Hello all my fanfic friends! I have missed you all so much! I am very happy to report that yesterday as I was lounging around my house I got this aching feeling to take out my laptop and revisit my THG stories and then all of a sudden the words just started pouring out of me.
Disclaimer: I do no own the Hunger Games or any of its characters. These belong to Suzanne Collins.
The sun is so warm on my face it's hard to believe it's well into September. I sit in the grass in back of our house and watch Peeta and Haymitch fumble with the instructions to our new swing set. I told Peeta not to bother. Alexander is content just following around his daddy all day. He doesn't need swings and slides to keep him entertained. Just give the kid a rolling pin and a mound of dough and he's set. It's hard to believe that Alexander was born almost three years ago already. We had tried to get pregnant for about a year before it finally happened. I was so frustrated that I wanted to give up all together. But I didn't. I went on for Peeta. Because even though I finally did come to want a child my whole future wasn't planned around it like I later found out Peeta's was. He didn't tell me how he'd already had a name picked out. I never knew that he had planned which room would be the baby's. And I certainly didn't know that Haymitch was on his side.
When I found out I was pregnant I told Haymitch that he wasn't allowed near me or the baby until he gave up the booze. He hated me for it, said he was angry because I was trying to tell him what to do. I knew better than that. I knew he was really angry because he wanted this child just as much as Peeta did. Maybe more. It was exactly six weeks before I gave birth to Alexander when he finally quit. Of course I didn't know this. I figured he had just crawled into his house to sulk when I didn't see him stumbling around. But in actuality he had called up the Capital and gotten into one of their rehabs which eased him out of the terrible withdrawal symptoms painlessly. He still has nightmares though. They aren't the Capital nightmares that Peeta and I struggled with so long. They're the withdrawal nightmares that come with quitting substance abuse. At least that's what the doctors and the morphling addicts he had met told him.
"Katniss!" Peeta calls out to me. I look up from the mound of mud Alexander and I have created to see my frustrated husband waving me over.
I sigh. "Daddy needs me," I tell Alexander. "Be right back."
"Because he doesn't know how to do it?" he asks with concern.
"How'd you get so smart?" I ask with him a smile, patting his head before I get up. It doesn't take long before I hear the squish of his diaper as he quietly follows behind me.
The bright green slide is partially propped up against the poorly constructed wooden beams meant to anchor it. The chains for the two swings are jumbled together though miraculously both are actually hanging in their right spots. The ladder that allows you to climb the structure is being slowly taken apart by Haymitch because clearly it has been built inverted and, therefore, has become a virtual death trap for my child.
Peeta puts his arm around my waist and draws me as close to him as he can before Alexander squirms between us demanding to be included. "You've got to get him off my hands for a while," he whispers in my ear. "I would have been done hours ago if he would just stop helping me." His eyes plead with me and I can't help laughing. I knew this was going to happen.
"Let's get the kid on it," I tell him.
"Good idea," he agrees. He lifts Alexander into his arms and my heart still skips a beat when I see the way they look at each other. Alex has Peeta's bright blue eyes and even though he has my dark hair he still has beautiful soft curls just like his daddy. "Alexander," he says quietly, do you want to take Papa for a walk?"
"He's ruining everything isn't he?" Alexander asks loudly in broken baby English.
"I can hear you!" Haymitch yells out. Alexander's eyes get big and he tries to hold in the giggles that are threatening to escape. Peeta mouths for him to hold it in but it's no use. He starts laughing uncontrollably. "Fine!" Haymitch says in frustration, throwing his tools on the ground.
Peeta lets Alexander down and he walks over to the unstable slide. "You're doing it wrong, Papa," he says.
"Oh, what do you know?" Haymitch asks him. "Let's get out of here." Alexander grabs his hand and they start walking toward town together.
"See you for dinner!" I yell out to them but they are already in their own little world.
I turn back to Peeta. "Do you want some help?" I ask, rubbing my fingers across his lower back.
"That's all right," he says. "This'll go quick now."
"You know…we have an empty house," I indicate, pressing my lips to his. I hear the tool in his hand drop into the grass before his arms are around me. He needs no convincing.
He sets me down on our bed. "I'm all sweaty," he warns.
"Even better," I say, my hands sliding down the front of his bare chest. His lips hungrily find my skin as we take advantage of this short time we have without Alexander banging on our door asking if he can play too. The tendons in his muscle flex as he holds his body above mine, his strength makes me want him even more. He pulls my shirt over my head and kisses my chest while my fingers tangle into his hair. His pants are just barely hitting the ground when we hear Haymitch screaming in a panic.
"You two better get down here!" he yells from the living room.
We stop. Our eyes connect. Our minds both automatically go to Alexander. He gets off of me and grabs his pants before running full speed down stairs.
"Alex!" he yells.
