19.
Haymitch glared at the red flashing warning light on his dashboard.
"We won't make it." Finnick stated.
"A little more optimism wouldn't hurt." Haymitch pointed out. Not that he was really optimistic himself.
"What is there to be optimistic about exactly?" the younger man chuckled. "The mutts who almost got us at the hospital, all the zombies hitchhiking or the fact that we're about to get stranded on a lonely back road in the middle of nowhere?"
Haymitch was in no mood for his sass. Getting in and out of the hospital had been a nightmare. They had managed to find appropriate meds and even a prosthetic leg for when Peeta eventually recovered but they had almost gotten eaten alive trying to escape. And that was when, of course, they had stumbled upon another huge group of zombies similar to the one that had cost Peeta his leg. They had to double back and find another road. They wasted time and gas.
They didn't have much of either left as the flashing red light and the decreasing sunlight kept reminding him.
He watched as the needle indicating the level of gas quivered a little lower. It had long since plummeted into the red zone and was now closer to zero than to one.
"We have to get to the house." Katniss argued from the back seat, leaning forward to look at the gauge. "Peeta needs the meds, just speed up before there's no gas left."
"Because we can outspeed our lack of gas." Haymitch snorted. "See? This is why nobody lets you make the plans, sweetheart."
He could feel Katniss's glare burning at the back of his neck and that made him smirk.
"We will make it." Gale offered. "We're not that far, now. Half an hour at most."
"It might be too late." the girl insisted. "Go faster, Haymitch."
He sighed but complied with her request.
The car shuddered to a definitive stop about fifteen minutes from the house they had taken as shelter. The walk back wasn't enjoyable but it wasn't dangerous either. Katniss' arrows took care of the few zombies they met and they made it back in good time. Finnick made a beeline for Annie, Katniss almost tripped in her impatience to check that Peeta was still alive – and, to everyone's relief, he was – and Gale went to talk to the rebels he was becoming fast friends with. Haymitch looked around and frowned at the distinctive lack of blonde curls.
"Where's Effie?" he asked.
It was like the whole room had frozen. Everyone stopped moving at once and that was when Katniss looked around and went white. "Where's Prim?"
"And Jo?" Finnick added, his hand on his harpoon.
"They decided you were taking too long and went in search of medicine." Coin explained, arms folded on her chest. "Against my orders, I must add."
"It didn't happen quite like that." Annie piped from the couch where she was busy trying to get the meds in Peeta's body. "Peeta's fever was getting worse. We needed to do something. Effie suggested the building we drove by and Prim was adamant she should go to make sure she took the right meds. Johanna went with them as protection."
"They left you here alone?" Finnick was obviously displeased but Haymitch didn't care much about the boy's sensitive side.
"And you let them?" Haymitch roared, terror and fury battling in his chest for dominance. He glared at Annie and Coin.
"Calm down, soldier." The President sneered. "I forbade it, they chose to dissent."
"I'm not your soldier." he hissed with a threatening step in her direction. The remaining soldier immediately lifted his gun but Haymitch ignored him. "Better pray that nothing happened to them or there will be hell to pay."
"That can wait." Katniss shot to her feet and grabbed her bow. "I need to find Prim. Where did they go?"
Annie explained their plan and it was as foolish as it was stupid. Clearly a typical Effie plan. Taking on a building that large with only Johanna for qualified fighter…
Gale volunteered to go with Haymitch and the girl but Finnick declared he was staying with Annie. No one was very surprised by that decision. A problem arose as soon as they walked out of the house however. The only cars left were Johanna's and the rebels. Johanna's was full of supplies and as Gale promptly informed them just as low on gas as Haymitch's had been.
"Let's take the SUV." Haymitch shrugged, already starting to walk to the rebels' truck.
"Coin will never let us take it." Katniss argued.
"That's why we're not asking her." he growled, climbing in before she could add anything more. The keys weren't in the car because, of course, the rebels had to do everything differently than the rest of them. If Coin had thought that would have stopped them, she was seriously mistaken. It had been a while since he had stolen a car but he still knew how to do it.
"You need to teach me how to do that." Gale requested when the engine roared into life.
Plutarch and Coin barged out of the house just as Haymitch drove away. He waved at them through the window before flipping them off. Coin would just love that, he bet. Well… What could she do ? She needed them to reach Thirteen. Three people on the road would never make it by themselves, if anything the larger groups of zombies they kept meeting proved that.
