I LOVE these reviews and predictions! I'm glad everyone is having so much fun with this one. Well, a lot of you guessed things would get worse before they got better…and of course they will. I live for that. Angst ahoy!

This AU fic was inspired by the brilliant work of aimmyarrowshighin "Five Loaves of Bread: Dark Toast". .net/s/7294215/1/Five_Loaves_of_Bread_Dark_Toast

This isn't a collaboration or co-written piece, just my spin on a possible continuation of that story that I loved dearly. Takes place three months after the aim's story ends.

(While you're at it, read "Dark Toast" and everything else aimmyarrowshigh has written. They're awesome. For real.)

Betrayal

"Finnick! Katniss raced across the village center from the medical tent to the handsome young man speaking with Annie.

"Katniss!" he held open his arms and caught her in a hug.

"You're all right! I'm so glad to see you," she said breathlessly.

"I was second wave, I'm all right," he laughed. "They were so caught off guard, once the first strike was through there was hardly anything to do. The Capital guards never expected we'd have the numbers we did.

And, young lady, I heard about what you did. That was foolish. You could have been killed," he grinned at her.

"I'm far too stubborn to get killed," she smirked.

"Where's Peeta?" Annie asked. Katniss looked over and saw she was not sharing their mirth.

"He's meeting with my father," Katniss said, furrowing her brow. "Why?"

"Have you spoken with him?" Annie's voice was tense and set Katniss' nerves on end.

"He just got back…I saw him at the train station." Finnick was now looking at her in the same troubling way. "What's going on?"

Annie looked away guiltily. "It's just…I thought you'd want…someone there might say something."

Her veins now filled with ice. "What do you mean, Annie?"

"It's none of our business, Ann," Finnick admonished. "I'm sorry, Katniss. I know things are going to be confusing when they dissolve the Contracts. It's nothing we should be giving you advice on."

"Finnick, please! What are you two talking about?"

The young couple exchanged a glance. "We heard about you and Gale. And it's fine, it really is!" Annie rushed, smiling uncomfortably. "It's your choice now. But I think you should tell Peeta before they destroy the Contracts."

Katniss fought nausea. "What did you hear?"

Annie looked to Finnick. "About him…staying with you. Really, Katniss, it's fine, it's just-"

She was running to the tent before he finished his sentence.

She flung open the main flap of the new tent and ducked inside, her eyes searching frantically. There were a few recent arrivals remaining and their eyes caught her wild expression. She pushed her way through to the young private seated at the desk, checking in visiting diplomats.

"Where's my father?"

"Probably back in the debrief area," he said, barely glancing up from a towering stack of paperwork.

She pushed her way back to the hallway where she and Gale had first crept into the debrief room. The sides of the walls no longer matched and the ground was still scorched in places. She burst through the doorway like a cork, glaring in annoyance. She yanked the tent flap down behind her to silence the din in the hall and reception.

She spotted her father in the corner and called to him. He stepped to the side and turned.

She started to speak, but she then spotted Peeta standing behind him. His face told her he knew.

"I'll give you a minute," her father mumbled uncomfortably, gently patting Katniss' shoulder and slipping out of the tent flap.

They both stood silently for a moment.

"Peeta," she breathed, tears slipping from the corners of her eyes. She wanted to run and hold him and have him hold her back but he had erected a wall keeping her away. "You can't -"

"I should finish the debrief," he muttered, and moved past her to the door as quickly as he could with the crutch. He fumbled to lift the flap with one had while gripping the crutch.

"Peeta!" she screamed.

A few remaining faces in the exposed hallway turned at the sound of her outburst. Peeta turned back into the room and let the flap fall back down.

"You believe them, don't you?" she gasped, trying to stop the tears.

"What the hell am I supposed to believe, Katniss?" he cried in anguish. "You tell me you want me to come home, but the next night you're in bed with him!" He turned away and covered his red eyes.

"Nothing happened!"

"Why was he even there? Why was he in our bed?" Peeta was yelling.

"I missed you. I didn't to be alone," she cried, inching towards him desperately. She reached out to touch him arm and he pushed her hand away.

"Don't," he warned.

She dropped her hands to her sides and let the tears fall. She had no idea anything could hurt as much as this moment.

"I know…I know I wasn't your choice," he started carefully. He gave her a stern look to silence her attempted objection. "And I know your father wants you to choose Gale. I know Coin thinks it will be good for the free citizens of Panem to see that they can live the life they want without guilt," he measured. "But I thought," a hint of pain entered his voice, "that you would at least tell me to my face you were leaving me." He turned his face away from her as he cried.

"Peeta," she mewled, her fingers were itching to grab on to him and make him stay in this room with her until he forgave her and held her. She was gulping for air in between sobs. "I didn't-" Her fingers brushed his coat sleeve and he jerked away.

