A/N : Still with Gale POV people, still going off story, still having fun? Decided the real or not real should have happened sooner :P

thanks to JB and DAK for the reviews

Chapter 68

Peeta's Game

Since Ariana is still out cold, and Makenzie says it might be a while before she wakes up I do things she would have wanted to do. I visit Katniss to fill her in on what I have been doing. I talk with Beetee and Ziggy, they say Vivian only knows her as a good person and a friend in this war. She didn't mention anything about a hard drive.

Then I talk with Makenzie. I'm taking a page out of Katniss' and Ari's book of rules and am ignoring my communicator now, I feel like taking it off but if I did that I wouldn't be going to meals since I tend to get caught up. I explain my need to help with Peeta and they agree to let me. I'm no doctor, but I know what prey looks like, and Peeta was definitely prey for the capitol. I see his bright eyes watching a video and he's fighting the urge to flee, and he can't even flee if he wanted to because they have him strapped down. I know Katniss would be hurting and Ariana would be crying them to stop because it's upsetting him but the doctors are nodding and patting each other on the back. I guess that's what is supposed to happen.

The doctor on duty is Aurelius, nice guy, seems to know my brain isn't wired like Ziggy, Makenzie or Ariana so he plays it straight.

Peeta is improuving slowly, they have had Delly sit with him and talk and he is starting to realize that Katniss wasn't made to kill him. But he's having difficulty separating the true and the untrue images he sees. He used an analogy of a tea cup and a forgery that looks a lot like the real one but is made of paper-mache, it convinces the eye but it can't hold anything because the paper will just fall away.

The fake memories are the forgery, they just have to find what 'liquid' will break them down, sedating him helps but it's tricky. He's at his limit of what he's allowed to have half the time, they have shortened the duration and his calm moments can last hours even a couple days. But triggers are everywhere. Katniss being a big one; the smell of blood, roses, and hearing the hum of electricity are others.

"Are there things that calm him?" I ask, "like things he can say or hold that bring him back"

"We tried what they did with Katniss, the repeating things you know are true, but he can only say he's Peeta Mellark and he's from district Twelve before he starts to sob because the rest is confusing and upsetting" the doctor explains, "poor boy"

"So, the basic thing you are trying to get across to him is knowing what is real and what isn't real?" I ask, because my brain is starting to get this, in a backwards way I am sure but maybe all he needs is to ask questions, when the doctor nods, "well why don't you ask him? I mean he tells you something he doesn't know is real and you tell him if it is or not, people just have to be honest no matter if it's a good or bad"

His panel discusses this and agrees it's worth a try.

They call Delly and she comes almost like she teleported, they give her pen and paper and explain the new game plan.

Delly looks at me weird but I guess its what Ariana told me, the difference in class, she might not understand I am here to help because of the two girls who can't right now due to injury or inability.

In she goes and she tells Peeta what the game is. We see his eyes light up, it's like they have given him an open door. He starts rambling off questions. Delly is having a hard time keeping up and even she is smiling because the chance for him to take a proactive role in his own recovery is what he needed not just be pumped full of drugs or forced to listen to people telling him what to believe. I remember seeing him in the prison, his arms were bruised from needle sticks, he was skinny like a rail, and he was trembling and twitchy something awful.

Peeta starts to slur his words and Delly tells him to sleep, she will come back when she has some answers for him.

Three pages. Full no spaces of questions. A lot have to do with him and Katniss, or the games so we get a notepad for her and I have to deliver these. There are a few for me that I answer.

My relationship to Katniss: I reply that were just close friends nothing more or less.

That district Twelve was destroyed: sadly I reply it's true.

That his family is indeed dead: again a sad but true fact. I'm glad I answer this one because Ariana wouldn't be able to, it would upset her too much.

That Katniss killed them: No, not true, the Capitol bombed Twelve, she had nothing to do with that.

I'm almost finished when Peeta starts awake and cries for someone to come quick he has something else to ask, and he needs to know this now!

It seems since he has ways to vent his worries it has unlocked something, the small slip of paper that an orderly brings to me is a question.

'Ariana is alive true?' I think I'll bring this to her

I go and deliver Katniss' homework to her. I smirk, homework like we're back at school.

She doesn't know what to make of this but says in a couple days she'll be able to give all the answers. I make it back to my girlfriend, she's still out. Two days and she is off the chest tube and intubation, her breath makes a fog on the inside of the mask. I take her hand and rub some warmth in it when I hear an argument. Makenzie doesn't want someone here. But when she is rudely pushes aside Haymitch comes in.

"What do you want?" I ask, he has a plaster on his nose and the black eyes from yesterday are clear as day now. I feel like punching him again, but if I did I am sure Makenzie would kick us both out.

"Wanted to apologize, you weren't with your Ma so I put my bet you were here" he says and leans against the wall, "Plutarch came to see me not long after you left"

"Come to try and get me to make Ariana comply? Good luck with that"

"Nah, figured trying to talk you into helping wouldn't work, because you already chose a side" he explains, "same as me"

"The only side you have been on is your own Haymitch" I really want to toss him out each time he opens his mouth, or actually see an orderly do so

"Until now self preservation has been my way of life Gale, like any victor" he says, "I'm with them now, Katniss and Ariana"

"If they are on the same side" I reply, "depends where Peeta falls"

Haymitch looks around the stark room, the light box in the far corner. Then his eyes fall on that slip of paper. He goes to take it and I stop him

"That is for her not you" I say, "Peeta wants to know and I think she should answer that herself"

"Love notes from nutbread boy?" Haymitch says, "please how-" he looks at the question and drops the paper back on the night stand. His face frowns, "sorry"

"It will make her smile though, she was worried he would think she was really dead, but this shows he has doubts and doubts mean there is still part of him in there that remembers her" I brush hair from her face and I'm sure I look worn out because Haymitch notices.

"Why don't you get some shut eye Gale" he says, when I look angry for him telling me to leave he corrects himself, "you can sleep here, will give you a real pain in the neck but hey people do crazy things when they are in love."