A/N: Sorry for the delay! This chapter has been giving me trouble from the start. :P
The next morning, Bear stays up later than usual to plan my departure. When I stumble in to the meeting after another restless night, I'm still mad. I don't look at Bear, but pull up an empty chair to join the group.
Bear must have already told the others I'm leaving for sector two, because they've already decided on a plan. When I sit, Spinner starts filling me in, "Hey, Maddie. Hear you're heading out?"
"Yes, it's time I got back. I should've gone ages ago," I answer. Johnny sighs, and I glance over to him, but he won't meet my eyes. He's looking down at the table instead.
In the meantime, Spinner continues, "Rebels are gonna take the marina. I'll go with you to the waterfront - take some supplies and meet up with the rebels down there. These two -" he nods at Bear and Johnny, "will find out what Carlo and Marai are up to."
Surprised, I reply, "Uhh … oh. Okay. Is that …"
Bear answers stiffly before I even finish my question, "We all agreed. Spinner goes with you."
I'm still mad at Bear but also a little hurt. I don't know why I should be. It distracts me from the conversation, trying to figure out my mixed feelings. I've come to know Bear better than the others, and he's the only one who fully knows my past. I guess I'd assumed, even after last night, he'd be the one to go with me. Not that I have anything against Spinner. And after all, I'm saying goodbye to all of them, what does it matter who comes with me to sector two?
I realize I've let my mind wander, and force myself back into the conversation. Spinner and I will go to sector two where I'll find my family, if they're there that is. Spinner will hunt down the sector two rebels by the marina. Bear and Johnny are going to join Marai and Carlo with the other rebels. With the surge of enthusiasm coming from the rebels, there's talk of a joint attack on the marina. We're basically abandoning the apartment for the time being, which means everything important has to be taken with us. That means more delay, but I don't argue. I've waited this long. I can wait another day. We spend the day packing everything up and preparing to leave. At some point, Johnny brings me a stack of items from the common supply, including a light-powered water purifier, a gun with some ammunition, and some rope and hooks. As I pack up my belongings, I realize how much these friends have done for me, in a time when nothing is easy to come by. I realize how practically all of my clothing is really Marai's, made from fabrics built for district four's summer heat. I feel grateful but guilty to have taken so much from them, even if it was readily given. Now I take only what I think I need, but recognizing how underprepared I was for district four when I arrived, my pack fills up quickly. In the summer heat, I'll need food and plenty of water too.
The rebel propos keep coming, and we know the rebels' passions are rekindled by them. When Finnick appears on screen, there's a lot of jumping and hugging and slapping hands; they are all so relieved to see their victor. Enthusiasm is sure to be running high in the district. We consider leaving immediately, but everyone is tired after the long day, and we agree to wait until morning. In the evening, Bear takes me aside to review maps and how to find my aunt's place. He's oddly formal the whole time, and thanks to years of playing the proper mayor's daughter, I instinctively fall into my overly polite mode. It's strange, though. He tries to fill in lots of miscellany about district four, and what he knows about sector two, things I would know if I were really from here. Soon I'm so busy trying to remember it all I don't even notice his change in attitude, or maybe some of the formality actually melts away. By the time we're done, I know he's doing everything he can to help me.
During the night, I hear the sounds of bombs somewhere in the city. I'm sure they are meant to be retribution for Finnick's appearance, and intended to kill morale in the district. I hope it backfires.
We leave early the following morning. In the golden light of dawn, I hug Bear and a tearful Johnny goodbye. The morning is already warm and humid. Spinner appears with a small wooden cart on which is loaded everything he is taking to sector two. There is some pretty serious artillery tucked away under a canvas.
We weave our way through the streets carefully, guns at the ready, pulling the cart along after us. We carefully check each cross street and corner as we reach it. There are peacekeepers patrolling some areas and we'd rather see them before they see us. Our bullets aren't wasted.
I picture the map in my mind as we make our way through the back alleys and side streets of district 4. I had almost forgotten my father's instructions for finding my aunt's house, but with the Bear's maps and enough time, I had remembered my father's instructions eventually, and mapped it out well enough. I know where to go now.
As we get deeper into sector two, we see more evidence of bombings, old and new. Whole buildings lay in ruins, and a few roads we'd planned to take are blocked with rubble and debris. We work our way around them, but eventually we can't find a clear path for the cart. Still, we're only a couple of blocks away from my aunt's home.
I stop Spinner, saying "We should split up here. We're close enough; I don't need you to see me to the door."
