A/N: So sorry for the LOOOOONG wait! I actually experienced a death in the family. (That was, unfortunately, literal, however also not what I meant.) My muse kicked off and I've had to wait for her daughter to grow up enough to be useful. That being the case, here we are finally free of that hiatus-causing condition, and I have some news for anyone watching pretty much any other story of mine aside from Technical Difficulties... I probably won't be posting in them for a long time, if ever. My focus is now and probably always will be Hunger Games and Mass Effect.

Now, onto the most important piece of information! This chapter was written listening to the band In This Moment, mostly with Comanche on repeat, though a few other songs were used as well. I'll peg lyrics when a different song is used.

I feel this is the beginning...The beginning through the end.

A deep breath before the plunge, that's how they always describe that feeling of silence on the battlefield before something happens. The calm before the storm, that last moment of peace before hell breaks loose. At least this time I know that I'm walking into hell with the only people I have left at my side. Oh, I still have Finnick I suppose. Him and Annie, Prim and my mother, but at my side I have the only ones left who can fight for the injustices we faced.

Johanna grips my fingers for the barest moment, neither one of us able to smile or even show a hint of warmth. It's still enough to slow my heart, allow me to feel the monster caged inside of me, screaming through my bones. At my left shoulder is Gale. He's always been there, even when we fought. Even now, after all the times he's put Johanna down, disparaged my choices, called me a dyke. After the beatings I've given him. He's still here with me, and that somehow reassures me. Boggs is behind me, Paylor is behind Johanna, Beetee is in the Command tent linking us all up, and Haymitch is with him watching the holo. Lyme is talking to some of the soldiers of 266, keeping them calm.

Come on, get up, let me hear your war cry.

I don't know the words that pass my lips, but it doesn't matter. We start forward, no troubles and no hitches. Cressida is calmly directing Castor and Pollux in how to follow us, how to capture the rebel assault. For what seems like hours we encounter nothing but empty streets, Beetee and Haymitch in our ears directing us on where to turn and avoid any known active traps.

Still nothing is happening, and now I'm beginning to feel uneasy. It's so quiet that either this section of the city is uninhabited or we're walking into a trap, and my bet is on trap. I glance to my right, checking that 266 is still there. There aren't many of us in either squad, but we're all still here on either side of the road. I'm still looking at them when I feel a jerk from behind, four sparks at my feet a fraction of a second later telling me that Gale just saved my life. 266 spread out with a shout, ducking into doorways and empty buildings while we in 251 scramble to get up higher, somewhere we can see and control the whole street. Except it doesn't work out that way.

Gale and I burst onto a rooftop side by side, him already staring through his scope and me with an arrow on the string and drawn. The four snipers up top go down quickly, but the screams of dying men and women reach us now and we can't see what's happening. There's nothing we can do, no way we can help from up here and yet I know that we'll never get back down to ground level fast enough to make a difference.

The distinctive timbre of a Victor's war cry rips through the air, and though I've never heard her voice, just that fact alone is enough to let me know that it must be Lyme. Our men have stopped screaming and silence has descended on the Capitol boulevard so that we can hear every sound, every impact in the fight that is happening now. Somewhere about a block further into the city, I hear my Valkyrie and my heart restarts, but now I need to reach the street. I toss Gale a look and hand him a thin cable before diving off the side of the building, the pavement rising to meet me at a breakneck speed before his grip slows me and swings me into the wall.

I grunt in annoyance, that jolt enough to let me know that I will have a pretty big bruise on my shoulder later. I unclip and leave the line hanging, the whine of Gale following intruding just as a crash of shattering glass cracks through the air. A dark-skinned woman that it takes me a moment to recognize as Enobaria rolls to her feet, the hulking form of Lyme stepping into the street and crunching crystal fragments under her boots. She is bleeding from several bite wounds, but she isn't slowing down and she looks determined to kill the smaller woman, not caring that she must have mentored her.

