Mary had been uncertain about Trevor's plans to turn a testimony into a poetry recital, but he had had a point when he said that it was important for the judges to know just what the teacher had been incarcerated for for over thirty years. Hopefully, it would not turn the trial into a circus.

Katherine Zeman described her life before the arrest. Fifty years when detained, she was eighty-three years old now. She had lived an entire life before being arrested, subjected to a show trial, and sent to a prison camp where for decades, she had sat at a knitting machine and made mittens. And all because of a poem she read to her students.

"For the record, witness, could you please recite a fragment of the poem?"

"Very well. Now, this is a pre-Cataclysm poem, written in the nineteenth century."

The audience seemed to be taken aback, but Mary, who knew the poem, understood that great art was timely even on the other side of the Cataclysm.

A curse to the Fatherland, whose face is

Covered with lies and foul disgraces;

Where the bud is crushed as it leaves the seed,

And the worm grows fat on corruption and greed.

"I think half the country would have agreed," Lior whispered to Mary.

Mary nodded. 'The Weavers' was a great poem, and what Zeman had really been getting at was patently transparent. She had heard it plenty of times before - it was always a hit at poetry recitals back in Thirteen. While she had sat in a comfortable chair and listened to the speaker declaim, someone had been arrested for doing the very same thing.

It was unpleasant to think about that. The testimonies reminded Mary that for tens of thousands, the rebellion had come too late. It could not have happened earlier, but it still stung to think about it.

After that came an anticlimactic presentation on the penitentiary system. There had been two types of prisons in Panem - conventional and secret. People had been sent to conventional prisons after being sentenced for a crime and to secret prisons - without a trial, though there had been instances of people being sent to secret prison for certain types of political crimes or for one too many instances of recidivism. Both types of prisons had come in two varieties, indoor - where people like Zeman had worked in sweatshops - and outdoor, where the prisoners had done heavy labour in quarries, mines, and building roads.

It had taken Mary by surprise to find out how complicated this system had been. Back in Thirteen, it had been simpler. For petty crimes, like stealing food, people had been subjected to a few days of corporal punishment and let go - not very effective at preventing recidivism, but the system had been hard to change. For more serious crimes, people were fitted with shock anklets and had their area of movement as restricted as considered necessary, up until a serial killer who spent his days going between his compartment and a workshop where he and several other convicted murderers made clothes. Multiple offenders had often been pressured into emigration. There were still diplomatic tensions with Ontario over that.

Good thing they could rely on the experiences of foreign countries to set up a proper system. Mary listened to the prosecutor read affidavits from former prisoners - it made for horrifying listening. Beatings, sixteen-hour days in freezing cold and scorching heat, lack of the most elementary healthcare, arbitrary violence, prisoners being forced to kill each other, a brutal system of divide-and-conquer that had encouraged prisoners to do the most vicious things to each other for a literal piece of bread. If someone found it hard to imagine, a former prisoner was brought in, together with smuggled photo and video taken by a guard, to explain what was going on in the images. And tomorrow would be even worse.

Thumeka idly munched on her lunch, waiting for the session to begin. A correspondent she didn't recognize made his way towards them. Jiao waved in a friendly way, but he drew back suddenly. "Smells like garlic here."

Thumeka smelled her soup - no scent of garlic. She was about to look at Mikola's sandwich but froze when she saw his face, which was twisted into an angry sneer. "Uh-huh," he said blandly.

The correspondent smiled and retreated towards the very back row.

Mikola bit into his sandwich, tearing off a piece of bread and jam. "What was that?" Jiao whispered.

"Antisemitic joke from our parts. Hard to believe that there's barely any Jews left there but the jokes remain."

What was she supposed to say to that? Thumeka finished her soup in silence and waited for the judges to enter, followed shortly afterwards by the next witness.

Thumeka watched the man walk up to the witness stand. He didn't look in the direction of the dock, instead focusing on the floor. Next to her, Mikola, already unhappy, tensed further.

"This is going to be terrible," he whispered.

