25
When I wake, I have a brief, delicious feeling of happiness that is somehow connected with Peeta. Happiness, of course, is a complete absurdity at this point, since at the rate things are going, I'll be dead in a day. And that's the best-case scenario, if I'm able to eliminate the rest of the field, including myself, and get Haymitch crowned as the winner of the Quarter Quell. Hopefully my death will appease President Snow and thus save my family. Still, the sensation is so unexpected and sweet I cling to it, if only for a few moments. Before the gritty sand, the hot sun, and my itching skin demand a return to reality.
Everyone's already up and watching the descent of a parachute to the beach. I join them for another delivery of bread. It's identical to the one we received the night before. Ten small loafs of bread from District 3. That gives us fifteen in all. We each take one, leaving ten in reserve. No one says it, but ten will continue to divide up perfectly if we all live. Somehow, in the light of day, joking about who will be around to eat the rolls has lost its humor.
How long can we keep this alliance? I don't think anyone expected the number of tributes to drop so quickly. What if I am wrong about the others protecting Haymitch? If things were simply coincidental, or it's all been a strategy to win our trust to make us easy prey, or I don't understand what's actually going on? Wait, there's no ifs about that. I don't understand what's going on. And if I don't, it's time for Haymitch and me to clear out of here despite what Haymitch thinks he has lined up.
I sit next to Haymitch on the sand to eat my bread. For some reason, it's difficult to look at him. Maybe it was all that honesty last night. Maybe it's knowing the brief amount of time we have left. And how we're working at such cross-purposes when it comes to who should survive these Games.
After we eat, I take his hand and tug him toward the water. "Come on. I'll teach you how to swim." I need to get him away from the others where we can discuss breaking away. It will be tricky, because once they realize we're severing the alliance, we'll be instant targets. Haymitch is reluctant to join me in the water, but the subtle wink of my eye convinces him to play along.
If I was really teaching him to swim, I'd make him take off the belt since it keeps him afloat, but what does it matter now? So I just show him the basic stroke and let him practice going back and forth in waist-high water. At first, I notice Johanna keeping a careful eye on us, but eventually she loses interest and goes to take a nap. Finnick's weaving a new net out of vines and Beetee is preoccupied with drawings that he has made in the sand. I know the time has come.
While Haymitch has been swimming, I've discovered something. My remaining scabs are starting to peel off. By gently rubbing a handful of sand up and down my arm, I clean off the rest of the scales, revealing fresh new skin underneath. I stop Haymitch's practice, on the pretext of showing him how to rid himself of the itchy scabs, and as we scrub ourselves, I bring up our escape.
"Look, the pool is down to eight. I think it's time we took off," I say under my breath, although I doubt any of the tributes can hear me.
Haymitch nods, and I can see him considering my proposition, weighing if the odds will be in our favor. "Tell you what," he says. "Let's stick around until Brutus and Enobaria are dead. I think Beetee is trying to put together some kind of trap for them now. Then, I promise, we'll go."
I'm not entirely convinced. But if we leave now, we'll have two sets of adversaries after us. Maybe three, because who knows what Chaff's up to? Plus the clock to contend with. And then there's Beetee to think of. Johanna only brought him for me, and if we leave she'll surely kill him. Then I remember. I can't protect Beetee, too. There can only be one victor and it has to be Haymitch. I must accept this. I must make decisions based on his survival only.
"All right," I say. "We'll stay until the Careers are dead. But that's the end of it." I turn and wave to Finnick. "Hey, Finnick, come on in! We figured out how to make you pretty again!"
The three of us scour all the scabs from our bodies, helping with the others' backs, and come out the same pink as the sky. We apply another round of medicine because the skin seems too delicate for the sunlight, but it doesn't look half as bad on smooth skin and will be good camouflage in the jungle.
Beetee calls us over, and it turns out that during all those hours of surveying and focused thought, he has indeed come up with a plan. "I think we'll all agree our next job is to kill Brutus and Enobaria," he says mildly. "I doubt they'll attack us openly again, now that they're so outnumbered. We could track them down, I suppose, but it's dangerous, exhausting work."
"Do you think they've figured out about the clock?" I ask.
"If they haven't, they'll figure it out soon enough. Perhaps not as specifically as we have. But they must know that at least some of the zones are wired for attacks and that they're reoccurring in a circular fashion. Also, the fact that our last fight was cut off by Gamemaker intervention will not have gone unnoticed by them. We know it was an attempt to disorient us, but they must be asking themselves why it was done, and this, too, may lead them to the realization that the arena's a clock," says Beetee. "So I think our best bet will be setting our own trap."
