Disclaimer: I'm just playing with Suzanne Collins' characters and her world. They're hers. Not mine.
In the looking glass, pt 6
AN: Thanks to FortuneFaded2012 for beta'ing.
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For several stunned seconds the group stares at her, not really sure what they're seeing.
She's darker. Birdy's skin has a warm tan across it, or maybe it always had and the lurid tones of her hair and makeup had simply washed it out of her before. Like on the television, she's lost her shine. Her hair is a murky blonde, not curled or twisted up in an intricate bun or braid, but loose and stringy. The dress she's wearing is dull, simple as the one Madge has on, in a muddy brown color. Madge squints at her, trying to detect painted makeup on her, but it too has vanished. Even the green on her lips is gone, and Madge had been certain they were tattooed.
If they'd passed her on the street Madge might not have even recognized her.
She's lost her gaudy plumage, turned back into the plain little girl from her Reaping, and Madge wonders if she plucked herself, or if this had been a forced molting.
Madge blinks her vision clear. This isn't the time to wonder about those things.
She had expected the little Victor, sooner than last year, but not the second the bloodbath ended.
Gale growls. Madge feels his hand catch at her waist; pull her closer to him and away from the perceived threat. "What're you doing here?"
Birdy shrugs. She pads past them to Madge's mother, puts down the glass in her hand, gently slides the metal container with the ice cream from her and begins helping herself, scooping large spoonfuls into a blue-patterned bowl. She picks up her glass, swirls the liquid around before taking a long drink. Apparently she'd found Madge's father's liquor cabinet.
"I just missed your witty repertoire," her eyes roll at the statement. "Honestly, how dense are you? Why do you think I'm here?"
Madge's father intervenes, probably sensing another bloodbath brewing in his kitchen.
"It's earlier than we anticipated, that's all," he explains. His even expression never falters, "Shouldn't you be mentoring?"
Birdy scowls, "Only need one Mentor for each Tribute. I'm considered 'unnecessary', strategically speaking."
There's more to it, Madge can sense that, but her mouth stays clamped shut.
"Let Madgie go, Dorothy," Birdy tells him, eyes narrowing on Gale's fingers digging into Madge's side. "You hurt her again, and I'll make Thread look like the pitchfork carrying peasant he is."
Gale makes a noise, a low grunt deep in his chest, but with a look from his family, the Everdeens, and Madge, he loosens his grip. His hand doesn't drop though. It stays protectively at Madge's side.
His lip curls up and Madge instantly knows he's about to do something monumentally stupid.
"You're a real Victor, you know that?" He takes a step, between Madge and Birdy. "Your friends die on live television and you don't even care. Head out of town and break into peoples' houses to have yourself dessert and a nightcap."
For a few seconds nothing happens. Birdy simply stares at him, studying every inch of his face.
Then, before any of them know it's even happened, Gale is on his back, hitting the floor with a thud. The glass in Birdy's hand falls to the floor and explodes into a thousand dazzling shards. Birdy grabs one of Mrs. Oberst's wooden spoons, has it tight in both hands, her knuckles paling as she takes it and leaps onto Gale, using the long handle of the spoon to choke him.
He sputters and struggles against her, but she has her knee in his groin, using it to keep him from fighting too much.
Posy starts screaming and her mother and brothers try to comfort her, though they look utterly at a loss as to what to do. Prim starts to sob, begins begging Birdy to 'Please stop'.
Mostly because Madge thinks Birdy won't hurt her, she dives at the Victor. She won't let her kill Gale.
They roll off Gale, tumble into the doors to the pantry with a crack.
Eyes widening, still lolling a little, Birdy makes an irritated noise.
"Are you trying to get on my bad side, Madgie?"
Gale, still sputtering and trying to catch his breath, growls from behind Madge, "You have a good side?"
Shut up, Gale!
Did nearly becoming the victim of a kitchen utensil homicide not teach him anything?
Birdy pushes herself up, looks to be deciding how slow and painful she wants Gale's death to be, when she starts laughing again.
"You are a slow learner, you know that?"
She shakes her head, as though she'd just been involved in nothing more interesting than a schoolyard scuffle.