"I know," Thumeka replied, quickly typing up a description of the man on her phone. He had wavy black hair to his ears, light skin, dark eyes, and had clearly not gotten enough to eat as a child. The nice suit he wore made him look like a child borrowing his parents' clothes. He looked around the room like a rat seeking a hole to hide in, but how else could a witness of a mass shooting look like when confronted with the perpetrators?

Thumeka studied the dock carefully. Blues looked satisfied that at least today, she would be spared. Slice looked confused, as always. The former Peacekeepers looked the most worried. Bright, especially, looked anxious. She sat up straight, but her eyes were tense. Lux was taking notes angrily.

The audience stirred. That morning had been spent listening to the prosecution enter document after document into his record, with the defense reaching a new low of nitpicking. The correspondent sitting next to Mikola had been ogling Wreath for the past two hours because there was nothing else to look at.

The witness was sworn in. He put his left hand over his heart and raised his right hand as he swore in a tremulous voice to tell the truth. His eyes took on a somber cast instead of their old blankness as he answered the judge's questions in a monotone. Thumeka could recite the rote questions and the identical responses in her sleep by this point.

"Witness, state your name, age, and address." Sanchez sounded almost asleep.

"Briar Whitetree, forty-three years old. I am from Seven, and live in the village of Twocreek during the winter, which is near I-5. My address is Five-A Creek Street."

The prosecutor was an older woman from Three who had to stand on a wooden box to be able to see over the lectern. "How close is your house to the woods?"

"It was the closest one. My parents had been poachers, so they had deliberately bought a house so close to the forest."

"Why did they not hunt legally?"

"They did have a permit, but because of money problems, they also hunted more than allowed, at the wrong time of year, protected species, things like that."

"What is your occupation in the winter?"

Whitetree licked his lips. "Truck driver. I was known as the most daring driver, so I was sent to do all the emergency supply runs, as the town is connected to bigger communities only by unpaved roads that become barely passable if there's a thaw in winter. I was officially employed as the sole mechanic in I-5, but I only spent a few years there full-time until they stated keeping me in Twocreek the entire winter." A village in this climate with no mechanic in winter. That must have caused some problems.

Low took off her legs and put them in a bag, causing a minor distraction all the defendants immediately focused on.

"Was it common for the local Peacekeepers to request you to carry something for them?" the prosecutor asked in a firm voice, as if not noticing.

Whitetree shook his head. "No," he said, licking his lips again and breathing deeply. "No, it wasn't."

"How often did it happen?"

"A few times. Twice, they couldn't have a hovercraft bring in some supplies in time because of a scheduling issue, so they sent me to fetch them. Once, the garrison commander from the county seat forced me to take him to Twocreek and back during the autumn mud time, I don't know why. And once-" he cut off, eyes darting around the courtroom. His shoulders hunched over. "It was when the rebellion was just starting. Well, before. It was before the Quell."

All of a sudden, Bright didn't seem so worried. She had been in Eight at that point. Thumeka noted that down and refocused on Whitetree.

"Do you know the exact date of that incident?"

"It was in the spring. The ground was still muddy. Commander Uraj told me to-told me to-" Whitetree started to cry, tears falling from his eyes faster than he could wipe them away. "I had to drive a group of Peacekeepers somewhere. I thought it was because the road was terrible, so they picked the best driver." The prosecutor did not interfere. The audience sat frozen. The vast majority of them hadn't seen anything of this sort before.

"I drove them to a clearing," Whitetree continued, eyes blank again. He stared at the wood panel his hands were clutching. "There, a few Peacekeepers from the logging crews were guarding a group of dirty people. There was a large shallow pit. I realized they had dug it." His voice was blank, too, now. "The Peacekeepers took boxes of alcohol from the truck and started drinking. Then, they ordered half the people to go inside the pit. I was sitting in the truck cabin. With the door open. Facing the pit. It was maybe ten metres from me. Or less. One person started to run. She was shot. A Peacekeeper shouted, 'Anyone else?' Nobody moved. The people in the pit were then shot by the Peacekeepers. I saw their faces. They looked terrified. Resigned. Some of them held hands. I remember one of them playing with his baby before being forced to lie down. After they were dead, the other half had to lie down on their bodies. They were also shot."

