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Effie’s long fingernails grate against the glass bowl for a few moments before she grabs one of the slips of paper, leaving the other lonely in the bowl.
Katniss’s breath is tight and barely existent. She watches Effie unfold the slip, which takes forever with her impractical nails.
Effie leans towards the microphone. “Peeta Mellark,” she says in her screechy voice.
Katniss lets out a breath of relief. Peeta looks down before taking a step forward. Her breath catches again in the silence that follows.
“I volunteer as tribute,” Haymitch finally says.
Peeta freezes, glancing back at his mentor.
“What?” Effie asks.
“I volunteer as tribute,” Haymitch repeats loudly.
He steps forward out of the pen but Peeta catches him by the sleeve. “What are you doing?” he hisses.
Haymitch gives a tiny shrug. “You can’t stop me.”
He joins Katniss beside Effie, who wraps things up without as much enthusiasm as she normally would have. Peeta stays frozen, one foot in and one foot outside of the pen. Katniss doesn’t want to look at him. How can she explain why she did this? He’d never understand.
“And may the odds be ever in your favor,” she says.
All three victors know that they aren’t.
They’re rushed off stage and straight into the train. Katniss doesn’t get a chance to say goodbye to any of her family and she loudly protests that to the peacekeepers that dragged her onto the train. Haymitch sits in one of the cushy armchairs and pours himself a drink.
After a few minutes, Effie enters, practically pulling Peeta by the arm she has looped around her own. She’s got a fake smile plastered to her face while Peeta doesn’t even try to hide his emotions.
He glances up, searching Katniss’s eyes. She immediately excuses herself and bolts out of the room.
“Guess she was saving it for the fancy Capitol toilets,” Haymitch jokes.
“Shut up. What in all of Panem was that?” Peeta snarls.
Haymitch holds up his hands like he doesn’t even know.
“He’s right, Haymitch. Why did you do that?” Effie asks him, her voice shrill and concerned.
“Katniss didn’t have to explain her reasoning last year, why do I?”
“Did she put you up to this? Ask you to do this? Haymitch, we had a deal. Katniss was supposed to make it out!” Peeta yells.
“She still will!” Haymitch shouts back. “You think if it came down to the two of us I would choose myself? Yes, okay, she asked me to take your place. You asked me to do everything I could to save her. I agreed to both and I plan to keep my promises, okay?”
Peeta gives a small nod. Effie makes a whole big deal of fanning her face and rushing out of the train compartment.
“Oh, you act like you’ve never sent someone to their death before!” he calls out after her, reaching for another sip of his drink.
Peeta intercepts him. “You can't be drunk or hungover in the arena.”
“Can’t a man enjoy his last drink?” Haymitch protests but it ends in a sigh as Peeta takes the glass and bottle away from him.
He calls in an Avox, though he treats them with respect unlike most, and asks them to remove all the alcohol on the train.
“We’ll be getting off of this pretty soon, you know,” Haymitch points out.
Peeta doesn’t say anything for a while. His lips don’t seem to work. What should he say? Is he angry or sad or grateful? All three? “... thank you, Haymitch,” he eventually manages.
Haymitch just nods and then watches his new mentor leave in the same direction as his new district partner, leaving him alone. Again.
Cinna remains Katniss’s stylist. Portia is passed onto Haymitch, he grumbles the entire time his scratchy beard is shaven. Peeta pours over old Games tapes while the two of them are washed and prepped.
They emerge from the train adorned in shimmering outfits making them look like embers.
Katniss looks stiff, but even she can’t help smiling at the outfit. Haymitch, on the other hand, is barely containing his laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Portia asks, offended.
A giggle escapes him. “Just, so different from what I wore last time.”
It’s the happiest Peeta and Katniss had seen him since quitting the drink, even if it was out of place, so they didn’t want to push too hard.
“Who was your stylist last time?” Peeta asked, knowing Katniss would never ask him something personal.
“Magno Stift, the jerk.”
Effie, who had followed them out, clears her throat.
“Effie stepped in when he didn’t show. But she wasn’t there for the chariots,” Haymitch reveals.
“Thank goodness I wasn’t! They were a mess that year,” she says, one hand over her heart.
Haymitch’s face immediately darkens, his laughter cutting short in his throat. “Come on, let’s get this show going.”
Their chariot is last in line, as always. Haymitch waves to a few of the other tributes he knows, but is reserved, sticking close to Katniss and the horses. Finnick comes up to them, obnoxious and extra flirty. In perfect timing, Haymitch slips to the other side of the chariot, leaving Katniss to deal with him on her own.
As the other districts begin to pull out, Haymitch clambers onto their coal themed ride, with legs shakier than they should be. Katniss starts to follow him, but in an instant, she turns around and falls into Peeta’s arms. He doesn’t hesitate at all before returning her hug.
“Come on, sweetheart,” he says, when the lovers have hugged for long enough. Almost immediately he regrets saying the nickname.
She nods, climbing, much more gracefully, onto the chariot next to him. He doesn’t take his eyes off her hands until they’re firmly grabbing the railing. Everyone watches them as they ride by.
The Capitol crowd hoots and hollers at their glowing costumes. Katniss doesn’t wave or blow kisses, she stays stone faced and staring ahead at Cinna’s orders. Haymitch doesn’t interact with the crowd either. He keeps his gaze on his feet.
Katniss nudges him with her elbow when they ride in front of Snow. He still can’t bring himself to look up. He doesn’t want to think about what happened in that exact spot 25 years ago. So instead, he watches the horses to make sure he’d know if they were going to go wild again.
The chariots slow and Peeta and Effie walk over to them. Katniss starts to leave, but Haymitch seems stuck in place.
“Hey, are you okay? We should meet with Peeta and Effie. Check out the other tributes too,” she says.
He finally moves when he nods. She doesn’t miss the fact that he wipes away a single tear.
“Haymitch, I know I asked too much of you-” she says, feeling every ounce of guilt she didn’t realize would come with saving Peeta.
“It’s okay, sweetheart,” he interrupts her, gentleness but also firmness in his voice.
He’s not sad about his fate now anyway, he’s wishing it had come earlier.
They make it back to their new living arrangements, though Katniss is still dazed from Johanna’s and Chaff’s antics. It’s all Haymitch can do not to laugh and Peeta is barely holding in a smile when he tells her why.
Katniss looks spectacularly angry, so Haymitch interrupts. “Okay, mentor Peeta, mentor us.”
He actually looks frightened to speak. But he clears his throat and begins, “Well, the Career pack still seems to be full of capable people. 4’s the only one I would say is looking weaker.”
“Finnick also came up to me, because someone left me alone,” she stares at Haymitch while she speaks.
He simply shrugs.
“Finnick is not the one I’m talking about. There’s this older woman who volunteered-”
“Mags,” he interrupts again. “She won the 11th Games, establishing 4 as a Career district.”
“Right. There’s not much footage from her Games, but she’s been mentoring for years. She’s partly mute now and the oldest tribute,” Peeta says.
