A/N: You guys hate me. I'm sorry but I did tell you that this wasn't going to be a smooth sailing story! :(
Disclaimer: I don't own the Hunger Games.
Chapter Five
Cato had been called to a meeting in the Command Room. There weren't many people there, just Coin, Plutarch, Haymitch, Harold, himself and Finnick. Maybe they were the best 13 had to offer? Cato knew the only reason he was here was because he was the Mockingjay. If Peeta had been in 13, he doubted he would be part of this meeting at all.
"We're in trouble," was the first thing out of Coin's mouth.
That can't be good.
"How much trouble?" Harold asked.
"Big trouble," Coin clarified. She looked very calm and collected for a woman who had just announced that they were in big trouble. "If you would direct your attention to the screen." She lifted a remote and flicked the screen at the top of the room on, not even bothering to look at it as if she had seen it a thousand times before.
The screen flickered to life and the Capitol seal appeared with, This is a Capitol approved message, stamped below it.
Then Peeta appeared.
It felt like Cato hadn't seen him in years. His heart skipped a beat and he fought to hide his joy at seeing him again, staying impasse. Peeta looked so happy. He was healthy and beautiful, smiling like wasn't a Capitol prisoner. Cato couldn't believe how comfortable his partner looked and how confident he sounded when he started speaking, talking about stopping the war and letting the Capitol take control again. What was he doing? Why would he speak for the wrong side of the war?
The worst thing was, he was good. His words weren't scripted but believable, convincing but not fake. Cato found himself rethinking everything at least twice during Peeta's speech.
Half way through, Coin paused the video. "This was broadcast live everywhere last night," she said. "Every single District and every single corner of the Capitol. And they're listening to him."
Harold got out of his seat and wandered over to the screen. He stood there, staring at the paused image of Peeta with intense fixation. Cato wondered what the hell he was doing, it wasn't a time to be fixating on Peeta, even if he did steal a couple of glances himself, relieved that he was healthy and well.
"Is he betraying us?" Finnick asked.
"He wouldn't do that," Cato snapped, irritated that Finnick would even consider something like that. Something had to be wrong. Peeta wouldn't just conform to Snow's side like that. He just . . . wouldn't.
"Yeah, tell him that," Finnick said, gesturing at the screen.
"We need to start on our propos and fast," Coin said. "There's already another planned programme tonight at seven and if it's even half as convincing as this one I don't know how long we've got before people start rethinking everything."
Harold stepped back from the screen, his face grief. "Just as I thought," he muttered.
"What?" Cato asked. "What is it?"
"Look at the iris of his left eye," Harold said, snatching Coin's remote off the table and zooming in on Peeta's eyes. At first, Cato couldn't see it, just the ordinary baby blue that used to always make his heart flutter. But on second glance, it was there. There was the tiniest of slithers of turquoise-green dyed into the blue.
"What is that?" Cato asked, pushing out of his seat and moving to stand beside Harold.
The Capitol man didn't answer, instead zoomed back out and examined the picture for anything else. Cato looked as well and was shocked when he spotted it before Harold did. On Peeta's neck, just missing his juglar, was a spot. Like a pinprick. Or an injection site.
"Tell me what you know about this!" Cato exclaimed, pointing at the pinprick.
Harold stayed silent.
"Harold, tell me!"
"I can't," Harold said quietly.
President Coin stood up. "As of right now, Peeta Mellark is an official traitor and when we win this war, he will be publicly executed along with Snow and the other traitors."
"Excuse me?!" Cato yelled. "I thought he was your goddamn Mockingjay!"
"Obviously not anymore," Coin simply answered. "He has made it clear, who's side he's on."
~xXx~
He deserves to know.
He deserves to know.
He deserves to know.
Harold kept repeating this mantra to himself as he walked down the seemingly endless line of dorm rooms. Was Cato's number 45 or 54? Or was it 67 . . . Harold shook his head, trying his best to pull himself together before came face to face with Cato. He had to seem strong and together when he told him. If Cato was going to take a fit, then he had to be the one that stayed strong. Two broken men were not going to helpful, especially since they both had a tendancy to be violent when they were upset.
Cato was in number 33. Harold felt stupid that he had forgotten. But the feeling was quickly replaced with fear as he knocked once on the door before pushing it open. Thankfully, the former career was just in the middle of taking his pills when Harold came in. At least that meant that he wasn't going to go bi-polar about all of this. Then again, maybe what he was about to tell him was beyond medication's aid.