Someone in the audience was crying. Whitetree swayed from side to side, holding on to the witness stand with a white-knuckled grip. "The Peacekeepers were covered with blood and gore. They told me to bury the bodies. I began to toss soil over the bodies. The Peacekeepers got completely drunk as I worked. That was why they took me. They needed someone to drive them back. I tossed the soil over them. I tried to spread it lightly, in case someone was alive." He sagged against the back. "Then, I-I drove them back."

"Do you know why the shooting happened?"

"Terrorists had been found in their village."

"What were the names of the perpetrators?"

Whitetree rattled off a list.

"Did any of them show reluctance?"

"All of them. Uraj had to remind them of the order the C-in-C had signed. I think a few didn't shoot."

As Whitetree was asked more questions about that order, Thumeka studied everyone's faces. The prosecutor was long-used to it. She did not flinch. Lux took notes. Shaw looked bored.

The testimony came to end. The defense declined to cross-examine, but Baer spoke up about the relevance of the evidence. What some local commander did when working off a vague order could not reflect on Lux. Arguing about that went until lunch, when a recess was mercifully announced. The defendants looked crushed.

"'Anyone else'?" Chaterhan hissed to Blues. "What an outrage. This is the sort of thing that went on behind our backs!"

"An outrage," Blues agreed. "I can't believe we had no idea these sorts of things were happening." The defendants were led out for lunch. Thumeka and Mikola queued at the coffee shop for soup and sandwiches, leaving Jiao to appear on air. By now, even such horrors did not worsen their appetite.

"I can't believe we let it go on for so long," Mikola sighed as he craned his neck to see how many people were in front of them. "For seventy-five years, this was the regime that reigned here."

"That it did."

The queue advanced slowly. "I'd line them all up against a wall," Mikola hissed suddenly. "Even that Slice. Can't they see she's lying every single time she opens her mouth?"

Thumeka said nothing, aware that Mikola didn't want to hear her actual opinion.

Mikola reached the front of the queue. "Medium bean soup, large vegetable salad, one apple, ham sandwich but without the ham, jam donut, small coffee with one sugar, and fifteen donut holes - five chocolate, five honey, and five jam-filled," he rattled off. They alternated who bought the donut holes.

It was Thumeka's turn next. She showed the card that identified her as being someone involved with the trial. "Chicken wrap, small vegetable salad, one apple, and a medium black tea." She loved this coffee shop. It was still unique in the country, and she had access to it.

They went to the press room to eat, write articles, and wait for Jiao. "I wonder if they'll move on from arguing this afternoon," Mikola mused as he ate a spoonful of soup.

"Maybe."

Leon went down the row of documents, stapling the thick stacks with a special stapler. Ten years ago, an official had visited District Twelve and come away with this report on the conditions, which was promptly buried in a filing cabinet somewhere and forgotten.

The famine of 31-32 in Nine had been hard enough to read about, but Twelve had always been on the verge of famine. In a small town of merely ten thousand, people had starved to death every year. No wonder the population had shrunk by so much. It had been much bigger when the borders had been first sealed.

Leon had read all about it by now, of course. At the trial, a lengthy film had been shown, taken by a Peacekeeper. The proverbial camera-wielding Peacekeeper struck again to condemn the regime by accident. Leon had watched the film. It was absolutely horrifying. The poverty was like if someone took the rural poverty in small-town Capitol, cranked it up to one hundred, and got rid of even the paramedic-midwife stations.

Rumour had it that Twelve had been some sort of experimental Petri dish for the government. Leon was of the opinion that its existence was exactly as illogical as it appeared - there had been precious little of that before - but he had to admit that there was no reason to have the children of District Twelve go to school when, in the rest of the country, miners' children had gone to work at the age of five or six.

Vaccination rates - two percent. Life expectancy at birth - less than forty. People had died left and right from starvation, food poisoning, childbirth. The only reason the District hadn't simply died out was because the only form of birth control miners were able to afford was abstinence. And the useless work they did - the handful of lumps of coal they were able to tear out of the ground was sent across the border to rural Eight, and no further.