“Wait, let me amend what I said. She won the 11th Games, before 4 was a Career district. Her district may be full of Careers, but she is not one of them,” Haymitch says. “And if she’s not joining them, neither will Finnick. They’d be good allies.”
“You know her?” Katniss asks.
“She was my mentor.”
“Haymitch, I don’t know any of these people. Maybe I recognize them from when I was a kid, but… tell me what you know,” Peeta gives in.
Haymitch nods. “District 3. Beetee, smartest person alive, I’m pretty sure. Knows his way around electricity like it’s nobody’s business. Wiress… she won the 49th. Outsmarted the other tributes, the gamemakers, everyone. She was my mentor too, she hasn’t mentored much though, some… things happened,” he says, eyes avoidant. “Good allies.”
Haymitch goes through everyone he knows. He mentions Johanna, who he says would do anything Finnick does. He talks up Chaff from 11 with a smile on his face.
“Let me guess, they’d all be good allies too?” Peeta asks when he’s finished speaking.
“Excellent allies. You- we need people with a multitude of skills,” he says, catching himself before slipping into mentor mode.
“This seems like too many people to ally with. Peeta and I got by just fine by ourselves,” Katniss points out. “You may, but I don’t trust these people. All of them have been in there before, they want to get out again. Your friendships might not last with these people when they’re desperate to live.”
“Isn’t that what you are too?” Haymitch snaps back.
“Katniss is right, Haymitch. We can’t be friends with everyone. With anyone. There are no friends in the Games,” Peeta tries to calm the situation.
Haymitch bites back a snarky response but can’t bring himself to nod in agreement.
“I know it’s hard that you know all of these people. But, if they’re going to do whatever it takes, then you have to as well,” he says.
Finally, Haymitch nods. But right after he excuses himself and leaves them alone.
Peeta starts to say something, but he gives up and sits on the plush couch in their apartment area. Katniss hesitantly sits beside him.
“Why did you ask him to do it, Katniss?” he asks in a whisper.
“Snow is out to get me. I can’t let him hurt you anymore.”
“Be careful what you say. But, if anything, he’s after us. I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you in there while I can’t stop it,” he says. “I’m not a good mentor. I’m hardly good at anything but at least I could be a body to protect you if Haymitch hadn’t taken my place.”
“Peeta, I’m sorry for putting this on you. But this way, no matter what, one of us lives.” She leans into him, closing the icy distance. “And they have to stick it to the Capitol,” she whispers in his ear.
He nods, letting himself put his chin on top of her head. She doesn’t pull away, so he wraps his arm around her, protecting for as long as he can.
Katniss occupies herself at training with learning and practicing new knots. Despite, or possibly in spite of, Peeta and Katniss’s discomfort about it, Haymitch heads almost straight to where Wiress and Beetee are at the shelter building station.
He crouches down beside them, looking busy putting together a makeshift tarp roof. “It’s weird to see you in here without the potatoes,” he jokes.
Beetee laughs quietly.
Haymitch glances up and sees Wiress smiling. She meets his gaze and he quickly looks back down.
“Not your faul…” she starts to say, so softly Haymitch can barely hear her, but he does. And he hears when her mind wanders away from her words.
He hasn’t had many interactions with her since after his Games, and he still doesn’t know how to act around her. If she had been someone else’s mentor, she might not have been in on their rebellion plot and made it out completely safe.
Beetee clears his throat. “Are you still in, Haymitch?”
“Man, this is serious deja vu,” he comments. With no positive reply to his joke, he sobers his attitude. “Yes. More so than ever.”
“And the boy?”
“I can’t tell him just yet.”
“If you wait too long, you might never get the chance to,” Beetee warns.
“I’d like to be able to explain everything, but I can only do that if it happens now. And if that happens, he has a good shot of telling her. I’m waiting until the last minute,” he explains.
“You’re sure about keeping her from knowing?”
“Yes. She can’t know.”
Just as he says this, the ‘she’ in question approaches. Katniss takes the empty spot next to him.
“Making friends?” she mutters.
“Perhaps. It wouldn’t hurt if you tried with them too,” he invites. “I’m going to work on another skill.”
Katniss reluctantly starts a conversation with Beetee as Haymitch walks away. He has no certain destination, so he wanders for a few minutes.
There’s a knot tying station similar to the one at his old Games. It’s empty, though he doesn’t head over there, his fingers were never as nimble as Maysilee’s were. The booth on camouflage and paint is crowded with all the morphling tributes surrounding it. Haymitch knows Peeta would be all over that if he was here.
Johanna’s district partner seems to have dragged her over to a table full of nuts and berries and is trying to make her identify them. She annoyedly listens to him as she fidgets with the axe she must have stolen from another skill’s set up. She doesn’t make eye contact with Haymitch as he passes, and he can’t tell if that’s on purpose or not. He doesn’t know her well, but there is something very important that they both know of.
Finally, he ends up at the empty throwing station. There are three targets at the end of long tracks. Along the wall, there are dozens of weapon choices. Knives, tridents, spears, things that look like ninja stars.
Haymitch picks up one of the knives, twirling it in his hand. He throws it at the first target. His aim is off and he comes off too strong at first. It lands in the yellow ring outside the red center. When he throws again with no improvement, he sighs.
Flexing his fingers, he tries to think about how he used to throw, easily and swiftly. But he’s out of practice. He never thought he would be back here. In the Games, or in the possession of a knife while having a strong desire to destroy the Capitol and the means to go out taking a few peacekeepers with him.
He throws once more and hits the edge of the red. Better, but not the best.
“Nice shot,” a voice from behind him notices. It’s Finnick, who picks up the trident option and strolls over to Haymitch.
“Thanks,” he grumbles, not able to stop from feeling like he’s being taunted.
“I’ve heard some things about you, Haymitch,” he says, launching his weapon and hitting the center immediately.
“From who?” He takes another knife off the rack and throws it, getting back into the swing of it and hitting closer to dead center than before.
“Volts.” Another trident lands next to the previous one. “And Mags. It appears we may have similar interests. Involving her,” he says, pointing his head towards Katniss, who has moved onto the archery station.
Haymitch and Finnick, and every other tribute, watch as she hits every single target thrown into the air by the instructor. For a moment, Haymitch can see somebody who has something to live for, something to kill for. And for that moment, he thinks they can pull this off.
Training goes by too quickly. Haymitch reaffirms alliances and communication, but the only people Katniss will talk to outside of him are Wiress and Mags. And even with those two, she mostly focuses on the stations.
Between the two of them, they learn how to make shelters, throw knives, shoot arrows, skin a fish, pick out poisonous fruits, and how to make rudimentary weapons.
Haymitch goes first for their private session with the gamemakers, but it’s already been hours since they were rounded up for these meetings. He walks into the room, disturbed by how quiet it is and having no clue what to show them. Why does it matter anyway? If all goes to plan, the Games won’t finish. He starts to head to the knives, it’s the only sort of talent he has, but he’s interrupted.
