Title: Awake and Sing
Author: A Crazy Elephant
Summary: Or "Let the 10th Annual Hunger Games Begin!"
Category: Action/Adventure/Drama
Chapter Word Count: 1,895
Disclaimer: The Hunger Games universe and related characters do not belong to me.
Author's Notes: Continuing thanks to you all for your comments and support I love hearing what you have to say! Thanks everyone! I apologize for the epic hiatus there – work got crazy and then I fled the country. Literally and just in time to pick up a fantastic lung infection which is still giving me fits after two weeks. Needless to say, my holiday has not been conducive to writing. But for now, I'm back again with the continuing adventures of young Mags. Enjoy!
Chapter Fun Facts: 'Saoirse', ironically, is the Irish Gaelic word for 'freedom'.
14 – Victor
A hovercraft fishes me out of the Arena.
It doesn't feel real. It feels to good to be true. A good dream while I rot in the Arena.
But I'm just so cold. I'm soggy and soaking and shivering so terribly I can scarcely stand. There are Capitol attendants and nurses and Peacekeepers all bustling around me in the sterile underbelly of the hovercraft. No one speaks to me. They just bundle me in heated blankets. Someone presses a needle into my neck and the lights go out.
I don't know how long I'm unconscious, but when I wake, I'm not in the hovercraft.
I'm in a bedroom. Still stark and white like the hovercraft and the launch rooms, someone has tucked me into a soft bed, loaded down with warm blankets. I'm dressed in one of those thin gowns they used in the prep center, but the bandages over my chest and the IV in my arm say that I'm not in the prep center. And while my bed is cozy and welcoming after ten days on the cold, damp ground, I'm chained to it.
Not shackles, exactly. The straps around my wrists and ankles are padded and soft, but that doesn't stop the panic that wells up at the restraint. I tug at them, testing the strength.
"Its no use fighting them." A voice explains. "They don't want you lashing out in surprise, you see."
A woman is sitting on a chair beside me.
She has been so quiet and unassuming, I'd overlooked her entirely in the wake of the terror that had come with the restraint. She's lovely, my guest. Skin a shade darker than Zeke's had been and entirely unblemished. Soft, loopy curls that tumble down her shoulders in an effortless tangle. Her eyes are round, dark and knowing. She's dressed in a fine linen dress the color of sunshine which somehow is at once drab by the Capitol's standard and outrageous by the District's.
"W-W-W-" I choke out.
"You are back in the Capitol, Margaret Benoit." She tells me. "The Recovery Floor of the Training Center." She explains. "You survived."
"W-W-Where's Thom?" I manage. "And M-M-Minerva?" I ask.
"Thom Argon is sedated." The woman tells me. Her voice is quiet. Far away. "Minerva Holmes is in a meeting." She continues. Something shifts in her face. Like her train of thought has jumped the track and she stares blankly at the wall opposite her.
"W-W-Why is Thom sedated?" I ask. My voice seems to snap her back to the present. The smarts in her eyes snap back and she looks down at me again.
"He is very angry." She says calmly. "They have forbidden him to see you. He punched an attendant and Cobb and Dom had to tackle him down." She explains, as she drifts off again.
"W-W-Who are you?" I ask. She is silent for a painfully long time, just staring blankly at the empty expanse of wall.
"Daisy." She says finally. "I am called Daisy."
Somewhere through all the dreadful memories of the last two weeks, I remember that name. From the opening ceremonies. The District 11 Victor. Crazy Daisy, that's what Keepsie had called her.
"W-Why are you here?" I ask.
"Victors take care of Victors." She says as if this explains it. Daisy looks at me fondly at me and pats my forehead. The door is wrenched open.
It's Cobb.
"Dais-" He looks surprised, but thoroughly exasperated with Daisy. "12!" He roars into the hall behind him. "Get in here and get your girl!"
"Loud." Daisy observes distantly. She's staring off at the wall again. Cobb sighs heavily.
"Come on, Daisy Maisy." Cobb's quieter now. Calm. Soothing almost. He takes Daisy's arm and gently pulls her to her feet. Shep appears is the door frame, looking sad and tired, but not intoxicated like he had been the last time we met. Shep pulls Daisy into his arms and steers her away, the door hissing shut behind them.
"I'm sorry about that, Maggie." Cobb says, sitting heavily in Daisy's recently vacated chair. "Daisy's coming off her meds - she wasn't supposed to be here."
Cobb looks younger up close. Not even thirty, which if I think about it, is accurate. But he's tired. Worn out, like he hasn't slept. His goatee is a mess and his scruff isn't perfectly groomed like that night of the parade. It's overgrown and scraggly, like he hasn't so much as looked at a razor in days. His eyes are red and puffy and he's dressed in only two thirds of a very wrinkled three piece suit.
"C-C-Coming off?" I ask.
"Capitol dopes her up to mentor - meds give her some moments of lucidity, but make the fall worse. She's been drifting." Cobb explains. "Do you know who I am, Maggie?" He asks.
"C-C-Cobb." I say. "You're Z-Zeke's mentor." He looks sad for a long moment.
"That's right." He nods. "What did Daisy say to you?"
"S-S-She said I survived." I observe.