There had been a curiosity in the film. The Peacekeeper had gone to the black market (why did people have to go to a black market to buy the most elementary things?) and caught on camera a child trying to sell some sort of rags. That child was identified as Katniss Everdeen.

It was strange to even think about her. Leon remembered seeing her for the first time on television - stunted, scrawny, and horribly skinny. After the double victory, he was slightly annoyed by the change of rules, as a rule change was never good, and then forgot all about it. He hadn't paid much heed to the Quell, either, being more concerned with the empty shelves in the stores. Leon still didn't quite understand why some miner had been chosen to be a symbol of the Rebellion. As if anyone had needed a reason to rise up besides their own experiences!

Leon flipped through a stapled copy of the report. There was a photograph of a skeletal dead body lying in the snow. As if there had been a war on, or a famine. There was also a population pyramid, which looked quite typical, and a table showing average height and weight at different ages. Leon would have been taller than the average man in Twelve.

If not for the trial, this report would have been filed away and forgotten about. But instead, it would be read into evidence and recorded in the transcript. And then, every historian would know centuries into the future what kind of a life people led under the Games regime.

It irritated Mikola and Jiao to see the self-assuredness of the perpetrators as they took the witness stand. The victims and witnesses bore the psychological scars caused by their experiences, but the perpetrators seemed to be completely unaffected by what they had seen or done. This wasn't quite reflective of the true mental state of the perpetrators - even generals suffered from PTSD after witnessing mass executions - but they did a good job of hiding it.

Colonel Paulson was one of those. She stood in the witness stand as if on a parade ground, but everyone knew that she had been removed from command because of her alcoholism before the rebellion had even begun. She had been one of the many scourges of the outer Districts, leading a task force of roving murderers from county to county, burning villages and plantations to the ground and shooting their inhabitants when rebellion had been suspected of one of their inhabitants. Thumeka leaned forward slightly, trying to see a sign of the evil that lived within her, but as always, there was nothing. Paulson was tall for a woman, with short dark wavy hair and weather-beaten tan skin. She was in her late forties, and looked her age. Just a woman like any other one.

As Sanchez walked Paulson through the process of being sworn in, Thumeka carefully studied Kitteridge. The middle-aged man had grown up in the richest neighbourhood in the District's capital and thus had seldom had to think about mass executions, but this was still the murderer of his fellow Eleveners. Kitteridge did not seem to be feeling anything unusual. Thumeka jotted that down. The audience looked more alert than usual. Not only was this a welcome respite from the endless documents most of them did not comprehend, but this was a perpetrator on the witness stand. Everyone in the Capitol wanted to know how someone could have done what they had once tried to pretend did not exist.

"Witness, state your name, age, and address."

"Catherine Paulson, forty-eight. No permanent address," she said in a firm and excessively loud voice. She was currently also being held in the Justice Building, awaiting trial.

"What is your rank?"

"Colonel, retired," Paulson nearly shouted.

"Witness, there is no need to be so loud. Please lean towards the microphone and speak in a quieter voice," Sanchez cut in.

The prosecutor was a man of around thirty-five from Eight. He looked at some papers on the lectern before continuing. "Witness, do you recall the events of the twenty-first of June, 74?" he asked, getting straight to the point.

"Yes," Paulson said in a quieter voice that still had steely undertones to it.

"Please describe them."

For a second, Paulson appeared lost, unable to say something without having been told exactly what to say. "I received an order from Head Peacekeeper Thread," she began. Thread fumed and leaned forward to whisper to his lawyer. "The workers of an orchard were in open rebellion."

"What orchard?"

"O-015."

"What form did the rebellion take?"

The simple question made Paulson pause. "I do not know," she said, raising her voice. "I was told they were rebelling. No details were given. I was ordered to send in a task commando to deal with the threat."

"What threat?"

"My job was not to ask questions," Paulson practically shouted. "If the Head Peacekeeper said there was a threat, then my job was to eliminate it." Thread looked ready to implode.

The prosecutor nodded slightly, having gotten what he wanted. "Were you aware that the Peacekeepers' handbook, a copy of which you certainly had, prohibited obeying illegal orders?"