"Wait, let me get Johanna up," says Finnick. "She'll be rabid if she thinks she missed something this important."
"Or not," I mutter, since she's always pretty much rabid, but I don't stop him, because I'd be angry myself if I was excluded from a plan at this point.
When she's joined us, Beetee shoos us all back a bit so he can have room to work in the sand. He swiftly draws a circle and divides it into twelve wedges. It's the arena, not rendered in jittery strokes but in the smooth engineering lines of a man, whose mind focuses on every detail and on far more complex things. "If you were Brutus and Enobaria, knowing what you do now about the jungle, where would you feel safest?" Beetee asks. There's nothing patronizing in his voice, and yet I can't help thinking he reminds me of a schoolteacher about to ease children into a lesson. Perhaps it's the age difference, or simply that Beetee is probably about a million times smarter than the rest of us.
"Where we are now. On the beach," says Haymitch. "It's the safest place."
"So why aren't they on the beach?" says Beetee.
"Because we're here," says Johanna impatiently.
"Exactly. We're here, claiming the beach. Now where would you go?" says Beetee.
I think about the deadly jungle, the occupied beach. "I'd hide just at the edge of the jungle. So I could escape if an attack came. And so I could spy on us."
"Also to eat," Finnick says. "The jungle's full of strange creatures and plants. But by watching us, I'd know the seafood's safe."
Beetee smiles at us as if we've exceeded his expectations. "Yes, good. You do see. Now here's what I propose: we use one of the hourly events as a trap. Which ones would be the quickest, most deadliest?"
"The lightning bolt that hits the tree," I say.
"Yes. That would work well, but luring them close enough to the tree could put us in danger as well. Has anyone seen exactly how the lightening catches its victims?" asks Beetee.
There's a long pause as we realize we hadn't. It seems a bit fantastical to me, impossible even. But why? I've set thousands of snares. Isn't this just a larger snare with a more scientific component? Could it work? How can we even question it, we tributes trained to gather fish and lumber and coal? What do we know about harnessing power from the sky?
Haymitch takes a stab at it. "Lighting seems unpredictable. It could take everyone in the section."
"It could. We could investigate and see if the ground has been set up with a conduit substance that helps snare the victims. If there is, we could see how far from the tree it extends," says Beetee.
"How do you know that there needs to be a conduit... thingy?" asks Johanna, clearly not convinced.
"Because electricity needs a ground, a path to travel," says Beetee, pleased by Johanna's ingenuity. "I doubt it's natural lightning nor the tree a real tree. You know trees better than any of us, Johanna. It would be destroyed by now, wouldn't it?"
"Yes," she says glumly.
Haymitch pauses to make solid eye contact with Beetee. "I don't think that we have time to investigate something this complex."
"Ah, right. How about the poison fog?" Beetee suggests.
"They could out run it. And it would be too risky for us to ambush them near it," says Finnick.
"The monkeys?" asks Beetee.
"Wild animals are too unpredictable, even if they were programmed by the Gamemakers," I point out.
"Very true. The blood-rain would not work," says Beetee.
"There are four unknown sectors," I say. "Perhaps we can carefully investigate them a sector behind and discover their traps?"
"We don't have time," says Haymitch. "It would be our luck to actually stumble into one of the traps."
"That leaves the massive wave of saltwater," says Beetee. "They can't out run that. I've been wanting to explore that sector."
"Why?" asks Haymitch.
"My specialty was water engineering: pump houses, canals, and dams," replies Beetee with a smile. "They've done a nice job constructing this arena with all the saltwater and atmospheric control. All the mechanics I'm most familiar with will be behind sector ten, or should I say under it."
"We should leave now," says Haymitch "But as we are allies and this will require all our efforts, the decision of whether or not to attempt it is up to you four."
We are like schoolchildren. Completely unable to suggest ideas that are helpful. Most of which don't even have anything to do with his actual plan except guard or fight.
I look at the others' disconcerted faces. "Wait. How will we lure them off the beach, that is, if they follow us at all?" I ask. "Brutus and Enobaria are going to be extremely cautious since it's just them, and possibly Chaff."
"Because we have bait," says Haymitch. "We've got the Mockingjay. If they are thinking like victors, they expect that killing the Mockingjay will break our alliance, simple divide and conquer. We'll figure out the trap after we inspect the sector."
Finnick looks at Johanna and raises his eyebrows. He will not go forward without her. "All right," she says finally. "It's better than hunting them down in the jungle randomly. And I doubt they'll figure out our plan, since we can barely understand it ourselves."