"If they're alive, I'm going to kill them." Katniss muttered next to him. She was tapping her feet anxiously and Haymitch speeded up despite the fact that he didn't know the roads and that it wasn't very wise.
"Get in line." he retorted.
"What were they thinking bringing Prim?" Gale grumbled.
"That the kid would be safer with them than with Coin." Haymitch shrugged. "I'm not angry because they took Prim with them, I'm angry because they went without any protection."
"Jo is protection enough." Gale argued. "And Effie can handle herself."
"With a gun. How much ammos does she have? None. Just what's left in her handgun." he growled. "She's shit with a knife and she knows it. It's stupid to go there with only Johanna and her axe to keep the zombies away."
"I'm going to kill them." Katniss said again, nibbling on her nail nervously. "Johanna first because she should know better, then Effie because I trusted her and then Prim because seriously…"
"I will be in charge of killing Effie, thank you." he snapped.
The sun set when they were still five minutes away from the company building. It made him curse. "Do we have torches?"
"Maybe in the trunk…" Gale suggested.
"Do they have torches?" Katniss grumbled. "If they got themselves killed I swear I'm…" The sentence ended in a shriek when he swerved abruptly to the right to avoid colliding with a human-shaped something.
He would have went on if Gale hadn't gripped his shoulder from the back seat. "Stop! It was Prim!"
"What?" He barely had time to stop the engine before Katniss was out of the car and hugging her sister, alternating between scolding and making sure she was alright. Prim struggled free from her grip and appeared relieved to find Haymitch and Gale standing next to the car. Her eyes were as wide as a doe caught in headlights – which was probably a good description since Haymitch had almost run her over.
"Effie and Jo are in trouble." she panted, obviously out of breath.
"Of course they are." Haymitch grumbled. "Get in."
Once they were all back in the SUV, Prim started summing up what had happened, trying to escape her sister's coddling hands. Haymitch took it all in: the booby trapped building, Effie and Johanna locked in a cage – that, at least, he would have paid to see, he was sure they would kill each other before long – the military guys…
"So I picked up the phone from the reception while Darius wasn't looking and I hit him as hard as I could behind the head. Then I ran for help." Prim concluded.
"Clever girl." Gale smiled, ruffling her hair.
"No." Katniss snapped. "She's not clever. What were you thinking going anywhere without me? You were supposed to…"
Haymitch tuned down the dressing-down, he was too worried to care about that. Finally, finally they reached the building and Haymitch abandoned the truck more than he parked it next to Annie's. He was opening the trunk before the others were properly out.
"Prim, you're waiting in the car. Katniss, grab a gun and a knife, it's a close space you won't be able to use the bow. Gale, you're staying with the kid." He barked his order without even glancing around but it occurred to him when he straightened up that no one had moved. He lowered the trunk to see what was taking so long and froze. Katniss and Gale were gaping – with good reasons – at the two women casually leaning against Annie's truck. Prim was tightly latched on the waist of one of them.
"A bit late for the rescuing, aren't you?" Johanna sneered.
They looked worse for the wear and he couldn't even see the full extent of it in the dark. There was more blood on their clothes than when they had left for the hospital in any case. Haymitch breathed out slowly, his heart suddenly started beating at a normal pace again. Effie was right there, avoiding his eyes but also very much alive.
"I take it you found meds for Peeta?" Effie asked politely, directing her questions at Katniss.
"Yes." the girl narrowed her eyes at her though. "Thank you for keeping an eye on my sister while I was away by the way. It's good to know I can trust you to keep her safe."
She grabbed Prim's arm, pulled her away from Effie and manhandled her into the car.
"Come on, Katniss…" Johanna rolled her eyes.
"Don't even start, Jo." Katniss warned her. "Just… don't."
She gestured at Gale to get behind the wheel and before Haymitch had even opened his mouth they were gone, leaving him stranded with two women he realized he was just as angry to see as he was relieved.
"Go on, yell at us." Johanna challenged him. "You just can't swallow that we don't need a big man like you to rescue us like proper damsels in distress, can you? You know what, Haymitch, we were fucking fine on our own, you can't…"
He heard nothing after swallow. Three long strides were enough to invade Effie's personal space. She kept her eyes down but he was so close he could feel her breath on his neck.