Birdy reaches down, hauls Madge from the floor by the collar and lets her stumble back into her mother, before grabbing Gale by the hair.
Her little dagger, the one she'd threatened him with last year, the one she'd used to euthanize her District partner with, is out, the flat blade pressed to Gale's neck. Madge can see his pulse thrumming under the glinting metal.
"I should've killed you last year. Saved us all a lot of trouble." She adds a little pressure to the blade, pushes it closer against Gale's skin. Her expression shifts, her wicked grin reemerges, "Oh, Katniss, I love you".
The color drains from Gale's face as Birdy's twittering laugher fills the kitchen.
Her laughter continues, "Oh, Dorothy, did you think they wouldn't know? That I wouldn't know? It's my job to know these things. It's my job to find the chinks in other Victor's armor." She tilts her head, "And believe me, there are more than a few in Miss Everdeen's."
With a forceful shove, Gale hits the wall. Birdy drops her hand, the one holding her dagger, and sneers at him. She raises it again, gestures with it, giving him a dark look.
"This is all your fault, you know that right?" There's a bite in her tone, a bitter edge, that hadn't been there last year, even when she'd been threatening Gale.
"You could have any girl in this backwards District, but you chose the one you can't have. You're infinite stupidity sent her back into the Arena. Which, if you recall, I worked damn hard to get her out of. You, you entitled little brat, are the reason that she might die. And don't think I won't dance on her grave if she does, baby and all." She's shaking now, Madge can see a glimmer in her eyes, "You as good as killed my friends. So don't you dare tell me I don't care. I care a hell of a lot more than you."
The knife drops again. She stuffs it into her dress before turning to the stunned onlookers, false smile back on her lips.
"So, how has everyone been?"
Prim is the first to find her voice. She gives Birdy a weary smile, "Oh, fine." She bites her lower lip, chews it, "If you don't mind my asking, why are you here so soon?"
Birdy tilts her head, considering the question, then points to the three youngest Hawthornes, "I brought some chocolate from the Capitol. In my bags in the living room. You three go and get it."
Posy squeals, runs off without question, but Rory and Vick stay planted by their mother's side.
"Go," Birdy tells them again, making a shooing motion with her hands.
"You're going to talk about something," Vick tells her. "We should get to hear too."
"I'm almost as old as Prim," Rory adds.
"Don't you know girls mature faster than boys?" She gestures to Gale, "Look at your brother, judging by how he acts, I'd say he's no more than ten or eleven. Which makes you two roughly your sister's age. So go."
Their mother gives them a little push, "Someone needs to watch your sister."
"I can do it."
Madge's mother floats to the entryway, toward the hall, and turns to Mrs. Hawthorne, "I can watch the little one and they can listen to the girl. She talks in riddles anyway. I don't want to hear them."
Before either Madge or her father can point out to her that Posy would probably watch her better than she could ever watch Posy, Madge's mother has glided out of the room.
"Hm," Birdy grunts. "She's still crazy, I see."
Madge starts to say something, opens her mouth, and Gale makes a threatening grunting noise, but Birdy just waves them off.
"I know, I know, I'm a witch."
#######
They crowd around the tiny table in the breakfast nook. Birdy brings her bowl of ice cream and starts eating, ignoring the worried stares around her.
"Are you going to tell us why you've graced us with your presence so early this year or not?" Gale finally snaps. His mother's eyes widen in terror, jump back and forth between her son and the Victor.
Birdy sets the bowl down, wipes some blueberry from her lips, then sighs, "They want footage of the families." Her nose wrinkles up, "Lots, apparently. They like a good show, and the deaths of the 'Star-crossed pains in the ass' from District Twelve are going to be one of the biggest shows for years to come."
Mrs. Everdeen pales, "But they could win-"
"No, they can't," Birdy cuts her off. "This year, the only option those two have is to come home in a custom made pine box from Seven. I've suggested the silk lined."
"But…" Prim starts shaking. "That's not fair! They should have a chance!"
"Since when is the Capitol concerned with fair?"
Never. At least not as far as Madge has ever been aware.
"These Games were designed to rid them of as many 'problem children' as possible." She starts playing with her melting ice cream, slapping at it with her spoon. "Odair, Mason, Chaff, Seeder, Abernathy, and, of course, the ever charming Miss Everdeen, just to name a few. Everyone else Reaped is just collateral damage."
