Not much Prim and Rory *fluff* in the beginning of this chapter. It's pretty hard to write anything too romantic when bombs are falling on their district. It gets better further on, I have to say. All rights to Suzanne Collins! (Do I have to keep saying that?)

13 Years Old.

As the screen turns off, Gale looks at me with fear in his eyes. We know what Katniss did, shooting an arrow at the force field. It took several seconds for us to shake of the confusion when the first bomb hits the school so hard it shakes the district. Sounds of panic and yells echo along District 12 as Gale runs around the house, grabbing this and that. I take Posy's hand and Vick and wait patiently for Gale. He seems to know what to do when the rest of us don't. Another bomb falls, and a shudder runs through the house. Gale gives me a look and quickly opens the door. We all run out onto the streets.

Panic falls over me as I see our district- or at least it used to be. The roads are crumbling with ashes everywhere. People are on the streets, begging, moaning for help. I see a woman screaming, tears streaming down her face as she holds at her shoulder. She has no arm.

I gasp. I see the hovercrafts above us and I feel anger flushing through me. Once again, the Capitol is showing us how powerless we are against them.

Gale leads us down the streets, jumping over bodies and fallen poles, ordering us to cover our mouths and noses with the neck of our shirts. We make it to the meadow, as the next bomb crushes our house. I'm relieved we got out when we could. Gale listens to the fence quickly for an electrical hum before helping Mom and Posy in, lifting the wire up for Vick. I'm about to follow them when he stops me.

"Get them." he says one last time, this time with panic in his voice. "Get them, and bring them here. Make sure they get under the fence. I'm going to see if I can help anyone else.

I nod, my whole body shaking with fear as Gale runs off in the opposite direction of the woods. I gulp, and force my arms and legs to move. I sprint down the roads, trying not to look at the dead bodies on the streets. Bomb after bomb falls as screams and shouts fill District 12, and I try my best to avoid them.

I finally reach her house, and tears of joy fill my eyes as I see the house is still up. Of course it is, though. The Capitol would never bomb the Victors Village. I try the door, but it won't budge. I pound at the door, screaming her name.

The door flings open as she throws herself into my arms, sobbing. She's saying my name over and over again. I let myself pat her head and hold her in my arms for only a few seconds until I lead her and her mom back down the streets. I see her face as she sees the bodies on the streets, broken and twisted. I make her and her mom get under the fence first before I wiggle in after them.

Vick is collecting berries in a large leaf while Mom's trying to stop the bleeding in Posy's arm. She cut it on a sharp metal pole on the way here. It doesn't look too deep, but the main worries are blood poisoning or tetanus.

Her mom takes one look at the cut and frowns. "I'm going back and bringing some medicine." she says grimly. "Posy's cut doesn't look bad, but just in case, I'll disinfect it." She wriggles under the fence and runs off down the street

Mom looks so thankful; I know she's staying strong for the rest of us. But she has tears in her eyes and she ducks her head before any of us can see. She's cooing Posy's name and kissing her forehead. She looks at us while Posy cries, wiping her red nose and dabbing her eyes with her sleeve. "Get us some food, Rory. Katniss taught you last year." She orders. "As for you," she points her chin to her, standing limply next to me. "You either help him or help Vick gather some berries."

I run down, searching under a big rock for my bow. She runs behind me, curling her fingers around mine. Silently, we tiptoe down together as I shoot down a clumsy rabbit and a squirrel high in the trees. I check Gale's snares and I'm happy to see more than nine squirrels in total. I grab a burlap bag and stuff them in, and reset all the snares. I curl my fingers around hers and run down the leafy forest's ground.

I sit down on a big rock, patting the spot next to me. "How are you?" I ask stupidly.

"I'm just great." she snaps back. She doesn't take the seat next to me but instead, starts pacing around me. I'm surprised until she shakes her head. "Look, I'm sorry. You out of all people must understand what a hard year this was for me."

I look at her. "Of course." I say, and she gives me a genuine smile, the one with sorrow yet happiness mixed together. I hold onto it in my mind, knowing I won't see it in a while, sad or not. She sits next to me, and leans against my shoulder as I fiddle with her hair, taking a strand or two and twisting it until she giggles.