"I could kill you right now, sweetheart." he growled, cupping her face in his hands with a care that betrayed the stupidity of his threat. "Don't ever do that again."
"Believe me, I have no wish to." She gave him a small smile.
"Are you hurt?" he asked, trying to get a good look at her in the dark. She shook her head, so he glanced at Johanna who was sitting on the hood. "You?"
"Oh, finally you ask…" She rolled her eyes. "If you're done being all lovey-dovey, you might be interested to know we found a golden mine."
"Yes." Effie's smile grew warmer. "Enough food for weeks if we're careful, bottled water and quite a lot of ammos. We should move in this building."
"Yeah." Johanna nodded. "Ground floor is a wreck but the first floor is trapped so it should be secured and the second floor will be more than homey once we get rid of the corpses."
"Zombies?" he frowned. "Prim said there were men…"
"The key word being were." Johanna shrugged. "Told you we didn't need you. The princess was kind of smart in there, I'm surprised."
Haymitch felt something like dread and guilt steering in his stomach. She shouldn't have had to deal with human monsters, zombies were enough…
"I didn't kill them." Effie added defensively, leaning against him a little in a hug that wasn't really a hug. "I only handled the talking. Johanna did the rest."
"You stabbed one." Johanna pointed out. "I only finished him."
"You stabbed…" Haymitch repeated, dumbfounded. He forced Effie away from him so he could look her in the eyes. "One of you better tell me what happened and fast."
Effie's quick summary was very similar to Prim, she stopped abruptly after explaining how Colonel Thread had ordered Cray to kill them and winced, glancing at Johanna for help.
Haymitch was confused. "How did you get out of that cage?" He directed his question to Johanna since she was probably the one who had escaped and killed the guy in the first place. He did notice Effie discreetly shaking her head next to him but that only made Johanna smirk harder.
"She seduced the pervert." the younger woman shrugged. "Once his dick made the thinking for him it was actually pretty easy."
"Nothing happened." Effie was quick to say. "And language, really, Johanna, must you be so crass?"
"There was some gross kissing and groping." Johanna corrected her.
Haymitch could feel his face becoming more and more purple with each passing second. "You…" He couldn't even finish his sentence, he wasn't sure how he felt about the whole thing. Effie was looking at him, obviously wary of his reaction. "Let's hit the road. You can tell me the rest in the car."
An argument about leaving the building unprotected followed but Haymitch insisted they went back to the house at least for the night. Peeta couldn't be moved for now and he didn't want to attempt it in the dark anyway. The building would still be there the next morning.
The silence in Annie's truck was deafening. Effie had claimed the wheel and Johanna was sitting next to her before Haymitch could object so he ended up on the back seat.
"Don't you want to know what happened next? It's the best part…" Johanna taunted. She was having too much fun with the whole thing.
"Could you not?" Effie sighed but it was a lost cause.
Johanna told him in painfully thorough details how Effie had reached for the knife hidden in her boot while Cray was busy fondling her body and stabbed him in the shoulder without thinking twice about it – a stupid move according to Johanna, she should have aimed for the neck – but it had been enough to push him away. By the time Cray was on his feet, Effie had freed Johanna and it hadn't taken long to pick up the axe and making sure the pervert kept his wandering hands to himself forever. Zombies or human, she then announced, all died the same way.
Effie's hands were shaking on the wheel but Haymitch pretended not to notice as he listened to Johanna narrating the next part of their break-out. Thread hadn't seen the gunshot coming. As for the third guy, they had found him waking up from a nasty blow to the head but since he had helped Prim, they had let him go with the warning that they wouldn't be as forgiving if they saw him again. When the SUV arrived, they were about to take the truck and go look for Prim.
"Quite the story." His voice was flat and Johanna seemed disappointed by his lack of reaction given that she was, for once, pleased with Effie. Effie, on the other hand, didn't look pleased at all but steered the conversation towards the supplies they had found.
He was relieved to reach the house and to escape the oppressive atmosphere in the car. He checked on Peeta, listened to Coin's aggressive rant about stealing the rebels car and watched the debate about moving camp to the Capitol building unfold without really agreeing to anything. He was mostly going through the motions. The familiar thirst for alcohol was burning at the back of his throat and his hands were shaking badly. When everyone started to settle for the night after deciding to head out to the Capitol the next morning, he volunteered to take first watch.