My breath is stolen as they charge and collide, Enobaria not standing a chance. The reach of the much taller Victor causes her head to snap to the side, and the most one-sided beating I have ever seen begins. I saw Cato snap a neck in the arena without effort. I watched Brutus and Gloss train. I watched Finnick move in the forest, a wave swallowing the tide of mutts. I have never seen a single-minded pugilist systematically destroy their opponent. A few bone-shaking punches in, Eno drops to the ground, gaze unfocused. Lyme doesn't care. she just straddles the fallen savage and continues to pound her fists into her face, tearing the flesh until a low squelch echoes through the air and Enobaria's skull caves in.

The assault hasn't gone well. After Lyme killed one of her own tributes, what was left of 251 and 266 regrouped and charged forward. We didn't even make it four more streets in before we hit the edge of the intel that Plutarch and Beetee were able to provide. Another block in and three pods erupted at once, shrapnel cutting Boggs down at the knee and tracker-jackers swarming five of Johanna's remaining soldiers. With only Jo and Lyme still standing and Paylor thrown over the shoulder of the blonde behemoth, most of the soldiers left were mine. Two more of them activated the third trap and were swallowed in the steaming tar-like sludge before we got into the nearest building.

Now it's down to Gale, myself, Jo, Lyme, Paylor who is slowly starting to come around, one sharpshooter, and our camera crew. How the hell are we supposed to make it to Snow now?

I scramble out of the sewers, desperate to escape the scent of roses and blood. All that is left of our strike force is Victors, Gale, Cressida, and Pollux. Paylor's gurgling echoes up from below but I can still hear the chatter of her weapon as she fires into the mass of...things following us. Gale looks back sadly, detaching a yellow-striped grenade and tossing it into the hole in the ground, the pin in his hand as Lyme drops the cover down with a heavy clank. A moment passes, then a dull thump signals the detonation of the phosphorus below, hopefully igniting enough of the foul creatures to keep them from finding a way to follow.

We are all exhausted, so tired and beat up from the push deeper and deeper into the Capitol, and we're not done yet. Somewhere along the way, Cress has picked up a rifle and she carries it like a trained soldier, making me wonder if I missed seeing her on the courses in Thirteen or if she learned somewhere else. It doesn't matter in the end, she's been a great help since losing Boggs. She and Lyme had kept the few soldiers we had left in line, and now they are still standing behind me. It comforts me to know that Cressida is there, fighting just as hard. Fighting to go home to Cashmere.

The ground shakes, opening up at our feet. Thankfully there are so few of us now that we don't lose any more, but we are so close that this setback causes us just as much pain. We can see a large mass of Capitol citizens fighting to get into the gate of the President's Mansion, but we have to circle around a block to reach them.

We are still down a street when a hover glides by overhead, dozens of little silver parachutes dropping into the midst of the crowd, the trusting sheep smiling and reaching for them joyously. Gale goes deathly still, refusing to even breathe, and then I understand. It's a trap.

The first wave goes off, children, mothers, whole families swallowed in whickering clouds of shrapnel and blood. Those that survive are screaming in pain for several minutes, all of us unmoving until another hover catches our attention. This one is emblazoned with a medic's cross and Gale swears quietly, charging forward and waving his arms to try and warn them off. Something is wrong with that picture, and it only gets worse when I see a familiar head of flaxen hair and an untucked shirttail I know all too well. Two things in that moment become clear to me: My sister is in the Capitol as a medic, and she is about to die. Gale trying to stop it tells me that the trap is one he knows about, one he probably even designed.

I'm running and outpacing everyone in a desperate, mad attempt to reach her in time, but I can't. I'm tackled to the ground just as the rest of the parachutes explode, napalm licking over every it touches. I hear a heavy grunt, catch a flash of red hair, and then the heat is unbearably close. The last image I have of that pretty little blond is her clear blue eyes looking at me, recognition and love staring at me, and then flames wrapping around her. I fight the arms holding me even as the liquid flames roll down the body protecting me and drip onto my face, my shoulders, my legs. The pain is too much, the agony of losing my sister too great, and I slip quickly into unconsciousness when i realize that my flesh is being eaten away.

The last thing I see before the black swallows me is Pollux's unseeing gaze, a gentle, proud smile on his face.

