"Effie!" I cry as I see her sitting at a table in the cafeteria for breakfast the next morning.
"Katniss," she says in her Capitol accent. "How are you?"
She is dressed like anybody else in Thirteen. Dark grey jumpsuit and brown workers boots but she stands out amongst the others. It's obvious that she is struggling with Thirteen's sense of fashion.
In an attempt to make herself look more fashionable she has tied a patterned handkerchief over her hair as a replacement for her wig and is sporting oversized, rose tinted sunglasses to mask her naked eyes. I never thought I'd be glad to see her, but part of me feels sympathy towards her.
"What are you doing here?" I ask as I sit down.
"I'm here as a political refugee," she says quickly "Plutarch got me in."
I realize that like me, she feels out of place and confused, but she is trying to cope.
"Can you believe this place," she continues as she picks up her her plastic cup of water, "I miss coffee."
She sighs before brightening up a bit, "But, seeing as I'm the only competent person in this group of - of savages I will be doing my part for my mockingjay." She turns around and hauls a large portfolio on to the table.
"What's this?" I ask as I open it.
It was filled with sketches of a costume. A moulded breastplate, a sheath of arrows, a resemblance of wings on the beautifully designed shoulder pads.
"It's beautiful." I breathe.
"Cinna didn't want you to see it until you had agreed to be the mockingjay yourself." says Effie gently.
I look back down at the beautiful watercolor sketches, "Cinna, he's . . . dead?" I ask slowly.
Effie purses her lips and nods.
I look down at the sketches of the costume Cinna had painstakingly designed for me. "I'm still betting on you." he had scrawled at the bottom of the page.
"They have it." says Effie, "They have the Mockingjay costume."
...
"Okay," says Plutarch into my ear piece.
I'm standing in the middle of a studio on an elevated platform, wearing the Mockingjay costume. Plutarch and other tech workers are standing in a sound proof room across from me separated by a two-way pane of glass. Effie, to my right, is trying to make herself useful.
Armed with comb and makeup, she swoops down on me like a hawk whenever she sees a flyaway hair or any imperfections by the Capitol standards.
"Let's have you hold Aiden and I want you to kneel than get up, like you have just finished a battle." Plutarch says.
"Don't worry," he says as I look around at the bare studio, "we'll fill in the background later."
I nod and Aiden is placed gently into my arms with his head resting on my breastplate. He is dressed in a soft one piece costume that covers his hands and feet resembling my own, complete with a tiny hood. I notice that the hood has a little mockingjay sewn on it.
I am shaking.
"Great, now pretend you have just got up from battle. Raise one arm and declare 'Panem, we fight, we dare to end this hunger for justice!'" says Plutarch.
Slowly I bend down on one knee. I can feel my legs shaking as I try to hold Aiden without dropping him. Now that I have him in my hands I realize that he is even smaller than I anticipated. My entire hand covers his back.
"Whenever you're ready." says Plutarch.
"Panem, we fight, we dare, to - to end this hunger for justice." I say lamely as I stand up shakily.
Effie cries "Cut!" and rushes over to me. "Katniss, be careful, support the head, support the head."
I look down and realized that Aiden's head has fallen to the side. He can't support it by himself and he looks uncomfortable in my arms. He lets out a small squeak before opening his toothless mouth and starting to cry, his face wrinkling up like a prune.
The panic is probably etched into my face as Effie tries to get both of us to calm down. "Don't worry Katniss, just rock him back and forth, he should stop crying if. . ."
Effie's attempts to calm us down just make Aiden scream louder. (He has surprisingly good lungs for someone so small).
"I - I can't," I say over Aiden's screams. I try vainly to loosen my death grasp that I had put on him for fear that he would fall.
"And that is how a revolution dies." booms a loud voice