He sat outside, on the porch, his gun on his knees and wondered if Coin would properly kill him if he forced the trunk of her car to get the bottle of vodka. They had used most of it to clean Peeta's lump, there couldn't be more left than two swallows but, he thought, it would be enough to clear his head. He was about to stand up when the front door opened and closed in a long and loud squeaking noise.
He didn't need to look to know who it was. Effie was the only one wearing heels – even if they were square and practical, she felt feminine as she had so proudly informed him on several occasions.
"It's Finnick's turn." he said, staring straight ahead at the winding path that led to the main road.
"We swapped." She came to sit next to him and for a long time, they simply surveyed their surroundings. Haymitch thought it was more to avoid looking at each other than to watch out for eventual zombies. "You are crossed with me."
He pondered how to answer that and then shrugged. "I don't know. Yeah, probably."
"Because of what I did with…" Her voice trailed off and she hugged herself, burrowing in her red leather jacket. It wasn't warm enough anymore, he had told her plenty of times and still she had given all the coats away to the others. "I did what I had to do. I saved us both. Nothing happened. You have no reason to be jealous."
He turned his head to stare at her so fast something snapped in his neck. "You think it's what this is about? Jealousy?" He didn't hide his sneer. "Sweetheart, I wished Johanna hadn't killed him just so I could do it myself and not because I'm jealous. Did you want him to kiss you? Did you want his hands pawing at you?" His over-active mind had conjured a pretty clear picture and it made him mad, absolutely seething with rage.
"I handled it." she replied firmly.
"You could have gotten raped. Or killed. Or both." he hissed. "You don't go and take off without me, Effie. You don't."
She narrowed her eyes. "You went with Katniss, Finnick and Gale without asking for my opinion on the matter. You didn't ask me to come along."
"So you decided to have your own girl night to punish me?" he snapped.
Her mouth was pursed into a thin annoyed line. "It had nothing to do with you – or with us – I simply wanted to help Peeta."
"By putting yourself in danger?" he snorted. "And taking Prim with you? Aren't you the one always insisting she's only a kid?"
"I thought she would be safer with Johanna than with Annie." Effie replied. "I explained my reasons to Katniss and she understood them even if she didn't seem quite thrilled."
"You bet she didn't." he spat. "You were stupid."
"I will thank you to stop questioning my intelligence each time we have an argument." she retorted. "You were late and Peeta needed medicines. I took a decision and if I had to do it again, I would probably still choose to go."
"Well, you would be stupid again then." He rubbed a hand against his face, trying to chase the exhaustion away. How long had he been awake? He had lost count of the hours. Nights spent sleeping in a truck crammed with people, without alcohol to control his night terrors, weren't helping him to get some proper rest.
There was a short silence but it wasn't comfortable. He was almost relieved when she started talking again.
"I make my own decisions, Haymitch." she declared very seriously. "You are not my keeper but my partner. If you don't trust me to…"
"I trust you with my life." he interrupted her, surprising even himself with that impromptu declaration. "I don't trust you with yours. You never stop to think before you do dangerous things. You will risk your life for bloody nail polish or clothes or…"
"The nail polish, the clothes and the girly stuff you like to make fun of makes everything bearable." She hunched on herself to keep the cold at bay. He rolled his eyes, shed his jacket and placed it on her shoulders. Her smile was small but sincere. "I know you think it's foolish but it is less destructive than liquor. Besides, it has nothing to do with the reason you're angry. I went for Peeta, just like you did. Why is it any different?"
"Because I can't lose you, Effie." he snapped. "Is that what you want to hear? I came back here and you weren't there where you were supposed to wait for me. That's why I'm mad." His angry outburst left him out of breath and he averted his eyes before he could see anything akin to sympathy on her face. He forced his voice to get back to a lower level, he didn't particularly want anyone to hear their conversation even though he was pretty sure more than one of their friends were listening. The house was old and they weren't exactly being discreet. "What if that guy had stopped you before you could stab him?"
"It didn't happen." Her argument was weak.
"It could have." he barked. "At the end of the day, I would have been left with your corpse and God knows what he would have done to you before that. I don't care what Johanna said. It was a stupid reckless move."
"Haymitch…" Her hand fell on his arm tentatively. He glanced at her, she looked distressed but he was still too angry to properly care about hurting her feelings. "I apologize. I didn't realize it would affect you this way."