"He's fine," Haymitch says. "You have to see this." Pulling my shirt over my head I come down just in time to see Gale's face on the TV screen.
"…this is no time to panic," he continues. "Our government is much stronger than it was before. We will not let these few radical revolutionaries thwart the progress we, as a nation, have made." A news anchor begins talking over the broadcast and cuts to a shot of one of the largest new districts in the country. Mesotex is a district south of the nation and after it was created they discovered a huge amount of natural gas resources. We had heard the democratically elected governor wasn't as forthcoming as the Capital wanted him to be about these resources but this was not public information. Peeta and I weren't apart of the government but we were still given classified updates as part of our contract consultant positions that Plutarch had set up for us to guarantee we'd get briefed every month.
The TV camera cuts to a fire in the center of one of largest towns in Mesotex. There is a crowd of people with signs, chanting and throwing debris into the fire. Then I see him. Antoine Bartlett, the governor of Mesotex himself, is at the center of the crowd with a bullhorn leading the mob. A TV journalist catches up to him and shoves a microphone into his face.
"What is all this about?" she asks, yelling over the chanting crowd.
"The Capital is trying to control us. We all know how that ended up last time. Mesotex wants sovereignty. The natural resources here could be making the citizens of this district rich but instead we have to hand over all of these resources and income gained from these resources to the Capital. Not anymore!" he yells. The crowd cheers along with him.
Mesotex has a monopoly on the oil supply for the nation and the Capital has been trying to gain control over the natural resources since the district discovered it. The fuel that they produce is used in every single district to power the hovercrafts and trains; it's used to make steel, glass, paper, clothing, bricks. It's used to generate electricity and make paint, plastic, film. We use it to run the dishwasher, water heater, stoves and every other household appliance. Peeta and I look at each other. We both know what this means.
District 12 is the only other district in the entire nation that could compete with Mesotex. The reason? Coal. We are the nations coal producers and even though we don't produce nearly as much as Mesotex we can survive without them if need be. By "we" I mean our district. Our district only. We can't support the entire nation on what we mine here. Not since the population boom after the revolution. Even if we could, the pollution from mining that much coal would kill us all way before we'd feel the inconvenience of losing our gas power. That's where Mesotex has everyone beat. Their natural resources produce little pollution which means a safer nation. We can all survive on coal but will we be able to survive the sulfar dioxide it produces which comes in the form of acid rain and damages our forests, lakes and buildings? Can we survive the mercury it releases which can kill off an entire lake of fish with just a single teaspoon?
"District 12!" Governor Bartlett yells into the camera. "They will come for you next. Either join us now…or lose the choice all together," he says menacingly. I know he is speaking to me. The phone rings and we all stand frozen in the moment.
"Phone!" Alex finally yells impatiently. I cross the room to answer it while Peeta finally pulls on his pants.
"Katniss?" Plutarch calls out on the other line. "Have you seen it?"
"We're watching it right now."
"You have to get over here," he says.
"Absolutely not," I tell him sternly. "We are not getting involved."
"You don't have a choice!" he yells at me, frustrated. "They're already on their way. What you are watching is from hours ago. They could be there any minute. We are sending a hovercraft to come and get you."
"We aren't leaving!" I yell. "You have a military now. Call in the Army. That's what they are for."
The line is silent. The first thing the Capital did when it rebuilt itself was establish a military to prevent any more revolutions like ours. General Atkins is the leader of the established Army and single handedly helped with the new zoning of the districts and established military bases in every district meant to protect the citizens from issues just like this.
"Katniss, we can't," he finally says. "General Atkins is in Mesotex…they're working together."
His words hit me like a sledgehammer. The man in charge of each and every army outfit in the nation is co-conspiring to start a revolution? Not only does he have access to census reports and zoning parameters but he is also in control of every weapon issued in the entire nation.
"Katniss," Peeta says next to me. "What is it?"
I regain my composure and tell Plutarch, "We'll be ready." I hang up the phone and Haymitch and Peeta stare at me, waiting.
"We're leaving," I tell them.
"Why? What's going on?" Peeta asks.
Haymitch already has Alexander in his arms. "Let's go find that teddy of yours," he says, taking him upstairs.
"Katniss," Peeta says again, panic breaking through is voice, "What's wrong?"
A war is brewing and it is coming to us. What better leverage do the revolutionists need than to have the Mockingjay held hostage? I have not been in the mentality of having to protect myself or my family in years. I have had the false sense of safety ever since Peeta and I were married. We were never safe.
"Katniss!" Peeta yells my name. He stands in front of me demanding an answer.
I finally meet his eyes, panicked but still unaffected by the reality of what is to come. I want to protect him from this. I want to protect all of us from this but I can't. Not by myself anyway. So I give it to him straight.
My voice is small, choking on the shock of what this means. "Mutiny."