The crackle of an intercom comes through. The gamemakers are behind a shield this year, no doubt because of Katniss. So Plutarch’s voice comes through with some static. “Haymitch Abernathy, you are dismissed.”
“What? I haven’t even done anything yet,” he argues, staring up at where they sit.
He searches Plutarch’s eyes to find some reasoning behind this, but feels discouraged when another gamemaker whispers into his ear before he speaks again. “We remember you. You are dismissed.”
“Seriously? Everyone else got their new chance, right?”
“You are dismissed,” he says again as a few peacekeepers enter the room.
“Oh, I see how it is. There’s nothing fair about any of my Games, is there? First an illegal reaping, then a prejudiced training session. What’s next?” Haymitch calls up, disregarding any care for how he may seem.
A peacekeeper comes up to him and grabs his forearm.
“Okay, okay. No peacekeepers, no peace, right?” he taunts.
A second one socks him in the stomach. He can’t help but groan, though he doesn’t want to seem weak.
With a peacekeeper holding onto either arm, he is dragged out of the room. Throughout the whole interaction, he doesn’t break eye contact with the gamemakers.
They hold him in another empty room for five minutes. The men in white uniforms don’t release him until that time is up. He is shoved out of the room to find Peeta and Effie. He joins them, waiting to hear what crazy thing Katniss does in her meeting.
“Have they ever given a zero before?” Katniss asks, a hint of worry making it into her words.
“I don’t think so,” Cinna answers.
Haymitch, Peeta, Effie, and the stylists are all still shook from hearing what she did. Hanging Seneca Crane right in front of the gamemakers is a madman’s move. So of course Katniss did it.
Though he won’t admit it, Haymitch finds it funny. She’s a burning fire, all right. He doesn’t laugh about it, despite wanting to. Effie’s already staring at him like he’s done something wrong and his gut would hurt too much to hide it.
Finally, the program comes on. The Careers plus Finnick and Johanna get higher scores, but as the district numbers get higher, the scores lower. With the exception of Chaff, who earns a 7.
Katniss’s photo and score appear first out of the two of them. She gets a 12. A 12, the highest possible option, one that’s never been awarded before.
And Haymitch gets a 2.
“...w-what? Why would they do that?” she asks.
“To target you,” Haymitch and Peeta say at the same time.
Haymitch holds up his hands to say that he’s letting the actual mentor continue.
“Now everyone will want to be after you. Katniss, maybe allies aren’t the worst thing in the world anymore,” he says.
“It seems more likely for them to betray me now than before.”
“But, if they don’t, it gives you protection. You won’t have to constantly be on guard.”
“It’s the Hunger Games. Of course I will.”
“I’m just saying,” Peeta gently says.
Katniss swallows her words and gives a small nod. She doesn’t verbally agree, but she doesn’t disagree either.
Peeta turns to Haymitch.
“Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t do anything!”
“You must have really done nothing to get a 2. The addicts got higher than you. What did you say? Could any of it be seen as rebelling?” he accuses.
“I hardly said anything. I was good, I promise,” Haymitch says, though he subconsciously touches the tender area where he was hit.
“At least it was an improvement,” Effie says, her hopeful voice wavering.
“Improvement?” Cinna asks, slightly bewildered.
Haymitch opens his mouth, but he’s interrupted by their overly eager and nervous escort. “In the 50th, Haymitch, the poor thing, got a 1. Lowest score ever given. Why, you had to split off from your allies because of it, didn’t you? Thought the gamemakers were targeting you. Well, look at you now.”
“A 1? Out of 48 tributes, you got the lowest score? And you’re sure you won?” Portia asks, amused and amazed.
“I question that every once in a while, don’t you worry.”
“Haymitch, seriously, what did you do?” Katniss asks him.
Everyone looks at him. He stammers and longs for a drink, but he manages to get out a few sentences. “Come on, I made history 25 years ago. Katniss did today. Like Effie said, I improved. That’s all there is to it. We should focus on Katniss.”
“Ladies and gentlemen of the Capitol, I know we’ve been here all night and you must be tired, but give some energy to our last district!” Caesar announces, beaming from ear to ear. “Not that much, not that much!” he hollers, calming the crowd. “Tonight we have a first ever change to the interview rules!”
The crowd cheers as Katniss walks onto the stage in her breathtaking, though old fashioned wedding dress.
“You know her, you love her, The Girl on Fire! But tonight, she won’t be alone! For the first time in the history of the Games, I have explicit permission from President Snow to allow our mentor on stage!”
Peeta walks out after she sits down, adjusting the sleeves of his tailored suit.
The watchers absolutely lose it. They hoot and holler and whistle and cheer. Even a year later, Peeta and Katniss, the star crossed lovers from District 12, are everyone’s favorites.
“Well, well! How are the lovebirds of our coal district?” Caesar asks once he can be heard again.
“While the circumstances are unfortunate, we’re glad to have been welcomed back with such a warm greeting,” Peeta says, his charm spiking up the cheers again.
“Oh, yes, yes. We must address the elephant in the room. Katniss is returning to the Games,” he says, making an exaggerated frown.
The crowd boos.
Katniss attempts to smile but it quickly falls from her face. Peeta grabs her hand, more for her than the crowd, though they lap it up just as much.
“How do you feel, Peeta, about having your name drawn but your old mentor volunteering?” Caesar asks, knowing what he’s stirring up.
“Well, uh…” For the first time, Peeta falters on camera.
“Haymitch is a good man,” Katniss interrupts.
Everyone laughs. She wants to retaliate, and she starts to say something, but Peeta squeezes her hand in a way that’s less comforting and more warning. “We’re just sad you all didn’t get to see our wedding before the Quell,” she amends what she was going to say.
“Yes, yes, it’s quite a shame you two never got to experience marriage.”
“Well, she didn’t say that.”
Peeta begins to talk, to lie, about the two of them already being married by tradition in 12. He gets Caesar and the audience alike tearing up. Even without being in the Games himself, he creates the best interview of the night.
“That sounds lovely, Peeta. I’m glad you two had something special, and hopefully it won’t be your last special moment together,” Caesar says, wiping a tear away, carefully as to not mess up his elaborate makeup.
“We’re happy you could at least see a part of what our official wedding would have looked like,” Katniss says, putting on a pained smile.
“Yes, you two look beautiful.”
Katniss glances into the crowd and finds Cinna. He just nods his chin down. She stands up, Peeta following suit.
“Let me give you a better view,” she says before letting go of Peeta’s hand and spinning around.
Her dress begins to smoke and catch on fire, before transforming into a mystical black feathered outfit. It makes Katniss look radiant and powerful. It makes everything besides her look worthless.
“You’re-”
“A mockingjay,” she whispers under her breath.
“-stunning,” the interviewer finishes.
Peeta takes her hand again and walks her off the stage with 15 seconds still left in their interview. After stunned silence, there are more cheers for almost a whole minute.