"You risk your neck without me to make sure you're alright and you don't think it will affect me?" he chuckled. "Sometimes I wonder why I even bother with you…"
She snatched her hand back as if she had been burned. "Yes. Why do you?" Her tone was clipped and her accent was stronger which meant she was actually angry now.
She had some nerves being angry when it was his prerogative, he thought.
There was no good answer to that question, no answer he was ready to give in any case, so he simply kissed her. Her lips were chapped, she pushed him away almost at once.
"So I can warm your bed at night?" she sneered and it was an ugly look on her.
Why did they always get back to that particular topic? "Didn't we already cover that? If I just wanted sex, I could get it elsewhere." He didn't need to say where precisely it was fairly obvious : there were only two other single women and Coin had never been an option. Her cheeks flushed red with fury and she opened her mouth. He didn't let her speak. "Not that I want to." He rolled his eyes. "How did we get from me being angry with you because you pulled a stupid stunt to you being angry with me, sweetheart?"
She seemed to consider very seriously remaining angry for the time being but in the end she just shuffled closer to him and rested her head on his shoulder. "You were being a heartless… I despite cursing but you should know I am thinking of a bad word."
"Asshole?" he snorted, wrapping an arm around her shoulders to bring her closer. He was cold without his jacket and she was warm.
"You said it, not me." She burrowed against his side, thrusting her hands in the pocket of his jacket. She needed gloves. He did too, he mentally put that on the list for the next raid. "I am sorry, though. I didn't mean to upset you, I was just trying to help."
"I know." he sighed. "Just… Wait for me next time. And if you can't… Stay clear of guys with wandering hands. Stay clear of guys full stop. I don't know if anyone could resist your two millions insured ass."
She hummed softly in agreement and then giggled. "You do realize I was mocking you when I said that, don't you?"
He thrust his left hand in his jacket pocket, intertwining their fingers. "I figured."
They played with their thumbs for a while, trying to get the other's pinned down in the safe warmth of his pocket. It was childish but Haymitch enjoyed the peaceful moment. Eventually they stopped their little game and she relaxed further against him. He thought she was slowly giving up to sleep so he was a bit surprised when her voice rang out again. It was only a whisper but it sounded loud in the nocturnal silence. "I feel dirty."
His arms instinctively tightened their hold and he pressed a kiss to the top of her head, trying hard not to care about the fact that her hair hadn't been spared by zombie gore at some point and it was so filthy it was more brown that blond those days. "I'm sorry, Princess, you're stinking so much I can't tell if you mean that literally or metaphorically."
"You don't exactly smell like roses yourself, you know." she huffed.
"Yeah, but I was good enough not to bring it up." he snorted.
He didn't need to see her face to know she was rolling her eyes, it didn't stop her from coming back to her main topic. "I want a hot shower." she whined. "Or a bubble bath. I can't remember the last time I took a bath… But a hot shower would be sufficient. "
He mulled that over for a while and shrugged. "I will siphon some gas from Coin's car later, they have plenty left. We will go get our truck as soon as the sun is up."
He winced when he realized he had said our instead of my but she didn't seem to pick up on it.
"You have peculiar ideas about dates, you know." she laughed.
"How many dates have we been on?" The prospect amused him. He had certainly never dated in his life. He and his girl had been a thing for as long as he could remember and the women after that… No dating had been involved. It had been a string of one-night stands.
"Oh, I lost count… But the first one was unforgettable. You took me shopping and insulted my sense of fashion by picking up a Stetson and when I forbade it, you chose that awful beanie." she teased.
"A beanie that mysteriously disappeared." he reminded her. "You still don't know where it is?" If his guess was right it was lost somewhere on a back road.
"And now you're going to take me on a romantic stroll to put gas back in your truck." she continued as if he hadn't spoken at all. "I'm such a lucky girl."
"And you better remember it, sweetheart." he joked, squeezing her hand. She turned her head and their mouths naturally met as if they had their own gravitational system. The kissing, for some reason, seemed to help get the argument fully behind them. Haymitch felt more grounded when they finally stopped to breathe. "There's a stream not far from the truck. It will be freezing but you can wash-up and pamper your hair with your stupid pink shampoo. I will keep watch for you."
Her beaming smile was enough of a reward but he accepted the extra kiss anyway. He was smiling too when she buried her cold nose in his equally cold neck.
"You love my pink shampoo." she muttered.
He kind of did but he wasn't about to admit that.