girl grinned, eagerly taking in Clarke's new costume before she looked at me. "How do I join?"
"Uh… we're pretty good member-wise right now," I said, the girl's grin suddenly reminded of some of the kids I saw when we went out to the Districts as a team; she might be older than the usual groups I saw playing 'Avengers' in the streets, but she had that same childish enthusiasm about her. "I take it you're… Octavia?"
"Yeah," the girl said, her smile faltering from eager to slightly sheepish. "Sorry, it's just… well, as Bellamy can confirm, I always loved pretending to be the Black Widow when I was growing up…"
"She had to hide most of the time anyway; telling stories about someone who made a living out of hiding seemed like a good idea," the boy who was apparently Bellamy shrugged, looking around the hovercraft with a sheepish expression.
"Hasn't even grown up yet and the saint already has competition, huh?" Johanna grinned over at me.
"Huh?" Octavia asked, looking curiously at me as I glared back at Johanna.
"Mockingjay's sister… well, she's basically the new Black Widow," Clarke explained, awkwardly indicating me and her jetpack as she spoke. "This team's a mix of old and new, really; this thing belonged to an ally of the original Avengers, one of the other members is using an old Iron Man armour they found somewhere, and Mockingjay's shield used to be Captain America's…"
"That's the shield?" Octavia grinned, looking at the shield on my back with a new sense of enthusiasm. "Can I-?"
"We have other matters to discuss now," Anya said, glaring at Octavia before she indicated the man Clarke had identified as Lincoln, who had been tied to a chair by Johanna while the rest of us were talking. "I spared the Reaper because Bloodaxe would not permit me to kill him at the time, but you must understand that there is no hope for him-"
"Lincoln!" Octavia yelled, walking over to stand practically nose-to-nose with the older woman. "He's not this 'Reaper' thing; he's Lincoln!"
"What he used to be does not matter," Anya said firmly. "He is nothing more than a Reaper now; he must be eliminated before-"
"NO!" Octavia yelled, the outraged punch she threw at Anya catching the older woman in the face thanks to surprise more than anything else; even I could see that this girl had no real training in hand-to-hand even if she had a lot of sprit.
"You dare-!" Anya began, glaring at Octavia with a foreboding green gleam in her eyes.
"ENOUGH!" I said, slamming my shield against the wall of the hovercraft to ensure that I had everyone's attention before the situation escalated. Glancing around, I noticed that Clarke had moved slightly to stand alongside Bellamy and Octavia as they glared at Anya, but I was grateful to see that Johanna was standing back and showing no sign of favouring Clarke or Anya if things degenerated into a fight, even if Finnick had turned around and the console was displaying the green 'autopilot' light. "Before this goes any further, can someone please tell me what the Hell a 'Reaper' actually is?"
"People who have been corrupted by the Mountain Men," Anya explained grimly, indicating the bound man behind her. "We do not know how, but sometimes, when the Mountain takes our people, we see them again transformed into monsters who eat human flesh and have no memory of who they once were."
"Cannibals?" Finnick asked, turning in his chair to look at Anya in shock. "These mountain guys turn your people into cannibals?"
"Reapers," Anya corrected firmly, before she turned her attention back to Lincoln. "We have attempted to find out what was done to them, but attempts to contain captured Reapers have simply ended with their deaths-"
"You killed them-?!" Octavia began in outrage.
"They died on their own accord," Anya said. "Early on, we kept them contained in the hope that they would exhaust their anger and return to us, but such attempts always ended in them collapsing and dying as we watched."
"I can vouch for that," Johanna put in, nodding briefly at Anya as she leant against the wall alongside that large axe of Thor's. "I mean, I can't confirm that's what happens, but she told me pretty much the same thing back in that car park."
"Just to be sure, how long did it take them to die?" Clarke asked, looking uncertainly at Anya. "I take it we're not just talking about them starving to death, right?"
"Each Reaper only lasts a few hours in captivity before they collapse and cease," Anya confirmed grimly. "It has been described as an agonising end by those who have witnessed it, and we have never been able to determine the cause."
"Until now," Johanna put in, glancing at me with a quizzical raised eyebrow. "I was thinking we might want to get Saint Widow in on this?"
"What?" Octavia asked, before her eyes widened in understanding as she turned to me. "Your sister? The Black Widow? You're going to-"
"She took the name to reflect her desire to imitate the original Black Widow's stealth techniques; my sister is our healer, not our assassin," I said firmly, staring at Octavia as though I wanted to make sure she understood me before I turned back to Clarke. "You mentioned that your group originally lived in the dropship that brought you to Earth; I take it that ship's not in use any more?"
"No," Bellamy answered for her, looking grimly between me and Anya. "After we had to burn the whole area to the ground using the dropship's engines… well, nobody's interested in staying there long-term any more."
"Right," I said, nodding in thought for a moment before turning back to address Finnick. "We'll get back to the Ark to drop off our prisoners-"
"Prisoners?" Bellamy and Octavia said simultaneously.
"Later," I said, noting Clarke nodding gratefully at me; her feelings about this situation might be complicated, but she wasn't going to argue with my decisions. "Once we're there, you can leave us to get to the dropship on foot while you and Bloodaxe take… Lincoln here and head back to the compound to pick up Widow and Iron Man. Tell her to bring whatever she'll need to carry out a blood test so that we can work out what the mountain's using to turn people into… that; we can carry out more detailed tests at the dropship in case things get… well, unpleasant."
"And what about the prisoners?" Finnick asked, indicating the rear of the ship.
"Who are-?" Octavia began.
"Once we're at the Ark, I'll make sure Mom understands that they're to stay under house arrest until we can… work out what to do next," Clarke interjected, a pleading look in my direction telling me that she needed time to work out what she wanted to do before she told the Blakes what had happened.
Personally, I wasn't sure about that decision, but considering my own lack of experience with these people, for the moment I was going to trust Clarke's judgement and trust that she knew the consequences of what she was asking.