"Yes, you did little girl." He smiles kindly at me. "You survived."
"S-S-She said they d-d-don't want me lashing out." I raise a wrist as high as the restraints will let me. "S-S-She said Minerva's b-busy and Thom's sedated." I continue and he nods.
"Minnie should be around when they let her out of that meeting with the Gamemakers. Your stylist too." He explains. "They're holding Thom back."
"W-W-Why?" I ask.
"They want your reunion to be on television." Cobb informs me. "Want genuine reactions." He snorts. "Now I ain't rightly sure where you stand on that whole doomed love story, but it's a hell of a thing Thom's done, so you best go with it. Be just as starry eyed as he is." Cobb sighs. "And I'm sorry about the cuffs." He pats my wrist for emphasis. "Too many of us have caused a scene when we first came to. Heads are still in the Arena, so it's standard procedure to lock us down now. They'll crack 'em off after your evaluation, when Min gets here." Cobb explains. I nod.
"D-Daisy said that V-Victors take care of Victors." I observe. The word feels strange. Almost Wrong. I don't feel the least bit victorious about anything and I'm loath to think what I've actually won. A shatter reality like Daisy? Self-imposed social exile like Thom? Substance abuse like Shep and the District 6 Victor? Cobb smiles
"We try, little girl." He tells me. "Can't always, but we do what we can. Most of the year, you'll be back in your District and there'll be plenty of folks telling you they know how you must be feeling, but they don't. Only folks who can ever truly understand are the ones who've been in the Arena themselves and made it out alive." Cobb continues. "So we try to stick it together. Makes things almost bearable." Cobb sighs wistfully. It's strange to see him like this. So understanding. Almost vulnerable. At the opening ceremonies he'd been larger than life, threatening Keepsie and dishing out orders. Now, he just looks like a beaten young man who's failed two more families.
"I-I-I'm sorry about Z-Zeke." I choke out. My voice fails me again at the rush of grief and guilt, but I have to say something. "I should have-"
"Hey, hey, little girl." Cobb strokes my forehead like Daisy did. A soft pat and a brush over my hairline. "Ain't your place to be apologizing. Weren't your fault and there ain't nothing you could have done." He explains.
"B-But-" I begin to protest, but the door hisses open again. A familiar surprised face in a blood red wig pokes around the frame.
Minerva Holmes.
"Oh! Thank you Mr. Cobb." She gushes. I have never seen Minerva so happy. Her face is still pinched in permanent surprise, but she's positively beaming. She's even in a brand new red suit.
"Ms. Holmes." Cobb stands and shakes her hand.
"Thank you for sitting with her." Minerva repeats. "You really didn't have to."
"Course I did." Cobb smiles softly and glances back at me fondly.
"That's very kind of you Mr Cobb." Minerva beams again.
"Not at all, Ms. Holmes." Cobb insists. "Ms. Holmes, Maggie." He nods a goodbye and leaves us alone. When the door has safely hissed closed, Minerva drops into the visitors chair.
"Oh! Maggie darling!" She gushes again. "We are so proud of you!" Minerva isn't crying outright, but she's a little watery. She touches my cheek fondly.
"Minerva?" I ask. "When can we go home?"
"Soon, darling, soon." Minerva pulls herself together. "We've still got the recaps to go. I suspect they'll clear you here in the next day or so and we'll get you back to Saoirse and the Remake Center." She explains. "Everyone just can't wait to see you. Poor Thom's been a complete wreck." She even sounds a little concerned for Thom's well being. I'm not sure what to make of this. Thom must be falling apart at the seams for Minerva to be so, well, worried about his condition. But I'm not entirely clear on why he would be such a mess in the first place. Certainly we're friends, or at least something like it. We didn't walk to school together for eight years for nothing, but we aren't what one would call close these days. Not since his own Games. Not since he moved up the beach and stopped looking the rest of District 4 in the eyes.
"Where's Saoirse?" I ask instead. Besides Thom, Saoirse is really the only other person in the Capitol I would want to see.
"Working on your recap interview gown." Minerva explains brightly. "And your homecoming dress! And of course there are all thing things for your Victory Tour to be thinking of!" Minerva clucks happily. "She's certainly got her work cut out for her, our Saoirse!" Minerva sighs contentedly. "Oh, darling girl! We are just so happy to have you back!" She gushes.
I want to be happy too.
I want to be happy that I made it out of the Arena. I want to care about things like Victory Tours and pretty new wardrobes.
But I can't.
Something in other Victors stops me. Something dark and broken in their eyes. The very distinct public facades they wear for everyone but one another and their chaperones. Something about them tells me that what the Capitol doesn't say about the Games is that the Arena isn't even the most terrifying part.
It's the living with yourself afterward.
The lucky ones are your former fellow tributes who will be going home in wooden boxes, not you the Victor. The shaken shell of a person who can never be the same as the day your name was pulled from that jar.
I stew on this while Minerva prattles on about this party and that dress and how excited Thom and Saoirse and the preps are to see me. While she chatters about how thrilling it will be to meet these influential Capitolites and, of course, the other Victors, it occurs to me. What will define the rest of my life. What was it Daisy had said?
It's no use fighting them . . . they don't want you lashing out.
No, I can't imagine they do.