Haymitch finally enters the stage when the crowd is done fawning over his district partner and mentor and their tragic love story. And possibly their act of rebellion, if there was anyone clever or sober enough in the mob of fans to realize it.
He sits and crosses his legs. Some people in the front rows look eager to see him, he remembers the last interview he was all flirtatious and happy. Maybe they’re hoping for that boy, but he’s changed a lot. And of course, other people forfeit their prime spot just because they don’t care anymore.
“Well, Haymitch, you’re the only tribute here with past experience in a Quarter Quell. That’s really something, isn’t it?”
“Sure, it’s something. Doesn’t give me any advantages, though. Just makes me look old,” he says, getting some laughter.
“Last time you were up on this stage, you were sixteen-”
“Come on, Caesar. You of all people should relate to not wanting the subject to turn to your age!”
The audience bursts out laughing. Caesar gets a little red in the face and has to force out a chuckle. “Anyway, young man, last time, I asked you about your odds. There were twice the tributes in the 50th, for you babies who weren’t alive yet,” he says, playing into Haymitch’s jokes. “And now it seems like there’s twice the experience and talent. What do you have to say to that?”
“You got the facts right,” Haymitch says, shrugging.
Caesar laughs a little too forcefully. “I mean, not to repeat history, but what do you think about your chances with these changes?”
“What do you want me to say? That the Games will be just as stupid again? Because, nope. I think they’ll be even worse than before,” he says, coolly.
That gets a few chuckles, but mostly winces from the Capitol folk.
Haymitch points to someone in the audience. “See, that guy liked it!”
The camera pans to a Capitol woman dressed in an outfit like a jester. She panics and bites at her enhanced sharp nails while shaking her head violently.
“Right, uh, now for the million dollar question,” Caesar says, regaining control. “You took Peeta Mellark’s place-”
A few sighs and ‘aww’s interrupt him.
“And became the second volunteer tribute in two years for District 12. Can you tell us why? Many people, me included, are wondering why you would split up the famous star crossed lovers.”
“To be honest, it was a spur of the moment decision,” he lies. “I didn’t want to see the two of them forced into the Games again anymore than you.”
“But, this could arguably be worse. With your ‘noble’ action, you’ve doomed poor Peeta to survive no matter what,” he says before he makes another cringy sad face.
“I wouldn’t say ‘poor Peeta’ just because he isn’t in another one of these murder games,” Haymitch says, glowering at his interviewer.
“All I’m saying is, god forbid, Katniss doesn’t make it back from the arena, Peeta will be stuck with a broken heart, all alone. Can you imagine?” Caesar says, pulling at his watchers’ heartstrings.
Haymitch grits his teeth to stop him from shouting out the worst curses he knows at Snow on live television.
“Is that really what you want to see happen?”
“I’d rather see that than watch them both be brutally murdered by the people you, and everyone involved in the Games, offered safety to, only to take it away.”
Everyone is dead silent.
“Or if that’s too hard to comprehend, I could just be selfish. I can only take one more dead kid’s blood on my hands. Not two.” With that, Haymitch walks off halfway through the interview. A chorus of tentative but growing stronger boos follow him out.
Haymitch walks straight into Peeta as he goes backstage. All the other tributes are being led out the door, back to their designated places, but there was supposed to be another few minutes in Haymitch’s interview for them to clear out in time.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Peeta says, putting a hand on his chest to stop him from moving forward.
“What?” Haymitch hisses.
“Okay, I don’t know what that was.” He shakes his head trying to get clearer thoughts. “Haymitch, that was really, really-”
Haymitch makes fleeting eye contact with Beetee, who’s slowly shuffling out the door. He tugs his partner Wiress after him and disappears through the door frame surrounded by peacekeepers.
Grabbing onto Peeta’s wrist, he pulls them out the side exit. “We’re just getting air,” he says to a peacekeeper trying to stop them. He turns to Katniss, who follows after them, “Stay here, sweetheart.”
She freezes up, but listens.
Haymitch pulls Peeta into what looks like a back alley behind the studio where they film interviews.
It looks empty enough, so he starts talking. “Listen, District 13 is alive. 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 11, me, and now you, are all in on it.”
“What? What are you saying, Haymitch?”
“We’re breaking Katniss out of the arena. She told you that if she died to stick it to the Capitol or something like that, right? Well, we’re going to end the Capitol, the district system, the Hunger Games, all of it,” Haymitch says, rapid-fire.
He pulls out a small flash drive from the pocket of his velvet suit. Pressing it into Peeta’s hands and quickly concealing it, he says, “When the Games start, tell District 3’s mentor you need to use their computer. Put this in, memorize what you can, and then destroy it. Don’t tell anyone else.”
“Wait, I still don’t understand!” Peeta panics.
Haymitch puts a hand on his shoulder. “We’ve made an alliance to break the arena. A hovercraft from 13 will carry you, some other officials, and pick up Katniss. Best case, all of us. Worst case, just her.”
“‘All of us?’”
“Me, Finnick, Mags, Beetee, Wiress, Johanna. That’s everyone confirmed. But no doubt there will be some confusion or betrayal, we just hope they wait until they can’t tell Snow.”
“So it was never a choice, your guys’ allies?”
“No. This has been set since the Quell was announced.”
Peeta shakes his head again. He looks down at the flash drive in his hand before Haymitch closes his fist around it for him. “Th- this is too much.”
“I know,” Haymitch says, letting his breath slow from its frantic energy. “And you can’t tell Katniss.”
The goodbye is harder than they thought it would be. Even though Peeta has a flash drive burning a spotlight of hope in his pocket, it’s all he can do to only shed a few tears. He tells himself over and over that she doesn’t need to see him crying. And that this won’t be the last time he sees her.
Katniss thinks the same thing, but the weight of that is starting to crush her. Enemies, really just people like her, dead. Allies, ones she didn’t want but allies all the same, dead. Haymitch, dead.
She hugs him, burrowing her face in his shoulder. “Peeta, I…” she whispers into his ear just in case she can’t do it, can’t make it out alive.
“I love you too,” he replies. After a moment or two, they separate. He kisses her forehead, not saying anymore. She makes eye contact for a second before walking into her launching room, where Cinna is waiting for her.
Haymitch walks up to Peeta from behind.
“Haymitch, I-”
“Don’t worry so much. Everything will be fine.” She’ll be okay. We’ll succeed.
He gives Peeta a nod before opening the door to his own room. It’s empty, no Portia. A silent fear grabs the pit of Haymitch’s stomach, but he ignores it. Portia didn’t do anything, so if this is a punishment, it’s for him. If there’s anyone he should worry about, it’s Katniss and Cinna. He can’t ignore it anymore.
Having already been injected with his tracker, the literal little bugger, and showered, an automated voice tells him he only has ten minutes.
Ten minutes before everything changes. Possibly the last normal ten minutes he’ll ever get. Either he’ll die in the Games or immediately be launched into a full scale rebellion. He forces himself to swallow and change into the outfit.
It’s skin tight with a dumb looking belt but he doesn’t have much time to feel uncomfortable before the voice chimes in again.
