A/N: If you've seen/read Divergent imagine that it's like when they are taking their aptitude test to figure out in what faction they belong in. Remember that.
"Very well Cato, lay her on the couch. I have some things to do before getting started"
I go to put her in the couch while Alma disappears somewhere and am stuck looking at her for five minutes. Her long brown hair, those fiery eyes that are now closed, supple lips. I'm lost in my thoughts of Katniss when I hear a cough coming from my right. Alma.
"Oh, don't mind me. It's completely normal to be smitten with her she's beautiful. Many people have been where you are right now." She's smiling at me and just looking at her sends a chill down my spine.
"I'm not smitten. That's childish and unreasonable."
"If you say so. Pick her up and carry her to the infirmary, we have things to do."
I do as I'm told but can't help but ask.
"What are you going to do to her?"
"You'll see."
She looks at Katniss once more before turning on her heels and walking away.
The infirmary is deserted, there is only one doctor that I have never seen before and a lot of expensive looking material.
There is a big screen on one of the walls and a dentist's chair looking kind of thing. Next to it there are heart rate monitors and several other things that I have never seen in my life.
"Lay her here please." The doctor asks pointing to the chair.
I lay Katniss down and he starts plugging things to her, electrodes to her head, an IV and places the heart monitor's wrist band on her and immediately you can see her heart strumming in the monitor.
"Why the TV?"
As I ask that the doctor looks at me, acting as if it was a norm to know why there was a TV in an infirmary, then again maybe it isn't for the patient but for the doctor to have fun.
"I find that it is easier to show than to tell. You'll see soon enough."
That was a waste of an answer. I turn around to find Alma standing behind me. I didn't even hear her approaching. She turns to the doctor.
"Is she ready?"
"Yes. Everything is set and ready to go."
Alma makes her way to Katniss' sleeping form and picks up a syringe spilling the green liquid in to the IV.
"What is that?"
"Nothing you should concern yourself with." She doesn't even look at me but leans further and speaks to Katniss as if she'd hear her. She's out cold.
"Now Katniss, I just have some questions to ask you."
She looks at the doctor and nods her head once and the man goes to the TV and turns it on. It continues black, no image on it, which is until Alma speaks again.
"You have secrets Katniss, you have been keeping them from me. I want you to think about what those secrets are, to think and imagine them in your mind as objects you can see and hear."
The screen comes to life and it shows Fire Girl in some sort of apartment while storm clouds start gathering outside her window, she takes a step forward and everything shatters, sending shards to her while she tries to shield her face.
"Wake up."
As just like that Katniss opens her eyes, yet they are not the same, they're unfocused looking straight ahead.
"Subject is conscious and fully under the influence of the venom."
"Good, it's preferable when the subject is lucid. Instead of hearing and seeing fragments you see the whole picture, hear every word."
"What is that?" The green fluid slowly making its way to her veins is making me sick.
"Tracker Jacker venom can be used for many things Cato. When injected with the certain amount, the venom has an interesting side effect, patients experience a sort of waking dream-like state, most people replay traumatic life events or see visions representing their deepest fears or under the right circumstances they can see visions I suggest them."
"Katniss is hiding something ever since she came to us six years ago and I'm intent on finding out what."
"By taking a crowbar to her subconscious."
"Division agents don't get to keep secrets. Not from me."
She turns to Katniss once more.
"Katniss I want you to imagine yourself walking down a long corridor, it seems familiar, you've been here before."
The image on the TV shows Katniss in one of Division's many corridors.
"You are looking for something, something you've hidden. You've hidden it very well but it's not safe anymore. People are coming to steal it. You have to find it and move it."
Katniss starts running, searching until she finds a little girl no older that ten years-old.
"You're-"
"I don't like this place. I want to go home."
She goes closer to the little girl.
"What are you doing here?"
"You put me here."
"This is not a safe place. People are looking for you. I have to get you out."
She starts running towards a door but when she opens it there's an abyss there. They step away and there are flashlights filtering through the doors.