"I've got work to do," he sniffed unsteadily, wiping his face and turning back to the flap.

"Don't leave," she pleaded as he raised the flap. She saw her father watching them in the hallway.

Peeta looked back. "I didn't leave, Katniss."

Peeta turned finally and Donnel held the flap for him to exit, leaving Katniss alone with her emptiness.

She gripped the edge of a desk, her fingernails boring into the scorched wood. She wanted to scream and run after him. But she didn't.

She heard her father's voice returning, calling her name softly, and she ran to the tent wall, pulling up the edge and rolling under into the early evening. She ran as hard as she could back to her house and slammed the door.

She slipped over to the table and sat down. She looked around. Everything looked in place, nothing seemed strange. But there was no bread on the counter. And Peeta was not going to come and sit at the table with her. He wouldn't be in the bed, keeping her warm against the winter night. She laid her head down on the table and let the sobs come.

For a moment she was back in the Capital. The pounding on the door was a Peacekeeper in white uniform, there to drag her to her death. Peeta was in the foyer, in front of the door, watching them take her impassively. Her hands reached out to him, begging for help, but his lifeless eyes watched her like glass. The pounding continued and continued, even as she was ripped from their townhome.

She opened her eyes and looked around. She had fallen asleep on the table and her neck ached. Someone was knocking at the door by her ear. She felt it must be late, but had no idea how long she had been asleep. She stumbled from the chair, tripping on a leg and reaching for the door clumsily.

She hadn't expected to see him. "Peeta!" she exclaimed in surprise.

He was looking at his name on their door in her handwriting. He shook his head and turned to her. "Didn't mean to wake you," he said.

"No, no, it's okay. I'm glad you came back," she said, breaking into a desperate smile. She stepped aside to let him in, and he limped inside, the crutch thumping against the wooden floor.

"I just came to get my bread pans," he said blankly, gesturing to a canvas bag he was holding. "I need to cook for some of the families whose cabins burned."

"Won't you stay?"

"I don't think so."

"This is your home," she pleaded.

He looked pained and heaved past her to the kitchen.

She stood a few feet away from him, watching him pack up the simple tools the soldiers had procured for him. She didn't know how to make him stay.

"Peeta?"

He glanced up.

The knocking at the door startled her and she jerked away. Peeta moved, but she said, "No, I'll get it."

Johanna's face was set hard and her jaw locked her lips into a thin tight line. "Katniss." The word was clipped as it left her mouth, full of venom.

"Johanna! When did you get here?"

The woman ignored her. "I wanted to return this to you. I found it with my Spouse's things at my tenement. Unless you want it back," she turned to Peeta, thrusting a folded garment in her hands.

Katniss recognized Peeta's robe in her hands. The one Gale had taken to wash when she was bathing and hadn't yet returned. Katniss looked back and forth between Peeta's stricken face and Johanna's rage. "He took it to wash," she struggled to explain. "I was wearing it outside...it got dirty-"

"Do you need a place to stay?" Johanna ran over Katniss' words, ignoring her and looking at Peeta.

"Yes, please," he breathed, limping over to the door.

"Peeta!" Katniss bleated as he stomped out the door. She caught his arm and he nearly fell. "I didn't betray you. Please believe me!"

"Katniss," he murmured, gently pushing her off of him. "I can't...," he sighed in agony, and moved as fast as he could into the night.

Johanna's eyes watched Katniss as he brushed past her. "Johanna," she began, tears started fresh.

"I hate you," Johanna replied, and threw the robe on the floor and slammed the door in her face.

She sat limp on her living room floor again, Peeta's robe draped over her. She hadn't bothered to light a fire. He was back and now further away than ever.

Gale had come by fifteen minutes after they'd gone, his face swollen with tears asking if Katniss had seen her. Johanna had heard the rumors, too. She'd arrived with Ash and the babies that very morning, and within minutes of landing she somehow had the story. Gale said she'd asked Annie to watch the children and then took him out into the woods to scream at him. He had told her the truth, nothing had happened, but the pain was too much and she'd asked him to stay with his father while she figured out what to do. He had barely seen the babies and was miserable.

A knock at the door went unanswered. She half-hoped it was Johanna back to kill her.

She raised her head to watch the door, but didn't call out. It pushed open, like it always did.

"You still look like shit." Haymitch eyed her unkempt hair and odd clothing.

"What the fuck do you want?"

"Hadn't seen you or Gale around. Thought I'd check in on my star soldiers."

"We're just as you wanted. Abandoned by our better halves," she said miserably. "You can go away and congratulate yourself now."

"That's actually why I'm here," inhaled Haymitch, nudging her away from the sofa so he could sit down.

"I didn't really invite you in," she said pointedly.

"I don't really care. I know who told Peeta and Johanna that Gale was sleeping here."

She sat up. "It wasn't you?" she was genuinely surprised.