He thinks a minute and nods, "Yeah, Okay. I don't think we're going to find a path to get the cart through anyway, and I can't leave it unguarded. Are you sure you're okay from here?"
I force a smile. "No problem!"
He nods, and my smile fades. We look at each other in sad silence for a minute, then he pulls me into a hug. When we break apart, my eyes are wet. "Alright," Spinner says. "If you need me, I'll try to be at the sector's central plaza tonight." He grins. "You take care of yourself, girl." Words fail me and I nod back at him. With that, he fastens a strap to the cart handles so he can pull it alone without being completely vulnerable. I turn, and step lightly through the rubble, heading toward my aunt's house.
It doesn't take long to get to the right street, and as I make my way down the block, I move faster and faster, jogging quickly down the street looking for the right house. I see the windmill my dad described, but it's fallen against the pavement, and I am all out sprinting, hoping against hope that I am wrong, that somehow my eyes are deceiving me. It's the windmill that should mark my aunt's house, but what's left of the house is in ruins, destroyed by bombs. I kneel by the windmill, my pack dropping to the pavement. I'm not sure if it's to catch my breath or to convince myself this isn't all real. But it is real. And this is yet another piece of my life stolen from me by the Capitol's bombs.
I don't know how long I sit there, but it isn't long before I feel like I am being watched. I get up and slowly sling my pack back up on my shoulder, using it as an excuse to spin slowly back toward the street and survey my surroundings. I catch the movement of a curtain in a window across the street. I have to decide what to do. Quickly I review my options. I can go to that house and confront whoever is there. I can ignore them and leave the street as quickly as possible, hoping to avoid any consequences of being seen. But the ruins of my aunt's house are drawing me to them. I need to investigate them. And I have to do it now; if I wait until nightfall, I will miss my opportunity to find Spinner again, and I really will be on my own. The decision is easy. I turn my back on the inquisitive neighbor and carefully walk through the debris and into the ruined house.
The wreckage inside the house, if it can be called "inside" when there is no roof and only partial walls, is terrible. I am relieved that there is no smell of putrifying flesh. Maybe they escaped? The bombing seems not too recent, and once I start looking closely, I can see evidence of others having come through the house since the bomb, like the rubble that's unnaturally piled here or there. In sector one, those dead from bombings were usually buried by other rebels. I wonder if that's what happened here. The kitchen seems relatively unscathed but the remaining cupboards are empty. So the remains of the house have been looted. There's a picture of a happy-looking couple set carefully on the counter, the frame broken. The woman, I think, must be my aunt. She reminds me of my daddy. Someone must have put the picture here after the bombing. Looters wouldn't do that, would they? Maybe it was neighbors who buried the bodies?
There's nothing remaining in the kitchen, and I know I should check the rest of the house for anything I should take with me. I don't know if I want something sentimental to take with me, or just planning on looting it myself of anything left worth taking. I climb carefully through the wrecked house, when I hear a scuffling noise. I point my gun in the direction of the noise, waiting. For a long minute nothing happens, but then I hear someone's muffled curse.
"Who's there?" I call out. A long silence fills the air, but soon there's more scuffling. I keep my gun trained on the remaining entrance to the room, and in a moment, a scraggly sunburnt blond, maybe a year or two my junior, pokes his head into the room. He looks surprised when he sees my gun pointed at him, and raises his hands in exaggerated surrender.
"Who are you?" I repeat.
"What's it matter?" he asks. "If you're gonna shoot me dead? Hell, if you shoot me it better be dead, you don't wanna leave me dying in the kitchen. I'd be cursin you with every breath. Then again, if you did shoot me dead, I might come back from hell just to haunt ya. Guess you just can't win."
What kind of person takes a gun in his face so lightly? I don't say a word, just raise my eyebrows. He rolls his eyes, "Okay, Okay, I'm Mick. What's it to you anyway? You gonna tell me who you are, and why you're scroungin 'round my house?"
"YOUR house? You mean you live here?" I gasp.
He looks offended. "Well, I did, b'fore it went up in flames. Not quite so cozy anymore, ya know? Anyway there's nothing left to loot so you might as well leave."
"Wait, you lived here? Really? Do you know Henry Undersee? Or Sally? Do you know where they are?" He looks at me puzzled for a minute, before answering, "Of course I knew her, couldna' lived here and not, could I? But I guess she wasn't so lucky as me." He pauses, and his voice drops. "Or maybe she was the lucky one, after all. But what's that other name? Sounded like her old family name, wa'nt it?"