“Tributes, please prepare for launch.”
It’s weird to be alone. There are probably peacekeepers just outside his door, but he can’t see them and they can’t see him. He's unsupervised. Whatever panic he gave them during training has clearly evaporated. Or they're just too busy with the other tributes. With Katniss. Even alone, he gets into the glass tube. He has a job to do.
It slowly begins to rise, plummeting him into darkness. Then, he’s hit with the light. It isn’t as blinding or as bright as the first time. But it’s jarring all the same.
Immediately he knows what’s different, though. There is the sound of waves crashing against his metal plate. As it rises fully up, he can see he’s right. They are surrounded by water.
“Ladies and gentlemen, let the 75th Hunger Games begin!”
All the tributes have a little bit to get their bearings. Haymitch and Katniss can’t see each other. And it looks like none of the district partners are directly close to one another. The gamemakers isolated them. Haymitch looks to his right, Mags is there. Johanna is to his left, next to Beetee.
Neither of them makes eye contact with him, but his old mentor does. He wants to look for Katniss more, but before he can risk leaning to look past the Cornucopia, the cannon rings out. His body moving faster than his mind, he leaps into the water, heading straight for Mags.
He’s knocked underwater by Chaff’s foot kicking him in the head, but luckily that’s all he does. He finds it easy to float back up, even with his ears now ringing.
Mags spots him and points to her belt from in the water. She smiles and lets go of her starting pole to show him their use. He laughs just a little bit, drowning out the bloodbath behind him and focusing just on her.
But then he hears the arrow fly. Instinctively, he whips his head around to look for Katniss. She and Finnick are on their side of the Cornucopia now, alone on the little island. And she’s shot an arrow at him.
Mags gives him a nod, and he swims towards the two of them. Katniss has another arrow ready in her bow and Finnick’s holding his trident when Haymitch pulls himself onto land. She pulls back on the string just a tad more and Haymitch rushes in between her weapon and the District 4 tribute, who flashes him both panicked and annoyed glances.
“Sweetheart,” he says, quietly, grabbing the end of her arrow.
Suddenly, movement catches his eyes, and he barely has time to shout her name before Finnick throws his trident past them and into one of the tributes from 5.
“It’s a good thing we’re allies, right?” he asks, his face daring Katniss to disagree.
She lowers her bow and nods.
“Make nice, you two. I’ll get Mags.” He dives back into the water, hoping they’re capable enough to grab supplies and not die.
Mags and Haymitch swim to the beach that borders a vast jungle.
Finnick and Katniss rush out of the water just after them. Katniss hands him an axe, and on Mags’s insistence, she gives her an awl.
It’s then when Haymitch notices Katniss’s lip is trembling. “Katniss?” he asks.
“Haymitch, C-Cinna. They-” she barely gets the words out.
Haymitch’s face contorts in pain as there’s the sound of a weapon hitting flesh.
Finnick pushes Haymitch, Mags, and Katniss into the jungle. He looks around, but there’s no way to tell who threw the knife that’s now in the back of Haymitch's leg.
Haymitch leans against a tree. Katniss gingerly touches where the knife handle juts out. He winces and bats her away, standing up to get her off his case.
“We need to move,” Finnick says, entering the thick tree line.
Katniss starts, “Haymi-”
“Let’s go,” he interrupts her.
Finnick carries Mags on his back, leading the way forward, while Katniss and Haymitch follow after him. They walk for nearly a mile, and surprisingly, they make good time.
“Stop!” Katniss hollers out of nowhere.
Finnick pauses mid-step, inches away from the forcefield marking the edge of the arena. She picks up a small nut and throws it ahead. It bounces back, sizzling and smoking.
“It’s a forcefield. Like in the training room. I can s… hear it with my Capitol reconstructed ear,” she stammers to explain.
Finnick gives her an odd look but thanks her for stopping him.
They start to head back towards the Cornucopia. The cannons have stopped going off, so they decide it’s safe. They make it a few minutes before Haymitch falls down. He tries to get back up but Katniss stops him.
“We need rest anyway. Sit,” she instructs.
He does as she says, letting her be the doctor.
Finnick sets down Mags, who promptly eats a random nut she finds on the ground.
“Mags!” Katniss exclaims.
“Oh, hush, she's a smart woman,” Haymitch says.
Mags smiles at him, mumbling something that none of them can detect but sounds a little like, “smart boy.”
Katniss purses her lips in a way that her mother would. Then she pulls out the knife in his leg. He winces, but she just grabs nearby leaves to make a bandage. After a little while of wrapping, she secures it with his flotation device belt.
Haymitch gives her a weak thumbs up before leaning against a tree trunk. “We need water,” he says, voice already sounding parched.
“I’ll go look for some. There must be something to follow to its food source around here,” Katniss says as she gets up.
“I’ll come with you,” Finnick offers.
She’s about to decline but Haymitch stops her, “Good idea.”
Katniss shares a glance with him but doesn’t protest anymore. Although leaving with Finnick puts knots in her stomach, she knows there’s hardly any reason for him to betray her now. And if Haymitch trusts him, maybe she can too.
Haymitch doesn’t miss her discomfort with Finnick. But there’s nothing he can do to change that. If only she could know the truth…
Katniss wakes them in the middle of the night. Poisonous fog creeps over them while they try to gather what little they have.
“Run!” she urges them.
Finnick pulls Mags onto his back again and takes off. Haymitch and Katniss follow behind him.
Just as it seems they might outrun the fog, it reaches out in arm-like tentacles, trying to grab them.
Sores and blisters cover their bodies from just being close to it, so when it grabs onto Katniss’s ankle, it’s agony.
She falls flat on her face, knocking the wind out of her. Haymitch catches onto the string of her quiver and yanks to pull her free. While Haymitch’s and Finnick’s limbs shake a little, Katniss has lost almost all control over her leg. She manages to get up with the help of both of them, but can’t make it more than a few steps. The fog threatens to overtake them all.
“Here,” Finnick says, letting Mags down and pushing her towards Haymitch. He picks up Katniss, holding her jerking leg close to his torso as she sits in a piggy back.
Haymitch carries Mags like a firefighter. But the time they lost catches up to them. His injured leg buckles with the strain, blisters, pain, and heat. He falls, shifting himself so he doesn’t crush Mags.
He pushes himself to get up, to keep moving. But he can’t seem to do it and get Mags up at the same time.
While they both lay panting on the jungle floor, she whispers in his ear, “Smart boy.”
A little panicked, he whispers back, “I learned from you, smart woman.”
She smiles and gets up. Haymitch struggles to do the same. By now Finnick has stopped and turned around to see them. He runs back. He’s strong, but Haymitch can see he’s faltering.
“Mags, I can’t carry both of you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he repeats.
She just leans in close to him and gives him a kiss. Then she pushes Haymitch towards Finnick and Katniss and walks straight into the fog. Straight into death.