"What is it Harold?" Cato asked. He sounded tired. Harold didn't blame him, he was probably still mad at him for not saying what he knew earlier at the Command meeting.
"I've decided to tell you . . ." Harold began, trailing off as he thought about how he was actually going to go about telling Cato about Peeta. "I've decided to tell you about what they're doing to Peeta . . ."
The mere mention of his name had Cato listening. Harold could immediately tell by the snap of his head and how he had ditched trying to fix a broken window on his pill box. "What's with the change of heart?" he asked.
"Erm . . ." I decided it wasn't my place to keep it a secret? "I decided you deserve to know."
Cato threw his pill box onto the bed. "I'm listening," he said.
"Okay . . . well . . ." Harold fought to find the words. "You see . . ." He ran a frustrated hand through his hair and shut the door tight behind him. "I was an experiment kid, when I was younger. My father sold me away when my mom died and Snow would try out all these crazy things on me. Like serums and stuff. One of the things he tried was a serum extracted from the venom of tracker jacker stings."
"Right," Cato said slowly. "Is there a point to this story?"
"I'm getting to it," Harold replied. "It would make you believe things that aren't true. Snow tried convincing me that I had always lived in the Capitol, which wasn't right because I'm born and bred District 1. But I believed it anyway because the venom told me it was true. I wish I had been stronger and had been able to fight it. But I wasn't. I doubt anyone really is."
"And you're saying, what? That you have a tragic past? What's this got to do with Peeta?" Cato asked. Harold knew that Cato wasn't trying to be rude, he was just desperate to know what they were doing to Peeta in the Capitol. Still didn't mean it didn't sting a little bit.
"Eventually the venom wears off but Snow still uses it as a punishment technique," Harold explained. "Mya even used it in her slavery business to convince her captives that . . . that she was their aunt."
Realization finally dawned on Cato. "So you're saying that Mya used this venom on Peeta then?" he said. "That's why he was so convinced she was his aunt? But that doesn't make sense, since as you say the venom wears off."
"The venom only wears off if you aren't exposed to too high a dosage. Mya is far from a nurse and in my opinion she was two steps away from overdosing Peeta when he was fifteen," Harold said. "And now that he's in the Capitol, if he's exposed to it again then it might leave a permanant imprint."
"Permanant?"
"Yeah."
"And what is it you think Snow is trying to convince him, then?" Cato asked.
Harold shrugged, his eyes looking around the room. They landed on several parts of the 13 regulated room but never on Cato. He couldn't bear to look him in the eye. "It's just a hunch but . . . but I think he's going to try and turn him into one of his Capitol drones. Like Mya and Hunter and Semira and Emily, etc."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Who the hell is Hunter and Semira and Emily?" Cato asked incredulously, only recognizing Mya's name.
"Oh right, you don't know them. Uh, well, Hunter is Mya's partner. Well, a resurrected version anyway," Harold explained. "When the peacekeepers busted their business in 12, Mya's partner in crime Mort was shot and killed. And the only reason Mya agreed to help Snow was if he brought Mort back."
"That's impossible. You can't cheat death," Cato said.
"When I say 'resurrected' I don't mean we put Mort's body onto a stone slab and chanted until his spirit returned to his body or any of that voodoo crap. I mean Snow's scientists brought him back to life through science. Inside his body is completely wired up. Like a robot or a computer." Harold saw Cato's expression and sighed. "I'm not joking! Sometimes the wires slip and he jerks or twitches."
"Is that even possible?!" Cato exclaimed.
"In the Capitol, who knows what's impossible," Harold answered. "Hunter doesn't remember much of being Mort but it will come back to him. And when it does Mya will have her partner back and he will be the disgusting, sleazy Capitolite he had been before the resurrection. Oh, and Semira is Peeta's mother. Her death was staged ages ago-"
"You told me she really died," Cato interuppted.
"I didn't know you well enough to tell you the truth then," Harold replied. "You were still some annoying career trying to take Peeta off me back then. I don't think I even trusted you then."
Cato rolled his eyes, knowing that he didn't really trust Harold too much back then either but not admitting it. "What about this Emily girl then?"
"Snow and Semira's child," Harold explained. "She was born just when my experiments stopped. Spoilt bratt, really."
Cato sat down on the edge of his bed, trying to consume all of this new information. "How do you know all this?" he finally questioned.
Harold busied himself with pulling a loose thread off his sleeve as he spoke. "Snow trusted me. I don't know why but he did. I suppose it's because of how long I'd been in his care. It took a lot of work but I managed to work my way through the ranks to become his right hand man. He told me everything then and even sent me away on missions and jobs. Jobs I didn't mind doing, really, as long as I wasn't being experimented on anymore."