I realize how stupid it was of me to blurt his name out to this stranger. I was still hoping … but who in district four would know about my family? This could be trouble. "Never mind." I say quickly. "So, Sally, Sally Amelin, they killed her? And her family?"
"Yeah, they killed her good. Probably wanted us all dead, set an example. But before you go gettin my life story, you mind tellin me just who I'm talkin to?" he drawls.
"You can call me Maddie. I just came to … check in on Sally, I didn't know … about the bomb. I'm no looter, I just need to know what happened." I lower my gun a bit, to show I mean no harm. But I don't let my guard down.
He steps further into the room. He looks a bit worn on the edges but not starving, though his eyes have a hint of a hungry look to them, and he's got a knife sheathed at his waist. "Well, Maddie, I'm all that's left of the Amelins, and I'm not even one of them. Ms. Amelin took me in a few years back and this here's been my home ever since. And now she's gone and I'm all that's left. I'm not sure I see how anythin else really matters," he sighs.
The old Madge would be all sympathy and optimism, but I know there's no real hope and nothing I can do for him. "Well I'd still like to hear. You had any other visitors? Was that you across the street, or your lookout?" I ask.
"Lookout?" he snorts. "In case you hadn't noticed, this ain't the grand plaza. Been pretty quiet 'round here since half the neighborhood was blown to pieces. Most folks took their leave one way or another."
"Just you then? For how long? What've you been doing here alone?" I am not sure I believe he really is alone, but no harm in letting him think I do.
"Slow down, missy. My throat's parched enough in this heat. The Amelin's boatshack's still standin, ain't it? I make do on my own." He drops his voice and adds thoughtfully, "Why you checkin in on her anyway? You part of the network?"
The network? He means the rebels. "I guess you could say that." I answer warily. "Had some folks hopin' to refuge here but I guess that ain't gonna work out. If you're so interested, why are you sitting around here?"
He snorts again. "What would the rebels want with a scrawny kid like me? I ain't got nothin I can do to help their cause."
"You're wrong," I say. "I bet there's lots you could do with them if you wanted. If you're doing so well on your own here, I bet you're pretty resourceful."
He shrugs. I wonder if I can trust him. Just then I hear his stomach gurgle, and laugh out loud.
"Okay maybe you're not so resourceful. When was the last time you ate?"
He sighs, and grudgingly admits, "Been a little tight the last few days. Capitol's stepped up their guards on the water since those new propos started. Haven't gotten much fishin in."
With my spare hand I rifle through my pack, pull out a ration bar and toss it over to him, along with a small bottle of water. Nothing I can't spare, but those ration bars really benefit from something to wash them down, and in this heat it's easy to dehydrate. He catches them easily, and looks at them in surprise. "Hey, Thanks!" I pull out another water bottle for myself and lean back against what's left of the living room wall, sipping from it slowly, wondering what to do about my new friend.
Soon, Mick is talking my ear off, and I quickly figure out that neither of my parents ever showed up here. The bombing was several weeks ago, not long after I arrived in district four from the sound of it. I shudder to realize that if I had come directly here, I would probably be dead now, just like my aunt. Mick really is the closest thing to family I've got in this world. Not that I'll let him know that. His real name is Mikhail, and his parents were close family friends of Aunt Sally's husband, which is why they took him in when his parents died. Eventually I decide he really is alone, too, just getting by as he can.
There's nothing for him here. Or for me. I figure the best plan for me is to try to meet Spinner in the plaza tonight. I'll need to leave soon. But what do I do about Mick?
I say to him, "Hey Mick, what do you think about joining those rebels? I hear they've got some big plans in the works. Could probably use all the help they can get right about now. Time's coming for me to meet my crew."
He looks up at me and shakes his head, "Hell it's been nice to talk to somebody. I'da given anythin to be fightin for the cause, but Ms. Amelin never would let me near any action. Guess she can't stop me now, and I doubt she wants me sittin 'round here another day. I'm in."
"Okay," I answer. "Here's the deal. My crew won't take a stranger, wouldn't trust them. But if I tell 'em you're my brother, they'll accept it. We'll see how it goes, like I said there are big plans and we can use all the hands we can get." He looks enough like me we probably could pass for siblings.
"Your brother?" He asks incredulously, "How are they gonna believe that?"
I smile. "I guess you'll have to trust me on that. I can't guarantee anything long term, but it'll at least connect you to the rebels and give you a chance to show them what you've got." I wink.
A/N: What do you think? Reviews welcome! This was originally two chapters but I didn't want to end it with more destruction.