Haymitch yells even though his voice is hoarse. Finnick catches him when he stumbles but pulls him along. They both wince as their blisters make contact, but they run forward.
They run until they’re no longer dodging trees and instead kicking up sand. They run until their feet hit the water and it splashes up. It burns the injured parts of their skin where the waves splash up.
Finnick takes a step back, even if it's towards the fog, because it hurts so bad. But Haymitch sees the white wisps drift out of his blisters. He takes a step further into the water. And another until he can float on his back, letting all the poison leak from his body.
Finally, he plunges his head under. It burns, oh it burns. But when he surfaces moments later, he’s not shaking nearly as badly and his head feels clearer.
“The water, it helps,” he tells Finnick.
But Finnick is watching where the fog seems to have hit a wall, no longer reaching out towards them but piling up.
“Finnick,” he says, splashing water at him.
He winces, but watches as white wisps float off of him too. He sets Katniss by the edge of the beach, having her ankles soak in the water, before plunging in himself. Haymitch doesn’t have time to warn him how much it hurts, but he doesn’t think that would stop him anyway. Finnick stays under for longer than Haymitch could. He screams and cries under the water, but nobody can hear it, and no cameras catch it, so it’s like it never happened at all.
When he breaches the surface again, he helps Haymitch pour water down Katniss’s back, front, neck, everywhere. She dunks her own head in the water when enough of the poison has been cleared from her body. Haymitch and Finnick stand at the shore, keeping watch.
“I’m sorry. About Mags,” Haymitch says.
“You shouldn’t be the one to say that,” Finnick replies, his voice lacking charm and finesse.
“I couldn’t carry her.”
“Neither could I.”
Haymitch wants to say and hear more, but he knows they can’t. And besides, the question he wants to ask, he already knows the answer to.
District 4 was the second district to join Plutarch’s big plan after the Quell was announced. Of course the tributes had talked about what they were willing to give. Mags volunteered for Annie, but also for the rebellion. She knew what could come.
Haymitch did that too. He doesn’t think of himself as nearly as brave as Mags, but that commonality makes him feel close to her again.
They’re setting up camp on the beach when it happens. Just in the jungle, they see the pale, quirky morphling make too much noise crossing through the trees. They get to see as mutt monkeys launch down at her and sink their teeth into her flesh.
Haymitch throws the knife, the one that used to be in him, at the monkey without thinking. It bares its teeth as it looks up.
Katniss shoots an arrow directly in its forehead. She preps for more to come, but they back off, slinking back into the depths of the jungle now that their job is done.
The morphling tribute lies still on the ground, her breaths coming with great trouble and blood seeping out of her body.
There are two ways to deal with what they all know will come next. There’s the way Haymitch has always done, avoiding death, distancing yourself so far away from it that you hardly recognize it’s happening. Because if you do, nothing good can come from it. That’s what Finnick does as he turns back to the water.
Haymitch doesn’t judge him. But he doesn’t do the same. He chooses the second option where he goes up and holds the dying woman’s hand. He doesn’t know her name or what her Games were like. Not what made her turn to the addictive drug or who she’s leaving behind, either. But he holds her hand, shushing her like he would a baby, until the cannon rings out and hovercraft comes to take her away.
Haymitch leaves her, letting the claw reach down and scoop up her body. He walks back to his allies feeling numb. His head still swims with repressed memories when Katniss puts a finger to his lips.
“I didn’t even say anything,” he points out, a little angrily.
“Shh!” she tugs on his arm, making him crouch behind their little camp set up.
She points a little ways down the beach. Finnick stares intently at the three figures there, his eyes squinting to get a better look. They’re all covered in red, like they were dipped in paint. But Haymitch recognizes their movements. The angry stomp of one and the wild wandering of another. The other is limp, but he can guess who it is.
Finnick comes to the same conclusion just a second earlier. “Johanna!” he calls, springing up and running towards her.
Katniss is hesitant, but once Haymitch does the same she follows them.
Beetee is hurt, but they manage to help him for the time being, thanks to what Katniss picked up from her mother’s work.
Katniss worries that the larger group will draw more attention to them, but there’s a shared relief between everyone else. They’ve lost friends, but they haven’t lost everything yet.
The dizzying spin of the Cornucopia island finally stops, but it takes a while for everyone to get their bearings. Only Beetee was flung off, and Finnick, who is the first to get up, swims out to fetch him.
Haymitch, battered from his injured leg and gut from the peacekeeper’s punch so long ago, takes a while longer. Johanna walks over to him and extends her hand out to him. As he takes it, a cold feeling creeps up his spine. From the corner of his eye, he can see the pool of faded red in the water. Wiress’s body floats in the middle of it.
The image of her with blood seeping out of her neck will stay burned in Haymitch’s mind along with Mags’s contorting body, Ampert’s tiny skeleton, Maysilee’s defiant final stare, and the red dripping out of Lenore Dove’s mouth.
When he stands, he nearly doubles over with the stomach quenching realization that overtakes him. The coil is in Wiress’s now lifeless hands.
They need that coil of wire. Without it, they’ll fail. If the Capitol gets a hold of it, they’ll never get it back and they won’t have a plan. The Games will continue until one poor victor is left alive and the cycle will never end. The sun will always rise on a reaping day.
“The coil,” he says weakly.
No one seems to hear him.
“Beetee’s coil,” he repeats, louder this time.
Johanna and Katniss give him confused looks. He points towards Wiress, finding it nearly impossible to speak. The realization dawns on the two of them. Johanna immediately looks for Finnick, who’s still too busy grabbing the only remaining District 3 tribute.
Katniss glances at Beetee too, who also doesn’t seem to realize what the problem is as he’s too busy trying not to drown. She doesn’t get it. Haymitch is the one who asked for that, for her to stay oblivious. The whirring hovercraft rings in his ears.
Before Katniss has a chance to ask anything that might compromise them, Haymitch dives into the water. The Capitol machine gets lower, but Haymitch swims faster than ever before. He is much too aware when the water changes color.
When he finally reaches her, the hovercraft is about a tree’s height up. He grasps the coil of wire, his fingers brushing against hers. And then he doesn’t let go of her. He can imagine what the gamemakers are thinking. Not this again. What mutt can we send after him this time? But Haymitch isn’t trying to take Wiress away, if anything, he wants her to be able to go home. He just remembered that he’s never held her hand before.
He’s suddenly overcome with the want to sing to her or say something nice, all the things he never got to do for Mags or his friends in the 50th. But his legs burn from exhaustion and literal salt in a wound.
So he swims back to the island, where everyone has now regrouped. Haymitch coughs up some water as he chucks the coil at Beetee’s feet.
Both of his mentors are now dead. The people who helped save him are the ones he couldn’t save. Wiress’s useful song is still in his head, even if he didn’t exactly follow it this time around.
First avoid the slaughter,
Get weapons, look for water
Find food and where to sleep,
Fire and friends can keep.