"There was nothing illegal about the orders," Paulson insisted, sounding like she was addressing her task force on the parade-ground and not a tribunal in a courtroom.

Sanchez intervened again. "Witness, please speak quieter."

"The rebels were a dangerous, terroristic force." Paulson's voice was marginally quieter. "They had to be eliminated." Thumeka jotted that down. She suspected that Paulson had been brought in by the prosecution to nail Thread and Lux for the mass executions, and she was seizing the chance to exonerate herself. "There is nothing illegal about neutralizing a terrorist organization." All of the former Peacekeepers in the dock nodded along.

"How did this 'neutralization' occur?" the prosecutor asked. "Let me remind the Tribunal that the twenty-first of June was the day after the death of twelve-year-old Rue Washington in the Hunger Games sparked minor riots in her home village." Anything of the sort had been extremely rare - if not for the death happening at the same time as a mass firing, the real reason why the average inhabitant of that latifundia was extremely upset, no unrest would have occurred.

Next to Thumeka, Mikola ran a hand over his face. "I still can't get over the fact that the Hunger Games happened," he whispered.

"I can," Thumeka said, and immediately kicked herself for saying it.

"The Rebels were liquidated," Paulson said simply.

"What were their ages?"

"All ages," Paulson said.

"Including the babies?"

"Of course," Paulson said loudly. "Rebellion had to be torn out by the roots, or else the children would grow up to avenge their parents."

In the dock, the defendants were carefully not meeting anyone's eye.

"How were they killed?"

For the first time, Paulson's composure cracked, and Thumeka could see emotion on her face. That lasted for a second, before the mask came back. "The village was surrounded by the task force. All of the inhabitants were taken out and locked up in a barn."

"Including the plantation manager and their family?"

"Of course," Paulson said. "The plantation managers were the ones with the most access to information."

The prosecutor nodded. "What happened next?"

"The barn was set on fire."

Mikola swayed in his seat, clutching at the low wall in front of him with trembling hands. Thumeka, as always, couldn't help but wonder how someone could say that with such a calm expression, as if reporting to a superior about a job well done.

"Were there any survivors?"

Paulson shook her head. "Some people tried to leap out windows, but they were all shot. The entire plantation was then set on fire, to get anyone who may have tried to hide." Her composure cracked again, and a haunted look flickered over her face.

"Did you personally make the decision to annihilate the plantation so utterly?" the prosecutor asked. He looked completely unfazed.

"No. Head Peacekeeper Thread told me to raze the place to the ground." Thread looked down and stared at the papers he was holding.

The prosecutor held up a piece of paper. "'Wipe Rebellion from the face of the earth'. Was that the phrasing used in the order?" Paulson nodded gratefully. "And how did Thread react when you sent in your report that evening?"

"Thanked me for a job well done, and passed on the report to Commander-in-Chief Lux."

The audience looked furious. Some people appeared to be near tears, others were glaring at Thread and Lux. Bright was clearly glad she was being left out of it for now.

"Did you participate personally in the operation?"

"Of course. A commander must lead their soldiers by example." She didn't look so certain now, though. Thumeka studied the former colonel's face. Paulson looked completely broken. Given that she was now deprived of access to alcohol, there would be nothing to chase away the nightmares. Paulson's eyes darted around the courtroom as if seeing something only she could see. In a uniform with the decorations and insignia torn off, she did not look like a menace. None of them did.

The direct examination continued until the session finally ended. "I'm going to have nightmares," Jiao complained to her as they left.

"So will she, I bet."

"She cannot stay in a cell," Dr. Shentop insisted to Stephen. They were in her office, ostensibly for a routine report. "Dr. Mallow agrees."

Paulson had stayed in a cell last night just fine, in Stephen's opinion, but he had to default to the experts here. "Why?"

"Because she has PTSD which is triggered by being reminded of her crimes, and that on top of the fact that she is still in withdrawal."

Privately, Stephen couldn't care less if Paulson suffered. She had brought her ill health on herself. "And Dr. Mallow thinks she should be kept - where?"

"Transferred to a facility where someone can keep an eye on her."

Stephen noticed Dr. Shentop sounded hesitant. "Are there any free cots?"

