I do not own The Hunger Games.

Finnick Odair is precious.

The Girl With The Green Eyes

Welcome to the 70th Annual Hunger Games

"Listen, when the countdown timer goes off, run."

They're standing on the tarmac, in the bright sunshine.

It's warm here.

And no one should be having the conversation they're having.

Finnick Odair, Murder Game Mentor.

And Annie Cresta.

Murder Game Mentee.

She's dressed in lightweight clothes, so it's definitely nothing artic or space age.

He hopes.

"Don't try to go for anything. Just run."

She's looking up at him.

All wavy hair and big, round, green eyes.

"Finnick."

Her voice is a whisper and she's trembling.

"I'm scared."

He nods, trying to refuse his own flood of emotions from breaking through.

He'd caught Avil again that morning at breakfast.

"Hey. Remember."

"Yeah. Yeah. I know."

"Help her escape. That's all you gotta do."

"Okay, man. I know."

He can only hope it will help.

Her survive longer.

Suffer longer.

"I know. Just run, okay, just . . ."

And suddenly he just wants to gather her up in his arms.

Hug her to him, strong and tight.

Whisper some stupid, pointless platitude like, 'it's going to be okay' or 'I believe in you' or something dumber.

He just wants to do that.

But he can't.

It would be too hard to let go, wouldn't help anything.

She's just got to go and he's . . .

"Just get away and find shelter."

. . . got to let her.

"Water."

And she stands there a second longer, looking up at him.

As if waiting for a miracle, a rescue.

We can't even run.

We're in the middle of the Capitol and there's Peacekeepers everywhere.

That's never going to come.

So she stands there a second longer and he knows he's going to have make her get on that damn plane and-

"Okay."

-and go off to die in some godawful arena.

"Goodbye, . . ."

Just because . . .

". . . Finnick."

. . . President Snow says.

And Finnick Odair . . .

Goodbye.

. . . watches her.

And she does run, she does.

Just like he told her to.

The alarm goes off, tributes leap from their pedestals.

Some sprint straight to the cornucopia, intent and laser-focused on weapons, supplies.

They are met by the fastest, the strongest of them, the Careers.

And Death.

It's a bloodbath, the cannon will boom for close to ten tributes here alone, in the very first seconds of The Games.

It's music to Finnick's ears as he sees Annie still alive.

Every boom is a person who won't kill her.

And every still living tribute is a person who might.

He's more tense than he realized, every muscle bunched tight as he grips the arms of the chair he's in.

He doesn't even notice until he feels Mags' gentle hand on his forearm.

He pulls his eyes away from the screen to her.

Her grey hair is a frizzy cloud around her wrinkled face.

The joints in her fingers thick with arthritis.

And still she wears her wedding ring, reminder that one can still have a semblance of a life after The Games.

Her symbol of hope that she's tried so hard to impress on Finnick's hopeless soul.

Her eyes are kind enough now as that same hand raises to Finnick's cheek, skin thin as paper and gentle as she brushes back his hair.

He can only bare her kindness for a moment, he's looked away too long already, Annie may already be dead and would be something of a pain and a mercy for both of them-

But she's alive and frozen with fear, watching children murder each other in a field of unfamiliar green.

Run, run, dammit.

Avil does his part, grabs a weapon, and runs toward Annie, shouting.

'Run' and 'go' and 'treeline'.

Annie, face a mask of terror and confusion, recoils from him.

And when he gets to her, he grabs her arm, grabs it and starts to pull.

Away from the meele, away from the fray.

Helping her, helping like Finnick insisted he do-

Good boy.

-but she is too much of a state to understand his intent.

And Annie Cresta, darling dear delicate necklace maker and Frightened Girl Extraordinaire, does not understand.

But hauls back.

Ouch.

And kicks him in shin with all her might.

Mags flinches next to him, hands up to her own face and Finnick thinks she might be silently laughing, joying in this girl, who laid in her arms and cried all last night, joying in her sudden fighting spirit.

He starts to smile too, thinking he's happy she didn't kick the daylights out of him in the past five days since the Reaping.

But it's the Hunger Games and no joy can hold for long.

Because another tribute is running up behind them and he's got an axe and-

Shit shit shit-

- and he's swung it right at Annie.

She's seen it coming, seen it and tried to duck.

Duck and only managed to spin them both around in a rough circle.

Somehow Avil's held steady.

And driven his spear into the tribute's stomach.

Whilst taking the tribute's ax clean through his own neck.

Shit.

And both tributes wobble.

The non-District 4 batting uselessly at the spear sticking out of his torso.

Avil starting to pitch forward.

Right into the screaming Annie.

His eyes are rolling up, his jugular veins spraying her with bright red arterial blood, all over her face, her clothes, her wild, flying hair.

His head snaps off his severed neck, too heavy for the one flap of skin the axe didn't slice through.

And drops into Annie's claw-like hands.

She fumbles it like a human coconut and it drops to the ground with a brain-heavy thud that cannot be heard above the other mayhem ensuing in the field.

The Games have been going on for two minutes and fifty-three seconds and Annie's time to get away relatively unnoticed is rapidly running out.

She has to go, she has to go-

And somehow, screaming and crying and falling over her own feet, she scrambles, flails, toward the treeline.

When she reaches it and she's alive and the cannons are booming out the lives of dead tributes, Finnick chances to breathe.

Just a little.

Whew, right?

Let me know what you think.

And thanks for reading. :)