++Johanna++

Ten days have passed since everything fell apart. Ten days since Katniss lost Prim. Ten days since almost everyone we knew died trying to reach the Mansion. Ten days since I had to watch flames licking hungrily at the skin of my beloved. Ten long days, and in those ten days, zero nights of sleep. I pass out for an hour here and there, the image of Katniss burning always waking me in screams. Cressida has been at my side for ten days, forcing me to eat, to drink. Never once does she force me to sleep though.

I owe her for this, I owe her a lot for this, but all I can think about is Katniss. Gale asks about her every day, and Cressida, patient and good-natured Cressida, gives him the same answer day after day, the tone of her voice sharper and harder each time. I don't think I've said much, but I know that somehow she can see how much that means to me.

I've been sitting here in this room for seven hours since my last 'nap', just holding my Mockingjay's hand. Cressida is sitting beside me, concern in her emerald eyes as she rubs my back. I think maybe she needs the contact as much as I do, she's lost her team and I think she's worried that she'll lose one of the few friends she's made.

Katniss has fairly large expanses of skin grafted over the burned areas, but she's still touch and go. The heart monitor has flat-lined twice since we managed to get her into the medical facility. The first time, I went into hysterics and nearly ripped the throats out of two doctors before Lyme got me in a headlock and restrained me until they restarted Kat's heart. The second time, Cressida darted forward and wrapped herself around me. She's got a nice bruise marring some of the vines on the side of her head for her trouble, but we're all still here.

I've slipped into despondency again when the fingers in my hand twitch. Cress notices immediately because I've sat straight like a shot, desperation in my eyes. The fingers twitch again and Katniss' face screws up in pain. I am flooded with conflicting emotions and I don't know whether to laugh or cry, because I know that she's waking up and hurting but she's just so cute in that moment when her face scrunches up, and I'm relieved that she's alive and likely to stay that way, and somewhere in there I feel anger as well. Anger against the Capitol for doing this to her, anger against whoever designed those traps, anger against Snow for deploying them in the middle of a crowd just to lure in the rebellion and try to kill them.

Cressida is on her feet, her voice cooing in my ears as she encourages Katniss to wake up, to show us a little more life. A startled laugh bubbles through my lips even as tears leak from the corners of my eyes when I see a small camera in her hand, capturing this moment of hope even as she tries to ensure that Kat opens her eyes for me. Still a filmmaker, still showing the rebellion that their symbol lives. Still doing her job, even when she could be, should be with her lover. I'm starting to remember what having family is like with her around, and by extension having Cashmere around. The sister I didn't get, and the best friend I might get to keep.

Another month, thirty whole days, has gone by. In the hours after she finally regained consciousness, Katniss was subjected to test after test, but now we can't keep her in her room to convalesce. Every day, she wanders somewhere else in the Mansion. Haymitch found her the first couple times, but soon she learned how to avoid him. Lyme found her once after that, but the shiner she received made her swear off searching again. Since then, it's always me.

Today, I find her in a spacious bedroom in the east wing of the building. As I push open the door, I hear a quiet scuttle and see a shadow slip under the gigantic bed in the center of the room. I don't know what else to do, so I kick off my boots and shuck my clothes down to my undergarments so I don't get caught on anything. My feet move slowly and I gingerly bend down, crouching on the ground to look under the bed, familiar stormy eyes staring back at me. When she doesn't bolt, I lay out and slip into the gap to join her, no words escaping my mouth.

I can feel her trembling as I wrap an arm around her, but she calms a bit after a moment. I'm not sure why, but she does. She nuzzles into my neck and...I'm home. That one simple action, the scent that even now hasn't left her skin, the familiar warmth, and I'm home. I hope she is too, even if she still hasn't spoken. When her fingers entwine into mine, I grin and kiss her temple. Then, a gift of hope, of love, of everything I've lost, she whispers into my shoulder, "...Jo."

A/N #2: Okay, so I realize this chapter is short, but I wanted to finish up the Capitol in the next chapter. That includes all the stuff that is supposed to happen with voting and executions and stuff. After that, it's finally into the unstructured AU that I've been trudging towards, and I can be free to write whatever the fluffy hell I want. Thank you guys, SO so much, for being patient with me. I love you all.

Song credits: Burn, In This Moment; Comanche, In This Moment