"You didn't mind doing the jobs, even when they were as disgusting as pretending to be in love with someone who couldn't stand the sight of you?" Cato asked.
"It wasn't fun, I'll admit that," Harold said, "but it was better than being strapped to a cold table wondering what they were going to stick in me next and what it was going to do to me."
Cato was silent. He tried to imagine what something like that would be like but he didn't get it. He supposed it was something that only the people who went through it would understand. Sometimes he didn't really appreciate how easy a life he had had until now. "I really think we got off on the wrong foot, Harold," he finally said. He looked at the misunderstood Capitol man and sighed. "I think we should start again."
Harold nodded. "I think that too."
Cato stood up again and held out his hand. "Hey," he said, "I'm Cato."
Harold took the hand. "And I'm Harold." That hadn't went as bad as he thought it was going to. At least that was one thing. A silver lining in a sea of darkness.
~xXx~
Seven o'clock came pretty fast.
A part of Cato didn't want to watch but when Coin called the Command group back so they could examine the footage, he knew he had no choice. He supposed it was a good thing he had made amends with Harold as it assured him that there was at least one other person going through the same thing as him.
Peeta looked the same in the new footage as he had in the one from the previous day. Healthy, well, happy. On the outside anyway. Who knew what inner termoil he was suffering because of the tracker jacker venom Harold described. But he still spoke with ease, discussing the possibility of a ceasefire and the effects the war was having on the Districts.
"Something's different," Harold murmured, so quietly only Cato could hear it. He was right, something was different. Peeta's eyes were glazed over, the turquoise slither in the left iris much larger as it had been before.
"Why is it like that?" Cato whispered.
"He needs another dosage. He's missed one," Harold answered. He sounded fearful. "Why has he missed one?"
"Is it bad to miss one?"
"It can be dangerous, yes."
"How dangerous?"
"Very."
Cato was about to ask another question when Harold held up his hand. "What is it?" he hissed.
"He's stopped talking."
They both looked back at the screen, where the others hadn't stopped watching. Peeta's eyes were squeezed shut and he looked in pain. A millisecond later, he opened them and the entire left iris had turned turquoise. Cato vaguely heard Harold swear beside him. Peeta looked at the ground, almost confused, before looking back up at the camera. "Cato . . ." he whispered, under his breath. As if saying his name was a trigger of some sort, his face twisted into panic and he screamed, "Cato, you have to get out of there they're going to bomb 13! You have to run! Get out of there!"
Someone behind the camera yelled, "Cut the camera!"
Peeta continued regardless. "You have to to get out of 13 before they kill you! You have to!" As he spoke, the camera got knocked over and all Cato could see was feet. His heart was beating so fast his blood vessels couldn't keep up. What did he mean? The Capitol was going to bomb 13? They were going to kill him?
"Someone hold him down!" A voice clearly recognizable as President Snow yelled. The feet cleared out of the way as Mya appeared and dragged Peeta to the ground, still screaming for Cato to run. She could barely hold him down but when an unfamiliar blonde woman straddled him and handed Mya a needle, the struggles seemed fruitless.
Mya uncapped the needle and the blonde woman grabbed Peeta's throat to hold him in place. He tried to unseat her from him but it didn't work. Mya stabbed the needle into his neck and pushed all the liquid inside into him. Peeta screamed, like the pain was unbearable, before falling limp. Lifeless as a rag doll.
Cato was horrified. He couldn't even speak.
"Did the Districts see that?" Finnick asked Coin when everything cut off and was left on static.
Coin frowned at the tablet in her hands, tapping away to find out. "No. The footage was cut off to all Districts a second after the break down. And there's a five second delay so I doubt anyone saw it."
"Why did they keep it going in 13 then?" Finnick asked.
"Who knows."
Cato knew. They wanted him to see it. He pushed out of his seat and left the room, unable to bear sitting there a second longer. "Mr Hadley, get back here, we need to start evacuation poceedues!" Coin yelled after him. He didn't hear her. All he could hear was Peeta's screams. Harold was the one who caught up with him. But he didn't want to talk to him. He didn't want to talk to anyone. Sensing this, Harold stuck a needle into his arm, a needle full of sedative.
The darkness was unwelcome. But at least he couldn't hear the screams there.
A/N: I'm sorry if you guys hate me. But I never said this fic was going to be easy. It even pains me to write it but it has to be done :/
Please R&R anyway?