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Plutarch is, not for the first time, pissing me off. Really should’ve seen it coming. Once he got the rescue mission green lit, he decided the best use of my time would be in Command. After firmly ensuring both Katniss and Finnick were put together in the crazy ward, using some words that Plutarch lectured me on like I’m still sixteen and the arena can still be taken down by a fucking potato. Would have to be one heck of a potato, the arena seems to have expanded so much that it takes up most of the space in my lungs. Normally I’m able to stave it off with my liquor but 13’s probation law has ripped that possibility from my ever shaking hands. Part of me, a tiny part that died when I came home to find my ma and brother burning alive, is glad I’m in such a state of awareness because I have been anticipating this for weeks.
I sit in some chair, that could really use a comfier cushion, as I wait for the team to arrive back. I get my entertainment from watching Plutarch make stupid faces upon learning some news he doesn’t like (it’s a way to ease the constriction over my heart because of the fear that it could concern my kid). My feet are level with my head and resting against some sharp table that I can feel pierce my skin to no end. It’s good somehow, reminds me to stay diligent or whatever it is that all these Thirteen soldiers mutter as they run (walk with a brisk pace) through the never ending dove halls. Sometimes the chaos makes my skin crawl but sometimes it makes me remember how much I still have left to lose even after all I did and the promises I made that kept me alive when I couldn’t imagine a worse fate.
My girl once told me to never let the sunrise on the reaping and this is the way some idiot has decided to go about that. By making an unstable seventeen year old girl, who is the only person not aware of how much she loves the kid, the figurehead of a long awaited rebellion. She is a hard pill to swallow at the worst of times when she acts surlier than I can remember being, not saying much but still, and an even harder one at the best of times. When she looks carefree like Louella, when she leaves like Lou Lou, when she sings like Lenore Dove, when she hunts like Burdock, when she gives herself power in a situation where she had none like Maysilee and most of all when I see myself in her, both when she’s being a jerk and other times like when she took Rue under her wing, same way I did to Lou Lou. Despite all that, I have been waiting too long to tell her any resemblance of good news that I can’t wait for this mission to be done. It cannot fail. It will not.
It seems the mission doesn’t fail, but takes a good time longer than necessary. So much so that when Plutarch tells me it was a success, I had woken from a two hour nap. There’s a wicked crick in my neck from the position I slept in but it doesn’t stop me from finding the girl with Finnick where I left them. As I see the lost look in her eyes, it makes me doubly anxious to give her the news. I shove the door open and both their eyes snap to mine.
“They’re back,” I tell them. “We’re wanted in the hospital.”
I see some life flood into her eyes and notice how she chews her jaw open, no doubt to ask a million questions that I don’t know the answer to myself. So I cut her off by saying “That’s all I know.”
The journey to the med bay feels like the exact opposite to the time Asterid March drugged me with sleep syrup. Instead of my world slowly collapsing to darkness, I feel the word slowly come into light. I see a gurney with a bald Johanna, she had too much fire than what was needed and overall reminded me too much of Maysilee, more specifically my first thoughts of her. Her burns and the wild look in her eyes makes guilt appear like a hole in my chest that takes and never gives back.
My feelings of melancholy are somewhat disrupted by the reunion of Finnick and Annie. I know their love is not easy but it’s as true as anyone’s ever doubted. They kiss each other in a way that reminds me of the job I have to do. I lead Katniss to a room that has Boggs in front. He tells us Peeta’s currently still under effect from the gas and to go in. I turn to Katniss and see joy shine in her eyes. I can’t help my grin.
“Come on, then,” I say.
We enter and all of a sudden I’m more aware of my heart rate than I have been in at least twenty five years. It stops and starts in my chest because whatever is sat on that bed looking lost and bewildered as the medical team attack from all sides, with marks that I have never seen on my skin before, all over his frail looking body is not my kid. It’s not Peeta. But for my hearts sake I try to pretend nothing is amiss, an attempt aided by the emotion that shines on both kids faces’. However Not Peeta’s takes on an undertone that I feel in my gut that I should pick up on, but I’m still hung up on the love in the girl’s eyes and the confusion in his.
There’s a threat present in this room, where, I cannot say. Not Peeta seems to have the moral fibre of some mad man, as he sweeps away the hovering doctors with just one arm. He jumps to his feet and makes his way towards the girl. She runs to meet him, with her arms outstretched in a way that predetermines an embrace and he seems to return the gesture in a way, his hands reach for her, looking like they’ll make impact on her cheeks, probably to caress them and I make a mental note to make myself scarce if I see any kissing. I see the elation on her face as her lips form his name. Then it slowly changes to fear, then pain, when his fingers lock around her throat.
Suddenly the rug is pulled out from underneath me. The manic anger on Peeta’s face reminds me of Lou Lous screams of “Murderers!”. And I know in the way you know to never trust a seventeen year old to lead a revolution, that this boy is not her Bread boy.