She tries to calm the little girl, telling everything will be okay but the girl straightens her shoulders and says with all certainty.
"No. It's her, she's coming, and you can't stop her."
"Listen I know a secret way out."
Then they take off again Katniss urging the little girl to run faster, so much that she actually speaks up from the chair.
"C'mon, keep up. C'mon."
"Who is the little girl?" The doctor asks Alma.
"I don't know, it could be a relative, family, a friend, someone she saw on the street. What you have to understand is that the people in the dream are merely the projection of the dreamer. Their hopes, their fears, their secrets. What I have to understand is what those people mean."
Katniss speaks up again.
"We have to run, this way hurry."
"Calm down Katniss, there is no need to run. I'm right here. Now tell me, who's with you?"
"We have to find a place to hide. This way, hurry."
"Why are you hiding a little girl? Who is she?"
"We have to run."
"Now Katniss I want you to find a safe place. Somewhere you feel secure."
The screen shows her in the training room and she stops running hiding behind a stack of training mats when they hear feet shuffling.
"C'mon, get down." Katniss is pushing the little girl to the floor in case anyone sees her.
"I don't think it's safe here."
"Calm down. Take it easy."
They're both looking in the middle of where the training mats are stacked together until someone pulls on Katniss' ankle. A man.
He doesn't seem familiar, I've seen footage of Peeta and that isn't it. He looks taller, brown hair, grey eyes, he could be Katniss' brother on physical appearance alone.
She tries to run away but the man cradles her face in between his hands making soothing motions. Confusion is on Katniss' face momentarily but then realization dawns on her.
"Gale?" He puts his fingers to her lips, telling her to be silent.
Alma interrupts.
"Gale? Who's Gale?"
"He wants to escape."
"Katniss, who is Gale?"
She doesn't answer her and I can see Alma is getting frustrated at not knowing who the boy is.
The three of them start running towards something in Katniss' mind.
"Her heart rate seems elevated. That doesn't seem normal." The doctor interrupts her.
"Nothing is normal. She's fighting me. I keep hitting these roadblocks her subconscious has built. Katniss why are you running?"
"I need to keep up."
"No, you don't. You have to slow down."
"Where almost there. We have to go on."
"No, I'm not afraid of her."
In the screen they've come to a big clear area where they slow down when suddenly a lot of agents stand behind them and the boy sacrifices himself and starts fighting them all telling Katniss and the little girl to run.
As they are running the little girl speaks up.
"He always said you can't trust other people."
"I never believed that."
"She's coming!"
"Listen, I won't let Alma hurt you."
She herself speaks out loud.
"I won't let Alma hurt you."
"She shouldn't be aware of what I'm doing." Alma looks at the doctor.
They screen starts shaking has if an earthquake was happening and her heart rate picks up.
"What did you do?" I speak up for the first time, and in my opinion I've been quiet long enough. "You made it worse."
Katniss starts heaving, her breathing rapid and her heart rate picking up even further.
"You said you could control this." The doctor is trying to figure something out with Alma but my eyes are glued to both Katniss and the screen.
In the screen Katniss crawls under the bed and on the other side she's again in some kind of apartment. She goes to a drawer and takes out a gun, stepping out of the room she sees a guy there.
"Hey sleepy head. Ready for breakfast?"
The actual Katniss speaks drawing Alma out of her discussion with the doctor.
"Peeta."
"Peeta?"
Katniss looks at her hand where a gold band rests. A wedding ring.
"Peeta, have you seen a little girl?"
"Of course, she's right there." He points to the living room. "Did you think I left her in the subway or something?"
She goes to look into the living room and there's a baby in a cradle giggling.
"This is crazy. We just met."
"I know, we've been married for three years and sometimes it's still like, wow." Peeta is smiling openly and Katniss looks completely enamored.
"I've lost her completely. She was afraid of something and I want to know what." Alma gets closer to Katniss, grabs her by the shoulders and shakes her. "I don't know where you think you are right now but you're not safe."