The nasty stench of rotten fish fills my nose as Gale pushes me along the cafeteria. The tables are crowded with people hungry for food and digging in with their hands, ignoring the neat, matching sets of forks, knives and spoons set near them.

I see Greasy Sae, wiping her dirty hands on her apron and adjusting her hair net. She never wore these things back at District 12, but District 13 is all about hygiene. I literally can't cough anymore- if I do, people throw me dirty looks as well as napkins.

I accept a bowl of clam chowder, obviously sent from District 4, a late wedding present for Finnick and Annie. "What's up with the smelly fish?" I ask her, pointing my chin over to a box pushed aside to a corner. Despite my bad eyesight, I can make out a fuzzy fish tail poking out of the side. Greasy Sae sighs, wipes the sweat off her forehead with her arm, and continues chopping her... whatever.

"A district sent a whole load of them a couple of weeks back." she explains. "Never got 'round to eating 'em. I hope Hanny doesn't get told off too bad for spoiling 'em."

I nod, pretending to know who Hanny is, take my chowder, and leave. I walk cautiously, trying not to spill even a drop from my bowl. I make it to the Everdeen/Hawthorne's table in time and I collapse across Gale who's almost finished.

Peeta's there too, this time the guards just stand next to him menacingly. Peeta seems all right to me, though. He's starting to lose the crazy look in his eyes. I start to eat, digging in with my fingers, starving. Everyone had to go down to the underground farms this afternoon and dig turnips like our lives depended on it. It tuckered out everybody.

I see her walking in, rushing to stand in line for her share of food. President Coin seems to take record of everybody who's ever been late for anything. She takes her chowder and sits next to me.

"Why are you so late?" I ask her curiously. I realize Katniss isn't here, either. If she comes too late, she'll miss her whole meal entirely.

"Mom got me looking for Katniss." she says, digging around her clam chowder, frowning. "She freaked out when we rode the elevator past the mines. It was even worse when we passed this room with giant television screens with Peeta freaking out at the sound of Katniss's voice on every single one of them. She ran then, and mom told me to find her. It wasn't very hard to find her, though. She was in one of the supply closets."

I search her face. She's trying to keep her emotions bottled in, but I can almost see tears at the edges of her eyes. "Peeta seems to be getting so much better." I point out. "Besides, I ran into Haymitch the other day, and he told me your idea about hijacking him back is working. You know Haymitch isn't the one to lie about that stuff."

She nods hopefully. "She seems so torn, though." She says and her voice breaks. "She loves him, spent so much time worrying about him when he was kidnapped by the Capitol. But since Peeta thinks she's some kind of mutt, she's not taking it well."

A loud beep rings through the room as we put our dishes away for our next- I don't know, activity, I guess. I check my arm, and I'm relieved to see I have an hour off until the next. So does she and I pull her by the hand, to the left, and up the winding stair cases. Since the bombing of the Capitol, our bunkers were destroyed. But Gale took me up here a couple of times for me to know the way.

It's only about two minutes until we reach the last staircase. When we get up, panting, I would pay a bucketful of money to see her reaction again.

Instead of ashes and crumbling walls, this place was unharmed. It's an old room with peeling wallpaper and creaky floorboards. But if you put that all behind you and look more closely at the walls, you can see stories. They're written this way and that way, curving into spirals that make you dizzy. Even so, I've spent hours up here, reading the words on the walls behind the ugly brown wallpaper.

She walks around the room, peeling off wallpapers at every wall until all you can see is words. Suddenly, the dull, drab room has been changed to a breath taking sight, lines of words strung together along wall after wall, with different fonts and sizes. It's what they call beautiful. She has tears in her eyes. "It's been so long," she says, running her hands along the walls, distinct tears forming in her eyes. "It's been so long since I've seen something pretty."

I find a surprisingly new mat deep down the closet, and after wrestling with it for a while, I lay it down carefully along the floor and we read for the whole 54 minutes we have left together in each other's arms, wiping away both our worries and just seeing each other and the beautiful words through the dim light.