Haymitch insists again that we leave now. Judging by the sun, it's almost eight in the morning. We'll have to leave our beach anyway before the wave comes. So we break camp and head into the jungle. Beetee is still too weak to hike up the slope completely on his own, so Finnick and Haymitch take turns helping him. I let Johanna lead because it's a pretty straight shot up to the force field since the rushing water has cleared much of the small or loose foliage, and I figure she can't get us too lost. Besides, I can do a lot more damage with a sheath of arrows than she can with two axes, so I'm the best one to bring up the rear.
The dense, muggy air and the early sunrises weigh on me. There's been no break from it since the Games began. I wish Peeta would stop sending us that District 3 bread and get us some more of that District 4 stuff, because I've sweated out buckets in the last two days, and even though I've had the fish, I'm craving salt. A piece of ice would be another good idea. Or a cold drink of water. I'm grateful for the fluid from the trees, but it's the same temperature as the seawater and the air and the other tributes and me. We're all just one big, warm stew.
As we near the top, Finnick suggests I take the lead. "Katniss can hear the force field," he explains to Beetee and Johanna.
"Hear it?" asks Beetee.
"Only with the ear the Capitol reconstructed," I say. Guess who I'm not fooling with that story? Beetee. Because surely he remembers that he showed me how to spot a force field, and probably it's impossible to hear force fields, anyway. But, for whatever reason, he doesn't question my claim.
"Then by all means, let Katniss go first," he says, pausing a moment to wipe the steam off his glasses. "Force fields are nothing to play around with."
The identical lightning tree's unmistakable as it towers so high above the others. I find a bunch of nuts and make everybody wait while I move slowly up the slope, tossing the nuts ahead of me. But I see the force field almost immediately, even before a nut hits it, because it's only about fifteen yards away. My eyes, which are sweeping the greenery before me, catch sight of the rippled square high up and to my right. I throw a nut directly in front of me and hear it sizzle in confirmation.
"Just stay below the lightning tree," I tell the others.
We divide up duties. Finnick guards Beetee while he examines the area, Johanna taps for water, Haymitch gathers nuts, and I hunt nearby. The tree rats don't seem to have any fear of humans, so I take down three easily. I return to the others and clean my kill. Then I draw a line in the dirt a few feet from the force field as a reminder to keep back, and Haymitch and I settle down to roast nuts and sear cubes of rat.
Beetee is still messing around near the force field, doing I don't know what, taking measurements and stomping on the ground. At one point he snaps off a sliver of bark, joins us, and throws it against the force field. It bounces back and lands on the ground, glowing. In a few moments it returns to its original color. "Well, that explains a lot," says Beetee. I look at Haymitch and can't help biting my lip to keep from laughing since it explains absolutely nothing to anyone but Beetee.
Haymitch tosses back a nut. "So what have you learned, Beetee?"
"The water has to come through the force field. There is probably a large holding tank that takes 12 hours to fill. I'm guessing that they lower the force field in this sector for a couple seconds as the water rushes in."
This grabs Haymitch's full attention. "Could we..."
"No. There's probably a wall of concrete behind it. We'd most likely get caught in the wave anyway."
"Beetee, what were you looking for when you were stomping about?" I ask.
"Something... mechanical," Beetee says discretely. "With the force of water, the earth should be bare in this area, free of vegetation. I have a hunch about this immediate area"
The sound of boisterous hissing begins to emanate from the nine o'clock sector. The sound of it makes my skin crawl, making me thankful that we didn't explore it.
"I don't even want to know what is making that sound," I say. "We should gather the food."
"How big can a snake get?" asks Finnick.
Beetee stares off towards nine. "I remember on my victory tour when I visited District Eleven, the Mayor told me about some large four legged creatures that live in the swamps. He said they could easily snap up a human before they could flex a muscle."
The sound swells, as if alerted by our quiet words to the proximity of live flesh. Whatever is making that noise, I bet it could strip us to the bone in seconds.
"We should get out of here, anyway," says Johanna. "There's less than an hour before the wave comes."
We don't go that far, though. Only to the identical looking lightning tree in the eleven o'clock section. We have a picnic of sorts, squatting on the ground, eating our jungle food, waiting for the cacophony of water. At Beetee's request, I climb up into the canopy as the top of the hour approaches. I begin to tense since being this close to the wave, the force of water will be astounding. But the wave feels late. I'm about to call down to others to inquire when the sky suddenly turns from pink to its natural blue. I can now see outside the arena, which does me no good since we appear to be below a ridge, affording me to see only sky outward. I wait for a minute and study the scattered clouds in the bright blue sky, before I swing down, and report my findings to the group. To my surprise, they seem to have been expecting the particular change.
"Do you think we can talk now?" Johanna asks Haymitch.
Haymitch surveys the area. "I don't know why not. Even if they haven't cut the power to the cameras and microphones, they certainly know by now."