Madge freezes in her seat, eyes jerking around the room. "Should you be…" She makes a gesture to her mouth, forms the words 'talking about this'.
Birdy's wicked grin lights up her face.
"I'm a great many things, but stupid isn't one of them, Madgie." She sits back in her chair, waves her hand at the house in general, "I've spent the last few hours recoding the bugs in your house. They are now broadcasting the home life of the ever so gracious Mayor Stahl of District Ten. He volunteered."
For what feels like the first time in a short lifetime, Madge feels a weight lifted from her shoulders. Her home isn't infested with Capitol ears.
"So," Birdy licks the ice cream from her spoon, "we have until they come for me to get this place ready."
Madge's father frowns; he looks suddenly so much older, "Ready for what?"
"The end." She shrugs, as though she hasn't just placed a certain finality on all their lives.
"Heavensbee says it'll be a few days at most, maybe less. He's a sharp man, and his apartment has a great view." Birdy sighs. "I'm the canary in this coal mine, Mayor. When they come and stop my singing, you had best clear out."
"If they wanted to 'stop your singing' why didn't they just send you into the Games?" Madge finally asks.
It's bothered her for days, made her question Birdy's intentions, made Madge doubt her own judgment.
Several long moments later, after slapping at the now milky mess in her bowl, Birdy gives her a sad smile.
"Because they think they clipped my wings ages ago, but they don't know much about animals like me." She gives the table a rueful glance, "Plus, I have a very practical use. I'm the one they send out to gather information for them. They're going to kill me, just as sure as they're going to kill the others, but they want to get all the use out of me they can. We Victors are the bridges to the gap between them and the Districts."
It makes sense now, why the Capitol would sacrifice its beloved Victors.
They have too much power, too much sway.
"… if I want to, if I choose to, I can rile them up. I can have them demand he favor the boy. I've had years to perfect this art, Magdalene."
The Capitol, its citizens, put too much stock in them. Birdy and the other Victors have sway over them; they've learned to control them, just as they've been controlled for years.
The Victors have found the chink in the Capitol's armor. They've adapted, grown into the chaos of the world they were thrust into, and are too close to controlling it.
"Probably could've made it a few more years, planned this a little better, but our hand has been forced." She scowls at Gale. "You and that idiot girl couldn't control your baser urges and now we're all about to have to fight in a countrywide bloodbath."
It's stupid, that Birdy's revelation about Gale and Katniss stings so much. It does though. A piece of Madge's heart chips off, tumbles into her stomach.
"Baser urges?" Gale's eyes narrow. "I kissed her-"
"And you plotted to run away."
Gale freezes. He might've guessed they'd known about the kiss, but any talk of taking off, disappearing into the woods he must've thought was safe. "How-"
"I know everything," Birdy tells him simply. "I know what detergent your mother uses. I know which mine shaft you're going to be sent into. I know the name of every girl you've taken up to the 'slag heap', even though I don't know what a 'slag heap' is. I know how many slips of paper have your brother's name on them next year." She leans across the table, eyes fixed on him, "Everything."
#######
Birdy tells the Hawthornes and Everdeens to leave after that.
"I need a break from your overwhelming stupidity."
Despite wanting to go upstairs, cry her crumbling heart out on her Gale scented pillow, Madge gathers up Posy and walks the families out.
"Be back, bright and early tomorrow," Birdy yells at them as she scoops herself out another helping of ice cream.
Gale, who is bringing up the tail end of the groups, shoots Madge a look.
"How do you stand being around people like her all the time?"
He thinks Birdy is the worst of the worst, a being that just barely rates above a rotting carcass. Both are vile in his mind, useless and potentially hazardous.
Gale doesn't see how similar he and the girl he dislikes so much are.
Both he and Birdy are powerful, have a sway over people. Both have the ability to do damage to people, more than the average.
But Birdy at least knows her power. Or Madge thinks she does. She realizes she hurts people. She knows the damage she's causing, the danger she carries in her wake.
Gale doesn't. He doesn't sense the danger, see the damage, know all the potential he has to be so much more destructive than Birdy ever will.