But of course, friends only keep until they’re dead. Why hadn’t he been the one to hear her stop singing? Why wasn’t he keeping a better eye on her? It was the least he could have done, being the reason she wasn’t fully there mentally. Same with Mags. Why wasn’t he strong enough?
“Haymitch?”
He had tuned out their conversation, just numbly following them into an unknown section of the arena.
But Katniss grabbed his shoulder and shook him out of it. “Finnick is going to collect water, okay?”
Haymitch nods his head. “I can go with him.”
“I’ll be fine. You rest,” Finnick protests.
“You should have someone watching your back. Katniss and Beetee can work on making another map and Johanna will scare anybody who comes along away,” he says, trying to at least sound snippy instead of sad.
“Okay,” Finnick doesn’t argue any more.
Haymitch brushes off a glance from Katniss and the two of them set off into their undetermined hour of the arena.
A sharp, pained cry echoes through the jungle. Both Haymitch and Finnick snap to attention. It’s Katniss' voice who screamed.
They wait a moment. No cannon.
Blood rushes fast to every part of Haymitch’s body, fueled by fear and relief. He can’t fail her too. “Go to the beach, check for the others!” he orders, not waiting for Finnick to respond before running deeper into the jungle.
He’s not a very fit person anymore, but he runs like lightning. There’s no one there, though. He can’t find where Katniss is screaming from but she does it over and over again. And suddenly, it’s coming from everywhere.
It hits him like a brick. Jabberjays.
It wouldn’t be hard to get the sound of Katniss screaming. She was in two Games. They could have gotten the sound from just a few days ago.
As quickly as he can, Haymitch turns around and starts to back track. He slows down unintentionally, his lungs wishing for air and legs burning. It seems like there are hundreds of jabberjays as they blanket the jungle trees. Haymitch glances up and sees the birds staring at him with their beaks open wide emitting that terrible sound. He slips and crashes straight into the invisible wall that separates him from his allies.
It takes a moment for him to get up, his legs ache and his back is bruised. When he does stand, he sees Katniss directly opposite of him.
He huffs out a breath of relief. She’s okay.
But her hands are up against the clear wall and she’s saying something, but he can’t hear her. He looks at Finnick, Johanna, and Beetee, but it’s the same for them. Their mouths move, some faster than others, but he still can’t understand what they’re saying.
Then the birds catch up with him. Every open spot on a branch gets filled with a jabberjay. For a moment, they stay silent.
Then they open their mouths.
It’s not Katniss screaming anymore. It’s Sid.
Haymitch’s eyes go wide. Katniss and Finnick pound hard on the barrier seeing him panicked. He lets his knees give out and falls to the floor. Every bird had now picked up the sound of his brother’s pain.
How did they get this? Was his house bugged? Was he crazy or could he hear the fire crackling in the background? Were these the last sounds Sid ever made?
Haymitch brings his hands up to his ears and pulls his knees to his chest. There’s so much screaming he doubts he would be able to hear the others even if the barrier wasn’t soundproof. Remembering that, he yells too until his voice is hoarse. No one can hear him anyway. Sid can’t know that his brother is trying to reply.
He shifts so his back leans against the hard wall. He doesn’t want to see his allies, to watch them watch him.
Without meaning too, he starts to rock back and forth. The birds don’t ever get quieter, but Haymitch’s ears ring after a while. He only knows the hour has passed and the barrier has faded when he falls onto his back on the sand. The screaming stops. The jabberjays fly off, looking like a giant cloud. Haymitch is tempted to curse at them, but he can hardly bring himself to take his hands from his ears and everyone is talking at him now.
“Haymitch? Haymitch?” Katniss asks repeatedly.
Beetee stands to the side not saying anything out loud but his eyes speaking volumes.
Johanna puts a hand on his back and pushes him up to a sitting position, supporting him until he can get his feet to hold him up again.
“What happened? What was that?” Finnick asks, eyeing the jungle like there might still be something in there to physically harm them.
“Jabberjays,” he rasps. Hearing his own voice, he swallows and clears his throat. He immediately stands up, hating how vulnerable and weak he looked.
“So when we heard Katniss scream, that was the birds?”
Haymitch nods, regretting getting up so quickly as he feels woozy.
“I came straight back here and when she was fine, I tried to go back for you, but the barrier popped up,” Finnick explains.
“Could you hear us?” Johanna asks.
He shakes his head, unintentionally taking a step away from everyone.
“It’s clever. Psychological pain caused by being trapped with the sounds of their loved ones hurting. It’s clever but cruel,” Beetee says.
Nobody says anything for a moment. It’s not like any of them believed the gamemakers were above that kind of torture, but they didn’t remember it every happening. Not in that way or any way like it, at least.
Haymitch takes their silence as a chance to leave and sits by the water, letting it splash at his feet.
Katniss is the first to move and sit beside him. “You heard me screaming? For an hour?” she asks.
“Yes,” he answers. He pauses, unsure of what to say. “And my brother,” he adds quietly.
“You have a brother?” Katniss asks, confused.
“Had.”
“I’m sorry,” she says.
“It’s fine, sweetheart,” he replies.
Johanna walks up behind them, holding the spile that she took from Finnick. “I’m going to finish getting water,” she informs them.
An involuntary “don’t” comes out of Haymitch’s mouth before he fully registers it.
“They can't hurt me. I'm not like the rest of you. There's no one left I love,” she says, brushing him off.
“That’s what I thought too,” he mumbles.
Her eyes flicker with recognition, one tortured soul meeting another, but she doesn’t say any more. And she still walks into the jungle.
Katniss offers to take the first watch, out of all of them, she’s gotten the most rest. The others fall asleep relatively quickly, or as quickly as possible in a killer arena. Haymitch is supposed to be sleeping too, but he’s not. His eyes are closed and all, but Katniss can tell he’s faking. She’s woken him from enough drunken slumbers to be able to tell when he’s really out.
“Haymitch,” she says, poking his uninjured leg, hoping most of the audience is asleep by now so they can really talk.
He sits up slowly.
“How are… you doing?” she asks, awkwardly.
“I’m fine.”
She doesn’t believe him. “The birds. Wiress. Mags. Whatever happened back at the chariots.”
He sighs gruffly. “I’ll be okay. You?”
“Good.”
He doesn’t believe her either. “Peeta.” He doesn’t dare to say anyone else’s name out loud yet. But he props himself up more and opens his arms.
Katniss looks around, but lets herself fall into his arms.
“You were saying something about Cinna earlier,” he whispers into her hair.
She nods, her head against his chest.
“Did they take him?” he asks, so quietly that it’s barely audible, even to her.
She nods again, tightening her grip on him. It’s like he can sense she’s going to cry because he shushes her in a comforting way.
“It’ll be okay, sweetheart. It will.”
Katniss sniffles but then backs away, resuming her guarding position. Her bow is at her side with an arrow already loaded.
They sit in silence for a bit. Maybe she expected him to fall asleep right away but that’s not what he does.
“Everyone else has lost their district partner,” she points out, whispering to break the quiet.
“That’s true,” Haymitch replies, closing his eyes again.