"What's happening, Haymitch?" I take hold of his arm.
"The coup has begun, Katniss," Finnick says excitedly.
"I don't understand. Haymitch, what's going on?" I face him directly, waiting for an explanation.
"Look, sweetheart, Katniss, I can only give you a quick explanation for now." Haymitch gives a quick sweeping gesture to the others to give us some space, which means that he expects me to be upset. "We'll tell you all of it once we're safe. But for now, I can quickly tell you that many people have hated the government and desired change for a long time. The government is not about to relinquish their hold on power, as you have seen more clearly as a victor. For years we have been working to bring change, being ever careful not to ever speak of it in public, even using extreme caution in private."
"Katniss, like I said when we first met," says Finnick, "I deal with secrets. Secrets that eventually grew into the coup you see today."
"We finally arrived at our stage of planning," continues Haymitch, "where we thought we were ready, but we were missing one thing."
"What?" I inquire.
Haymitch presses his lips tight for a moment. "You."
"Me? I'm nobody." I begin to feel a panic well inside me, feeling as if the gigantic wave is about to hit me.
Haymitch takes hold of my shoulders. "You're the Mockingjay, the symbol of the resistance."
"I'm not part of any resistance!" I break free and take a step back. "I'm just a girl who survived the Hunger Games."
"You're the girl who woke the people of the Capitol to its cruelty. You're the girl who is uniting the Districts. Because of you, people believe that change can happen."
I begin pacing back and forth. The center of attention was something that I never enjoyed. To be the center of a revolution that I didn't even know was happening was suffocating. "I don't want to be part of any of this. They'll punish my family, my friends."
Haymitch tries to calm me by reaching out, but I avoid his touch.
Johanna crosses her arms. "You only have to stay alive long enough for the coup to stand. Once Snow and his cronies are gone, you'll be able to go home in peace."
I continue pacing in circles, trying to come to terms. "Will the war last long?"
Beetee tries to give me a comforting smile. "We are hoping that there will be no war. Everyone believes that once the government has been overthrown, the military, the Peacekeepers will comply with the new government."
District Four believes in the revolution," says Finnick. "Plutarch Heavensbee is only worried about Districts 1 and 2."
I stop pacing and turn again to Haymitch. "The Head Gamemaker?"
"He's leading the coup in the Capitol," says Haymitch. "Their vast plan is to have everyone arrested within fifteen minutes. They've planned every second to the last detail. This coup has been in the works for years, more than a decade. Over time, they have been moving people up into positions of authority on the inside, making sure everyone was ready."
"Inside, inside," I'm just babbling now. "Peeta! What about Peeta?"
Haymitch takes a firm grip of my hands. "He's safe. He's with Effie."
"How is Effie going to protect him?" I burst out.
"She was told of the coup," says Haymitch in a calming voice. "She agreed to inform Peeta of all the details once the games had started. They were to be hidden my members of the revolution once the coup began. I'm certain he's safe."
I break loose from Haymitch again. "You're certain? You mean that you don't know!"
"Um, guys?" calls out Johanna. "I know it's important to get little Miss Mockingjay up to speed, but I think we need to get moving. Listen."
We listen in silence to the sound of clicking as the volume and intensity increases. What makes everyone move in hast is the sound of the hissing, which has already spread into the ten o'clock sector.
"Without the power, all the creatures they've genetically created for the arena are loose to roam, completely uncontrollable," says Beetee.
"And I bet they're hungry," adds Finnick.
Haymitch grabs his gear. "I officially declare the 75th Hungers Games over. Let's get out of here."
We head diagonally towards the now absent force field of ten o'clock, hoping to keep clear of all the living traps. When we reach the spot where the field was located, we begin to see a tall 30-foot concrete structure through thinning jungle.
"See," points Beetee. "That is probably a large storage reservoir that has pumps and a quick release gate."
"Do you think that wall goes all the way around the arena?" Haymitch asks.
"No. This is only the mouth where the water is to be released," answers Beetee. "We just need to go around it. I doubt it covers much of this sector.
We move to the right along the wall when Johanna reminds everyone of a specific danger. "Keep an eye out for Brutus and Enobaria. They are certain to still be in game mode."
"Point taken." says Haymitch.
The wall begins to bend away, allowing us to see over the ridge. The jungle starts to open onto a vast rocky landscape.
"As I expected, the arena is in the middle of nowhere," says Beetee. "We should easily find an access door to the underground facilities somewhere along the wall."
We stare out at the endless inhabitable desert horizon contemplating our next move when we hear someone shout at us.
"Stop or I'll shoot!" calls out a Peacekeeper.