She has the reins pulled tight on her propensities, her bad habits. She tries to prepare people and soften the inevitable blow. Gale hasn't quite learned that skill.
"You learn to smile through everything when you're a politician's child," she finally tells him. A tight smile involuntarily finds its way onto her face. He's done her damage, and he doesn't know. He wouldn't care if he did. "You bite your tongue, you swallow down the bile, and you smile as brightly as you can. You never let them see you break."
He nods, frowns slightly, then chases after his family, out the gate and into the growing night.
#######
Madge follows her father and Birdy into his office after helping him put her mother to bed.
Someone, probably Birdy, has pulled the curtains shut, and Madge hears the faint click of the lock as her father shuts the door behind them.
"Tell us the rest," he tells Birdy as he collapses into his chair, behind his desk. "All of it."
Birdy flops, sideways, into one of the winged back chairs in front of him, her legs dangling over the armrest. She sighs.
"You aren't going to want to hear it."
"We need to," he tells her sharply.
"Fine," Birdy groans.
It occurs to Madge that Birdy is only a little older than her, only slightly older than Gale even. Madge imagines Birdy, with her childish sprawl in the chair, as a reckless teenager being told off by her irritable father.
After a moment of thought, Birdy turns in the chair, poises herself for what looks to be a painful confessional.
When she starts Madge doesn't know what to think.
"We've been planning this for ages. Since before my Games."
They would cultivate a Tribute, someone the Districts and the Capitol both would rally around, earn them the place in the hierarchy of Victors. Then use their place, their popularity, to bloodlessly overthrow the government.
"I was so good at manipulating the Capitol audience, it was seamless how good I was." She rubs her eyes. "The other Victors asked me to help them, during the Seventieth, to get the girl out, Cresta." Birdy laughs, "I thought it was a big joke, you know? She was a disaster, a wreck. I thought it was going to be a slap in the face of those pigs. Giving them a mad Victor, one they couldn't, wouldn't want to, play with."
It hadn't been a joke though; it was part of a long con. A dry run.
"I was so stupid. Even when I realized what they were having me do, I kept doing it." She gets up, walks to the liquor cabinet and pulls out a bottle of something honey colored. Popping the glass stopper, letting it fall to the floor with a thud, Birdy takes a long swallow of it, wipes her mouth with the back of her hand before continuing.
"The next year, I went with Wiress, she was always so nice to me. We got assigned to Seven, she manipulated the lottery that picked where we went, see? The others had been watching Mason, and decided to try again."
This time, though, it would be with what they saw as a very clever Victor. Johanna Mason wasn't a leggy, gorgeous thing, like so many of the other female Victors. She was cunning and devious, and the other Victors decided they needed to see if they could get someone like her, someone that could help them manipulate the Capitol without being consumed by the fire.
"It was so much easier to control Mason's family. They were so sweet, just wanted their girl to come home." Birdy shakes her head, presses her fingers to her eyes. "And I helped them do just that. My team and I dolled them up, made them shine, told them what to say and how to say it, we helped them help her."
"Wiress, she taught me everything I know about audiovisuals and deciphering information. She was right there beside me when Mason finally won."
She twists her lips up, into a mirthless smile, "When we got back to the Capitol, for the review of the Games, they took us into custody. Not just Wiress and I, but my prep team to." Her voice cracks, "We were under wraps for months. Tortured Wiress and I, shot Ursula, Patrice, Dionyza, and Bianca, right in front of me. They didn't even know anything. It was like slaughtering newborn birds. They were blind and flightless and helpless, and so-so scared." She bats a few tears from her cheeks, "Then they shot Lineus, my District escort. He wasn't even in Seven. They just did it to be cruel."
Birdy drops into the chair again, lets the glass bottle dangle between her fingers as she stares down at the pattern on Madge's father's rug.
"When this girl came into the picture," she closes her eyes, lets out a long, pained breath, "they saw that spark in her, the one they'd thought they'd have to build. She inspired hope in people, probably because they didn't notice she's about as sharp as a brick. We weren't ready though. Not even close. There was so much planning that needed to be done. They wanted what they wanted though, were afraid they wouldn't get the opportunity again." She shrugs, "So, we moved quickly, messily, and, since we placed all our hopes and aspirations on such an unreliable piece, we are now stuck playing a much more dangerous Game than we'd ever intended."