The doctor glanced out the window of her office. The place was more of a clinic, with a few examining tables that could be surrounded by curtains if needed. This was not a place where someone could sleep. "That's the problem."

"I see three options," Stephen said. "One - find her a place in the nearest hospital, pushing her ahead of the queue." Paulson was currently eating dinner, which meant that they had to decide quickly. "Two - keep her here, potentially not letting her sleep if someone comes in with an emergency. Three - put her in a single cell and potentially not let her and others sleep." As per Eleven's request, releasing her from under guard was out of the question.

"Dr. Mallow says-"

"That we should let others suffer because of her?" Stephen assumed a gentle yet firm posture. "Believe me, Doctor, I do not claim to be an expert in the field of health. But the queues for the hospital are long, and only those who must be given an inpatient spot are even considered. Does the word 'must' really apply to Paulson, especially when there are doctors on call at all hours of the night? Not to mention all of the anti-suicide precautions in the jail. We can have an eye on her for the entire night."

Dr. Shentop glanced at her watch and cursed. "Fine. Keep her in a cell. Do you have enough room?"

"We do." The incarcerated witnesses could be transferred to the Districts or into the hands of the Depuration system once they had testified, freeing up some room. "Thank you very much, Doctor."

"You're welcome."

Stephen went to pick up Paulson. She had been brought in just in time to testify and would need to be settled in for the night. On the way there, he collided with Tiller. "How are things?" he asked.

"Fine. Sean Manji is wanted by Five - others withdrew their request."

That did not mean anything good for Manji, a particularly loud-mouthed major with a propensity for anti-District slurs.

"Anything else?"

Tiller adjusted her helmet. "Just tired. At least I get a day off next week." She was undoubtedly going to spend it with her TA. "You? When does your shift end today?"

"Four, and then I have to be on duty at noon." Less than eight hours off.

"Ouch."

They reached the cafeteria, where a group of witnesses were finishing up dinner. Stephen noticed Paulson sitting at one table with a group of very taciturn former Peacekeepers. She wasn't eating, only poking her food with a shaking hand. Stephen felt zero pity for her.

"Paulson?" he said.

She looked at him mutely. "Yeah?"

"With me."

Paulson left the food behind without a second thought. Her neighbours quickly divided it up and ate it before anyone could blink.

"So," Stephen said as the two of them walked down the corridor, leaving Tiller to supervise the others. "Have you been given your things yet?"

"Things?" Paulson looked sick.

"Do you know what cell you're in?"

Paulson shook her head, eyes firmly on the ground. She was wearing a grey jumpsuit and ratty shoes. "They just took my stuff," she said quietly. "They didn't take my uniform even in Eleven!"

Stephen concealed how much she disgusted him. "Well, I've got a list here," he said, taking out his notebook. He had asked for a smartphone, but all the smartphones were in the pockets of his guards. "Alright, you're on the third floor. There should already be everything you need in there already - we've got plenty of turnover, it's like we're running a hotel!"

Paulson cracked a weak smile at the joke. "Lieutenant, I don't feel so good," she said.

As well she should have. The prosecution had thought she was in custody, but she had accidentally been released months ago, only being re-captured by a stroke of luck. The call went out, and the proprietor of a bar in a town in Eleven next to the POW camp where she had been held reported that she was there. The soldiers capturing her had thought she had taken poison, but in reality, she had simply been drinking for the past month. That had happened only a few days ago. Stephen, by now an expert in the various stages of intoxication on any imaginable substance, could well imagine how she was feeling.

"We'll send someone up to look at you," Stephen said kindly. "If something goes really wrong, we'll put you in the infirmary."

"Thanks, Lieutenant."

Paulson visibly struggled to walk up the stairs. When Stephen unlocked her cell, she fell onto her cot without taking off her shoes and wrapped herself in the blanket despite the extreme heat.

"Are you sure you don't want to eat anything?" Stephen asked.

"Nuh-uh." Was she shaking? Stephen used his communicuff to get Dr. Shentop to send someone in.

A/N: The excerpt cited at the start of the chapter is from 'The Weavers' by Heinrich Heine.