Everything starts shaking again and when she opens a door and she's back in Division.
"Why am I back in Division?"
"Division is your home Katniss. Why'd you ever want to leave?"
Katniss grimaces.
"I'll ask you again. Why would you want to leave?"
In the screen another girl appears. Tall, blond hair, green eyes.
"Because she is a traitor. After all this time am I still the only one that can tell you the truth?"
"Glimmer."
"You are still the same. A killer, through and through."
"That's not true."
"Yes it is. You know it is. You may fool everyone else but not me."
They start fighting until Katniss shoots her.
"See? Killer instinct." She starts laughing, a cold, bloody laugh. "It's in your blood." She shows her teeth which are covered in blood and starts cackling again.
Katniss ends up hitting her until she submits to her death.
Alma steps in.
"No, it don't want this!"
"Then what Katniss? What do you want?"
"I want to go back to Peeta."
"You can't."
"Why don't people ever listen? No one ever listens! But you will now, because now, I know what I want."
We were focused on the screen until Katniss starts ripping the wires off screaming.
"I wanna get out of here! Get me out!"
She gets off the chair and pushes everything aside, punching the doctor in the face when he was trying to restrain her. I step in.
"Shhh, Katniss, calm down. You have to calm down okay?" I involve her in a secure grip that is somewhat similar to a hug and feel her relax against me nodding her head.
I press a gentle kiss to her hairline to calm her down and whisper soothing words to her ear until she eventually stops fighting and goes limp in my grasp.
I pick her up and put her in the chair again directing my next order to the doctor that is checking in a mirror if whether or not he has bruising.
"Fix her up. She's going back to her room to rest."
I turn to Alma using my coldest glare.
"This little experiment of yours is over. It caused her all this pain and you got nothing out of it. It was useless."
She dares smile at me. That crooked smile that makes skin crawl but right now I'm not deterred.
"Oh, I got something quite important out of it."
Then she saunters off leaving me wondering what she meant, from my point of view it was useless but I'm not the crazy one here. All of that doesn't matter now, what does matter is Katniss.
I have to get her safe.
I watch as the doctor reapplies clear fluid to her IV and starts shutting the rest of the things off. He tells me the process of getting her fluids and everything else back to normal will take at least 20 minutes and then I can take her to our room. That time gives me time to think.
Think about how Katniss was right and how I said Alma wouldn't hurt her, what Alma said about getting something out of this and most importantly why I cared and was so protective of Katniss.
The last one confused me the most. My mentors where right, this girl is worming her way past my defenses and she hasn't even tried.
I'm so screwed, if this keeps going and someone notices it won't even matter the time and dedication they've put into me being the best, I'm as good as dead.
"She's ready to go if you want to take her to her room."
I don't say anything just pick Katniss up and my way to our room.
When I get there she's waking up, she's drowsy and doesn't really know where she is so I lay her down on the bed and lock the door with me still in there.
"Cato?"
"I'm right here."
"You said she wouldn't hurt me."
That hit me like a ton of bricks. She remembered.
"You remember?"
"Not really. Just remember screaming."
Her answers are getting slurred by the second and decided it was my cue to leave seeing that she'd be asleep soon.
In an uncharacteristic move I go to tuck her in and as I'm adjusting the sheets she pulls my arm to her, nearly making me fall right on her.
"Stay. Please. I don't want to be alone."
"I can't. Rules."
"Screw 'em. Please Cato."
And when she looked at me with those big grey eyes filled with sleep I knew I couldn't say no so I put my arms around her body and moved her a little to make room for me to sleep and as soon as I lied down she came to my side as if she was scared I would disappear in thin air.
It felt, nice.
Comfortable.
But before I fell asleep after hearing her breathing even out I only thought one thing and it wasn't how she was holding on to me, or how this felt natural but it was I'm so beyond screwed.
A/N: Read and Review :)