"If that damn girl and that lobotomized amoeba masquerading as a functional human being had any sense, we could still have done this so much less messily." She takes another drink of the amber liquid, "But we made a stupid move, so here we are."
"What's going to happen?" Madge asks, choosing to ignore the slight against Gale. She doesn't know what she wants to hear.
"You can't tell the boy, not until the end. He's a glory hound. Likes to take care of things. You let this slip to him before the moment is right and he'll be the death of us all." She shrugs, "Well, an earlier death anyway."
#######
The Mayor from Ten, a dark skinned man, bald, appeared on the television in the office the moment Birdy put her tube of lip gloss into a cable outlet.
"I love District Three, such a fun bunch," she grins at her Mayor.
"We think it'll be a bombing," Mayor Stahl tells them. He's in what appears to be his office. His wife, a tall, elegant looking woman with dark curls and glittering eyes is behind him, holding a compact, apparently blocking the Capitol from hearing the conversation. "We've got men in the woods to your west, ready with the signals when they come."
It's apparent now,clear as the sun in the sky, that there's no way District Twelve will be allowed to survive. They've provided the rebellious Victors, and who knows who else, with a means to overthrow them. They'll eradicate the entire District as a warning.
"Have you had any luck with the wiring?" Madge's father asks.
Mayor Stahl shakes his head, "It's a protective measure, I'm afraid. They've got it rigged up so that no matter what, turning it off can't be done safely."
Madge frowns at her father. What is he talking about?
He'd asked her for a book on wiring from the library, ages ago, when Gale had been whipped, but she hadn't thought much of it since them.
With a grim expression, Madge's father nods, "So be it."
Mayor Stahl and his wife exchange a look, but say nothing.
"Keep your eyes on the sky." Stahl's wife tells them. "And listen to your canary. We have a pretty good idea that it'll come when they take her away." She frowns at Birdy, "And be careful."
Birdy snorts. "Careful? Don't worry about me Mrs. Stahl. I know exactly what I'm doing."
#######
Madge helps Birdy carry her bags, only two, just enough for a short stay, up to her room.
"Did you kill the Glaives?"
Birdy's eyebrows arch, "Do you think I did?"
Madge nods.
"Well," Birdy kicks her suitcase to the wall, "you wouldn't be wrong."
"Please tell me you didn't do it just so your friend could get an apartment." Madge doesn't think she can stomach the thought. Even as awful as the siblings had been, killing them for property is stomach turning.
"Not entirely. Though that was a lovely fringe benefit." She scowls, "And Heavensbee isn't anyone's friend."
Flopping onto the bed, she sighs, "I killed them because they were terrible people. Worse than me, if you can believe that. I don't see it as a bad thing. I might've saved people by killing them."
The bed dips as Madge sits next to her, "Would you really have killed Gale?"
Birdy doesn't even hesitate, "In a heartbeat." She sits up, "I might've saved my friends if I had."
The other Victors, her friends, might still be alive if Birdy had taken Gale out last year. They could've avoided kissing and talks of running away, avoided revolts and deaths, avoided what is surely coming their way in a few days.
Madge just nods, gets up, and starts for the door.
"She didn't say it back," Birdy says suddenly, when Madge is a footstep from the hallway. "Everdeen, I mean. She didn't say she loved him back."
She must think that might make Madge feel better, but really, it doesn't.
Katniss is confused. Too much has happened, too quickly. She isn't the perfect Tribute, molded by the invisible hand that decided she would be the beacon for the Districts. She's a seventeen year old girl, just like Madge.
Just because Katniss didn't say she loved him back, didn't mean anything.
"She does though," Madge finally says, just above a whisper. "He loves her, and someday, somehow, they'll be together. She's the important one and I'm just going to be a faded memory."
Even without careful crafting, Katniss is the essential part of the Game, for Gale, and for the entire country.
The bed creaks, Birdy's bare feet pad quickly across the floor, and before Madge knows what she's doing, she's flung her arms around her neck.
"We'll all just be faded memories someday, Magdalene. That doesn't mean we aren't important."