He looked angry with her. "That was your business to deal with, no one else's."

"I just thought…You told Annie something," she fought. "Back in training."

"I told her to keep an eye on you because I thought Coin was screwing with you and Gale. Trying to confuse you."

"Coin."

"Yeah," Haymitch said, running a hand through his thinning hair.

"She told them we were betraying them." Haymitch nodded. "Why?"

He laughed joylessly. "What do you do in a war when one side isn't winning? You get the other side to retreat."

He saw she didn't follow. "You weren't going to leave Peeta. So she had to get him to leave you. And if she got Johanna to leave, maybe Gale would come to you…and there you have it. The Faces of the Future just in time for a televised takeover."

She stared at him.

"I'll kill her."

Haymitch sat back and sighed deeply. "You can't really judge her too harshly, Katniss. The Contract system cost her an eye and half of her face," he said sadly. "You were really lucky." Katniss still fumed.

"If your match had been like Madge's, would you be this angry?"

Katniss closed her eyes and saw the flames leap from Madge's body. "No," she whispered.

"And Gale's really lucky too. So yeah, you'd be a great face for the rebellion except that you're already in love. It's just a coincidence that it's your Contracted Spouse."

Katniss considered the weight of the sentence. She loved Peeta. She hadn't imagined such a thing would be hers in her lifetime, but now the truth of it all enveloped her and expanded to fill the whole room. This is what Peeta felt for her. Or, did.

"But he doesn't love me back," she realized, her momentary hope shattering.

Haymitch actually smiled at her genuinely. "That's the thing about love, sweetheart. Someone you love can – and will hurt you. More than you imagined possible," he said. "But you can't stop loving them. When it's real, it's forever." For a moment she saw the young man who had been so desperately in love with Scarlett Donner he risked his life and family for her.

She looked up at him. "I don't know what to do."

He met her eyes. "You do whatever it takes."

She was looking for him but found her father in the ops center.

"Hey, sweetheart," he said sadly, embracing her gently. "How are you feeling?"

She shook her head, her mouth a determined line. "Have you seen him?"

"He's inside. We're reviewing the order of ceremony for tomorrow. There's a little disagreement over whether we're going to have a demonstration."

She heard shouts start up inside, and he turned his head. "I better get back in there. I'll come by your tenement later, we'll have dinner."

She nodded, but as he pulled back the flap she saw Peeta arguing with a group of older soldiers. When she heard Gale's voice, she followed her father inside.

The central meeting room was filled to capacity and she squeezed in along the edge of the room. Haymitch was calling for order, but the fifty plus men and women were in heated debate.

"It's not like it matters!" a stranger yelled over the din. The crowd quieted to hear what he was saying. "The database was destroyed; they've already dissolved."

"I'm not arguing that," Peeta fired back. "I'm arguing that you have no idea what you're destroying now. You don't know any of the people whose names are on those papers and what it means to them."

"I do," Gale shouted. "I know Madge Undersee's name, and so do you. You don't want to see that burned?"

"They weren't all like that Gale, and you for one know it."

"Stop being so selfish!" Gale yelled. "This isn't about you and Katniss!"

Peeta's face went white and the room turned to stony silence except for Katniss' gasp. Peeta saw her just as Gale turned around to see her.

She felt all the eyes in the room burning into her flesh. Donnel turned and saw her behind him. "You two-" he gestured to Peeta and Gale. "Out. You're too close to this."

Peeta was already shuffling to the door flap leading to the hallway, whipping his crutch around him as quickly as he could manage. Gale stomped out past Katniss to the exit, muttering, "Sorry" as he left.

Donnel turned to dismiss Katniss, but she ran after Peeta down the hall. He turned into an office and she followed him in.

"It's about Madge," she pleaded, startling him. "Gale watched her burn, Peeta. It has nothing to do with you and me."

"You and him," Peeta corrected.

"There is no me and him."

"Katniss," he sighed, sinking to lean on the scorched desk in the room. "You don't-"

"I'm not going to let you leave me." She was surprised to hear the words when they left her mouth.

He glanced up sharply. "What?"

"I'm not going to let you leave me. I'm not going to let you give up on me," she felt panic rising inside her like the morning she learned he was going into battle. "He never replaced you. I didn't betray you. You are still my husband and I am going to do whatever it takes to keep it that way."

He stared at her, trying to recognize this new person she'd become. She didn't miss the fearful, assimilated person she'd try to be in the Capital. She hoped he didn't either.

She flinched as Peeta had to close his eyes and look away. "It's a little late for that now. Your father destroyed the central Contract database in the Capital. And tomorrow they're going to burn the remaining paper contracts." He was watching her.

"That's what you were arguing for?"

"Against."

Tears stung her eyes as she smiled. "To save our contract?"

He stood up and balanced his crutch. "To save Johanna's. She's pregnant."

He turned and hobbled out.