She bites her lip, still on guard. “You and Finnick have lost your mentor. Or mentors.”
He grunts a little in response.
“I can’t imagine,” she says. Haymitch can’t tell if it’s genuine, for the cameras, something else entirely, or all of the above.
“If things go well, you won’t have to just imagine.”
She goes still, arms and shoulders tensing up.
“You’re getting out of here, Katniss. No further questions.” He won’t say she’s going home. She isn’t, not for a while.
Katniss still hardly breathes. If the discomfort of thinking about how Finnick, Johanna, and Beetee will die felt like choking, trying to figure out Haymitch’s death is like suffocating.
“Relax, I won’t make you kill me.”
“Good.” But the thought of him killing himself makes her feel sick. “Go to sleep, Haymitch. Rest,” she dismisses him.
He lays back and rolls onto his side, next to Beetee. “I won’t,” he mutters, surprising a sad smile out of her.
Katniss stays on watch a little longer than she should, still tumbling over the thoughts in her head. She could kill them all now. It would only take 4 well-aimed arrows and none of them would wake up.
The fact that this crosses her mind makes her skin crawl. Haymitch is her friend. Beetee’s been nothing but kind to her. Finnick has earned her trust over and over again. And she even can’t picture being the one to end Johanna.
They’re going to die no matter what. Despite what it means, there’s still the desperate feeling in the pit of her stomach that aches for her to keep living. She wants to live and go home and tell Peeta she loves him.
But there’s also the sinking feeling there too. They are all going to die.
Finally, she wakes Finnick and takes his place lying on the beach sand, falling into a fitful sleep.
Beetee’s plan is an excellent cover up. Katniss buys into it, not fully able to understand it. In honesty, nobody except for Beetee really understands it. But Haymitch, Johanna, and Finnick all know why it is important for it to succeed.
Johanna and Katniss go to lay the wire, a useless task. Beetee is nervously glancing up at the force field’s chink over and over again. Finnick nudges him to tell him to stop doing it, but he can’t.
They notice the signs, like footsteps and crunching branches, just moments before the wire is cut, and moments later than they should have. Brutus and Chaff break into their view, weapons swinging at each other. A stray blow hits Beetee in the arm, sending him and his knife into the force field. He’s shocked and thrown backwards, but alive.
Haymitch tries to get to him but stands frozen when a cannon rings out. Brutus has killed Chaff. The only friend Haymitch had who could sort of understand his district. The ally who never got to go out for the cause of the rebellion.
As Brutus turns his attention to Finnick, Haymitch chucks his axe, which he had only used to cut away branches and leaves until this point, and it lands with a sickening squelch in Brutus’s head. Just like Silca.
Another cannon booms. It’s the first life Haymitch has taken in these Games.
Somewhere much deeper in the jungle, Katniss stands woozily. The remaining Careers just passed her, thinking she was dead. She thinks she might be dead. But she’s not, at least not yet.
It may be stupid, she knows, but she starts making her way back to the lightning tree. If Johanna attacked her, it must mean their alliance is over, that Finnick and maybe even Beetee will betray Haymitch. And she can’t stand the thought of him dying alone. So, she treks back to him.
Enobaria comes next. She leaps out of the trees and at Finnick, who deflects her sword attack with his trident. They spar for a few moments, but Finnick stumbles over the real device he and Beetee made and Enobaria takes the chance to dig her fang-like teeth into his arm.
Haymitch grabs his axe and takes a low swing at her legs, injuring one of them, causing her to buckle. But she slashes her sword, cutting him across the chest. It’s not too deep, but his whole shirt is stained with blood in a matter of seconds.
Finnick flips his trident around and hits Enobaria with enough force to knock her out.
It doesn’t matter what the audience thinks anymore, they’re too close to the culmination of everything to care. They only have a minute or two before the lightning will strike.
Just then, another figure breaks through the trees. But it’s not an enemy, it’s Katniss. She stumbles as she walks, but her bow is drawn, with an arrow aiming directly for Finnick’s heart.
Once again, Haymitch steps in between her arrow and Finnick. He’s got a knife in his hand, and for a moment, Katniss thinks that she might be the only one being betrayed. That she’ll be the one to die alone. But then she realizes he’s picked up Beetee’s knife, the one with wire coiled around it, from what she knew as the test of their trap.
“Sweetheart,” he says, starting to feel lightheaded himself, “We aren’t your enemies.”
“Who is?” she asks, but she knows the answer as soon as she speaks.
Haymitch holds out the knife to her and she takes it, transferring the wire to one of her remaining arrows. She moves quickly, afraid she might fade before she can finish her task.
As soon as she’s done tying, she fixes her aim to the chink in the force field Beetee taught her to find. She hesitates for only one moment, unsure of what this will mean and her mind too useless to figure it out. And then, Katniss lets the arrow fly.
The lightning strikes, sending them all flying backward. Katniss lies, immobilized on the ground. The whole arena goes dark.
In the moment of darkness, adrenaline takes over for Finnick. He drops his trident, scrambles to his feet, and hauls Beetee’s body onto his back. He calls out Johanna’s name, no longer afraid for cameras to hear him.
Adrenaline isn’t the right word for what happens to Haymitch. He gets up, not even feeling the pain, though his outfit is sticking to his skin with his own blood. His thoughts are clear, though, decisive and real. He feels like singing. Something he hasn’t done in years. He feels like singing the song he sang when the arena went dark the first time, 25 years ago. But maybe it’s because he remembers it, that he knows this darkness won’t last. So he doesn’t sing.
Instead, he scoops up Katniss. Her legs walk for her, but the rest of her is pressed tight against him, his hands holding her shoulders up.
It’s because his thoughts are so clear that he isn’t afraid of them. He isn’t going to make it back to District 12. There'll be no victor train for his coffin to ride back in. Maybe the Capitol will find him and dispose of him like they did Lou Lou. Or maybe he’ll stay in this broken arena forever, a marker of what happened.
Haymitch can feel the hum beneath his feet. Katniss did what he couldn’t do. The arena really is breaking. It will explode any moment.
He pushes Katniss into Finnick’s arms as he feels his own legs give out. He hopes this time Finnick can carry both of them. He hopes they will find Johanna. He hopes the District 13 hovercraft will carry all of them, Peeta too, to the place he’ll never get to see, where they will plan the Capitol’s downfall. He hopes so much for the better future he tried to fight for.
Katniss, numb and wounded, can still feel when the warm arms around her switch from Haymitch’s to Finnick’s. She wants to call out for him, but she’s barely putting together thoughts as it is.
And then the arena isn’t dark anymore. It’s imploding and burning and breaking.
She, Finnick, and Beetee are blasted away from the tree as all the area surrounding it explodes. Katniss passes out from the impact. She later wakes up on a hovercraft (with Finnick, Beetee, Johanna, and Peeta) that's taking her to a path she didn’t choose, but the one she must take.
And Haymitch, he goes out like he was supposed to. With an explosion and the death of the Hunger Games.